Escaping the Drift with John Gafford - #94: The Road to Redemption: Aljamain Sterling MMA and Beyond

Episode Date: December 12, 2023

This week on Escaping the Drift, host John Gafford sits down with UFC bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling. He opens up about growing up in a large family on Long Island and how wrestling helped put him on the path to MMA. Sterling discusses meeting Jon Jones in college and being inspired to start his fighting career. Sterling shares stories from his early amateur and pro fights as he worked his way up the ranks. He talks about the grind of being a low-level UFC fighter and having to work as a gym teacher. Sterling also opens up about the highs and lows of his UFC title wins and losses. He gets candid about the controversy surrounding his first title fight.The champ dives into his business interests outside of fighting like real estate and starting his own rum company. Sterling discusses the importance of financial literacy for athletes. He also shares his goals for competing at bantamweight and featherweight in the future. It's a fascinating look into the life and career of one of the UFC's most decorated champions.Highlights: "I don't understand the world, how it operates in this manner. Like, we see the same thing repeating itself over and over and over. And it's just like to me, Well, why aren't we learning from those mistakes so that history doesn't repeat itself so that we could do things a little bit smarter or better.""I think I've been able to at least learn from my, my ancestors in the sense of fighting, learn for these guys, the forefathers and things that they did things that worked. Oh, less damage, longer career wrestling, okay, if I can get the fight, get different finishes. fan favorite. That's what people want to see." "I do think the UFC should do a little bit more of that. The only thing is, maybe they should put the course out on video. And this way is not like they need to spend a bunch of money every single time to hold these events, just here's the resource."Timestamps:00:00: Introduction 03:22: Family 07:18: Gang Affiliated Neighborhoods 13:28: Goals & Obstacles 17:03: Athletic Path24:15: UFC Fights34:47: Negativity Into Positivity 44:54: Financial Management 53:45: Rum Brand 56:55: The Future

Why do we have to make the same mistakes as everybody else? I don't understand the world, how it operates in this manner. Like we see the same thing repeating itself over and over and over. And it's just like, to me, well, why aren't we learning from those mistakes so that history doesn't repeat itself so that we can do things a little bit smarter or better. And I think I've been able to at least learn from my, my ancestors in the sense of fighting,

learn from these guys, the forefathers and things that they did, things that worked. And now escaping the drift, the show designed to get you from where you are to where you want to be. I'm John Gafford. And I have a knack for getting extraordinary achievers to drop their secrets to help you on a path to greatness. So stop drifting along, escape the drift,

and it's time to start right now. Welcome back, everybody, to another episode of Escaping the Drift. And I got to tell you, man, I know I say this every single week, every time I come in here that I say I got a banger, but today I got a banger. So today's guest is somebody that normally, dude, you hear this dude get introduced. Somebody's about to get their ass whipped. But today, hopefully we're not going to do any ass, but we're just going to do some talking. So this cat is the most decorated Bantam heavy, or sorry, Bantamweight champion in ufc history he has more uh consecutive wins more title defenses just just all around unbelievable badass and a great dude from what i i know a

couple people that are really really tight with this cat and they just do not say one bad thing about him they say the greatest things about him so we're happy to have him here ladies and gentlemen this is the funk master this is al jermermaine Sterling. Al Joe, what's up, buddy? How are you? Good. Thanks for having me. Yeah, man. Super happy to have you in studio today. So you got a cool story, man. You, uh, I mean, obviously when you reach the levels of success that you've had through athletics, it is, it's not by accident that there's definitely clues that you've left along the way and things that you've done. So, but I always like to start at the beginning, right? So tell me about growing up out, Joe, tell me about you, Matt, tell me about the, where, where you started.

Where I started, I grew up in Roosevelt, New York, Long Island. And then I moved over in middle school to Uniondale high school. So I graduated, I wrestled there. I played a lot of different sports. Growing up, we played a lot of pickup sports like basketball, football, racing each other down the streets and things like that, playing some pickup baseball and soccer as well. And when I got to high school,

I got a little bit more disciplined, like trying to figure out what I wanted to do. And I found wrestling. I tried out for the basketball team, but that was my first love. And I came short in the tryouts. I made the first day, second day I got cut. And my wrestling coach forced me again, came to me and said, listen, you're never going to be nothing but five foot four soaking wet, 112 pounds, come out and wrestle. So I came out and wrestled, checked it out. It was a fun practice and I haven't stopped since then. I used that to take me to college.

And somehow, some way I met Jon Jones. And then the next thing you know, I'm fighting in the UFC. That's kind of a quick jump though, man. So like, my question is, obviously you had a heavy competitive edge to you growing up like you like you like to compete it was something that was in you is there something you got from your parents is it something you got from a mentor growing up like who was the person that you think instilled that in you um that's a good question i never thought

about that where did i get the competitive edge from? Well, maybe because I had so many siblings growing up, we had to fight for everything. Fighting for food for seconds, fighting for. There's seven of you in the house with 12 total extended, right? 12 total extended. Yeah, I guess you include the parents and then the rest. It would be about like 10 of us. 10 of you? Yeah.

Where did you fall on the pecking order as far as age with that? I was like the, I mean, living at the house with my brothers and sisters at that time. What did I say? My sister, brother. I was fourth. You were fourth. Yeah. But then with my other side, I would be six, actually seventh, including my, to my older brothers and sisters on the other side. It was a lot of us.

There was a lot of you. Yeah. What did mom and dad do? Mom, my dad was a street pharmacist and, uh, that's a good way to put it. That's a good way to put it. Yeah. And my mom was a, um, uh, I guess kind of a stay at home mom. She, she did like a lot of different odd jobs. Like she was

working at a hair salon for a little bit. Uh, she helped my dad, um, and pretty much stay at home. Mom, that's pretty much her job. Pretty much. We'll do. I mean, that's that many kids. That's a full time deal. It's a lot. I mean, she was almost pregnant every single year, like back to back. Yeah. That's a lot. When you went away to college, had any of your other siblings done that? Or were you the first? I had my older sister, Laverne. She went to college first. I went second, but I was the first to finish. Uh, I think she ended up finishing like later on, but I was the first to finish. And then my other younger brother on the same side, my mom and same dad, um, we went to SUNY Cortland, but that was pretty much our introduction to school.

And it was through wrestling because the NCAA clearing house, once I learned what that was and I realized I had no shot in getting in because I tried to like turn it around after my ninth year on my ninth grade year I just kind of you just kind of be a little bit of uh just I don't I don't know if you you got a lot of curse on here or not yeah you can say whatever you want we fucked off a lot you know so yeah it just wasn't good so by time i realized and for wrestling in order to go d1 and i realized this is what i wanted to do um i tried to see and look at all the schools and stuff and i saw the grades and everything the classes i needed i was like bro i i'm not getting in yeah you know so i had to figure out another way which was either to go to

juco school or i went to another D3 school, SUNY Morrisville, upstate New York. I went there for a year for an accounting major. Then when I figured out I didn't want to do that anymore, I switched to phys ed, but I tried to take the classes that would transfer over to my course. Otherwise just like wasted electives and wasted time in school, you're just paying all this money for nothing. And that's when I went to Cortland eventually. Right on. So where did you meet John Jones? SUNY Morrisville.

You met him. He was there. Yeah. He had his own issues at Iowa Central College where he was a national champ his freshman year. Then I guess the second year he came back, I guess he had some issues with the school and he dropped out and he'll come in

soon anymore his first semester um next semester I just didn't see him I didn't really know what he was doing I just followed him on myspace see some of the stuff he was posting and he was doing these grappling matches I thought it was pretty badass that I've always seen on tv I just never knew this was like there was an avenue to get here I thought it was just kind of like you got to know somebody yeah to do this and he was doing jiu like, you got to know somebody to do this. And he was doing jujitsu matches. I reached out to him. I saw him taking a couple of fights.

I was like, yo bro, I want to do that. I think I could do that too. Yeah. Yeah. That's pretty much exactly what I said. And he was like, no,

you don't. And I was like, I'm telling you, that's what I want to do. And he told me where his gym was. And when he gave me the address, it was in SUNY Coraline. It was at Coraline.

It was like the same town where you were training pretty much a couple of miles away. Yeah. So I was like, dude, this is a no brainer. I went down there and just, I haven't looked back since then. So here's a question, man. Do you think that, cause like, if you look at, if you look at college athletes, I think that like, if you look at the, like D1 football athletes, right. They have a fucking mass of people

that just keep them out of trouble and just make sure that they're on the right way. Did you, I'm guessing at wrestling, they didn't really have that mass of people to keep you out of trouble. No, not like that. I mean, I still hung out with the guys I hung out with. Like some of my friends, I had some good friends

and I had a group of friends that weren't. Necessarily in your best interest. Yeah,'t necessarily in your best interest yeah yeah that's interest we'll say you know take this path or take this path yeah and one of my brothers that my older brother he was actually blood he still is um so he was heavily involved in gangs and uh you know i almost went that route with him know? So it was one of those things like I had this group of friends who were like, you know, they're cool kids still, but not involved in that type of stuff. And then I had other friends over here who are involved in that type of stuff. And, um, you know, when you want to hang out with big bro all the time and you kind of get a

little bit mixy with that. So yeah yeah life was uh very interesting growing up very interesting i can i can see that at what point i mean obviously this is going to skip forward a bit or whatever but at what point did you kind of say hey man i can't really hang out with with you guys anymore like i got to draw a line there i mean is that something where you still get kind of like go home and like see some guys from back in the day and it's you know you still get now i'm not sucked into the life but you're still i mean where are you with that because some people man have to like draw a hard line some people can still drift back and forth like where are you with that i i think the good thing was i never made a full commitment to

that life so it's it wasn't really something that pulled me back because I still had the flexibility to kind of be like, I could do this or I could do that. And it wouldn't be any like negative repercussions or anything like that. And I think for the most part, I was pretty friendly with everyone in high school, even with the rival gangs. Like I never really had like, you're a nice guy. There's no reason for me to have an issue with you. You know know the only issues i would ever have is when my brother would get into some stuff and uh and i wasn't very big man so i was just like what am i doing what am i doing when my brother's not around what am i

gonna really do this little kid who wrestles at 112 pounds walks around about 119 122 pounds soaking wet like what's that guy gonna do against some of these big giant guys that are walking around with these flags on like, this is, is just different. It was a different time back then, you know? So for me to, I didn't really draw a line, but I knew where I wanted to go and I was to go to college so that I can wrestle. Cause I came up short in high school. I knew if I went to college,

I had another opportunity to get another four years to all American. Cause I never got to go to States in high school. And I knew if I went to college, I had another opportunity to get another four years to All-American. Because I never got to go to states in high school. I was ranked in a state my senior year. I beat the kid that beat me for the last match. I beat him twice earlier that season. And then he beat me when it mattered the most. And he got to qualify. And it was in the finals, county championship finals.

And I didn't get to go. Dude, I find that really interesting. Because, and I'll tell you why. I mean, even at a very young age, it's like you kind of, it seems to me like you were good at setting goals for yourself and understanding where you were trying to go and how to get there. I mean, it seems that way. Well, not in the beginning because I didn't know what I wanted to do.

Okay. But then once I realized what college, through wrestling, the only way to get there was, well, to have this, you got to do that. Yeah. And that was the, that was the turning point that helped me kind of navigate which way I want to go. Because before it was just kind of like, I'm just going through, going through the motions. My dad does what he does. If anything, I could always join the family business and maybe that's like the avenue I take. But somehow, some way wrestling, I really say this all the time, but I know it's a little cliche, but I really do feel like wrestling saved my life. Like it really changed a whole lot of things for me, my perspective on life, what I wanted for myself. Because then when you have this guideline, this bar, you can't get there doing all the other stuff that I was doing. So I had to get my grades up in order for me to even get any type of looks from schools. And thankfully, it allowed me to at least go to Morrisville.

I mean, there was almost no barrier to entry to go there. But thankfully, I went there with a goal in mind, and it was to transfer. My goal was to get here, bring my grades up. I got a fresh slate. It's not like my ninth grade year where i just had like 60s and 65s so now i get an opportunity to actually apply myself and uh get good grades and i surprised myself i was like okay you're actually smarter than what you give yourself credit for you just gotta well i have a feeling about you when it comes to that

right because obviously dude i i see you and i know the guys you hang out with that I at least know. And they're not hanging out with somebody that's dumb. So my guess with you is you're that kid that could probably pretty much without even looking at a book, get like a B or something on a test, but never turned in one page of homework, which caused you to get like Ds. Is that fair? Yes, that's fair. If I had some notes to kind of study real quick, I could hang it out and just memorize everything and I'm good. I'm good in that front,

but come to like the other stuff, I just struggled a little bit, but yeah, thankfully it worked out, man. The wrestling really did give me that avenue, gave me a platform and gave me direction. I think that's the most important part. When you know where you want to go, I think it makes things a lot more clearer because then you can write out your goals.

And that's when I started to do that. Really? So now you're putting pen to paper. How old is this college? This is in high school. High school. My senior year. So I knew what I wanted to do when I got to school.

And then when I got to school, then those goals kind of changed. And I gave myself like a little bit of a loose kind of like goal sheet of what I want to do and what I want to accomplish. And I knew if I at least hit that, I was in striking range to at least transfer out and go to a D1 school or another college. So what made you like, I think that's so interesting, though, because I mean, where did you like, what made you think to write the goals down? Like what, like what made you, I mean, most kids at that age are not thinking like that, especially if they don't have like a heavy role model influence. That's, you know, here's read this Tony Robbins book. Let's do that. Like they're not, they don't get that. So where, so where did that come from, man? Um, I'm trying to think now, because I never really get asked these questions.

I never even think about it. I think it's, man, it's hard to really say. I just feel like it was more of, there's one thing I always did do. It was when it came to money, I was good at budgeting, understanding expenses and stuff like that. And I got that from accounting my senior year when I took that class. And that's why I went to school for accounting. Cause I was like, Oh, this is something I'm actually into. And I think I could be pretty good at it. And I started writing stuff down. Cause then when you start budgeting, you're almost like indirectly writing goals and knowing what your expenses are, what you're willing to spend and how much money

you could play around with kind of thing. So I so I kind of took that and I think maybe that's probably what it was. I don't think there was anything else that I really look to like, yeah, you should probably write out your goals. Uh, maybe the teacher, the, the, the, maybe said that the blackboard, when she makes us write the same thing over and over a hundred times all the way across, uh, maybe. Yeah. Just getting into trouble at the school or something like that. I'm guessing you're still a goal. You still write your goals down today. A hundred percent. A hundred percent.

I had one post that did really, really well. I didn't think anything of it. I just like to share stuff. Cause I think on social media, you see a lot of things that's like fabricated, you know, it's more. No, this is a glitz and glamour. Everything's real. That rented Lambo is totally real.

Come on, man. 100%. This is what people think though. You know, it's, you know, their reality is their perception, you know? So people see these things and they think it's just like, this is all what it is.

And they kind of use that and they judge themselves and what they have and don't have. And I feel like being able to show my vulnerability kind of lets people understand like it's OK, man, even when you're at the highest high. What people might think my life is all this amazing. I got so much crap in my shed, in my my doghouse that I'm trying to clean out to kind of liberate myself that I have going on behind the scenes that nobody knows about that. I don't really talk about that type of stuff. Family stuff, you know, siblings, parents, divorces, like all kinds of craziness, man. So I like to show that there are other things that go on besides the just perfect image. Cause it's never like that, man. This really isn't. And I think me sharing those goals, it helped a lot

of people because I posted my goals from 2019. And I think I posted that maybe a year ago. And it was, I guess it was just very relatable for a lot of people to see someone who was knocked out badly, came back and did all these things where most people wrote me off and gave me no shot. But I just told myself, this is what I plan to do. And the only way to do it is I put the work in and that's it. You know, so John Jones, let's go back to do. And the only way to do it is I put the work in and that's it. You know, so John Jones, let's go back to that. John Jones tells you to go to the gym. You're like, it's right here where I'm at. So you go to the gym and who's your first mentor in the gym there?

Cause now you're learning a different skill. You go from learning right grappling to learning jujitsu. This is when you went that way. Yeah. Jujitsu, boxing, learning how to throw a punch. The right way. Yeah, exactly. Now the stuff I see on TV.

My first mentor there, I mean, it was kind of John, but not really because I didn't really see him all that often. I had class. I was still in school. I was still wrestling

at a high level. And in order for me to go there, I had to go around the off season or after a workout from the gym like the practice and then try to eat real quick and then try to run to the to the training room so it was really crazy and that was just the dedication i had i went through a full two-hour practice go eat something small or something big and then take the leftovers and i go run to the gym and go do some grappling mma training just because i was just curious infatuated and just uh infatuated with what it was because i just wanted to see that this was something i could do did you fall in love with the grind pretty quick oh i mean it's

very relatable to wrestling so yeah you get in what you put in that's what i love about combat sports you legit get in what you put in there's no secrets yeah there could be another guy who could be a bit more talented but if you work hard if you're smart enough and you come up with a good game plan, you could kind of tilt the scales back in your favor a little bit and kind of level the playing field, especially if that person who's talented doesn't really work as hard. You know, it's funny talking about athletes and how they look at things. And I was in a small group the other day when Marshall Falk was there talking to us. And he said something that I never thought about with pro sports, with all the people I've heard Speaker have talked to.

And he said, what it takes to be great. We're talking about the NFL. And he goes, what it takes to be great in the NFL. Because you have to remember, every dude that has a roster spot on an NFL team was the dude at one point on a team. Either on high school or in college, they were the baddest dude on their team. And so the dude that's your third string backup behind you at one point was the man. And he goes, what it takes to be great in the NFL is you have to realize there's rooms with inside the room, inside the room. And we're like, what are you talking about? He goes, well, like, look at me.

He goes, make it the league's big deal. He goes, and then there's hall of famers. That's a room you want to be in. I was like, yeah. And he goes, but there's another room. Then there's first ballot hall of famers. And then there's first ballot hall of famers that also want a Superbowl. And then there's first ballot hall of famers that also want a Superbowl. They were also league MVP. He goes, that then there's first ballot Hall of Famers that also want a Superbowl. They were also league MVP.

He goes, that's a pretty small room for us. Yeah. He goes, but I was always looking for that room. So from when the point I'm getting to, when I make this is when you first started out, was it always like,

as soon as you kind of fell in love and saw that you could do this in this gym, were you immediately thinking I'm going to, I'm going to UFC. This is where I want to go. You know, I thought of it more like as a hobby and then i was like you know i'm young i'm gonna roll the dice and just see what happens i'm gonna get my degree to make sure worst case scenario i have something to fall back on and it's gonna be no harm no foul it's just i tried something that i always was interested in

The next level from fighting has always been the less the next level from wrestling has always been fighting Yeah, so whenever you want a match or lost a match You always kind of had that like that macho man Like I want to know if I could beat him in a fight even if he beat me in a match He's one I but I bet you I beat you in a fight That's always like the next you know, cause it's just too like outfits trying to go at it and someone has to win. Someone has to lose kind of thing. And that's always like the next thing that we think about for the most part. That's how I know most wrestlers are.

Yeah. So I just figured, let me roll the dice, see what happens. It wasn't like I started with the goal of, Hey, I'm going to go to the UFC. I saw John Jones when I got to my senior

year, that's when the goals start to change. I told myself as soon as I'm done, cause I already had a couple of pro fight, uh, amateur fights. I had seven at the time, banged out seven amateur fights as a college student, full-time college student. I'm training full-time I'm partying, but I'm, I'm managing the party. And like, I, this is me knowing what I want already. Yeah. So I have my fun. I still try to live like a college kid, but for the most part,

I'm still thinking longterm, short term, five, five years, 10 years. What life could be if this ends up working out. If this worked, I see John Jones,

he's in the UFC and got there in like six months. So I'm like, I don't know the recruitment process, but I know he whooped a lot of ass. Yeah. And he did it super quick to have six months. So I'm like, I don't know the recruitment process, but I know he whooped a lot of ass and he did it super quick to have six fights in like six and six months is that's insane. There's not even a lot of people who are willing to do that in two years. You know, they want to take their time. This guy was just out there killing everybody. So I'm using him as my blueprint. Well, if I bang out a couple fights and i look good

doing it and i win maybe i could go to the ufc too yeah and i can make some money along the way because you get paid for it wasn't very much but you get paid for it so i'm thinking where were your fights what what i fought in pa i fought in new hampshire um i fought in new york on the native american reservation and New Jersey. Okay, cool. But these were just like one-off cards. This was not like. Yeah, so I would just take short notice fights, jump in here, jump in there.

I'm just like, I didn't care. I'm young. Yeah. I feel like I'm invincible just going after it and showing off it worked out. And then as, like I said, as I went pro and I made that jump, it was at that moment where I said, my college season is done for wrestling I still got school but this is what John did okay how can we get there let's try to get these fights and when I had the first two I was like this is not as easy as he made it look because he was able to just turn around and go yeah um finding opponents opponents pulling out um the weight cut I don't know for him. It just

seemed to be a lot easier. I was still cutting like 20, 25 pounds sometimes. Um, but I was still able to do it cause that was wrestling. That was wrestling for me. Cutting 20 pounds a week was like normal. So I was able to make it a lot easier back then. And then after, you know, you have a couple of tough fights, um, a little bit of injuries here and there slowed down a bit. And then when I finally was eight, you know, so I finally got the call to the UFC on short notice. They told me I wasn't ready. Then I got the call.

What was that moment? I was drinking a beer. I had friends and family over, barbecue. They're like, yeah, we need you in 15 minutes. And I'm like, sure. Okay. And I got off the phone. I gave my beer to one of my good friends that I still talk to today.

And I go, yo, finish this. And he go, what happened? I'm like, I just got the call, bro. I'm going to the UFC. I'm like, I'm about to go for a run right now. That was like one of the greatest moments for me. Um, went for like a, I think like a 20, 25 minute run just to break the sweat, get the alcohol out of my system a bit. And I was pumped, you know? So, but that, that was the goal it became to get to the UFC. And then once that finally happened, pumped, you know? So, but that, that was the goal. It became to get to the UFC. And then once that finally happened, then, you know, the goals, they slowly start to change every year. You start to check things off. You start to move that goalposts, add new things, take some things out. And you look back and you're like,

you see all the things you've covered and you're like, damn. Well, let's talk, I want to talk about that first fight, man. I want to talk about, cause you're going, you fought these regional promotions, but I mean, I mean, Indian reservation, we're talking about what? Maybe 2000 people max. How many people were talking? Yeah, not very much. Not very many.

The gates were not huge, right? Cafeteria. Okay. There you go. So where they're going to have like wrestling tomorrow night, right behind you, like pro wrestling is going to be there. So the first fight, man, where was it? How many people?

My first amateur fight or pro? No, no, no. UFC UFC I'm talking about you got the call ah wow you get the call first UFC fight was here in Vegas Mandalay Bay at Mandalay Bay UFC 170 Ronda Rousey versus Sarah McMahon Daniel Cormier versus Pat Cummings um so so you work you work your camp before the fight yeah now I now I don't know if this is I don't know if I heard this and I don't know if it's right or not or if it's real, but I heard, like, dude, you're a one-man show. Like, you are your own team. Like, you handle all your shit. Is that accurate?

Yes, but I want to be careful the way I say that. Okay. Just so no one takes offense. No, no, no, no. There are people that help you. But in the sense of organizing my training schedules, um, for the most part now, I kind of leave the diet stuff to the UFC when it gets closer to the fight, but outside of that, it's mostly me.

Um, and trying to find training partners, I guess that's mostly me as well. And holding myself accountable to my training sessions, I guess is me. And so I guess in that sense, my strength and conditioning, I was doing that. Now for this fight, this next one that's coming up, I'm leaving that to the UFC to help me build a strength program to develop strength. Okay. To get ready to go up a weight class of 145. Just because the way I did it was more for weight loss. Yeah. Muscle conditioning.

You just figured you've done it for so long. You knew your body. You knew what you needed better than anybody else would. Yeah. And I coach. I wrestle. I was a physical education major. So I had experience in that. You know, I've taken the anatomy A and P1 and 2.

I've taken the biomechanics classes, the exercise physiology class. And we have to come up with these systems or plans to kind of dictate what would you do if you were a phys ed teacher and you want to develop this for this kid or that for that kid. You have to come up with a plan based on the stuff that they teach us. You have to base it around that. And that helped me kind of figure out, well, I know what we did for wrestling because my coach put us through these programs with the snc coach and i could take this this works and i know i'm trying to do this so i could kind of just make my own little thing and it worked and it just worked and it worked it worked i still think to this day still work yeah so if it ain't broke don't fix it yeah right but now i need to change it up because i'm trying to now trying to move away class yeah

all right well let's back up again. So you're at UFC, their first fight, the Ronda Rousey fight, and you're sitting there. You go through your camp, you do your thing, you get to there, you get to there. When does it get, I mean, real? Was it like the weigh-in? Was it like in the back watching the monitor waiting for them to call your name? Was it when you

went through the curtain? Was it like, when was the holy shit moment? Because there had to have been at least one. The first time the first time is probably when i saw daniel cormier in the workout room we're both losing weight together he's doing his hitting pads and i'm just like that's daniel cormier this guy wrestled in the olympics this guy's the man you know and i saw ronda rousey i saw sarah mcmahon she also wrestled in the Olympics I believe I think she was a silver or bronze medalist so there was a lot of like fanboy moments for me yeah but then I even told myself then I was like when you get here you got to remember that you

are now the guy act like you belong yeah act like you belong here you're the guy also and where's my grandmother you say act like you've been somewhere yeah i i even till this day man i still see fighters it'll be their debut they'll come up and it just looked like they're like a deer in headlights they're just walking around like yeah i'm like yo bro don't look like that guy like it's okay to have them to feel that emotion i'm like not i'm not saying don't address it that's real yeah but you know show like you you know, show your, like your peacock feathers, you know? Yeah. Put it out.

I mean, I just, for me, man, it's like every time I go to like, I have really good seats for the nights, right? Like they're really low. They're kind of right down by the ice. So when the crowd really pops, dude, you're close enough to the ice where you feel it. Yeah. And I can't even imagine what it's like being in the center of that having all that noise concentrated at you it's nuts it's nuts i mean it's just got to be just just ground shaking so that that first fight comes off you win the first fight i won the first ones um 29 28 cody gibson he also took it on show

notice um now this is mandalay bay this is the's in Vegas. So the, the arena is never really filled here in the States, especially in Vegas. People are like out partying and drinking events. And then they come there usually for the main card. Yep. So after the fights, then I then go to the crowd because they give us tickets and I get to watch this thing fill out. And that was probably one of the best experiences kind of seeing like one day I believe this is going to be, going to be me. And it's just crazy going from curtain jerker. of the best experiences kind of seeing like one day i'm gonna i believe this is gonna be gonna be

me and it's just crazy going from curtain jerker um i mean we weren't the very first fighter tonight but we might we it was close it was close you know so to go from that to headlining two pay-per-view cards i i feel like that was like the culmination of everything finally coming together so that's it's unreal man you're in the center main event where the people are booing for you cheering for you it's it's an unreal feeling and it's nerve-wracking but it's also exciting at the same time especially my last one uh with the O'Malley fight yeah I knew I was going into enemy territory I'm taking it all in okay so okay so can we can we we were going to get there eventually,

but since you brought it up, we'll talk about it right now. So, so how, I mean, okay. How does that pitch go from Dana? Do you like,

here's what we're going to do. We want you to fight this cat and we're going to do it in his hometown in front of all of his people. And even if it's not his hometown, it's a, it's as many Irish people as we can fit into an arena. It's like, we want you to fight conor mcgregor we're gonna do it in dublin it's essentially what happened how does that

conversation go or can you even if i ask something's crazy you can't talk about it feel free to tell me no we actually didn't even have a conversation after i just beat henry ceuto two division champion yeah just coming out of retirement um you know i beat him by split decision even though i thought it was i thought i clearly won but um split decision win and to go from that to go from that high and then feeling like you're gonna finally get like to decompress and then a couple hours later you hear that dana white makes an announcement that you're gonna be fighting in three and a half months i'm just like, I could barely even walk right now. What are you talking about?

Like at least check on me first. Yeah. That's, that was my whole thing with that situation. Um, but it was a tough scenario. Like I, I took it for financial reasons, clearly. Cause anybody else in their right mind is going to be like, if there's, you remove the money, you're just going to be like, dude, I physically can't. I can't do it.

It doesn't make any sense. But me, I like to push the envelope and just see what I can do. And if I was to win in that situation, man, honestly, I would have been walking around like the man. Like you couldn't have told me anything just because I know what it took to get into that fight. I knew what it took for me just to get there. Not in the sense of like all the other stuff. I'm talking about from my health perspective, just to get to the fight.

There was so much behind the scenes nonsense that people could say whatever they want about calling it an excuse. It's not an excuse. These are actual factual things that happened. I think everyone's seen that Dana White turned this fight around really quick to give this guy an advantage, to give him an advantage from a weight cut standpoint,

an injury standpoint, a home field advantage for people standpoint. I mean, that stuff doesn't bother me. The only thing that really was the worst part for me was just my my legs being beat up yeah and from a physical standpoint like how am i supposed to kick a bag how am i supposed to kick pads and i can't even train if i can't train i'm at a very big disadvantage coming out of the gate um so that was the only thing that was a little bit tough about that other than that i felt like any other day on a regular situation like situation i

think that fight's completely different that's just my personal opinion yeah i think again back to back to that home court advantage deal dude it's got to be like you look at like pro wrestling right like whatever those dudes are out there playing a role right they're acting they're playing a role and they're designed to get the crowd to boo them and hate them and scream at them or whatever the fuck they're going to do. Right. But when you're like a real dude and you go out there and you don't always get the crowd, right. Depending on where you are, where your opponent, who your opponent is, where they are, whatever. Obviously you were not going to get the crowd in that O'Malley fight. There was zero chance you were going to get the crowd.

Does that fuck? I mean, it's on some level. Are you able to block that out or does it fuck with you on some level? Cause I don't. For me. Yeah. For me, I block it out. It's not a, that stuff doesn't bother me.

Like I look at it as even during COVID people were complaining about no fans in the arena, like the athletes. Yeah. And I, and I simply just put it out there and I go, well, if you're in the back alley and someone's trying to mug you, it's just you and him. And there's nobody watching. Do you need somebody to cheer for you? Do you need a cheerleader to get up and fight?

Like, I'm confused. That mindset doesn't make any sense. So now you, you, you have the have the fans you you're in the enemy territory you knew this going in i knew that going in yeah i knew that going into my last three four fights since my first pd on fight where i got illegally need and then i somehow overnight became the bad guy yeah because you won for the fort lauderdale under dq right yeah but it wasn't even the dq people were mad at they they swear that after the dQ, they think I faked the concussion, but they're not even mad about that.

They think because they think I faked the concussion and then I went out partying, they think that's what I did. Yeah, but if the rules say you can't get kneed in the head, I mean, should it matter if you got a concussion or not? That part shouldn't matter, but for the fans, it does. And I understand. All right. But never faked anything.

I never partied. I never posted anything. I had friends and family that came out to watch me that flew all the way out, spent thousands of dollars to come watch me fight, tickets,

flights, hotel rooms. Yeah. And they're all at my house. I have maybe 40, 50 people at my house coming to just see me and check on me

after that whole crappy fight went down. And, uh, we did a toast. There was no partying and somehow I became the bad guy because there's one photo of you. Cause my teammates did it. They posted it. And I guess they took that as, Oh, he's an actor. He was faking the whole time. I'm like, are you kidding me? I'm in the bathroom fucking throwing up. and this is what you guys are saying like this is what you're doing that pissed me that pissed me off so when people started doing that they started saying i kind of ran with it and started like playing the heel even more well let me ask you let me let me ask you this man what's better fuel for for aljo is it the is it is it the is it the cheers from the crowd or is

the fucking hate you just turn that into into rocket fuel or do you just block all of it out? When you're in the moment. When I'm in the moment. That's a good question. I don't know. I feel like both have like their, when I wrestled in high school and I wrestled in college, we have these things called do meets. Okay.

Individual weight classes. The best guy is supposed to go out and wrestle their best guy at the weight. Sometimes people would avoid each other because they don't want to risk losing too early in the season because then it could be held against them when it comes to rankings and seedings in the tournament or the national tournament. It's a whole game. So whenever I'm up, the guy before me or the guy after me, I don't care. If the guy loses before me or wins before me i'm getting i'm getting pumped up the same exact way he lost fuck i'm gonna i'm gonna i gotta go get this back for my team yeah he wins hell yeah let's fucking go i gotta keep this momentum going for my team this

is just the way i think i turn anything from a negative into a positive positive i just make it an extra positive um it does so it doesn matter. Like, so from a cheering or booing standpoint, I'm going to use that energy to fuel me no matter what, whether you're there for me. Thank you. I love that energy. If you're not there for me, okay, I'm going to make you mad. Somehow, someway.

I'm going to send you home in tears. And that's it. That's the way I channel that energy. It's not like it happens and then I'm like in my head like, oh, man, I can't believe that people are mad at me. Like that stuff don't bother me. Not, not when I'm in the middle of the, I'm here to fight. You're here to cheer Roman gladiator days. Yeah. And Hey, you better win or you're going, you're going probably getting fed to the lions or something, or you're getting killed what's to this to the date right now what's the what is the most memorable experience either good or fucking negative with a fan that you've had or or not fan what's what is good or negative with a fan yeah um a fan what's called a fan of the ufc not necessarily a fan of yours it could be either the rematch with p.yote on that i had okay this was in jacksonville now i won my split decision after just coming off of a neck surgery and whatever i i've been in a long

training camp because mind you after surgery in april everything is pt every single day trying to get back trying to get healthy trying to get strong and then jumping right into a training camp so it took me a year to get back until I felt good enough where I could compete. Okay, so now we're here, Jacksonville. I'm getting booed in the States. I'm fighting a Russian during the Russian-Ukraine war that just started. You're like, haven't you people seen Rocky?

What's wrong with you, dude? You're not supposed to boo me. What's going on? It was the most bizarre thing. That was one of the things. I made sure I picked a walkout song. What'd you walk out to? That no one could boo.

It was Pepa's Farruka, whatever it's called. Really fun song, popular nightclub song. And when the song came on and my face hit the screen, everyone started booing right away. Ah, you actor but as the beat picks up I can hear the boos and like they kind of change and people are kind of like confused like well do we boo this or do we cheer for this

yeah like you like the songs this is a feel good song you should have come out to like Hulk Hogan's I'm a real American that would have been hilarious how are you going to boo that? Or just straight up the national anthem. Just walk out to the national anthem. That would have been the funniest thing.

Actually, I don't know why I didn't think of that. Just walk out to the national anthem. That would have been hilarious. You guys are booing the American? You can't do that. On American soil? That's crazy. Did you expect it?

I expected animosity to that level. but then once it changed i was like i was like i'm looking around the car like yeah you guys like this you guys like this yeah like you can do all you want but i know your footstep yeah i know it is i know it is we're so confused and uh later that night there was a fan money, I guess, because my fight he lost and I won by split. He sees me at the hotel. I guess his $6,000 bet would have been a million dollars. He showed his bet slip or whatever online. He showed his bet against me.

And that's what I said. I was like, bro, I was the biggest underdog on the entire card. And you bet for this guy, I think. So for him to bet for Piotr Jan he was all pissed so he saw me at the hotel and he starts like boo like doing this weird thing

and I was like okay I get it whatever thank you enough I'm just coming off an adrenaline dump

because I'm like finally monkey's off my back I won the rematch suck it to the whole world and everyone said Piotr Jan by whatever he wants,

he's going to dominate. He's going to kill him. Oh, he was dog walking him. He doesn't have a chance. What's he going to do this time? I beat the guy. And there's all these excuses.

Ah, no, you did this. Yeah. Like bro. He had allergies in Florida. Did you see the pollen down there? You have a chance.

And, uh, yeah. So pretty much that guy was, uh, he was an asshole. And then I saw him the next day and he was doing the same thing and now now it's a different day yeah fight's over your your

time of being a fan in the in the arena yeah now we're just in the hotel now you're being a prick now you're being a complete douche and i saw him at the arena on my way out he started doing the same thing boo like making his face like, you, ah, boo. And I'm walking out, I'm just clapping. I'm just like, yeah, like just, I'm playing into it. Like, you're a fan. I don't know what's going on. You're probably upset. Clearly you're upset because you thought you had a million dollars in the bag. You should never bet against me. And that's on you. And then I see him at the hotel. He does it again. Then the next day, that was the third time I was just like, all right. i pressed him and i'm like yo bro this is a different day like you got to stop this shit because now

you're in my personal space and this is something completely different so if you want me to react a different way you're going to get that reaction i'm just letting you know this is not going to end pretty i was like if you want to sue go ahead and fucking sue i'm gonna it's going to be worth every single fucking penny what he said that so then he was just kind of like, he kind of started backing down. And then my teammates came out. I was like, yo, don't touch him. This is what he wants. And then they started fucking with him.

Shit. So one of my teammates grabs the coffee cup out of the one kid's hand. And he's like, what are you going to do? He has no voice because he's screaming the whole time. It was an insane night. He grabs the coffee cup. He's like, what are you going to do? What are you going to do? I'll fucking kill you you go i'll fucking kill you it was the funniest thing because

i'm watching on the side i was like yeah fuck that kid like you're being an asshole man you're like you deserve this his friends didn't want nothing he wanted no parts of it he's like bro it's not us sorry dude yeah it's just out of control that was like the worst experience i've had i would say like face to face where someone actually had balls to actually say something but then then he became polite later on. Then he was just like, nah, man, I just got to just want to ask, did you really feel like you want to fight? And I'm just looking at him like, I'm going to say no. Like, I'm glad you're going to say no. Glad you like chilled out, but that's a dumb ass question. I'm like, please show me where he won the fight. I was like, but whatever. That's obviously six. Everybody's always got an opinion.

Yeah, it's okay. At what point, man, did you realize, like, I'm famous? Like, at what point did something happen where you were like, holy shit, like, I'm famous? I think the Pedro Munoz fight, that was in 2019. And then I had to take a year out to fix my wrist. That was a year in recovery. And then after I finished sandhanging the way I did in 2020, that was like less than two minutes. And he was like the next coming of Moses to walk on water.

And, um, I killed the guy in less than two minutes. So I think after that, everything catapulted and snowballed. And then I had the first Piotr Jan fight. So I was like, that was like a pick-em type of fight. Because no one knew.

They saw how good I was. And then I have a shit fight like that against this guy. And then I come back and beat him. So that's around that time frame. I want to say 2019 was like starting to pick up. 2020 became like another level. And then after the rematch with Peleon, I think it got a little bit higher after that.

And then of course now after this last one with O'Malley, I think when you sit on top for so long, now you're on the pay-per-views, your co-main event, your main event, back to back, you start to get a little bit more notoriety and things like that. And you're doing more stuff.

And I think you're the advertisement advertisers of you just start to circul get a little bit more notoriety and things like that. And you're doing more stuff. And I think you're the advertisement advertisers of you just start to circulate a little bit more. Yeah. I think it's funny what you said, because, you know, in boxing, the promoters will protect fighters as they bring them along. In UFC, I don't, from the outside looking in, you know, I don't know how much of that there really is. It doesn't seem like there seemed like they moved people up pretty quick to put them in. How bad does it seem to screw up their plans behind the, behind the scenes when like you, you dust one of their golden boys, it's coming up. Is that, is that, is that a weird situation? All right, cool. No, no. Is there like a, can you feel kind of the, oh shit, that just happened

in a situation like you just described? Yeah. Yeah. It's always like win-win though. Cause they know who they want to win. Yeah. And they kind of do like their whole war room thing where they kind of like pick their X's and O's like, well, if he wins here, this puts him here, then this is what we think that's going to happen. And we'll do this and we can slide them into this position, but then it's on the athlete

to win. So I think when you're pissing the Cheerios and you mess with the plans, they just have to go to plan B. And sometimes they really don't have a plan B for you. And that's where I think the business side comes into it. It's like, they can like you as an athlete. Yeah. But when it comes to the business,

if you're not good for business, good for their bottom line, then it's kind of like, well, you're cool, but we kind of need to slice someone else in your position. So enjoy while it lasts kind of like, well, you're cool, but we kind of need to slice someone else in your position. So enjoy it while it lasts kind of a thing. You know, and I do, we're going to transition the conversation from fighting into business. Cause I know that's something that's very passionate with you.

And you've obviously been one of those people that, you know, you hear the stories of athletes making a bunch of bank and being broke five minutes later. I mean, the money that Tyson burned through, the money that Allen Iverson burned through and like just amazing sums of money they burned up. And I'm guessing a pretty early point, you know, again, you have an accounting degree. You decided that's not going to be me. I'm sorry. But you took accounting before. Sorry. Sorry. But you, you, you had an understanding of basic accounting that you probably said this is never going to be me yeah i and uh i look at other people and learn from their mistakes i think that's

the best way i could put it i've always said why do we have my brothers and i would talk and i was i would always say to them even my friends and i'll go why do we have to make the same mistakes as everybody else i don't understand the world how it operates in this manner. Like we see the same thing repeating itself over and over and over. And it's just like to me, well, why aren't we learning from those mistakes so that history doesn't repeat itself so that we can do things a little bit smarter or better?

And I think I've been able to at least learn from my ancestors in the sense of fighting, learn from these guys, the forefathers and things that they did things that worked oh less damage longer career wrestling okay if i can get the fight get the finishes fan favorite that's what people want to see so you learn from these things you learn from the things that they do you see the guys who go broke well how did he go broke he had million over a hundred million dollars how on earth is it possible to go broke in such a short amount of time i know it's possible but how like what

what were you possibly doing it wasn't just one large purchase was it just multiple things like john daly i guess blew through like 50 or 60 but like how many hooters chicken wings can you eat dude i mean it's just it's not even possible. Yeah. Yeah. I, it's crazy. Have they done a better job at UFC of trying to set like, do they, is there any type of like in the NFL that started the NFL rookie symposium where they bring people in and they're like, okay, you know, dipshits, if you want to buy a car, fine. Don't buy 10, right? Like we don't want you to be broke in three years. And they started trying to bring into the rookies some sort of financial, you know, talk. Because a lot of these guys have never even had conversations like that.

Does UFC do anything like that at all? So they've done something in the past. We call the, they call it the athlete retreats. I only remember them doing two of them though. I went to both. And I think now they're trying to do some stuff here in Vegas. the athlete retreats. I only remember them doing two of them though. I went to both and, um, I think now they're trying to do some stuff here in Vegas when people come in. I think they might've done another one. It was like a small short function, but I don't remember it being that

in depth with financial solutions or what an LLC is or S corp and that type of stuff. Um, how to protect your assets. Yeah. Making sure you put aside money for your taxes, win or lose. How to account for your expenses going into a fight camp. There's a lot of that goes. Like I truly do think accounting helped me with that. If I never taken the accounting class, I would never have, I wouldn't think like that. I think that's what helped me in that sense.

I do think the UFC should do a little bit more of that. The only thing is maybe they should put the course out on video and this way it's not like they need to spend a bunch of money every single time to hold these events for. Here's the resource. You know, you mentioned earlier trying to budget for training camps and do those things. I mean, I've heard that like for those low card fighters, I mean, you can literally lose money on a fight. Oh, yeah. Well, and see, that was the thing. When I came in, I made eight and eight, 8,000 to show up, make weight and another 8,000 if I won. Yeah. So with that being said. And this is UFC, you made that money?

UFC, yeah. Wow. That was in 2014. Is it a gradual climb in money or is it a quantum leap when you go from the bottom to the top? So I went from eight and eight.

My first fight, my first contract actually was a four fight deal, eight and eight, 10 and 10, 12 and 12, 14 and 14. And I fought my deal out

because I just figured to roll the dice and see how much more money I could get they typically tend to renegotiate when you have one or two fights left on the contract um that was standard practice I don't know if things have changed and with that said when I made the 8-8 uh if I had lost and I just got my 8,000 I was at least smart enough or maybe bold enough to take the chance in all those fights where I didn't have any physical therapy. I'm not saying this is good. I'm just saying this is just the things that I did to help me get by.

I wasn't going to fancy restaurants. I didn't buy a whole bunch of new gear. I was using a lot of hand-me-down stuff. And fortunately for me, it just worked out where my expenses in the very beginning weren't very huge. I didn't have a ton of overhead. I was still living at my house with my parents before the divorce and was able to save money on rent that way before I had to eventually move out. Then I started taking in extra expenses in New York,

which is very expensive. So when you start to account for those things, recovery stuff, whether it's a sauna, physical therapy, dry needling, all the stuff that at high level athletes should be able to have access to and should be able to afford to do no problem, like comfortably. Yeah. have access to and should be able to afford to do no problem like comfortably yeah um so you could

go you could go negative on a fight really quickly especially if you don't win especially in the very beginning of your career if you're not careful of how much you're you're spending and then of course you got to pay your coaches so a lot of those early card dudes they have other jobs yeah i had i was a gym teacher the whole time until I think I was working at phys ed all the way to 2017 where I won two fights back to back. And I was like, okay, now I got a little bit of a breather and I can pull back and focus on just fighting as a full-time athlete.

So now that you, now that you're making real money, I guess I should say, you're on top of those cards. You're making, you're making real money i guess i should say you're on top of those cards you're making you're making real money to fight now what are some things that you started to do to diversify your money yeah not everyone's just because they're on the top of the card doesn't mean they're making real money though just okay fair yeah um i'm in a different situation because as a former champ defended consecutive uh times it starts to go up every single time but then as you lose the belt you go back to what we call um like your regular pay your standard pay but you have your championship paying and you have your challenger pay and now i no longer have access to pay viewpoints on my contract so there's little perks of becoming a champ and sometimes you lose

it and when you do you lose some of those, those things as well. But now some of the things I diversify myself with is real estate. I have three houses. I'm actually partnering up with Jason on one more. And then I got one more in the pipeline. So I'm hoping to have five single family houses and I want to eventually get into multifamily because that's, I think that's where real wealth can come in from versus the single family homes. Cause there's a little bit more work in that. It's a little bit more work intensive in terms of

turnover and things like that, vacancy. And then I'm also in the stock market as well. And I have my retirement accounts and things like that. Cool. Another question, because very much like you handle your own kind of stuff there. Do you have a financial advisor that you trust to help you pick stocks? Or is this something that you are personally interested in? I was personally interested. That's a different world.

Yeah. I don't have time for that, man. So I got my financial advisor, Aaron Freeman. He's over at Janie Montgomery Scott um they do a very good job the people that he puts me in line and in touch with to handle my asses and one of the things i do now like even i think the last four fights man five as soon as i get paid i pay my coaches right away yeah i budget for taxes i take my 30 out right away because i'm going to have expenses. So I would imagine my expenses would at least be enough where I'm not putting 37% or 35% away for my S-corp.

So 30% is reasonable. And then the rest is my money. But then for the most part, my money part, I split that in half and I put that almost all into my retirement. Yeah. Retirement, SEPTA IRAs. Are you buying property? You have a Roth IRA, yes? I have a Roth.

I have two SEPTA IRAs. Are you buying property in those IRAs? In the IRAs? I haven't put them in the IRAs, no. It's great tax deferment. You might want to talk to your guy about that. Yeah. About utilizing those

funds to actually invest because it'll grow faster than it will probably just in whatever standardized stuff you're investing in now okay that's good yeah it's good to know yeah there you go um i want to

talk some rum though man because i hear i hear there's a new spirit brewing out there somewhere yeah tell me about the rum dude so i'm waiting for that we're working on the label once

the label is done we can submit that to the TTB. And then from there, we should be good to go and official to start taking sales and things like that. This is something I've been wanting to do for a very long time. One of my vices, I drink, man. I drink. And it's like my happy place outside of fighting for whatever reason. Obviously not to a point where it's damaging anything.

You're fine. Yeah. So if there's anything I do enjoy, some people enjoy a blunt. Some people enjoy just hit a bong. Some people enjoy edibles. Some people enjoy mushrooms. I enjoy drinking. Yeah.

That's just what I'm into. Yeah. And my parents are Jamaican. So this is one of the things I've always wanted to do. I've wanted to get into a rum spirit. Um, rum is very heavily favored in Jamaica and it just makes the most sense. And so far the product,

I don't want to, I don't want to oversell, but I'm telling people, you got to oversell it, dude. I think it's going to be really damn good. I think the people out there who are already on the market, they, they're going to have a, the new guy in town is coming. Listen, if you can pull off a spirit, I'll tell you a story.

If you can pull off a spirit and this should motivate you. A buddy of mine, uh, we were on the same reality show a million years ago. He was on the season before me, but it was a guy that I knew. And, uh, at some point, several years ago he goes i'm gonna start a liquor company and we all thought he was batshit crazy we're like what are you talking liquor company or no i'm gonna say i'm gonna start a spirit company sorry a spirit a spirit company and he said i'm gonna bring back this spirit that's been dead in america for like 80 years and it was rye and i was like who the who the fuck is going to drink rye whiskey?

Yeah. That brand's Whistlepig. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. Good for him indeed. If you haven't heard of that yet. Yeah. Raj did quite well with the old Whistlepig brand. So dude, I wish you so much. I wish you so, so well with that brand. I hope it goes amazingly well, but I want to finish this up talking about something else. Cause I think part of being a champion, which obviously you are, is the ups and downs of it. Yeah. And I want to talk real quick again. I know we talked a little bit about the O'Malley fight, but I want to talk about the mentality right after you losing the belt and what the period of getting your mind right. If there was

one and where your mentality is going forward to get back to where you work is every great athlete. I know doesn't like once you, once you sit atop the throne, my man, I gotta believe you ain't real happy if you're not sitting there now. Yeah. Um, my mentality after losing the fight, I was relieved. Really? Yeah. Relieved in not in a sense of like losing the fight, I was relieved. Really? Yeah. Relieved in not in a sense of like losing the belt. Relieved that I was, I didn't have to fight anytime soon again. Yeah.

Because that was the crux going into that fight was I had to figure out how to mentally switch that. My legs are banged up. I still have some injury. My wrist is fucked up. My neck. I had so much going on. My bicep. But I'm just like, after the Henry fight, I wanted my downtime.

Yeah. I didn't get my downtime. So it was like I got to enjoy maybe like a week or two of hanging out with my friends and family. Then it was back to trying to do recovery and trying to heal up as fast as I could to make the fight happen for the fans. Yeah. You know, at the end of the day then it was back to trying to do recovery and trying to heal up as fast as I could to make the fight happen for the fans. Yeah.

You know, at the end of the day it was for me, but it was also for the fans. Yeah. Cause I could have just been like, cause I was told if I didn't fight, I wouldn't be able to fight till January, February.

I could have been like, we'll see you guys next year. Yeah. I could have done that. And I thought about it. I even told my manager at the time, I said, yeah,

you know what? I'm just going to just chill and kind of got coerced by him and you know talking to a few other people and we kind of had like the pros and cons so then after the fight being over it was just a big relief to just have a mental relaxation whereas like you mean to tell me no one's gonna try to punch me anytime soon I could just relax yeah I can literally turn my I can turn my phone off right now if I want. And just live like a regular person. That's all I wanted.

Yeah. I asked for an extra month just so I can have this taken care of so that I can train right out of the gate going like the way I normally do. But I wasn't granted that. And unfortunately for me, but fortunate for them, you know, their guy won. Good for him. You know, when they say anytime, anyplace, anywhere, that's one of those situations. So for him, that place, that time, it worked out in his favor.

And that's why I do feel like if it was a different time, it would have been a little bit more of my favorite because now you have a more level playing field. I just felt like the scale was a little bit more tipped into his favor. Yeah.

And of course, he's good. Yeah. But when you're good and you have a little bit more things on your side, it makes it a little bit easier for you to make

those things work out. So after the fight, very relieved. All I thought about was where we were going to go on vacation. We literally were probably out of the country for like nine weeks,

my fiance and I. So we've got to go to Australia to the Sydney car. I got to watch Sean Strickland versus Israel Adesanya. That's awesome. Went to Bali, Indonesia, got to surf again. Um,

vacation, literally wake up and train, have a beer, go surfing or go out and party and eat as much food as I want to. Got to just relax and be a normal human being for three weeks in Bali, hanging out. Then we went to Wales. I had a grappling match that I just randomly took. Probably not the smartest thing because you just ate for three weeks.

I was like, bro, I haven't trained. And I told these, there's like, yeah, it's just a grappling match. I'm like, yeah, but I don't want to lose. I'm like, but they told me, me oh well pay for your whole vacation i was like i just you literally just you just put me that that that movie the great white hype with uh with uh damon or whatever he's like you're not in shape he's like i am in shape i'm around around the shape yeah and then uh we went to london came back to the states and then we went to Amsterdam for two days, came back, went to Abu Dhabi for about two weeks, Abu Dhabi, Dubai. And I came back, went to Mexico for a wedding. And then when I was done, it was like when I got to the Mexico part of the trip, that's when I was kind of like starting to miss training.

Yeah. Like, man, I kind of want to get back and get ready to compete. Like, that's what I've been wanting so that I can be just mentally fresh and have a clean say. And then this way I could kind of get ready to get back after it. But. So what's the goal now, Mr. All right, I'm down. Where are we at? Are you going back after O'Malley or are you moving up in weight?

No, they already made the fight. I already knew they were going to make the fight with him and Chito. They were going to skip over my guy, Marab, to make that rematch happen. So it is what it is. I think it's going to be a great fight either way. Like, I know some people might think I'm still salty, but I really don't care. I made my money. I accomplished what I accomplished.

There's nothing to be salty about. All I said is I just wish I got a fair shake on the fight. But it is what it is. I took the fight. No one put a gun to my head to make me take it. You know, they dangled the carrot, but I took the carrot. You know, so it is what it is. And now it's just getting ready for the next one.

Hopefully it's in March or here in Vegas. Same weight class or you moving up? No, I'm going up. You moving up. 145. Okay. Yeah, so that's the plan right now. I was trying to get the Max Holloway fight.

Probably not going to happen happen but we'll see if not maybe Calvin Cater okay so how many how many fights do you think you need to win

at that weight class before they give you a shot at the gold two one or two yeah I think it just depends on who I fight

and it depends on who wins between Volkanovski and Teporia and how it looks how it looks I think it could open up the doors for me really quickly if Alex wins I think it's more And it depends on who wins between Volkanovski and Teporia. And how it looks. How it looks. I think it could open up the doors for me really quickly. If Alex wins, I think it's more in my favor.

And then if I come in and I could win one, I think it's definitely in my favor because Alex pretty much beat everybody already. Yeah. So it just depends on how that looks and how that works out. And just go from there. Well, I love it, man. Well, dude, I'm a fan. Best of luck to you on those fights. And dude, when the rum comes out, you have to bring it back by. We'll have a taste test to try to sell some bottles for you, man. All right. Thank you. I appreciate it.

Cool, brother. Appreciate you. And guys, we will see you next week. What's up, everybody? Thanks for joining us for another episode of Escaping the Drift. Hope you got a bunch out of it, or at least as much as I did out of it. Anyway, if you want to learn more about the show, you can always go over to escapingthedrift.com. You can join our mailing list. But do me a favor, if you wouldn't mind, throw up that five-star review. Give us a share. Do something, man.

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