JRE MMA Show #164 with Israel Adesanya
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Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast. What's up? What's up? What's up? Good to see you, my friend. What is the chain? What does that stand for? Engage. This is my fightwear brand. Ashbel Castro started this. Oh. He was one of the, I'll say this, he was one of the only guys who fucked with me before I really blew up.

So when I was fighting in China and I lost to Alex, they stopped giving me fights. And I had, I think at the time, I was the highest paid foreign fighter in China at the time. Probably not now anymore, but then they stopped giving me fights. And I was like, look, I have seven more fights on my contract. Can I at least just get three? I just need three because money was running out, you know, the money I had saved up. And then, yeah, I was down to my last one day, like $500,000.

And Eugene was holding pads for me because he saw me was up. And I just said, bro, I'm about to be broke, this and that, right, right, right. He said, don't worry, just leave it with me. I get home. I think I was on the toilet. And he just goes, check your bank account. And I'm sitting there just like start crying. And I call him. He's like, no, don't thank me. Thank Ash, who started Engage. And I call Ash. I'm taking a shit. And I'm just like, thank you. Thank you so much. Like, honestly, just intense. Because, you know, I mean, I've been there like years.

and had everything and nothing again. So for me, yeah, he's always been a guy that's been in my corner. And me and Alex Volkanovski now, we've helped raise the brand so we own part of the company. So yeah, I like to rep the set. Oh, that's cool. Nice. And I think Engage also was...

Last final three when they had the whole Reebok fiasco. It was a venom engage and someone else I can't remember who else so we didn't get the the gig but it would have been nice though Oh the UFC gig. Yeah engaged fight kids for the fighters. I

But now it's Venom Fight Kits. Yeah, the whole Fight Kit thing is weird. I really preferred it when fighters could have sponsors. Condom Depp on the back of your shorts. I don't like that. I mean, they should probably have some discretion. I did like it, though. And I do like the fact now, like, the last fight I had, Hunter hit me up way before...

any gold gloves or anything. Says, Izzy, we're going to do this for certain fighters. What design would you like on your shorts? And I was like, bet. And I hit up Curtis who works with Engage, does a lot of the designs. And I taught him what I wanted. And then he just did some custom stuff and I sent a few to Hunter and then boom, I got my shorts, the lightning. And I quite like that. I like expression. That's one thing I do miss about boxing.

or kickboxing is the expression on the Hong Kong bands, the shorts. Like Jonathan Haggerty, he has cool shorts with golden bows on the side. I like that. It's cool. I do too. I don't like everybody has to wear the same shit. I think maybe the UFC at the time, they wanted to be...

taken seriously in a sense. So we had to like professional sports. But nah, I think we're all different independent contractors and we have different styles. So I'm glad now they've brought out

for certain fighters like O'Malley in his pink shorts, Bryce Mitchell in his camo shorts. Yeah. Let us express ourselves. I like that, but I wish fighters had the ability to advertise. Oh, big time. Yeah. That's big. Sponsors on your shorts is a lot of money. Like, Shaw was making more money from the sponsors than he was from his fight purse. Yeah, I agree. And...

There's a way to bring it back, I'm sure. But even now, because they've got some, you get some kickbacks, but it's better if you can just plaster Condom Depot and get $100,000 on the back of your shorts. How much was Condom Depot paid people? I don't even know, but I used to think it was funny. It was funny. And the fact that it was on the back of the shorts, I'm like, that's placement.

I just feel like, you know, if they didn't like some because it didn't represent the sport, like Condom Depot, then just fucking, you know, have a list of ones that you agree to. That's actually a good idea. Like say,

Approve sponsors. Okay, these guys. Or maybe they go through a check first. Right. You want to maybe advertise on the fighter shorts. You have to go through this rigorous check. What's your company? You know, what do you guys sell? Right. Right, right, right. And then, yeah, plastered on the shorts. Get some money. But I do like it when boxers wear cool shorts. You know, they wear whatever the fuck they want. Like, I love it when Melvin Manhoeffer would wear those gladiator skirts. Yeah. Yeah, he was a badass. I like tassels, though. That's what I mean. When I wear my shorts, I always like tassels because when you kick...

Yeah. The way they shimmer, the way they look, and it just, yeah, it makes for cool pics. Yeah. I mean, that's just one of the things about the UFC. It's just they want everything to be uniform and organized. But again, like now for certain fighters, they're changing it, which is good, but hopefully that trickles down. I don't feel like anybody should be wearing shorts in grappling.

I feel like the temptation for grabbing is just too much. And it does happen. Yeah, I've seen it. It happened to me even with the, what's his name, Brunson. And the Brunson, he grabbed my tights. And I was like, yo, that's two times you've done it now. So it is tempting. But I think tights would be the best way to fight him.

But again, some guys have cool shorts, and if that's their style, that's their style. Because some people, I guess maybe they're body type. Maybe they got no ass. They don't want to be... I got something back there, but I don't know. A guy like... I won't drop no names, but who's wearing tights, he look like a fucking stick or something. Yeah, you look a little flat. Yeah. That's what it is, though. Yeah, it is what it is. I mean, there's a lot of room for expression. It's interesting to watch...

all the different styles that people promote themselves as well. You know, like, there's so many different ways now. And then there's guys like Alex who, you know, he doesn't even speak English, and he's risen to the top just based on performance. But even the fact that he doesn't speak English, that's also his superpower, just shama. Right. What do you think about that fight this weekend? I can't wait. I just did the breakdown for it. We're about to drop it on YouTube now. I am picking, in this fight, Alex. Because...

I just think the momentum behind it. This episode of the Joe Rogan Experience is brought to you by Call of Duty. You know, when a new Call of Duty drops, everyone's trying to find a way to squeeze in those extra hours of gameplay. I get it. Life is busy. But sometimes, you just need it.

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Look, I was the most active champion in UFC history. I think next to Alex Volkanovski as well, he was right up there with me, or if not more than me. I think Alex now is on his way to being the most active champ in UFC history because he's already saved...

This year, I think two or three cards alone, he's like stepped in and be like, yeah, Sharma. Just does a jump. And he fights fucked up. He fights injured. Apparently, his knee was really fucked up in the first Yuri Prohaska fight. Oh, wow. You know when he stopped Yuri and then he did like a forward roll off of Yuri? Yeah, yeah. He said he did that because he didn't trust standing on his right knee. Oh, wow.

Oh, wow. Momentum. Yeah, his knee was fucked up. So he didn't, like, it was fucked up in training camp. And so when he stepped off of him, he just decided to roll forward instead of putting weight on his right knee. That's smart. That's some parkour shit. But again, that's what you have to do. Look, when you get in the UFC, this is what I did as well. He did it the right way. Fight as much as possible.

Fight as much as possible so you can be in people's faces so they can see. That guy just fought. That guy just fought. I just saw him fight last month. And you fight as much as you can, and you get that momentum behind you, and then you become champion. You're that guy. And then again, you just, that momentum constantly. You're in people's faces. You're getting posted here, here. And that's how you build a stock up. So I've done that, and he's doing it the right way as well. And I think if he keeps going, I hope he retires never getting defeated by anyone ever again. Just you.

And the way you did it, too. Oh, my God. That was one of the greatest celebrations of all time. It just, look, it's the story behind it. No matter what, it's just the history. Because David even mentioned to me, my brother said, like, you know you're the only one that can actually stand with that guy. Like, no one's lasted more than two rounds or even a round with him. And I thought about it during the breakdown. Like, yeah, you're right. And it's because I knew him.

I've fought that guy so many times. And regardless of what happened, I lost three times and I finally won one.

It was just the fact that I knew I could beat him. Every time I fought him, I was just like, I was beating him. I thought you won the first one. I felt so too. But then that's, you know, the Chinese judges. That's the kickboxing fight. They gave it to him. And then the second fight in Brazil under the same company that he gets me. But again, I was besting him. Had him on skates. He was fucking. And then he, bro, his spirit. You know what Jerry said about the whole juju thing? Like that's real.

That's real. So the last time I fought him in Miami, look, he beats me. That's why I hate when people say, oh, is he scared? He's scared. It's like, bro, I ain't scared of shit. The guy beat me in the biggest arena on the planet, Madison Square Garden, same way as the last time he beat me in Brazil in his hometown. I was beating his ass, had him hurt in the end of the first round, all that shit, took him down.

And then he gets me in the last round. It's his spirit, his whatever, like, ancestors or his people that are praying for him. Because I got prayer worries as well. My mom and dad be fasting, and they have people, like, in the spirit praying for me. But, like, the way he carries himself, something about him just, he knows how to recover well. So I just knew I could get him. I could get him. And then after that, he knocks me out in the biggest arena in the world, and I'm just like...

Let's do that shit again, Dana. Because I just knew. I was like, I can get him. And then that camp, I was so...

I went to a different place and that was the one I kind of mentioned. I microdosed a little bit or macrodosed a lot. And like I always say this, the shower is the most interesting place on the planet, I feel, because you have the element of water running over your body, stripped naked in your bare essentials. You kind of have this, if it's a white shower, like a void white space. I can create a lot in there. I can make a lot of things happen.

And yeah, one time after one of my showers, I just wrote this thing on my mirror because I just had this premonition like this is where I get it done. Like there's no way. You could beat me one time. You could beat me two times. You might beat me three times. But I was like, nah, this guy's not going to beat me this time. And I just knew I had to get this done. And the way it happened as well, because first round I think I won. And second round I was winning. But then that fucking leg kick, bro. You know what it is? You look at his foot. You look at this bit of his foot. It's like a hammer.

You know, like the back of a hammer or a hammer like a ball. It is because that's what he kicks you with as well. So he doesn't have to turn the hip over. Right. And then when he hits you with that, even because he's bone density, long legs, and he hits you with that, you just feel it like, ooh, that's bad. And it's a different feeling because I've been kicked by kickboxers all my life.

on the thigh, on the calf as well. But when he hits you with that bit, it's just the surface area is so small, but it travels and transfers through your whole calf, and you're like, oh, I can't put weight on this. It's so interesting, too, how he keeps his body completely square, and he doesn't even really turn the hips. Yeah. And so it's so sneaky. He doesn't have to because he's got so much bone density, so much whip from that little... Mm-hmm. And, yeah, it's dangerous. And I think that's going to be a problem this weekend, too,

for Khalil. But I don't know why Chael says he... Did you hear about what Chael said? Yeah, Chael said he thinks Khalil's going to knock him out. That's possible. But I just don't think he's... It's possible, but I don't think he's going to get it done because all it takes is one.

From either side, but I just think Pereira right now has just got that momentum behind him and the frame because he's going to just avoid the shots Khalil's throwing because he's just got the long frame. He'll get right out the way. And I don't think Khalil has the reach to mess with him like that, so he might have to get inside, but...

Yeah, we'll see. This is why paper can't fight paper. They have to get in there and fight. So we'll find out. It's very interesting because Khalil's so fast. And Khalil's had experience with high-level kickboxers when he knocked out Gokhan Saki. That was a big one. Yeah. That was a big one. And that was early on where everybody was like, oh, shit, Gokhan Saki's finally in the UFC. And then, boom, Khalil just takes him out. Khalil's fast. He hits fucking hard. And he throws like the thing that he did with Lionheart. He throws that off-speed shit sometimes.

He'll give you a little of this, and then he jolts in on you. That off-speed uppercut was nasty. It's the looks. Yeah. I'm here. I'm almost Prince Nassim-esque, but different. It's like looking, looking, bang. But again, he's just violent. Like, when he smells blood, he just goes in. Yeah. Like I said, he beats you like you owe him money or something. He's on you. He's on you. Yeah, very violent. But again, I think Khalil, for him to win this fight, he just has to believe in himself. And that sounds real cheesy, but...

believe in himself. Also, he's a Southpaw. I didn't think about that. Right. I actually forgot about that until David mentioned it before, but he's a Southpaw, so...

But I'm sure Alex and his team know how to deal with it. But I understand how Alex deals with southpaws as well because I can fight him both ways. And I know what he – when you give him that front leg and he knows he can get it, he gets more confident. But if you're a southpaw, he finds other ways to keep you at bay until he can get that leg. It's going to be interesting to see right away how Khalil deals with the distance and how Alex deals with the speed.

Because the thing is, like, Alex can be hit, you know, and Bruno Silva tagged him a few times. You took him out. I think the 85 thing was the I think the drain for him to make 85 was insanity. I think it was insane. He's still he's still he's he still can. Yeah. Look, it only works until you get knocked out. And it's like, I bet. And let's go to 205. And I said, look, all these 185 should thank me, man.

Honestly, I tell him, thank me, because a lot of the top guys didn't have to fight him. He fought, okay, who did he fight? Strickland. Strickland, that was one of the only top guys he fought, beat him, and then I think he got a shot at me next pretty much. But yeah, fucking Rob, Driggers, all them, because it's not about just fighting him. Getting ready to fight him is a different thing, but I had to do it fucking four times, so I understand. I have a different history with it. What's different about getting ready to fight him?

For me, getting ready to fight him, you just know you're going to be in for a war. You know it's not going to be an easy fight. Same for him. He knows when he has to fight me, it's like, fuck, it's not an easy fight because he knows what I can do to him. But for me as well, I was just like, fuck, okay, let's go again. And again, it's not like, because I feel that way with certain people. But with him, it's just a different feeling, I guess, because he beat me.

That's another thing. And I was like, man, I got to fucking face this demon again. All right, bet. Let's face my demons. And I get myself up to fight him. But it's just getting ready to fight him. It's just the hurdle. I think maybe just because of the history. That's why for me I felt that way, because of the history. Because to fight someone who's beaten you multiple times, it's like...

And you know you can beat them. In your heart, you just know. But again, that's the beauty of the story. Right. You had come so close a couple of times. Every time. And then even in the first fight in the UFC, so close at the end of that first round. Like, you had him. If there was 30 seconds left in the fight or in the round, yeah. 10 seconds left. But again, that's the beauty of the story because then he waited until the fifth round or got to the fifth round. He's just like...

Did his fucking juju, whatever thing. And then fucking... He just had this energy. And he came at me. And then my leg was compromised from the leg kick because of the perineal nerve or whatever. And I couldn't do anything. So, yeah. But look, I love that story for myself. And I'm happy. And people still go, oh, we need a third one. I'm like, look...

I do it again. If I can knock him out. Oh, no, it's 3-2. We got the best out of seven. I'm not fighting for anyone else. I only have so much left in this game. I'm not going to spend this game fighting. One guy. Exactly. Over and over and over again. I don't know how long left, but I just know I'm definitely on the other side of my career. So I want to get these fights out the way. And now I'm not champ anymore in the UFC. So I'm in this situation where what do I do?

I know I want to fight, though, because I took 11 months off and I let my body heal and all that. And I felt great. So now I want to get back to being active. Not as active as I was in the beginning, maybe, but I want to be active. And I still feel great from the last camp. Did some testing about three weeks ago. Find out where we're at. I was about where I was before this last fight, four weeks out. So it's like, OK, cool. We're still good. Let's build off that. So, yeah, I want to fight again. How much of an effect did taking 11 months off have?

I think it was more good than bad. I know some people say ring rust or this and that, and I'm like, nah. I felt good in there. I felt good in there. And it was only when I watched the fight back, I saw a couple of mistakes I made, even on the feet, where I was like, ooh.

Don't do that again. Just with my feet work, my exits, even David said, you had sloppy exits. I was like, yeah, my bad. But yeah, that and then the moment at the end when I slipped and just the lapse in judgment when I was just letting him know it was me tripping.

Those kind of moments, maybe if I was as active, it wouldn't have happened, but who knows? We'll never know. But I am happy with how I performed. I was happy with the shape I came in. I came in really good shape. And...

What's his name bill this guy he did the numbers for me He said this is the most active I've been in any fight by far my UFC career. He crunched the numbers up and said my Strike per minute rate or whatever all you nerds figure it out. You can do your own but yeah, he built smart He's this guy who helps him out me now with my strength fee Yeah, did the numbers and said this is the most active you were so we can do some things different and

Put a little bit more gas in the tank, things like that, and then just stay active like that. It was good. And I had fun in there. I had fun just exchanging. Yeah. I wanted to ask you about that, like the gas in the tank thing, because there's a philosophy that Marv Marinovich and Nick Curzon, some of these guys have. BJ Penn's coaches. So what they wanted BJ to do when BJ was in his prime, essentially the camp was entirely based around strength and conditioning. Right.

So it was all conditioning to give you this insane gas tank. Their philosophy is, you know how to fight. You've been fighting your whole life. You're not going to get better at fighting in six weeks. But what you can get is insane cardio if you only concentrate on that.

And their thought process is that is the most important thing. That is the thing that fails you the most in fights. That's the thing that keeps you from hitting the gas, keeps you from doing the things you want to do, keeps you from being able to scramble out of positions. But if you can, instead of all this fight-specific training, put that aside...

Just give yourself the most fucking insane gas tank humanly possible and then fight and then the margins the things the times when you're going to need it like your skill level is already elite world championship skill level It's not going to deteriorate because your cardio gets better in six to eight weeks But what you can do is give yourself this insane base of cardio So in those moments when you need to hit the gas you can yeah, I

And that's what they did for BJ when BJ was at his best. Yeah. I think the best I saw BJ from watching him, especially live, he was training with them. UFC 107. I think Diego Sanchez. He looked like a demon. Exactly. Unbelievable gas tank and insane confidence. Even in shape. Like it was fucking abs, all that. I agree. Definitely. You can always sharpen the tools, you know, keep it sharp. But again, for when you're in a camp, it's just about getting fit.

And, yeah, there's some things we can tweak so that way we can keep that output. Because when you get fatigued is when you lose your laps in judgment. You could, your reflexes as well. Things like that just start to, like, go down. Were you feeling fatigued in the last round with Trichus? I don't think so. There was one point in the third round where me and him, we really put it on. And we kind of had this, like...

low-key agreement like okay you're fucked I'm fucked let's chill for a little bit and then I think round four I came out like cool bam bam bam and I did that sprawl on him but again he's so stubborn because I sprawled on him like I literally he shot I sprawled and my hips hit the back of his head into the mat and

It might have rocked him. I don't know. And then, what's his name? Mark Goddard's like, get up. And he's on one knee. And then when he was like, get up. And he finally decided to get up slowly. And I tried to attack him. He just threw. But not to try and hit me. He just threw just to stop my momentum. You know, stop me from coming at him. And yeah, he's a guy that just strong will. Strong will. Like...

Yeah, I can respect that. Physically strong, too. Yeah, not as strong as I thought it would be, probably because I felt strong as well. Like, I packed on some muscle for that fight. Preparing for those kind of grueling exchanges? Yeah, but even just for me myself, I just wanted to feel strong. So me and my boy A.B., we put on some muscle for that fight, and then having Matt actually making good food for me for the first time ever, because I got this far off just...

Whatever I wanted to eat, you know, Uri eats. Yeah, we were talking about that when we went to Terry Black's barbecue today. Yeah. It's the worst thing to eat right before a podcast. It's like, oh. I got the coffee now. I'm like, yeah, let's go. We pigged out. We pigged out. But honestly, for me, having those kind of, because I'm not 23 anymore, 24. Right. My body doesn't metabolize food and, you know, the way it used to. So I have to think about it like Israel. Be smart.

understand your body's getting older. No, I don't feel old though. That's the thing. When I was young, I thought 34, I'm done with this game. Then I'm like, I'm old. But that was when I was 24. But now that I'm here, I'm like, I could still squeeze a lot out of this. I could still squeeze a lot out of this. So we are. And the whole thing- Have you ever used a hyperbaric chamber?

Nah, not yet. I don't know if we have that in Auckland. Probably do. Dude, I did a whole series. When I first moved to Austin, I did the whole series because there's this protocol. I think it was an Israeli study that they did where they showed that it lengthens telomeres. You do like 60 sessions over 90 days and-

You know what they measure your biological age by the length of your telomeres. It puts 20 years on you. It decreases your age of your telomeres by 20 years. Is telomeres like the DNA strand or something? Well, yeah. I don't want to fuck this up. So what exactly are telomeres? Layman terms. The way you measure someone's biological age is the length of the telomeres. And through things like NMN. Yeah, that thing. Yeah. Yeah.

I got it right. Yeah. There it is. Telomeres are protein and DNA structures at the ends of the chromosomes that perform several important functions, including protecting DNA, preserving chromosomal integrity. Telomeres help maintain the structure and integrity of DNA during replication. It's the bit at the ends, right?

And as you get older, they get shorter and they get weaker. I don't even know how I know this. I think it's just a reel I saw somewhere. NAD shot, when people get NAD infusions, that helps that as well. I've been seeing that lately. Bieber, the Kardashians getting them. I get those. With Briggs? You can definitely do it with Brigham. I use another company. I see, I see. But there's a lot of companies that do it.

it. Okay. Is it USADA approved or is it one of them things? Yes, it's USADA approved. I'll see you later on Briggs. Yeah, but the thing that does it just as well, maybe even better, is hyperbaric chambers. And so hyperbaric chambers, you elevate it up to two, it's like

Two atmospheres, so twice our atmosphere, and then you have oxygen. You wear an oxygen mask, and you sit in it for an hour and a half. Okay. And, dude, you come out of that, and you're just like, whoa, like, what the fuck is going on? How often do you do it? Every day for six weeks? I've been doing it a lot lately. Okay. Because I got one at the house, so I've been doing it quite a bit. But it's just a completely different way of recovering. I found out about it for recovery when Uriah Faber fought Jose Aldo. The leg? Yeah.

Yes, his leg was fucking brutalized. I remember. I saw Uriah was always ahead of the game, and he was using hyperbaric chambers to help him recover. And so then I started looking into it, and then I found out about this Israeli study, and then I started seeing all the different ways that hyperbaric chambers

chambers can increase your recovery and you know TJ Dillashaw did a lot of that as well I think but it makes a big impact they always do it like when you go down to CPI in Mexico when they do stem cells they give people hyperbaric chamber treatments as well okay I got to look into that so if I wanted to do it I'd maybe do it say like what twice a week or something yeah something like that and how long does the effect last for

That's a good question. I mean, it probably depends on the individual, but it just makes, anytime I have something wrong with me, I get in there, I just feel just better. I bet you someone else, if they have one in Auckland now, they'll definitely hit me up and be like, hey. I bet they do. Yeah, I'd like to try that. Yeah, I bet Auckland has it. It's time consuming. You know, the whole experience is two hours because it has to get up to pressure, then it has to decompress, and you're in there for 90 minutes.

So it's like 15 minutes getting up to pressure and then 15 minutes of decompressing at the very end. But that's a great way to recover as well. I feel like every, especially as you get older, every edge you can get. Sauna, cold plunge, hyperbaric, everything. Every edge you can get. Red light therapy, all that. That's where I'm at now. That's where I was this last camp. And I feel like even the one before that, and the one before that, I just remember thinking like, how can I...

It was actually Eugene who said, "How can you make this camp better?" And I'll always find something to do to make this camp better, the next one. So that's like the last three camps. So this one, I took it with the whole having breakfast, having a chef help me actually cook. - That was crazy that you used to train with no breakfast. That's so crazy. - So that was my way, I guess. Then I found out about intermittent fasting and I realized, oh, I've been doing that shit for years. I was just doing it by, I guess, laziness or accident. But it actually helps though. Like, wake up, have two eggs,

Or maybe he'll make sometimes like something with chia seed, but normally eggs and a bacon piece or something. She needs something. Yeah, something just to get the fuel. And even Jordy from Fight Dietitian, he told me, yeah, you should definitely be having breakfast because he thought like you're crazy training the way you do train. And some of my morning sessions as well will be grueling. And then I'll go have breakfast. But I enjoyed it that way because I felt like more. One thing is when I fight, fight day, my body doesn't want to eat.

He'll make me like a nice plate of something delicious, and my body is just like...

So fight day, I still try and eat something, maybe at least an egg because he'll have pancakes, eggs, whatever, bacon, an egg and a little bit of bacon. But my body just doesn't want to eat. But do you think if you force yourself to eat, that would be a good thing? No. No? I think DC said the same thing as well one time. He said he likes to fight hungry so that way he gets that edge. And I feel that way when it's fight day. But when it comes to training now, I definitely like to have breakfast. I like the way it feels. Like now I've done it for a few months. I understand the...

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visit simply safe dot-com slash Rogan But this offer is available for a limited time only so be sure to order today. That's simply safe dot-com slash Rogan There's no safe like simply safe of a healthy breakfast before you have a grueling training session. Yeah, it just gives you more gas Yeah, I'll Joe said that when he fought pure yawn that he didn't eat first or second one first And he said he felt like shit or the day of the fight. Yeah, you know, I think

the time of the fight got pushed back I forget exactly what the reasoning was or he just forgot to eat or he just wasn't feeling it because of the anxiety fighting for the title you know the whole deal and he just felt it in the fight it just was wearing and especially with a guy like Aljo who cuts so much weight yeah

You know, Aljo is so... He's a big boy. He was so big for 35. Yeah. I remember running into him. He was like 176 pounds. I was like, what the fuck? How are you going to make 135? He's so big. He looks good at 145 at UFC 300. Yeah. I like this for him. I was bummed out that that Mosvar-Ivloev fight fell out because... Especially this weekend, right? Yeah. That's a very... Aljo is strong at 145. Why did that fight fall out? What happened? Aljo got injured. Oh.

Oh, that's insane. He got injured and he thought he'd be able to work through it but couldn't. And there's a point of diminishing returns with these weight cutting dudes. And I think, you know... There'll be something. Like, they've got the whole thing at one with the hydration clause. But the thing is, no matter what, people are always going to try and find a way. Yeah. They're always going to try and find a way to sneak past the hydration test or something that they could use to pass it. But...

I don't know how that works. I don't know how they test for it. It's never happened to me. But weight cutting, even when I started fighting, people used to tell me, go down to 170 for you guys. Oh, my God. Hell no. How the fuck can you make 170? Back when I was skinny, before I got really brawlic, I could make maybe 80 kgs. That's close to 170 because 170 is 77 kgs. Lowest I ever got to was 80 as a kickboxer. That was it.

Yeah, 170, I'd die. I wouldn't even... Because I've seen some of these weight cuts where guys... Like Hamza. Oh, bro. Like when Hamza would make 170. Or even Cyborg. Oh, yeah. You see her when she was in the tub crying and shaking. And Oliveira when they go and they huddle around them. When you cut weight, though, I'll say this thing. For me, when I cut weight, it's a spiritual experience sometimes. It's a weird experience because I've... Not just me, I've seen fighters who have...

not get delirious, but start saying things that they wouldn't normally say. Not even in a bad way, but just the way they talk. Because you're close to death. Yeah. You see the light. Yeah, man. You really are close to death. I mean, it sounds ridiculous to say that. And for someone who doesn't understand what fighters are going through, you go, oh, you're being hyperbolic. But not really. Not really. You really are close to death. If you keep going for a few more hours, you'll die. Yeah. Especially, I mean, I've seen... My weight cuts are normally...

Pretty tame, not as bad, because I think I'm perfect for 185. But the ones that I've seen guys lose a lot of weight the day of, and I see them, how they are. And even when they go to the scale, you see their face just... Yeah, you never look too destroyed. I always come in underweight as well. What do you normally weigh, like the week of a fight? Week of a fight? If I get to the fight location, say... If they weigh me, if I'm, say...

198. Oh, that's not that bad. 200. Yeah, that's easy for me. I'm like, cool. That's normally what I'm at. That's just a few hard sauna sessions. Yeah. But even not just the water loading. And then it's like, my body knows. It's weird how my body does it. My body is just like, it just knows. Okay, we're getting on the plane. You've done it before. It just knows. It's just like muscle memory. And I get to the fight location. My body is like, cool, we're doing this. And then the weight just starts to go up.

Did you notice a difference when they didn't allow IVs versus when they did allow IVs? I never used it. You never used it? I never used IVs. That's the thing. So you never cut weight enough where you were so depleted that you needed to get those bags in you? Fuck, I would have liked to. They say that's the best way to rehydrate the brain. Yeah. Because it takes how many hours if you do it orally? It takes a long time. Yeah, to get the brain. And that's the... Affects your chin. You're trying to protect as you're fucking noggin slushing around in your crib. Yeah.

Yeah, because what is cerebral fluid? It's made of, well, I'm guessing a lot of water, right? There's a lot of water in there. Yeah. And the rehydration of the brain apparently is the slowest because of the blood-brain barrier. That's the slowest. Your body's, your muscles rehydrate fairly quickly. But still, it just never makes sense to me that a person is literally on the verge of death 24 hours before a cage fight. Let's go battle to the death. And then you get head kicked in the fucking chin and...

Yeah. I mean, look, I do love this game, and I think weight cuts is always going to be a part of it right now. But who knows? Because even though we have height differentials, are we going to start discriminating against that? Like, okay, we only have height classes. Is that the next? No, that doesn't make any sense because you've got guys like DC that, you know, even though he was not even barely six feet tall, he was a heavyweight champion, but he's a tank. Yeah. And these are the wrestling skills.

I think that the way to do it really is to have more weight classes. I think when you have the big gaps, like 85 to 205 is 20 pounds. That's crazy. That's such a big-ass gap. And then, you know, 205, if you want to start fighting heavyweight, and then you're dealing with guys like Francis, who's a natural 265, that's such a gap. They should have the ones in between. Okay, let's take it. 10 pounds. 165, 170, 150.

175, 180, like that. They could do that, but I think that's maybe a little too much. I think 10 pounds. Yeah. 10 pounds is reasonable. Yeah. All the way up the board. 175, 165. 25, 35, 45, 55, 65, 75, 85, 95, 205, and then maybe 225, and then heavyweight. Super heavyweight, yeah. You have more chance. The whole thing of 265 being a limit for heavyweight to me is crazy, too. Because there's bigger boys out there. Right. Mark Hunt used to cut down to 265. Yeah. Crazy. Even Francis did as well.

Yeah, if they did, I mean, they can just, I think they talked about doing it. They talked about doing it recently. Maybe last year, I think. They talked about adding more weight classes, but then I never heard anything about it again. I know California was flirting with it. Okay, maybe that's what I saw. They should have it everywhere. There's too many gaps. They're too wide. Like, there's too many tweeners. Yeah. You know, too many guys that are too small to fight at 170, but they really can't make 55 healthy. At least they took this shit out.

Yeah, they took... Finally. Yeah. Finally. Look, I always thought that's like a group chat-like decision. Just say, yo, this is a dumb rule. Let's take it out. Boom. But why does it take so long? Is it because the commission...

all over the United States or whatever have to get together or something. I don't know. I don't understand how that seems like a common sense rule and especially anybody who understands the power of elbows. Like this is not the most powerful elbow. No, it's just not. And so to deny that and to say that somehow or another that can't be

block well that's crazy you could do that just as easy as you could do that you could block that elbow facts yeah it doesn't none of it makes any sense there's a bunch of things that are unrealistic in my opinion one of them is not being able to up kick from a downward position when a guy's on top of you

So if a guy's on top of you and you're on your back and the guy has a knee down, you can't up kick. Oh, yeah, that's silly. Yeah, I get what you mean. That's silly. That doesn't make any sense. I think you should be able to up kick when you are flat on your back and he's on his knees. Yeah. Because that's a real technique. If you have rubber guard or flexible hips or whatever, you can just bring your leg and boom. Yeah. Anderson did that to someone. Who did he do that to? What's his name? Yoshinokami, I think.

You should have called me. Did he? Yeah, he got disqualified and not in the UFC. Oh, was that in Rumble on the Rock? Rumble, the yellow cage. Yeah, so that was a good knockout. But then they disqualified him. They disqualified him. Yeah. That technique, like if you are in a guy's guard and that guy can elbow you in the face, punch you in the face, why can't he kick you in the face? He should be able to lean back and...

up kick you and it would make the guard way more effective. Dangerous. It's also more real... Here it is. This one, yeah. Boom. Oh, shit. That was a good knockout. That's a beautiful knockout. That should be 100% legal. Look at the hip dexterity. Yeah. Look at it like the way...

He just brought that back. Boom. Oh, like an axe kick. Yeah. Like an axe kick from the outside. Yeah, you know what? You're right. That's 100% a good technique. It should be legal, and you should be avoiding that if you're on top. Top is an advantageous position. Anything the guy that can do on bottom that is real for a real fight should be allowed. It's not like you're cemented in this position. The idea of not allowing soccer kicks to a downed opponent, what I think about that is the cage. Yeah.

I think if you're pressed up against a cage and someone can stomp you or soccer kick you, there's no way to move. Yeah, true. But if you're in an open space and there's a place to move, all those things should be legal because all those things are real techniques. Facts. But especially if a guy's on top of you. If a guy's on top of you on his knees in your guard and you can get a leg back and stomp him in the face, that's good. That's a real technique that should be 100% legal. The one I like, soccer kicks, is just...

It just looks cool. But again, if you have someone pinned against a cage and they even need them, and was it one they go, okay. Yes. They allow it. I don't even know what the...

what the discretion of the referee is to allow it. I think it's if they're pinned against the cage. Then he doesn't allow it. Exactly. Okay. Which makes sense. If you're in an open space. Right, if you're in an open space. Soccer kicks go. Did you ever see the one where Roger Huerta fought and won and got one of the worst soccer kick KOs ever? Maybe, but I've forgotten it. He fought some big Brazilian cat and this dude soccer kicked him and it was like, oh my God. Like,

Like, in the open space? Yeah. Oh, yeah. He had him rocked already. Yeah. And then he's down like this, and this dude just leans back. I think the thing as well is the look of it for, I guess, the people who aren't really hardcore fans. If they see that, they're like, ooh. And then it goes back to human cockfighting. Yeah. Okay, but if that's true, how about Irani Aldana? When she fought at the Sphere, her whole face is cut open. Oh, that was crazy. Insane. They didn't stop the fight. Tough, though. So tough. Yeah. But...

So here's the Roger Huerta one. So Roger's hurt, and Roger shouldn't have been fighting at 170 anyway. And watch this. Oh, no. Boom. Oh, yeah. I mean, that one. I have seen this. Bro, that one can fucking kill you. That one can kill you. I mean, that dude had everything in that kick. He even held it for a little bit. And then lined it up. Just really lined it up. Full fucking goal. Ooh, that's a rough one. That is bad. That is bad. That's a rough one. But. Mm-hmm.

That's a real technique. Legal. Yeah, I mean it's... You can do it in real life. Yes! That's the point. It's the sport of fighting. And if it's a sport of fighting and you can't up-kick a guy when you're in your guard because his knee's on the ground, that's ridiculous. Even the one you've actually... Was it maybe you at this fair? You mentioned it with the Marab fight. They stood them up somewhere at the end and I was thinking like...

Yeah, why are they standing them up? Made no sense. Yeah. I think so, yeah. I think Herb was alluding to they want more action. I don't know if he's getting pressure from someone to have more action, but one of the things that Herb said was if someone wants it, I think he was alluding to some specific officials and executives, whoever. He's like, if they wanted to look different, I wish they would tell me.

Because, like, this is— Oh, wait, Herb's saying this to you. No, no, no, not to me. He said it in an interview when he was being criticized for trying to get people to work and trying to stand people up. So let me get this straight. He's saying maybe some officials or someone would be alluding— He's alluding to the fact that they want it to look a specific way. Ah.

I think I pick up what you're putting down. See if you can find his statement on it because it was interesting the way he phrased it. The way he phrased it. Like cryptic. Yes. Okay. He's trying to put someone under the bus, but he's saying like, look, maybe someone's saying to him that. Exactly.

And I think they are because he's always like, let's work, let's work. Sometimes when it doesn't even make any sense. Like, they're working. I know. I saw. I remember and I was like, yeah, he's on top. He just got him down. He's actually trying to, you know, beat him up. Yeah. Sean was defending well but still saying, ah, true. That would be interesting though. That would – that's – when I say interesting, that's like –

Shady. Yeah, it's shady. But it's what we were talking about at lunch today, too, is that there's certain fighters they want to win because those fighters are more exciting. And I'm a purist. I feel like there should be no stand-ups. Unless it is a violation, unless someone does something illegal, there should be no stand-ups. I think if a guy can take you down like Merab does and just...

beat you up and you can't do shit. And even if the audience is booing, that's the fight. Sean wants to get up. He's got to get up. I don't think it should be you can just hold him on and you're full guard and the referee just stands you up. Because that's such an advantage for the striker. Yeah, big time. To be standing up again. And you already have the advantage of every round starts standing up. Yeah. And you work so hard to get something to the ground and they go, okay, stand up. Yeah. I'm trying to think, have I ever been in a position that they made me stand up? Not on top.

But even on the bottom, I always get up. I find a way. That's the ego thing. Because again, look, I had to kill that to really be great at this game. Because I knew for a fact...

I couldn't beat some nerds in pajamas. So that was for me my, okay, humble yourself and learn how to grapple. And then I sucked at first and I got better. I never have shown too much of my grappling skills because they never really put me in a position to show as much as I need to. So for me, I was just like, cool, I'll just fucking do a Derek Lewis, stand up, get up and just beat him up as much as I can.

But, yeah, fuck. That is suspect if someone is. I actually want to watch that. I'll watch it later on. Let's see what the statement is. Did you find it? So far, I've only found it. Like, Luke Thomas made a video, and he said Herb called him after he made the video. Interesting. Luke Thomas. Who's that again? Luke Thomas, the journalist. Okay. MMA journalist. They spoke for 30. I'm reading the closed captioning because I can't listen to it.

He said those instances... I'll just play this, I guess. This might be it. I don't know if you saw Herb's video. Oh, Luke. Oh, my bad. ...of Herb. Ultimately, his opinion... ...but not limited to those instances where he had called for more work from Merab. What I cannot do today is speak on behalf of Herb. Ultimately, his opinions and beliefs are his own, and they are his to tell whenever he elects to do so. What I can do is speak on behalf of my views. Yeah, I'm just trying to not be what it was.

That's not it. There was an article where they had interviewed him. A statement from himself? Yes, it was a statement from Herb himself. And he was saying, if someone wants the fights to look different, I wish they would tell me. Damn, that's suspect. Yes. You found it?

That's a way that the way again, that's cryptic cryptic. Yeah, that means they're they're they're telling you I want more action Okay, here it goes. I've seen on social media people have spoken about me call calling the fighters for more action That's what I've always done. I can tell you what I tell fighters during the rules briefing I tell them anytime I'm going to interfere or any intervention I'm going to talk to you first like if I'm going to stand you up

What I'm going to say first is I'm going to say let's work. I usually clap at what I'm expecting from him is not busy work. I specify I'm looking for effort to finish the fight. So either you posture to where you can set up fight ending attacks or advance your position, effort to advance,

Because it's not as easy as just passing the guard, but effort to pass, effort to advance your position, effort to bring the fight to finish. That rule was put in place, standing fighters up, to make our sport look the way we want it to look. But he said something else. It was more... If he goes as a referee, blah, blah, blah, blah.

But, I mean, if that's what he said, I trust your recollection of it, but if that's what he said, that's still very suspect. You don't want to get this game. This is one thing about the UFC, it's as real as it gets, or MMA itself. This is what it is. But if you have that happening, then...

That's starting to seem a little bit like, you know, not to take away, like it's the WWE or anything. It's not that, but you are influencing the course of a fight where a guy has control and where a fighter... And the referee is the guy officiating the fight. So if he's getting word from someone... Right. The way he said that, someone...

I think he was saying if someone wants me to, if they want the fight to look different, I wish they would tell me. But that's what I'm saying. When he says someone, it's like, who is that someone? I don't think the referee's job is to instruct a fighter to do anything other than follow the rules. And if you can hold a guy down, I'm the worst with this because I think you should start in the same position you ended the last round because I think it's one fight.

I think it's one fight. It's not five fights. So an advantage for the striker is always standing up. So if a guy gets you down and has your back and the round ends, I think he should have the exact same position in the exact same place on the octagon floor when the next round starts because he earned that position, and you didn't earn the stand-up.

So if you're standing up, standing up for a guy like you is a giant advantage. Yeah, I'm like, I'm biased. I'm going to be like, nah, fuck that. Yeah, of course. Well, also the audience would be like, shut the fuck up, bro. You know, you fucking pussy. It does make sense when it comes to pure fighting. Because even, bro, even Pride had 10-minute rounds, the first round. That's cool. Look, some things, like I'm glad this, they've taken out the way, but again...

Bring back tournaments just for one night. Let's see who's a real badass. Yeah, that would be crazy. I've done a kickboxing. I've never done it in MMA. I've done it in boxing. But I might bring back a tournament. So let's see who's really about this because we have to fight, get the adrenal dump, and you go back and sit down, sit down for ages, and then eventually have to warm up again. I remember that. I've done it a few times. I've won a few of them. But it shows...

Yeah. Like this. You know what I mean? Well, it's also built-in drama over the evening where people watch a guy fight once and now he's going to fight a second time. And that was always wild about the early days of the UFC. Yeah. Watching those tournaments. And pride as well. Mm-hmm. We did that a lot. But yeah, that'd be fun. It would be. I think even for like, oh, they did it once though.

Glory did it remember last man standing that was great The UFC did it once with the flyweight the inaugural flyweight title and I think it was Mighty Mouse and Ian McCall and in the final no, no, I got it wrong They fucked up the decision because if there was meant to be a draw and they'd have one more round in Sydney I think hmm. Yeah, and then they were meant to but then they gave they fucked up the decision and

But that would be crazy though. They go, okay, cool. The judges have it this, that. It's a draw. We're going to one more round after a crazy fight like that. That would have had the whole place just go boom. Well, that's what glory does. Yeah. One more. Ah, same, same. And you see the look on the guy's face like, oh, fuck. Oh, shit. Yeah, I've had that too. But that's where this comes in. Yeah. Yeah. You have to just like, cool, let's go. Get back in the corner. Is that one of the most difficult things to change your mindset in mid-fight? Like if something throws you off? Mid-fight. Yeah.

Do you remember, what I'm bringing up specifically, do you remember Tim Kennedy and Yoel Romero? Oh, get up, get up. Yeah. Yeah, stool game, stool game. So Tim Kennedy, yes. Tim Kennedy had Yoel Romero fogged up, fucked up. And then they put Yoel on the stool. They threw ice on the floor. They fucking, and he kept sitting on the stool. And Big John's telling him to stand up, and he's still sitting down. And Tim Kennedy's walking around going, what the fuck? This fight should be stopped. Yeah.

fight's over. Yeah, the fight should have been stopped. But then Yoel got up and then he stopped him afterwards. But he had like a good solid 35 seconds extra recovery time, which when you're hurt is just...

huge. Yeah, ice on the floor as well. Tim said it fucked with his head and it was his mental weakness that he didn't, he thought he was angry. They're robbing me. This is bullshit. I had him. I should have won. The fight should have been, the round started. The minute was up. It should have been, I could have got on him and I could have finished him. And so in his head, he lost focus. It does happen. Like I said, even with me pointing at the ground in that moment, any small lapse in judgment, you just need

30 minutes or 25 minutes of focus. So in that point, yeah, I can see how that would get to him. Yeah, that would get to him because you're like, what the fuck? They're about to screw me out of this one. Exactly. And they did. And so then he's got to fight again while he's going, motherfucker, this shit already been over. So instead of concentrating completely on being in the present in the fight...

You're thinking I got fucked. Anderson versus Bisping when Anderson 31 was on the case celebrating. Right, right. And then if, I think it was Herb or whoever, they'd be like, yo, get down here, this and that, right, right, right. Which could have been over if Anderson just followed up with one or two more shots. That would have been it. It's like we were talking about Jalen Turner and Renato Marcano. He drops him, has him fucked up, and then walks away like it's a KO. I literally went like, because I was front.

I went to 300. I'm such a fan. I was there from the first fight. That's why I like to wear that as a badge on. I'm like, yeah, I was there. And I watched that. And I was just like, why? He had eight more seconds. He could have just done something and taken him out. Nato's fucked up, too. He was hurt bad. Yeah. And Jalen can crack. He's tough. Oh, he's so big for 55 and so long. I think he's also really talented as well. He's fast. He's smooth.

Like when he fought Dan, you heard that shit. Yes. Bro, that kick when I heard that and Dan grabbed his waist.

And then Dan had his neck at the end of the round as well. I lost my voice in that one. That's the one where Dan broke his arm, right? Yeah, just a scratch. Dan's a savage. Trust me. I love watching him come back into the top five now. I love it. I love that he did that. I love it. I love who he is as a person because, look, Dan, I see him every day most days, and he's a guy that you don't know what to expect. Like, out of nowhere—

Boom. He just customized himself with all these tattoos. Yeah, crazy. I was like, that's badass. Yeah, he just covered himself. I think he's in Spain. Do you know Oscar Willis? The MacLife reporter. He's fighting Bare Knuckle this weekend, I believe, or maybe next weekend in Spain. But Dan's going to go there and corner him. I'm like, fucking... Bare Knuckle boxing or MMA? No, boxing. That's not for me. I can fight. Look, if I had to get into a fight, whatever, sure. But for me...

I'd rather not. I'll pass on that. But that's the kind of shit that Dan loves. Dan's like, yeah, let's do that shit. He wants to do that shit. He wants to be like, yeah. He just loves fighting. Masvidal's got that whole MMA league where it's all bare knuckle MMA, which I like. Because it doesn't make sense to me that you don't cover your shins or your knees or your elbows, but you do cover your knuckles. I just don't like the knuckles because you see, again, Moose Knuckles is still there. This can cause more damage.

Like cuts. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Slices you open. Exactly. Guys get sliced up. So if gloves, I guess they protect. The new gloves as well. I think I've only fought once in the new gloves now. I might give it maybe one or two more. But I'm like the old gloves just they didn't really protect. The wraps protect your hands. But the old gloves, they felt like rubber, like tire rubber.

And I think they were just dangerous, like dangerous to hit with. If you hit someone with those, it's like bang. These new gloves, they feel like a little bit of a memory foam. A little softer? Softer. And I don't know about this whole curve thing. They don't really curve. I can still do that. Yeah. I try not to do that. I'm a, you know, whatever, but still.

This I'll wait and see see listen man the best gloves for sure are Trevor Whitman's Yeah, the best gloves. He made the best gloves. They're the best and I've never seen them Yeah, I've got see if you can pull them up the onyx is that the only one yeah? I've got the big ones Bob never ever has MMA gloves Yeah, they curve so it's curved so your hand is in this position So if you want to do this you have to open them up, but it's still you could do that for grappling It's all the same but

They're in a curved position, and I think that would avoid so many eye pokes. So many. So many. You haven't really been eye poked too many times. Nah. Only time was in training. Really bad one was in training. But nah, not in a fight. Nah. Avoid that as much as I can. I have another thought on that. Tell me what you think of this. I feel like they should cover the fingers. How? I feel like why with like a mitt that goes over the top with like a round surface. Like a boxing mitt. Like a little something soft. Yeah, like those little back glove mitts. Uh.

Like, that's Trevor Whitman's. Okay. That's the Onyx gloves. Those are the best gloves. Trevor Whitman's a fucking genius, man. He makes incredible gear. Has he ever brought this idea to the UFC? Yeah, they were in negotiation, but I think Trevor went crazy and wanted, like, something

money something according to Dana at least that's his version having okay - yeah yeah but regardless of all that he makes the best gloves they're the best MMA gloves of all time by Bart bar none yeah but the big ones watch I'll hit him up see if I can get those ones just to try them out it's also the best

foam like he uses the most high-tech foams the most expensive foam like everything and he makes them all by hand like Trevor I've seen him yeah I've seen him stitch and he's passionate about it but um yeah these new ones I'm so far at fighting with them I still prefer the the old ones you think they're more damaging yeah yeah like I get it

I don't like to get hit, so maybe that's why I'm biased with it. But when I hit someone with those, I feel it causes more damage. And I mean, I can cause damage. I cause some damage on DDP with those ones. But I still want to try them maybe one more time just to feel them. They felt different. Yeah, felt different. I can definitely tell. Even the wraps. When I was squeezing my wraps into them, I was like, okay. Just took a while, but it still got in. But I'm like, all right, cool, grab. I like to test the grip strength to make sure I can hold someone. But...

Yeah. We'll see. I don't know why the fingers have to be exposed. Because you never do this. There's no reason to have the fingers ever in this position. Every time you grip, you're gripping like this. Like that, yeah. Or you're gripping like this. Also, it would prevent...

Joint manipulation. Yeah. Yeah, small joint manipulation. If you had, like, it's almost like a webbing. Yeah. That just covers that. Why can't you just have a thin piece of leather that goes over the fingers and then something that's curved around the top? Like you said, like those bag mitts with the thumb out. Yes. So even if you do get poked in the eye, you're getting poked by a large thing instead of a finger. Yeah. It goes all the way into your eye. And fingernails. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, so the nails would be covered.

Which, even if you trim your fucking nails, that's still a hard surface that could scratch the shit out of your cornea. Then you got toes. I've seen people get kicked in the eye, even in training. Oh, man. And infected the eye as well. Oh, yeah, man. Yeah, I've seen that. Toe nails. But, no, I mean, that makes sense. I mean, it just, I think people are scared of change. Right. Even with these new gloves. I think it's maybe, that's why I'm trying to be like, let me give it one more shot. I'm not going to say I'm against them. I just feel, meh.

The other gloves were just, they had that thing on them. Well, Mike Wendell, John, you know, he lost an eye. Oh, that's why he wears the shades. Exactly. Yeah, he did. From holding pads from somebody. So he was holding pads and someone missed and caught his eye with their toenail. I'd do that too if that happened to me. PTSD. Yeah, fuck, man. I think everybody should wear goggles if you're holding mitts. Just the possibility. Just that we know that it happened to one of the top trainers in the sport. Yeah, and it's not just a freak accident. Right. Because even just grappling, I try and keep my nails clean.

like, trim, just because I don't want to, I've done it before by accident on someone and I've caused, I think I had collar tie and then they did something and then, and I got, not on me, on them. It's happened to me as well, but I felt bad when I did it on a person. I had their skin in my nails and I was like, yeah, my bad. So again,

Yeah. Cut your nails. But still, that's not a bad idea. I would fuck with that. I feel like it wouldn't affect the grappling at all. Yeah. And it definitely would help eye pokes, which are the biggest problem. Eye pokes are a giant problem, man. So many guys have gotten eye surgery now. I mean, Bilal's had three eye surgeries. Yeah. And remember when he got poked real bad against Leon? Oh, wait, he did. Oh, no, the Leon one. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Fuck, yeah, I can imagine. You can change the culture. Yeah.

I feel like it should be done because I don't think it's bad. I don't see any negative to cover in the fingers, and I see only positives. Yeah. And I don't think it would do...

It's just real simple. Piece of leather here. I get you. I get what you're saying. Measure the fighter's hands. Some guys have very long fingers. Some guys have short fingers. Measure the fighter's hands. Build a custom glove. That's not hard to do. Same thing like having glove size. I'm sure someone will make it now. Has someone made that before? I don't think so. I don't know if anybody that's made that, but that should be the way they do it because that would eliminate enormous...

a number of eye posts. That's a money-making scheme right now. If someone decides to make that and then put it out there as a prototype, be like, look, this actually works. Train with them and then they go, I'm patenting that. Boom. Well, the UFC doesn't listen to me because I have all kinds of crazy ideas. I'm like, get rid of weight cutting, add more weight classes, change the gloves. No stand-ups. No stand-ups. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fair enough. Because also, I'm not...

in making the fight more exciting. I'm making... I'm interested in what's the best, what actually works. I'm a purist. I want to see what is the actual effective technique. Like, there's sometimes, like, when you see in jiu-jitsu tournaments where guys are doing something, like, they're in a 50-50 position, I'm like, this guy could punch you in the face, kick you in the face so easy. This is not a good...

Self-defense position. Yep. And you see it in MMA. The leg lock stuff. Where guys are accustomed to doing that and they're literally face down holding onto an ankle and the dude just boom, boom. One of my boys, Nate Law, he just fought in his, I think, third pro fight. The guy had a leg lock and Nate posted this quote from Chill Sonnen after the fight about if a guy is holding onto your leg, just posture up and punch him in the face. And that's what Nate did and won the fight.

So yeah, I mean the whole leg lock game, I know some stuff with X Guard and whatnot, but I don't really fuck with it too much because I get scared because the commitment when I hold onto someone's leg and then you're just exposed. Unless I'm like a Craig Jones type who I just know. As a wizard. Yeah. The thing about leg locks is you have so little time to react. Yeah. If you don't tap, if you, there's such a brief, especially like an inside heel hook,

There's such a brief amount of time you have before your shit is just blown up in smithereens. It's just fine. This is fine. This is fine. And it's gone. Rips apart, and then you're fucked for nine months. Even if I'm rolling with people, if I don't trust that person, or if I just feel like, I'll just go, yeah, cool. Tap. Because ego's not worth it. I don't try and hold on to shit like that. Especially like locks. Do you have a hard time like that? With people trying to get a name for themselves training with you? Yeah.

Yeah, so that's for me. It's not even, if I go to a new gym, I pick and choose who I go with. And it's not like an ego thing because I don't want to get my ass whooped. It's just like, I don't know you well enough that. And sometimes you see people, they salivate like, oh, this is my chance. This is my, I got my shot now. But now sometimes in grappling with some people in the jiu-jitsu class,

they'll just lower belts they'll be like i'm like i'm good thank you you know what i don't like when i see a dude sitting out around and waiting while you're exhausted and then they go do you want to go like bitch i watched you i'll call him out i watched you just sit down yeah for 10 fucking minutes oh you'd get that as well why didn't you just jump in yeah why weren't you just rolling right now you want to roll fresh yeah is that what this is yeah and you like call him out on you see the look oh shit yeah man

I just go, nah, I'm good, thank you. And I'll get someone that I actually trust. Because, yeah, it's not, it's just, I know the feeling as well, because I'm sure that someone will tap me or do something, or I'll just let go. And then it's like that. I know when it's real, and it's generally like, good job. And I know the one when it's like, they're like, yeah, I want to tell everyone about this. Can't wait to get online. Here we go. But again, that's the thing when I talk about ego, and I had to kill that.

Before I started training grappling because it was just I sucked right like now I get taps one thing I definitely will get is a submission in the UFC before I'm done I will I will choke someone out like a guillotine or red naked. I like guillotines but I've It's learning how to find the sweet spot for me the sweet spot when I get it and when I get it I

It's like even a bulldog choke. I get really good at those. Some I can find the spot and I just because I got the frame for it. The best person at our gym, Dan Hangman. That's his shit. He grabs your neck. You're going like it's like, yeah, find a way out. You can't cool tap. But yeah, I like using guillotines, though, especially on gyms.

on wrestlers because yeah it just lets them know okay this is always a threat this is always a threat but again it's something I've been working on but eventually before I retire you'll definitely see me get a submission well it's interesting because you're a specialist you know you're one of those guys that like you didn't come in with a full MMA experience you didn't start as an amateur MMA fighter you were a kickboxer and so you I remember when you and I first started talking online I reached out to you on Instagram yeah and you were like I

I'm going to wait a little while. I'm going to just do this right. Which I thought was very intelligent. Because you could have just jumped in like many guys do. And then they get UFC throws you in with a wrestler. You get exposed. And now you're so far behind the curve. It takes a long time to build up your confidence and your momentum again. Because you got smothered in your first fight. Yeah. That was 2015, I believe. I even sent a DM to Dana saying, just give me one shot. Just get me to the cage. I'll do the rest. And look.

Look, I would have, but I'm glad I took my time. And it was good for me just to fight different people from Ukraine, China, Brazil, all different types of places. And then experience different styles. And that way I felt confident enough when I got to the UFC. My first fight, shout out Rob Wilkinson, good guy, good friend of mine now.

And, yeah, he tried to take me down constantly. And I was able to withstand that because of the work we did. And Andre, Andre Paulette, my wrestling coach, a lot of drills, just drills, wall work constantly. What year did you start that? What year did you start grappling training? I started in 2010, but I was meant to go into MMA straight away, but there was just so many kickboxing fights, and I kept on getting kickboxing fights that it was just too –

Also, I like fighting kickboxing. So I was just like, I'll just take this fight, take this fight. But I was always grappling on the side, like low-key grappling on the side. And eventually, I think... I can't remember what year my first MMA fight was. Would have been 2014, maybe, or 13. And then I started taking it more seriously. Like, I'm a purple belt now, but I'm like...

I'm a purple belt. I know I'm dangerous, but it's like, I'm not like, there's levels. There's levels to belts. There's some purple belts, blue belts who can kick my ass, you know? But yeah, I do enjoy it though. I love grappling. I like, I feel like a ninja cat when I'm grappling and I'm on that flow state. I just feel like I just, it's fun to play with. But then again, I've only ever shown cases of brief, like again, who's won? Not just the Pereira fight in Madison Square Garden. Gastelum, I had a triangle on them.

To virus I had a guillotine at the end of the round some other ones with the Kimura traps, but yeah Just no one's really put me in that position to make me have to like really use my offensive grappling But again when I get taken to the ground, I'm just like fuck I'm just gonna stand up if kickboxing was as big as MMA Do you think you've ever done MMA? That's a good question Fuck if okay money wise probably ego

Because I just knew a fucking nerd in pajamas could kick my ass. I just, I can't have that. Honestly, it's just, I just know like some dude can beat me and he doesn't have to even throw a punch. In the back of my mind, it's still, that's why sometimes when all these, you know, boxers, you know, like back in the day when it was UFC versus boxing or whatever, I was like, well, this is real fighting. Like, do you want to see what the baddest person on the planet is?

Right. No one's telling you you can't use your weapons, but you want to take away all my weapons. Right. That's why I don't think I'll ever box again because I just think it's too limiting. Even kickboxing, I feel like it'd be really hard for me to because it's too limiting. I do like aspects of grappling that I can use in a fight. But yeah, nah, I like full-fledged fighting. I think it's a healthy ego. I just knew I have to really humble myself so I can learn how to

Fight these guys at their own game. So, yeah, that's why. I like how one FC has everything. They have grappling matches. They have kickboxing matches. They have Muay Thai matches. And they have MMA matches. I think that is the way to go. And I really wish the UFC, I know they're invested in this slap fighting shit. But instead of that, like, have a kickboxing league. Yeah.

I think they don't think that people would get into kickboxing. I think they're wrong. Yeah, they just did the one in Denver for 1FC recently, recently.

went well and the fights are crazy yes a lot of knockdowns uh huh a lot of action packed stuff but if it was just marketed the right way right with the UFC's marketing machine easily easily it would be one of the biggest leagues because everybody loves KOs everybody loves stand up fights and you're gonna slap fight there's a lot of KOs there

But you're going to get real chaos because kids, they can't, no one can grapple. You can't grapple. So you're going to get people that are forced to stand up and you could then attract the greatest strikers in the world like 1FC is doing. They're getting all these Thai killers, you know, these rod tanks, all these like elite Thai fighters and they're all coming over and they're fighting in the cage now. And I feel like there's an opportunity for that for a

kickboxing league in America that would be hugely successful if, like, the UFC machine got behind it. You know, John Waypaw started that. I think he did. Yeah, he did. Cage, yeah. Little gloves. I watched both fights with Brad Riddell, I think. Or the first, no, the first one with Brad Riddell. The second one, sorry. That was the one I watched at Cage fighting. Great fight. Crazy fight. Even though John lost, he just showed me who he is. But, yeah, I think he did start...

cage Muay Thai. Yes. That was his thing. I think it was his thing. He should have fucking trademarked that shit. Yeah, well, Muay Thai with little gloves is different too, right? Because, you know, there's blocks you can't use. Just shielding like a Dutch style. I remember with the big gloves, I always talked about it as well. I always felt my striking was better for MMA. I always felt it was better for MMA because I was like, nah, if you can just do this,

That's... Yeah. You just block whatever hit. It's just who's tough. Who's tougher. Right. But with the small gloves, you can get around the guard. The hand traps are different. So I always just felt like, yeah, my striker would excel better than MMA. I wasn't as... Not... I'm tough, but I wasn't as just like...

Tough for no reason. Yeah. Thank you. I used my brain. Yeah. So I was just tough for no reason. Like boom, boom, boom. Okay, hit you, hit me, hit me, hit you, hit you. Yeah. That's not my style. I always felt I was slicker, the way I moved, the way I set traps. And that's why I like MMA striking better. It's kind of crazy about the Dutch, right? Like what is it about them that makes their style so savage? Because if you go back and you watch like Ramon Deckers or Rob Kamen or Ernesto Hoost. Ernesto Hoost, yeah. Oh, my God. I think it's his culture. Yeah.

Is that what it is? Yeah, I think it's the culture of the stock. I've seen some of the gym spas. I heard it's insane over there. Khalil was talking about it. Khalil was telling me he went up the train over there years back, and he's like, I can't fucking do this. These guys are going hard every day. For zero dollars. Yeah, zero dollars. What do you get paid in glory? What do the best fighters get paid in glory? What is like...

I wasn't getting paid that much. What does Rico Verhoeven get paid to defend his heavyweight title? I think he probably gets more than most. He's still in glory, right? Yeah. Okay, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, I kind of fell off them after they robbed me off the fucking belt. I was just like, yeah, whatever. Oh, the Jason Willis fight? Yeah, after that I kind of fell off. I thought you won that fight too. Yeah, I know. It's one of those things. Look, I'm glad things happen the way they have in my career because it always gives me an opportunity to come back or rise again and showcase my spirit, my fighting spirit, not just in the cage but as a human being. So all the things that have happened to me in my career when it comes to losses or setbacks, I just go, cool.

Let's see what I can do next. Right. Yeah. Like even, look, the DDP fight, Spriggan fight. What's another one? Well, Pereira got that back. Yanwan, I feel like that was a side quest. I'm just kind of like, man, that's cool. And I never hold on to them. I never hold on like...

I need to get this. It's like, nah, this is fine. Like the Alex one, I was cool if that never happened. But then he decided to chase me and I was like, cool, let's do it. The Jan thing is a crazy situation, right? Because Jan goes to a split decision with Pereira. It's a great fight. It's a tough fight. He has that crazy fight with Ancaleta.

it goes to a draw. Yeah. And then no one's talking about him. Yeah. Everyone's talking about contenders in the light heavyweight division. Like, what about Jan Bohovic? Yeah. get him in now before he's too fucking old. Yeah. I think he's already in his 40s. Yeah. Early 40s. But I think he won the title that old. Yeah. Wasn't he like 39 or 40 when he won the title? He was. I'm trying to think. He,

I just feel like he's being disrespected. He's just not getting the attention. If you look at his performances, the guy's not had a bad performance. There's not one fight that was boring. There's not one fight where he wasn't...

trying to win he's not a wrestler right he's fighting top contenders he's fighting top guys yeah he's a fucking animal and he's out of the conversation like they're talking about Ankalayev fighting you know like oh Alex is avoiding Ankalayev so he takes Khalil

Al-Khalaev and Jan Bohovic went to a fucking draw. Like, what about that? Like, what about him? Yeah, maybe because he doesn't make as much noise because I don't really see him on there as much anymore. What does it say? Okay. Oh, he's supposed to fight Rakic, but he got a shoulder injury. Okay, he's hurt right now. Oh, shoulder surgery. But that was January, so that was 10 months ago. Maybe it's not back yet. Yeah, it must be. Well, that's about the amount of time, especially when you're –

dealing with shoulder injuries, man. Those fucking things take forever. Yeah, nah. Go see fucking what's-his-name Briggs. But yeah, I'm glad I got some today, though. Thank you for that. I actually feel better. Stem cells. Yeah. Not from the stem cells. I like them from the drip I got earlier. But yeah, the stem cells. The ones I had in my...

My ankle. Yeah, they worked. I went to Mexico. Yeah. It's a game changer. Yeah. It's a game changer. And we're getting fucked here in America where it's very difficult to get the same kind of treatment that you can get in Mexico and Panama. What they can do here is much more limited. Hopefully in the future, they'll release those limitations. But-

In America, you're dealing with a lot of corruption because orthopedic surgeons, pharmaceutical drug companies, they're going to lose a lot of money if they have stem cell treatments because there's so many different things that it could fix. Even Briggs was just talking about what he said on here, just going at them, and that went viral, which is good. I just told him, bro, put out a tweet and say, I will never, ever kill myself, ever. I think that's a smart thing to do.

Just put that tweet. When you start fucking with those guys, pharmaceutical companies, they'll find anything. Yeah, you get the plane crash. Whoopsie. Oh, how did that happen? Yeah. Fuck. There was one. What was the one for me? I put that tweet out one time because I kind of got a little paranoid. So I did this interview with Oscar Willis, right?

And I started talking about the whole... This is when Epstein just got arrested. And I was saying, like, well, Epstein just got arrested, right? And then Oscar goes, yeah, it's funny how the Johnny Depp and Amber Heard case is getting more attention than that. And I'm like, crazy, isn't it? So this Epstein guy just...

Sold kids or whatever traffic them to these rich oligarchs and whatnot. I was like what happened to them What happens to those people? Where's the list? Yeah, and then I didn't think anything of it But then it went viral and then every year since it goes viral at least twice or three times I'll see it just circulate again, and I'm just like oh fuck I Would and I'll say to get look was it I will never ever kill myself I've never even come close

I mean, we all think about it sometimes. Like when I was working this job, you just have like a passing fleeting thought like, oh, if I just jump over this bridge and hurt my leg, I don't have to work for the next six months because I hated my last job. But I would never, ever, ever, ever kill myself. I'm not that...

I'm not built that way. And I've been there before when, I think 2013, I realized, is this how people feel before they kill themselves? Like how sad they were? And I was like, man, that's sad. That just made me feel sad for those who actually go through with it. But yeah, anyway, I would never kill myself just in case. Well, there's enough people commenting on the Epstein case that I don't think you have to worry. But the people that are in...

the position to actually know the people's names on the list, those people are probably in trouble. Yeah. Because that's a crazy piece of information to have. And the fact is that, look. No one's been tried. No one's been brought, no one's been discussed. We know who went there. We know flight logs. No one talks about anything. There's no effort to prosecute. There's no effort. And then you have Ghislaine Maxwell, who's in jail for sex trafficking to who?

To who? That's what I'm saying. You have to have done it to someone, but there's no effort at all to uncover that. Yeah. But I'm saying now this year, it's kind of crazy how this year started off with, what's his name, Cat Williams on Shannon Sharp. He starts talking, spilling the tea, sipping the cognac. Yeah. And then now this whole P. Diddy thing. Sometimes you have to tell Diddy no. Oh, man. Bruh. Yeah. It's crazy. Oh, man.

Sean Diddy Combs alleged list of accomplishments to be revealed soon the names will shock you attorney says whoa I think he's gonna sing a I think I think he has to sing or he goes to jail for the rest of his life God protects me I'm so glad God protects me because look

If I got invited to the white party, I'd have gone. Especially if you didn't know. Of course. No one knew. No one knew. If you don't know, you're just a celebrity and you know, oh, Jennifer Lopez is going to be there. Oh, Rick Ross is going to be there. Everyone's going to be there. That would be a cool place. I want to meet those people. And I just want to be there having fun partying. But then they start to apparently, they said they were using...

I'm going to guess it's like ketamine because it said horse tranquilizer and they're putting in people's drinks and the champagne and then getting them all loose. Yeah. I'll tell you a secret. It's just us two, right? Yeah. After I knocked out Pereira in Miami...

We went to Tootsie's the next night, and they were like, yo, P. Diddy wasn't here watching your fight last night. I was like, wait, word? Crazy. And I went and I checked my DMs, and I saw, oh, shit, he hit me up. And he was talking about two months later, I want to do an interview or whatever. And I said, here's my manager's number. Bop, cool. Nothing ever came off it. But again, that's why I said, God be protecting me. Right, right.

Because who knows? Like, you never know. Oh, yeah, we're having this party later on. Yeah, that's cool. Cool, cool. And then they start to, like, you know, you find some chick, you pull on you, and then boom. Oh, how was that 15-year-old? Like, wait, what? Right. And you're filmed. Yeah. I heard about that, yeah. Allegedly. Yeah, all allegedly. Cameras all over the house. Oh, yeah.

A hundred. A thousand bottles of baby oil. Yeah. What? Nobody's that ashy, bro. A thousand. Also, by the way, that's shit lube.

Coconut oil is better. Fucking water-based lubricant. But baby oil is acidic as fuck. Johnson & Johnson's. Like, that's demonic, bro. Like, why would you use baby oil? Even if you're a fucking dude. Nah! You probably started out with it. That's all the bottles. Nah, that's AI. That's gotta be AI. I don't know if it's AI. I think that's real.

I think it was lube and baby oil. I think he had a variety of different substances. Who counted that? It was 1,000. Look at that. One, two, three bottles of baby oil. Imagine having 500 bottles. Five, six bottles of baby oil on the wall. Imagine having 500 bottles and go, we need to go for a fucking Target run. Nah.

man. Oh, the fact that said it was fucking, what do you call it? Costco and Costco goes now we don't sell that shit. What is this? Defaced AR 15s. Interesting. What does that mean? Does that mean they scratched the serial numbers off? Yeah. Whoa, that's a serious crime. Yeah, that's a serious crime. But again, see, he's in cahoots with Epstein. And then is he in cahoots with, was he in cahoots with Epstein or was it just a similar type of an operation? They were friends. Really? Yeah. Cause Epstein had a fucking, you know, uh,

On Miami as well. That really private, rich estate in Miami. So they were all in cahoots as well. But...

Again, I think he's going to sing. Isn't it crazy? That was always the conspiracy theory, tinfoil hat thing. Oh, there's a place where the elites go to fuck underage kids. You're like, what? What's his name? Alex Jones. Alex Jones. He was right. He was right. He was right about a lot of things. Almost everything. Yeah, most. About almost everything. Fucked up that one. But almost everything else, he was right. But you've got to realize that that guy had been uncovering real conspiracies all

that the media had not covered for fucking decades. And he was literally having like a psychotic break because of it, because he's just drinking all the time and dealing with the stress. How would you even Kanye? Imagine you trying to tell people something. Right. And then no one believes you and they call you crazy. I go crazy just trying to explain to people, even,

I can imagine the frustration, the frustration of trying to explain to someone. And you're like, no, this is really happening. And they're like, yeah, whatever, you're this and that. And I went down the rabbit hole in 2020. I'll tell you, I did. I had to. And for me, it was just like I could see the fuckery. Look, this is the mark of the immigrant. It's right here. If you look at any immigrant, it's just like that little dot. It's a keloid. It's from a vaccine we all had.

As kids all over Africa, I can't remember what it was for. So I'm not opposed to vaccines. But when someone's trying to force you or coerce you or whatever into taking something that, you know, something just doesn't feel right about it. You know what I mean? But again, I grew up in Nigeria. I know how corruption works. Right. So, I mean, I'm a law-abiding citizen. Right.

You know what I'm saying? I did my part. Whatever. But still, I just knew something was afoot. So I, yeah, I did my part. I played the game because it's all a game. I got offered different ways to play the game, but I was like, I'll find my own way. And I did. So,

Yeah, stay pure, which is good. Yeah. This whole thing was just money. It was just they were trying to convince everybody they needed a vaccine because they wanted to make enormous amounts of money, and they pulled it off. And then now, with all the information that's come out, all the deaths, I saw that show, Die Suddenly or whatever. Yes. And you see the blood clots from the same time that the vaccine got pushed. Excuse me. And then everyone just goes, ah.

Oh, well, carry on with my dad. It's like, again, I'm frustrated in a sense, but I don't say it because I'm like, we fucking told you. Yes. But then...

I don't need an apology. No one needs an apology, but it's kind of like everyone just, oh, well, I guess that's that. And then carry on with their fucking life. I was talking to a dude last night who's a veteran who was telling me that the hospital where these veterans get treated, they literally told him we are not allowed to make a connection with any of these adverse side effects to the vaccine. Yeah.

Even ones that are listed as vaccine side effects, they're not allowed to make that connection because they mandated the vaccine. Yeah. And this is the real problem. The reason why all these corporations and all these people don't want to talk about it is because they mandated their employees to get vaccinated. Yeah. So even though there's no liability for the vaccine manufacturers because they're exempt, which is part of the problem why they fucking propose all these things anyway. Hmm.

But then you're not allowed to make the connection with the problem these people are having and the fact that they got vaccinated two, three times. You're not even allowed to say that this might have been the cause of it. They're not even allowed to...

bring up that connection. So they have to just treat whatever this side effect of the vaccine is without talking at all about the vaccine and not give any connection to it. Isn't that funny? It's through the looking glass. Yeah. It's like we're living in the matrix, man. It really is. It's like there's complete mind control. And the idea of mind control is like, no, mind control is not real. Of course it's real. It happens. I've seen it. So many bots, bro. Like sometimes I move through life and I feel like, look, we are all born

like as players in this game but everyone gets kind of programmed through so you know schooling or whatever education system society and then they just become bots and i can see it as well i can because when i was bringing it up and i'd say something when people i really love and trust sometimes and they did instantly what they call it uh agent smith syndrome and they decide no actually this and that right right right i might

But you know why that is? Because they got vaccinated and they told people to get vaccinated and they don't want to believe they made the bad decision and they don't want to believe they coerced other people into making a bad decision. So they want to come up with all sorts of reasons why all these health problems...

And then the overall all-cause mortality increase, which is through the roof. In some age brackets, it's 40% increase in all-cause mortality, strokes, cancer, heart attacks. All these things have gone through the roof.

No one is making a connection. It must be just, you know, the food people are eating. Yeah. Who just ignore it. It's just money. Even some people that did get it, they tell me they regret getting it. Yeah, most people. So many times they say, I regret getting it, but I had to because if not, my job was going to fire me. Then I had to. And the fucking gaslighting thing, our former fucking...

Prime Minister, she did. Oh, I don't believe we coerced anyone into getting it. I don't. Yeah. And you just, I'm like, bitch, you literally said if you can't, if you don't get this, you can't go grocery shopping. Yeah. Can't go to restaurants. You can't do that. Can't work. So your livelihood gone. But then we didn't, I don't think we forced anyone. We didn't force your hand. Like when people do, that's the ultimate form of gaslighting. You're just like.

In our face. The pressure was incredible. The pressure was incredible. And, you know, I felt it in the weirdest way because I saw people lying about me on CNN. I was like, this is crazy. Or the horse tranquilizer thing. Yeah, it was horse dewormer. They changed the color of my face. They made me look yellow and sick on television. I'm like, if you do that to me, and by the way, no one's going to know.

No one gave a fuck that I got better real quick. That was the craziest part about it. Isn't this supposed to be about recovering from a disease? Here you got a guy who's recovered in three days and is telling you all the shit he took. And you're lying. You still try to like superimpose that sepia kind of filter over you. The one that got me. So because we still travel during 2020. I did four of those MIQ quarantines.

The one where you go back to your own country and then you have to quarantine in a hotel for two weeks before you get let back into society. My coach usually did nine. A lot of those. He even told me Israel, that last one. Luckily, the last one, he was able to do it in his house, but then his family had to go live somewhere else for two weeks. He was just grateful he had it in his house. My last one, I remember I went outside for...

our fucking daily outside for what 40 minutes or whatever sometimes we get shipped onto the playpen on a bus like prisoners or whatever and then i remember everyone's doing these circles just walking in a circle and i almost did a full circle one time and i was like what the fuck am i doing and then i went back into my room and i stayed in my room for the remaining uh 11 days because i just felt like this was too much and then also the one that got me was

Third one, this lady had a kid and she may be paraplegic or whatever. She had a neurological disease. And then the kid had a seizure while the mom was having to smoke somewhere. The kid had a seizure. And one of the guys went and helped the mom with the kid. And the officer that helped the mom with the kid, they put him in quarantine for three days because he didn't have the correct PPE gear on. So that let me know this isn't about...

looking after people. It's about punishing this guy for disobeying the law because he didn't have it. So wait, oh, someone's having a seizure. Hold up, miss. Let me go put on this fucking overall and tape my gloves on this. While this kid's dying. Exactly. And they punished him for that. So that let me know, like, okay, this is fuckery. This is a foot. Well, I remember when Dan Hooker had fought over here and then there was a picture of him being on the side of a fence looking at his daughter. Oh, yeah. It was heartbreaking. He couldn't. Yeah.

couldn't see his daughter for like two weeks eugene had the same thing he had a newborn at the time so i have a picture of him with his wife and his son on the other side as well and then you're just separating families all that kind of stuff look i i like my alone time i love i might seem like a social butterfly and i am i can do both but i love my alone time and i like being inside but when you have too much alone time that's bad i didn't like that because then you start to go in your head with all these other things

I mean, I didn't go crazy, but I was dancing on the edge. Well, that was a lot of things. I enjoyed it. People on Twitter lost their fucking mind because they were on Twitter all day long, locked in their house during quarantine for months and months at a time, just literally getting mentally ill, just reading Twitter and attacking people and then blaming all these people that are unvaccinated on all the problems of the world. They just put us against each other. Yeah. Constantly.

I just hope people don't do that again. I hope people realize like, hey, that was no one benefited from that. No one got better. No, it didn't help anybody survive. It was all bullshit. I hope there's another lockdown. But just for like a month, I think. OK, look.

Every year, at least for two weeks or even some places maybe a month, just shut everything down, everyone go. It was good. You get to spend time with your family or the people you live with and realize, do I fuck with these people or do I not? And then also build relationships and relationships, things like that. The whole world got better. The fucking ocean got cleaner. So I think it's good. Lockdown was good for that when it was like, okay.

But not for extended periods like six months or whatever. That was crazy. It's terrible for the economy. Even a lockdown for a month is terrible for the economy. How so? It takes a long time to recover. Oh, true. When everything seizes and you're not getting any packages in. Like right now there's a Teamsters and Longshoremen strike in America, which means all the docks, all the shipments are coming in. No one's moving nothing. Everything's locked down. I think it's still on Amazon just for two weeks. No, no, no, no, no, no. Damn, really? Eventually that's all going to lock down. Oh.

Eventually, there's going to be nothing. If these guys keep going, it's going to cripple the economy. Okay. Right now, it's only been a couple of days, but...

The head of the Longshoremen's Union was talking about what effect it's going to have. And he basically said, I will crush you. Why are they doing that? Because they want more money. Okay. They feel like they have a more valuable position than they're being compensated for. And this is the best way they can negotiate. You guys need to understand how valuable we are to your society. You take us for granted. You don't want to give us what's fair. And so we're going to fuck you. Sure. And they haven't had a lockdown like that since 1977. 50 years apparently. Yeah. Damn.

Damn. Like I said, it's a real one. It's a real one. It's a scary one, too, because they have an immense power and they haven't flexed it before. And they're flexing it now. And they're flexing it like right before an election, which is who knows what kind of effect that's going to have. Because if the economy tanks because of that and they can blame Biden and Kamala Harris, you know, it could it could get crazy. Yeah.

We'll see. When did that start? A week ago, two weeks ago? A couple days ago. Oh, really? I think it was October 1st. Shit. Yeah. Interesting. I always like it when... Look, I love America, but I like watching it from New Zealand. When I come here, I love the food, the fucking Shake Shack, just delicious. Last night, it took so long for this...

a burger or something Austin to get to our hotel but then when it got there we just smashed like all these smash burgers I ate three of them so good and I go back home and I eat clean and I get my body right again but here I love it even though when Trump won I was stuck here for in San Diego for about eight weeks that's when I went to Atos Jiu Jitsu and I got really really good at Jiu Jitsu for a while um

Me and my teammates, we just thought like when Trump wins, we need to have food for four days because it's going to be fucking crazy. Because from where we are in New Zealand, the camera only shows you this. So Trump wins. We're looking outside like, okay, safe, cool. Nothing's really happening. We see Trump flags on someone's lawn, Biden or whatever on someone's lawn still. It's fine. But then someone explained to me that even the Capitol riots when –

And DC, they face the cameras this way. If you just turn the cameras this way, you'll see the rest of the street just normal. So from New Zealand, when we see what's happening here, it's just the biggest, craziest sitcom. And again, like I said, I love America, but I like watching it from New Zealand. But I do enjoy being here. But again, watching it from New Zealand, we have our own chaos to deal with, but this one is just juicy. It's a different kind of chaos. The whole world's watching. That's what's different because America is such a weird country that the whole world is watching when we have elections. Even, look,

Trump just got almost assassinated. Twice. Twice? Twice. What? There was a second assassination attempt. Yeah, there was a guy who got caught with an AK-47. He was hiding in the bushes for 12 hours, got in a shootout with the Secret Service. I missed all this. Yeah, because they took it in and out of the news in like a heartbeat. Wait, there was a shootout? No, the Secret Service shot at him. He fled. Oh, my God.

I don't think he shot at the Secret Service. He fled, and then they caught him. Was this before or after the one you go? After. After. Okay, I see. So this is a guy who's a real lunatic. He went over Ukraine to fight for the Ukraine forces. It's a crazy person. Okay. And this guy was somehow or another armed to the tits, even though it's illegal for him to be carrying a gun. He's a convicted felon, and he almost assassinated Trump, and it was...

out of the news cycle in a couple of days. I missed that completely. I didn't even know about it. That's just news to me. Bro, they gloss over it. They don't give a fuck. But again, how do you gloss over that? They just do. The one when he got shot and he just turned his ear. Crazy. There's so many things fucked up with that. You know why? I mean, I'm sure you've already talked about this with other people, but it's just the fact that it's just...

They apparently saw him on the roof for, what, nine minutes or something beforehand and just watched him. So many things. Everything's wrong with that one. Yeah. Everything's wrong. It wasn't really Secret Service. A lot of those are Homeland Security. The lady with the gun that she kept on. Fumbling with the gun. Yeah.

Full panic. Yeah, the whole thing was madness and the fact that that went out of the news cycle real quickly, too Nobody cares about the fact they almost killed that guy. It's about the debate It's about the day and they went right back to calling him a threat to democracy a threat to our society And like hey, who is that kid? How did he die? What happened there? How did he get a hold of those detonators? How did his apartment get? completely professionally scrubbed

When they went to that kid's house, there was no silverware. His house was professionally scrubbed. And he lived by himself. Isn't he a teenager? 20 years old. Meanwhile, he was in a BlackRock commercial. BlackRock the company? Yeah, he was in a BlackRock commercial. Okay.

And then, yeah, dude, there's so much to that story. And here's the thing. If he kills Trump and then they kill him, who knows? It's all lost. It's all in the wind. Oh, lone shooter, crazy person. Unfortunately, got a hold of Trump. You know what we need to do? Take everyone's guns. This gun violence is a real problem in this country. You know, it's also a problem...

Mind control? Like, what did you do to that kid? What drugs was he on? No toxicology examination. They burned his body in 10 days. Really? FBI took a hold of his body. So they didn't even bury him? No, they fucking cremated his ass. Fuck.

See, this is what I like. I just get the popcorn. I just go, yeah. It's nuts. It's crazy. Because he would have been Lee Harvey Oswald, too. I mean, just like Lee Harvey Oswald allegedly shoots JFK, Jack Ruby walks up to him, bam, shoots him. He's dead. What happened? Who knows? That's the whole magic bullet theory. Again, I've gone down that rabbit hole to a point where I saw that it might have been the driver. No.

No? Nah. Okay. So is that clip AI? Yeah, that's bullshit. Multiple shooters for sure. Most likely people in the grassy knoll and most likely probably somebody from where Oswald was as well. It might even have been Oswald. Oswald might have taken a shot as well. Fuck, I saw this video. See, this is the thing. You can't trust shit these days. No. Bro, I swear next year,

Think next year it'll be the when it's like you have to really know what you're watching I'll have to question everything because now it's fingers text I can kind of oh, that's a bullshit and also there's a little texture there's a texture with the AI videos and I'm like that's AI for now. Yeah next year Yeah, I got a piss. Let's take a leak real quick. No, right back. Yeah, I'll take a piss as well my documentary

Great. So we're talking about what we're talking about before. Oh, we just went on a tangent about fucking chemtrails and shit. No, but I was just telling Jamie about my documentary. I said, like, you should watch it as well. So even if it wasn't about me, I'd still recommend it because it was a well-made, not so sporty, sporty films. Like one of the best pictures I got sent was this lady knitting on a plane and then watching it.

And I thought that was like an old lady, not her demographic watching MMA. She's watching me through the documentary knitting because it was something that it was different. When did they start filming this? They came on board in 2018. We started talking and then they came on board with their cameras. But Jeff St. Leo, who is my videographer, works for Zuck now.

Literally does everything but yeah, he had a lot of behind-the-scenes footage and we just put all together talking about my kind of rise in this game But also dealing with the I guess the pressures of all this, you know, cuz no one there's no book on how to be famous Right. I had to learn this on my own. I had to learn this myself What was the most difficult part of it for you for me? I think people I just didn't expect that I knew I wanted to be

When you grow up, you think, I want to be rich and famous. Like, you know, the MTV Cribs era. Right. The Pimp My Ride era. I thought, yo, when I'm rich, I'm going to have seven cars, one for every day of the week. I'm going to have this many houses, have real estate now differently. But also, I only need two cars. Like, there's all these other stuff that comes through also. Yeah.

I'm not a car person like you. I just like Hot Wheels. But I can buy one of them. Don't you have the McLaren, though? Yeah, that's what I'm saying. My best reaction when I wrapped it was, I love seeing little boys be like, when they see it, yeah, but now put it back to black and I'm going to do something different to it later on with some airbrushing. Not me, my guy, Matty Bro. But yeah, it was just people. There's even a bit in this documentary where they were just filming one day and then these kids are like,

They just drove by my house and they beeped the horn. It kind of gave me a fright and they came to my door and then the camera was filming. So it's in the documentary and I explained to them, oh, that's cool. Let's take a photo. But then it got to a point where it'd be like 9 p.m., 10 p.m. And then

Yeah. Oh, a starbender home. Because my house, my front door was accessible to the street. That was my first house I ever bought. Now, David lives there. That's his home. And I live in this fucking complex that has a gate and a code. So if you have to get to my front door, you have to be there. And yeah, just dealing with people was the main thing for me because I didn't expect the attention I was getting. I was expecting it. But I guess the variable of...

the unknown so yeah i just had to learn how to protect my energy and protect my some boundaries you know what i mean like today after lunch excuse me i i'd say yes to photos but if i feel like say i'm at the airport if i say yes to you've had this before we say yes to one and people are like oh he's taking photos and it becomes like a zombie apocalypse and i'm like yo i gotta go somewhere so if i tell someone like you know

I can't right now. If I say yes to you, I got to say, oh, please just one. And I'm like, it's not just one. Right. You don't understand. Yeah. And then I'm the asshole. And I love my fans. I love people who actually support me. And I try and make time for them. But then also I have to make time for me. Yeah. Because I've been there before where it's pretty much I'm just there. And then on my turn, my turn. I'm like, bro, I'm not even having fun. I don't even have kids yet. But when I have kids, that's when I'm going to be like.

Yeah, my youngest daughter won't have it. She grabbed me and dragged me away. Good. Like when people try to take photographs. She hates it. Good. My middle daughter, it doesn't bother her that much, but the youngest daughter, she gets fucking angled. They're stealing my daddy's attention from me. Thank you. Yeah. For me, even if I...

If I go on a date or whatever and someone sees me and tries to take a photo, I just go, I'm on her time right now. You have to ask her. Or if I'm with my family, I just say no. Especially when you're sitting down having dinner. That's crazy. When they come up to the table, like, come on, man, get the fuck out of here. I think it's social awareness, this day and age, and everyone. And you know what? It's funny. I can feel it coming once they see me because they look like they're about to pull out a gun.

Right. That's what it feels like every time they do it. I'm just like and I say yes to most of it. But there's times I'll say no. So that would be I say that the most difficult thing so far was just dealing with people. But again, I do like people, but also I don't like some people. Some people just so entitled, entitled. They just come up at you and it's just like I feel like you owe them something because they know who you are.

I'm like, you're not even a fan. Sometimes it's this thing where they just see people taking photos. I want a photo, too. Right. You don't even know what I do. I'm like, oh, can I get one, please? Who are you? Yeah. Oh, yeah. I love that. You know why? I like it when someone doesn't genuinely know who I am. But when they, oh, I'm sorry. I don't know you. It's okay. My name's Israel because I got to meet them on a first name basis. Right.

But one of the best ones and the best replies I gave one time was these three chicks or two guys, they were just, you know, oh, my God, fan, fan, fan. And one of them was like, excuse me, but who are you? I was like, I'm no one. It's always a girl. Yeah. And then she came back again like three more times. She's like, excuse me, but who are you? I don't even know who you are. And I was like, bitch, I don't know who you are. And then her face was just like...

And I just left it alone. But again, I prefer meeting people on a first name basis. Right. It makes me feel like I get to know you and you get to know me without some preconceived notion of what you've seen on TV or YouTube. Yeah. Yeah. I love when someone doesn't know who I am now. Me too. Now it's nice. Now I can have a regular conversation with someone. You know, like, what do you do?

You're like, I'm a comedian. Oh, have you ever been on television? Yeah. A couple of times. Oh, I'll look out for you. Okay, good. No, I like those. Yeah, easy. It's just two people talking to each other. It's real. I like what you said, protect your energy. Because that's really what it is. Because if you give up your energy to everyone, you will get lost. Yeah. You will get lost. I learned that the week before the Robert Whitaker fight in Melbourne. So I had this epiphany.

And then did the fight, did well. And again, you know how I told you after my UFC debut, it was all this attention and stimulus. And when I went home, boom. Right. And for like a month, I just felt sad. And I'm thinking like, nothing's wrong. I'm so fucking, like, I should be happy. I should be happy. Right. And that's when I started going to therapy. But then I learned through the techniques and tools I've got from that how to protect myself. So before the rub fight...

I felt the same thing again because my girl at the time had to drag me away from the after party because I hid in the after party. I hid in the toilet. I had a drink. Jesus Christ. Put all the seats down, just sat there. And she's like, where are you? So I just sent her a text and she's like, nah, I'm coming to grab you. So we went to go get ramen somewhere.

And then at the hotel before I flew out, I just put out something in my story saying, look, guys, I appreciate the love and all that. If you see me, you can come say what's up. But if you come yelling at me, I'm just going to walk away. It's the yelling thing. And I think that's learned behavior. They say, oh, my God. Yeah. Joe Rogan. I'm a huge fan. I've loved you since this. I've watched you since this. And it's the same, like, bot responses. Yeah. NPC responses. And they're yelling. But if someone just comes up like...

Hey, man, I'm a big fan. Do you mind if I take a pic? Cool, let's go. And they make it quick. They're ready. They're not going, oh, excuse me. What are you doing here? I'm just like, yo, don't hold me hostage. Let's just go. Like, take the picture. I like those. But if we have a genuine connection and I vibe with someone and we end up talking for like five minutes, even better. But you can't try and facilitate that. But yeah, it's when people come. And then they hang around and then they won't leave.

Yeah. And I'm just, don't hold me hostage with your conversation. Do you remember the first time you met a famous person? You. I did something real silly. You will remember this. And I, this is another one of those things. I can tell you now because we're boys. But,

I met you at UFC 192 when Dan fought Yair, and I met you backstage at the weigh-ins, and then I came to say what's up, and then I did fucking bot shit, bro. Then I was like, bro, do you remember my friend Chris? He took a photo with you, and it's a video, huh? And you're like, yeah, a lot of people do that. And I was like, oh, yeah, let's take this picture. And then for the next, like, five hours,

idiot, idiot. Why'd you say that? And I just felt cringe. I got over it eventually. But again, it's one of those things that you learn. Yeah. Certain things I learned, even with Snoop one time at Staples Center, when it was a Staples Center, I ended up smoking with him, but then I filmed it. And then afterwards, I remember thinking like, why did you do that? Like, you should have just enjoyed the fucking moment. Right. And I cringe at myself when I like, I'm like, oh,

who doesn't want to fucking smoke with Snoop Dogg? Right. But why did I have to film it so I can show people? I don't even think I, did I post it? I did post it. Yeah, of course I posted it. But again, it's one of those things I learned now. So there's people I've met, places I've been now that I just, I enjoyed the experience and it is what it is. I don't need a photo. Right. It's in here. I've taken snapshots. Well, but you've had those experiences. That's where I give people grace when they're first meeting me. It's like,

I get it. I remember the first time I met someone famous. It's weird. Yeah. It's a weird feeling. You don't remember that one, do you? I don't. Good. For the next five hours up to the next day, I think the fight's here. The next day, I was just like, okay. Then I kind of got over it. And I just think. And I told Chris when I went home. I was like, yeah, I told him about that. And I felt so stupid. But I know now it's better because when I meet people I really appreciate, I don't.

geek out or whatnot even if it's not I'm just like yo that's that person I kind of bird watch them and if they recognize me one of the coolest ones was Eminem in Saudi Arabia because everyone was trying to get a photo and then my my guy Ike security just goes hey Em Israel would like to take a photo he goes oh yo what's up and he came and took a photo with me and I out of everyone he like he let me take a photo with him so I was like yeah I felt cool because it's Eminem you know what I mean so things like that I'll appreciate and certain moments like that I appreciate but I don't

I don't force it. I don't try and facilitate it. I just let it be. I just let it be. And if I get it, cool. And I don't need it. That's the thing. You don't need to take a photo for everything. Just enjoy the moment. Just enjoy the moment. Enjoy the interaction. Enjoy the energy. But I understand the weirdness of meeting someone famous because I do remember it. It's an odd feeling. You don't know what to do. You feel weird. You say dumb things. You don't know why you're saying them. And then you're like, what did I just do? I'm better now. The coolest one I think I had was Trump.

Where was this? Vegas at the fights. I haven't even... The clip was one of the UFC's thing.

documentaries. And I saw him, I was like, oh, yo, America's Last Hope, what's up? I dapped him up. And Dana's there just smiling. And then we're talking. We just dapping up and talking. And then he's like, enjoy your fight, this and that. And it wasn't weird because, again, I can understand. Like, I'm meant to be here now. Right. Sometimes I get imposter syndrome. Sometimes it still creeps in. I don't know if you still get it. It still creeps in, but I know how to identify it now. And I go, right, I'm going to shut it down. Like any emotion, but...

Yeah, that was one of the cooler ones I had where I was like, okay, I handled myself well. I wasn't an idiot. And many other ones. But yeah, the ones... And there will be more. I used to get imposter syndrome so bad. Yeah? Where I'd meet people, I'd be like, I can't believe you know who I am. I gotta hide. You shouldn't know who I am. I know who you are. You should know me. I'm a fucking loser. I felt that a little bit yesterday. What?

I went to the mothership a little bit, but again, you watch it on YouTube all the time. You're like, oh my God, me and my wife's like, we're here. This is cool. And then only for a little bit, but I realized I meant to be here because everyone's standing around me. I'm kind of having to hold court, but I kind of just want to shut up and just be like, this is cool. Just enjoy. Yeah. But everyone's around me and I was just cool. And Ari was the man, bro. He's just such a, he's a funny dude. So tall and talking about kickboxing with him.

And, yeah, I'll probably head there tonight, see what's up, and I'll try and not geek out so much. Yeah. Play it cool. Play it cool. Yeah. That's a fun place. We have so many people roll through it, too. It's so interesting. Like, all of a sudden, Jelly Roll's there. Yeah. Now, you guys did it, man. Like, you literally, I think it was at Ron White that kind of started the...

you know the idea and then all of you started to just march to austin one by yeah he came here before the pandemic yeah and he was the one who put it in my head because you know rams i love it here it's easy to travel it's like this country it's beautiful place no traffic people are nice

I just came back from L.A., so the contrast is definitely, you can see it. Oh, it's so much better here. And it's better for comedy. It's just because it's the only club in the country that's owned by a comedian. So it's free. It's like you can be yourself. There's no executives or producers. Yeah, it's just me. I don't even have any partners. It's just me. Excuse me? When you say that, you mean like, do people have to pay...

Other comedy clubs to perform there only when you are very very beginning and it's corrupt comedy clubs that you really pay for stage time Yeah, that's that's not normal. That's something taking advantage of Amateurs so they can make extra money so they could justify open mic nights and stuff like that But that's not a lot of clubs

Most clubs, you know, you have amateur nights. They all should have it, but we have two nights. We have two nights of open mic nights. So we just want to make it a real place where people can develop. Yeah. From the very beginning, you could do your first set on stage ever at the Mothership and eventually headline there someday. I've seen it. Cam Patterson, some of these guys, they start there and now they just...

Killing it. Yeah. Hard work. Hard work. Just grinding the kids in that club every fucking night. And he's traveling all over the place, all over town, doing different clubs, going on the road. He's making the most of the experience. And for someone like me, just a fan of comedy in general, it's fun to see the process of them starting up.

And then, because I used to listen to Kill Tony, my old job, just so I didn't go postal. I'd just like sit there with my headphones in and the hoodie on just to hide it so they don't know I'm doing it. I'm just like, and then now to see where it's become. And then, you know, where on the street is it coming up? And I'm like, oh shit. So it's going to be on there and then it's going to be even bigger. You know what I mean? It's fun to see that. And I've seen a lot of comics like,

Just grow. And then seeing their sets develop, all that kind of thing. And look, I know how hard it is now just watching that. Because you think, oh, I've made a joke before. I can do it. Nah. And seeing people bomb on Kill Tony after just 60 seconds, I'm just like, yeah, nah, fuck all that. I'd fight in front of millions of people with the stand in front of a crowd and try and make them laugh.

Just that, yeah. It's a weird kind of rejection. Thank you. That's what it is. It's a terrible feeling. It's like, oh, shit, that didn't land. Escape, escape, escape. You can't do shit. It's just like, nah, fuck this shit. But you also see other people can do it, so you got to figure out a way to do it. And that's part of the challenge of it all. It's why it's so exciting to succeed. Yeah, I'll leave that to you guys, the expert. It's hard, but it's also fun. I mean, it's the most fun thing to do for a living. Yeah.

And you could do it forever. All the time. You don't have to rely on your body being fit enough to do it. Fighting is so unique because there's a small window. You have from 18 to maybe 38 if you're lucky. Or you could be a Yoel Romero and compete deep into your 40s. But he's the rarest of the rare. Or Bernard Hopkins, world championship level at 50. Crazy.

But those are the outliers. For most people, there's a small window. Make the most of it. And in MMA, that window's the smallest. Yeah. It's the smallest of all the combat sports. That even make it to the top. Yeah, man. God, think about how many guys have an amateur fight versus how many guys make it to just a world title fight. Just to fight for a world title. Forget about defending the world title. What you've done is the rarest of the rarest of the rare and then win it back again.

You know, it's so rare. Yeah. I've seen people throughout the walks of life and gyms I've trained at that I'm like,

I think you're better than me. But they just never made it. They never got the experience or the exposure. Also, when the lights are on, they shut down. Yeah. And they don't show up. And I'm like, you're better than this. But again... Gym champions. Yeah. Yeah, that's a real thing, man. With people that perform so well with no pressure. And then when that pressure's on, they're like 30% of what they are. You see them make the mental mistakes. You see them rush in. And it's weird. It takes...

skill to learn how to perform under the lights, but also you have to have that thing. Like, you have to know you're that guy or you have to have that belief in yourself. So, again, I'm glad I've done it and I'm glad I'm doing it, but now I'm just like, I just want to fight. I just want to fight, have fun. And again, it's weird. Like, I just know that fucking gold belt always circles back around. I don't chase it, never have, and I knew it would always be there at some point. But yeah, it will. And in the moment, bro...

If I'm not happy with what I've done in this game, what's going to make me happy? Right. Right. How could you be? Exactly. Exactly. I mean, think about how many times you defended the title, you won the title, you beat the greatest guys of your generation. How could you not be happy with what you've done already? But I still feel great. And again, you know when fighters talk about, I lost the belt, I felt this pressure lifted, whatever. I never felt that when I lost it in MSG. I was just like, I'm going to fight this guy again. And I got it back. But no.

But then when I lost it, not to Strickland, but even this last one is the only time when I was just like, I wasn't a champ, I guess. But this last fight was the first time I felt that like, well, but I still feel like I'm that guy because a lot of people still have that target on my back because I'm Israel Adesanya. But having to fight for the belt, having to fight with that thing, I don't know. This is the first time I've ever felt that where I'm like, meh.

I'm good. So I'm just going to see what happens. Train, get better, and fight again at some point. Just concentrate on the task instead of this whole thing of the titles. Yeah. Because I feel like when you have the title, there's spotlight on you. There still is a spotlight on me, but it's not the same thing. And now I get to enjoy a little bit more freedom in a sense. Well, I've heard fighters talk about it heaps. So again, for me, I never felt it.

Till recently that I'm like, oh, I get what they mean now when they talk about the pressure. Pressure is still there, but it's not the same. And I'm like, cool. I get to just fight for me now. I get to have fun. Yeah. Just I want to try some crazy shit. Like I actually want to fight and just do some. I want to go back to the way I used to fight when we didn't have so much on our line. Because it's not just about me. It's about the people that are around me that, you know, I have to not have to. But, you know, like if I do good, everybody eats, right?

You know what I mean? So now that we still do good, we still eat. But it's like, ah, fuck the belt. We'll just have fun. So I just want to go back to having fun. The way I used to fight when I was a young fucking schizo fritterer who just did shit for fun. Like the fucking Tavares fight. End of round one, I'm like, I'm going to try a Minari roll. See what that does. And I kind of missed it.

But yeah, I'm gonna bring that back. I kind of want to do that that kind of shit again just cuz so do you think that like as the stakes are higher the pressure is more and it just restricts your creativity restricts your ability to just be loose it didn't at first what the longer you defend the belt it happens the Anderson as well it Happened to Anderson as well I saw it because I watched Anderson's rise and I saw them even to the point where people wanted him to lose and

Just because it was so great. And then it's just that natural thing where people build you up because they want to tear you down. And I felt that happen to me as well. They're like, oh, we just want to see him lose. And when it happened, they're like, yeah. And then when I won it again, it was like, yeah. And I lost it. They're like, yeah. So it's just natural. It's natural way of, I don't know, the mob...

humans or whatever, the fans. It's just how it is, the coliseum. Well, there's always a bunch of people that don't like that you've accomplished something they will never accomplish. Oh, there's always them. Yeah. And so they do want to watch you fall because it makes them feel better about their lack of success. What did Dave say? Someone rejoices when a great man falls. Yeah. It was a great quote he had in one of his specials. The cowards. Yeah. That's the truth. Yeah, facts. I've seen it. I've even felt it as well. Like when you're just like

I wonder what would happen if he loses. Like, it would just shake the whole landscape of things up. So you just wonder. Like, I felt it, I think, with Floyd. I just wonder, not that I wanted him to lose, because I'm a big Floyd fan, but I was just like, what would happen if he lost this fight? And like, oh, shit. But that's what makes it exciting. You never know, you know? But, yeah, anyway, I'm just here now, and I'm just like, cool, let's have fun. Let's fight. Let's just get some, you know, some good matchups. But, again, I'm in a spot now that you've got,

Rob comes out fighting. DDP and Sean are going to fight. And I can't think of who else. Is DDP and Sean set in stone? I think it's not set in stone, but it's what they're looking at. When is that supposed to take place? Next year sometime, but I'm trying to get something in this year. So we'll see. There's already a few call-outs here and there. Like who? The guy that just won in France. I forget his name. Not the main event. Imanov.

Yeah, he said something and I'm like, we'll see. It'll be a good fight. It'll be fun. But again, what has he done? He beat Brandon Allen. And is that five round worthy? Because I'm never doing three rounds again. All my fights are probably going to be five. If I ever do a three round again, fuck, let's go. Would you want to?

Because, like, there's some three-rounders that I feel like we got robbed that it wasn't a five-rounder. Like, Saryukian and Charles Oliveira. That was a good example of that. Scrap. That was a scrap. Such a crazy five. I was there live as well. Oliveira almost caught him a couple times with submissions. He went flat at that point. Yeah, man. And lost a controversial decision, like, very close decision. And then I feel like you give him two more rounds, who knows what would happen. Another one was...

Hamzat and Kamaru. Oh, yeah. That third round, Kamaru was coming on strong. Off the couch as well. Yeah, off the couch. 10 days notice. Crazy. Fighting at 85, 170-pound champion, right off the title loss, and then, you know, third round he wins, and you're like, God, what would have happened fourth and fifth? Yeah, that's when some people come alive. Especially champions. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I can't do five, but again, I say three, I just feel like I would fight like

Like a bat out of hell. I just feel like it would be different. But again, it's not even...

I do enjoy the time in the cage, but even training for five-round fights, a lot of people train for three-round fights, but they don't understand. Everyone wants to be champion, so you got to train for five rounds, and it's like, oh, shit, you got to do this shit. You have five rounds of the spider circuit. Oh, shit, that's where you find out the men from the boys. You separate. So, yeah, I do like a five-round fight, and also you don't get paid by the round, so sometimes fights end like that. So, yeah, that's up to you.

So do you have a timeline of when you would like to fight again, how many fights you would like to have? Because I know you're 35 now. How long do you think you're going to do this? I don't know. Like I said, I thought I would be 34 and I'm done with this. I always just thought like, yeah, when I'm 34, I'm done. But then I'm here now and I feel great. So I'm like, let's see. Three more years, who knows? Who knows? Fucking kid might come out of nowhere. I'm like, oh, shit, I'm done with this game.

Is there any fights that, like, Strickland that you'd like to do again? Oh, yeah. Strickland and DDP. Strickland won definitely because that fight was not me. And, again, I don't make excuses. It was just another Dave Chappelle quote. You have to realize when it's your time. He's such a fucking philosopher with it. He said something about, like, when it's your time, you have to know and be humble enough to know when it's someone else's. You know what I mean? That was just his week. That was just his and everything. So I just...

you know, his time let him have it. But I definitely know what I can do. And I took his best shots and I just know like, yeah, I can take this guy. I know what I can do. I'm not similar to the Pereira one where I, you know, I was winning, but this one, I definitely know what I can do with this guy.

Yeah. So it was that one shot that cracked you in that first round that changed the whole momentum of that fight. Yeah. Straight punches, looping on linear punches. He caught me good. And in the moment, I remember thinking like,

Oh, shit, this nigga's hitting me. Oh, shit, he's hitting me. And I went to Mark Goddard, like, you see the picture, like, I'm okay. And then even he told me my next fight with DDP is like, don't do that. Don't have to do that. You just have to find a way out. But it was hitting me, and I was thinking, like, oh, shit, this is really happening. Fuck, and I had to fight out the position and just get back on him. But, yeah. How much damage did he do in that exchange? In that exchange? Nah, not really much. Just the one shot. The one shot was the one that got me. But the rest was just kind of like...

Nothing really got through. It was just a lot of flurries and it looked violent, but that's why I was able to look at Mark and be like, yeah, we're good. But yeah, got to come back. See what happens with him and DDP. He could win.

you know, beat him. We almost won the first time. Yeah, it was close. Very. It was close. Very close. Yeah, that was a rough fight. Even at the end, they were just swinging. They had nothing left in the tank. You see Strickland's like, it was all arms. Arms, yeah. There was nothing in the tank. Yeah. They emptied out. Well, we'll see. We'll see what happens in that fight.

And, yeah, at the moment, I just, look, I kind of like the feeling of not knowing because sometimes people ask, who are you going to fight next? When are you going to fight again? I'm like, I don't know. I'm just chilling. So, again, I'm just going to keep training. And sometimes short notice shit happens, you know what I mean? And it's like, well, I'm already in shape. Fuck, let's go. Right. Yeah.

But we'll see. So stay ready. Yeah, stay ready. Like I said, I've done the testing already and I know where I'm at. After this, I'm going to go get some work in. And yeah, even on the road, bro, I love this food there, but fuck.

I know when I get home, I'm going to have to take all this off. And I know it will come off because I've got, you know, good nutritionists now and stuff. But, yeah, I just try to stay ready. You guys don't have barbecue in New Zealand? Oh, we do. Oh, yeah. You have like a Terry Black's in New Zealand? Yeah, they have. Just even the food there, I think the quality is different. But also, I try to stay off Uber Eats as much as possible. Now I have Matt cooking for me. So if I want something, I'll see something on the reels.

Matt, can you please make this? He'd be like, yeah, cool. Boom. And he'll just make it that night. And you don't have to worry about bullshit in it. Yeah. In camp, it'll be healthy. But right now, I can stretch my legs a little bit. Add some cheese, whatever. But, yeah. Yeah.

I just stay ready. That's the main thing. Just stay ready. Your camp, that city kickboxing gym, what a fucking gym that is. There's so many killers coming out of that. And Oldberg now on the rise. God damn, that dude's good. There's so many... He's so tall and dangerous. There's so many good fighters coming out of there now. Even recently...

We had Cam, Aaron Toe, and then Navajo fight on the Contender Series. Navajo was the only one to get a contract. He got it with a hook, actually. I don't know if you saw that fight. I didn't. Yeah, Navajo Sterling. He knocked out the guy in the second round. So now he's in the UFC. He got a contract, and he's going to fight this year, I think in December. So he's already in camp for his next fight because he was kind of fresh coming off that fight. So, yeah, he's another guy that...

That's him, yeah. The guy in the red. Big nav, boom. And they set him up. Boom. Boom. Out. And the guy I fought was tough, too. Came strong in the first round, but Navajo was able to put him away. Another king in the ring champion as well. I think he's two-time king in the ring champion. What weight is that at? Light heavyweight. Damn, that's a big fella. So he's the guy in my Miami fight with Pereira. He helped me a lot. Ben Johnston helped me a lot with the looks, you know. But, yeah, he's just a fucking...

savant the next level kickboxer but knows how to grapple he looks at shit downloads it drills it and he's using it on you straight away or the next day it's just one of those guys and he loves to fight he's a guy who just stays in the gym stays ready like I say he's gonna fight already locked in even losses go to fight was the mayor fighting always the mayor in Macau you know what's his name no time yeah Volker today yeah that's a good fight I like that for Carlos I

Who else? Yeah, so I like the gym, the way it's growing, even on the local scene as well. You have a lot of guys who are just coming up in the local scene and they're looking at us.

Because of what we've done. No government funding, no backing from the sports, what do you call it, New Zealand. They try to stifle us during COVID, you know, moving the goalposts. Or you can quarantine in the gym. Okay, now you can't quarantine in the gym. We're sneaking around trying to find places to train. They're following us with reporters, taking photos, putting us in the papers, making us look bad. We're disobeying the law. Think about your grandma. All that kind of stuff. So, yeah, we've done it our own way. And...

I thought we're still one of the best gyms, if not the best gym in the world. That's why I'm there. Only reason I'm in New Zealand is because of City Kickboxing. If not for that place, I definitely would still be there to see my family, but I would have probably moved

All over the place. Like Melbourne, I definitely would have lived in Melbourne for a while. Like Melbourne, I love Melbourne, Australia. Canada somewhere. Melbourne's great. Yeah, Melbourne. I just like the culture, the food. It was here in Austin. Australia and New Zealand just have such restrictive laws. Yeah. And the government has such control over people. And I didn't realize it until the pandemic. Yeah. And then I was like, Jesus Christ. That's why you got to play the game, Joe. Yeah. Keep moving. I play the game. It's almost egotistical in the sense that

The rules are there for a reason, and I am a law-abiding citizen. But sometimes there's certain things where I think, like, the laws doesn't apply to me. You know what I mean? That's why I don't follow politics. I only ever voted recently in New Zealand because of the fucking referendum. They were going to make marijuana legal. I was like, okay, that applies to me.

I'll vote for that. So what do you call it? One policy voters or whatever. The other laws and stuff, I'm like, man, unless if it's something crazy, like someone decides, oh, we're going to tax the rich 50% of their money. That applies to me. Then I'll vote. So when I say the law doesn't apply to me, it's in the sense of like, I don't really care about what their policies are, you know? So yeah, that's how I live. And I'm able to travel a lot, which I'm grateful for. But yeah, if it wasn't for CKB, I definitely would have left NZ. Yeah.

Or maybe traveled more, checked out Europe or shit like that. But right now as I'm fighting, maybe after fighting I will. New Zealand is beautiful. Oh, it is. Beautiful spot to live. I like the pace. I do like the pace. And again, I like watching America and the rest of the world from New Zealand because it's just like this little corner of the world just like chilling and just, oh, yeah, Kiwi, mate. G'day. You know? And then, yeah, just see what happens to the rest of the world. And we still get a lot of things happening culturally that are relevant to the world. But, yeah.

I definitely want to travel after fighting. And I get to travel. I'm in fucking Austin, Texas now, you know, talking to you. Where was I? After this, I'm going to New York. Yeah, I'm sure I'll be somewhere else on the planet at some point. But yeah. What do you think you want to do when this is over? So I have a plan in place because I know me. I'm an adrenaline junkie.

So I know I'll need something every, like maybe thrice a year where I feel like I'm going to die. So one of my plans is... That's such a crazy thing to say. But I get it. That's why I have a McLaren and, you know, I've never crashed it. Amen. But yeah, so for me, like I skydived twice already in the last year.

That was fun. So again, if I said, okay, I'm done fighting now, then okay, the running with the bulls, cool. Let's do that. And I'll just train for that. And then when it's time, I'll go to Spain or whatever and get ready for that and then go run with the bulls. Cool. Really? Yeah.

That would be fun. It's dangerous. You could die. Yeah, but that's a dumb way to die. Yeah, dumb ways to die. There's many fighting that's a dumb way to die too. But it's glorious. It's glorious. It's a glorious way. Getting stomped to death by a bull is not a good way to die. Yeah, but I mean, what do I have? So what's another one? Okay, let's say I go to the outback and go learn—

to jump on a crocodile and save it from some, I don't know, there'll be something. I'll find things. There's always something. I'll find something to do that'll make me feel like my life is in danger. So you feel like you're going to need that forever. Because if not, you just fall. A lot of guys, they come back and fight again because they miss that, you know, I was that guy. I was that guy. And those, especially who never made it to the pinnacle or what they wanted to do,

Then they still have that dissatisfaction. And then they come back to try and reclaim that glory. Yeah. Do it for less money. And then they fall short. They become journeymen.

Become alcoholics drug addicts, you know shit like that. So I don't want to also who knows I my main thing though is definitely start a family That's one thing I want to do after fighting it'll happen I'm not I don't go looking for that shit because when you do you find the wrong thing Mm-hmm, and I've made that mistake before we're gonna make that mistake again So I know what happened for me and when it does I'm gonna be a great dad You can't convince yourself that it's good

It has to be good. Oh, yeah, facts. There's a lot of people that want a great relationship, so they talk themselves into one. And the next thing you know, you're with some girls going through your phone. I got talked into one. That's the thing. So now I know I'm like, okay, bet. You got talked into one. When you fall in love, you just...

Stupid. Because I'm such a lover as well. I'm so soft. But I learned my lesson. And, again, it's one of those things you just have to go through. And I'm grateful for the experience. I'm grateful that I did because now I know exactly what not to do next time. So that's why I don't look. I'm single because I just enjoy myself. I enjoy not being responsible for someone else's emotional state. Right. Because she has a fighter. Right. Because you know...

You know this. You know fighters when they have to deal with shit before a fight. Before the cost of fight, the shit I had to deal with

And I was quarantining at the gym as well. So that kind of stuff I don't want to deal with. I just want to focus on me. There's a problem that girls, when they think that you are busy with something else and you don't care about, you're not paying attention to them, they're not your primary focus. They get very upset. I've seen guys where they're getting ready for a fight and their girl starts fights with them as they're weighing in.

Not that bad. At least she knew better. But still, it's just... Look, it's more about... Also, don't try to compete with your husband or your boyfriend. With me, you'll lose. It's not like...

In a sense, this is what I do for a living. You don't have to try and compete. It's weird. When someone tries to compete with their person or whatever. I know. It's nuts. Yeah. This is meant to be a partnership. Right. The intimate person in your life wants you to fail because they're competing with you. They want to get over on you. But the thing is, what's good for me is good for us. What's good for you is good for us. Right. If you're a team. So again, I'm learning and I'm not looking because I think that ship sailed in the sense like...

When I look at someone like, say, even a corner with Dee Devlin, that's fucking cool. I love that. She's still with him to this day. They've got how many kids together? That's cool. Regardless of what the state of their relationship is now, it's like, look, she was with him when he was no one, and she believed in him. That kind of stuff is rare these days. When I see the other people, I'm just like...

Right. They still love in the air, Joe. Sometimes it works. Yeah. It can work, but boy, you got to find the right person. No, they got to find you. Yeah. I'm not looking. I'm not looking. I'm just chilling. I actually got on Hinge the other day just for fun in LA. I was like, let me see. I hate these apps. I don't use those. I try to get on Raya. They still have me on the fucking waiting list for fucking the last two years. I'm like, my life is cool enough. Oh, that's hilarious. But I went on Hinge in LA just to see what's up. But that's just how it is.

It's just funny. It's just funny to see the experience. I had a couple of interactions. It was cool. But I was like, ah, this is what people do now. It felt like the questionnaire to get on Hinge. I thought it was going to be like this thing, cool, cool, cool, put some pictures up. I'm like, am I trying to do adoption or some shit? Because it's like, what is this and what is your primary focus? And I'm like, I spent like 20 minutes doing the whole thing. So it's up now. I still have it on in Austin. I'm like, ah, let's...

Just for fun, for the lulz. Cast a line out there for the lulz. Just for the lulz. Yeah. Yeah. Easy. Well, you know, you have to protect your time. That's the problem. It's like you only... Especially when you're doing something like fighting, there's...

The amount of time and dedication that's required to be at your very best is insane. And there's nothing like it. There's nothing like it. Even in sports. If you're a basketball player, you have to play basketball. You have to practice. But there's a lot more free time. Yeah. A lot more free time. And it doesn't drain your body the way fight training does. The consequences is different. Right. After a game of rugby or whatever, cool. I don't know how the...

the fucking the brackets work or whatever even in basketball football soccer but then you get to play the next day or the next not the next day sometimes the next week you know fighting it's not always like that and also if you get hurt you get hurt battling you suspension six months and you have to wait and then if you don't if you're not strong mentally I've seen people break yeah I've seen them break and it's just like fuck come on man you can you're better than this so yeah for me fighting takes everything

It takes everything. And I've done well in this game. And sometimes in the beginning, I didn't give everything. So that's why now that I'm at this age, I'm like, yo, give everything. So that way when I'm done, I just know I did everything I could to be the best. And I was. And I'm proud of myself. So I'm, yeah, I'm still here, man. I'm still, like I said, I'm not fighting for fame.

you know, a belt or anything anymore. That'll come around when it does. But it's just, I'm just fighting just because I have... Bro, a submission is more worthy to me than a third belt. Like, I'm going to get that. Really? Yeah, I'm going to get that. It's going to... And I'm not going to look for it. It's going to present itself and I'm going to get it. And I'll be like, right, I take that off. Cool. Because I've done a lot of cool shit in this game. It's more like just the highlights. And I just know I can. So that's more...

Worthy to me at the moment and that's like a maybe ego thing or personal thing. But yeah, that's just me though Did you have a timeline on how much longer you want to fight for? Like I said right now I say three years, but I'll be 38 and

That's probably the end where guys can compete at the high. Like Jared Cannoneer got to like 38, 39. He started to fall off a little bit. And the last two fights he's lost. I think GSP stopped just around there as well, 37 maybe. When he fought Bisping? Yeah. But who knows? That's what I'm saying. I don't think I'm going to fight at 40. I think that's not me. Even for me as a person, I'm like, no, I'd rather be doing something else.

But 38 right now is in my head. Who knows? Fucking 36, 37. I'm just like, right. Peace. I'm out. I'm spontaneous like that. But I think 38 at 39. But let's see 30. Let's see what happens first.

But at the moment, I'm still here. Do you have any thoughts of things to do other than things for adrenaline? Oh, yeah. Like to do with your time? Apart from raising a family, production. I definitely want to have my own production company and do stuff like...

A couple of acting things, of course, because they've already come up and I turned them down because of this game. I was like, you know, you have to give everything to this game. I don't want to spend three months somewhere filming, you know, this kind of stuff. But definitely motion capture. Definitely want to do that. You know, what's his name? The guy that did Andy Serkis, Planet of the Apes, Gollum, Caesar. He's one of the best at it. And I see the way he works and operates. And I just I know I can do that. I can learn.

I'm very coachable. I can learn stuff like that. Voice over work with some cartoons or animes or whatever. Video games, motion capture stuff. I'd like to... I have my own ideas of things I want to bring to fruition. But I don't necessarily have the skills. Even though I was doing computer graphic design for about three years, I knew how to make a red ball bounce in Maya, the 3D program. That was my biggest achievement in that. But I can...

partner up with someone on studio and just bring my ideas to life if they like it. Like, I'll learn how to write a script maybe so I can present it properly. Also, fuck, all this shit with AI, I might just be able to do it with AI in two years and be like, right, boom. And if it hits, it hits. If it sucks, cool, do it again at the drawing board. But,

Yeah, a lot of things. A lot of things. I already have, again, shout out to my pops. My pops is a real OG because he helped me just triple and quadruple my money. Yeah, because if I didn't have him, I definitely would end up as one of those sad stories. I feel just because of who I am as a person, I feel like I would have ended up as one of those sad stories because of the trust I have in people. So I'm glad I have my dad around just to like...

Just make sure things are cool. There's always vampires, right? There's always vampires. It's just human nature. It's human nature. I'm sure you have it as well on the way up. And even now, I'm sure you have it as well. But they always, they come out the woodwork. And it's like, let me see. But then my dad's able to tell, this is legit. This is shit. Let me have a look at this first. He goes through every contract.

I can read, but sometimes, because I'm dyslexic, I read really slow or I just lose focus and shit like that. Especially contract shit. That's very difficult to really absorb. There's no pictures. You need an anime contract. Make me a fucking cartoon that explains what happens if everything goes wrong with

With me crying. Oh, no money. Or me living in a palace with a bathtub filled with gold. Yeah, but I just get like, unless it's something maybe fiction that entices me and I can really go deep. But I like reading comics and shit like that. But a contract is just detail. But there's one person on this planet I trust that wants the best for me is my father. That's a great thing to have. Amen. Because even I've said this.

Guys like Habib, rest in peace to his pops. He had him in his corner. Michael Jordan, he had his dad in his corner on the court. My dad is in my corner, but that's on the stuff that really matters outside the cage in life. When I talk about imposter syndrome, I'm like, how the fuck do I have this many houses? I'm doing well. Cool. I know I'm adulting, but that's because of my pops. And I learned the game through him.

But the details of the game, I still don't know yet. So after this, I'll have more, I guess, input in the sense that, okay...

and that, and this is what this means and that, you know, with the property values and whatnot, I try not to get too much into it because right now all I can focus on is this, fighting, the main thing. If I don't have this, then yeah, I can definitely tap into all that kind of stuff. But no, I'd rather just focus on this and let my dad handle it. So again, I'm grateful, so grateful that he's around and he's the one that's helped me get to this point because a lot of people don't even have their dad in their lives, you know, and I'm glad I do. Yeah.

Overall, it seems like you're in a real good place. I am. So, yeah, I am. Look, this is life. You know how it is. Ups and downs, smiles and frowns. But right now where I'm at, I'm in a good place. Way better place. Because, again, like people, the thing I didn't like, I appreciated it after my last fight. People come up to me like, hey, man, that was a great fat last fight. Oh, you did well. Thank you. But when people come, because I was at the buffet in Perth, and some guy came up to me just like,

hard luck, mate. I was like, what? Like he wanted to feel sorry for me. I was like, nah, get your fucking shit off me. I'm like, I'm good. I'm like, bro, if you knew how much I made from this fight, you wouldn't even feel sorry for me. But some people don't know how to react. So they come back.

Or they were rooting for you and they feel bad. I know, but I like the... Again, I don't fault them for it because they don't know what to say. But the ones that come up and be like, bro, that was a mean fight, man. You almost had him, but that was a fucking good fight. I'm like, thank you. I felt good in that one. It's a different look on the same thing. Some look at it with like, yay, and some look at it with that. But I'm in a better place because, again...

This isn't everything. Fighting's not everything in my life. I've lost many times out of fighting, you know, and I've come back. I've lost in fighting many times and I've come back. So for me right now, where I'm at in life, I'm enjoying it. I'm enjoying the ride.

And yeah, I look forward to the future. I look forward. There's a thought that some people have that in order to be at your best, it has to be everything. You have to live and die by your performances. And when your performance sucks, you have to suffer until you get a good one. Nah, that's not for me. I've been there before and it's not for me. Everyone is different. And I understand that when it's like, because even when I was on top of the world, you know, like number one and this and that, it never defined me.

I never let it define me. I always knew I was Israel Adesanya before and after the belt. I'm still me. No matter what, they're still going to be trying to fight me because they want to have Israel Adesanya on their record. You know, they want to fight me. They don't want to fight the champ. Like people will probably even pick a fight over me than DDP. Or maybe not because it's probably easier fight they think. But still, like, I'm me. And that's never ever going to change. That's never ever going to change as long as I stay true to me.

Yeah. Look, if this game was going to change me, if money was going to change me, it would have done it ages ago. A lot of zeros ago. But I've always been this guy with or without money. You can ask anyone who really knows me. They'll tell you, oh, yeah, that's the same dude I was dancing with back in the day. Still the same goofball. Keeps the same energy. But now that I'm here, I just have a lot more freedom to do things that I want to do than I'm grateful for. But, yeah. Yeah.

I even look forward to seeing who I become next year, like who I evolve into next year. Because again, I am me, but learning. There's things I'm going to learn about myself. I'm sure you have this as well. Jamie has this. We all have this. We just...

Figuring out who we are even what do you know 57 no way yeah, yeah, so you're still learning You're never gonna stop you never stop learning when you do you're gonna die yeah facts Yeah, this life is an experience It's a long and people have like this number thing in their head Oh by 30 you should know this some people some people know some people don't learn until they're 40 some people never learn I thought I was gonna be married with two kids at 23

Wow. He could have been. Yeah. Did you zig when you could have zagged? Yeah. I'm glad I zagged. I glad I zagged for that one. That was so long ago. And I was, again, I'm soft, bro. I'm like, I'm surprised I'm fucking great at this. This fighting shit. Like, I'm soft. Do you see some idiot try to step me out? Do you ever see that? No. What happened? Some, some.

This is two weeks, three weeks ago. I had a great, great day at training morning. Went to the shop to get a pie. And I just thought, you know, people were just showing love. I'm just, oh, hey, what's up? So I'll take a picture. Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. And then one guy just pulls up and goes, yo, Izzy, let's go one out. I'm like.

And I thought, like, bro, this is stupid. I was like, so one outs in New Zealand slang, like, one on one, like, one outs, let's go. And I was like, this is silly. Like, what the fuck? And I just started laughing. And I said, bro, I get paid millions for this. I'm not going to whoop your ass for free. And then he kind of got angry, and he's stuck at the lights. It's green. People are honking, driving around him. And I'm laughing, walking away with my pies in my hand. And I remember just looking like, what the fuck? And I grabbed my car door. I went...

And that pissed him off. Then he drove and then parked in front of my car. And I was like, okay. Took my watch off and I told the guy, can you please call the cops? And I'm glad only one person actually decided to help. Oh, I did see the video of that. I saw just a small clip of it. I didn't know exactly what was going on. Just an idiot. But again, I'm glad. This is the day and age of people just...

boom, cameras out. Because everyone who was around, everyone got their cameras out. There was only one guy who used his phone to call the cops when I asked him because I didn't want to hurt this guy. And this guy, I don't know if he was going through something or he was maybe cracked out or something. Because even the guy, the video that came out, it seemed like it was set up because the guy kept on going...

And I'm like, what are you trying to say? And I'm glad I, like I said, I'm soft. I have patience. And if I had a bad day, it might have been different. I like to say that because of freedom of, but also my friend, you know, Falvake got killed by senseless street violence. This is something that we've talked about, even in the film, it was something that we all had to go through because he got hit with a coward punch and then hit the ground.

And then, boom, he's in a coma for about two weeks. And then eventually they have to pull the plug. As I'm talking to this guy, at one point I go, bro, I don't know you. Like, whatever has happened, I don't fucking know you. I'm sorry. And he's like, yeah, talk to me nicely, bitch. And I started getting angry and then got to the point I spat at him.

And that was me, like, I hoped he did something. And then I'm like, right, I'm taking this guy out. But then when I spat at him, he just looked down and kept on talking. And I realized, you know what about this life? I'm not going to spend the next 10 minutes talking and meh, meh, meh, meh, meh to this guy. It just elevates him in his mind. Exactly. Oh, he took his shirt off at the end. I got in my car. I was driving off. He had his shirt off, flexing, like, what, bitch, what? And I was like, no, this nigga's cracked out. Oh, he's a crazy person. So for me, again, that's why I say I'm soft. And I had to...

I had to really hold myself back. I don't know. I'm sure you've... No one tries you anymore, of course. They'd fucking be stupid to try you. But I was thinking no one would try me anymore because back in the day, someone would try me. I'm like, bro... Bro, people were trying Chuck Liddell in his prime and he was a complete psychopath. Try that to Dan Hooker. Dan would not have the patience that I have. Dan would fucking...

Instantly demolished that guy. But again, I just don't want to do something. Because if you breached the line, I was within range and within my rights to strike him. And like what happened with your friend. If you knock that guy out and he bounces his head off the curb and dies. That was what was going through my head. And also we started this charity Walk Without Fear. And I'm glad nothing happened. I'm glad I was patient because...

now that video can be used because we're trying to change the laws. Look, the guys that killed my friend, when we were in lockdown, they were on home detention. So they're free now. They're walking free, enjoying their life. And my friend is dead. They didn't get convicted?

I think one of them did, but the rest of them, they had home detention. The ones that actually even helped, they got home detention. And I think for a year and a half, so six months of that home detention, we all did it together in lockdown. So what kind of punishment is that? You get to sit at home and watch Netflix. And my friend's daughter has to grow up without a father. For nothing. For nothing. Just because ego, alcohol, drunk, this and that. So again, I'm glad.

I'm soft and I don't like confrontation, but when it's time to get down, I will get down. And I've put it out enough, like I want to protect my boundaries and shit like that, but I don't ever want to be put in a position where someone tries to set me up just so they can make money off me. But there will be a point if someone tries me enough that I will have to definitely defend myself. And there's no fucking referee in a street fight that's going to drag me off a person's

And now I see red, bro. Not that shit. I see red, bro. Is it the funniest shit? Not that shit. It's your own blood. I see red. You should see clearly. That's a ridiculous thing. I've never heard anybody say I see red and it worked out well.

But yeah, I just, yeah, I'm glad it worked out well for me. And I spared a life that day because if not, it would have been really bad. And then I might not be here. Right. I might be in a fucking cell somewhere. They might try to make an example out of you. They will. Yeah. Especially if you killed somebody. I know these motherfuckers in NZ, like the bureaucrats, they don't like people like me.

I like people like me who was outspoken, who was not a quintessential Kiwi, you know what I mean? The guy that just keeps quiet and yeah, you know. Follows the rules. Just very humble. Fake humility is something I've never been. I know humble is, or what it is for real, because I deal with that every day. I fucking spark Carlos Navajo. I grow with Dan. I get humbled every fucking day. So I know what real humility is. But for me to try and like,

Let the world know I'm humble just so I seem like I'm humble That's that fake shit and I'll never be that and when I see it I cringe cuz I'm like I know I know you right? I know you Just be real, you know, yeah, I try to keep it real as always but again, like I said, I

I'm soft, but sometimes, you know. It's a real challenge to be yourself with the kind of attention and pressure that you get. The magnifying glass of the world. And I would never change. I'll never not express myself the way I always do. But sometimes the world will try and put you in a box and be like, this is what you're meant to be. This is...

who you're meant to be. I'm like, nah. - It's always weak people that wanna do that. - Bruh, like, what was the one I put up the other day, 'cause I was, there was a scene from my movie, I was getting my nails done, I was like, what was I doing, some drip tips.

And then I put a clip next to it where Cam goes, well, I've been wearing pink my whole life. Niggas been saying I'm gay. Bro, if you think I'm gay, bring your mother around. Bring your sister around. I fucking love that. I was like, yes. Because again, I don't care. It's never been an issue for me. I think people think because I never flexed my...

Girlfriends or anything online. They're like not definitely this guy's sus also cuz I'm nice Being a nice person makes you sus. Yeah, cuz I'm not a dickhead so silly, but I can't be a dickhead I have been a dickhead in the past But again, I'd rather I was raised right my family actually, you know, my mom and dad raised me with good morals and yeah I treat people with respect when and even if I don't get it back. It's like cool, whatever but

Yeah, people expect you to be this kind of... Oh man, you're a lot different than I thought you would be in person.

Well, you're not trying to fight me, so no. You know what I mean? People expect you to be some type of whale. Hard. Yeah, or even an asshole. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Look, there's people you can find who'd be like, yeah, he's an asshole. And I was like, well, yeah. But who are you? Yeah, exactly. I was an asshole. To you? Yeah, exactly. But you were an asshole, so I had to be an asshole to get you to fuck away from me. Facts, facts. And I'm fine with that now. Because back in the day when I first came into this game, I always felt like I had to...

with every fan. I had to put on the song and dance. Oh, hey, how's it going? But sometimes I might be at a four or five energy level. So if someone pulls up on me, I'm just like, yeah, cool. Let's take a picture. But I don't have to ham it up to make them feel like this is a great experience. Oh, he's such a nice guy. It's like,

Bro, the day my cat died, I was pumping gas and the guy tried to make me talk to his cousin on the phone. And I said no and he's like, oh, all good. And I felt bad and I was like, oh, give me the phone. And I'm there with the phone pumping gas and I went, bro, no phones. I was like, get the fuck away. But I did that because I felt bad that I didn't talk to his cousin on the phone while I'm pumping gas. So what happened if something happened and boom, boom.

Oh, what? Because I wanted to talk to this guy's cousin on the phone because he saw me at a gas station while I'm pumping gas. So when I talk about protecting my boundaries, it's just about time and place and approach. Yeah. People not...

And I've put that out enough where I feel like people do respect it now. But some people still think I hate fans or whatever. But I'm like, that's what you think. If that's what you got from my message, then cool. You think that. But it's about protecting my energy and protecting my boundaries. Well, I don't think they'll ever understand what it's like to be a person like you. Yeah. Yeah. Being in the spotlight. Yeah. And so, again, they feel like you have this advantage, this privilege that no one else gets. So they think that you owe them something. You owe them your time.

I'm a fan. I pay for your pay-per-views. No, you don't. You're just talking shit. Oh, the ones that is when it come, bro, I bet on your fight, eh? I'm like, yeah, fuck your multi. Because again, I put my life on the shit. Every time I step in there, I put my life on the line. But they will never understand that. They'll come and tell me like, yeah, bro, one time, this was years ago, and the guy showed me a betting slip. I was like, and? This is after a yarn fight. He showed me a bet. I'm like, cool.

Like, what do you expect me to do? Give you a refund? Right. Nah, fuck you. So I can't remember how I respond. Yeah. Do you think I wasn't trying to win? If you ain't got it like that, don't put your money up. Right. I only gamble with money that I'm going to lose or I can afford to lose. But again, yeah, I'm fucking gambling with my life. Right. I'm trying to win. And then something bad could happen and I'm not here again. You know, so yeah, people are weird and I love people. Like, I always say this. Yeah.

There's something about every group of people on this planet that I love, including my own. And there's something I hate about every group of people on this planet. Just little things, little things that just annoys me. I'll say like, okay, Nigerians. I hate how the elders sometimes confuse respect with fear.

because that's how I grew up. They confuse respect with fear and I've had to deal with that. You know, I'm not going to say anything else about anyone else because they know it's like, oh, Israel hates these people or whatever. But again, I love people, but I don't know

But at the same time... They're taking advantage of the fact that you're being respectful. I love me first. I know what you're saying. I got to put me first. Yeah, you have to. If you don't, nobody else will. Facts. Nah, you have to, bro. Well, listen, brother, I think the way you handle yourself and the way you communicate and the way you're honest and just you can be yourself, it's a great example to other people, especially young fighters that are coming up and trying to figure out how they're going to manage this. And if they ever be so fortunate, they get to a position like yourself...

you gave him a little roadmap. And I think that's a beautiful gift to give people, an understanding of how an intelligent, sensitive person deals with this crazy position in life. Thank you. That actually hit. Thank you so much. It's real. Nah, yeah. I can say the same about you. What you've done, everything from day one since I've met you that you don't remember and I'm glad you don't remember to now, even being friends with you. I like being friends with you. And also, I don't,

because you still have a job to do and I never want to put you in a compromised position. I always still have to respect you and what you do and I still kind of keep my distance a little bit, but I always respect and appreciate every time that we've interacted on Hangout and...

you know, who you are as a person. So thank you. I appreciate you, brother. Thank you, brother. Thank you, man. You're the fucking man. Let's go. All right. Let's wrap it up. What else? Watch style bender. I'm watching. Watch it. Apple TV. There it is. Bang. Beautiful. Awesome. All right. Thank you so much. Thank you. I appreciate it, brother. Thank you. Bye everybody. Bye.