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

Episode Date: January 24, 2020

Joe sits down with former Strikeforce Lightweight Champion and current Bellator commentator Josh Thomson.

Three, two, one. Joshua! What's happening, my man? What's going on, man? Good to see you. So, I looked at your Instagram yesterday, and you had that video of Stephen A. Smith, and immediately I was like, oh my goodness, this explains so much. Play this. Play this, Jamie. Watch this. Watch this. First of all, someone needs to explain to me what's happening here. It looks like a dick punch to the left. watch this first of all someone needs to explain to me what's happening here unless that guy's got a two-foot dick look how low he's punching no idea man this guy should not be allowed to talk about fighting yeah look um just i'm gonna cut him a little bit of slack only i seriously we had this here's the thing with strike force we had kind of a similar situation not like this though by the way with gus johnson i remember gus yes was trying to talk him and i love gus when he's talking basketball i think he's got the energy and the voice that

makes people like oh wow they're gripped to the tv this i can understand what steven ate but this is not what you want to release after you just called someone who's a pioneer in the sport, you basically call him a quitter. You call a guy a quitter. First of all, he had a broken orbital bone. Okay. You're saying he was a quitter? He got his face smashed. Yeah.

Okay. He got cracked by one of the biggest punchers in the sport. Yeah. He has the most wins in the sport. He has the most wins by finish. He has the most bonuses. I mean, come on. He has the most fights. Come on.

You calling that guy a quitter? He got cracked. That's what happens. Look, fighting is the only sport that you could end it early. Right? You can't end a football game in 40 seconds. Imagine if your front line was so strong, your fucking quarterback was so badass, you could

storm a football game in 40 seconds. It'd be a different sport. Yeah. My concern with him, though, was that, like, look, he's fine. He just did the video. I get it. Like, it's good that you're trying to learn the sport. But I got to tell you, like, D.C. sent me this video,

and he basically commented on it. And I said, D.C.'s trying to protect him. I said, you cannot protect this guy. Not from this. You can't call someone like Cowboy Cerrone or any other, I'm sorry, any other top guy in any organization. I don't care if it's UFC, Bellator, one, any of them. All these organizations, you cannot do that to these guys.

These guys lay it on the line every time. We're not slapping a puck or hitting a baseball, okay? We're really out there getting hurt. And when someone calls you a quitter like that, you better be, I'm not saying he should be careful, like watch his back, but don't expect these fighters to be very courteous to you next time you walk in the hall. And that's the issue that I think we come across here with top fighters are

very offensive when they get offended when things like this. Rightly so. Yeah. It's a different thing. There's the, the emotional cost of losing a fight is so much different than losing a game. It's not the same. And there's a culture in sports broadcasting, whether

it's radio or television, this just diminishing of people. There's this shit talking that goes with sports. He always falls apart! That guy, that motherfucker needs to give his money back! He sucks! He this and that. And the other guy's like, oh, I can't believe you're saying that.

And you can do that in sports radio. And people love it. Because if you're on the job site and you're listening to the radio and you're fucking hammering nails, you're like, you're right. He does suck. There's a mentality that goes along with that kind of sports radio, sports guy talk. I hate that shit. I've resisted that from the beginning. And I've shit on those guys from the beginning because

it's not the same thing. You're not talking about the same thing. You're talking about fighting. You're talking about unbelievable physical consequences including knock on wood in our sports very rare but death. Yeah. No it's true but the other thing though too is that you're criticizing someone for being a quitter and

someone who's been there on every level of the game. Every level. But not only that but then you look like you've never played basketball or baseball or any other sport in your life either it admits like that i'm sorry so you cannot criticize people and to be on the talk show like you're saying those talk show radios that's the energy you need to bring when you're going against someone like max kellerman or any of the other or skip bayless and those guys go ahead and have that conversation with them. But you cannot, you can't look like that and then talk shit. I'm sorry, man. That culture, the culture of the sport.

Look, Max Kellerman is a different animal. Max Kellerman is incredibly knowledgeable when it comes to sports and really so when it comes to boxing. He's not a shit talker. He's just more honest about it. Yeah, that's true. But there's a lot of currency in being a Stephen A. Smith. You know,

he's really entertaining. That shit talking that he does, he's a, he's, you know, he's a guy that's fun to watch. He talks a lot of shit

and he gets real loud and everybody disagrees with him and look, it's made him a fantastic career. That's why. And he carries that over to MMA.

I think it's a bad idea. Is it a shtick though? That's my thought. My process, like, you know how Chael has his shtick? Yes. And the's a bad idea. Is it a shtick, though? That's my thought. My process is like, you know how Chael has his shtick? Yes. And the camera turns off, Colby has his shtick, and when the camera turns off, they're not that person. Right.

Is he that person in real life? I think it blends in. He just now inherited that person, so that's who he is now in real life? Andrew Dice Clay. Andrew Dice Clay. His real name is Andrew Silverstein, and the Dice Man was a character that he used to do in his act. Dice Clay is like name is Andrew Silverstein and the Dice Man was a character that he used to do in his act Dice Clay is like one of the best impressionists ever yeah he does like he does John Travolta and all these different people and it's amazing and in his act he would do

all these impressions and he would do this guy the Dice Man and he would do these fucking rhymes and he put this jacket on and everybody loved that so much he just became the Dice Man. And then after a few years, he was the Dice Man 24-7. He's wearing these leather jackets everywhere. Everywhere he goes, he's got weightlifting gloves on. Every time you meet him, he's got weightlifting gloves. He became this guy, right? And it's a thing that happens to people sometimes where people love one thing.

You lean into your fans. And I think Stephen A. Smith, I don't know him as a human being. I've only met him a couple times. He's a nice guy. Nice guy to me. We had a nice conversation. On air, we had a little weirdness because he was just saying, we didn't learn anything about Connor.

I'm like, the fuck you didn't? He just destroyed Cowboy in 40 seconds. You learn something. You learn he can perform under the bright lights in a giant pay-per-view after more than a year and a half out of the game. Yeah, you learned something. You just don't know what you saw. Yeah, I agree with you 100% that he did learn something.

I learned something from him. Somebody who'd taken that amount of time off. And I'm going to say this to be frank. Obviously, I work for Bellator, and I do a lot of work for them. But the thing is, you can't have to give credit where credit is due. I give credit to all the fighters. It doesn't matter if you're in one.

Look, Eddie, to me, is one of the best 55-pounders to ever walk the face of the earth. Conor McGregor, to me, I thought he did things in that fight against Khabib that no other guy has been able to do. First off, he won a round. That's something no one's ever... People say, oh, well, Khabib took the round off.

Yeah, because maybe he tried to finish him at the end of the second, but the bottom line is, he still won the round. And there's not only that, but there was a lot of times and opportunities where Khabib had a hard time getting the takedown. We didn't see that against guys with wrestling backgrounds like Abel Trujillo and those other guys where he was flinging around winning records basically for the most takedowns in one fight. There's tons of things that Conor does that people overlook and underestimate

because he's such a knockout artist and he's so good. And his stance and his style and things like that, he brought this to the next level. And you cannot discredit what he's done in the sport. What I learned from that is that from somebody who can take 15 months off and come back and perform the way that he did against someone like Donald Cerrone is absolutely amazing. That's why you need guys like you doing post-fight commentary

and discussing these, not people who don't understand the sport and practice dick punches. It's a different thing. Maybe he's hitting babies. He's really in a punch of babies. I want to ask you this, though, because it was funny because I could see your face in the middle of it all. How awkward is that for you to stand between the two of them

and go, what are you guys fucking talking about yeah i mean i would have preferred to talk to dc or felder or you or anybody who understands the sport i don't think it's the right way to do it uh the one gentleman to my right michael what jamie what is his last name he was great and stephen smith was very nice to me too and he said he's going to get into podcasts i have no problem with him as a human being i just think look i don't know jack shit about baseball i don't know jack shit about basketball i literally don't even know the rules i don't know what when people foul people i'm not sure why i don't know what's happening yeah i know mma i understand it so if you want to talk about mma i'd like to talk to mma about

someone else who knows MMA. Like you were saying though, I was listening to one of your podcasts the other day with Mike Baker. And he said like, look, I don't agree with Bernie Sanders' policies. But Bernie Sanders probably is a really nice guy. It doesn't mean that I have to like what he does in front of the camera

for him to call MMA. I don't have to like that. I can still like him as a person. That's where we need to make sure that we differentiate between the two things. Look, he probably is a really good guy. And I actually have met him. I met him at the Floyd Mayweather and Conor fight and said hi. I said, hey, how's it going? Like, hey, what do you think?

And that was the conversation. It was real quick, real brief, maybe two minutes. But he seemed like a nice person at that time. But when I was listening to him talk and calling Cerrone basically a quitter, to me I just lost respect in the avenue that you're not supposed to be working in our sport. Yes. Okay? And you need to make some sort of adjustment,

whether it's dick punching or something else. You need to figure it out. You need to, like, I understand. I get that it's a good idea for all people that have never covered the sport to try to get into it. Okay? Maybe hold off on the videos like that for a while. Before you post them. Before you post them. Before you post them.

Yeah. But I like that he's trying. And I'm going to give him credit for that. And I think like with Gus, there was a lot of rumblings about Gus Johnson in the very beginning. But we gave him a run for a while. And I really like Gus. He's a great person. Always been great.

Every time I've talked to him and met with him and worked with him side by side as well, calling fights with Strikeforce. Great person. But his forte is basketball. And for him, whatever his forte is, Stephen A. Smith, he's got, I think, he may have to stick with that. And I think I agree, they have to bring DC

back in to work with you alongside. Well, DC is phenomenal, man. Yeah, DC's phenomenal. And DC and me having that conversation would have been a completely different conversation. And it would have been better for the sport. Because, look no there's no positive in downplaying the career of donald serrani or what he can do as a fighter what that showed to me was how phenomenal connor performed that's what it showed me and if if either you or i was talking about cricket we're

on on tv doing commentary on cricket We would look out of place. It would be fucked up, and real cricket fans would be upset at us. Right? Now, that's nothing. That's just a sport, right? Yeah. You are naked in the most literal sense of the word. You're naked physically.

You're naked emotionally. When fighters lose, it's fucking devastating. For Conor to smash Cowboy like that in front of his wife, his kid, his grandma, and then the whole world. You've got to have some respect for that man. And this sport demands a different perspective. It's not the same thing as a ball going into a hoop. It's not the same thing as crossing a line with a football.

It's different. It's very intense and very personal. And it's also very fucking dangerous. And to play it off like it's just a game, I don't agree with it. And I just think that we have plenty of fucking people out there that understand the sport. There's plenty of them. But the thing about him is he's really popular. And, Jamie, when you say he's got a giant deal or something like that?

He's the top paid. i had his contract up he's got like an extension to get like eight million a year now or something like that yeah and that's because he's so his personality is so fun it's he's a fun guy to watch and people love shit talking they love two people arguing about shit one person's better at arguing and and stephen a smith is really good at that stuff but it's not the place for mma it's just not the place it's not it's not the same thing it's it's not because um because the guys themselves can fight you know when you see what happened last night what kansas and kansas state or whatever they started throwing punches and it was like it looked like a bunch of girls throwing windmills you know what i mean like that's really the reality of it's like now if he wants to go out there and talk about it, go ahead and talk about it.

He can say all the things he wants because these are college kids that can't fight. Obviously, we just saw. But we're talking about professional athletes. Their life has been around this craft. And now you're going to say things like that. It's very disrespectful. It's just so common with sports

to talk about a guy who can't show up on game day, to talk about a guy who keeps dropping the ball, talk about a guy who can't show up on game day to talk about a guy who keeps dropping the ball talk about a guy and you shit on those guys but it's just a different thing with fighting and it's also with fighting like you you you have to know it or no one's going to respect you if you don't know what you're talking about and you're talking about in front of millions of people like man that's a bad look for everybody it's a bad look for espn it's a bad look for him it's a bad look for the sport it's like there's other people that can do this yeah we we caught a lot of flack for gus for a while the strike force did like uh and then i think it trickled on up to cbs and that whole deal but then diaz mayhem brawl

yes these things happen in mma yeah that's definitely not the words you want to use in that situation you know what i mean but it does honestly like you just said it does reflect badly not just on espn itself but the ufc as well because they're in business together and it kind of looks bad for both like hey you guys we need to monitor who's behind that microphone because we're representing our talent and our talent is what makes us the money but what's funny is with stephen a smith he's his personality and his brand is based on that kind of shit talking so this is all good for him this is all good for him like the more people talk shit about him better it is for him and then he just ramps it up even more and more people are paying attention the ratings go up

until he sees cowboy in an elevator go ride a fucking head buddy who's quitting now bitch yeah you know those are the things i gotta tell you you just don't know think about this if he said something like that about a nader nick diaz and they saw him in a fucking elevator they would fuck him up they would fuck him up legitimately like you would just gotta be like those are scenarios you just gotta be careful now the cowboy's never gonna do that hey man kind of just watch what you say come on man like that you know my family's there my grandmother's there you know my kid's there right you know let's let's dial it back a little bit that's cowboys the fucking he's just an amazing person you know overall yeah so when you're talking yeah when you're talking about athletes and fighters like nate diaz though he ain't saying shit to you he's

just gonna sock you look everybody knows what happened what happened is connor had a spectacular performance cowboy got caught off guard and he got finished quick that's what happened yeah all the other stuff is unnecessary the most the emotional devastation of a 40 second ko like that is we have as a with as a respectful human being you got to leave all that other stuff alone all that shit talking if you want to say it in the gym to one of your homies and you're just hanging out and maybe one of them doesn't like cowboy and someone talks trash and that's private and no one hears it, that's fine and good. But when you want to do that publicly, you want to broadcast that and then also do it on ESPN, I think it's just short-sighted and I think it's foolish. also do it on ESPN, I think it's just short-sighted, and I think it's foolish. Yeah, I'm going to go a little bit more hard on the paint on guys like DC, who are on my post right there, defending him right now.

Is he defending him? He's defending him. Well, hey, man, he's trying to learn the sport. I said, D, quit trying to toe the company line, son. That's what you're doing right now. And then I got Kendall Grove that goes on there, too, saying, oh, you know what? I can respect the fact that he's trying to learn it Look at this

I think it's fine He's trying to better understand our sport It means he's a massive star He can talk from his perch And no one can touch him Yet he chooses to try and learn the game So there's some weight to his opinion You're a little off base, champ

Oh, DC's a wonderful person Oh, he's just struggling I told him, I said, look Just because Stephen A. Smith might be good for business in the ESPN business for you later on, I said, that doesn't mean you've got to toe that line, buddy. I'd like to give him a hard time. But look, DC's one of my best friends, man, and he's absolutely hilarious and just fun. He likes to do this to stir the pot because like you were just saying with Stephen A., he likes to do this type of stuff.

So people keep talking. DC likes to try and nail shit like this. So we're here right now talking about DC and this whole situation. That's exactly what DC does. He's brilliant when it comes to this type of stuff. And I'm sure he really does love Stephen A as a person. Stephen A, he's a nice guy.

Like I said, I've met him a couple of times. He's a nice guy. But just so like, there's a style of broadcasting that sports radio and sports broadcasting that they do this kind of stuff yeah but when it leaks over into fighting fighting is just not a sport like you can call it a sport it's kind of a sport but it's it's sport in its highest sense of expression where it's you're literally using your body to try to stop another man's body. And as intense as it gets, and I think it deserves more respect. That's just my opinion.

That's how I've always treated it. That's how I've always, when I talk about fighters, my concentration has always been to elevate. My concentration has never been to demean someone. Unless there's something that they did that's illegal, and there's some sort of blatant foul that should be stopped or something that's really dangerous that they're doing that should be chastised. But the sport, it's a higher level of consequence and risk and it needs to be respected that way.

Yeah, I feel, so I listen to your show quite a bit and I like a lot of what you had talked about before when you first got into comedy about talking about how some of the other comics was like kind of shit on other young comics kind of up and coming. And when you came in, it was like a different – you try to just ingrain in people like, hey, I want to build all of you guys up that are with me on the same set. If we're doing the show and we're all on the same night, let's all just fucking make each other look good. I feel like, especially in fighting, whether it's boxing, MMA, anything along those lines, we got to be elevating each other to make each other better.

Like, hey, this guy is good, this guy is good, without talking shit, because we, like yourself specifically, as well as like even myself and other guys that have shows and podcasts and start talking, we're on a different level of platform that can really kind of either make or break some people's careers.

Also, the sport is confidence. MMA is a confident level. Anytime you do wrestling, it's a one-on-one combative sport. Anytime wrestling, MMA, confidence is key. If my confidence is low, then that means that I'm probably not going to perform my best.

And when you take a loss, it goes lower and lower. When you got to hear it from fucking people that don't know the business like this right here, it's just another thing added on. And for other MMA guys to shit on other MMA guys, all that does is tear them down even more. And you could potentially,

I'm not saying ruin their career, but you're, you're not helping them get to their goals and their levels. It's better if everyone shines and we all handle ourselves with class and respect. And I feel like we just, in general, need to hold ourselves to a higher standard if we're talking MMA and making sure that we showcase this guy is really good. Like here, I'll give you an example. All I do when I talk about Frank Yeager is talk about how such an amazing person, even when he has a bad performance, he's still one of the best to ever do the game

and all the things that he's done from before in the past. I say the same thing about BJ Penn. Somebody who, look, he exploded on the scene. I was training with him when he had that first run through Din Thomas, Uno, all those guys. He was training at AKA. All the things that happen now, to me, those are just bumps in the road as fighters get older, you know, and they just don't know how to react.

This is it. I don't know what's going on. They need somebody to step in, not shit on them. They need someone to step in and talk to them. I text and talk to him all the time. It's like, hey, man, it might be time to move on. It might be not. Whatever the deal is, but they're good people at heart.

I know them personally, and we should just be talking in general about lifting these guys up to the next level. And that's the way I think every sport should handle it. The argument against that would be the massive success that Conor's had shitting on people in press conferences and shitting on people and leading up to a fight. And the fact that that's built up so much animosity, but also so much attention, like the Aldo fight. Dude, he made that fight by talking so much shit it's a big part of why that fight was so successful and it was also like some serious psychological warfare when aldo went into that cage with connor you could see the weight of all that shit talking was weighing heavy on him you could see it it was like he probably hadn't slept

you know he's probably really fucked up like that emotionally because Aldo was super respected. He was the fucking king He was the guy that had torn through the featherweight division for years and he had beaten everybody Beaten the best of the best and were widely regarded as the greatest featherweight of all time And then all sudden Connors is shitting on him and shitting on him and shitting on him tearing his picture apart Stealing his belt at press conferences and all that craziness It made the fight way bigger, but it also fucked with Jose physically and emotionally. So when they actually fought, he had a diminished performance. He was too emotional.

He lost his composure. He rushed forward. He tried to hit him before everything was set up and he got cracked for it. Yeah, I understand what you're saying in those terms. But look, when you're promoting a fight, promoting a fight to me is a separate thing. I think Conor overstepped the boundary when he talked about Khabib and all the other family stuff, especially when he posted the picture with his wife.

That to me is, you're over the, I understand, Chael's done it a couple times when he talked about Jenna Jameson and Tito and that whole situation. There's moments, I think, where guys have stepped over the line. But if I'm talking shit to you, taking your belt and doing those things, look, I'm marketing the fight.

That's a separate issue than doing what some guys do. And if you get a percentage of the pay-per-view, it actually benefits you when that guy shits on you, which is even more disturbing. But the other thing as well is that, look, always, whether win or lose, Conor's never shown a disrespect after. I haven't seen that. I haven't seen that afterwards as far as, like, whether win or lose, Conor's never shown a disrespect after. I haven't seen that. I haven't seen that afterwards as far as in the cage,

when they see him, hey, great fight. Even when he lost to Nate the first time, he was very respectful. Yes. Very respectful. And I think, look, there's a difference between marketing the fight and then realizing when the fight's done,

shaking hands and being like, okay, look, let's do it again. And that, to me, that's a fighter's mentality. I want another crack at you, whether I won or I lost. I want another crack at you. It's okay to market the fight, but once the fight is done, shake your hand. That's what this sport is about. That's what fighting is about.

That's what it's always been about. You know, from back in the days when guys would just put up their dukes. I mean, we would fight each other, okay, help you up off the ground, shake your hand and move on. Well, people like that about it. It's one of the things. Do you remember when Ronda Rousey beat Misha Tate and she wouldn't shake her hand after the fight

and the fucking boos were so crazy? I was interviewing her after the fight. You could barely hear her talk. It was just boo. People didn't like it. They didn't like it at all. Yeah, no, that's... You're going to always get that i

think when there's disres blatant disregard or disrespect for somebody especially of that caliber like misha tate and after the fight's over yeah like what people want to see is that it's resolved they don't want to see these crazy endless wars yeah or you're never happy you just arm barred you fucked her arm up yeah and you're still Yeah, we got plenty of endless wars everywhere else. We don't need that shit in the cage. Exactly. Exactly. Man, when you see

Conor at 170, you know, obviously he beat Donald really handily, but do you think he's a legit 170? No. I don't think so

because we saw with Khabib. Khabib could potentially be a legit 170, but even him, he'll be a little bit too small. For guys like Usman.

Yeah, guys like Usman. Now, I think he could out-wrestle Usman. He can out-wrestle Colby Cutts. I think he can out-wrestle 100%. I've seen him wrestle with DC. I've seen him wrestle with Olympic caliber wrestlers in our room. I'm telling you right now, yes. Did he train with Jordan Burrows at your place?

I didn't see him train with Jordan, but I heard Jordan had came through. I wasn't there during that time. Boy, I would like to be a fly on the wall to watch those two guys go at it. But I can tell you this. He trained with Ed Ruth. Yeah? How was that?

And it was – yeah. Really? Like, yeah. I mean – You don't want to say anything, but – No, but there was moments, though, where Ed was able to get some stuff on him, but then he was able to get some stuff on Ed as well. And Ed was able to get the – or Khabib was able to get the takedowns as well on a three-time NCAA national champ.

Wow. And you could tell, look, Khabib's had more experience in terms of MMA. You know, like Samba was basically just MMA with a gi top on and occasionally wore shingars. With Ed, Ed was relatively new into the sport when they first started training. And Ed was able to do a lot of good things to him. And, and Ed was able to do a lot of good things to him, and Khabib was able to do a lot of good things to him. Without saying too much, both of them definitely benefit from their training together, and that's what's great about our gym is that it's not a pissing match in our gym.

Sure, guys want to one-up each other when it comes to sparring, but I would say that Ed, he got the better of learning the most from that situation, whereas Khabib realized that his stuff works on the top caliber guys in the world. Well, you guys have, at AKA, you guys have one of the most wrestling heavy in terms of high level wrestling. You have one of the most concentrated camps. Yeah, what people need to remember is that that camp was ran by Crazy Bob Cook.

And Javier first. Javier, Crazy Bob Cook. But then also when they linked up with, when Bob Cook linked up with Zinkin Entertainment. And the Zinkin family is very into wrestling. All three brothers were All-Americans at Fresno State. Wrestled with Lorenzo Neo, who was a professional football player in the NFL. But also wrestled at Fresno State. Also an All-American.

Those guys all linked up. And they're big, big into wrestling. So what they've done, like I literally could tell you this, is he would, the three brothers would, if I brought up to a wrestler right now that I'd never heard of, you probably never heard of, they could tell you all their stats. They could tell you what they did in high school. They could tell you what they did in college. They could tell you how far they potentially will go in the Olympics. You know what I mean? Like that's They could tell you what they did in college. They could tell you how far they potentially will go in the Olympics.

You know what I mean? Like that's how much ingrained that they are into this. So a lot of the reasons why we've gotten guys like Ed Ruth, Aaron Pico was signed with them when he first started his career. DC, you know, Deron Wynn, all these guys that have come, they've all come through because of Dwayne Zinkan. Aaron Pico is a crazy case, right? He's such a talented guy and he's still very young, but there was so much hype on that kid right out of the gate and they put him in against real tough competition right out of the gate. Yeah, look, he had to fight tough competition right out of the gate. There's a couple of things. What people need to understand is this, is if I'm going to pay you

this amount of money because there's so much hype around you, then you're going to have to fight this level of guy. Now, the problem with what happened with him, he's not a 55-pounder. He's tiny. So he could potentially make 35. Really? Yeah, he's not a big guy. So that's what people keep forgetting.

So when he wanted to stay at 55, we said, okay, we'll give it a go. Let him get one or two fights in that position. But no one wanted to fight at 55 we said okay we'll give it a go let him get one or two fights you know in that position but no one wanted to fight him no one like we were calling some of the best guys in bellator you know at the time they're like now let's we want to see a couple fights in his first before we go you know throwing our names out there to fight this guy we'll see how he is you know what i mean and so when that happened and i'm not knocking them that's smart on their part i mean every top guys i mean like yeah let's see what he is first, and then we'll figure it out. But then as soon as he lost to Zach Freeman, who was tall, long, lengthy,

good, decent submissions, not a world beater, but he was good. Aaron got exposed in the first fight, got clipped, then jumped in on a double leg, got guillotined, was out. Then he decided to make the loop down to 145, had a couple good performances. He's got big dogs. He's got big dogs. He's got big dogs in his hands. He's got heavy hands, but he's a boxing base with wrestling background,

which works if you've already been around guys that have done plenty of kickboxing. If you're just a boxing base, kicks come from angles you're not used to. Like different from punches. And so he just needed to get to a camp and stay focused on one area with one or two coaches that would groom him into that now he's at jackson wink i think it's

perfect for him because he's there with good really really good grapplers and really really good good guys and so with with jackson they're grooming him and telling him how the game plan jackson's one of the best at game planning. I mean, you can't deny that. And the fact is, is that he just needed someone to get in there. Now, I do know, like, he had a couple little issues. Like, obviously, he really didn't go to high school. I mean, like, as far as he was just traveling around and trying to become the best wrestler in the world.

I mean, at a young age, he's, you know, he's winning everything. And it's hard when you take someone from school, put them into that type of thing, and they have success. And they think they're going to continue to have success on a world-class level like in any sport. And since he had such success at a young age, his dad and his family got really involved into doing that and pushing him in that direction.

And that's not always the best scenario and situation i think sometimes you need to have management and trainers guide you when you're talking about a sport that other people have no idea what's going on yeah it doesn't work that way you know like if people think like oh i think family members and i hear this all the time and i can speak from experience my family sometimes comes in and says yeah how come you know you don't make what conor mcgregor's making it's not the same i'm like are you fucking kidding me like you know like those are it's not the same you know what i mean you don't have to explain the entire business yeah i don't yeah i'd have to explain everything and so when you have

someone like pico's parent his dad and his you know his brother i think we're kind of helping with management and trying to get sponsors and do this they They were expecting people to bend over and be like, hey, this is Aaron Pico and this and that because he's had such success at a young age and how good and talented he was in the gym. But like Alvin Iverson said, man, we're talking about practice? It's not the same thing. Sure, he's great, but when the lights turn on and the fight happens

and we're sparring in little gloves, not 16-ounce gloves, it changes. The dynamic of the game changes. And you also have to take into consideration that, yeah, he's had a tremendous amount of success in wrestling, and, yes, he's got very good hands, but he has a small amount of MMA fights, and this is MMA. That's the difference. There is a difference.

And he's also a really young guy who's experienced some pretty high highs and pretty low lows very quickly i think guys need to be managed better and what i mean by that is i mean the same way boxing handles it boxing you see guys get to 15 16 you know when you see a guy like khabib was 28 no you know how the fuck no one gets there yeah you got john jones who's essentially undefeated you know the matt hamill fight in my mind he won that fight yeah he crushed him i mean there's never a moment in that fight where he's in doubt he just got disqualified but and i don't even agree with the disqualification but he's a rarity it's him and it's khabib and maybe there's a couple other guys that are like elite high level guys that are undefeated. They're the outliers.

Most guys get thrown to the wolves really quickly. But in boxing, you see that all the time because managers slowly groom their fighters. They go, okay, Josh, you know what, Josh? You're a fucking great puncher, but your inside game maybe should be tested. We got this tough Mexican dude who likes to fight inside, so we're going to match you up with him. You should beat him, but it's going to give you some seasoning, and they'll move you along that way.

Okay, we're going to try you against a long, lanky striker. Sometimes you have problems with the jab, and this guy's got a significant reach advantage. And then boxers, the boxing managers and coaches, they'll think about this shit for days and weeks before they commit to a fight. Whereas in the UFC, the UFC calls you up. Hey, you want to fight Khabib on three days notice? You're like, what?

And then all of a sudden you're there. Well, because boxing managers are usually in cahoots with the promoter. So the two of them work together. That's not the case with any promotion in MMA. The promoter is the promoter, and the manager is the manager. And you take what we give you, and if you don't, then okay, we'll put you on the shelf for six months. Because those type of things have been presented to me a couple times. And Joe was the manager trying to matchmake me when I was supposed to fight Anthony Pettis for the title.

And he called and said, hey, Pettis is out. He's like, yeah, we want you to fight some tough Russian guy that I've never heard of. And I was like, I just knocked out Nate, and I was supposed to fight for the title. I'm not going to fight some tough Russian guy from Dagestan I've never heard of. No thanks.

He's like, fine, I'm going to shelf you for six months. And I just told him, I said, hey, man, I'm pretty good with my money. I'll wait. So he just said, okay. So a week later, I got the Benson fight. That's such a fucked up thing to even say to someone. It is. It would shelf you.

Yeah, it is, though. But, you know, in reality, though, like, look, here's the thing. And I will say this, and I will stick up for Joe, even though I just said that. I will stick up for Joe Silva. I met with him shortly after that. And he's like, look at my phone. You see this? This is your division.

He's like, you see all these? These are all fighters in the division. He's like, you see the ones at the top that you wanted to fight? Yeah, all those guys in red, they're hurt. He only had two people to choose from. And those two people were already matched up against each other. So what do you do? But that's the thing.

Do you just take a fight because you want to keep fighting? But how does it move your career when you are literally one shot away from the title? Because when you knocked out Nate Diaz, first of all, you're the the first guy to do it you did it spectacularly with a head kick a lot of people forget that for some reason people keep saying he's never been stopped i'm like go back and watch the tape i like that you stick up for me i appreciate that always to make you always but so you're in this crazy position where you're really knocking on the door

for a title yeah and then they're saying go fight some savage from the fucking mountains. Yeah. It was really good. The fucking Dagestanians. They're the scariest fucking humans on the planet. It's amazing how many tough guys come from that part of the country or the world. They've exploded on the scene. And I think it's amazing to see them grow.

And I think I've seen, you know, when he first came in, when Khabib first came into AKA, I was like, well, he's tough. He's just a wrestler, you know, not a lot, you know, but he still came in, when Khabib first came into AKA, I was like, man, he's tough. He's just a wrestler, you know, not a lot.

But he still had some submission defense, good leg locks, good. He was physically strong then. He's just gained a lot more confidence now with anything in the gym. It doesn't matter what it is. Like I said, I've seen him wrestle with DC. I've seen him wrestle with Luke Rockwell. I've seen him wrestle, obviously, with myself. We wrestled tons of times.

Guys like Gray Maiden and all those guys. And he's phenomenal. When people ask me, when you said something about him, who were you saying? We were talking about him at Lightweight. Oh, you were talking about him with Joe Burrows. Oh, yeah. No, him with Usman. I think he out-wrestles those guys.

Wow. I think he out-wrestles them. Yeah, 100%. I think he out-wrestles them. The guy that I thought he would have had a hard time out-wrestling would have been Ben Askren. That would have been his guy. Wow. I think that guy right there would have been the only guy that I think could have potentially out-wrestled him. The guy that I thought he would have had a hard time out-wrestling would have been Ben Askren. That would have been his guy. I think that guy right there would have been the only guy that I think could have potentially out-wrestled him.

Ben is hurting now, man. You can see how he walks. Yeah. You can see his hip all fucked up. He needs a hip replacement. Yeah, he needs to get it done. I mean, that's the thing. But if he does, he's never going to fight again.

Why? Is he done? I think isn't he done? I think he's done because of the hip. Yeah. I mean, I don't know what the recovery process is. Is it a hip done? I think he's done because of the hip. Yeah. I mean, I don't know what the recovery process is. Is it a hip replacement? Yeah. Or is it just let's scope it all out, clean it out, and see how it goes,

and then see if he needs a hip replacement after. No, he and I discussed it. It's a mess. Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of these guys. They're so tough. They're almost too tough for their own good,

and they're training on injuries and just pushing through the pain, and they're just chewing up the cartilage and tearing up the labrum and yep and i want to and here's the thing like to go back to the joe silva thing but then a lot of it is because conversations like that it's the conversation like well fine we're just going to shelf you well these guys when they when they get a call for a title or they get a call for a fight like on the main card or you know they're that's their their families are starving or they're hungry. People think that everyone's making Conor McGregor money. My whole family thought I was making Conor McGregor money. Like, why are you not making

that money? And I'm like, you guys I almost want to say, shut up. Shut up. I don't want to hear I've been getting punched in the face for 20 years. I don't want to hear this shit right now. Someone's got a gut and a beer. Josh, how come you're not making any more money? It's the game, man.

I never thought about it. You know, maybe next time I talk to these guys, I'll tell them. Definitely tell them to give me that Conor McGregor money. What I wanted to talk to you about was you and Brendan had a talk and conversation about guys like Lima and other guys having competition with top guys. I think Lima's a top guy. I think Michael Chandler's a top guy. I think Bellator has several guys that could compete with anybody in the world.

And I think the same thing about 1FC. I still maintain to this day Mighty Mouse is probably the best pound-for-pound fighter on the planet. Probably, yes. I mean, Jon Jones has faced stiffer competition because there's stiffer competition in the light heavyweight division. But the way Mighty Mouse was running through the division, the way Mighty Mouse would just not get hit,

the expression of martial arts, in my opinion, when I watched him, I've never seen anybody more impressive. So, what's your take on him being traded then? I think they offered him a tremendous amount of money at one, and the flyweight division has never been a moneymaker for the UFC,c and henry cejudo beat him in a very close decision and i think they just came to a

position where mighty mouse was like look i'm not going to make as much money in the next fight because i lost but one fc is going to pay me x amount of times more than that and they're giving they gave him a huge contract man you know and they they have look Chachri is amazing and what they're they're doing over at 1FC I think it's great for everybody I think it's great for the sport I think it's great that the athletes have options I think the competition is great for the UFC when you see someone rise and someone start smashing people over there and everybody goes hey that guy might be the best 170-pounder in the world. That's good for everybody.

Because then you could set up potentially like a cross-promotional fight if someone's that big, and we get to find out. We get to find out who's the number one in the world. That's what it's supposed to be all about. And the more competition there is, the more big organizations there are, and the more places that athletes go, it's way better for the fighters. And that has to be taken into consideration. Yeah.

So I worked for one for a while and I work for Bellator now, but I was doing case commentary for them. And I called a couple of Timothy Nastyukin's fights, the guy that knocked down. Dude, he's a fucking monster. So if you were like, I told Jamie, I said before you came, I said, I'm going to call on you a couple of times. I said, so sort of love it. When he stopped Alvarez, I was like, that guy is a fucking killer.

He's got dogs in his hands. And I'm telling you right now, he either loses by submission in the first round or he knocks you out in the first round. I want to say up until like his 10th fight or 9th fight or something like that, he'd never gone outside the first round. He either knocked you out or he lost. And his record at the time was 9 or 10 and 1 when I was calling his fights. He had only had one loss, and I think he had lost by knockout.

But he's got heavy dogs, got good hips and takedown defense. The kid's phenomenal. He's just fucking rock solid. Rock solid everywhere. Fucking super savage in his approach. That guy, he's elite, man.

He's elite in terms of he could fight anybody in the world that's his size. I really believe. Look, that guy's a fucking animal, man. For him to beat down Eddie Alvarez like that. You're talking about Eddie Alvarez, a guy who's like notoriously one of the toughest fucking guys in the sport, period. And that was a real wake-up call for a lot of people.

There's some guys over there. Just because you don't know their name doesn't mean like, look, when fucking Zabit came over here. People didn't know his name. And then they see that guy fight, when fucking Zabik came over here, people didn't know his name. And then they see that guy fight. You're like, what the fuck? Where'd you come from? 360 roundhouse kicks and crazy fucking scissor sweeps and taking people down, submitting them, head kicking them, doing everything.

There's hundreds of guys like that out there. They're everywhere. They're everywhere. And that's the other thing is they're not just in Dagestan. Sure, I think right now that's a market that needs to be tapped into across for every promotion. But they're also in Asia somewhere. They're also in other countries everywhere else. I do know that there's a lot of top talented guys in Sweden and Switzerland that just never get to play because there's not an MMA market there really.

But they're great jiu-jitsu guys. There's good MMA gyms out of all these places especially in Italy and all these other places we're seeing talent come and when I saw when I heard

that he was fighting when I heard Eddie was fighting Nastyukin I was like oh shit I said either Eddie's gonna be able if Eddie's able to get him down

and get on top cause he does tend to fade a little bit Nastyukin it gets into the second and third round but if he can't get him down in that first round I said he's gonna get knocked out cause Eddie's got because he does tend to fade a little bit, Nassuken, as it gets into the second and third round. But if he can't get him down in that first round,

I say he's going to get knocked out. Because Eddie's got, I love Eddie, but he's always, he got a little chinny at some points. Not to the point where he gets knocked out, but he's always been rocked, comes back, and then fucks people up. But this is a guy that I'd seen him just starch guys. I mean, he fought this guy, what was his name?

Something full along, and there was talk and conversation about this guy was going to knock out Timothy. I mean, I don't think – it was almost like an Alistair Overeem type knockout, you know, when Nganou snapped his head back. I was like, oh, God, he was out cold. And so when I see guys like him, and there's other guys that are in these organizations all around. To me, Patricio Pitbull is probably the best 145 pounder in the world. And I'm a big Max Holloway fan. But I've talked about this before with Big John is that styles make matchups.

And Big John has talked to me about being in the cage, roughing Max's fights. And he said Volkanovski will give him problems. about being in the cage, calling or reffing Max's fights. And he said, Volkanovski will give him problems. And sure enough, Volkanovski gave him problems. He said, that will let me know how good Patricio Pitbull would do against Max Holloway. The speed, the wrestling, the power, all those things Patricio has. And to me, Patricio is better than Volkanovski

just from what I can see, not from the max fight, but from a lead up to all the fights. So I take guys like Lima, I take guys like Patricio who knocked out Michael Chandler at 155 pounds, I take those guys and I'll put those guys against, not just UFC guys, one guys, all these guys, all day long. These guys are nasty and they're tough. Who is this right here, Jim? This is Patricio Pitbull.

Patricio, he'll hook somebody. So there's Patricio, which is the older brother at 155, and then there's Patricio, who's at 145, and he's also now the 155-pound champ. But to me, look, to me, he now, like when I'm talking about Henry Cejudo, guys attach themselves to guys because they

can make themselves better. I'm not going to go train and stake my claim with someone unless I know that the two of us are making each other better. That's his main training partner, Henry Sujodos. And that's Henry Sujodos, his main training partner. Juan Archuleta was on like a 19 fight win streak and then faced

him. Juan Archuleta didn't look like the same Juan Archuleta when he got in there. And when guys are that good at that next level, that's what happens. They make somebody look like they don't belong in there. that's what happened and i was like man because people keep giving mvp a ton of shit and i'm like dude this guy's that good steven thompson in the beginning wasn't getting any respect either and look at him like he's got they've got that style of like oh i could get him down i could take him down i could do this but guys are so good at their

one craft that man you just can't get to them and they make these guys look like that. No, listen. I'm with you on this. And I disagreed with Brendan. Brendan thinks if you're not in the UFC you're not shit. And I don't think that's true. Why did he get... I want to know why. Why? He's got a little Stephen A. Smith in him.

I love Brendan, man. Just a sprinkle. Look, he's one of my best friends. I just saw him last weekend in San Jose. I went to his show. I love him to death. But he likes to talk crazy shit too. But he also believes what he's saying. Just a sprinkle. Look, he's one of my best friends. I just saw him last weekend in San Jose. I went to his show. I love him to death. But he likes to talk crazy shit, too. But he also believes what he's saying. He really does. He believes what he's saying.

I disagree. I mean, the Michael Venn and Paige thing is a perfect example. He's so good that Paul Daly turned into a fucking wrestler. Yeah. Right? How crazy is that? I want to tell you a story on that real quick. He goes-

Paul Daly mercs people, man. Paul Daly turned to some of the guys at Bellator and go, hey, man, I just want to apologize before you walked out. I just want to apologize. It's going to be a boring fight. He straight up said that? Really? He straight up like, hey, I just want to apologize.

This is going to be a boring fight. Wow. That's crazy. But look, if you watch how well Michael Venn and Page moved in that fight, you almost understand it. Because Paul, with that traditional Thai style. Look, Paul knocked out Lorenz Larkin. Lorenz Larkin is an evil man. He's nasty good.

He's so good. When you watch him, you watch his style, his movement. I mean, against Neil Magny, throwing those oblique kicks to the body. Who the fuck does that? That one that a lot of guys like to throw to the thigh. He's hitting him in the body like a front kick with that black and i'm like jesus christ he's so technical on his feet he's so sweet on his feet so for you see him get knocked out by paul daly you realize god damn that paul daly's a motherfucker that left hand of his is one of the best weapons in the sport everybody goes to sleep and here it is he you

see paul daly taking him down and i was like i can't believe this i remember like the fucking power that he has paul daly's power is like his left hand in particular one of the scariest fucking weapons in the sport it really is he just you know probably 36 now yeah he's not the same guy that he was when he was 25. He's not bad, though. I'm telling you right now. He's still really damn good. Fuck yeah.

If we put him back in the UFC, I'd still say he's probably in the top five or six. He's always going to have a problem with real wrestlers. Yeah, of course he is. But I also think that his game has always been shaped like guys like John Fitch were able to just grind and grind and grind. But guys like Usman and Colby, they grind on you, sure. But with John, when he fought him the last time, John's at a different stage in his career where he's not letting go of the leg for anything. Usman and Kobe will make space to throw punches,

which could get them in trouble against somebody like him because his power in his left hand is fucking nasty. It's fucking ridiculous. If you see the fight with him when he wobbled or dropped Nick Diaz. Nick Diaz don't get dropped. I know. How crazy is Nick Diaz? Nick Diaz forced him into a dog fight.

Forced him into a dog fight. And that was one of the most freakish, weirdest knockouts. It was amazing. But the thing is, that was when UFC had first taken over Strikeforce. And I was sitting there cage-sized, and I'm thinking to myself, this is hands down the greatest MMA one-round fight ever seen in my life. It was amazing. It was amazing.

He just wore him out. Yeah. He just put that fucking Nick Diaz pace on him and wore him out. But when he clipped him and rocked him and dropped him, I was like, oh my God, Paul Daly's going to stop Nick Diaz? This is crazy. This is nuts. This is nuts.

But just the fact that Nick fought him that way. I mean, Nick didn't try to take him down. Nick didn't try to submit him. He just went after him. Just like, come on, let's do this. But let's not forget the history of Nick Diaz, man. It all started with Robbie Lawler. The history of Nick Diaz started with Robbie Lawler.

Like, come on, motherfucker. I got this. And that's what elevated him to that next level. I called that fight. He walked into the octagon. He started yelling, Stockton, motherfucker. Stockton. And Robbie Lawler's like, what is happening here?

What is this? Robbie Lawler was this dark destroyer. Everybody was scared of him. He was a spooky dude. He was flatlining people. And Nick Diaz, not only was he not scared of him, he was talking mad shit to him. He was fighting. He was like, what, bitch?

What are we doing, bitch? What are we doing, bitch? And people don't understand this. It's so funny. I was talking to Big John the other day on our show, and I was saying like, what, bitch? What are we doing, bitch? What are we doing, bitch? And people don't understand this. It's so funny. I was talking to Big John the other day on our show. I was saying like, hey, man, the guys, I didn't get so damn tired when guys talk to me. It stresses me the fuck out, man. I just start sweating.

And I'm like, this is, shut the fuck up. We're supposed to be fighting. I couldn't believe it. I was like, dude. Do you remember when Nick did that to Frank Shamrock? shamrock was like i can't believe this is happening because it's usually frank that does it yes i trained with frank for years and i'm like i'm in his garden he's like come on josh get up like throw punches do something i'm gonna fucking sub you i'm gonna do this i'm gonna do that and you're just like shut up man i just want to punch you

harder and it makes you more tired and the fact that Nick was doing it and out cardioing him. Frank's thing was always being the best shape so you could put, like when he beat Tito just put that pace on him and Tito couldn't keep up and then he finished him. Frank was not the same guy when he fought Nick at that time but let's be real, at that time it was awesome to see

somebody like Nick do that because Nick though, if you recall at the end of the fight, he picks Frank up. He's like, you're a fucking legend. Do not sit down there like that. You're a fucking legend. And that's what people talk to me all the time about my fight with Nate. And I say, look, man, I have nothing but respect for both those guys.

Those guys are fucking animals. Not only are they animals, but what I love is I love people. We were talking about Big John being a good guy before we came on the show and Big John McCarthy. And I said, absolutely. And when i think of guys that are good guys i think of guys that stick by their friends no matter what you got to remember that brawl that happened on cbs right we were talking about that as well that brought with mayhem miller jake shields nick diaz but guess what that whole scrap pack that they die for each other yeah and you can't knock friendship

like that and i and i look at guys, and they're really good people. From Gilbert Melendez, his wife Carrie, Nick and Nate, and Jake. Jake's like still one of my good, good buddies. Gil is as well. But even though I don't talk to Nate anymore, really. But it's still, I have nothing but respect for those guys themselves. They did it on their own, and they're fucking amazing. I will buy their pay-per-view every single time they fight, no matter what.

Agreed. And, you know, Nick Diaz changed the game in terms of his elite cardio. They're fucking amazing. I will buy their pay-per-view every single time they fight no matter what. Agreed. And Nick Diaz changed the game in terms of his elite cardio. He did something that was a new thing. And that new thing was he's not going to hit you with 100% power. He's going to hit you with 50%. But he's going to hit you twice as much and you're never going to get to breathe. And he's going to stay on top of you and he's going to talk to you the whole time. So he's going to fuck with you psychologically.

He's going to disrupt your breathing by constantly hitting you and then once he realizes you're hurt then he's digging to the body then he's putting it on you and on top of that black belt jiu jitsu skills really good wrestling takedown defense fucking chin made of iron and an unstoppable will

his will to beat you was just unstoppable when Nick was at the top in Strikeforce to this day I think he's one of the best fighters that's ever done it. Yep. To this day. No, I agree. I think a lot of that unstoppable will, though, comes from him doing triathlons. Yes.

I was like, hey, I cannot stop, otherwise I lose my time. And I've only got five more miles or eight more miles until I get to the bike or until I get to the run or until I'm done with the swim. Those are things in your mind as an athlete. You're always thinking like, I'm almost there. Okay, I'm only going to run to the two-minute mark. Okay, I'm only going to run to the five-minute. You set goals for yourself as you go. Shit, I smashed a goal.

Okay, one more goal ahead. Those are the things that top athletes do, and I feel like that's what he's done with his career. He used triathlons to help get him there. He was always good, always nasty, like good jiu-jitsu, great, phenomenal guillotines. His game has always been really good. When he upped his game in boxing and the pace, like you're saying, just the touch, touch, touch, now bam, bam, touch, touch, touch, bam.

That's next level boxing that we hadn't seen in MMA at the time. Yeah, and sparring with Andre Ward on a regular basis too. I mean, he did, he he he did really change things he really changed things particularly with that fucking cardio of his he has some spooky cardio speaking of spooky cardio let's talk about tony ferguson okay that guy's got some guy and you you have personal experience with tony yes yes that guy has unfortunately unfortunately he's got spooky fucking cardio, man. I give him a real shot against Khabib.

I give him a real shot. Okay, so I do and I don't. And I'm not trying to take a dig at him. I actually am a big fan of his. And I was a big fan of his before I fought him. And I did a lot of research on him leading up to the fight. I never really showed him any respect up until like, ah, he's just okay, he's a little sloppy, he's this, he's that.

But once I did the research on him leading up to our fight, it impressed me. What impressed me was, dude, the guy can take a shot, give a shot, the guy doesn't slow down, the guy doesn't care where the fight goes. Anytime you have somebody who doesn't care where the fight goes, it changes the dynamic of how you approach him. Because if you take him down, what does that matter? He don't care.

He's good with the darts. He's good with the guillotine. He's good with triangles. He's good with all those. He doesn't care. So if he stays on the feet, guess what? He keeps his distance and his range with his long range push kicks and his jabs and his combinations. He doesn't care where the fight goes. Neither does Khabib. But obviously Khabib would like to keep the fight on the ground,

press against the fence, doing work, what he's done, and continues to work and does what he does best. Look, for me, I feel like the only way that Tony wins is by a cut. I don't think I don't think

that he can sub him. Now, I'm not saying he can sub him. Now, I'm not saying it can't happen. We understand when cuts happen, you get a little more slippery, things slide in a lot faster. Especially in that darts position. He'll hit that darts up from any direction. He'll hit it from his guard. He'll hit it from his butt.

He'll hit it from anywhere. So if you're hanging out, if B doesn't put the placement of his head in the right spot, it could be a really, really tough night for him. Yeah, he hits it from side control. Yeah, from being elbowed and from being choked. So he's got all the intangibles to become world champion. He's already a former interim champion, which I still consider him that he was the champion at the time. I have nothing bad to say about him.

I just think that physically strong, he is not. And I'm not knocking him. I'm just simply saying strength-wise, he is not. But Joe, here, I want to shake my hand. His hands will go around yours probably twice. Just bricks. No, he's got such long fingers. That's what threw me off.

Honestly, when I shook his hand at the weigh-ins, his fingers wrapped all the way around my hand, almost engulfed my whole hand. I was like, oh, shit, you got really big hands well that makes the power no not just that but when i when there was a moment there where he hit yeah wrist control so when i got into his guard he grabbed my wrist and i couldn't get my arm free and then in the meantime he's elbowing me in my head and i got two mercedes-benz cuts right here on the front of my forehead okay so it was like right there and then he cut me with the good elbow when I stepped in on one. But the two Mercedes-Benz cuts

were from him with wrist control and him elbowing me from his guard. If Khabib gets put into his guard, it could end up being a tough fight because cuts happen and when they do happen and you have a shaved head, there's nothing stopping them from flowing right into your eyes.

Your eyebrows are not going to stop all that blood. And if you recall, remember the Joe Daddy Stevenson and Eads Edwards fights? That shit was just squirting out. There's an Adam Piccolotti fight as well in Bellator where he had cut the guy on the top of the head and literally he gets a rear neck and chokes him and you see blood go

everywhere. And I'm just thinking to myself, in a fight where you shave your head or your hair's always really short, it's not going to look good to the judges or to the doctor and things like that. And Shaw brought this up. This fight's in New York.

Yes. With that fucking lame-ass doctor that stopped the Nick Diaz fight. Yes. The lame-ass doctor. Oh, he's got a vagina on his eye. No one gives a shit. The guy can still fight. The lame ass darkness. Oh, he's got a vagina on his eye. No one gives a shit. Like the guy can still fight.

Right. You know, they're just, they're being extra cautious in New York right now because it's a relatively new sport is what I believe. I believe too. You know, and then I believe they had that death of that boxer that was there. So then that, it just, they're just trying to make sure, which I understand, like the safety of the fighters is most important. Yeah.

I would prefer that being in Vegas. Yeah. Yeah. I would prefer in Vegas they'll let shit go. Although, you know, I think they, I mean, they did check Macy Barber's knee. That was kind of crazy. Wasn't that kind of crazy? I thought it was kind of awesome, though.

Because, yeah, I've done that a lot with my therapist. My therapist would be like, yeah, you have, like, probably a great tooth sprain, but you'll be all right. Like, you can tell. If that, if it's torn, your shit's flopping around. But didn't you think it was weird that they were checking her? Remember Tiago Santos? Yeah.

Tiago Santos has zero knees. His knees were gone, and he's still swinging haymakers at Jon Jones. Because he's a fucking savage. Savage. He's a savage. That guy's a savage. I mean, look, at that fight, I could see it going to Jon, but I could also see it going to Santos. Real close.

I was like, man, if you hadn't got hurt, how would this fight have been different? Right, right. You are good, really good. He's fucking dangerous as shit, and that power is undeniable. No. It seemed like he didn't get hurt from anything. It was like a weird thing, right? Like he threw a punch and his leg just kind of buckled.

Yeah, but you got to remember, though, remember Patrick Cote did the same thing with Anderson Silva? Yes, yes. You know, T. Wood, I think, or not T. Wood, Carlos Connett with T. Wood. Same thing. He didn't really do anything. It's like kind of one of those step backs. Well, Carlos, Tyron, though, was a leg kick. Remember?

Yeah, but he tore it, though. Was it from the leg kick or was it just when he died? Sometimes, like, you know how it is. Like, sometimes you are a little fucked up going into the fight. And sometimes you just get a little bit of an injury in the fight and then all of a sudden a big leg kick. But Tyron leg kicked him and then his knee blew out. Just bugged out. Tyron's legs are like two in one.

Yeah, I know. I've trained with him a couple times. Giant fucking legs. For someone who is built like a Greek god, he's fucking one of the nicest guys. He's a great guy. I so fuck, such a great guy. I love how smart he is too in terms of his full career. Like he's getting his, like he dips his hands in a bunch of different things, right?

He's rapping. He's doing a lot of TMZ stuff. He's constantly putting up YouTube content. He's on top of shit. So, to touch on, I was talking with, like I said, I keep bringing up John because John and I talk about a lot, obviously. But is fighters after fighting, you need to have a game plan. And I'm not saying it's going to all work. Okay, guys?

I mean, like, that's the thing is I own a fitness gym. I own a martial arts gym. And I do a podcast. And I own a clothing line. I do all these things. But all of them supplement a little bit of the income that I was making for fighting. I think the problem is fighters need to get into dabbling in other things. Look, whether it's a podcast

or whether it's owning a gym or anything like that, I would recommend no gym businesses. Just I would recommend that. Is it rough? It's rough. I mean, it's the constant hustle. I've got 15 employees,

so it's a lot of work when you've got that many employees. It's like you have trainers that work for you, you have front desk people that work for you. I've got jujitsu coaches that help work and help teach

when I'm not there. They're there now while I'm here with you. And so it's, it's a, and I owe, I owe a lot to them. Like, you know,

they run the fort while I'm gone. It's just a lot to manage. It's a lot to manage. I get back to the room, you know, later today and I'm getting on the computer, look at my computer, you know,

look at my cameras, like how you have here, UCA, everything's okay. Everything's going good. Plenty of kids came to class today. You know, I've got like over a hundred kids in my martial arts gym.

That's awesome. You know, a jujitsu base and a wrestling, I have a jujitsu, got DC's wrestling program in there, but all that gym business is hard. It's a constant hustle, but you have to remember it's an ebb and flow. So summers are slow because it's indoors. No one really wants to train during the summer. Everyone's like, I want to go to the beach. I want to go run up the beach. I want to go muscle beach and lift. You know, like those are the things that people who want to go hiking, you know, camping. Um,

that's the fitness side of it. The Jitsu part of it. Like sure. The Jitsu nerds, they're in there. They're going to be there no matter what, you know, kickboxers and anything like that. They take the vacation cause they will, you know, they want to be outside. Gym business is extremely hard during the summer. You're slow. September, October, you pick back up holidays. You're slow. New Year's you're're back to getting busy because New Year's resolutions. Y'all want to be skinny up until May, okay, when it's Memorial weekend and you're all in Vegas, you know, at the pool parties. That's their game plan. So you just got to learn to manage your money and budget your money and figure out things to supplement the income during the times that are slow.

That's really what it comes down to. It is a really smart thing for fighters. to supplement the income during the times that are slow. That's really what it comes down to. It is a really smart thing for fighters. I mean, Brendan obviously has struck pay dirt with the fighter and the kid and below the belt and all the other shit that he does. And in a lot of ways, and also stand-up, in a lot of ways he's opened up the door for a lot of fighters to follow that model.

And a lot of guys are doing podcasts now because of that. I mean, Mike Bisping has a really good podcast with Luis Gomez. And, you know, there's a lot of other fighters that are getting involved in setting up similar things too. But I think that's really important to say that they need some, like, you can't fight forever. It's not possible. So there's got to be something that you're going to do for the rest of your life to make an income. And when you're focused singularly on one thing, being the best fighter that you can be, it's very difficult to even imagine a future without fighting for a lot of these guys. So this is the advice that I gave myself.

So my last fight was against Patrycki Pitbull, which is Patricio's brother. And, you know, I lost. And when I lost, I kept going to the gym after. And when I kept going to the gym and I was thinking to myself, you know, you're 40 years old, like, you know, what's next? You know, are you going to the gym and I was thinking to myself, you know, you're 40 years old, like, you know, what are you going to be like?

What's next? You know, you're going to fight again. And when the reality set in that, like, if you want to do something else, your new life is going to cost you your old one. You have to have that mentality because I can't keep going to the gym,

wasting two, you know, four or five hours a day at the gym and still try to start another career right you've got to leave that behind whatever it is you're doing like in fighting if you're going to move and do something else then you need to leave it behind you have to approach it you have the same intensity that you approach your fighting career and the problem is fighters don't do that like fighters that leave the sport or are going to retire you know they're they're done fighting they don't do that they keep hanging to, I'm going to go to the gym every day, see all the boys. I'm going to go to the gym every day

and hit mitts with my trainer. Why? Get established first and another job. Okay. Start making that income. Now make that your hobby. Go and hit mitts with your coach again. Your coach is going to love you. You're still going to be there. If I call up Javier tomorrow, if he's in town, hey, I want to hit mitts tomorrow at say 630. All right, let me move some guys around for you. I only got about five minutes in me to know the mitts. But, you know, he'll make some adjustments for you. Those guys will be there. Those coaches will always be there for you. Go back to it.

I can't give any better advice than your new life is going to cost your own one. Let it go. It's okay. Move on. But give the same energy and enthusiasm to your new job or whatever it is you want to do that you did to fighting and you're going to be great well you have a very intelligent approach about it but for a lot of guys it's really hard because fighting is their identity it's everything it's it's who they are and also the highs the highs of competition

the highs of victory they They're always chasing that. And then when life gets dull outside of the cage, there's this feeling like, maybe I got one more in me. Maybe I got one more. I think that's a social media play, though. That's what it is. They're in love with the likes. That's what it is. Like, yeah, I'm just going to get the likes.

Let me see the hearts. But besides social media, it's been something that fighters have done throughout history. Way before social media. Sugar Ray Leonard did it. Remember when he got knocked out by Hector Camacho? Yeah.

And Terry Norris? And we were like, Ray, get out of there. Yeah, I mean, we've seen it with Roy Jones. Yeah. You know, it's sad, you know,

and Holyfield did it for years. You know, it's just, look, it is hard to get away from something you've done for your whole life. And no matter what it is, it doesn't matter just fighting. It could be the NFL. You see guys playing, NBA guys, playing in China, playing in Europe and all these other places.

Because they just love it. They love the competition. They love getting up and down the court. They love whatever it is they're doing. I understand that. But you got to move on. And I don't mean like you got to leave it behind. You just got to come back

to it later when you're established doing something else. You got to find the next stage of your life, the next chapter. Well, the hardest thing, I feel like realistically, the hardest thing is like you're trying to find something that supplemented the income that you were making. I was making really good money. Joe, it takes me a whole

year now of work of all four of these other companies to make what I was making really good money joe it takes me a whole year now of work of all four of these other companies to make what i was making in one fight or you know a fight and a half it's like ah but you have to understand that there's there's a means to an end like if i just keep doing what i'm doing you know and one day i'll have a man cave you know what i mean like well like look at henzo like henzo gracie is a huge school in New York City. Makes a shit ton of money. And, you know, got there from his career in fighting and jiu-jitsu. And figured out how to make more money than he ever made in his entire fighting career every year just doing that.

But he also had to line himself up with great people. That was the other thing. John Danaher is fucking amazing. You go to his class. I went there with Frankie Edgar and some of the other thing. John Danaher is fucking amazing. You go to his class. I went there with Frankie Edgar and some of the other guys that were there. I was like, good God, can I get a little two by two space to try the move? Because there were so many damn people there. It was impact.

And this class was at like 9.30 or 10.30 in the morning on a Tuesday. I'm like, well, don't you guys have jobs? What the fuck? There's so many killers that come out of that gym, man. It's insane. And just the approach and how Henzo handles his business. Every time you see Henzo, how is he? Super friendly.

What's up? How are you doing, bro? He's the best. That's what helps generate and drives business. That's the other thing I want to tell young fighters or fighters that are thinking about leaving. Be positive, man. You had a great time being an athlete and a fighter. Move on now.

When you move on, keep that same positive energy in everything you do. How are you doing? Hey, smile when you walk past people. We don't see that enough in some old bitter fighters. Like, why? Don't be that way. You were fucking great. Don't worry about what goes on.

Focus on what's next and be positive as you do it. I think everything will be great. It's hard for guys to accept the new chapter in their life. You know what another parallel is? Hot chicks. When hot chicks get older, some of them just have a hard time letting it go. Oh, yeah. It's just like, God damn, you used to be the thing you would walk by and every guy would be like, holy shit.

Yeah. And now you're invisible. And for a lot of women, that's a devastating transition in their life. For like a girl who's an average girl, an average looking girl, it's not as hard. When you get older, you know, you were never a showstopper to begin with, you know, but there's something about showstoppers. It's like, it's just a gift from the universe. A gorgeous girl, it's just a gift. You know, you just got fantastic genetics.

It's really all it is. That this facial symmetry, the way your body's built. I mean, there's a lot of girls that are showstoppers. They don't even have to work out. And when they get older, it's like the universe takes that gift away. It's almost worse than having never had it. And for fighters, sometimes it's the same way. Because as you get older and you're living a regular life with a regular job with a lot of people to be happy with, you're not happy with it because you remember being a conqueror.

You remember being the guy that gets his hand raised and have thousands of people screaming and cheering. You remember the after fight party. You remember training. You remember walking in the gym and everybody goes, that's the fucking man right there. Yeah, the sport will be on after you. It was there before you and it'll be there after you. Like every athlete needs to remember that.

And as far as with women, look, women go through the baby fat stage like kids do. They go through the baby fat stage when they're younger. I feel like they haven't fully matured. I feel like when you look, and I want to say women don't hit their prime until that 32 to 36, 37-year-old. You see them, I'm like, God damn. Then they become a woman. They become a woman, and they are absolutely beautiful. I'm telling you.

You look at Jennifer Aniston when she was probably in her early 30s or late 20s. You see her when she was that 40 age. Good God. Just way different. J-Lo, same thing. They also take care of themselves. They take care of themselves. You're right.

But I think a majority of women, though, between that 32 to 36, 37, that could be their sexual P. That's the hot spot. I really believe. that could be their whether it's sexual pee that's the hot spot I really believe because you know look there was a lot

there was there was some girls that I knew some girls that I knew that were ring girls and they when they first started on they weren't as beautiful

as they are now as they've gotten a little bit older the other thing as well is sometimes though they were pretty with natural looks when they started

and now all of a sudden they've got so much work done, they don't even look like the same person. So there's two sides to that. Just let your body mature before you go sticking that shit in your face, okay? And I'll bet you you're going to be beautiful no matter what. You start putting that shit, you look like every other person that's on social media. It drives me insane to see that because it's just, you guys all have the same doctor. I can see.

It's also, you see girls in their early 20s getting their face shot up. They're not even done. Yeah, they're not even done. Their body's not even done growing. They're physically filling out. And I'm thinking, gosh. They want to fill their cheeks in with those fillers and all that stuff. Yeah, it's a bummer.

They want to fill their cheeks in with those fillers and all that stuff? Yeah, it's a bummer. But, yeah, I like one of the things that Bellator and the UFC is doing is employing former fighters to do commentary and to do analysis of fights. Bellator does a fantastic job with you guys, and the UFC does it as well. Fighters as commentators, and I think that's a great avenue. I mean, and that's something that's going to be around for a long time. And if you're good at it, you're very good at it. I really enjoy you doing it.

That means a lot. That means a lot coming from you. I appreciate it. Thank you. You're great. But it's such a great thing that they've done, and it's amazing that they hadn't done that before. And now boxing has caught on.

I mean, boxing had it with George Foreman and a little bit with Roy Jones Jr. But for the most part, the people that are doing commentary, they were analysts, you know, and you know, you'd have like one fighter, but the guys sitting around the table talking about what they think about these matchups and what they think could go down, like that's very valuable insight to the fans too. It enhances the experience for the fans and provides a future career for fighters. George Foreman to me it was one of my favorites because he had the best line ever when he told Larry Merchant, you see

fighting, you don't know fighting. And that to me just let everyone know I'm going to put you in your place. Without actually throwing a punch. You know what I mean? And just let me know fighters are meant to be in that position and so when you're saying guys like DC stepping up and doing what he's doing, I think he's amazing.

Yeah. You know, um, you know, I love doing what I do and I got to tell you, I've been definitely blessed. The fact that I owe, I owe a big majority of my career to Scott Coker because these are things that sure I had to audition for. I still had to get out there and, you know, and, and do what they asked me to do. When it came down to the audition, you have to be able to nail it. And I was lucky enough that they were like, Hey, you're good enough.

We'll give you a try. So, but I feel that the reason I think why it worked out so well is situations like this. I had already started a podcast. I was already comfortable being in front of the mic. This, this is one of the knowledges. One of the things that I got from Brendan, when I went on his show the first time on Big Brown Breakdown. I'm like, you know, talk to me about how this whole thing did and how it all started for you. And he goes, Josh, just look at this microphone as if it's a rep. Every time you're in front of this microphone, it's a rep that you're getting for the shows that you're going to do.

And so when I get now in front of the microphone and you're, you know, and we, I'm holding it in there and I'm talking with Jay Glazer and Chael and whoever else, whatever fighters, one of the hardest things to do is listen to what the hell they're saying. You know, like when you're, this is why I admire like what you do so well. It's like, you're, you're, you're talking to me and I have to listen to you and you're listening to everything I say so you can come back with an answer. Most people already have a question in their head they're going to ask and they don't care what you're going to say.

Yes. And so when you're talking to a fighter, right, they generally will, well, for me, I did it like this and I did like, well, you can't do that. Well, it's like jujitsu. At that moment, you got to make it about the fighter. It's like jujitsu. If you're only thinking about what you want to do to a person, then you're not thinking about what they're going to do to you.

You're going to get surprised. Yeah. You have to just, you have to flow. a person then you're not thinking about what they're going to do to you you're going to get surprised yeah you have to just you have to flow and the conversation is like a flow you have to be able to listen and you got to be able to respond and if you're not listening you're just talking at that person the people at home are going this is awkward yeah and they don't like it yeah because now i'm just artificially putting in questions that you weren't even talking about it just sounds really bad yeah so when i had done the audition for bellator down in viacom studios they had sat me in a in a uh in a silent room it was like kind of like a room like this with a monitor and i had to call ed

ruth's fight and i already knew that ed knocked the guy out it was like it was very awkward i was like oh man and i that's how they auditioned that's how they auditioned like hey call this fight i was like oh man this is i already know the result and i was like yeah oh, man. That's how they auditioned you? That's how they auditioned me. Like, hey, call this fight. And I was like, oh, man, this is, I already know the result. And I was like, yeah, so I think, Ed, what he needs to do is set up that right hand and boom, knockout. I was like, yes, I knew I was right. It was like one of those scenarios and situations. But we did that. And then there was some other stuff, too, where they had someone, Goldie, do something.

And I had to answer questions with him. And there was a lot of things that came along, but that was part of the audition. And then I did a show with Brennan Shaw, the Bellator's show in New York. So it was him and I with Jen Brown at the desk. And the three of us were up there and that was the first show I'd ever done

at a desk ever sitting. And so that was something that I learned a lot from Brandon. I learned a lot from Jen. And I learned a lot from talking with Big John and Goldie and all the guys that were there. Mauro is phenomenal when it comes to me talking with him. I love that guy. He's amazing.

He's a great guy. I've never seen anyone write out. I don't know if you've ever seen his iPad. His iPad has stuff. I have no idea how he can visually see it. He types it all up and the writing is so small that my normal eye can't read it. He's got glasses on.

But he'll read it one time and then he'll recite the whole thing. He's got a photographic memory. Without a doubt, he's got a photographic memory. I tell you not. He'll read it all and then when we do rehearsals for the shows, he does this walk down where he walks and he introduces all of Bellator and like, hey, fans,

everything live, like on TV live. And all he, he's not carrying his iPad or his phone or notes or anything. He just recites it. Word for word, verbatim, like he did in rehearsals every single time. The guy's an animal. He's a machine.

He's an animal. And I kid you not, he does Showtime, he does WWE, and he does Bellator. Yeah. It's crazy to think of all the things he does, and he's just on his... I love how open he is about mental health issues, about his own struggles, and trying to let people know. The bipolar rock and roller, he calls himself. Yeah, I watched that on a plane ride overseas. I think I was going to Milan, and trying to let people know the bipolar rock and roller. He calls himself. I watched that on the, I watched that on a plane ride,

um, overseas. I think I was going to Milan and I watched that and I never had realized the, the severity of what he would go through before and after shows. And until you see that, you don't realize what, what mentally they go through. I was like,

man, you sucked. You did this. You fucked it up. You did like, he's yelling at himself in the mirror after like, you knew it should have been this, like he misses a word this. You fucked it up. He's yelling at himself in the mirror after. You knew it should have been this. He misses a word.

It's like, ugh. Yeah. It's a tough job, man. I only did that once, that play-by-play thing, or the play-by-play commentator gig once with Phil Barone. Me and Phil did it. It was fun. It was fun working with Phil.

We had a good time. Yeah. But that play-by-play spot is fucking hard, man. Yes. That's a different thing. Well, you got to take, sometimes you got to take them in and out of commercials. Oh, my God. You got to take them in and out of rounds.

You've got to. Traffic, you're running traffic. You're directing everything. It's fucking hard, man. It's way harder than color. Color, you're just sitting there. And, you know, if a fight starts happening starts happening, you're just describing what's happening. You know what's happening.

You know how to talk. It's not that hard. But to be able to do that play-by-play shit, like John Anik is a goddamn wizard. John Anik's the best I've ever seen. I've never seen anybody like him. He's so smooth. The right amount of talking, the right amount of laying back. He doesn't ever overstep his bounds in terms of like his knowledge

base and what he understands and doesn't he's got a great sense of humor great guy yeah i gotta tell you when he first came onto the scene with the ufc i was like i don't know you know but then no i gotta i'm being honest yeah but i gotta tell you he's grown on me i actually truly like i actually love listening to him kind of call fights, and I love when his interviews are good. Everything he does is great. Do you know him as a person? No, I don't. I've met him in Hey, How Are You?, but I don't know him. I've never hung out with him. He's fucking amazing.

Everything I've ever heard, DC talks so highly of him. He's like, he's one of the greatest guys. Super nice guy. And so, in the beginning, I was like, you know, but then as he started calling more fights and as he started – and I think when I started seeing some of the front camera angles that you got, that the UFC does for, like, your guys' reaction,

that's when I actually started really liking him. He just – Yeah. He loves it. He loves it. And those are things that you want to see from your guys Those are things that you want to see from people They love the sport and they're in it balls deep

They want to be the They want to know the sport I'm working with a guy right now over in the UK Because I handle all the UK series For Bellator So I call the fights cage side there And so I work with this guy named Dave Ferrara And he, I kid you not from the first day we

we worked together we meshed and he was great like and he's like hey man i don't know any of the submissions i don't know this i don't know that i said let me let me focus on that you worry about selling you know boom this shit happened you know like right and so um after the very we did the very first fight and he tried to he said something about a guillotine or something i was like you i said don't after the fight i said don't say that i and he tried to, he said something about a guillotine or something. I was like, you, I said, don't, after the fight, I said, don't say that. I said, he was on his back. It's a rear naked. So it was just one of those situations.

But then after that, he never, he never, but he also went to a couple of jujitsu gyms and started asking, didn't take class, but he started asking about what submission that was at, what submission. So he could start kind of doing, and he did his research, came back and had known what the guys were doing, how they had won fights, what it was. So he's just, ever since we've done a show,

he's progressively gotten better and better and better, and he's really good now. I love working with the guy. It can be a daunting task to step into that world that you don't really understand, and you're not a practitioner. And then to be a commentator for, look, there's one thing about MMA fans. If you don't know what the fuck you're talking about,

they will come down on you like a ton of bricks. It's hard. No, it's true. It can get rough. And they appreciate someone who's genuine. That's one of the things you were saying when you saw his enthusiasm. When you look at the video of him reacting to fights. Genuine enthusiasm is appreciated.

Because, you know, there's so many fans. And everyone knows how to talk. And everyone knows how to talk about fights. They're like, fuck, I could do that. And so if you're doing it, you're not interested in it, or it's not really your thing, they get mad at you. No, it's true. interested in it or it's not really your thing, they get mad at you. No, it's true. You need to make sure that you're, as an analyst, I think, as an analyst, I had to realize that

it's not about you anymore. You're not that guy in the cage. Right. Okay? It's about the guys that are in that cage. You got to make them bigger than light. You got to make them feel, not just feel, but I got to sell them to the world. Yes.

That this guy is the best guy. And so when I have these conversations with you and when I'm on my podcast talking about guys like Patricio and Lima and MVP and Gegard Mousasi, and those guys being as good as UFC and as good as 1FC guys, I say it because I mean it. And I'm not going to try to push somebody on somebody that I don't believe that in. I just truly think that there's guys all around the promotions, every promotion, that are the best, that are the best that we just haven't found. There's probably some guy up in the fucking mountains in Dagestan who's the world-class best guy in the world, but he just can't find his way to a paved road. Right. You know what I mean?

So he's probably the best, but he just doesn't know how to get there. So he's probably the best, but he just doesn't know how to get there. It's no different than when we watch, if you ever watch American Idol, hey, how come you're not a star yet? Well, because I don't know how the business works. I don't know how to get in front of people that can make me a star. That goes with all the fighters too. How do I get in the UFC?

I don't know. That's the thing. You've got to find a way in. And if they don't know how to get in then they're stuck living in the woods somewhere and you know trying to and if they don't see

that clear path they might not have the same level of commitment so they might slack off or find something else to do very true it's and we started about this

because Brendan was saying that if you're not in the UFC you're not shit yeah I mean I think that's a crazy perspective because when I look at like we're talking about Lima,

like there are guys out there, like I look at Lima and I go, he might be able to beat everybody. I really believe that. That guy's fucking terrifying. The way he knocked out Michael Venom Page. Yeah. I'm like, look, he might be able to beat everybody.

Yeah. To say no? Like, come on, man. Watch that guy fight. Look at his fucking power. Look at the way he knocked out Korshkov. Look at those fucking leg kicks, man. He tortures guys with those leg kicks. Watch that guy fight. Look at his fucking power. Look at the way he knocked out Korshkov. Look at those fucking leg kicks, man. He tortures guys with those leg kicks.

He's so powerful. Here's the thing, though. Let's not forget, when Roy left, he was still one of the top guys in the UFC. And just because, and look, I'm not trying to dig or don't, but what Dana does very well is he develops the narrative, and then the media runs with that narrative very well so they before they even put pen to paper

Dana's already wrote the story for them because he's already gave them the narrative you and I were talking about it earlier with Connor he made Donald Cerrone he caused him to lose in 40 seconds Dana came out and said it's not that Cow Conor's, or Cowboy's bad, it's that Conor looked that good.

That narrative was written for all the media to go ahead and follow because that's, before they wrote pen to paper, that's what the narrative was. He wrote the narrative for them. I just feel that, like, look, there's guys out there that can cross boards all across. Lima's one of them. Patricio's one of them. There's guys, I think, at 135 pounds that we have that can do it as well. We've got tons of guys, not just us, even in one. But I would put our guys, and I say our, but I just say because I came from

Strikeforce, and we got no respect, man. It was so hard, Joe. Tell the Strikeforce guys integrated with the UFC, and we realized how many of them became champions. Luke Rockhold and how many of them were world-class guys. Musashi. There's so many guys. Tim Kennedy. So many guys came over from Strikeforce.

You have to remember this. I've been getting criticized for years. Not criticized. I've been told for years that I was never a top guy. For years. Because I was in Strikeforce. And I said, well, I also know what the guys in UFC are making and I'm making more in Strikeforce. So I'm going to stay here.

Like at the end of the day, to me, it's about making money. Right. Like this is, I'm a prize fighter. Let's talk about that. Isn't it weird though that like this is the only sport, MMA is the only sport, where you have these names of these organizations, and they're more like boxing. Nobody gives a fuck if it's a WBC title or the WBO title. They don't care.

They care. Is it Deontay Wilder? Is he fighting? I want to see him fight Tyson Fury. I don't give a fuck if it's for the bubblegum title. It doesn't mean anything to me. But for MMAma for some reason the because the promotions become like the nfl or the nba it becomes the big thing we know there's

world-class fighters everywhere it's not like basketball or football where the best guys are definitely playing in the nfl there's so many different organizations, and I almost feel like fighters are hampered by the names of these promotions. I almost think, like, we'd all be better off if it was just MMA. You know, to call it the UFC. The problem with that is it's great because everybody knows there's a very high quality to the UFC events. The production value is amazing. There's so much attached to it and so much history. But at the end of the day, it's about MMA fights. There's so much attached to it and so much history.

But at the end of the day, it's about MMA fights. That's what it's about. And whether it's in Bellator or 1FC, it's about how good are these matchups? How good are the fighters? What am I going to see? Well, I believe it all started when credentials were taken away from top MMA media websites and saying, hey, we don't like what you say. You're not going to get a credential to get in. So then they replaced, they brought in the other media websites or whatever it was, USA Today, whatever it was, other media sites that came in and just said, it's all about UFC.

It wasn't a sport anymore. It was a UFC brand and we had the best fighters. And once you took away Sherdog's credentials, you know, all the other people that were doing what other companies at that time had webs, they took those credentials away. Now, whoever came in was like, well, shit, they're going to do it to those big time, you know, MMA websites. Why would they, they would do the same shit to me if I don't toe the line. And that all of a sudden became like fighters.

Now, when you see them, it's all about UFC. It's not about anything that they're doing. I, you as a fighter, I think, look,

even though it's an individual sport and sure you guys should be pumping your organization. I get it, but you should also be pumping you because after you're done the ufc will be fine you need to worry about building your brand whatever it is you do to make you big yeah and and it's all for i'm all for the organization the organization does a lot for fighters i'm not here to piss on any company or any organization they need to make sure though that they're doing what they can to make as much money as they possibly can and i to go back to the strike forcing, I was making almost double

what the guys were making in the top five in the UFC at the time. Now there was a lot of talk about backroom bonuses and this and that, but I was, I was on privy to a couple of those back year bonuses when we got bought out and I went over there, they were not what I was making on the other side of the rope. So just to give you an example, when I came over, they were like, i was making on the other side of the rope so just to give you an example when i came over they were like oh wow you're making that they were like whoa what do we got to do you only have one fight left and i was like well you got to match or at least beat it you know like what i'm making now and then in the thought process was like where the fuck am i going to go though josh you're kind of fucking stepping on your own dick here right you know because it's tricky right because you can't really negotiate correctly no i couldn I couldn't really. Yeah, that was the thing.

I couldn't really negotiate at the time. And I was just like, shit, all right, well, let's play this out. So I took the least amount of fights I could possibly take, wondering if Bellator was going to be around long and if Scott was going to stick with UFC or if he was going to try to go do his own promotion again. You know, a lot of my relationships come from people that have been around. Coker, to me, is, I think, one of the best guys, if not the best guy I've ever done business with.

I've learned a lot from watching him on how he approaches not just fighters, but the promotion itself. The one thing I admire the most about him is that you don't need to shit on other people, like the UFC or one, to say that my organization is the best. He takes that martial arts attitude and approach to a lot of things. And he never, I've never heard him say bad things about Dana White. Never in a public, a private conversation. And I have golf with, I play golf with him a lot. I have lunch

with him a lot. I've never once heard him say anything bad about Dana White or anybody else in the UFC. That's not his approach. His approach is, I'm going to have fights. I'm going to try to make my guys that are fighters as much money as I can, and my organization is going to do something that we're going to do and let them do what they're going to do. I appreciate that.

Yeah. He's a very universally loved guy. I would really like cross-promotion fights. I really would. Well, Bellator just did it with Ryzen. Yeah. And what's your take on that? I think it'd be good for everybody.

Like I said, I'm obsessed with Douglas Lima fighting at 170 pounds. Have you not seen Patricio fight? Yes. Look, I'm obsessed with Patricio, too. But look, I feel like right now 145 in the UFC is so fucking talent stacked. I'm comfortable with some of these matchups that I want to see. I really am interested in seeing a rematch between Volkanovski and Max Holloway. I think Max Holloway, with just a few adjustments, checking those leg kicks and maybe a little bit more movement,

I think he can win that fight. But I think Volkanovski, with a few adjustments, might be able to put on an even better performance. And now that he's beaten the GOAT featherweight, who knows? A lot of guys, you don't really see what they're capable of until they win the title. And then you see the confidence take over. I mean, I think cross promotion with all the champions would be fantastic. I mean, look, I'm a terrible business person. Obviously, obviously. I'd promote everybody. I'd be like, fuck yeah, Bellator, let's be friends. Let's fucking, I'll blow you guys up too. I wouldn't, I don't think the way the UFC does this sort of an isolationist perspective.

When Fedor was a champion, they would get bummed out that I kept mentioning him. When Fedor was over in Pride, and I was like, you've got to take into consideration Fedor Emelianenko. He might be the best fucking heavyweight alive. And there was a lot of guys over there that were fucking phenomenal fighters, and we absorbed a few of them. There were some problems with that. Obviously there was problems with of guys over there that were fucking phenomenal fighters. And we absorbed a few of them. And there was some problems with that. Obviously, there was problems with the fact that the contracts that they got from Pride,

a lot of them weren't real. So we thought we had Fedor, and we didn't. We thought we had a lot of guys. They had to just put him under new contracts. Mark Hunt was a good example. He wrote out his contract. And then there was a problem with supplements. A lot of those guys were on the Mexican juice.

Because it wasn't in the contract. I fought over there, and they of those guys were on the Mexican juice. But because it wasn't in the contract. I fought over there and they said we do not test for steroids like in the contract. And it's in any way tell me that it was

in a giant bold print. Yes, it was. It was. It actually was. Yeah. I want to even say it was underlined. Yeah.

It was like, no, look, so I agree with cross promotion. I want to see that. I 100% want to see that. But I also think though too you got to look out for all promotions. If we're going to cross promote, let's not have champion versus champion. Let's have your number two guy versus this number three guy.

Let's make the best fight. Here's the thing. Do you think it would hurt the UFC? Because I don't know if it would. I think it would definitely help Bellator. But I don't know. First of all, I hate the name Bellator. I think everyone did.

And honestly, I think everyone did. It was true. But here's the thing. They'd already spent millions, probably close to over a billion dollars, in trying to make sure that it was marketed properly back then. When Scott came in, it's like, let's not try to rebrand this. Scott's brilliant when it comes to doing these type of things. But you notice how he got rid of the, he made it very simple.

The logo is simple. Everything is simple now. And it's easier to easy to say oh that's our logo right there versus this big word that says with like a i don't even know what it was behind it was like a bellator fighter or whatever it was yeah it went away gone yeah so like he look at all these things it takes time to get branded do you remember king of the cage when they used to have the king of the cage a giant bodybuilder dude yes who was like the mascot yep remember how strange that Cage when they used to have the King of the Cage, a giant bodybuilder dude? Yes. Who was like the mascot? Yep. Remember how strange that was?

Shout out to Terry Trofocock, dude, that guy. Look, he's been around forever. Forever. Still around. Terry's still around. Still doing his thing, though, man. And you ought to appreciate guys like that. Yes.

Because even though he's not getting rich, but he's also making sure that young and up-and-coming fighters have a way to get their name out there and still fight at a high level. Bud Brutsman was one of the owners as well. He's a really good friend of mine. He actually sold him my old house. He lives in my old house. He's a real good friend of mine. I never met him, I don't think. Bud and Terry were partners in that venture.

They used to have this guy who was this enormous fucking bald bodybuilder dude who was the king of the cage. He was like a mascot yeah remember it was so strange he was always wearing like a dry fit shirt or like a really tight really tight yeah yeah big old fucking neck bald guy huge muscles yeah but it was so strange it was like but he's not the fighter this is so weird like you have a mascot yeah hey whatever man everyone's gotta try something different. Mascots are weird.

It's a fighting mascot. Because remember the UFC had the dude who was the bald, muscular guy in the logo. Do you remember that? Was that you? No. He was walking on me. It was more like Boss Rudin. It looked like Boss Rudin.

Do you remember the early days of the UFC? Yes. The logo had this guy who was this bald jack dude. And that was like a part of the UFC logo was some bald dude. Yeah, I do remember that. It was weird. And it looked like Boss. Like when Boss won the title, I was like, is this destined for you?

Like, look at this. It was weird. There it is. Look at the fucking old logo. Yeah, that's true. How weird is that? No one like that ever won the title up until Boss. But that's like, so when Scott came in, he changed the logo to make it is. Look at the fucking old logo. Yeah, that's true. How weird is that? No one like that ever won the title up until Boss. But that's like, so when Scott came in, he changed the logo to make it simple.

Like basically what Dana and Lorenzo and those guys did, basically made it simple like that. Yeah. So I think it's good for the sport. We'll see. Like, look, the name itself is like, hey, do we want to rebrand this? No, you don't want to waste all the money you did trying to rebrand a new organization. Right. That's just too hard.

And at the end of the day, it's the you know, the execs talk and they're like, hey, let's just try and make some changes, make it simple, make everyone just fall in love with us all over again, but, you know, for a different reason. The other thing too, even though we are doing a tournament format for our fights, we're not doing them every, like Bellator before was doing them every Friday, different weight class, and I didn't even really, I never paid attention because it was just too hectic to try and keep up. Now you have big fights scheduled once a month with the tournament fighters.

So this weekend we have Cyborg fighting Julia Budd for the title, which is phenomenal. Very good fight. Very underlooked fight. Yeah, Julia Budd's a monster. She's an animal. And it's funny because everyone just keeps overlooking her. She's so jacked. Not only is she she's got her wrestling's gotten a lot better

And I need to remind you guys her only two losses Have been to Amanda Nunes and Ronda Rousey when Ronda Rousey was at the top of her game now those two losses Those two were extremely early in her career She's been on a terror ever since then and she's been doing phenomenal that I've had Again talking with John him and I have talked. It's her confidence. Her confidence needs to be at a different level. Look at the fucking guns on that chick.

Jesus Christ. Her striking, I think, is better than Cyborg. Really? Yes, I think it's better. Really? Her striking's better than Cyborg. Dude, that's a bold statement. Can she take a shot from Cyborg?

Who knows? But I think there's a lot to be said. Cyborg doesn That's a bold statement. Can she take a shot from Cyborg? Who knows? But I think there's a lot to be said. Cyborg doesn't throw the straightest punches in the world. She throws a lot of hooks. So if Julia can pressure to the fence, get inside the clinch, make her get in that dirty boxing, get rid of those loopy punches and be inside that pocket right there, then I think she's got a good chance.

Well, after Cyborg got flatlined by Amanda Nunes, the whole game just changed. Everything changed you know it threw everybody off okay okay yeah well first of all nunez has fucking hammers that lady throws hammers it's crazy it's crazy how fucking badass she is i look at it though too that cyborg had been undefeated for so long hadn't lost in so long yeah that she's just like i I'm just going to walk through this chick. And it just cost her. I think her confidence was that none of these girls can hurt me. I could beat her.

And when she got hit, I'm going to hit you back. She was thinking she was going to impose her will like she did against everyone else. And she's going to try to do the same thing to Julia Budd. And it's a matter of how Julia Budd responds. And we're going to know, I think, in that first round, to Julia Budd. Right. And it's a matter of how Julia Budd responds. And we're going to know, I think, in that first round whether Julia is going

to rise to the occasion or if she's going to step back and let Cyborg dictate the pace like a lot of other girls have. Right. I think with Amanda,

when she pushed Amanda back, Amanda hit her and Cyborg got rocked and Amanda pressed forward and she thought she was going to hit her back and it became this exchange.

It was a very sloppy fight from both sides, but Amanda has big dogs and was able to land the clean good punches. And timing. Her timing was fantastic. What she did very well in that fight was that she made sure that she didn't blow her wad in wasteless punches. She was picking

and choosing her shots. So she was making sure that they were landing versus just throwing aimlessly and not landing. You see that a lot of times times people get rocked and the guy just comes and he smothers himself so much that nothing lands and the guy recovers and you're back to fighting yeah i you know what when i knew that amanda nunez was a fucking dangerous dangerous fighter it was first of all the first round went well well you know there's a lot of fights where you saw it you know you started to see it with Kat Zingano the first round she almost had Kat Zingano out but then she faded

and then she got put away later in the fight which just shows how tough Kat Zingano is Kat Zingano's a fucking savage she's at Bellator now yes I know I'm very happy to see her over there but when Amanda Nunes beat the fuck out of Misha Tate and then strangled her I was like oh god damn yeah Jesus Christ and then when the Raquel I was like, oh, God damn. Yeah. Jesus Christ. And then when the Raquel Pennington fight's an underlooked fight, because Raquel Pennington is as fucking tough as they come. That lady impresses the shit out of me.

And the fact that she was able to stop her and beat her down before she stopped her. You know, you just, you realize she was on another level at that point in time. But still, in the Cyborg fight, I had questions. I was like i was like is she gonna be look what she did to holly holm cyborg just bullied holly yeah she was just on top of her beating her down and holly is a phenomenal striker yes and i was like man is an end but the difference is amanda is her hands holly you know has good power in her hands excellent timing good counters, but Amanda has like legit one-shot knockout power. Yeah, I agree. I just would have liked to have seen them do a second fight

because I think that Cyborg would have fought a smarter fight and it would have been a different outcome. She would have made the adjustments. Yeah, she would have made the adjustments, not just made the adjustments, but we saw with Jermaine DeRonamy when Jermaine fought her that Amanda, as the fight goes on, she's not the same fighter. Why do you think that she decided to move over to Bellator? Why do you think she didn't pursue the rematch?

Oh, you know the answer to that. Come on, Joe. She's like Dana. No, just you can't. I think the comments, just the, to being treated like there, you know, certain ways, people talking behind her back, saying, you know, calling her, you know, a man, whatever it was. Those are, there's not just that, but then also too, a little bit of the, I think, some of the

mistreatment in that whole thing. The other thing as well, all that stuff aside, she's got a relationship with Scott Coker. She had him from Strikeforce, and they've always got along. He's always amped her, and you've got to remember, he's the one that first put women's MMA on the

big stage. Her and Gina Carano were the ones that made women's MMA that next level of what it could become. There was something that happened between them where the UFC was like, we're getting out of the cyborg business. I'm trying to remember what it was. I don't remember what happened, but there was some sort of a dispute that they had. Was it before? I think it was before the Amanda Nunes fight. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. They put out a video.

Cyborg's boyfriend put out a video where she put words in Dana White's mouth, and they were fake. They mistranslated it on purpose, willfully, and then she had to apologize for it, and then the UFC was like, get the fuck out of here. You can't do that.

And that's when they released her. But that wasn't her her right? That was her boyfriend and her management I think or something like that. Well her boyfriend is her manager yeah that's what it was that's why she got out of the business that's why the UFC got done with Cyborg but here's the thing is

that when she was with she hadn't lost in what 15 years or some shit like that? Since Gina Carano well before the Gina Carano fight. Her first fight. It was her very first fight she lost. Yeah. But whenever...

So that first fight, she hadn't lost since then. It's been what? Close to 15 years. Yeah. And to say that like now all of a sudden, because she had one loss after Amanda Nunes, when she lost to Amanda Nunes, that she's done.

Like she wants to fight easy fights. She wants to... Julia Budd is not an easy fight for her. You know, and, but that, we go back to when I was talking about the narrative, the narrative being that Dana shapes the narrative.

The narrative is that, look, if you want to fight over there, you're going to have easier fights. And the press jumps on board and the fighters jump on board and it becomes an issue. That's why I feel like we're not seeing cross promotions.

Well, I just think it's a business decision. The UFC doesn't have any vested interest in blowing up Bellator and making them bigger, and Bellator would get bigger along the way, but I think Julia Budd hangs with any 145-pounder in the UFC, and I would like to see her fight in the UFC. I would like to see cross promotion with her as well.

I just feel like it's just one of those things where it hampers the fans because the athletes, they're just not going to face each other. Well, let me go into this. We already saw a cross promotion when UFC was basically asking, or I don't want to say begging, but they were trying to force the issue with Chuck Liddell fighting in Vanderlei.

But they got fucked over because they actually sent Chuck over there, trying to force the issue with Chuck Liddell fighting Vanderlei. And remember that. But they got fucked over because they actually sent Chuck over there, and then Pride didn't send anybody over here. Yes. And here's the thing. We've already seen with Scott what he says he's going to do, he does. And that's a big reason when I actually had to fight Kawajiri, it was supposed to be they sent Aoki over when it was Dream,

and they sent Aoki over, and Scott was supposed to send Gilbert over afterwards to fight each other. So Aoki fought Gil in Strikeforce. And then after Gil beat him, he was supposed to go over there and fight him in a ring. That didn't happen. So I got a call on like 12 days notice, and Scott's like, can you do this for me? And I was like, I'm literally sitting at the fucking court side of the Warriors game eating chicken strips and drinking a beer. And I'm like, let me go home. I'm going to run about four or five miles, see how I feel, and I'll get back to you. I called him that night chicken strips and drinking a beer. And I'm like, let me go home.

I'm going to run about four or five miles, see how I feel, and I'll get back to you. Call him that night at midnight. And he's like, I'm like, yeah, I'm good. I can go. So that's how I took the fight with Caligari on like 10 days notice. And just so, look, when people want to talk about how the Japanese do business and what happened with the UFC, I can understand.

I can understand why they're hesitant to do cross promotion. Because when I actually accepted that fight with 10 days notice, I was supposed to fight Aoki. But when I got there, they changed it to Kawajiri. Wow, that's a big difference in styles. That's a big difference. But what they do is, one's a wrestler and one's a jiu-jitsu guy, sure. But the other thing too is what they do is they say, hey, here's another amount of money. Here's a check for this if you switch and you take this guy.

So it's different. They're so sneaky over there. I don't know if it's called sneaky. They really want to... I bet Aoki now is wishing he would have fought me because he got knocked out that night by a kickboxer because they made him fight a kickboxer. And that's what Japan is famous for.

They really want to put fights together that people don't expect to happen. We saw Hoist fight the big sumo guy. Those are fights that people talk about. They're ones for the ages, man. Look at when Fedor fought that big Hung Man Choi. We still, to this day, talk about those kind of fights. But even Fedor wouldn't fight Bob Sapp in his

prime. He's like, get the fuck out of here. Because when Minotaur got fucking pile-drived, he was like, no, no, no. Look, that's an injury you keep for the rest of your life. And Minotaur's neck is still fucked up to this day. It doesn't make any sense. Sure, there's guys that you can fight, but Bob Sapp was

one of the first guys to explode on the scene that had a lot of athleticism. 3.75 with abs. Jesus. Yeah, Jesus. 3.75. And 100% clean. Yo, as clean as a whistle.

Dude, when I met him, if you stand next to him, you just go, wait, wait, wait, wait. What in the fuck are you? What are you? What is this new type of human being? He's so big. Have you ever talked to him? Yeah. I've talked to him.

Yeah. He can talk. He can talk. He can talk. being yeah he's so big have you ever talked to him yeah i've talked to him yeah he could talk he could talk i was on a bus ride from somewhere in tokyo to uh saitama arena and it was like an hour and 20 minutes he talked the whole way he's made an interesting career right like yeah he was a enormous superstar in japan enormous like it's hard for us to understand like they were selling dolls of him and posters and he was huge but then he ran a foul with k1 remember there was this event where they didn't have a contract for him he was supposed to fight and he's like where's the contract and they're like we'll give you the contract after the fight he's like no no i need a contract i need I need to know what the fuck is happening here.

And then he walked out. And when he walked out, they decided they were going to ruin him. Yeah, it was that night. They were at the venue. He's like, I'm still willing to fight. Just give me the contract. They never gave him the contract. Yeah, he was telling me that story the whole time.

He's like, look, I was there. Is that the Yakuza? What are they doing over there? How does that work? I would imagine, yeah. I get the vibe that it is a little bit. You know, I don't think much has changed, just to be honest. That's a power move, you know, to let, you know, no, after the fight, we'll give you the contract.

Like, what are you talking about, man? No, and he's still, from what I understand, he's still fighting. He's still making like 60 grand for a minute 20. Yeah, he just gets tagged with a little one. He's like, that's a wrap. He swings. He swings until things get weird. No, he straight up told me. He's like, no, no, I tell them it's 60 grand, and I give you a little one. Yeah. He's like, that's a wrap. He swings. He swings until things get weird. No, he straight up told me.

He's like, no, no, I tell them it's 60 grand and I give you a minute 20. At a minute 21, I'm going down. That's it. He's like, yo, bro. I straight up, that was one of the conversations on the bus. That is crazy. I told him at a minute 21, I'm going down. That is so crazy.

I'm going to try to get him out of there. He doesn't want to take any more damage. When he got his orbital broken by Crow Cop, you remember, one of his eyes looks weird now. He's got one eye that's open really wide. Oh, man. It's because of Crow Cop, which is crazy. Crow Cop was like 220.

Yeah. You know? And fucking hit him so hard with a straight left, he fractured his eye socket. Sap was literally more than 100 pounds bigger than him. Was that with kickboxing gloves on? Yeah. Kickboxing gloves. Just gotta fit

it in the right hole. That's all it is. I think it was kickboxing gloves. I think it was kickboxing gloves. As I recall it was. Yeah, because I don't think he took him down. I think it was a kickboxing fight. Well, he beat Ernesto Hoos twice. Yep. Which is crazy. And Hoos had him really hurt. He dug shots to the body, fucked his legs crazy. And Hoos had him really hurt. He dug shots to the body, fucked his legs up. Couldn't put in.

He was switching his stance. Got dropped by a leg, kicked side of the cup one or two times. Got back up. I was like, that was before he decided the 121 was the limit. Well, that was when he was 89% steroids. Oh, man. His body was so big and so ridiculous. It just rocked up.

When he fought Minotauro, I remember Eddie Bravo and I were watching it, and they showed Minotauro ready, and they turned to Bob Saab. You're like, Jesus! His head was here, and then his neck started right where his head crests. Like, his neck went all the way to the edge of his shoulders. Like, that is the biggest human being I've ever seen in my life. It goes just from his ear to his shoulders. It's just so big.

It's nothing if you're too big. His fucking shoulders were cartoonish. It was like the big boss in a Mike Tyson punch-out video game. He was so big. And when he picked up Minotaur and pile-drived him, it was like, oh my God, he's going to kill him. He could kill him. We're all thinking, you're not allowed to do that. And in Japan, they're like, he's going to kill him. Yep. He could kill him. Everyone, and we're all thinking like, you're not allowed to do that.

And they're like, in Japan, they're like, yeah, fuck yeah, die. They don't care. Stomps, head kicks. They don't give a fuck. Have you ever been there to call, you've been there to call a fight? Yes, UFC. Have the crowds changed? Do the crowds change for the UFC?

A little bit. They're a little more cheery, but they're still very quiet. Very quiet. You know, in between transitions, you hear everything. It's weird because you hear the coaches. You hear left leg, left leg, get through, pass through, pass through. You hear the fighter can hear it. The opponent can hear it.

It's very strange. Never been to our gym because it's not quiet at all. When we're training and sparring, guys are like coaching each other. Fuck that guy. Get up. Get up. Don't let him fucking take you down. They're getting on each other.

But over there, it's so funny. My first fight over there in Pride, they had switched my opponent like six times. I showed up. And then finally, the original guy I was supposed to fight was a miraculously healthy and ready to fight again. He just shows up to the weigh-ins just jacked and shit. Oh, God. Yeah.

So I ended up fighting him. Who was it? I want to say his name was Dasuke Sugie. They call him the amazon real good jiu-jitsu guy phenomenal jiu-jitsu guy and um he swung for an armbar on me like in a minute i'm fucking almost god i was like belly down trying to escape but had had that fight been in any other organization i probably would have lost because i could hear crazy bob and dave camarillo yelling to me hey push the feet off the face, because my arm was fully extended, he was belly

down, I was belly down, and I'm like, and it was, I could hear my elbow just going, and I could just feel, you know when you feel the muscle kind of stretching and tearing a little bit? Yeah. And then I just started pushing, and then I could hear them crystal clear, get the feet off your face, get the feet off your face.

Dave Camarillo was like, in such, like, can't believe this happened, he almost almost started walking back to the fucking back to the locker room thinking that i was gonna tap because i was trying to reach for the feet and he's yelling put the foot put the get the feet off your face so i was able to push and wiggle it out and when i wiggled it out i swung around for the the e-bar in the perfect position i was able to get the knee bar and the fight ended like that it's like a minute 20 minute 30 that. So, but it was one of those, you know, one of those things that they do in Japan

where the culture is just so different over there. It's really quiet. Like when someone would pass the guard, everyone would cheer. Yep. Yay. I'm like, wow,

this is kind of cool. But it kind of is a little weird when you're, you know, you guys are squared up and you're bouncing around and you can hear a cuckoo, cuckoo, cuckoo from the canvas. The floorboards. The floorboards. And're all all right this is it's a little it's a little

distracting yeah you're like yeah i'd rather hear the crowd it's funny i wonder if you get used to that and then if you go to fight in the ufc it must be overwhelming for japanese guys that are used to fighting over there with that total quiet and they come to vegas it's like just bleed guys with the fucking on the shirt. You see that? You're like, whoa. And then like as they're walking out, you're going to die. You're going to die.

You know, it's crazy. It's crazy over there. What a wild fucking sport. It's such a crazy sport when you just think about the evolution of it. I mean, you started your career. I mean, you really are a pioneer, but you started your career like you're like a second wave guy. You're like there was the first wave where no one knew what the fuck was going on and then there was a second wave where guys were like complete martial artists that had a specialty

background yours being initially wrestling yeah and then you see the third wave guys are the guys who've been like essentially training mixed martial arts since they were children you know and that's like what we're seeing now yeah yeah and Max Holloway as well and some of these other guys and when when you see it now and you compare it to like what the UFC was when you first started watching and first started competing it's got to blow you away yeah you know what it does it blows me away because look I was actually fortunate enough and before I started training with Frank Shamrock and he was kind of like that first guy that kind of he was first wave yeah I mean like uh Marco Huas was kind of the first wave guy

I would say he was probably the first right but the first I felt like the first guy with the big notoriety the guy it was Frank Shamrock the guy that kind of like boosted up to there and And he was decent on the feet. Wasn't great. Good submissions, you know, but great. He elevated the cardio. He was like that first guy that's, you need to be in tip-top shape. There's no more barstool guys winning these fights anymore.

And he made sure that was clear. Him and Tito were kind of like, you're not just going to get off a barstool and come in here and fucking beat me anymore. He changed Tito's whole game in that fight. Well, not just in that game. After, I don't know if you know but after he lost to frank he went up and trained with frank for so frank could teach him how to get in shape and be like be as in good as shape as he as frank was for their fight so moving forward tito frank was always thinking about himself at that time i don't know if much has changed but he basically just said like hey i want to make sure you're not beat for a long time because it continues to make me look good.

So he made sure that Tito understood how conditioning worked, and he just trained him in his regimen. And that's the story. Where did Frank learn it from? He learned it from Javier Mendez and Maurice Smith. Oh, okay. Maurice. Yeah, Maurice always had phenomenal cardio. And Maurice also trained Bob Sapp, too.

phenomenal cardio and maurice uh also trained bob sapp too yes yeah that's that's a there's such an interesting time where things shifted and guys started to figure out the overall puzzle of mixed martial arts in that sense frank shamrock really was like one of the first really complete guys remember when he armbarred kevin jackson yep the first round in the ufc japan and i can tell you yeah in that in that conversation with he had with Javier Mendez, like, man, Javier goes, this guy's really tough. You gotta do this. You gotta do that. He's like, he's gonna take me down when he takes me down. I'm gonna arm bar him. Sure as shit. Same thing. He's like, you know,

they always put their hands on the mat. They always do this. They always do that. Frank just had this knack at that time. He was so driven and whatever it was that he was doing, it didn't matter. I kid you not, there was moments where I was training with him and it was to the point where he didn't care. He literally just rolled over, threw up on the mat, went back to training like it never

happened. Okay, guys, let's scoot away from it a little bit. Just kept rolling. Like there was never- Scoot away from the throw up? From the throw up. Clean it up. No, he didn't even clean it up.

Waited till the round was done. We all scooted all over, trained some more, came back over and he wiped it off the mat. Boy, that's distracting. It's distracting, but at the time it was the focus of like, hey, I'm not done with my round. Let me finish getting this in. I'm out of shape, sure, but I'm not going to get in shape if I keep quitting to stop and

do this and pick this up along the way. I don't know. I think this, I like seeing how the sports evolved. I like, I feel like we have, i think in combat sports from 170 down we're phenomenal from 185 to like 205 even like the talent needs to be questioned a little bit sure there's talented guys don't get me wrong but i think the best athletes in our sport are from 170 down and just because they seem to be the most well –

I mean, look, Jon Jones is an anomaly. He's just one of those guys just like – look at his brothers. I mean, phenomenal athletes. He's a phenomenal athlete. Fantastic gene pool. Yeah, right? I mean, three world-class athletes in the family.

Insane. So you have guys like him, and you have other guys that don't look the part but are the part Gagar Musassi same thing you don't look the part

you see him you're like eh you know Fedor Milenenko yep eh but guess what

fucking world beaters were you surprised at the rampage fight uh no not at all no I mean he's still got crazy hand speed

that's the one thing that Frank Mir when I talked to him after he's like ah I thought I could hit him I did I grazed him a little bit I thought I rocked him

he's like and then he just he knocked him out going backwards you know the power's still there the last thing to go we all know that

the speed is still there that's what's crazy is the speed he's not as durable as he used to be no not at all but you can't be no I mean

what is he 42 43 years old I mean but the thing is it's still no matter what he's fun to watch fight oh yeah man I enjoyed the Rampage fight I just thought Rampage I was sad when I saw Rampage 43 years old. I mean, but the thing is, is it's still, no matter what, he's fun to watch fight.

Oh, yeah, man. I enjoyed the Rampage fight. I just thought Rampage, first of all, I was sad when I saw Rampage was so heavy. Yeah. And I was like, there's no way he could have trained really hard. It doesn't help you to be that fat. Well, he was training with TJ Dillashaw's guy, the guy out of the training lab. Yeah. I mean, there was a lot of pictures.

San Calavita? Yeah, San Calavita. They had pictures of him doing the bike in his garage. I mean, I don't know if it was just a photo op. Maybe he only did it a couple times. I don't know. But look, there's a ton of guys in Bellator and the guys I would love to see. It doesn't have to be for title fights because we were talking about cross promotion.

It doesn't got to be title fights. Let's not ruin champions. Right. Let's put together fights. If we did, think about this. A year-end show every year where we pick you kind of let the fans pick

or you have, let's say you have a board. So you have a board of people that a year-end show we do and we say, hey, we'd like to see this guy fight this guy. I would love to see Volkanovski and Patricio. I would love to see Lima versus Usman, but they're both champions.

So let's have somebody else fight. Let's see Stephen Thompson and MVP. Let's have this conversation. Look, there doesn't need to be champions. There's nothing to lose or risk other than the fans getting to see the best fights that fans want to see. That's the one thing I've always given credit to Coker about

is like, let's see these fights happen. The problem is, I think the UFC feels like it would benefit Bellator, but it wouldn't benefit the UFC. Because the UFC can make many fights for Wonderboy. Let me just make an argument to that. There's the one fight with Conor McGregor and Mayweather. This is like other guys. I don't know if you

ever heard of them. It's Cuthberth Flay-Mayweather. These two guys, they got together for one fight. Right. And that fight did what numbers? Crazy numbers. Astronomical numbers. But that was a freak show, right?

Because you got a guy, Floyd Mayweather is the greatest boxer of all time, right? Undefeated, 49-0 going into that fight. It's a crazy situation. Yeah. And Conor's never fought in boxing ever. Zero professional boxing fights against the greatest fighter ever.

And you make this gigantic promotion where it's not really going to hurt Conor because it's not really his sport. I mean, it's a different animal. It's a different animal. Joe, the biggest pay-per-view right now for MMA is what? Khabib and Conor, correct? 2.4 million. Yeah, that would be the original. The fight to make, that would probably be the biggest rematch as well.

Okay, but I don't know how much it would be the biggest rematch, only because Conor lost, and he lost pretty convincingly. Yeah, but after smashing Cowboy like that, I bet you could sell it. Oh, no, I'm not saying you couldn't sell it. I'm just simply saying it may not do $2.4. It may do that, or it may do a little bit less. People have already seen it. They've already seen it wasn't close. So it may not do 2.4. It may do that or it may do a little bit less. People have already seen it. They've already seen it wasn't close.

So they may not buy it. Now, if Conor was to go and fight somebody else and have a dominant performance against someone like a Justin Gaethje and get him out of there or whatever, or against Usman, then you make that fight and it'll do more numbers. But not off of the 40 seconds we just saw. Maybe. And I'm not trying to tow what Stephen A is saying, but we didn't see enough to believe that people could say that he— We didn't see a fight. We saw a domination.

Yeah, and it's not enough to say that he could stop Khabib's wrestling. That's the only concern. People are going to talk about this. But what I was trying to get at was the conversation with pay-per-views. You do a year-end fight or a once-a-year fight, or let's just say once a year. It's easy to... And you take the fights that fans want to see

or you have a board member of groups from each promotion that say, look, let's put this fight and this fight together, not our champions. And I'll bet you that that one card does double or triple what the best pay-per-view ever has done. I don't think so at all.

I think so. I don't think people care that much. I think you care. I think you care and I care. i don't think so at all i think so if you say i don't think people care that much i think you care i think you care and i care i don't think people care that much you don't think so i think the buzz and i also think the marketing dollars behind each promotion to help push it they'll make it bigger than connor and khabib than anything i don't think you can i don't think you can make it bigger what makes a fight bigger is someone who already has a cult of personality behind them right khhabib already has this insane following First of all

The Muslim world's behind him He's one of the first Muslim fighters Ever to win a world title He's also just this phenomenal freak athlete Who fucking mauls everybody And you know this unstoppable force Against this irresistible object And then Conor's this incredible enigmatic person who's just so charismatic

and everybody wants to see him fight. And he's got lightning in his left hand. He's got a history of starching people like Jose Aldo and Chad Mendoz. And you look at it and you're like, what is going to happen when these two fight? But you don't have that. Look, I want to see, like I say, guys like Douglas Lima, but how much does the general public, the casual fan, want to see that? I don't think there's that much of a following.

I mean, what is Douglas Lima's Instagram? How many followers does he have on his Instagram? You look at Khabib and Conor. Conor's got like 50 million or something. Khabib's got something similar. Okay, so my take is this. You take someone like Islam Makachev who trains with Khabib nonstop. He's a something similar. Okay, so my take is this. You take someone like Islam Makachev who trains with Khabib nonstop. He's a fucking animal.

Savage. I've seen the two of them go at it. 160,000 followers for one of the best fighters on the planet Earth. But if you take a guy like Islam. You better click that follow, bitch. How come you're not following him? Click that follow. Give him 161.

So if you match guys you If you match guys If you match guys Like you say Islam Versus Chandler If you match guys like You know These other

You match some of the Gay guard Because there was a lot of talk Because gay guard was winning When he left the UFC Came over to Bellator Beat Chris Weidman When Chris Weidman

Was on top of his game So you take guys like gay guard And you match them against You know Somebody over in the UFC And you're And you're taking these These top guys,

MVP and Stephen Thompson. I think a stacked card like that, given the results from when we're talking about Japan when they do their year-end show, is the number two in all of Japan for their TV viewerships.

It's just some astronomical amount of numbers. I would imagine it'd be bigger than what Conor and Khabib did. I still don't think so. I don't even think it'd be close. I think it would. I'm glad you're not a promoter. You'd lose a lot of money. Well, here's the thing, though.

You're not taking any consideration. If we use Mighty Mouse, if we use Eddie Alvarez, if we use the guy Timothy Nastyukin, there's marketing dollars behind one. There's marketing dollars behind one. There's marketing dollars behind Bellator. It doesn't matter. You can't make someone famous. No, but you hit all those different markets that you're going to promote. Once a person

is famous, yes, you can promote it and make it a giant thing. But when they're not famous, to make them famous for a promotion, to make the promotion larger, it's not going to happen. The biggest fucking pay-per-view they could ever do with Mighty Mouse was inadequate. No one cared.

For whatever reason, the casual fan didn't care. Timothy Nasty-Ukin, they're going to care way less. Way less. I'm throwing out names that we're talking about so people understand. I understand what you're saying.

Look, I mean, it's just one of those things. For the hardcore fan, if everyone was like you or I, yeah, it would be 100% of the world would buy the ticket. I mean, it would be something that everybody would want to buy the pay-per-view. But just I don't care that much about how successful it would be.

What I care about, would it be good for the sport? And would people like you or I who are hardcore fans, would we want to see that? The answer is yes, 100%. I mean, I do want to see Pitbull versus Volkanovski or versus Max Holloway. I do want to see Lima versus Kamaru Usman. I do want to see these kind of fights. But in the UFC's position, man, 170 is so goddamn crazy as it is. What do you do with Masvidal?

What do you do with Conor now? What do you do with Kobe when he comes back from his jaw healing up? Do they set up a rematch for that fight? Because that was a phenomenal fight between him and Usman. Yeah. And boy, did that fucking get everybody hyped up and paid attention. There's so many big fights as it is. Tyron Woodley, he's going to fight Leon Edwards.

That to me is the fight, man. That's a dangerous fight for both guys. T. Woods, my boy. Leon, he's phenomenal. I've trained with him. I've trained with Wood. They're both extremely fast, both very good. And then now the evolution of Leon Edwards' grappling mixed with his wrestling,

what he did to Gunnar Nelson was just nasty. I was like, oh, wow. Oh, wow. We just decided to up our game all of a sudden. Very impressive. He's a dark horse in that division. He's one that people are not paying attention to. Speaking of dark horses, you've got Calvin Cater at 145.

He's the fucking dark horse at 145. When he was putting it on Zabit in that third round, I was like, holy shit, man. If this is a fourth and fifth round, he might stop him. He's that fucking good. You have guys like Zabit, though, that for me, I feel like they're doing, they do well, they do well, they're doing good.

They almost start to believe the hype a little bit. I feel like he took some time, uh maybe just not didn't go back to folks and then training hard i've done that a couple times in my career like i'm gonna walk through this guy not a big deal because you don't know about that person yeah but after cater starts llamas how the fuck do you think that he put llamas's lights out yeah you can also say though that like ah llamas wasn't what llamas wasn't what he was when he was making his title run. You know what I mean? Maybe, but he was still doing really well.

I think it's a case of massive amounts of talent in that division. Yes. And trying to figure out who goes where and what goes where. Yeah. And you can say that about 35 as well. 35 is a crazy talent stacked place, too. Yeah. So go back to 45. We got this kid named Adam Borich. about 35 as well. Like 35 is a crazy town stacked place too. Yeah. I mean like you're like, so it's 40,

go back to go back at 45. We got this kid named Adam Borich. Dude, Borich is a monster. And so flying knee, they knock Pico out with. And he's one of Henry Hoof's guys too. He did it.

He did it again before that. So he's got two flying knee knockouts in Bellator. And all the buzz around Henry Hoof's place is that some of the 55 pounders don't want to spar with him and train with him because he's fucking good. He's fucking good. He's long, he's lanky and he's extremely good. I've seen videos of him training and I've seen videos of him fighting and I want to see him fight live. I haven't seen him fight live yet, but this weekend, but how old is he? He's like 24. I think he's 26. I think he's 26. Yeah. So he's, you know, entering his prime. Yeah, for sure. I feel like the prime is 26 to 32 That's your 31, 32

Somewhere in there When I was training I felt like I was unstoppable Was that 27 to 32 age 26 That's my job though Good job Excellent fighter He's phenomenal

Also two people The guy that's fighting Patricio, Pedro Cavallo, who trains at SBG with the Connells. He's someone's fucking really good as well. And I just look at these guys and Adam Weichel, like Daniel Weichel. He's another guy that's like he's such a technician. He just doesn't fight the part because people want to see high flying, flying knee knockouts like Adam Borch does, but he's super technical, really good.

The 45 pound division is stacked. Who is your heavyweight champion now? Bader. Oh, that's right. Yeah. He's a dual champ.

Yeah, so he's 205 and he's, for some reason I felt like he relinquished one of the titles, but no, that's not the case at all. No, he's, yeah.

When he stopped Fedor, I was like, holy shit. quick, man. He's one of those guys that but no, that's not the case at all. No, he's, yeah. When he stopped Fedor, I was like, holy shit. Yeah, quick, man. That was quick. He's one of those guys that actually looks better in heavyweights. He needs to stay there. I don't know why.

He's supposed to be fighting coming up. We haven't announced the fight yet, I don't believe. He's fighting coming up. And so I wish he would get. He's fighting at 205. He weighs like 240. Walking around. Yeah, walking around.

I'm like, why? Why would you go down? I said, not only do you, you're faster, you're a better wrestler than all these guys. And look, I got a lot of respect for Stipe and him and Stipe are friends. But I think wrestling wise and fight wise, he has a good chance to beat Stipe. Only because of his ability with his wrestling, his cardio and his pace. The speed and everything. I think he could get in on him.

Well, his striking got so much better and so smooth. And, you know, he just got better in the pocket. You know, after like particularly the Lyoto Machida loss, that was a, you know, a big thing because he came charging in and Machida caught him in and clipped him with a counter shot and put him away. You know, there was some moments where you're like, man, maybe Bader's time has passed.

And then all of a sudden he has this resurgence and starts doing better and better and then goes on to become, in Bellator, like a fucking demon. Well, you got to remember that fighting is a confidence thing. As you win one fight, you win another, and you win another. It becomes...

Getting lean, defending the 205-pound light heavyweight title in April. Yeah, I'm trying to remember. I want to see. I don't know what the name, what the he's fighting I don't know if we announced it yet though. Who was there for him? Who was he looking for? I didn't see one.

Who's there for him at heavyweight? So you've got Check Congo. Yeah, you got Check. I don't know if they're not going to do the rematch with that because I remember there was like a weird eye poke slash like nose and thumb in the nose kind of weird thing. So Cech got out, and I don't know what the deal was. So you got Mitikoff.

Mitikoff was the former champion who was there before, and he had the flu, I want to say, and he lost to Cech Congo because he had the flu when he fought. But then he's someone that right now is phenomenal. That's his only loss. That's what got Czech the title shot. So the two of them. Minnikoff is someone that scares me with Bader because size-wise,

he's bigger than Bader. He's fast. He's got that kind of like Samba background, and he's good. He's really good. It seems like it's really hard to get top talent At heavyweight Top talent at heavyweight In the UFC at least It's always been the most shallow pool

Yeah I feel that way in 185 If you look at even boxing 185 is one of the most gutted weight classes there are Occasionally you get the 205 guys Like I said, Jon Jones Is an anomaly You get those type of guys that come in But I also think that now that the money's gotten better,

you're going to start seeing athletes that would have went to football and baseball and basketball, they're going to stop doing that and saying, hey, these guys are making this much money. Let me try and go over there. Now when they're seeing million-dollar paydays in organizations like the PFL, you're like, fuck, I can make a million dollars?

Like, shit, you know? And it's just, I think you're going to start seeing some of those athletes that may be a benchwarmer in the NFL or may be a benchwarmer in baseball or having to go through the D-League process. They're like, man, fuck this. I'm going to go make money over there. Look at Greg Hardy. You know, coming over and having good performances. Such a long road, though, man.

It is. You're just getting into fighting and then trying to go professional with skills that you've acquired from football and basketball. I mean, you're an athlete. You're a great athlete and fast and strong. But, boy, there's so many variables that come into play when you're fighting that you just don't have covered. You've got to look at it, though, as well. If you go to an organization like the UFC has done Greg Hardy greg hardy some favors you know they haven't given them right top top guys you know and so when that happens because he has a name and they're going to be groomed then why not well

they gave him a tough fight in volkov yes they did that was a tough fight yes it was and i was really impressed with him in that fight because volkov used to be bellator champion top of the food chain heavyweight big long tall guy, tall guy, difficult to fuck with. You know, it's like he knocked out Fabrizio Verdum, former heavyweight champion. So, like, Volkov is very skillful and awkward as hell, man. So tall and long. Yeah, it's one of those styles, like, you have to learn to get past the push kick and the long jab and all those things, and once you do, you rock right into the knees.

Dude, that Derek Lewis KO was so bananas. When Derek Lewis knocked him out, I was like, that is crazy. And then afterwards, he took his shorts off. My balls are hot. Oh, shit. Derek Lewis is a national treasure. He is a national treasure. And he has the best fucking Instagram in the game.

After that happened, I went to his Instagram the next morning and jumped up by almost a million followers. I was like, Joe out here making everyone famous. Jesus. But it was funny. I was following him before that. And I loved all the things he posts, man. He's so good.

He's so fun. He's hilarious. And anytime something fucked up goes down in the world, there's a video of it. It's on Derekrick lewis's instagram i think i think he uh i i don't know if he put there was something he posted the other day it was fucking hilarious but he's a man he's awesome man i always love at the end when someone like false four stories lands on their head and if his first quote is they're okay though yeah he Yeah, he's okay. He's okay. He's okay.

I'm thinking to myself, the guy's fucking dead. Oh, so they're going to do Francis Ngannou and Rosenstreich. That is a crazy fight. Yeah, that is. I wasn't impressed with Rosenstreich, though. I mean, he's got big power. He's got the power. Well, I was impressed with his durability against Alistair and his patience

and the fact that he landed that haymaker right hook with like, what, 15 seconds ago or something? That was nasty, man. Oh my God, that was one of the worst cuts I've ever seen in all my years. Yeah, people try to relate that shit to Lawler's cut and I was like, Lawler's cut was like, he had a sliver compared to what that was.

His face exploded. That was nasty. The fact that that happened with one punch like that is bananas. Yeah, and what was crazy about it was that it actually happened where his mouthpiece was. And for that type of power to land and split your mouth like that, your mouthpiece is supposed to stop those things. Yes, yeah.

And it didn't, so that was gross. It was nasty. It was crazy. I felt bad for him, to be honest. I was just surprised how he was walking through everything Alistair was hitting with. Yeah. I'm like, Alistair's a fucking killer. Outside of the cut, I have no sympathy for him.

He's married to a model, so I don't think I give a shit. I'm like, really, dude a fucking killer outside of like the cut I have no sympathy for him he's married to like a model so I don't think I give a shit I'm like like really dude you're married to a model like whatever dude the cut healed up so fast did you see how quickly it healed

yeah yeah and there was like no swelling either I'm like what are you made out of yeah well also you gotta look at that guy like he's been knocked out like 30 times or something crazy

like how is he and you hear him talk he sounds perfect. It's nuts. Probably because he's in love with a bottle. His model girlfriend talks. I don't know, man. I don't know either.

It's crazy. He cracks me up, though, because, oh, there's some things I can't say. With him, though, he's a good guy. I was over in Japan a couple times when we had fought, and he was there on the same card. And, man, he was jacked at that time Dude Just jacked Back when he fought Todd Duffy

Yeah Remember those days Yes I was on that card Holy shit Yeah I was on that card The Brock Lesnar fight Is the perfect example That's Uber Eats

That was finest When he fought Brock Lesnar So big Look at that cut I mean that's crazy That's like a couple weeks later Yeah Yeah I mean It swelled up It was fucked up For a couple weeks later. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's swelled up.

It was fucked up for a couple days. You got to imagine he probably got a little bit of plastic surgery done to it as well for them to kind of do a little skin graft. What do they do? I don't think they skin grafted it. I think they just stitched the fucking shit out of it. They stitch it inside. Yeah.

They stitch it outside. And if you look at that, that's going to heal real good, man. I mean, that's still pretty fresh. I had a very similar one. I was wrestling at AKA, and I doubled A this guy, and he hit the ground first. And when his head bounced up and hit me in the mouth, I wasn't wearing a mouthpiece.

So my tooth came all the way through the front of my lip. And it didn't look that bad, but it looked nasty. There's something about your mouth heals quick too. It's weird. Yeah, I would imagine to defend off against infections. Yeah. You know what I mean? You've got to wonder how many more fights a guy like Alistair can endure.

I mean, how many times can that guy get stopped? You look at all the times he got stopped in Pride, in K-1, and then the UFC. I mean, he's had some of the fucking, just the Ngannou one. That left hook Ngannou hit him with. The back of his head hit his spine. That was nasty. It flew back. I thought he died.

I was like, this guy's gone. Rosenstreich and Ngannou is going to be a very fascinating fight. Because Rosenstreich is a real high-level kickboxer. He has excellent Muay Thai. His leg kicks. And I'm wondering if we're going to see more of that in the Ngannou fight. Since Ngannou is so Boxing heavy

And power heavy But Ngannou The difference is Ngannou hits you once He hits guys once And just changes Your whole life I think

I think guys Are going to I'm surprised We haven't seen More guys Go to the well With the calf kick Like in the heavyweight division

I haven't seen it A whole lot. Well, Junior was hitting Ngannou with it a couple of times early in their fight. I feel like Junior, though, is a guy that he needs to evolve because he has the miles on him. I mean, he hasn't been the same guy since that Kane fight. He's been good at moments, but he's also been bad. The second fight with Kane, then the third fight with Kane really did him in. Yeah, and so he just hasn't been the same, but he's also been bad. The second fight with Kane, then the third fight with Kane really did him in.

He just hasn't been the same, but he's evolving, I think, with what the smaller guys are doing to exploit the heavier guys that just don't move as much. I feel like that calf kick has changed the game. The very first time I ever saw that thing being used was Masvidal. Masvidal used that against Gilbert Melendez.

I'm sure he used it before that. He swept Gil off his feet probably three or four times in that fight. And I was thinking to myself, wow, there's something to this. Well, Benson Henderson was the first guy I ever saw do it. Got it. Benson was throwing a lot of those back in the day, too. Heavy kicks. Yeah, but it's really interesting how much more effective it is now.

Like you're seeing guys take one or two shots to the lower calf, and then their leg's starting to give out. And it shuts your nerves down, which is what's so weird about it. Yeah, because that happened to Chandler when he fought on Brent Primus. That's right. Yeah, and so everyone was like, oh, it's nothing. It'll be all right. I'm like, no, no.

Your foot doesn't move anymore. How about Cejudo when he fought Mighty Mouse in the second fight? I was surprised he was able to get it back, though. That's what was nice about that was he was able to get it back. I mean, had I think Mighty Mouse went to it it a couple more times it maybe would have had a different effect on it it could have been the end of the fight yeah it's a it's crazy that these moments happen where something changes in the sport and everybody goes oh let's do that and then a lot of people start doing it like when anderson knocked out vito with that front kick to the face yes and

everybody's like oh yeah you could throw that shit to the face. Yeah. And then you saw a lot of it. You saw a lot of guys winning that way. Which is funny because when you take MMA and people need to remember what it stands for. And people for the longest time were like, oh, let's just wrestle and let's do Muay Thai. It was, you know, like, okay, we'll do a little bit of boxing and, you know, and some wrestling. They never went outside that box.

And then guys like Stephen Thompson and Machida came in. Now you see MVP. But when you see these guys, they're bringing in a different dynamic that works for them. Now, granted, they've been doing it their whole life. So you're not going to be able to adapt everything that they do. But you can steal a couple little things from them. I don't know if you recall,

but I was like the first guy that did that little, I used to use my heel to your thigh in the clinch against the fence. I did it to Eves Edwards. And Eves was like, you're such an asshole. He's like, I couldn't walk for a week, you know, because I was just healing him. Boom, boom, boom.

And that fight was only in the first round, you know? And so you have things like that. And then BJ Penn said with Matt Serra, Matt Serra kept punching him right in the hip bone. He's like, and I kid you not, and BJ'sra, Matt Serra kept punching him right in the hip bone. He's like, and I kid you not, and BJ's like, for almost two weeks,

I couldn't walk. I had to like limp because he had fucked up my hip. Wow. So little things make a big difference. I wonder, you know, when they got rid of that, from the guard,

remember those kicks to the, to the kidneys, to the kidneys, they got rid of those. I don't know if they're back now or not. I don't know why they got rid of those. Why is it okay to kick you in the head? It's not okay to kick your kidney?

I have no idea. It doesn't make any sense. Yeah, but... Isn't it also interesting that like the back of the head, like the back of the head's illegal, but when you roundhouse kick a guy in the head, a lot of times you're hitting him

in the back of the head. Your foot wraps around the back of the head. But it's not illegal. Well, explain this one to me. Right. Down elbow. Yeah, the down elbow's the dumbest thing ever. It's the only reason why Johnones has a loss yeah it's

just one of those things you're just thinking to yourself this is so stupid like john explained it on the podcast yes does the fucking commissioners thought that that's how you break bricks and you can't do that to a person yep and he basically just said like and then i guess lorenzo had said um you know john he wanted to fight for it and john goes look let's just leave that one alone as long as we can still do it from the guard we can still do it from any other angle if it has a little bit of an angle this way a little bit of a that's what's great like when I do my when I do my podcast with with big John McCarthy there's things that I don't know like people don't realize fighters don't know a lot about the rules we think we do right but let me just tell I don't like to admit because John you

know I don't like to admit John's right a lot you know like but there's a lot of, I don't like to admit it because John, you know, I don't like to admit that John's right a lot. You know, like, but there's a lot of things I don't know about the actual rules. And I fought for years, man. Joe Abbott was fighting for almost 22 years, 23 years. Also, the rules have morphed a little bit, too. What do you think about the new unified rules? Like the differences between a downed opponent now and things that you can do that you couldn't do before. But it's not, but they before. But are they finally unified?

Have they got it? Nevada only – they have a modified version of it. Nevada says you're still a downed opponent if you have one hand down. See, for me, I feel like – look, for me, I've always thought that you should be able to knee the head when you're on the ground. Yeah. Like if I stuff your takedown, I should be able to knee your head right there on all fours. Right. It doesn't matter.

Especially if you're not against the cage. Like, against the cage is the only argument against it because the guy can't move. He's stuck. That's the only thing that I can see an argument for. Okay, I agree. But then... Get out of there. Yeah, get out of there. It's just going to create more action, more excitement to the fight.

That's the one thing that I liked about Strikeforce when we were fighting for Strikeforce was that we didn't allow elbows on the ground. And people like them. The reason I didn't like them is was that we didn't allow elbows on the ground. And people like him. The reason I didn't like him is at the time, Sean Shirk was the champ, and there wasn't a lot of movement. It was like here, and he was so small. It was like, bam, bam, cut guys, and the fight was stopped, or it just got all bloody.

And for the actual fan at home watching the fight, not all fans like to watch blood. And so it's like, I want to see a good fight. I want to see guys getting starched and knocked it's like I want to see a good fight. I want to see guys get starched and knocked out. Right. But I want to see a good fight. And so I felt like when Strikeforce didn't have elbows, you posture up, it creates more space. It creates more space.

Let's jujitsu guy do his moves as well as try to get back to the feet. You know, or I can back out and try to go big ground and pound. There's a lot of things that you can, a lot of different variations. Why would you like knees on the ground but not elbows? Because you got, because I don't want to fight to be stopped by a cut. You get a lot of cuts if someone's in a north-south position and you're

kneeing someone in the face, they'll be out. They'll be knocked out. That'd be different than a cut. Yeah, I want to see guys, like I said, I want to see guys, I want to see fights end. I want to see them end by a knockout. I mean, that's what people pay to see. I would like them to be able to use everything. Yes.

I think knees to the ground, but also elbows. I think everything. Got it. Yeah, I just think that, especially the knee to the ground, it shouldn't be okay that you shoot a takedown and then you're safe. Yeah. Because you're on all fours. That seems crazy to me.

Yeah. You're not safe. It should be that the wrestler's forced to roll to their back to avoid the knee, to get the fuck away. It doesn't make any sense that in the center of the octagon, you wouldn't be able to hold on and knee someone in the head. Look, John Fitch is one of my best friends. But to watch how he fought Rory McDonald,

for the fans' sake, it's not a fun fight to watch Like you grab the leg And the guy like pushes out And limp legs out And then you chase him On your hands and knees And you're fishing for the legs Right

It's just not a fun fight And also too It makes It makes us look like We don't know what the fuck We're doing Right You know

And it's like Ah dude John you're way better than that But at the time You also don't want to stand With Rory McDonald And that all changes If you allow knees to the ground.

Yes, it does. The whole position, the whole exchange changes. Yep, you're going to see them start sprawling, knee in the head, and then the other thing as well. Look, if the wrestler is a good,

obviously there are a lot of good wrestlers in the sport, but let's just say the knee misses and he's able to grab the leg. Now he can get the takedown. So there's benefits on both sides. If a guy knees and it lands, the guy can get knocked out.

But if he knees and he misses, the guy can get knocked out. But if he knees and he misses and I grab the leg and I drive into you and take you down, now I'm on top fucking you up. So there's different ways of looking at it. Like when you sprawl,

you want to get your hips back, get your legs back. So when that happens, you've taken yourself out of the equation of really engaging in action. Once you try to knee me in the head, now you're engaging

back into the action where I can grab you and take you down. Dude, I don't even think there should be a cage how about that I think that's the problem he was doing a giant basketball court sized matted area you remember there was

those like Kumite style fights where they had the mats that were kind of Frank Shamrock had a thing yeah he had that and then somebody else tried doing it as well well the world combat league with Chuck Norris that's right and then the else tried doing it as well well the world combat league with chuck nars that's right and then um the what do they call it the fucking myrowitz the guy who started the ufc bob morrowitz yeah what is it the something pit you fucking weird name he came up with some weird name for the pit like maybe it was like something pit fighting championships,

and it was curved. The whole thing was curved. Like that. I mean, like, I don't know, because some guys kind of run a lot as it is. The cage kind of, yeah. What is this? Oh, that's right.

Boss Rutens has an interesting thing. Have you seen this? No. World Karate Combat League, or whatever the fuck it's called. Boss Rutens has an interesting thing. Have you seen this? No. World Karate Combat League or whatever the fuck it's called. What is it called? Karate Combat? Yeah. Just called Karate Combat?

Yeah. Yeah, they have these karate fights, and they fight inside this area, but they have this elevated outside. But this is just stand-up, right? Isn't it? I believe so, yes. Yeah, but it's interesting, interesting too because they're wearing pants but they're throwing low kicks and shit and they have black belts on like it's like all right i

wonder where this is at this looks like it's somewhere in la i don't know their their boss is still doing commentary on that they're morphing that changing it they're trying to evolve it but it's like greece actually that one is yeah yeah okay why not just do muay thai where's your what's your take on the bare knuckle boy i thought it was a great fucking idea until i watched chris lieben when chris lieben came back and his face was busted open i was like whoa that is a big cut chris lieben looked like he got hit with an axe yeah i think it causes a lot of cuts man i think it's gonna break a lot of hands too yeah it's gonna definitely break a lot of hands, too. Yeah, it's going to definitely break a lot of hands. Oh, man.

It depends if you like having vaginas on your forehead. You know, that's kind of what the look is. You're going for the look there. It's also like a way where you see guys who really should be done. They get a couple more fights in there. Yeah, and they're paying pretty well from what I understand. Is it? Yeah.

I mean, like for some of the guys, like I I said they're trying to supplement the income They were making before but if they can take half And still make money For fights that don't go as long Hector Lombard's doing it Yeah I mean Gonzaga did it right Against Bigfoot and those guys I mean Levin's doing it

Dakota Meyer Dakota Cochran rather UFC vet Tiago Alves Inks new contract with bare-knuckle fighter. Yeah. I just, I don't, I think it's good, but here's the thing. Is that the guys, they don't know the rules. Right.

The rules are you can grab the head, clench, and dirty box. You can punch the body. They just, they're taking MMA. Well, Tiago's a leg kicker. And you're taking MMA guys, though, and making them, They just, they're taking MMA. Well, Tiago's a leg kicker. And you're taking MMA guys, though, and making them, they don't, they're not, they're not shaping their style around the bare knuckle rules that they have.

Yeah. You can clinch and grab the head and control and uppercut and, you know, and those kind of things. And if they did that, I think it'd be more of a real, like, bare knuckle kind of gypsy style boxing. Well, Dan Henderson is going to do it. Oh, God. Yeah.

Dan Henderson signed up for it. Really? I was just with Dan in Hawaii for the Bellator show there, and he didn't say anything about it. We were also at karaoke at 3 in the morning. How many different bare-knuckle organizations are there? There's at least two, right? I think there's two.

Yeah, yeah. See if you find the Dan Henderson fight, if he's definitely going through with that. But I'm pretty sure they were getting him. Maybe they're trying to get him to fight Lombard. But they have Lombard. They have him. Gonzaga, I don't know if he's going to keep doing it. Chris Lieben.

Who else? Artem Lobov. Something Knight, right? And then Lobov. Something Knight, right? And then Lobov. Jason Knight. Jason Knight and Lobov. Are they fighting again? Jason Knight's face was falling off his last fight too.

Same thing. What they look like, honestly, when I see pitch, when they're going to all look like, if you pull up a picture of hockey players before they wore masks, that's what they're going to look like. Yeah. And it's not attractive. It's not.

It's not attractive. And I'm just thinking to myself, no teeth. Like, you know, sure you got mouthpieces, but are you wearing a dual, a top and bottom mouthpiece? And like, it just depends, man. I don't, for me, once I realized I wasn't going to be the best and I couldn't win a title, you just got to go. For me, I just had to go on. Now, I'm not knocking the people that they want to keep doing it because they want to make money. If you want to do it to make money, just, you know have at it like this is your this is your gig man this is

your opportunity to make as much money as you possibly can i just for me i just knew i i felt like my whole career i was one of the best guys in my division and i just wanted i didn't if i couldn't be the best and i didn't want to do it anymore. Yeah. Well, that makes sense. I mean, I appreciate your intelligence and your recognizing the landscape. Some guys, they just want to keep going. And also, it's hard when you don't have paydays. You've managed to figure out a way to keep income coming in through a bunch of different venues. Some guys don't figure that out. And then they get stuck.

And then they have to make a desperate ploy. Well, if you have a family, you have to make a desperate ploy. Majority, like, well, if you have a family, you have to think about what's after, you know, and you got to find ways to, you know, and you also got to have someone that's there with you and takes care of it. Like, you know, is willing to like be with you through it all, not just through you when you were making all the money, you know, and that's another thing.

I think a lot of fighters attach themselves to the wrong spouse. Oh, yeah. Or they want to live that lifestyle at the time, whether it's beach parties or pool parties in Vegas or whatever it is. But when that's done or when you're not the selfie king anymore with all the fans at the pool parties, what happens? When you're actually calling to try and make reservations to get a table versus them calling you and saying, Hey, we have a table here for you at the pool. Things change,

man. And like, you have to remember that. And so when that changes, what are you going to do after that? Right. And it's not going to always be glamorous, but you just gotta,

yeah, I think you just gotta come to reality that life there's, there's a ton of life after fighting. And if this is the one, all sports, yeah, you're only, let's just say you play you play no not all of us are fucking tom brady play till you're 55 you know crazy but it's nuts but you have you have a whole nother life after if you let's just say you live to be 80 yes you have a whole nother life like do they like this is just the fucking beginning i was listening to uh gary v uh what's his last name vandercheck yeah and for everyone that said i even for moments for myself

i was like man at 40 years old what are you gonna do like what like what can you really get yourself into like go become a cop a firefighter like but it's just the fucking beginning like you you it's just the beginning. I mean, I got really good at fighting in a couple of years. You can be really good at something else in one or two years. Yes. And just fucking make a ton of money. Yeah.

It's almost like the organization should maybe have some sort of seminars for fighters to try to give them some sort of advice or give them some framework to think about how to pursue your life after fighting. Yeah. I've talked to Chael about this a couple times i said man uh with brendan uh you know with chael you guys those two guys i feel like people can say what they want about brendan and chael but what they've done is they've done things to benefit themselves in a very positive light yeah and i love and i love being around

people like that because even in just a casual conversation you you can learn a lot from them you know and i have had this like even with big john like when he left being a ref to become an analyst and and it's just like all the excuse me all the stories that i've heard from him you know um you know while doing our show it. It's just so much knowledge that he has from the sport, period. From the way it was started, the way he got brought into it, to the fights that he's called and how it all went down. And I know there's probably two sides to every story, but it's like at least you get to hear certain parts of what happened

throughout the sport. And I love hearing, I love absorbing all that. And it's great to be surrounded by people like that. Yeah, it would be nice if there was a clear path that fighters could take. And again, it is nice that Bellator and the UFC are using fighters for analyst roles and things like that. But yeah, fighters have to approach it like this is a whole new world that you're entering into. Approach it the same way you approach fighting. Throw your everything into it

if you want to be successful. It's funny you say that because I've worked with a lot of people doing the analyst stuff and you already know what I'm going to say. You already know. It's not for everybody. I don't even got to say it. It's not for everybody. I don't even got to say it.

It's not for everybody. The bottom line is, is guys are going to show up sometimes and be like, yeah, I know what I'm doing. Yeah. And it's like, you got to be a student of the game. You really do. You know, I. That's what DC really excels. Yeah.

DC is awesome at that. You know, so is Dominic Cruz. You know, Dominic Cruz is awesome at that. They excel. You have to. So, like with DC, you brought up DC. What D has is he has a guy that does research for him on the backside. And Bellator does that.

They have a guy for us as well. And he gets us all the stuff for the prelim fighters. But you've got to read it all. Yeah. You've got to know who these guys are. You've got to talk about them. You've got to be educated when you talk to them. You've got to remember, you're trying to them. You've got to remember you're trying to

make it about them, not about you. That's one. Two is you're trying to make them the most dynamic, the best fighter that's ever stopped

in the cage, even though they're on the prelims of the prelims. It doesn't matter. That guy is the future champion. So you have to find ways to highlight all the things

that they do well and make them out to be like they are the best and they potentially could be the best just not found yet when did you start doing your podcast uh so i did it started doing about three years ago but i didn't start with john till about six months ago oh interesting so you did it up just by yourself yeah so i had me and there was another guy uh his name was sammy the two of us had did one called sammy and the punk and I was doing that with him and then I started doing one with John

and then Sammy and I kind of Sammy was basically doing some stuff with his wife and family and stuff so we just kind of decided to part ways

and I started working started filming more with John and when you guys first started did you always do it you said you're doing it through FaceTime right so with John

yeah so I FaceTime John in and we talk through FaceTime and right? So with John, yeah. So I FaceTime John in, and we talk through FaceTime. And then we have a pull-up. You film it through FaceTime? Yes, yep. That's crazy. Yeah, so my person- Because it's so much better than, have you seen how they do it, Jamie?

It's so much better than Skype. When we did one with Edward Snowden, we did it through Google Hangouts. And there's a weird delay. They talk, and then there's this weird delay and then you don't want to talk over them so it's awkward like person to person is the best yeah you're right there you see each other but facetime's fucking pretty close no it was uh there's no delay we john just calls in and then we record it through um i believe we have like a an app or a sling it's i think it's called slingshot or something like that he was halfway across the

world too. That's true. Allegedly. We don't even know. Correct. He might've been next door. Might be a little too late. We don't know where he is really.

He's probably in your bathroom in the salt. Yeah, he's saying he's in Russia. He's fucking crazy, man. Who knows? Yeah, so we just FaceTime him in and then my producer, we call him Podcast Dave.

So he does, he basically just like He screenshots it And just saves it And then John also does it on his side And he sends him the video And then we record the audio And then John records the audio

So we just sync He syncs up the audio to both So it matches Oh that's cool So we do both So there is no delay Oh that's excellent That's excellent

It's nice to have a producer I gotta tell you I tried I tried doing like the first 10 shows With no producer The visuals of the Snow 10 shows with no producer. The visuals of the Snowden podcast had no delay. But while you were recording it, there was.

Yes. I had to go back and fix it. Yeah. Shout out to Jamie. I was going to say. I was going to say. You got to have a producer. I was telling him before you walked in, I said, hey, don't be surprised if I turn to you just because I want to be one of those other, like some of the other guests that

just turn and go, hey, Jamie, pull this up. It's a fun thing to say. Yeah, and he goes, yeah, but you know what? There's moments to do it, though. They just never do it at the right time. Dude, I did a Legion of Skanks podcast, and me and Tony Hinchcliffe and the Legion of Skanks guys, and Jamie wasn't there.

And there was some shit I was trying to look up. I was like, hey, find out if that's true. I'm like, fuck, where's Jamie trying to look up i was like hey find out if that's true i'm like fuck where's james and then those guys are like how do you google it just wasn't the same it's not i i swear i've tried a couple when uh podcast dave wasn't there and big john and i were trying to film i was trying to set everything up i'm like where are all these chords going what buttons do do I push? I just, and then, so I FaceTime him and he's like walking me through

how to set it all up and then the fucking audio didn't record and we filmed for two hours that day and I was like, I just told, I told Dave, I was like, hey,

I was like, I'm not fucking ever filming again without you. Like when you said you had to do the, the play by play. Yeah. With Brony. And you were like, I guess you told Goldie,

you're like, I'm never doing this fucking thing again. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, that's a, the way you guys have it set up, it's very nice. I like it a lot.

Yeah, he's right outside of Nashville or Knoxville, I believe. So he's over there. He moved out there now. He moved out of Vegas and lives over there. He's in Tennessee?

Yeah, he's in Tennessee. He fucking loves it. He went from Simi Valley to Vegas. He was telling me how much he loves Vegas. No, he loves it there. He lives right on the fucking lake, man. But what made him move to Tennessee? Yeah, he's in Tennessee. He fucking loves it. He went from Simi Valley to Vegas. He was telling me how much he loves Vegas. No, he loves it there. He lives right on the fucking lake, man. But what made him move to Tennessee?

His wife. Oh. His wife. I mean, they found a beautiful ranch. I want to say his daughter, I think, is out there now or living out there. Oh, okay. And she was in the military, and so she's out there. But he's been an amazing man.

He's been amazing. He's a great guy. I mean, you want to talk about a pioneer. He was there from the fucking jump so that's the thing when him and i it's so funny because my last fight was against patricky and i got drop of the head but john was reffing and um he wasn't in the right he wasn't in the right position to see it so then i got hit right after that got locked out so he um i i basically went to what california satellite commission and was trying to argue it was no contest that you know they said it was a punch and it was a headbutt that anyways so i'm

just grilling john in in the in the process of you know fighting this because they have john on speakerphone and i'm like i'm telling him john did you see it john did this don't he he's like texting me josh i'm on your side man but like stop yelling at me right now in front of everybody and I was giving it to him but then he we both started working for Bellator and I gotta tell you man we hit it off we hit it off and it's just one of those things we would find ourselves you know at the bar having a drink after or before the show or after the show or during the week of the fight and it was like you know eight o'clock nine o'clock and the next you know it's two in the morning it's just the week of the fight. And it was like, you know, 8 o'clock, 9 o'clock. And the next thing you know, it's 2 in the morning.

It's just the two of us. Everyone else is gone, and we're just talking about fights, man. Just talking about guys we'd like to see fight, guys that did fight, and how the fight went, and just everything. Talking about the beginning of UFC, talking about how he roughed certain fights in Japan, and just everything. And just like I said, it's nice.

I enjoy being around people that have like a walking book of knowledge so it's basically organic you guys were just doing this all the time anyway they're like fuck man we should record this yep let's do it and then you know he used to have a podcast and so his podcast had like a hundred or 150 000 subscribers and i guess he had like a something he said something on it one day and i guess dana told him hey you got to get rid of the podcast or we can't use you anymore really and? And so he just was like- What did he say? Fuck.

He fought it a little bit, and then they got back on him, and he just had to, he deleted it. Wow. Done. I'm like, dude- You got to get rid of the podcast. Fuck. Yeah.

I was like, man. And that was, yeah. So that's tough. Well, that's another argument to go to Bellator, right? Yeah. I mean, we've been doing it now. So I was at about 7,000 when I started doing it with him six months ago. And now I think we're pushing 16,000 subscribers.

It's not a lot, but. Kind of surprised Colby Covington doesn't have a podcast. Right? Yeah. How the fuck does he not have one? But if it's your stick, do you want to live that stick on air? Then all of a sudden you become Andrew Dice Clay. You know?

Or maybe he gets even more popular yeah i mean look he's fucking good at it man colby's goddamn good at it let's be real you know him in person no i do not know fucking nice guy is he smart as shit nice guy works like a demon he's i mean you don't have that kind of fucking cardio if you're lazy. I watched his one with Tommy Lauren because Tommy Lauren actually reached out to me. She wanted me to be on the show this week. And then this whole thing with the impeachment thing, she's like, I can't. You mean Candace Owens? No, I have not met her. No, but it was Tommy Lauren he did a podcast with?

I thought he did a podcast with Candace Owens. No, he did one with Tommy Lauren. Oh. Yeah, he did one with Tommy Lauren. When he talks about his whole persona, how he created his persona and everything like that. No, she was asking Tommy Lauren. I was asking about... Shit, I believe it was...

Was it Tommy Lauren? I think... Did he do more than one podcast? No, I don't know if it was a podcast. It was like on a show, like a TV. Yeah. I think she did like a 30-minute or hour-long whatever with him. But she was mainly asking About Trump

Like what do you like about him What do you support about him What do you this What do you that There wasn't a whole lot Of the persona talk going on Dude those people who love Trump They love when someone else

Loves Trump And right now I mean if he does To start a podcast This would be the time For him to do it Yeah I mean

That's kind of his shtick Right now you know No you know who else Could have a podcast Maz Vidal Maz Vidal could have a podcast Fucking every day In a fucking Versace robe Just chest out You know right now, you know? No, you know who else could have a podcast? Masvidal. Masvidal could have a podcast. He's fucking every day in a fucking Versace robe

just chest out. You know? He's got to get the gold medallion and just fucking lay back, you know? Listen, man. I could just see it.

If I was the man who made the fucking calls, I know they want to do him versus Khabib versus Conor, but Masvidal versus Conor. That's the fight. Masvidal versus Conor would be fucking giant. When they had all the fighters and they put a camera on them at the event,

when they put that camera on Masvidal, the pop from the audience was fucking bonkers. He got the biggest pop of the night. I don't doubt it. I don't doubt it at all. He's a superstar right now. What people don't realize, when he fought KJ Nunes in Strikeforce,

it was like a coming out party for him. He made KJ look like he had no idea what the fuck he was doing on the feet. I mean, if you look at the after pictures of KJ Nunes, his face was, he looked like the elephant man. He fucked him up, man. He fucked him up. And just that moment on, he just progressively got better. Sure, he had some ups and downs,

but he never turns down fights. He should have never fought Damian Maia. That's not a fight. If you're a stand-up guy with good wrestling, takedown defense, he had some ups and downs, but he never turns down fights. He should have never fought Damian Maia. That's not a fight. If you're a stand-up guy with good wrestling, takedown defense, he probably shouldn't have fought him. He should have been like, I'll wait. I don't want to fight that guy. But he didn't. He fought the guy.

Good fight. He just didn't get the win. But then he's just fucking terror, man. Just terror. He's always been good. Always. The weight cut, I think, killed him a little bit when he was trying to get down to 55 because he is a big guy. Him and Conor is the fight to make.

If I'm at home, I haven't seen enough of Conor to show that he belongs in a cage with Khabib yet. But him and Masvidal, if he starches or beats Masvidal, that would be the next fight would be Khabib and him. The real question if he wants to make it

to 55 again, it's, you know, some guys, especially when they get into their 30s, they just do better when they're not cutting

as much weight and Conor's a thick dude. Yeah. He's probably walking around a buck 85 or something like that and for him to get down to 70,

it's not that hard. For him to get down to 55 is a long, laborious process. Yeah, Dana said that he only walks around 170. Really? Yeah, Dana said that he only walks around 170. Really?

Yeah, he said by the time he fights tonight, I was watching some of the presser stuff, he's like, he'd probably be 167. I'm 195, and I stand next to Conor. He does not look 170. Yeah. He looks thick. Yeah.

He looks thick. I think he looked like he cut to make 172 when when he was when he got on a scale he was wearing you know a bunch of different layers you know it was yeah he's trying to get his body in yeah it was standard shit when someone's cutting it wasn't like a guy just shows up remember when eve used to weigh in and bring a fucking cheeseburger yeah yeah like eve didn't really cut no you know there's a lot of guys like Frankie Edgar, perfect example. Yeah.

When he was a 55 pound champ, he didn't cut shit. No, he was eating. Yeah. You know, when Frank Shamrock fought Tito Ortiz,

he weighed in with quarters in his pocket. Yeah. You know, I guess the commission said, like, you guys have to be within 10 pounds.

Wow. So Frank had to put quarters in his pocket so he could fight Tito. Otherwise, the commission wasn't going to allow it. That's funny.

So that was hilarious. No, but there's been a lot of guys that just don't feel the need to cut weight. But when they go up, a lot of times guys just have better performances. Khabib's had some serious problems making 55. Yeah, he has. I honestly believe, I don't think he will. I would like to see, the fight to me, these are my dream um i think i would like to see the fight to me these are my dream fights is i would like to see patricio and volka volkanovski or patricio and max i would love to see that fight see that fight too i would love to see gsp and khabib

that to me is the fight the biggest fight i think that that blows everything away that's a big fight that's a huge fight you know uh mazdal and con a huge fight. You know, Masvidal and Conor? Huge fight. Yes. These are fights that Lima against... How about GSP and Conor? GSP and Conor as well. Here's the thing. That fight should have been made before he lost to Khabib. I'm surprised that they didn't do that.

Yeah. I'm so surprised. Here's the other thing though. It kind of, I think, is hindering and you brought me up on this before because I had heard through a lot of people in the UFC that they were talking and negotiating trying to think about ways to bring in 165. Yes. And you have too many

tweeners. Why do we have a 15-pound gap for the 55 with all the talent that is there? Preach! Let's do it. Let's do it, man. Let's do 55, 65, 75. Yes. Move those guys to 75.

Some of those guys, like Usman, could use a little bit of that. Oh, yeah. He's so big. And then you'll have guys, like, I don't know how big Colby is, but Colby to maybe 65 or Colby to 75. He could do 75 easily. You know what I mean? He's a big guy, too.

Lima's enormous, dude. Enormous. Enormous. Yeah. What does he walk around at? Gotta be 202 to maybe 205. Yeah. He's a big guy, too. Lima's enormous, dude. Enormous. Enormous. What does he walk around at? Got to be 202, maybe 205. Yeah, he's a big fella. He's a big guy.

And no fat. None. None at all. I saw a picture. He's somewhere on an island right now, but he just looks shredded right now. I'm like, he's not even in fight camp. What is next for him? I think they're waiting to see what's going to go on.

From what I understand, they're not going to do the MVP rematch right away. MVP's going to have to fight someone of significance. Yeah, he got some shit for his last opponent, right? Yeah, but look, his last two opponents, the guy that he fought in Japan, it was a last-minute replacement because Benson Henderson got hurt. So when Ben got taken off the card against Chandler, Japan was like look, we need somebody else to step up.

We need another talented guy on there because now you're supplementing him with somebody else. Benson, we need another big name. So they brought in MVP and fought one of the Japanese guys. And he stepped up on short notice to take that fight. I tipped my hat to him. And he still made him look bad. Knocked, finished him out.

Yeah. The other, the fight, the couple fights before that. Look, these guys are asking for it. But stylistically, not stylistically, but his fight in Italy. That guy, was it Italy? No, it was London. That guy was a last minute replacement also. And that guy was 13 and 1.

Right. But he's just so awkward. His style is so difficult to deal with. You know, hands down low and that karate blitz style. Did you ever see when he fought Raymond Daniels in point fighting? No, I did not.

I saw him fight Alfie Davis. That was a good fight too. Dude, there's something to that point fighting style that really can apply to MMA if they learn all the other stuff. Because that ability to blitz, to jump in and jump out and not get hit, there's a lot of those guys league can apply to mma if they learn all the other stuff because that ability to blitz to jump in and jump out and not get hit and there's a lot of those guys that are fucking masters at

that that's my next dream fight let's see those guys fight mma yeah like you have raymond daniels and you have mvp i mean i don't know if raymond daniels is even interested in them and mma i don't know if he does any um he's fighting this weekend ray Ray Medina's fighting MMA? He's fighting MMA. Has he fought MMA before? Jamie, I'm going to call on you right now. I'm going to call on you right now, buddy. He was on ESPN for one of the best knockouts last year in history. In MMA? Yeah, he did a 920 spin, came back through with a punch

and dropped the guy. I called the fight. I didn't even know if that was MMA. That was him. I called the fight and it was in Birmingham. That 920 spinning punch, why did I think that was kickboxing no that was in he dropped him with a sidekick the guy got up he jumped spin spun like i don't know some astronomical amount of times when i see him fight my stupid brain immediately goes kickboxing yeah how many mma fights has he had i want to say he's got two he's got yeah he's got two this will

be his third so like joe schilling has decided to abandon the kickboxing aspect and move on. See, the only thing that bothers me with that is, here he is, 1-1-0 in MMA. January 25th. Oh, he's fighting in Englewood next week. Yeah, he's on our card with Cyborg. That's not even next week. That's three days. Yeah, Saturday.

Oh, beautiful. And who's he fighting? Jason King? Okay. That's not even next week. That's three days. Yeah, it's Saturday. Oh, beautiful. And who's he fighting? Jason King? Okay. That's cool. But how old is Raymond now? I want to say he's 42. 40, huh?

Oh, sorry. I let us down. He's just decided to, at this point, make it into MMA. Look, man, on the feet, good fucking luck. Good luck even getting close to that guy. He's got a weird style. He's always – sorry. Is somebody's phone going off?

I thought that was you. He's got a weird style, that point-fighting style, and then the successful transition from point-fighting to kickboxing. I mean, he was a phenomenal kickboxer. And then from kickboxing to MMA, it's very interesting. Yeah, I think when guys feel like they've hit the top at whatever they're doing and there's no there's nowhere else to go let's go wherever we can to make as much money as we can he's always had a relationship with scott coker that's the other thing a lot of what you see from the guys

like gay guard came back to coker cyborgs coming back to coker i went back you know there's a lot of guys that had fought another in strike force when they were relatively new There's a lot of guys that had fought in Strikeforce when they were relatively new. There was a lot of talk that if Kane ever left, that he was going to potentially go back to – he was going to go to Coker as well. Really? If he was able to leave, yeah. Because his first fight was in Strikeforce, and he had a relationship with them. But when Kane says his back's all fucked up, and I'm sure it is,

but then you see him do the Lucha Livre, jumps up and scissors this guy's head and does fucking flips. Like, hey, but then you see him do the Lucha Livre, jumps up and scissors this guy's head and does fucking flips. Like, hey, how are you doing that? Which is super impressive for a guy who's 245, 250, right? I swear to God, I never thought I'd see him jump that high. Well, he must have loved that shit because if he can do those moves, that means he's been working on this.

He's one of those guys that his athleticism is just overlooked all the time because of the way he looks. His physical body, his physical appearance. Yeah, exactly. But you have to admit, Fedor's probably one of the most athletic heavyweights I've seen. And the same thing with Kane. People don't underestimate him because of their body style. Yeah, it's funny. It's like show muscles versus go muscles.

But with Kane, his fucking endurance was terrifying. His endurance for a heavyweight just didn't even make sense. I don't know if there's some truth behind this, but they were talking about how guys that are normally barrel-chested, bigger lungs, but they normally have a lot more cardio. And it seemed to be like most of the guys that I had seen, they have extremely good cardio. Look at Keith Jardine.

Same thing. Remember him? And then Kane. I've seen guys with big barrel chests that have good. Think about Junior Dos Santos. Dos Santos, yeah. Look at him. He's got really good cardio for someone who that pace him and Kane fought at,

that's insane for heavyweights. Insane. If Kane didn't have that type of pace, I mean, it could have been a different fight. It would have been a different fight. But Kane's pace just was superhuman. It didn't make sense. But it's also like those guys that have that kind of pace are never one-shot knockout artists.

No. You notice that? No. Those guys, they can put that pace. That's one of the more interesting things about the sport. There's all these trade-offs. It's like you want to have that super one-shot knockout power well then you're not going to be able to do it very often you know you blow your gas out it's like having a big v8 engine you stomp on the gas it drains that tank it's true yeah like you you see

it though with um with uh like explosive guys right like connor sure doesn't It seems like in the five-round fights, he struggles a little bit. Like, in that fourth and fifth round, it's not the same pace he had in ones, two, and sometimes into three in the third round. Yeah, he comes out hot. Yeah, I mean, maybe that'll all go away if he stays at 170. But then you're fighting guys that are 205. You're fighting guys like Usman. Yeah, I mean, like, he's extremely tight, extremely good. But, I mean, like, and I'm kind of on the Brendan way.

I'm a Connor Nut rider, man. I think I like what he's done in the sport. I don't see him beating Khabib. And I've had this conversation with Brendan a lot, like ever. I don't see him beating him ever, like ever. What does Brendan think? Well, here's the thing. Brendan used to give me

this whole spiel because I was on I was on his show Below the Belt as well and we had this conversation right before the fight happened and he goes he's like

oh if he fights the way he fought against Alec Quinta and this and that and I'm like it's completely different you're trying to shoot for Khabib to shoot

on Alec Quinta who's like 5'7 you know it's a different game than shootinginta, who's like 5'7". It's a different game than shooting on somebody who's 5'11". And a really good wrestler. Yeah, and a good wrestler. Yeah. And he's got some pop in his hands.

Yeah. And he knows and he knew with the fight that he knew that Khabib was going to try to take him down. Khabib's, and people got to remember, during that week, Khabib went through five or six opponents. Remember, it was supposed to be Pettis, supposed to be somebody else. It went through all these people. Max Holloway. Max Holloway, they pulled him off the weight cut. That's right.

Yeah, I mean, it was literally the last minute. And so when all of that happens, you're not the same fighter you were when you showed up in Vegas or wherever the fight was supposed to be thinking you're going to fight this person. Exactly. And so I cut him a little slack in that fight. And then fighting someone like Eli Quinton, who's a fucking savage. That guy, he's so good his nails tough as nails

never gets the credit he deserved absolute savage and just a gamer and so when you have to shoot on someone I don't know how tall he is 5'7, 5'8

you know but it's a lot harder to get low on someone like that and get the takedown on him so when I was telling Brennan he's like

if he stands with him, he's going to get knocked out. Well, who did the dropping in that fight? You know, it was Khabib. Khabib did the dropping because when you make someone

fear your takedown that much, your natural reaction is to drop your hands real quick to try to get the underhooks. He threw that right hand like a fastball too. It was like a whip. And so what he,

and that's in all the years I've trained with him, he's just learned like what he does, he drops and dips his head and comes back over with the overhand left or the overhand right. And it finds its mark. He sees it before he throws it.

And he, most guys will just throw blindly. He dips his head, comes back up and he sees his shot and then he throws it. It's different. And the majority of the time it lands. And I've been on the other end of that shit quite a bit. Can't fucking stand it Well listen brother We just did three hours

Can you believe that? Walk in the park Time just fucking flew by Walk in the park Tell people how to get a hold of your podcast With Big John It's called Weighing In It's called Weighing In

Yeah We're on YouTube Spotify SoundCloud Google Play All the platforms We're on all the platforms And then I own a gym

And a clothing line called Knox And tell people your Instagram Yep Instagram is At The Real Punk Play all the platforms. We're on all the platforms. And then I own a gym and a clothing line called Knox. And tell people your Instagram. Yep. Instagram is attherealpunk. So therealpunk is my Instagram. Beautiful. Glad we finally did this, brother. I appreciate you.

Thank you so much, Joe. Thank you. Josh Thompson, ladies and gentlemen. Goodbye. See ya. Thank you.