The Sevan Podcast - #46 - Jordan "The Monkey King" Leavitt

Episode Date: June 9, 2021

UFC Fighter @SEVANMATOSSIAN @BRIANFRIENDCROSSFIT @MONKEYKING_UFC The Sevan Podcast is sponsored by http://www.barbelljobs.com Follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/therealsevanpodcast/ Sevan's Stuff: https://www.instagram.com/sevanmatossian/?hl=en https://app.sugarwod.com/marketplace/3-playing-brothers Support the show Partners: https://cahormones.com/ - CODE "SEVAN" FOR FREE CONSULTATION https://www.paperstcoffee.com/ - THE COFFEE I DRINK! https://asrx.com/collections/the-real... - OUR TSHIRTS ... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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What's this jacket? I was and my and this was hanging on my chair i'm starting to no no no i'll take it off you mean because of the collar i'm just messing with you oh i'm not allowed to mess with you yeah you're allowed to mess with me every show you're a good dude you're you have a you have a drier delivery than me even. When I talk to you, I probably am getting a lesson in how people feel about talking with me. Because people are always like, I can't tell if he's serious or not. The truth is, I can't tell if I'm serious or not. I sometimes make jokes during deliveries at the gym, and I think that they fall flat on like 90%.

Yeah, you have a very, very, very, very, very, very, very. Is there something less than dry? Bitter. If you were a food, you'd be one of those foods, Brian, that takes the saliva out of people's mouth. You know what I mean? Oh, wow. That's awful. No, it's cool.

I think it's actually awesome. Because it leaves people with kind of their own shit. I mean, I don't do it on purpose, and you probably don't do it on purpose, but you're probably aware that you're very difficult to read. Sometimes that's good. Are you surprised sometimes the second you come on, I start recording, and other times... I guess I normally do that. We don't really talk much before the show, right? No, no. I'm never...

And then we talk a little bit after we get off a show. I'm usually so freaking excited I call you, and we have a little debrief. Yep. I tell you how great I did. Yeah, did yeah usually peeing while you call me that's true that's true how many people are you friends with who pee while they're calling you how do you want am i am i i'm the only one it's the only one who's not afraid to hide it um it's yeah it's funny i when i was making the movie pulling john the preeminent movie on professional arm wrestling there was an arm wrestler who i spoke with a lot named travis bajan he's one of the stars of the documentary and um i was probably i think it was

in my late 20s early 30s when i made that, when I would speak to him on the phone, he would pee. And he kind of like broke that. It would make me feel uncomfortable at first. But then he kind of broke me of that because we would talk for long periods of time. And he would pee during the conversation. And I was just like, okay, I guess that's, you know, I, I always just, no one ever taught me, but I thought the etiquette was not to pee or you're right to hide it. Right. Hit mute on the phone and pee when you're talking to someone. He kind of broke me of that.

And then there's like two or three other people in my life now that pee when I'm on the phone, will pee on with, I'm on the phone with them when I'm on the phone with him too. All dudes. I don't know if I've ever been on the phone with a woman besides my wife. But I guess being a boy. Do you think Jordan got the – do I send out the link to the podcast too late, like five or ten minutes before? Because I feel like if I send it out earlier, they'll get on too early. You're pretty prompt. You're always 10 minutes before, which is exactly what you, you know, some guests show

up right away. Others right on. And some never at all. Has someone ever not shown up? Yeah. That's how we did our first games episode. Remember it was, it was Andre. He had the, he had like. Oh, that's how we did our first games episode. Remember, it was Andre. He had like...

Oh, that's right, because we're in a different time zone. Oh, incredible. James got the time zone wrong last night at first. Because, yeah, yeah. He was not in the... He's just recently moved, so he was... Oh, that's right. That's fascinating.

And, yeah, that's fascinating. Hold on. Someone's calling me. I'm doing a podcast. I have a friend who you know. I won't say his name. Who either I call him or he calls me every single morning. Do you have any friends like that? How can you tell? Or he calls me every single morning. Do you have any friends like that? Oh. How can you tell?

There he is. As soon as he got to seven, my baby started crying. That happens. Good morning, Jordan. Good morning. good morning jordan good morning um yeah you have a you have a new baby i have three little boys at home that's why we do the podcast i prefer to do the podcast 7 a.m pacific standard time because that way my boys will still be asleep and then i know i'm doing a podcast so i could keep them up a little bit late the night

before in case so hopefully they won't come running out here during the middle of the podcast jordan that's brian the guy with the uh beard that's not gray and the guy with the gray beard is me seven like the number seven but seven well nice to see you guys good morning jordan you popped on my radar because i am a guy who does not watch any tv but i religiously watch the ufc so i guess i do watch tv i live for saturdays i think watching human fighting is barbaric and um it's as bad as um sugar, which I despise. And yet it is something I cannot stop watching. The director of the CrossFit Games, Dave Castro, introduced me to boxing about five years ago. I started getting into boxing. I quickly pivoted over to MMA. I watch both religiously and I'm about as diehard of a UFC fan as a probably a B-level fan can be. By that, I mean I watch all the fights.

I turn on the TV when the early prelims start, but I don't do any message boards. I don't do like – you know what I mean? I don't – I'm a huge fan of the guys who are usually in the top five, right? I'm really excited. I buy all the pay-per-views, but I watch everything. I invite people over to my house, even when my wife doesn't want people over the house, because I want to just watch fights with people. And I saw your fight with Matt Weinman.

Am I saying his name right? Yeah. And I was completely blown away. Not just because of the knockout. But because of how meticulous, smart, well thought out. Like a chess player it was. And then I went to your Instagram account. And I saw this post.

And it says, please be as weird as me. Please be as weird as me. Please be as weird as me. Me every time I meet. And I was like, for some reason, that really, really resonated with me. I'm a different kind of odd duck than you, but I'm definitely an odd duck. And Brian and I both have our backgrounds in CrossFit. I don't know if you're too familiar with CrossFit,

but I started working there when there were 300 gyms. I stayed there for 15 years. I left as an executive of the company. And I thought of this today. We're sitting on the toilet this morning, and this is a pretty bold statement to say, but I would say between Brian and I, there's no two people who know more about CrossFit, inside, outside, the sport and fitness, anywhere, who come together anywhere in the world.

And I feel comfortable saying that without even thinking I'm bragging. So that's our background. bragging. So that's our background. And I guess my attraction to fighting is that I wish maybe I was good at it, but it also shows two human beings doing something that's really, I don't have a word for it, but kind of at the very, very edge of a certain kind of kind of at the very, very edge of a certain kind of discipline, mindset. I mean, you're really, really vulnerable. I mean, it's the – and then to do it on TV on the biggest platform in the world is just fascinating to me. In CrossFit, there's – go ahead. Sorry.

Yeah, it's all very primal. That's one thing that kind of um attracted me to it it's because i love to compete but also i hated rules and i hated when i wrestled i got all these unnecessary roughness calls and unfortunate my conduct so i really liked how free and um primal it was so i understand the appeal and in crossfit no one's in crossfit we have a lot it's it's a cross is kind of a place where professional athletes go to die it's for people who like you were you were just weren't good enough to make the professional soccer team or the

the nfl or you weren't tough enough to be in the ufc but you have this incredible physical ability and so you need a place to express it so you the best guys in the world usually end up you know that they'll come over to crossfit and they'll do very very well and there was a guy named chris spieler who was uh i think he was a d1 wrestler and he said what he liked so much more about crossfit than wrestling combat sports was is that no one's trying to stop you from what you're doing right it's just you just you out there. And it's like, it's like track and field, right? Just run. And then you're, that's the only thing going on. There's just a guy trying to stop you the entire time from implementing your will on them. Yeah. On a bad night, I suppose. Yeah. Like it's so like, it's all very different. Like when when you're in fight shape, it's very different than being in regular shape.

Because you could be in the best shape ever. I've, like, rolled with many marathon runners, even ultra runners. And then after five minutes of rolling, they're exhausted. Because they're just not used to having their will kind of be pushed back and held at bay. And it's just, it's the craziest thing in the world. I still can't really describe it is that what was so impressive impressive about logan paul's performance the other night the fact that he could go into the ring and last eight rounds just his conditioning and the

adrenaline and yeah i think it just goes to show that um the number one quality you can have like in any type of fighting or combat sport is gameness like it's scary with like even at the gym if you're sparring somebody who's a beginner but they're completely game it's way scarier way more dangerous for you than if you're fighting someone who's very experienced but they're not in it you know they're not trying to fight today they don't't want to spar hard, but there's been plenty of guys. It's like, oh, it's my first week training. I'm going to be easy on me. I'm like, okay. And then they're trying to kill you, and you

have no idea what's happening. So I think it just goes to show, yeah, Logan Paul did really good this weekend. And sometimes just being game and being willing to go out there is the number one quality you need. Where were you born? Oh, born and raised in Las Vegas.

And you're 25 years old? Just turned 26 last week. Tell me, where in Las Vegas? Right now I live in Spring Valley Valley but I grew up in Green Valley and what was your upbringing like we born were you born and went to public school had sleepovers with friends all the um I'd say uh so I had like really normal upbringing my mom on her own uh I had two sisters and my mom adopted my older cousin when I was about 10. I went to public school up until fifth grade and private school for middle school. American Heritage

Academy, where I think kind of put me ahead in life. And then I went to public school and hated it. But then discovered wrestling and then I kind of got funneled into combat sports, and I'm still there. Went to college at UNLV and have nine credits left, so maybe one day I'll take the part-time semester and get that degree. But yeah, that's my life in SparkNotes version. Tell me, and you're a voracious reader, i as i reach as i researched you it's interesting so many of the ufc fighters during the lockdowns or the quarantines or the weeks before the fight when they're locked down they're either playing video games or well a lot of them seem to be playing video games or they have other guys in their room that they're just i'm shooting the shit with but

in all the interviews i've seen with you you have you're you're juggling books you're reading two books at the same time and when did you were you always into sports when did you get into when did you realize you wanted to move and do sports um i think my sophomore year of high school my freshman year of high school i quit wrestling because i never did anything athletic besides lightsaber fights with my friends when I was younger and wrestling was freaking hard man like I was thinking like Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock I thought it would be a lot more fun and then I just I couldn't I didn't make the cut so then I quit the team turn on The Ultimate Fighter not too long after and I kind of was like okay next year I'll have to start to do that wrestling thing again.

I had to start lifting some weights, get a little stronger. Stop being a skinny little effeminate vegetarian boy. And it kind of all came up from there. Were you a vegetarian in your freshman year? Yeah, I was a vegetarian from fifth grade until midway through my freshman how does the fifth how does a fifth grader get introduced to being a vegetarian um my mom's best friend at the time but now now he's my stepfather so um he was a vegetarian and he just said because i love animals i love I love animals, too. And then like,

it was really on a whim. Like, I'm not gonna lie. I was kind of just like, I'm being a vegetarian. And my mom's like, Okay, sure, it'll blow over. And then four years later, I'm like, I think I'm gonna stop being a vegetarian. And then it kind of just I stopped. But yeah, I can't honestly say there was any deep rooted beliefs at the time. It was just kind of something I said I was going to do, and I did it. That's the exact reason I was a vegetarian and a vegan. Not for long, maybe one or two years in college. The exact same reason. I just thought, hey, why should animals have to die for my existence?

And then I started eating meat again. And then somewhere in my 30s, I forced myself to go to that. I think it's the PETA website. They're the people who are like pretty vigilant about saving animals. And I watched their, um, it was like a 20 minute video on how animals are harvested. And then that made, I watched that and it took me, I must've started crying like three or four times during the video. Probably took me an hour to get through a 20 minute video. And then I was vegan again for like two weeks. And then once that wore off, I forgot about how bad animals are treated. I've, I've been eating animals ever since.

So you, you say wrestling practice was hard. You mean wrestling was hard. You mean basically the training, not, not so much the matches, but just the training. Yes. The training was, I just never had to grind before. I never had to do something when I wasn't in the mood or wasn't comfortable. And wrestling is all about being uncomfortable. And I think it was kind of disheartening when a lot of the people on the team had been doing it since they were a kid. Or they were just stronger or they came in from football and they had some athletic base. But I had nothing your your record going into your fight this weekend was eight no um you met a guy

who comes from peru i'm trying to think of his name i don't remember his name name claudio play is yeah and i i was obviously super you were actually the first ufc fighter it kind of takes my fandom to the next level you were sort of the first unknown ufc fighter that i ever became a like oh i'm getting on i'm getting on the bandwagon here. And I watched football in high school. I wasn't really a football fan. I was just a Raider fan. I watched all the Raider games. And the same with basketball. I wasn't really a basketball fan, but I made sure I watched all the Laker games.

And so you're the first person I'm ever like, okay, I'm going to watch this guy's career from the beginning. Well, thank you. Yeah. I get a lot of people that message me that. It feels pretty good. Yeah. I think it's more than just your performance. I think it's people like people who appear to be comfortable with who they are and people who want to break the mold.

Are you comfortable with who you are? Oh, yeah. I think towards the end of high school, I kind of got over my social anxiety about caring what people thought about me. And I kind of found that courage to be disliked by other people. And I really liked coming out of my shell. And I like who I see in the mirror. And I've never really thought about going back.

So a lot of people, I used to be really bad at first impressions because I never knew exactly what to say. And I would make a joke and it wouldn't land. And then I would kind of spiral out of control. And then that person's not my friend. And I'm super embarrassed about it. And I'm dwelling on it for years. I look back on it. And now I don't do that.

about it and I'm dwelling on it for years. I look back on it and now I don't do that. I really just recognize that even if I was totally cool, very relatable, all these things, there'd be some people who would just hate me and I just had to have the courage to deal with that and that's just how I am now. I now i just don't care i mean i do care i love it when people love me but if you don't love me it's it's not my fault used i'm not a religious guy but i always use what i sort of went through a phase like that too and um the two people i'd always look at would be like bob marley and jesus i'd be like well damn there were people who didn't like bob marley and people who didn't like Jesus. What's not to like about these guys? I mean, they're just spreading the love, you know, so I was just like, all right.

Well, if they can't win everyone over, no one, no one's winning everyone over. You say, you mentioned earlier that in wrestling, I think it was in wrestling that, I don't know if you got in trouble, but people would talk about your antics. I don't know if you got in trouble, but people would talk about your antics. That kind of shocks me that you would have antics because after your fight with, with Weinman, it looked like you were going to cry. Like you weren't, um, not cry out of excitement, but you look like you were going to cry because you were concerned you may have hurt someone. Yeah. That's why they actually went to commercial break. Cause I started crying and then my corner. So, so you know Matt Wyman's body for lack of a better term was like behind me and you just see me bawling and my corners all hugging

me and covering me and I just I have never knocked anybody out before and then when he wasn't waking up I started to panic I'm a bad person you know I should have not i should have i should have done this fighting thing this is what happens when i you know i let loose and oh gosh that was it was traumatic it was pretty it was a traumatic experience for me and i feel kind of lame i felt kind of lame saying that at first but um yeah and then in wrestling so it's funny like when i fight now i'm all very flowy. But in wrestling, I was definitely more of a wrecking ball type of person. I always had, like, black eyes and cuts on my forehead from grinding into people. And I wore a SpongeBob ski mask and a trench coat for my warm-ups.

Awesome. I would kind of just bounce around in that and kind of get in people's heads. And a lot of refs didn't like me, so I a lot of negative points it was kind of fun it became like a badge of honor i got booed at state that was cool yeah wow it seems like it would be a normal reaction to um to panic if you knock someone out it would i mean to me it would seem like a normal reaction to cry and be like, oh shit. I mean, there shouldn't be something inside of you that wants to hurt other people. Yeah, I agree. Like the whole, I was seeing red, you know, I keep hitting until the ref pulls me off. That's never resonated with me because I don't really see red. I don't hate my opponent. And you could tell when someone's done for the most part

i mean sometimes people wake up and i guess you might have to hit him again but as soon as i as soon as i felt him hit the ground i was like i'm not hitting him anymore and luckily i didn't because chris hyoni was like on the other side of the ring like he was like 15 feet away and i was like chris what the hell man i walked i walked across the ring slowly, and he's still that far away. But he's my boy. He's a good guy. But, yeah, I don't understand the whole I see red. I don't know what's happening.

I'm like, I understood what was happening. There was a video I watched last night. It's a 25-minute video. It's a short documentary on you, and it it's a build-up to one of your fights i wish i could remember which one and you fight the guy and you're extremely you're very aggressive in it you do when you have them on the ground you're slapping them in the head when you when you're on on side control you're punching them and then you put them in an arm bar and besides the arm bar that i saw um olivera put um ferguson ferguson in i'd never seen an arm bar that uh i'd never seen anyone's arm bend that way besides that fight it were you concerned when you

had that that guy in that arm bar that oh oh yeah for sure like if you watch my face i'm kind of grimacing and looking away from it. And I was like, please don't make me break your arm. Like, I didn't want to be doing that. But it was, like, bending all crazy. And it didn't even pop. That's the weird thing. Like, he was fine.

He bought me dinner after that. We, like, hung out. He, like, got a private lesson from me. Like, he was totally fine. And I was just like, oh, my gosh, I'm breaking his arm. And, yeah, he was totally fine and i was just like oh my gosh i'm breaking his arm and yeah he was stubborn yeah that was intense it looked like it looked like his shoulder you'd bent his straighten his elbow out so much that it looked like it was bending the wrong way that an elbow is not supposed to go and then i was look i'm watching it and i kind of had to look

away too and i remember um daniel cormier was looking away when Oliveira did that to Ferguson. Because something in your brain doesn't want to watch someone's arm go the wrong direction, right? But to compare that fight to your most recent fight, did you rewatch your most recent fight yet? I know it was just on... Oh yeah, about a dozen times now. And did you watch it with the commenters talking? Oh yeah, it hurt my feelings. I mean, they weren't talking about me, they were talking about you.

I didn't hear anything that they said that was mean. But they talked about how you were controlling the pace and about how you were moving slower to control the pace. They weren't referencing you as a slow fighter. They were just saying you were purposely doing that. But it was so different than the fight I watched last night in your younger years because this guy that you fought on Saturday, this last Saturday, when you had him in positions maybe to punch him or hit him or slap him in the ear, you weren't doing that. You looked like you were singly committed to the wrestling. Whereas in this other fight that I watched from, I think it was 2015, you were doing both. You were trying to soften the guy up. Am I seeing that right?

What was going on in Sunday's fight, in Saturday's fight? Am I seeing that right? What was going on in Sunday's fight and Saturday's fight? I think I was trying to skip to the end of the fight as opposed to just fighting. I think I took for granted that I was going to submit them. So I was like, OK, I'll submit them eventually. And I kind of I was focusing on the end result as opposed to just seeing things and making things happen like I usually do. And yeah, I've had off nights before. It's never mattered.

But I guess Saturday, a lot of people were telling me it looked like one of my off nights. And that's how it is sometimes. But he was a better fighter that afternoon. And I'm hoping to get that one back. It's going to bug me for a long time. And I think it's how it's supposed to be. Why were your feelings hurt when you're listening to commentators um just like he has no urgency he needs to do this and it's just like

i don't know in the moment i definitely had urgency sometimes i just feel like i mean sometimes your body doesn't like do what you're telling it to do. So I wasn't tired, and I felt comfortable on the feet. I actually outstruck him, so that was a surprise for me. It was the first fight where I watched, and I was like, I should have stayed on the feet. And it was kind of actually a cool experience, because during the fight, his corner yells, take him down, it's too dangerous. And that was the coolest moment of my fight career.

I was like, okay, they're scared of the stand-up. Then he took me down and it wasn't nice anymore. But, um, I felt good about the fight afterwards. Even though I lost, I wasn't hurt at all. That's always nice. It was a boring

fight, so, I mean, everyone will forget about it in a few weeks. And, you know, he's a good kid. I like Claudio. He's very polite, very respectful. And, yeah, I hope. You seem to have a high degree of awareness just from listening to you when you're fighting.

A lot of the athletes in our sport often are competitors. i didn't know what was going on in the crowd i was you have you have the ability to like be aware of the referee the opponent their coaches your coach the crowd all that while you're in there doing your thing yeah i i don't i can't maybe like it's the add like my when i was younger I can never just focus on one thing like even when there's a crowd like I'll hear people laughing in the crowd I'll hear my mom yelling I could hear my coach and my like I've I've listened to my opponent's corners in several of my fights like take your feet off the cage and I like do it like dang it I was using that kind of thing um yeah I definitely i i feel like i really experienced

the entire fight but also like in the third person like sometimes like you know when you play like i don't play a lot of video games but you could like switch from first person to third person i feel like i'm constantly toggling between those during my fight like i can kind of see myself fight if that makes sense yeah that's amazing that makes total sense do you remember the first fight you ever got in did you ever get in a fight outside of the cage luckily no but i it wasn't for lack of trying it was for i was very lucky to have good friends who always stopped me from getting in fights um i almost was in like three or four fights but they never they never they were cold wars never went hot and this was in high school yes high school was

angsty for me and so you so you so you're wrestling at 50 you do dabble in wrestling then you get out of wrestling and then you see what did you say the contender series or no you saw the ultimate fighter ultimate fighter and it what's your next step after that do you go back to high school wrestling or do you find a local gym um i found a local gym that summer i bought a my mom got me a heavy bag for christmas and i was just swinging haymakers on it i had no form. And then I really liked Muay Thai when I first started. I didn't like grappling as much. I liked hitting people. It's very easy for a beginner to conceptualize that you're winning like Muay Thai or boxing. So I really stuck to that at first. And then I went to a class with my first teacher, Lesney Sanchez, and one of his students, Will, knocked me out.

And then I stopped going to boxing for a lot of time, and I just focused on grappling. And now Will trains with me, and it's gone full circle. It's gone full circle. And so the first fight you were ever in was in the ring? Yes. It was terrifying. And so the first fight you were ever in was in the ring? Yes. It was terrifying. I think that's the only fight where I went blank.

The first 15 seconds, if you notice me in my first amateur fight, I'm kind of just getting pushed against a cage and not doing anything. I was having so much nerves. I remember just waking up and he needed me in the stomach. I'm like, okay, I know what to do now. But the first 15 seconds, I have no recollection of what I was thinking, what happened. Definitely was in shock. And as you approach the, I mean, it's kind of amazing.

It's your first fight. It's your first fight. You get in there. You've never been, I mean, I guess you said you were knocked out in training before. Is training just significantly different than the real thing? I mean, does training, how does training relate to the real thing? On most fighters, I think we'll say it's different, but I don't know. It's the same to me, but also I have trained partners who've been trying to like kill me for years because they know my ground game is good.

So when they're on the feet, they try to get their licks in. They're trying to get me back. So maybe I have bad training partners. Maybe they're very good. I guess it depends on what your viewpoint is. But for me, it's all the same. I trained with this kid, Sherard Blackledge. He is way faster than anybody I've fought, and he hits way harder than anybody I've fought.

So when I go out there, it's kind of like slow motion, if I'm being honest. I've never felt scared in any of my fights. And correct me if I'm wrong. Like I said, I'm just a hardcore fan. I'm not a fight expert. But you seem to have this move, and I saw one other guy rely on it a lot too, where it's a kick and then a takedown. Kick and then a takedown. Is that from the Muay Thai? Is that those two things coming together, your wrestling and your Muay Thai? Yeah, and it's weird because I don't train like that actually. I'm a lot more flat-footed when I train maybe because like the gym like you're sore all the time but I definitely um do a lot

more dirty boxing and I rely on my hands a lot more but when I fight I always think kicks kicks and takedowns I'm like okay I'll kick him so he blocks and I'll take him down so he can't counter the kicks and it all kind of usually works and especially this past weekend i i actually was pretty happy at a benchmark i reached because i was relying on my hands more i was throwing my jab and walking them down so that's one positive to take why why would you why would you want i mean it's super effective. You do it amazingly. I can't remember the guy's name, but the other guy I saw did it amazing too. But why would you want to create distance before you shoot in for a takedown?

Why does that work so well? Why does your takedown work so well when you start with a kick? My takedown works so well because I'm reactive with it. So, like, a lot of people, they punch, they move forward, and, like, subconsciously, even if someone's not trained, if you're throwing forward, they're going to back up. And you never shoot when someone backs up because then you reach and you get kneed, you get uppercutted. So I throw from so far away that, like like by the time you're thinking back up i'm

already on your leg and i shoot from a awkward distance because a lot of fighters um we react by touch so you feel someone get past your hand it makes you think and bring your legs back but um i shoot and i'm instantly like on your ankle or your leg i never try to touch your upper body so that way you're not like reacting by like instinct or muscle memory i try to always take muscle memory out of it i try to like shoot from an awkward distance instantly get contact and then kind of just grapple from there what did your mom think when you what did your parents think when you got into um and your friends and your siblings when you started uh when you got when you watched the um

ultimate fight ultimate fighter series and you started getting into sort of more combat sports were they were they proud of you were they concerned my my mom was definitely concerned my mom did not she said you don't know how to fight what are you going to do pin them was what she said when i scheduled my first fight your first fight was scheduled and your mom said you don't know how to fight yeah that's awesome you've never been in a fight and i'm like mom it's not it's not the same and so she was kind of like i don't know if this is a good thing my family they're all like professional like lawyers or surgeons um my family's hyper educated so they thought it was

kind of like a silly pastime i did that well i did while i was going to school and so it wasn't until my ufc debut my u my UFC, my contender series fight, that everyone was kind of like, oh, you want to do this? My mom had known at that point, but everybody else was kind of just like assumed that I was just fighting for fun. And I'm like, if I was fighting for fun, I would not have gone pro and gone elbowed and I wouldn't have cut weight. But they learned eventually. How many amateur fights did you have? Just four, because I planned on only being an amateur for a year,

but I had my three fights, and then I blew out my knee. And I was like, okay, I got to. I'm still within a year. So five months after my surgery, I had my last amateur fight. And then I won an amateur belt and then I stopped. And then I won pro. Wow. And that's a very short amateur career, isn't it? Yes. I was amateur for 13 months with five and a half of them off.

Just to put that in perspective for those of you who don't watch fighting there's fighters who come into the ufc who will have 75 pro fights 70 pro fights and like kickboxing i'm trying to think who i watched yesterday uh the guy who fought um rosenstruck he had he had had 70 fights in kickboxing with 64 knockouts. I mean, so you're getting in there with real killers who have not only a ton of amateur experience, but a ton of professional experience. Or you could even look at boxing, and I think it was Lomachenko's had hundreds of amateur fights. How did you know that you were ready to go pro, or did you not until you got the call? How did you know that you were ready to go pro, or did you not until you got the call? Well, when I was 17, 16, when I was 15, I made the fight team at Tap Out before Tap Out was shut down.

And they didn't know I was 15, so as soon as I made it, they're like, oh, that's okay. So I guess you can't fight. And I've just been competing in, like, sparring pros, you know, for 11 years now. And I had this thing where if I didn't know how good you were, like, I would tool you. And then the moment I figured out you were good, like, I couldn't spar you anymore. I was like, oh, my gosh, he's too good for me. And then I kind of just learned to view fighters as like, well, fighters are the most undisciplined athletes usually. They don't like to learn.

They don't like to be uncomfortable. Most people don't, but especially in fighting, because the consequences are so painful. So I was like, as long as I have a good relationship with pain and I don't mind losing and I don't have an ego, I know I can beat these guys, even if they're better than me or they have a more experienced than me with the right tactics, I could figure out a way to beat them. And I'm not sure if I ever, I didn't really think i was ready to be honest until i got my contender series call i always had that doubt in my head like i mean i beat okay i beat good guys

but maybe i'm not good like i think i just had the right tactics it took me a long time to actually see myself as a fighter to see myself as like a like a fighter of a high caliber and yeah are you disciplined yes i'm very disciplined um i mean except for social media yeah i don't i think i do pretty good on everything else what do you mean except for social media you mean you just like you'll too much time on it or something? Oh, yeah. Like, even though I read so much, like, I feel like I waste so much damn time on my phone. And, you know, I put the timers on my phone so it kicks me off.

And then half the time my phone forgets and I don't correct it. I'm like, okay, well, it's a sign. I can stay on today. And I just, I waste so much time. What's your poison? Which platform? Are you Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, all of them? Oh, I'm an Instagram person. Facebook's evil.

I guess Facebook owns Instagram. But Twitter, people are mean and catty on Twitter, so I stay off of that. Facebook, I think I have so many friends that it makes Facebook not intimate like it's supposed to be. So I have to delete a few hundred friends for me to go back on Facebook. And then politics on Facebook. As a poli-sci major, it makes me want to pull my hair out. And Instagram is just very simple. I like the picture. I read your bio if i want i figured out

my workouts and my yoga routines and everything off of instagram i i figured out what boxing drills i'm gonna do off of instagram instagram is very helpful what what about what do you mean the politics of facebook that you don't like them just the way the world's going right now i mean so i mean i I don't mind contention. I love some good political contention. Like, I switched my major to political science during 2016 because I thought it was the best time ever. So it's not just the contention that bugs me.

I kind of actually enjoy that part. I just hate the whole, I have a meme. I'm going to plant that. That's my argument. Meme. 18 words. And then when you try to debate them, another meme. Here's a meme. I'm going to plant that. That's my argument. Meme. 18 words. And then when you try to debate them, another meme. Here's another meme.

And I'm like, debate me. You know, use your brain. Like, we don't have to agree. But as long as, like, you have some type of logic, I'm cool with it. Like, if your beliefs are founded in at least some thought that's more than just reading a meme, I could respect that. I have friends that are communists, even though I think communism is the dumbest thing in the world. I have friends that are libertarian, liberal, republican. As long as you give me a reason. It can even be a dumb reason. I like it that way. I'm

fine with that. But I hate the whole this meme that's it that's my argument it bugs me i i have communist friends too it's funny you say that but none of my friends know that they're a communist do your do your friends know they're communist oh my gosh of course not okay good isn't. Isn't that amazing? Sorry, go on. Yeah, like only my friends who are probably sci majors, and like they've told me, I'm a communist, and you should read Das Kapital. And I did, because I really wanted to understand it.

I'm like, okay, I've taught you so much. You can't be stupid. Give it a read. And then a few hundred hours later, after all this literature, I'm like, some things you have to be, you have to be so smart to believe something so stupid. Like you have to be smart enough to trick your brain

into going through all these hoops to believe something to get to that point. And, you know, and maybe I just haven't read the right conceptualization of communism or I just haven't, it right conceptualization of communism or I just haven't. It hasn't been explained to me correctly, but it all seems like voodoo nonsense to me. So I think the big problem is, is that people don't understand how the mechanism of the brain works. they, I made this post on Instagram and I, and I, and I did sort of a, a Bigfoot analogy or simile.

They think they don't realize, and this is one of the mechanisms of the brain that keeping Bigfoot, if you say Bigfoot doesn't exist, or if you say Bigfoot does exist either way, it's telling the brain that you're keeping the idea of Bigfoot alive. I don't know if that makes sense. It's a little out of context. Yeah. And so some people think that they're by saying Bigfoot doesn't exist, Bigfoot doesn't exist, Bigfoot doesn't exist. They don't understand that what they're doing is they're keeping this idea of Bigfoot alive in society. And they think what they're doing is they're trying to get rid of the idea when really they're just fueling the fire by even talking about Bigfoot. Not even just talking about it, but giving it.

And so I think there's a lot of people there who have good intentions, but they don't realize that they're keeping the bad shit alive by trying to be against it. It's kind of Taoist in nature. If you stand up against something bad, it's like standing up against a wave. It will get bigger. Or like when you build a wall in front of a home to protect it, a seawall, everything else around that seawall just erodes. It's proven the rest of the wall just erodes. Anyway, that was a little out of context. I apologize. But I, but it would be fascinating to talk to you about that on some other podcasts.

I'd like to dig into some other stuff. So why get married? You clearly want to be a professional athlete. It seems like it's more than a full-time job. It requires 100% discipline, 100% focus, 100% commitment. And you get married. And not only do you get married, but you have a kid. So you bring two other people into something that is already, if you want to be at your level, should be completely consuming.

So let's start. How did you meet your wife? She must be amazing for you to bring her into the fold. Oh no, my wife, my wife is amazing. I dated a bunch of less than stellar women, but, um, I met my wife on a dating app called mutual, which it's like Tinder for Mormons, um, and stuff. And stuff and you know i'm all swiping and everything and and then we you know she lived like live in e from utah so it's like about six hours away from where i'm at and so she messaged me first like hey and i'm like okay i'm game hey and you know we start talking and the next day i'm like i like this chick I'll do a I'll do a six hour trip for a date whatever

so I'm all trying to be like cool and like slime so I'm thinking about driving up to Ephraim to see a girl like should I do it and she's like we can meet and we can make I'm thinking about going to St. George to meet this guy halfway. I'm like, oh, okay, this is getting pretty good. And then I was like, how long will we get to hang out in St. George? And she's like, oh, a day. And I'm like, a day's not long enough in my head. So I'm like, how about I just come to Ephraim and I'll get a hotel and I stay there for like a week. And we like talk and go on a few dates.

And then she like one-ups me. She's like, how about you stay at my sister's house? And I'm like, whoa, okay, so this is all kind of snowball. We both kept calling each other's bluff, you know, and I'm like, OK, now I got to meet this girl. And then my mom, who's usually super overbearing helicopter mom, I tell her the situation. I'm like, I'm going to I'm going on a date with a girl in Ephraim. I'll be back like in a week. And she just says, don't get taken. And then I left. This episode is brought to you by PC Optimum. If you like a curated playlist, why not try a curated grocery list? With Swap and Save,

the new feature in the PC Optimum app, you'll get PC Optimum's best price for your grocery items. Simply add products to your shopping list in the app app and it'll show you similar items at a lower cost. Add coffee to your list, then swap it for one that's cheaper. Craving chips? The app will suggest some on sale. To get started, just open the app. It's as easy as that. See the PC Optimum app for details. And, you know, so I spent like five days with her and I'm really feeling it and i get all these mixed signals like i i didn't think she liked me i'm like okay i am striking out hard like this is embarrassing i'm here for a week and she doesn't like me i dropped the love word like on day four and she was like obviously i don't feel the same. And I was like, I got to get out of here.

This is like the hardest, this is the most embarrassed I've ever been. And then after some time and then, you know, our relationship starts to grow and everything. And we do the long distance thing. And then I proposed to her. I think we were dating for three and a half months when I proposed to her. And we got married two months after that. And yeah, baby, everything. Is there going back to this dating app mutual? Tinder's way past. I don't understand. I don't do any of the dating apps. I'm 49. So they came after I was in the game. But is maybe it sounds weird that you went up there for a week because we don't understand the fact that it's a dating app called Mutual. It's all Mormons.

So is there already kind of like a built-in trust or acceptance there that you wouldn't find on Tinder? Is it not sound as strange as it really might be because you're already kind of in the same club? You know, okay, we both have the same faith. We both go to the same church. We're not like serial killers. Yeah, for sure. There's like an unspoken social contract and expectations, and that made me a lot more comfortable.

Tinder was terrifying when I was on it for a few weeks. I was like, okay, I need more vanilla, need something more my speed. And mutual is also horrible. But she was my first dating app date, the first person I met off of it. So I have 100% accuracy on it. I have nothing but good things to say for my experience. But, you know, nothing but good things to say for my experience. But, yeah, even if all those things put into the equation, I look back on it and I was like, I was very brave during that trip because I have never put that much effort into any um not that I never put any effort into a relationship but like I never put that much risk into one before did you stay with her sister

yes wow yes wow and so we're on you know I'm like on this trip and I think I'm striking out and her sister's like she really likes you don't worry about, I'm like on this trip and I think I'm striking out. And her sister's like, she really likes you. Don't worry about it. And I'm like, well, someone tell her because I don't know if she likes me. Somebody tell her. You know, so I'm like hanging out watching movies with like her nieces when we're not together. And she's like going to school and working. And I just like hung out with the family.

When I got home the next day, I was like Face, FaceTiming her parents to, like, meet them. It was, like, a fast track. Yeah, it's a crash course. Were they vetting you? Is that what was going on? Oh, yes. I was getting vetted. And I knew it.

So I was, like, oh, I had all this anxiety. And, like, it was all going so well that I was suspicious. I was, like, something's going up i am gonna get taken or this isn't working out like there's no way oh my god's obviously like he's he's he's about to test me but i'll pull the rug out from underneath me and he did it and it was you know pretty nice at what point in the in what point in the courting or did the fighting come up oh so it's funny because on my mutual bio like i was like it's like me it was like nerd bookworm undefeated i'm an undefeated pro fighter okay and i have like a picture of me a big smile like one of my belts from amateur and like me wearing like

a shirt, like the same dress shirt and all of them a different outfit. And she said actually she almost didn't, she almost said no because she didn't know what MMA was, she didn't want to date a jock. But then in my, under my bio I had this joke and it's like, I have a thousand combinations with this shirt. And she's like, so I swiped because I thought you were funny. And she didn't know how serious the fighting was until we met. But one thing that definitely piqued my interest was every time I told anybody I was dating or on a date with about the fighting thing, they're like, but how serious is it? What do you plan to do with it?

But what Ashley, my wife, said, she was basically like, how could I help you with this? How do I fit into this? And the way she approached it just was unique, especially in a conservative religious group. People often think about stability, and a lot of the time that a lot of chaos potential chaos in your future could be a negative but she she didn't treat it like anything other than like another job like an internship if you will and

she really put a lot of faith in me and it paid off pretty soon into our marriage. So even though she took a gamble, I think it worked out pretty good. And I'm thankful. The pro athletes that Brian and I know, all the super successful ones, it seems like that's a common denominator in the relationship. The husband or the wife, and we know both, it goes both ways, are extremely supportive, like crazy, crazy supportive, at least on the outside from what we can see. They're either the ones who cook for them. They're the ones who train them. They're the ones who drive them. I mean, they're part of the team.

I mean, they might as well be a professional supporter of professional athletes. I mean, it's next level so it sounds like you say exactly exactly the same thing yep yeah it's it's it's amazing did she have the stomach for fighting like i don't know like i watch fighting i don't know if i'd have the stomach for fighting if my wife got into fighting she's getting better. Does anybody have the stomach for fighting? I think my mom doesn't have to take a Zoloft and stuff before anymore. But my wife, I haven't been beat up before, so I can't say if she has a stomach for it. Because even though I lost my last fight, we went on a date the same night, and I'm not hurt at all.

I think it'll be different when I, you know, have a war or a hard, painful, ugly fight. But she's anxious until she says, like, she waits and sees how I feel. Like, she can tell by the walkout whether or not I'm having an on night or an off night. When I'm having an on night, she has no worries. When I'm having an on-night or an off-night. When I'm having an on-night, she has no worries. When I'm having an off-night, she's a little concerned. Like one time, she was in my corner. Oh, wow. Wow.

We should be interviewing her. Oh, yeah. She's the best. That was my favorite cornering experience. But she was in my corner, and I was having an off-night. Botched the rehydration, and I was in a place where I couldn't eat any of the food. So basically, I was surviving off of gluten free like TV dinners, like after weigh in, which are not optimal. And I was having an off night and she was worried. But then I and I won the fight. But she's good. She's pretty good. She has good. She has faith

in me. And that's what's important. Jordan, I just noticed something to show you what an amateur I am. I've been in media for 25 years. I noticed that on the podcast, you don't have a red light, which shows that you're not recording. But you actually are recording, so don't panic. You actually are recording. It's just a lesser recording.

It's going straight to the cloud. I'm just curious, for my sake of understanding the software I'm using. Do you not have five gigabytes of free room on your computer? I probably don't. Wow. Nailed it. Because I used to have that problem with Brian. What kind of computer are you using?

I'm completely un-tech savvy. Is that why you use an Android? Yes. Amazing. Well, I actually use an Android because... I judge people who use an Android. I don't know if it's a bad judgment, but I just...

Us Apple people, we have to see blue. The second we see green, we're like, oh shit, this is going to be a problem texting this guy. I know. I was team iPhone until a year ago. But then, a year ago, I was broke. So when I broke my iPhone, I'm like, okay, we need to buy the cheapest phone, and I got an Android.

And the hassle of switching everything over to an Android has made it not worth for me to switch back again. I can't relearn how to do things again. When you did the podcast with, was it Matt Serra? Yes. Did you have, were you on that same computer?

I was on my cell phone for the Matt Serra one. Ah, okay. And is that an Apple computer you're on? No, it's a Dell. Yeah, I mean, do you see this, Brian? He is like just he falls into every textbook stereotype reads uses an android um not an apple computer i didn't even know that other computers existed but yet he's got this thing that he fights professionally i mean

this is so i mean you're – you're breaking my brain. This makes no sense. So you meet your wife. She knows about your fighting. She even goes into your corner for one of your fights. Was she – does she go to the events live? I guess she doesn't now. You have a kid.

Well, it's been COVID protocol of my past four fights so she hasn't come into the last four but usually yeah so i think we'll we'll get the little ear protectors for the baby she'll be coming to my next fight she'll probably be in my corner again it all depends on how old the baby is at that time now that you have a baby do you do you have a different perspective on your parents' take on you fighting? That, hey, we have this really smart kid. He went to college and now he gets in the ring with other guys who want to hit his CPU. It kind of does give me a different perspective. But I think it gives me a different perspective for, I think it makes me think twice about if my daughter was to fight for a different reason.

So when I entered the fight world, my mom, my parents were more worried about me getting hurt. But honestly, I think the morals and the environment is much more harmful to somebody in the fight world than the actual violence. I think it kind of, it ruins people. I think there's not a lot of good people. Like, I've only met, like, three good people in the fight world that I would actually, like, associate with outside of fighting. And when I look at my daughter, I used to think it was cool when I was younger. I'm like, oh yeah, and then I'll raise my kids and then they'll fight and I'll have like a dynasty.

But I wouldn't, I think it takes a very special type of person to come into the fight game and keep their integrity or keep their morals or keep their values and not be changed. And I'm just, I'm not sure I would ever want one of my kids to enter this sport while it is in the state that it is. Can you elaborate on that?

By what you mean by, are there shady characters or they're angry characters or? There is shadiness and there's anger but it's a very selfish sport and for you to make it far you have most you have to usually be incredibly selfish and a lot of fighters are self-centered very few of them have successful marriages unless they're other fighters you have the whole like underground like pandemic of like a lot of girl fighters like have to like sleep their way up or um there's just a lot of abuse a lot of manipulation a lot of money being stolen from people and i've been blessed in that regard, but I wouldn't want my daughter, you know,

not to be like, you know, because she'll be a strong independent woman and all those things, but, you know. Reality is, the reality of the fight game is that it's very dark, it's very sketchy, and it really ruins people and makes you have to usually make pretty big concessions to your integrity. That's why you see a lot of drug abuse and a lot of cheating and a lot of shortcuts and a lot of sketchiness.

And a lot of times I don't think I have the stomach for the fight business as opposed to the fight game, which doesn't bug me at all. Interesting. Do you have a manager? The few characters that you've met that have been able to avoid that, have you been able to pinpoint a characteristic that prevents them from getting sucked in? I don't. I'm not sure if there's one characteristic uh

i think one of them is like the courage to be disliked like they're they're the weird people in the sport that no one really associates with and yeah i've been blessed to meet the few people that i have but most people in this sport I wouldn't trust them to watch my kids. I wouldn't trust them to look out for my best interests. And I think that's a healthy attitude to have. Do you have a manager? I do. I do.

Jason House and Iridium, I'm managed by them. And my legal counsel, Lance Spotty, he's my dude. He's one of the good ones. Yeah, they're managing me. They've done a good job. How many professional fights are you in before you get a manager? So I got a manager very early. I was contacted after my third amateur fight,

and then they, like, re-contacted me after my first pro fight. So I've been managed since I was 1-0. And that's the manager you have now? Yes. And does he manage other fighters? He manages, like, half the dang roster. But, yeah, Jason House has a lot of other fighters okay i wonder i wonder why i haven't heard his name i always just hear about the same same managers

over and over and over but but is he not is does he try to keep it on the down low is he kind of more like an al hayman type um i wouldn't say he's more on the down low i think it's mostly like he puts his management agency to the forefront so iridium as opposed to using his name as opposed to like ali or daniel rubinstein or whatever they use their name they he mostly uses his organization so jason house though you have to like go you have to like pay really close attention to hear his name a lot of fighters are managed by iridium and i think they have the biggest they do have the biggest roster of fighters in the ufc so tell me about how you get called to be on the contender series and is walk me through that no detail is too much i'm curious like it seems like prom night oh so for me

i wasn't given like most people get like several months notice where they have to have like the non-disclosure they can't talk about it and it has to be a surprise and up until like two weeks prior and for me i had just had my lfa fight where I beat this kid who they wanted to get on the contenders, LaVon Lewis, because his brother was in the UFC, and he was on an 11-fight win streak. And I fought him, and then I took his streak. And so I was just fishing with my wife's family. We were fishing for crawdads, you know, so I'm like in the creek, and, you know, fishing for crawfish.

And Lance, my legal counsel he calls me he's like how's your weight and i'm like eating through an entire box of cream sickles like by myself like a whole 24 pack is it still on yeah you're on you're on that that happens did we vanish or did you vanish? I just vanished. It's okay. Okay. So he calls me, like, how's your weight? I'm going through this box of creamsicles.

And I'm like, probably not good. What's up? And he's like, can you fight in 10 days? And I was like, I don't know. I'm not really sure if I'm in the mood to fight. I'm like, how's the money? He's like, it's not about the money. And I'm like, it's about the money, man. I'm like, he's like, it's for Contender Series i'm like it's about the money i'm like he's like

it's for contender series and i was like oh yeah sure we're doing that and and then i got my opponent like nine and one luke flores and i was like okay i could finish this guy pretty quick even though i'm not in the best of shape when i went out there and i finished him pretty quick and he was pretty good he was pretty savvy on the ground surprisingly but he was a nice quality win and i was happy with that yeah and were you ecstatic did you know that this is your chance were you like oh my god this is it like uh So for me, I always, it may be naive, but I always believe only lucky people get one shot. If you belong in the big leagues, you'll have many shots. So I was actually like, okay, even just getting on the show,

that was a lot of validation, and I was like, okay. And I could leverage this into other shots if it doesn't work out. So I was pretty, I actually had a really big sense of peace, like a mantle of peace over me. Because up until that point, and when I talked about earlier how I had all this self-doubt about whether or not I was a good fighter, or if I was just lucky, or if I just had good tactics, that was kind of like the validation that like, oh, holy crap, like I belong there. And people who watch my fights think I belong there. And I felt so good coming into that fight, even after eating a bunch of

creamsicles and just chilling with my family on vacation. We didn't end the vacation early. We went home like four days later and I was like, okay, let's start cutting weight. And it was really cool. It was really surreal and calming. It was actually quite a grounding experience because I had to look at myself honestly, and I hadn't really done that from such a positive stance before. So you had 10 days to get ready for the fight to be on the biggest stage you had met dana before right i saw a picture on your instagram in

2015 you had met him right yes we did this filming for the opening credit the opening song of um dana white looking for a fight which they didn't end up using or basically we were all like sparring angels landing on top of tanks, and a bunch of broken down buildings. It was really cool. So I got to meet him briefly. It was a nice experience. Nice little paycheck, too. And then you go on the Contender Series, and that's the second time you meet him? Yes. And if you win, is it guaranteed to the UFC or no?

You have to probably win and then also get his approval? Yes, you have to win. And if he's in a good mood, I guess you just have to win. But, yeah, you have to win impressively. It's all up to him. It's about whether or not Dana really likes you and thinks you're a good fit. And even if I was confident that I could win, I was not confident that he would like me.

So backstage, I was, like, super anxious. And especially because I thought he only gave out two contracts a day. So every fight, I was like, please be a bad fight. Right. Please make me look good by comparison. And then when he said my name, I almost like started to cry. I was so, felt so good. And yeah, he said he liked my attitude.

He said, I like his attitude. I like the way he carries himself. And that felt good because I'm self-conscious a lot of the times about how I carry myself, even if I am comfortable with it. And it was nice to have the man like your attitude and like the way you carry yourself. I like Dana just from the fan perspective, from watching him on TV.

If there's weigh-ins and he's not doing them, I won't watch the weigh-in. I see him as just a character and a persona, and I like what he brings. But when I watched that Contender series and when he said he liked you and the way you carried yourself, it made me like Dana more. It made me realize, okay, because I like the way this guy carries himself. And so it was cool. himself and so it was cool i i you never know because you're not you don't come out there all tatted up and mugging mean mugging people and you know you do you and uh and it made me like appreciate dana more like even that much more wow this guy's, he's more of a, um, what's the word? I want to say artistic or a thespian, but that's not right.

But I, but I just appreciated his broad scope of liking people. It's always, I always like people who like more people. Yeah. Yeah. So you, you have your first fight. You do fantastic. I mean, it really can't go any better. Right. Yeah. So you have your first fight. You do fantastic. I mean, it really can't go any better, right? Yeah, for sure. And then you have the second fight, and it's kind of a double whammy.

It's your first loss in the history of your professional career, and it's also on the big stage again. and it's also on the big stage again um how do you what goes through your mind after that like as you walk off the stage what goes through your mind i actually felt pretty good i felt like a big weight off my chest actually um whenever people imagine me as a fighter they're like that undefeated guy who does the splits and twerks and does dirty dancing stuff but it was always undefeated first right and it was kind of weird to have like my entire fight identity like put into like two digits like oh eight and oh seven and oh and it felt super good to change my instagram bio to eight and one and have all that pressure off because i never cared about the record i'm just trying to go out there and grow as a athlete and grow as a martial artist and the nice record the undefeated record was a side effect of that

but i i was saying before this fight like i have only fought three people of losses on their record everybody else i fought was undefeated and i took their oaths and i i think i've developed as fast as i have because i'm not like looking for wins i'm like going out there looking for losses if that makes sense um i feel like i'm not afraid of failure I kind of go out looking for it and this fight was risky because Claudio hadn't fought in two years, we had no recent tape

on him, he's not very active on social media he's a good grappler, he's young and we make great improvements when we're young and it was a risky fight and I would say that in interviews, I was like, he's a good fighter I could lose, and that's okay. And then I did lose.

And he made really good improvements. And I feel like I was too nice to him after the fight. Maybe I came off as patronizing because I was hugging him, and I'm like, dude, you've improved so much in the past two years. I'm so happy for you. And he kind of seemed like hot off guard. I'm like, dude, you've improved so much in the past two years. I'm like so happy for you. And he kind of seemed like hot off guard. I'm like, you did so good. And he's like, thanks for the fight.

And he kind of walked away from me. And I was like, it's hard not to be happy for somebody. His story is a good one. Two years off, comes back and then beats the undefeated prospect with the slam KO. And he's a good kid. He was respectful. I mean, I couldn't have lost in a better way. I'm not hurt.

He's a good guy. He's the type of fighter I think deserves more attention. So it felt pretty good. How will you know when your next fight is? How does that happen? As soon as I'm done with my athletic suspension for 10 days for a loss, they'll message my management agency and they'll say, when does he want to fight?

And probably say September or October. And then they'll give me opponents probably like eight weeks before that. They need to change that terminology it's fun it's funny it's just popped up on my radar in the last you know year like i'll see a youtube clip and it'll say like some fighter who i like and respect and be like his is on six months suspension and i immediately go to oh my god is it drugs every time and it's never drugs it's always like no he has he has to get a medical clearance because his knee got bent or they need to check his eye. I just wish they wouldn't say.

So basically after every fight, you have to wait 10 days before you fight again? Usually. Usually. If you show any signs of outward damage, you have to at least take 10 days of like 10 business days or 10 training days off. I don't know. I've given myself suspensions like my last fight for matt wyman when i slammed in my forearm bounced into my face and i had a black eye and i got a suspension for that so that was kind of funny you suspended yourself that's awesome yeah well yeah so if you show any damage, you have to take a suspension. If you lose by knockout or take you out, it's like 90 days. And if you lose by submission, you actually can compete whenever.

Decision loss, you can't compete for two weeks. You get submitted, you can compete whenever. So it's weird. And so it's that simple. Your fight's over. They'll contact your manager. They'll ask, when do you want to fight? And then do you get any input on who you fight?

No. You don't really get a lot of input at all because, you know, and it really bugs me because when I was coming up, like, in the regional scene, I couldn't get fights because nobody wanted to fight me. Because the stakes weren't high enough. No one wants to risk a loss for $400. So I was of the belief that it would be much easier in the UFC. Because now we're getting paid.

No matter what happens, your life's going to stay on in your home. We get paid okay, as long as you fight active enough and i had several fights just get like turned down from fighters that i really was excited to compete against and claudio's the only one who said yes and it was so and it's weird because everyone's like, this is bad matchup for you. And I'm like, he said yes for a reason, guys. I'm like,

you don't say, you don't say yes for no reason. And he ended up being right. Um, it was a good fight for him. So your manager calls you and says, Hey, do you want to fight ABC?

And you say, yeah. And then they come back to you and they go, sorry, ABC doesn't want to fight you. Do you want to fight D E F? And you say, yeah.

And then they come back to you and say, no, sorry, doesn't want to fight you. And then finally they're like, okay, Claudia want to fight you. Do you want to fight DEF? And you say, yeah. And then they come back to you and say, no, sorry, doesn't want to fight you. And then finally they're like, okay, Claudia wants to fight you. Will you do it? And you say, yeah, it's like that. Yeah, like exactly. Okay. And then are you the guy who would just say yes to anybody? Yes.

So I've only turned down one fight and that's because I was visiting my wife for a week and it was like in three weeks. And this really tough kid named Cameron Church, who just recently had his last loss, but that would have been a tough fight. But I've said yes to every fight before even looking at tape. My Lance, my legal counsel agent, he always gets annoyed because he'll send me a name, and I'll instantly send yes back. He's like, you didn't look at him. And I'm like, I don't care. If he's down, I'm down.

Like, it doesn't really matter to me. Like, it's just a fist fight, guys. If they would push you on the playground, you'd probably push back, even if you didn't want to fight them. So, yeah, I've only said no to that one fight, that one particular instance. Are you more comfortable fighting than you've ever been in your life? Yes, especially after there's losses out of the way. I feel pretty ready to get out there.

Especially because I might be the underdog for the first time, and people might expect me to lose because I've been exposed. So I feel pretty comfortable fighting, actually. Except for that first amateur fight, I haven't really had fear walking out there before. And, yeah, especially now that my rent's paid no matter what, even from my bonus from December, we're in a pretty good spot. So I'm excited to go out there and compete again. Tell me about that.

So after you win that fight against Matt Weinman, you get a bonus? Like, when do you find that out, and how exciting is that? So Dana will announce the bonuses right after the event at the press conference. And everyone was pretty sure I was a shoo-in to win performance for my slam. And it was weird because it was 2020, and I went from food stamps to low middle class in 22 seconds, and that was a crazy adjustment. They wired me the money money and I was like,

I don't know what to do with that. Save it. That's what I did. I bought a bookshelf. I'm going to buy myself a bookshelf. And then I was looking at bookshelves that were nice. It was like $1,200. I'm like, I'm going to buy an economy bookshelf for like $100. And that's what I did.

We bought a bookshelf and like a Jesus painting. That's all i did we bought a bookshelf and like a jesus painting that's all like i'm really boring i approve of both of those those purchases you need someone looking over you what when you sign up with the ufc do you sign up for a certain amount number of fights yes fights or a time period so it's like six years or four fights whatever happens first and so basically you you're guaranteed those four fights more or less not if everyone says no i'm guaranteed well the fires are really guaranteed nothing i'm guaranteed to have the like if everything goes well, I'm guaranteed four fights.

But the UFC really, and they have no consequences of cutting fighters. They can cut you whenever they want. So that's kind of scary for fighters. But luckily, I think I'm good, and I think I'll be fine. But I'm actually, if I win, and I don't do anything controversial unless i'm you know make a lot of money for them i am guaranteed four fights gotcha and do you have have you been offered um any names how how soon do they give you before they start offering you names for your next fight i haven't offered names this time i have a few ideas who they might give me and uh the fights are just so much more

interesting if i was to win this but um yeah i mean they haven't offered me anything yet i think i'll have like 10 days before they start they start dropping names that's interesting you say that so it would have been a different group of guys you're saying. Yeah. And, and, and, and people, you were, it's basically like you took two, you took two steps forward and then one step back. Is it like that? Yeah.

And you want bigger names so you can make more money and get closer to the title fight. Is that, I mean, is it that simple? Yeah. I really wanted to fight some more veterans of the sport like, or another undefeated prospect.

fight some more veterans of the sport, or another undefeated prospect. That's what I really wanted, because I just feel like I'm really just trying to grow as fast as I can in the early part of the UFC career, because I don't want to pick easy fights and then hit a wall and then not be able to win any more fights anymore. But yeah, I definitely basically

if they're undefeated in my weight class, I want to fight them and I've dropped the I've told my management, I want to contact these fighters and their managers and let's get it scheduled and basically I've gotten

no's of conditions. We have nothing to gain from this fight. You're not popular enough, you're not ranked enough, you're not this enough. So, yeah, I really just need to get more clout on social media so that these guys want to fight. What's the etiquette to talk about it? It seems like everyone's so open about that stuff. You seem open, they seem open in their interviews after the conference i want to fight this guy they won't give me this guy this

guy won't fight me is the etiquette just to just everyone just be forthright um well i think most fighters are actually kind of just saying they want to fight that person and they don't really plan on fighting that person but they want to seem like they're game because i've mentioned those type of fighters and they don't they don't want to fight but um i think it's most like like for example when a fight drops out okay and then everybody and their mom's posting on social media i'll take the fight it's like dude your two-way class is below him and you know for a fact you're not going to be held to that. You're just trying to look cool. Right. Social media. But yeah, a lot of fighters, I feel like in my experience, from my perspective,

they only call out fighters they know are going to say no. Because they want to seem like they're game to fight this really tough fight. But they know that person's not going to say yes. Right. So it's a business decision to say it yes for sure that's why i think calling out fighters i mean it's it's so stupid because now if i see someone call me out i'm thinking this person sees something that other people don't maybe i don't want to fight that person and do i want to risk only coming home with like my my show bonus and not my win bonus

is this person gonna like ruin my reputation like so many things come through your mind when And do I want to risk only coming home with my show bonus and not my win bonus? Is this person going to ruin my reputation? So many things come through your mind when a guy accepts a fight or wants to fight you. And I understand. Because you get a lot of the clout just from being willing to fight a person. You get more activity unless you get a nice finish from just the fight announcement than you do from the fight win. So it's a weird dynamic. There's a lot involved. It's more than just records. There's nuances. Yes, because not all undefeated records are made equal and i just i think what my coolest line i've ever said in an interview it was for

for my contender series fight where i was like i don't fight cans and cab drivers i fight real fighters and stuff and my opponent really couldn't say anything back to that it was like okay yeah he's got he's got a point i don't know if the sport has changed or if I've just become a bigger fan, but when you come into the sport, you definitely are intrigued by the guys who have the O's or who have the fewest losses. And now, you know, some of the fighters that are the biggest guys on the scene who seem to be making the most money have shit tons of losses. I mean, you see someone like Jorge Masvidal or, or, or, you know, Diaz and it's, it's, I don't know if I became a bigger fan, but it's refreshing to see that, to see hype around guys who have a lot of losses and then they,

and then they actually come and show up on, on game day. And of course there's nothing more sad than seeing a fighter fight who you really don't think should be in there. That's when you think that maybe you shouldn't be watching fighting anymore as a fan when you when you when you see a guy when you're praying that the guy doesn't get hurt before the fight yeah oh yeah that's like it's like so a one-sided fight is great as long as as long as every both guys had a fair chance if there's a one-sided fight one guy as long as every both guys had a fair chance. If there's a one-sided fight and one guy didn't have a fair chance, it's horrible.

Yeah. It's sad. Sad, yes. A lot of fighters don't have escape plans from this career, and they stay a lot longer than they should. And I definitely don't plan on doing that. If I don't got it, I think I'm going to stop. Do you have a backup plan what you'll do will you go back to school will you become a lawyer oh i hope i never have to become a lawyer

that uh that's that's like my that's my fallback fallback but um i'd like to coach i like to open up my own gym um i would also like, in Nevada, I could become a teacher. If I just get my degree, I could get put in a classroom instantly and just have three years to finish my master's. I like working with kids and young people. This is halfway through my camp, I actually stopped teaching the children's jiu-jitsu for the first time since I've been like 19.

It was a weird adjustment. I've always worked with teaching kids. And even when I was out of high school for wrestling, I coached wrestling for two years after I graduated. So I really liked teaching people. Do you wish you would have started earlier? Do you wish your parents would have put you in jujitsu at five? No, actually, I think I would have gotten burnt out. I think I'm a person who had to find it on my own. And I think if my parents would have become a fight family when I was young, I think I would have rebelled. I would have been like, no, I don't want to do that anymore. I want to be a lawyer.

And I think I'm happy with the way it went. Considering that about yourself, do you modify your modify training pretty regularly like change it up oh yeah i i change a lot of things like i've recently hired a a new strength and mobility coach like pj may and he's helped me out a lot with a lot of my chronic pain and just feeling better and like just a lot less inflammation. I went through camps where I was running 60 miles a week. My last camp, I lifted a lot more weight. I try to change it up a lot. Maybe I change it up too much, but I'm trying to figure out what's best for me.

Would you ever go back down to 145? I can't. I'm 177 right now. I'm just dense. And I got kidney failure my last 45 cut. Is that the one I saw? Is that the fight I saw? No.

Where they show you cutting to 45? I mean, that did look brutal on you. And you said you put on 21 pounds in a day or something after that yeah that's when i was still like i was 19 with that video so i was still growing i've grown an inch and a half since then and like the tapology says i'm 5'8 i'm like 5'10 5'10 and a half but um I'm just, I'm still, I just turned 26. I was 188 my last camp. And I'm not a fat 188. I just, some guys are blessed to, like, have a nice physique and still, like, be light.

And I am the exact opposite. I am, like, a dense, thick boy. Like, my genetics tell me I'm just meant to be heavy. like a dense thick boy like my genetics tell me i i'm just meant to be heavy but um no like this last this last fight i still had to cut 21 pounds wow and i was super skinny for this fight i think i just have to i don't know i'd figure out my body composition see what happens yeah you were crazy lean at 145 i mean you i mean and like you said you were 19 years old but you were just you were shredded i mean it was nuts and then to see you say in that in that short documentary i saw that you put on 21 pounds i mean that that's crazy yeah i used to

brag about before i got kidney failure and everything came in perspective but like after wayans i would not like go to the bathroom until after my fight so i learned and i learned years later that basically i was having acute kidney failure for all my fights and it waited until adrenaline hit me to turn back on like my bowels and everything but i had one fight where i put on 27 pounds in the 24 hours prior to the fight four hours like my second pro fight i was i was a catch weight at 150 i'm walking the cage at like 177 and um i used to brag about it it's like oh i put on 13 i'm like amateurs i put on 27 pounds and uh and then like that would hide side like dang that was kind of stupid like you should have been aware that

something was off should have respected my body a little bit more too much discipline too much discipline too much i was too good at cutting weight and And, yeah, so, and then after I had the really bad weight cut where I had to get IVs for several days and, you know, and I had water retention in my fingers, so, like, my hands were swollen. I was having, like, heart disease clubbing from all the, like, liquid retention. I was like, 55 sounds good. I can do 55, you know. I was like, 55 sounds good. I can do 55.

Claudio, he's pretty well-muscled, but I didn't particularly feel like he was strong. I didn't feel too out-muscled, actually, so that was interesting. Don't you want to take a deuce right before the fight? I would think, before we do this podcast, I want to take a deuce. Anytime I'm going to do something that I'm going to give my all, I want to take a deuce right before the fight? Like, I would think, like, before we do this podcast, I want to take a deuce. Like, anytime I'm going to do something that I'm going to give my all, I want to drop a deuce first. Well, I had Indian food the day before my last fight, so I had no problem in that department. I was actually quite the opposite. I was pretty, pretty, I was, like, on the toilet for, like, five hours of after weigh-ins. So that's not – okay.

So that's good because it made me nervous when you said like you didn't go – that one fight you were saying where you put on 27 pounds and you didn't even go to the bathroom 24 hours before the fight. Like that would bum me out. That would really bum me out. It's like – it's worse because you also don't go to the bathroom when you cut weight. So for like two and a half days, like nothing. So, yeah, I should have seen more insides.

That was my youthful hubris for sure. This is a little, question's a little out there. Have you met Derek Lewis? I have met, yes, I've met Derek. And how was that interaction, the two of you? We didn't talk very much. I found him hilarious, though. I liked him a lot.

Yeah, I would think you guys could be amazing friends. He's not operating out of the manual on how to be a fighter either. Obviously, he's very different than you, but he's shit. I mean, I remember seeing him come on the scene. I was like, like wow this guy's totally beating to his own drummer and then it's also awesome to see him take it more and more seriously as he realized i mean it's kind of a fascinating thing to see if someone come into professional fighting right and then take it serious right i mean it's just like how did this

guy get here if he didn't take it serious right there are so many people who are so talented but then they don't do very well and there's just some guys who like they don't know how to fight you know and they don't have to take it seriously until they are forced to forrest griffin was the same way forrest griffin never saw himself making it to a title shot or anything he's like i'm a dog i like to fight and he had to like discover for himself like hey i could i could do something really good of this and i could build a legacy and he did and you see a lot of fighters like who just go through the motions and they're successful and they're like wait with a little effort i can really be good at this and it's kind of cool to watch that happen from the outsider's perspective what it

looks like is you guys are going in the ring to kill each other. There's a couple rules. Don't kick the guy in the head in certain situations. But to me, I always think, what is this person doing by not having a nutritionist? Or how could you go in there and not be metabolically prepared? Your conditioning not be right. Don't you know that there's a guy in there waiting for you to fuck up so he can literally turn your lights out? And they're waiting for you to fuck up so he can literally turn your lights out. I mean, the motivation seems so strong to do everything you can to give yourself a chance to win, right? How do these guys?

It's funny that you mentioned that because I'm not sure. Like, I know UFC fighters who haven't been in a jiu-jitsu class in years, okay? Their plan is, well, he's not going to take me down. I'm like, but what if he does, you know? Like, I remember one of my favorite young development moments for me in MMA, like Kevin Randleman, he recently passed away, but he was like one of the first UFC heavyweight champions. And he was a freak athlete and he was one of my first coaches. And I remember teaching him how to do an omoplata when I was 15. He had no idea. He's like, whoa, I didn't know how to do that.

And he was like a champion. He'd been fighting for like like 14, 15 years. Like at that point, and he was like, I didn't know how to do that. I was like, but it's your job. When I was a fan, I was on YouTube all the time trying to learn things. I read books about fighting. I have a bunch of boxing manuals on my bookshelf. I'm like, okay, it's a job.

A lot of fighters, I have met, of all the fighters I've met only one fighter has impressed me with like how surprised being as well-rounded as they are every other fighter has been mostly disappointing um fighters are it's such an interesting sport it's not professional yet like we're professional fighters but as a whole not very professional that's so hard for me to get my head wrapped around maybe you just have higher maybe you also have very high standards yeah it's like because even like wrestling um the amount of effort you need to be a successful like college wrestler i think is above being a ufc champion for sure um you just you can't be a national champion wrestler and have deficiencies anywhere

but you could be a fighter who'd be very successful have deficiencies in many other places wow that's an interesting perspective jordan um i i had a i had a friend who was new york state uh high school wrestling champion, whatever that meant. He was the best high school wrestler in New York. And then he went to college and he said he couldn't beat a single person. And he's like, the levels to that game are so insane. So it's interesting to hear you say that he goes, man, the, the packets then quickly at

the top of wrestling. He said, it's just absolutely insane. Yeah. It's wild. Like, I got third at state, and I was offered to wrestle in college. And they're like, give it a few years. I think we can make you an All-American. I'm like, a few years for an All-American?

Nah. And I got to go into debt for it? Nah, I'll just fight. Like, that seems, I could have easier results and get a lot more recognition, a lot more connections just going into fighting. It wasn't worth it for me at that time. What weight did you wrestle in high school when you were third in the state? 160. So for state, I was was 160 but i wrestled up

to like 195 my senior year i just wow yeah my team we were we were a ragtag team so every time we we had a meet we had to like have a perfect lineup to like compete because we had like four weight classes we didn't have and so i needed to pin almost all of my matches and i had like the pin record at my school and i'll never be beaten but i love it but i i wrestled from 60 to 90 to 95 or 92 um my senior year depending on who like what was their best wrestler i was wrestling them at the dual meet to make sure I could pin them, and that way they couldn't get points.

And that's probably why you look so strong in the ring. I've seen you in interviews say that you don't work out, but you pick guys up like you do work out. You look like you deadlift. I mean, the way you move other human beings looks like you're a deadlifting monster um but i wonder if if if being at 190 or 170 or you know if that's what's made you so strong or contribute not the only thing but contributed to it

yeah it also just taught me that leverage is so important and underused. And when I was wrestling guys with like 30 pounds on me, I didn't feel like I was out-muscled because I was always in good position. And it's funny that you mentioned the deadlift. I've never deadlifted before in my life, except the day I was cleared after my knee surgery, I deadlifted with my friend. And that's the only time I ever deadlifted. Be careful. Oh, yeah. I deadlifted with my friend and that's the only time I ever deadlifted so be careful oh yeah

I learned to be careful be careful man that movement I love deadlifting you don't want to get addicted to deadlifting it leads to one thing Jordan we've been on with you for 96 minutes.

I can't tell you without being weird how much I appreciate you coming on. Thanks for having me on. I appreciate you guys. Yeah, I'm smarter for talking to you. I'm going to have a little extra pep in my step today. When I take my kids to jiu-jitsu today i'll tell all the other parents i interviewed a ufc fighter maybe pop my collar it's like kind of silly asking this but uh where'd your nickname come from the monkey king the monkey king i when forbidden came out, I think I was in middle school.

Oh, Jet Li and Jackie Chan. And I was watching it with my friends. And they're like, oh my gosh, you're so the Monkey King, man. That's totally how you are. And then the nickname kind of like died after I went to high school. But then I remember I wrestled this one match. And afterwards, I like crawled off the mat on my knuckles and stuff, and they were like, you're like a monkey.

And I'm like, no, a monkey king. They're like, yeah, you're like the monkey king, and it kind of been stuff like that. I love it. I absolutely love it. It's the best. Jordan, I am not a B-tier fan of UFC. I've watched very, very few.

But the insights that you provided into the sport and the way that you approach it have piqued my interest. And what Savant said, very, very grateful that you shared your time with us today. Thank you, guys. I appreciate it. I think we're going to have LeDuc on next week. Have you met him? I know you're in totally different disciplines. Okay. I know who you're talking about, though. I've heard of LeDuc.

Yeah. And it's fascinating to me what he's contributed to that sport. I mean, I would have never heard of it if it wasn't for him. So I'm excited. So you basically popped our cherry with having our first fighter on. We've had a lot of other professionals on, professional psychiatrists, professional CrossFitters. You're the first guy who punches people in the face for a living. I'm a good first time. It was good to be here.