Welcome to this curated educational transcript of the Joe Rogan Experience. In this session, we provide a deep-dive examination of the critical perspectives and historical dialogues presented in Episode #2456. Our mission is to offer a high-fidelity, searchable research resource for students of cultural history, emerging technology, and global discourse. This transcript has been specifically optimized for academic reference, linguistic study, and archival preservation regarding Martial Arts Philosophy, High-Performance Athletics, and Contemporary Cinema Industry Dynamics. Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan
Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by
night, all day. You're all suited up. You got
a wild card boxing hat on, a Bruce Lee shirt.
Come on, son. Hey, we got the yellow and thing
going on. Yeah, you got it all going on. What's
happening? Great to see you. Man, things are
really well. This thing is a little loud. Is
it? On that thing there, there's a little. Okay.
You can turn that sucker. There it is. Last time
I saw you was at Terry Black's barbecue. Yeah.
Yeah. Random run in. Yeah. That was crazy. That
was crazy. Yeah, man. I was thinking about going
there right after this. I'm like, what? Terry
Black's. That place was no joke. That place rules.
Yeah, man. Are you still in LA? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
What's it like? It's cool, man. Is it? Yeah.
You like it? You're the only person that said
that. No. Yeah, well, because, okay, I defend
L .A. in a way where, first of all, if you've
got a handful of good people with you, you know,
your family. Sure. So the fact that L .A. has
all kinds of different things. You could be on
a hiking trail in 20 minutes. Oh, geographically,
it's amazing. Yeah, and the weather, you can't
beat it. So if you've got good people, good friends
with you. Then it's all good. You just run by
crooks. It's a nice neighborhood run by the mob.
It's run by the woke mob. But, I mean, geographically,
you can't beat it. You could be at the ocean,
and then you could be in the mountains in two
hours. Yeah, yeah. Even if you don't partake,
it's still cool. It still amps up the... Oh,
yeah. Like the spot itself is magical. It is
a magical place to live. Although I am deeply
concerned that that motherfucker is going to
get hit with a big one soon. It's about time,
right? Yeah. I was reading this article about
massive earthquakes in California and how often
they're spread out and the possibility of one
of them happening within the next decade. It's
very high. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I try not to
think about that. I try not to think about it,
too. Yeah, yeah, but, you know, now there's,
you know, you can, I think they have better detection
of that stuff now, too. It's better. It doesn't
matter. It doesn't matter. They can't detect.
Do you remember what happened in Italy? A couple
guys got arrested and went to jail. They were
seismologists because the company, the country
rather, didn't understand the ability to detect
it. They had a big earthquake and a bunch of
people died. And so they blamed these geologists
or seismologists. They wound up winning in court
on appeal. Because eventually the science was
revealed. Like, hey, there's no fucking way you
can really tell. But they hung these guys out.
They blamed these guys on not being able to detect
it. Man. Well, I mean, just think about it. The
last crazy ones were 72 and then 94. Yeah. I
think it was 93. I moved to L .A. right after
the last big one. I saw one of the sections of
the highway that had collapsed on the other one.
I remember driving by going, fuck this place.
I was in the middle of that one. I came into
L .A. Oh, you were there? Dude, I don't even
like to tell the story about what happened during
that 94 earthquake because it sounds like bullshit.
But literally, I got up, ran out of my house,
my apartment at the time, jumped off the balcony
and watched it happen. You watched the house
collapse? I watched the earthquake happen from
outside. Oh. It's like no bullshit. So I thought,
oh, shit, I overreacted. I had a bad dream. I
lived on the first floor of this apartment building.
All I know is I wake up, I'm off balance, catching
my balance in the parking lot, right? And like,
oh, shoot, I got to find the guard to get me
back in the apartment building, right? And I'm
thinking, you know, like I've lost my mind or
something. The next thing you know, everything
shakes and the lights go out. Just everything
gets black. And so. I'm backing, I retreat back
because I'm thinking the building's going to
fall on me. And I'm like, wait a minute. Then
I got the story from everybody else that experienced
it. They said that the first thing that happened
was the building shook and the lights went out.
Well, I was outside watching that. So I'm outside
when it happened. Like some kind of canine. So
what made you jump over the. I don't know. You
had a feeling? Dude. Or did you have like the
first, was it the first rumbles? I thought, I
thought it was, I thought I reacted to the, like
some kind of an aftershock or some kind of rumble.
No, because the girl that was with me. You left
her in the apartment? Dude. All she knows is
that you jumped up and you ran out of. You ran
out of the house and I heard the door slide.
And then the next thing you know, everything
shook. She was trapped in there because there
was a closet door that trapped her in the hallway.
So when I got back in the place, me and a friend
had to try to pry the door open because she couldn't
get out. But I ran out of that place. before
the earthquake actually happened. How weird.
Yeah. You got good instincts. I don't know what
the hell that was. It has to be. I don't even
like telling that story because it sounds like
bullshit. Because it really happened that way.
Then the guard, I talked to the guard. I'm like,
hey, when did the lights go out? Oh, it shook
and the lights went out. I'm like, I'm watching
that happen. So you felt it happen before it
happened. Some kind of weird way. Well, I bet
humans have that. Animals definitely have that.
They talk about Thailand, how they had that tsunami
and all the animals ran up to the highest point
of the island. They all just took off. It's like
they just knew instinctively. I don't know. Nothing
like that has ever happened afterwards. But I
got to say, I've been lucky over the years. Yeah,
but you're a dude who's tuned in. You're tuned
into your body. You're tuned into your environment.
You're not going to get caught slipping. Like,
you probably felt something and your spidey sense
went off. Yeah, I kind of have been like that
growing up. Like, I've been on my own since I
was 14. been through crazy shit that you normally
would see on movies. And that's the type of shit
that gives you those kind of instincts. But,
yeah, and I was always the one that said, hey,
let's leave. Let's get out of here. And then,
hey, man, there was a shootout that just happened
right after you left. Or I could detect, like,
the predators. You know what I mean? Mm -hmm.
So I grew up kind of that way. Right. Because
you have to survive on that. With nobody looking
out for you. Yeah. Nobody was looking out for
you. You had to look out for yourself. Well,
yeah, I mean, I was... Oh, I was like always
the junior of the group a lot of times because,
like I said, I've been on my own since I was
14. I haven't grown an inch since I was 13, 14.
I looked like a grown -ass man, right? I was
fighting in tournaments at 15 against, you know,
grown men, like, you know, fighting heavyweight
at that time. But I was always hanging with older
people, kind of, you know. Kind of like I got
away with kind of living as an adult early on.
Did you work? Yeah, well, I was teaching a karate
class. What was happening, see, I used to hang
out at this community center in the hood. At
this time, I moved from Brooklyn to Bridgeport,
Connecticut, right? Bridgeport's a tough name.
Yeah, yeah. A lot of people don't know. Yeah,
we had the top murder rate per capita, man. Bridgeport's
rough. Oh, yeah, yeah. So I was constantly, I
mean, there's a community center that was like
my haven. And I would go practice with me and
my other karate nuts, you know. And so I'd be
in the paper for winning heavyweight competitions
or whatever. And so the people that was running
the community center said, why don't you teach
a class? They thought I was an adult. Oh, that's
hilarious. So I was teaching like a, you know,
like kind of like just under the table. I was
getting paid on the table, basically. But I had
like close to 200 students early on, like when
I'm 15, 16. Oh, that's crazy. Yeah. So, you know,
it was kind of kind of a trip, you know, which
is one of the reasons why I was a father at 15.
You know, because I had. One of my students'
older sister, you know, was like had a crush
on her on his instructor. But I was kind of living
the life of a grown up like early on. And so,
you know, there's there's a faction of people
in Bridgeport who think I'm Satan, I guess, because
they think that I'm probably in my 70s. You're
a vampire. Right. Yeah, so there's some people
I had to admit, like, no, I wasn't the age you
thought I was back then. Oh, that's crazy. Yeah,
but I mean, so yeah, you know, one of the things
I'm really grateful for is growing up that early
and having to, you know, use my instincts. And
being that street fighting and fighting was like
my favorite thing to do, actually. And so when
I got into the martial arts deeper and everything
else, you know, I just really dug into it and
wanted to learn style after style and this, you
know, everything. I was just a martial art nerd
for it. But I also liked the realistic portion
of it, even though I was doing other styles like
wushu and everything else. It was actually my
haven. Somewhere Eddie Bravo has to find this
video. There's a video of us working out together
at Legends where we were talking about hopping
sidekicks and different types of sidekicks. There
was a bag that we had that had a shitty chain.
But regardless, you threw a hopping sidekick
on that chain and the chain snapped and went
flying. The bag went flying. And Eddie Bravo
was like, what the fuck? It's a funny video,
man. Right, yeah. I know Eddie has it somewhere.
I'll probably, I'll text him after this and try
to see if he can put it up on his Instagram or
something. Yeah, man. Yeah, back then, man, we
were training when it wasn't even popular. You
know, I used to see you in the gym all the time.
Yeah. All the time, man. And you were, just think
about this. Do you know it was 29 years ago the
last time you interviewed me? Yeah, that's right.
29 years ago. That Bob Costa show. He took a
week off and I guest hosted it for a week. And
at that time, you were already training with
Maurice Smith. Yes. Maurice was one of the guests.
Right. Because I ended up training with Maurice
Smith every time I'd go to Seattle. We'd train
together. So we're part of this kind of... karate,
martial art, nerd culture. Yeah. When it wasn't
even popular. No. I used to see you all the time.
You know, you and... Doing jujitsu, Carl Parisian
and all these guys, legends. Where was another
place? There was Legends and there was another
place. The Bomb Squad? Yes. The Bomb Squad was
the first place that Eddie taught at. And then
that place closed down. Then we went to Legends.
Legends, yeah. And then we moved to the other
Legends that was in more East LA. And then Eddie
started opening up his own place in downtown.
Yeah, yeah. And that's where I would train with
Josh Barnett. at that place quite a bit. Yeah.
Yeah, man. The old days. Yes, man. Yeah. Who
would be coming through? Because I was training
Bob Sapp at one time, and then that's how I got
Frankie Lyles connected into that. Wow. That
whole thing. I remember Frankie. Frankie used
to be at the Bomb Squad first. Right, yeah. Frankie
was like my best friend in the world, and he
was, you know, he was super middleweight champion
in the world. That's who got me deeply into boxing.
And so I would always be at his training camps.
And, you know, I got to train with, like, Tommy
Hearns and all these amazing people. Sugar Ray
and all these guys, man. Frankie's a great boxing
coach. He's one of the most technical guys I've
ever worked with. He analyzes every aspect of
your jab. He's pulling in your elbow. He's tightening
this. He's moving you here. He's showing all
the various basic little tiny details that make
all the difference in the world. Yeah, man. He
was my personal boxing coach. I would train with
him. Joe Goosen early on. But Frankie, I mean,
we really kind of combined a lot of things. Because
I started kind of teaching him things with the
jab, like the un -telegraph type of stuff. And
he started applying that. And he would bring
me into stuff and have me show people like Sugar
Ray. Like, Mike, explain this. And I'm like,
what? I'm explaining this to Sugar Ray? This
feels ridiculous, right? But it was like this
combination because, like, I don't know. I'm
very analytical, and I love technique, you know.
And so I would just try to break things down,
and my whole thing was always to pressure test
things, you know. So if I could develop a tool
or a skill, and you can't stop it even if I tell
you, what I'm doing, then it's a really good
technique. Then it's legit. The thing about no
telegraph at all, it's so much more effective
than a harder strike with a telegraph. Oh, God,
yeah. Because it lands. Yeah. But it's so difficult
to teach people that because everybody wants
to hit everybody as hard as they can. Yeah. Especially
if you have power. Your instinct is to fucking
load up on everything. I remember I first saw
you teaching that to Kimbo Slice. Oh, yeah, yeah.
You were on a movie set. Yeah, yeah, because
Kimbo. Oh, man, what a great guy. What a great
guy he was. What a wonderful guy. So that's one
thing about fighting. You can't hide your nature.
You know what I mean? People see who you are.
And he was a wonderful human being. But like
a lot of people, almost like street basketball
as opposed to professional, you miss out on certain
techniques that you need when you're trying to
step up. Right. And so, like... Well, Kimbo,
you know, he would like a lot of people, he would
kind of telegraph. And so when we were shooting
the movie, you know, and I basically we had a
cameraman that did not really know how to shoot
stuff. So I just had to do everything on screen.
And so I would I would I just wanted to make
everything very realistic. And so so Kimbo had
this rubber knife and I was like, try your best
to. touch me with a rubber knife. And so he would
try, but as soon as he would move, there'd be
a little bit of an indication that I'd see, and
then I'd throw the punch, and it would go really
close to him, and I'd have him react to that.
But he was going, wait a minute, how are you
hitting me before I can get this knife out? And
then I told him, you know, I'll show you what
that is later, because, you know, kind of like,
not to be real nerdish about it, but like, why?
Why are like 50 - and 60 -year -old trainers
meeting people's hands, like a 20 -year -old
guy's or contender's hands, like this? You see
the person with the pad moving just as much as
the other guy because there's an indication.
They do this beforehand. They're always kind
of flexing and going in reverse before they go
forward. So just for over years, I— wouldn't
do that and I would exploit that you know so
it's kind of like a cheat code that I'm like
hell what the hell what the hell I'm gonna do
with it I'm I'm an actor so my thing is just
like yourself when I see you you know with George
St. Pierre and how we're all always in the gym
we're you know we're kind of collaborating we're
you know we're we're it's about just getting
better not no ego or anything else like that
it's just like hey man we're like kind of Kind
of like jamming. On technique and getting better.
Well, especially if you're running into someone
who has a different style. Yeah. Because there's
always something in different styles that you
could take out of it. Absolutely. There's always
something. And we're seeing that now. There's
all these different martial artists that are
entering into MMA that have these different techniques
that people haven't seen before. And there's
a lot of them that people dismiss that you're
finding are very effective. Especially if you
don't know how to do them. You don't know what
they are. So you don't. You have. like a database
in your mind of movements like I'm sure you see
one of guys loading up on a spin oh yeah everybody
sees that but if you don't know that you don't
see it right and if you if you were loading up
then you're not gonna you're not gonna capitalize
on it right because you don't you know you're
taking it there's a millisecond that you're taking
because Your movement is not efficient. This
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that still to this day people aren't doing effectively
when someone loads up because you can see the
load up. And it's just a jam. It's just lifting
your foot up and putting it on the hips. And
it's super effective in Taekwondo because everybody's
fast. Everybody's trying to do that technique.
But that jam of just lifting your foot up and
just not trying to hit them hard, just putting
that foot on the hip, it fucks people up. And
I don't see anybody using that right now. I tell
you, man, as in life. there's always something
that you can gain. People want to, I don't know,
people are in their own egos a lot of times.
But, like, even wushu, me, it was hard as hell
for me doing wushu against guys half my size.
It's not against, but it's a performance thing.
Right. But if I can do all, if I can go to these
very hard techniques of, like, I got to get down
to the... Floor and I got to – Body mastery.
Yeah. At my size. Right. Well, then I'm better.
So if I want to kick you in the eyebrow, I can.
Right. Because it's about, you know, having my
body do what my mind is telling it to. Right.
And so – but, of course, people want to dismiss
it because, oh, that ain't real. You can't use
it. Yeah. Good. Yeah. Just like ballet is hard
as hell. You can't use that either. But anybody,
any heavyweight who put themselves through ballet
– would be a better fighter. 100%. Look at Lomachenko.
Yeah. His dad taught him Ukrainian dance. Lomachenko's
dad pulled him out of boxing for two years when
he was young and said, you're just going to do
Ukrainian dance. Yeah. He's like, what the fuck
am I doing? But look at that guy's footwork.
Exactly. Exactly. So it's just that as in life,
man, I don't look at anything from one group
and just discard any other stuff. I used to when
I was young. Yeah. When I was young, I was pretty
arrogant about certain things. I thought forms
were stupid. All I wanted to do was spar and
hit the bag. Then as I got older, I realized,
oh, there's a lot of wisdom in all this shit.
Oh, absolutely. Like I say, I try to apply that
to life, period. I never look at anything from
one perspective. I grew up in the hood, and my
favorite band is freaking the Eagles. Really?
Yeah. I'm listening to Jody Mitchell and people
are like, what are you doing listening? I'm like,
what the fuck? You know, this is my life, man.
Fuck you. You hear these lyrics? You hear Jody
Mitchell's lyrics, man? What the fuck? That's
all for me, too. I mean, I'm just as passionate
about, you know, Aerosmith as I am about the
Isley Brothers. But I've never looked at life
as I have to think in this parameter. You know,
I've got to be marginalized. That's that's just
man. Come on. It's such a waste of life. It is.
It's all for you, man. So I agree with with the
martial arts and everything else. I look at every
martial art just like everything else. Everything
has something to contribute. Yeah. Just like
all people have something to contribute. Even
an idiot. You can learn from an idiot. You can.
A lot of idiots say wise things occasionally.
Yeah. Because everybody's going to have a quotient
of. of legitimacy. Mm -hmm. You know, maybe it
may be 20 % and they don't see the 80%. Right.
But until you acknowledge that 20%, they're not
going to hear you. Right. You know what I mean?
So that's the thing. It's like, man, we're on
this planet and one of the things I, man, I don't
envy a whole lot of people, but I do, dude, I
do envy you because you get to expand your world.
You talk to so many interesting people and that's,
I mean, what a great thing. What a great thing
to just, have all these type of perspectives
and all that coming through. And I got to say,
man, I'm super proud of you because I know you
as Joe from the gym and look what you've done,
man. Thank you. Man, it's like that's a shot
in the arm because it's like people that you
like and seeing them prosper. That's cool as
shit. Yeah, I've learned a lot, man. And I didn't
expect to. When we first started doing this,
it was just for fun. We'd just get together with
our friends. But you knew what you wanted to
do, man. You were pretty damn clear. Do you remember
this? You remember me coming to, I think it was
the Ice House? In Pasadena? No, no, no. Oh, shoot.
It wasn't Ice House. It was in Orange County.
Comedy Magic Club, maybe? I came to see you perform,
and I offered you. The role in Blood and Bone.
Do you remember that at all? I do. Yeah, I do
now. Yeah, okay. Because Blood and Bone, which
is like actually Sony's most successful non -theatrical,
that was basically a kind of reimagining of hard
times with Charles Bronson and James Colburn.
Great movie. Yes, well. That role was basically
that I was offering you was the James Colburn
role. Right. And but you were so you was dead.
I don't want to do this acting stuff. I want
to do I want to focus on what I you know, your
interest, which was, you know, you stand up and
you you're getting together. I mean, I know you
and Eddie were doing like kind of the early podcast
type of stuff and whatever. And I'm like, man,
you know, you really kind of knew what you wanted
to do. Well, the thing about acting is, I mean,
I admire it, especially good acting, but it takes
a lot of time out of your day. It's a 16 -hour
day. It's a long day, and it will take away from
other things you do. And I saw that with a lot
of comics that they started doing acting, and
it would take away from their act because they
really couldn't go and do sets every night. They
couldn't really polish their material. You could
see stuff getting a little clunkier. You got
to focus. You got to find the things you enjoy
and focus on them. Yeah, that's why I say I'm
so proud of just being there and seeing what
you did. You being a part of the UFC when it
was nothing promised. You know what I mean? And
not only was it not promised, but people looked
at you like you were doing like snuff films or
something. Exactly. They looked like I remember
the early days. Dana White always says there's
people who talk to you like you're doing porn
or something. Right, right. Like I was on news
radio, the sitcom on NBC, and I was doing commentary
where I was doing post -fight interviews for
the UFC. And they were like, why are you doing
this? Why are you flying to Alabama and doing?
Cage fights. See, this is what movies are. Good
movies are made of shit like this. You know,
and somebody just out of their spirit doing what
they want to do with no promise of anything.
And then accomplishing something. So, you know,
kudos, man. Seriously, man. Well, for me, and
I'm sure for you as well, when we were young,
there was always a question, what is the best
style? Is it Kyokushin? Is it Judo? Is it Kung
Fu? What is it? What's the best style? And no
one really knew. I mean, Benny the Jet fought
in a bunch of those no -rules fights early on,
but they never really took off. There wasn't
a lot of those. And Benny was obviously a very
special fighter. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he was one of
my teachers, too. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I trained at
his gym. He was on the podcast with Blinky, Blinky
Rodriguez. Right, right, right, yeah. And I told
them, I said, when I came to L .A., there was
two places I had to go. I had to go to the Comedy
Store and I had to go to the Jet Center. I had
to go to the Jet Center. Yeah, yeah. And I was
there in 94 right before it went under because
the earthquake damaged the roof. Exactly, yeah.
And so when the rainy season came. On Friar Street,
right? Yeah, yeah. It was on Friar Street. Yep,
yep, yep. Right down from the Goossens. Yep.
Yeah. Yeah, right down. Yeah. And that was an
honor, man, to be able to train in that gym.
That was incredible. It was an incredible place.
Oh, yeah, yeah. I used to be there. Yeah. Yeah,
man. Those were some great times because, I mean,
I connect with Benny because when I was in Bridgeport,
my instructor, Matty Malisi, went to California
and started training with Benny. Oh, wow. Early
on. So he put that on the map about. Coming to
the Mecca and training with Benny. It was the
Mecca. For kickboxing, especially in the 90s,
that was the Mecca. You had to go to the Jets
Center. Everyone talked about the Jets Center.
Yeah, man, that was classic. So we were always
wondering, like, what is the style? What's the
best style? And then the UFC came along. I'm
like, oh, my God, they did it. They did it. They
figured it out. They put it all together. And
for a while, it was jiu -jitsu because nobody
understood jiu -jitsu. And Hoyce Gracie was just
running shit. Whoa. You know how that was kind
of set up a little bit. It was a little set up.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, I mean, look, he had some
challenges. Like Ken Shamrock was a beast. Oh,
yeah. He had some really good fighters he was
facing against. Kimbo Slice. I mean, excuse me,
not Kimbo Slice. Not Kimo. Kimo, sorry. Kimo
was fucking huge. He was a big dude, but, you
know, he didn't really. It was a 100 -pound advantage.
Yeah. He had 100 pounds over a hoist. The Gracies
were smart. They were very smart at that time
in knowing, you know, the right people to kind
of pick at that time. Because, you know, there
was some killers out there. There were some killers
out there. Yeah, they definitely set it up, especially
the early ones. But it's also, it's like... You
know, it was good for us to see a guy like Hoyce
who wasn't jacked. He was a slender guy who weighed
175 pounds, and he was strangling everybody and
armbarring everybody. It was wild to see when
he beat Dan Severin. Dan Severin was 260 pounds,
and Hoyce tapped him off his back with a triangle.
Man, what a story. That put jiu -jitsu on the
map. On the map big time. But, you know, one
thing that always broke my heart is people never
knew about Hickson. Right. Oh, my God. I know.
That dude. Yeah. That cat was like, I always
considered him like pound for pound the best
because he had this, not only, you know, jujitsu
skills, but just his concentration. Yeah. And
he was almost like, you know, hypnotic. Right.
You know what I mean? And just no waste of. None.
Just unbelievable. What an amazing person to
watch. I would encourage anybody to pull up his
fight. Talk about David versus Goliath stuff.
Oh, yeah. Another great example of cross -training,
too, because Hickson got really into yoga. And
everybody's like, what the fuck are you doing
yoga? Like, yoga's for girls, right? Hickson
got really into yoga and got super flexible and
really good at controlling his breathing. Oh,
yeah, yeah. And never got tired. Yeah, you saw
him in the Hulk? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. It's something, man. Talk about a legend.
Oh, real legend. Yeah. Yeah, man. Well, Hickson,
there's a video of him and he did this multiple
times where he would go to these gyms and he
would teach a seminar, like a long seminar, and
then roll with all the black belts and just tap
them one after the other. World champions. Guys
that just didn't understand what was going on.
Like, how is this happening? Oh, yeah. Like,
Paulo Filho, when he was a WEC world champion,
and he had won the Mundials, I believe. He had
won multiple jiu -jitsu championships. And he
trained with Hickson, and he's like, man, it's
true. He goes, I can't believe it. He goes, that
guy treated me like I didn't even belong in there.
It was crazy. And Hickson, by that time, was
probably like 40. And he's still just dominating
guys on the mat and effortless. It wasn't strength.
It was just pure technique and movement. Basics
and just mastering of basics. Oh, basics. It
was like there's no Barambolos and no X -Guards.
Nothing crazy. Everything he did is like jujitsu
101, but to a masterful, masterful degree. Yeah.
It was incredible. And telling people that, you
know, because everybody knows Hoist. And I'm
like, you guys don't know who his big brother
is. He would openly say that my brother is 10
times better than me. Right, yeah. Yeah. So,
you know, that really put – and I love jujitsu
because it's held up the tradition. that martial
arts, so much of karate lost because it became
a business. And people would just, you know,
put their time in and pay for their black belts.
Right. And it just watered it down. Right. And
all these people running around saying that they're
master this and, you know, grand whatever and
all these made -up things. It's like, oh, yeah,
the guy's a master in an Asian martial art. That's
an English word. You know what I mean? How did
master sneak its way into it? But anyway, but,
you know, male ego. Well, the thing about martial
arts other than jujitsu is when you're sparring,
it's very controlled. Like a lot of karate sparring
is very controlled. A lot of Taekwondo sparring
is very controlled. But in jujitsu, the beautiful
thing about grappling is you know how good everybody
is because they all spar. They're all rolling
with each other. And they essentially go in full
blast until the tackle. Yeah. And so there's
no hiding. There's no hiding your skill. Yeah,
I love what Eddie Bravo used to say. Basically,
when you won, I killed you. Yeah, yeah. I just
killed you. Yeah. So that's like, wow, that is
a trip because it actually works out that way.
Oh, yeah. If he gets you in a triangle and you
tap, it's because you were about to go to sleep.
Yes. And once you're asleep, you can just stomp
your head into a pancake. Yeah, yeah. You're
done. Yeah, just hold on to that triangle and
then you never wake up. Yeah, whatever. a humbling
thing. Yeah. Yeah. Very humbling. Yeah. And what's
really humbling is how quickly someone could
do it to you when you don't know what you're
doing. Like that was shocking to me because I
had all this martial arts experience and I first
started training. I was like, what's someone
going to do to me? I wrestled in high school.
I'm strong. I'm fast. I know how to fight. I
just got manhandled over and over and over again.
Oh, yeah. This is ridiculous. Yeah. See that.
But kudos because a lot of people, because if
you got an egotistical thing going. and you get
your little, I don't know, your comfort because
you got your black belt and all that kind of
stuff, that means jack nothing. Everybody I know
who continues and really to learn real fighting
knows when you had a boxer beat the hell out
of you and you go, oh, wait, there's a lot of
this stuff I got to toss out the window. Yeah.
Because, I mean, I never forget times where,
you know, like... A wrestler gets to me or a
boxer, like, pieces me up, like, early on. I'm
like, no, I got to learn this. Oh, yeah. Yeah,
yeah. I went through several of those. I went
through one of them in high school because I
had a friend in high school. that was a wrestler
and uh i didn't think anything of wrestling i'm
like that's not even a martial art and then we
wrestled on the grass one day and he just took
me down at will yeah i was like this is ridiculous
yeah he was pinning me down i couldn't i couldn't
move i couldn't get up i'm like this is stunning
right i thought i'm strong yeah i thought i could
move i thought i'll be able to get out of the
way no not i had no chance yeah he wasn't even
a great wrestler he was just a decent wrestler
yeah he just humbled me over and over and over
again so then i started wrestling and then when
I got into Taekwondo I thought I'm really good
at Taekwondo I was competing on a national level
I won the state championships four years in a
row I was fucking people up and then I remember
the first time I boxed with a really good amateur
boxer I was like oh lord And this kid was like
18 years old. And he went on as a kid. His name
is Dana Rosenblatt. He went on to become New
England middleweight champion. He beat Vinny
Pazienza. He beat Howard Davis Jr. as a professional.
He was a really good boxer. Yeah, he had to be.
But he was kickboxing at the time and I was going
to get into kickboxing. And so I was sparring
with him. But when I was boxing with him, I was
just getting lit up. I was like, oh. And then
also when we're kickboxing, the moment he got
close to me, I was in trouble. Right. I was like,
oh, no. Like Taekwondo had too many flaws. Exactly.
The hand techniques. So I had gone through that.
And so then I thought, OK, well, now I understand
kickboxing. Then I met a dude who went to Thailand
a bunch of times and was training Muay Thai and
fighting over there. And then I started learning
leg kicks. I'm like, well, oh, good Lord. Now
all they have to do is kick my legs? I didn't
even think of that. And then I started really
paying attention to... wka fights like the old
dennis alexio days don the dragon wilson it was
like leg kicks leg kicks are everything oh my
goodness yeah and then i'm like okay well now
i got a solid foundation i understand how to
fight and then i started getting jiu -jitsu like
oh no back to square one yeah i'm getting raped
i was just getting mauled on the mats but i'd
been through that so many times and restarted
so many times i was like well it's time to learn
this now yeah that's that's what I'm saying is
everything has something to teach you and you
know even though there's that there's a martial
art there's a fantasy world which is I look at
it as hilarious you know there's this you know
I don't know there's sometimes I would say it
like this like with martial arts is the Dunning
-Kruger effect in the largest way possible because
everybody out there has an opinion of martial
arts though very few people really know what
it is. They want to look at the movies and everything,
and they really want to believe that. They want
to believe that this guy who kicks in the air
and all that kind of stuff will be able to beat
a champion. And in a way, hey, I benefit from
that to some degree because they think that about
me. But even though I'm comfortable fighting
and I love to, I mean, I just love. fighting
against anybody. But you've had actual competition
experience, like a lot of competition experience.
Yeah, but my best experience is with like, I
got the chance to train against champions at
their place, you know, when they're at their
best. And it's not an ego thing. It's just like,
I love to be able to test myself. And I mean,
because I'm my biggest competition. And so that
whole thing about, And just what the bow means
to me is, like, thank you for making me better.
Right. By providing me an obstacle. And the higher,
you know, the better the person, the better I
can become. 100%. And so I loved it. So I, you
know, for years I'm in there with Gokhan Saki
and, you know, Maurice Smith and, you know, you
name it. I've gotten. I consider myself one of
the luckiest martial artists on the planet because
I get to train with so many people. Sometimes
at my house and I've got all these former champions
training. Rampage, when he was champion, I'd
go to his place. And honestly, like, the things
I brag about is when I get humbled, you know,
because that's when I learn something. For sure.
My philosophy is I love to be wrong because every
time I'm wrong, I learn something. Absolutely.
And so, like, some of the best times for me is,
like, I know when I was, you know, Michael Bisping
was getting ready to fight George St. Pierre.
And we were in Thailand. I was like, yeah, you
know, let's mix it up. What were you doing in
Thailand? We were doing a movie out there. Oh,
wow. But he had to train. He was getting ready
for the George St. Pierre fight. And so, you
know, I was like, yeah, let's do some rounds
or whatever. And I got so winded the second round.
I'm like, dude, just whoop my ass. I feel so
like, like. I'm embarrassed. Bisping was a cardio
machine. Yes, he was. He was a cardio machine.
I didn't expect that because we spent all day
on a yacht. The day before, and he was drinking
nonstop. I'm a non -drinker, right? I'm like,
this guy's going to, you know, I'm going to probably
take it easy on him today. He is one of the toughest
motherfuckers that ever fought in the sport.
I swear. This is what I say about him. No matter
what you think about watching his fights, you
have to understand, not only did he accomplish
so much, he accomplished a lot of it with one
eye. One fucking eye. He had 11 fights in the
UFC with a winning record with one eye. Yeah.
Crazy. Yeah, that's, man. He would memorize the
eye chart so that when they covered his eye,
he could side it out like he could read it. Oh,
yeah, yeah. How fucking crazy is that? He's got
a hell of a personal story, too. I was trying
to encourage him to get that. Get that made.
Honestly, man, I really look at these UFC fighters
and the MMA guys as our modern -day heroes. They're
our gladiators. And so whenever I have a chance,
man, I always like to put them in movies and
try to expose them to another kind of way of
getting paid, especially afterwards because it
breaks my heart that... They're heroes, and then
they get discarded sometimes. Not by the union
that they're with, but just by the fans. They're
so fickle sometimes. Yes. Well, the casuals,
the people that aren't really martial artists.
Right, yeah. They dismiss a guy when they lose
a few. Yeah, I just did my third movie with Cowboy
Cerrone. We just finished a little over a week
ago. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, he's doing really
good, man. I love that dude. Yeah, yeah, me too.
That's a guy that could really legitimately transition
to become a movie star. Yes, yes. And he's got
a lot more confidence. Like I said, the third
movie, he did a Western with me, Outlaw Johnny
Black. I wrote and directed it. But I had Cowboy.
Randy Couture in it. Oh, wow. And then Josh Barnett.
Randy's done an amazing job of transitioning.
Oh, absolutely. The expendables, you know, and
he's great at it. Yeah, yeah. He has a great
personality. Absolutely. Just very calm. Like
he, well, I remember one time he was fighting
Tim Sylvia for the heavyweight title and he came
out there and he had a smile on his face. He
looked over at me and he winked. I'm like, how
is this motherfucker so relaxed before his fight?
But he had an amazing perspective. He's like,
He said to me, the people who love you will love
you whether you win or lose. And he said, what's
the worst thing that can happen? You lose? He
goes, you've lost before. It's no big deal. I
remember him spanking Tito. Yeah, he got on top
of him and spanked him when he had him down.
Randy was an animal. You know, he had that heart
attack while he was shooting my movie. That's
crazy. And it came back to set like nothing.
How did he have a fucking heart attack? I don't
remember how exactly. And I think he drove himself
to the hospital. Yeah, man. Talk about an American
hero, man. I was there for his first fight. Really?
Yeah, 1997. Yeah, I was there for his very first
fight. Oh, shoot. He fought this huge jack dude,
took him down, mounted him, beat the shit out
of him. It was wild. That was the time where
wrestlers had first started cracking this code.
Right. There was this code of there was a lot
of people that thought jujitsu was the only way,
and then the elite wrestlers got in there. Oh,
God. The Mark Kers, the Mark Coleman. And then
Randy, a bunch of these guys got in there. And
then they realized, like, if a guy can just take
you down and beat the fuck out of you from the
top, there's not a whole lot you could do about
it. Right, right. And then we realized, like,
boy, that's the true cornerstone of martial arts,
the ability to take a guy down. My goodness.
I mean, what's harder than wrestling? I don't
think there's anything. The hardest sport in
the world. Yeah. The hardest sport in the world
and the best sport in the world to get your kids
into at a young age because the discipline and
the mental toughness that they get will carry
them through for the rest of their lives. of
their life. Yep. Tenacity. Just the... Stick
-to -itiveness, whatever you want to call it.
Yeah, that's just like. Even high school wrestling.
I remember wrestling in high school, and I had
already done martial arts, but I was like, I've
never trained that hard. I was like, I can't
believe. And then it carried me over into my
Taekwondo career because I realized, like, oh,
I'm leaving a lot on the table. Like, I'm not
training like these guys are. So I started running.
I started adding all these things to my training
that I wasn't doing before. I started doing a
lot more calisthenics, a lot more different things.
I was like, I'm leaving something on the table
because we were not training. In the gym. And
we were sparring hard. We were doing hard rounds.
You'd get tired. But it was not the same as what
we were doing in wrestling. No one trains harder
than wrestlers. That anaerobic stuff, man. I
got the wrestling bug when I was a senior in
high school. And the football coach was a wrestler
in college. And he challenged me. I think we
did this two years in a row, in my junior year
and my senior year. At the end of the year, we'd
wrestle. We'd just go, like, you know, he and
I. Like I said, I was big for my age. Were you
playing football? I was for a very short time,
but I ended up, I wasn't designed for it. Team
sports. Me neither. I ended up beating up the
football coach. Oh, no. Yeah. Dude, like, I had
the worst temper than anybody I had ever seen.
I mean, I used to go in the fits of rage. I was
so angry early on, man. It's like the Hulk is
like, Mike, you should chill out a little bit,
man. It's probably from being on your own at
14. Yeah. What it is is I was growing up in a
very harsh environment. And I didn't know I was
an artist. I didn't know I was a writer, director,
whatever. You didn't see those growing up where
I am. And so when you're a sensitive kid, man,
what you do is you build armor. I was to play
Mike Tyson later on, and I understood him quite
well. If you're sensitive, you know, anything
that's precious, you put it in, you lock it in
a safe and you become the safe. And it's like,
I grew up, my brothers were completely different.
They're engineers. So things rolled off their
back. But like for me, just, I was just volatile.
And luckily I had martial arts to kind of put
my focus into. But like I said. Like I was to
play Mike Tyson, I understood him a great deal.
And, you know, even though you take the moniker
of this monster, it's only to hide what's really
deep inside. And that's why you would see if
anybody's going to go into tears in front of
a million people, it's people like Mike Tyson.
And you go, how does that fit in the same person?
Right. And so that's what I was growing up. I
don't know if you know this, but I was a school
teacher before I was an actor. Oh, really? Yeah,
I taught EMD. I was a special ed teacher. So
I focused on a lot of kids who were very much
like me, and I still do that. In a way, I consider
that my real job. Whenever I'm off from work
on a movie or whatever, I go into the inner cities.
I go into community centers. I devote my time
because there's nothing I could do. There's no
better spending of time than something like that.
I was luckily, luckily saved. I had just at the
right times in my life just different seeds planted.
And so I'm confident that if those seeds were
not planted, I would not be here. Because, like
I say, I've been through some crazy stuff. It's
a classic story. Yeah, bro. Man, like I tell
you, like just a little under two years ago,
a buddy of mine, it was a close friend of mine.
He got out of prison. He was in prison for almost
like 30 years. And he found me on Facebook. And
so when I went back east, we linked up. And,
you know, I know a lot of people who have businesses
and everything. I hooked him up, you know, got
him a job, and we were sitting over lunch. And
in the middle of him telling me, like, the third
or fourth story, like, back in the glory days
of us or whatever. While he was in the middle
of this story, I was kind of getting myself set
to kind of set him straight because I don't know
if you want to call this superstitious, but I
won't lie. I refuse to lie to my friends. I won't
lie by omission. So I was getting set to tell
him, dude, man, you got to stop embellishing
on these stories. Just because you were locked
up and you made these stories sound bigger than
life. Right. I get it. But that's not real. You
got to really, you know, kind of not do that.
And in the middle of me thinking that, and I'm
listening to him, I go, holy shit. He's telling
the truth. I started remembering what he was
telling me. And I'm like, now I'm finishing his
sentences. Not only was that story true. But
the other ones were true, too. And, dude, like,
I swear, every time I think about this, I got
these goosebumps. And I realized, oh, my God,
how close I was to being where he was or just
not being on this planet. Right. Like, I better
devote my time into helping kids the way I was
helped. Yeah, don't pull that ladder up. No,
hell no. Hell no. Even if I'm taken out, I accept
that. Even if I'm in some projects where I'm
not supposed to be and I shouldn't have been,
I accept that. Because, dude, I am abundantly
lucky. Like, it doesn't even fit on the radar
how lucky I am. And I can remember a lot of these
crazy stories, you know, aside from the ones
that he, Made me conjure back up. But man, I'm
like, wow. Well, that speaks to your character
that you had downplayed it all in your mind so
much that you thought he was exaggerating. I
swept it under the rug. Yeah. Because you're
not that person anymore. No, no. But I mean,
but there was so much. There were so many events,
things that I just call it on a Wednesday that
I went through that. It's like, I don't know.
Like, I think I wouldn't trade it because I continue
to be the happiest guy I know because of, I think,
some of that. Because you can appreciate the
good times. Oh, my God. Yeah. And I should be
slapped if I complain about anything. Right.
You know what I mean? Like, what? And so, you
know, so I just, boy, I just know I'm so blessed.
You know, what we do, what we're doing right
now, man, we're we're in the service industry,
man. You know, you're here to serve. In my opinion,
that's what we're all here for. And, you know,
it's great that we get to serve and doing the
things that we would like to do. That's definitely
a lot of what we do. I mean, there's definitely
a lot of it. Right. You you entertain. But I
feel very blessed that I've been able to expose
people to so many different. ways of thinking,
so much information, so many different human
beings that have led completely different paths
that can tell you about whatever discipline they're
involved in, what they've learned and what we're
working on right now and what you can learn about
the human mind, the body, ancient history, fill
in the blank, like whatever it is. Yeah, yeah.
And I see you do that over and over and in utmost
honesty, I remember like when you had to kind
of pull Shab aside until... as a friend, some
things that are hard for people that, you know,
other friends to tell him, you know, and like,
that was real hard. Yeah. Well, that was real
hard because I love that guy. He's a great, he's
a great person. He's a great human being. And
I knew the path. I'd seen it too many times.
But I hadn't seen it with someone I was that
close with. I was like, you have to stop. Because
not only that, you're in the heavyweight division.
So the knockouts are brutal. And you're going
to get three or four more in the next couple
of years. And then you're not going to recover
from those. Man, so many people. I hope they
take a page out of that. Because it's so non
-manly, I feel. to not to just not say anything
right and allow somebody you love To go down
the road. I mean, that might be detrimental for
them. Well, it was also when Schaub had another
path. He was really good at podcasting. He's
fun. He's a funny dude. Right, yeah. He's like,
as a podcast, he's got a great personality. He's
silly. He's a big, giant, silly dude. We would
have so much fun. And he was doing really well.
And he was making more money doing that than
he was fighting. But his identity was so wrapped
up in him being a top 10 UFC heavyweight. He
had beat world -class guys like Mirko. crow cop
you know and he was legit man but that time had
passed and I saw that his he was one foot in
and one foot out and as soon as the guy's one
foot in one foot out you're gonna run into some
guy who has both feet in and he's a fucking samurai
and then you're gonna wake up on a stretcher
yeah you're on the way to the hospital going
what happened and you don't remember the fight
you don't remember nothing And then you don't
know where your keys are. You forget people's
names. You tell the same story over and over
again. And then you struggle to put sentences
together. When you start seeing dudes with the
slur. Nothing's worth that, man. Nothing's worth
that. Because you're, I mean, at the time he
was only 35 years old or whatever he was. I'm
like, man, you got another 45, 55 years of life.
You can't do this. You can't sacrifice all these
years. for glory that will never be achieved
anyway because you're not on that path anymore.
Yeah, and it's not about what strangers say about
you. No. It's about your friends, your family.
People really love you. It's just so hard for
people to abandon that identity. That's the hardest
thing with fighters is to abandon that identity.
We've seen so many guys, even the greats, they
come back and they shouldn't and you see it and
you see them get humiliated and you're like,
oh. Yeah, and when it comes down to it, these
people, they don't love you, man. They love you
as the image. Yeah, they live vicariously through
you. I remember one time I was fighting in Boston,
and I remember when something completely changed.
Usually, if anybody, because I did any kind of
thing. kickboxing or this tournament, I just
loved my best. I think the thing I did best in
the world was fighting. I always had these cheat
codes in a way, and I enjoyed the chess match
of it. And anybody who was against me, I don't
care if you were my cousin or whatever, you were
going to pay for all the angst that I've had
in my life. But until there was this one time,
I swear, I ducked a technique. I caught somebody
with something that was kind of, you know, kind
of cool. And I just remember the audience just
cheering. And in that moment, I was like, just
angry. Kind of like, yo, this guy could really
be messed up right now. You're cheering for me.
You're living vicarious through me. Like I'm
a pit bull or something. Right. And I got angry
at the audience. I fucking hated them. And I
said, because if I was down on the ground, you'd
be cheering for the person that put me down.
And something just snapped. And I go, no. This
is not enough for me. This is not what I want
to do. And, you know, just something snapped.
And I'd much rather. be skillful, test myself
in a skillful way. And I'd much rather not try
to peel your head off, but show I could, as opposed
to, you know, that triumph of dominating. It
was nothing for me anymore in that. You know,
it's just something just rubbed me the wrong
way, and I just... Any time I would do any kind
of competition, it was for me, and it wasn't
for an audience. You know? Just something soured.
I always thought at one time, I'm going to be
called out. You know? And I thought, oh, I'll...
I'll rise to that occasion if that happens. And,
you know, kind of like, remember the thing with
you and Wesley? Oh, yeah. Which would have been,
oh, my God, that would have been terrible. But
I always thought, hey, you know, maybe, you know,
something. I think Wesley just needed money.
I mean, that was when he was rapping. I don't
think that was ever serious. We were in negotiation
for quite a while, man. We had lawyers involved.
Yeah, it's always easy to pull a plug on something
like that. Just like Jean -Claude's talking about
fighting Jake Paul, right? Is he talking about
that right now? He's 100 years old. He weighs
50 pounds. I'm like, come on, man. Come on. Is
he really talking about it? I just saw something
in the last couple of days. I'm like, OK. I think
Wesley was serious because I think they had hit
him with that tax case. And he owed a lot of
money to the government. No, this was before
that tax case. No, no, no. It was in the middle
of it. Really? Yeah, 100%. I know it was. Yeah.
Yeah, it was 2000, I want to say, 5 or 6. It
was in the middle of all that, and he was in
trouble. It was serious. And he, you know, obviously
eventually wound up going to jail. Yeah, yeah.
And so they were going to set up a fight with
him and Jean -Claude Van Damme. That was the
first fight. But Campbell McLaren from the UFC
was like, no one gives a shit about you fighting
Jean -Claude Van Damme. You got to fight someone
who's current. And so he said, let me contact
Joe Rogan. He called me up and he said, would
you be willing to fight Wesley Snipes? And I
was like, what? And I was like, come on, really?
I go, what is this? So I said, let me think about
it. I thought about it. I called him the next
day. I said, let's fucking do it. Really? Yeah.
I was training with Rob Kamen in the mornings,
and then I was doing jujitsu at night. I trained
twice a day for six months. Wow. I was always
tired. I was always tired. That's one thing that
I realized. Like, fuck, man. And I wasn't even
a professional, really. But I was training like
a professional. I was like, I can't believe how
tired I am all the time. But, you know, I think
Wesley had never really had a fight. I don't
think so. I think he was an accomplished martial
artist. He had good technique. I trained with
Wesley's instructors. Marcus Elgato was a good
friend of mine. And also Lamar Thornton, who
was Marcus Elgato's instructor. I believe that's
the lineage I believe that he's through. I've
known Wesley since... way before he was kind
of Wesley. I was a giant fan of Wesley too, which
was also wild for me because I love Blade. Blade
was like my favorite comic book when I was a
kid. Yeah, yeah. I just didn't, I didn't think
they were serious about it. I couldn't imagine
why would Wesley, I always thought it was not
real. I think Wesley thought that I was just
a grappler and think he knew that I was doing
jujitsu. I don't think he knew my background.
And so like, Wesley was talking to them, saying,
oh, he thinks he's going to be able to stop you
from taking him down and he's going to catch
you with a knee while you're coming in to try
to take him down. I go, oh, he wants to stand
up? I go, I'm way better at that. Yeah. Yeah.
I was wondering how that even occurred. I didn't
think that was serious. I was like, OK. It was
serious. Yeah. It was serious. It went on for
a long time. It was a lot of negotiation to the
point where I even. talked about it on the UFC
broadcast once. I said, come on, Wesley, sign
the contract. I'm getting bored training. Let's
do this. Like, I have to do it now. I was like
35 or 36. I was like, I don't have much time
left. If we're going to do this, we have to do
this now. Like, come on, let's go. And then he
decided not to. And then I'm like, that's probably
for the better. Yeah. I know Wesley for a while.
I remember when he was first telling me about
this. being sovereign. Yeah, that's where they
got him, with that sovereign citizenship. Yeah,
and I was like... I wish I was friends with him.
I would have said, dude, they're going to lock
you up. I'm super protective of my friends. I've
always been that way. And with Wesley, I was
always... My thing is, he used to have people
around him that I'm like, you know, we have little
get -togethers at my house or whatever. I'm like,
don't bring any of those motherfuckers. Or it's
going to be a problem. You know, because there's
people that just I felt like were hangers on
and, you know, that kind of a thing. And I was
always like, hey, man, are you good? And, you
know, are you staying healthy? I've always been
that way because the way I look at it, he's a
big brother. If not for him, it may not be for
me. He gave me some good advice early on. He
always encouraged me that if I have a movie that's
overseas, get there. Show up in those overseas
markets and let them know that you're down. And
I took that to heart, and that helped me out
in my career a great deal. And so I look at it
like that. I'll never say anything. derogatory
about him or whatever. So, I mean, I'm always,
I just recently tried to reach out to him like
a couple days ago just to check in, man, because
I, you know, I wish him the best and, you know,
I want him to like really, you know, start kicking
ass again. I would love to see him return as
Blade. Yeah, that would be cool. He could do
it too. Yeah, yeah. An older Blade, he could
do it. Yeah. Fuck, he was good in the original
Blade. That opening scene, that was one of the
best scenes in any action movie of all time.
When it's that vampire party, and the sprinklers
start spraying blood, and they're about to kill
that dude. And all of a sudden, Wesley shows
up. Yeah, man. What really gets on my nerves
is that, you know, he saved Marvel, man. That
movie saved Marvel. You know that, right? Oh,
yeah. That movie was a huge hit. Even Stan Lee
admits that. They were like in trouble until
that movie. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. Because superhero
movies are the biggest fucking movies in Hollywood
right now. Yeah. I mean, when they have a big
budget movie, superhero movies are like the only
movie that you can throw hundreds of millions
of dollars and be sure it's going to kill it
in the box office. Yeah. Whether it's the Avengers
or Spider -Man or Superman or whoever the fuck
it is. That's the only kind of movie that Hollywood's
like, yeah, okay. We'll throw $500 million at
this one. Yeah. I'm not a big fan of those things.
I know it's not—they didn't design it for people
like me. Right. So it's for the fan base. And
to me, it's like, ugh. They tend to meld into
each other as far as I'm concerned. They do.
Yeah. They do. There's only so many times you
can tell the stories. There's only so many—you
know. Yeah. But— I still enjoy them. I still
enjoy some of them. They're fun. Yeah, I like
when people are believable. Right. Believable.
Yeah, there's nothing believable about those
movies. Yeah, you know, I like the actors that
are, like, you know, have some quirkiness and
some, you know, edge to them, right? Yeah. Yeah.
You know, maybe I'm being unfair because I really
hadn't seen a lot. Maybe I owe it to myself to
give some. No, I think you got it. It's simple
entertainment. It's a silly release and escape.
That's all it is. It's not a great. There's no
great films that are superhero films. Right.
Yeah. Because sometimes I'm like, oh, yeah, she's
90 pounds and she just threw. OK. Yeah. Like
Charlie's Angels or something. Yeah, I'm like,
oh, come on now. Kicking ass in stilettos. Anytime
somebody lands in a three -point stance and then
looks up, I'm like, I just changed the channel.
I'm just like, stop. Just stop. Yeah. But, you
know, people love those things. I'm like, that's
cool. I don't know why they have so much appeal,
especially in the American market. People, that
is one of the only movies that you can make that's
guaranteed to be huge. Yeah, it's McDonald's,
man. It's McDonald's. But I remember when. That's
it. Yeah, I remember when you had, what was that,
like the 300. You know, that was like nobody
knew anybody. Right. But that was just such a.
breath of fresh air because it would look like
some badasses that were real. You know what I
mean? I'd like to see more of that kind of a
thing. Like, you know, not the star power thing,
but just some motherfuckers that you believe.
Right. You know what I mean? That would... You
know, that would attract me. Also, the style
of that movie was so unique because it blended
fantasy with reality. Right. And history, too.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. You know, I would.
I got some things in the works. Do you? Yeah.
What are you working on? Oh, man. I've been blessed,
man. I've got some really good movies coming
out and some things that I'm planning on doing.
I'm getting to a place where I'm really shooting
the things that I want. I'm producing and all
that stuff. I have movies that have their body
count, but also have a little bit of something
to say. You know what I miss? What's that? Spawn.
Oh, man. People forgot about Spawn. You don't
hear about it anymore. Right. Yeah, man. That
was fucking great. Yeah. You didn't, most people
didn't see the first adaptation of it. The first,
well, I saw a cut of the movie before it, I mean,
at this time it had like 71 special effects in
it. But Bob Shea at the time that was running
New Line liked the, that version he just gave
the director, to just add whatever he wanted.
And the director, was a special effects guy.
So he started throwing special effects in there
that was really killing the story, which kind
of drove me up a wall because then, like, you
didn't even see why my character wanted to get
back. You didn't even see the life that I wanted
to get back to because there was so much special
effects. And even when I saw the final version,
I'm like, what the hell is going on? People that
knew Spawn... They were fine with it because
they understood the character. But for me, it
was like the story got all convoluted. But, like,
you know, but, I mean, people love it. I think
it was a thing for its time. But, unfortunately,
I saw a version of it that made you care about
it. I understand, but I cared about the one that
I saw. And I felt like I don't understand how
Spawn sort of escaped the zeitgeist. You don't
ever hear about Spawn anymore. You know what
I mean? There's all these superhero films, all
these different things, but Spawn was unique,
and it was really good and dark. Yeah, I always
say if they did another one, you should do it
just like the comic book. Make it hard R, or
non -rated. Because, I mean, to do a Spawn PG,
how we did PG -13, it's like, what do you want?
Are you trying to go for a breakfast cereal,
like Spawn O's or something? Like, come on, man.
Let's go hard like the cartoon, right? See if
you can find a clip from Spawn. Because I feel
like no one talks about it anymore. It's kind
of weird, man. They damn sure talked to me about
it. Bro, it was good. What year was this? 97.
Wow. Yeah. They were fucking great, man. The
memories. Bro, that was a fucking great movie,
man. New Line Cinema Presents. Yeah. That was
a great movie. How many did you guys do? One.
Just one. Just one. There was nothing else? Wasn't
there something else, like a series? It was a
cartoon first. That's right. Yeah, well, it was
a comic book, then it was a cartoon on HBO. Oh,
that's right. Yeah, yeah. Keith David was the
voice of Spawn on that one. Oh. Yeah. Yep. And
so, yeah. But that was a big hit. I think so.
It made its money back. I mean, I remember it
was very popular. Like, everyone was talking
about it. People got excited about it. Especially
people like me that liked the comic books. Right,
right. They were very into it. I was always surprised.
But it's weird to me that even the comic book
spawn doesn't get brought up anymore. Right.
Every now and then, like, I'm off doing a movie
or whatever, I drive by comic book stores. I
go in and I just start signing shit, right, the
spawn stuff. So there's still stuff there. Oh,
yeah. There's always going to be a hardcore fan
base. Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, you know, there's
people, like, there's still hardcore about that.
And then Todd McFarlane is always. talked about
doing another Spawn for the last 25 years. It
was huge. But the weird thing is, it's like,
okay, I wish you all the best of luck, bro. But
you created the comic book. When he's talking
about doing another Spawn, I'm like, you haven't
done a first one. Like the comic book. No, he's
not a director. It's just like Stan Lee hasn't
directed a Marvel movie. Right. And Tom McFarlane
is talking about doing another Spawn, but I'm
like, well, that would be the first time a person
that created a comic book directed and produced
a movie that I know of, right? Because even though
he talks about he's going to do one, and he had
this concept that he talked to me about, and
then he said he wanted to, you know, I guess
he wanted to use Jamie Foxx, and he talked about
this concept that Spawn would be, you wouldn't
see him. And it's like Jaws. He would never be
around, but just people would get fucked up.
All of a sudden, like a mist would come and people
are destroyed. I'm like, good luck with that.
You know, I don't know. But he's been talking
about it for a while. And people say, oh, man,
I'm sad that you're not the next spot, that they're
using Jamie. I'm like, when is it going to happen?
He's been saying that for a long time, but I'm
going, hey, maybe somebody is going to give him
that amount of money to do a movie when he's
never directed anything before. Right. He hasn't
directed anything before. He visited set a few
times because he created a comic book. Directing
a movie is something completely different. You
know what I mean? So I'm like, all power to you
if that's happening, but it's like. I wonder
why people believe it. Yeah, that's a lot to
bite off, especially a movie like that, which
would probably be a large budget. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. And then you're going to get the executives
involved and they're going to fuck with it because
they always have to have their say. Yeah, man.
It's a miracle that a movie gets done the way
it's intended, period. Yeah. I'm like. A lot
of times when a movie works, I go, how did some
executive not fuck this movie up? Right, right.
I mean, I'm always like that. There's only a
few guys that can get away with a movie where
everybody just leaves them alone. There's a few
Tarantinos out there. Let them go. Just let them
go. Yeah, yeah. If you tried to make Once Upon
a Time in Hollywood and you weren't a successful
director, you were just some guy with an idea,
someone would come along and fuck that up. Oh,
absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. Luckily, people
are leaving me alone. I've been directing and
doing my own thing. They go, OK, you got this.
OK, like I say, I'll give you the body count.
But now if I could put stuff in it, you know.
What is going on with Jamie Foxx doing Tyson?
Because that's been rumored for a decade at least.
Yeah, that's another thing. It's like weird that
Jamie Foxx wants to do a Tyson and a Spawn. But
it's like, I don't know. I don't take it personally.
Very talented guy. But yeah, I think. Jamie does
a very good impression of Mike Tyson. Yeah, but
you've got to gain like 100 pounds. Right. He's
got to pack on that meat at 50. But then why?
I just sit there and I go, why? When Tyson's
life itself has been very transparent. Right.
And so you can see the real guy in documentary
form and everything else. What? story do you
have to tell that's true I'm not trying to be
a hater but I'm like I just I'm I'm just curious
the only thing that would be interesting is seeing
like Jamie do it seeing him pull like you pulled
off Ray Charles like seeing him pull it off that
would that would be the appeal of it I think
right but yeah I in my personal opinion I don't
think that's enough you gotta tell the story
right I know what you're saying yeah you gotta
you gotta it's got to be some compelling story
I mean, hell, people saw Titanic. You know how
it's going to end. But he had to present a story
there. Jamie is so versatile. He is. There's
very few guys that can do all the different things
that he can do. He can sing. He can act. He can
do stand -up. And he can do all kinds of different
characters. And he's so believable in so many
different roles. You know what I watched the
other day? which is a fucking great movie that
I forgot was so great, is Collateral. Oh, hell
yeah. Oh, my God. No, no. When Jamie had Collateral
and Ray, to me, you couldn't have had a better
year. Right. Two completely different human beings.
Oh, my God. Yes. Absolutely. Absolutely. And
he became those people. He became Ray Charles.
Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. And as good
as he can sing, him singing as Ray Charles was
insane. It's one of the best performances ever.
Ever. Ever. But so is Collateral. He really played
that dude in Collateral. You believed it. And
fucking Tom Cruise. Oh, my God. Tom Cruise really
proved something to me in that damn movie. Because
I would never think I would ever be scared of
Tom freaking Cruise. Right. And how... Convincing
he was. He's a bad motherfucker. Yes. He's crazy
as bat shit, but he's a bad motherfucker. He
brought it in that movie. You have to be that
crazy to do all the stunts that that guy does.
He's 60 years old. He's jumping off buildings
and shit and breaking his ankle. Yeah, just like
Johnny Depp. I'm like, Johnny Depp, when he did
Black Mass, I'm like, oh, you had that in you?
Right, right, right. Holy shit. And just like
with Tom Cruise, I'm like. Him having that character
in him? There's a scene in Collateral that tactical
instructors play. Yes. The double tap. Yes. He
whips it back. Double tap, double tap. He knocks
the guy's gun out of the way and pulls it out.
And it's so fast and so smooth. See if you can
find that scene, Jamie. It's a scene where they're
trying to take Tom Cruise's briefcase and he's
in an alleyway. Yep. Yeah, I played that over
and over myself. The amount of times that he
must have drilled that to get that, unholster
the gun, pull it out, shoot him, shoot the other
dude so smooth and the way he did it so professional.
I mean, it looks like a legit hitman. Oh, absolutely.
Absolutely. Yeah, that character, I mean, from
start to finish. To me, proved a lot. Yeah. I
mean, he embodied that guy. And you know it is.
Is that my briefcase? Is it your briefcase? Yeah,
it is. Why, you want it back? About your wallet.
What else you got for me, huh? Come on, son.
Yeah. I actually visited that set when they were
shooting that. Not that scene, but it was another
day. And I remember it was weird because they
were shooting something, and they were shooting
behind Tom Cruise's head. And he had eight camera
angles just behind his head. I'm like, and I'm
looking at the video village where it's. They
made sure they had a choice of whatever perfect
thing that they want. It was the craziest thing.
And I guess Michael Mann, he's known for, like,
shooting a lot. But it was, like, eight cameras
that was just behind the dude. That's crazy.
Yeah. I'm like, this is a whole other, like,
level. Yeah, it was crazy. It's a great fucking
movie. That movie holds up. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
That's prime Jamie, man. Yep, yep. And the fact
that he's got that much range, that he can do
this nerdy dude who's terrified, doesn't know
what the fuck is going on, he's just driving
a car, and all of a sudden he has this hitman
with him, and then he gets wrapped up in this
whole thing. Yeah, but as a fan, I want to see
him do something else like that. Right, right.
You know what I mean? Like something like...
that requires what he can do. And there's a lot,
you know, that's one of the things, there's not
a lot of things out there sometimes. You know,
so, you know, he's been doing things that I think
show, you know, certain parts, but like to where
he was going in Collateral and Ray, you know,
it'd be nice to see that stuff again. It's got
to be hard to find those roles, right? And when
you find those roles, there's probably like...
six or seven A -list dudes that they have, like,
on a board somewhere, and they're trying to figure
out who's the guy for this. Yeah, but I believe—
Who's going to sell the most. I believe you've
got to create your own stuff, man. Put it this
way. Nobody was going to write Black Dynamite
for me. Right, right, right. You know what I
mean? Right. You know, my thing is largely creating
my own lane. That was a fun movie, by the way.
Oh, thanks, man. Really fun. Thanks, man. So,
yeah, man. So, luckily, like, I— I enjoyed writing.
I was always looked at everything from I was
always fascinated about this industry. And I
showed a lot of things as a writer separate from
the acting thing. And so, you know, just putting
it all together is something that's like I really
enjoy doing. How do you dedicate your time when
you're writing? Do you just like have an idea
and say, OK, for the next X weeks, I'm going
to sit down and dedicate myself to this? Dude,
it's all different. A lot of times I will see
the entire movie. Like when I did Black Dynamite,
dude, I was in China going to set. I was in Shanghai.
And I was listening to James Brown's Superbad.
And I just started thinking about, I'm laughing.
I'm in the back of this car and there's a driver
wondering what the hell is going on with me.
I'm seeing the whole goddamn movie, including.
a nunchuck fight scene with Richard Nixon. And
I'm laughing. And, you know, I started jotting
stuff down because it occurred to me, man. I
was like, I mean, one day I was thinking like,
wow, man, like growing up we had Shaft and we
had Superfly and the Mac and posters like that
that we idolized. And I'm going, those were pimps.
There was something wrong with my childhood.
Why am I like the Mac? Like that's a hero. And
so it made me really think about it. And I'm
like, I'm looking at these movies and like Jim
Brown and Fred Williamson are like killing like
60 people. And it's OK. Everybody's like this.
They have a club, and they got all these women.
And I'm like, this is actually hilarious. So
I do a movie that depicted it exactly like it
is. I'm thinking about this. One of the biggest
movies of that time was Three the Hard Way. I
don't know if you remember that movie. Jim Brown,
Fred Williamson, and Jim Kelly. Oh, yeah. I forgot
about Jim Kelly. Three the Hard Way. What was
it about? It had the three predominant blaxploitation
stars, right? And the movie was about an evil
Dr. Feather who had these liters of liquid that
he was going to put in the water systems of L
.A., Chicago, and New York that were going to
kill all the black people. It's not a comedy.
That's the movie? It's not a comedy. It was going
to give sickle cell anemia to all the black people.
The conspiratorial thing, I've been a black man
for a long time, and it is really funny because
in the community, conspiracy is a big thing,
right? So like that whole conspiratorial thing,
oh, they trying to get you, that kind of a thing,
it really, its engine was that, that paranoia
that this leader of liquid was going to kill.
Black people. Well, there was so much evidence
that those conspiracies were real, like the Tuskegee.
But of course, that's something that's like it's
on its feet, though. But come on, a leader, something
this big, in the water systems, that was going
to kill all the black people. And that's not
a comedy. That was a serious movie. But when
you look at it, that's hilarious. It's absolutely
hilarious to think that you can do a movie about
that. So to do a movie, I thought that really,
really talked about that time period where it
was kind of this overcorrection because, you
know, you had in the 60s, there were like, you
know, butlers and maids and all that kind of
stuff. But now you had these super overcorrected
badasses that could just do anything. Right.
And I thought it was hilarious to look at it
and treat it as if it were, like, back in that
day, like a lost movie. Actually, Tarantino was
somebody I was talking to about that whole thing
when I was putting Black Dynamite together. And
he had certain ideas, but, you know, I kind of
went my own direction with it. But, yeah, man,
so, yeah, things like that. Like, you know, I've
gotten to a place where I'm putting these things
together that really. interests me. And I'm finding
that there's an audience that likes it as well.
But yeah, man, so, you know, it just occurred
to me that it was bizarre. Yeah. Yeah. So, I
mean, you know. So for that movie, that movie
just came to you. Yeah. But it came to me just
like the whole movie came to me in a ride to
set. Is that normal for ideas or do you sometimes
sit down and say, like, I want to write an idea
about blank? Sometimes. Sometimes. Like I have
a movie that the next movie I'm going to do is
a sequel to a movie I did called As Good As Dead.
Right. And it became Samuel Goldwyn's, one of
their most successful movies. I wrote the idea.
It was based off my brother. My brother, he went
from Florida into Mexico and started a family.
He just fell in love with Mexico. And I kind
of based my character on him. And he's basically
a cop that's hiding out in Mexico and trying
to avoid... this syndicate or whatever that's
trying to kill him. But that movie just came
to me. I wrote it. We were in production like
two months later, and we actually got the movie
done within a year. How did you get it made so
quick? Yeah, I mean, they responded to the script,
and it was kind of like a grown -up Karate Kid
in a way. So my character, you don't know what
was this black dude doing working construction
in Mexico. And he's got his Wing Chun dummy.
He's training in his backyard. And it's a kid
who's trying to avoid the gangs that he befriends
that he teaches this unique kind of martial art.
And so one thing leads to another. This kid gets
good at it and they trace the style back to my
character. And then. You know, then the bad guys
are trying to kill me and I have to fight back.
So what we're doing, we're about to do a sequel.
I start that in a couple of weeks, actually.
So I wrote that one. But, yeah, so I feel like,
I don't know, I'm still a fan of movies. I don't,
I wouldn't write something I wouldn't want to
see. And I've seen a lot. You know, I think I
understand this industry. I understand there's
a lot of stories that I think could be told with
fresh ways and with the action and martial arts
that could be new and exciting. I'm getting to
a place where I'm trying to make fight scenes
look very real, including choreographing mistakes.
You know what I mean? I think people have become
so much more sophisticated watching UFC fights
and all that type of stuff. I think you've got
to raise the bar to make something look real.
And there's a lot of the stuff that's in the
superhero movies and whatever that you just kind
of go, okay, you're seeing choreography for choreography's
sake. Right. And you're not invested because
you don't feel like you're looking at a real
fight. And so I like to try to, you know, use
my platform to step that up a bit. Yeah, that's
hard, especially as a person who is a martial
artist, to watch fight scenes and go, you have
to kind of suspend disbelief and go, all right,
let's just play out. Well, yeah, kind of like,
you know, it's weird, but, you know, kind of
full circle. It's kind of going back to the way
Bruce Lee did stuff. And he's a little faster
than the other person. He has a little bit more
technique. And, you know, if you imagine, like,
even if I imagine you in a real fight. your technique's
not going nowhere. And other people are not going
to have that same technique. You beat somebody
to the punch, you do things that would logically
give you the edge, that's what you shoot. You
know what I mean? Right. Yeah, so it's not like
you got to do a lot of camera tricks. If you're
moving faster and stronger than another person,
well, there it is. There it is. So luckily, you
know, I mean... I can put things on screen that
kind of resemble what things might look like,
you know, and you get the benefit of the doubt
because, you know, you're in a heroic position.
It's just very hard to do that. It's very hard
to make it look real. There's a real art to that.
Yeah, yeah, but like with the movie that you
turned down, Blood and Bone. I turned down John
Wick 4, too, though. I turned down a lot of movies.
You do. You did the right thing, because what
you're doing, this could not be more up your
alley, doing the things that you're doing. John
Wick was hard. I'm a giant John Wick fan. Are
you? Especially John Wick 1. Well, there's going
to be a John Wick 7, so you can decide to do
it if you want to. They got kind of crazy. They're
over the top now. But even John Wick 1 was totally
unrealistic. Oh, man. But so fun. I fucking love
those movies. Yeah, well, I got something that's
kind of in that vein that I just finished. There's
a lot of body count, but a lot of CQB. I've been
studying that for a while. What is CQB? Close
Quarter Combat. Oh, okay. Of course, Close Quarter
Battle. But, you know, I've been doing, like,
you know, a lot of, like, tactical training.
Kind of getting myself, I may compete at some
point. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah. I'm pretty into
it. Where do you train at? Well, a lot of places.
I train with a guy named Tyler Gray. He's Delta
Force. I have a lot of friends who are, like,
you know, Special Force guys. You ever go to
Terran Tactical? Oh, of course, yeah. Yeah, I
go to Terran quite a bit. That guy's the best.
Oh, yeah. He's a man. He's amazing. You want
to talk about someone who's very technical. Oh,
my God. He shoots from the hip better than anybody
using a laser. No, he's preposterous. It's unreal.
Always iron sights. Yeah. He uses red dots, but
he prefers iron sights. He's like, they never
fail. They never go wrong. Yeah. And he's so
crazy accurate. It's wild to watch. And when
you think about how long. How fast could you
just take out everybody in this damn room? It's
kind of... It's kind of spooky. Yeah, it is spooky.
Yeah. Well, it's also, he's so calm about it,
too. Yeah, yeah. It's weird, like, almost, like,
autistic. Like, weird, fucking Rain Man -ish.
Yeah, yeah. Like, what the fuck? When you watch
him do it, like, many times I've gone to his
range and trained, and then, you know, people
goad him into it. Like, do a run. Like, do this.
And he's like, okay, I'm going to do this. I'm
going to do that. I'm going to do this. I'm going
to do that. And then I'm going to pull this out
right here. Yeah. It's crazy. You're like, what
the fuck did I just watch? That's crazy. And
then you see how many times he's won the championship.
Oh, yeah. Ridiculous. And like, there's only
a few people that won consecutive years. And
he's got like seven years in a row and just chunks.
I'm like, this is crazy. Yeah. He's a very unique
talent. Yeah. Very unique talent. Yeah, a buddy
of mine, like Tyler Gray, he's been Delta. He's
been decorating. Oh, my God, his place in Vegas,
he creates guns. And he's got more in his arsenal
than every gun store you can imagine. But he's
something else. One of the most mellow people
you ever want to meet in your life. He's been
the guy. been the consultant and director on
Navy SEALs for years. But I got a lot of friends
doing that. So my brother, he just retired from
Secret Service. And, you know, you know Danny
Hester? No. He was a former Mr. Olympia, classic
physique. But he's gotten into, I mean, I shoot
with these guys all the time. And actually Flex
Wheeler. A lot of the guys are. Into the gun
stuff. So we go set up stuff. But once you start
training, you realize how difficult it is and
how long the learning curve is. Because you think,
oh, you point, you pull the trigger, what's the
big deal? Then you get into it, and then you
see someone like Taron or someone who's competing,
and you go, oh, this is just like everything
else. karate like jiu -jitsu like there's levels
oh yeah levels and levels and levels yeah and
you see people competing and you go oh wow yeah
i'd like to do that someday yeah yeah you're
in a great place for it yes Yeah, Texas is a
great place for it. Oh, yeah. There's a staccato
range that we go to sometimes. It's awesome.
They have all these different setups out there.
They have this old west town with all these different,
like, targets set up, and you run from doorway
to doorway. It's pretty badass. Yeah, John Jones,
I see, is doing quite a bit of that stuff. John
Jones is a fucking scary human being. He's so
scary. Yeah, yeah. And if you get past him, he's
got his fucking dog Dutch. Yeah. Which is, you
know, he brings a Belgian Malinois everywhere
he goes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know Mike. Good
for you. friend, Josh Barnett, he's at Terrence
a lot, too. Yeah, he's another scary human being.
Yeah, yeah. And a very analytical, intelligent,
very well -read. He is, like, Jeopardy smart.
He's, like, ridiculous. There's not many things
that he doesn't know. He's amazing. I watched
you guys on this show. I was very flattered.
He mentioned Out of nowhere, he started talking
about how he was inspired by myself and my wife.
And that, you know, actually got me real choked
up. Yeah, I was like, what? Josh is a great guy.
Yeah. You know, incidentally, my wife is somebody
that, I don't know, you met her a long time ago.
You last saw her sliding down the Luxor. Oh,
wow. That's crazy. Yep. That's crazy. On Fear
Factor. On Fear Factor. Wow. Yep. She was sliding
down the Luxor when you last saw her. That's
crazy. She slid right into my arms. That's awesome.
Yeah, we've done our sixth movie together. Oh,
wow. Yeah, so we've been, you know, we got two,
our teenagers are, we got one less, well, we
got two left in the house. We're going to college
now. So, you know, we're about to be empty nesters.
Yeah, man. So, yeah, it's wild how these things
kind of. It is wild. Yeah. It is wild. Yeah.
Josh is one of the – he's like one of the best
examples to me of when people think of a martial
artist or think of a cage fighter, former UFC
heavyweight champion, and you think of a guy
like, oh, probably some brute. Have a conversation
with him. Yes. And you realize the depth of his
intellect and the depth of his knowledge, like
how much he knows about – Nietzsche. He can quote
Nietzsche. Oh, my God. He's so well -read. He
makes his own whiskey. Yeah. He's a very interesting
guy. Man, what a renaissance guy, man. Exactly.
A real renaissance guy. Yeah, we usually have
the same birthday, so sometimes we... throw parties
together. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, when he's
in town. He's always in Japan and just all over
the place, man. He's an amazing human being.
He really is. Yeah, yeah. And again, one of the
best examples, like when people have a stereotype
of what they think a cage fighter is. Yeah. And
Josh was the youngest ever UFC heavyweight champion.
Yeah, yeah. And man, that's probably, like, I've
trained more with him than so many people. Like,
you know, and it's just, What a great friendship
and what an inspirational thinking person. And
he did Never Back Down 3 with me. We shot that
in Thailand. Oh, wow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What
is it like training in Thailand? That's got to
be fun. Oh, man. Kind of hot. Yeah, but the motherland
of Muay Thai. Yeah, yeah. Again, like with every
style, it's strengths and it's weaknesses. You
know, a lot of them, you know, a lot of things
around, you know, they go around and not straight,
right, straight. You know, of course, the quickest
distance between two points is a straight line.
So it's not a whole lot of, well, they could
do with a lot more boxing technique. and some
of those things. But, man, talk about toughness,
that kind of a thing. But it's kind of tragic
how they beat the shit out of themselves. By
the time they're in their 30s, man, they're like.
Yeah, they're busted up. Well, they start fighting
when they're very, very young. But it's also
led to them training so intelligently. One of
the things about Thai training, they don't spar
like a lot of Americans do where they beat the
fuck out of each other. They play spar. Yeah.
And that play sparring allows them to not get
beat up by the time they get into the ring on
Saturday because a lot of them are fighting every
week. So they do touch sparring. And a lot of
people say, oh, you can't get good touch sparring.
Well, you certainly can. Oh, yeah, absolutely.
Especially when you're fighting every weekend.
Yeah. And that's probably the best way to do
it because you're just – working on timing, pattern
recognition, and just getting your reps in. Yeah,
just like with jiu -jitsu, of course, when you
don't muscle things, you let the technique do
its thing. That's so much better. Right, right.
And you maintain so much better as well. Right,
and I think one of the best examples of that
is like Sanchai because Sanchai is in his 40s,
and he's still fucking people up. I mean, it's
crazy watching that guy fight, but you look at
him, a very unassuming guy. You know, he's not
ripped. You know, he's an older guy, but he's
just... and his smoothness and the way he moves.
It's very playful. He's just fucking people up.
Yeah, yeah. Man, it makes me, I miss Thailand.
I actually did my, we did our wedding ceremony
in Thailand. Oh, wow. Yeah, and you know who
was, who officiated part of it was Tony Jaa.
Oh, really? Tony Jaa did the Buddhist part of
our wedding. He did the water blessing, and he
also sang at the wedding. That's cool. Yes, yes.
One of the greatest martial artists ever. What
a great movie that was. For martial arts technique,
that was one of the first times real true Muay
Thai was exhibited in a film. Super high level.
Tony, just, my God, he would do these incredible
feats in front of you. Unbelievable. He can do
a somersault, hit you in the shoulder, and just
tap you like that with his foot. He had that
much control. It's unbelievable. He was sick
recently, but I think he's overcoming. I think
it was a C -word, man. I haven't talked to him
in a minute, but I just found out about it a
couple weeks ago. I knew he got thinner, but
I'm hoping that he's better now. Yeah, he's a
legend. Yeah, he's something else. It's so fascinating
to me how different parts of the world develop
a different style of martial arts, and Thailand
in particular. Because of the fact that there
was so much gambling and there were so many fights
that they developed this very heavy leg kick,
clinch, elbow, knee style. Yeah. It was just
very different than a lot of the other styles.
You know, and for a long time was really dominating
in kickboxing. But then you're starting to see
other styles, like particularly a lot of Kyokushin
guys now. Yeah, yeah. Specifically out of Japan.
Have you ever seen this kid, Yuki Yoza? Is he
Kyokushin? Yeah, Kyokushin guy out of Japan who's
dominating people. He fights very different,
man. He's fucking up a lot of Thai guys with
calf kicks. Okay, okay. Oh, my God, dude. No,
I hadn't heard of him. I just officiated a Kyokushin
tournament yesterday. It was Sunday. Was that
two days ago? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'm
still connected in the Kyokushin. I mean, been
doing that since I was a kid. Well, you did the
whole thing, like where you have to fight like
100 guys in a day. You did all that shit, right?
I've done 30, man. I haven't done 100. I'm exaggerating,
but it's like a lot of people. Yeah, yeah, which
is the toughest. Honestly, I love it. It was
the toughest thing I ever had to really face
because you come to a point where you want to
give up. And you have to just, you know, kind
of walk the burning sands. What is it like walking
the next day? Man, I had, I mean, I remember
the first time I did a 10 -man. And I had several
knees on my legs, put it that way. Because they
destroy your legs so bad. Yeah. Right? I did
a 20 -man one other time and made the mistake
of having a, I had like an energy drink. Which
is stupid because now my heart is racing higher
than normal. And so it made it even harder. But
somewhere around, like, inevitably you get to
a place where I remember the 12th guy, I'm like,
what the fuck are you doing? Why are you here?
You know? But you had to dig deep. And you got
18 more to go. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm like, man.
But honestly. It's such a hard style. Yeah. But,
man, it's something about getting. Because you're
going to be faced with yourself. You want to
quit. And you have to just dig down and get through
it. And there's nothing like it when you accomplish
it. Because you know where you can go. You know
that most of the time you tell yourself you're
done. You're not. What a valuable lesson it is
to know that about yourself. Yeah. And you can't,
there's no substitute for that. And it's just
something that you just benefit. I remember the
last time I did this, we had to train out in
Banff, Canada. Because usually these things are
in Japan. And people from all over the style,
they come and they train. You're like training
eight hours a day. You got these little lunch
breaks. And I didn't think it through. I think
the last one was like about five, six years ago.
I, you know, wanted to challenge myself. I wanted
to do this, but I'm by myself. And most people
come with family members and all that kind of
stuff. So you're by yourself. You're a movie
star. Yeah, and I have the target on my back.
Of course. And it's like we have a training thing,
and then you got a certain amount of time to
go eat, but then people want to take pictures
of me, and I'm the last guy to get into the lunch
thing. And then I was like, oh, shit, I got 10
minutes to eat and then I got to get back in
the next training session. And you have a full
stomach. Yeah. And then you got like, I mean,
it kind of sucked, but I taught myself something.
I said, you know, you could be three hours in.
I tell myself, I just got here. I just got here.
And I dig deeper and whatever. And then the last
few days, you're just fighting down to the last
person. And, you know, there's people that's
like, you know, they got their. Their eye on
you because, like, you know, I've got the bullseye
on me. But the great thing is, dude, like I say,
I learned a lot. I'm doing footwork with Frankie
for years. I'm a boxing technique. I've got Benny
Urquidez. Bill Wallace was my instructor. I've
got so many things in my arsenal. And to test
myself, it's such a great benefit to, you know.
And it was weird because I was thinking, like,
am I insane? Because I had a movie that I was
going to be starting like a week later. I could
have just been messed up. I could have had a
broken leg or whatever. A lot of times you leave
with a souvenir, they call it. Like, you know,
when you trade in Japan, a lot of the Japanese
want to give you a souvenir. That means a broken
bone. But I had to try to, you know, overcome
that. So in life, especially in this kind of
coddled, life I'm living, I don't get a chance
to test myself that much, right? Right. And,
you know, yeah, I had to, you know, listen to
my own complaints and shut the fuck up and get
through it. Yeah, oh, it's not fair because everybody's
taking pictures and you're doing this and I'm
by myself. No, no, that's not, the point is get
through it, you know? Yeah. And I'm so glad to
do that and I always like to, that's why I like
to train with, champions and and stuff because
you know that's you you want you want to get
through things it should be you should be tested
i mean as if i had a religion a large part of
it if i was the head of my own religious cult
would be that men go through something there's
a rites of passage yes you got to know how to
protect yourself and your family and your loved
ones that to me is is paramount. You also have
to know what's inside of you. That's exactly
right. And the only way to find out is to test
it. Exactly. Because otherwise you get these
dudes that have their chest pumped out and they're
talking loud. Why are they doing that? Because
they want to scare people off. Right. Because
they don't know what they're capable of. They're
terrified. Yeah, and you can't hide from yourself.
Right. And that's the thing. I'm not going to
bullshit myself. I want to know. And it's great.
And there's no substitute for going through that.
And that's the thing why I love fighters so much.
You know, you're basically naked to the world.
You have to dig down. You have to overcome things.
That's why I love them so much because they're
our gladiators. We live vicariously through them.
And that's why I'm a little dogged about. actors
receiving those accolades when they haven't done
it. Myself included. I don't care if somebody
says, oh, he's not a fighter. He's an actor.
Fine. You should think that way. But personally,
it's something deeper for myself. One person
I think I identify with that is you. Because
I've seen you. I've seen you in the gyms back
when it wasn't popular. And we're doing it for
reasons that are not. It had nothing to do with
glory or ego or anything like that. It's just
for self -improvement. Yeah. And that's what
it's about, man, because it's about overcoming
obstacles. And your biggest obstacle in the world
is yourself. Yeah. Yeah. My instructor, when
I was very young, told me that martial arts were
a vehicle for developing your human potential.
Exactly. Exactly. But it's so hard. Yeah. And
people need something hard. Yeah. And what about
Khabib's? What did Khabib say? Like, what he
says about discipline? Oh, that rant? Man, I
had to recall. Oh, that. I don't know if that
rant is real. Somebody told me that rant is AI.
What? Yeah. Is it AI? Damn it. What? Well, who
cares? It's in Khabib's voice, and I bet. Khabib
would agree with every word it said. Yes, yes.
Find that rant because let's pretend that it's
not AI. Or it may be one of AI's greatest contributions
to martial arts. Right, absolutely. Because becoming
addicted to discipline. Yeah, every man addicted
to something. Yeah. Oh, it's such a great rant.
Here it is. Give me this. Give me this. It's
such a fucking great rant. Start from the beginning,
too. Every man addicted to something. Some smoke,
some drink, some chase girls, some waste time.
But real man, he addicted to discipline. To early
wakes, to prayer, to training, to silence. Discipline
no need motivation. Discipline move without feeling.
Discipline say, I go anyway. Even when tired,
even when lonely. Discipline is best addiction.
You want strong life? Discipline build it. You
want peace? Discipline protect it. You want respect?
Discipline earn it. No shortcut, only work. Be
man with control, not man with excuse. No cry,
no blame. You want better life? Start with better
habits. Discipline every day until discipline
become you. Fucking yeah. Yeah, I don't give
a damn if there's AI or whatever. Well, kudos
to the AI person that put that together. Yeah.
That's how he lives. Yeah. So even if it's AI,
he would go, this is accurate. Yes. Well, I'll
tell you what, man. That part of the world, Dagestan,
you want to talk about a hard part of the world
that is developing some of the baddest motherfuckers?
Even in Muay Thai, there's this cat coming out
of Muay Thai out of Dagestan right now, Azadullah
Imam Ghazaliyev, who's like 22 years old, and
he is fucking everybody up. A Dagestani Muay
Thai fighter. Really? his own style he's this
tall lanky dude who's one of the most terrifying
strikers alive right now a lot of people think
he's the best striker alive oh man he's 22 22
or 23 years old and he's just fucking everybody
up he fights for one fc give me a highlight reel
of this cat That's it. Best technical striker
in the world. That's it. Click on that. Just
give me some of this. Just start it from the
beginning. This dude, that tall dude with the
beard, Azadullah Imam Ghazaliyev. Watch this
motherfucker. What a style he has. I mean, it's
just this long, tall, lanky dude, perfect timing
and measurement, and he just starts piecing dudes
up. I think this is like his full fight. Yeah,
well, I don't think so. If you scoot ahead, I
think he fucks this guy up pretty quick. I've
seen this fight. This guy, he catches with one
shot, but some dude's not so lucky. Oh, man.
Yeah, that was one shot, but it keeps going,
and then give me the next fight. He just starts
lighting guys on fire, including Thais, and they
don't know what the fuck is going on because
he fights different than them. I mean, he's a
Muay Thai fighter. He's got that straight. You
know, he's exploiting the fact that they got
so much round technique. Exactly. A lot of front
kicks up the middle and especially to the face.
But also his spinning attacks. He's got wicked
spinning attacks, man. And also comes off angle
a lot. His head's never on the center line. Super
fucking technical. But just lighting dudes on
fire. And just an attack. always attacking and
has the benefit of that range that long range
yeah i mean nice dude is incredible incredible
and again 22 years old like look at that so he's
combining like taekwondo techniques karate techniques
and precision muay thai i mean the problem with
this this this not this style, but this form,
is that a lot of people aren't seeing it. One
FC is doing a really good job of highlighting
a lot of elite Muay Thai fighters. They have
Tawan Chai over there and Siddha Chai and all
these high -level guys. But in America, this,
for whatever reason, has not caught on. And the
only way this guy is going to get the kind of
attention that I think he deserves is if he gets
into MMA. Boom! Axe kick, spinning back fist,
boom! His straight rights are no joke. He's a
laser beam. He's so focused. He's so good, man.
So good. Yeah. So the Dagestanis are now entering
into Muay Thai, which is a... terrible sight
for all these Muay Thai guys. Those are hard
people. Hard people who start at a very young
age. I mean, a very young age. And also, Dagestanis
now, because of Khabib and Islam, they all know
that this is the pathway to greatness. And so
there's heroes. And there could be Ankalayev.
There's all these guys that have been world champions
out of Dagestan now. So it's like you're seeing
all these guys come out of there, and some of
these young guys that are coming up are so good.
They're so good. But this is fascinating to me
that you take a guy who's adapted this Thai style
but then morphed it into something that's different.
And again, like you were saying, a lot of straight
techniques, especially when you're a tall guy
like that for the weight class, because I think
he fights at 145. And when you're that tall at
145, You've got those straight shots down the
middle. His right is just like you can't really
see it. Laser beam. Right directly at him. But
it's also the hooks, too. His hooks are coming
around the guard. Right, right. Everything is
precise, and his accuracy is spectacular. Yeah.
Yeah. I'm a student, obviously. I watch every.
fight i can't i watch i watch kickboxing i watch
muay thai i watch jiu -jitsu matches i watch
it all but i i'm always fascinated by these cats
that stand out and this guy just stands out yeah
Yeah, it's great when somebody knows how to use
their length like that. Yeah, yeah. Well, Yukioza,
the Kyokushin guy that I was telling you, totally
different. This guy is doing a shelling up and
getting in tight on guys and kicking the fuck
out of their inner thigh, outer calf, lower.
He's chopping at their legs. Even Thai guys don't
know what to do because they're not used to guys
kicking their calves like this guy. Right, yeah.
So he's inside going shin to shin. And you know
as well as anybody, Kyokushin guys have some
of the most. conditioned shins in the world they're
always battering shin to shin and this dude is
just getting in and you see in the second round
a lot of these Thai guys like oh fuck I can't
walk I can't move right my calves don't work
anymore so the calf kick which is really kind
of revolutionized MMA it's changed MMA because
One, two hard calf kicks, you're compromised.
You're not moving right anymore. And you're not
pivoting off that foot when you're punching.
So your punching power is diminished. This Yuki
Yoza guy is like putting it on Thai guys with
it. That's something. I mean, especially for
a Kyokushin guy to, I mean, the knock with Kyokushin,
I've been doing it ever since I was a kid, is
just that not developing facial. Exactly. Facial,
you know. Well, this guy has incorporated Russian
-style boxing. He's got Russian -style boxing
with Kyokushin karate techniques. Well, yeah,
with that Russian -style boxing, they really
kind of mastered the non -telegraph kind of thing.
Yeah. Because it looks like they're not going
fast. Yukio's a highlight reel. There's a bunch
of fights with him and Thai guys. And, you know,
the first round, Thai guys are doing their thing.
And it looks, you know, like a normal fight.
But Yuki Yozu just starts chopping at those calves.
Inside. And he's like multiple kicks to the calf
from in tight and close. Yeah, that's punishing.
And you see guys, like, playing at, like, go
ahead, kick me, kick me. And then after a while,
they're like, fuck, don't kick me anymore. They're
trying to get macho with him, but then it's not
working. But, yeah, like, what would it take
to develop, like, tabs? This is you, Piozza.
Just like your thighs. You see how he's chopping
when he's getting tight. Look at this. Always.
Look at how much he's utilizing all the karate
techniques, but also in tight just destroys guys'
legs. But also spinning back kicks, all that
other shit. But look at his boxing is excellent
too. Ooh. A lot of Muay Thai stuff, dumping people.
But look at that. He's constantly kicking the
inside of the leg. When they're committing to
kicks, he's taking their legs out. This dude,
one of my favorite guys to watch right now. Like,
look, that's a Thai guy, man. He's just destroying
their legs, man. Man. An excellent movement.
Yeah. And he comes out of a very high -level
gym in Japan that's produced a lot of really
Masasaki Nori. Another guy who's like that is
a very similar guy who beat Taiwan Chi recently
like these guys are just destroying people's
legs. So they're utilizing a lot of the question
mark kicks, a lot of the stuff that evolved in
Kyokushin, but putting it into kickboxing, also
with the toughness that is in, you know, a lot
of the Kyokushin fighters. Yeah, I see them slip
into like a Superman. Yeah. Everybody's going
to be susceptible for that. If you got a kick,
a leg kick, that's... that's that legitimate,
they're going to bite on that. It's going to
be open for them. And then he uses a Superman
punch. Yeah. And another very young guy. So there's
these people that are exploiting these holes
and these styles because some of these Thai guys
are so hard to beat. By the time they're competing
and they're 25 years old, they might have 150
fights. So much experience. But this cat's figuring
them out, man. It's really interesting to watch.
Yeah. I would love to see. I wish there was,
like, some kind of governing body that would
get all the, like, some, like, superstars or
whatever. Get this guy versus this guy from.
Well, one is doing that a lot. But, you know,
one, unfortunately, is not that popular in America.
What I love about one is they'll have grappling
competitions. They'll have kickboxing. They'll
have Muay Thai. And then they'll have MMA. They'll
have them all combined on one card. One is the
one that Michael Giavello is on, right? Well,
he was on that. Michael Chavelle's not with one
anymore. Michael Chavelle's one of the best commentators.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's excellent. Great guy,
too. I'll probably be seeing him in another three
weeks. You going to Australia? Yeah, going to
Australia. Nice. My wife and I, we did a tour.
I do seminars over there. you know, meet and
greets and stuff like that. We haven't done that
in a while, but yeah, we've got some really good,
some good fighters out there. Oh yeah. John Wayne
Parr. Yeah. You know, some great fighters have
come out of Australia. Yeah. So yeah, we're going
to have some fun out there. That's awesome. Yeah.
They're in New Zealand. Oh, yeah, another hotbed.
Oh, yeah. Another hotbed for fighters. Well,
it's just warrior cultures. Yeah, absolutely,
yeah. Warrior history. I don't think I've never
met an Australian that I didn't like. I know.
They're the nicest fucking people. They're so
fucking cool, yeah. Yeah, they're the coolest
people. They're friendly, easygoing. Yeah, you
have rites of passage still. You know, places
like that. I mean, that's one thing that is sad
about the United States. It's like we're not
making men anymore. Not a lot of them. No, no.
When they are, they stand out. Yeah, you know,
that's why it's like a lot of times in these
movies, if you have an alpha male, a lot of times
that American alpha male is being played by an
Australian or somebody from the— Chris Hemsworth.
Yeah, it's like it's very rarely an American.
It's like such a trip, man. Well, masculinity
is demonized here for some strange reason over
the last couple of decades. Bro, I saw the beginning
of a lot of it because, you know, like I said,
I was a school teacher. And I was right on the
forefront seeing everybody gets a trophy. You
know, these kids, you know, it's about their
self -esteem and you got to protect them. I'm
like, come on. And, you know, taking away competition.
Yeah. I saw the beginning of that shit. And it's
just so, so bad. These kids don't know how to
deal with loss or anything, and then they end
up shooting the classroom. You know? Dealing
with loss is one of the most important lessons
you could ever learn. If you want to get better,
lose. Yeah. Losing is the best medicine because
you lose. I don't ever want to feel that again.
And then you start thinking about all the things
that you cut corners on, all the things that
you didn't do. What can I do differently to make
sure that never happens again, that I never feel
that feeling? Or you quit. Those are the two
options. Either you get way better or you quit.
But winning sometimes you don't learn. You go,
well, I'm doing the right thing. I'm winning.
I'm getting better. I'm developing confidence.
That's good. But, man, sometimes a loss is the
best medicine. Yeah. I mean, I realized something
when I was, you know, I was born with some gifts,
okay? One thing that got me into college is decathlon.
As a fluke, I jumped into a race against one
of the fastest guys on the track team and beat
him, right? And that was just a fluke. And the
coach saw that. The track coach saw that and
was like, oh, my God, you're fucking running
for the school. And I was like, oh, OK. I was
just like, I didn't have anybody, any kind of
adult that took a liking to me like that. And
next thing you know, I'm on the track team. And
I started, I mean, I was really good. And then
I wound up going to college because of that.
And incidentally, that's the stuff that really
kind of taught me. to kind of evolve my martial
arts because nowhere is there a benefit of cutting
off fractions of seconds in movement like track.
Like when I'm doing the shot put. Well, a lot
of times I was competing against people that
were ginormous and all they had to do was stick
their arm out and their arc was going to be better
than mine. Well, I had to generate enough power
to go at a 45 -degree angle and inertia and all
that to get past them. And with running, of course,
if you shoot the gun off, all your motion has
to go forward. If you go backward, you're going
to be a step behind everybody. So as far as efficiency
of motion, all the things I had to do with track,
I started applying in fighting. And that's what
kind of gave me cheat codes into things to where
being super efficient really helped. Right. And
so one thing would kind of help the other. But
like, yeah, a lot of my whole track thing was
a great benefit. But I did learn that I was kind
of in a way like the Bo Jackson's or the Herschel
Walker's. I was gifted. And so when I would fight,
I was a big guy that was fast, and that was kind
of rare. So fighting was easy to me. But I learned
that when I was the celebrated fighter, that
was less of a good martial artist because then
I kind of would kind of flake off other things.
Like I wasn't. I didn't try as hard as other
people. And that's another thing I don't know
if Khabib really said, but it was a thing that
he said about those gifted people. A lot of people
who are gifted were not the best fighters. Yeah,
that is a quote from him. Exactly. And I took
that, you know, that same thing because I realized,
dude, you're doing it wrong. I mean, my philosophy
was like, I feel I adapted the philosophy of,
Okay, say this kid Sean is 140 pounds and there's
me. And it takes me 1 ,000 kicks to become fatigued.
And it takes him 100 kicks to become fatigued.
And he pushes to 120. And I push to 1 ,001. Who's
the better martial artist? He is. Because he's
pushed into his comfort zone. He's pushing himself
further. What if he one day... get to 1 ,000.
For him to go from 100 to 1 ,000, that's going
to be a quality 900 that I don't have. Me being
the gifted one, I'm looking at it using the comparative
method, saying, well, you know, at the end of
the year, I used to kick a basketball rim. I
had that ability. But when I started thinking
about, well, what I compare myself to other people,
that was the wrong thing. said, no, I'm going
to be like Sean. I want to train to my ability,
not in comparison to someone else. And that really
taught me something as far as like, again, why
I put myself through these things and the benefit
of it by really like what the martial arts really
teaches is, you know, and the fact that, yeah,
I had these gifts. But if I use those gifts as
a crutch, I'm limiting what I can be. Right.
You're limiting your potential. Exactly. And
oftentimes it's too easy for the gifted guys.
And so they kind of slack off. Right. Yeah. And
I realized that's what I was doing. They also
are not as comfortable with struggle. Absolutely.
And being comfortable with struggle is a very
important part of growth. Yeah, yeah. It's a
mixed message because we start to admire the
freak sometimes. As men, we celebrate the pugilist
a lot. And that's kind of a thing that came full
circle to where, okay, yeah, I'm able to do these
things, but is that really me? The limit of what
I can be by having someone else go, oh, yeah,
you can do this or that. That's kind of a that's
not really the the the crux of it. Right. You
know what I mean? And it's in and it's really
about like, yeah, there's going to be people
that's going to praise what you can do physically.
But is that but I realize there was a point where
that was kind of retarding. where I could be
mentally and what I can really become. You also
have a responsibility to those gifts, right?
Because if you are gifted athletically, you have
a responsibility of achieving the full potential
because you've been given this thing by genetics,
by life, by God, this thing where you are faster,
you move quicker, you have more explosive power.
But are you going to harness that gift and allow
it to reach its full potential? When you do that,
then you get a Mike Tyson. When you do that,
then you get a Michael Jordan. You do that, then
you get an elite of the elite. You get what David
Goggins always liked to call uncommon amongst
uncommon men. Right, right. And that's the real
hard thing to do. Because so many of these like
really gifted guys in the gym, they always kind
of. peter off and disappear and when they're
in a fight where they fight another gifted guy
that maybe trained a little harder than them
and maybe he's got a little bit more experience
they realize man I don't want to struggle like
that I don't like that I don't like that feeling
I like beating up guys in the gym that are below
me Yeah, and then you got to deal with that person
in the mirror. Yeah. And that's not— It's hard
for guys when they're the hammer their whole
life, and then one day they're the nail. Yeah.
And you see guys that are, like, really elite
that are dominating, and then one day they get
fucked up, and then you never see them again.
Yeah. It's oftentimes. But then you'll see the
guy who, like, gets fucked up a bunch of times
and keeps showing up. Oh, yeah. He keeps showing
up. He keeps learning. And then you realize,
like, oh, this guy is now elite. Yeah. And those
are the true heroes. Right. You know, right.
You know, there's people I don't want. You know,
sometimes you get get in trouble pointing out
people like like I don't want to say somebody
like Izzy or whatever. But like you see the the
the people who are used to having that ability
over other people and when it gets hard. Right.
Right. And then it's like even sometimes there's
a there's a talk about even Tyson as just. People
are just spectators. When you go, oh, man, this
guy's so gifted. Now, some of the knock has been
that when it became hard, you hadn't seen him
dig down and overcome that thing. Right, right.
You know, because a lot of times when it got
hard, it was like he just, you know, kind of
tapped out. Yeah. And so that's something that...
You know, not to disparage him, but just as people
are looking at life, we look at those things
and we can take a lot of meaning from that and
apply that and say, oh, wow. I mean, that's on
him to say, oh, was that the case? Or is it something
that, I don't know. I think with Mike, it's a
very special case because I think. he had the
elite coaching in the beginning with custom auto
and training. And then when cuss died, he was
kind of left with all this amazing ability that
he had developed when he was young, but not with
the elite coaching. Like, so if Mike had left
when custom auto died, if he had then went to
Emmanuel Stewart or if the, you know what I'm
saying? If he had then went to an elite boxing
coach and had someone, analyze his style, and
someone he really respected. Respected, yes,
absolutely. That he could still maintain that
same level of discipline when he was the 21 -year
-old dominating the world. Oh, my God, but he
had so much pressure on him. So much. Because,
you know, I had to play him, so I had to study
everything he did. And it's interesting because,
oh, my God, like, I always viewed him as somebody
who was always looking for a father figure. Yes.
And I would study him, and, you know, with Customato,
he would dress like Customato. He's a young black
guy from Brooklyn with suspenders. Right. You
know, and a cabbie hat. Yeah. And then when Custom
Auto was gone, he was around Kevin Rooney. And
Kevin Rooney had this really fast way of talking.
And it seemed like he adapted that. And when
he was with... Swatwell? No, no. Shoot, why am
I blanking? The other manager... Jim Jacobs?
Jim Jacobs. You know, Jim Jacobs was married.
And I think marriage became important to him
at that point because he was really under the
umbrella of Jim Jacobs. And then when he was
with... Robin Givens? With Don King. Oh, yeah.
The N -word is every third word out of his mouth,
very much like Don King. He goes to prison. He's
got two father figures on him, Mao Zedong, and
he's got Arthur Ashe on another shoulder. And
I would just notice that even speech patterns
would change. And I looked at him as, wow, here's
a guy that I felt like I identified with a great
deal because coming from the same kind of place.
But yeah, it's interesting because I think a
lot of people don't know. How much struggle he
had to deal with, because the people think that
Kevin Rooney was kind of a savior in that situation
when he wasn't. Kevin Rooney explained to me
directly that he he says, if you ever see Mike,
please, please apologize for me. Because when
I mean, when Mike was was married to Robin Givens,
he didn't want to do this interview. And then
turn around, Kevin Rooney did the interview and.
Kevin Rooney's like, I really messed up when
I did that. And Kevin Rooney even told me that
when at the Spinks fight alone, Kevin made like
over a million dollars. He left, he left that
casino owing. Mike had to bail him out like so
many times. And so people thought, oh, Kevin
Rooney is in control. No, Mike was, I mean, he
had so much pressure on him. And I think with,
with Don King trying to hire Mike's cohorts to
help out, if he's going to hang out with him
anyway, to try to just do that. He had so much,
this dude had so much pressure on him. It's unbelievable.
And Don King definitely took advantage of that.
Yeah, I believe so. You know, because I knew
Don from, because I was always in the fight camps
with Frankie Louse. In fact, that's how I got
to first meet Mike Tyson. When Mike was in prison,
Frankie put Mike and I on the phone together.
And so I would, you know, do my little kind of
interviewing of Mike while he was in prison because
I was going to be playing him. So I wanted the
whole story. Right. And I went to Catskills on
my own and knocked on that door and spent time
with the people he grew up with in that house.
Oh, wow. You know, so I learned a lot. There's
a lot that, you know, the public doesn't know.
And I think he was concerned about, you know,
coming out. And, you know, it didn't. And so
it was really interesting. I was front and center
on how much pressure this guy had to deal with.
He had to kind of develop with the whole world
looking over his shoulder. Yeah. And he was 20.
Which is crazy. Youngest ever heavyweight champion
in the world. Went from being a 13 -year -old
kid with no family to being adopted by this guy
who's not just training him but also hypnotizing
him. And then he's got Jim Jacobs who exposes
him to this library of all the greatest fighters
of all time. He's watching video footage of it.
Bill Caton. Yeah. Bill Caton and Jim. Yeah. It's
an extraordinary story because it's like unlike
anyone else's. Like the environment that he was
exposed to and the way it – produced this guy
who was unlike any heavyweight before I mean
in his prime I always point to the Marvis Frazier
fight I always tell people you want to see like
the scariest motherfucker that ever stepped into
the ring Mike Tyson versus Marvis Frazier he
was just undeniable just undeniable but that
pressure the kind of pressure that no one could
explain what that's like there's no internet
back then so there's not as many favorite famous
people so like who's gonna who's he gonna relate
to who's gonna tell him what this is like who's
gonna there's no one like him yeah you had muhammad
ali you had a few other guys that could maybe
tell him what it was like but for the most part
he's not he's got no roadmap And he's out there
in this world of superstardom. We could do whatever
the fuck he wants. Everywhere he goes, people
are screaming and cheering. And he's knocking
everybody out in the first round. Yeah, yeah.
The pressure on that, man. And then they have
to fight Holyfield. Right. A guy who was really
kind of more like a big brother to him throughout
his life, you know, his professional life. Because,
you know, Holyfield was his cruiserweight. You
know, and Holyfield was the type of guy, how
you doing, Mike? You checking on him and all
that type of stuff. Then he has to fight this
guy. Deep down, like, he's got to fight this
guy who's got this reputation as a holy man and
all this type of stuff. And then I remember being
at that fight, and I remember the press conference,
and Mike was, like, really manufacturing this
hatred that I was like, that's not real. he's
trying to dig down to really get this edge to
really hate Holyfield and I was like I thought
that was a mistake but and I don't think psychologically
he was in his game right Holyfield had an edge
on him. Yeah, psychologically. I think it was
also the fact the holy man thing was a big deal.
Holyfield had this incredible belief in God,
and he really believed that God was looking out
for him and he was going to go in there and couldn't
be deterred. Dude, the third round. I mean, look,
of course, I studied all this stuff on Mike Tyson.
Third round of that first fight got chills because
think about it. He heard something that he never
heard his entire career. Everybody started chanting
for the other guy. Right. Holy field, holy field.
And I swear to you, I saw just the air come out
of this guy. Yeah. And it was like, I've done
all of this, and they're chanting for this man.
And how gracious he was, how Tyson was at the
end. I felt like that's not a new thought. You
kind of had that opinion of him. Going into this.
Well, Holyfield had been through the wars, right?
He had those wars with Riddick Bowe. He had the
first war with Dwight Muhammad Kawi. Remember
that fight at Cruiserweight? Oh, my God. Go back
and watch that fight. That fight. He had the
war with Burt Cooper. He had wars. And Holyfield
was unflappable. He's like, I don't know why
Mike Chain is about me, but... He's just like...
He never got angry. Yeah, yeah. It's like, how
you doing? It's hard to maintain, like, anger
for that dude. He's just like, okay. Well, that's
also terrifying, too, because you know you can't
get in there. You're trying to get in that head,
and it's like you're not getting in there. God's
in there. Yeah, and then it's like, if you look
at it, you know, Mike Tyson was committing to
every first blow. Yep. Holyfield is a counter
fighter. Fake him, let him throw that counter,
and you got him. And I was like, I think normally
Mike knows this. Holyfield's center of gravity,
so different. He's thin -legged, big up top.
Mike should be able to push him easily. Easily.
I didn't see the things that I normally saw from
Mike Tyson in that fight, which made me feel
like... This is a psychological component. It's
a psychological component, but it's also a training
component because, again, he wasn't with an elite
trainer at that time. It wasn't the same as him
being trained by Costamano. It wasn't the same.
He didn't have the bobbing and weaving style
that he used to have. Do you remember when he
caught Holyfield with the body shot and the uppercut?
Yeah. And just like basically you almost said,
you saw, finish him. Yeah. But he just chilled.
Do you remember that moment? I don't specifically.
Yeah, there's a moment. There's a moment like
that. Where he hurts him. He hurt him. And Holyfield
looked like it's like. Yeah, but Holyfield would
rebound. I mean, the really go fights. But you
look at Tyson. You look at almost everything
he's done. I thought I was about to see the beginning
of the end. And I'm like, what the? I remember
being there going, why isn't he jumping on him?
You know me. Maybe I'm wrong or whatever, but
I swear I saw that moment. And I remember going,
what's going on? Why is he not jumping on him?
I mean, it's interesting. It's interesting. Psychology
plays a big role in how you feel about the opponent.
And the opponent essentially holds up a mirror
and allows you to look at yourself. And when
he's comparing himself to this holy man, he probably
didn't like it. Joe, you know, I think. That's
the way I thought about it. Of course, who am
I to do it? But it's my opinion. Those dudes
with that kind of character, like Holyfield had
at the time, those are scary guys. Because they
can't be broken mentally. Right, right. And if
you try to break them physically and he rebounds,
like, oh, God. How much do I have left in the
tank? Yeah, yeah. How many more of these shots
can I take? Yeah, no, it's different if somebody,
like, taunted you. Mm -hmm. Now you can, you
know, manufacture, like, you know. Right, right.
But when a guy's just like, okay, I'm just doing
my thing. You kind of start going, oh, is it
me? Right. Because you don't, you know, it's
like, that's when you have the fate oars. Right.
Somebody like that is just like. Like this. It's
like you drown yourself. Stoic. Because I can't
derive nothing from him. Oh, he was the best
at it. Yeah, yeah. Fedor was the best at it.
Fedor would be in the middle of the most chaotic
war, and it looked like he was just sipping a
cup of coffee. Yeah. It was crazy. There was
no one like that guy. He's one of the most unique
characters. I think we were robbed of one of
the greatest heavyweight matchups of all time.
when they never figured out how to put Cain Velasquez
versus Fedor when they were both in their primes.
Man. Cain Velasquez is the scariest person I've
ever seen, as far as I'm concerned. Like, if
there was one guy that, like, because I pride
myself, I get in a ring with anybody. That guy,
man. He never got tired. Man, he's just a juggernaut.
He had cardio for a heavyweight that was like
a marathon runner. It didn't make any sense.
He was a 240 -pound guy who never got tired.
Yeah, didn't— Perfect technique. Yeah, and I
think the fights with— Junior Dos Santos? I feel
like they ruined each other. Yes. I feel like
they ruined each other. Well, I think certainly
ruined Junior, especially the second fight. The
first fight, Junior caught. The first fight,
Kane should have never took that fight. Kane
had to take that fight because it was on Fox.
It was a big deal. It was the main event of the
Fox, the first Fox card, and Kane blew his knee
out. So if you look at that fight, Kane's wearing
a knee brace. His knee was fucked up. His meniscus
was torn. He was all fucked up. He couldn't.
anchor on it. He couldn't really post on it.
And then he couldn't get out of the way. And
Junior caught him with a big right hand, cracked
him, dropped him, stopped him. And then he comes
back. Here it is. Here's Tyson versus Holyfield.
Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. Yeah, but Holyfield's
still there. He's still there. Remember, he has
a chance. He has a chance right now. You heard
what he said, right? Mm -hmm, yeah. But that
took some wind out of Evander right away. Biggest
round for Mike yet. But the thing about Evander
is Evander was always there. He had been through
these kind of fights before. But I don't know
where I am, but I was there. And something about
seeing that, I felt like, oh, he's about to take
him out. But I think because Evander rebounded,
and Evander had a history of rebounding. Oh,
sure, sure, absolutely. He had a history of wars.
Absolutely, but it still doesn't change the fact
that there was, I feel like there was an opportunity,
and that was a very un -Tyson -like situation.
I just don't think Tyson was Tyson anymore by
this time. I mean, I think he was a one -punch
guy by this time. He wasn't cutting those crazy
angles where he would slide off to the side and
rip the body. He was standing right in front
of guys. Yeah. He lost a lot of what made him
special, which was the speed of combinations
and the movement. The movement is primarily because
he couldn't have never gotten that far if he
didn't do that. Show that Marvis Frazier fight.
Show that Marvis Frazier fight. Tyson versus
Marvis Frazier is my favorite Tyson performance.
Because Marvis Frazier looked like he was going
to a funeral at the beginning of the fight. Look
at him. I mean, you feel the energy from his
face. And he didn't play the Covenant right after
this with the grizzly bear just mauling. It's
the same thing. Here it is. He's just all over
Marvis, like from the beginning. This was on
ABC Wide World of Sports. I remember watching
this at home. But look at the bobbing and the
weaving. It's not just right in front of him.
It's angles. Like, right here. Boom! Oh, man.
Oh, man. That was when he was the champ. I mean,
he wasn't the champ yet, but he was the champ.
He was about to fight Trevor Burbick, but everybody
was like, oh, my God, he's real. Yeah, here's
the thing that sparked some controversy. Mike
Tyson versus Muhammad Ali. It depends on which
Tyson and which Muhammad Ali. Well, the best
of both. I think the best Muhammad Ali wasn't
Muhammad Ali. I think it was Cassius Clay. I
think the best was when he fought Cleveland Big
Cat Williams. To me, I always tell people, like,
you want to know Ali before they took his title
away, before they put him on the shelf for three
years because he wouldn't fight in Vietnam? Watch
Cleveland Big Cat Williams because Cleveland
was a big, scary power puncher, and Muhammad
Ali was just dancing around him, dancing around
him. But was he bigger than Muhammad Ali, though?
See, that's the thing about Muhammad Ali. People
don't realize he was like the biggest guy in
the ring. You know, he was only four pounds different
than Foreman. People don't realize because he
moves around the way he moves. Back then. But
in the Cleveland Big Cat Williams days, he was
lighter. Was he? Yeah, he was only like 215 or
220. And Cleveland Williams was what? Big. Look
at the size of Cleveland. Look at his back. Look
at the back on Cleveland. And look at the legs,
though. Yeah, but he was a power puncher, man.
Look at his back. Cleveland was a scary dude,
man. He might be lean. He might be lean, but
Muhammad Ali is a big dude. Oh, he's definitely
a big dude. I think Muhammad Ali is bigger than
that guy. Maybe. But look at the movement, man.
Oh, absolutely. So this movement was absent when
he came back three years later. He never fought
like this again. And when he fought Cleveland
Big Cat Williams, Cleveland just did not know
where he was. Muhammad Ali was 212. Williams
was 210 that way. Oh, okay. Well, dudes were
smaller back then. Like think about Rocky Marciano.
He was only 185. The thing is that people don't
realize because he's fighting like a lighter
guy, you got a bigger guy. He didn't – especially
he'll trick people to coming in, and that magnifies
everything. Yeah, sort of, but they're basically
the same size. But 212 is fairly small. This
is smaller than Mike was when Mike was in his
prime, and Mike was only like 215, 220. Yeah,
221. So that's why it's interesting because Mike
moved his head, and the people who did the best
against Muhammad Ali were Joe Frazier and Ken
Norton who moved their heads. Yes, but again,
these are the guys after this three -year break.
This three -year break. Muhammad Ali didn't train.
He didn't train at all for three years. When
you watch when he comes back after that, like,
come on, son. The speed. And Cleveland's like,
what the fuck is going on? But speed and a bigger
guy. That's the thing. That's the thing. Because,
like, you know, you thought. when we were going
into this clip, that he was bigger than Muhammad
Ali. I did. But the thing is, people don't realize
how big Muhammad Ali actually was. Because George
Foreman, you know, was a monster. Look at these
combinations. His legs are bigger than George
Foreman's. And we know where the power is, right?
Well, George Foreman, what did he weigh when
they fought? 218, and I think Muhammad Ali was
214. They were like right. So the actual fight
day, who knows? who was heavier. Right, right,
right. I'm just saying it's interesting. It is.
Because you got a guy the same size as Foreman
moving faster. Yeah, but he didn't in that fight.
In that fight, he mostly laid on the ropes, remember?
Well, he did the rope -a -dope, but I'm saying
he's still a big... 220. 212 to 220. Pretty close.
Yeah, I've seen it different. He wasn't the same
guy. If George Foreman of that time fought the
Muhammad Ali that fought Cleveland Big Cat Williams,
it's a completely different fight. Foreman's
getting pieced up. Foreman's getting pieced up
from the outside, and Ali was just picking him
apart and moving, and Foreman's swinging it in.
He was like nobody else before him, man. He was
so different. He was so different. But those
three years. When he had to take three years,
and he didn't train at all, and then he came
back, and now he's 30, and no strength and conditioning
for three years, no running, no boxing. His body
looked different. Who did he fight when he came
back? He fought... Lyle? No, that white dude
had horrible brain damage towards the end. Cobb?
Jerry Cooney. Oh, Jerry Quarry. No, no, no, Jerry
Quarry. Jerry Quarry, okay. Yeah, when he fought
Jerry Quarry. See if you can find that fight.
Now, look at his body when you see it. You see
his body smooth. His footwork doesn't look the
same. His timing is off. He had a ton of ring
rust. He just didn't—what's that, Jimmy? He just
didn't look the same. He didn't look the same,
and I think that— That three years, they fucked
him, man. Yeah. They fucked him. They fucked
him. And, I mean, look, it made him a cultural
hero because he wasn't willing to fight in Vietnam.
And, you know, he famously, like, look at his
body. It's different, man. He's just not the
same guy anymore. He's not moving as fast. And
Jerry Quarry was just a really tough guy who
was, you know, famous for being able to take
a beating. Yeah. Like, Ali didn't have the endurance
anymore. Like, look at him. He's just not the
same guy anymore, man. Yeah. He was a shadow
of what he was before. He still went on to win
the title. He still went on. But I always wonder
what he would have been if those three years
were not stolen from him in his peak, in his
prime. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That would have been
something else. Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's one
interesting thing. Another interesting thing
about Ali is, like, try to find him throwing
a body shot. Right. Not a lot of those. No, he
almost never did. Maybe a jab or two to the body.
It's true. It'd be interesting to count up all
the body shots throughout his whole career, and
you might get 10. That's true. Yeah, it's interesting.
Yeah, it is. That's why when people talk about
the greatest boxer, of course, he's one of the
greatest human beings. Greatest Americans ever.
Right, right. Like, just, man, the stuff he's,
he put it, talk about putting himself out there
for, you know, as far as a servant of the world.
There's nobody, I don't know anybody who compares
to him. Also, the personality. When he would
go on talk shows, and he was just so fun. How
sharp was he? Oh, so sharp. And all those things
were memorized. One of my favorite ones was Howard
Cosell said, you're a very truculent champ. And
he goes, whatever truculent means, if it's good,
I'm that. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, he was
just a different human being. He was not scared
of anything, man. There's some stuff that, some
interviews that he's being real controversial.
Like, he would actually talk shit to people and
talk about whooping their ass. You know, just
recently I've seen some stuff that I was like,
wow, I hadn't seen this one. Oh, yeah. If anybody
disrespected him, if anybody like if they wouldn't
call him Muhammad Ali, if they were calling him
Cassius Clay, he would fuck them up. What's my
name? Pop. What's my name? Pop. Yeah. Yeah. He
was a special person. And just. culturally, like
one of the most significant figures ever in the
history of America. Because at a time where the
world was torn, like, why the fuck are we in
Vietnam? And this one guy says, I'm not doing
this. And then they're like, okay, we're going
to strip your title away from you. And then for
three years. He was persecuted and the whole
world was watching and they eventually let him
fight again. By then we had realized that Vietnam
was not a just war. And this guy, they had taken
three years of his life away from him because
he wasn't willing to participate. Yeah, man.
What a hero, man. A real hero. A real hero. And
like, again, a cultural icon, like just a different
kind of human being that inspired so many people
outside of fighting. My parents were hippies
and my parents wanted to watch the. Leon Spinks
rematch when he fought Leon Spinks. Like, everybody
was sitting around. I'm like, I remember being
a little kid going, I can't believe they want
to watch this fight. This is so weird to me.
Like, they want to watch a fight because that's
who Muhammad Ali was. He was just different.
He meant something to America in a way that no
other fighter before or since has. Yeah. Man,
there's so many, man, just even for equal rights
and just... For everything. Yeah, so much that...
I really can't think of many people that have
been more significant. No. And many people think
about, like, what do you stand for? I mean, this
guy, he could have easily just taken some stupid
fucking desk job with the Army or something.
Easily, yeah. I mean, I did a movie last year
in Louisville, Kentucky. And while I was there,
I went and visited Muhammad Ali's gravesite.
And, dude, man, I didn't expect it. I was just
like, let me see it. And, dude, I couldn't talk
for two hours afterwards. I just sat in my car
and just got overwhelmed just to think what this
man really meant. It was just like it jacked
me up. I didn't expect that. Yeah, I can't think
of another fighter that meant more, like in terms
of like a cultural icon. Can't think of another
one. Yeah, and put his life on the line and just
was so, you know. And that's a cautionary tale
to fighters, too, about the end, about fighting
too long. Look, no one ever forgave Larry Holmes
for beating him up. Larry Holmes, one of the
greatest heavyweight champions of all time, never
got his just due because people never forgave
him for beating up Ali. Yeah, yeah, honestly,
yeah. Which is crazy. Yeah. You know, it's not
fair. Didn't make any sense. I mean, Muhammad
Ali was trying to beat him up. But, you know,
everybody knew, even though Ali was fighting,
everybody knew it was over. He wasn't the Muhammad
Ali of old. Yeah, and he wanted to call it into
the fight, man. Holmes was like, why am I doing
this? That was sad. Holmes was never that much
of a likable presence. It's hard to come behind
Muhammad Ali. He was never that kind of a person.
Damn, did he have a jab. That's the best jab
around. Even when he fought Tyson. He was popping
him with that jab and it made you wonder. I wonder
what Larry would have done in his prime. This
would have been an exciting fight to see in his
prime. The two of them? Yeah. I still don't think
he would have been able to beat Prime Tyson.
No. But it was wild to see. Tyson made his bones
on fighting bigger guys and making them miss
and pay for it. Yeah. Yeah. So he load up on
his legs. And a lot of times when he's landing,
he's in the air. Yep. He's in the air, man. It
was the speed, too. Middleweight speed in a heavyweight
body. He's the fastest. Well, he was one of the
fastest heavyweights. I think. There's one guy.
Usyk's pretty damn fast. Oh, Usyk's nice. Yeah.
Oh, man. Talk about a person. He's funny. That's
a funny dude. Oh, he's a character. Yeah, yeah.
And you want to talk about technique, too. And
another guy was trained by the same guy as Lomachenko.
Lomachenko's father trained Usyk. Oh, cool, cool.
Which is also why he's like a heavyweight Usyk.
Or a heavyweight Lomachenko, rather. Lomachenko,
yeah, yeah. He's got that footwork and movement
and that Russian style. You know, Ukrainian -Russian
style. It's like those guys, they figured out
moves. and footwork, Bival has it, you know?
Yeah, yeah. No, look, we're very fortunate that
we can see all of these incredible human beings
that have, you know, risked their life and their
health and put it on the line so we could see
true lessons about character and technique. Yeah,
I just wish heavyweights would concentrate on
technique a little bit more. Right. Well, maybe
Usyk's changing people's perspective on that.
Maybe they're realizing, like, wow, you can't
just one -two everybody. Yeah, I think what happened,
there's another thing in this country. It's like
people, I think, they're not following boxing.
They're not getting into boxing. A lot of these
guys are going for the money. They'll try to
play football or whatever. Well, since Deontay,
we haven't really had a heavyweight boxing champion
in America. Deontay was our last. heavyweight
boxing champion. Yeah. And talk about technique
is. Not the best. But, you know, he had what
Teddy Atlas likes to call the eraser. Right,
yeah, true. He can make all the mistakes in the
world. He had that one eraser, blam. Yeah, yeah.
Deontay's was the craziest knockout puncher that's
ever existed. Yeah. It was nuts. He hit you moving
backwards and flatlined you. Yeah, but he weighed
like 212. 209 when he fought Tyson Fury the first
time. 209. Yeah, he and I went shooting before.
Like, we've done some. tactical stuff together.
Really nice guy. Yeah. I love talking to him
on the podcast. Oh, yeah. He's great. I don't
know. Just work on his technique, man. It's like,
geez. Yeah, I don't know, man. It's too late.
It's what you do for a living. I think he relied
on that gift for so long. Because, I mean, look
at the gift, though. I mean, at one point in
time, he was like 39 knockouts out of 40 fights.
Yeah. Yeah. It's like he's. I know. Nuts. But
it didn't matter when it landed. When it landed,
you couldn't do shit about all that sloppiness.
I still wouldn't mind seeing AJ versus him. I
still wouldn't mind that either. That would be
interesting. I think after the car accident,
AJ might be done, though, because he was knocked
unconscious in that car accident. I heard really
bad. I heard he was out for like 10 minutes.
Really? Yeah, and his two friends died. You know,
I mean, and after all his fights and, you know,
that was the last thing he needed is some extracurricular
brain damage like that. True, true. And then
also losing his two great friends like that has
got to be, you know, that's just fucking crazy.
Yeah, that's a sad thing. But I think, you know,
if he's my brother or my cousin, I'd be like,
you got to go through this. You can't, you know,
you got to, for their sake. Yeah. What would
your friends want you to do? Well, we'll see.
Yeah, yeah. I hope for the best. He's another
one of our warriors, man. He puts his body and
life on the line for us, man. That's our modern
-day gladiator, you know? I know. There's nothing
like a fight. It's different than any kind of
sporting event. It's very different. And the
losses are way different. They're way harder
to deal with. And the victories are way greater.
Yeah, you know, one of my best friends being
Frankie, man. Like, so I got a front seat to
all of that. You know, Frankie knocked out Roy
Jones back in the amateurs. And, you know, I
wanted to see him get his due. I mean, he was
WBA super middleweight champ for five years straight.
But, you know, it was a front seat to the boxing
life and the fighting life. It's a hard world.
Yeah, it is. It's a hard world. In the end, it's
not pretty, and there's no one there for you.
I was watching this piece on Bobby Chacon, who
was a great fighter in the 80s. Oh, my God. In
the end, it was horrible. It was just horrible
watching just the deterioration and the brain
damage and no one there for you. That's a lot
of guys. Yeah, yeah. I mean, your brain. it doesn't
regenerate. No, it only gets worse. Yeah. And
if you're experiencing brain damage now, I mean,
without treatment, there's some treatments now
that they're able to use to help regenerate some
neural tissue. Yeah. But there's a certain amount
you never come back from. Yeah, yeah. I know
my son, one of my sons is, I mean, he's been
going through, what do they call it? This is
like a stimulation thing. Mm -hmm. The magnetic
stuff? Yeah. Man, I forget. But he's actually
helped him out a great deal. I mean, he kind
of went kind of an interesting route, like kind
of experimented with some stuff before. But now
he's kind of come back. He's turned him around.
What happened? Yeah, he kind of was like getting
high, kind of went that route for a minute. But
it's... But he's gotten, I've just actually seen
things turn around with this, I don't know why
I can't remember, but it's this brain stimulation
thing. And it kind of rewires you, you know?
You know, I think I heard you talk about the...
Ibogaine? You know, NED and those type of things.
So, yeah, there's... There's things that are
going— There are things that can help, but you've
got to be very vigilant about it. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, so I've been connected to a lot of the
anti -aging type of stuff. We're getting up there,
brother. Yeah, it's fascinating. A good friend
of mine, Bob Goldman, I don't know if you know
who Dr. Bob Goldman is. No. Yeah, you should
have him on your show. He's an interesting guy.
He runs A4M. I don't know if you've ever heard
of it. It's this conglomerate of— Doctors are
all around the world that's dedicated to fixing
causes of diseases, not just chasing around the
symptoms and stuff. And so it's like very much
in the face of the pharmaceutical companies,
they are really dedicated to taking care of things
from the source. And it's been going on for a
while, man. They have like about six of these
things a year. The biggest one is in Vegas. But
like, look it up, A4M. Okay, check it out. Sylvester
Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, he's been dealing
with them. I've actually tried to, I've hooked
Nick Diaz up with him to help him. Because, you
know, they're on the forefront of the new medicine
type stuff. So, yeah, it's an interesting thing.
A4M, they have a lot of doctors who will be giving
lectures on all the most innovative stuff, and
they have all the newest equipment that's just
like the biggest kind of, I don't know, like
rooms, huge rooms full of all the most. Collaborating.
Yeah. It's a good time to be an older person.
There's a lot of science behind it now. They
have the belief that you should be living to
100 but healthily. Yeah. They really believe
that. If it's ever been possible, now's the time.
Oh, yeah. I think so, too. My doctor, Dr. Alavizos,
Dr. 63, he looks like a freaking superhero. That's
awesome. 63 -year -old guys when we were kids
were basically dead. Yeah. They were just old
men, frail, feeble. Yeah, it's interesting, man.
It's like, yeah, we're getting older. But knock
wood, man, I've been very fortunate. I've been
very lucky. Yeah, me too. This is a good time
to be an older person. Yeah. Man, you look good,
man. Thank you. You too. Yeah. I think I'm a
little older than you, though. How old are you?
Yeah. I'm 58. Oh, yeah, I'm a little older than
you. Okay. Yeah. Well, you look great. Well,
thank you. You look great then if you're older
than me. I feel good. Yeah. I feel very good.
Well, there's so much information now on how
to maintain your body and how to maintain your
health when you're older. Yeah, yeah. Well, hey,
brother, it's been great. I'm glad we got together.
It was a lot of fun. Me too, man. Again, man,
I got to tell you, man, how proud I am of Joe
from the gym. Is doing his thing, man, in a big
way. I feel the same about you. Thank you. Well,
thank you, man. This was a lot of fun. Yeah,
man. Thanks for having me. We'll do it again
sometime. Yeah, we got to. All right. For sure.
All right. Bye, everybody.