JRE MMA Show #147 with Sean O'Malley & Tim Welch
2023-09-29 03:30:32
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
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And we're up, boys, when did we do the first one together?
Joe.
It was like five years ago?
Yeah, I think it was 2017, right, or 2018?? Yeah. I was 2-0 in the UFC, I was just coming off the Andre Sockermom fight where I broke my foot.
Um, yeah, I was 23..
Yeah, that was just after you broke your foot.
Yeah.
And now here you are, the fucking champ of the world.
We did it.
Living in a dream.
It's crazy, because that whole fight week, I always take a lot of naps fight week, especially because it was on the east coast and we were trying to stay up late. And I would have crazy, vivid dreams, not necessarily about the fight, but just really vivid dreams. And so after the fight, I just felt like I was kind of in one of those dreams. I'm like, there's no way that went out, that played out perfect. There's no way that played out, literally how I wanted to play out.
So for a while, I kept thinking like, I'm going to wake up in my bed and still have to go out there and do that. But I haven't woke up from a nap yet, so we're still rolling.
Well, it makes you wonder what dreams really are. Yeah. It's so weird that we just accept that we close our eyes every night and scenarios take place that don't really take place and they seem super vivid, and then weird things happen in them, and then you wake up and you're like, oh, that wasn't real. But we just accept that there's many times where I've been in a lucid dream, or many times I've been in a dream that felt so real.
Yeah.
Like, what's going on in our heads?
Probably a lot during a sober October for you too, because I noticed when I quit smoking, weed and camp, like when I get close to the fight, my dreams are so fucking vivid. It's kind of scary. It's like a snapshot of another dimension. I'm like, could that possibly be us in another dimension, witnessing our life play out some other way?
It could be that what you're doing is like peeking. You're like, every night. you like peek into another dimension and pop back up in the morning when you wake up. That's one of the theories about DMT. It's some sort of a chemical gateway to the next dimension or the next realm of existence, and that when the lights go out and then your brain floods with that stuff, your consciousness uses that chemical as a gateway.
Yeah.
We've never done DMT. I've told myself I want to do, like DMT, ayahuasca stuff after fighting, because right now I have a mindset that I want to be world champ, I want to be the greatest, I want to kill in the cage. I feel like if I do something like that, maybe I switch that around. I want to wait. Yeah, it might be a problem.
You might become loving. Yeah.
That's literally the issue. I'm like, all right. I still have that fucking want to kill. Yeah. Not Sean Strickland want to kill, but like in the cage, like dominate.
Yeah, dominate.
When we were talking to Dana too, he said Cheeto has recently started doing mushrooms when he was training and stuff. I wonder if that has anything to do with his performances versus Sanhagen and stuff. Cheeto just looks stuck in the mud.
I think it's just Sanhagen.
That's what I think. Sanhagen was just way faster.
He's so diverse. Yeah. He's got so much going on. I love watching that guy fight, because, like when he's going after folks, he's given them so many looks. There's so much going on, and you don't...
The patterns are non-existent. I mean, sure they exist, but I'm not picking them up. Yeah. You think he's going to kick, he shoots. You think he's going to punch, he kicks.
There's movement to the side. You think he's going to engage, and he doesn't.
Yeah, his last three fights, too, he's been really wrestling a lot. So you've got to think like... Because I don't know. I could fight... I mean, there's a couple of different people I could fight next, but think about fighting Corey.
It's like, okay, is he going to turn into that wrestler, or is he going to want to strike, or is he going to mix it up? I'm assuming going into a fight with Corey, he's going to want to mix it up a bit, but...
You just don't know.
Yeah, it's interesting.
He can do anything. Yeah. And the fact that he pulled that fight off with a completely torn tricep, first round, tears, the tricep from the bone, needs surgery.
I was excited for that fight, too.
Yeah, me too.
I stopped watching at one point. I think that was the same night, Jake, Nate. So I was kind of flipping back and forth, but... Yeah, I was so excited for that fight. I thought it was going to be one of those bangers, but he did what he had to do to win.
Yeah. It wasn't super entertaining.
Yeah, I was really interested in seeing him fight Umar.
Yeah.
That was the interesting one. Yeah.
Fuck, I forgot that was it.
Umar Nurmagomedov is a fucking... He's a problem.
I want him to start... I mean, he's got the name Nurmagomedov. I don't know how many fights he has in the UFC, how many wins he has. I've actually never really watched a fight, but I know he's got the name, and I know he's fucking super skilled. He trains with those guys.
That could be a huge fight someday. Huge fight. I want him to fucking start winning some fights. I was excited for him to potentially beat Corey, or for Corey to get a win over him. Right.
Just to build characters and build big fights, because that's what I want. I want big, fucking fights. Right.
Well, you're going to bring big fights. That's what's so exciting about having someone who's a champ, who's such a big personality.
Yeah.
And there's so many eyes on the Bantamweight division now, you know? The Bantamweight division has always been like just a fucking murderer's row, from Hennenborough to TJ Dillashaw, like across the board. Dominick Cruz, you know. God damn. I mean, Cody Garbrandt.
People forget because of Cody's losses, but how good Cody is when he's on. You know? Cody's just a guy who's been in a lot of wars, you know?
Seems like he's got just injury issues, too, right?
A lot of injury issues.
Which sucks. I remember after one of my fights, I got injured, and he said, some people just aren't built for this, and that didn't age well for him. But, I mean, hey, dude, I feel like I'm fragile sometimes, too. If I didn't start working with Brandon Harris, like my strength and conditioning coach, and Dan Garner for nutrition, I feel like I was getting injured all the fucking time. It sucks.
This sport's brutal.
It's the most brutal, and there's no way to prevent that. You know, some people are incredible, like Jim Miller.
Yeah.
Jim Miller's never had surgery.
I feel like it's their genes. It must be. It's got to be.
He's got some weird fucking woodsman gene.
Yeah.
Some blogger gene. Right?
Like a Benson Henderson. It's crazy. there's just so many different paths to make someone a champion. There's not just this one way, you've got to do it. Yeah.
No, there's just so many ways.
Like Sean Strickland's, sparring all the time, and then I fucking literally only spar in camp. It's like just two opposite styles, both just one at similar times. It's wild.
What Sean is doing is so unique because, you know, they put a mouthpiece on him. You know, the UFC had some device. I think it was a mouthpiece. Did they use it with you where they try to figure out how many times you get hit in sparring?
Uh-huh.
Well, they gave him this thing, and they found out that he spars more than all the other fighters they tested, and he gets hit less than all the other fighters they tested. He gets hit less than anybody, which is amazing. Yeah. But it's the timing. It's his distance control.
He's like so tuned in to the idea of hitting a person, not just hitting a bag, not just doing drills, but all of his moves, all of his movements, when he's training, are hitting people.
I wonder how many of his sparring partners are like, I don't even want to fucking hit him, because he's just going to turn it up, and it's going to be a full fight. Yeah. Because there's guys you spar with, and it's like, okay, if I hit this dude, we're going to fight. Yeah. So I wonder how many of those guys know going into sparring, like, okay, if I even hit him, it's going to turn into something.
I might as well just kind of play around for five minutes, get to the next guy.
I'm sure.
But, I mean, you look at the guy. He's got talented guys he trains with, like Chris Curtis. Chris Curtis is talented. And really, Chris Curtis is really talented. in the pocket.
You know, he's really good at, like, ripping the body. His boxing is excellent. He's got really good defense. So him and Sean together, I mean, that's, like, it's too sad.
Yeah.
Just good boxers, too.
And Strickland. Solid boxer.
Strickland just doesn't switch stances at all. Just orthodox the whole time. Man, that's just fucking sweet to watch.
And, dude, his leg checks, the checks from those kicks was so on point.
Yeah, it was impressive.
None of them snuck in. The best at that of all time of sneaking kicks in is Pejeta.
So scary. Yeah. It doesn't, like, make sense the way he does it. It's just, like, his shin moves, nothing else. Yeah.
It's wild.
He keeps his shoulders completely square, and you do not see it coming. So he sacrifices, I mean, but he's got so much power. He can sacrifice some power, and it doesn't matter. He's just doing numbers on that calf.
Yeah.
And Izzy's leg was fucked after the first round of the second fight. You could tell.
I can't. That's crazy. they just added that to the co-main event for Jon Jones and Stipe. Because neither of them are champions, so they're going to stack that fucking card and only have to pay out Jon Jones because he's the champion for pay-per-view. Oh, that's interesting.
That's probably why they're thinking like a businessman now.
The champ thinks like a businessman.
I've been thinking like a businessman. Yeah, I hear you. I feel like I've been champ for a long time, just finding the official. But, yeah, that card's going to be fucking sweet. Who else is on that card?
That's a good question. Pull it up, Jerry. I think there's another banger on that card.
Yeah, they always try to stack New York City. That Madison Square Garden card is special. There's something special about that arena. That arena gives you goosebumps. just walking in.
You're like, God damn.
That TD Garden was fucking crazy. Because my first nine fights in the UFC were all in Vegas, Vegas, Vegas, Vegas. And then I fought in Abu Dhabi. And then we went to Boston. So it was the first time fighting somewhere other than Vegas in the United States.
Yeah, so those are the two big ones. And scroll down, we'll see the rest of it. Jessica Andrade, Mackenzie, Dern. That's a good fight.
Okay, some decents, but not what I was thinking.
Jared Gordon, Mark Mads. And that's a good fight. Yeah, I thought there was more bangers.
Sometimes they have a nice prelim. Nice main event prelim.
Yeah, what's the prelim? Go to the ESPN.
Mackenzie, Dern, Jiggly. It would be right here.
Okay, so that's what makes sense, because this doesn't look like the actual order. Because here we're talking in September. And I believe that's the main, the co-main, and probably maybe the fight before that. But they might move all this shit around. This is just the announced fights.
Yeah, okay, that makes sense.
I don't think he would open up the pay-per-view with these match-ups.
I guess it's not even October yet. Right.
I'm very interested to see how much steep he's got left in the tank. You know, one of the things I really like is that he spent all this time off. So he hasn't been hit. You know, no punishments, no wars, no KOs. He's been two solid years of recovery.
That's huge. It's big. Even if he wasn't training crazy, but his body was able to kind of recover, I feel like there's so much into that than just being training, training, training, training, and fucking busting yourself down.
I mean, it was his name. Never take anything away from DC. But I've often wondered if that KO, if some of that KO, was him coming off that fight with Francis. Because if you go watch that first round of that fight with Francis, Jesus Louise-us. I mean, Francis hit him with some meteors.
He just opened up the gas tank too much and ran dry. But he wasn't patient. He was just trying to take him out. He was just winging wild and burned off all his energy. But Stipe took some shots.
He took some fucking shots.
Yeah, Stipe forced some of those wrestling scrambles, and that just zapped Francis. I think that Stipe-John Jones fights can be more competitive than people think.
Well, the real question is, you know, what is it like when John fights a legit heavyweight that can do everything?
Yeah.
Right? Because Stipe is not just like-. Cyril Ghosn is a fantastic striker. I mean, he's one of the most beautiful strikers in the heavyweight division. I love watching that guy move.
He does wild stuff. You ever see how he throws that front kick from a side stance? And he throws it like a twisting kick?
Uh-uh.
He doesn't throw the front. He stands like Southpaw, right? And he bobs around like this, and he's totally sideways, and he twists his foot out. Oh, they'll show it there. Let's see.
He twists his foot out like a twisting kick. They show the front kicks to the body if he does any. He did a lot of them against Taito Iwasa, too.
Yeah, I thought Hembert's John Jones was going to be a fucking crazy, like, war. At least kickboxing, but John-.
John's just so much better at wrestling. So much better grappler. He's so fast, man.
D-Luke, that's crazy, because D-Luke looked good. last fight, right? The knee. He looked skinny. He looked in shape.
But he just doesn't have the kicking acumen. It's not his style. If you could find the ones that's him throwing kicks with. He just does this weird thing where he stands sideways, and instead of the front kick going like this, like straight out, the front kick goes like this.
Oh, yeah, yeah, I know. Okay, I see what you're saying.
So his knee, when he lands, is almost like sideways. He did a lot- Oh, that was a Tuiwasa fight. That was a crazy fight.
Tai's only like 32 or something, wasn't he?
Oh, my God.
I thought that fucker was-.
He's 85 at war.
Right, especially with the boos.
Oh, yeah, the boos and the war. He's just an animal, man.
The boos will get you.
Hopefully they'll show it.
Oh, boom, boom. Uh-oh. Yeah.
He kept stabbing him with this front kick. This is the combination. Oh, my God. He's good.
Yeah, stabbing body shots.
He's just so unusual for a heavyweight, that kind of movement. There it is.
See it? Yeah.
That was more like a front kick. That was definitely more like a front kick. But he'll show it totally sideways.
Just a little trick.
Almost like a crescent kick or something like that, which people are starting to do now, too. I forget this dude's name, but one guy knocked a guy out in an MMA fight with an inside crescent kick. I was always wondering. I was always wondering if someone was going to be able to pull that off.
Where you're standing like this, you go like that.
Yeah, you do it like this way.
Yeah.
It's just so hard to pull off when you're moving around. Anderson tried it a few times.
Here it is. I'll throw an X, right?
Check this out.
That's nasty. Dink, that looked fucking weird.
I shouted out that dude on Instagram when it happened. But what is his name, Jamie? Justin Barry. Justin Barry. Show that one more time.
Because from where he's standing, you kind of feel like you're safe.
Oh, I was right to the fucking shin. Right.
So you see how it's like he's kind of. his foot is in the center, right? So watch how he stands. He's kind of out of place, you would think, to kick you in the face.
Well, even to do the right defense, he's doing a right T. if you're going to use your right hand. So you're going to leave that exposed. I mean, it's tricky for sure.
But it's wicked. Look at how it worked. I mean, my God, that's great. And he did not see that coming.
Uh-uh. I'll throw that up next fight.
Let's go. I will.
Let's go. So the next fight is not officially announced, but you believe it'll be Cheeto.
I want it to be Cheeto. I called that before the fight. Once they announced that. Well, Cheeto was supposed to fight Henry on my card. So I was like, I want the winner of that.
I want Cheeto versus Henry. I want the winner of that. if I go out there and do what I do against Aljoe. Henry pulled out. Pedro stepped up.
And I was like, well, if Cheeto wins, it makes sense. You know? So that's what I want.
Why is PewDieYawn been on the shelf?
He's just got announced. Song Yedong.
Oh, when's that?
I think that's sooner than later, actually. But that's fucked, Peter. Because Song's an animal.
Song's a problem. That was another great fight. We went to see the San Hagen Song Yedong fight at the Apex, which is incredible. Have you gone to the Apex just to watch a fight?
We watched the Contender Series there once. It was fucking cool.
I was thinking about flying out last weekend for Fazee versus Gamrock.
I was like, I want to see that one.
That was at the Apex, which is the best place to see fights, man.
I hate the small cage. I hate it. Big difference, right? I'll probably never. Well, I guess it's at the Apex.
I'll never fight in a small cage again.
It doesn't help my style. I like being able to move around as much as possible.
That's why I'm confused. Why? Why have a small cage when you own the arena? They had a small cage back when we used to do the Pearl of the Palms. Because it was a smaller place to put the stage.
So they said, we'll just make the cage 30% smaller.
44% or something like that. It's damn near 50%. It feels like it. It fucking feels like it. I remember when Corey fought Aljo in the small cage.
I said something about not wanting to fight in a small cage. I don't think Corey should either, because of his style. Then Corey said, that's just your insecurity. I said, dude, you got choked out in 14 seconds against Aljo.
Yeah, there it is.
I think they said the lighting wasn't set up. They didn't put the right lights in for the big cage.
Hey, guess what? You're the UFC.
Guess what?
You guys fucking, for no reason decided to build your own arena.
I'm getting a fucking full-size octagon. I'm building a warehouse on my property right now. I'm getting a full-size octagon. At Tim's gym, at the MMA lab, pretty much any gym you go to, they all have smaller gyms or smaller cages in there. Even sparring, it's just different.
If you're going to be in the NBA and you're playing a half-court, it's just different.
I've been advocating for no cage for a long time.
I would be unbeatable. No one's going to beat me.
There was this Russian promotion that we were just watching from back in the day with Igor Vovchanchin. He was fighting some dude. It was just this big, round platform. It was just flat. You see everything.
That's sweet.
The fucking eyesight, there's not a bad eyeline in the house because everybody's seeing the fight. There's no poles that are blocking the way. What was that called?
What promotion was that called?
I don't know. This was in the 90s. Mr. Power Man, 1996.. Oh, no way.
What the fuck?
I thought it was like Ritu.
Yeah, show it, so you can see what it looked like, Jim. It's pretty dope, and that's my dream. My dream is no cage, because I think the cage is just too many elements. There's too much going on. Look at this.
There's just a little barrier on the outside. This is only one of them that they did.
That's the only one that they did. Another one that they did was completely flat. Igor was a fucking animal, dude. That's when he was smaller. 5'8, heavyweight.
No way. 5'8. heavyweight? 5'8..
TKO'd Mark Kerr as a 5'8 heavyweight.
Yeah, see, the cage is like...
Isn't that way better? And look at how much size you would have to move around. Obviously, you wouldn't have that bullshit floor. That floor looks like the moment you sweat, you're tearing an ACL. That floor looks terrible.
God, that floor sucks. It does. It sucks so bad. It's loose. It's everything.
I hate when I go to a jiu-jitsu gym, and they have homemade mats, so they have the loose stuff.
Yeah, a little saggy tip, Matt.
Do you guys hate grip? Do you guys hate foot positioning and slipping around on all that shit?
Yeah, no cage would change the game.
It would change everything.
Because a lot of wrestlers... I feel like the only chance people... I could take it down in the open, but I feel like it's going to be a lot harder than to push me up against the cage. I mean, that's what Aljo's 100% goal was. Push me up against the cage, take me down, work from there.
But if there's no fucking cage, what's your fucking game plan?
Also, how much fewer clinches would there be?
Yeah.
It would be a huge factor. Because how many clinches take place in that weird danger zone when you're right up against the cage?
Like, just grab this motherfucker.
There's so many moments where guys are trying to reset, and they go in for the clinch. That shit would not be available if there's no cage. If you have this big-ass basketball-sized circle in the middle of an arena, and that's where the guys are fighting, it would be incredible. It'd be incredible. It's really the way to do it.
Yeah. Something about the cage makes it, like... Badass. I don't know what it is. Yeah.
Good bulls and glitter.
Yeah.
Steel deflection shirts. It's a dragon fucking a pit bull in the ass. Yeah.
With Japanese lettering.
The old school, real gangster shit.
I love those shirts.
Yeah. Fighting in Japan would be fucking crazy.
Yeah. Fighting in Japan... If you're a world champion, that's like a mecca place, right? Yeah. If you want to fight in Madison Square Garden, but fighting in Tokyo as a martial artist?
That would be crazy.
Saitama Super Arena, right?
Oh, my god.
I wonder if the UFC's never done that, right?
We did an arena in Japan. I commentated at it. It was in Tokyo a few years back. It's amazing. They're so knowledgeable, and they're also...
They applaud. when things happen, like when someone passes the guard. They get it. Yeah.
They get it a little bit.
I wonder why Dane or any of them haven't looked into yellow cards. That's a good question.
Well, the problem with that is, it's so subjective, right? Let's look at this Valentina Shevchenko, Alexa Grasso rematch, where one judge scores the final round, a pivotal fight round. It's like, that's what makes the fight. One judge scores a 10-8.. No one agrees with him.
Literally no one agrees with him. You're like, what the fuck?
Because if he didn't score a 10-8 and he just scored a 10-9,.
then Valentina wins.
I went back and watched it just once, but I was kind of surfing on my phone. I thought Grasso won three out of the five rounds, but I also, like I said, I was surfing a little bit on my phone.
Yeah, it's hard. It's hard to casually watch a fight. Yeah.
You got to fucking...
Yeah, I like watching fights with... Eddie Bravo taught me how to do this, because Eddie Bravo, at one point in time, was doing the Max Kellerman. Not Max Kellerman. Who's that dude, Letterman, that does it on Harold Letterman? He's doing it on HBO Fights, where, in between rounds, I gave that round to Davis, 10-8, and this is what...
And he would give his explanation for what he thought. So he was basically like an independent scorekeeper. So Eddie would do that, and it was like we did it for a few UFCs, where he would come in and he would talk about, we're going to go to Eddie Bravo with what he thinks happened, the score was. And he would take a piece of paper, and he would have two sides. Like one side would be this guy, one side would be that guy.
And he would write on the lines, like kicks, punches, takedowns, power, like power shots. I forget all of his criteria. So, as he's watching the fight, he's writing things. So it's not just going on memory. I think he got a more...
And he also had access to whatever stats we had at the time, although I don't think we had the kind of stats you have now, where now you're getting constantly updated on significant strikes.
What is a significant strike?
That was a weird one in Izzy and Strickland, right? Yeah. Because they were showing that there was one point where Izzy had landed more significant strikes. I'm like, but to where? Like what is a significant strike?
It's like a leg kick that gets checked. Are you calling that a significant strike? If a guy lifts his leg up, yeah, he did get kicked hard, but like what is, here's Eddie Bravo, Randy Silver, or Tim Silver and Randy Couture.
I think that was a good thing to do. It's also a good thing to put the actual judges on blast.
I agree.
Because, like when DC and I are doing commentary, you can't do commentary and score a fight. You can kind of like, have an idea, but you're trying to be entertaining. You're trying to like, give life to what's happening, and you're just reacting like, oh, you want to scream and swear, and I'm doing my best to not. But you can't do, you should be quiet, just quiet and thinking about it, and you should also have access to replays.
Do you think you'd be in like that close, or should you be on a monitor where you see different angles in a room like this?
I think they have monitors now. They didn't used to have monitors, which is crazy.
Because the refs stand in there sometimes, or the poll, I guess not a poll, you're a judge.
I don't think they listen, though. Like I don't think they listen to commentary, which is probably good, because commentary could definitely influence it, like it's someone DC trains with.
It's so crazy, though. Yeah, if you're a judge and you never felt a checked kick, because when I fought Pedro, I swear like I felt his foot land on my shin, and I felt like I was fucking him up when he was kicking me, and then the judges obviously gave him the first round. He didn't punch me in the face once. I had more significant strikes, but he was landing leg kicks, but I was checking them. I feel like I fucked his feet up from checking kicks, and they gave him the round, but it's just like they've probably never checked a kick or threw a kick in their life.
But these guys are making such an important decision.
Yeah, Chris Lieben, he's making his Nevada judging debut.
That'd be interesting.
I think he already did.
And he's already been a referee. He's been a referee for quite a while now.
Did he make his debut last fight, or is he going to?
No, he did.
Yeah, last weekend. Oh, okay. On the fight card.
Damn, that's probably a lot of pressure on him. Everyone's looking at it like, how'd you score it, how'd you score it?
Man, there's some crazy stories about Lieben back in the day. Heard a while, man. Just getting fucked up the night before fights. Really? Yeah.
Yeah. Being drunk at the slots and stuff, Robert Falls would tell me, and then go out and win.
He could crack, though. Fuck yeah. He could crack. Remember when he knocked out Vandalay?
Oh, that was sweet.
Remember that fight? Oh, shit. Chris Lieben had a hammer of a left hand. I mean, a hammer.
Especially when he was hurt.
Yeah. There's some guys that just fucking, have just some kind of stupid fucking power.
Mm-hmm.
You know, there's some Paul Daly dudes out there. Yeah.
He's fun to watch. He's interesting because he's orthodox, left-handed, right?
Yes.
He'd throw that fucking crazy left hand. That's fun to watch.
Yeah, he's—.
I hope Michael Venom Page comes to UFC. I know there's a lot of talks.
I believe they're going to get that.
That would make that division so interesting.
Oh, yeah.
He's a handful.
He's so difficult because, like— That style. And I always said that, that that was going to be the next— that's going to be the next factor in MMA is these point karate guys. Mm-hmm. Like, one of these point karate guys, really figures out everything else.
Mm-hmm.
They become dedicated to become an actual MMA fighter. That blitz thing that they do— Yeah. It's so different. It's so hard to deal with.
Well, that's going to be interesting, Stephen Thompson versus—.
Shavkot. Shavkot. Shavkot.
Yeah. That's going to be fun to watch.
That is going to be fun to watch. But Shavkot can grapple, too. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Shavkot's a lot.
That motherfucker can do everything.
I watched a documentary on him recently, like his come-up from when he turned pro. Like, the second he turned pro, he was fighting, like, good, good guys. First fight, second, third fight. He didn't have any easy fights. Well— Yeah.
He was fighting fucking killers.
He's interesting, man.
I wonder how many people the UFC's already— I mean, I don't know if they can be in talks, but— because Bellator's going away, right? Yeah.
Well, they're going to merge with the PFL, allegedly, apparently. I read something from Chaudhry at 1FC. Apparently, they offered them Bellator, too. They were, at one point, considering it, I guess. But Dana White was like, what are you getting?
I saw that.
Yeah, right? The thing is, she's right. Yeah. Here's the thing. There's no pay-per-view.
Like, maybe they can develop a pay-per-view model, but you need stars. And the UFC has always had stars. The UFC is always going to have pay-per-views. And we can't wait to watch them. It's not like convincing someone.
You know, like this fight. Like, Yuri Prohaska, Alex Baheda, Jon Jones, and Steepie Man— take my money.
Well, even that December card that's coming together. Fucking Tony Ferguson, Patty. Fucking—I think that's Stephen Thompson, Rock Knot.
Leon Edwards.
Leon Colby.
And Colby Covington.
There's Brandon Roy Valvers', Pentousia.
Oh, that's right. That's on that card, too.
Yeah.
Oh, my God.
Man, Tony Ferg, though. Six-fight losing streak.
I know. Crazy. I feel like it's the lose-lose for Patty. Because even if he wins, it's like— Tony's fuck is still dangerous, but he's not going to get the credit, you know?
Tony looked good in his last fight. He looked good. I mean, he didn't look like the Tony of old.
Who did he fight again?
Didn't he fight Bobby Green?
Yeah, that's right. Yep. Yeah.
And Bobby Green's a motherfucker.
Well, even Tony versus Michael Chandler. Tony wasn't looking too bad until he ate that fucking heel.
Go back to that card, Jimmy, please. Look at that. Vicente and Luka. Vicente, Luka, and Gary. Vicente, Luka versus Ian Machado-Gary is a crazy fight.
That is sick.
And they trained at the same gym, so I wonder how much they sparred.
Oh, they probably sparred a ton. Yeah.
God, sparring and fighting, though, are so fucking different. At least for me. I feel like—because when I spar, I crack people, and I hurt them, and it changes the fight. But in sparring, it's like I'm not necessarily trying to fucking crack you, so it's like sparring is going to play out way different than if it was a fight. Right.
And it depends how you spar, though, but I feel like it's just such a different sport.
For KO artists, for sure.
Yeah. Yeah, for KO artists. Yeah.
But for, like, volume guys.
Yeah, that's probably pretty true.
Or it's probably super similar.
Sparring, like, that's where you get—that's where I get injured, like, for the most part, just sparring. It's not usually too bad. Like, it's—I kick someone's fucking elbow last—six weeks before my last fight, and my fucking left toe, I have a turf toe, and it still fucking hurts. It's just from kicking an elbow hardest. Because I'll throw teeps and body shots as hard as you can in sparring.
Like, you're going to be all right. So I whipped a fucking teep and landed on an elbow, and I fucking swear my foot—my toe turned the other way. It didn't, but that shit still hurts to this day.
You remember Jon Jones versus Chael Sonnen?
Yep.
He still has to tape his toes up.
I believe it. Damn.
He has to tape his big toe to his little toe just to hold it in place while he fucks people up. Oh.
Yeah.
That sounds fucking funny. It's funny.
But he has to. Otherwise, it's just like, it's so torn apart that I guess it just doesn't hold anymore.
Brutal. That was the first fight. you didn't wrap your ankles against Aljo, right?
We weren't allowed to in Boston. But yeah, I didn't wrap them. I didn't feel like I needed to either. Like, I felt my shit was good, but usually I like to get a little fucking—.
And that probably gives him grip on his single legs and stuff.
Yeah, before the fight, you're like, hey, let's not even give him that—even that little bit. Because wrestling—like, I'll grapple or wrestle with really fucking high-level wrestlers. We have so many fucking good guys we train with. I get in on a single leg, I'll limp leg out. But wrestlers are used to being able to, you know, when someone's got a limp leg, or you use that shoe to kind of hold on.
And fighting, they're just—I mean, unless you have your ankles wrapped. Who was the fight? I think it was Luke Caver's RDA. In between rounds, I took off his ankle wraps. Did that happen?
I think—yeah, I think it was right. before we fought, Aljo, too. I took off the ankle wraps because he was using it as a little grip. Even that little, tiny advantage.
It makes a difference. It makes a difference. You know, like Eddie Bravo used to always say, like, you wear as much as you can on your legs. It'll make your guard more dangerous. Like in jiu-jitsu tournaments.
And in fighting, like Frank Mir used, to try to wear these long-ass knee sleeves. Like, if you could wear long knee sleeves and shorts— a couple guys did. George Sotiropoulos did that. He basically almost had pants on. Like, he had knee sleeves, and then above the knee sleeves, he had, like, tights where the shorts were.
So there's so much friction. And that would aid you. And so if you've got that shit on your ankles, for sure, that's going to aid a guy grabbing your ankle, even if it's just for that minor adjustment.
Fuck. Yeah. I was worried about that fight. I was like, these motherfuckers. Usually—I mean, even against, like, Peter Yan, I was like, okay, it's fucking—I can beat this dude.
But Aljo—I knew I could beat Aljo, too, but I was like, this dude's fucking dangerous. Like, he's fucking—especially the tear he's been on. Just beat Henry Cejudo. So the dude's fucking in his prime. Like, this motherfucker's dangerous.
And to choke Sanhagan out the way he did. Oh, God.
That was one of my—like, when you think about fights going good or bad, one of the—thinking about bad, especially when you've seen it happen. Like, you know, he can do that. He did it recently. Yeah. So I'm like, I just don't want to get embarrassed and just be that guy.
I just don't want—Corey's got to live with that forever.
Yeah. And that sucks.
Yeah.
I mean, he's—I mean, obviously, we all know how good Corey is, and, like, that probably wouldn't happen again, but it doesn't matter if it would or wouldn't happen again. It fucking happened.
I think sometimes, when things like that happen, it just changes your approach to fighting and steals your mind, and I think that's what it did with him. He just became way better. Yeah. Because Corey Sanhagan that we think of now, like, the guy wheel-kicked Marlon Mraz.
Yeah.
Like, that's a different Corey.
Frankie Edgar-Knee.
Frankie Edgar-Knee.
That's one of the nasties.
He's an animal. now. He's a fucking animal. He's just—he flows in there. Mm-hmm.
You know, but, like, that fight, like— And then it's crazy. Like, Marlon Mraz, dude. At one point in time, Marlon Mraz was the motherfucker.
God.
For, like, this long. That's all you get sometimes. Fuck.
He was so big for the division and fucking super jacked, and his striking was nasty. Mm-hmm. And when he knocked out Aljo with that switch, kick, his left high, kick off. the switch was beautiful.
More or less, Aljo shot into his knee. That's right. Yeah, he shot into his knee.
They threw it at the same time. I thought he was dead.
You know. what's funny is I was actually at that fight, and I was—I don't know where I was at in my career, but I think I was only one fight in, maybe. But I was at that fight and watched that, and I hadn't really been to fights before. And I was just watching the stands as, like, just a normal fucking— wasn't sitting in the UFC section. I was just—and I was like, oh, fuck.
He died. He died. He was out for 5, 10 million. It was scary.
That's always the scary ones, right, when someone's running in, and then the other guy catches him with a knee or a kick, like fucking Cyborg and Michael Venom Page.
Oh, that was gross.
Oh, that was the worst one ever.
That makes you question, like, do I still want to do this?
People don't know what we're talking about. Michael Venom Page, who we were just talking about earlier, who's just so phenomenal, caught this guy Cyborg. Not Cyborg that you think of, like Chris Cyborg, but her husband. Also Cyborg, which must have been a fucking confusing household.
Oh.
Yeah. Goddamn. And he crushed his skull. So his—with that, like him moving in and that knee landing perfectly, it literally fractured the front of his skull. And they had to have it—look, he's got a dent in his skull.
Look how shattered it was.
That's insane. Insane. Video game type shit. Insane.
Now, also, what does that do to your brain?
Yeah, that's not good.
What's going on in there? And he was like, I'll be back, and everybody's like, dude. Hang on. Fuck. I think that might be a wrap.
Yeah, especially if you have kids. Like, I know, once I had a baby, I'm, like, you think, a little bit different. It's like, okay.
Well, that's why you can't do ayahuasca. Not yet. So you think of everybody as you. Oh.
Yeah.
Fuck.
Yeah, just chew Adderall and punch people.
I've never done—well, I think I might have done Adderall once. I've never done it. But I'm like, I don't really need to. I think I like it. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Tim always tries to get me doing it. Oh, yeah.
Fire. Oh, my God. He went right into that. That was a crazy one.
Yeah. And now he went on, like, a fucking eight-fight losing streak, too, didn't he?
Yeah, you know what happened? Henry. Henry got him in that second round. That is an—go to the first round. See if you can find—Marlon Mraz versus Henry Cejudo, round one.
Just find the fight and we'll watch, though. So the first round, Marlon is fucking Henry's legs up. Yeah. I mean, he just looks incredible. He looks like a world champion Muay Thai fighter.
Yeah. And then Henry made the adjustments.
Marlon gassed the fuck out. Yeah. Oof.
But, dude, he looks so good. It's just, Marlon couldn't keep up the pace. And I often wondered—I wonder how much of it had to do with Marlon cutting weight because he was so big.
Yeah, yeah.
Like, that guy never looked like a 135-pounder. He always looked like a featherweight.
God, he's just so short, though, for the division, too.
For bantamweight?
I mean, I guess not short for the division, but he's only—I mean, Henry's, like, fucking, what, 5'3"? Yeah.
Henry's so fun. I feel like Henry's obviously good as fuck, but I feel like he thinks he's a little bit better than he is. When he was trying to teach Habib how to fucking throw kicks, and Habib—remember that video?
Yeah, I've never seen that.
He was trying to teach Habib something, and he was, like, landing a kick with his foot on Habib's knee. And Habib was, like, what are you doing here? It was funny. But, yeah, I remember watching this fight because I didn't know if I was going to fight Henry or Aljo. I was kind of preparing for both.
So I remember watching this fight back, thinking, like, fuck, he made some good adjustments.
There was a good leg kick by Henry there, but Marlon caught him with some great counter. Look at that right there. Just look at that counter left and then the right hand over the top. The left body kick, sharp. And then starting to really put it on Henry.
in these exchanges. Like, every one of these exchanges, he's the guy who's getting off the hardest shot. And that fucking switch kick he does is so pretty. That switch kick off the left leg, if you got a fast one like an Edson Barbosa one, it's such a dangerous weapon. I never saw anybody throw it faster than Barbosa.
Yeah, dude, it's fucking slick. He's at 45 now, right?
Yeah. Isn't that weird? It is weird, yeah.
I don't like when people go down like that.
It's hard. It's like Frankie when he went down during his career, BJ went down. It's just like...
Cub Swanson tried to go 35 for one fight too. Yeah, it just crushes you.
And especially as you get older, I think it's even more punishing and more difficult to come back 24 hours after such a brutal weight cut and fight.
Those weight cuts are not fucking good for you.
Remember, not long ago, remember, the commissions would start at 24 hours before the event would start?
Oh, God. Before I got in the UFC, I'm so fucking glad they changed that. We could weigh in at 9am. It's a game changer. Yeah.
Well, really, what they should figure out how to do is not have weight cutting. Really, the best thing to do would be to have more weight classes and to just eliminate that whole bullshit.
It's crazy. I wonder what Aljo would fight at then, because, like we were talking about earlier, that motherfucker gets up to 170 pounds.
I bet he'd fight at 165..
That's crazy.
Yeah, that's what I think he would fight at. I think he would fight actual 165-pound guys. Look, I mean I'm not disparaging anybody doing it, because it's part of the sport, but it's sanctioned cheating.
That's what it is. You're not really 135 pounds. Aljo's not 135 pounds.
I do find advantages in there because I know I'm doing it right. I know I'm doing it as scientific, as healthy as possible, and as disciplined as I possibly can where I know other guys aren't. I don't think Aljo did his weight cut better than I did and the rehydration. I have the team around me to fucking make sure we're doing it perfect to where I don't think a lot of fighters are. They're just doing it.
I know how to make weight. I'm going to fucking get it off, and I'm going to fucking just—.
How much of a relief is it for you when that's over, the camp's, over, the fight's over, and then you just— How long do you just eat whatever the fuck you want?
Well, yeah, in camp—.
We just had Terry Black's barbecue.
Yeah, no, I definitely—especially when I'm traveling, it's not like—if we're traveling, I'll get a cheeseburger. I'll fucking not be super disciplined, but when I go back home, I try to still keep it clean. We'll still eat, have something good for dinner, but right now I'm dealing with this little back injury, and I'm like, I know if I eat—the worse I eat, the longer it's going to take to heal. So I've been trying to—like this last week, I did a 24-hour fast. I'm like, I don't need to eat.
I'm not really working out. And then if I did eat, we were eating really clean. But after a fight, a couple weeks, I just don't give a fuck. But it's still not like Snickers and fucking Skittles and shit like that.
You see, guys like Patty, who is saying that he's kind of really developed an eating disorder, because it's like the cut is so hard that after it's all off, all he wants to do is eat whatever the fuck he wants to drink.
Yeah, even when you're full, it's like, but I don't have to make weight. So you mentally trick yourself, and there's definitely something there.
You've got to crash diet 30 pounds in eight weeks. You've got to be so strict, and you've got to train twice a day, so you're starving. going to these sessions. So you for sure cause an eating disorder.
It only makes sense. It only makes sense. I mean, because it's like how much—like wrestlers, too, especially. How much of your time is fixated on losing weight? It's like a big part—we had Kurt Angle on, which was an amazing podcast,
because did you listen to it?
When he was talking about how he weighed 199 pounds, and he didn't want to cut weight to make 198, so he just wrestled heavyweight. He's like, I think I'm going to beat him anyway.
And I was like, what an animal.
Yeah. Plus, I ate whatever I wanted. I trained, however I wanted.
Something like that.
I was always recovering. There's something to that. Because there was a video of him beating this dude, who was 270 pounds, in a wrestling match.
Yeah. What a stud.
Yeah. What a stud. I don't need to lose a pound. Not even a pound!
Why does it have to lose a pound? That last camp, about two and a half—no, probably three weeks out, I had some meat that did not sit well with my stomach. I had diarrhea bad for like ten days, to the point where I was getting a little worried. I'm like, okay. Because I was looking stuff up, and it's like if you have diarrhea for more than two or three days or whatever, it's like you probably got a parasite or some shit.
For ten days, every single night, I would wake up two to three times. Right when I woke up in the morning, I had to fucking shit my brains out. But my weight came down real fast. I was like, well, I guess that's a benefit, because I was like 155, 156, and then by the end of those ten days, I was walking around like 152.. I was like, well, that worked out, but that sucked.
Remember that?
It's crazy for that camp, too, because usually we'd be working a lot on the wall, a lot of different stand-ups, a lot on our guard, developing the guard, normal platas and stuff instead of giving up your back. But we literally didn't get to grapple.
Zero.
Five weeks out.
Six weeks out to the day from the fight. But yeah, it could have been beneficial because we were doing a lot of mitts. I was just hitting mitts, hitting mitts, shadowboxing, boxing.
Focusing on not getting grabbed. And what did you have in your head saying, if I get grabbed, I'm dead?
It's life. Well, I was going into that fight when I was 100% healthy, six weeks before the fight got announced. I'm like, it's life or death if he grabs me. Not because I don't think I can grapple, but that's the mindset I want, because that's really going to make it to where I'm not going to let him. If he does grab me, I'm going to do everything I'm fucking capable of.
That's why I try to, I mean, I feel like I got out of that so fast. The longer we're here, the better it is for him. But yeah, so we went into that fight. Life or death if he grabs me. And then, when I got that injury, I was like, it's just that times fucking 10..
I cannot let this motherfucker touch me.
So what was the extent of this?
I had a muscle strain in between my ribs, and I couldn't even get into like a light clinch. I don't know. It fucking, just, yeah, it hurt so bad. I haven't even tried to grapple since the fight yet too, because I'm dealing with this little back injury right now. But I'm hoping by now I should be good.
The muscle strains are fucked.
The ones in between the ribs are so hard. Sometimes people tear the cartilage as well. Did you get an MRI?
I did get an MRI. I didn't tear anything that I remember. I think it was just a muscle strain. But like we gave it a couple weeks to say, all right, let's just see if it will heal in a couple weeks and then try to grapple again. Tried to grapple in just the littlest kind of together movement.
Couldn't do it. Which sucked, because that was the fight I had the most mental demons going in, because I was like, I'd like to be able to grapple. I'd like to be able to fucking grapple. Because even for all fight week I told the whole team, I don't want to do anything to where I feel this. Because in my mind it's fixed.
I'm good. I haven't hurt it. in a couple weeks. I convinced myself that I was 100% fine. And so all fight week we didn't even clinch once.
No zero exchanges.
I'd take a Michael Jordan type athlete, though, just to have that kind of pressure going against this guy who's the best on the fucking planet, and just being in the moment and not worrying about that. I mean, fucking impressive.
Yeah, well, the result was amazing. That was probably one of the prettiest right hands I've ever seen in my life.
Floating back too.
I mean, it's literally like Muhammad Ali sunny listed.
You know?
Yeah.
Steps back away. Bam.
That was crazy. And the TD Garden too. That was cool. Boston. That was wild, because that was my first main event.
And every time I fought I always felt like I was a big deal on the card. Like the sugar show was there. But when we were in Boston, that arena was 99% sugar, 1%, Aljo. If that. Like the fuck you Aljo, chants were louder than them cheering me on.
I felt bad at some point. I was like, oh God.
Isn't it crazy that it's all because of the way he won the title by disqualification, which is not his fault at all? Yeah. Not his fault at all. Other than that, everybody liked him.
It's crazy that that won.
No one had any problem with him up until that fight. Like everybody loved Aljo. When he choked out Sanhagen, everybody loved Aljo. Like Aljo was the fucking man. And then he gets fouled.
Yeah. And legitimately got fouled. And his neck was fucked up before he went into that fight. He's had a fucked up neck. He has disc replacement in his neck.
Yeah.
So he's got an artificial disc in his neck because of an injury that he had. And then Piotr Jan hits him with that fucking knee to the head on the ground.
It's crazy how that knee changed so many people. Like my career, I ended up fighting Peter instead of Peter being champ. It's crazy how that one mistake Peter made. And now he's on a fucking three fight losing streak. Crazy.
Or four, maybe.
Crazy. Song Yudong. fight is not a gimme.
It's going to be a sick fucking fight, though.
That guy can crack. He keeps getting better too. Song Yudong keeps getting better.
He's young, right? 24?. 25?.
He got robbed recently in California.
Oh, yeah. I saw that. I already saw him talking about it.
Scary shit, dude. At a gas station.
God. If only those guys knew. I guess, if you got a gun, not much you can do.
Not much you can do.
We saw this weekend that one comedian died.
Yeah.
I didn't see. that. Is comedians in depression, is that a pretty common thing?
Oh, yeah.
For sure.
I didn't know this guy, but everybody at the club last night was so sad. Yeah. He was my friend David Lucas' opening act. Yeah. A lot of people knew him.
It was a bummer. I did not know him. He took his own life, apparently.
Yeah. That's crazy.
Yeah. It's like there's a lot of the reasons why people want to do comedy is because they want a moment in their life where it's fun. And if they can make other people laugh, so at least for that moment, it would be fun. This guy was one of the greatest of all time, Richard Jenning. He took his own life.
He shot himself in the back. Then he didn't die.
He had to take him to the hospital. No.
He died at the hospital, yeah.
But he was one of the best comedians ever and just hated life. He was so depressed. Just the fact that everybody, all the comics, worshipped him. When he was in the room, everybody would come in and watch Jenning. Like, oh, my God, Jenning's on stage.
Let's go watch Jenning. He was so good. He did this one club in Long Island called Eastside Comedy Club. And this guy, Peter, who was the host, we were all sitting around after the show.
And Peter was depressed.
I said, why are you depressed? He goes, he did four different hours. He goes, he did two different hours on Friday and two different hours on Saturday and just destroyed. And you would think, a guy who's that good at the top of his game, just killing it. Like, the guy's on the top of the world.
He's probably so happy. Everybody loves him. Meanwhile, the guy kills himself. Yeah.
I was watching this Deion Sanders, a little documentary on YouTube, and he tried to kill himself after winning the Super Bowl. Wow. Yeah. He tried to drive his car off a cliff.
Oh, my God. Yeah.
That was great. I didn't really know much about Deion Sanders prime time, but that dude fucking played in the MLB and NFL at the same time in the same seasons. He was signing, like, one-off contracts to go play with the fucking team. Then he'd fly in a helicopter to the football game. That was a fucking ñ.
I didn't realize how good of an athlete he was.
Imagine a guy like that taking up MMA. Oh, yeah. You know, because there's, like, calibers of athletes that I think just automatically go into the NFL or the NBA or the ñ. you know, they go where the real money is.
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