The Joe Rogan Experience - JRE MMA Show #86 with Josh Thomson

00:00:01.000 Three, two, one.

00:00:03.000 Joshua!

00:00:04.000 What's happening, my man?

00:00:05.000 What's going on, man?

00:00:06.000 Good to see you.

00:00:06.000 So, I looked at your Instagram yesterday, and you had that video of Stephen A. Smith.

00:00:11.000 And immediately, I was like, oh my goodness, this explains so much.

00:00:17.000 Play this.

00:00:18.000 Play this, Jamie.

00:00:19.000 Watch this.

00:00:20.000 Watch this.

00:00:21.000 First of all, someone needs to explain to me what's happening here.

00:00:25.000 He's punching a baby? 0.98

00:00:27.000 I don't even think it's a dick. 1.00

00:00:28.000 Unless that guy's got a two-foot dick. 1.00

00:00:30.000 Look how low he's punching. 1.00

00:00:33.000 No idea, man.

00:00:34.000 This guy should not be allowed to talk about fighting.

00:00:37.000 Yeah, look, I'm going to cut him a little bit of slack.

00:00:42.000 Here's the thing, with Strikeforce, we had kind of a similar situation, not like this though, by the way, with Gus Johnson.

00:00:47.000 I remember, yes.

00:00:48.000 And I love Gus, when he's talking basketball, I think he's got the energy and the voice that makes people like, oh wow, they're gripped to the TV. This, I can understand what Steve and Nate, but this is not what you want to release.

00:01:02.000 After you just called someone who's a pioneer in the sport, you basically called him a quitter.

00:01:06.000 You called a guy a quitter.

00:01:07.000 First of all, he had a broken orbital bone.

00:01:09.000 You're saying he was a quitter?

00:01:11.000 He got his face smashed.

00:01:12.000 He got cracked by one of the biggest punchers in the sport.

00:01:15.000 He has the most wins in the sport.

00:01:19.000 He has the most wins by finish.

00:01:21.000 He has the most bonuses.

00:01:23.000 I mean, come on.

00:01:23.000 He has the most fights?

00:01:25.000 Come on.

00:01:26.000 You're calling that guy a quitter?

00:01:27.000 He got cracked.

00:01:28.000 That's what happens.

00:01:29.000 Look, fighting is the only sport that you could end it early, right?

00:01:33.000 You can't end a football game in 40 seconds. 0.99

00:01:35.000 Imagine if your front line was so strong, your fucking quarterback was so badass, you could storm a football game in 40 seconds. 0.99

00:01:43.000 It'd be a different sport, right? 0.99

00:01:45.000 My concern with him, though, was that, look, he's fine.

00:01:48.000 He just did the video.

00:01:49.000 I get it.

00:01:50.000 It's good that you're trying to learn the sport.

00:01:52.000 But I got to tell you, DC sent me this video, and he basically commented on it.

00:01:57.000 And I said, DC's trying to protect him.

00:02:00.000 I said, you cannot protect this guy.

00:02:02.000 Not from this.

00:02:03.000 You can't call someone like Cowboy Cerrone or any other top guy in any organization.

00:02:09.000 I don't care if it's UFC, Bellator, Juan, any of them.

00:02:12.000 All these, you cannot do that to these guys.

00:02:15.000 These guys lay it on the line every time.

00:02:16.000 We're not slapping a puck or hitting a baseball, okay?

00:02:19.000 We're really out there getting hurt.

00:02:21.000 And when someone calls you acquitted like that, you better be, I'm not saying he should be careful, like watch his back, but don't expect these fighters to be very courteous to you next time you walk in the hall.

00:02:29.000 And that's the issue that I think we come across here.

00:02:33.000 Fighters are very offensive when, they get offended when things like this.

00:02:36.000 Rightly so.

00:02:36.000 Yeah.

00:02:37.000 It's a different thing.

00:02:38.000 The emotional cost of losing a fight is so much different than losing a game.

00:02:45.000 It's not the same.

00:02:46.000 And there's a culture in sports broadcasting, whether it's radio or television, this diminishing of people. 0.98

00:02:55.000 There's this shit-talking that goes with sports. 0.99

00:02:57.000 He always falls apart! 1.00

00:03:00.000 That motherfucker needs to give his money back! 1.00

00:03:02.000 He sucks! 1.00

00:03:03.000 And the other guy's like, I can't believe you're saying that! 1.00

00:03:06.000 You could do that in sports radio and people love it. 1.00

00:03:08.000 Because if you're on the job site and you're listening to the radio and you're fucking hammering nails, you're like, you're right, he does suck! 0.98

00:03:14.000 There's a mentality that goes along with that kind of sports radio, sports guy talk. 1.00

00:03:19.000 I hate that shit. 0.99

00:03:20.000 I've resisted that from the beginning and I've shit on those guys from the beginning because it's not the same thing. 1.00

00:03:27.000 You're not talking about the same thing. 0.96

00:03:29.000 You're talking about fighting.

00:03:30.000 You're talking about unbelievable physical consequences including Knock on wood in our sports, very rare, but death.

00:03:38.000 Yeah.

00:03:38.000 No, it's true.

00:03:39.000 But the other thing, though, too, is that you're criticizing someone for being a quitter and someone who's been there on every level of the game.

00:03:44.000 Every level.

00:03:45.000 But not only that, but then you look like you've never played basketball or baseball or any other sport in your life either.

00:03:49.000 It admits like that.

00:03:50.000 I'm sorry.

00:03:51.000 You cannot criticize people.

00:03:52.000 And to be on the talk show, like you're saying, those talk show radios...

00:03:55.000 That's the energy you need to bring when you're going against someone like Max Kellerman or any of the other or Skip Bayless and those guys.

00:04:01.000 Go ahead and have that conversation with them. 1.00

00:04:03.000 But you cannot look like that and then talk shit. 1.00

00:04:08.000 I'm sorry, man. 1.00

00:04:09.000 That culture, the culture of the sport.

00:04:11.000 Look, Max Kellerman is a different animal.

00:04:13.000 Max Kellerman is incredibly knowledgeable when it comes to sports and really so when it comes to boxing. 0.99

00:04:18.000 He's not a shit talker. 0.97

00:04:19.000 He's just more honest about it. 0.99

00:04:21.000 Yeah, that's true.

00:04:22.000 But there's a lot of currency in being a Stephen A. Smith.

00:04:25.000 He's really entertaining. 0.98

00:04:27.000 That shit-talking that he does, he's a guy that's fun to watch. 1.00

00:04:32.000 He talks a lot of shit, he gets real loud, and everybody disagrees with him, and look, it's made him a fantastic career. 1.00

00:04:39.000 That's why. 1.00

00:04:39.000 And he carries that over to MMA. I think it's a bad idea. 1.00

00:04:43.000 Is it a shtick, though?

00:04:44.000 That's my thought.

00:04:45.000 You know how Chael has his shtick, and the camera turns off, Colby has his shtick, and when the camera turns off, they're not that person.

00:04:51.000 Is he that person in real life?

00:04:53.000 I think it blends in.

00:04:55.000 He just now inherited that person, so that's who he is now in real life?

00:04:59.000 Andrew Dice Clay.

00:05:00.000 Andrew Dice Clay.

00:05:01.000 His real name is Andrew Silverstein.

00:05:03.000 And the Dice Man was a character that he used to do in his act.

00:05:07.000 Dice Clay is, like, one of the best impressionists ever.

00:05:10.000 And he does, like, he does John Travolta and all these different people, and it's amazing.

00:05:13.000 And in his act, he would do all these impressions, and he would do this guy, the Dice Man.

00:05:18.000 And he would do these fucking rhymes, and he'd put this jacket on, and everybody loved that so much, he just became the Dice Man. 0.91

00:05:24.000 And then after a few years, he was a Dice Man 24-7! 0.99

00:05:29.000 He's wearing these leather jackets everywhere.

00:05:31.000 Everywhere he goes, he's got weightlifting gloves on.

00:05:33.000 Every time you meet him, he's got weightlifting gloves.

00:05:34.000 He became this guy, right?

00:05:36.000 And it's a thing that happens to people sometimes, where people love one thing.

00:05:41.000 You lean into your fans.

00:05:42.000 And I think Stephen A. Smith, I don't know him as a human being.

00:05:45.000 I've only met him a couple times.

00:05:46.000 He's a nice guy.

00:05:47.000 Nice guy to me.

00:05:48.000 We had a nice conversation.

00:05:49.000 On air, we had a little weirdness because he was just saying, we didn't learn anything about Connor. 0.99

00:05:54.000 I'm like, the fuck you didn't? 0.99

00:05:55.000 He just destroyed Cowboy in 40 seconds. 1.00

00:05:58.000 You learn something.

00:05:59.000 You learn he can perform under the bright lights in a giant pay-per-view after more than a year and a half out of the game.

00:06:04.000 Yeah, you learn something.

00:06:06.000 You just don't know what you saw.

00:06:07.000 Yeah, I agree with you 100% that he did learn something.

00:06:11.000 I learned something from him.

00:06:12.000 Somebody who'd taken that amount of time off.

00:06:14.000 And I'm going to say this, to be frank.

00:06:17.000 Obviously, I work for Bellator.

00:06:19.000 And I do a lot of work for them.

00:06:20.000 But the thing is, you can't have to give credit where credit is due.

00:06:22.000 I give credit to all the fighters.

00:06:24.000 It doesn't matter if you're in one.

00:06:24.000 Look, Eddie, to me, is one of the best 55-pounders to ever walk the face of the earth.

00:06:29.000 Conor McGregor, to me, I thought he did things in that fight against Khabib that no other guy has been able to do.

00:06:35.000 First off, he won a round.

00:06:36.000 That's something no one's ever...

00:06:37.000 People say, oh, well, Khabib took the round off.

00:06:39.000 Yeah, because maybe he tried to finish him at the end of the second, but the bottom line is, he still won the round.

00:06:44.000 And there's not only that, but there was a lot of times and opportunities where Khabib had a hard time getting the takedown.

00:06:50.000 We didn't see that against guys with wrestling backgrounds like Abel Trujillo and those other guys, where he was flinging around winning records basically for the most takedowns in one fight.

00:06:58.000 There's tons of things that Conor does that people overlook and underestimate because he's such a knockout artist and he's so good.

00:07:05.000 And his stance and his style and things like that, he brought this to the next level.

00:07:10.000 And you cannot discredit what he's done in the sport.

00:07:14.000 What I learned from that is that from somebody who can take 15 months off and come back and perform the way that he did against someone like Donald Cerrone, Absolutely amazing.

00:07:23.000 That's why you need guys like you doing post-fight commentary and discussing these things, not people who don't understand the sport and practice dick punches.

00:07:33.000 It's a different thing. 0.99

00:07:35.000 Maybe he's hitting babies.

00:07:36.000 Yeah, he's hitting babies.

00:07:38.000 I want to ask you this, though, because it was funny because I could see your face in the middle of it all.

00:07:41.000 How awkward is that for you to stand between the two of them and go... 0.98

00:07:45.000 What are you guys fucking talking about? 0.98

00:07:47.000 I would have preferred to talk to DC or Felder or you or anybody who understands the sport. 0.99

00:07:55.000 I don't think it's the right way to do it.

00:07:57.000 The one gentleman to my right, Michael...

00:07:59.000 Jamie, what is his last name?

00:08:01.000 He was great.

00:08:02.000 And Stephen Smith was very nice to me, too.

00:08:04.000 And he said he's gonna get into podcasts.

00:08:05.000 I have no problem with him as a human being. 0.98

00:08:07.000 I just think, look, I don't know jack shit about baseball. 0.99

00:08:11.000 I don't know jack shit about basketball. 0.98

00:08:13.000 I literally don't even know the rules. 0.98

00:08:14.000 I don't know when people foul people.

00:08:16.000 I'm not sure why.

00:08:17.000 I don't know what's happening.

00:08:19.000 I know MMA. I understand it.

00:08:21.000 So if you want to talk about MMA, I'd like to talk to MMA about someone else who knows MMA. Like you were saying though, I was listening to one of your podcasts the other day with Mike Baker.

00:08:31.000 And he said like, look, I don't agree with Bernie Sanders' policies.

00:08:34.000 But Bernie Sanders probably is a really nice guy.

00:08:36.000 It doesn't mean that I have to like what he does in front of the camera for him to call MMA. I don't have to like that.

00:08:42.000 I can still like him as a person.

00:08:44.000 That's where we need to make sure that we differentiate between the two things.

00:08:47.000 Like, look, he probably is a really good guy.

00:08:49.000 And I actually have met him.

00:08:49.000 I met him at the Floyd Mayweather and Connor fight.

00:08:51.000 And said hi.

00:08:52.000 He said, hey, how's it going?

00:08:53.000 Like, hey, what do you think?

00:08:54.000 And that was the conversation.

00:08:55.000 It was real quick, real brief, maybe two minutes.

00:08:57.000 But he seemed like a nice person at that time.

00:08:59.000 But when I was listening to him talk and calling Cerrone basically a quitter...

00:09:04.000 To me, I lost respect in the avenue that you're not supposed to be working in our sport. 0.95

00:09:08.000 And you need to make some sort of adjustment, whether it's dick punching or something else. 0.95

00:09:13.000 You need to figure it out. 0.98

00:09:15.000 I understand.

00:09:15.000 I get that it's a good idea for all people that have never covered the sport to try to get into it.

00:09:21.000 Maybe hold off on the videos like that for a while before you post them.

00:09:27.000 I like that he's trying and I'm gonna give him credit for that and I think like with Gus, there was a lot of rumblings about Gus Johnson in the very beginning, but we gave him a run for a while and I really like Gus.

00:09:37.000 He's a great person, always been great every time I've talked to him and met with him and worked with him side by side as well, calling fights with Strikeforce.

00:09:44.000 Great person, but his forte is basketball and for him, whatever his forte is, Stephen A. Smith, I think he may have to stick with that and I think I agree, they have to bring DC back in to work with you alongside him.

00:09:56.000 Well, DC is phenomenal, man.

00:09:57.000 Yeah, DC is phenomenal.

00:09:58.000 And DC and me having that conversation would have been a completely different conversation.

00:10:02.000 And it would have been better for the sport.

00:10:05.000 Because, look, there's no positive in downplaying the career of Donald Cerrone or what he can do as a fighter.

00:10:12.000 What that showed to me was how phenomenal Conor performed.

00:10:16.000 That's what it showed me.

00:10:17.000 And if either you or I was talking about cricket, we were on TV doing commentary on cricket, we would look out of place. 0.94

00:10:25.000 It would be fucked up and real cricket fans would be upset at us, right? 0.95

00:10:30.000 Now that's nothing. 0.98

00:10:31.000 That's just a sport, right?

00:10:33.000 Yeah.

00:10:34.000 You are naked in the most literal sense of the word.

00:10:37.000 You're naked physically. 0.58

00:10:38.000 You're naked emotionally. 1.00

00:10:40.000 When fighters lose, it's fucking devastating. 0.99

00:10:43.000 For Conor to smash Cowboy like that in front of his wife, his kid, his grandma, and then the whole world. 0.99

00:10:50.000 You've got to have some respect for that man.

00:10:53.000 And this sport demands a different perspective.

00:10:56.000 It's not the same thing as a ball going into a hoop.

00:11:00.000 It's not the same thing as crossing a line with a football.

00:11:02.000 It's different.

00:11:03.000 It's very intense and very personal. 0.98

00:11:05.000 And it's also very fucking dangerous. 0.97

00:11:07.000 And to play it off like it's just a game, I don't agree with it. 0.99

00:11:12.000 And I just think that we have plenty of fucking people out there that understand the sport. 0.99

00:11:17.000 There's plenty of them. 0.99

00:11:19.000 But the thing about him is he's really popular.

00:11:21.000 And Jamie, when you're saying he just got a giant deal or something like that?

00:11:25.000 He's the top-paid switch.

00:11:26.000 I had his contract up.

00:11:27.000 He's got an extension to get $8 million a year now or something like that.

00:11:30.000 Yeah, and that's because his personality is so fun.

00:11:34.000 He's a fun guy to watch. 0.99

00:11:36.000 And people love shit talking. 1.00

00:11:38.000 They love two people arguing about shit. 1.00

00:11:40.000 One person's better at arguing. 0.99

00:11:42.000 And Stephen A. Smith is really good at that stuff.

00:11:44.000 But it's not the place for MMA. It's just not the place.

00:11:48.000 It's not the same thing.

00:11:50.000 It's not, because the guys themselves can fight.

00:11:55.000 When you see what happened last night at Kansas and Kansas State or whatever, and they started throwing punches, it looked like a bunch of girls throwing windmills. 0.97

00:12:02.000 You know what I mean?

00:12:03.000 That's really the reality.

00:12:04.000 Now, if he wants to go out there and talk about it, go ahead and talk about it.

00:12:07.000 He can say all the things he wants, because these are college kids that can't fight, obviously.

00:12:10.000 We just saw.

00:12:11.000 But we're talking about professional athletes.

00:12:13.000 Their life has been around this craft, and now you're going to say things like that.

00:12:17.000 It's very disrespectful.

00:12:19.000 It's just so common with sports to talk about a guy who can't show up on game day.

00:12:24.000 Talk about a guy who keeps dropping the ball. 0.98

00:12:26.000 And you shit on those guys, but it's just a different thing with fighting. 0.99

00:12:31.000 And it's also, with fighting, you have to know it, or no one's going to respect you. 1.00

00:12:37.000 If you don't know what you're talking about, and you're talking about it in front of millions of people, man, that's a bad look for everybody.

00:12:44.000 It's a bad look for ESPN, it's a bad look for him, it's a bad look for the sport.

00:12:48.000 It's like, there's other people that can do this.

00:12:51.000 Yeah, we caught a lot of flack for Gus for a while.

00:12:54.000 Strikeforce did.

00:12:54.000 And then I think it trickled on up to CBS and that whole deal happened.

00:12:58.000 Nick Diaz mayhem brawl.

00:13:00.000 These things happen in MMA. Yeah, that's definitely not the words you want to use in that situation.

00:13:06.000 You know what I mean?

00:13:07.000 But it does, honestly, like you just said, it does reflect badly, not just on ESPN itself, but the UFC as well, because they're in business together.

00:13:14.000 And it kind of looks bad for both.

00:13:15.000 Like, hey...

00:13:16.000 You guys, we need to monitor who's behind that microphone because we're representing our talent, and our talent is what makes us the money. 0.98

00:13:22.000 But what's funny is, with Stephen A. Smith, his personality and his brand is based on that kind of shit-talking, so this is all good for him. 0.97

00:13:31.000 This is all good for him. 1.00

00:13:32.000 The more people talk shit about him, the better it is for him. 0.99

00:13:35.000 And then he just ramps it up even more, and more people are paying attention, and the ratings go up. 0.99

00:13:39.000 Until he sees Cowboy in an elevator. 1.00

00:13:43.000 Go ride a fucking head, buddy. 1.00

00:13:45.000 Let me hear you. 1.00

00:13:45.000 Who's quitting now, bitch? 1.00

00:13:47.000 Yeah. 1.00

00:13:47.000 You know, those are the things that I gotta tell you. 1.00

00:13:50.000 You just don't know.

00:13:50.000 Think about this.

00:13:51.000 If he said something like that about a Nate or Nick Diaz and they saw him in a fucking elevator. 1.00

00:13:55.000 They would fuck him up. 1.00

00:13:56.000 They would fuck him up. 1.00

00:13:57.000 Legitimately. 0.99

00:13:58.000 Like, you would just gotta be...

00:13:59.000 Like, those are scenarios where you just gotta be careful.

00:14:01.000 The Cowboy's never gonna do that.

00:14:02.000 Hey, man.

00:14:03.000 Right.

00:14:03.000 Kind of just watch what you say.

00:14:05.000 Come on, man.

00:14:05.000 My family's there.

00:14:06.000 My grandmother's there.

00:14:07.000 My kid's there.

00:14:09.000 Let's dial it back a little bit. 1.00

00:14:10.000 Cowboy's a fucking... 1.00

00:14:12.000 He's just an amazing person overall. 1.00

00:14:15.000 When you're talking about athletes and finders... 0.97

00:14:19.000 Nate Diaz, though, he ain't saying shit to you. 0.99

00:14:20.000 He's just gonna sock you. 0.99

00:14:21.000 Look, everybody knows what happened.

00:14:24.000 What happened is Connor had a spectacular performance.

00:14:28.000 Cowboy got caught off guard and he got finished quick.

00:14:30.000 That's what happened.

00:14:31.000 All the other stuff is unnecessary.

00:14:33.000 The emotional devastation of a 40-second KO like that is...

00:14:39.000 We have, as a respectful human being, you've got to leave all that other stuff alone. 1.00

00:14:43.000 All that shit talking. 0.99

00:14:44.000 If you want to say it in the gym to one of your homies and you're just hanging out and maybe one of them doesn't like Cowboy and someone talks trash and that's private and no one hears it, that's fine and good. 1.00

00:14:56.000 But when you want to do that publicly, you want to broadcast that and then also do it on ESPN, I think it's just short-sighted and I think it's foolish.

00:15:04.000 Yeah, I'm going to go a little bit more hard on the paint on guys like DC who are on my post right there.

00:15:10.000 Defending him right now.

00:15:11.000 Is he defending him?

00:15:12.000 He's defending him.

00:15:12.000 Well, hey, man, he's trying to learn the sport.

00:15:15.000 I said, D, quit trying to toe the company line, son.

00:15:18.000 That's what you're doing right now.

00:15:20.000 And then I got Kendall Grove that goes on there too saying, Oh, you know what?

00:15:24.000 I can respect the fact that he's trying to learn it.

00:15:26.000 Look at this.

00:15:26.000 I think it's fine.

00:15:27.000 He's trying to better understand our sport.

00:15:29.000 It means he's a massive star who can talk from his perch and no one can touch him, yet he chooses to try and learn the game so there's some weight to his opinion.

00:15:36.000 You're a little off-base, champ.

00:15:38.000 Oh! 0.60

00:15:40.000 Oh, DC's a wonderful person.

00:15:42.000 Oh, he's just struggling.

00:15:43.000 I told him, I said, look, just because Stephen A. Smith might be good for business in the ESPN business for you later on, I said, that doesn't mean you've got to tone that line, buddy.

00:15:52.000 I'd like to give him a hard time.

00:15:54.000 But look, DC's one of my best friends, man, and he's absolutely hilarious and just fun.

00:15:57.000 He likes to do this to stir the pot because like you were just saying with Stephen A., he likes to do this type of stuff so people keep talking. 0.99

00:16:04.000 DC likes to try me on shit like this. 0.97

00:16:07.000 So we're here right now talking about DC and this whole situation. 0.99

00:16:11.000 That's exactly what DC does.

00:16:12.000 He's brilliant when it comes to this type of stuff.

00:16:14.000 And I'm sure he really does love Stephen A as a person.

00:16:18.000 Stephen A, he's a nice guy.

00:16:19.000 Like I said, I've met him a couple of times.

00:16:21.000 He's a nice guy.

00:16:21.000 But just to like, there's a style of broadcasting that sports radio and sports broadcasting that they do this kind of stuff.

00:16:29.000 But when it leaks over into fighting, fighting is just not a sport.

00:16:33.000 You can call it a sport.

00:16:34.000 It's kind of a sport, but it's It's sport in its highest sense of expression, where you're literally using your body to try to stop another man's body.

00:16:45.000 And as intense as it gets, and I think it deserves more respect.

00:16:48.000 That's just my opinion.

00:16:50.000 That's how I've always treated it.

00:16:51.000 When I talk about fighters, my concentration has always been to elevate.

00:16:57.000 My concentration has never been to demean someone.

00:17:00.000 There's something that they did that's illegal.

00:17:02.000 There's some sort of blatant foul that should be stopped or something that's really dangerous that they're doing that should be chastised.

00:17:10.000 But the sport, it's a higher level of consequence and risk, and it needs to be respected that way.

00:17:20.000 I listen to your show quite a bit, and I like a lot of what you had talked about before when you first got into comedy about talking about...

00:17:28.000 How some of the other comics was like kind of shit on other young comics kind of up and coming and when you came in it was like a different you try to just ingrain in people like hey I want to build you all of you guys up that are with me on the same set. 0.91

00:17:39.000 If we're doing the show and we're all on the same night let's all just fucking make each other look good. 0.88

00:17:43.000 I feel like Especially in fighting, whether it's boxing, MMA, anything along those lines, we gotta be elevating each other to make each other better. 0.71

00:17:51.000 Like, hey, this guy is good, this guy is good.

00:17:53.000 Without talking shit, because we, like yourself specifically, as well as like even myself and other guys that have shows and podcasts and start talking, we're on a different level of platform that can really kind of either make or break some people's careers. 0.91

00:18:07.000 It also... 0.99

00:18:08.000 Also, the sport is confidence.

00:18:11.000 MMA is a confident level.

00:18:13.000 Anytime you do wrestling, it's a one-on-one combative sport.

00:18:16.000 Anytime wrestling, MMA, confidence is key.

00:18:19.000 If my confidence is low, then that means that I'm probably not going to perform my best.

00:18:23.000 And when you take a loss, it goes lower and lower. 0.97

00:18:25.000 When you've got to hear it from fucking people that don't know the business, like this right here, it's just another thing added on. 0.99

00:18:32.000 And for other MMA guys to shit on other MMA guys... 0.99

00:18:35.000 All that does is tear them down even more and you could potentially, I'm not saying ruin their career, but you're not helping them get to their goals and their levels. 0.71

00:18:43.000 It's better if everyone shines and we all handle ourselves with a class and respect.

00:18:47.000 And I feel like we just, in general, need to hold ourselves to a higher standard if we're talking MMA and making sure that we showcase this guy as really good.

00:18:56.000 Like here, I'll give you an example.

00:18:57.000 All I do when I talk about Frank Yeager is talk about how such an amazing person, even when he has a bad performance, he's still one of the best to ever do the game and all the things that he's done from before in the past.

00:19:08.000 I say the same thing about BJ Penn.

00:19:10.000 Somebody who, look, he exploded on the scene.

00:19:12.000 I was training with him when he had that first run through Din Thomas, Uno, all those guys.

00:19:17.000 He was training at AKA. All the things that happen now, to me, those are just bumps in the row as fighters get older and they just don't know how to react.

00:19:26.000 This is it.

00:19:26.000 I don't know what's going on.

00:19:28.000 They need somebody to step in, not shit on them. 0.99

00:19:31.000 They need someone to step in and talk to them. 0.99

00:19:33.000 I text and talk to him all the time.

00:19:34.000 It's like, hey man, it might be time to move on.

00:19:37.000 It might be not.

00:19:38.000 Whatever the deal is.

00:19:39.000 But they're good people at heart.

00:19:41.000 I know them personally.

00:19:42.000 And we should just be talking in general about lifting these guys up to the next level.

00:19:46.000 And that's the way I think every sport should handle it.

00:19:49.000 The argument against that would be the massive success that Conor's had, shitting on people in press conferences and shitting on people and leading up to a fight and the fact that that's built up so much animosity but also so much attention.

00:20:02.000 Like the Aldo fight. 0.99

00:20:03.000 Dude, he made that fight by talking so much shit. 0.98

00:20:05.000 It's a big part of why that fight was so successful. 1.00

00:20:08.000 And it was also like some serious psychological warfare. 0.98

00:20:11.000 When Aldo went into that cage with Conor, you could see the weight of all that shit-talking was weighing heavy on him. 0.99

00:20:17.000 You could see it. 0.99

00:20:18.000 He probably hadn't slept. 0.99

00:20:20.000 He's probably really fucked up like that emotionally. 0.99

00:20:23.000 Because Aldo was super respected. 1.00

00:20:25.000 He was the fucking king. 0.99

00:20:27.000 He was the guy that had torn through the featherweight division for years. 1.00

00:20:30.000 And he had beaten everybody.

00:20:31.000 Beaten the best of the best.

00:20:33.000 And widely regarded as the greatest featherweight of all time. 0.98

00:20:35.000 And then all of a sudden, Conor's just shitting on him. 1.00

00:20:38.000 And shitting on him and shitting on him. 1.00

00:20:39.000 Tearing his picture apart. 1.00

00:20:40.000 Stealing his belt at press conferences.

00:20:42.000 And all that craziness. 0.96

00:20:44.000 It made the fight way bigger, but it also fucked with Jose physically and emotionally. 0.63

00:20:50.000 So when they actually fought, he had a diminished performance. 0.96

00:20:53.000 He was too emotional.

00:20:54.000 He lost his composure.

00:20:55.000 He rushed forward.

00:20:56.000 He tried to hit him before everything was set up, and he got cracked for it.

00:21:01.000 Yeah, I understand what you're saying in those terms, but when you're promoting a fight, promoting a fight, to me, is a separate thing.

00:21:07.000 Though I think Conor overstepped the boundary when he talked about Khabib and all the other family stuff, especially when he posted the picture with his wife.

00:21:13.000 That, to me, is...

00:21:15.000 I understand.

00:21:17.000 Chael's done it a couple times when he talked about Jenna Jameson and Tito and that whole situation.

00:21:22.000 There's moments, I think, where guys have stepped over the line. 0.96

00:21:25.000 But if I'm talking shit to you, taking your belt and doing those things, look, I'm marketing the fight. 0.97

00:21:29.000 That's a separate issue than doing what some guys do. 1.00

00:21:32.000 And if you get a percentage of the pay-per-view, it actually benefits you when that guy shits on you, which is even more disturbing. 0.97

00:21:37.000 Yeah. 0.92

00:21:38.000 But the other thing is, look, always, whether win or lose, Conor's never shown a disrespect after.

00:21:45.000 I haven't seen that.

00:21:46.000 I haven't seen that afterwards as far as in the cage, when they see him, hey, great fight.

00:21:51.000 Even when he lost to Nate the first time.

00:21:53.000 He was very respectful.

00:21:54.000 Yes.

00:21:54.000 Very respectful.

00:21:55.000 And I think, look, there's a difference between marketing the fight and then you realize when the fight's done, shaking hands and be like, okay, look, let's do it again.

00:22:01.000 And that to me, that's a fighter's mentality.

00:22:05.000 I want another crack at you, whether I won or I lost.

00:22:07.000 I want another crack at you.

00:22:08.000 It's okay to market the fight, but once the fight is done, shake your hand.

00:22:12.000 That's what this sport is about.

00:22:14.000 That's what fighting is about.

00:22:15.000 That's what it's always been about.

00:22:17.000 You know, from back in the days when guys were just...

00:22:19.000 Put up their dukes.

00:22:20.000 We'll fight each other, help you up off the ground, shake your hand, and move on.

00:22:25.000 Well, people like that about it.

00:22:26.000 Do you remember when Ronda Rousey beat Misha Tate and she wouldn't shake her hand after the fight? 0.99

00:22:31.000 And the fucking boos were so crazy. 0.98

00:22:34.000 I was interviewing her after the fight. 1.00

00:22:35.000 You could barely hear her talk.

00:22:37.000 It was just, boo!

00:22:39.000 People didn't like it.

00:22:40.000 They didn't like it at all.

00:22:44.000 You're going to always get that, I think, when there's blatant disregard or disrespect for somebody, especially of that caliber, like Misha Tate.

00:22:51.000 And after the fight's over.

00:22:52.000 What people want to see is that it's resolved.

00:22:55.000 They don't want to see these crazy endless wars where you're never happy.

00:22:58.000 You just armbarred her. 1.00

00:22:59.000 You fucked her arm up. 1.00

00:23:00.000 And you're still upset? 1.00

00:23:02.000 Yeah, we've got plenty of endless wars everywhere else. 1.00

00:23:04.000 We don't need that shit in the cage. 1.00

00:23:05.000 Exactly, exactly. 0.99

00:23:07.000 Man, when you see Connor at 170, you know, obviously he beat Donald really handily, but do you think he's a legit 170?

00:23:15.000 No.

00:23:15.000 I don't think so, because, um...

00:23:18.000 We saw with Khabib.

00:23:19.000 Khabib could potentially be a legit 170, but evens him, he'll be a little bit too small.

00:23:23.000 For guys like Usman.

00:23:24.000 Yeah, guys like Usman.

00:23:25.000 Now, I think he could out-wrestle Usman.

00:23:28.000 He can out-wrestle Colby Cutter.

00:23:29.000 I think he could out-wrestle 100%.

00:23:30.000 I've seen him wrestle with DC. I've seen him wrestle with Olympic caliber wrestlers in our room.

00:23:36.000 I'm telling you right now, yes.

00:23:37.000 Did he train with Jordan Burrows at your place?

00:23:39.000 I didn't see him train with Jordan, but I heard Jordan had came through.

00:23:43.000 Yeah.

00:23:43.000 But I wasn't sure if they...

00:23:44.000 I wasn't there during that time when I trained.

00:23:45.000 Oh, I would like to be a fly on the wall to watch those two guys go at it.

00:23:48.000 But I can tell you this.

00:23:49.000 He trained with Ed Ruth.

00:23:50.000 Yeah?

00:23:51.000 How was that?

00:23:51.000 And it was...

00:23:52.000 It was...

00:23:55.000 Yeah.

00:23:56.000 Really?

00:23:57.000 You don't want to say anything.

00:23:58.000 No, but there was moments where Ed was able to get some stuff on him, but he was able to get some stuff on Ed as well.

00:24:04.000 And Khabib was able to get the takedowns as well on a three-time NCAA national champ.

00:24:09.000 Wow.

00:24:09.000 And you could tell, look, Khabib's had more experience in terms of MMA. You know, like, Samba was basically just MMA with a gi top on and, you know, occasionally they wear shin guards.

00:24:21.000 With Ed, Ed was relatively new into the sport when they first started training.

00:24:24.000 And Ed was able to do a lot of good things to him.

00:24:27.000 And Khabib was able to do a lot of good things to him.

00:24:30.000 Without saying too much, both of them definitely benefit from their training together.

00:24:34.000 And that's what's great about our gym.

00:24:35.000 It's not a pissing match in our gym.

00:24:38.000 Like, sure, guys want to one-up each other when it comes to sparring, but...

00:24:41.000 I would say that Ed, he got the better of learning the most from that situation, whereas Khabib realized that his stuff works on the top caliber guys in the world.

00:24:52.000 Well, you guys have at AKA, you guys have one of the most wrestling heavy in terms of high level wrestling.

00:24:59.000 You have one of the most concentrated camps.

00:25:02.000 Yeah, what people need to remember is that that camp was ran by Crazy Bob Cook, and Javier first, Javier, Crazy Bob Cook, but then also when they linked up with, when Bob Cook linked up with Zincon Entertainment, and the Zincon family is very into wrestling.

00:25:16.000 All three brothers were All-Americans at Fresno State, wrestled with Lorenzo Neal, who was a Professional football player in the NFL, but also wrestled at Fresno State, also an All-American.

00:25:25.000 Those guys all linked up, and they're big, big into wrestling.

00:25:29.000 So what they've done, like I literally could tell you this, is he would, the three brothers would, if I brought up to a wrestler right now that I'd never heard of, you probably never heard of, they could tell you all their stats.

00:25:39.000 They could tell you what they did in high school.

00:25:41.000 They could tell you what they did in college.

00:25:42.000 They could tell you how far they potentially will go in the Olympics.

00:25:44.000 Yeah.

00:25:44.000 You know what I mean?

00:25:45.000 Like, that's how much ingrained that they are into this.

00:25:47.000 So a lot of the reasons why we've gotten guys like Ed Ruth, Aaron Pico was signed with them when he first started his career, DC, you know, Deron Wynn, all these guys that have come, they've all come through because of Dwayne Zincon.

00:26:00.000 Aaron Pico is a crazy case, right?

00:26:04.000 He's such a talented guy, and he's still very young, but there was so much hype on that kid right out of the gate, and they put him in against real tough competition right out of the gate.

00:26:16.000 Yeah, look, he had to fight tough competition right out of the gate.

00:26:19.000 There's a couple things.

00:26:20.000 What people need to understand is this, is if I'm going to pay you this amount of money because there's so much hype around you, then you're going to have to fight this level of guy.

00:26:27.000 Right.

00:26:27.000 Now the problem with what happened with him, he's not a 55 pounder, he's tiny.

00:26:32.000 So he could potentially make 35. Really?

00:26:36.000 Yeah, he's not a big guy.

00:26:37.000 So that's what people keep forgetting.

00:26:39.000 So when he wanted to stay at 55, we said, okay, we'll give it a go.

00:26:42.000 Let him get one or two fights in that position.

00:26:45.000 But no one wanted to fight him.

00:26:48.000 No one.

00:26:49.000 We were calling some of the best guys in Bellator.

00:26:52.000 At the time, they're like, no, we want to see a couple of fights in his first before we go throwing our names out there to fight this guy.

00:26:58.000 We'll see how he is.

00:26:59.000 You know what I mean?

00:27:00.000 And so, when that happened, and I'm not knocking them, that's smart on their part.

00:27:03.000 I mean, every top guy's going to be like, yeah, let's see what he is first and then we'll figure it out.

00:27:07.000 But then as soon as he lost to Zach Freeman, who was tall, long, lengthy, you know, good, decent submissions, not a world beater, but he was good.

00:27:15.000 Aaron got exposed in the first fight, got clipped, then jumped in on a double leg, got guillotine, was out.

00:27:20.000 Then he decided to make the loop down to 145, had a couple good performances.

00:27:24.000 He's got big dogs.

00:27:25.000 He's got big dogs in his hands.

00:27:27.000 He's got heavy hands, but he's a boxing base with wrestling background, which works If you've already been around guys that have done plenty of kickboxing, if you're just a boxing base, kicks come from angles you're not used to, like different from punches.

00:27:42.000 And so he just needed to get to a camp and stay focused on one area with one or two coaches that would groom him into that.

00:27:50.000 Now that he's at Jackson Wink, I think it's perfect for him because he's there with good, really, really good grapplers and really, really good guys.

00:27:57.000 And so with With Jackson there grooming him and telling him how the game plan...

00:28:02.000 Jackson's one of the best at game planning.

00:28:04.000 I mean, you can't deny that.

00:28:05.000 And the fact is, is that he just needed someone to get in there.

00:28:08.000 Now, I do know, like, he had a couple little issues.

00:28:11.000 Like, obviously, he really didn't go to high school.

00:28:14.000 I mean, like, as far as he was just traveling around and trying to become the best wrestler in the world.

00:28:18.000 I mean, at a young age, you know, he's...

00:28:20.000 He's winning everything.

00:28:21.000 It's hard when you take someone from school, put them into that type of thing, and they have success.

00:28:27.000 And they think they're going to continue to have success on a world-class level like in any sport.

00:28:33.000 And since he had such success at a young age, his dad and his family got really involved into doing that and pushing him in that direction.

00:28:43.000 And that's not always the best scenario and situation.

00:28:46.000 I think sometimes you need to have management.

00:28:49.000 And trainers guide you when you're talking about a sport that other people have no idea what's going on.

00:28:55.000 It doesn't work that way.

00:28:57.000 People think like, oh, I think family members, and I hear this all the time, and I can speak from experience, my family sometimes comes in and says, yeah, how come you don't make what Conor McGregor's making?

00:29:06.000 It's not the same. 0.96

00:29:08.000 I'm like, are you fucking kidding me? 0.92

00:29:10.000 Like, you know, like, those are, it's not the same. 0.96

00:29:12.000 You know what I mean?

00:29:13.000 You don't have to explain the entire business to them.

00:29:15.000 Yeah, I don't, yeah, I'd have to explain everything.

00:29:16.000 And so when you have someone like Pico's parent, his dad and his, you know, his brother, I think, were kind of helping with management and trying to get sponsors and do this.

00:29:23.000 They were expecting people to like, you know, to bend over and be like, hey, you know, like, yeah, this is Aaron Pico and this and that because he's had such success at a young age and how good and talented he was in the gym.

00:29:34.000 But like Alvin Iverson said, man, we're talking about practice?

00:29:37.000 It doesn't, it's not the same thing.

00:29:39.000 Sure, he's great, but when the lights turn on and the fight happens and we're sparring in little gloves, not 16-ounce gloves, it changes.

00:29:48.000 The dynamic of the game changes.

00:29:50.000 And you also have to take into consideration that, yeah, he's had a tremendous amount of success in wrestling, and yes, he's got very good hands, but...

00:29:57.000 He has a small amount of MMA fights.

00:29:59.000 And this is MMA. That's the difference.

00:30:02.000 There is a difference.

00:30:03.000 And he's also a really young guy who's experienced some pretty high highs and pretty low lows very quickly.

00:30:08.000 I think guys need to be managed better.

00:30:10.000 And what I mean by that is the same way boxing handles it.

00:30:14.000 Boxing, you see guys get to 15, 16 and 0. When you see a guy like Khabib who's 28 and 0, you go, how the fuck? 0.99

00:30:20.000 No one gets there. 0.96

00:30:21.000 You got Jon Jones, who's essentially undefeated.

00:30:25.000 You know, the Matt Hamill fight, in my mind, he won that fight.

00:30:28.000 He crushed him.

00:30:29.000 I mean, there's never a moment in that fight where he's in doubt.

00:30:31.000 He just got disqualified.

00:30:33.000 And I don't even agree with the disqualification.

00:30:35.000 But he's a rarity.

00:30:37.000 It's him, and it's Khabib, and maybe there's a couple other guys that are like elite, high-level guys that are undefeated.

00:30:44.000 They're the outliers.

00:30:45.000 Most guys...

00:30:47.000 Get thrown to the wolves, like, really quickly.

00:30:49.000 But in boxing, you see that all the time.

00:30:51.000 Because managers slowly groom their fighters.

00:30:55.000 They go, okay, Josh, you know what, Josh? 0.97

00:30:57.000 You're a fucking great puncher, but, you know, your inside game maybe should be tested. 0.98

00:31:03.000 We got this tough Mexican dude who likes to fight inside, so we're going to match you up with him. 1.00

00:31:07.000 You should beat him.

00:31:08.000 But it's going to give you some seasoning, and they'll move you along that way.

00:31:11.000 Okay, we're going to try you against a long, lanky striker.

00:31:14.000 Sometimes you have problems with the jab, and this guy's got a significant reach advantage. 0.98

00:31:19.000 And then boxers, the boxing managers and coaches, they'll think about this shit for... 0.99

00:31:24.000 Days and weeks before they commit to a fight. 0.99

00:31:27.000 Whereas in the UFC, the UFC calls you up.

00:31:29.000 Hey, you want to fight Khabib on three days notice?

00:31:31.000 You're like, what?

00:31:32.000 And then all of a sudden you're there.

00:31:34.000 Well, because boxing managers are usually in cahoots with the promoter.

00:31:38.000 So the two of them work together.

00:31:39.000 That's not the case with any promotion in MMA. The promoter is the promoter, and the manager is the manager.

00:31:46.000 You take what we give you, and if you don't, then okay, we'll put you on the shelf for six months.

00:31:51.000 Those type of things have been presented to me a couple times.

00:31:55.000 Joe was the manager trying to matchmake me when I was supposed to fight Anthony Pettis for the title.

00:32:02.000 He called and said, hey, Pettis is out.

00:32:03.000 He's like, yeah, we want you to fight some tough Russian guy that I've never heard of. 0.99

00:32:07.000 And I was like, I just knocked out Nate.

00:32:09.000 And I was supposed to fight for the title.

00:32:10.000 I'm not going to fight some tough Russian guy from Dagestown I've never heard of. 1.00

00:32:14.000 No thanks.

00:32:15.000 He's like, fine, I'm going to shelf you for six months.

00:32:17.000 And I just told him, I said, hey man, I'm pretty good with my money.

00:32:19.000 I'll wait.

00:32:20.000 So he just said, okay.

00:32:21.000 So a week later, I got the Benson fight. 0.99

00:32:23.000 That's such a fucked up thing to even say to someone. 0.99

00:32:25.000 It is. 1.00

00:32:25.000 Shelf you. 1.00

00:32:26.000 Yeah, it is though.

00:32:27.000 But you know, in reality though, like look...

00:32:29.000 Here's the thing, and I will say this, and I will stick up for Joe, even though I just said that.

00:32:32.000 I will stick up for Joe Silva.

00:32:33.000 I met with him shortly after that, and he's like, look at my phone.

00:32:37.000 You see this?

00:32:38.000 This is your division.

00:32:39.000 He's like, you see all these?

00:32:41.000 These are all fighters in the division.

00:32:42.000 He's like, you see the ones at the top that you wanted to fight?

00:32:45.000 Yeah, all those guys in red?

00:32:47.000 They're hurt.

00:32:49.000 He only had two people to choose from.

00:32:51.000 And those two people were already matched up against each other.

00:32:53.000 So what do you do?

00:32:54.000 But that's the thing.

00:32:56.000 Do you just take a fight because you want to keep fighting?

00:32:58.000 But how does it move your career when you are literally one shot away from the title?

00:33:03.000 Because when you knocked out Nate Diaz, first of all, you're the first guy to do it.

00:33:06.000 You did it spectacularly with a head kick.

00:33:08.000 A lot of people forget that for some reason.

00:33:10.000 People keep saying he's never been stopped.

00:33:12.000 I'm like, go back and watch the tape.

00:33:13.000 I like that you stick up for me.

00:33:14.000 I appreciate that.

00:33:15.000 Always.

00:33:15.000 Thank you.

00:33:16.000 Always.

00:33:16.000 So you're in this crazy position where you're really knocking on the door for a title.

00:33:21.000 And then they're saying, go fight some savage from the fucking mountains. 0.99

00:33:25.000 Yeah, it was really good. 1.00

00:33:28.000 The fucking Dagestanians, they're the scariest fucking humans on the planet. 1.00

00:33:31.000 It's amazing how many tough guys come from that part of the country. 1.00

00:33:34.000 The world.

00:33:35.000 They've exploded on the scene, and I think it's amazing to see them grow.

00:33:39.000 I've seen...

00:33:40.000 When Khabib first came into AKA, I was like, he's tough.

00:33:44.000 He's just a wrestler.

00:33:45.000 But he still had some submission defense.

00:33:48.000 Good leg locks.

00:33:48.000 He was physically strong then.

00:33:51.000 He's just...

00:33:53.000 He's just gained a lot more confidence now with anything in the gym.

00:33:56.000 It doesn't matter what it is.

00:33:58.000 Like I said, I've seen him wrestle with DC. I've seen him wrestle with Luke Rockwell.

00:34:01.000 I've seen him wrestle, obviously, with myself.

00:34:03.000 We wrestled tons of times.

00:34:04.000 Guys like Gray Maiden and all those guys.

00:34:06.000 And he's phenomenal.

00:34:07.000 When people ask me when you said something about him, who were you saying?

00:34:11.000 We're talking about him at Lightweight.

00:34:13.000 Oh, you were talking about with Joe Burrows.

00:34:14.000 No, him with Usman.

00:34:16.000 I think he out-wrestles those guys.

00:34:18.000 Wow.

00:34:18.000 I think he outwrestled him.

00:34:19.000 Yeah, 100% I think he outwrestled him.

00:34:21.000 The guy that I thought he would have had a hard time outwrestling would have been Ben Askren.

00:34:24.000 That would have been his guy.

00:34:25.000 I think that guy right there would have been the only guy that I think could have potentially outwrestled him.

00:34:28.000 Ben is hurting now, man.

00:34:30.000 You can see how he walks.

00:34:31.000 Yeah. 0.98

00:34:31.000 You can see his hip all fucked up. 0.98

00:34:33.000 He needs a hip replacement. 0.99

00:34:34.000 Yeah, he needs to get it done.

00:34:36.000 I mean, that's the thing.

00:34:37.000 But if he does, he's never going to fight again.

00:34:40.000 Why is he done?

00:34:41.000 I think, isn't he done?

00:34:42.000 I think he's done because of the hip.

00:34:44.000 Yeah.

00:34:44.000 I mean, I don't know what the recovery process is.

00:34:46.000 Is it a hip replacement?

00:34:48.000 Yeah, he's a hip replacement.

00:34:49.000 Or is it just, let's scope it all out, clean it out, and see how it goes, and then see if he needs a hip replacement after.

00:34:54.000 No, he and I discussed it.

00:34:55.000 It's a mess.

00:34:56.000 Yeah.

00:34:56.000 Yeah, there's a lot of these guys, they're so tough, they're almost too tough for their own good, and they're training on injuries and just pushing through the pain, and they're just chewing up the cartilage and tearing up the labrum.

00:35:07.000 Yep.

00:35:07.000 And here's the thing, to go back to the Joe Silva thing, but then a lot of it is because conversations like that.

00:35:13.000 It's the conversations like, well, fine, we're just going to shelf you.

00:35:15.000 Well, these guys, when they get a call for a title, or they get a call for a fight on the main card, or their families are starving, or they're hungry, people think that everyone's making Conor McGregor money.

00:35:28.000 My whole family thought I was making Conor McGregor money.

00:35:29.000 Like, why are you not making that money? 0.98

00:35:31.000 And I'm like, you guys, I almost want to say, shut up. 0.99

00:35:36.000 I've been getting punched in the face for 20 years. 1.00

00:35:38.000 I don't want to hear this shit right now. 1.00

00:35:40.000 Someone's got a gut and a beer. 0.99

00:35:42.000 Josh, how come you're not making any more money?

00:35:45.000 I never thought about it.

00:35:47.000 You know, maybe next time I talk to these guys, I'll tell them.

00:35:51.000 Definitely tell them to give me that Conor McGregor money.

00:35:53.000 Yeah.

00:35:54.000 But look, what I wanted to talk to you about was you and Brendan had a talk and conversation about guys like Lima and other guys having competition with top guys.

00:36:04.000 I think Lima's a top guy.

00:36:06.000 I think Michael Chandler's a top guy.

00:36:07.000 I think Bellator has several guys that could compete with anybody in the world.

00:36:12.000 Yeah.

00:36:12.000 And I think the same thing about 1FC. I still maintain to this day, Mighty Mouse is probably the best pound-for-pound fighter on the planet.

00:36:18.000 Probably, yes.

00:36:19.000 I mean, Jon Jones has faced stiffer competition because there's stiffer competition in the light heavyweight division.

00:36:23.000 But the way Mighty Mouse was running through the division, the way Mighty Mouse would just not get hit, the expression of martial arts, in my opinion, when I watched him, I've never seen anybody more impressive.

00:36:35.000 So what's your take on him being traded then?

00:36:38.000 I think they offered him a tremendous amount of money at one, and the flyweight division has never been a moneymaker for the UFC, and Henry Cejudo beat him in a very close decision, and I think they just came to a position where Mighty Mouse was like, look, I'm not going to make as much money in the next fight because I lost, but one FC is going to pay me X amount of times more than that.

00:37:01.000 And they gave him a huge contract, man.

00:37:04.000 Yeah.

00:37:05.000 And look, Chautry's amazing and what they're doing over at 1FC. I think it's great for everybody.

00:37:12.000 I think it's great for the sport.

00:37:14.000 I think it's great that the athletes have options.

00:37:16.000 I think the competition is great for the UFC. When you see someone rise and someone start smashing people over there and everybody goes, hey, that guy might be the best 170-pounder in the world, that's good for everybody.

00:37:26.000 Yeah.

00:37:26.000 Because then you could set up potentially a cross-promotional fight if someone's that big.

00:37:31.000 And we get to find out.

00:37:32.000 We get to find out who's the number one in the world.

00:37:34.000 That's what it's supposed to be all about.

00:37:35.000 And the more competition there is, the more big organizations there are, and the more places that athletes go, it's way better for the fighters.

00:37:43.000 And that has to be taken into consideration.

00:37:45.000 Yeah, so I worked for one for a while, and I work for Bellator now, but I was doing case-side commentary for them.

00:37:50.000 And I called a couple of Timothy Nastukin's fights, the guy that knocked out. 0.99

00:37:54.000 Dude, he's a fucking monster. 0.98

00:37:56.000 I told Jamie all I said before you came. 1.00

00:37:59.000 I said, I'm going to call on you a couple times. 1.00

00:38:02.000 When he stopped Alvarez, I was like, that guy is a fucking killer. 1.00

00:38:06.000 Dogs in his hands. 1.00

00:38:07.000 And I'm telling you right now, he either loses by submission in the first round or he knocks you out in the first round.

00:38:12.000 I want to say up until like his tenth fight or ninth fight or something like that, he'd never gone outside the first round.

00:38:16.000 He either knocked you out or he lost.

00:38:18.000 And his record at the time was 9 or 10 and 1 when I was calling his fights.

00:38:21.000 He had only had one loss and I think he had lost by knockout.

00:38:24.000 But he's got heavy dogs, got good hips and takedown defense.

00:38:27.000 Yeah, there he is.

00:38:28.000 The kid's phenomenal.

00:38:29.000 And he's just... 0.99

00:38:31.000 Fucking rock-solid, man. 0.99

00:38:33.000 Rock-solid everywhere. 1.00

00:38:34.000 Fucking super-savage in his approach. 0.99

00:38:37.000 That guy, he's elite, man. 0.99

00:38:39.000 I mean, he's elite in terms of, you know, he could fight anybody in the world that's his size. 1.00

00:38:45.000 That guy's a fucking animal, man. 0.99

00:38:48.000 For him to beat down Eddie Alvarez like that, you're talking about Eddie Alvarez, a guy who's notoriously one of the toughest fucking guys in the sport, period. 1.00

00:38:56.000 And that was a real wake-up call for a lot of people. 0.92

00:38:59.000 There's some guys over there. 0.84

00:39:00.000 Just because you don't know their name doesn't mean, like, look, when fucking Zabit came over here, people didn't know his name. 0.99

00:39:05.000 And then you see that guy fight, you're like, what the fuck? 0.99

00:39:08.000 Where'd you come from? 1.00

00:39:09.000 360 roundhouse kicks and crazy fucking scissor sweeps and taking people down, submitting them, head kicking them, doing everything. 0.99

00:39:17.000 There's hundreds of guys like that out there everywhere. 0.99

00:39:20.000 They're everywhere.

00:39:21.000 And that's the other thing.

00:39:22.000 They're not just in Dagestan.

00:39:23.000 Sure, I think right now that's a market that needs to be tapped into across for every promotion.

00:39:27.000 But they're also in Asia somewhere.

00:39:29.000 They're also in other countries everywhere else.

00:39:32.000 I do know that there's a lot of top talented guys in Sweden and Switzerland that just never get to play because there's not an MMA market there really.

00:39:41.000 But they're great jiu-jitsu guys.

00:39:43.000 There's good MMA gyms out of all these places, especially in Italy and all these other places.

00:39:47.000 We're seeing talent come. 0.99

00:39:49.000 And when I heard that he was fighting, when I heard Eddie was fighting Nassouk, I was like, oh shit. 0.97

00:39:56.000 I said either Eddie's going to be able to get him down and get on top, because he does tend to fade a little bit. 0.93

00:40:02.000 Nassouk gets into the second and third round.

00:40:05.000 But if he can't get him down in that first round, I say he's going to get knocked out.

00:40:08.000 I love Eddie, but he got a little chinny at some points. 0.87

00:40:12.000 Not to the point where he gets knocked out, but he's always been rocked, comes back, and then fucks people up.

00:40:18.000 But this is a guy that I'd seen him just starch guys.

00:40:21.000 I mean, he fought this guy, what was his name, something full along, and there was talk and conversation about this guy was going to knock out Timothy.

00:40:30.000 I mean, it was almost like an Alistair Overeem type knockout, you know, when Ngannou snapped his head back.

00:40:36.000 I'm like, oh God, he was out cold.

00:40:39.000 And so when I see guys like him, and there's other guys that are in these organizations all around, like to me, Patricio Pitbull is probably the best 145-pounder in the world.

00:40:50.000 And I'm a big Max Holloway fan.

00:40:52.000 But I've talked about this before with Big John, is that styles make matchups.

00:40:57.000 And Big John has talked to me about being in the cage, roughing Max's fights, and he said Volkanovski will give him problems.

00:41:08.000 And sure enough, Volkanovski gave him problems.

00:41:11.000 He said, that will let me know how good Patricio Pitbull would do against Max Holloway.

00:41:16.000 The speed, the wrestling, the power, all those things Patricio has.

00:41:21.000 And to me, Patricio is better than Volkanovski just from what I can see, not from the max fight, but from a lead up to all the fights.

00:41:28.000 So I take guys like Lima, I take guys like Patricio who knocked out Michael Chandler at 155 pounds, I take those guys and I'll put those guys against, not just UFC guys, one guys, all these guys, all day long.

00:41:40.000 These guys are nasty and they're tough.

00:41:42.000 This is Patricio Pipple.

00:41:44.000 So there's Patricio, which is the older brother at 155, and then there's Patricio, who's at 145, and he's also now the 155-pound champ.

00:41:52.000 But to me, look, to me, he now, like when you talk about Henry Cejudo, guys attach themselves to guys because they can make themselves better.

00:42:01.000 I'm not going to go train and stake my claim with someone unless I know the two of us are making each other better.

00:42:06.000 That's his main training partner, Henry Cejudo.

00:42:08.000 And that's Henry Cejudo's his main training partner.

00:42:11.000 Juan Archuleta was on like a 19-fight win streak and then faced him.

00:42:16.000 Juan Archuleta didn't look like the same Juan Archuleta when he got in there.

00:42:20.000 And when guys are that good at that next level, that's what happens.

00:42:23.000 They make somebody look like they don't belong in there.

00:42:26.000 And that's what happened.

00:42:27.000 And I was like, man. 1.00

00:42:28.000 Because people keep giving MVP a ton of shit. 1.00

00:42:30.000 And I'm like... 1.00

00:42:31.000 Dude, this guy's that good.

00:42:33.000 Steven Thompson in the beginning wasn't getting any respect either.

00:42:35.000 And look at him.

00:42:36.000 They've got that style of like, oh, I could get him down.

00:42:39.000 I could take him down.

00:42:40.000 I could do this.

00:42:41.000 But guys are so good at their one craft that, man, you just can't get to them when they make these guys look like that.

00:42:47.000 No, listen, I'm with you on this, and I disagreed with Brendan. 0.99

00:42:51.000 Brendan thinks if you're not in the UFC, you're not shit. 0.99

00:42:52.000 And I don't think that's true. 0.98

00:42:54.000 Why did he get the...

00:42:55.000 I want to know why.

00:42:55.000 Why?

00:42:56.000 He's got a little Stephen A. Smith in him.

00:42:59.000 I love Brendan, man.

00:43:01.000 Just a sprinkle.

00:43:02.000 Look, he's one of my best friends.

00:43:03.000 I just saw him last weekend in San Jose.

00:43:04.000 I love him to death.

00:43:04.000 I went to his show.

00:43:05.000 But he likes to talk crazy shit, too. 1.00

00:43:07.000 But he also believes what he's saying. 1.00

00:43:09.000 He really does.

00:43:09.000 He believes what he's saying.

00:43:10.000 I disagree.

00:43:11.000 I mean, the Michael Venom-Page thing is a perfect example. 0.99

00:43:13.000 He's so good that Paul Daly turned into a fucking wrestler. 0.99

00:43:16.000 Yeah. 0.99

00:43:17.000 Right?

00:43:17.000 How crazy is that?

00:43:18.000 I want to tell you a story on that real quick.

00:43:20.000 Paul Daly mercs people.

00:43:21.000 Paul Daly turned to some of the guys at Bellator and go, hey man, I just want to apologize before you walked out.

00:43:27.000 I just want to apologize.

00:43:28.000 It's going to be a boring fight.

00:43:29.000 He said that?

00:43:30.000 Really?

00:43:31.000 He's straight up like, hey, I just want to apologize.

00:43:33.000 This is going to be a boring fight.

00:43:35.000 Wow.

00:43:36.000 That's crazy.

00:43:37.000 But look, if you watch how well Michael Venom Page moved in that fight, you almost understand it.

00:43:43.000 Because Paul, with that traditional Thai style...

00:43:46.000 Look, Paul knocked out Lorenz Larkin. 0.96

00:43:48.000 Lorenz Larkin is an evil man. 0.99

00:43:50.000 He's nasty. 0.99

00:43:50.000 He's so good. 0.99

00:43:51.000 When you watch him, you watch his style, his movement.

00:43:54.000 I mean, against Neil Magny, throwing those oblique kicks to the body. 0.99

00:44:01.000 Who the fuck does that? 0.99

00:44:02.000 Yeah. 1.00

00:44:02.000 You know that one that a lot of guys like to throw to the thigh? 1.00

00:44:05.000 He's hitting him in the body like a front kick with that.

00:44:08.000 Blah! 0.86

00:44:08.000 And I'm like, Jesus Christ! 0.86

00:44:10.000 He's so technical on his feet.

00:44:11.000 He's so sweet on his feet.

00:44:13.000 So you see him get knocked out by Paul Daly. 1.00

00:44:16.000 You realize, God damn that Paul Daly's a motherfucker. 1.00

00:44:19.000 That left hand of his is one of the best weapons in the sport. 1.00

00:44:22.000 Everybody goes to sleep.

00:44:23.000 And here it is.

00:44:24.000 You see Paul Daly taking him down.

00:44:27.000 And I was like, I can't believe this. 1.00

00:44:30.000 The fucking power that he has. 0.99

00:44:32.000 Paul Daly's power is, his left hand in particular, one of the scariest fucking weapons in the sport. 1.00

00:44:38.000 It really is. 0.97

00:44:39.000 He just, you know, probably 36 now.

00:44:42.000 Yeah.

00:44:43.000 He's not the same guy that he was when he was 25. But the thing is, he's not bad, though.

00:44:46.000 No, he's still good.

00:44:47.000 He's still really damn good. 1.00

00:44:49.000 Fuck yeah. 0.99

00:44:49.000 If we put him back in the UFC, I'd still say he's probably in the top five or six. 0.99

00:44:54.000 Well, he's always going to have a problem with real wrestlers.

00:44:56.000 Yeah, of course he is.

00:44:57.000 But I also think that his game has always been shaped like guys like John Fitch were able to just grind and grind and grind.

00:45:03.000 But guys like Usman and Kobe, they grind on you, sure.

00:45:07.000 But with John, when he fought him the last time, he just was...

00:45:10.000 John's at a different stage in his career where he's not letting go of the leg for anything.

00:45:14.000 Usman and Kobe will make space to throw punches, which could get them in trouble against somebody like him. 0.99

00:45:19.000 Because his power in his left hand is fucking nasty. 1.00

00:45:22.000 It's fucking ridiculous. 0.99

00:45:23.000 If you see the fight with him when he wobbled or dropped Nick Diaz, Nick Diaz don't get dropped like that. 1.00

00:45:30.000 How crazy is Nick Diaz?

00:45:32.000 Nick Diaz forced him into a dogfight. 0.52

00:45:34.000 Forced him into a dogfight.

00:45:35.000 And that was one of the most freakish, weirdest knockouts. 0.95

00:45:38.000 It was amazing.

00:45:39.000 But the thing is, that was when UFC had first taken over Strikeforce, and I was sitting there cage-sized, and I'm thinking to myself, this is hands down the greatest MMA one-round fight I've ever seen in my life.

00:45:49.000 Ever.

00:45:49.000 It was amazing.

00:45:51.000 He just wore him out.

00:45:52.000 Yeah. 0.99

00:45:53.000 He just put that fucking Nick Diaz pace on him and wore him out. 0.98

00:45:56.000 But when he clipped him and rocked him and dropped him, I was like, oh my god, Paul Daly's gonna stop Nick Diaz? 0.99

00:46:02.000 This is crazy.

00:46:02.000 This is nuts!

00:46:03.000 This is nuts!

00:46:03.000 But just the fact that Nick fought him that way.

00:46:05.000 I mean, Nick didn't try to take him down.

00:46:07.000 Nick didn't try to submit him.

00:46:08.000 He just went after him.

00:46:09.000 Just like, come on, let's do this.

00:46:10.000 But let's not forget the history of Nick Diaz, man.

00:46:12.000 It all started with Robbie Lawler.

00:46:14.000 The history of Nick Diaz started with Robbie Lawler. 1.00

00:46:16.000 Like, come on, motherfucker. 0.99

00:46:17.000 I got this. 1.00

00:46:18.000 And that's what elevated him to that next level.

00:46:21.000 I called that fight. 1.00

00:46:22.000 He walked into the octagon and started yelling, Stockton, motherfucker! 1.00

00:46:25.000 Stockton! 1.00

00:46:26.000 And Robbie Lawyer's like, what is happening here?

00:46:29.000 What is this?

00:46:30.000 Robbie Lawyer was this dark destroyer.

00:46:32.000 Everybody was scared of him.

00:46:33.000 He was a spooky dude.

00:46:35.000 He was flatlining people. 1.00

00:46:36.000 And Nick Diaz, not only was he not scared of him, he was talking mad shit to him. 0.99

00:46:40.000 He was fighting. 1.00

00:46:40.000 He was like, what, bitch? 1.00

00:46:41.000 What are we doing, bitch? 1.00

00:46:42.000 What are we doing, bitch? 1.00

00:46:44.000 People don't understand this. 1.00

00:46:45.000 It's so funny.

00:46:46.000 I was talking to Big John the other day on our show and I was saying like, hey man, guys, I didn't get so damn tired when guys talk to me.

00:46:54.000 It stresses me the fuck out, man. 0.99

00:46:56.000 I'm like, I just start sweating and I'm like, this is, shut the fuck up. 0.99

00:47:00.000 We're supposed to be fighting. 0.99

00:47:01.000 I couldn't believe it.

00:47:02.000 I was like, dude.

00:47:03.000 Do you remember when Nick did that to Frank Shamrock?

00:47:06.000 Yes!

00:47:07.000 And Frank Shamrock was like, I can't believe this is happening.

00:47:09.000 Because it's usually Frank that does it!

00:47:10.000 Yes!

00:47:11.000 I trained with Frank for years and I'm like, I'm in his guard and he's like, come on Josh, get up, throw punches, do something, I'm gonna fucking sub you. 0.96

00:47:17.000 I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that. 1.00

00:47:18.000 And you're just like, shut up, man! 1.00

00:47:20.000 Shetler's wanna punch you harder and it makes you more tired. 1.00

00:47:22.000 And the fact that Nick was doing it and out cardioing him.

00:47:25.000 Yes.

00:47:26.000 Frank's thing was always be in the best shape so you could put, like when he beat Tito.

00:47:30.000 Just put that pace on him, and Tito couldn't keep up, and then he finished him.

00:47:33.000 Yeah, Frank was not the same guy when he fought Nick at that time, but let's be real, at that time, it was awesome to see somebody like Nick do that, because Nick, though, if you recall, at the end of the fight, he picks Frank up. 0.98

00:47:45.000 He's like, you're a fucking legend. 0.97

00:47:46.000 Do not sit down there like that. 1.00

00:47:47.000 You're a fucking legend. 1.00

00:47:48.000 And that's why people talk to me all the time about my fight with Nate, and I say, look, man, I have nothing but respect for both those guys. 1.00

00:47:55.000 Those guys are fucking Animals. 0.98

00:47:57.000 Not only the animals, but what I love is I love people. 1.00

00:48:00.000 We were talking about Big John being a good guy before we came on the show and Big John McCarthy.

00:48:04.000 And I said, absolutely.

00:48:06.000 And when I think of guys that are good guys, I think of guys that stick by their friends no matter what.

00:48:11.000 You got to remember that brawl that happened on CBS, right?

00:48:13.000 We were talking about that as well.

00:48:15.000 That brawl with Mayhem Miller, Jake Shields, Nick Diaz.

00:48:18.000 But guess what?

00:48:18.000 That whole scrap pack, they die for each other.

00:48:21.000 And you can't knock friendship like that.

00:48:23.000 And I look at those guys, and they're really good people.

00:48:25.000 From Gilbert Melendez, his wife Carrie, Nick and Nate, and Jake.

00:48:29.000 Jake's still one of my good, good buddies.

00:48:31.000 Gil is as well.

00:48:32.000 But even though I don't talk to Nate anymore, really.

00:48:35.000 But still, I have nothing but respect for those guys themselves. 0.89

00:48:38.000 They did it on their own, and they're fucking amazing.

00:48:41.000 I will buy their pay-per-view every single time they fight no matter what. 0.96

00:48:44.000 Agreed.

00:48:45.000 And, you know, Nick Diaz changed the game in terms of his elite cardio.

00:48:48.000 He did something that was a new thing.

00:48:51.000 And that new thing was, he's not going to hit you with 100% power.

00:48:54.000 He's going to hit you with 50%.

00:48:56.000 But he's going to hit you twice as much and you're never going to get to breathe. 0.98

00:48:59.000 And he's going to stay on top of you, and he's going to talk to you the whole time, so he's going to fuck with you psychologically, he's going to disrupt your breathing by constantly hitting you, and then once he realizes you're hurt, then he's digging into the body, then he's putting it on you. 0.98

00:49:11.000 And on top of that, black belt jiu-jitsu skills, really good wrestling takedown defense, fucking chin made of iron, and an unstoppable will. 0.99

00:49:19.000 Like, his will to beat you was just unstoppable. 0.93

00:49:22.000 When Nick was at the top in Strikeforce, to this day, I think he's one of the best fighters that's ever done it.

00:49:27.000 To this day.

00:49:28.000 No, I agree.

00:49:29.000 I think a lot of that unstoppable will, though, comes from him doing triathlons.

00:49:32.000 I was like, hey, I cannot stop, otherwise I lose my time.

00:49:36.000 And I've only got five more miles or eight more miles until I get to the bike or until I get to the run or until I'm done with the swim.

00:49:44.000 Those are things in your mind as an athlete, you're always thinking like, I'm almost there.

00:49:48.000 Yeah.

00:49:48.000 Okay, I'm only going to run to the two-minute mark.

00:49:50.000 Okay, I'm only going to run to the five-minute mark.

00:49:52.000 You set goals for yourself as you go. 1.00

00:49:53.000 Shit, I smashed a goal. 1.00

00:49:54.000 Okay, one more goal ahead. 0.99

00:49:56.000 Those are the things that top athletes do, and I feel like that's what he's done with his career.

00:50:00.000 He used triathlons to help get him there.

00:50:02.000 He was always good, always nasty, like good jiu-jitsu, great, phenomenal guillotines.

00:50:07.000 His game has always been really good.

00:50:08.000 When he upped his game in boxing, and the pace, like you're saying, just the touch, touch, touch, now bam, bam.

00:50:15.000 Touch, touch, touch, bam.

00:50:16.000 That's next level boxing that we hadn't seen in MMA at the time. 0.85

00:50:19.000 Yeah, and sparring with Andre Ward on a regular basis, too.

00:50:22.000 I mean, he did, look, he did really change things. 0.98

00:50:26.000 He really changed things, particularly with that fucking cardio of his. 0.99

00:50:29.000 He has some spooky cardio. 0.98

00:50:30.000 Speaking of spooky cardio, let's talk about Tony Ferguson.

00:50:35.000 Okay.

00:50:36.000 That guy's got some...

00:50:37.000 And you have personal experience with Tony Ferguson.

00:50:39.000 Yes, yes.

00:50:40.000 That guy has some spooky...

00:50:41.000 Unfortunately.

00:50:42.000 Unfortunately. 1.00

00:50:43.000 He's got spooky fucking cardio, man. 0.99

00:50:45.000 I give him a real shot against Khabib. 1.00

00:50:48.000 I give him a real shot.

00:50:49.000 Okay, so...

00:50:52.000 I do and I don't.

00:50:54.000 And I'm not trying to take a dig at him.

00:50:56.000 I actually am a big fan of his, okay?

00:50:58.000 And I was a big fan of his before I fought him.

00:51:00.000 And I did a lot of research on him leading up to the fight.

00:51:03.000 I never really showed him any respect up until like, ah, he's just okay, he's a little sloppy, he's this, he's that.

00:51:08.000 But once I did the research on him leading up to our fight...

00:51:11.000 It impressed me.

00:51:12.000 What impressed me was, dude, the guy can take a shot, give a shot, the guy doesn't slow down, the guy doesn't care where the fight goes.

00:51:19.000 Anytime you have somebody who doesn't care where the fight goes, it changes the dynamic of how you approach him.

00:51:25.000 Because if you take him down, what does that matter?

00:51:26.000 He don't care.

00:51:27.000 Yeah, he's good with the darse. 0.98

00:51:29.000 He's good with the guillotine.

00:51:29.000 He's good with triangles.

00:51:30.000 He's good with all those.

00:51:31.000 He doesn't care.

00:51:32.000 So if he stays on the feet, guess what?

00:51:33.000 He keeps his distance and his range with his long-range push kicks and his jabs and his combinations.

00:51:39.000 He doesn't care where the fight goes.

00:51:42.000 Neither does Khabib.

00:51:43.000 But obviously, Khabib would like to keep the fight on the ground, press against the fence, doing work, what he's done, and continues to work and does what he does best.

00:51:54.000 Look, for me, I feel like the only way that Tony wins is by a cut.

00:51:59.000 I don't think that he can sub him.

00:52:05.000 Now, I'm not saying it can't happen.

00:52:06.000 We understand when cuts happen, you get a little more slippery, things slide in a lot faster.

00:52:12.000 Especially in that darts position.

00:52:13.000 He'll hit that darts up from any direction.

00:52:16.000 He'll hit it from his guard. 1.00

00:52:18.000 He'll hit it from his butt. 1.00

00:52:18.000 He'll hit it from anywhere. 1.00

00:52:19.000 Yeah.

00:52:20.000 So if you're hanging out, if Khabib doesn't put the placement of his head in the right spot, it could be a really, really tough night for him.

00:52:26.000 Yeah, he hits it from side control.

00:52:28.000 Yeah, from being elbowed and being choked.

00:52:30.000 So he's got all the intangibles to become world champion.

00:52:34.000 I mean, he's already a former interim champion, which I still consider to him that he was the champion at the time.

00:52:40.000 I have nothing bad to say about him.

00:52:42.000 I just think that physically strong, he is not.

00:52:45.000 And I'm not knocking him.

00:52:47.000 I'm just simply saying, strength-wise, he is not.

00:52:49.000 But Joe, here I want to shake my hand.

00:52:51.000 His hands will go around yours probably twice.

00:52:53.000 Just bricks.

00:52:54.000 No, he's got such long fingers.

00:52:56.000 That's what threw me off, honestly, when I shook his hand at the weigh-ins.

00:53:00.000 His fingers wrapped all the way around my hand, almost engulfed my whole hand. 0.99

00:53:04.000 I was like, oh shit, you got really big hands! 0.99

00:53:06.000 Well, that makes the power. 0.99

00:53:08.000 No, not just that, but there was a moment there where he had wrist control.

00:53:12.000 So when I got into his guard, he grabbed my wrist, and I couldn't get my arm free, and then in the meantime, he's elbowing me in my head.

00:53:18.000 And I got two Mercedes-Benz cuts right here on the front of my forehead.

00:53:22.000 Okay?

00:53:23.000 So it was like right there, and then he cut me with a good elbow when I stepped in on one, but the two Mercedes-Benz cuts were from him with wrist control and him elbowing me from his guard.

00:53:31.000 If Khabib gets put into his guard, it could end up being a tough fight because cuts...

00:53:37.000 Cuts happen, and when they do happen, and you have a shaved head, there's nothing stopping them from flowing right into your eyes.

00:53:44.000 Your eyebrows are not going to stop all that blood.

00:53:47.000 And if you recall, remember the Joe Daddy Stevenson and Eads Edwards fights? 0.99

00:53:50.000 That shit was just squirting out. 0.93

00:53:52.000 There's an Adam Piccolotti fight as well in Bellator where he had cut the guy on the top of the head, and literally he gets a rear neck and chokes him, and you see blood go everywhere. 1.00

00:54:00.000 And I'm just thinking to myself, In a fight where you shave your head or your hair is always really short, it's not going to look good to the judges or to the doctor and things like that.

00:54:14.000 Shaw brought this up.

00:54:16.000 This fight's in New York.

00:54:17.000 Yes. 1.00

00:54:18.000 With that fucking lame-ass doctor that stopped the Nick Diaz fight. 1.00

00:54:21.000 Yes. 1.00

00:54:21.000 The lame-ass doctor. 1.00

00:54:22.000 Oh, he's got a vagina on his eye. 1.00

00:54:24.000 No one gives a shit. 1.00

00:54:25.000 The guy can still fight. 0.98

00:54:26.000 Right.

00:54:28.000 They're being extra cautious in New York right now because it's a relatively new sport, is what I believe.

00:54:32.000 I believe, too.

00:54:32.000 And then I believe they had that death of that boxer that was there.

00:54:35.000 So then that, they're just trying to make sure, which I understand, the safety of the fighters is most important.

00:54:41.000 Yeah, I would prefer that being in Vegas.

00:54:43.000 Yeah. 1.00

00:54:44.000 In Vegas they'll let shit go. 1.00

00:54:46.000 Although, you know, I think they did check Macy Barber's knee. 1.00

00:54:50.000 That was kind of crazy.

00:54:51.000 I thought it was kind of awesome, though.

00:54:53.000 Because, yeah, I've done that a lot with my therapist.

00:54:56.000 My therapist would be like, yeah, you have probably a grade 2 sprain.

00:54:59.000 You'll be all right.

00:55:00.000 You can tell. 1.00

00:55:00.000 If it's torn, your shit's flopping around. 1.00

00:55:03.000 But didn't you think it was weird that they were checking her? 1.00

00:55:05.000 Remember Tiago Santos?

00:55:06.000 Yeah.

00:55:06.000 Tiago Santos has zero knees.

00:55:08.000 Yeah.

00:55:08.000 His knees were gone and he's still swinging haymakers at Jon Jones.

00:55:12.000 Because he's a fucking savage. 1.00

00:55:13.000 Savage. 1.00

00:55:14.000 He's a savage. 0.99

00:55:14.000 That guy's a savage. 0.99

00:55:16.000 I mean, look, at that fight, I could see it going to Jon, but I could also see it going to Santos.

00:55:21.000 Real close.

00:55:22.000 I was like, man.

00:55:23.000 If you hadn't got hurt, how would this fight have been different?

00:55:26.000 You are good.

00:55:28.000 Really good. 1.00

00:55:29.000 He's fucking dangerous as shit. 1.00

00:55:30.000 And that power is undeniable. 1.00

00:55:32.000 It seemed like he didn't get hurt from anything.

00:55:36.000 It was a weird thing, right?

00:55:37.000 He threw a punch and his leg just kind of buckled.

00:55:40.000 Yeah, but you've got to remember though.

00:55:41.000 Remember Patrick Cote did the same thing with Anderson Silva?

00:55:43.000 Yes, yes.

00:55:43.000 You know, T. Wood, I think.

00:55:44.000 Or not T. Wood.

00:55:45.000 Carlos Conant with T. Wood.

00:55:47.000 Same thing.

00:55:47.000 He didn't really do anything.

00:55:49.000 It's like kind of one of those step backs.

00:55:50.000 Well, Carlos with Tyron, though, was a leg kick.

00:55:52.000 Remember?

00:55:53.000 Yeah, but he tore it, though.

00:55:55.000 Was it from the leg kick?

00:55:56.000 Or was it just when he died?

00:55:57.000 We don't know.

00:55:57.000 Sometimes, like, you know how it is.

00:55:58.000 Like, sometimes you're a little fucked up going into the fight. 0.96

00:56:01.000 And sometimes you just get a little bit of an injury in the fight, and then all of a sudden a big leg kick. 0.98

00:56:05.000 But Tyron leg kicked him, and then his knee blew out.

00:56:08.000 Just bug out.

00:56:08.000 Tyron's legs are like two.

00:56:09.000 Yeah, I know.

00:56:10.000 I've trained with him a couple times. 1.00

00:56:11.000 Giant fucking legs. 0.99

00:56:13.000 For someone who is built like a Greek god, he's fucking one of the nicest guys. 1.00

00:56:17.000 He's a great guy. 0.98

00:56:18.000 I love how smart he is, too, in terms of his full career.

00:56:24.000 He dips his hands in a bunch of different things.

00:56:27.000 He's rapping.

00:56:28.000 He's doing a lot of TMZ stuff.

00:56:31.000 He's constantly putting up YouTube content. 1.00

00:56:33.000 He's on top of shit. 0.99

00:56:35.000 To touch on, I keep bringing up John because John and I talk about it a lot, obviously. 1.00

00:56:43.000 Fighters after fighting, you need to have a game plan.

00:56:47.000 I'm not saying it's going to all work.

00:56:49.000 That's the thing.

00:56:50.000 I own a fitness gym.

00:56:51.000 I own a martial arts gym.

00:56:53.000 I do a podcast.

00:56:54.000 I own a clothing line.

00:56:55.000 I do all these things.

00:56:57.000 But all of them supplement a little bit of the income that I was making for fighting.

00:57:01.000 I think the problem is fighters need to get into dabbling in other things.

00:57:04.000 Look, whether it's a podcast or whether it's owning a gym or anything, I would recommend no gym businesses.

00:57:10.000 Just, I would recommend that.

00:57:11.000 Is it rough?

00:57:12.000 It's rough.

00:57:12.000 I mean, it's the constant hustle.

00:57:14.000 I've got 15 employees, so it's a lot of work.

00:57:17.000 When you've got that many employees, it's like you have trainers that work for you.

00:57:20.000 You have front desk people that work for you.

00:57:21.000 I've got jiu-jitsu coaches that help work and help teach when I'm not there, like they're there now while I'm here with you.

00:57:26.000 And so it's, and I owe a lot to them.

00:57:29.000 Like, you know, they run the fort while I'm gone.

00:57:31.000 It's just a lot to manage.

00:57:32.000 It's a lot to manage.

00:57:33.000 I get back to the room, you know, later today and I'll get on the computer, look at my computer, you know, look at my cameras like how you have here.

00:57:38.000 You see, hey, everything's okay, everything's going good.

00:57:40.000 Plenty of kids came to class today.

00:57:41.000 You know, I've got like over 100 kids in my martial arts gym.

00:57:43.000 That's awesome.

00:57:44.000 You know, a jiu-jitsu base and wrestling.

00:57:46.000 I have jiu-jitsu.

00:57:46.000 I've got DC's wrestling program in there.

00:57:48.000 But all that gym business is hard.

00:57:51.000 It's a constant hustle.

00:57:53.000 But you have to remember it's an ebb and plow.

00:57:55.000 So...

00:57:56.000 Summers are slow because it's indoors.

00:57:58.000 No one really wants to train during the summer.

00:57:59.000 Everyone's like, I want to go to the beach.

00:58:00.000 I want to go run up the beach.

00:58:01.000 I want to go muscle beach and lift.

00:58:03.000 Those are the things that people want to go hiking, camping.

00:58:07.000 That's the fitness side of it.

00:58:08.000 The jiu-jitsu part of it, sure, the jiu-jitsu nerds, they're in there.

00:58:11.000 They're going to be there no matter what.

00:58:13.000 Kickboxers or anything like that, they take the vacation because they want to be outside. 0.95

00:58:17.000 Gym business is extremely hard.

00:58:19.000 During the summer, you're slow.

00:58:20.000 September, October, you pick back up.

00:58:22.000 Holidays, you're slow.

00:58:23.000 New Year's, you're back to getting busy because New Year's resolutions.

00:58:26.000 Y'all want to be skinny up until May, okay?

00:58:29.000 When it's Memorial weekend and you're all in Vegas, you know, at the pool parties.

00:58:33.000 That's their game plan.

00:58:34.000 So you just got to learn to manage your money and budget your money and figure out things to supplement the income during the times that are slow.

00:58:42.000 That's really what it comes out to.

00:58:43.000 It is a really smart thing for fighters. 0.96

00:58:45.000 I mean, Brendan obviously has struck pay dirt with the fighter and the kid and below the belt and all the other shit that he does.

00:58:51.000 And in a lot of ways, and also stand-up, in a lot of ways he's opened up the door for a lot of fighters to follow that model.

00:58:58.000 And a lot of guys are doing podcasts now because of that.

00:59:00.000 I mean, Mike Bisping has a really good podcast with Luis Gomez.

00:59:03.000 And, you know, there's a lot of other fighters that are getting involved in setting up similar things, too.

00:59:08.000 But I think that's really important to say that they need some, like, you can't fight forever.

00:59:14.000 It's not possible.

00:59:15.000 So there's got to be something you're going to do for the rest of your life to make an income.

00:59:18.000 And when you're focused singularly on one thing, being the best fighter that you can be, it's very difficult to even imagine a future without fighting for a lot of these guys.

00:59:28.000 So this is the advice that I gave myself.

00:59:32.000 So my last fight was against Patricio Pitbull, which is Patricio's brother.

00:59:35.000 And, you know, I lost.

00:59:37.000 And when I lost, I kept going to the gym after.

00:59:40.000 And when I kept going to the gym, and I was thinking to myself, you're 40 years old, what's next?

00:59:48.000 Are you going to fight again?

00:59:50.000 And when the reality set in that if you want to do something else, your new life is going to cost you your old one.

00:59:57.000 You have to have that mentality.

00:59:59.000 Because I can't keep going to the gym, wasting four or five hours a day at the gym, and still try to start another career.

01:00:06.000 You've got to leave that behind.

01:00:08.000 Whatever it is you're doing in fighting, if you're going to move and do something else, then you need to leave it behind.

01:00:14.000 You have to approach it with the same intensity that you approach your fighting career.

01:00:17.000 And the problem is fighters don't do that.

01:00:19.000 Fighters that leave the sport or are going to retire, they're done fighting, they don't do that.

01:00:23.000 They keep hanging on to, I'm going to go to the gym every day, I see all the boys, I'm going to go to the gym every day and hit mitts with my trainer.

01:00:28.000 Why?

01:00:30.000 Get established first in another job.

01:00:31.000 Okay?

01:00:32.000 Start making that income.

01:00:33.000 Now, make that your hobby.

01:00:35.000 Go and hit mitts with your coach again.

01:00:36.000 Your coach is going to love you.

01:00:37.000 He's still going to be there.

01:00:38.000 If I call up Javier tomorrow, if he's in town, hey, I want to hit mitts tomorrow at, say, 630. All right, let me move some guys around for you.

01:00:44.000 I only got about five minutes to meet you.

01:00:46.000 No other minutes.

01:00:47.000 But, you know, he'll make some adjustments for you.

01:00:50.000 Those guys will be there.

01:00:52.000 Those coaches will always be there for you.

01:00:54.000 Go back to it.

01:00:55.000 I can't give any better advice than your new life is going to cost your own one.

01:01:00.000 Let it go.

01:01:01.000 It's okay.

01:01:02.000 Move on.

01:01:02.000 But give the same energy and enthusiasm to your new job or whatever it is you want to do that you did to fighting.

01:01:10.000 And you're going to be great.

01:01:11.000 Well, you have a very intelligent approach about it, but for a lot of guys, it's really hard because fighting is their identity.

01:01:16.000 It's everything.

01:01:18.000 It's who they are.

01:01:19.000 And also the highs.

01:01:21.000 The highs of competition.

01:01:22.000 The highs of victory.

01:01:24.000 They're always chasing that.

01:01:25.000 And then when life gets dull outside of the cage, there's this feeling like, maybe I got one more in me.

01:01:31.000 Maybe I got one more.

01:01:32.000 I think that's a social media play, though.

01:01:35.000 That's what it is.

01:01:35.000 They're in love with the likes.

01:01:38.000 That's what it is.

01:01:38.000 Like, ah, maybe.

01:01:39.000 Just scroll around and get the likes.

01:01:40.000 Let me see the hearts.

01:01:41.000 But besides social media, it's been something that fighters have done throughout history.

01:01:45.000 Way before social media.

01:01:47.000 Sugar Ray Leonard did it.

01:01:48.000 Remember when he got knocked out by Hector Camacho?

01:01:50.000 Yeah.

01:01:50.000 Terry Norris?

01:01:51.000 And when you're like, Ray, get out of there.

01:01:54.000 Yeah, I mean, we're seeing it with Roy Jones.

01:01:56.000 Yes.

01:01:56.000 You know, it's sad.

01:01:58.000 And Holyfield did it for years.

01:01:59.000 You know, it's just...

01:02:01.000 Look, it is hard to get away from something you've done for your whole life.

01:02:05.000 And no matter what, it doesn't matter just fighting.

01:02:07.000 It could be the NFL. You see guys playing, the NBA guys, playing in China, playing in Europe and all these other places.

01:02:15.000 Because they just love it.

01:02:16.000 They love the competition.

01:02:17.000 They love getting up and down the court.

01:02:19.000 They love whatever it is they're doing.

01:02:20.000 I understand that, but...

01:02:23.000 You gotta move on.

01:02:24.000 And I don't mean like you gotta leave it behind.

01:02:27.000 You just gotta come back to it later when you're established doing something else.

01:02:30.000 You gotta find the next stage of your life, the next chapter.

01:02:34.000 Well, the hardest thing, I feel like realistically the hardest thing is like you're trying to find something that supplemented the income that you were making.

01:02:40.000 I was making really good money.

01:02:42.000 Joe, it takes me a whole year now of work of all four of these other companies to make what I was making in one fight or a fight and a half.

01:02:50.000 It's like, ah, but...

01:02:52.000 You have to understand that there's a means to an end.

01:02:55.000 Like, if I just keep doing what I'm doing, you know, and one day I'll hop a man cave.

01:02:59.000 You know what I mean?

01:03:00.000 Well, like, look at Henzo.

01:03:02.000 Like, Henzo Gracie is a huge school in New York City, makes a shit ton of money, and, you know, got there from his career in fighting and jiu-jitsu, and figured out how to make more money than he ever made in his entire fighting career every year just doing that.

01:03:18.000 But he also had to line himself up with great people.

01:03:21.000 That was the other thing. 0.99

01:03:22.000 John Danaher is fucking amazing. 0.99

01:03:25.000 You go to his class. 0.98

01:03:26.000 I went there with Frankie Edgar and some of the other guys that were there.

01:03:30.000 I was like, good God, can I get a little two-by-two space to try the move? 0.98

01:03:35.000 Because there were so many damn people there. 0.98

01:03:37.000 It was packed. 0.99

01:03:37.000 And this class was at like 9.30 or 10.30 in the morning on a Tuesday. 0.99

01:03:42.000 I'm like, well, don't you guys have jobs?

01:03:44.000 No.

01:03:46.000 There's so many killers that come out of that gym, man.

01:03:48.000 It's crazy.

01:03:49.000 And just the approach and how Hanzo handles his business.

01:03:53.000 Every time you see Hanzo, how is he?

01:03:55.000 Super friendly.

01:03:56.000 What's up?

01:03:57.000 How are you doing, bro?

01:03:59.000 He's the best.

01:04:00.000 That's what helps generate and drives business.

01:04:02.000 That's the other thing I want to tell young fighters or fighters that are thinking about leaving...

01:04:07.000 Be positive, man.

01:04:08.000 You had a great time being an athlete and a fighter.

01:04:10.000 Move on now.

01:04:11.000 When you move on, keep that same positive energy in everything you do.

01:04:15.000 How you doing?

01:04:15.000 Hey, smile when you walk past people.

01:04:17.000 We don't see that enough in some old bitter fighters.

01:04:20.000 Why?

01:04:20.000 Don't be that way.

01:04:22.000 You were fucking great. 0.99

01:04:23.000 Don't worry about what goes on. 0.99

01:04:25.000 Focus on what's next and be positive as you do it.

01:04:27.000 I think everything will be great.

01:04:28.000 It's hard for guys to accept the new chapter in their life.

01:04:31.000 You know what another parallel is?

01:04:33.000 Hot chicks. 1.00

01:04:34.000 When hot chicks get older, some of them just have a hard time letting it go. 1.00

01:04:38.000 Oh, yeah. 1.00

01:04:39.000 It's just like, God damn, you used to be the thing you would walk by, and every guy would be like, holy shit, and now you're invisible. 1.00

01:04:46.000 And for a lot of women, that's a devastating transition in their life. 1.00

01:04:51.000 For a girl who's an average girl, an average-looking girl, it's not as hard.

01:04:56.000 When you get older, you were never a showstopper to begin with.

01:05:01.000 You know, but there's something about showstoppers.

01:05:03.000 It's like, it's just a gift from the universe.

01:05:05.000 A gorgeous girl.

01:05:07.000 It's just a gift.

01:05:09.000 You know, you just got fantastic genetics.

01:05:11.000 It's really all it is.

01:05:13.000 That this facial symmetry, the way your body's built...

01:05:17.000 I mean, there's a lot of girls that are showstoppers that don't even have to work out. 1.00

01:05:20.000 And when they get older, it's like the universe takes that gift away.

01:05:23.000 It's almost worse than having never had it.

01:05:25.000 And for fighters, sometimes it's the same way.

01:05:28.000 Because as you get older and you're living a regular life with a regular job with a lot of people to be happy with...

01:05:34.000 You're not happy with it because you remember being a conqueror.

01:05:38.000 You remember being the guy that gets his hand raised and have thousands of people screaming and cheering.

01:05:44.000 You remember the after fight party.

01:05:46.000 You remember training. 0.99

01:05:47.000 You remember walking in the gym and everybody goes, that's the fucking man right there. 0.99

01:05:50.000 Yeah, the sport will be on after you. 0.99

01:05:52.000 It was there before you, and it'll be there after you.

01:05:54.000 Every athlete needs to remember that.

01:05:56.000 And as far as with women, look, women go through the baby fat stage like kids do. 1.00

01:06:02.000 They go through the baby fat stage.

01:06:03.000 When they're younger, I feel like they haven't fully matured.

01:06:06.000 I feel like when you look, and I want to say women don't hit their prime until that 32 to 36, 37-year-old. 0.99

01:06:13.000 You see them, I'm like, God damn. 0.99

01:06:15.000 Then they become a woman. 0.99

01:06:16.000 They become a woman, and they are absolutely beautiful.

01:06:20.000 I'm telling you, like, you look at Jennifer Aniston when she was, like, probably in her 30s or early 30s or, you know, late 20s. 0.57

01:06:27.000 You see her, like, when she was that 40 age.

01:06:30.000 Good God.

01:06:31.000 Just way different.

01:06:32.000 J-Lo, same thing when she was younger versus... 0.94

01:06:35.000 They also take care of themselves.

01:06:35.000 They take care of themselves.

01:06:36.000 You're right.

01:06:36.000 But I think a majority of women, though, between that 32 to 36, 37, that could be their...

01:06:41.000 Whether it's the hot spot.

01:06:42.000 That's the hot spot.

01:06:43.000 I really believe.

01:06:45.000 Because, you know, look, there was a lot...

01:06:47.000 There was some girls that I knew that were ring girls and when they first started on they weren't as beautiful as they are now as they've gotten a little bit older.

01:06:58.000 The other thing as well is sometimes though they were pretty with natural looks when they started and now all of a sudden they've got so much work done they don't even look like the same person.

01:07:08.000 So there's two sides to that. 1.00

01:07:09.000 Just let your body mature before you go sticking that shit in your face. 1.00

01:07:15.000 And I'll bet you you're going to be beautiful no matter what. 1.00

01:07:19.000 You start putting that shit, you look like every other person that's on social media. 1.00

01:07:23.000 It drives me insane to see that. 1.00

01:07:26.000 You guys all have the same doctor.

01:07:28.000 I can see.

01:07:29.000 Also, you see girls in their early 20s getting their face shot up.

01:07:33.000 This is crazy.

01:07:34.000 Yeah, they're not even done.

01:07:35.000 Their body's not even done growing.

01:07:37.000 They're physically filling out.

01:07:38.000 And I'm thinking, gosh.

01:07:39.000 They want to fill their cheeks in with those fillers and all that stuff.

01:07:42.000 Yeah, it's a bummer.

01:07:47.000 I like one of the things that Bellator and the UFC is doing is employing former fighters to do commentary and to do analysis of fights.

01:07:57.000 Bellator does a fantastic job with you guys and the UFC does it as well.

01:08:02.000 Fighters as commentators.

01:08:04.000 I think that's a great avenue.

01:08:06.000 And that's something that's going to be around for a long time.

01:08:09.000 And if you're good at it, you're very good at it.

01:08:10.000 I really enjoy you doing it.

01:08:12.000 That means a lot coming from you.

01:08:14.000 I appreciate it.

01:08:15.000 Thank you.

01:08:15.000 You're great.

01:08:16.000 But it's such a great thing that they've done, and it's amazing that they hadn't done that before.

01:08:21.000 And now boxing has caught on.

01:08:22.000 I mean, boxing had it with George Foreman and a little bit with Roy Jones Jr., but for the most part, the people that are doing commentary, they were analysts, you know?

01:08:30.000 And, you know, you'd have, like, one fighter.

01:08:32.000 But the guys sitting around the table talking about what they think about these matchups and what they think could go down, that's very valuable insight to the fans, too.

01:08:42.000 It enhances the experience for the fans and provides...

01:08:45.000 A future career for fighters.

01:08:47.000 George Foreman, to me, it was one of my favorites because he had the best line ever when he told Larry Merchant, you see fighting, you don't know fighting.

01:08:53.000 And that, to me, just let everyone know I'm going to put you in your place without actually throwing a punch. 0.99

01:08:59.000 You know what I mean?

01:09:00.000 And just let me know that fighters are meant to be in that position.

01:09:03.000 And so when you're saying guys like DC stepping up and doing what he's doing, I think he's amazing.

01:09:08.000 Yeah, he's fantastic.

01:09:10.000 I love doing what I do and I gotta tell you, I've been definitely blessed the fact that I owe a big majority of my career to Scott Coker because these are things that sure I had to audition for.

01:09:20.000 I still had to get out there and do what they asked me to do.

01:09:25.000 When it came down to the audition, you have to be able to nail it.

01:09:27.000 And I was lucky enough that they were like, you're good enough, we'll give you a try.

01:09:32.000 But I feel that the reason I think why it worked out so well is situations like this.

01:09:38.000 I had already started a podcast.

01:09:39.000 I was already comfortable being in front of the mic.

01:09:42.000 This is one of the things that I got from Brendan when I went on his show the first time on Big Brown Breakdown.

01:09:49.000 I'm like, you know, talk to me about how this whole thing did and how it all started for you.

01:09:53.000 And he goes, Josh, just look at this microphone as if it's a rep.

01:09:56.000 Every time you're in front of this microphone, it's a rep that you're getting for the shows that you're going to do.

01:10:01.000 And so when I get now in front of the microphone and I'm holding it there and I'm talking with Jay Glazer and Chael and whoever else, whatever fighters...

01:10:10.000 One of the hardest things to do is listen to what the hell they're saying.

01:10:15.000 This is why I admire what you do so well.

01:10:18.000 You're talking to me and I have to listen to you and you're listening to everything I say so you can come back with an answer.

01:10:23.000 Most people already have a question in their head they're going to ask and they don't care what you're going to say.

01:10:28.000 And so when you're talking to a fighter, they generally will...

01:10:32.000 Well, for me, I did it like this.

01:10:34.000 Well, you can't do that.

01:10:36.000 At that moment, you've got to make it about the fighter.

01:10:38.000 It's like jujitsu.

01:10:39.000 If you're only thinking about what you want to do to a person, then you're not thinking about what they're going to do to you.

01:10:43.000 You're going to get surprised.

01:10:44.000 You have to flow.

01:10:46.000 And the conversation is like a flow.

01:10:48.000 You have to be able to listen and you gotta be able to respond and if you're not listening, you're just talking at that person, the people at home are going, this is awkward and they don't like it.

01:10:58.000 Yeah, because now I'm just artificially putting in questions that you weren't even talking about.

01:11:03.000 It just sounds really bad.

01:11:05.000 When I had done the audition for Bellator down in Viacom Studios, they had sat me in a silent room.

01:11:12.000 It was kind of like a room like this with a monitor, and I had to call Ed Ruth's fight.

01:11:16.000 And I already knew that Ed knocked the guy out.

01:11:18.000 It was very awkward.

01:11:19.000 I was like, oh, man.

01:11:21.000 That's how they auditioned?

01:11:23.000 That's how they auditioned.

01:11:23.000 They were like, hey, call this fight.

01:11:24.000 I was like, oh man, I already know the result.

01:11:26.000 And I was like, yeah, so I think Ed, what he needs to do is set up that right hand and boom, knock out.

01:11:30.000 I was like, yes, I knew I was right.

01:11:32.000 It was like one of those scenarios and situations.

01:11:35.000 But we did that and then there was some other stuff too where they had someone, Goldie, do something and I had to answer questions with him.

01:11:43.000 There was a lot of things that came along.

01:11:46.000 But that was part of the audition.

01:11:47.000 And then I did a show with Brennan Schaub, the Bellator's show in New York.

01:11:52.000 So it was him and I with Jen Brown at the desk.

01:11:56.000 And the three of us were up there.

01:11:58.000 And that was the first show I'd ever done at a desk ever sitting.

01:12:01.000 And so that was something that I learned a lot from Brennan.

01:12:05.000 I learned a lot from Jen.

01:12:06.000 And I learned a lot from talking with Big John and Goldie and all the guys that were there.

01:12:09.000 Morrow is phenomenal when it comes to me talking with him.

01:12:12.000 I love that guy.

01:12:13.000 He's amazing.

01:12:14.000 He's a great guy.

01:12:15.000 I've never seen anyone write out...

01:12:19.000 I don't know if you've ever seen his iPad.

01:12:20.000 His iPad has stuff...

01:12:21.000 I have no idea how he can visually see it.

01:12:23.000 He types it all up and the writing is so small that my normal eye can't read it.

01:12:28.000 He's got glasses on.

01:12:29.000 But he'll read it one time and then he'll recite the whole thing.

01:12:33.000 He's got a photographic memory.

01:12:34.000 Without a doubt, he's got a photographic memory.

01:12:37.000 I tell you not, he'll read it all...

01:12:39.000 And then when we do rehearsals for the shows, he does this walk down where he walks and introduces all of Bellator and like, hey, fans, everything, live.

01:12:47.000 Like on TV, live.

01:12:48.000 And he's not carrying his iPad or his phone or notes or anything.

01:12:53.000 He just recites it.

01:12:55.000 Word for word, verbatim, like he did in rehearsals every single time. 0.77

01:13:00.000 The guy's an animal.

01:13:01.000 He's a machine. 0.86

01:13:02.000 He's an animal.

01:13:02.000 And I kid you not, he does Showtime, he does WWE, and he does Bellator.

01:13:07.000 It's crazy to think of all the things he does and he's just on his...

01:13:12.000 I love how open he is about mental health issues.

01:13:18.000 About his own struggles and trying to let people know.

01:13:21.000 The bipolar rock and roller he calls himself.

01:13:23.000 I watched that on a plane ride overseas.

01:13:27.000 I think I was going to Milan and I watched that.

01:13:30.000 I never had realized the severity of what he would go through before and after shows.

01:13:35.000 Until you see that, you don't realize what mentally they go through. 1.00

01:13:39.000 Like, man, you sucked. 1.00

01:13:40.000 You did this. 1.00

01:13:41.000 You fucked it up. 1.00

01:13:41.000 He's yelling at himself in the mirror after. 1.00

01:13:44.000 You knew it should have been this.

01:13:46.000 He misses a word.

01:13:47.000 It's like.

01:13:48.000 Yeah.

01:13:50.000 It's a tough job, man.

01:13:52.000 I only did that once, that play-by-play thing, or the play-by-play commentator gig once with Phil Barone.

01:13:59.000 Me and Phil did it.

01:14:00.000 It was fun.

01:14:01.000 It was fun working with Phil.

01:14:02.000 We had a good time. 0.99

01:14:03.000 But that play-by-play spot is fucking hard, man. 0.98

01:14:06.000 That's a different thing. 0.98

01:14:08.000 Sometimes you gotta take them in and out of commercials.

01:14:10.000 You gotta take them in and out of rounds.

01:14:12.000 You're running traffic.

01:14:14.000 You're directing everything. 0.99

01:14:16.000 It's fucking hard, man. 0.99

01:14:17.000 It's way harder than color. 1.00

01:14:19.000 Color, you're just sitting there.

01:14:20.000 And if a fight starts happening, you're just describing what's happening.

01:14:25.000 You know what's happening.

01:14:26.000 You know how to talk.

01:14:27.000 It's not that hard. 1.00

01:14:28.000 But to be able to do that play-by-play shit, like John Anik is a goddamn wizard. 0.99

01:14:33.000 John Anik's the best I've ever seen. 0.99

01:14:35.000 I've never seen anybody like him.

01:14:36.000 He's so smooth.

01:14:37.000 He's the right amount of talking, the right amount of laying back.

01:14:41.000 You know, he doesn't ever overstep his bounds in terms of his knowledge base and what he understands and doesn't.

01:14:47.000 He's got a great sense of humor.

01:14:48.000 Great guy.

01:14:49.000 Yeah, I gotta tell you, when he first came onto the scene with UFC, I was like, eh, I don't know.

01:14:56.000 You know, but then I'm being honest.

01:14:58.000 Yeah.

01:14:58.000 But I gotta tell you, he's grown on me.

01:15:00.000 I actually truly like...

01:15:02.000 I actually love listening to him kind of call fights, and I love when his interviews are good.

01:15:06.000 Everything he does is great.

01:15:08.000 Do you know him as a person?

01:15:08.000 No, I don't.

01:15:09.000 I've met him in Hey, How Are You?, but I don't know him.

01:15:11.000 I've never hung out with him. 0.96

01:15:12.000 He's fucking amazing. 0.97

01:15:13.000 But everything I've ever heard, DC talks so highly of him. 0.99

01:15:16.000 He's like, dude, he's fucking one of the greatest guys. 0.92

01:15:18.000 Super nice guy. 0.98

01:15:19.000 And so...

01:15:22.000 Yeah, in the beginning, I was like, eh, you know, eh, you know.

01:15:24.000 But then as he started calling more fights, and as he started...

01:15:27.000 And I think when I started seeing some of the front camera angles that the UFC does for your guys' reaction, that's when I actually started really liking him.

01:15:38.000 He's just...

01:15:41.000 He loves it.

01:15:42.000 He loves it.

01:15:43.000 And those are things that you want to see from your guys.

01:15:45.000 Those are things that you want to see from people.

01:15:47.000 They love the sport and they're in it balls deep.

01:15:50.000 They want to know the sport.

01:15:53.000 I'm working with a guy right now over in the UK because I handle all the UK series for Bellator.

01:15:58.000 So I call the fights cage side there.

01:16:00.000 And so I work with this guy named Dave Farrar.

01:16:03.000 And he...

01:16:04.000 I kid you not, from the first day, we worked together, we meshed, and he was great.

01:16:08.000 And he was like, hey man, I don't know any of the submissions, I don't know this and all that. 0.99

01:16:12.000 I said, let me focus on that, you worry about selling, you know, boom, this shit happened, you know? 0.55

01:16:18.000 And so, after the very, we did the very first fight, and he tried to, he said something about a guillotine or something, and I was like, you, I said, don't, after the fight, I said, don't say that. 0.99

01:16:27.000 I said, he was on his back, it's a rear naked. 0.89

01:16:30.000 So it was just one of those situations.

01:16:32.000 But then after that, he never...

01:16:34.000 But he also went to a couple of jiu-jitsu gyms and started asking.

01:16:38.000 Didn't take class, but just started asking about what submission that was at.

01:16:42.000 So he could start kind of doing...

01:16:43.000 And he did his research.

01:16:45.000 Came back and had known what the guys were doing, how they had won fights, what it was.

01:16:51.000 So he's just...

01:16:53.000 Ever since we've done a show, he's progressively gotten better and better and better.

01:16:56.000 He's really good now.

01:16:58.000 I love working with the guy.

01:16:59.000 It can be a daunting task to step into that world that you don't really understand and you're not a practitioner.

01:17:05.000 And then to be a commentator for...

01:17:08.000 Look, there's one thing about MMA fans. 0.99

01:17:10.000 If you don't know what the fuck you're talking about, they will come down on you like a ton of bricks. 0.99

01:17:14.000 It's hard. 1.00

01:17:15.000 No, it's true.

01:17:16.000 They can get rough.

01:17:17.000 And they appreciate...

01:17:19.000 They appreciate someone who's genuine.

01:17:21.000 Like, that's one of the things you were saying when you saw his enthusiasm.

01:17:23.000 When Anik, you're looking at the video of him reacting to fights.

01:17:27.000 Genuine enthusiasm is appreciated because, you know, there's so many fans.

01:17:32.000 And everyone knows how to talk.

01:17:34.000 And everyone knows how to talk about fights. 1.00

01:17:37.000 They're like, fuck, I could do that. 0.99

01:17:38.000 And so if you're doing it, you're not interested in it, or it's not really your thing, they get mad at you. 1.00

01:17:43.000 No, it's true.

01:17:44.000 Like, you need to make sure that you're...

01:17:47.000 As an analyst, I had to realize that it's not about you anymore.

01:17:54.000 You're not that guy in the cage.

01:17:55.000 It's about the guys that are in that cage.

01:17:57.000 You've got to make them bigger than light.

01:18:00.000 You've got to make them feel, not just feel, but I've got to sell them to the world that this guy is the best guy.

01:18:07.000 And so when I have these conversations with you and when I'm on my podcast talking about guys like Patricio and Lima and MVP and Gegard Mousasi, those guys being as good as UFC and as good as 1FC guys, I say it because I mean it.

01:18:22.000 And I'm not going to try to push somebody on somebody that I don't believe that in.

01:18:25.000 I just truly think that there's guys all around the promotions, every promotion, that are the best, that are the best that we just haven't found.

01:18:33.000 There's probably some guy up in the fucking mountains in Dagestan who's the world-class best guy in the world, but he just can't find his way to a paved road.

01:18:39.000 You know what I mean? 0.97

01:18:40.000 So he's probably the best, but he just doesn't know how to get there.

01:18:43.000 It's no different than when we watch, have you ever watched American Idol?

01:18:47.000 Hey, how come you're not a star yet?

01:18:50.000 Because I don't know how the business works.

01:18:52.000 I don't know how to get in front of people that can make me a star.

01:18:54.000 That goes with all the fighters, too.

01:18:57.000 How do I get in the UFC? I don't know.

01:19:00.000 That's the thing.

01:19:01.000 You've got to find a way in.

01:19:02.000 And if they don't know how to get in, then they're stuck living in the woods somewhere and trying to...

01:19:08.000 And if they don't see that clear path, they might not have the same level of commitment, so they might slack off or find something else to do.

01:19:14.000 Very true. 0.98

01:19:16.000 We started about this because Brendan was saying that if you're not in the UFC, you're not shit. 0.95

01:19:21.000 I think that's a crazy perspective because when I look at, like we're talking about Lima, there are guys out there, I look at Lima and I go, he might be able to beat everybody. 0.96

01:19:31.000 I really believe that. 0.99

01:19:32.000 That guy's fucking terrifying. 0.99

01:19:33.000 The way he knocked out Michael Venom Page, I'm like, look, he might be able to beat everybody. 1.00

01:19:38.000 To say no?

01:19:39.000 Like, come on, man.

01:19:40.000 Watch that guy fight. 1.00

01:19:41.000 Look at his fucking power. 1.00

01:19:43.000 Look at the way he knocked out Korshkov. 1.00

01:19:44.000 Look at those fucking leg kicks, man. 1.00

01:19:46.000 He tortures guys with those leg kicks. 1.00

01:19:48.000 He's so powerful.

01:19:50.000 Here's the thing, though.

01:19:51.000 Let's not forget, when Roy left, he was still one of the top guys in the UFC. And just because, and look, I'm not trying to dig or dunk, but what Dana does very well is he develops the narrative and then the media runs with that narrative very well.

01:20:06.000 So before they even put pen to paper, Dana's already wrote the story for them because he's already gave them the narrative.

01:20:15.000 You and I were talking about it earlier with Connor.

01:20:18.000 Yeah.

01:20:20.000 He made Donald Cerrone, he caused him to lose in 40 seconds.

01:20:24.000 Dana came out and said, it's not that Connors are Cowboys bad, it's that Connors looked that good.

01:20:29.000 That narrative was written for all the media to go ahead and follow because that's, before they wrote pen to paper, that's what the narrative was.

01:20:36.000 He wrote the narrative for them.

01:20:37.000 I just feel that like, look, there's guys out there that can cross boards all across.

01:20:43.000 Lima's one of them.

01:20:44.000 Patricio's one of them.

01:20:45.000 There's guys that I think get 135 pounds that we have that can do it as well.

01:20:49.000 We've got tons of guys, not just us, even in one.

01:20:52.000 But I would put our guys, and I say our, but I just say because I came from Strikeforce.

01:20:58.000 And we got no respect, man.

01:21:00.000 It was so hard, Joe.

01:21:01.000 Two of the Strikeforce guys integrated with the UFC, and we realized how many of them became champions.

01:21:06.000 Luke Rockhold, and how many of them were world-class guys.

01:21:09.000 Musasi.

01:21:09.000 There's so many.

01:21:10.000 Tim Kennedy.

01:21:11.000 So many guys came over from Strikeforce.

01:21:14.000 You have to remember this.

01:21:15.000 I've been getting criticized for years.

01:21:18.000 Not criticized.

01:21:19.000 I've been told for years that I was never a top guy.

01:21:22.000 For years.

01:21:23.000 Because I was in Strikeforce.

01:21:24.000 And I said, well...

01:21:26.000 I also know what the guys in the UFC are making, and I'm making more in Strikeforce.

01:21:30.000 So I'm going to stay here.

01:21:31.000 At the end of the day, to me, it's about making money.

01:21:35.000 I'm a prize fighter.

01:21:37.000 Let's talk about that.

01:21:38.000 Isn't it weird, though, that this is the only sport...

01:21:41.000 MMA is the only sport where you have these names of these organizations and they're more like boxing. 0.93

01:21:48.000 Nobody gives a fuck if it's a WBC title or the WBO title. 0.94

01:21:52.000 They don't care. 0.97

01:21:53.000 They care.

01:21:54.000 Is it Deontay Wilder?

01:21:55.000 Is he fighting?

01:21:56.000 I want to see him fight Tyson Fury. 0.99

01:21:58.000 I don't give a fuck if it's for the bubblegum title. 0.98

01:22:01.000 It doesn't mean anything to me. 0.97

01:22:02.000 But for MMA, for some reason, because the promotions become like the NFL or the NBA, it becomes the big thing.

01:22:13.000 We know there's world-class fighters everywhere.

01:22:15.000 It's not like basketball or football where the best guys are definitely playing in the NFL. There's so many different organizations, and I almost feel like fighters are hampered by names of these promotions.

01:22:27.000 I almost think we'd all be better off if it was just MMA. To call it the UFC, The problem with that is it's great because everybody knows there's a very high quality to the UFC events.

01:22:40.000 The production value is amazing.

01:22:42.000 There's so much attached to it and so much history.

01:22:44.000 But at the end of the day, it's about MMA fights.

01:22:47.000 That's what it's about.

01:22:48.000 And whether it's in Bellator or 1FC, it's about how good are these matchups, how good are the fighters, what am I going to see?

01:22:59.000 I believe it all started when credentials were taken away from top MMA media websites and saying, hey, we don't like what you say.

01:23:12.000 You're not going to get a credential to get in.

01:23:15.000 So then they replaced, they brought in...

01:23:18.000 The other media websites, or whatever it was, USA Today, or whatever it was, other media sites that came in and just said it's all about UFC. It wasn't a sport anymore.

01:23:27.000 It was a UFC brand, and we had the best fighters.

01:23:31.000 And once you took away SureDog's credentials, all the other people that were doing...

01:23:36.000 Companies at that time, they took those credentials away. 0.98

01:23:39.000 Now whoever came in was like, well shit, if they're going to do it to those big time MMA websites, they would do the same shit to me if I don't toe the line. 0.98

01:23:48.000 And that all of a sudden became like, fighters now, when you see them, it's all about UFC. It's not about anything that they're doing. 0.99

01:23:56.000 You as a fighter, I think, look, even though it's an individual sport, and sure, you guys should be pumping your organization, I get it.

01:24:03.000 But you should also be pumping you because after you're done, the UFC will be fine.

01:24:08.000 You need to worry about building your brand, whatever it is you do to make you big.

01:24:13.000 And I'm all for the organization.

01:24:16.000 The organization does a lot for fighters.

01:24:17.000 I'm not here to piss on any company or any organization.

01:24:20.000 They need to make sure, though, that they're doing what they can to make as much money as they possibly can.

01:24:25.000 To go back to the Strikeforce thing, I was making almost double what the guys were making in the top five in the UFC at the time.

01:24:32.000 Now, there was a lot of talk about backroom bonuses and this and that, but I was privy to a couple of those back-year bonuses when we got bought out, and I went over there.

01:24:40.000 They were not what I was making on the other side of the rope.

01:24:42.000 So just to give you an example, when I came over, they were like, oh wow, you're making that.

01:24:47.000 They were like, whoa, what do we got to do?

01:24:48.000 We only have one fight left.

01:24:49.000 And I was like, well, you got to match or at least beat it.

01:24:52.000 You know, like what I'm making now. 0.98

01:24:54.000 And the thought process was like, where the fuck am I going to go though, Josh? 1.00

01:24:57.000 You're kind of fucking stepping on your own dick here. 1.00

01:25:00.000 It's tricky, right? 1.00

01:25:01.000 Because you can't really negotiate correctly.

01:25:03.000 No, I couldn't really.

01:25:04.000 Yeah, that was the thing. 0.99

01:25:05.000 I couldn't really negotiate at the time, and I was just like, shit, all right, well, let's play this out.

01:25:09.000 So I took the least amount of fights I could possibly take, wondering if Bellator was going to be around long, and if Scott was going to stick with UFC, or if he was going to try to go do his own promotion again.

01:25:20.000 You know, a lot of my relationships come from people that have been around.

01:25:24.000 Coker, to me, is, I think...

01:25:26.000 One of the best guys, if not the best guy I've ever done business with.

01:25:29.000 I've learned a lot from watching him on how he approaches not just fighters, but the promotion itself.

01:25:35.000 The one thing I admire the most about him is that you don't need to shit on other people like the UFC or one to say that my organization is the best.

01:25:45.000 He takes that martial arts attitude and approach to a lot of things. 0.71

01:25:49.000 I've never heard him say bad things about Dana White.

01:25:52.000 Never in a private conversation.

01:25:54.000 I play golf with him a lot.

01:25:57.000 I have lunch with him a lot.

01:25:58.000 I've never once heard him say anything bad about Dana White or anybody else in the UFC. That's not his approach.

01:26:04.000 His approach is, I'm going to have fights.

01:26:06.000 I'm going to try to make my guys that are fighters as much money as I can.

01:26:10.000 And my organization is going to do something that we're going to do and let them do what they're going to do.

01:26:14.000 I appreciate that.

01:26:15.000 He's a very universally loved guy.

01:26:17.000 I would really like cross-promotion fights.

01:26:19.000 I really would.

01:26:20.000 Bellator just did it with Ryzen.

01:26:23.000 What's your take on that?

01:26:24.000 I think it'd be good for everybody.

01:26:26.000 Like I said, I'm obsessed with Douglas Lima fighting at 170 pounds.

01:26:30.000 Have you not seen Patricio fight?

01:26:32.000 Yes. 0.94

01:26:32.000 Look, I'm obsessed with Patricio too, but I feel like right now 145 in the UFC is so fucking talent stacked. 0.94

01:26:39.000 I'm comfortable with some of these matchups that I want to see.

01:26:42.000 I really am interested in seeing a rematch between Volkanovski and Max Holloway.

01:26:48.000 I think Max Holloway with just a few adjustments, checking those leg kicks and maybe a little bit more movement, he, you know, I think he can win that fight.

01:26:55.000 But I think Volkanovski with a few adjustments might be able to put on an even better performance and now that he's beaten the goat featherweight, I mean, who knows?

01:27:03.000 I mean, a lot of guys, you don't really see what they're capable of until they win the title and then you see the confidence take over.

01:27:08.000 I mean, I think cross-promotion with all the champions would be fantastic.

01:27:13.000 I mean, look, I'm a terrible business person.

01:27:16.000 I would Obviously.

01:27:18.000 I'd promote everybody. 0.98

01:27:19.000 I'd be like, fuck yeah, Bellator, let's be friends. 1.00

01:27:21.000 I'll blow you guys up too. 0.98

01:27:23.000 I don't think the way the UFC does is sort of an isolationist perspective.

01:27:28.000 When Fedor was a champion, they would get bummed out that I kept mentioning him.

01:27:32.000 When Fedor was over in Pride, and I was like, you gotta take into consideration Fedor Emelianenko. 0.97

01:27:37.000 He might be the best fucking heavyweight alive. 0.63

01:27:39.000 And there was a lot of guys over there that were fucking phenomenal fighters, and we absorbed a few of them, and there were some problems with that. 0.93

01:27:46.000 Obviously, there was problems with the fact that the contracts that they got from Pride, a lot of them weren't real. 0.91

01:27:51.000 So, you know, we thought we had Fedor and we didn't.

01:27:54.000 We thought we had a lot of guys.

01:27:55.000 They had to just put him under new contracts.

01:27:57.000 Mark Hunt was a good example.

01:27:58.000 He wrote out his contract.

01:28:00.000 And then there was a problem with supplements.

01:28:01.000 You know, a lot of those guys were on the Mexican juice.

01:28:04.000 But because it wasn't in the contract.

01:28:05.000 I fought over there and they said, we do not test for steroids, like in the contract.

01:28:09.000 Ensign Inuay told me that it was in a giant, bold print.

01:28:12.000 Yes, it was.

01:28:13.000 It was.

01:28:14.000 It actually was.

01:28:15.000 Yeah.

01:28:16.000 I want to even say it was underlined.

01:28:19.000 I agree with cross promotion.

01:28:22.000 I want to see that.

01:28:23.000 I 100% want to see that.

01:28:24.000 But I also think, though, too, you got to look out for all promotions.

01:28:27.000 If we're going to cross promote, let's not have champion versus champion.

01:28:29.000 Let's have your No.

01:28:30.000 2 guy versus this No.

01:28:31.000 3 guy.

01:28:32.000 Let's make the best fight.

01:28:33.000 Here's the thing.

01:28:34.000 Do you think it would hurt the UFC? Because I don't know if it would.

01:28:37.000 I think it would definitely help Bellator, but I don't know.

01:28:40.000 First of all, I hate the name Bellator.

01:28:41.000 I think everyone did.

01:28:43.000 And honestly, I think everyone did.

01:28:45.000 It was true. 0.75

01:28:46.000 But here's the thing.

01:28:47.000 They'd already spent millions.

01:28:49.000 I understand.

01:28:49.000 Probably close to over a billion dollars and trying to make sure that it was marketed properly back then.

01:28:53.000 When Scott came in, it's like, let's not try to rebrand this.

01:28:57.000 Scott's brilliant when it comes to doing these type of things.

01:29:00.000 But you notice how he got rid of the...

01:29:01.000 He made it very simple.

01:29:03.000 The logo is simple.

01:29:04.000 Everything is simple now.

01:29:05.000 And it's easy to say, oh, that's our logo right there.

01:29:07.000 Versus this big word that says...

01:29:10.000 I don't even know what it was behind.

01:29:11.000 It was like a Bellator fighter or whatever it was.

01:29:14.000 Yeah, it went away.

01:29:15.000 Gone.

01:29:16.000 So, look, in all these things, it takes time to get branded.

01:29:19.000 Do you remember King of the Cage when they used to have the King of the Cage, a giant bodybuilder dude?

01:29:24.000 Yes.

01:29:24.000 Who was like the mascot?

01:29:25.000 Yep.

01:29:26.000 Remember how strange that was?

01:29:28.000 Shout out to Terry Troublecock, dude, that guy.

01:29:30.000 Look, he's been around forever.

01:29:31.000 Ever!

01:29:32.000 Ever!

01:29:33.000 Still around.

01:29:33.000 Terry's still around.

01:29:34.000 Still doing his thing though, man.

01:29:35.000 You gotta appreciate guys like that.

01:29:36.000 Yes.

01:29:36.000 Because even though he's not getting rich, but he's also making sure that young and up-and-coming fighters have a way to get their name out there and still fight at a high level.

01:29:45.000 Bud Brutzman was one of the owners as well.

01:29:47.000 He's a really good friend of mine.

01:29:48.000 He actually sold him my old house.

01:29:50.000 He lives in my old house.

01:29:51.000 He's a real good friend of mine.

01:29:52.000 I never met him, I don't think.

01:29:53.000 Bud and Terry were partners in the adventure. 0.92

01:29:56.000 And they used to have this guy who was this enormous fucking bald bodybuilder dude who was the king of the cage. 0.96

01:30:04.000 And he was like a mascot. 0.98

01:30:06.000 You remember?

01:30:07.000 It was so strange.

01:30:07.000 Yeah, I do remember.

01:30:07.000 He was always wearing like a dry fit shirt or like a really tight, really tight...

01:30:12.000 Jacked.

01:30:13.000 Big old fucking neck, bald guy, huge muscles. 1.00

01:30:15.000 But it was so strange. 1.00

01:30:17.000 It was like, but he's not the fighter.

01:30:19.000 This is so weird.

01:30:20.000 Like, you have a mascot.

01:30:22.000 Hey, whatever, man.

01:30:23.000 Everyone's got to try something different.

01:30:25.000 Mascots are weird.

01:30:26.000 It's a fighting mascot?

01:30:28.000 Because remember the UFC had the dude who was the bald, muscular guy in the logo.

01:30:34.000 Do you remember that?

01:30:34.000 Was that you?

01:30:35.000 No!

01:30:37.000 It looked like Boss Rudin.

01:30:40.000 Do you remember the early days of the UFC? The logo had this guy who was this bald jack dude.

01:30:46.000 And that was like a part of the UFC logo with some bald dude.

01:30:50.000 Yeah, I do remember that.

01:30:51.000 It was weird.

01:30:52.000 And it looked like Boss.

01:30:53.000 Like when Boss won the title, I was like, is this destined for you?

01:30:56.000 Like, look at this.

01:30:58.000 It was real weird.

01:31:00.000 There it is. 0.99

01:31:00.000 Look at the fucking old logo. 0.99

01:31:01.000 Yeah, that's true. 0.99

01:31:02.000 How weird is that?

01:31:03.000 No one like that ever won the title up until Boss.

01:31:06.000 But that's like, so when Scott came in, he changed the logo to make it simple, like basically what Dana and Lorenzo and those guys did, basically made it simple like that.

01:31:14.000 Yeah.

01:31:14.000 So, I think it's good for the sport.

01:31:16.000 We'll see.

01:31:17.000 Like, look, the name itself is like, hey, do we want to rebrand this?

01:31:19.000 No.

01:31:20.000 You don't want to waste all the money you did trying to rebrand a new organization.

01:31:23.000 Right.

01:31:23.000 That's just too hard.

01:31:24.000 And, you know, at the end of the day, it's, you know, the execs talk and they're like, hey, let's just try and make some changes.

01:31:29.000 Make it simple.

01:31:30.000 Make everyone just fall in love with us all over again.

01:31:32.000 But, you know, for a different reason.

01:31:34.000 The other thing, too, even though we are doing a tournament format for our fights...

01:31:38.000 We're not doing them every, like, Bellator before.

01:31:40.000 We're doing them every Friday, different weight class, and I never paid attention because it was just too hectic to try and keep up.

01:31:46.000 Now you have big fights scheduled, you know, every, you know, once a month, you know, with the tournament fighters.

01:31:52.000 So, like, this weekend we have Cyborg fighting Julia Budd for the title, which is phenomenal.

01:31:56.000 Phenomenal, man.

01:31:57.000 Very underlooked fight. 0.83

01:31:58.000 Yeah, Julia Budd's a monster. 1.00

01:32:00.000 She's an animal. 0.97

01:32:01.000 And it's funny because everyone just keeps overlooking her. 0.98

01:32:05.000 She's so jacked.

01:32:06.000 Not only is she jacked, her wrestling's gotten a lot better. 0.99

01:32:09.000 And I need to remind you guys, her only two losses have been to Amanda Nunes and Ronda Rousey when Ronda Rousey was at the top of her game.

01:32:16.000 Now, those two losses, those two were extremely early in her career.

01:32:19.000 She's been on a tear ever since then, and she's been doing phenomenal.

01:32:22.000 I've had, again, talking with John, him and I have talked, it's her confidence.

01:32:27.000 Her confidence needs to be at a different level. 1.00

01:32:30.000 Look at the fucking guns on that chick. 1.00

01:32:34.000 Her striking, I think, is better than Cyborg. 1.00

01:32:37.000 Really?

01:32:37.000 Yes, I think it's better.

01:32:39.000 Really?

01:32:39.000 Her striking's better than Cyborg.

01:32:41.000 That's a bold statement.

01:32:42.000 Can she take a shot from Cyborg? 0.99

01:32:45.000 Who knows?

01:32:45.000 But I think there's a lot to be said.

01:32:47.000 Cyborg doesn't throw the straightest punches in the world.

01:32:49.000 You know, she throws a lot of hooks. 1.00

01:32:51.000 So if Julia can press her to the fence, get inside the clinch, make her that dirty, getting that dirty boxing, get rid of those loopy punches and be inside that pocket right there, then I think she's got a good chance. 1.00

01:33:02.000 Well, after Cyborg got flatlined by Amanda Nunes, the whole game just changed.

01:33:06.000 Everything changed.

01:33:08.000 Yeah, it threw everybody off.

01:33:09.000 Okay, okay. 1.00

01:33:10.000 Well, first of all, Nunes has fucking hammers. 1.00

01:33:13.000 That lady throws hammers. 1.00

01:33:15.000 It's crazy. 0.99

01:33:16.000 It's crazy how fucking badass she is. 1.00

01:33:18.000 I look at it, though, too, that Cyborg had been undefeated for so long. 0.98

01:33:23.000 Hadn't lost in so long.

01:33:24.000 That she's just like, I'm just going to walk through this chick.

01:33:27.000 And it just cost her.

01:33:28.000 I think her confidence was that none of these girls can hurt me. 1.00

01:33:31.000 I can beat her. 1.00

01:33:32.000 And when she got hit, I'm going to hit you back. 0.99

01:33:34.000 She was thinking she was going to impose her will like she did against everyone else.

01:33:38.000 And she's going to try to do the same thing to Julia Budd. 1.00

01:33:42.000 It's a matter of how Julia Bud responds.

01:33:45.000 And we're going to know, I think, in that first round whether Julia is going to rise to the occasion or if she's going to step back and let Cyborg dictate the pace like a lot of other girls have. 0.81

01:33:55.000 I think with Amanda, when she pushed Amanda back, Amanda hit her and Cyborg got rocked and Amanda pressed forward and she thought she was going to hit her back and it became this exchange.

01:34:03.000 It was a very sloppy fight, I think, from both sides.

01:34:07.000 But Amanda has big dogs and was able to land the clean, good punches. 1.00

01:34:10.000 And timing.

01:34:11.000 Her timing.

01:34:12.000 Yes.

01:34:12.000 What she did very well in that fight was that she made sure that she didn't blow her wad in wasteless punches.

01:34:18.000 She was picking and choosing her shots. 0.60

01:34:20.000 So she was making sure that they were landing versus just throwing aimlessly and not landing.

01:34:25.000 You see that a lot of times.

01:34:26.000 People get rocked and the guy just comes in and smothers himself so much that nothing lands and the guy recovers and you're back to fighting.

01:34:32.000 Yeah. 0.70

01:34:33.000 You know, when I knew that Amanda Nunes was a fucking dangerous, dangerous fighter, it was, first of all, the first round went, well, you know, there's a lot of fights where you saw it. 0.96

01:34:44.000 You know, you started to see it with Kat Zingano. 0.96

01:34:47.000 The first round, she almost had Kat Zingano out, but then she faded, and then she got put away later in the fight, which just shows how tough Kat Zingano is. 0.99

01:34:54.000 Kat Zingano's a fucking savage. 1.00

01:34:56.000 She's at Bellator now. 1.00

01:34:57.000 Yes, I know.

01:34:57.000 I'm very happy to see her over there.

01:34:59.000 But when Amanda Nunes beat the fuck out of Misha Tate and then strangled her, I was like, oh, goddamn. 0.99

01:35:05.000 Yeah. 0.99

01:35:05.000 Jesus Christ. 0.99

01:35:05.000 And then when the Raquel Pennington fights an underlooked fight, because Raquel Pennington is as fucking tough as they come, that lady impresses the shit out of me. 0.99

01:35:15.000 And the fact that she was able to stop her and beat her down before she stopped her. 0.89

01:35:20.000 You realize she was on another level at that point in time.

01:35:24.000 But still, in the Cyborg fight, I had questions.

01:35:26.000 I was like, look what she did to Holly Holm. 1.00

01:35:28.000 Cyborg just bullied Holly Holm. 0.79

01:35:30.000 She was just on top of her, beating her down, and Holly is a phenomenal striker. 0.99

01:35:34.000 And I was like, man, but the difference is Amanda is her hands. 1.00

01:35:38.000 Holly has good power in her hands, excellent timing, good counters, but Amanda has legit one-shot knockout power. 1.00

01:35:46.000 Yeah, I agree.

01:35:47.000 I just would have liked to have seen them do a second fight, because I think that Cyborg would have fought a smarter fight, and it would have been a different outcome.

01:35:55.000 She would have made the adjustments.

01:35:57.000 Yeah, she would have made the adjustments, not just made the adjustments, but we saw with Jermaine Deronomy when Jermaine fought her, that Amanda, as the fight goes on, she's not the same fighter.

01:36:03.000 Why do you think that she decided to move over to Bellator?

01:36:07.000 Why do you think she didn't pursue the rematch?

01:36:09.000 Oh, you know the answer to that.

01:36:10.000 Come on, Joe.

01:36:12.000 I think the comments, to being treated, certain ways, people talking behind her back, calling her a man, whatever it was.

01:36:22.000 There's not just that, but then also, too, a little bit of, I think, some of the mistreatment in that whole thing.

01:36:29.000 The other thing as well, all that stuff aside...

01:36:32.000 She's got a relationship with Scott Coker.

01:36:34.000 She had it from Strikeforce, and they've always got along.

01:36:37.000 He's always amped her.

01:36:39.000 And you've got to remember, he's the one that first put women's MMA on the big stage.

01:36:44.000 You know, her and Gina Carano were the ones that made women's MMA that next level of what it could become. 0.99

01:36:51.000 There was something that happened between them where the UFC was like, we're getting out of the cyborg business.

01:36:55.000 I'm trying to remember what it was.

01:36:58.000 I don't remember what happened, but there was some sort of a dispute that they had.

01:37:02.000 Was it before, I think it was before the Amanda Nunes fight?

01:37:05.000 No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

01:37:07.000 They put out a video, Cyborg's boyfriend put out a video where she put words in Dana White's mouth, and they were fake. 0.98

01:37:15.000 They mistranslated it on purpose, willfully, and then she had to apologize for it, and then the UFC was like, get the fuck out of here, you can't do that. 0.75

01:37:22.000 Yeah.

01:37:23.000 And that's when they released her.

01:37:24.000 But that wasn't her, right?

01:37:25.000 That was her boyfriend and her management, I think, or something like that.

01:37:28.000 Well, her boyfriend is her management.

01:37:29.000 Yeah, that's what it was.

01:37:32.000 That's why she got out of the business. 0.99

01:37:34.000 That's why the UFC got done with Cyborg.

01:37:37.000 Here's the thing.

01:37:39.000 She hadn't lost in what?

01:37:41.000 15 years or something like that.

01:37:43.000 Since Gina Carano.

01:37:44.000 Before the Gina Carano fight.

01:37:46.000 Her first fight.

01:37:47.000 It was her very first fight she lost.

01:37:50.000 So that first fight, she hadn't lost since then.

01:37:53.000 It's been close to 15 years.

01:37:54.000 And to say that now all of a sudden, because she had one loss when she lost to Amanda Nunes, that she's done.

01:38:01.000 She wants to fight easy fights. 0.93

01:38:03.000 Julia Budd is not an easy fight for her. 1.00

01:38:07.000 But we go back to when I was talking about the narrative.

01:38:10.000 The narrative being that Dana shapes the narrative. 0.65

01:38:12.000 The narrative is that, look, if you want to fight over there, you're going to have easier fights.

01:38:16.000 And the press jumps on board and the fighters jump on board and it becomes an issue.

01:38:20.000 That's why I feel like we're not seen.

01:38:23.000 Cross-promotions.

01:38:24.000 Well, I just think it's a business decision.

01:38:25.000 The UFC doesn't have any vested interest in blowing up Bellator and making them bigger.

01:38:29.000 And Bellator would get bigger along the way.

01:38:31.000 But I think Julia Bott hangs with any 145-pounder in the UFC, and I would like to see her fight in the UFC. I would like to see cross-promotion with her as well. 0.94

01:38:40.000 I just feel like it's just one of those things where it's...

01:38:43.000 It hampers the fans, because the athletes, they're just not going to face each other.

01:38:49.000 Well, let me go into this.

01:38:51.000 We already saw a cross-promotion when UFC was basically asking, or I don't want to say begging, but they were trying to force the issue with Chuck Liddell fighting in Vanderlei.

01:39:04.000 But they got fucked over because they actually sent Chuck over there, and then Pride didn't send anybody over here.

01:39:10.000 Yes. 0.98

01:39:11.000 And here's the thing.

01:39:12.000 We've already seen with Scott what he says he's going to do, he does.

01:39:15.000 And that's a big reason.

01:39:17.000 When I actually had to fight Kalajiri, it was supposed to be they sent Aoki over when it was Dream.

01:39:22.000 And they sent Aoki over, and Scott was supposed to send Gilbert over afterwards to fight each other.

01:39:26.000 So Aoki fought Gil in Strikeforce.

01:39:29.000 And then after Gil beat him, he was supposed to go over there and fight him in a ring.

01:39:32.000 That didn't happen.

01:39:33.000 So I got a call on like 12 days notice and Scott's like, can you do this for me? 0.96

01:39:38.000 And I was like, I'm literally sitting at the fucking court side of the Warriors game eating chicken strips and drinking a beer. 0.96

01:39:43.000 And I'm like, let me go home. 0.98

01:39:45.000 I'm going to run about four or five miles, see how I feel and I'll get back to you.

01:39:48.000 Call him that night at midnight.

01:39:49.000 And he's like, I'm like, yeah, I'm good.

01:39:50.000 I can go.

01:39:51.000 So that's how I took the fight with Caligiri on like 10 days notice.

01:39:54.000 And just so, look, when people want to talk about how the Japanese do business and what happened with the UFC, I can understand.

01:40:00.000 I can understand why they're hesitant to do cross-promotion.

01:40:03.000 Because when I actually accepted that fight with 10 days notice, I was supposed to fight Aoki.

01:40:08.000 But when I got there, they changed it to Kawajiri.

01:40:11.000 Wow, that's a big difference in styles.

01:40:13.000 That's a big difference.

01:40:13.000 But what they do is, one's a wrestler and one's a jiu-jitsu guy, sure.

01:40:17.000 But the other thing, too, is what they do is they say, hey, here's another...

01:40:23.000 I'm out of money.

01:40:23.000 Here's a check for this if you switch and you take this guy.

01:40:27.000 So it's different.

01:40:29.000 They're so sneaky over there.

01:40:31.000 I don't know if it's called sneaky.

01:40:32.000 They really want to...

01:40:35.000 I bet Aoki now is wishing he would have fought me because he got knocked out that night by a kickboxer because they made him fight a kickboxer.

01:40:40.000 And that's what Japan is famous for.

01:40:42.000 They want to put fights together that people don't expect to happen.

01:40:47.000 We saw Hoist fight the big sumo guy.

01:40:50.000 Yeah.

01:40:52.000 Those are fights that people talk about.

01:40:54.000 They're ones for the ages, man.

01:40:55.000 Look at when Fedor fought that big Hung Man Choi. 0.99

01:40:59.000 We still, to this day, talk about those kind of fights.

01:41:02.000 But even Fedor wouldn't fight Bob Sapp in his prime. 0.92

01:41:06.000 He's like, get the fuck out of here. 0.99

01:41:08.000 When Minotauro got fucking pile-drived, he was like, no, no, no. 0.99

01:41:12.000 That's an injury you keep for the rest of your life. 0.99

01:41:14.000 Yeah. 0.99

01:41:15.000 And Minotaro's neck is still fucked up to this day. 0.99

01:41:18.000 It doesn't make any sense. 0.95

01:41:19.000 Sure, there's guys that you can fight, but Bob Sattel was one of the first guys that exploded on the scene that had a lot of athleticism.

01:41:25.000 375 with abs.

01:41:27.000 Yeah, Jesus.

01:41:28.000 375. And 100% clean.

01:41:30.000 Yo, as clean as a whistle.

01:41:32.000 Dude, when I met him, if you stand next to him, you just go, wait, wait, wait, wait. 1.00

01:41:36.000 What in the fuck are you? 1.00

01:41:37.000 What are you? 1.00

01:41:38.000 What is this new type of human being?

01:41:40.000 He's so big.

01:41:42.000 Have you ever talked to him?

01:41:42.000 Yeah, I've talked to him.

01:41:44.000 Yeah.

01:41:45.000 He can talk.

01:41:47.000 He can talk.

01:41:48.000 I was on a bus ride from somewhere in Tokyo to Saitama Arena and it was like an hour and 20 minutes.

01:41:56.000 He talked the whole way.

01:41:58.000 He's made an interesting career, right?

01:42:00.000 He was an enormous superstar in Japan.

01:42:04.000 Enormous.

01:42:05.000 It's hard for us to understand.

01:42:06.000 They were selling dolls of him and posters.

01:42:10.000 He was huge.

01:42:11.000 But then he ran afoul with K1. Remember there was this event where they didn't have a contract for him.

01:42:17.000 He was supposed to fight, and he's like, where's the contract?

01:42:19.000 And they're like, we'll give you the contract after the fight.

01:42:21.000 He's like, no, no, no.

01:42:22.000 I need a contract. 0.99

01:42:24.000 I need to know what the fuck is happening here. 0.99

01:42:26.000 And then he walked out. 0.99

01:42:28.000 And when he walked out, they decided they were going to ruin him.

01:42:30.000 Yeah, it was that night.

01:42:31.000 They were at the venue.

01:42:32.000 He's like, I'm still willing to fight.

01:42:34.000 Just give me the contract.

01:42:35.000 They never gave him the contract.

01:42:36.000 Yeah, he was telling me that story the whole time.

01:42:37.000 He's like, look...

01:42:38.000 I was there.

01:42:39.000 Is that the Yakuza?

01:42:40.000 What are they doing over there?

01:42:41.000 How does that work?

01:42:41.000 I would imagine, yeah.

01:42:43.000 I get the vibe that it is a little bit.

01:42:45.000 I don't think much has changed, just to be honest.

01:42:47.000 That's a power move.

01:42:49.000 To let you know, after the fight, we'll give you the contract.

01:42:52.000 What are you talking about, man?

01:42:54.000 From what I understand, he's still fighting.

01:42:57.000 He's still making 60 grand for a minute 20. Yeah, he just gets tagged with a little one.

01:43:01.000 He's like, that's a wrap.

01:43:02.000 He swings.

01:43:03.000 He swings until things get weird.

01:43:05.000 No, he straight up told me, he's like, no, no, I tell them, it's 60 grand, and I give you a minute 20. At a minute 21, I'm going down.

01:43:14.000 He's like, yo, bro.

01:43:16.000 I straight up, and that was one of the conversations on the bus.

01:43:19.000 That is crazy.

01:43:20.000 I told him at a minute and 21, I'm going down.

01:43:23.000 That is so crazy.

01:43:24.000 I'm going to try to get him out of there.

01:43:25.000 But he doesn't want to take any more damage.

01:43:26.000 When he got his orbital broken by Crow Cop, you remember, like, one of his eyes looks weird now. 1.00

01:43:31.000 He's got, like, one eye that's open really wide.

01:43:33.000 Oh, man.

01:43:33.000 And it's because of Crow Cop, which is crazy.

01:43:35.000 Crow Cop was like 220, you know? 0.99

01:43:38.000 And fucking hit him so hard with a straight left, he fractured his eye socket. 0.99

01:43:42.000 Sap was literally more than 100 pounds bigger than him. 0.99

01:43:46.000 Was that with kickboxing gloves on?

01:43:49.000 Yeah, kickboxing gloves.

01:43:50.000 Just got to fit it in the right hole, that's all it is.

01:43:53.000 I think it was kickboxing gloves.

01:43:54.000 I think it was kickboxing.

01:43:55.000 As I recall it was.

01:43:57.000 Yeah, because I don't think he took him down.

01:43:58.000 I think it was a kickboxing fight.

01:43:59.000 Well, he beat Ernesto Hoos twice.

01:44:01.000 Yep.

01:44:02.000 Which is crazy.

01:44:03.000 And Hoos had him really hurt. 0.99

01:44:05.000 Dug shots to the body, fucked his legs up. 1.00

01:44:07.000 Couldn't put anything. 1.00

01:44:08.000 He was switching his stance.

01:44:09.000 Yes.

01:44:09.000 Got dropped by leg kick side of the cup, what, one or two times or something?

01:44:12.000 Got back up.

01:44:13.000 I was like, that was before he decided the 121 was the limit.

01:44:17.000 Well, that was when he was 89% steroids.

01:44:19.000 Oh, man. 0.99

01:44:20.000 Like, his body was so big and so ridiculous. 0.99

01:44:23.000 It just rocked up. 0.94

01:44:24.000 When he fought Minotauro, I remember Eddie Bravo and I were watching it, and they showed Minotauro ready, and they turned to Bob Stout and be like, Jesus!

01:44:34.000 His head was here, and then his neck started right where his head crests.

01:44:39.000 Like, his neck went all the way to the edge of his shoulders.

01:44:42.000 Like, that is the biggest human being I've ever seen in my life.

01:44:45.000 He goes, like, just from his ear to his shoulders.

01:44:47.000 It's just so big! 1.00

01:44:49.000 His fucking shoulders were cartoonish. 1.00

01:44:51.000 It was like the big boss in a Mike Tyson punch-out, you know, video game. 1.00

01:44:56.000 He was so big. 0.65

01:44:57.000 And when he picked up Minotaro and pile-drived him, it was like, oh my god, he's gonna kill him. 0.99

01:45:01.000 He could kill him. 0.98

01:45:03.000 We're all thinking, you're not allowed to do that! 0.90

01:45:05.000 In Japan, they're like, yeah! 0.93

01:45:07.000 Die! 0.93

01:45:08.000 They don't care. 1.00

01:45:09.000 Stomps, head kicks, they don't give a fuck. 0.99

01:45:11.000 Have you ever been there to call a fight? 0.99

01:45:12.000 Yes, UFC. Have the crowds changed?

01:45:15.000 Do the crowds change for the UFC? A little bit.

01:45:18.000 They're a little more cheery, but they're still very quiet.

01:45:22.000 In between transitions, you hear everything.

01:45:24.000 It's weird because you hear the coaches.

01:45:26.000 You hear left leg, left leg, get through, pass through, pass through.

01:45:29.000 You hear the fighter can hear it, the opponent can hear it.

01:45:33.000 It's very strange.

01:45:34.000 Never been to our gym because it's not quiet at all.

01:45:36.000 You When we're training and sparring, guys are like coaching each other. 1.00

01:45:40.000 Fuck that guy! 1.00

01:45:41.000 Get up! 1.00

01:45:41.000 Don't let him fucking take you down! 1.00

01:45:43.000 They're getting on each other. 0.99

01:45:44.000 But over there, it's so funny.

01:45:46.000 My first fight over there in Pride, they had switched my opponent like six times.

01:45:50.000 I showed up and then finally the original guy I was supposed to fight was miraculously healthy and ready to fight again.

01:45:55.000 He just shows up to the lance, just jacked. 0.99

01:45:57.000 Didn't shit? 1.00

01:45:58.000 Oh, God. 1.00

01:45:59.000 Yeah, so I ended up fighting him.

01:46:00.000 Who was it?

01:46:02.000 I want to say his name was Dasuke Sugie.

01:46:04.000 They call him the Amazon.

01:46:06.000 Real good jiu-jitsu guy.

01:46:07.000 Phenomenal jiu-jitsu guy.

01:46:08.000 And he swung for an armbar on me like in a minute. 0.98

01:46:12.000 I'm fucking almost got it. 0.97

01:46:13.000 I was like belly down trying to escape. 0.99

01:46:14.000 But had that fight been in any other organization, I probably would have lost.

01:46:18.000 Because I could hear Crazy Bob and Dave Camarillo yelling to me, Hey, push the feet off the face!

01:46:23.000 Because...

01:46:24.000 My arm was fully extended, he was belly down, I was belly down, and I'm like, I could hear my elbows going and I could just feel, you know when you feel the muscle kind of stretching and tearing a little bit?

01:46:35.000 And then I just started pushing and I could hear them crystal clear.

01:46:39.000 Get the feet off your face! 0.99

01:46:41.000 Get the feet off your face! 0.99

01:46:42.000 Dave Camarillo was like, in such like, can't believe this happened. 1.00

01:46:45.000 He almost started walking back to the fucking, back to the locker room thinking that I was going to tap because I was trying to reach for the feet. 0.99

01:46:51.000 And he's yelling, put the feet, put the, get the feet off your face. 0.99

01:46:54.000 So I was able to push and wiggle it out.

01:46:56.000 And when I wiggled it out, I swung around for the knee bar in the perfect position and was able to get the knee bar and the fight ended like that.

01:47:01.000 It's like, I don't know, minute 20, minute 30, something like that.

01:47:04.000 So, but it was one of those, you know, one of those things that they do in Japan where...

01:47:09.000 The culture's just so different over there.

01:47:11.000 It's really quiet.

01:47:12.000 Like when someone would pass the guard, everyone would cheer.

01:47:14.000 Yep.

01:47:14.000 Yay!

01:47:15.000 I'm like, wow, this is kind of cool.

01:47:17.000 But it kind of is a little weird when you're, you know, you guys are squared up and you're bouncing around.

01:47:23.000 You can hear a cuckoo, cuckoo, cuckoo from the canvas.

01:47:25.000 The floorboards, yeah.

01:47:25.000 The floorboards, and you're all, all right, this is...

01:47:27.000 It's a little weird.

01:47:29.000 Distracting.

01:47:30.000 Yeah, you're like, eh, I'd rather hear the crowd.

01:47:32.000 Yeah.

01:47:32.000 It's funny.

01:47:33.000 I wonder if you get used to that, and then if you go to fight in the UFC, it must be overwhelming for Japanese guys that are used to fighting over there with that total quiet, and they come to Vegas, and it's like, just bleed, guys, with the fucking... 1.00

01:47:46.000 You see that, you're like, whoa. 0.99

01:47:48.000 And then, like, you start walking out, you're gonna die! 0.79

01:47:50.000 You're gonna die!

01:47:50.000 You know, it's crazy.

01:47:52.000 It's crazy over there. 1.00

01:47:53.000 What a wild fucking sport. 1.00

01:47:54.000 It's such a crazy sport when you just think about the evolution of it. 0.99

01:47:58.000 I mean, you started your career, I mean, you really are a pioneer, but you started your career, like, you're like a second wave guy.

01:48:05.000 You're like, there was the first wave where no one knew what the fuck was going on, and then there was a second wave where guys were like complete martial artists that had a specialty background, yours being initially wrestling.

01:48:14.000 Yeah.

01:48:15.000 And then you see the third wave guys, the guys have been essentially training mixed martial arts since they were children.

01:48:21.000 And that's what we're seeing now.

01:48:23.000 Roy McDonald.

01:48:23.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:48:24.000 And Max Holloway as well and some of these other guys.

01:48:27.000 And when you see it now and you compare it to what the UFC was when you first started watching and first started competing, it's got to blow you away.

01:48:37.000 Yeah, you know what?

01:48:38.000 It does.

01:48:39.000 It blows me away because, look, I was actually fortunate enough before...

01:48:44.000 I started training with Frank Shamrock He was decent on the feet, wasn't great, good submissions, but great.

01:49:08.000 He elevated the cardio.

01:49:10.000 He was like that first guy that's, you need to be in tip-top shape.

01:49:14.000 There's no more barstool guys winning these fights anymore.

01:49:16.000 And he made sure that was clear. 0.95

01:49:18.000 Him and Tito were kind of like, you're not just going to get off a barstool and come in here and fucking beat me anymore.

01:49:22.000 Well, he changed Tito's whole game in that fight. 0.66

01:49:24.000 Well, not just in that game.

01:49:25.000 I don't know if you know, but after he lost to Frank, he went up and trained with Frank so Frank could teach him how to get in shape and be as in good a shape as Frank was for their fight.

01:49:35.000 So moving forward, Tito...

01:49:37.000 Frank was always thinking about himself at that time.

01:49:39.000 I don't know if much has changed.

01:49:41.000 But he basically just said, like, hey...

01:49:44.000 I want to make sure you're not beat for a long time because it continues to make me look good.

01:49:48.000 So he made sure that Tito understood how conditioning worked and he just trained him in his regimen.

01:49:53.000 Where did Frank learn it from?

01:49:55.000 He learned it from Javier Mendez and Maurice Smith.

01:49:58.000 Maurice always had phenomenal cardio.

01:50:01.000 And Maurice also trained Bob Sapp too.

01:50:04.000 Yeah, that's such an interesting time where things shifted and guys started to figure out the overall puzzle of mixed martial arts.

01:50:13.000 In that sense, Frank Shamrock really was one of the first really complete guys.

01:50:18.000 Remember when he armbarred Kevin Jackson the first round in the UFC Japan?

01:50:22.000 And I can tell you, yeah, in that conversation that he had with Javier Mendes, like, man, Javier goes, this guy's really tough.

01:50:28.000 You got to do this.

01:50:29.000 You got to do that.

01:50:29.000 He's like, he's going to take me down.

01:50:31.000 When he takes me down, I'm going to arm bar him. 1.00

01:50:32.000 Sure as shit. 1.00

01:50:33.000 Same thing. 1.00

01:50:33.000 He's like, you know, they always put their hands on the mat. 1.00

01:50:35.000 They always do this.

01:50:36.000 They always do that.

01:50:37.000 Frank just had this knack at that time.

01:50:39.000 He was so driven.

01:50:40.000 And whatever it was that he was doing, it didn't matter.

01:50:43.000 I kid you not, there was moments where I was training with him.

01:50:45.000 And it was to the point where he didn't care.

01:50:47.000 He literally just rolled over, threw up on the mat, went back to training like it never happened.

01:50:51.000 Okay guys, let's scoot away from it a little bit.

01:50:53.000 Just kept rolling.

01:50:55.000 Scoot away from the throw up?

01:50:57.000 No, he didn't even clean it up.

01:50:58.000 Waited till the round was done.

01:51:00.000 We all scooted all over, trained some more, came back over and he wiped it off the mat.

01:51:04.000 Boy, that's distracting.

01:51:05.000 It's distracting.

01:51:07.000 It's distracting, but at the time it was the focus of like, hey, I'm not done with my round.

01:51:10.000 Let me finish getting this in.

01:51:12.000 I'm out of shape, sure, but I'm not going to get in shape if I keep quitting to stop and do this and pick this up along the way.

01:51:18.000 I don't know.

01:51:19.000 I like seeing how the sports evolved.

01:51:23.000 I feel like We have, I think in combat sports, from 170 down We're phenomenal.

01:51:32.000 From 185 to 205, the talent needs to be questioned a little bit.

01:51:37.000 Sure, there's talented guys, don't get me wrong, but I think the best athletes in our sport are from 170 down.

01:51:43.000 And just because they seem to be the most well...

01:51:46.000 I mean, look, Jon Jones is an anomaly.

01:51:48.000 He's just one of those guys, just like...

01:51:50.000 Look at his brothers.

01:51:53.000 Phenomenal athletes.

01:51:53.000 He's a phenomenal athlete.

01:51:55.000 Fantastic gene pool.

01:51:56.000 Yeah, right.

01:51:57.000 Yeah, right?

01:51:58.000 Three world-class athletes in the family.

01:52:01.000 Insane, insane.

01:52:01.000 You know, so you have guys like him, you know, and you have other guys that don't look the part but are the part.

01:52:06.000 Ghegar Mousasi, same thing.

01:52:08.000 You don't look the part, you see him, you're like, eh, you know, Fedor Milneko.

01:52:11.000 Yep.

01:52:11.000 Nah.

01:52:12.000 But guess what? 1.00

01:52:13.000 Fuck you. 1.00

01:52:13.000 Were you surprised at the Rampage fight? 1.00

01:52:16.000 No, not at all.

01:52:17.000 I mean, he's still got crazy hand speed.

01:52:20.000 That's the one thing that Frank Mir, when I talked to him after, he's like, I thought I could hit him.

01:52:24.000 I grazed him a little bit.

01:52:25.000 I thought I rocked him.

01:52:26.000 And then he just knocked him out going backwards.

01:52:28.000 You know, the power's still there.

01:52:30.000 Last thing to go.

01:52:31.000 We all know that.

01:52:32.000 The speed is still there.

01:52:33.000 That's what's crazy is the speed.

01:52:34.000 He's not as durable as he used to be.

01:52:36.000 No, not at all.

01:52:37.000 But you can't be.

01:52:38.000 No, I mean, what is he, 42, 43 years old?

01:52:41.000 But the thing is, no matter what, he's fun to watch fight.

01:52:45.000 Oh, yeah, man.

01:52:45.000 I enjoyed the Rampage fight.

01:52:47.000 I just thought Rampage, first of all, was sad when I saw Rampage was so heavy.

01:52:50.000 And I was like, there's no way he could have trained really hard.

01:52:53.000 It doesn't help you to be that fat.

01:52:55.000 Well, he was training with TJ Dillashaw's guy, the guy out of the training lab.

01:53:00.000 Yeah, I mean, there was a lot of pictures and photos.

01:53:02.000 Yeah, Sal Calavita.

01:53:04.000 They had pictures of him doing the bike in his garage, and I mean, I don't know if it was just a photo op, but...

01:53:08.000 Maybe he only did it a couple times.

01:53:10.000 I don't know.

01:53:11.000 But look, there's a ton of guys in Bellator and the guys I would love to see.

01:53:16.000 It doesn't have to be for title fights because we were talking about cross promotion.

01:53:19.000 It doesn't have to be title fights.

01:53:20.000 Let's not ruin champions.

01:53:23.000 Let's put together fights.

01:53:24.000 If we did, think about this.

01:53:26.000 A year-end show every year where we pick, you kind of let the fans pick.

01:53:33.000 Let's say you have a board.

01:53:34.000 So you have a board of people, the year-end show we do, and we say, hey, we'd like to see this guy fight this guy.

01:53:41.000 I would love to see Volkanovski and Patricio.

01:53:44.000 I would love to see Lima versus Usman, but they're both champions.

01:53:48.000 So let's have somebody else fight.

01:53:50.000 Let's see Steven Thompson and MVP. Yes.

01:53:53.000 Let's have this conversation.

01:53:55.000 Look, there doesn't need to be champions.

01:53:56.000 There's nothing to lose or risk other than the fans getting to see the best fights that fans want to see.

01:54:01.000 That's the one thing I've always given credit to Coker about.

01:54:04.000 Let's see these fights happen. 0.98

01:54:06.000 The problem is I think the UFC feels like it would benefit Bellator, but it wouldn't benefit the UFC. Because the UFC can make many fights for Wonderboy.

01:54:14.000 Let me just make an argument to that.

01:54:16.000 There's the one fight with Conor McGregor and Mayweather.

01:54:18.000 This is like other guys.

01:54:19.000 I don't know if you ever heard of him.

01:54:20.000 It's called Floyd Mayweather.

01:54:21.000 Okay, so there's these two guys.

01:54:23.000 They got together for one fight.

01:54:25.000 Right.

01:54:26.000 And that fight did what numbers?

01:54:27.000 Crazy numbers.

01:54:29.000 Astronomical numbers.

01:54:29.000 But that was a freak show, right?

01:54:31.000 Because you got a guy...

01:54:32.000 Floyd Mayweather is the greatest boxer of all time, right?

01:54:35.000 Undefeated...

01:54:36.000 49-0 going into that fight.

01:54:38.000 It's a crazy situation.

01:54:40.000 And Conor's never fought in boxing ever.

01:54:42.000 Zero professional boxing fights against the greatest fighter ever.

01:54:46.000 And you make this gigantic promotion where it's not really going to hurt Conor because it's not really his sport.

01:54:52.000 I mean, it's a different animal.

01:54:54.000 It's a different animal.

01:54:55.000 Joe, the biggest pay-per-view right now for MMA is what?

01:54:58.000 Khabib and Conor, correct?

01:55:00.000 2.4 million.

01:55:01.000 Yeah, that would be the original.

01:55:05.000 The fight to make, that would probably be the biggest rematch as well.

01:55:08.000 Okay, but I don't know how much it would be the biggest rematch, only because Conor lost, and he lost pretty convincingly.

01:55:14.000 Yeah, but after smashing Cowboy like that, I bet you could sell it.

01:55:18.000 No, I'm not saying you couldn't sell it.

01:55:20.000 I'm just simply saying it may not do 2.4.

01:55:22.000 It may do that or it may do a little bit less.

01:55:25.000 People have already seen it.

01:55:26.000 They've already seen it wasn't close.

01:55:28.000 So they may not buy it.

01:55:29.000 Now, if Conor was to go and fight somebody else and have a dominant performance against someone like a Justin Gaethje and get him out of there or against Usman, then you make that fight and it'll do more numbers.

01:55:39.000 But not off of the 40 seconds we just saw.

01:55:41.000 Maybe.

01:55:42.000 And I'm not trying to toe what Stephen A is saying, but we didn't see enough to believe that people could say that he...

01:55:48.000 We didn't see a fight.

01:55:49.000 We saw a domination.

01:55:50.000 Yeah, and it's not enough to say that he could stop Khabib's wrestling.

01:55:53.000 That's the only concern.

01:55:54.000 People are going to talk about this.

01:55:56.000 But what I was trying to get at was the conversation with pay-per-views.

01:56:01.000 You do a year-end fight, or a once-a-year fight, or let's just say once a year.

01:56:06.000 It's easy to...

01:56:07.000 And you take the fights that fans want to see, or you have a board member of groups from each promotion that say, look, let's put this fight and this fight together, not our champions.

01:56:15.000 And I'll bet you that that one card does double or triple what the best pay-per-view ever has done.

01:56:22.000 I don't think so at all.

01:56:23.000 I think so.

01:56:24.000 I don't think people care that much.

01:56:25.000 I think you care and I care.

01:56:27.000 I don't think people care that much.

01:56:29.000 You don't think so.

01:56:30.000 I think the buzz and I also think the marketing dollars behind each promotion to help push it, they'll make it bigger than Conor and Khabib than anything.

01:56:37.000 I don't think you can.

01:56:38.000 I don't think you can make it bigger.

01:56:40.000 What makes a fight bigger is someone who already has a cult of personality behind them, right?

01:56:44.000 Khabib already has this insane following. 0.89

01:56:48.000 First of all, the Muslim world's behind him. 1.00

01:56:50.000 He's one of the first Muslim fighters ever to win a world title. 0.98

01:56:54.000 He's also just this phenomenal freak athlete who fucking mauls everybody. 0.98

01:56:59.000 And this unstoppable force against this irresistible object. 0.95

01:57:02.000 And then Conor's this incredible, enigmatic person who's just so charismatic and everybody wants to see him fight.

01:57:08.000 And he's got lightning in his left hand.

01:57:10.000 He's got a history of starching people like Jose Aldo and Chad Bendo.

01:57:14.000 And you look at it and you're like, what is going to happen when these two fight?

01:57:17.000 But you don't have that.

01:57:19.000 Look, I want to see, say, guys like Douglas Lima, but how much does the general public, the casual fan, want to see that?

01:57:26.000 I don't think there's that much of a following.

01:57:29.000 I mean, what is Douglas Lima's Instagram?

01:57:33.000 How many followers does he have on his Instagram?

01:57:35.000 You look at Khabib and Conor.

01:57:37.000 Conor's got like 50 million or something.

01:57:39.000 Khabib's got something similar.

01:57:41.000 Okay, so my take is this.

01:57:43.000 You take someone like Islam Makachev who trains with Khabib non-stop. 1.00

01:57:46.000 He's a fucking animal. 1.00

01:57:47.000 Savage. 1.00

01:57:48.000 I've seen the two of them go at it.

01:57:50.000 160,000 followers for one of the best fighters on the planet Earth.

01:57:54.000 But if you take a guy like Islam... 1.00

01:57:55.000 You better click that follow, bitch. 1.00

01:57:56.000 How come you're not following him? 1.00

01:57:58.000 Click that follow.

01:57:59.000 Give them 161. So if you match guys, if you match guys, like you say, Islam versus Chandler, if you match guys like, you know, these other, you match some of the Gegard, because there was a lot of talk, because Gegard was winning when he left the UFC, came over to Bellator.

01:58:16.000 Beat Chris Weidman when Chris Weidman was on top of his game.

01:58:19.000 So you take guys like Gegard, you match them against, you know, somebody over in the UFC, and you're taking these top guys, MVP and Steven Thompson.

01:58:27.000 I think a stacked card like that Given the results from when we're talking about Japan, when they do their year-end show, is the number two in all of Japan for their TV viewerships.

01:58:41.000 It's just some astronomical amount of numbers.

01:58:44.000 I would imagine it'd be bigger than what Conor and Khabib did.

01:58:49.000 I still don't think so.

01:58:50.000 I don't even think it would be close.

01:58:52.000 I think it would.

01:58:53.000 I'm glad you're not a promoter.

01:58:54.000 You lose a lot of money.

01:58:56.000 Well, here's the thing, though.

01:58:57.000 You're not taking into consideration.

01:58:59.000 If we use Mighty Mouse, if we use Eddie Alvarez, if we use the guy, Timothy Nastukin, there's marketing dollars behind One.

01:59:05.000 There's marketing dollars behind Bellator.

01:59:07.000 It doesn't matter.

01:59:08.000 You can't make someone famous.

01:59:09.000 No, but you hit all those different markets.

01:59:12.000 You're going to promote.

01:59:13.000 Once a person is famous, yes, you can promote it and make it a giant thing.

01:59:17.000 But when they're not famous, to make them famous for a promotion, to make the promotion larger, it's not going to happen. 0.62

01:59:22.000 The biggest fucking pay-per-view they could ever do with Mighty Mouse was inadequate. 0.96

01:59:25.000 No one cared. 0.98

01:59:26.000 For whatever reason, the casual fan didn't care.

01:59:29.000 Timothy Nastyukin, they're going to care way less.

01:59:32.000 Way less.

01:59:33.000 I'm throwing out names that were talked about so people will understand.

01:59:36.000 I understand what you're saying.

01:59:36.000 Look, I mean...

01:59:38.000 It's just one of those things.

01:59:40.000 For the hardcore fan, if everyone was like you or I, yeah, it would be 100% of the world would buy the ticket.

01:59:45.000 I mean, it would be something that everybody would want to buy the pay-per-view.

01:59:47.000 But just, I don't care that much about how successful it would be.

01:59:51.000 What I care about, would it be good for the sport?

01:59:54.000 And would people like you or I, who are hardcore fans, would we want to see that?

01:59:58.000 The answer is yes.

01:59:59.000 100%.

02:00:00.000 I mean, I do want to see Pitbull versus Volkanovski or versus Max Holloway.

02:00:05.000 I do want to see Lima versus Kamaru Usman.

02:00:08.000 I do want to see these kind of fights. 0.66

02:00:10.000 But in the UFC's position, like, man, 170 is so goddamn crazy as it is.

02:00:15.000 What do you do with Masvidal? 0.55

02:00:16.000 What do you do with Conor now, right?

02:00:18.000 What do you do with Kobe when he comes back from his jaw healing up?

02:00:21.000 I mean, do they set up a rematch for that fight?

02:00:24.000 Because that was a phenomenal fight between him and Usman.

02:00:26.000 Yeah. 0.98

02:00:26.000 And boy, did that fucking get everybody hyped up and paid attention. 0.98

02:00:30.000 There's so many big fights as it is. 0.98

02:00:32.000 Tyron Woodley, he's going to fight Leon Edwards.

02:00:34.000 That to me is the fight, man.

02:00:36.000 That's a dangerous fight for both guys.

02:00:38.000 T. Woods, my boy.

02:00:39.000 Leon, he's phenomenal.

02:00:41.000 I've trained with him.

02:00:42.000 I've trained with Wood.

02:00:43.000 They're both extremely fast.

02:00:45.000 Both very good.

02:00:46.000 And then now the evolution of Leon Edwards' grappling mixed with his wrestling, what he did to Gunnar Nelson was just nasty.

02:00:52.000 I was like, oh, wow.

02:00:53.000 Oh, wow.

02:00:54.000 We just decided to up our game all of a sudden.

02:00:56.000 Yes.

02:00:56.000 Very impressive.

02:00:57.000 He's a dark horse in that division.

02:00:59.000 He's one that people are not paying attention to.

02:01:02.000 Speaking of dark horses, you got Calvin Cater at 145. He's the fucking dark horse at 145. When he was putting on Zabit in that third round, I was like, holy shit! 0.99

02:01:11.000 If this is a fourth and fifth round, he might stop him. 1.00

02:01:15.000 He's that fucking good. 0.97

02:01:16.000 You have guys like Zabito that, for me, I feel like they're doing, they do well, they do well, they're doing good. 0.99

02:01:21.000 They almost start to believe the hype a little bit.

02:01:24.000 I feel like he took some time, like, maybe just didn't go back to focusing and training hard.

02:01:29.000 I've done that a couple times in my career.

02:01:31.000 Like, I'm going to walk through this guy, not a big deal.

02:01:33.000 Because you don't know about that person. 0.97

02:01:35.000 Yeah, but after Cater starts Lamas, how the fuck do you think that? 0.97

02:01:38.000 He put Lamas' lights out cold.

02:01:40.000 Yeah, you can also say, though, that Lamas wasn't what he was when he was making his title run.

02:01:45.000 You know what I mean?

02:01:46.000 Maybe, but he was still doing really well.

02:01:49.000 I think it's a case of massive amounts of talent in that division and trying to figure out who goes where and what goes where.

02:01:58.000 I mean, you can say that about 35 as well.

02:02:01.000 35 is a crazy town stacked place, too.

02:02:04.000 Yeah, I mean, so go back to 45, we got this kid named Adam Boric. 0.84

02:02:08.000 Dude, Boric is a monster.

02:02:10.000 That flying knee that he knocked Pico out with, and he's one of Henry Hoof's guys, too.

02:02:15.000 And he did it again before that. 0.95

02:02:16.000 So he's got two flying knee knockouts in Bellator, and all the buzz around Henry Hoof's place is that some of the 55-pounders don't want to spar with him and train with him because he's fucking good.

02:02:25.000 He's fast, he's long, he's lanky, and he's extremely good.

02:02:28.000 I've seen videos of him training, and I've seen videos of him fighting.

02:02:31.000 I want to see him fight live.

02:02:33.000 I haven't seen him fight live yet.

02:02:34.000 This weekend?

02:02:35.000 How old is he?

02:02:36.000 He's like 24?

02:02:37.000 I think he's 26. I think he's 26, yeah.

02:02:40.000 So he's entering his prime.

02:02:43.000 Yeah, no, for sure.

02:02:44.000 I feel like the prime is 26 to 32. Like, that's your 31, 32, somewhere in there.

02:02:49.000 Like, when I was training and I felt like I was unstoppable, was that 27 to 32 age.

02:02:54.000 26?

02:02:54.000 26. That's my job, though.

02:02:57.000 That's my job.

02:02:59.000 Good job.

02:03:00.000 Look, there's...

02:03:01.000 Excellent fighter.

02:03:01.000 He's phenomenal.

02:03:03.000 Also, two people, the guy that's fighting Patricio, Pedro Cavallo, who trains at SBG with the Cardinals, he's someone who's fucking really good as well.

02:03:12.000 Yes, yes.

02:03:12.000 And I just look at these guys, and Adam Weischel, or Daniel Weischel, he's another guy that's like, he's such a technician, just doesn't fight the part, because people want to see high-flying, flying knee knockouts like Adam Borch does, but...

02:03:26.000 He's super technical, really good.

02:03:29.000 The 45-pound division is stacked.

02:03:31.000 Who is your heavyweight champion now?

02:03:33.000 Bader.

02:03:34.000 Oh, that's right.

02:03:35.000 He's a dual champ.

02:03:36.000 Yeah, so he's 205. For some reason, I felt like he relinquished one of the titles, but no, that's not the case at all.

02:03:43.000 When he stopped Fedor, I was like, holy shit! 0.99

02:03:45.000 Yeah, quick, man. 0.99

02:03:46.000 He's one of those guys that actually looks better at heavyweight.

02:03:48.000 He needs to stay there.

02:03:49.000 I don't know why he's supposed to be fighting coming up.

02:03:52.000 We haven't announced a fight yet, I don't believe.

02:03:54.000 He's fighting...

02:03:56.000 Coming up.

02:03:56.000 What does he weigh?

02:03:57.000 He's fighting at 205. He weighs like 240. Walking around?

02:04:00.000 Yeah, walking around.

02:04:01.000 I'm like, why?

02:04:01.000 Why would you go down?

02:04:03.000 I said, not only do you, you're faster, you're a better wrestler than all these guys, and look, I got a lot of respect for Stipe and him and Stipe are friends, but I think wrestling-wise and fight-wise, he has a good chance to beat Stipe.

02:04:16.000 Only because of his ability with his wrestling, his cardio, and his pace.

02:04:20.000 The speed and everything, I think he could get in on him.

02:04:22.000 Well, his striking got so much better and so smooth.

02:04:25.000 And, you know, he just got better in the pocket.

02:04:28.000 You know, after, like, particularly the Liotta Machida loss, that was a...

02:04:32.000 You know, a big thing because he came charging in and Machida caught him in and clipped him with a counter shot and put him away. 1.00

02:04:38.000 You know, there was some moments where you're like, man, maybe Bader's time has passed. 0.99

02:04:42.000 And then all of a sudden he has this resurgence and starts doing better and better and then goes on to become in Bellator like a fucking demon. 0.95

02:04:51.000 Well, you got to remember that fighting is a confidence thing. 0.98

02:04:53.000 As you win one fight, you win another and you win another.

02:04:57.000 Right there.

02:04:57.000 It becomes...

02:04:58.000 Getting lean, defending the 205 pound light heavyweight title in April.

02:05:02.000 Yeah, I'm trying to...

02:05:03.000 I want to see...

02:05:05.000 I don't know what the...

02:05:06.000 He's fighting...

02:05:08.000 I don't know if we announced it yet, though.

02:05:12.000 Who was there for him?

02:05:14.000 Who was he looking for?

02:05:14.000 I didn't see one.

02:05:15.000 Yeah.

02:05:16.000 Who's there for him at heavyweight?

02:05:18.000 So you've got...

02:05:19.000 Check, Congo. 0.99

02:05:20.000 Yeah, you got Check.

02:05:21.000 I don't know if him and...

02:05:22.000 They're not going to do the rematch with that.

02:05:24.000 Because I remember there was a weird eye poke slash nose and thumb in the nose kind of weird thing.

02:05:29.000 So Check got out.

02:05:30.000 And I don't know what the deal was.

02:05:31.000 So...

02:05:32.000 You got Minikov.

02:05:33.000 Minikov was the former champion who was there before, and he had the flu.

02:05:39.000 I want to say he lost to Czech Congo because he had the flu when he fought.

02:05:43.000 But then he's someone that right now is, I mean, he's phenomenal.

02:05:46.000 That's his only loss.

02:05:48.000 That's what got checked the title shot.

02:05:51.000 So the two of them.

02:05:52.000 Minnikov is someone that scares me with Bader because size-wise, he's bigger than Bader.

02:05:56.000 He's fast.

02:05:57.000 He's got that kind of like sombo background.

02:05:59.000 And he's good.

02:06:00.000 He's really good.

02:06:01.000 It seems like it's really hard to get top talent at heavyweight.

02:06:05.000 Top talent at heavyweight, in the UFC at least, has always been the most shallow pool.

02:06:10.000 Yeah, I feel that way in 185. If you look at even boxing, 185 is one of the most gutted weight classes there are.

02:06:16.000 Occasionally you get the 205 guys.

02:06:18.000 I mean, like I said, Jon Jones is an anomaly.

02:06:21.000 You get those type of guys that come in.

02:06:24.000 But I also think that now that the money's gotten better, you're going to start seeing athletes that would have went to football and baseball and basketball, they're going to stop doing that and saying, hey...

02:06:33.000 These guys are making this much money.

02:06:34.000 Let me try and go over there. 0.99

02:06:36.000 Now when they're seeing million-dollar paydays in organizations like the PFL, you're like, fuck, I can make a million dollars? 1.00

02:06:41.000 Like, shit. 0.99

02:06:43.000 And I think you're going to start seeing some of those athletes that may be a benchwarmer in the NFL or may be a benchwarmer in baseball or having to go through the D-League process. 1.00

02:06:54.000 They're like, man, fuck this. 0.98

02:06:55.000 I'm going to go make money over there. 1.00

02:06:56.000 Look at Greg Hardy.

02:06:57.000 Mm-hmm.

02:06:58.000 You know, coming over and having good performances.

02:07:01.000 It's such a long road though, man.

02:07:03.000 It is.

02:07:04.000 When you're just getting into fighting and then trying to go professional with skills that you've acquired from football and basketball.

02:07:11.000 I mean, you're an athlete.

02:07:12.000 You're a great athlete and fast and strong.

02:07:14.000 But boy, there's so many variables that come into play when you're fighting that you just don't have covered.

02:07:19.000 You've got to look at it, though, as well.

02:07:21.000 If you go to an organization like...

02:07:23.000 The UFC's done Greg Hardy some favors.

02:07:25.000 They haven't given him top, top guys.

02:07:28.000 And so when that happens, because he has a name and they're going to be groomed, then why not?

02:07:34.000 Well, they gave him a tough fight in Volkov.

02:07:36.000 Yes, they did.

02:07:37.000 That was a tough fight, man.

02:07:38.000 Yes, it was. 0.98

02:07:38.000 And I was really impressed with him in that fight because Volkov used to be Bellator champion, top of the food chain, heavyweight, big, long, tall guy, difficult to fuck with. 0.98

02:07:47.000 You know, it's like he knocked out Fabrizio Verdum, former heavyweight champion. 0.95

02:07:51.000 So, like, Volkov is very skillful and awkward as hell, man.

02:07:55.000 So tall and long.

02:07:57.000 Yeah, it's one of those styles like you have to learn to get past the push kick and the long jab and all those things.

02:08:01.000 And once you do, you rock right into the knees.

02:08:03.000 Dude, that Derrick Lewis KO was so bananas.

02:08:06.000 When Derrick Lewis knocked him out, I was like, that is crazy.

02:08:09.000 And then afterwards, he took his shorts off. 0.99

02:08:11.000 My balls are hot! 1.00

02:08:15.000 Oh, shit! 1.00

02:08:17.000 Derek Lewis is a national treasure. 1.00

02:08:18.000 He is a national treasure, and he has the best fucking Instagram in the game. 0.98

02:08:23.000 It's so funny. 0.97

02:08:23.000 After that happened, I went to his Instagram the next morning and jumped up by almost a million followers. 0.97

02:08:28.000 I was like, Joe out here making everyone famous.

02:08:31.000 Jesus!

02:08:32.000 But it's funny.

02:08:34.000 I was following him before that.

02:08:36.000 And I love all the things he posts, man.

02:08:38.000 He's so good.

02:08:39.000 He's so fun.

02:08:40.000 He's hilarious.

02:08:40.000 I love it.

02:08:41.000 And anytime something fucked up goes down in the world, there's a video of it, it's on Derek Lewis' Instagram page. 0.95

02:08:48.000 I think he... 0.94

02:08:50.000 I don't know if he... 0.94

02:08:51.000 There was something he posted the other day that was fucking hilarious. 0.95

02:08:54.000 He's a man. 0.95

02:08:55.000 He's awesome, man.

02:08:55.000 He's a man.

02:08:56.000 I always love at the end when someone falls four stories, lands on their head, and his first quote is, they're okay, though.

02:09:02.000 Yeah, he's okay.

02:09:03.000 He's okay.

02:09:04.000 He's okay. 1.00

02:09:05.000 I'm thinking to myself, the guy's fucking dead. 0.99

02:09:08.000 Oh, so they're going to do Francis Ngannou and Rosenstreich. 1.00

02:09:12.000 That is a crazy fight.

02:09:13.000 Yeah, that is.

02:09:14.000 I wasn't impressed with Rosenstreich, though.

02:09:17.000 I mean, he's got big power.

02:09:18.000 He's got the power.

02:09:19.000 Well, I was impressed with his durability against Alistair and his patience and the fact that he landed that haymaker right hook with, like, what, 15 seconds to go or something?

02:09:28.000 That was nasty, man.

02:09:28.000 Oh, my God.

02:09:29.000 That was one of the worst cuts I've ever seen in all my years. 0.99

02:09:31.000 Yeah, people try to relate that shit to Lawler's cut, and I was like, Lawler's cut was like, he had a sliver. 0.99

02:09:37.000 It Compared to what that was. 0.99

02:09:39.000 His face exploded.

02:09:40.000 That was nasty.

02:09:41.000 The fact that that happened with one punch like that is bananas.

02:09:43.000 Yeah, and what was crazy about it was that it actually happened where his mouthpiece was.

02:09:47.000 And for that type of power to land and split your mouth like that, your mouthpiece is supposed to stop those things.

02:09:52.000 And it didn't.

02:09:53.000 So that was gross.

02:09:54.000 It was nasty.

02:09:55.000 I felt bad for him, to be honest.

02:09:56.000 I was just surprised how he was walking through everything Alistair was hitting with. 1.00

02:10:00.000 I'm like, Alistair's a fucking killer. 1.00

02:10:02.000 Outside of the cut, I have no sympathy for him. 1.00

02:10:04.000 He's married to a model, so I don't Like, really, dude?

02:10:09.000 You're married to a model. 0.97

02:10:09.000 Like, whatever, dude. 0.97

02:10:10.000 It healed up so fast.

02:10:12.000 Did you see how quickly it healed?

02:10:13.000 Yeah, yeah.

02:10:14.000 And there was, like, no swelling either.

02:10:15.000 I'm like, what are you made out of?

02:10:17.000 Yeah.

02:10:17.000 Well, also, you gotta look at that guy.

02:10:19.000 Like, he's been knocked out, like, 30 times or something crazy.

02:10:22.000 Like, how is he...

02:10:23.000 And you hear him talk, he sounds perfect.

02:10:26.000 It's nuts.

02:10:27.000 Probably because he's in love with a model.

02:10:30.000 His model girlfriend talks.

02:10:31.000 I don't know, man.

02:10:32.000 I don't know either.

02:10:33.000 It's crazy.

02:10:34.000 He cracks me up, though, because, um...

02:10:36.000 Oh, there's some things I can't say on that.

02:10:38.000 With him, though, he's a good guy.

02:10:41.000 I was over in Japan a couple times when we had fought, and he was there on the same card.

02:10:45.000 And, man, he was jacked at that time.

02:10:48.000 Just jacked.

02:10:49.000 Back when he fought Todd Duffy?

02:10:50.000 Yeah.

02:10:51.000 Remember those days?

02:10:51.000 Yes, I was on that card.

02:10:52.000 Holy shit. 1.00

02:10:53.000 Yeah, I was on that card. 0.99

02:10:54.000 Well, the Brock Lesnar fight's the perfect example.

02:10:56.000 That's Ubering at his finest when he fought Brock Lesnar.

02:11:00.000 So big.

02:11:00.000 Look at that cut.

02:11:01.000 I mean, that's crazy.

02:11:02.000 That's like a couple weeks later.

02:11:04.000 Yeah.

02:11:04.000 Yeah, I mean, it swelled up.

02:11:06.000 It was fucked up for a couple days. 0.96

02:11:08.000 You gotta imagine he probably got a little bit of plastic surgery done to it as well for them to kind of do a little skin graft. 0.98

02:11:13.000 What do they do?

02:11:13.000 I don't think they skin grafted it.

02:11:14.000 I think they just stitched the fucking shit out of it. 0.99

02:11:17.000 They stitch it inside, they stitch it outside, and if you look at that, that's gonna heal real good, man. 0.99

02:11:22.000 I mean, that's still pretty fresh.

02:11:24.000 I had a very similar one.

02:11:26.000 I was wrestling at AKA, and I doubled in this guy, and he hit the ground first, and when his head bounced up and hit me in the mouth, I wasn't wearing a mouthpiece.

02:11:33.000 So my tooth came all the way through the front of my lip.

02:11:37.000 And it didn't look that bad, but it looked nasty.

02:11:40.000 There's something about your mouth heals quick, too.

02:11:42.000 It's weird.

02:11:43.000 I would imagine to defend off against infections.

02:11:47.000 You know what I mean?

02:11:48.000 You've got to wonder how many more fights a guy like Alistair can endure.

02:11:52.000 I mean, how many times can that guy get stopped?

02:11:54.000 You look at all the times he got stopped in Pride, in K1, and then the UFC. I mean, he's had some of the fucking, just the Ngannou one. 0.98

02:12:02.000 That left hook Ngannou hit him with. 1.00

02:12:04.000 The back of his head and his spine. 0.60

02:12:06.000 That was nasty.

02:12:08.000 It flew back.

02:12:09.000 I thought he died.

02:12:11.000 I was like, this guy's gone.

02:12:12.000 Rosenstreich and Ngannou is going to be a very fascinating fight because Rosenstreich is a, you know, he's a real high-level kickboxer.

02:12:20.000 He's an excellent Muay Thai, his leg kicks.

02:12:22.000 And I'm wondering if we're going to see more of that in the Ngannou fight since Ngannou is so boxing heavy and power heavy.

02:12:27.000 But Ngannou, the difference is Ngannou hits you once.

02:12:30.000 He hits guys once and just changes your whole life.

02:12:35.000 I think guys are going to...

02:12:36.000 I'm surprised we haven't seen more guys go to the well with the calf kick.

02:12:42.000 Like in the heavyweight division, I haven't seen it a whole lot.

02:12:45.000 But Junior was hitting Ngannou with it a couple of times early in their fight.

02:12:49.000 I feel like Junior, though, is a guy that he needs to evolve because he has the miles on him.

02:12:54.000 I mean, he hasn't been the same guy since that Kane fight.

02:12:58.000 No.

02:12:58.000 He's been good at moments, but he's also been bad.

02:13:01.000 The second fight with Kane and then the third fight with Kane really did him in.

02:13:05.000 Yeah, and so he just hasn't been the same, but he's evolving, I think, with what the smaller guys are doing to exploit the heavier guys that just don't move as much.

02:13:13.000 I feel like that calf kick has changed the game.

02:13:16.000 The very first time I ever saw that thing being used was Masvidal.

02:13:19.000 Mm-hmm.

02:13:20.000 And Masvidal used that against Gilbert Melendez.

02:13:22.000 I'm sure he used it before that.

02:13:24.000 But he swept Gil off his feet probably three or four times in that fight.

02:13:27.000 And I was thinking to myself, wow, there's something to this.

02:13:29.000 Well, Benson Henderson was the first guy I ever saw do it.

02:13:32.000 Got it.

02:13:32.000 Benson was throwing a lot of those back in the day, too.

02:13:34.000 Heavy kicks.

02:13:35.000 Yeah, but it's really interesting how much more effective it is now.

02:13:38.000 Like, you've seen guys take one or two shots to the lower calf, and then their legs starting to give out.

02:13:43.000 And it shuts your nerves down, which is so weird about it.

02:13:46.000 Yeah, because that happened to Chandler when he fought Brent Primus.

02:13:50.000 That's right.

02:13:50.000 And everyone was like, oh, it's nothing, it'll be alright.

02:13:53.000 I'm like, no, no, your foot doesn't move anymore.

02:13:56.000 How about Cejudo when he fought Mighty Mouse in the second fight?

02:13:59.000 I was surprised he was able to get it back, though.

02:14:01.000 That's what was nice about that, was he was able to get it back.

02:14:03.000 I mean, how did he...

02:14:04.000 Had I think Mighty Mouse went to it a couple more times, it maybe would have had a different effect on it.

02:14:09.000 Yes, it could have been the end of the fight.

02:14:10.000 It's crazy that these moments happen where something changes in the sport and everybody goes, oh, let's do that.

02:14:18.000 And then a lot of people start doing it.

02:14:19.000 Like when Anderson knocked out Vito with that front kick to the face.

02:14:22.000 Yes. 1.00

02:14:23.000 And everybody's like, oh yeah, you can throw that shit to the face. 1.00

02:14:25.000 Yeah. 1.00

02:14:25.000 And then you saw a lot of it. 1.00

02:14:26.000 You saw a lot of guys winning that way.

02:14:28.000 Which is funny because when you take MMA and people need to remember what it stands for, and people for the longest time are like, oh, let's just wrestle and let's do Muay Thai.

02:14:39.000 It was like, okay, we'll do a little bit of boxing and some wrestling.

02:14:43.000 They never went outside that box.

02:14:45.000 And then guys like Stephen Thompson and Machida came in.

02:14:49.000 Now you see MVP. But when you see these guys, they're bringing in a different dynamic that works for them.

02:14:53.000 Now granted, they've been doing it their whole life.

02:14:55.000 So you're not going to be able to adapt everything that they do.

02:14:58.000 But you can steal a couple little things from them.

02:15:01.000 I don't know if you recall, but I was like the first guy that did that little...

02:15:04.000 I used to use my heel to your thigh in the clinch against the fence.

02:15:09.000 I did it to Eves Edwards. 1.00

02:15:10.000 And Eves is like, you're such an asshole. 1.00

02:15:12.000 He's like, I couldn't walk for a week. 1.00

02:15:13.000 You know, because I was just healing him.

02:15:15.000 Boom, boom, boom.

02:15:17.000 And that fight was only in the first round.

02:15:19.000 You know, and so you have things like that.

02:15:20.000 And then BJ Penn said with Matt Serra, Matt Serra kept punching him right in the hip bone.

02:15:25.000 He's like, and I kid you not, and BJ's like, for almost two weeks I couldn't walk.

02:15:28.000 He said I had to like limp because he had fucked up my hip. 0.98

02:15:31.000 Wow. 0.99

02:15:31.000 So little things make a big difference. 0.99

02:15:33.000 I wonder, you know, when they got rid of that from the guard, remember those kicks to the kidneys?

02:15:38.000 To the kidneys. 0.75

02:15:39.000 They got rid of those.

02:15:39.000 I don't know if they're back now or not.

02:15:40.000 I don't know why they got rid of those. 0.98

02:15:42.000 Why is it okay to kick you in the head? 0.97

02:15:44.000 It's not okay to kick your kidney? 0.99

02:15:45.000 I have no idea. 0.76

02:15:46.000 It doesn't make any sense.

02:15:47.000 Isn't it also interesting that the back of the head...

02:15:49.000 The back of the head's illegal, but when you roundhouse kick a guy in the head, a lot of times you're hitting him in the back of the head.

02:15:56.000 Your foot wraps around the back of the head.

02:15:57.000 But it's not illegal.

02:15:58.000 Well, explain this one to me.

02:16:01.000 It's the only reason why Jon Jones has a loss. 1.00

02:16:05.000 Yeah, it's just one of those things you're just thinking to yourself, this is so stupid. 0.99

02:16:08.000 Well, Jon explained it on the podcast. 1.00

02:16:10.000 Yes. 0.99

02:16:11.000 The fucking commissioners thought that that's how you break bricks and you can't do that to a person. 1.00

02:16:15.000 Yep. 0.99

02:16:15.000 And he basically just said like, and then I guess Lorenzo had said, you know, he wanted to fight for it. 0.99

02:16:20.000 And John goes, look, let's just leave that one alone as long as we can still do it from the guard.

02:16:24.000 We can still do it from any other angle.

02:16:26.000 If it has a little bit of an angle this way and a little bit of that.

02:16:28.000 That's what's great.

02:16:29.000 Like when I do my podcast with Big John McCarthy, there's things that I don't know.

02:16:34.000 Like people don't realize, fighters don't know a lot about the rules.

02:16:38.000 We think we do.

02:16:39.000 But let me just tell, I don't like to admit, because John, you know, I don't like to admit that John's right a lot.

02:16:44.000 Yeah.

02:16:45.000 You know?

02:16:46.000 But there's a lot of things I don't know.

02:16:49.000 About the actual rules.

02:16:50.000 And I fought for years, man.

02:16:52.000 Joe Abbott was fighting for almost 23 years.

02:16:55.000 Also, the rules have morphed a little bit, too.

02:16:57.000 What do you think about the new unified rules?

02:16:59.000 Like the differences between a downed opponent now and things that you can do that you couldn't do before?

02:17:03.000 But are they finally unified?

02:17:06.000 Nevada doesn't.

02:17:07.000 They have a modified version of it.

02:17:10.000 Nevada says you're still a downed opponent if you have one hand down.

02:17:13.000 See, for me, I feel like...

02:17:14.000 Look, for me, I've always thought that...

02:17:17.000 You should be able to knee the head when you're on the ground.

02:17:19.000 If I stuff your takedown, I should be able to knee your head right there on all fours. 0.99

02:17:22.000 It doesn't matter.

02:17:24.000 Especially if you're not against the cage.

02:17:26.000 Against the cage is the only argument against it because the guy can't move.

02:17:29.000 He's stuck.

02:17:30.000 That's the only thing that I can see an argument for.

02:17:32.000 Okay, I agree, but then...

02:17:33.000 Get out of there.

02:17:34.000 Yeah, get out of there.

02:17:35.000 It's just going to create more action, more excitement to the fight.

02:17:38.000 That's the one thing that I liked about Strikeforce when we were fighting for Strikeforce was that we didn't allow elbows on the ground.

02:17:44.000 And people like him.

02:17:45.000 The reason I didn't like him is at the time, Sean Shirk was the champ, and there wasn't a lot of movement.

02:17:51.000 It was like here, and he was so small.

02:17:53.000 It was like, bam, bam, cut guys, and the fight was stopped, or it just got all bloody.

02:17:57.000 And for the actual fan at home watching the fight, not all fans like to watch blood.

02:18:01.000 Right.

02:18:02.000 You know?

02:18:02.000 And so it's like, I want to see a good fight.

02:18:05.000 I want to see guys getting starched and knocked out.

02:18:07.000 Right. 0.59

02:18:07.000 But I want to see a good fight. 0.59

02:18:08.000 And so I felt like when Strikeforce didn't have elbows, you posture up, it creates more space.

02:18:14.000 It creates more space.

02:18:15.000 Let's the Jiu-Jitsu guy do his moves as well as try to get back to the feet.

02:18:18.000 You know?

02:18:19.000 Or I can back out and try to go big ground and pound.

02:18:21.000 There's a lot of things that you can...

02:18:22.000 A lot of different variations.

02:18:24.000 I really think...

02:18:24.000 Why would you like knees on the ground but not elbows?

02:18:26.000 Because you got...

02:18:27.000 So you think that that would be better?

02:18:28.000 I don't want a fight to be stopped by a cut.

02:18:30.000 But you get a lot of cuts if someone's in a north-south position and you're kneeing someone in the face, they'll be out.

02:18:36.000 They'll be knocked out.

02:18:37.000 That'd be different than a cut.

02:18:38.000 That's true.

02:18:38.000 Yeah, I want to see guys, like I said, I want to see fights end.

02:18:42.000 I want to see them end by a knockout.

02:18:44.000 I mean, that's what people pay to see.

02:18:45.000 I would like them to be able to use everything.

02:18:46.000 Yes.

02:18:47.000 I think knees to the ground, but also elbows.

02:18:49.000 I think everything.

02:18:50.000 Got it.

02:18:51.000 Yeah, I just think that, especially the knee to the ground, like, it shouldn't be okay that you shoot a takedown and then you're safe.

02:18:59.000 Yeah.

02:19:00.000 Because you're on all fours.

02:19:02.000 That seems crazy to me.

02:19:03.000 You're not safe. 0.99

02:19:04.000 It should be that the wrestler's forced to roll to their back to avoid the knee, to get the fuck away. 0.98

02:19:10.000 It doesn't make any sense that in the center of the octagon, you wouldn't be able to hold on and knee someone in the head. 0.85

02:19:16.000 Look, I'm John Fitch, one of my best friends, okay?

02:19:20.000 But to watch how he fought Rory McDonald, like, for the fans' sake, it's not a fun fight to watch.

02:19:26.000 Like, you grab the leg, and the guy, like, pushes out and limp legs out, and then you chase him on your hands and knees, and you're fishing for the legs.

02:19:33.000 It's just not a fun fight. 0.96

02:19:34.000 And also, too, it makes us look like we don't know what the fuck we're doing. 0.98

02:19:38.000 Right. 0.97

02:19:38.000 You know, and it's like, ah, dude, John, you're way better than that. 0.97

02:19:40.000 But at the time, you also don't want to stand with Rory McDonald.

02:19:43.000 Right.

02:19:43.000 And that all changes if you allow knees to the ground.

02:19:45.000 Yes, it does.

02:19:46.000 The whole position, the whole exchange changes.

02:19:48.000 Yep, you're going to see them start sprawling, knee in the head, sprawling.

02:19:51.000 And then the other thing as well, look, if the wrestler is a good, obviously there are a lot of good wrestlers in the sport, but let's just say the knee misses and he's able to grab the leg.

02:19:59.000 Now he can get the takedown.

02:20:01.000 So there's benefits on both sides.

02:20:02.000 If the guy knees and it lands, the guy can get knocked out. 0.99

02:20:05.000 But if he knees and he misses and I grab a leg and I drive into you and take you down, now I'm on top fucking you up. 1.00

02:20:09.000 So there's different ways of looking at it. 0.99

02:20:11.000 Like when you sprawl, you want to get your hips back, get your legs back.

02:20:13.000 So when that happens, you've taken yourself out of the equation of really engaging in action.

02:20:18.000 Once you try to knee me in the head, now you're engaging back into the action where I can grab you and take you down.

02:20:24.000 Dude, I don't even think there should be a cage.

02:20:26.000 How about that?

02:20:27.000 I think that's the problem.

02:20:28.000 I think he's doing a giant basketball court-sized matted area.

02:20:33.000 You remember there was those, like, Kumite-style fights where they had the mats that were kind of...

02:20:38.000 Frank Shamrock had a thing.

02:20:39.000 Yeah, he had that.

02:20:40.000 And then somebody else tried doing it as well.

02:20:42.000 Well, the World Combat League with Chuck Norris had a version of it.

02:20:45.000 And then the...

02:20:47.000 What do they call it? 1.00

02:20:48.000 The fucking... 1.00

02:20:49.000 Myrowitz. 1.00

02:20:50.000 The guy who started the UFC. Bob Myrowitz.

02:20:53.000 Yeah.

02:20:53.000 Myrowitz.

02:20:54.000 What is it?

02:20:55.000 The...

02:20:55.000 Something Pit?

02:20:57.000 Yuba? 1.00

02:20:58.000 Fucking weird name. 1.00

02:21:00.000 He came up with some weird name for the pit. 1.00

02:21:02.000 Yeah.

02:21:04.000 Maybe it was like something, pit fighting championships, and it was curved.

02:21:07.000 The whole thing was curved.

02:21:09.000 Like that.

02:21:09.000 I mean, like, I don't know, because, like, some guys kind of run a lot as it is.

02:21:15.000 Oh, they run like crazy.

02:21:17.000 What is this?

02:21:19.000 Oh, that's right.

02:21:21.000 Boss Rutten's...

02:21:22.000 Has an interesting thing.

02:21:24.000 Have you seen this?

02:21:24.000 No.

02:21:25.000 World Karate Combat League or whatever the fuck it's called. 0.95

02:21:29.000 What is it called? 0.94

02:21:29.000 Karate Combat. 0.94

02:21:30.000 Just called Karate Combat.

02:21:31.000 Yeah, they have these karate fights and they fight inside this area, but they have this elevated outside.

02:21:38.000 But this is just stand-up, right?

02:21:40.000 Isn't it?

02:21:41.000 I believe so, yeah. 0.98

02:21:42.000 Yeah, but it's interesting, too, because they're wearing pants, but they're throwing low kicks and shit, and they have black belts on. 0.97

02:21:48.000 It's like, mm, alright. 0.96

02:21:50.000 I wonder where this is at.

02:21:51.000 This looks like it's somewhere in L.A. I don't know.

02:21:54.000 Boss is still doing commentary on that.

02:21:56.000 They're morphing that, changing it.

02:21:57.000 They're trying to evolve it.

02:21:59.000 It's in Athens, Greece, actually.

02:22:00.000 That one is?

02:22:01.000 Yeah.

02:22:02.000 Okay, why not just do Muay Thai?

02:22:04.000 What's your take on the bare knuckle? 0.98

02:22:06.000 Boy, I thought it was a great fucking idea until I watched Chris Lieben. 0.98

02:22:10.000 When Chris Lieben came back and his face was busted open, I was like, whoa, that is a big cut. 0.99

02:22:14.000 Chris Lieben looked like he got hit with an axe.

02:22:17.000 I think it causes a lot of cuts, man.

02:22:20.000 It's gonna break a lot of hands, too.

02:22:21.000 Yeah, it's gonna definitely break a lot of hands.

02:22:24.000 Man, it depends. 0.99

02:22:26.000 If you like having vaginas on your forehead, you know, that's kind of what the look is. 1.00

02:22:29.000 You're going for the look there. 0.99

02:22:31.000 It's also like a way where you see guys who really should be done.

02:22:36.000 They get a couple more fights in there.

02:22:38.000 Yeah, and they're paying pretty well, from what I understand.

02:22:40.000 Is it?

02:22:40.000 Yeah.

02:22:41.000 I mean, like for some of the guys, like I said, they're trying to supplement the income they were making before.

02:22:46.000 But if they can take half and still make money...

02:22:50.000 For fights that don't go as long.

02:22:52.000 Hector Lombard's doing it.

02:22:53.000 Yeah.

02:22:53.000 I mean, Gonzaga did it, right?

02:22:55.000 Against Bigfoot and those guys.

02:22:57.000 Yeah, I mean, Levin's doing it.

02:22:58.000 Dakota Meyer's... 1.00

02:22:59.000 No, Dakota Cochran, rather.

02:23:01.000 Dakota Meyer.

02:23:02.000 Sorry, Dakota.

02:23:03.000 UFC vet Tiago Alves inks new contract with Bare Knuckle Fighters.

02:23:11.000 I think it's good, but here's the thing.

02:23:13.000 The guys, they don't know the rules.

02:23:16.000 The rules are you can grab the head, clench and dirty box. 1.00

02:23:18.000 You can punch the body. 0.96

02:23:20.000 They're taking MMA. And you're taking MMA guys, though, and making them... 0.80

02:23:25.000 They're not shaping their style around the bare-knuckle rules that they have.

02:23:30.000 You can clinch and grab the head and control and uppercut and those kind of things.

02:23:35.000 And if they did that, I think it'd be more of a real bare-knuckle, kind of gypsy-style boxing. 0.99

02:23:41.000 Well, Dan Henderson is going to do it.

02:23:43.000 Oh, God.

02:23:44.000 Yeah.

02:23:44.000 Dan Henderson's side up for it.

02:23:46.000 Really?

02:23:46.000 I was just with Dan in Hawaii for the Bellator show there, and...

02:23:52.000 I didn't say anything about it.

02:23:53.000 We were also at karaoke at 3 in the morning.

02:23:57.000 How many different bare-knuckle organizations are there?

02:24:01.000 There's at least two, right?

02:24:02.000 I think there's two.

02:24:04.000 See if you find the Dan Henderson fight, if he's definitely going through with that.

02:24:09.000 But I'm pretty sure they were getting him.

02:24:12.000 Maybe they're trying to get him to fight Lombard.

02:24:14.000 But they have Lombard, they have him.

02:24:17.000 Gonzaga, I don't know if he's going to keep doing it.

02:24:19.000 Chris Lieben.

02:24:21.000 Who else?

02:24:23.000 Artem Lobov.

02:24:24.000 Something Knight, right?

02:24:25.000 And then Lobov.

02:24:25.000 Jason Knight.

02:24:26.000 Jason Knight.

02:24:27.000 Are they fighting again?

02:24:28.000 Jason Knight's face was falling off his last fight, too.

02:24:30.000 Same thing.

02:24:31.000 What they look like, honestly, when I see pitch, when they're going to all look like, if you pull up a picture of hockey players before they wear masks, that's what they're going to look like.

02:24:39.000 Yeah.

02:24:39.000 And it's not attractive.

02:24:41.000 It's not.

02:24:41.000 It's not attractive.

02:24:42.000 And I'm just thinking to myself, no teeth.

02:24:44.000 Sure, you got mouthpieces, but are you wearing a top and bottom mouthpiece?

02:24:50.000 It just depends, man.

02:24:51.000 I don't...

02:24:52.000 For me, once I realized I wasn't going to be the best and I couldn't win a title, for me, I just had to go on.

02:24:59.000 Now, I'm not knocking the people that they want to keep doing it because they want to make money.

02:25:03.000 If you want to do it to make money, just do it.

02:25:05.000 Have at it.

02:25:06.000 This is your gig, man.

02:25:08.000 This is your opportunity to make as much money as you possibly can.

02:25:12.000 For me, I felt like my whole career, I was one of the best guys in my division.

02:25:19.000 If I couldn't be the best, then I didn't want to do it anymore.

02:25:22.000 That makes sense.

02:25:24.000 I appreciate your intelligence and your recognizing the landscape.

02:25:28.000 Some guys, they just want to keep going and also it's hard when you don't have paydays.

02:25:32.000 You've managed to figure out a way to keep income coming in through a bunch of different venues.

02:25:38.000 Some guys don't figure that out and then they get stuck and then they have to make a desperate ploy.

02:25:44.000 Well, if you have a family, you have to think about what's after.

02:25:48.000 And you've got to find ways to...

02:25:51.000 And you also got to have someone that's there with you and is willing to be with you through it all, not just through you when you were making all the money.

02:25:59.000 That's another thing.

02:26:01.000 I think a lot of fighters attach themselves to the wrong spouse. 1.00

02:26:06.000 Oh, yeah.

02:26:07.000 Or they want to live that lifestyle at the time, whether it's beach parties or pool parties in Vegas or whatever it is.

02:26:14.000 But when that's done or when you're not the selfie king anymore with all the fans at the pool parties, What happens when you're actually calling to try and make reservations to get a table versus them calling you and saying, hey, we have a table here for you at the pool.

02:26:27.000 Things change, man, and you have to remember that.

02:26:30.000 And so when that changes, what are you going to do after that?

02:26:33.000 And it's not going to always be glamorous.

02:26:36.000 I think you've just got to come to reality that there's a ton of life after fighting.

02:26:42.000 And this is all sports.

02:26:44.000 Yeah.

02:26:46.000 You're only...

02:26:47.000 Let's just say you play... 1.00

02:26:48.000 Not all of us are fucking Tom Brady. 0.99

02:26:50.000 Play until you're 55, you know? 1.00

02:26:51.000 Crazy. 0.75

02:26:52.000 But it's nuts.

02:26:53.000 But you have a whole other life after.

02:26:57.000 Let's just say you live to be 80. Yes.

02:26:59.000 You have a whole other life. 1.00

02:27:01.000 This is just the fucking beginning. 0.99

02:27:03.000 I was listening to Gary V. What's his name? 0.99

02:27:07.000 Vanderchuk?

02:27:07.000 Vanderchuk, yeah.

02:27:08.000 And for everyone that said...

02:27:11.000 Even for moments for myself, I was like...

02:27:13.000 Man, at 40 years old, what are you going to do?

02:27:16.000 What can you really get yourself into?

02:27:18.000 Go become a cop, a firefighter. 1.00

02:27:21.000 But it's just the fucking beginning. 1.00

02:27:23.000 It's just the beginning. 0.99

02:27:25.000 I mean, I got really good at fighting in a couple years.

02:27:27.000 You can be really good at something else in one or two years. 0.99

02:27:30.000 And just fucking make a ton of money.

02:27:33.000 It's almost like the organization should maybe have some sort of seminars for fighters to try to give them some sort of advice or give them some framework to think about how to pursue your life after fighting. 0.96

02:27:44.000 Yeah, I've talked to Chael about this a couple times.

02:27:48.000 I said, man, with Brendan, you know, with Chael, you guys, those two guys, I feel like people can say what they want about Brendan and Chael, but what they've done is they've done things to benefit themselves in a very positive light.

02:28:03.000 And I love being around people like that because even...

02:28:06.000 In just a casual conversation, you can learn a lot from them.

02:28:10.000 And I have had this...

02:28:12.000 Even with Big John, when he left being a ref to become an analyst, and it's just like all the...

02:28:18.000 Excuse me.

02:28:19.000 All the stories that I've heard from him while doing our show, it's just...

02:28:24.000 It's so much knowledge that he has from the sport, period.

02:28:27.000 From the way it was started, the way he got brought into it, to the fights that he's called and how it all went down.

02:28:33.000 And I know there's probably two sides to every story, but it's like at least you get to hear certain parts of what happened throughout the sport.

02:28:42.000 And I love hearing, I love absorbing all that.

02:28:45.000 And it's great to be surrounded by people like that.

02:28:49.000 Yeah, it would be nice if there was a clear path that fighters could take.

02:28:54.000 Again, it is nice that Bellator and the UFC are using fighters for analyst roles and things like that.

02:29:01.000 But yeah, fighters have to approach it like there's a whole new world that you're entering into.

02:29:06.000 Approach it the same way you approach fighting.

02:29:08.000 Throw your everything into it if you want to be successful.

02:29:11.000 It's funny you say that because I've worked with a lot of people doing analyst stuff and You already know what I'm going to say.

02:29:23.000 You already know.

02:29:24.000 It's not for everybody.

02:29:24.000 I don't even got to say it.

02:29:26.000 It's not for everybody.

02:29:27.000 The bottom line is, is guys are going to show up sometimes and be like, yeah, I know what I'm doing.

02:29:31.000 Yeah.

02:29:31.000 And it's like, you got to be a student of the game.

02:29:35.000 You really do.

02:29:36.000 That's where DC really excels.

02:29:38.000 Yeah.

02:29:38.000 DC's awesome at that.

02:29:40.000 So is Dominic Cruz.

02:29:41.000 Dominic Cruz is awesome at that.

02:29:43.000 They excel.

02:29:44.000 You have to...

02:29:45.000 So, like with DC, you brought up DC. What D has is he has a guy that does research for him on the backside.

02:29:52.000 And Bellator does that.

02:29:53.000 They have a guy for us as well.

02:29:54.000 And he gets us all the stuff for the prelim fighters.

02:29:57.000 But you've got to read it all.

02:29:58.000 Yeah.

02:29:59.000 You've got to know who these guys are.

02:30:01.000 You've got to talk about them.

02:30:02.000 You've got to be educated when you talk to them.

02:30:04.000 You've got to remember, you're trying to make it about them, not about you.

02:30:08.000 That's one.

02:30:08.000 Two is you're trying to make them the most dynamic, the best fighter that's ever stopped in the cage, even though they're on the prelims of the prelims.

02:30:17.000 It doesn't matter.

02:30:18.000 That guy is the future champion.

02:30:20.000 So you have to find ways To highlight all the things that they do well and make them out to be like they are the best.

02:30:27.000 And they potentially could be the best, just not found yet.

02:30:29.000 When did you start doing your podcast?

02:30:32.000 So I started doing it about three years ago.

02:30:34.000 But I didn't start with John until about six months ago.

02:30:37.000 Oh, interesting.

02:30:37.000 So you did it up just by yourself?

02:30:39.000 Yeah, so I had me and there was another guy.

02:30:40.000 His name was Sammy.

02:30:41.000 The two of us did one called Sammy and the Punk.

02:30:43.000 And I was doing that with him.

02:30:45.000 And then...

02:30:47.000 I started doing one with John, and then Sammy and I kind of, Sammy was basically doing some stuff with his wife and family and stuff, so we just kind of decided to part ways, and I started working, started filming more with John.

02:30:56.000 And when you guys first started, did you always do it?

02:30:59.000 You said you're doing it through FaceTime, right?

02:31:02.000 So with John, yeah.

02:31:03.000 So I FaceTimed John in, and we talked through FaceTime.

02:31:07.000 How do you film it through FaceTime?

02:31:10.000 Yes, yep.

02:31:11.000 That's crazy.

02:31:11.000 Because it's so much better than, have you seen how they do it, Jamie?

02:31:15.000 It's so much better than Skype.

02:31:16.000 When we did one with Edward Snowden, we did it through Google Hangouts, and there's a weird delay.

02:31:23.000 Like, they talk, and then there's this weird delay, and then you don't want to talk over them.

02:31:26.000 So it's awkward.

02:31:28.000 Like, person-to-person is the best.

02:31:29.000 You're right there, you see each other. 0.84

02:31:31.000 But FaceTime's fucking pretty close. 0.84

02:31:34.000 No, there's no delay. 0.97

02:31:36.000 John just calls in, and then we record it through, I believe we have an app, I think it's called Slingshot or something like that.

02:31:43.000 He was halfway across the world, too.

02:31:45.000 That's true.

02:31:46.000 Allegedly, we don't even know.

02:31:47.000 He might have been next door.

02:31:50.000 We don't know where he is, really.

02:31:51.000 He's probably in your bathroom in the stall.

02:31:53.000 Yeah, he's saying he's in Russia. 1.00

02:31:54.000 He's fucking crazy, man. 1.00

02:31:55.000 Who knows? 1.00

02:31:56.000 Yeah, so we just FaceTime him in, and then my producer, we call him Podcast Dave, so he does...

02:32:04.000 He basically just like, he screenshots it and just saves it and then John also does it on his side and he sends him the video and then we record the audio and then John records the audio so he syncs up the audio to both so it matches.

02:32:15.000 Oh, that's cool.

02:32:15.000 So we do both so there is no delay.

02:32:17.000 Oh, that's excellent.

02:32:19.000 That's excellent.

02:32:20.000 It's nice to have a producer.

02:32:21.000 I gotta tell you, I tried doing like the first 10 shows with no producer.

02:32:25.000 The visuals of the Snowden podcast had no delay.

02:32:27.000 But while you were recording it, there was.

02:32:29.000 Yes.

02:32:29.000 I had to go back and fix it.

02:32:31.000 Yeah.

02:32:31.000 Shout out to Jamie.

02:32:32.000 I was gonna say.

02:32:34.000 You gotta have a producer.

02:32:35.000 I was telling him before you walked in, I said, hey, don't be surprised if I turn to you just because I want to be one of those other, like some of the other guests that just turn and go, hey, Jamie, pull this up.

02:32:44.000 Like, Yeah, it's a fun thing to say.

02:32:48.000 He goes, yeah, but you know what?

02:32:50.000 There's moments to do it, though.

02:32:51.000 They just never do it at the right time.

02:32:53.000 Dude, I did a Legion of Skanks podcast, me and Tony Hinchcliffe and the Legion of Skanks guys, and Jamie wasn't there. 0.92

02:33:00.000 And there was some shit I was trying to look up. 0.58

02:33:03.000 I was like, hey, find out if that's true. 0.99

02:33:05.000 I'm like, fuck, where's Jamie? 0.96

02:33:07.000 And then those guys are like, how do you Google it? 0.99

02:33:11.000 It just wasn't the same.

02:33:12.000 It's not.

02:33:13.000 I swear, I've tried a couple when Podcast Dave wasn't there and Big John and I were trying to film.

02:33:19.000 I was trying to set everything up.

02:33:20.000 I'm like, where are all these cords going?

02:33:22.000 What buttons do I push?

02:33:25.000 And then so I FaceTimed him and he's like walking me through how to set it all up. 0.95

02:33:29.000 And then the fucking audio didn't record and we filmed for two hours that day. 0.96

02:33:33.000 And I was like... 0.99

02:33:35.000 I just told Dave, I was like, hey, I'm not fucking ever filming again without you.

02:33:39.000 Like when you said you had to do the play-by-play? 0.87

02:33:42.000 Yes, with Barone. 0.99

02:33:43.000 And you were like, I guess you told Goldie, you're like, I'm never doing this fucking thing again. 0.96

02:33:48.000 Yeah, the way you guys have it set up, it's very nice. 0.97

02:33:51.000 I like it a lot.

02:33:52.000 Yeah, he's right outside of Nashville or Knoxville, I believe.

02:33:55.000 So he's over there.

02:33:56.000 He moved out there now.

02:33:57.000 He moved out of Vegas and lives over there.

02:33:59.000 He's in Tennessee?

02:34:00.000 Yeah, he's in Tennessee. 0.99

02:34:01.000 He fucking loves it. 0.99

02:34:03.000 He was telling me how much he loves Vegas. 1.00

02:34:04.000 No, he loves it there. 1.00

02:34:05.000 He lives right on the fucking lake, man. 0.99

02:34:07.000 But what made him move to Tennessee? 1.00

02:34:08.000 His wife.

02:34:10.000 I mean, they found a beautiful ranch.

02:34:12.000 I want to say his daughter, I think, is out there now, or living out there.

02:34:16.000 And she was in the military, and so she's out there.

02:34:19.000 But he's been an amazing man.

02:34:22.000 He's been amazing.

02:34:22.000 He's a great guy.

02:34:23.000 I mean, you want to talk about a pioneer. 0.99

02:34:24.000 He was there from the fucking jump. 0.99

02:34:26.000 So, that's the thing. 0.99

02:34:27.000 When him and I... It's so funny because my last fight was against Petriki and I got drop of the headbutt.

02:34:32.000 John was reffing.

02:34:33.000 And he wasn't in the right position to see it.

02:34:37.000 So then I got hit right after that and got knocked out.

02:34:40.000 So he...

02:34:41.000 I basically went to, what?

02:34:44.000 California State Athletic Commission and was trying to argue it was no contest that, you know...

02:34:49.000 They said it was a punch and it was a headbutt.

02:34:51.000 Anyways, so I'm just grilling John in the process of fighting this because they have John on speakerphone.

02:34:58.000 I'm telling him, John, did you see it?

02:35:00.000 John, did you do this?

02:35:01.000 He's texting me, Josh, I'm on your side, man.

02:35:05.000 Stop yelling at me right now in front of everybody!

02:35:08.000 And I was giving it to him.

02:35:09.000 But then we both started working for Bellator.

02:35:11.000 And I got to tell you, man, we hit it off.

02:35:14.000 We hit it off.

02:35:14.000 And it's just one of those things.

02:35:15.000 We would find ourselves at the bar having a drink before the show or after the show or during the week of the fight.

02:35:22.000 And it was like 8 o'clock, 9 o'clock.

02:35:24.000 And the next thing you know, it's 2 in the morning.

02:35:25.000 It's just the two of us.

02:35:26.000 Everyone else is gone and we're just talking about fights, man.

02:35:28.000 Just talking about guys we'd like to see fight, guys that did fight, and how the fight went.

02:35:33.000 And And just everything.

02:35:34.000 Talking about the beginning of UFC, talking about how he roughed certain fights in Japan, and just everything.

02:35:40.000 And just like I said, it's nice.

02:35:41.000 I enjoy being around people that are like a walking book of knowledge.

02:35:47.000 So it was basically organic.

02:35:48.000 You guys were just doing this all the time. 0.99

02:35:50.000 And you're like, fuck, man, we should record this. 0.99

02:35:51.000 Yep, let's do it. 0.99

02:35:52.000 And then, you know, he used to have a podcast.

02:35:54.000 And so his podcast had like 100 or 150,000 subscribers.

02:35:58.000 And I guess he had like a...

02:35:59.000 He said something on it one day and I guess Dana told him, hey, you got to get rid of the podcast or we can't use you anymore.

02:36:04.000 Really?

02:36:04.000 And so he just was like...

02:36:05.000 What did he say? 1.00

02:36:06.000 Fuck. 1.00

02:36:07.000 He fought it a little bit, and then they got back on him, and he deleted it. 1.00

02:36:11.000 Wow.

02:36:11.000 Done.

02:36:12.000 I'm like, dude.

02:36:12.000 You gotta get rid of the podcast.

02:36:14.000 Fuck! 1.00

02:36:15.000 Yeah, I was like, man. 1.00

02:36:17.000 And that was, yeah.

02:36:18.000 So, that's tough.

02:36:20.000 Well, that's another argument to go to Bellator, right?

02:36:22.000 Yeah, I mean, we've been doing it now.

02:36:24.000 So, I was at about 7,000 when I started doing it with him six months ago, and now I think we're pushing 16,000 subscribers.

02:36:31.000 It's not a lot, but...

02:36:32.000 I'm kind of surprised Colby Covington doesn't have a podcast.

02:36:34.000 Yeah.

02:36:35.000 Right? 0.99

02:36:36.000 How the fuck does he not have one? 0.99

02:36:38.000 But if it's your stick, do you want to live that stick on air? 0.99

02:36:41.000 Then all of a sudden you become Andrew Dice Clay.

02:36:44.000 Or maybe he gets even more popular.

02:36:47.000 Yeah. 0.99

02:36:48.000 I mean, look, he's fucking good at it, man. 0.99

02:36:51.000 Kobe's goddamn good at it. 0.99

02:36:52.000 Let's be real. 0.99

02:36:53.000 Do you know him in person?

02:36:54.000 No, I do not know him. 0.98

02:36:55.000 Fucking nice guy. 0.99

02:36:56.000 Is he? 1.00

02:36:56.000 Smart as shit. 1.00

02:36:57.000 Nice guy. 1.00

02:36:58.000 Works like a demon. 1.00

02:37:00.000 I mean, you don't have that kind of fucking cardio if you're lazy. 0.98

02:37:03.000 I watched his one with Tommy Lauren because Tommy Lauren actually reached out to me and she wanted me to be on the show this week. 0.98

02:37:09.000 And then this whole thing with the impeachment thing, she's like, I can't.

02:37:12.000 You mean Candace Owens?

02:37:13.000 No, I have not met her.

02:37:15.000 No, but it was Tommy Lauren he did a podcast with?

02:37:17.000 I thought he did a podcast with Candace Owens.

02:37:20.000 No, he did one with Tommy Lauren.

02:37:21.000 Oh.

02:37:22.000 Yeah, he did one with Tommy Lauren.

02:37:23.000 When he talks about his whole persona, how he created his persona and everything like that.

02:37:28.000 No, Tommy Lauren was asking about... 0.99

02:37:31.000 Shit, I believe it was... 1.00

02:37:34.000 Was it Tommy Lauren? 0.99

02:37:35.000 Did he do more than one podcast?

02:37:38.000 No, I don't know if it was a podcast.

02:37:39.000 It was like on a show, like a TV. Yeah.

02:37:41.000 I think she did like a 30 minute or an hour long whatever with him.

02:37:43.000 But she was mainly asking about Trump, like what do you like about him, what do you support about him, what do you this, what do you that.

02:37:48.000 There wasn't a whole lot of the persona talk going on.

02:37:50.000 Dude, those people who love Trump, they love when someone else loves Trump.

02:37:53.000 And right now, I mean, if he wants to start a podcast, this would be the time for him to do it.

02:37:57.000 Yeah.

02:37:57.000 I mean...

02:37:58.000 That's kind of his shtick right now, you know?

02:38:00.000 No, you know who else could have a podcast?

02:38:02.000 Maz Vidal.

02:38:03.000 Maz Vidal could have a podcast. 1.00

02:38:05.000 He's been fucking every day in a fucking Versace robe, just chest out, you know? 1.00

02:38:10.000 He's got to get the gold medallion, just fucking lay back, you know? 1.00

02:38:13.000 I could just see it. 1.00

02:38:14.000 If I was the man who made the fucking calls... 0.99

02:38:18.000 I know they want to do him versus Khabib versus Conor, but Masvidal versus Conor would be fucking giant. 0.99

02:38:27.000 When they had all the fighters and they put a camera on them at the event, when they put that camera on Masvidal, the pop from the audience was fucking bonkers. 0.93

02:38:34.000 He got the biggest pop of the night. 0.94

02:38:36.000 I don't doubt it.

02:38:37.000 I don't doubt it at all.

02:38:37.000 He's a superstar right now.

02:38:39.000 What people don't realize, when he fought KJ Nunes in Strikeforce, it was like a coming out party for him. 0.97

02:38:46.000 He made KJ look like he had no idea what the fuck he was doing on the feet. 0.91

02:38:50.000 I mean, if you look at the after pictures of KJ Nunes, his face was, he looked like the elephant man. 1.00

02:38:56.000 He fucked him up, man. 1.00

02:38:57.000 He fucked him up. 1.00

02:38:57.000 And just that moment on, he just progressively got better. 1.00

02:39:00.000 Sure, he had some ups and downs, but he never turns down fights.

02:39:03.000 He should have never fought Damian Maia.

02:39:05.000 If you're a stand-up guy with good wrestling, takedown defense, he probably shouldn't have fought him.

02:39:10.000 He should have been like, I don't want to fight that guy.

02:39:13.000 But he didn't.

02:39:14.000 He fought the guy.

02:39:15.000 Good fight.

02:39:16.000 He just didn't get the win. 0.99

02:39:18.000 But then he's just fucking terror, man. 0.99

02:39:20.000 Just terror. 0.99

02:39:21.000 He's always been good.

02:39:23.000 Always.

02:39:23.000 The weight cut, I think, killed him a little bit when he was trying to get down to 55 because he is a big guy.

02:39:28.000 Him and Conor is the fight to make.

02:39:29.000 If I'm at home, I haven't seen enough of Conor to show that he belongs in a cage with Khabib yet. 1.00

02:39:36.000 But him and Masvidal, if he starches or beats Masvidal, That would be the next fight, it would be Khabib and him.

02:39:42.000 The real question, if he wants to make it to 55 again, some guys, especially when they get into their 30s, they just do better when they're not cutting as much weight.

02:39:53.000 And Conor's a thick dude.

02:39:54.000 He's probably walking around $1.85 or something like that.

02:39:57.000 And for him to get down to 70 is not that hard.

02:40:00.000 For him to get down to 55 is a long, laborious process.

02:40:03.000 Yeah, Dana said that he only walks around 170. Really?

02:40:06.000 Yeah, he said by the time he fights tonight, I was watching some of the press or stuff, he's like, he'd probably be 167. I'm 195 and I stand next to Connor.

02:40:17.000 He does not look 170. Yeah.

02:40:19.000 He looks thick.

02:40:20.000 Yeah.

02:40:21.000 He looks thick.

02:40:21.000 I think he looked like he cut to make 172. When he got on a scale, he was wearing a bunch of different layers.

02:40:31.000 It was standard shit. 1.00

02:40:33.000 It was standard shit when someone's cutting. 1.00

02:40:36.000 It wasn't like a guy just shows up. 1.00

02:40:38.000 Remember when Eve used to weigh in and bring a fucking cheeseburger? 1.00

02:40:40.000 Yeah. 0.99

02:40:41.000 Yeah, like, Eve didn't really cut.

02:40:43.000 No.

02:40:43.000 You know, there's a lot of guys, like Frankie Edgar, perfect example.

02:40:46.000 Yeah. 0.99

02:40:46.000 When he was a 55-pound champ, he didn't cut shit. 0.99

02:40:49.000 No, he was eating. 1.00

02:40:50.000 Yeah.

02:40:50.000 You know, when Frank Shamrock fought Tito Ortiz, he weighed in with quarters in his pocket.

02:40:53.000 Yeah.

02:40:54.000 You know, I guess the commission said, like, you guys have to be within 10 pounds.

02:40:59.000 Wow.

02:40:59.000 So Frank had to put quarters in his pocket so he could fight Tito.

02:41:02.000 Otherwise, the commission wasn't going to allow it.

02:41:03.000 That's funny.

02:41:04.000 So that was hilarious.

02:41:05.000 No, but there's been a lot of guys that, you know, that just don't feel the need to cut weight.

02:41:09.000 You know, Khabib's got his...

02:41:11.000 When they go up, a lot of times guys just have better performances.

02:41:15.000 Khabib's had some serious problems making 55. Yeah, he has.

02:41:19.000 I honestly believe...

02:41:20.000 I don't think he will.

02:41:22.000 I would like to see...

02:41:23.000 The fight to me...

02:41:24.000 These are my dream fights.

02:41:27.000 I would like to see Patricio and Volkanovski or Patricio and Max.

02:41:32.000 I would love to see that fight.

02:41:33.000 I would love to see that fight too.

02:41:34.000 I would love to see GSP and Khabib.

02:41:36.000 That to me is the fight.

02:41:38.000 The biggest fight I think that blows everything away.

02:41:40.000 That's a big fight.

02:41:41.000 That's a huge fight.

02:41:42.000 You know, Masvidal and Conor?

02:41:44.000 Huge fight.

02:41:45.000 These are fights that are...

02:41:48.000 How about GSP and Conor?

02:41:49.000 GSP and Conor as well.

02:41:52.000 Here's the thing.

02:41:53.000 That fight should have been made before he lost to Khabib.

02:41:56.000 I'm surprised that they didn't do that.

02:41:59.000 Yeah.

02:41:59.000 I'm so surprised.

02:42:01.000 Here's the other thing, though.

02:42:02.000 It kind of, I think, is hindering, and you brought me up on this before, because I had heard through a lot of people in the UFC that they were talking and negotiating, trying to think about ways to bring in 165. Yes.

02:42:13.000 And you have too many tweeners, and why do we have a 15-pound gap for the 55 with all the talent that is there?

02:42:20.000 Preach!

02:42:20.000 Let's do it.

02:42:21.000 Preach it.

02:42:22.000 Let's do it, man.

02:42:23.000 Let's do 55, 65, 75. Move those guys to 75. Some of those guys, like Usman, could use a little bit of that.

02:42:30.000 Oh, yeah.

02:42:31.000 He's so big.

02:42:32.000 And then you'll have guys.

02:42:34.000 I don't know how big Colby is, but Colby to maybe 65 or Colby to 75. He could do 75. He's a big guy, too.

02:42:41.000 Lima's enormous, dude.

02:42:42.000 Enormous.

02:42:43.000 Enormous.

02:42:43.000 What does he walk around at?

02:42:45.000 Gotta be 202, maybe 205. Yeah.

02:42:49.000 He's a big fella.

02:42:49.000 He's a big guy.

02:42:51.000 And no fat.

02:42:52.000 None.

02:42:52.000 None at all.

02:42:53.000 I saw a picture.

02:42:53.000 He's in somewhere on an island right now, but he just looks shredded right now.

02:42:58.000 I'm like, he's not even in a fight camp.

02:42:59.000 What is next for him?

02:43:01.000 I think they're waiting to see what's going to go on.

02:43:06.000 From what I understand, they're not going to do the MVP rematch right away.

02:43:09.000 MVP's going to have to fight someone of significance. 0.98

02:43:13.000 Yeah, he got some shit for his last opponent, right? 0.98

02:43:16.000 Yeah, but look, his last two opponents... 0.99

02:43:18.000 The guy that he fought in Japan, it was a last minute replacement because Benson Henderson got hurt.

02:43:24.000 So when Ben got taken off the card against Chandler, Japan was like, look, we need somebody else to step up. 0.78

02:43:30.000 We need another talented guy on there because now you're supplementing him with somebody else.

02:43:34.000 Benson, we need another big name.

02:43:35.000 So they brought in MVP and fought one of the Japanese guys. 0.90

02:43:39.000 And he stepped up on short notice to take that fight.

02:43:42.000 I tip my hat to him.

02:43:43.000 And he still made him look bad, finished him out.

02:43:46.000 The couple fights before that, look, these guys are asking for it, but his fight in Italy, that guy was a last minute replacement also, and that guy was 13-1.

02:44:02.000 He's just so awkward.

02:44:03.000 His style is so difficult to deal with.

02:44:06.000 Hands down low and that karate blitz style.

02:44:09.000 Did you ever see when he fought Raymond Daniels in point fighting?

02:44:12.000 No, I did not.

02:44:13.000 I saw him fight Alfie Davis.

02:44:14.000 That was a good fight, too.

02:44:16.000 There's something to that point-fighting style that really can apply to MMA if they learn all the other stuff.

02:44:23.000 Because that ability to blitz, to jump in and jump out and not get hit. 0.97

02:44:27.000 And there's a lot of those guys that are fucking masters at that. 0.91

02:44:30.000 That's my next dream fight. 0.98

02:44:32.000 Let's see those guys fight in MMA. Like, you have Raymond Daniels and you have MVP. I mean...

02:44:36.000 I don't know if Raymond Daniels is even interested in MMA. I don't know if he does any...

02:44:41.000 He's fighting this weekend.

02:44:43.000 Raymond Daniels fighting MMA? He's fighting MMA. Has he fought MMA before?

02:44:47.000 Jamie, I'm going to call on you right now.

02:44:48.000 I'm going to call on you right now, buddy.

02:44:49.000 He was on ESPN for one of the best knockouts last year in history.

02:44:53.000 In MMA? Yeah, he did a 920 spin, came back through with a punch and dropped the guy.

02:44:56.000 I called the fight.

02:44:57.000 I didn't even know if that was MMA. That was him.

02:44:59.000 I called the fight and it was in Birmingham.

02:45:02.000 That 920 spinning punch, why did I think that was kickboxing?

02:45:05.000 No, he dropped him with a sidekick, the guy got up, he jumped, spun, like, I don't know, some astronomical amount of times. 1.00

02:45:12.000 When I see him fight, my stupid brain immediately goes kickboxing. 0.99

02:45:16.000 How many MMA fights has he had? 1.00

02:45:17.000 I want to say he's got two.

02:45:20.000 Yeah, he's got two.

02:45:21.000 This will be his third.

02:45:22.000 So, like Joe Schilling has decided to abandon the kickboxing aspect and move over.

02:45:26.000 See, the only thing that bothers me with that is, there he is, 1-1-0 in MMA. Yeah.

02:45:33.000 January 25th.

02:45:34.000 Oh, he's fighting in Inglewood next week.

02:45:37.000 Yeah, he's on our card with Cyborg.

02:45:39.000 That's not even next week.

02:45:40.000 That's three days.

02:45:41.000 Yeah, it's Saturday.

02:45:43.000 Oh, beautiful.

02:45:44.000 And who's he fighting?

02:45:45.000 Jason King?

02:45:46.000 Okay.

02:45:47.000 That's cool.

02:45:49.000 How old is Raymond now?

02:45:50.000 I want to say he's 42. He's just decided to, at this point, make it into MMA. Look, man, on the feet, good fucking luck.

02:46:02.000 Good luck even getting close to that guy. 0.99

02:46:04.000 He's got a weird style.

02:46:06.000 Sorry.

02:46:07.000 Is my phone going off?

02:46:08.000 I thought that was you.

02:46:10.000 He's got a weird style, you know, that point-fighting style and then the successful transition from point-fighting to kickboxing.

02:46:18.000 You know, I mean, he was a phenomenal kickboxer.

02:46:20.000 And then, if we go from kickboxing to MMA, it's very interesting.

02:46:24.000 Yeah, I think when guys feel like they've hit the top at whatever they're doing and there's nowhere else to go, let's go wherever we can to make as much money as we can.

02:46:32.000 He's always had a relationship with Scott Coker.

02:46:34.000 That's the other thing.

02:46:35.000 A lot of what you see from the guys, like Gegard came back to Coker, Cyborg's coming back to Coker, I went back.

02:46:41.000 There's a lot of guys that had fought in Strikeforce when they were relatively new.

02:46:45.000 There was a lot of talk that if Kane never left, that he was going to potentially go back to Coker as well.

02:46:51.000 Really?

02:46:51.000 If he was able to leave, yeah.

02:46:53.000 Because his first fight was in Strikeforce, and he had a relationship with him. 0.98

02:46:57.000 Well, when Kane says his back's all fucked up, and I'm sure it is, but then you see him do the lucha libre, jumps up and scissors this guy's head and does fucking flips. 0.96

02:47:06.000 Like, hey, how are you doing that? 0.99

02:47:08.000 Which is super impressive for a guy who's 245, 250, right?

02:47:13.000 I swear to God, I never thought I'd see him jump that high. 0.99

02:47:16.000 Well, he must love that shit, because if he can do those moves, that means he's been working on this. 0.99

02:47:21.000 He's one of those guys that his athleticism is just overlooked all the time because of the way he looks. 1.00

02:47:27.000 His physical body, his physical appearance.

02:47:29.000 Yeah, exactly.

02:47:30.000 But you have to admit, Fedor's probably one of the most athletic heavyweights I've seen.

02:47:35.000 And the same thing with Kane.

02:47:36.000 People don't underestimate him because of their body style.

02:47:39.000 Yeah, it's funny.

02:47:40.000 It's like show muscles versus go muscles. 0.99

02:47:43.000 But with Kane, his fucking endurance was terrifying. 0.99

02:47:47.000 His endurance for a heavyweight just didn't even make sense. 0.99

02:47:50.000 I don't know if there's some truth behind this, but they were talking about how guys that are normally barrel-chested Bigger lungs.

02:47:57.000 Bigger lungs, but they normally have a lot more cardio.

02:48:01.000 And it seemed to be like most of the guys that I had seen, they have extremely good cardio.

02:48:05.000 Look at Keith Jardine.

02:48:06.000 Same thing.

02:48:06.000 Remember him?

02:48:07.000 And then Kane.

02:48:09.000 I've seen guys with big barrel chests that have good...

02:48:12.000 Think about Junior Dos Santos.

02:48:13.000 Dos Santos, yeah.

02:48:15.000 Look at him.

02:48:15.000 He's got really good cardio for someone who...

02:48:18.000 That pace him and Kane fought at, that's insane for heavyweights.

02:48:22.000 Insane.

02:48:22.000 If Kane didn't have that type of pace...

02:48:25.000 I mean, it could have been a different fight.

02:48:27.000 It would have been a different fight.

02:48:28.000 But Kane's pace just was superhuman.

02:48:31.000 It didn't make sense.

02:48:33.000 But it's also, like, those guys that have that kind of pace are never one-shot knockout artists.

02:48:38.000 No.

02:48:38.000 You notice that?

02:48:39.000 No.

02:48:39.000 Like, those guys, they can put that pace...

02:48:41.000 It's like, that's one of the more interesting things about the sport.

02:48:44.000 There's all these trade-offs.

02:48:45.000 It's like, you want to have that super one-shot knockout power?

02:48:48.000 Well, then you're not going to be able to do it very often.

02:48:50.000 You know, you blow your gas out.

02:48:52.000 It's like having a big V8 engine.

02:48:53.000 You stomp on the gas, it drains that tank.

02:48:56.000 It's true, yeah.

02:48:57.000 You see it, though, with explosive guys, right?

02:49:03.000 Like Connor.

02:49:03.000 Sure.

02:49:04.000 It seems like in the five-round fights, he struggles a little bit, like in that fourth and fifth round.

02:49:08.000 It's not the same pace he had in ones, two, and sometimes into three in the third round.

02:49:12.000 Yeah, he comes out hot.

02:49:13.000 Yeah, I mean, maybe that'll all go away if he stays at 170. But then you're fighting guys that are 205. You're fighting guys like Usman.

02:49:20.000 Yeah, I mean, he's extremely tight.

02:49:23.000 Extremely good.

02:49:24.000 And I'm kind of on the Brennan way.

02:49:28.000 I'm a Conor Nutrider, man.

02:49:29.000 I think I like what he's done in the sport.

02:49:32.000 I don't see him beating Khabib. 0.99

02:49:34.000 And I've had this conversation with Brennan a lot.

02:49:37.000 Like ever.

02:49:38.000 I don't see him beating him ever.

02:49:40.000 Like ever.

02:49:41.000 What does Brennan think?

02:49:43.000 Well, here's the thing.

02:49:44.000 Brennan used to give me this whole spiel because I was on his show Below the Belt as well.

02:49:49.000 And we had this conversation right before the fight happened.

02:49:52.000 And he goes, he's like, oh, if he fights the way he fought against Ale Quinta and this and that, I'm like, it's completely different.

02:50:00.000 You're trying to shoot, for Khabib to shoot on Ale Quinta, who's like 5'7", you know, it's a different game than shooting on somebody who's 5'11".

02:50:08.000 And a really good wrestler.

02:50:08.000 Yeah, and a good wrestler.

02:50:09.000 Yeah.

02:50:10.000 And he's got some pop in his hands.

02:50:11.000 Yeah.

02:50:11.000 You know, and he knows, and he knew with the fight that he knew that Khabib was going to try to take him down.

02:50:17.000 Khabib's... 0.61

02:50:18.000 And people gotta remember, during that week, Khabib went through five or six opponents.

02:50:22.000 Remember, it was supposed to be Pettis, it was supposed to be somebody else.

02:50:24.000 It went through all these people.

02:50:26.000 Max Holloway.

02:50:27.000 Max Holloway, they pulled him off the weight cut.

02:50:28.000 That's right.

02:50:29.000 Yeah, I mean, it was literally the last minute.

02:50:31.000 And so when all of that happens...

02:50:33.000 You're not the same fighter you were when you showed up in Vegas or wherever the fight was supposed to be thinking you're going to fight this person.

02:50:39.000 And so I cut him a little slack in that fight. 0.99

02:50:42.000 And then fighting someone like Aliquita who's a fucking savage. 0.99

02:50:45.000 That guy, he's so good. 1.00

02:50:47.000 He's nails.

02:50:48.000 Tough as nails.

02:50:48.000 Never gets the credit he deserved.

02:50:50.000 Absolute savage.

02:50:52.000 And just a gamer.

02:50:54.000 And so when you have to shoot on someone, I don't know how tall he is, a 5'7", 5'8".

02:50:57.000 But it's a lot harder to get low on someone like that and get the takedown on him.

02:51:02.000 So when I was telling Brent, I'm like, He's like, if he stands with him, he's going to get knocked out.

02:51:06.000 Well, who did the dropping in that fight? 0.95

02:51:08.000 You know, it was Khabib. 0.98

02:51:09.000 Khabib did the dropping because when you make someone fear your takedown that much, your natural reaction is to drop your hands real quick to try to get the underhooks.

02:51:17.000 He threw that right hand like a fastball, too.

02:51:18.000 It was like a whip.

02:51:19.000 And so what he...

02:51:20.000 In all the years I've trained with him, he's just learned what he does.

02:51:24.000 He drops and dips his head and comes back over with the overhand left or the overhand right and it finds its mark.

02:51:30.000 He sees it before he throws it and most guys will just throw blindly.

02:51:35.000 He dips his head, comes back up and he sees his shot and then he throws it. 0.99

02:51:39.000 It's different and the majority of the time it lands and I've been on the other end of that shit quite a bit. 1.00

02:51:44.000 Can't fucking stand it. 0.99

02:51:45.000 Well, listen, brother. 0.99

02:51:46.000 We just did three hours.

02:51:47.000 Can you believe that?

02:51:48.000 Walk in the park, Kazanski. 0.99

02:51:49.000 Time just fucking flew by. 0.99

02:51:50.000 Walk in the park. 0.98

02:51:51.000 Tell people how to get a hold of your podcast with Big John.

02:51:54.000 It's called Weighing In.

02:51:55.000 It's called Weighing In.

02:51:56.000 Yeah, we're on YouTube, Spotify, SoundCloud, Google Play, all the platforms.

02:52:01.000 We're on all the platforms.

02:52:02.000 And then I own a gym and a clothing line called Knox.

02:52:05.000 And tell people your Instagram.

02:52:07.000 Yep, Instagram is at TheRealPunk.

02:52:09.000 So TheRealPunk is my Instagram.

02:52:11.000 Beautiful.

02:52:12.000 Glad we finally did this, bro.

02:52:13.000 I appreciate you.

02:52:13.000 Thank you so much, Joe.

02:52:14.000 Thank you.

02:52:14.000 Josh Thompson, ladies and gentlemen.

02:52:16.000 Goodbye.

The Joe Rogan Experience - March 04, 2011

JRE MMA Show #86 with Josh Thomson

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript