Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 902: Josh Thomson

Starting point is 00:00:00 If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mite, op, mite, op with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. It's been a while since we've had Josh on. Yeah, we had him on like a year, too. I like the guy, I grew up, you know, watching him fight back in it. He's gonna fight again, maybe. Good dude.

Starting point is 00:00:22 That's crazy, huh? I thought he was gonna fight you. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no thought he was gonna fight you. No, no, no, no, no, no. He's a little bit too lucky to look in there. No, we're not gonna do that. Yeah, he knows better. Yeah, see if it. You know, you know, cause you carry a guy.

Starting point is 00:00:34 Cause he's not in here right now. Yeah, that's the reason. Is he gonna listen to this by the way? I hope so. Edit that out, Doug. Yeah, watch out. No, Josh is a great guy. He's working on his media.

Starting point is 00:00:43 He's got a podcast. He's got a school in San Jose that he teaches kids and adults. He's a fucking cool dude. He's one of the most charismatic pro MMA fighters that I've met. Not a lot of them are super charismatic, but he's got that. Yeah, he's got a lot of promise going forward with his like Commentating like if you guys have watched he's doing a really good job over at Bellator, so yeah I know he's he's doing big things.

Starting point is 00:01:05 Yeah, he was always exciting to watch when he used to fight because he's one of the more well-rounded fighters, especially when he first started, you know, the fighters weren't as well-rounded as they become now. And he was one of the first guys to really come out there. I don't even lace it all out there, too. He does. He does fight with Nate Diaz, one of my favorites. That was an awesome one.

Starting point is 00:01:23 So Josh Thompson can be found on Instagram at the real punk. And then his podcast, and of course he talks a lot about mixed martial arts, the sports of mixed martial arts on his podcast. The podcast is called Sammy and the punk. It's really good to go check that out. Before we get to the episode, I do want to remind everybody that this month maps anywhere is 50% off,

Starting point is 00:01:45 so we redid the whole program, new blueprints, new videos, everything. And the program, we designed it for people to be able to do anywhere. That's why we call it maps anywhere. In other words, you don't need barbells, you don't need dumbbells, you don't need machines. All you need is your body and bands.

Starting point is 00:02:02 And the challenge with training without equipment is how do you make a workout effective, especially as you become more and more fit. Like if you're really, really fit, how do you get the muscle stimulation, how do you get the endurance, the stamina, the strength, without using lots of weights and machines. Well, we programmed it.

Starting point is 00:02:21 We put it together specifically for people to get really good results. That program brand new is now half off. All month long, 50% off. Just go to mapswhite.com and use the code white50WHITE. A number of 50 without a space for 50% off. And if you have any questions on our other maps programs, we have programs for everybody.

Starting point is 00:02:44 We have programs for beginners, We have programs for beginners, intermediate advance, bodybuilders, athletes, people who work out at home, people who want to work outside, whatever. We have a strong man program even. You can find the right program for your body, just go to mapsfitinistproducts.com and that's it. That's it with the commercial. So without any further ado, here we are talking to our friend, Josh Thompson. You know, it's funny with martial arts type studios, because I've been on martial arts since I was a kid,

Starting point is 00:03:13 and one thing that I noticed from the business side of them is they either succeed and do great, or a lot of them don't do well at all, and you're growing. Yeah, what makes a successful martial arts facility? Like, what do you do? Because the biggest one I can think of is like Ernie Reyes, you know, facilities and they had a chain of them, right? But when you think of Ernie Reyes, what do you think of? I think of like just Taekwondo and what comes with the members? What do you think of? I don't think, I definitely don't think MMA. Like, age wise, you mean? Oh, kids. I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I'm just saying, I don't think, I definitely don't think MMA. I don't think. H-Y is you mean, is that your ass? Oh, kids.

Starting point is 00:03:45 I'm just saying general. Kids. Yeah, kids. So my kids program is huge. We got close to like 70 kids. Here, there's way more business. There's way more. But then on top of it, and I should be giving out my secrets,

Starting point is 00:03:54 but what I did was, because we are here locally. But what I did do though, was as I ran all of the workout classes, simultaneously with the kids classes, so the parents could work out. Oh brilliant. Fucking brilliant. So I said it was eight-hull. If you drop your kid at 4.30 or for a four-clock class, I have a four-clock class.

Starting point is 00:04:13 If you drop your kid at 4.30, I got a 4.30 workout class. So what percentage of the kids, would you say their parents are also working out? So until I expanded, I didn't have that because I only had that one side to work with the parents. So as soon as I expanded to the other side, I was like, you know what, we never have a 430 fitness class.

Starting point is 00:04:31 Let's add a 430 fitness class since we have the kids at 430. And so when that happened, I added the 430 fitness class, now is the biggest class we have. Oh, that's cool. It's done. My gym is dead by seven o'clock at night.

Starting point is 00:04:43 So I'm home by 730. Oh, worked out. Well, I love it. And because I'm also in a community where there's all houses, and I'm sure I've got like six or seven high schools or schools all around. I live right by you.

Starting point is 00:04:52 Yeah, yeah. So it's funny, I haven't seen it in my gym. Yeah, I'm just interested in all your kids. Yeah. So no, it's just, yeah, we, we, we've got all the schools that are there and we just marketed it to the kids. I mean, basically, we got just, yeah, we, we got all the schools that are there and we just marketed to the kids. I mean, basically we got lucky.

Starting point is 00:05:08 We had a couple of parents that came in and brought their kids and then they just caught on like, wildfire. I mean, obviously it helped a little bit that people knew who I was, but when they realized that there's no fighters in the gym, I'm not trying to make fighters, I'm not trying to make,

Starting point is 00:05:21 I'm not trying to have your kid be a fighter. You know, and that's the one thing I stress is, even though I stress respect which most martial arts places do, is I'm not gonna put up with, you know, one kid picking on another kid. There's like being, even if you're a gray belt or an upper belt, you shouldn't be able to talk down. Is that common?

Starting point is 00:05:39 Is that common? Yeah, it is. It's totally common. You'll see that coach, it's tendency for all coaches. They'll tend to favor their upper belts. You know, and not just upper belts, but like you say, you have a track star who's like a star. You know, you're gonna be like,

Starting point is 00:05:53 I'm gonna spend more time with that kid than I am. It's common, you know, the star running back, at the star quarterbacks, then I'll always get more publicity than the offensive lineman. It's just gonna happen. Yeah. And so, that's the one thing I don't do.

Starting point is 00:06:04 I treat the three and four year olds, cause we have three to five year old kids. So I treat all the three year olds, even better than I treat my gray balls. Cause my gray balls, they should understand that like, hey, that was you at one time. You came four years ago to me, that was you. And they also have more of a responsibility,

Starting point is 00:06:19 I think, as you get better to teach and help with the coach. Every time I give them a stripe, I explain that to them. I say, here's with this stripe, you have a little bit more responsibility, whether that's leading warm up, or whether that's helping and giving instruction to the kids, and also to what I do,

Starting point is 00:06:33 that some parents were like, oh, wow, that's pretty cool. Is I break up all the upper belts, and I say, okay, here, here's one, we have one or two upper belts, they work with all the three to six, three to seven year olds. And I say, okay, they need to learn how to, they have to learn how to open guard.

Starting point is 00:06:48 So you go over there and you coach them. So I put like four or five kids with them and they teach them how to open guard and pass guard. So it teaches them how to teach with kids. And then also the one reason why I did it was so they understand how impatient it is to be, how patient you have to be, to teach a kid who does not want to learn or just wants to play around and goof around because that used to be, how patient you have to be, to teach a kid who does not wanna learn or just wants to play around and goof around

Starting point is 00:07:07 because that used to be them. When I used to say, hey, you know, open garden, you guys were like, oh, I don't wanna do it. They're laying on the ground, making snow angels. You know, and you're thinking to yourself, man, like why can't you get this, stop goofing around and just do it, and now they understand. So I said next time I tell you,

Starting point is 00:07:23 hey, quick, goofing around and do the move, you'll get it. That's what I have to deal with. Did you take child psychology class? No, no, no. Well, and the reason why I'm asking is because you're tapping into, this somewhat of a passion of mine. You're tapping into, by the way,

Starting point is 00:07:37 your sounds like you coach, is some of the most effective ways to get children to learn. Like for example, when you give a child responsibility, especially an older child or more experienced child, when you give them the responsibility of younger kids or kids who are less experienced, it brings out, it tends to bring out the best in them.

Starting point is 00:07:55 All of a sudden they feel like they have some authority, they have some responsibility. I gotta do a good job, I gotta teach. And they end up learning, they learn their skill even more as a result. Yeah, and that's what they find in education studies. And this is no different. And for me, as a parent, one thing that I loved about the martial arts more than anything

Starting point is 00:08:13 was teaching them how to be good people and teaching them responsibility. So yeah, you can fight, but now you're more responsible. You have this ability now, but you're less likely to get into a physical altercation. You're more confident with yourself. So what's the big difference between the six, because you, yes, you were a profiter, you're well known, but that's not why you're succeeding, because there's a lot of fighters who tried coaching and stuff, and they're just not good.

Starting point is 00:08:41 Were you just a natural working with kids? Just to talk, touch back on what you were just talking about is I used to get a lot of fights as a kid. And as I started learning how to wrestle better and as I started learning how to train in Jiu-Jitsu and learning submissions, I used to even up until I was like 19, 20 years old, these skinned like street fights. It's like, man, when I was 20 years old,

Starting point is 00:08:58 I got some of the UFC, you know? And once I realized that I was fighting guys and I was training with people, teaching people at AK, they were coming in that were adults, like mid 20s or early 30s. And here I am 20 years old, just rolling these guys up like quick,

Starting point is 00:09:16 I mean, submission of submission, right? And then you go out to a bar, and now you're dealing with a drunk guy, who's not sober, and you're thinking to yourself, why do I have to beat that guy up? Like it would take me less time than it would to roll him up if he was sober. So that was meant, like to touch what you were talking about,

Starting point is 00:09:33 that's exactly what it made me feel, it made me feel like, man, what are you doing? Like you don't need to, you don't need to, you just felt no threat. Yeah, there's no threat, like you go to a bar, there's not one threat in this room that scares me. You know, like I walk in, I'm like, I can walk in with the confidence of knowing that,

Starting point is 00:09:49 you know, it doesn't matter. Sure, you can beat me at tennis, you can beat me at golf, but I can beat you up. You know, and that's- And that trumps everything. That trumps everything. And really when you're talking about in the scheme of like, you know, in the animal kingdom, you know, like,

Starting point is 00:10:00 hey, I can beat you up, like I can kill you. You know what I mean? That's when it comes down to, like, you know, it doesn't matter if you're better at tennis and golf and basketball, I don't give a crap, it doesn't matter. And so you actually got less fights. So I got, no, I pretty much have a minute of street fight sense.

Starting point is 00:10:13 Wow. It's just the reality of once you understand that, you can click that in your mind that, you know, while you're wrestling in the Olympics and these guys are barely like, they're taking seminars at three and five years old, when you think about it when you go to a bar. That I'm close.

Starting point is 00:10:30 Now, do you think that's common, or do you think some fighters are still battling like insecurities and they feel that they need to assert their dominance on people with that, or is it normal? Is it normal? Every person is different. I can't put a stereotype on everyone,

Starting point is 00:10:42 because there's different. Like, I know there's guys that they hated fighting from the moment, but there was the best way for them to make a lot of money. You know, Trevor, bring me one of my best friends. He's from South Africa and he fought in the UFC, fought in all the biggest organizations in the world. He hated it. He every time he has fights like nervous and just stressed

Starting point is 00:11:00 and just hated fight camps and just hated it. But man, just how good at it. Yeah, they got me good money. Man, it was ranked in the top 10 in the world for a while. You know what I mean? Like it's sometimes you just got to do what makes what makes sense and what makes you the most money. Did you realize when you got to the point where you were training

Starting point is 00:11:17 with all these fighters and you just didn't want to get in fights anymore, at least you didn't get in fights anymore because you felt more confident. Did you realize that in the past, all the fights you got into, did you realize your role that you played? In other words, at the time, where you think, like, why are these people all fucking with me and then you think back and be like, I wonder if I was...

Starting point is 00:11:32 No, no, I wasn't wondering. I knew. Yeah, I knew. There was never any doubt. I always said I didn't start it. I didn't throw the first punch, which I didn't, but I insiated to the point where someone wanted to throw the first punch. You know, I was just, I was that kid. You know, I would always say the meanest and harshest thing that I possibly could, but I insiated to the point where someone wandered through the first punch. You know, I was just, I was that kid.

Starting point is 00:11:45 You know, I would always say the meanest and harshest thing that I possibly could, you know, to see if I get a rise out of you. That's kind of like how you get the nickname the punk. You know, there was a lot of different other things, you know, like in the gym, I would say that. I would do things. I mean, there, like, Javier, if you listen to our,

Starting point is 00:11:59 what we did a podcast with Javier Mendez on Sammy and the punk, and, and, and shameless, plug, plug, plug, yeah. But, it's, no, but we, with Javier, Javier Mendez on Sammy and the punk. And he and, and Shameless plug, yeah. But, no, but we, with Javier Javier said the same thing. He's like, hey, I would fight with Paul Bonatello and Mike Kyle who were heavyweights and top guys in the UFC, Paul Bonatello fought for the UFC title.

Starting point is 00:12:17 You know, and I just threw the gloves off and just started throwing down with them in the middle of the ring, like, because we got mad at each other. Sent Mike Kyle, same thing. Mike Kyle and I got in a couple of fist fights. Phil Baroney and I, full on fist fights. Really?

Starting point is 00:12:27 No gloves, let's fucking get after it. That was us. Oh wow. It didn't matter. That's how we are. That's how it was. That's how I am. Well then, hugging it out and having a beer afterwards.

Starting point is 00:12:40 Yeah, but here's the thing. Baroni lived with me at the time. So it was like, I had to drive him home to my house. So here we are. We throw the gloves off. We're throwing down, we're yelling and cussing at each other, throwing blows at each other. And we're getting things like, all right, bro. So you don't figure it out. Yeah, yeah, we got it. What's for dinner? Yeah. The shower, you know, get you know, you go take a shower and come back down. You're like, all right, you ready to go? Yeah, we're gonna go. It's funny because funny, because you have that fighter instinct, you're definitely a tough guy,

Starting point is 00:13:07 but then you seem to thrive working with children. Have you, did you always know that you had a knack for that, or that come from? You know, honestly, it could tell you that it comes from, probably like I helped raise my brother and sister. I'm the younger brother, your sister. And, you know, my parents were young when they had me, they were 19 and 20 years old.

Starting point is 00:13:25 And that was kind of, I think I would say, wouldn't say it was normal back then, but it was a little bit more common than like now, these days, it's like 32 to 35, it's when people are having kids now. I mean, but back then, it was, you know, my parents were still kind of living the younger lifestyle.

Starting point is 00:13:43 They would leave me to watch my brother and sister, I was like six years old, they would be like, okay, we're gonna were still kind of living a younger lifestyle. They would leave me to watch my brother and sister. I was like six years old. They would like, okay, we're gonna go out, boom. Go on, you know, they'd go out and hang out and come back home. People would all come back to the house at like two in the morning and hang out

Starting point is 00:13:52 until five in the morning, you know, that kind of thing. You know, it was just different. It, whatever, I'd wake up, make breakfast with the kids, you know, pancakes. They just learned all those skills, girl. Yeah, I mean, like, you know, I was hungry, you know? There wasn't any cereal. You got one how I make pancakes. We like lash-key kids too. Like when you mean like, you know, I was hungry, you know? There wasn't any cereal, you got one how make pancakes.

Starting point is 00:14:05 We like lash key kids too, like when you come home and like your parents weren't there, you just come home and you're a key. Yeah, we always had, we didn't even have a key, we had a back, the back slider was always almost always open. Yeah, you know, so we just, we had a little side gate, we, you know, I jumped to side gate and then we just, I'd walk in the house,

Starting point is 00:14:21 the back door was always open. Dude, that used to be the, that was the era though. It was like at the time, like kids would just walk home from school, it was safe, like it seemed safe anyway. Which I think it's more safe now than it was back then. It is. It's just because social media, and yeah, internet, I mean, like the internet and the social media,

Starting point is 00:14:38 I think everyone just knows and hears about it now. And we get an ember alert on the phone. One kid was kidnapped, you know what, two weeks ago, you're like, everyone got it. We all of a sudden, you're in a restaurant, right? Everyone's like, boom, boom. Everyone's picking up their phone. Well, do you find, too, like, so these kids in rolling,

Starting point is 00:14:52 do they have different motivation than maybe they did when we grew up in terms of going through martial arts? No, I think it's just, the martial arts has evolved, MMA. Mixed martial arts. I mean, you would call, like, there's not just one discipline that they have to learn now. And you take someone like myself, who comes from a wrestling background,

Starting point is 00:15:11 played sports his whole life. And I was on team sport and I was an individual sport, which I think is probably the most key thing is you teach people how to, you teach kids how to work with other kids by playing a team sport, which I played soccer. I was on a traveling team, traveled all around the US and played. But then I was also on the individual sport where I traveled all around and just wrestled

Starting point is 00:15:30 individually. I was still part of a team, still had a coach. But when you walk out on that mat, it's just you. And for me, there was nothing better than doing that. Because even though I would have loved to have played at a higher level in college for soccer, because there wasn't as much pressure on me, and it was more fun to socialize and be around

Starting point is 00:15:51 everyone playing soccer. But the actual reward for me to become who I am today was definitely because of wrestling and because of mixed martial arts. Without a doubt, I'm doing it by myself. I mean, there's nothing better than knowing that you've done something, you've achieved something but on your own.

Starting point is 00:16:09 You didn't need, sure you have coaches, but at the end of the day, your coaches can't make you get on a treadmill and run. You know, at the end of the day, sure they can hold meds for you, but they can't make you push yourself. You gotta want that. So you were driven, 100%. Do you see this in the kids that you take your classes?

Starting point is 00:16:23 Can you identify the kids? Okay, he's gonna be getting out of it. Early of an age, can you tell if the kid's gonna be a badass? You can tell pretty early. Whether, here's the thing, as I tell parents, I don't look at what, how the kids learn, based on what it goes on at home. And that lets me know,

Starting point is 00:16:41 if your kids have an hard time absorbing things, if your kid's not paying attention in class, that's a parenting issue, that's not a coaching issue, that has to do with like, hey, you know, that should be taken care of at home. I don't care if your kids want 50 medals for me. That doesn't mean anything to me. I care if your kid pays attention

Starting point is 00:16:58 and works well with the other kids and listens and absorbs what I'm trying to teach. That's important to me, you know, because later on down the road, being a having a coachable kid is more important to that's how the kid succeeds in life. If you can't be coached, odds are, you probably won't be as successful

Starting point is 00:17:13 as you could have been in later on. Regardless of how talented you are. And it's funny because I have a kid right now who is just, he's a phenomenal athlete. He's a workhorse, but he only likes to train live. So when he trains live, he's good. You know, he's intense, he can beat a lot of the kids, but then he's been doing that now for the last two years.

Starting point is 00:17:35 But now, the kids that he was smashing, you know, for the last two years, they have finally adjusted in their technique has gotten better, and they don't have to try as hard to stop what he's doing because of his athleticism and they can just use technique and beat him. And that now is like an eye opening to him and I've told him, I said,

Starting point is 00:17:53 you need to slow things down and you need to focus on your technique because you're sure you're getting to an arm or position. Sure, I'm getting to a mouth position but you don't know how to finish it. You don't know how to finish it because you haven't spent the time to learn the technique and the proper transitions to get there.

Starting point is 00:18:10 Whereas these other kids, they get you to mouth and they finish you. You, you get to mouth, sure, you got them there because you must let them over and threw them down and ragged all them around and now you're on top. But you don't know how to finish. You don't know how to finish because you don't know the technique to get there.

Starting point is 00:18:22 How old is this kid? How he's eight. Eight years old. I mean, I put more pressure on him because he is like you need to put pressure on those Sure, the ones that have the most athleticism and the ones you have to be the hardest on Because they're gonna skate through life thinking that they're the best well because they if you Especially when things come easy to you then you think oh, that's this is all the effort I need to put in they don't get challenged From their competition. So many times it's their coach or their parent that has to teach them how to challenge themselves.

Starting point is 00:18:50 I've had sales people like that who worked for me where they were so good that they could put half the effort and outperform everyone else. And so I had to find ways to motivate them to challenge themselves because it wasn't from their peers. They already blew them out the water. So I had to like teach them how to motivate themselves. That could be a very, very tough thing to do.

Starting point is 00:19:08 So now you said you got more space and you're doing up, you have a whole podcast and media studio thing. What's the goal with all this? What are you doing with it? You know, so we originally just started it. I started with Sam in the, it's got a name Sam Diggity from 1 to 2.5 K Don. Just the morning show. He runs the morning madhouse.

Starting point is 00:19:25 All right. So him and I were just talking and he was like, you know, hey, he knew fighting for a lot of years. He was watching me fight. Him and I met when I did a couple, like appearances down on his show, to help sell some of my fights. And so him and I just started chatting.

Starting point is 00:19:42 He's like, you know, why don't we try doing this? You know, I have the studio here. We, I used to drive down to Salinas and film in the studio there, you know, like, you know, why don't we try doing this? You know, I have the studio here. We, I used to drive down to Salinas and film in the studio there, you know, every, you know, once a week and film. But then when I came and done your guys' show, you guys were like, yeah, we're filming as many times as we can, we're getting as much content as we can.

Starting point is 00:19:56 I'm like, yeah, I'm not driving to Salinas, you know, five days a week. You're out of your damn mind. So, we did though, and then I found producer day, producer day, which I call producer day. But Dave and I, we used to drive down for almost over a year, right? Yeah, it was over a year him and I used to drive down.

Starting point is 00:20:13 Every Monday and we'd film, talking about whatever the fights were and just shooting the shit. And it just slowly, I'd say in the last probably six months, we had zero subscribers on YouTube and all these, you know, iTunes and all these other things. Then once we hit a thousand, it slowly grew to like a, you know, 2000. And then once we hit 2000,

Starting point is 00:20:31 it grew to 4,000 real quick. And then now we're kind of been stuck in around six and a half thousand, something like that. So it's, the YouTube is, the iTunes and stuff is growing pretty well. But it's, it's hit or miss, obviously talking about whatever it is you're talking about. You know, you guys don't have to be on.

Starting point is 00:20:45 You know, it's been performing the best. So anything to do with like Connor McGregor could be even the moment of course. You know, AKA, anything to do with AKA DC, you know, cause you have a lot of insight there. Yeah, I do have it and that's the one thing that scares me because I've got so much insight on the AKA, but the issue is though is that what happens

Starting point is 00:21:03 when all those guys are gone, I mean, Cain's 36, DC's coming, he's 39, I have 40, I mean, I'm pretty much, yeah, Rockhold lives in Florida now, I'm sure him and I text and talk all the time, but it's what happens when all of us are gone, like that generation of us guys are gone, you know, and so there would be Kubee left, Islam, Makachef, you know, and then there's a couple other younger guys that are really talented are coming up, but, you know, there's a lot of things that we gotta, you know, you gotta make sure you're focused, you gotta focus on the whole sport, you can't just focus on what's in the front of you. How many shows are you guys airing a week now? We're just doing one a week, but then I started doing one on Sunday now called Punx

Starting point is 00:21:36 Opinion, where I give my opinion based on whatever the latest drama is in the sport. So yesterday we talked about Ben Askerin coming over from it's gonna be nasty about that. Yeah, we talked about Ben Askerin coming over from one FC and so I talked about that and then the trade for Demetrius Johnson. So those two things we talked about as well as and then the 125 division being either wiped out or not.

Starting point is 00:22:02 Yeah, that's the word, right? How does a trade work explain that? How do they trade athletes like that? How do you trade NFL athletes? It's the same thing. Same exact thing. I want your athlete, you want mine. Let's talk about which one's better.

Starting point is 00:22:15 We'll listen to GoShay. And then remember, there's something, there's money attached to that as well, not just a trade. Yeah, that's what I'm wondering. Yeah, I mean, with that, with them, I think it was just a straight trade, because they could care less about the 125-hundred division

Starting point is 00:22:26 and they never liked to meet you as Johnston if you came with. And they don't like Ben Asker neither. Yeah, why don't they like Ben, he's a fucking machine. Yeah, he's a machine, but I want everyone to remember. And I said this yesterday, once you guys watch Ben Asker and fight, halfway through that fight, you guys will be like, now I know why you guys didn't watch as well.

Starting point is 00:22:40 Oh yeah. As he went through your blanket. He's a blanket and he's always been a blanket. I mean, and here, the story on him and I've trained with DC and DC said like, look, it wouldn't make a difference on the Olympic team. If that guy locked his two fingers like this, he's taking you down.

Starting point is 00:22:54 Yeah, yeah. Doesn't make a difference. So if he gets his two fingers locked on you around your leg, he's taking you down. And that's that kind of animal he is. I mean, he's, you can't knock his wrestling. That's never been the knock. The knock is that he's really of animal he is. I mean, he's, you can't knock his wrestling. That's never been the knock. The knock is that he's really good on the ground.

Starting point is 00:23:07 You get to wise, but he don't go for finishes. So everyone's like, yeah, he's coming. Yeah, he's coming. Until about the second round, people were like, man, F this guy, watch. They're gonna be thinking that, like, man, I can see why he didn't come. I can see why the number.

Starting point is 00:23:22 Really evolved more into an entertainment aspect to it. Yeah, so. The one thing that has me thrown off, and I want to know is, is how are they going to bring, they're going to bring him over, and then he fights, he coaches Tyrone Woodley at the 175 pound division,

Starting point is 00:23:37 how is he going to coach T Wood and still become champion at 170 if T Woods is the champion now? So what's gonna happen? Someone brought this up to me yesterday and I was talking with him about it and they said What's gonna happen? I think is that they're gonna create that 165 pound division like we've all said they were So Connor has a place to be champion and then they will make up 175 pound division and they'll either bend or T would We'll go in either direction. So they'll split them up, so that gives them an opportunity

Starting point is 00:24:06 to face Kabeab or to face Conor or to face whoever. But it gives Conor a chance to be a champion somewhere and it gives Kabeab to be a champion somewhere and then it gives T-wood and Ben to be a champion somewhere it gives them a chance. But I'm telling you now, as soon as Ben asks him loses, the hype will be gone. People are gonna hate him. They're gonna hate him, they're gonna hate everything

Starting point is 00:24:26 of Adam, he runs his mouth really well, but once he loses, everyone's gonna come out of the woodwork. Man, we knew you fucking suck. Right. Because right now there's a lot of him. Steak around the guy. Oh yeah. Can he beat the best?

Starting point is 00:24:37 Can he beat the best? He's been championing everywhere he went. You know, um. And it is true when he gets his hands on you, you're gonna get taken down. You can't stop his his game Yep, it seems that way at least if for me when watching the sport and realizing you know that it's the The shit talk the entertainment the

Starting point is 00:24:54 Excitement that generates the big fucking dollars and in the people that consistently win sometimes like Demetrius You know the guys a fucking legend Yeah, but he's just not, doesn't talk a lot of shit. Not a big draw. Do you think that we're really getting the best fighters now, or do you think that that's now it's starting to just become the best entertainers? Yeah, yeah.

Starting point is 00:25:16 No, we're getting the best entertainers. That's what we're getting. If you wanted the best fighters, right? If Ben wanted to fight the best fighters, Scott Coker offered him a chance to fight in the Bellator tournament, which Rory McDonnell's already beat Tyrone Woodley. He just beat him. And recently that was Tyrone Woodley's last loss was Roy McDonnell. So if you wanted to fight the best fighters,

Starting point is 00:25:33 why would you go somewhere where you've already beat where the guy that lost is not there anymore? The guy that beat Tyrone Woodley, the beat the champion there, he's not there anymore, he's in Bellator, he got offered to be put in that Bellator tournament. So Scott Coker. He's in Bellator. He got offered to be put in that Bellator tournament. So Scott Coker was talking from Bellator to one FC about using Ben Askron, not buying him, but using him for the tournament.

Starting point is 00:25:53 That's risky on a promoter's standpoint. To go ahead and put him in a tournament, a well-to-weight tournament with all of his best well-to-weight, saying like, hey, you lend me him, and he can fight, we'reormord Donald the very first fight Mm-hmm, that's risky sure, you know and but Scott went out on a lemon did it and then turned it down So why why would you turn that fight down? Yeah, I think that's it's I mean money, right? You want some more mommy wants more 50 cent put a million dollars on the way on the well-to-weight tournament Oh really?

Starting point is 00:26:19 It's a million dollars. That's not counting their fight versus I did not know that their fight versus plus the winner gets one million dollars that's not counting their fight versus I did not know that they get their fight versus plus the winner gets one million dollars oh wow I wouldn't somebody then yeah I have no idea no idea why I think I think honestly he's he was the guard toward champion before he was the Bell tour champion before and and he was the one FC champion I think now the only organization he hadn't fought him was the UFC I think he wanted to go just fine yeah you know why do you think the UFC has such a I guess what why do you think the UFC has such a, I guess, what, why do you think they have such a stranglehold over this image of that's where the best fighters are, that's where you need to go because turn down a million dollars and to turn down, like you're saying some of the best fights ever so they can go to the UFC.

Starting point is 00:26:58 Why do you think that's the original? That's the hard. I think any promotion that comes in is going to have a hard time. They're the, they're the original. You know, it's going to be hard, I think, to unseed them. At any time, doesn't matter. I think Bellator has an opportunity, but man, let's be real. They've got a long ways to go.

Starting point is 00:27:13 You know, I'm a big Bellator fan. I work for Bellator, I work for Viacom, I work for these guys doing commentary for them and stuff. I have a contract with them for fighting. But to be honest, let's be real. I mean, and we've said this, I'm a huge Belator fan. I love it. I love being there. But if you took, if you take a look at what Connor did in his, in his last weigh-ins, I mean, they had 12,000 people there, 10,000 people.

Starting point is 00:27:36 Yes, you're taking a look. I mean, in Belator and San Jose, we had 14,000 people that came to the fights. I mean, it's, you're talking about, at a weigh-in for them, for Conor McGregor, and the whole fight, it's different. Ensure a weigh-ins are, I wanna say that the weigh-ins are free or they're like, I don't know, maybe they cost money, I've never been able to go, but, you know what I mean? It's, we've got a long ways, there's a long ways to go,

Starting point is 00:28:00 but let's not be mistaken when you look at the actual figures and the numbers of what Bellator does on viewership wise and what Fox Sports one does viewership wise. They're pretty much neck and neck You know, we were talking yeah, and I would say Bellator's actually beat them a couple times and not just a couple But you know they're leaning swing more towards because on the regular Bellator cards They're getting top name guys to fight on the on the regular belts or cars whereas on Fox Sports 1 you're getting You know, maybe one fighter there's a champion and then the rest of the cards kind of garbage You know on the Fox Sports 1's cars now even their Fox cards aren't doing all that well now

Starting point is 00:28:33 The there's two sides you right there's the the business side guy you understand what's gonna get people to want to buy tickets What's gonna get people to watch and then there's probably the purest Fighter inside you that that wants to see the best fighters and the best fights. And like, for the business side, what do you think that these organizations have to do to really succeed? Like, what's your opinion? And then what would you fight or side of you like to see?

Starting point is 00:28:58 Well, I mean, let me reverse it. Like, what would you prefer to see? For, well, see, I'm a jujitsu guy. I like ground stuff, but I'm totally different from most Americans. Like most Americans get bored when people on the ground for too long. I love that.

Starting point is 00:29:11 I would think 80% of the people just want the drama. I think that's what they look for. I mean, I think that's why Connor is such a big name in this. The hype and all that. I think it's the soap opera of it, right? What do you want to see? It's sort of a hybrid of both.

Starting point is 00:29:24 I mean, I pay attention to a lot of the shit talking, but for the most part, like I wanna see real striking techniques, and I wanna see somebody that's legitimately, like the best. Yeah, see, you guys are the everyday casual fan. So whatever it is, you guys wanna see is what the rest of the rest of the world wants to see.

Starting point is 00:29:41 Like for me, I could give two shits about rankings. I wanna see the best fight. Like for me, I could give two shits about rankings. I want to see the best fight. Like if you watched the Roy McDonald and Douglas Lima fight for Bellator, the best type of fight I want to see. You know, I want to see that fight. I want to see two guys where there's no quitting them and just gamers. The Dan Henderson show gun fight. That's the fight you want to see. You know, the Josh Thompson Gilbert Melendez fights. I mean, those are the fights I wanna see. I wanna see fighters like that.

Starting point is 00:30:09 You know, even though I came out, even though I lost the Tony Ferguson, that's the type of fight I wanna see. I wanna see a guy who gets, who I got destroyed in that fight, got cut up nasty. But there was never a moment I was like, man, this sucks, I should quit. You know what I mean?

Starting point is 00:30:23 Those are the fights you wanna see. You wanna see those fights. You wanna see fighters that there's always a moment for them to win. Look at Derek Lewis, he got his title shot against D.C. even though he didn't win the title shot because he fought Volkov and he was getting his ass kicked. He lost, in the last 10 seconds of the fight,

Starting point is 00:30:39 he's not out. That might have been one of the greatest cards that ever seen. That was gonna be the greatest card. That's my point. My point is I wanna see those kind of fights. I wanna see a guy who never, there was never a moment that he thought man, I wanna quit.

Starting point is 00:30:50 No way man. And many times when you're matching fighters up, are you looking at their styles that will ensure that that's gonna be something like that? Or what are the things that you would look at when you're matching fighters up to ensure that you get a fight like that? So I look at a lot of, I look at styles

Starting point is 00:31:07 of who would be the best to do, to do, like to competing against each other. Like let me give an example, I'll look at what, what's kind of what Scott Coker does, exactly what Scott Coker does. And I know I'm leaning more towards the Belly-Tour thing because I've followed Scott for so many years. But no one, Paul Daly wasn't ranked

Starting point is 00:31:25 or in the ranking, even fight Niktias. But that ended up being probably the most exciting first round fight I've ever seen in my whole life. They fought, you know, and it's like, when you see that fight and you're part of that fight, that to me, it's insane to watch Nikt Dys and Paul Daly at the time they weren't even, they weren't really scheduled,

Starting point is 00:31:42 they weren't supposed to fight each other in the ranking system, but they knew it was gonna be a great fight and it was at the time they weren't really scheduled, they weren't supposed to fight each other in the ranking system, but they knew it was gonna be a great fight and it was probably the greatest one round fight I've ever seen in my life. He was most excited. That was right when the UFC had bought a strike force and you had Lorenzo and Dana and everyone like sitting on the cage side, they were up out of their seats.

Starting point is 00:32:01 Like, man, this is insane. I mean, my honest opinion is that the UFC kind of, they kind of did a, they kind of, they could have used, they could have done what they're, what everyone originally wanted them to do is you had two different promotions and they could have built up two different promotions, had two different sets of champions and then eventually at the end, year end, had like a year end show

Starting point is 00:32:23 where champion versus champion. Yeah, that would be a big thing. They could have done that because they're having so many. That would have been smart, I think. Looking professional sports with, you know, in the national and like American league or something like that. Exactly to see who's the best. They already had the proof that the guys in Strike 4 sold.

Starting point is 00:32:41 Yeah, DC, T-Wood, you had Mark Court, you had myself, you had Gilberman Lendez, you had me like, sure you could have intermixed a couple of the underranking guys to fight the champions on each side every once in a while or maybe the number one contenders, you know, and said like, hey, you could at least be a champion on that side. People wanna see, outside of Conor McGregor,

Starting point is 00:32:59 people wanna see champions. Like no one has a crap of Conor McGregor has a title or not. They just wanna see him fight. They wanna see the promo and the lead up in the drama like this guy right here. You want they want to see all the drama and all the BS coming up to it. You know, that's what they want to see. They don't want to see the rest of them. The rest of them they want to know like what titles in the line. Yeah. But it doesn't matter for him. Yeah, I think if I think that would be a very

Starting point is 00:33:21 smart strategy because you'd see one guy as a champion, another guy who's a champion So now I'm in the buildup to that would be amazing. Can you imagine a year-end show every year where champion versus champion? No, that would be amazing. I mean like that would be it like in Japan pride used to do their year-end show every year and they still do it and it's huge man I mean like we're talking 30 40 50,000 people in an arena. Yeah, it's nuts. It's crazy It's like I mean That's a strategy that's worked for a long time for sports events, even pro wrestling did that for a long time where you'd have the intercontinental champion

Starting point is 00:33:52 and the world champion and they're going to go together and it's champion. I mean, everybody loves seeing that. That's a smart strategy. I, and they had already had the format that worked. I mean, they could have just left Scott Coker in place, could have kept them on, and never have to worry about him being your competitor. They could have had Rich Chow, who was the matchmaker for them,

Starting point is 00:34:08 and just kept doing what they're doing, and plugging away, trying to sign talent. Because you know how many, then that would have ensured no other promotion, like promotion like one FC, whatever would have a chance. And they own the rights to both of them, that. You know, like they had the chance and the opportunity

Starting point is 00:34:22 to do that, and I think they just wanted to shut it all down and make one. just do it all one Yeah, what's the vibe like at Bellator with UFC? Is there is there a lot of shit talking that goes on behind the scenes Are you guys not big fans of UFC or what do you guys? No, there's there actually no negative vibe at all Like I and the same thing was was with strike force all he did all Scott did was bring the same people that worked for Strike force over the Bellator. And just said like, hey, we're just going to create this family atmosphere and this vibe, and we still have all the same employees we had from Strike Force, and we're just starting from the bottom now, and we're going to work our way back up. It took six, seven years for Strike Force

Starting point is 00:34:59 to get to that level. And here we are, I think in year four, coming up on year four now. It's getting there. It's just going to take some time. You know, everyone forgets, like, you know, the other thing as well is, even though we saw it, even though he's with Paramount Network and that new fight app called the zone, even though they're on there, which is good, but they're still, I think they still need to make sure that they get into some sort of like mainstream TV, just for a couple big fights, you know, whether it's showtime, whether it's CBS, whether it's Who knows maybe even Fox, you know, because you have sees gone there, you know at the end of the year

Starting point is 00:35:34 They're gone. They're they're gonna be on ESPN Which I think is gonna be which I don't think is a good idea for them. That's interesting. Hmm. How come? Well, because if you think about it right right? ESPN, who watches ESPN? Fight, not five fans, but sports. Right. And if you actually listen to the ESPN, they're commentary guys, like, they don't know, they have no idea what's going on.

Starting point is 00:35:54 Well, who are they gonna bring in? They have no clue. Like DC and something. Well, DC will be part of it, I'm sure. But from what I understand, DC's gonna probably stay with Fox, covering football and wrestling. Oh, really? And the other things, yeah. his deal is mainstream appeal. Yeah, he's very mainstream

Starting point is 00:36:08 I gotta tell you man. He's the best in the business. I mean, and I'm I'm not trying to be biased But I truly think he is he's phenomenal man like he He's ready to go to the next level. He can be he can cover football He can cover basketball. He can cover obviously wrestling. We were just getting started too, man. Yeah, it told me a little bit about that. Just getting started, I'm excited, man. We just did a, I decided a three year deal with Viacom. So, did you?

Starting point is 00:36:31 Yep, so we'll be, we'll do in commentary for them. I still have fights left on my contract with Bellator. There is a chance that I may fight. We're waiting on one fight to potentially progress, but we'll see what happens on that. Awesome. Would you be excited to fight again? Uh, no.

Starting point is 00:36:47 No, but there is one fight I'd like to run it back and we may see that fight again. So we'll see. So I have a question for you. So something that I used to love about, one thing that I loved about MMA, I was a kid when the first UFC came out. And I don't remember how old I was, but my dad ordered it on pay-per-view, and I'm watching it, I do nothing about, what I believed true about martial arts

Starting point is 00:37:10 was what I saw on the movie. So like the flashy dude with the six pack, the rip guy or whatever's gonna kick everybody's ass. Firstly, and we all know that, hoist-gracy beat everybody on that one, he's this kind of skinny Brazilian dude. And we always, we see that a lot of times in MMA like Fedor, you know, if I saw Fedor on the street,

Starting point is 00:37:28 or at the beach with the shirt off, or DC, yeah, I'm like, they don't look, the guy's not that ripped, but they beat the shit at you. So it almost makes you question, can you tell by looking at someone if they're a bad ass, you're a fighter. Are there things that you can see in someone? Because for the average person, it's so hard,

Starting point is 00:37:44 you just see somebody's ripped and you think they can fight, but that doesn't mean shit a lot of time. I think What we talked about earlier, I think it's the confidence when someone walks into the room You see the confidence in them their demeanor their personality their their willingness to engage with other people Not afraid of anything that happens because like I said, you know, you can be me at tennis and golf But I can beat you up So when you walk into a room, you have that sense of confidence. I'm like, it doesn't matter what goes down right now. Unless someone who's out of gun or knife, we're good, bro.

Starting point is 00:38:12 Like I can have fun. So you can sense that when you see that. Yeah, you know, like DC, you're watching a room, he's just electric, you know, Kane, he's a little bit more humble, he's quiet, kind of comes in, but you look at Kane, he looks like a fighter. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:38:23 You know what I'm saying? I'm not saying that he's ugly, but he just has that like, you know, he has that like, hey, go ahead, say something. But he's so nice, man. I don't know if I see them big cauliflower ears, that's normally a sign for me. That's an easy one. That's some years of, that's some years of rolling around

Starting point is 00:38:39 and you get to the ears that fucked up. It is, but I mean, DC doesn't have cally. Right. So it's like one of those things where you're like man DC doesn't you would never know if he had DC You think this jaw I ran into a multiple times that he's always out in about in San Jose And he doesn't look he's not very tall either so he's not like this crazy But not canes a big boy like you get around can and you're like okay, you know what you wouldn't he's got a head like this big You know, it's like six one round six one just thick like a tree trunk, you know DC

Starting point is 00:39:04 He's big too, but I mean like he's shorter. He's like 510, you six one, just thick like a tree trunk, you know? DC, he's big too, but I mean like he's shorter. He's like five, 10, you know, him and I are about the same height. And so when you see him, you're like, man, you don't look that big, but I mean, like, you don't look like it. But he'll give you some frequent flyer, but I mean, DC's always smiling though. That's the super happy guy.

Starting point is 00:39:18 How much respect you got for him coming out and whooping on an old boy on the last one? Oh, I mean, I do. I mean, but things we, I think he, he, he, he weighed the measurements. K, pay me this much money. All I gotta do is wrestle. I've been wrestling my whole life, you know,

Starting point is 00:39:31 getting a good enough shape to run. I mean, his hand was broken all through camp. He didn't really strike with it at all. He didn't spar and use it. Didn't do anything. He wanted to make sure it was healed as much as it could have possibly been healed before the fight.

Starting point is 00:39:42 I mean, he's just looking to the Brock fight. I pretty much can, I would think that he's gonna be done after the Brock fight. Now, do you guys, I love for sure. Do you feel like you guys have this ability? Like, how often are you like right on when you know you can take a guy,

Starting point is 00:39:55 like how often do you look at a fight? Like DC looked at that fight and knew, like I know I can do a little bit of cardio the next couple of weeks, I'm in good enough shape, I'm not even scared. Yeah. You know, can you normally tell like if you got a guy and how often is it that somebody surprises another fighter?

Starting point is 00:40:11 Well, it's the fight game and that's why we fight the fight. You never know. You know, like you don't know what's gonna happen until you get in there. It all takes one punch. You know, with Derek Lewis, we saw that in his fight before that. Oh yeah. It took us one punch.

Starting point is 00:40:22 So it's hard to say that this fight will end. I can finish this fight anyway I want, because you don't know if the guy lands a clean shot. Well everybody has, you know, the shooters, the shooters luck or the lucky punch that could possibly potentially happen. But there's gotta be guys that based off of your skill set and you see their skill set where you just know like,

Starting point is 00:40:41 oh, he's just, it doesn't matter. He's not a match. It's a worst case scenario. I know I can let him get him down and he's's then you can be able to do anything. Yeah that would be the fight that I would I would say that was the Derek Lewis fight but when you think about it I mean like we saw in his like I said going back to his last fight you just never know it just takes one thing here's the thing if you watch even if you look at watch with DC with John Jones there's their last fight yeah I was like man I had DC win in the fight three I was two or three rounds

Starting point is 00:41:04 to none and but then you got you got clipped a little bit with the head kick. I was like, man, I had DC win in the fight. Three, I was two or three rounds to none. And, but then you got clipped a little bit with the head kick and it was like wobbled them and then the fight was over. It only takes that. Even though I felt like DC was one in the fight, that's a make a difference, man. Like it just takes it, like you just, you get carried away, lack less of your thinking you're controlling the fight

Starting point is 00:41:19 and the fight's over. You wake up and you're like, man, what happened? You know, that's what happened? That's exactly what, who was the most surprising fight for you that you got in the ring that you were like, man, what happened? You know, that's what happened? That's exactly what, who was the most surprising fight for you that you got in the ring that you were like, oh shit, this dude. That wasn't expecting that.

Starting point is 00:41:29 Uh, you know, I would say Tony Ferguson. Yeah. You know, it was just different. Like he had, he reminded me a lot of Mike Swick. Like kind of bony. Uh, wiry, you know, and it just had that like, that strength. He wasn't strong. That's the one thing with Tony

Starting point is 00:41:45 He wasn't physically strong, but man he had huge hands So like when we shook hands the lands and his hand like wrapped all the way around mine It makes a difference so when we were I was like I had he pulled me into his guard and he got risk control And I couldn't get my hand back and most people I can roll out But I couldn't I was like trying to roll out of there and I couldn't get to that position and just felt like you couldn't get your hand back. I was like, man, this sucks. I mean, he threw me off. Like everything he did threw me off.

Starting point is 00:42:11 He threw the push kick. I was like, those don't look hard, but I blocked five or six of them and then I woke up the next day. My forearm was swollen. Those of you guys that were watching on YouTube, my forearm was swollen from my elbow to my wrist. It was like probably a mound.

Starting point is 00:42:22 I would say at least three or four inches thick. It swalled up so bad. I thought maybe I fractured, I went to the doctor and they're like, no, you just have a severe bone bruise. Which bone bruise is like a little microscopic fractures. But still, it was just like, man, it sucked. What do you do? After these fights, what do you do to recover

Starting point is 00:42:40 to just lay in bed and do that? Well, every fight's different, man. Every fight's different. With the second Gilberinah's fight, I couldn't lay down, because I had lumps all over my head. So I had to sleep with a neck roll pillow. For three nights, I slept with a neck roll pillow

Starting point is 00:42:52 sitting up in my couch. Yeah. Yeah, I had to sleep like that. So I put all the pillows around me and I was like, make sure I was comfortable and I just had a neck roll pillow and I just slept sitting up. Now, do you guys talk to each other afterwards?

Starting point is 00:43:02 You're like, bro, you fucked me up. Yeah, man. Gilbert and I have, we have a couple conversations afterwards. You know, it was a tough, tough fights, man. Like, 21st and I had cuts all over, so I couldn't, I had to change all the sheets on my bed because I had white sheets, so I had to change them all to the dark sheets, you know?

Starting point is 00:43:19 So, you know, it's like, because I had cuts, I had, I want to say I had 24 stitches here, on my forehead here, up, I had, I had two Mercedes bends like cuts right here in the front of my in front of my head. So I think I had like another 14 and 12 stitches on each side. Yeah. Yeah. And then I had like cut on the bridge of my nose.

Starting point is 00:43:35 It cost it was like two stitches. I mean, I got cut up pretty bad in that fight. If you watch a lot of his fights, that's what he does. So he tries to grab and he elbows really well. He's going to be in the elbow man. So it's just hard to deal with something different to deal with and the length and the reach kind of threw me off. Tough guy man, really tough guy. I remember when I was you know the few fights I've been in as a kid I remember I never felt anything till after. Does that happen for you as well? Are you in the fight and you're

Starting point is 00:44:03 like oh shit I'm getting cut or is it afterward? You're like, what the hell happened? I mean, I didn't even feel that. No, I mean, honestly, the forearm in the in the Tony fight, I felt that a couple knots in the head with the Gilbert Refight. I felt those little bit, but no, you really, yeah, you really don't feel a whole lot. The very first Gilbert fight through a couple kicks and I kicked his elbow, and I went to plant my foot after I kicked his elbow, and I could fill the pain, and it kind of caused me to shuffle my feet, like, ooh, that hurt. But other than that, you just kind of try to work through it.

Starting point is 00:44:36 All the real hard things that you feel, you don't really feel, because you're either knocked out or you're wobbled, you don't feel those. You know, so... Those are a surprise. Yeah, the adrenaline that's going, you don't feel it. The only time you'll really feel it is when you... You won't feel it, but what you'll know is you'll know you got to hit with a good shot,

Starting point is 00:44:57 because all of a sudden, the lights get dim, or you start to vibrate, your body starts to vibrate, you got to hit with a clean shot, you'll feel like, oh wow, that was different. You don't feel as much control of your body at that moment. That's gotta be a skill that you learn just through fighting where if you get hit,

Starting point is 00:45:16 how to react and respond while you're a little bit hurt. Because one of the biggest, I guess, criticisms of martial arts in the past has been, if you don't train full contact and you actually get hit, you don't know what to do because you never experienced that. How do you learn that process of getting hit and knowing how to react is just through?

Starting point is 00:45:34 Let me ask you this, does that translate to football also? It might, yeah. Yeah, because I mean, that's my, like they moved football to one paddock practice a week. And now we see guys just getting laid out and knocked out and fought in games, right? So like they're, instead of just getting like a concussion and still being on the play,

Starting point is 00:45:52 now they're just getting just annihilated. Guys are like, you know, arms are going stiff, they're shaking, toes are pointed out. And I was telling, and who would I tell them? I was telling somebody their day. I said, they moved to one pad of practice week with really no contact. And they get in the game, they go as hard

Starting point is 00:46:09 as they possibly can at each other. And then what do you think's gonna happen? It's worse. It's worse. I mean, to me, I feel like it's worse. Now you're getting legitimately knocked out. That's an interesting theory. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:46:20 So, there's a skill to getting hit, man. As much as I would like to say that dumb Oklahoma drill where they ran right into each other and try to win, you know, in football, that's the same thing as what fighters do when we call sparring. It's the same thing. We get out there and we spar,

Starting point is 00:46:34 and we punch each other in the face to get our body used to the movements, how to roll with the punches, how to absorb the contact, and how to come right back and throw something right back. So not only do you hit me, but I roll with it, I move and I throw right back to try and land something on you. Well, football players, I feel like they've gotten away from that.

Starting point is 00:46:51 So they don't leave, they stopped learning how to take the shots. They stopped learning how to tackle. They stopped learning how to just absorb that type of punishment and their body's not used to it, you know, and I'll give you a, for instance, when I don't train or I don't spa for say a month or two or like after one fight to the next. And the first two weeks or first week and a half I'm sparring, my forehead is all like super sore

Starting point is 00:47:20 and I wear head gear. And I'm doing light sparring with some guys but I've been hit so many times now all of a sudden my forehead hurts like little like paint like it's like just little bruises all around your eyes All around your cheekbones, you know your chin kind of hurts your neck is a little stiff from taking the shots And that's only like say a month a month and a half of not being not taking any punishment So what do you think is gonna happen with football players? They never take any punishment. Like they're playing touch football during the week.

Starting point is 00:47:48 Oh yeah, they're pretty much eliminated. Yeah, and then they get into the game and then they wonder what's going on. How come the guys get in the concussions? Oh, we gotta make the sports safer. Right. I mean, you got to be interested. That's an interesting point.

Starting point is 00:48:00 Yeah, that's an interesting point. Cause I felt that, you know, going through camp and everything's like, you needed those shots. You needed to feel that feeling. So that way, yeah, you could respond and also breathe, you know, and recover on top of that. Well, isn't there a term for it with like building their shell?

Starting point is 00:48:13 Why I called it that, yeah, well, time. Like it felt like it was like building my shell, you know, to get out there and look for it. You definitely learn, you definitely learn how to move with hits and how to handle them. And then you probably learn how to move with hits and how to handle them. And then you probably learn how to process quickly in that state where you get hit

Starting point is 00:48:32 and then you know how to respond and react because that's the thing that you'll notice about. This is why full contact fighters can be so dangerous. Like a boxer with two years of experience, what makes him so dangerous if you hit him, he knows how to move, he knows how to react to your punch, whereas if you hit someone who's a 10 year black belt

Starting point is 00:48:49 in a martial art, it's never really been punched, they're gonna get hit and they're gonna get kind of shocked. So there's definitely a skill you build from that. Plus of the other fighter seas that you're wavering at all, or any like, you've affected them at all, they'll smell blood, right? And like you're really bringing on. Absolutely.

Starting point is 00:49:03 Exactly, when I see your tired a little bit, is when I try to push the pace. When I see, when I'm training, when I'm training younger fighters, and I tell them I say, as soon as you feel like you're tired, and you back away, I'm gonna go ahead and press the pace.

Starting point is 00:49:18 And when you see that I'm tired, you should be thinking, press the pace. Even if you're not gonna throw punches, at least take a step forward. That makes me think, oh man, I'm tired. It makes me even more tired thinking that you're gonna try to push on me, you're gonna try to lean on me, you're gonna try to throw punches. I mean, now I gotta circle and get away.

Starting point is 00:49:34 I'm using energy in moments where I didn't wanna use energy. That's why I stopped punching. That's why I stopped pushing on you. It's, I wanna take a break. So when the fighter pushes back, you're like, oh man, and that's why you end up with guys that you end up with entertaining fights. I've seen some fights where they both look at each other

Starting point is 00:49:55 like, okay, we're both tired, let's take a break. That's how it happens in sparring. So I tell people every single time you spar, it doesn't matter if you spar with the fresh guy every round, it will never simulate how hard a fight is. Even when I was getting ready for Gilberman and I was all three times and I had a fresh guy that came in on me every single round

Starting point is 00:50:15 and they would give me one hard round and I was like getting exhausted and getting exhausted. But that still didn't simulate how hard those fights were. Because every time I wanted the rest, my sparring partners would let me rest a little bit because they were tired. I would push them to the point where they were a little bit tired. They were like, okay, look, they would just slow down.

Starting point is 00:50:35 Whereas with fighters, when they see you when you're in the actual case, like, no. I don't know if they think there's money involved. Like, I see you tired, no, I'm coming after you. You see how tired you're coming after no. There's money involved. Like, yes, you tired. No, I'm coming after you. You see how tired you're coming after me. You know, there's a lot of stake. What would you say are some of the most important physical

Starting point is 00:50:54 attributes for fighting? Like strength, stamina, endurance, flexibility. What would you say are some of the most important things that a fighter physically needs to have in order to perform? Well, number one is cardio. Just stamina. What would you say are some of the most important things that a fighter physically needs to have in order to perform? Number one is cardio. Just stamina. Yeah, because cardio, 100% helps with your mental.

Starting point is 00:51:11 And fighting to me is mental. I feel like you always see an example that like with the ultimate fighter show, like these guys that like, they can only, they do like the two round things. And if they were ever, I think at one point, I think they did do three rounds and it was terrible because the guys would just be all gas.

Starting point is 00:51:27 And I remember seeing that going like, wow dude, even as good as all of these kids are that you're watching the show, they get to the pro level, they're gonna get mopped up. And they're so young, which baffles me to believe that they're not in shape. Right, you know, and why is that? Just, to me honestly, the bad coaching,

Starting point is 00:51:43 well, they should have coaches that should get you on the treadmill. Now it's hard to make that adjustment when you're in the, when you're on the reality show, because they have you on a set schedule of when you can work out, when you can't, like you know, but I think you would come into that though. Wouldn't you come into the show like you would think you would come in with a little bit of conditioning at least.

Starting point is 00:52:04 But my whole focus has always been in any of my fights come into the show like you would think you would come in with a little bit of conditioning. Yeah. But my whole focus has always been in any of my fights is making sure that I was in the best shape I could possibly get in. I mean, we're talking cardio wise. Yeah, always conditioning like muscle endurance and everything I did was high reps, lower weights. I never really lifted heavy weights. I never, you know, I mean, like occasionally I did some dead lifts, you know, and that was it.

Starting point is 00:52:24 Who's some of the best examples in the in the fight game of that like had the best gas tanks came Velasquez Oh, yeah, definitely that doesn't make sense as his eyes to yeah, just doesn't get tired came Velasquez, man You know, it's funny it this is what you'll notice well at least what I've noticed in MMA is that high level wrestlers Who enter into MMA seem to be the most fit. And I think it's because wrestling teaches that very well. Like you learn that at a very high level in wrestling. You get up to the high level of college wrestling, you have incredible stamina and endurance

Starting point is 00:52:59 that it spills over to MMA. Well, I wouldn't say what it is, is you're teaching your athlete how to push their mind and their body to the same brink. That's what it is. Is they aren't, I wouldn't say they're in phenomenal shape, but they just train their body,

Starting point is 00:53:16 their mind to understand that their body can do more. Oh, I see. You know, and that's what wrestling is. Wrestling lets you know that when you feel like your body is tired, that it trusts me, your body can do it. I can't explain it enough to people that when you think you can't keep going, you can keep going. 100% you can keep going.

Starting point is 00:53:35 How do you, how do you, your mind will quit before your body? How do you train that in someone? If you're training someone, would you just push them till they cry? No, more repetition. Yeah. I feel like it's all about the repetition. Like when I first ran out and did 400 yard sprints, we were doing a full track sprints.

Starting point is 00:53:51 I did four of them and I thought I was gonna die. I was like, there's no way. There's no way. I went out there with my coach and he was like, yeah, Javier Mendez went out there and he's like, okay, we're gonna do four. I ran the first one like in a minute, minute one, minute two.

Starting point is 00:54:03 He's like, okay, three more and I was like, there's no way. I was like, I don't know what, minute two. He's okay, three more. And I was like, there's no way. I was like, I don't know what I was thinking. That we were going in to run one, but there was no way. I was like, there was no way. And my second one was like a minute 30, minute 35, minute, I was like, man, this is horrible.

Starting point is 00:54:17 And then, but by the time I got close to the fight, we were doing two, two lap sprints. So I was doing a whole mile of sprints, you know, so I was doing to the fight. We were doing two lap sprints. So I was doing a whole mile of sprints. You know, so I was doing eight eighties. So I was doing two of those and I was doing six, four forties and keeping all the times under 125. Wow. Wow.

Starting point is 00:54:35 So full lap would be under 125. So my first like full lap, yeah. So we started off with two eight eighties sprints, then we did six, four forties and then you have me do a couple like bleachers sprints, like up and down the bleachers, like up and down the bleachers, hop up and down the bleachers, full step up and down, skip every other step,

Starting point is 00:54:48 you know, that kind of thing. And then that was, you know, we did that, and that was my conditioning workout. What about strength? What, where do you see the biggest or the best application of strength in MMA? Would it be the ability to hold someone, grip strength, back strength?

Starting point is 00:55:05 Explosive strength. It's hard to say, I would say it's more technique. There's never something that says, I don't think there's anything, I can give you, oh man, I'm like, I so strong, you won because you were strong. I think you win because of the technique. I've trained with some guys that are 135,

Starting point is 00:55:24 145 pounds, but just phenomenally to you two guys, and they feel a lot stronger because they're like backpacks on your back. They get to your back, they're not letting go. I mean, it has nothing to do with a whole lot of the strength. It's more of the technique and the position of where they're at. That's a new technique out there.

Starting point is 00:55:40 I know the sports evolved quite a bit, but are anybody bringing in other modalities into the mix? That's mean you just watched the other night, right? With, yeah, you're Rodriguez. Hit, hit, Kareen Zommi with that little upward back elbow. Oh, I saw. And knocked him out. I mean, that's probably one of the greatest knockouts ever

Starting point is 00:55:58 in history and MMA history. Definitely a weird kind of fluke type of thing, but being, I mean, he's got, he had to be willing to throw it and it was amazing. Man, didn't clean and beautiful. It sucked, because Koreans, all of them was up on the cards, was gonna win the fight,

Starting point is 00:56:13 and there was less than a second left and he got knocked out. Yeah, so this is just one more thing to be aware of. Yeah, I mean, how'd he got dropped and was able to get up? He would have won. That's how crazy that is. That was crazy.

Starting point is 00:56:24 And I was telling producer Dave yesterday, when we did the punk's opinion, I was like, man, I said, dude, he actually even kind of fell like a zombie. The way he fell was like, all his arms went limp, hit his face, and I was like, man, I feel so bad. I'm too bad. No, but you know, it's true. It does evolve so quickly.

Starting point is 00:56:42 I'm seeing a lot in grappling sports, as leg locks seem to be just dominating like crazy. Are we going to start to see that spill over in MMA? You'll see a little bit of it because like Bellator has Dylan Dennis, who loves to do the leg lock position. He won his first fight in with a toehold. You will see it, but there is a lot of risk involved when you're talking MMA and leg locks, because if you don't get to the proper position fast enough, the guy will be able to squash or smash your legs in and get on top and start punching you.

Starting point is 00:57:12 So we saw, I want to say it was Ian Freeman with crap, I want to say Frank Mirr, we're Ian Freeman just annihilated, I want to say Frank Mirr with strikes because he kept trying to go for the leg lock or the, and it was like one of those feel good stories because Ian Freeman had just lost his dad that day and found out why he was there for the fight and was able to beat Frank. I wanna say it was Frank Mirr, but man,

Starting point is 00:57:39 what a, it's just very inspirational, but that was a classic case of like, that's why MMA guys don't really go for leg locks a whole lot For me, I feel like leg locks knee bars those type of things. There's something you got to catch them in transition Mm-hmm. You catch them in transition when they're not ready for it And you're able to lock it in quickly and try and finish it if you don't get it You basically kick them back and get away and make space to get back up to your feet or sit up to like another position But the thing I love about MMA is that you know, we've heard so many times like,

Starting point is 00:58:06 oh, spinning kicks, those are just for the movies, they're never gonna work in MMA. Dude, started using them, started knocking people out. We're not gonna, oh, you know, front snap kick to the face, that's a movie shit, that's not gonna, boom, people started getting knocked out, you know, of spinning backward elbow or back fist, that'll let people start getting knocked out.

Starting point is 00:58:22 It's like it keeps proving us that you can, can if you know the right fight or can start to incorporate these things. We got to clear something up for me. So Steve and Segal. What is the story behind that? Like this this I don't know if it's a urban myth or whatever with this front kick that he taught Anderson Silva and I have to know like from somebody that actually knows it's all it's all for TV man. Oh, it's bullshit I thought so it's all it's all for me to go I mean in reality though, it is a it definitely was something that and everybody's body style is different Anderson civil was perfect for that leotal machita used it later again on renegative I

Starting point is 00:59:03 Used it on KJ noons when I fought him. And it lands. I mean, it does. It works, but with every technique, the setup has to be right. You know, so when you do the setup properly, it doesn't matter who's thrown it. As long as you're setting it up properly,

Starting point is 00:59:17 and you're able to throw it at the cleaning crisp, then you have a chance. Do you see any positions or moves right now that are underutilized that you think if a that a fighter really focused on they might have it in advantage? What do you mean? Like anything like do you see any any any any room for improvement right now? In other words, like I said, hit leg locks. It seems like maybe they there's a lot of them in grappling. Is it going to spill over? Do you see anything where? Okay, I think there

Starting point is 00:59:43 could be an advantage if a fighter starts to focus on You know more of this particular position. Do you see anything like that? Or is it just so complete now that it's so difficult? I think it's everyone is for themselves is whatever works best for you and your body style and your technique Mm-hmm. Excellent. You know, there's nothing that I can like there's things that I can do that that you can't do There's things that you can do that I can't do. And you know, someone's always better at something than I am. Definitely. I always love talking MMA so with you, but I want to talk to you a little bit about the

Starting point is 01:00:10 business again and what, I mean, how are you announcing, podcasting, running a school, like how are you, and then also training to fight potential? Like, how are you managing your time right now? Pulling my damn hair out. You don't even do a movie, too. Yeah, so I did a couple movies over in Asia. How are you managing your time right now pulling my damn hair out? Movie too. Yeah, so I did I did a couple movies over in Asia. I'm actually talking with a couple people right now about me doing some more movies over there The new rush hour for is coming out and they actually hit me up about pot potentially working. You know, I'm on that show as well, so We'll see there's so many little things and so many things that need to happen for things like that to happen. The timeframe has to work. Now that I sign a deal with with Viacom working with them, it's got to work around their schedule. I mean, that's

Starting point is 01:00:54 long term. For me, my long term goal is to do exactly what DC's doing is, I mean, he already understands, I mean, I want to say he's making some, he's making really good money working for Fox. I could see him working into covering more sports. And that's exactly what I want to do. I love doing great. But this is this, this pot, like your guys is podcasts and me working for, for them is exactly what I want to do. Just keep doing that.

Starting point is 01:01:19 Keep talking, keep communicating to people. Exactly. Now are there, are there people like an, I mean, you mentioned DC. So I imagine he's somebody you follow. Are there other podcasts and announcers that you're paying attention to what they're doing? And are you, how are you evolving your style? Well, I mean, for me, it's easier to just keep doing what we're doing because I'm talking about fighting. Fighting is exactly what we've been talking about for the last hour and hour now. I can talk about this all day long.

Starting point is 01:01:45 I mean, I've been doing it for 20-something years now. Then you mix in with the wrestling, the sports, the athletes, and people that I know, as far as dealing with, or as far as viewing and talking and seeing what other people do, I do follow Brennan's show because I've been on there a couple of times. Brennan's show.

Starting point is 01:02:02 I'm a huge Rogan fan. I like listening to some of his stuff. What I like with, what I like with Joe show is that he, he tends to bring on people even if they don't agree with his stuff and he will go ahead and have them on and let them explain. Sure.

Starting point is 01:02:17 And what I find refreshing, and it's not just because of his show, but I actually, it's kind of started taking that mentality in my approach to the climate of what we live in now. And just let everyone be them. And just, you know, in sure, maybe you can agree with them, maybe you can't, but just take that approach of let them be them and whatever suits them,

Starting point is 01:02:39 let them do it their way, you know? And maybe there are things that I don't agree with, but I tend to just let them just deal with themselves. However they wanna do it, hear them out. There are things that I've heard people say, and I'm like, I don't really agree with that. I don't understand. But then when they explain to me,

Starting point is 01:03:02 I'm like, you know what, it does make sense. It does make sense on why you feel that way. You know, so, and I gotta say that I kinda got that a little bit from listening to some of Rogan shows, some of the people that he's had. I wanna say, and I've talked about this before, that there was a girl on there. I wanna say her name was Michelle Kel Felper or something.

Starting point is 01:03:26 Anyways, she was like the, she was on there. And she talked about how she grew up in a church that went around a protested veterans or gay people's marriages and say, okay, your daughters, are your kids dead because he was gay, are your kids dead because they're a lesbian? Or, you know, your kid was a... Was this the Westbro Baptist Church?

Starting point is 01:03:46 I believe so. So I listened to that one. That was actually the one that got me listening to Rogan at all. Oh, interesting. You know, I didn't listen to any of his podcasts. That was one of the first ones I listened to. And I was like, now I like this show.

Starting point is 01:04:00 Now I will listen to you. Are you have any plans of having, because we're obviously a fitness and health podcast, but we've had quite a few episodes now that had nothing to do with fitness and health, and that's all by design. We have a lot of other interests, and we like talking to different people,

Starting point is 01:04:15 like you're saying, do you have any interest in doing that as well, where you have some episodes that maybe don't have to do with martial arts and MMA, that are other things that you're interested in? Yeah, so we've had on Tyler Far, who's a country singer. We've had Jimmy Allen on, who's a country singer as well. So Jimmy Allen right now, I think he's got a top five

Starting point is 01:04:33 on the billboards for, it's called Best Shot. So we had him on. We've had a couple other people that have been on that are not fight related, which I kind of, I do enjoy, we had Shane Faisen on, who does fight tips, but we talked a lot about how he moved from Minnesota and came over from, I wanna say Minnesota, I mean theapolis,

Starting point is 01:04:53 came over from there and he, him and his wife started, this thing called fight tips and they basically just talk about, they basically put together like videos on YouTube. That's how they make their living now. They move out to LA and do the whole deal. And I'm captivated by people that do things that are completely different than what anybody else ever thought they would do. You know, I mean, like when you guys were younger, did you guys think you'd be sitting in the

Starting point is 01:05:17 studio right now doing exactly what you're doing? Like sitting here talking to me. I mean, sure, maybe you guys always have this little interest in, you know, did you usually do bodybuilding competitions, right? Or fitness competitions? Yeah, so, did you think you'd be sitting here traveling around like meeting all these people? I mean, and think about the people that you've met

Starting point is 01:05:34 and how they've changed your life on how to live a healthier lifestyle, and not just like lifting weights, you know, in the gym, pump an iron, but like living an actual healthier lifestyle, you know? The things you put in your body now is completely different than when we were younger, what we used to think we would put in our body.

Starting point is 01:05:50 And so I think about all those things, all the times that I've listened to either whether it's Rogen, whether it's List You Guys, or whether it's Shob, or whatever it is, or just even listening to ourselves, and I have so many meetings and conversations with you know Scott Coker the guys from Bellator even guys from the UFC that I still am friends with over there and to hear their Conversations about how athletes and how the sport and how everything is fully changed and evolved and the people that I'm still friends with

Starting point is 01:06:17 Over all these years. It's insane. Yeah, and I never thought in a million years that I have my own podcast You know with Dave and with Sammy and I never thought in a million years I I have my own podcast, you know, with Dave and with Sammy. And I never thought in a million years I'd be doing punks opinion and people actually care about what I'm saying. I mean, like we're getting a lot of traction on those type of things. And I never thought that I'd be sitting in front of the camera whether it's with you guys right now or even with Bellator.

Starting point is 01:06:40 And people are just, they're clinging on to every little last word that you're saying. But with that is no different than when you're talking about kids getting a stripe that comes more responsibility. You gotta be very careful what you say. Have you got any heat? Have you got any heat? Well, people disagreeing with you and being like,

Starting point is 01:06:57 I disagree with your opinion. Well, when I was with the UFC, yeah, I did. There was something that I had asked, I had asked the question and to touch on this and I probably shouldn't get into it too much. But I had asked the question and I said, because it was right around the time that they were trying to pass for gay marriage to be legal.

Starting point is 01:07:15 And I had asked the question and said, hey, do you feel like gay marriage should be legal? And I said before you answer that, I said, should you be allowed to have more than one spouse? So I just, I just was asking based on, you know, when, when you change the definition of marriage, does it open up the door for people to say like, well, I work through it for a lot of questions. It's a logical question. And not just that, but then does it open up the question for people to say that they should be allowed to have more. And then how

Starting point is 01:07:43 do you work the tax benefits of that? Sure. How do you work the healthcare for that? How do you do these things? And those are all things that... Say you got heat for that. Yeah, I got a ton of heat for that. Actually, I actually lost a job working for Fox because of that.

Starting point is 01:07:56 Oh, oh. Yeah, so Fox wanted me to work for them. I was supposed to be there with DC and I were supposed to work together. And they were like, look, it's just too much controversy right there at this moment in this time. And it let me know that like, that's kind of around the same time I sort of listened

Starting point is 01:08:09 to Joe Rogan. And I had heard this whole ordeal with the Baptist church thing. And I was like, you know, this is, she's 100% right. She was, there was moments in there she was like, you know, I knew it was kind of wrong, I knew I probably shouldn't have been doing it, but that's all I ever knew.

Starting point is 01:08:24 And so it made me think about like she left her family and everyone to do what she felt like was potentially right to go out there and explore. And I said, you know, what it did was it opened my mind to really listen to what other people have to say and understand when they talk to you, why do you feel that way? And I want to hear without a name, I can't talk to people that are aggressive with it. Like, I'm a fighter. Don't, don't be aggressive with me about whether we're talking politics, whether we're talking taxes, whether we're talking any of these

Starting point is 01:08:54 things. Don't be aggressive. Like, let's have a conversation. Let's sit here, like, we're sitting here right now and talk about it. And, um, and that made me feel that, that, kind of opened my eyes to like, like wow people will take a question like that And they'll turn it in and I was just kept asking questions and I kept asking questions I'm like I don't fill these things. I don't feel like I just wanted to know what if it led to something else or other things Outside of what we guys are all trying to get approved What how would we handle those situations and those circumstances when they come? And then no one had asked for them or they did have answers, but you know,

Starting point is 01:09:27 it's like how are we gonna get all that stuff passed? So when we did that, it put a negative look on me. I was pretty upset over the whole thing. I was like, you know what, you need to do something about yourself. You need to do something to change. How you look at things, you know, on whether you just listen to more people

Starting point is 01:09:47 on here and this. So you put yourself on the other side of it and you said, okay, I'm not gonna judge people so harshly, I wanna hear what they have to say. Well, I wasn't judging. There was never a moment where I, I could, I could, well, you felt judged.

Starting point is 01:09:56 Yeah, I felt judged and I was like, you can't be that person. That's what I do. And I felt like I was being judged for just asking a question, you know, and you know, and I just, when I look back now and I'm like I was being judged for just asking a question. And I just, when I look back now, and I'm like, man, you have to listen what everyone has to offer and what they're saying, and just take it in stride.

Starting point is 01:10:15 Yeah, I learned that lesson a long time ago. I had a client who, I love to discuss and debate controversial topics. One of my favorite things to do, it's mentally stimulant. I enjoy it. And I had this woman that I trained, and she was so effective at how she communicated her opinions and ideas. She was so effective, in fact, that she was rarely, rarely do you see someone change someone

Starting point is 01:10:37 else's opinion when it comes to religion or politics or stuff like that. But she would do it all the time, and she'd get other people in the gym to kind of consider her opinion. So one day I asked her, I said, how did you get so... How did you get so good at communicating your ideas? And she said, well, what I did is a long time ago is I would form an opinion and I would seek out the opposing opinion with a total open mind and I would find the best argument for that side. And she said either... She said two things would either happen. One, it would strengthen my own opinion because I would know more best argument for that side. And she said either, she said two things would either happen.

Starting point is 01:11:05 One, it would strengthen my own opinion because I would know more about the other side and I would be better at my own argument. Or sometimes it would change my mind, in which case I was happy because I realized I was no longer having the wrong opinion. And so I started doing that, I started doing that myself. And what you end up finding is,

Starting point is 01:11:23 there's definitely assholes and shitty people out in the world. But more often than not, we all kind of want the same thing. People want good for themselves, good for their families, they have good intentions. So if you hear them out, even though you may disagree with an opinion, you start to empathize a little bit. We have a difference of opinion, but your opinion isn't because you're an evil person, it's because you really think that's the best thing for everybody. And it helps you a lot, it helps a lot with the conversation.

Starting point is 01:11:48 I really would like to meet your friend, because I have another friend who's exactly like that who actually helps me all the time. And now he's one of my members of my gym. We've been friends for a while now, but he gives me the same outlook and he asks questions because he's curious, not because like he's trying to prove me wrong.

Starting point is 01:12:05 Sure. And that's the thing. Like anytime I say something or anytime he says something, I'll respond back to him with a question because I'm curious, not because I feel like, oh, that's the way it should be. I'm not trying to catch you and like, well, that's what I said.

Starting point is 01:12:19 I'm not trying to do that. I'm trying to actually, I'm curious, I'm asking you a question because I'm curious. I want to know why you feel that way. I want to know if you see, if you see it potentially my way, if I ask it this question, if I ask you this question, could you potentially see it my way if you answer the right way? Well, things are so crazy now that you can't even ask questions sometimes. It's getting really crazy. Nobody wants other perspectives.

Starting point is 01:12:44 Yeah, or if you ask a question automatically, oh, how dare you. What do you think? You know, who do you think it's like, listen, let's have a conversation. Yeah. I'm exactly, honestly, I'm exactly like, you know, that's exactly how I am. I want to know. I want, I'm not, I'm not asking you when I talk about racism or I talk about, uh, gay marriage. Yeah. When I talk about anything, it's a hot topic. Sure. I wanna know. I wanna know how you feel and why you feel that way. I wanna know, I'm curious. It has nothing to do with whether I believe,

Starting point is 01:13:11 my way, look, I can care, like I won't even have to tell you how I feel. I just wanna know because I, maybe there's something you're gonna say that's gonna make me think, you know what, you're right. That's the way I should feel. And I wanna know.

Starting point is 01:13:23 And it opened up my eyes, I think in that moment, I had so many people saying that because I was asking the question, they were offended, that they were upset at me. And people were actually riding the UFC, and people, because I was with the UFC at the time, they were riding the UFC, and they were riding like, they were saying that I should be kicked out of the UFC.

Starting point is 01:13:41 And I was like, I was just asking a question. I was asking, how does this does this may lead to something else? And what are we gonna do when it does lead to that something else? I could care less. I think every person that has ever been in a relationship, look, if you wanna be in a relationship, be in a relationship, I don't care who you love.

Starting point is 01:13:56 It doesn't make a difference to me. How long ago was that? You got some serious heat from that. Yeah, that was a while ago. I would say probably. That must have been 2013. Yeah, I was gonna say at least five or six years ago, right?

Starting point is 01:14:06 2013 because now it's not even I mean nobody even when it comes to game marriage, not even really a controversial topic anymore It's I don't think it should have ever been a controversial topic, but for me, I was more curious to know Like how you guys know those are real questions. Yeah, how are you gonna stop somebody for saying well? I want two wives or I want two Husbands I want three husbands or three wives. How are you going to stop that? And then when you do, what are we going to do for expense? Like, what are you going to, how you know? My question was always, why the hell do you need to ask, why does the government think she didn't get any

Starting point is 01:14:34 involved? There's two adults and they want to have a legal agreement. Then it can be any two adults who gives a shit. And I never understood that. Yeah, I think because they're starting getting more, because the government wanted to get more involved in healthcare. Oh, I'll always care. With the healthcare, so then how are they gonna break out

Starting point is 01:14:48 the healthcare for? How are you gonna say like, hey, now I gotta, I'm gonna have your husband and your husband. Or, you know, I'm like, what happens if you marry someone that has kids and it's moving on, like just, it just opens up a whole lot. You just wait, the more the government gets involved

Starting point is 01:15:02 with healthcare pretty soon, they're gonna start telling you what you can eat. What you can't eat, you know pretty soon. They're going to start telling you what you can eat. Yep. What you can't eat, you know, your activity levels, they'll start telling you everything and they'll be justified because they're paying for your health. Your health care. That's yeah. I've always felt that less government is better.

Starting point is 01:15:14 Yeah. I mean, it doesn't matter if you're, yeah, it doesn't matter if you're conservative or a Democrat, whatever it is. I've always felt that the less people are involved in your life, let you live your own lifestyle. Yeah. The better. Go ahead. I mean, Mary, let you live your own lifestyle. The better. Go ahead. I mean, Mary, 10 people, I don't care.

Starting point is 01:15:28 If you guys all want to do it, go right ahead. Just don't ask the government for help. You know, that's the thing, just take care of yourselves. And I think when we first, when everyone started moving out west from the east, you know, all they wanted was a plot of land and to live their own life. And now, somewhere on the line, we have decided that the government wants,

Starting point is 01:15:48 that we want the government to pay for our healthcare, we want the government to pay for our roads, we want the government to pay for all these things, right? Like, whether it's, I mean, you hear people when Obama got elected, they wanted people to pay for their gas and their cell phones. And I just, I don't understand how that all came about. You should want to do everything on your own,

Starting point is 01:16:04 and there's nothing that's make somebody more strong than being able to have a job and pay for themselves. You create character that. You know, it's funny that attitude that you have about wanting to, you know, be autonomous and take care of yourself and have the freedom to dictate your future. A lot of that is learned through hard training.

Starting point is 01:16:24 I notice when I train kids, for example, and they start to learn the lesson of work, sacrifice, result, work, sacrifice, result, and if they don't put in work, they don't get the result. It starts to bleed into the rest of their life, and you learn that. You learn that with hard training. Like, no, no, no, I need to put in the work.

Starting point is 01:16:41 I need to put in the effort. It's the only way I'm going to get what I want. I'm not going to be able to rely on other people. Even if other people say they're going to do things for me, it to put in the work. I need to put in the effort. It's the only way I'm gonna get what I want. I'm not gonna be able to rely on other people. Even if other people say they're gonna do things for me, it's just not the same. Well, I'll get into, that's why I feel like wrestling is so important. Okay, is that, to me wrestling is the individual sport,

Starting point is 01:16:56 but the team sport, sure it's great, but I can turn around and tell my parents, man, so and so missed that thing. That's why we lost. Sure. Well, if I go out there and get stuck, well, I went out there and made a mistake, okay? I got pinned because I made a mistake, because of me, or if I got out, if I got tech-falled,

Starting point is 01:17:16 probably because I got outworked, someone just outhustled me and outworked me because I probably wasn't in very good shape. You can't blame anyone but yourself. For his ownership. Exactly, so when you get into these conversations, the whole thing always falls back on it, because I probably wasn't in very good shape. You can't blame anyone but yourself. For his ownership. Exactly. So when you get into these conversations, the whole thing always falls back on it.

Starting point is 01:17:28 No one's gonna take care of you but you. That's it. So why are we relying on the government to do anything for us? And that's always that's, yeah. That's always gonna be my take. You know, and not to mention just the way that they waste money.

Starting point is 01:17:42 Why am I allowing us? Why am I allowing them to put any money, any of our money, our tax paying money that we paid them, in anything other than just maybe potentially fixing our roads. Just do that. You're preaching the choir now. You can't get me like the school systems, the school systems, we all know the school systems are broken.

Starting point is 01:18:00 I mean, a lot of majority of the people send their kids to private schools or charter schools or a lot of the CEOs and CFOs and major companies, Facebook, they're all sending their money to the charter school systems. They're not donating money to the government systems anymore. No. Because all their kids go to the charter schools. All their kids go to the private schools.

Starting point is 01:18:20 Yeah, another it's, Catholic schools or Christian schools or charter schools or whatever, you know? It's true. It's true. You work with kids all the time so you can see what works and what doesn't work quite a bit Well, I see the kids that go to the private school. I see the kids go to the public school big difference in person I really way big difference. Yeah, I mean I've got nieces that I've got my fam so and obviously I'm let me Clear the air my family owns a charter school. They started their own, it's called STEM charter up and up in Cordelay and Idaho. Oh, did they? Okay. So they're one of, they're considered one of the best charter schools in all of Northwest. So in the state of Idaho, they are the best. So, but it's all hands on. There's a, I want to say that like in 95% of the classes, they don't have chairs. So the kids have to stand all day. That's right. And they

Starting point is 01:19:04 talk. They just communicate and they do, they go't have chairs. So the kids have to stand all day. And they talk, they just communicate, and they go from station to station, doing their projects. You know, they do it either in a group setting of two, or they do it in a group setting of like five to six kids. You know, I mean, they, how do you see that translated into the kids that you're teaching and stuff?

Starting point is 01:19:17 Can you, what do you set, what do you set? Yeah, what do you set? Yeah, the kids that, they go to the private schools or the kids that they just feel like, I feel like their attention span is a little bit greater. They also seem like that they have a sense of other kids' feelings involved. Like they care like, oh no, you can go ahead of me. Oh no, no, no, you can go ahead and you go first.

Starting point is 01:19:38 Or you drill them. Do you want to go first? No, I'll go for, okay, you go first. Like that conversation happens amongst kids that are five and six years old, that go to the schools that foster that. And you're seeing it in the private schools, a lot of it because the market pressures, a private school succeeds, it does well,

Starting point is 01:19:55 if it doesn't, it fails and it shuts its doors. Public schools just get more funding typically because they'll say, our test scores are low, our performance is low, we need more money. Private schools, if they performance goes down, they're not doing a good job, they shut their door. So there's a strong motivation for them to do what really works, and you get a lot of hands on is what you see.

Starting point is 01:20:14 What I don't like is that we reward, the government rewards schools, or districts, or whatever it is, for spending all their money. And that's what drives me crazy, or whatever it is, for spending all their money. And that's what drives me crazy, is you guys are spending all of our money and because if they don't spend all the money, then they say next year, like, oh, you didn't need all that money,

Starting point is 01:20:36 so now we're not gonna give you as much. It's a really crazy thing. And I'm like, how does that work? Like now they're just throwing money away on things that they don't need, and they're not actually making the schools any better. If you look at the middle schools in the United States, the elementary schools are not bad.

Starting point is 01:20:49 The high schools, they're not bad. The middle schools are like the armpit of America. They're horrible. I mean, you look around in the Bay Area in the middle schools, they're all like threes and fives. I don't think there's a school over seven, you know, in the ranking in their ranking system. They're horrible.

Starting point is 01:21:04 The middle schools are garbage. But then in the elementary schools, you'll get some schools that are 9s and 10s. When you get to the high schools, they'll be like 8s and 9s, you know, but it's very rare to find high schools that are 10s. And if you do, let me just tell you, the housing around that area,

Starting point is 01:21:18 you're talking too many of our houses and up. Yep, yep, yep, crazy. Yeah, so I mean, so you do podcasts on these topics? Because I think you like these topics. I love these topics. But I mean, it helps. But the third rail bro,

Starting point is 01:21:32 yeah, I love the third rail. It helps the fact that like my family, like I said, they started a charter school, they got a sponsor, they basically got grants from a company called the Albertsons Group. So the Albertsons help pay for the full funding. They started off their school. I wanna say it was kindergarten through fourth grade.

Starting point is 01:21:49 And within one year, the Albertsons had hit them up and said, hey, we would like to give you a bigger grant if you go all the way to eighth grade. Oh, good deal. So they extended it to eighth grade. And their program is successful and their school is the number one school in all of Idaho

Starting point is 01:22:02 and like one of the top schools, I wanna say two or three in all the Northwest. That's great. And it's phenomenal. Now they're moving, now they moved into high school. It took them two years more because they just didn't have the curriculum written out for it yet.

Starting point is 01:22:12 But then my uncle, because he started it with his wife, my aunt uncle did, and they brought out the curriculum for high school, and now their high school kids are phenomenal. That's great. I move it there not graduating in a huge class, so they're graduating like five kids, eight kids. Because you know, most parents, because it's a new mean, they're not graduating in a huge class, so they're graduating like five kids, eight kids. Because, you know, most parents, because it's a new

Starting point is 01:22:27 school, they're not going to say, yeah, my kids are freshmen. Let's move in there, not knowing how it's going to all pan out. Yeah. You know, so it's tough. It's definitely a hard school. And the kids were some of the kids were so far behind, the parents got frustrated that their kids were so far behind that they actually pulled their kids out. Like, oh, no, it's just too much homework. They're like yeah, we're trying to get your kid caught up to standards. Your kids way behind like in just normal standards and so the parents like yeah, well he doesn't you do that He's got this and he's got that and well, that's hard to control and you can't control that so and it's upsetting like My whole focus would be if I had kids was like my whole focus would be to make sure that my kids are

Starting point is 01:23:02 My whole focus would be if I had kids, it was like my whole focus would be to make sure that my kids are educated. I mean, there's nothing more important, not basketball, not football, you know, nothing else is more important. Now sure, your kids should be active outside, I agree 100%. But those things are not as important.

Starting point is 01:23:15 You want to have a family one day? Yeah, one of these days. We'll figure it out. A lot of kids are on the other hand. We'll figure it out. I see you having a lot of kids, man. Really? I'm 40 years old, man. It's a little late.

Starting point is 01:23:24 I thought right, dude. You can make kids that are your age. You have a lot of kids man. Really? I'm 40 years old man. It's a little late. I thought right dude. You can make kids that are your age. You have a lot of kids. I'm not. Since you kind of have a lot of kids, all right. Yeah, almost, right? I think that's why a lot of some teachers don't have kids. They don't have like one. They already have 40 kids.

Starting point is 01:23:35 Every 30 or 40 new kids every semester or every year. Yeah. Yeah, no, yeah, definitely. I'm okay with adopting though. Yeah. That's my big thing. I mean, I think for me, I like to have a girl and a boy and I'm okay with adopting though. That's my big thing. I mean, I think for me, I like to have a girl and a boy,

Starting point is 01:23:47 and I want them in that order, the girl first and the boy second. You know, I think, is then, I think the boy ends up taking advice or learning how to treat a woman. That's a good point. It takes his older sister. That's a good point. He understands like how you should treat, you know,

Starting point is 01:24:02 like if you're the older brother, you don't always treat your younger sister in the right way. Sure, you look out for her, you should treat, you know, like if you're the older brother, you don't always treat your younger sister in the right way. Sure, you look out for her and you protect her, but I think to actually learn how to respect the woman and being the younger brother would probably be better. Oh, it's an interesting theory. I like that theory. Yeah, that's interesting.

Starting point is 01:24:18 Well, shit, man, it's always a good time with you, bro. And we're done already. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Always a good time, man. And I think we're supposed to, are you having us on your show or what do we do? Yeah, so I. And we're done already. Yeah. Yeah. Always a good time. Yeah, man. And I think we're supposed to, are you having us on your show or what do we do? Yeah, so I think what we're gonna do right now is we're just, I mean, I was just told that we're gonna flip it and basically,

Starting point is 01:24:32 I'm gonna bring in Sammy and then Dave and we're gonna try to make some space and do something where we share a mic or something. We'll figure it out. All right. And then, you know, we'll just chat with you guys about what you guys are doing. Excellent. You know, and then, yeah. That's it.

Starting point is 01:24:43 This is it, man. This is what we do. I mean, think about it, And then, yeah. This is it, man. This is what we do. I mean, think about it, guys. I know. This is our job. How crazy is this? It's a trip. We talk about it every day.

Starting point is 01:24:53 We do. It's so much fun. I mean, I'm enjoying every second of it. I can sit in here all day. Like, let's, we can. It feels like nothing. Yeah. Which we'll be here for another two hours.

Starting point is 01:25:01 Absolutely. I'm sorry, guys. Thanks, man. Thanks, man. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance,

Starting point is 01:25:14 check out our discounted RGB Superbumble at Mind Pump Media dot com. The RGB Superbumble includes maps on the ball, maps performance, and maps aesthetic. Nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels and performs. With detailed workout nutrients in over 200 videos, the RGB Superbumble is like having Sal Adam and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction

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Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 902: Josh Thomson

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