JRE MMA Show #185 with Ethyn Ewing

the joe rogan experience train by day joe rogan podcast by night all day good to see you it's good to be here i like your shirt i appreciate it professor finesser is that your professor finesser line this is one of my designs of my uh professor finesser line got the cross guard there i like it that's dope we got a couple different symbols something that i'm building up i want to get out to the people it's a cool nickname it's uh it's unique for sure it's it came about a funny way but i like it it's the mantra that it brings to the fight game and to who i am is is perfect well it's finesse and you fight with a lot of finesse you know um so we should start from your ufc debut because uh that was when you really burst onto the scene you fought this guy malcolm wellmaker who's a killer vicious knockout puncher and had a ton of hype behind him because of his performance was it the contender series we had the big performance uh it was all three of them yeah contender series you knocked that dude out fly and then uh i don't remember who was second but then it was chris mutino was the third one yeah that he knocked out like that and um you put on a show man and nobody had heard of you and that's one of the craziest things about this sport is that there can be a guy like you that's learning and growing on in the shadows and then they get the call and on i don't know if it's i think it was two days notice yeah so two days notice you fought above your weight because you're a bantamweight normally and you fought a featherweight and dude you just it was wasn't just that you fought a guy who was this vicious striker it was the calmness and the technique and the smoothness of it all that was so impressive and i was like this guy's different like you the way you fight is very intelligent and i love that i love watching a guy who's just all technique and movement and you're you're the epitome of that i appreciate it um that's something i pride myself on that's i think maybe it's because i've i've delved into more of a boxing realm with perfecting the striking and really focusing on um that that technical aspect that style but yeah it's to me to watch guys go in there and just brawl it out and say uh you know let's see who can take more punches before the other guys can take more punches before the other guys can take more punches before the other guy drops is is just silly to me it's it's like you said i like to fight with finesse i like to hit and not get hit and champions don't take return fire so um i hope to have a lot of longevity with this game and uh yeah that's why i fight that way that is the formula for longevity i was having a conversation with fate or the guy who's sitting next to us who's uh one of the best pool players in the world and he's getting we just got back from ways to well so shout out to brigham and all the people at ways to well for taking care of us um but he uh and i were talking about fighters and about it's very similar to i think everything whether it's pool or golf or and there's the people that really focus on technique and fundamentals and and really objectively look at what they're doing and refine it and we were talking about guys who just stand in front of each other and blast each other i'm like look the crowd will cheer they will love to see you but your career will be shorter and the end will be better and be bad right the end will be bad and and then you'll probably fight past the time where you should and no one's going to stop you they're gonna maybe you have one or two close friends that'll tell you when you're going to hang them up but a lot of coaches let guys fight way too long and i think the organization lets guys fight way too long there's a few guys that in the past at least i've seen them on the lineup in an upcoming fight i'm like oh god and then i see who he's fighting i'm like oh god yeah like i don't want to see this guy take any more punishment i don't know enough is enough and those styles of just face first just attacking boy the audience loves you and that's a trap right that is a real trap yeah i mean 100 and i think that's it's almost a little frustrating that the like general public gives that kind of energy to that kind of a match sure i get it's exciting you want to see blood spilled like people just really enjoy the chaos of all that and all the movement and the energy that goes into it but yeah you're foregoing that whole technical aspect like the perfection of controlling the dance from the beginning to the end and everything in between you know it's and it's almost just like a like an educated street brawler you're getting in there and just swinging and going crazy and to me that's not what martial arts is i mean it's it literally is the the chase of perfection to it of you know like the the hit and don't get hit that is the art of of boxing but the art of striking and martial arts you know you're not going to be able to do that you're not going to be able to do that you're you want to be yeah near perfect in the way you engage in this is land the damage and be able to cut those angles move your head pull out the distance and not take any of that in return and uh yeah a lot of guys get get cheered on initially and so it's unfortunate that um maybe it's not unfortunate but you just you just see it a lot that yeah those guys get hyped up off the beginning and then all the other things happen like you said well i mean look they are exciting i love when guys fight like that because it's just crazy to watch but i have to set aside the rational part of my brain that says this is not smart it's not a good thing for them right and this is there's no future in this eventually it's going to catch up to you yeah no for sure i mean if i watch these guys you know get after it like roman puka versus uh his opponent on the dana white contender series this last tuesday i believe it was oh yeah that was crazy dude i mean i've trained with roman a little bit here and there he's from the same area as me and uh yeah the guy's the guy's very skillful both those guys walked out of there just busted up i mean they went straight to the hospital and it's fantastic to watch but from a fighter's perspective at least from someone who's engaging in this on the same level as they are yeah i i uh i don't know that's why i like you know a little bit more of that precise style with the boxing specifically i guess i've really drawn a lot of aspects from it oh for sure i mean there's there's an art to like a fighter that fights with style and i think that's a really good point i think that's a really good point in a fighter that fights with finesse like i always go to izzy in his prime adesanya in his prime when when he was just styling on dudes i mean it was a beautiful thing to watch it was it was it was like a dance it was almost like he was coordinating them right you know he was moving them into his strikes and everything was like feints they were all like very specific to gauge reactions and he put it all into the computer and the next thing you know he's tuning you up yeah i mean uh he's dancing his way out yeah into the octagon and then he's dancing in there you know yeah yeah it's um and i think the other thing that the general public doesn't understand about this game is that it's a smart man's game yes it's not a tough man's game well that's one of the reasons why i wanted to talk to you because i've seen a lot of your quotes online i've seen you talk you're obviously a thoughtful person and i think you have to be to have that kind of a style because it does take a lot of thinking it takes a lot of like what you're doing in there by overloading your opponent's nervous system with movement and and and constant counters and being like right out of range but then right in range and then right out of range there's a lot of intelligence involved in that right and for someone like me who really loves the art of it i love watching a guy like you fight because i really wish young fighters would emulate people like you young fighters would see a guy like that like that's what i want to fight like i don't want just a roadmap of scars and i got cte but boy people remember back in the day when i knocked that guy out or when we had this fight of the night and yeah this show is presented by draft kings something big is coming september 2nd draft kings game day arrives with massive deals exclusive offers and an all-day celebration one app every sport all 50 states the biggest day in sports history get pumped new draft kings customers sign up with code rogan spend five bucks to get 200 in rewards within 21 days that's code rogan in partnership with draft kings the crown is yours bet with dk sports book gambling problem call 1-800-GAMBLER 1-800-MY-RESET connecticut call 888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org on behalf of boot hill casino in kansas bet tax pass through may apply in illinois 21 and over void in canada event contract trading with draft kings predictions involves risk of loss availability varies predictions offer void in new york bet to get bonus bets that expire in seven days trade to get bonus bets that expire in seven days trade to predictions dollars that expire in one year fifty dollars in rewards issued every seven days via click to claim for 21 days one non-withdrawable reward redeemable terms at dkng.co slash offer limited time offer this episode is brought to you by the farmer's dog here's a fun fact research shows that dogs who maintain a healthy weight can live up to two and a half years longer on average than dogs who are overweight isn't that wild and also kind of obvious at the same time so why is feeding vague scoops of ultra processed kibble still the status quo for most dog owners healthy alternatives exist and trust me i know i buy one the farmer's dog i use it for both my dogs they love it they eat it up quick it smells good to them it smells good to me it's human 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kings customers can get a profit boost for every football game new draft kings customers sign up with code rogan spend five bucks get 200 in rewards within 21 days that's code rogan in partnership with draft kings the crown is yours event trading offered by draft kings predictions a cftc registered introducing broker trading involves risk of loss market availability varies eligibility restrictions apply fifty dollars in non-withdrawable predictions dollars issued every seven days via click to claim for 21 days restrictions dollars expire in one year one football boost per customer maximum trade limits and restrictions apply tokens expire at the end of the final select game each day when offered terms at dkng.co slash offer yeah and um it's taken a lot of experience a lot of growth a lot of seeing different things because when i was a wrestler it was the i would style of wrestling that i emulated and that i hope to emulate which is is just get in your face it's break you down break your spirit break you physically just completely wipe you out with just outstanding pressure you know and i think i suffered with the finesse with a little bit of the technicality of of setting things up and being smooth because i was just clubbing on your head snapping people down going going going and i i refined that i've i've pulled back from that almost almost too much i would say to where if i'm if i'm striking with someone i don't even want to engage in like a battle of physicality these guys try to push and move and get up and i'm like you know i'll sit and i'll dance and i'll roll up and i'll i'll shut them down real quick and i'm steering them off and i'm throwing really quick and they try to get physical where they're really trying to make it you know a high pace and and and just more physical i don't want to engage with that at all i want to steer from beginning to the end i want to keep my heart rate as low as possible i want to land shots and then i want to be back to sitting and and like you said covering a distance controlling everything where i can sit i can take my breath and i can see what's coming next and then i can move accordingly and so you know after being out for a little bit of time i'm now even elevated another um yeah to it to another greater extent in my own mind that i'm now starting to combine the two things to where before i i wouldn't say i shied away from it you know i'm i'm a tough guy if if we want to get physical and if it needs to go to that i'm there all day you know don't get me wrong with that but um i'm finding that middle ground i was i was too much of that iowa style without the finesse now i was trying to be all skillful all finesse dance around the muhammad ali shuffle throw that flicker jab be out of range you know and and not want to engage in the physicality too much and now i've elevated once again to where i'm finding that perfect middle ground that you know my i'm letting my ego go in the gym to where if we do get to that physicality or someone gets me with something if it doesn't look perfect i'm perfect and and avoid these things now i'm just sending it and getting after it so yeah it's it's an ever-evolving game and uh i'm just getting better all the time with everything so you'll never see me go in there and brawl anybody but you'll see less hesitation you'll see uh more precise shots and then all the other finesse will always be there well it is a constant work in progress right and i think that's one of the more interesting things about mma is that you see a as fights go on and they get more fights they get more confidence they get more experience and they also get significantly better you know it's it's kind of rare that you see athletes in a sport generally speaking when they get to a certain professional level they're kind of already at their peak and they might get a little better but in mma in particular you see dramatic improvement in fighters over the course of four or five years especially if they have good management and good training and one of the things that you're talking about is the fact that you're you're talking about is like letting your ego go in the gym that is so important it's so important to recognize that training is for learning it's not you're not trying to win every training session you're not trying to win fights you're trying to get better at winning actual fights and sometimes getting better at winning actual fights is addressing whatever weird weaknesses or weird places where you're not as comfortable and getting comfortable there and the best way to do that is just force yourself in those situations yeah 100 it's hard to do though because guys want to be able to lose a training session you don't want to give you know this guy that you're sparring with the impression that he can kick your ass right so you want to get it back on them but sometimes it's smart to not yeah 100 i mean i'm i'm over there uh the rotolo brothers are training over there at csw with eric paulson right now and yeah it's those guys are phenomenal yeah they're the best in the world at what they do they're so fun to watch those guys could put jujitsu on the map oh yeah because the rotolo brothers like when they do jujitsu it is like this chaotic exciting like very kinetic very technical path to your neck right you know that's what it is it's just this constant path to your neck dude and they got these monkey arms that it can just wrap around your neck and get that darts choke from anywhere man it's ridiculous long arms are awesome long arms are in such an advantage like hodger gracie had that yeah a lot of guys have that a lot of like the best darts guys hamzat has that right those long arm guys yeah and then like you said like their their ability to they they almost like enforce the chaos because that's where they they thrive at you know all that scramble situation they're they're running doing crazy jumps like crazy sweep setups uh was it kate or ty i think i don't say it was ty when he ran and he bounced off the cage or the ropes and he runs back in and double legs like dude like it's like a wwe match you know they're like thriving off of that chaotic energy scrambles yeah they they they're so good in scrambles you know and it's really interesting watching it is it ty that's doing one fc that is doing mma fights now they're both fighting they're both fighting now and that's it's going to be exciting to have those guys enter into the ufc someday hopefully they will yeah because uh for sure that they're they're just freak athletes you know it's something that they've been around since they were super super young and uh yeah i mean even even they're striking you know it's not super technical quite yet they're very brand new in it but they're just they got long reach they're very methodical they're athletic they understand distances from the jujitsu world of setting up takedowns and you know closing closing that distance so um but yeah what i was saying is like going with that kind of a guy it's like the last thing i want to do is engage in like a grappling position with them in the jujitsu or in the mma and uh but it's like yeah the more i do that i'm only going to get better at doing that kind of stuff you know kill the ego engage full head-on into what you're bad at that's the only way to get good at anything another great thing about those guys is they're totally natural and in the jujitsu world that's rare right that's really rare jujitsu is a dirty sport man yeah or you know i mean is it dirty if everyone's doing it no let me say it this way it's an enhanced sport right for the most part the elite guys are on some brazilian supplements yeah it's it's legal but they're all doing it yeah they're all juiced up so i mean it's kind of legal like abu dhabi doesn't test a lot of places don't test so it's like and you see these guys there's no way some of them and you know kudos to guys like gordon like gordon ryan who talks very openly about it he's like everybody's on performance enhancing drugs why wouldn't i be on performance enhancing drugs right my goal is to be the absolute best that i could be period right you know and the idea that the only reason why he's so good is because steroids is also equally ridiculous because when he was younger and when he was much smaller he was winning tournaments left and right and beating world champions right and he was totally natural yeah i mean there's there's no way you can say someone like gordon ryan isn't the highest prowess of skill set for jujitsu you know like his technical technicality and his abilities they are unquestionable yeah i mean what are you going to do if everybody else is is on that level you're now at a deficit if you're not taking it so um there's a few guys that don't um and and maybe i don't know obviously there's maybe some strength skill or strength deficit there but that's that's why again going back to my style and what i like to do with like the technicality and having that ability there's there's there's just so many aspects to everything but if you're that much more technical than someone then that can negate size to some extent that can negate um strength to some extent like there's there's there's a lot of equalizers there now you know on the on the opposite end someone who's got that one hitter quitter they could be less technical but they're always dangerous if they hit you time and you go to sleep then all sins are forgiven they could have got beat up for two rounds straight and they knock you out that's all the crowd remembers so uh there's a there's a lot that goes into it but if you're that much more you know skilled in your technicality that's that's you're gonna to me that's the best you can do that's that's really what you're chasing for sure the really dangerous guys are the guys who have that one hitter quitter power and then they get real technical yeah those are the scary guys oh for sure i mean yeah that's then now you have it all yeah that's that but it's often not the case though that's what's interesting is power can be a curse as can talent talent can be a curse too because you don't work as hard because you fuck everybody up in the gym and so you don't show up for practice sometimes you still fuck these guys up they're just not on your level physically or for whatever reason yeah and then there's guys that have that power that always just rely on that power and never really develop the fundamentals and so like deontay wilder is a great example of that deontay wilder who i think is the greatest one punch knockout artist in the history of the heavyweight division that fucking guy whoo and not a big guy yeah but his power is nuts and teddy atlas has the greatest uh definition of it the description of it he said it's the great eraser any mistakes he makes one shot erases them all yeah it's so true oh 100 yeah it's uh i agree i mean but could you imagine if deontay could move like tyson fury right if deontay could box like tyson fury yeah with also with that crazy insane power yeah that's that's game over for that's game over for everybody who stands in front of that guy yeah not a single person you know this episode is brought to you by blue chew man let's talk about blue chew they're already the number one brand for better sex but what they're doing with blue chew gold is completely next level gold is a four-in-one formula designed to make your bedroom noisy again obviously it gets you hard like you're back in your 20s and everything is handled 100 online but gold boosts your arousal getting you ready for sex physically and mentally plus it dissolves under your tongue for faster absorption so you get that spontaneous energy back look at the stats gold is three times stronger five times faster and eight times longer lasting than old school methods blue chew gold is the real deal right now buy two months of blue chew gold and get the third free with my code rogan you will also receive free overnight shipping head over to bluechew.com for details and important safety information check it out this ad and the products being advertised are intended for a united states audience yeah if he could move like ooze i mean it's a tall fucking order because no one can move like ooze other than ooze but imagine if he could move like ooze right you know i mean n has that crazy stop bang right one shot you're in another fucking dimension yeah and that's you know there's and then um that's that's obviously like at a personal level like some people are blessed with that talent like you said or a skill set or athleticism well the power thing is just it seems like it's a gift yeah no it is i mean i mean i think it was for us i was talking about connor and he was talking about how the muscles connect to the muscle head differently it's like a long or short one so then you either have like that real explosive power but then your your cardio suffers whatever it is he's going into it it's a gift i mean can you develop it to some extent yeah of course now the other thing with with punching with with striking is it's not always like power that knocks people out it's the shot that you don't see coming that knocks you out sure you know yeah and so it you know then you can kind of equalize on that playing field i suppose to some extent if you're getting people guessing you're getting people fainting you're hitting them with shots that they're not seeing then you're going to get similar you know knockout finishes like that there's a lot of guys that knock a lot of people out that don't have one punch power for sure max holloway is a great example of that like max has never even though he has knocked guys out with one shot it's generally like after a bunch of damage right but i mean max talked about it pretty openly about guys like connor and jose aldo and he's like they just get tired quicker because of the speed and power they're so explosive it's so much energy to try to close the distance that quick and land those big nuclear bomb shots but you only have a few of those in a whole fight yeah i feel like uh max's um perspective on those two guys may be construed just because of i mean he fought connor the first time i guess when connor was in his prime you know and he's coming up it was almost before his it was it was on that rise they were both kids i think max was 20 at the time yeah he was i think he was like the youngest usc fighter at that time or something close he was a different human back then for sure but i just think so like because connor's cardio is something that i have noticed it wasn't it wasn't super poor like initially when he was fighting at 145 i mean to me he never like chad mendes they had a lot of grappling exchanges chad took him down chad hit him with shots you know connor just stayed nice calm cool and he was like i don't know i don't know i don't and uh he he got back to the striking where he could do that but to me he never was like gassed out but then he watched the second diaz fight and he's running around the cage for five rounds now he's gone up on a weight class so then it goes back to you know what's his what's his training regimen look like he's he's not cutting as much weight so he doesn't have to be as much as discipline his diet changes there's a lot of aspects so like i don't know the connor one was was weird to me just because i i saw a change in it when he was at 145 he didn't have poor cardio as soon as he left that weight class his cardio waned and then jose aldo i mean that guy was undefeated for what 10 years champion for 10 years and you never saw him get tired and i never saw him get tired yeah max fought him at a certain point when he's a little bit older this and that so i don't know maybe that's just max's perspective on that i'm not saying max is incorrect and what he's saying but um i don't know there's there's to me there's just i haven't um pinpointed exactly what's the right and wrong way to do everything just because there's so many variables especially in mma i mean we were kind of discussing a little bit earlier is it's not just solely that you have like good cardio that allows you to continue to perform in that fight there's another aspect of how calm cool and collected you can be because you know like we were talking hitting the mitts and something if you're real tense and you're just trying to kill him you're just trying to kill him and you're just yeah you're going to burn yourself out but if you're fast and snappy you're producing just as much if not more power and now you're being more efficient with it you know and so um i don't know the cardio one is is uh is a funky one and combat sports to me it really is but i think if you look at jose aldo jose aldo when he was on top when he was the king he was wrecking everybody and he was the hammer most of the time and he was so athletic and he was so athletic and he was so athletic and so fast and had some of the best leg kicks we had ever seen like the uriah favor fight how fucking tough is uriah favor yeah because like that guy many many many humans would have been stopped a long time ago just from those leg kicks and uriah just kept trying to the very last second right even though he was way behind the scorecards never folded up his tent he was still trying but aldo wasn't the nail you know i'm saying like there was there was very few moments in a fight where someone had really started overwhelming him one of the things that max has always been so good at is knowing when to hit the gas and knowing when to just slowly ramp up the pressure and you see guys start to fade and max is a cardio fucking machine i mean super disciplined guy right and great camp those guys in hawaii really prepare him well he is always like 100 like the fight with gaethje fighting in the fifth round of a fucking crazy chaotic war just the same exact pace he was fighting in the first round right so it's the experience of knowing what your body can do when you can hit the gas when you need to back off when to move when not to and when you feel your opponents start to fade a little bit you see the mouth being open a little bit more you see the movement looks a little sloppier right oh 100 that's yeah knowing when to rest is is a big aspect of that as well because you go and you i mean that's why a lot of the training you do is is that short bursts you know you hit like your sprints um you know you might maybe hit the straightaway on on the track and then you jog and maintain because you're not going to be able to do that you're not going to be able to do that in a fight you're never completely resting you're always moving a little bit um so yeah i mean that's that's a huge thing the experience i think his his style and just what he's created like you said in his camp is is a high output high volume individual so you know his body's probably um become used to that and that's that's how he performs yeah i was shocked that connor wanted to fight him in his first fight back after years off i mean five years is a long time to not fight and then to come back and fight a guy like max who's been constantly fighting yeah the best guys in the world and knowing that max is a guy who never fades and he's in very different i mean the only guy who's really gotten him out of there is ilia and you know ilia caught max when max went down from 55 down to 45 which i think was a mistake he was so big he got so big to get up to 55 to fight justin and he did it over a long period of time put a lot of effort into it and he did it over a long period of time put a lot of effort into it and he did it over a long period of time put a lot of effort into it and he did it over a long period of time put a lot of effort into it and he did it over a long period of time and he did it over a long period of time and he put a lot of mass on and then you essentially you're starving yourself to get down to 45 again your body's going to be weak no matter what you do it's not like he was When he was fighting at 45, he maintained a lower weight class, knew exactly when to cut, and would make it no problem each time. That last cut to 45 was a nightmare. It was a horror show. And so when he got in there with Ilya, and then you're fighting El Matador, that motherfucker, you want to talk about technique. Technique and his strike, the smoothness and efficiency, and the one-punch, go-night-night power. I mean, that guy has it above it. Who the fuck did that to Charles Oliveira the way that guy did? I mean, that's nuts. And up at 55, when Oliveira's a big 55, too. Yeah, I mean, him moving up to 55, those are some big dogs right there. Big, especially when you look at him and Justin. When him and Justin were facing off, I'm like, that's a way bigger dude. Justin's bigger than me, and Ilya's smaller than me. When I stand next to the two of them, I'm like, this is crazy that Ilya has the kind of power that he's just wrecking guys even that are way bigger than him. Right. Yeah, I mean, his skill set is. His power is amazing combined with the power. That's someone you talk about has the skill set and the punching power, you know, and encompasses both those things. Yeah, he's got it all. I mean, and the thing with him, too, is he's just so calm, cool, and collected. I think that's also something. I mean, I do a lot of, like, comparison from Muay Thai boxing to the MMA world because, you know, I'm in MMA, so I understand that there's so many different aspects to it. Where, like, someone could take you down, and that's going to affect your striking skill set, you know? If you've got someone who's a real dope wrestler, and you're a way better striker, if you're sitting there and worried about them taking you down and smothering you, your striking goes out the window a little bit because now you have a whole different set of weapons that you're worrying about. And you can get caught easier. Yeah, especially if you're, like, just loading up on them. Yeah, you're going to get ducked under and double-legged and then taken down, and that's the whole thing. I forgot where we even started this train of thought. But, yeah, I mean, I think it's his collectiveness, too. But I was saying there's comparisons to all these. And that's why, like, boxing, you see these guys, they might have a couple more rounds, but they come out in, like, the first round. Maybe the second round is a feeling-out round. You know, it's a slow build-up where they're collecting data, they're setting traps, they're doing a lot of that. And you see that. In MMA, it's just not at the same level. Obviously, there's a greater skill set. There's more weapons to worry about. It is different. But I don't know. Obviously, I'm reaching for peak perfection with everything. So if we're coming and we're looking at distance control, I think the boxers do it better. If we're looking at setting up feints and working off a jab especially, I think that's the most frustrating thing when I watch MMA or UFC fights and watch the majority of the guys. Never, ever use a jab. And it's always just this big overhand right. I'm like, what are you doing? Like, you have two hands. That's crazy. You have the jab. Set it up. Now, I'm not saying that's everybody, but I see many people doing that. But going back to Teporia, that's one thing that he does so well is he's a shorter guy. He sits back on that back foot. He's throwing that jab. He's understanding your distance control so he can get in. And then that's where he's got that power and he lets that go. It's going to be interesting to see how he rebounds because that was a – a lot of damage. He had two fractured orbitals. They had to stop the fight in between rounds. Yeah. And he took big punches from a guy who's got fucking rocks in his hands. Yeah. I mean, Justin can crack. Well, they call him, what, the most violent? Yeah. The most violent in the game, and I think that stands true. Yeah, that's a hard one to bounce back from. It's going to take extra time of him really letting all his injuries heal and be fully recovered before he even thinks about sparring again. Ever get touched in the face again. Yeah, I don't know where he's at now, but I know that he's still recovering, and it'll be a while. I mean, the fight was in June. We're doing this right now. It's August 30th. Was it 30th or 31st? 31st, yeah. 31st. So he's had a couple of months, but he probably needs like six months before he's even sparring again. Oh, yeah, for sure. Yeah, I mean, it's going to take some time. It's going to take some time. And the thing that I really hate to see is when you have undefeated individuals like that. Who have gone undefeated their whole career, feel invincible, and then sometimes that one takes them off their pedestal. You know, like Jose Aldo is a great example of that. I mean, and he came back and he fought tough, but he just never was the same. Right. He was never that untouchable. You know, there's probably many people that I can touch back on, but, yeah, I think hopefully that's the main thing that he's going to need is that mental indestructibility. And to come back and just be like, I'm the same person, that one fight doesn't change anything, and I'm ready to go do it again. Well, he's a very mentally strong guy, and I think he will bounce back in that regard. It's just, there's also just the reality of how much damage, and only he knows how much damage he actually took in that fight. Yeah. You know, how that affects him as well. Because you know as well as anybody that there's only a few of those kind of fights that you could have in your career, and you've got to be very careful how you recover from those. And a lot of fighters, a lot of great fighters, have made a mistake of coming back too soon. Volkanovsky is one that I point to all the time, who's arguably the greatest featherweight of all time. He is one of the most masterful fighters in the game. He took a short, short notice fight with Islam in the rematch and got head kicked. And then I think it was only four months later that he was fighting Ilya. And that is crazy. That's a crazy thing to do. He took a full head kick, shinned the dome, gets KO'd, and then four months later he's fighting the fucking scariest challenger that he's ever had to face. Right. Yeah, 100%. You can't rush back into those things. I mean, especially when you're that cemented, you don't really need to rush back into it. Right. You know, you have your legacy behind you. Well, he shouldn't have even taken that fight with Islam. There's no way. You should take a world championship fight when you're hanging out with your buddies, drinking beer, you know, eating fish and chips or whatever the fuck he was doing. He's hunting with Volk over there, you know. Yeah, he's having a good time. But he wasn't in training. He's just. There's no way he was in training. He didn't look like he was in training physically. Like, his body didn't look the same. Right. Not only did he look out of shape, but he definitely looked smoother and less ripped than he usually does. There's a difference to being in a two- or three-month fight camp of day in, day out, two, three practices a day. The diet's set. The mentality is set versus I'm just training on the outside of that. When you came in on two days' notice to fight Wellmaker, were you in training at all? Like, what was your scenario? I was doing a food-eating championship training. I was killing double-doubles and three-by-threes. No, but with that one, I was fortunate because I stay strict pretty much year-round. So I had fought in January at the beginning of the year, and then I was supposed to fight multiple times, and I just had two or three opponents pull out. And then I fought November 7th for the title fight for the A1 combat, which was literally the weekend before. So, fortunately, I did it. I was. Even though people were falling out, I kept to the course. I stayed strong. I stayed in a fight camp mentality. That November 7th fight ended up happening. So I had a strong two months. Now, still, even that one-week difference of going, being in a fight camp, and then I have a couple drinks at the casino, I'm eating food. And I thought to myself, because January was a similar thing, where they said February, Australia, get ready, get your passport, let's look into this, blah, blah, blah. You know, I had a nice knockout finish there. But then, yeah, just that one week of being off, of eating whatever I wanted to, and just kind of doing whatever. I ran once. I showed up to sparring and light touch sparred. I had gone to one other practice because, in my mind, I was like, I need to be somewhat ready for this. Like, I can have a week. I've been in fight camp all year long. I can have one week, and then that's the week. That's the week that they call. It's a 48-hour notice, MSG, 10-0 undefeated Malcolm Wellmaker. You want it? And then, of course, I can't say no to that one. So, had you fought the weekend before the Wellmaker fight? I fought November 7th, yeah. Wow. That's actually good. If you didn't get hurt. Yeah. Well, it was a minute and 30 seconds. I knocked him out in the first round. So, it was, to me, it's just the stars aligned. I mean. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. Big news. Aldi is now on Uber Eats. And you get 20% off your first grocery order with code NEWALDI26. 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Because we all know how important it is to keep your gut happy and healthy. AG1 Next Gen or AG1 Pro, both are here to help you level up. Whichever you go with, your body will thank you. Go to drinkag1.com slash Joe. And for a limited time, save 20% on your first subscription order of AG1 Next Gen or AG1 Pro. That's drinkag1.com slash Joe. Don't you think it's also good that you just had the experience like seven days prior to the whole thing, getting in the cage, cage shots, you just fought. So it's much more comfortable for you than if you had, like Connor, taking five years off. As elite as Connor is, double champ, one of the greatest of all time, for that, even a guy like that, you take five years off and you could see like what it did to him. It's like it fucked with his head. Oh yeah, you could see it. There wasn't the same Connor energy going into it. Of course, I always want a quick turnaround, like after I fight, just for that very reason. I, I, I cut the weight. I know what that's like. I warmed up in the back with all the anticipation, you know, and that energy flowing through my body. I walked out in front of the crowd. They announced my name. I got there. I, I actually fought someone. So yeah, if you have that going for you, then that's, yeah, it's way, way better for sure. Yeah. The more active you could be, the more comfortable you could be with the experience, as long as you're not getting hurt. Yeah. Here's a stat that I was reading about Izzy. And people forget about this. When he was a champion, he, he defended his title a lot, man. He was the guy that they can go, Hey, we need someone to headline this card. And Izzy would step in. And I think he fought three times. He defended the world title three times in one year, which is crazy. Cause I don't think the middleweight title since he's gone has even been content. Like how many middleweight fights have there even been for the title since he's been gone? There's only been a few fights. I think there's only been, I mean, there's Sean. And Drikus, Sean and Drikus too. Drikus and Hamzat. And then Sean and Hamzat. And Sean and Hamzat. I mean, it might literally be like maybe five fights since he's lost the title and fuck he defended it more than anybody. Right. Yeah. Which is crazy. He defended it three times in one year. Yeah. And then you have this, you know, huge span of time in between defenses. But then there's the question of like, what is the, when does it become a benefit? And when does it become a detriment? Like when, when you're fighting too many times a year, like the Marab Dovish-Willie fight. One of the things that a lot of people talked about after Piotr Jan beat him in the rematch was what about the strength of schedule? I mean, Marab was fighting constantly. He was fighting, he fought so often and for so many years that you got to think that at a certain point in time, maybe he's doing himself a disservice by being so active. Yeah. I mean, for sure. Um, I don't know. I mean, that's, it's something you got to feel out for yourself. You know, it's, it's something that you have to know in your heart of hearts and nobody else can tell you that your coach can't be like, nah, you're training really well these days. You're super sharp, this and that. Like if something's off, realistically, you should be perfect going into your fight, especially at a, at a world championship caliber. Um, it's just, I mean, I keep making these comparisons, but it's another thing that I, I go back to it. The boxing world is, these guys look at it as a business. Like look at Floyd Mayweather. Like everything was like, he, he made sure that the, the cage was his side. He picked the gloves. It was certain people at certain times. And there's, there's some things to be said about that, but it's a business mindset. It's a very smart approach to it. You know, I'm fighting when I'm ready. I'm not fighting injured, which is, which is more of the main thing is like people go in there with injuries and, you know, get hurt or, or lose even. And it's like, that's, that could be detrimental on your record. I think the MMA guys are a little bit, they're a little bit, more on the tough side instead of the business side of things where they'll, they'll fight anyone anytime, which, I mean, that's how you gotta be, but that's how you build your team around you. You have a team that tells you, Hey, you know, this time isn't, isn't necessarily the best to go into it and this and that, and just being a little bit smarter about your schedule. It's like, yeah, us fighters are going to sit there and go, I'll fight anyone, any given time. Um, doesn't matter, but yeah, this is a, this is a business. It's not just, um, fighting, like getting in that cage solely. It's, it's a lot of aspects that go into it. Don't you think it's way more difficult to go into a fight? Perfect in MMA than it is in boxing though. In boxing, it seems like it's much easier to avoid injuries. For sure. There's, there's, there's differences. I just, I reflect back to that. I like the way that they conduct themselves. I think it's, it's, and there's a lot that's to be said to that. Cause it's, it's a longer standing sport. There's been more time and experience into it, but yeah, I mean, you know, I, I was before this April fight, I, the first round of the day of sparring, I was just going light with Callum Bisping for literally one second. And we moved around and he's a heavyweight. We moved around. He took me, took me, he tried to take me down. I stuffed, he took me down and I kind of just sat with it cause I didn't want to get caught in any, you know, knee tweaking positions or anything. Cause he's just so much heavier than I am. And I sat into a butterfly, which is typically how I would do that. Elevate the hips immediately and take a scramble. And my, my meniscus just popped instantly right then and there. First round of the day, barely, barely had done anything, barely started. And it wasn't even like a, a crazy position, but yeah, now I've sustained injury. Now I don't go against heavyweights anymore cause I'm stupid. Yeah, you should never be doing that. As a bantamweight, you should not be sparring with heavyweights. Well, that's why I go the first day. I'm, or not the first day, but the first round, I'm just trying to warm up. There's, there's a lot of things to be said. I, I don't spar with guys that are reasonably close to your weight period. 10, 10 pounds is probably a maximum above you. You know, you shouldn't be going with anybody more than that. Yeah. I get, I get smarter with these things. Yeah. I, I do dumb things and, uh, I figure for the, for the most of my history, I've had to learn the hard way with things. So, uh, I'm getting better at it. I'm getting smarter. So, but like I said, it was just a freak thing. It wasn't like we were going crazy hard or anything. Like it just was the first round. I just trying to move and, and then some little thing happens like that. Uh, it wasn't a full, full tear, but it happened back in like February ish, right before that, that April one. So leading up to the Esteban fight, it's like, I didn't grapple till the last, maybe, maybe month of it, maybe a couple of weeks. Oh, so it was bothering you even before that fight? It was all the way up to it. I mean, like that's, that's when it happened was the April fight, which was the Esteban fight. Wow. So yeah, it's, it's very difficult to avoid everything. You know, like there's a lot of different things that won't even seem like a detrimental position but yeah, you got grappling, which can tweak all sorts of different parts of the body. A simple cut from, from striking can happen very easily. So for sure it's, it's much more abundant in the MMA world because there are more weapons. There's a lot of variations of things to watch out for. Um, but that being said, I like to carry, like I said, this is a smart man's game. I like to carry a, a level of, of business wise and smart wise to this. And that's, so though, the, um, exact functions may differ. It's, it's the mindset that I like to carry from it. Right. Is it, well, it, what you said is perfect that it's a long business. Boxing has been around for a long time and the really elite trainers, the really elite coaches, they know how to prepare their fighters and they know what fights to take and when to take them. Right. And unfortunately with the UFC, like sometimes you get a call like the Malcolm Wellmaker fight, you know, and you're like, oh shit, it would have been nice to get two months to prepare for Malcolm, but I have two days. Right. And I just fought, fuck it, roll the dice. And you also were coming out of nowhere. And I don't think a lot of people had time to prepare for you because as good as you are, when you fought Wellmaker, when you fought, uh, how do you say his name? Estevan, what is his? Rafael Estevan. Rafael Estevan. He was also undefeated and super skillful. He was a, really good fighter and still is. But, um, to have those two performances in a row, the way you looked, you looked like a guy, like if you were 20 years ago, you would have been a fucking alien. Like no one had seen anybody like you before. That's how much this sport has grown just in 20 years. So you go back to like ultimate fighter season one, there was fucking nobody like you, nobody like you back then. Right. You know, it really wasn't until Anderson burst onto the scene shortly after that, that we really got to know each other. Yeah. I mean, yeah. Talk about an alien for that time. That was Anderson Silva. That's, that's one of the top to ever do it. There's, there's no question. Oh my God. People forget because maybe they see his later fights in his career, but you go back and watch him when he was in his prime. I remember when, when he fought Chris Lieben and Chris Lieben is a murderous puncher. Like one of the hardest punchers that's ever fought in the UFC. He's, he's one of those guys that's got that fucking - Right. - And he's just such a warrior. I mean, wades into the storm, you know? but that style is tailor-made for him and when I was looking at the odds a friend of mine was there I go bet the house on the Brazilian I go bet the house I go listen to me this is a motherfucker dude just wait because that's when he really came into his own over in cage rage when he that's when he really became Anderson Silva that was a yellow cage was that yes that's when he did that the elbow the crazy elbow yeah Tony Fricklin yeah what was the it was like a up kick like a crescent up kick was that pride or was that the cage rager he was on the bottom and he whipped his leg over the top it wasn't like a straight up kick he he kind of like brought it over oh I don't remember that yeah I don't I don't recall either who was he fighting I don't know I'm not I'm not good at names so in pride it was uh who's he fighting here Jamie Japanese gentleman Japanese gentleman Yushin Okami oh Yushin Okami this was rumble on the rock this is BJ Penn's promotion look at that oh yeah he's just doing things that like yeah nobody had ever thought of at that time he gets that right leg loose ties his hands up bow that's crazy and Okami was a beast and they fought again in the UFC later and he KO'd Okami yeah stuff like that the elbow you're talking about yeah just like just a pioneer for it you know it's not like he's watching film he's not sitting on YouTube watching people do these things prior he's the one that's coming up with yeah this is the crazy elbow you know what the funny story about this elbow he was training that and his coach told him stop doing that you're not gonna do that yeah so he made his wife hold pillows at home and he was he was practicing it at home he was having her hold a pillow and he was just working on the mechanics of that elbow it's like he wanted to prove his coach wrong right and he wanted to get the knockout with that that technique and lo and behold he did it well he had some great fights over there particularly the the Lee Murray fight did you ever see that fight probably I know the Murray is right he's the the British do that became a bank robber was the bank robber Craig biggest heist in UK history yeah yeah and that was a bad dude too at the time everybody was scared of that dude well that guy could crack he's another guy had crazy power yeah and just a vicious dude just absolutely vicious guy who's a legitimate criminal yeah exactly he had like that whole aura and persona to him yeah he's a real gangster yeah that brings a little bit more of like this you know I don't wanna say fear but like oh yeah who's this guy you know the fucking guy was an elite fighter and he was also a elite criminal he's multi-talented I mean that's something in a movie like a guy like who's a top-tier criminal who also competes and wins in the UFC right yeah and won by triangle that beat Jorge Rivera by triangle yeah and it's crazy yeah I know and you have Anderson come in and just wrecked him and he wrecked him with technique and it was a lot of it was leg kicks yeah he just Anderson's Muay Thai was at such a different level it was so artistic yeah I think that's the perfect word to describe that was artistic because it's just beautiful the way he said things up I mean he made elite guys look very brand-new in the cage and I didn't see very many close fights with them until later in his career yeah it's a later in his career thing and I always say that with fighters you really have to look at them when they were at their highest rpm whatever it's what you generally it's only a few years right with that few years like judge them by that judge them by those performances when they were just on fire yeah and I I tell people you have to always go back and watch those Anderson fights when he front kicked Vitor in the face right first time anybody had ever won by knockout with a front kick to the face in the UFC now people do it all the time right but I didn't even think that was a good option like there's a video of and I grew up kicking there's a video of me and Eddie Bravo we're working with those Bob one of those Bob dummies and he's like what do you think about a front kick to the face I'm like it's better the body I mean you could land it to the face but you know I don't really see very many guys do it it's much more wrong it's perfect just watch the Anderson Silva fight and everybody does it now so many guys get knockouts with a front kick to the face because you don't see it coming when it comes straight up the middle right if everything's coming around and all sudden something comes straight up the middle and catches the bottom of your chin for sure I I like I like that side kick to the body to the liver throwing that heel on the liver I think that's more of a natural motion but I have been working with the front kicks I like them a lot especially with that with the weight on the back leg a little bit and especially with these calf kicks people are really trying to bear down and throw the calf kick hard that's that's what's gonna be my technique and my last one was when that when that calf kick comes off their very beginning because that's what footy does is comes out he control looks for his distance and he bases down he throws that calf kick almost every single time against every opponent and I was like you know especially because I was planning on going there one-handed and I was like so I'm just gonna pull this front leg up front front kick to the face and it's gonna land it's gonna be beautiful but yeah I started to work that like you you put all that weight on that back leg this one comes up fast and with the one I like better especially with the boxing as I come down here is kind of getting that lean forward and you're stepping back and then when people think your face is in range forward you just pull back and throw that one straight up the middle and you talk about off the front leg from the back leg on this on the second one you're kind of basing on here and you're you're stepping back onto the to the back leg and when they open up like they're gonna throw something oh you lean back and throw it up the middle yeah and so you're changing the distance there's people don't expect it for the calf kick you're just light on the front leg and you're throwing it off the front leg are you sliding forward are you just picking it up and stabbing I just pick it up and stab it because they got to close a little bit of distance to get that calf mm-hmm that one's um you know the kick is a longer range but that one you have to come a little bit closer mm-hmm for me to throw it appropriately some people smack it with the the foot or whatever it is I don't like that I like that Dutch style almost like a soccer kick just you're raising it straight up and that shin bone is touching that soft calf and so to do it that way I get a little bit closer distance but then that's where you know you set it up and all the other stuff be a little safer doing it that way yeah the calf kick is interesting because a lot of guys are kind of just going straight up right you know like you ever see yuki yoza fight he's one of my favorite guys to watch fights that's probably like the perfect example of throwing yeah a very deliberate and technical calf kick is how he does it he destroys people's legs destroys them and he's kicking up he's kicking up all the time and there's no pivot and it's so fast it's so fast and there's no tell and he's throwing it in every combination so he's hitting you with a jab he's inside low kicking you the left hook he's outside low kicking you like yeah he's smacking you from all the different levels constantly and taking out your base every time right every time you're close enough he's taking out your base every time every time and from all angles I love watching this guy fight he does that cool thing too like what he just did check out that watch it they gave him trouble for that cuz you're not supposed to do that in kickboxing see he does that he hooks the guy's leg so he throws like a half speed kick so that back it up again so you can see that he throws like a half speed kick holds it and then trips him my dad was actually just talking about that one with me that's a very clean technique my dad was actually just talking about that one with me that's a very clean technique real but he is such a wild guy to watch because of the damage that he does to guys legs so this is what I love about the artistic aspect of it and the technical aspect when people figure out okay what do you do when you're fighting a guy like this well Jonathan Haggerty figured it out it's constant switch stances constant knees to the body moving jabbing constant movement you never let him get set up for those you never let him get set up for those you know and he took a lot of leg kicks in know and he took a lot of leg kicks in that but he landed way more than he took that but he landed way more than he took and he won the decision against yozos it was a big win but it was also like a yozos it was a big win but it was also like a blueprint like if people got to see that blueprint like if people got to see that fight they see it see you can find that fight Jonathan Haggerty and Yuki Yoza he did a really good job of picking that fight he did a really good job of picking that front leg up mm-hmm that's and that's going that front leg up mm-hmm that's and that's going back to MMA is something that it's still back to MMA is something that it's still developing but I don't see a lot of guys developing but I don't see a lot of guys defend the calf kick I see a lot of guys defend the calf kick I see a lot of guys willingly eat them yes and it's like you willingly eat them yes and it's like you do that with the shin guards on you do that with the shin guards on you could probably spar all day and take calf could probably spar all day and take calf kicks you know sort of if they're kicks you know sort of if they're landing clean like really clean yeah landing clean like really clean yeah you're gonna feel it yeah but for the you're gonna feel it yeah but for the most part you pick the leg up you pull most part you pick the leg up you pull it back a little bit it doesn't land it back a little bit it doesn't land super flush you could take it with shin super flush you could take it with shin guards on you take you take one good one guards on you take you take one good one with no shin guards on it's a completely with no shin guards on it's a completely different game it takes you know you're different game it takes you know you're that leg away from you this episode is that leg away from you this episode is brought to you by superpower your doctor brought to you by superpower your doctor spends eight minutes with you and your spends eight minutes with you and your insurance decides what blood work you insurance decides what blood work you get that's not 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look how on your membership yeah so look how Jonathan is never stationary constantly Jonathan is never stationary constantly switching stances look I mean literally switching stances look I mean literally constantly and constant movement and constantly and constant movement and then when you're thinking about the legs then when you're thinking about the legs the jab the the jab the jab the step forward knee everything is step forward knee everything is constant movement there's never a chance for constant movement there's never a chance for yosa to set up and nice spinning back yosa to set up and nice spinning back kicks the body there and close to you I kicks the body there and close to you I know he's wicked man this dude's wicked know he's wicked man this dude's wicked but how could he figured him out man but how could he figured him out man look at that outside low kick on a hop I look at that outside low kick on a hop I mean in constant stance switches in that mean in constant stance switches in that switch knee to the body look yo says look Looking for those, man. You can only take so many of them from this guy, too. He's got fucking stones for shins. Yeah, he's got no nerve endings on anything below the knees. It's really incredible, man. Watching this fight is a real master class in striking. And this is one thing that I always give credit to one for. I think one has the absolute best strikers when it comes to just pure striking. Right. And the exciting guys that they have over there, Azadullah Imam Ghazalia, have you seen that guy fight? Yeah. He's my favorite. I fucking love watching that guy fight. It's like, Jesus Christ, he's good. And one of the guys that he trains with just fought in the PFL, Magomedov. Did you see that fight? No. I forget how to say his name. It's like, I think it's Abu or, I forget his name. But he put on a master class in striking. And he looked just like Azadullah. Azadullah Imam Ghazalia, like the way he was fighting, like that style. Long, tall, striker. And these Dagestan guys, man. Dagestan's got elite Muay Thai, too. That's what's crazy. Yeah, that's the dude. Amru. Amru Magomedov. Well, speaking of that. Show me a little bit of that. Because this cat, he fights just like Azadullah. Like, very similar. And I know they're from the same place. You talk about artistic, that's like Zabit. Yes. And Sharipov is another one. Yes. Yeah. And he was kind of the first. First of those guys that you go, oh, I think of these guys as wrestlers. Yeah. But look at this guy. He's throwing 360 roundhouse kicks and wheel kicks. Well, he was doing like, I don't know, not Kung Fu, but one of those practices before he was ever wrestling. Yes. Yeah, it was like Sanchu or something. But you watch this cat fight. He fights just like Azadullah. He's got that long reach, slick striking, wicked kicks. He throws a lot of high kicks. And that dude Alvarez that he's fighting was tough as shit, dude. Because he took a lot before he finally wilted. You can see he's hurting from the leg kicks already before that. Oh, he's getting destroyed. This cat's vicious. Being a long guy like that is just so much more beneficial. That's why everybody thinks it's all these big muscle heads. Like the OG UFC, that's the fighter build. The guy on top of the world who's missed. It's like it's the tall, long, skinny guy that can strike well. Like that's the perfect MMA. MMA build. Yeah, because they can strike you from six inches away from where you can strike them. That's a crazy advantage. That's back to where it was with Ty on Thursday, whatever it was. And he's like, I want to say he's at 78-inch reach. Wow. He's like, I have a 78-inch reach. He's like, so I can touch you guys from this and that, anti-Southpaw and blah, blah, blah. But I'm like, well, yeah. That's like a light heavyweight reach. Yeah, it's like, well, no, dude. Both of those guys have crazy long reach. It's ridiculous. Real long arms. Real long legs. Perfect for triangles. Perfect for any kind of darts. Right. Guillotines, anything. Rear naked. Rear naked with an arm in. Yeah, and then you fight Southpaw like this. It's like you can touch from a million miles away. That's what me, I'm the opposite. My whole style is all the way out or all the way in. I got to get in and get to work in there, you know. And there's something to be said about that, too, because those two styles cancel each other out. If you have a long guy, he's not going to fight as well on the inside. It's not saying that he can't, especially with the Muay Thai. The way they clinch is actually very efficient. And with the boxing stuff, opening stuff up and being able to get your longer limbs in there is perfectly viable as well. It's just you got to play off of your, you know, your God-given talents and your assets. And so the shorter guy is going to negate the long guy by getting inside. And if the long guy can maintain the distance and keep him there, then he's going to win that. Yeah, there's benefits to all body types. It's just knowing what to do with that body type. Like, look, Mike Tyson is arguably the greatest heavyweight of all time. He's in the conversation with Ali and Joe Lewis. And there's a few guys that you could, like, put into that category as the greatest heavyweight of all time. And I think Mike Tyson certainly in his prime was right there. Yeah. You know, Lennox Lewis. You got to put Lennox Lewis in that conversation. Even primetime Larry Holmes. You got to put him in that conversation. Right. But Mike Tyson was 5'11". You know, as a heavyweight, that's crazy. And he was only like 215, 220 in his prime. But that bobbing and weaving and constant movement, he would just overwhelm guys. You see the tall guys putting their hands out. They were just dealing with this fucking wolverine that was running towards them. Yeah. And I had just seen something from him or read a quote. And he said, it wasn't my physicality that was my greatest asset. It was my elusiveness. It was that I was so elusive that I could get in and I could get to work, you know? Yes. A lot of people, unless you're like a real practitioner or, you know, a student of the sport, they don't see that. They just see the bombs coming and they attribute that to he's got punching power, he's this monster. But there's just so much more intricate, you know? It's like you said about Anderson. Like, this is an art form. This is, it's a game of setting things up. It's a chess match, you know? Everybody looks at it like it's checkers, but it's, there's so many more moves that could be made and that need to be made to be the best at this. And you really want to be appreciated by the people that understand that. You don't want to be the guy that gives in to the howls and the cheers of the casuals. The real feeling, the good feeling that fighters get is when someone is a true student of the game who really understands what they, like, I love when you're doing this. I love that thing you do when you do. There's, that's what guys want to hear. They want to hear, like, from their fellow fighters. Right. Like, if, you know, like, when you're doing this, you're doing this. Like, when an elite fighter goes up to another elite fighter, it's like, bro, I fucking love what you're doing. You can see they're like, thank you. Like, it's like, it hits different. Oh, 100%. It means more when you know that a guy is really operating at a very high level. Right. Yeah, because the rest of the people have never stepped room into even a gym to spar or, like, go a couple rounds of grappling, you know? So it's. They oftentimes, they don't know what they're seeing. They have no understanding. Sometimes they think when the guy's missing, it's because he sucks. You know what is funny is that even I have. I've had that realization because, like, growing up, it was like me and my pops watching UFC and, to me, you know, that was my thing. But I would always sit there and go, well, why doesn't this guy do this? It's right there. Just do that. It's right there. It's like, dude, you're not standing in a cage surrounded by thousands of people. You don't have the same fatigue. You don't know injuries you're going into with it. You don't know what you practiced leading up to it that you even have the capacity to think about and to act on. It's like, there's just so many things. So, like, I watch stuff now. And I'm so. I'm so much better at that because I'm sitting there going, he could do that, but I don't know what he's seeing, you know? I don't know what's going on in his mind. So, yeah, there's different levels to it. Yeah, for sure. It's, I mean, it's a very complex game. It really is. I wanted to ask you a question. Do you think that it was a benefit for you to lose your first two fights? Do you think there's maybe something to that? Because we were talking about your first two opponents in the UFC being undefeated until they fought you. They had never experienced loss. They were professional before. And then they get on this crazy big hype thing. And there's something about being undefeated as well, especially when you're a guy like Wellmaker, who's not just undefeated, but a knockout artist. Like, people get really, really jazzed up and excited about that. Do you think that maybe having that bad feeling of loss earlier in your career maybe grounded you more? Yeah, certainly. I went 6-0 undefeated as an amateur, but I can tell you at that time, I was. I was not living a fighter's lifestyle to the fullest, you know? At that time, I would literally go to practice in the morning, and then I had to go to work at night or whatever. But I was like, man, fighting's the best. You just go wake up, practice once, you get to kick it the whole rest of the day, you get to go fight and make all this money and live your dream. If that's all it takes, this is cool. And I went in all these amateur scene fights, which that's what the amateurs are for, for learning and getting your experience. But yeah. It really showed me that there was change that needed to be made in what I did with fighting and what I did outside of fighting. And outside of fighting was arguably more important, you know? There was a lot that I needed to change, a lot that I needed to refocus on and make right by. And it wasn't until I did those things that I saw this drastic change, you know? It wasn't until I erased all the negatives and then filled it with. It wasn't until I erased all the negatives and then filled it with all the positives that I'm able to be on a 10-fight win streak doing what I'm doing now because who knows? I mean, maybe I would have changed that, but I don't think it would have been as drastic if I hadn't experienced those two losses the way I did. So before those two losses, your first two professional fights, were you kind of fucking off? Yeah, for sure. Yeah? 100%. What were you doing? Just everything. I mean. Drinking? Partying? Smoking? Smoking, drinking, being a delinquent, being not the best partner. How old were you back then? I came back from college in 2017. I tore my meniscus in a dual meet, and then my coach was. Same knee? My right knee. Different knee. Coach was an asshole about it. I snap, crackle, popped all the way through the rest of the season. It wasn't until after I got checked. In what way? Like, you didn't want to admit that you were. He just ignored it, like, completely. He just pretty much told me, suck it up. Oh, what a great coach. Yeah. And, uh. Yeah, exactly. That's why I didn't go back. I mean, it was a lot of things. I was in Bristol, Tennessee, so it's like, there's not a whole lot to say. to do out there coming from socal so that was a culture shock i was on my own for the very first time and then yeah i got hurt so then i started i don't know everybody else is out there partying and stuff i never partied i grew up very religious i was very strict i all throughout high school i didn't i didn't touch anything i didn't look anything i didn't want to partake in anything i i just wrestled that was my only drug was wrestling back then you know like that's all i did and i had a lot of success then and it wasn't until i deviated from that course and i started finding fun or enjoyment or just maybe just trying to fill time and and numb some of the things that i was thinking about or worrying about or like that wrestling thing of it it might not have been the biggest thing to people but for me like that was my first time experiencing where i had just placed like eighth in the california state i was fifth at the national tournament i was just just doing everything right you know i had won the u.s open for my age division and then i go to this and i'm on my own for the first time and i have all this adversity and it's just like i don't know i just felt like like why is this happening to me you know i felt like uh i had been abandoned at that point and maybe maybe other people would have recovered from it better but that was a first time experience for me so but yeah i was barely 19 years old around that time i think i probably started fighting around in the amateurs around 20 so i was i was relatively young but so the that's when you started partying i was as soon as i tore my meniscus i finished out the wrestling season and then i remember like even school like slouched off like i did i wasn't really caring about school too much we had finals i didn't really even try too hard and then i went i remember that day as soon as the last final was done we all went to the my buddy's house and that's the first time i ever got drunk like ever and so and it's not to say that those things are like the end of the world if if you're controlling them but i certainly wasn't you know i had like a lot of compounding things being first time and uh that carried over it was like that all the way up until yeah uh it was after that second loss i was probably still not doing what i needed to be doing to be a disciplined athlete um a respectable just like you know good person really i wasn't i wasn't being a good person and uh yeah there was there was a lot of change a lot of growth you know i had a lot of experience and i had a lot of experience and i had a lot of people guide me back into that and as soon as i made those changes yeah now now i'm here haven't been able to live and experience it because that's the best teacher out of all of them you know you can go and watch a youtube video on how to do something right like fix a car oh i know exactly where the alternator is i know where this this pump is i know how this connects to this then the second you open it up it's like okay well i didn't know i needed this tool and wow this is really way harder to pull off and it's the experience that i've had since i've been here it's the experience it's it's the hardship and experience that teaches you things so 100 if i hadn't gone through that who knows where i'd be and what i'd be doing right now you when you hurt your knee in college was that the first time you'd ever done where you had an injury where it completely compromised your ability to perform where you realize like oh like my body's very vulnerable um so i i had actually sprained my ankle it was it's called the oc duels it's like the number one and number two in orange county face off and uh i had tore up my ankle pretty good that was going into league and then cif and all that stuff and i had almost worried that i wouldn't be able to wrestle which is a big thing luckily i was able to wrestle on that but yes i guess the meniscus was probably the first time where it really took me out of my game like that and to me it was more of uh i don't know if it was a vulnerability of the body i like i had come to terms with that i i understood that um i don't know i've maybe i i thought there was a higher power like protecting me and at that moment like i was no longer protected and i had been abandoned and that's kind of what got to me honestly is i thought like god had abandoned me essentially at that time really you didn't think maybe god what did you even consider that it was a challenge i can look back on it and say with certainty that it was a challenge and i was like i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know it is and that you were young i was young and that's that's why i said i clouded my mind with a bunch of other things and instead of focused on it and thinking about it clearly i just just moved farther away from the issue so like at that time that's what i thought now being a mature man having grown my relationship with god having read and studied and and understanding that like i said that those hardships are what build us is that that's what tests our faith and what really brings us closer to god now i see that it wasn't as big as i had made it you know but i learned and and maybe falling farther down the path taught me even more yeah i think it does i think falling i think failing is actually a very good teacher i really do i think in all aspects of your life and uh especially when you're a young person you have this idea of who you are having that get knocked down where you have to rebuild is very important because once you rebuild and you realize like okay now i know what i'm capable of now i know that this is there's going to be ups and downs but i must maintain the path right this episode is brought to you by snapdragon take the leash off your laptop with the processor that gives you long battery life work on the go jump between back-to-back calls 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you've got to go to ziprecruiter.com slash rogan to post your job for free once again that's ziprecruiter.com slash rogan did you have to get your knee fixed did you have to do anything to it yeah they did a scope on it so they they shaved uh the part that was hanging away which to me i wish i had never done yeah because that knee gave has gives me issues to today like any of this inversion like a triangle choke with the right leg going over that meniscus it was my lateral meniscus outside it rolls over and it catches so then i gotta bring my leg straight and pop it back into place and uh it's gotten better you know i i get through it quicker these days but they tell you to not even get that surgery now well so that my my second professional fight where i got ankle locked i got uh i think it was like an outside reap and i went to sit up to to grab it and he had the position locked and my knee just went like eight times in my ear real bad and it was in the same exact spot that lateral meniscus the outer which uh i don't know what what other ligament is on the outside there but uh to me it was like exactly where the the meniscus on the right leg had happened but i grabbed up or sat up i grabbed his arms i kept trying to fight through it and then he switched it over to the to the heel hook on the other side my ankle popped twice as i rolled and i finally tapped then but i didn't i didn't even get an mri on that one i tried to it took so long that i was doing that and i was like i'm gonna do it again i'm gonna do it again i was doing the knees over toes and strengthening and i was starting to move on it that by the time they're like okay we can get your mri in a week i'm like dude i'm already moving and exercising and doing stuff on this like i was cool but yeah i never did anything with that and that knee's really never given me any issues and then the one i got the scope on still bothers me to today yeah they don't recommend that anymore because they did a study of people that have had meniscus surgery versus not not having meniscus surgery and just rehabilitation and it shows that rehabilitation seems to be the better path yeah i mean especially for like this i have one that's been scoped and it bothers me all the time that's the one i got shot up today okay it always bothers me it's like there's a missing padding on one side of it it's missing but i had a bucket handle tear and in jujitsu it would lock and my leg would be stuff like stiff and i could i have to like push it back into place it was excruciating it was like stuck locked out yeah yeah yeah it would go back eventually but it would take sometimes it'd take a day before and it would swell up you know but if i need first of all this is a long time ago unfortunately there was no stem cells available back then right i would have 100 just done stem cells and now i would have done the knees over toes stuff and a lot of cycling like stationary box bike cycling at not high resistance is a fairly low resistance is just repetitive motion it's really good for getting the blood flow to the knees and really good for strengthening up the tendons and it's really good for strengthening up the tendons and the ligaments and everything but without load you know it's just you do it like a very low resistance and just for a long time right and that's really Really good for your knees. Sweet. Yeah, I mean, there's so many things. Like, I think even, like, leg extensions would probably be, like, a good little exercise for the knees. I mean, it's a pretty deliberate spot. I think, you know, like, backpacking. I think, like, a controlled version of that because there's a lot of times, you know, you're dropping down, like, pretty heavily, this and that, which is probably not the best impact on the knee. Yeah. Yeah. But if you were doing it, like, because that's kind of the knees over toes is he's doing some similar motions. If you had some, maybe not as much weight, some weight on your back, you could slowly kind of find that and then have a soft landing. Like, I don't know. I was backpacking recently, and I was just thinking about this. I'm like, like, in a controlled setting, like, in a gym, like, on a machine that I'm, like, maybe not as much as, like, a steep incline or decline, like, something like that would be really good. And then the range of motion stuff is I've had, you know, with my injury and stuff and time to step away, I've had, like, a lot of opportunity to think. And I feel like I've grown tremendously. And it's, like, yeah, all the little tiny things, like the knees, like, they're fine. Like, I do it. I really don't have an issue too much. Like, maybe if I get into that position, it'll do it. But it's, like, you know, what happens when I do get into, like, a position, let's say a leg lock position, for example, or, like, a straight knee bar. And, you know, what if my flexibility is an issue there? Or just simply, like, a whizzer position where the knee is getting popped up. Like, just any. There's a million and one positions that the knees could be compromised there. And so, yeah. Yeah. Just going back, doing a lot of range of motion stuff, a lot of strengthening on the knees. Do you do Poliquin step downs? Do you know those? No. Charles Poliquin. See if you can find Poliquin. It's very simple. You're essentially doing it. Either you're doing it from an incline board with, like, a little bit of elevation. Or you're just doing it from a straight up step. And what you're doing is you're just lowering yourself down. So, one foot is above on the step. And the other foot, you're lowering like that. Like there. There you go. He's doing it on plates. Very simple. Very simple, right? I mean, you're literally only going, like, 10 inches. But you're going up and down like that. And it's just controlling the body weight like that. Phenomenal for knee strengthening. And for knee stability. It's excellent. It's one of the best exercises. Sweet. Are you doing backwards pulls with, like, either a sled or on a treadmill? Do you walk backwards doing that? I'm not doing, like, really any exercises. But weight and, like, I mean, I do little things for strength and conditioning after boxing. But I stay away from the weights. But it's not even for the weights. I'm talking, I mean, you do it on a treadmill. Okay. You do it on a treadmill. Just basically keep the treadmill off. And just with your own resistance, you step backwards. Okay. So, you put your back to the screen and hold on to the bars. And you're basically just pushing with your legs going backwards. And it's really good for strengthening your knees and also for blood flow. That's a knees over toes guy thing. Okay. All right. His page is phenomenal. I'll go to the 24-hour fitness and burn out their treadmill. Yeah. Yeah. You can do that. Or you could use a sled. You know, we do it with a sled here. You know, you put the sled. You put, like, a waist strap. And you just back up and pull the sled. And it doesn't have to be a lot of weight. It's not a weight thing. Right. It's really just a circulation thing and a strengthening thing. He has another one that you get the band around your back. And then you're kind of, I forgot how he did it. You're essentially, like, leaning. And then straightening the leg. You're, like, in a lunge, I guess, actually. You're in a lunge. The knee goes over the toes. You have the resistance on the back. And then you're pushing and essentially doing the same thing as probably walking back with the sled. The band is attached in the front or behind you? It's attached in the front. Oh, I see. So your resistance is pulling you forward. Okay. And you're lunged over the knee, the knee over the toe. And then you're extending that leg. And it's just hitting that knee perfectly. It's very similar to the one you're talking about, I'm sure. Yeah. Because someone. It's time you spend pushing forward. And not a lot of people spend much time pushing backwards. But pushing backwards is really important. Right. It's really important to just overall knee strength. Right. I think the side-to-side stuff, too, is, like, I was almost, like, let me get in the sand. And I do a lot of, like, working out in the sand just for the boxing, for the footwork and being able to stay in a stance. But, like, that little, like, side explosion stuff would probably start strengthening those muscles on the side and the ligaments going that way. Oh, yeah. So I'm trying to think, like, you know, how do you get that motion? I mean, you could get a band and probably, like, do kind of, like, a lateral extension or pull it up into your, like, an inward extension. You know who used to do a lot of weird shit with bands? BJ Penn. Oh, yeah. He did a lot of weird shit in his prime. Yeah. With, like, flexibility stuff and developing strength from weird positions with bands. Huh. Yeah. I see, I don't know if BJ was a part of that program, but, like, the Rafael dos Anjos. Yes. The fascia kind of stuff. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Well, Rafael dos Anjos was training with Nick Kersan. Nick Kersan was a student of Marv Marinovich. Okay. And Marv Marinovich is the guy who trained BJ when he was, like, in his prime. Okay. When he really got super serious about cardio. But it's a very controversial approach. The Marinovich's approach was you already know how to fight, so forget about fight training. We're just going to give you the most fucking insane gas tank you've ever had, and that way you'll be able to execute everything you want. And so, the primary focus was just plyometrics and their conditioning program, and it was hell. Right. And BJ did not like going through it, but when he went through it, he was, like, unstoppable. Yeah. Because he just never gassed. Right. And that's the interesting thing about conditioning in general, is we have these ideas of what the threshold is, like, what a human body's capable of doing for five minutes, for three rounds or five rounds, like, in terms of what kind of pace that you could put up. Yeah. And then you have certain guys that come along that sort of redefine what the threshold is, like Marab. Marab comes along, and here you got some guy whose gas tank is fucking superhuman, and he makes the best fighters in the world just wilt under this constant pressure being taken down, and his strength and his skill as a wrestler is just this constant attack, constant, constant, constant, constant. And you wonder, like, okay, how long did it take to build up that reserve? How long did it take? How long did it take to build up that gas tank? That's not something you can achieve in just one camp. Like, that's something that takes literal years to develop. Oh, for sure. That's why, I mean, like I said, going back to wrestling, my, what I would say, my superpower, my most utilized skill set was my cardio, my gas tank, you know? And I don't know, what is it, anabolic versus anaerobic? Like, the striking versus the grappling cardio? Mm-hmm. I think there's something to be said. I think there's something to be said about that wrestling cardio, like, just that, like, strict, you're just grinding it out 24-7, you know, you're always colliding, your muscles are always tensed up. I think there's something to be said about that, that if you had great wrestling cardio, you could do almost anything in the world. Yeah, it builds up a foundation that's kind of unstoppable. Right. If you can maintain that kind of work ethic. Right. Because it's, it's, that's the other thing about it, it's the mental toughness that comes from wrestling. Right. There's some, like, when a guy has, like, an elite wrestler. Wrestling background, and he enters into the UFC, I always say, they have an advantage. They have an advantage over everybody else. Because whether or not you choose to put yourself, or you get coached by someone who puts you through hell in camp, with wrestling, you don't have a choice. Like, everyone's going through hell. Right. There's no one, there's no easy path to get on a fucking wrestling team, anywhere in the country. Right. It's. You have to wrestle for your, your position. Yeah. Like, it's literal, you gotta battle for that, that spot, you know? And then the practice is, once or twice a day. Once or twice a day, of just purely grinding it out. Staying in a wrestling stance alone is extremely tough to do. Now you're doing it at elevated pace, now you're doing it with someone snapping on your head, now you're doing, it's like, and then you go and you do live wrestling, and then finish it up with sprints. Yeah, to me, to me there's nothing that beats that. Like, and, and I think the, the style of it is, like, go, go, go. Like, even jiu-jitsu, you're finding places to rest. You know, you can throw in the guard, and, and you can, you can rest in certain entanglements. Biking is all about being able to have an explosive motion, and then find your way to, to be defensive, to slow down what they're doing. You're either, you're getting in and stuffing it, you're at a distance where you can be a little bit relaxed because they can't reach you, or, you know, you're, you're moving off, making the miss where there's no resistance there, you know? I, just with wrestling, you don't have any of that. There's, there's no chance for a break, especially if you got someone like Rob who's just on you 24-7. And so, to me, that's, you know, back to the cardio thing. We talked about earlier, I don't know, I, I think if you got, yeah, elite wrestling cardio, then you could do all the rest of it. You'd be able to strike, you'd be able to do the jiu-jitsu entanglements, like, you can hang for that duration of time with great cardio. It's also, if you can figure out how to be a great wrestler, you can kind of figure out anything. It's just a matter of taking that same focus that turned you into a great wrestler and applying it to whatever it is, MMA, whatever, whatever else you're trying to do. Because if you're willing to go through what it took to become a great wrestler. That's an extraordinary human, that's, very few people ever reach a very high level of wrestling. It's just too fucking hard. Yeah. And it's the best foundation for combat sports, for sure, for MMA, because if you could take a guy down and he can't take you down, that's a massive advantage. Right. Massive. You dictate where the fight takes place, and if you develop elite striking on top of that, it's a perfect combination. Oh, for sure. I mean, anybody asking me, personally, I would say, get a wrestling background. Get some boxing, you can figure out the rest of it. Yeah. You can figure out how to check kicks, block kicks. You can do the rest of it. But if you have those two fundamental core bases, yeah, you're pretty good against most people. I would say that too, but I would say another thing is, and this is very controversial. If I was teaching a young kid, I would say get into point karate. Learn point karate. Because if you could learn how to move the way those guys move, the things that those guys, when you see like Michael Venn and Page just stomp people, they're just stomped. Like, I don't have any, like Kevin Holland, who fights everybody. He's fucking competitive with everybody he fights. With MVP, he was just stumped. Like, what the fuck am I doing? I can't even touch this guy. That is a giant skill set. And I always said before MVP came onto the scene, I'm like, one of these guys, one of these really elite point fighter guys is going to come in and start fucking everybody up because you can't hit them. Yeah. Yeah, and that goes back, like him and like Wonderboy are both the prime examples of a. Karate style individual. Yes. And they're really long. So, you know, they can utilize that a little bit to their advantage with that, that lungy in and out. But to be honest, yeah, that's something that like I've wanted to delve into a little bit more with myself because I like, I can throw kicks really well. Honestly, I have, I have good flexibility. I have the ability to throw them with speed, with power. But having something like that where you can throw it nice and fast and snappy, those little sidekicks. And the way that they throw the kicks. I mean, the only other relation I would have to that is the Savat style. I like the way the Savat style guys throw their kicks. I'm not very familiar with Savat. The only thing that I don't utilize myself is a lot of the toe stuff because I'm not wearing shoes. Oh, like toe kicks to the body? They're like stabbing you with their toes. Right. Like everything. Like they'll even, they're even kicking like your leg. Well, you know, Yosa does that. Yeah. He stabs guys in the body with his toes. It's like the ball of his foot, right? Well, he's going in with the toes, man. Yeah. There's a lot of like. Slow-mo videos of him stabbing guys in the liver with his fucking toes. You know who else is really good? They're conditioning their toes. Yeah. Well, that's the thing is you better have some, you'll probably have many, multiple breaks on each toe leading up to that. Yeah. Because it's just, that's why we were talking about the front kick to the body is good if you do it like a traditional Muay Thai where you're going up and out, which is fantastic. You can produce a lot of speed and power. But I think everybody does this, this kind of shovel up toes into the body kick nowadays. In the MMA world. That's what I see more so. I mean, Conor, Conor utilized the heck out of that. Most guys bring the toes up. It's, and you better be very precise with that because all it takes is one elbow blocking down and your toes out. Yeah. Did you see Rodriguez's toes after he fought Fluffy? Yeah. Did you see that picture? Jamie, pull that picture up. It's off Gregory Rodriguez, his Instagram page. After he beat Fluffy, he showed a photo of his. You haven't seen it? I haven't seen it actually. Oh, you're going to cringe. It's hell. Is it like a John Jones break? Worse. Ugh, bones are sticking out? The bones aren't sticking out, but it's, it's hellacious. You look at what happened to his toes. Dude, and that one, like, that takes it out of you. You start smashing your toes like that and you got to continue fighting. Oh yeah. Or you got to continue into a fight camp with like broken toes. Yeah. Yeah. That's what, one of my wrestling camps, I was chasing my brother in the front yard the day before and his heel came back and my pinky toe was like this straight sideways. Went to the family doctor. And you, look at that. Oh yeah. I have a picture just like that actually with my fingers, my toes thrown west side. Oh, look at that. Jesus. Ow. Yeah. That's, that's terrible. Those feet have seen some elbows, son. Right. It's got a big old bunions and everything on there. Wow. Yeah. That's, that's tough. That's, uh, he did it in really good fashion too. Yeah. There's a guy that's just, I don't understand how he makes 185. Right. I don't understand it. Whenever I interview him, I'm like, you're 220 pounds, sir. Yeah. How are you, you're at least 220, and shredded. I know. I mean, it's like, I guess the bigger guys have a little bit more to lose. They probably float a little bit. They definitely do. With all that muscle, you have water to lose for sure. Right. If you're shredded, I mean, that's one thing to be said, but especially like heavyweights, like the Alex Pinedas, I'm sure he gets a little bit looser, goes up to 220 and then, but that's, but that's still 40 pounds. I mean. I mean, that's a lot of weight. Yeah. It's a lot of weight to lose. And, but. Well, I don't know. I mean, look at Aljo cutting to 135. Yeah. He's like 175 pounds. Yeah. You know? I mean, I think. But he doesn't do it anymore and he feels way better at 45. For sure. And he had to move up because of that. I think a lot of the bantamweights get up to relatively that weight. I think everybody, I think that's why I've started seeing people try to comment the, the whole weight bully thing. They've said it to me on Instagram, this and that. They saw one of my training pictures where I was a little, a little loose. And they're like, the funniest comment was someone was like, like hire a nutritionist ASAP. Like, and I was just cracking up at that. Like these guys are roasting me. But yeah, I think everybody cuts relatively the same amount of weight. How big do you get? Like what's the heaviest you get in between? 135. No. That's what you weigh, son. What do you weigh when you're, when you're thicken up? What's the heaviest you get? What's the heaviest you've ever been? Like 175 is probably, give or take. Maybe like 178 if I'm just full of food, eating and being a delinquent. But yeah, I get up there pretty big, so. But when you're in camp, like the week before, what do you like to be at? I've had all my cuts right around 150. I don't really get much lower than that. That's not too bad. It's not the end of the world. I mean, 149, 148, 145 would be beautiful. If I could just do 10, it'd be no problem. But this last time we did 11. We did 11 in one night, and it was smooth sailing. You know, I just keep, that's another thing. You experience it more, you get better and better at it. And I've gotten wiser that the sauna doesn't have to be a million and 10 degrees, you know? Like, the USC portable saunas, I think I like maxed out at 150, it said. And I could sit in that for 22, 25 minutes. Is that a red light sauna? The portable ones? It probably is, right? It probably is. I don't recall, but I'm sure it is. But that with the emergency blankets, and then cooling off in between, that's something that I had to get wiser to as well. You know, like, because everybody tries to tell you, you're already there, you're already sweating. Like, don't lose the heat. And it's like, no, dude, this isn't a sprint. This is a marathon. We're taking this nice and easy. So, like, this last time I was taking all my gear off, putting ice on the body, cooling the body temperature back down, which is arguably the most important aspect of the whole weight cut is the body temperature versus the dehydration. Because the body gets dehydrated, and it has more of a capacity to deal with that than it does to overheat. If you overheat, you're done for. Like, that is what it is. So, is the overheating, does that drain you more in terms of, like, your ability to recover for the next day? Like, so when you're cutting weight, if you're doing it at, like, 180 or something like that, something high, and is it that? Like, because it does wear you out, obviously. Like, if I do a sauna session for 20 minutes when I get out, I'm tired. Yeah. So, you've got to think, if you're doing multiple ones of those, if you're trying to make weight, and then you have to fight the next day, you went through a lot physically. Right. As opposed to what you're doing, if you got it at 150, it's not that bad. It just sucks a little. Yeah, because I've done both. And that's, you're throwing a sauna suit on as well. You know, the sweet sweat, the sauna suit, and then you get in that portable sauna. But it's like before, I was doing that with a pair of, I don't know, like a spandex, you know, like top and bottom, and then a jacket, and then sweat. And then a big jacket. And then I'm getting in the 180, 190 degree, 24-hour sauna and sitting there for 15 minutes. It's like, dude, yeah, I felt, there's been weight cuts where I just feel like terrible, atrocious. I look terrible, you know. And then I have some of these more recent ones where I lower the temperature down. I extend the duration of how long the weight cut is itself. And there's a major difference in it for sure. That's really good advice. Work smarter, not harder. Oh, wait. You've trained for two months over just pushing your body to the absolute limit. You're going to go fight somebody for 15 minutes, you know, possibly, 25 minutes. There's all this hard stuff already happening. You know, that part should not be hard. That should be the, it's going to be hard, but you should make it as easy as possible. That should be the mindset to it. This episode is brought to you by Dodge. I recently had the chance to get behind the wheel of the new gas-powered Dodge Charger Scat Pack. And it reminds me how much I love cars. They give you an adjustment. They give you an adrenaline rush the second you hit the gas. First thing that got me was the sound of the performance exhaust. It sounds awesome. Paired with a twin-turbo, six-pack gas engine. Mind-blowing. I love cars that sound like that. And then I tried launch control. It's fantastic. 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No monthly fees, no overdraft fees, and thousands of fee-free ATMs. But here's the real kicker. If you get their Chime card, it gives you 5% cash back on a category you actually pick yourself. Your savings rate, crazy high. It's nine times the national average. They're calling it the most rewarding way to bank. Go to Chime.com slash Rogan. Takes a few minutes to sign up. Chime is a fintech, not a bank, banking services and Chime card provided by Chime's bank partners. Terms and limits apply. Go to Chime.com slash disclosures for more details. Yeah, it makes sense. It makes a lot of sense. Did you see the Moses Itama fight this weekend? I don't think so. Do you know who he is, right? No. No? Okay. He, up until this fight, was probably the most promising prospect in the heavyweight division in more than a decade. He is a young guy. He's only 21 years old. And people were talking about him being able to break Mike Tyson's record of being the youngest ever heavyweight champion. So he missed that mark. And then he finally got a title fight this weekend. Looked phenomenal for the first few rounds. Oh, I know exactly what you're talking about. Yes. Yep. And he's fighting this big Croatian cat. I forget his name. Yeah, yeah. Filip Hergozovic. And he couldn't- Yeah, he was stunned on it at first. Yeah. In the beginning, he was tuning this guy up. I mean, he's so fast and so elite. But he had never been into deep water before. Every one of his fights, he'd been able to stop people. And he hadn't had any real good decision wins where he fought a bit. And he's not the biggest heavyweight, but he's wicked fast. I mean, just wicked fast and beautiful technique. But as the fight went on, he started to fade. And in the eighth, you could see him really slowing down and just really trying to take this dude out, but couldn't. And thought he could. He was emptying the gas tank. Instead of boxing him and just outpointing him and being skillful, he just was inexperienced. And he emptied the gas tank. And then Filip came back, man. Yeah, he finished him. Yeah. Well, he finished him in a weird way. It was almost exhaustion. Yeah, he was just stumbling over himself at that point. Because they're both exhausted because it was a war. There's a nice right hand. And he stung him there. Well, did you see their little table talk where they're sitting across from each other? Yes. And he's all like, it's not about how many times you can get hit or you can hit somebody. It's about how many times you can get hit and keep coming forward. And then Moises is like, that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. He's like, why would you base your fighting style off how many times you can get hit? And then lo and behold, you know, like this comes across. That's why, you know, I talk about technicality and finesse and skill set and it's a game of hit and don't get hit. But, dude, you could just have someone who's just so tough and just so willing that this is a perfect scenario. That's why there is so many aspects to this fight game. Well, it was really funny because he was basically quoting Rocky. Yeah. He really did quote Rocky. It ain't about how hard you hit. It's about how hard you can get hit. Right. And keep moving forward. Exactly. And he, you know. And he pulled a Rocky on him. He literally did exactly what he said he was going to do. But it's all these things. It's like youth and hubris and thinking you're the greatest of all time and looked like the greatest of all time. Pull up a Moses Itama highlight reel because if you look at his highlight reel, you're like, this guy is the second coming. Like, this guy is something really special, man. When you watch how he fights, I mean, his hand speed, his knockout power. And for a young guy. You know, this fight, I think he was 20. And you look at his highlight reel, you're like, oh, my God, the sky's the limit for this kid. He's just putting everybody out. But, you know, he wasn't really being tested. You know, and then he finally, I think, was it Derek Chisora? Who did he fight before this fight? He finally beat a top level guy. And he took him out. And so, but, you know, it was a guy who's a real veteran, been around a long time. Uh-huh. And he. He kind of thought that he could put it on everybody and knock everybody out. But, you know, this is like one of the things about any combat sport is you have to know when to hit the gas, when not to. And you have to have those experiences of these long, grueling fights. And he really didn't have that yet. Right. So his first experience with a, yeah, Dillian White, that's who it was. And his long, his first experience with a real, no, it was, it was Chisora, I think. Because I think it was Dillian White first. And then Chisora was the next fight afterwards. Am I right about that? No, it was just his KOs on this video. What is it? Pull up his record. Who was his last fight before Hergovich? But, I mean, I still think he's got potential to be a world champion for sure. I mean, the kid's only 21 years old. Jermaine Franklin. Dillian White right there. That's who it was. It wasn't Derek Chisora. It was Dillian White. Um, Jermaine Franklin was right after that. So every fight has been TKO, TKO, TKO, TKO, TKO, TKO. I mean, if you watch his fights, I mean, they're fucking stunning performances. But wasn't really being tested in that way with a really big, durable heavyweight who could take a shot. Who, you know, has a ton of experience. And, you know, now he's got his first loss. But he'll be back. Yeah. He's only 21. Well, that's, you know, on the, that's, that's how they do it in boxing. They feed these guys, build them up. And then when they're solidified, now, now you fight somebody who's substantial, you know. Yeah. And that's, you know, I've done a lot of comparisons. But that's, to me, where the MMA guys are just more down to go and do their thing. They'll fight anybody at any given time pretty, pretty quick. Is that by decision, though, or is that by necessity? Because the UFC, you know, if they call you up and say, hey, in fact, I'm going to fight you. In four weeks, do you want to fight for the world title? I know you've never fought in the UFC before. But that's, in boxing, that's unheard of. That would never take place. Right. But in the UFC, if you're a pretty good fighter and you're doing well and you win a bunch of championships and other organizations, and all of a sudden this opportunity arises, we've had guys with their first fight in the UFC fight for the world title. That is true. I mean, that's what you get when you have, like, a melting pot of things, though. Because those guys are, like. They're, like, well-established in their own personal careers. Sure. Maybe wrestling or kickboxing or whatever it is. Or rising. Yeah, it's not like you're pulling out, like, the local kid and telling him, let's go fight for a world title. But they would pull out the local kid and fight a guy who has 10, 15 fights in the UFC. For sure. That does happen. That happens all the time. Well, that's what I'm saying is, like, I think that the boxers would be more hesitant to take something like that, like you're saying. Yes. But the MMA guys. Yes. Are always down to do that kind of stuff. Well, the boxers, though. It's a different culture, I suppose. It is, but it's also the fact that no one gives a shit who the promoter is in boxing. If someone's going to watch Gervonta Davis fight, they don't say, well, who's performing? Hold on. Is this for Bob Arum? Is this for Golden Boy? Like, no one cares. Right. It's just, who are the fighters? With the UFC, it's a very different animal. So, if you get a call for the UFC, like, oh, my God, we're in the big leagues. Right. And that's different. 100%. Yeah. They have all sorts of different promotions. And different people you can fight for in boxing. But UFC is the pinnacle. It's, yeah, if you get the call from the UFC, that's where you want to go. So, there's a whole lot of differences to it. I just think, whatever it is, that, yeah, the MMA guys are more willing to step in on the short notice and put their careers at risk and put their, you know, opportunities to continue fight streaks or whatever at a risk. So, that's how I see it. And that's what I picked up from those two different things. Yeah, it's definitely a different culture, right? It's a culture of accepting those risks and also of probably people that are just, they're much more willing to take a chance, it seems. Yeah, exactly. That's why I think, like, that's us a little bit more padded up to it. A little bit more wild to be fighting MMA anyway. That's, yeah. You know? That's, it's a little bit more wild for sure. Yeah. And that's a little bit more of a business, I would say, in my opinion. The box. The boxing is. Which. We've got a lot of, like, very smart people involved in boxing that are, like, managers and trainers that are, like, really working to build a guy and turn him into a prospect, turn him into a contender. Yeah. And then turn him into a champion. In the UFC, you only have the one organization doing that. Exactly. And they're managing all the weight classes and all the prospects. And they're picking and choosing certain fights. Not only that, they schedule fight, they schedule fights around cards. Right. They don't schedule cards around fights. So, like, say if Canelo Alvarez is fighting someone, it is, whenever Canelo's ready to fight, that's when the card takes place. Yeah. Right? So, Canelo Alvarez wants to fight September 12th. Okay, great. September 12th, let's put together a fight card around Canelo Alvarez. Right. With the UFC, it's like, the UFC's coming to Salt Lake City October 3rd. Who's there? Right. Who wants to fight? Right. Like, we're going to have a fight. Who's going to be on the fight? Who's going to be on the card? And then you put the card together. So, it's a different animal. Yeah. No, they're different, for sure. Yeah. I mean, I try to draw. Wisdom from all aspects of everything. So, I'm constantly delving into all the different realms. myself do you uh read a lot are you a guy who do you like read any things on on psychology or on warrior tactics you ever get into like book of five rings or any of that shit for sure i'm reading uh it's called hagakari right now and it's essentially um it's a it's a single individual yamamoto it's like tunisian or something i forget his name exactly but um he served for like the the reigning leader at the time his leader passed away he wanted to commit seppuku because he was of that that mentality that warrior mentality but um his leader had had commanded like that no one was allowed to do that this and that but he's taken a lot of storylines inspirations from all these samurai because it's going into a time period where the samurai weren't a necessity anymore and so the ideology the lifestyle what it meant to to live that bushido lifestyle had changed a little bit and their purpose was different and uh my boxing coach gave it to me actually when i was kind of in this limbo state of like it's essentially saying how should a warrior live outside of the fight you know like what does he need to be doing on a daily basis and but then it's it's i like the real life uh like storyline because now you're getting a bunch of different perspectives from all these people that were samurai all were warriors who lived that who you know fought in battle and now you get to see like a lot of different things like someone says you should do this and someone says no don't do that and to me i like that because i get to kind of delve through all the mindsets and then apply what works best to me you know but uh i love i love reading all that stuff i've not been so good at staying off the phone and and you know i watch a youtube which is it's always fighting or some kind of gun channel or hiking or camping or hunting or spearfishing or something but um yeah i'm trying to get way better at that trying to stay off the screens like i want to be more interactive with the world around me learning things constantly and so picking up a book and reading it is along along that set of goals that i have is continuously be doing that yeah i think there's benefits to a lot of stuff on youtube i think youtube is not social media and i think i learn a lot on youtube and i just get it's for me i like to wind down on youtube just watch some ancient history thing or watch a professional pool match or something like that just wind down time but it doesn't feel like i'm wasting time whereas if i'm looking at instagram or twitter or whatever it feels like i'm doing something i shouldn't be doing that's not beneficial oh 100 that's to me as i'm building up my platform and whatnot i and so i understand there's some necessity for me to be into it producing content not necessarily taking in content uh but yeah 100 it's it's something that has uh affected our culture in a large way it's all the the uh what's it called like the short-term like media you know where you're clicking through it it's just it's killing our attention spans it's it's just uh like you know your dopamine is is firing at all times going crazy it's just you're getting this you're at focus yeah you're getting this like that's where that's where i love the youtube but i almost have to recognize that just because i'm watching a spearfishing video doesn't mean i'm getting in the water and going and spearfishing because sometimes i feel like i get my fix a little bit by doing that but then i have to remind myself it's like uh life is lived and your actions and and and your experiences so sitting and watching the the tv screen somebody else experienced that you know you you get the inside scoop you get to kind of be there under the water watch what's going on but yeah you're not actually living it so i like it i love i love to to learn from that social media yeah it's it sucks it's zapping everybody and uh it's certainly not a part of the warrior lifestyle yeah as you're talking about oh for sure samurai because then like you want to think about like your your meditative aspects of like how often are you delving deep into your own brain and just figuring out things about yourself and asking those questions and pushing beyond and when you got a phone screen stealing all your attention how are you ever doing that right yeah absolutely you're not yeah you're not you know if you're if you're spending so much time doing that you're a spear fisher guy huh you really like spearfishing i like to spearfish i uh it's been some time since i've been back in the water i had a buddy that we used to go all the time and then he moved up to washington and uh i don't know where are you guys spearfishing uh we go local like uh there's a beach that you walk down and it's got plenty of structure and all sorts of fish out there uh laguna's got the kelp forest so i just been going shore diving and uh going over there grabbing lobster when it's lobster season grabbing down to the honey holes and just grabbing them with our hands so this it's all the shore stuff right now i haven't been off a boat it's uh for my friends that have been hunting that they say they love it because they say it's like hunting underwater right it's not really like fishing it doesn't you call it spearfishing it's not like but it feels like you're hunting it's it's yeah it's you're in the action you know you get to pick and choose which fish you're going to take which one to let to let go and uh yeah you're also i like it because i like the primitive aspects like we talked about like a little bit of bow hunting before i'm really enthralled with the bow hunting stuff over the rifle hunt because dude you can sit at like three four sometimes guys are shooting about like a 500 yards with this big old rifle and you're just smacking something it's like that thing didn't even like ever know you were there you know you're just like propped up and there's a place for it i suppose but having a bow and have to get up 30 ish yards give or take and having to make sure they're not catching your scent and having to perform the stock i like the primitive stuff i like it i like something that involves a skill set instead of just like a technological uh prowess no i agree with you obviously i'm a big bow hunter i don't think there's anything wrong with rifle hunting and it's definitely the best way to acquire meat if you're just going on a meat hunt and you just want to get your meat for the next few months a rifle is the way to go but if you want a real challenge there's something that's way more special about a bow hunt it's more difficult it requires more practice requires more of you like uh i went on a pig hunt um about a year or so ago with a friend of mine in california where we had uh had a successful elk hunt and then we went pig hunting and i hadn't shot a rifle in two years a year and a half two years like not one shot with a rifle ace this pig at like 90 yards like it was nothing boom dropped him in his tracks like that was so easy right and compare i mean all you have to do is get the crosshairs on them don't flinch squeeze the trigger slowly make sure you're in a good position yeah and know how to shoot a rifle and once you know how to shoot a rifle i mean i'm not taking thousand yard shots but yeah you know how to shoot a rifle it's pretty easy if i was bow hunting i wouldn't even run a rifle i wouldn't even run a rifle i wouldn't even run a rifle i would imagine if i hadn't shot a bow in a year and a half of even thinking about shooting something with a bow right not a chance in hell i wouldn't even think about it for like months i would say i need to practice i need to hit targets all the time i need to make sure my shot is at i need to get my technique down i'd want to film myself make sure i'm not doing anything stupid like let me look at my form why why is my elbow to the right it should be above i would i would never imagine rifles way easier but the feeling of taking an animal down with a bow is a complete different feeling it's so much harder to do it's so much more exciting and if you fail it doesn't you know many a hunt where you seven days nothing happens okay that's just part of the thing right but at least you know we're out here getting after it and trying and you succeed or you fail but at least you're in nature and the experience of it is still really fun even if you're totally unsuccessful yeah not for sure i mean that's why with the spearfishing stuff like these free divers that can hold their breath up to four or five minutes you know and they're diving 40 50 60 70 feet some of these guys out there in the middle of the blue water and they're going down to ship wrecks or whatever structure is down there and they're shooting these big old fish it's like yeah there's like there has to be a skill set to that it's something you had to work for to achieve you know yeah it's something you had to build up to so yeah i i love all that stuff i haven't been like bow hunt i haven't even been rifle hunting it's something that i really want to get into all that outdoor stuff we can help you we can help you get into that yeah definitely i'll connect you with some people i i love all that you know i like to have a backpack i just did uh mount whitney last year in august and uh i just love being out there in nature so you know being able to engage in it that way too is like you said the excitement the the build-up the work you have to put into it the knowledge you have to acquire the people you have to bump into um the meals are a lot different too when you eat a meal that you prepared for you and you're like oh i'm gonna eat a meal that i'm gonna yourself that you went and hunted it's just a completely different feeling oh for sure and you're living in california now and california is a giant pig population there's a lot of pig hunting to be had in california pretty much all year round yeah yeah because they're invasive species like that's one that i i'll get in the helicopter with the rifle and just take those guys out because i know they're just destroying animal like you know like habitat and eating all the food and destroying the geography of most places they are so millions of them here in texas yeah literally millions yeah they they breed like no other too you know they just multiply three times a year they have litter sometimes wow at least twice a year um i have some friends of mine and I we have a hunting lease out here and as you're walking through like the woods, you hear them. They sound like demons. Yeah. You hear them like fighting with each other in the bushes and shit. You're like, what the fuck am I getting into? Right. They sound like monsters, man. And they're everywhere. Yeah. Like you go to every one of these ranches out here is infested with pigs. Yeah. They're just destroying. They have to hunt them. They bring in people to hunt them. A friend of mine has a huge ranch in out near Fort Worth and he brought in a bunch of Navy SEALs to kill pigs and they set it up like an operation. They literally decided to use it for training. Yeah. And so they, you know, and you can blow them up with like thermite. You can do all kinds of, not thermite. What's that shit that they use? Tannerite. Tannerite. That's it. Thank you. I've seen that video. Yeah. Oh, it's crazy. It's ridiculous. Yeah. But they can, you can basically do whatever you want to them because they, they're just encouraging people. They're saying, listen, other than like declaring war on the pigs and bringing in the military and literally going through every state and trying to kill them. Like we've got an economic war where these pigs are destroying people's crops. Right. I mean, literally billions of dollars worth of damage every year they're doing to these farms. Yeah. And they just keep, there's more of them every year. More of them every year. They're not gonna stop fucking. They're just gonna keep reproducing. Three times a year, yeah. Just gonna keep reproducing. And it's, you know, really been a few hundred years since they've been introduced to this country. Yeah. And boy, they're in every state now. Yeah. I mean, and what are you gonna do? Just let them continue to roam? I don't know if they're in every state. Are they, like, New York State and places like that? Do they have wild pigs? How many states have a wild pig population? Let's put that into perplexity and see what they say. Our AI sponsor. I, I'm gonna guess. Let me say 30. I say 30 states have a wild pig population. That's my guess. 30 out of 50. Am I close? Yep. How many? 35. Figure of firsts to states with documented feral swine presence. I like that term. Feral swine presence. Does not necessarily mean that every one of these states has a large, self-sustaining population. 35 states. Population established. Numbers could be lower. Some states only have occasional sightings. Small, localized groups are less than 30% of the population. So it really depends on where they have farms. States with farms have the real problem. In the Southwest, especially Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Florida, Georgia, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, and South Carolina. Yeah. Wild. It's, it's such a crazy animal, too. Because they're, you know, they're so smart. They're so smart and they're very durable. Right. Yeah, some of them get gigantic, like, a thousand pounds, right? I mean, you've seen. Not really. Really. See, I used to think that, too. Those are not really the wild pigs. What those are is domestic pigs that got loose. And, you know, the thing about domestic pigs, when they get loose, they kind of become wild. Their nose lengthens. Their fur gets, like, thicker and bushier. And their talons, or their tusks, rather, actually grow, which is nuts. They actually metamorphosize. Well, that's, I mean, that's what, like, a feral pig is, right? It was a domesticated animal that became wild. The opposite. It was a wild animal that they took and domesticated, but then when you let them loose in the wild, then they become wild again. Oh, okay. That's what's weird. Yeah. It's like, they originally were wild animals. It's such a, like, crazy transformation. Yeah. All covered in hair and big tusks and stuff, and then, like, the pigs you see in the farm, like. Same animal. Yeah. What's nuts is it happens quick. Apparently, this, the metamorphosis starts to take place. Look this up. See how long it takes before pigs start transforming? I think it's, like, six weeks or something crazy. Like, it starts to begin. Yeah. Or six weeks where they have to feed themselves, where they have to forage for themselves. They're like, "Alright, I guess I'm wild." Yeah. Right. And then they just start the transformation. Yeah. It's a very weird animal. I don't know of any other animal that does, well, we'll ask Perplexity that. I don't know if there's any other animal that does that. Domesticated pig become feral in behavior within weeks to months of escaping, becoming wary of people, nocturnal, mobile, unable to forage and survive without care. But it does not literally turn into a wild boar in one lifetime. But it does have physical changes. What is the physical change? Radically different skull. It's overstated. Adult pigs can become tougher, leaner, hairier, and more elusive as conditions change. Major inherited traits become more common when the animals survive and breed, pass on advantageous variants over successive litters. Evidence on feralization emphasizes that these changes are shaped by both environments and multi-generational selection, not an instant biological reversal. Not instant, but they do physically change. I don't think this is totally accurate. But if you see the biggest pig that they ever shot that was a wild pig, I think it's called Hogzilla. Have you ever seen that picture? I think so, yeah. It looks like a domestic pig. It looks like someone was feeding that thing. A lot. And then it got out and became a wild pig. Right. I don't know how big that was. There's a photo of it, but it's one of those perspective shots where the guy's like behind it. They stand all far behind it. Yeah. Yeah. Make it look ten times larger. Yeah. But it looks crazy. There's one of them where one of them is hanging from a tractor. And I don't give a fuck how close you are to that thing. That thing's giant. Yeah. How big is Hogzilla? That's like some of the gators, or the crocodiles, I mean, that they're hanging in Africa and stuff. They have the pictures sitting next to those things, and they're like 20 plus feet long, you know, like ridiculous. Yeah. Crocodiles get big. I think the biggest ones they've got are like close to 20. See, that's the one thing about spearfishing is you know the sharks are there, you know. Do you ever see them? I have not seen, I've seen leopard sharks, but that's nothing crazy. You've never saw a great white? I've never seen a great white. If you do, would that be the last time you go spearfishing? I want to say no, but I don't know, I'll have to get there first. What if you have to hit one on the nose? Yeah, if it's like getting crazy, it's probably like, alright, I'm cool on that. But they have all sorts of different things, like an ocean guardian. Yeah, this one. Okay, that guy's definitely behind that thing, but that fucker looks like he's got tusks. Well, look at that one to the left. The giant 36 stone. Yeah. Oh, you want that one, too? They said this one was maybe 1200 pounds. It was originally thought of to be a hoax. There's a documentary about it. This is back in 2004 and 5, though. Hmm. What's that one on the upper left? That dude's resting his arm. Is that a real picture? Well, that's like a little kid, though. The upper one, but the upper left, the kid. This one's way too close for that guy. Yeah, that one's closer than the guy. The guy's behind it, but that kid. Same, same, no. Oh, he's not resting his arms on it. He's resting his arms. Yeah, it is the same. That's a fat fucker, though. Look at the size of that thing. That looks more like a domestic pig, though. Like that one, right there. That's a good example. Go back up a little, make it small. Yeah. Look at his snout. Ah, it's actually kind of long. They're also still behind it, too. Yeah. Hard to tell how far, but. Why do people do that? It's big. Try to make it look cool, man. I know, but it's big. I like how that one says, "36 stone." That must be an English pig. Yeah, it's the mirror. That's crazy. That's a big pig, but it's not. Like, what is the biggest reported wild pig that was shot in Texas? Let's ask that. I think that's a porno. Turn that off. It's on IMDB. The other white meat bites back. Did you say the biggest one shot in Texas? Yes. What is the biggest wild hog that was shot in Texas? Let's guess. I'm gonna guess, like, 500 pounds. That's my guess. That's just a guess, though. No official. Largest ever shot. Most credible. 790-pound boar. Holy shit. Captured, not shot. Near DeLeon in Comanche County. January 2015. Weighed on certified mill scales. That's fucking crazy big. 790's nuts. That's so big. Ugh. Can you imagine millions of 790-pound wild pigs running through this country? Yeah, that would, uh, not be very good. Not ideal. Yeah. Um, so, never been hunting? I've shot some birds with a pellet gun or something, that's about it. But you want to? I would love to, yeah. What would you want to go hunting for? Do you have a thing in your mind that you think would be. Um, I think something like a deer is probably a good starting point. Do you know how to shoot a bow? Or would you want to use a rifle? I haven't shot compound too often. I shoot recurve. Um, it's definitely not something I'm, uh, super practiced with, but I'm pretty good with it. I went to an archery competition pretty recently and did pretty good with it. Did you really? With a compound bow? With a recurve bow. A recurve bow. Um, don't hunt with that. Yeah. It's too risky. You're not gonna. That would be. You gotta get real good. You'd have to, yeah. A lot of practice, a lot of hunts, and a lot of experience. How far are you from San Diego? Uh, an hour, two hours if there's traffic. There's a really good archery shop in San Diego. I think it's Performance Archery. Is that it? Is that the name of the place? Um, but it's one of the best co- shops in the country. Okay. Yeah, if you want to get a compound bow and want to get someone to, um, really make sure that it's sized correctly, that the draw length is correct and everything like that. Yeah, performance archery. Why are you showing me a map? Yeah, just go back to the. Yeah, I've been there before with John Dudley. It's a great place, like really elite. 4.6 stars on Google. You want to go to a really good place, so they make sure they set you up correct. Like, that's a big thing with bows. It's like, you know, I couldn't shoot John Jones' bow. You know, he's really tall, I'm short, the length would be different, my peep sight would be different. It has to all be measured out to your size, and everyone's different. So you'd have to really make sure that your bow is set up for you correctly. And it's just like martial arts in that you want to learn correctly first. You don't want to unlearn it and try to learn something the right way because you're always going to fall back on the way you got comfortable with doing it the first time. Right. So that's a good thing to do. Nice. Yeah. That sets you up. I've shot a compound bow here or there. But I like all that stuff. I'm really, like I said, I'm big into continuing to learn lots of different skills, especially in that realm. And yeah, I'm all about it. That'd be cool. Do you think of that as a way to just advance your mental function in just an all-out way? All of life that will help your fighting? Like the more different things you learn, the more different things you do, that you can like take things from that and apply it to fighting? Or do you just do it because you enjoy it? I have to say I do it because I enjoy it. It's probably not directly related to fighting, but more of the self-reliance and the self-preserverance. Like to me, like I'm like at home making my own like kydex holsters and my leather holsters and doing all that. That kind of stuff is a good start. I have this old truck that I want to tear apart and learn how to work on it from the ground up. Being able to hunt and provide, like just I'm always thinking like when shit hits the fan, I better be ready for it, you know? And so being a martial artist, being a warrior encompasses a lot of aspects, you know, hand-to-hand combat is only one of those things. There's a lot of different aspects to self-perseverance. So I think about it a little bit that way. I do it because it's fun. And it's just exciting to learn a new skill and then have an end product, something that you made yourself. Yeah, for sure. I mean, it's always a good idea to be self-reliant. And also like if you have a garden, that's another great thing. Like you have a place where you can grow your own food. Yeah. So you're not getting any pesticides or herbicides or bullshit on your food. A hundred percent. I mean, the end goal for me is to have, probably would not be the only property because my wife just loves Southern California. So much. But Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, go get a couple acres up there, move the family, maybe some close friends and just have our own little self-reliant thing up there with some crop, some wildlife, the ability to hunt up there on our land. A lot of the stuff I'm seeing out there, they have stocked lakes and the rivers have fish as well. So something like that is really beautiful. You were really thinking about a possible catastrophe. It's always on my mind. No, I just, I want to get away with it. Get away from the hustle and bustle of everything. Just be out there in nature is really kind of the hopes for that. Are you stuck in California because of your wife and what you do outside of MMA? Or have you ever thought about moving to a different place to train? Well, training is kind of the main thing that keeps me there, honestly. My team is there. All my coaches are there. Of course, I can bounce around. What gym are you out of now? I'm all over the place. I train at the Dent Training Center in New Orleans. I train at Seattle. I train at CSW Fullerton with Eric Paulson. I love Eric. Yeah, he's awesome. Didn't your dad train with Eric? He did. That's how I got over there in the first place because Ben was running the fight practice at CSW then. Bro, Eric's an OG. He's so dope, man. He's an OG, dude. He's such a cool guy. Eric Paulson was, I remember back in the day when he had like a crazy ponytail in the days where he could grab hair. Yeah, well, that's why he cut it off. Yeah. I think it was Sean Shirky, right? He was, he was fighting him bare knuckle and homie kept grabbing his ponytail and holding him there and that's the only reason why and I think right after that fight he went and chopped it off and had short hair from that point. I know it's nice to be good looking with long flowy locks but that shit is, especially back in those days when you could grab hair. You remember Hoist Gracie versus Kimo? Hoist had a fucking handful of hair when he was on top and just blasted him. That's, I mean, to me, cut the hair, man. Cut it or braid it. Especially if it's the old UFC days where you could actually grab hair. If you could grab it, yeah. Yeah. You know, people complain all the time about guys grabbing their shorts and it does happen all the time. Guys grab shorts. I'm always like, why are you wearing shorts? Right. I don't know if you wear shorts. Do you wear spandex or you wear shorts? Spandex, yeah. Yeah. Why are you wearing shorts? Why are you wearing anything someone can grab? And especially, like, everybody likes the loose, like the high slit cut shorts nowadays. So, I mean, it's more to grab onto, yeah. Yeah, I just don't know. Here it is. It's crazy. Yeah, it's crazy. He's giving me headbutts and shit. Yeah. Oh, yeah, man. This is bare knuckle, headbutts. Yeah, and then you kick him on the nuts and all that stuff back then. Bro, wrestlers were a fucking nightmare when you could headbutt. If you go back and remember, like, the Mark Coleman days, he would get in your guard and headbutt the shit out of you. Right. Yeah, and how are you getting off of the, off your back against a high level wrestler like that? I know, it's crazy. He's just grabbing his hair like it's a wrist lock. I know. It's crazy. He had his hair and then, I don't know if Eric escapes or if the time goes out, but Eric ends up finishing him at the end of it. God, he got a crazy cut here. What is this, a floor time count you had to get up if you're on the ground for too long? Is that what it is? It's WCC. That's crazy. I wonder if it's like how much time, oh, it's counting down. Yeah, I want to see what happens if it gets up here. Right, do they stand him up? Yeah. Wow. He got a minute on the ground. That's crazy. Wow. Yeah, but Eric Paul, Eric Paulson is such a legend of the game. Oh, yeah, he is. There's not a day that I go in there and learn submission flows from him that I'm not just like blown away. That's crazy. I forgot they did that. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace. If you're thinking about building a website, you should try Squarespace. I know because I use it. That's right. JoeRogan.com is powered by Squarespace. It has all the features that you need to create a standout website like an AI-enhanced website. It has an AI-enhanced website builder, SEO optimization tools, and seamless checkouts with mobile pay links. Head to Squarespace.com slash Rogan for a free trial. And when you are ready to launch, use the offer code Rogan to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. This episode is brought to you by Visible. As fall hits, we enter another season of change. Time to shift gears, drop the dead weight, and upgrade the wardrobe for the drop in temperature. But once again, one thing that doesn't need to change, your phone. The smartest upgrade this season isn't a new phone. It's a better wireless plan. Switch to Visible, the ultimate wireless hack. You get unlimited 5G data and unlimited hotspot powered by Verizon for just $25 a month. That means keeping the phone you already have, ditching your overpriced phone bill, and pocketing some savings for yourself. All the perks of big wireless for half the cost. Switch today, at Visible.com. The Visible plan starts at just $25 a month, or get the premium Visible Plus Pro plan and save $10 on your first month with promo code Rogan. Terms apply. See Visible.com for plan features and network management details. Interesting. Well, I think back then, in the early days of fighting, there was a lot of promoters that were trying a bunch of different tactics to try to make the fights more interesting. Right. That would be the only reason. Like, they don't want you to sit and lay there anymore and get up and fight. And start throwing fists again. I hate stand-ups. I hate them. Yeah. I hate them with all my heart. I don't think in a five-minute round, you should ever be stood up. There's a lot that could go on there. I mean, especially if you're holding position, you're regaining your breath a little bit, you're setting up a pass or something. You know, it doesn't always look apparent to the crowd or to the ref, so. Even if you could hold them down. Like, who cares? You could hold a guy up against a cage, right? Okay? And all you have to do is land a few knees and a few punches. Occasionally, and they'll let you stay in that position. I feel like they're breaking that up even more and more. I don't think you should break up anything. I think it should be reserved for fouls. I think if someone commits a foul, then you stand them up and then you assess whether or not someone gets a point taken away or whether or not that person needs time. But if it's a place where you don't want to be and the guy's putting you in a place where you don't want to be, he's winning that exchange. Right. If a guy can hold you down and you can't get up, if you don't like it and you can't get up, then he's winning. Right. We lose as an audience. The audience loses. There's a 10-minute limit for ground time. What fight was this? This is WCC? Yeah, yeah, yeah. What was it called? World Combat Championships? Is that the one where Henzo. Yes. Henzo Gracie fought Ben Spikers. Do you remember that one? Oh, dude. This is one of the reasons why elbows to the back of the head are illegal. Because Henzo, this guy, was calling Henzo There's you, dog. Look at that. look at that guy Henzo was in his hotel room room and this guy was calling him every fucking 10 minutes like to try to wake him up and the Henzo had to take the phone and shove it in a drawer like he was fucking with him constantly and Henzo got his back and elbow the fucking shit out of him from rear mount so this isn't the same fight oh here it is this is that's it so there's Henzo gets his back and here it is look at these elbows dude just ferocious elbows so this dude was a judo champion I was gonna say why would you wear a gi against against a guy like Henzo and Henzo doesn't have a gi on and then Henzo steps off and then gets on his neck yeah ow that was crossing the line after he just elbowed the shit out of him see that you know it's funny is like the 12 to 6 rule everybody fantasizes about like how how much better that is and sure you got some cutting but your your force that you can deliver in my perspective straight down with an elbow like that is so much more tremendous than you doing this yes this was only you know why it was outlawed right why Big John McCarthy has got a great story about this when the ESPN people or the athletic commission people rather were first uh deciding whether or not they're going to sanction MMA they had seen these ESPN karate breaking demonstrations at like two in the morning these guys yeah and they break a bunch of bricks and they're like you have to outlaw that that should be illegal people could die yeah that's literally what they thought was the most powerful strike was the 12 to 6 elbow yeah so you couldn't even do a 12 to 6 elbow standing which is crazy right you couldn't tomahawk so you couldn't come down with a tomahawk 12-6 yeah it had to be at a slight angle it had to be some kind of angle which is the dumbest thing ever chop this by far across like it's rotating your shoulders to do it like a punch yeah it's the most power yeah for sure yeah you might get more cutting and it's available if a guy's doing this you know if the guy's covering up like that and you go straight down for sure but to eliminate it as an option the only reason why so the WCC had two different brackets grapplers bracket strikers bracket grapplers could be on the ground for up to 10 minutes strikers only had two minutes and submissions were illegal what in a striker's fight yeah so it said and then the idea was the winner of both brackets would fight at the end oh that's so crazy yeah it only made it that one tournament that's so crazy what year was that uh 94 or 595 maybe okay so this is right after the UFC burst onto the scene that's uh UFC was 93. it just says they were trying to be different than the UFC with different rules yeah they're doing something like that again where it's like striking only MMA where I don't know if they go back to the ground they stand you back up or something where's this I don't know I saw it on Instagram I mean what is one FC's doing it the right way where they just have striking fights yeah they have MMA fights and striking fights right dude I've been trying to talk Dana into doing that for years you know because I know they got into zoo for boxing which is great you know I'm like why not like when people boo when things go to the ground how about have striking fights just have but in his mind kickboxing in America has a stink on it from the PKA karate days you know which just wasn't that good they weren't allowed a leg kick it was all above the waist right and you know there was great fighters back then like Rick Rufus and a few guys that were like really Elite but for the most part the skill level wasn't that high and people never really got into PKA karate and never really got into kick it never really became the kind of success that boxing was and so I think in his mind that's how people look at kickboxing right I think it's the most it has the most possibility in terms of like a sport that is not being taken advantage of like that it has the most potential by far I mean like you say you look at the one championship guys that are over there kickboxing Muay Thai and they're they're even doing hybrid fights for that that DJ versus raw Tang one yeah they're switching it up all crazy and yeah I don't know I mean it's that's getting pretty good traction over there so it is I I heard you know they they have some difficulties and I hope they do really well the world needs more organizations the MMA world needs a bunch of options right and you know this PFL merger where PFL has merged with um what is this yeah Jake Paul's production company MVP yeah that's great we need more of that Netflix is involved fantastic need more you need more more options more fights and it's just going to make more MMA fans right just me when you see a guy like that cat that I was telling you about Mega Medoff who fought for PFL like more people need to know about these guys like there's so many guys out there that are killers man now that the talent pool is so deep like outside of the USC it's extremely deep you got people out of coming out of Russia these Brazilians like people all over the world that nobody's ever heard of just because they haven't been on that big stage quite yet so exactly I think uh I think it would be really cool that we did like a champion versus champion kind of fights it's never gonna happen yeah the UFC would never do that why would what if their guys win you it's not the the benefit of it for the UFC is like it's so outweighed by the negatives right especially since they're number one yeah and they're not number one like a little bit you know right like for the casual MMA is UFC you know it's like Q-tips it's not a cotton swab it's a Q-tip yeah from a business perspective I understand it yeah I think as a fighter it would be cool to challenge yourself once you once you get to that pinnacle if you have title defenses and you're kind of taking everybody out it's like hey I really want to be the best in the world let me fight yeah all the top guys in the world so it may never happen but the only way it could happen if something like MVP um got to a level of prominence in the public eye where they developed a roster of champions that was equal to the UFC right then it would make sense then no one's losing yeah yeah because then the crowds from everywhere right everybody gets and then you do a co-promotion for like a gigantic super fight like uh you know the UFC's version of Floyd Mayweather versus Manny Pacquiao right you know you have something where these guys are so huge it's just like let's make this happen everyone's gonna get rich let's go yeah no for sure yeah it has to be something of that caliber like it has to be a Conor McGregor level champion where that you know people are coming from all over anywhere to stand on to to buy the fight at home or to show up in person and I think you'd have to have two level two guys of that level to bring some of that traction to do you think Connor fights again um I don't know it sounds like you he sounds like he's going to I think he does I think he does the one more and then he's done with it yeah I hope you know it's just that's what like you say guys stay in it too long it's like and some of these guys that's all they know it's the only thing um to put food on the table or provide for their families and so like what else do they know they they gave everything to fighting well with Connor it's not that but that's not Connor he's yeah he went from such a high place to like doing what he's doing now in the fighting world it's just like why even step in and do that anymore I think it's just because he still can for a little bit more time I mean he's 37 38 now realistically he's got two years left maybe you know if everything if he's got two years left maybe you know if everything if you really take care of yourself and we both know there's yeah part a little bit I don't think he's gonna get back to that level of training and like mindset to it though you know it's very difficult to know because he was capable of doing it at one point in his life and it doesn't mean that he can never do that again just because he's rich right and I think you can underestimate a man's character and say that he can't ever reach those Heights again a guy Connor's a special guy the special it takes a special type of person to put on a performance like he did against Eddie Alvarez like that was he was in the Matrix man right to be there live when he was doing that I was like good Lord yeah that was special yeah he's pulling it just Eddie's like right getting his nose and then he's countering instantaneous with perfect precision yeah he was on fire if he can reach that height as long as his body holds up but here's the problem is both of his ACL's been torn both of his meniscus has been blown out you know now with this the crazy one with that crazy jumping roundhouse kick like who knows man right who knows what he could still do there's I will never say never it's not that he couldn't do it right it's just that will he do it will he put that time and effort to to recollect and to be of that Zen of that Bushido like he used to be because like the way he used to talk and be philosophical and stoic about training the way he explained it and delved into it that's what that's what drew people to Connor before anything the way he talked about the Warrior lifestyle and and he didn't care about anything else and he lost his mind to it those are the things that intrigued the people this real true Warrior persona and that that was the biggest question with this last one everybody's like oh do you think Connor's gonna do it do you think Connor and it was the same answer do I think he can do it for sure but the problem with that is Connor's so good at talking that he could convince you that he's doing he's been doing anything you know so I'm like I'm not there in his camp I'm not seeing what he's doing behind the scenes I really can't I really can't make that guess honestly yeah and much like you I want to believe you know you hear him talk you're like i want to believe i want to see him pull it off of course yeah we all did you know it's it he was a very important part of fighting he was a really um a special person that came along and brought a lot of attention to the sport that would not it wouldn't have been the same without him that whole era of time from 10 years ago or whatever it was when he really burst more than that but i think he won his what year would he win his first title when was against jose aldo what year was that end of 2015 it was december 20 yeah so 11 years ago really when he became connor you know that one punch knockout of jose aldo is really when he became that guy i mean he was huge before that but that was the one and then of course the eddie alvarez fight was another one i mean it's 10 years man that's a long time right a lot of booze a lot of partying a lot of fucking off you know yeah a lot of luxury you know not waking up that's it's hard to hard to go right also the difference as you said before between 45 and you know and going all the way up now he wants to fight at 70 you know yeah and he's also that's a weight class of killers right there you talk about carlos protez and these are this that i'm like morales bro yeah yeah morales that guy's giant those guys are all huge huge even ian gary you saw him sparring connor and he's far bigger than connor is yeah connor's not connor's not that ginormous of a guy from my understanding he gets like pretty like thick but he's not really like that that big of an individual no 55 is really probably as heavy as he should be fighting at right realistically when you think about those guys yeah but then is he going to cut the weight to do that like it's hard is he going to do all that stuff well if he doesn't want to do that he really probably shouldn't be fighting i mean he the only thing with that is that he can kind of pick who it is he's fighting to an extent and so he can get away with the weight class thing a little bit he can he can do whatever the fuck he wants but you know if i was in his it's also at his age should he even be cutting that kind of weight anymore right maybe just pick the real fight is 170 with michael chandler like have that fight you want to have one more fight and go out that you know that would be beautiful for him because max is a tough it's a tough matchup for him it's tough if he doesn't get max out of there in the first two rounds and good luck with that like max is gonna i mean max's whole strategy goes we're gonna drown him yeah that's like right that's what his thoughts were yeah and he yeah that's a tough one max is uh as tough as they come and and he's fighting the top of the top consistently so yeah he's only getting better he's only getting more experienced i think michael chandler would be great regardless i think it draws the crowd i think it brings the energy to it i think that's a good skill level he went through the whole ultimate fighter thing i think it's a good skill level i think it's a good skill level together and talked all the shit to each other it's like it's crazy that chandler sat in the shelf for like two years waiting for that fight and then finally he's like all right i guess it's not happening right yeah and he got fucked he did and uh chandler to me is like he's he's very physically tough i just you know i don't think he is as skillful as max or some of these other guys so i think that's a great fight for connor i think that's a good one for him to come back on yeah i mean chandler's a wild dog he is a wild dog but he relies on that too much is what i've seen is like he comes out all crazy and it's just like dude like that's the same thing start with the jab start oh and it's who am i to say it quite yet you know he's he's there doing his thing but from my perspective you know there seems to be a little bit more calculation there well it's not going to happen at this stage of his career but yeah if you go back and watch his fights back when he was fighting in bellator those and that was but that's like a war back and forth you know like both those guys hit the canvas like insane three or four times each you know those fights were insane yeah some of the like like for people that like you want to see a great fight that you probably never saw before if you only watch the ufc go back and watch michael chandler versus eddie alvarez one and two those fights are nuts right yeah like i said it's just like a like a war war back and forth but that's that's also and chandler is a very physical guy he's very explosive and just think like back to prime you know how much more explosive he was how much power he had how much energy he was delivering to that fight so and that's that's why he was performing like that but like like a lot of fighters you know like the roy jones and stuff is you can't always rely on that especially in your later years like that's back to this you got to be thinking with with this especially as your body starts to get a little bit slower and not as explosive so i don't know he he's he's over there getting after it i mean that gaugey fight he was definitely not on the winning end of it but in it and and fought hard and then the poirier fight he's had some great fights he's had some great fights for sure uh i mean you fight a guy like rufy rufy's just on a tear right now if you don't take him down to the ground there's not a lot of people that beat him on a pure striking match right now anyway so so good yeah he's see that's another one that's another like individual that you look at it like like a work of art you know someone who really understands uh what it means to be a striker yeah and super creative he does a lot of wild stuff in sparring there's some awesome sparring footage of him like pulling off crescent kicks when he's like two inches from you yeah he's like backfist yeah he's artistic i mean he's very creative when he's in there it's beautiful to watch he's got a great fight coming up um who is he fighting why did i blank on it he's fighting someone oh arman sarukian oh yeah yes two or three weeks yes arman sarukian and they're fighting in la that's a that's a good fight that's a really good fight and that's yeah that's that's the whole thing with him he's got to like make sure he doesn't get taken down against someone like arman sarukian that's uh that's a tall task right there yeah absolutely that guy's one of the best wrestlers in the sport it's interesting to see him stay relevant outside the ufc when the ufc hasn't been offering fights that's great yeah very smart he's doing his thing he's doing his thing it's very smart what he's doing and and you know getting the raf matches and doing a bunch of different things on social media he just stays out there yeah he's hanging out with all the twitch streamers and stuff and it's not like he needs money you know right he's good on that part that's weird it's weird for a guy to be that good who's rich right he's so good it's so tough yeah two trains of thought there it's like you either have all the amenities to do so or like you have all the amenities so then you're you're a pussy you don't need to do anything you're soft you just sit around but not him he's fucking shredded and he grew up yeah yeah like stupid rich literally bruce wayne he's the usc bruce wayne he's bruce wayne i mean he's always got ferraris and shit you know you ever watch his video series on youtube his training series uh which one like the so they were yeah so they're rolling to a town like it rolls into la first thing he does is goes and rents a lamborghini so when he shows up at training he's driving around a rented lamborghini everywhere he's got that kind of scratch right and yet he's training like a fucking absolute you know he's got a lot of money he's got a lot of money he's got a lot of money he's a great fighter right i mean he has no flaws in his game no flaw in terms of heart he doesn't quit it's like that his first fight with islam was fucking chaos he gave islam one of the toughest fights of his career right i think that's i think that's probably the closest i mean besides obviously islam's loss yes he really got tested like that you know absolutely that was a short notice wasn't it for armand yes yeah so he's he's got all the skills he's he's a top contender for sure and when you think about uh the uh the the real problem that he had in the ufc was that one fight with benoit sandini we got taken down and you know benoit is obviously very elite grappler so it'd be interesting to see right if he can avoid uh armand that's that's the big question right there for sure uh i i would think that that's what his camp is surrounded around is takedown defense getting up off the bottom yeah blocking some uh chokes and i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know being able to get back to the feet i mean that's the thing that's you know for the mma striker guys it's not like you have to be like the dopest wrestler like all around but you do need to be really good at defending takedowns yeah and you do need to have one two three escapes off the bottom a sweep some kind of ability to stand up um you know and then yeah get back to your feet and make this make this a close fight if you get stuck on the bottom then you're you're done for you're screwed and i think for a lot of these guys that are elite strikers it takes that one fight where you do get dominated on the ground to really have a wake-up call and i think a good example of that might be cyril gone when cyril gone fought john jones yeah you know and also francis francis beat him up on the ground as well right but the john jones one was i think a real humbling wake-up call because john essentially avoided getting hit completely took him down and strangled him yeah real quick right and then he's sitting there like fuck and from that moment on that dude's been on a tear right i mean and you you see how he performed on the white house lawn against you know what we thought is arguably one of the greatest strikers that's ever fought in the ufc alex perera and he certainly was at middleweight and light heavyweight but cyril gone at heavyweight is something special man yeah there's a good example of a guy that you were talking about who hits and doesn't get hit we've literally never seen him get rocked right well that's just crazy and he's he's got that savant ish style i wouldn't say it's completely savant but he bounces it's almost like that karate savant he moves really well in and out dude if you can do that at heavyweight You're that big, and you can move like that. It's going to be very difficult for a lot of those guys to track you and keep up with that. And, you know, we were talking about, like, point fighting, like how point fighting has, like, such a, like, I think it's a great skill to learn. Another great skill to learn is basketball, and that's what Cyril Ghosn did. He played a lot of basketball. And if you think about a big guy where you're constantly exploding and moving and all this different changing directions, that would definitely benefit you with footwork. Yeah, there's all sorts of hand-eye coordination. You've got to be very quick and, yeah, be able to move your hands and your feet in succession. Because, look, nobody, no heavyweights move like that guy. Right. He's the gold standard for, like, elite moving heavyweights in the UFC. It's Cyril Ghosn. And there's no close second. Like, who's a close second at heavyweight? You've got to go back to Travis Brown when he was in his prime. Travis Brown, when he was in his prime, was very light on his feet and moved very well. But I think Cyril Ghosn is, like, a new level, a new level of, like, elite mobility. A new level of mobile heavyweight who also has ridiculous knockout power. Yeah, for sure. I mean, I would say the only person that rivals his speed and agility would be maybe, like, a Hokit. I haven't really seen. Hokit's fast, but I don't think he's got that kind of footwork speed. Not at all. There's no comparison on the skill levels of that movement and the striking. He just has similar speed and agility. What Hokit has is elite wrestling, though. And a lot of shit talking. A lot of shit talking. He gets people riled up. I don't know. I think that's also something that Conor did really well, is that you got these guys going into a fight going, I cannot get beat by this guy. He just did. He said this and this and this. And I have all this pressure. And you could see it. Like, you saw it on Jose Aldo. What's the other Brazilian he fought? I don't know. It starts with an R. He's fought him before. Maybe it was the second fight? I don't know. I don't know. I'm blanking on his name. Yeah, I know who you're talking about. I'm seeing it in my head. You can see he comes out. He runs out all crazy. Like, just everybody. Everybody. He gets them riled up. If you have that added pressure, it's a psychological effect. And I think Hokit does the same thing, you know? He takes people out of their comfort zone. Now everything's extra tense. Everything's guarded. You're not making any, like. You're not taking any chances or risks or stepping out of line. You're just. You're very, very safe and secluded. And fighting. You know, you have to be loose when you're fighting. You can't be loose. You can't be thinking that. And you probably didn't sleep good the night before because you fucking hate this guy. Yeah. And then you're like, yeah, riled up, pissed off. All I want to do is take his head off. You're not thinking about technique. You're thinking about taking his head off. That's it. One big overhand. It's like, dude, when you fight angry, then you're. You had all this skill and your emotion could take it, like, right out of you. See, that's another aspect of this striking game, of this MMA game. Do you think that that should be taught more? That the mental aspect of the game, of just being able to stay in your own. In your own head and not get affected by these outside influences, not get affected by. And understand what these things are. So when you encounter them, you know, like, you have a coach, I think, that could teach you not just how to fight, but also how to maintain your peace of mind and how to maintain your focus and not get distracted. Oh, 100%. I don't know. Like, everybody's individual, you know? It's hard to have a program because you have guys that go to, like, like, therapists or whatever, like, performance therapists, and they certainly do all that stuff. I think a little bit is you're born with it. You have the ability to control, like, emotions better than others. Some people go through, again, back to, like, just hard life experiences is the best teacher. So a lot of people learn that way. I don't know. I don't know what it is for, like, each individual person. Me, like, the third person I train with is my boxing coach, Dale Roybal, out of his. We literally train out of his garage in his front yard. In his front yard, you know? And, like, we talk spiritually beyond, like, just boxing. We talk about the world. We delve into the spirituality of the gospel and God and what that means to us. He's a big-time recurve guy. That's who I went and did my archery competition with. He's a big-time leatherworking guy. And so we just sit and talk about, like, what it means to be a warrior, the philosophy and the psychology behind that, what it means to control your emotions, when you're engaged with certain aspects in life, how do you come out on the other side of it. Like, every day, I mean, oftentimes we just, we stop and we're just sitting and talking about things. And, you know, my wife's always like, you're just sitting there talking, hanging out with them. Like, this is part of training, babe. We talk in psychology, you know? Like, it's something we gotta spend extra time doing. And, uh, but I do. Like, I get there and we'll sit and talk for 30 minutes sometimes before we even warm up. I'm stretching and we, then we get into it. He starts wrapping hands. Like, we're always just, like, adjusting and concentrating. We're constantly talking about it. So. That's a great resource. To me, that's, that's fantastic. Like, it's, it's, it makes fighting spiritual to me. It makes it, like, it takes it another level up. You know? And so, and then, yeah. I mean, I got him. We really connect on a lot of things. Eric Paulson is an absolute legend of the game. I have a lot of experience that I learned from him. A lot of mindset. He's, he's the same way. Ben Jones, he's, he's the guy that you want to go into battle with. He's the one that you guys hear in the corner that's super loud. And he's the kind of guy that, yeah, he's, he's, he's putting you through that hardship mentally and physically in the room. And if you can endure that, then you can go out and fight. So, I think there's different levels to it. You got to get it in different ways. But, it's interpersonal. You know? And you got to, you got to delve into that. And it's got to be its own practice, its own training for the day. So, 100%. I mean, yeah. If you get riled up by the littlest thing and then you go out there and you try to go crazy, you're just, you're just like a kindergartner in this fight game. You've lost everything. And emotion can do that to you. So, yeah. I mean, you have to be on top of that. It's, you know, I say there's so many levels to this. There's the cardio. There's skill set. There's being relaxed. There's an emotional aspect that you have to think about. Like, you know, because everybody gets hit. And like, what's the natural reaction? I'm going to get you right back. But the best fighter can get hit and just not even think about it. Not even get riled up one heart. You know, their heart, their heartbeat doesn't even go up one level. Bam. The game plan stays the same. Bam, bam, bam. I'm intelligently blocking. I'm doing my stuff. I've never deviated from what I'm doing. And if you could do that, it's beautiful. You got it. That's an awesome mindset, brother. I can't wait to see you inside there again. And thank you very much for being here. It was a lot of fun. I really enjoyed it. Thanks for having me. It was a great experience. My pleasure. Good luck in the future. I'm sure I'll be calling one of your fights soon. Yes, sir. All right. Beautiful. Bye, everybody. This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. It may be hard to believe, but identity theft is the number one crime in America. Right now, millions of people are dealing with stolen accounts, fraudulent loans, and the exhausting process of proving who they are to banks, creditors, and credit bureaus. LifeLock helps you fight back. They monitor your personal and financial influence, information, alerting you when something looks suspicious. And if identity theft does happen, LifeLock has live U.S.-based experts who step in and fix it, guaranteed or your money back. Don't fight that battle alone. Get LifeLock identity theft protection. Visit LifeLock.com and save up to 30% your first year with promo code JRE. 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