Barbell Shrugged - 172- A Comeback Story w/ Maurice Clarett

Episode Date: April 8, 2015

Maurice Clarett is a former American football running back. During his freshman year at Ohio State University in 2002, he helped lead the Buckeyes to a national championship. In a widely unexpected move, Clarett was drafted on the first day of the 2005 NFL Draft with the final pick of the 3rd round (#101 overall) by the Denver Broncos. He is well known for unsuccessfully challenging the NFL's draft eligibility rulesrequiring a player to be three years removed from high school and for his tumultuous life outside of football, including his dismissal from Ohio State, several arrests, and later, imprisonment.

Hey, this is Rich Froning. You're listening to Barbell Shrug. For the video version, go to barbellshrug.com. Welcome to Barbell Shrug. I'm Mike Bledsoe. I'm sitting here with Chris Moore and our new co-host, AJ Roberts. And we have CTV behind the camera along with Charlotte we have traveled up to Columbus, Ohio to the Arnold Sports Festival as we try to do most years and we're sitting here with Maurice Claret

he played for Ohio State Denver Broncos and had a national championship at Ohio State I heard Ohio State football is? Yes. I remember watching it. I was still playing ball at the time. I heard Ohio State football is pretty good. They won a championship again this year. I had to warn Maurice ahead of time, I'm not much of a sports fan myself.

I was like, you start talking football, I'll just nod. Okay. Like I do at the barber shop. They're like cutting my hair every time I talk about sports. I'm like, oh, yeah. They're really fast, aren't they? Yeah. But, yeah, you have a really amazing story.

You played football. You went pro. And then you spent some time in prison. Yeah. And then came back out of that and made some huge changes and are really thriving now. I guess just take it away. Where did your – because you were obviously –

your high school career at Ohio is probably really big time. You entered Ohio State as a blue chip prospect, right? Yes, I entered Ohio State. Well, when I graduated high school, I was the number one rated football player in the world. Damn. Yeah, so – No, that's not the easiest thing to accomplish.

Yeah, just – I always say, I humbly say, you know, I was blessed. We was on a real good team. I had a real great coach. But anything that you could want to accomplish in regards to high school football, I accomplished. Ran for a bunch of yards, a bunch of touchdowns. And at that moment, in that moment of time, it was a big deal in Ohio because I was the biggest thing in football. LeBron was the biggest thing in basketball. You guys were able to come up at the same time, eh?

Let's move this mic just a little bit closer. Excuse me, I'm sorry. Yeah, so we're basically 30 minutes away from each other. And when I would sell out stadiums with 25,000 people for football, he would do the same thing. A high school football game. High school football game. Jesus.

So I love this because all eyes were on you coming out of high school. And obviously, from that, your destiny was kind of laid out for you. Yes. And when you were coming out of high school, going into Ohio State, did you think, because I know part of that, you wanted to jump to the NFL. Did you plan that from high school? Because seeing LeBron do that goes straight to the NBA. Did you kind of think, why can't I do the same thing?

No, I can kind of walk you through that progression. So I come out of high school, and I never thought that I would go and even start at Ohio State. I knew I could come down and compete, and I knew I was a hard worker. So those things were like my competitive advantages, so to speak. So I got to Ohio State, and once I started to train harder, once I started to be more focused on the game and understand the game and started to slow down,

I started to realize that my natural talent was just better than a lot of other guys. And my skill set and my competitive advantage was always running people over. I never had skills to move around guys. You just ran straight through people. It was beautiful to watch That's my favorite job

People falling down Flapping around I wouldn't have wanted to try to tackle you In respects to just We're in a fitness arena As a freshman I was benching 430 I was squatting I was 238 at the time

So I was benching 430 Squatting 870, and hand cleaning about 340. What the fuck, Mark? You squatted what? 870. And your body weight was 2,000. Jesus. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's a big talk. You know, obviously being a strength athlete. We heard those numbers. We were like, that is insane. I think that's an important point right there. People who are in the fitness space and people who are trying to rise up the ranks in lifting and whatnot and talk about we need better athletes or whatever in this country for lifting, man, you forget the kind of freak athletes that are playing fucking football in the United

States. I mean, some seriously strong, explosive guys hitting each other in a fantastically impressive way. 870 squat. Yeah. He'd be top. With that squat at a 242 weight class, which is what you compete in, in powerlifting right now with the guys competing, you'd be one of the top lifters.

Are you serious? Yeah. You'd be a top five lifter I mean Dan Green and you know Chris Duffin and those guys are the setting of new ones it they're high eights But you'd be right you wouldn't make a fucking penny doing that maybe You made the right choice. You'd get a $5 medal, and you'd always be proud of that shit. After winning the meet. Hooking up with Corey, I obviously fell in love with weightlifting.

And so to kind of jump into the story, one thing with Corey, Corey was cool and introduced me to weightlifting, and I got back into it. But in regards to how that helped me in college, I was just kind of stronger than everybody, and that thing happened. And, A.J., to get back to your point, and so after we had completed the season, I ran out there and ran for a bunch of yards and got the championship. When the offseason that came, I basically accepted a bunch of illegal benefits. And with that being said, the NCAA kicked me out of school.

And so when they kicked me out of school for a year, just my life kind of got turned upside down. And so I didn't want to stay out of football. And I said, hey, I believe I'm good enough to play in the NFL. Some of the people that I had competed against, I've seen these guys go in the first and second round in a draft prior to that. And I said, you know, I said no offense to them, but I can play this game. You know what I'm saying? I was big. I was strong. At 18, you know, you feel like you're running the world. You know, 18, 19 years old, I felt like I controlled the world. If you scrubbed that

much, I don't see why you wouldn't. Yeah, and just basically that's how it happened. And so I tried to enter the NFL after my first year of college, my second year actually, and they basically rejected me. And since I had declared to go to the NFL, it made me ineligible to go back to college. You were just middle ground, eh? So I was kind of like the man without a country.

And so at that point, I came back. I turned back to the streets. I never had a will to want to do anything academically. So when I was in school, I was taking officiating softball, officiating golf, and classes just to stay eligible, but nothing in regards to just basically having a career of some sort. You had like a passion vacuum at this point because all you want to do is prove that I can fucking play this game.

They took it away. Well, you find this dead space. So you're left to kind of make bad decisions if like your passion is robbed from you. You don't know what else to do. Was it just like too much time sitting around like, man, I got to fucking get back in it? I guess it goes back to mentality coming up. I grew up in the inner city of Youngstown, so you don't see a lot of people have success academically. They don't have professions.

It's just drugs, crime, and that. You know what I'm saying? So the only way that you're taught to make it out is just either run a football, dribble a football, or be an entertainer. This is the only thing. So to your awareness, this is your option. If you don't have it, they're telling you basically you're taught that you don't have an option.

Well, the other thing, too, is as you have massive success, there becomes no doubt that this is your path. Like I always say, there's no plan B. Plan B is plan A. Because when you're 100% in, you're 100% in. So you're not thinking, like, oh man, what's my full back? Because the minute you think what's my full back, you're actually declaring I'm not gonna be the best. And you weren't just good, you were the best,

and that thought process was, you know, this is gonna be, and everyone around you, no one around you was saying to you either, like, you better have a backup plan. And that's probably, well everybody's like, looking at the size of your wall, looking to just push you as hard as possible forward. Like, just fucking keep going. Push, push, push. Yeah, man.

And this is the thing where actually I'll get a greater return for my investment. I invest in myself. I lift weights. I do some conditioning drills. And I'm going to make millions of dollars. And just like with any other profession, you start to see the guys ahead of you. You see the awards that they have. You start to see the guys ahead of you. You see the awards that they have. You start to see the awards that I had.

You know what I'm saying? It's all the guys who went on to have all the success. I was basically following in that track. So me going to worry about my studies, it didn't mean anything at that point. You know what I'm saying? So to get back into the story, when I got kicked out of school, I had nothing. You know what I'm saying? Like depression and life kind of hit me.

So in regards to getting better on the football field, I can deal with that stress because I can lift more. I can study more film. I can learn how to do a better stiff arm. I can learn how to eat better so I can be quicker on my feet and things like that. But in regards to just being a young man and dealing with life, I had no clue of how that worked.

You know what I'm saying? Wow, yeah. Because you're a kid. You're a fantastically physically gifted man. But at 18, you don't have all the experiences yet. No, you don't have the fluidity to just think and solve problems. And just my cognitive skills weren't there. You know what I'm saying?

And so after that, I basically went right back to the streets. When I go back to the streets, I'm just doing what I know. I'm just the same behavior. But I'm very popular. My potential for my success in football is high. You know what I'm saying? But I'm not sort of seizing the moment. And when I set out those two years, just my energy and my priorities had changed.

You know, I'm out in California. Every single day I'm waking up, it's Xanax, Percocets, Vicodins, you know, just partying. You know what I'm saying? The whole California culture, smoke all day, party all day, party all night. I got involved in that. You know what I'm saying? And so this happened for two years, and they was like, hey. It's fine if you're an entrepreneur, Mike.

This guy should not be a fucking professional athlete. Mike's like, that's pretty fucking good to me, Maurice. I was like, I'm in California. I'm not living that lifestyle. I don't know. You're like, maybe they're the wrong people. I was on Sunset too much. I was on sunset too much. I was on sunset entirely too much.

But, you know, two years have passed, and it's time for me to come back to the NFL. And when we went through a workout, like, the day was approaching. You know, sometimes when you're not prepared, you can kind of feel it. So we go to the workouts, and when it's time to run a 40, when it's time to jump a vertical jump, I basically fail horribly in all these activities. And so with that being said, they're basically like, hey, my dreams of being a professional athlete started to diminish. Luckily, two months later, April had to come, and Coach Shanahan was coaching for Denver at the time. He called me up, and he said, hey, Maurice, you know, we're going to take a chance on you,

and he's trying to, like, rekindle that fire. I got out to Denver, and when I'm out here, just my mind wasn't right. You know, so I didn't have the mentality that, hey, I want to become a professional athlete. In my mind, I was a gangster on the streets. You know what I'm saying? A gangster who played football at one point, but I was trying to transition to professional football like this.

That's a big fucking transition, man. Scary jump, right? Yeah, to go from the streets and the guy who was living a street life and a party to a guy who's transitioning and trying to be a professional athlete, it just doesn't mash up. So I get to Denver, and I'm not socializing with guys. I'm real. I'm an introvert. I don't want to be a good teammate.

And Denver tried to help me. So they tried to put me down with a psychologist and were like, hey, you've had a few traumatic experiences happen. Can you have somebody to kind of help you out? And so me just being naive and ignorant to the process, I was like, nah, there's nothing that this lady can help me out with. She doesn't understand where I'm coming from. So we're continuing to go on through the preseason. It's like week four, we're playing the Indianapolis Colts.

And he called me in again. He said, hey, Maurice, could you please sit down with this woman because she's trying to help you. Next thing I know, I tell Coach Shanahan, no, and that Monday he called me in his office. He said, hey, we've tried to give you all the help that we could, and you're resistant to it, so we have to get rid of you. And that's when they got rid of me and basically just came right back to Ohio and right back to the streets.

How was your mindset then? I mean, this is the low point or one of the low points. Yeah, you know, anytime you're with the drugs and the depression and even when you fail in life, even when you fail at something that you love. You know, I've never been told in my life that I wasn't good at football. And so the fact that I failed, it hurt my ego, it hurt my pride, it hurt everything. That basically my whole image or my whole identity was based around football. I think I got shattered this moment.

I got shattered, right? And so inside of that, coming back to Ohio, the way I felt about myself was pretty much the way I treated other people. I hated life. I hated everything going on. And even when I was back here hustling, it just didn't feel the same because I knew I didn't give everything I was supposed to to the game. So after that, after two or three months of being back, I catch a robbery case in downtown Columbus. This is New Year's Eve, January 31st, transition 06. Another two weeks after that, my girlfriend, I found out she's pregnant.

We're still together. We've been together 10 years. But found out in the process that she's pregnant. That's another amount of stress, stress for me. Yeah, dude. Fuck yeah. And then August. August, obviously, the big arrest came.

And I was coming down to Columbus. It was about 3 in the morning. And I'm actually on the east side. And so I'm coming down, and I get off on the exit. But I've been drinking at this point, so I get off on the wrong exit. So I come down and I'm actually on the east side. And so I'm coming down, and I get off on the exit, but I've been drinking at this point, so I get off on the wrong exit. So I come down. I get off on the wrong exit, and I pull up to the stoplight. I pull up to the stoplight, and I say, hey, well, I'm just making a U-turn.

I'm drunk. I'm going the wrong way. As I'm making the U-turn, there's a police officer sitting inside of the Home Depot parking lot. So I make the U-turn. He pulls out. And mind you, I have an AK-47 on the seat. Oh, shit, Maurice.

Oh, man. Damn. Yeah, so I pull over to the side of the road. Why'd you have that? What? What are you? Oh, shit. What are you saying?

The fucking cop, he pulled over. And like, yeah, this is a gift from my friend. He's a gun collector. What the fuck did you say to him? Damn. So this is the moment. So I pull over, and he pulls behind me. for my friend. He's a gun collector. What the fuck did you say then, man? Damn. So this is the moment. So I pull over and he pulls behind me.

And so I saw an episode on Cops once where the guy got out the car, the police officer got out the car, he walked up on the car and the guy kind of scooted off. So this was in my mind to kind of do this.

So I pulled over, he gets out the car, he walks up on the car and I pull off. And as I pull off, like, I'm not going too fast and I'm not going too fast because I'm in a Hyundai. And a Hyundai is not a getaway car, you know what I'm saying?

You're like, hmm, no options here, man. Yeah. So I jump on the freeway. I'm going and going and going. We probably get two miles down the road. Are you familiar with Columbus? Yeah, we've been here a bunch. Okay, so you're familiar with Pataska?

Yeah, that's where Old School Jim is, I think. Old School Jim is there, right? So it's also a bunch of woods, right? You know, the brothers don't do the woods. I say it all the time. The brothers don't do the woods. The Caucasians don't do the hoods. So I make the U-turn.

I'm coming back. And as I'm coming back towards Columbus, I have it in my mind to get out of here and get away. There's a police officer sitting in the middle of the road. He throws the spike strips out. He hits the car. This is intense, man. Yeah, Youngstown boys, if you watch it.

Yeah, this is national news. I remember the whole thing. I mean, again, it was weird. Now the world was on you again, but for something completely different. I just want to break before you carry on because I think what's interesting is you were the very best best and then this happened but in your experience you probably see a lot of athletes and I was probably part of what you do now and why you do what you do is because your experience although maybe new to some

people listen in the show it's not a unique experience no like you know I'm blessed have met a lot of professional athletes because of who I was and the connections I have, but I hear this story a lot. ESPN has done a lot of stuff, shorts and stuff on how people go from top of the world to nothing. This is not

an unusual thing in the United States. It's more common than the successful race. It's a very normal thing. At this point in time, like, did you have, did you still have that, like, I know you had a chip on your shoulder, you were angry. Did you still have the kind of thought process, like, well, I'm Maurice Corrette? Like, even when you were doing the escape, part of you was like, I'm going to get away with this because I'm Maurice Corrette. Yeah, because when you're an athlete, you're a dominant athlete, you tend to live outside of the normal rules. You know what I'm saying?

People allow you to do what you want to do, and there's always somebody who saves you because you contribute to something. But what happened in this moment, I didn't have any more eligibility at Ohio State, or I didn't have any more eligibility. I wasn't in the NFL, so it made it a bit harder. And even when you said this story is more common than the success story, and fundamentally it's like that because so much is given to guys when they're young that the only way that you're going to make it in life is to become a professional athlete. This is the only way to secure yourself a future. And that's the point that I argue all the time. I feel like when you get placed on these campuses,

they should have a responsibility to educate you right, right? If we look around here, if you look all around here, there's no, let's say, football players in here, but there's a lot of successful businessmen, right? You can build yourself a company. You can learn accounting, finance, and some of everything else, right? But what happens is that you place these athletes on these campuses and you give them classes like officiating softball, officiating golf.

It takes the easy road. Yeah, but it does nothing for you long term, right? So if the statistics show you that only 1% of these guys will go on and out of that 1%, the average career will be four years, right? If I'm going to spend my time on this college campus, right, and I'm going to give my body and I'm going to generate all this revenue, I should be getting compensated equally in regards to education. And I believe athletes should be paid.

And so that's where the gap is. You know, that's when I go around. I talk to athletic directors. I talk to coaches. I ask this, right? You're the head coach of a university, right? Would you allow your child to take those same courses that you allow your star quarterback to take?

No. Because you know the consequences. He's like, no, I need you to have skills in case this doesn't work out. In case this doesn't work out. Because it probably won't. So if this guy's helping you secure your job, he's helping you to make millions, why would you set him up for failure, so to say? It's interesting with that, too, because they are such role models to you.

But beyond that, athletes as individuals have a set of skills that are transferable. Absolutely. The passion, the dedication, all of the stuff you did. Like you said, everything was training. You failed on the field. It was, okay, back to the drawing. What do I need to do? What do I need to do?

Athletes don't have that, like, fail and, like, now I'm done, right? It's not a failure. It's a lesson. Every game is a lesson. That skill, that's the same skill you need in business. That's the same skill you need in life, right? Absolutely. You have an argument with your girlfriend.

Like, you don't just walk away. It's like, like okay how do we make another girlfriend anymore but like you said they don't show you that it's transferable they they set you up so literally this is all i know how to do and then you're left on your own let's get back to the story because that point was would you say that was a life-saving moment it's dark as it was as bad as it was was that really the turning point for you uh for me it was a life-saving moment because it forced me to stop everything that I was doing. Up until that point, I never gave myself time to just discover myself.

So the fact that I got caught with all the guns and I had a case pending, I knew I wasn't going anywhere. Well, hang on a second. So the cop threw the spikes out. Yeah, I mean, we left that part of the story. I feel like there's like this big, everyone's like, So the cop threw the spikes out. Yeah, I mean, we left that part of the story. I feel like there's like this big, everyone's like, well, what happened? That's what I'm thinking the whole time.

He throws the spike strips out. Tires blow up, and I'm riding down the freeway. And at this moment, I get on the phone with my mother. And it shows it in the film. Hey, Mom, how are you? How are you doing? How was church and all? Yeah, and just really, I just said, Mom, I feel like getting out of the car and having a shootout with him. You know what I'm saying?

It was like, it was me. And it shows it in the film. And she starts crying when she talks about it because I was like, hey. Holy shit, imagine this conversation. Wow, man. And it just really just like, but you know, like everybody, I'm pretty sure everybody up here has been depressed at some point. You feel like you hit rock bottom. It doesn't matter who you are, where you're from or anything. You just kind of hit rock bottom. You know what I'm pretty sure everybody up here has been depressed at some point. You feel like you hit rock bottom. It doesn't matter who you are, where you're from, or anything.

You just kind of hit rock bottom. You know what I'm saying? I felt like this moment was my rock bottom, but I wanted to have a shootout because I knew they'd kill me. You know what I'm saying? It wasn't me intention. It wasn't like you thought you were going to get away with it. It was your way out.

I'm about to kill myself. I didn't have the courage to kill myself, but I'm about to get killed from doing this. Right, right. And whatever she said to me, I'm not sure what she said to me at that moment. I pull over. They put a taser on me and throw me in the back of the paddy wagon. And at that moment, that's kind of when everything has stopped.

So I get to the county jail. And based upon my status, I'm locked in isolation, right? And so. This is the worst environment a human can be in, right? Yeah, I mean mean just putting anybody in the cage and just shutting the door and saying hey here here's a metal slab and here's a toilet you know i'm saying that's your reality for 23 hours of the day there's no input there's no hardly any light no there's no light there's no light uh there's no light there's a toilet you

get two pair of drawers uh you get two t-shirts and you get three meals the first one's at four the second one's at 10 and last one's at three or four. And this is pretty much, this is your life right now, you know what I'm saying? Fuck, man. How long did they keep you in there? The initial process was seven months to 23 hours out the day. Fuck, Maurice! How'd you do? Jesus.

Bro, I tell you like this, you'll find out a lot about yourself just sitting still. Like, if it was us four just sitting still right here over the course of seven months, you'll just start to think about what you're thinking about. You know what I'm saying?

Seven months. We were talking, his wife's going to do a meditation retreat. We were talking about how people don't realize how difficult it is to sit in silence.

Oh, yeah. So 10 days of Vipassana retreat. It's 10 days of complete silence. Complete silence. No eye contact. And you sit for six to 10 hours a day. Like sit and meditate. I think there's a little bit of instruction, but there's no interaction.

But imagine doing this where there's a cage around you. I mean, obviously what you experienced was more intense than that, but if you wanted a taste of kind of what you're talking about, it's the same intent. Most people can't even meditate for 30 minutes. You'd be, you know, like late. Five minutes, dude. Five minutes they can't do it. And if you don't believe in meditation, like most people don't sit and pray it like once a day.

Like they find it hard to even focus on prayer, you know. So it's like no matter what it is, like just sitting still with your thoughts is like one of the most powerful things. But it is the hardest thing. You are forced into that. Some people, it breaks them. You know, they say like people lose their mind in jail. For you, it was a good experience. things but it is the hardest thing you were forced into that some people it breaks them you know they say like people lose their mind in jail for you i'd say most people it was a good good experience i've seen more people uh and i never seen i never could identify when they say people go crazy

prison i've seen guys actually transition from normal and like this to just crazy because uh the dynamics of the environment or the intense amount of everything, everything in prison is like your biggest weightlifting competition every day. You know what I'm saying? Whether you like it or not, whether you want to be on it or not. Everybody, like, so you have to imagine, the prison that I was in, 85% of the guys are doing more than 20 years. And so you have a mixture of, like, you have the mixture of guys who've been in the 70s, the early 80s,

all the way to the new guys coming in, which are myself. And you just have all type of cities. It's just nuts. Did you think at that point that you were going to be in there for 20? Was that running through your head? I had seven and a half years. I got out in four. I had seven and a half years at first.

But, like, you can't even think that far. You know what I'm saying? I didn't even think that far. You know what I'm saying? I didn't even think that far. There's survival every day. Yeah, but I got more interested into the programming because one thing prison does do, they offer up programs if you're into them. You know what I'm saying? So my first day in prison, the warden came to me and he said, man, I want to help you

to try to succeed through this moment. And I'm going to set up these classes for you to kind of go through and kind of do your deal. You know what I'm saying? So I went through about 13 months worth of coursework, and also I got connected with the guy who was in there. He was a Navy SEAL, and I think that was kind of the best thing initially that happened to me.

So I went to prison, and just from the drinking and drugging, I was 275. So I got with him, and his workouts were so intense. You know, once you start working out again, you get your confidence back, your mentality's rolling. But this was the first time I actually picked up books. I never read prior to prison and I started falling in love with books.

And so I used to have this catalog, it was called Bargain Books. And so you were able to order books for two and three dollars. You know what I'm saying? You could order

high-end books and it was like a discount bookstore. So people would send me money and I'd just order huge amounts of books. 20 books at a time, 25 books.

Wow. They'll sell these different, these notepads in prison. So I would just take it. This is after your seven months in solitude. Yeah.

This is once I'm in prison. So you did seven months in solitude. Yes. Essentially. Prior to prison. That was prior to prison. Yes. So basically that was during like the sentencing process.

They sentenced me and then you basically go to a reception facility. And you go from the county jail to a reception facility, and then they determine where you go throughout the state. And so, you know, they have 52 prisons, and you have to basically go in one of them. So during that seven months, what do you feel like that solitude did to you? Do you feel like maybe you got to know yourself? Yeah, I call it like the meditative state.

You sit in silence because you and your celly don't talk. You know what I'm saying? You and your guy, you have nothing to talk about because it's like two different people from two different environments getting placed in a cell. And just from the amount of mail I had in and just from me initially starting to read, I was just figuring out how did I come here. You know, I'm like, there's nothing important. There's no card that's important. There's nothing, there's no thing that's important. The only thing that's important is like like, how did I come here?

You know what I'm saying? What did I do? And how did my thinking on a daily basis bring me here? And so that was, like, the origination or the starting point to kind of me going in prison. So when I went to prison, I had some sense of self. I didn't have the confidence because I wasn't in shape. And I was, like, you sit down for seven months without exercise. You're, like, you're blowing up. I'm eating

crackers and Little Debbie's and stuff like that. A junk food. Nothing good. Nothing good. And essentially all that stuff kind of pushed on to prison and once I got there, I'll just tell you, it sounds so cliche, but education. Self-education. It's funny, we interviewed

Corey who's stood here for the Barbell Shrug and Barbell Business, but he was talking about reading, too. And I emphasize the point that the most successful people, they read almost every day. And so even in the worst environment, you picked up one of the basic skills to success.

And you had that foundation and the fact you fell in love with reading. I had kind of a similar experience, but I didn't read a book until college. I didn't read either, man. I got into business, and that's when I actually could read a book. Half the stuff they were trying to teach in college, I never even paid attention to. Somehow I made it through college.

But when I got into a subject I loved, I found I'm obsessive and I'm exploratory. So if the book recommends another book, I take note, I go order those books. I read one book, I have another 10 I gotta read. But it's cool to see that that was kind of the same experience even though in the environment was completely different. But with that moment, it's like,

because you become curious, you get to understand better, you get to communicate better, you can appreciate more. In just my life, the appreciation for words and everything, you know what I'm saying? Just even like, this is like, just even with a podcast, the purest form of communication. You know, you're just communicating with people and expressing feelings and all that. And so I enjoyed that part of it. You know what I'm saying? So when I was in prison, it didn't seem so, it didn't seem like a big punishment. You know what I'm saying? It looked more like as a time to develop myself. You felt gratitude even in the worst of situations. Yeah, absolutely.

But, you know, reading a bunch of philosophy, psychology, and also I think another thing that helped, I was reading business. And so, like, my whole mind was like, okay, I can't play football anymore. What am I going to do with myself? You know what I'm saying? So I started reading everything I could about Warren Buffett and value investing and financing. Yeah, everything.

I'll tell you a cool story in a minute, right? And so essentially all these things basically just helped to form and develop my mind. And after three years and 11 months, right, after me gaining the respect from all the inmates and people knowing me and like, hey, Reese is just going to work out. He's going to come to the gym. He's going to play basketball. He's going to come to the gym. He's going to play basketball. He's going to mind his business. But I started to have a group of young guys.

So the young guys would come in and they'd be like, damn, how the hell did you get to where you're at now? Like, why doesn't this bother you as much as it does him or him or somebody else? And so one of the coolest things in there was like I was able to give young guys books. You know what I'm saying? Because a lot of this stuff comes down to, yeah, you know, a lot of them don't have father figures. You know what I'm saying? A lot of young guys in inner a lot of them don't have father figures. You know what I'm saying?

A lot of young guys in inner city, they just don't have father figures, and they want to do right, but they just don't have the guidance. You know what I'm saying? They just don't know, man. They just don't know. And so I was the, like, in a way, the initial approach, it was hard for me to get to them because they don't know how to go ask for help. You know what I'm saying?

Help is not considered strong. You know what I'm saying? So even in regards to that, you know, I had a chance to do that, and after four years, I eventually was let out of prison. But when I was in there, I completed some coursework from Ohio University, and when I initially got out, I wanted to get into senior care services, and I wanted to get into adult daycare, adult transportation, in-home care, and I wanted to attack the whole baby boom generation,

have me a whole plan behind it. Let's take a break real quick, and then we'll talk about how you made that transition out of prison. Let's take a break real quick. This is Tim Ferriss, and you are listening to Barbell Shrugged. For the video version, go to barbellshrugged.com. Barbell Shrugged is brought to you by you. To learn more about how you can support the show,

go to barbellshrugged.com and sign up for the newsletter. And we're back with Maurice Claret. Maurice, you were just telling us, so you got out of prison and you were, you had this plan for your transition. A lot of information. For senior care. I mean, you had educated yourself, you had read books,

you had helped out younger guys that were there, you'd been giving them books and kind of served as a role model. You got out kind of early, I guess. Yes, I got out in four years. And you had this plan to go after senior services, like take on the Baby Boomer. I mean, it's obvious the Baby Boomers need help at this point. All of them aren't doing physically well. Yeah, the whole industry is wide open for services.

And so I got out, I went back to Ohio State, and had the whole mission of completing my degree. But when I was out there, Coach Trussell, who was the coach at the time, he got in touch with me and he said, Hey, Maurice, there's a team in Omaha, Nebraska, who wants to eventually have you try out. So I said, okay, are they paying? You know what I'm saying?

I didn't want to go out there and pay for free because I was broke when I got out of prison. The next thing you know, I go out there, I try out, and I eventually get on the football team. So I'm out here for a year. We have a moderate success. It was like a four and four season. But I was like, this is not my only thing. I'm cool on this.

You know what I'm saying? I don't have any interest in football anymore. I don't want to get banged on. I'm cool with that. So I was like, okay, how do I thing. I'm cool on this. You know what I'm saying? I don't have any interest in football anymore. I don't want to get banged on. I'm cool with that. So I was like, okay, how do I implement the plan of giving me some money? So in football, the thing that everybody knew about me is that I wasn't fast. I had brute strength, but I was very intelligent, right? I can understand the game like the back of my hand.

I understood concepts, formations. I understood tendencies. I understood how to teach it. And this was my way to basically get back into it. Excuse me. You have a lot of guys who treat strength and conditioning and speed, but there wasn't anything to teach. There's a lot of things that you can get in regards to teaching the actual game.

So I went over to a youth league practice. And excuse me, to separate myself from people, I said, hey, can I come and give you coaches a coaching clinic? I watched you all for two or three days. And I think there's just some ways I can help you out to be able to coach better. So I gave them a coaching clinic for free. I had about seven or eight guys show up and I go through the board and basically I hooked them in, right? I showed them everything I know. I show them how different ways to approach kids and teaching and coaching and all that stuff, right? So they bought into it. I said, hey, we can come and do this thing every Saturday. Just give me

20 bucks and we'll go from there. So the coaching grew from like seven guys to maybe 20. After that, I went and basically attacked their kids. So I got the first camp we had. It was me and a guy by the name of Matt Overton. We had about 25 kids initially. 25 kids grew to 50. 50 grew to 75. Awesome.

Matt eventually left from Omaha. He went to the Indianapolis Coast. He got picked up by the team. And after that, the last thing, we had about like 370 kids, right? So we were running a full-fledged business. And this was all within like 18 months of me being released from prison. I was over there coaching, helping out. But basically, I was able to build a business with football and teaching football

and the aspects of the actual game, you know what I'm saying? And I felt like that's how I separated myself. So I was doing relatively well doing that. Excuse me, another cool story I was going to tell you about Omaha. So Omaha is the place of Warren Buffett. And the cool story is that our head coach, you got to keep up with me on this one, our head coach was the ex-CEO of TD Ameritrade. His name is Joe Moglia.

So Joe Moglia made about $300 million. He left Ameritrade. He's still the chairman of the board, but he said he wanted to get back into something he loved, which was football. So he got back into football, and so we would sit down and we would just talk. And he said, hey, Maurice, one day he was like, just come to the golf course. He was like, I want to hear a story. I want to hear the story about your life.

So we sit down, we talk, and we got going through everything. Excuse me. I was telling him about my fascination with Warren Buffett and finances and the whole business world. He was like, you knowination with Warren Buffett and finances and the whole business world. He was like, you know what, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates are my good friends. He was like, yeah, that's all right. Some wild friends I have, man. This is a rapid change of circumstance, man.

Yeah, so next thing I know, I'm like, okay, cool, Warren Buffett's your buddy. And I'm like, he's not going to meet me. You know, I knew from then, you know, it cost $600,000 to meet him. People pay $600,000 an hour the first time. Right. Next thing I know, we – I'm more high rate. Yeah.

Like, we afford that for his advice, Mike? How many e-books we got to sell right now? We'll work on that. So he hits me up. This is a Wednesday. I'm walking through the hall. I'm walking through my apartment. He hit me up, and I heard him on so many interviews.

He was like, hey, Maurice. And I'm like, oh. I started looking at my girlfriend. I'm like, this is Warren Buffett. You know, I'm jumping up and down like a kid. And he was like, hey. He was like, Joe told me he wanted to meet me. He was like, I'm at my office Saturday.

He said, do you have anything going on? And I'm standing there like, hold on. I got to pull my schedule out. Let me check. I know I'm busy, everything's canceled. You know what I'm saying? So it was a cool moment. I had a chance to bring my family. We went down.

And after we go down, I sat with him for five hours. Just five hours, one-on-one. The value of that discussion. You had a $3 million conversation. Yeah, $3 million conversation free. Yeah. On the house. But the cool thing about it was, like you said, with the reading, all successful people,

he said the biggest thing is that he reads four hours a day. And so he said, I think that's the only thing that separates me from people because I keep on developing my mind. And he said, I write notes all day. I read every day. And he said, if I want to invest in business, I'll understand your business more than you. Another good thing, he said he only accepts seven phone calls a day. And he said, because people are a distraction. He said, if your life doesn't naturally intersect with others, then you really don't have business talking to other people. Not in a bad way, but he said you should be that committed to your process of becoming who you are.

And so it was cool to have those takeaways. So basically, after two and a half years, the league I was playing in had shut down. And due to my probation, I was only in Omaha to play football. So they said, hey, you have to go back. I don't care about your business. You have to go back to Ohio. So I was like, all right, cool, no problem. But I had a successful model that I was basically going to bring back to Ohio.

And I said, okay, if I can teach football in Omaha, everybody knows me in Ohio football, I can do the same thing. So I came back here, and in the process of that, ESPN had reached out to me. And I'm not sure how they knew what was going on in my life, but they knew everything, right? So they said, hey. ESPN knows all. ESPN and Google.

They know everything. And basically they reached out to me. They said, hey, can we do a story upon your life? And I said, you know, who are the directors and, you know, what's the storyline? You know, and they wanted to talk about football initially. And I said, you know, I don't have any interest in talking about football. I got an interest in talking about decisions and choices and the consequences and more life type of deals than anything. So the next thing I know, we hooked up.

And eight months throughout that process. We were just filming everywhere. But I had a lady which started me speaking. I had a lady from Quinnipiac. It was in Connecticut. She reached out to me. She was a law professor and had been doing a study on my life. So she said, hey, can you come out here and can you talk about your life to a seminar that we have? I go

out there, I talk, and after I get done, you know, it was cool. One, she gave me a check, and I was like, cool, you get paid for talking. That is a better way to make a living. I like it. But after that you know she just was like you know your story can help so many young guys just people in general she said I continue to tell your story she said it's rough now but the more you tell it the more you understand it the more you understand the more you be able to help people you know what I'm saying. And it, the more you'll be able to help people. You know what I'm saying? Oh, wow, yeah. And when she said it, it didn't make sense, but I remember just years down the road that

she actually said that to me. So the next thing I know, one moment or one engagement led to over 80 last year. I was in 80 different cities, being with universities. That's amazing, man. That's awesome. Nonprofit things. Just some of everywhere. I've seen everywhere around the country.

I probably have about 60 on the road now. But it's obviously been able to give me money and get a few rental properties. Next week, I'll buy a semi and get to the trucking game. Just a full-fledged entrepreneur. Yeah. And also, again, pretty fucking awesome, dude. Yeah. That's really cool.

Yeah, but also in the packaging world, too. So I hooked up with a guy in Oklahoma and just in the packaging world. You and Corey have a podcast, right? Yeah, yeah. So that's the fun part. So Corey, when I actually came into Ohio, me and Corey got together, we had met 10 or 12 years ago. But when I came back, it was muscle farm. You know what I'm saying?

Yeah, yeah. It went from guy from the local gym owner to – He got busy. That guy got busy, man. He got busy. And Corey just kind of blew up. And next thing I know, the common denominator was that I enjoy getting up early and I enjoy working out.

So I start going over to the old school gym in the morning. And he's just like the grimy fella. It felt like a prison. You know what I'm saying? So, like, old school gym has the prison feel, the same feel that you get when you're incarcerated. So I fell in love with the weightlifting and training, and then he loved to read as well.

So we began to conversate back and forth and then it was like, okay, how can we kind of wrap this information up and give it to people? Because social media is so big and you send out a couple minutes to a tweet, but you really just try to spread your mentality. You know what I'm saying? Whenever you see somebody going through something, you can identify with it just where they may be at or if they need some

sort of help and that's how the whole podcast with me and Corey came. But I enjoy it. Very cool. Yeah. That's an amazing story. It's mind-blowing. Is that most of that story captured in this ESPN-produced documentary, Youngstown Boys?

Yeah. Dedicated under fire. Boom. Yeah. You've learned a staggering, amazing amount of lessons. You've turned things around in an extraordinary way. But here's the thing. There's people that are maybe not exactly in a situation,

but they're young athletes struggling to find their true passion. Sport could be it. Some are more talented than others. What's your best advice for young, developing athletes who may not have the vision, maybe they don't quite believe, maybe they don't know where to start. They're hungry to do something. What's the best guidance you could offer them having learned all these damn lessons?

It's awesome. In that case, it's a good question. Each individual has to define what success is to them. You know what I'm saying? So many times we push on young athletes that football is the only way. But I make an illustration all the time. If you head to any of these suburbs around Columbus, you won't find an athlete in them.

You'll find guys who have built lives. You'll find guys who are small business owners or skilled professionals. And a lot of times in football, that's not pushed. It's not expressed. You know what I'm saying? So there's a thousand ways to get to where you want to get. But just like AJ said, you can take the skill set or the mentality of an athlete and apply that elsewhere.

You know what I'm saying? So I try to push more guys away from football than I do to say, hey, you can make it because statistics don't prove it. Like, I couldn't get up on the stage right now and bench 1,000 pounds because I've not prepared myself. You know what I'm saying? There's a lot of athletes in that same fashion who haven't prepared themselves for the lives they want to live, yet still they're just shuffled through the system.

So it's just finding out, defining what success is to you. This is what success is. This is how I want my life to be. And just finding multiple paths to get there. You know what I'm saying? And if like, okay, if me and you decided to have a crap game right here, right, and I told you if we roll, you have a 1% chance of making it. You have a 1% chance of hitting your point, right?

You wouldn't wage your whole future on it. No. You wouldn't wage everything. But as athletes, we do that. We wage everything that we have, everything we work for. We wage it on a 1% chance. You know what I'm saying? And so I actually push to find what success is and just explore it.

You know what I'm saying? Like, I have an athlete. Okay, so, excuse me, I've heard his name before, and I just heard it through passing and just probably just being associated with Westside and Louisville. That's the right way. But here we go. So he has social capital, right?

So he can go meet any and everybody in here. And if he has something to say or if he has some service, they're going to hook right on to it. They're going to like the association. So for athletes, right, these guys are in everybody's communities, right? The fact that a guy played at Ohio State or Notre Dame or Michigan, he can use that social capital to basically leverage himself for some sort of business. You know what I'm saying? And so I try to push that and try to explore, like, there's a lot of money in here.

There's a lot of money in a lot of industries. You know what I'm saying? There's a lot of opportunity, endless opportunity. Wherever you can look, you can find it. Here we go. Go ahead. So I was saying, universities, I always explain this, right? Universities run off of donations, right?

In order for you to have these donations, you need people who have money. So if I can get directly next to you and say, hey, can I just come intern for you? Can I get next to you and find out how you do what you do? And let's see if this may be of some interest to me. So I try to push that to young guys. Like, you know, don't chase the dream of being a football player. It's cool. And if you don't make it, it's not the end of the world.

You know what I'm saying? There's a thousand ways to get to where you want to go. You know what I love about your story, too, is when you started this business venture with activities to help kids and help coaches, your focus was, I have a lot of experience, and I've gone through a lot of tough things. I have a clear vision for how I can just help people. I didn't charge up front.

I didn't have a grand vision. Other than I can help them when I want to, and I'm going to start helping whoever will't charge up front. I didn't have a grand vision. Other than I can help when I want to. I'm going to start helping whoever will listen and then give everything I have. And it grew all of a sudden because the initial drive was there. The honesty. Most of our listeners probably didn't pick up, but your hustle from the streets. You get $20 and I'll be here on Saturday. That's a straight street.

Give me $20. Same exchange. You change the conversation. It's service. So I won't say the top book because everyone asks me that. I hate that because I always have a few. But what would be the top books you would recommend for a couple of people who maybe not read books? I've also heard people ask to make it easy.

It's like what's the book you gift most? I don't gift it, but I recommend it on Twitter. I think the first one that sparked my mind was James Allen, As a Man Thinketh. Have you ever heard of Dr. David Hawken? So Dr. David Hawken, Power Versus Force, Transcending Levels of Consciousness. He has about 20 books, right? He has a whole series. And his series of books are the most impactful thing I've ever read.

Just transcending levels of consciousness, the most impactful thing I've ever read. Just transcendent levels of consciousness, the things you associate with, the conversations that you have. It's actually backordered on Amazon. I ordered it about four months ago

and it's not coming. I got all the other ones but that one is still, that's the one I went to order. It's iBooks. Download that thing. I like the physical books, man. I'm like, hey, look. If you can't find like the physical books, man. I hate you.

Well, if you can't find it, get it. No, I tell you, like, it has – look, I have a pad downstairs. I can't read books on the iPad. It's hard for me. I like the physical. I like the highlight. I'm like an old-school reader. I don't know.

I'm like a nerd in that aspect. But those are a few. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. Like, I'm a personal development guy. Just even the whole hook and business and anything is right. Let me give so much to you and let me offer you so much service that you need me. And based upon my skill set, I'm going to be compensated for it. You know what I'm saying?

And that's like I said, if you don't have a competitive advantage, don't compete. And so when it comes to training, everybody can train guys from a physical standpoint, but my intellectual property from knowing the game, that's where I was servicing these guys at, and I just found a way to package it. You know what I'm saying? There's only one person with your skill set on this whole fucking planet. It's you. Yeah, absolutely.

There's only one person who can do this job you're doing now. But like I said, a lot of guys don't understand themselves. You know, there's a lot of guys who are super successful but who just have no clue of who they are. You know what I'm saying? And so in that sense, you can't duplicate it. You know what I'm saying? Like a lot of these guys are made up from a bunch of coaches. You know what I'm saying?

He plugs into me, he plugs into me, he plugs into me, and then I become something but I don't understand who I am, right? Yeah. The only difference is I've understood who I was. The isolation, that process of reading. And, like, I'm a right? Yeah. The only difference is I've understood who I was. The isolation, that process, and reading, and like I'm a big biography guy. Just reading other people's stories allow you to like

understand your story. You know, like that's that. Oh, yeah. And you see it like, well, I thought I was the only guy alive struggling with this shit. Turns out,

everybody struggles with this shit. I say that all the time. You think you're on your own little island and you get around other people and that's me and Mike connected that way.

Yeah. We were at a conference, we started talking, and it's like, we're like the same person. Your story is so different, yet the at a conference we start talking it's like we're like the same person your story is so different yet the big takeaways i feel like it's like the same journey different experiences different worlds but the the the lessons are very similar and i agree with you the concepts are the same you read biographies and you're like man i i'm not the only one who thinks so weird like i'm not the one like because you're like maybe

everyone else is right and I'm just weird over here, right? You know, it goes through that head. You're like, why do I think like this? And even, like, go back all the way when you were in high school and college and then even now, obviously now you surround yourself

with like-minded people like Corey and a bunch of other people. But back then, you probably, you felt like you were on your own island. And a lot of that's why things happened the way they did because, you know, no you but now you understood yourself it was a lot easier and now it's obviously it's a whole it's always a process we're always growing and learning but you don't have that when you're young you know no i even say this uh even going through the process

of just educating yourself you know just like uh when i went through the process of educating myself and becoming more confident to conversate you know i'm saying like when you're not educated you don't want to talk to people uh you don't want to ask for help but no just just being more vulnerable being a human being you know i'm saying uh but that's that's basically how i've been able to grow myself and grow everything i've been doing uh when i when i went to speak i never advertised you know i never advertised or anything i used to believe that the energy i'll give these people, it'll be duplicated because you'll go tell somebody else and he'll go tell somebody else and things will kind of like organically

grow. And that's basically how I just kind of like everybody I've met from the most successful people to just average Joes has been from just the personal, just me being me. You know what I'm saying? And I don't know. I just think that's kind of like the cool thing where you can be yourself and you can have success and you don't have to be a character of any sort.

That's awesome. Wow. Let's get to the real important issue here, Maurice. You're talking squad at 8-7. Do you have any plans? Because you're looking pretty jacked to me, man. You want to do any kind of competition? Is it all kind of satisfied a little bit?

I feel like we should get you in one of those old school meets. I went to an old school meet, but I can only stay for like a portion of the time. The cool thing about it is like I like lifting weights. That's the thing. This is not like a, hey, you have to force this guy to lift weights. Like I like lifting weights. It's a pretty cool thing to do. We love it too.

Now, look, I actually think it's a spiritual thing, right? Because like from a spiritual standpoint, they say like you're in the here and the now. Like you got to be in it's a spiritual thing, right? Because from a spiritual standpoint, they say you're in the here and the now. You've got to be in the moment. Meditation, right? Starting the day off, putting effort into something. I just think pushing the bar up or locking in. I've got all this damn weight on my back, and I've got to push it. You know what I'm saying?

And I love that portion of it. And it's always objective. Like Henry Rollins said, 200 pounds is always 200 pounds. He said it could have kicked you the real deal. It would never fucking lie to you. It's the most honest place in the world. I love that. You know, people, you say, what do you lift?

Well, I probably do about. No, there's no you probably do. You know or you don't know. Like, there is no, like, I may be benched 300. No, you can't. Have you done it before? It's like Yoda. Do or do not.

Don't try. That's why I love the weight room. It is the most honest place. You can't lie about anything under the weights. Like, they tell the story for you, you know? I tell you what. Listen to me. When I say I love it, like, I just love.

I'm like a meathead. I hate to say it, but I'm just like a guy who can get up under the bar. I push. I probably stay in the weight room all day if I could. You know what I'm saying? But I just enjoy it. I tell you like this. I wouldn't mind trying to like actually compete for one.

You know what I'm saying? AJ, train him. We're going to train Maurice for a big-time power meter or something. See what this guy can do. Yeah, I'd be like, just come out and do the meet that AJ's doing. Hold on. They're a bit stronger than me. If I get about eight months, eight or nine months of serious. I'll a bit stronger than me. If I get about

eight months, eight or nine months of serious damn. I'll come out here and train and we'll get you ready for a

meet. If I ever get serious, I wouldn't want you to have to come out here. I retired three years ago.

Now, for me, lifting is more of just a daily process than a job. We'll have fun. Mike, you think that's about good,

eh? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I'll come out too. We'll have fun. Mike, you think that's about good, eh? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I'll come out too. All right, we'll get Mike out. We'll do the ollie lifting too. We'll do the snatch and the clean jerk. They probably won't have a problem learning. No, I got a feeling they'll be like, like this?

But we didn't. Oh, that was like 400 pounds. You probably experienced this a lot with Corey. So we're talking about open, like our own office facility. So basically we lift weights, but we brainstorm business like during, because, I mean, that's where we want to be, so why not like have our meetings in the weight room? Brainstorming while we lift.

That's how your chief presence had a better idea. I mean, we just had a lead FTS. Dave has his conference table for his meetings inside the gym. Light presses, squat racks, all surrounding it. It's glorious. I'm so jealous of that. Don't they have signs where it says the brain is more active when you exercise it? Yeah, the more he can move. Doug swears by that.

And when he needs the idea and wants to think better, he moves. Walks around, moves the gauge. Humans are made to move, and when you move, you're being more human. I don't understand why in schools they've taken it out. I mean, they keep removing physical education. Because they think the body's just carrying the brain around. They don't understand why in schools they've taken it out. I mean, they keep removing physical education. Because they think the body's just carrying the brain around. That's wrong. They don't understand.

That's wrong. All right. Yeah, well, you got something else you want to say? Oh, no, I just always say the body is the servant of the mind. Boom. Yeah. James Allen, yeah. James Allen.

By the way, we're going to link to all these books, folks. So if you're busy, like, writing down, you missed a few, in the show notes you'll be able to see a reading list, and I recommend you get to read them. That's a great list of books. Yep. Where can people find you? Website, Instagram, Twitter?

Yeah, website is MauriceClauretOnline.com. Twitter is actually ReeseClauret13. It has a blue check, R-E-E-S-E, Clauret, C-L-A-R-E-T-T. And my Instagram is MauriceClauret. I wasn't intelligent enough to make them all the same name. I screwed up, Jim. Some other Mike Bledsoe somewhere stole my name. And on Twitter, I'm AJRoberts33.

Because AJ Roberts, someone registered it when Twitter first went live. They've never posted once. And I'm not big enough yet to get that blue check. So I'm working on it. You're going to get there, AJ. All right, guys. Make sure you go over to barbellshrug.com. Sign up for the newsletter.

Five-star review on iTunes. Positive comments only. Positive in the name of the game. Thanks, Maurice. That was a pleasure. Thank you.