The boys, Yo hit your boy comp nasty.
Alongside his boy, not really alongside his boy, but also Taylor Luwan, I'm sitting in my fucking girlfriend's closet right now recording this intro on this beautiful Monday turn of events. My mind's all over the place, So I apologize for this weird excitement, just level of whatever. The boy just got called by Oakland. I'm about to pack, in the middle of packing right now to fly out to Oakland. I have a workout tomorrow. Not not on the team yet,
but big week ahead. I'll keep you guys posted obviously, but crazy journey man, you know the boy.
We're trying to give you guys some podcasts.
You know.
Reminder, everything's backlog, so everything you hear is from the summer.
But exciting shit.
Man, your boy, your boys going out to Oakland, have a try out. Keep you guys updated. But pretty cool shit. Spooketober stuff spooktober Merch. We're at the end of October. Awesome, Taylor. We went to this spook last last week with UH, with our UH, with our better halves.
We went to the slaughterhouse. Phenomenal spook.
I'm talking like a forty minute banger, and at the end there's like this little maze that you got to get through. Everybody's kind of crammed and you got to pick the right door find your way through it. It's scary as shit. Huge shout outs of Slaughterhouse. They do it right. We we had a good season of Spooks, man, We had a good season on Haunted Houses. Beast House was dope, Slaughterhouse was awesome, Nightmare in Nashville was awesome, but Slaughterhouse, man, I really liked.
What I loved about Slaughterhouse is they had the classics, dude. So we're like going through it.
You know, it's my turn to be in the front, but it's a little spooky going through each one.
Then boom, they got Jason. They got the classics. Jason. Uh uh, who am I trying to think of?
They got Jason, Freddie and Mike Mys just bam bam bam, all back to back and talking in their element. You're kind of walking. Jason just pops out of you. Dudes, like six six they got a gray look at Jason in there comes at you with a freaking sword or whatever.
He's got the machete. Scared of shit.
Oh shit, you know, go on to the next on Freddy Krueger sitting there, and then they got the they got the music.
Playing the dun du du du du du du dun d and you're like, oh shit.
Mike Mars is around here, and you just respect getting spooped by Mike Marris because he's a legend.
But they had the classics in there. Make it through the maze.
Go check out Slaughterhouse if you get a minute. And these are these are these are sponsored deals. These are just like you know, the boys are out there reviewing and seeing what haunt houses are out there in Nashville.
But Slaughterhouse was a dope one last week. But yeah, Spootober merch, go get your spootober shit.
Uh twenty five percent off of running a sales Since you know, obviously we're at the end of October, shout out Spootober.
Phenomenal came wait for next year.
Already getting into the nice little holiday season now and Christmas and Thanksgiving, so time to.
Put on that little winter coat.
My pups eat up eats candy, going into the Thanksgiving food and then the Christmas holiday meals and the gifts.
And I love it this time of year. Is amazing.
But go to BUSTINWTV dot com and hit on our merch store and I'll take you to Hang ten. Shout out Hang ten for the boys. We also got for the girls shirts, hoodies and pink shirts that say for the girls. If you're not formingre against him, the boys ain't shit without the girls. Proceeds are going to breast cancer research. So go and pick out that merchandise. Reminder about podcasts there, Donnie, I've already talked about that these podcasts here. Taylor is not has not been podcasting all
that season. That's really the reason why I continue to say it. Huge shout out our sponsors, Hunter Briley, Regal Realty Group Regal RG dot com. Hunter Briley, folks, he's a stud, he's kind of been the he's been one of the secret MVPs, so this whole operation helping us out with tailgates and everything else. But most importantly he sponsors the pod, his his reality group from everything from commercial, residential or investment Bold Investment. Love talking shop with him
all the time. Hit him up his person six one five six three zero nine seven three five. Let him know the boys sent you. Let him know Cam nasty sent you. He's gonna take care of you. He's gonna he'll talk shop with you, he'll ment it. Whatever you gotta do, man, hit up on a Bradley, dude, just start around Nashville. Also huge shout out hashtag don't give a Anheuser Bush and Ajax Turner the local distributor for Anheuser Busch.
You know, keeping the boys.
Fresh supplied with those sexy little seltzers. You know you got the nice little six percent get where you're going faster. You got the all Loha Beaches and the Catalina Lion mixers. Dude, nice little jams, nice little change up that don't give a mentality A strong out there, keep sending us your pictures with your natty light selzers.
There's just anything under the.
Anheuser Bush and umbrella hashtag uh, don't give a and for the boys.
Whatever you gotta say, man.
Do for the boys, We'll poach you, we'll put you on our YouTube episodes, we'll shout you out, we'll do all that fun stuff. Man.
Love hering your guys.
Are reviews, by the way, that shit is hilarious and dope.
But yeah, shout out Olaha Beaches. A Catalina line mixer.
And also those little subtle the little subtle climbing of the load of those little bone and Viv baby, I had I love the little bone and Viv's the little woman.
With the little mermaid on the can. Dude.
I'm all about that life, dude, And I'm gonna keep I'm gonna keep plugging the little bone of bees because they're a litt subtle favorite of the boy. All right, guest today, Michael Chandler. Dude's an MMA fighter, three time belt or champion. He's ranking number seven as a as a lightweight in the whole freaking world as far as all MMA fighters go, UFC, belt or all of it combined. Dude, just stud man. He's on quite a journey right now.
We talk about his journey. We talk about defending the title, getting the title, rematching for the title, losing the title. He's going. He lost his last fight when he lost the belt. He came on the bus, talked about it, We talked about uh, we talk about a lot of things. Man, What goes onto the mind of a fighter as you're in the in the middle of this journey. He's got a fight coming up in December, So we're all for the boy dude, so be on the lookout for that.
But awesome conversation Me and Taylor sit down with them. Super awesome dude. Man, I'm telling you, he's really uh, really unique individual, has a lot of great shift for perspective, a lot of great stuff to stay motivated and inspired. Big fan of Michael Chandler. You're gonna love the episode, so you know, yeah, my puffs go out. There be a fucking wolf.
I love it, dude, I love it. Man, Dude, I'm old as fuck now. I don't even know what they do anymore. Gone soon, man, And we.
Usually just start to find there. We usually just go into it. We're right, yeah, we're in right now. Yeah, we're not professional enough to know. We're just like, you know what, fuck it. Let's just we don't even just start talking. And that's when the podcast starts.
That's the best, that's the best time. Yeah.
It's just because I feel like a lot of podcasts like they sit there and they're like, all right, hey, five minutes boys.
And then everybody looks at their phone and then you're a guest. You don't know these dudes that we know, these dudes. You sit there and you're like, all right, like what the fuck are these guys gonna ask me? Like what's going on?
And then and then the main guys they got their sheet of paper to like read the end about you.
I'm glad to see our our production crew. They have notes on you. Usually it's fucking terrible. Like usually it's it says, it says summertime.
And good luck like that. So what's going on?
Man?
How's life? What's what's up?
Life is good? Man? Just enjoying life between fights. So like between fights when I'm not when I'm not in training camp, you know, I can kind of cut back a little bit, cut of loose a little bit, hang out with the family.
What's the workout schedule?
Like though, when you're off fights, like you go to a fight, how much time do you take off? And so I'm not as well versed in UFC or any of that stuff. I do like it. I love watching it. So you go hit a fight. When's the next time they'll usually have a fight?
Oh, hang on, hang on, yeh, he actually just lost his belt.
Yeah, oh jesus, So this is a depression podcast, a depression.
It's actually going to be a bad it's gone.
You guys got sound effects and stuff. I mean, more than more than anything right now in my life is realizing what is most important, realizing you know that this fight game is about the journey and not the wins and losses. But you know, this last fight wasn't I didn't take a ton of damage. It was like very quick.
It's pretty crazy off. Do you feel like it was too short? They stopped it too short?
No, you're fine, Yeah, I know. It's so hard being in my position because I of course I I'm the guy who lost. I'm the guy who you know. So the good thing is there's a lot of people out there who thought it was an early stoppage, a lot of people out there who thought I got wronged. So you let them do the talking. You let them do it because because if it's you, then you just and truthfully, I think it It was an awesome the way that
it happened. And then when I got onto the you know, when I got onto the mic afterwards, people were like, man, that was one of the coolest losses I've ever seen, or like one of the best speeches after a loss I've ever seen, So like a like a great lose, great loser.
Yeah, no, dude, what I can't.
So this guy what's his name? Pat?
And he came up right yeah, personal, it's pretty personal. I throw a long jab here, he just catches me behind the ear.
Right there.
Yeah, that's some bullsh So it was crazy too because those were illegal shots as well. So I think the ref jumped in just as much because they were illegal shots.
But then, oh, you're mad as fuck here too.
Oh man, Yeah, you're just trying to you're holding it in, Yeah, you are.
And and it's and when you and and I truthfully think that they should never let two fighters come together like that after a fight, because there's nothing worse than the man that just you know, whether it was right, whether it was wrong. So right there the top of your ear there, right behind the ear.
That hurts.
But like I mean, yeah, if you're probably more off balance than you were stunted there he missed.
In your arms.
Yeah, and you kind of you kind of they're putting the hands up. I mean, it's were you with a fight. So you're you know you guys know, you get boom, you get kind of your you're with knocked out about you a little bit but you're still white, you're still awake, You're still you know, you're still going, but it's there. There's a couple different types of knockouts. There's the knockouts where you just go stiff, you know, and the toes are curling, and then there's the other ones where you
just loosey goosey. So it's kind of a it's a weird thing, you know, the way the body, the way the body handles damage like that. But yeah, so my body kind of went limp. You kind of just lose. You don't lose consciousness, you almost just lose your equilibrium. You lose That's what happened.
You always because the staff will always be concerned about I mean in me too, I'm always wondering about you. I might concuss or not, because sometimes I'll take hits on the head and I'll just like lose the present moment, Like i might not be able to feel anything for a second, but I'm all there and literally I'm snapped out of it. Yeah, you know, after after a second. There was one time we always laugh about it. There's
just Limon, who hit me? He's like night night, motherfucker, And you know, I was like stiff, and I couldn't really get up at that on that one. But there's been a couple to where they'll be coming out hey stay down, stad down, and I'm like, yo, I'm literally fine now. But I kind of took it for a second. Is that Is that what you felt when you took that shot in the back of the head.
Yeah, I mean it's it's well, it's one of those things too where you kind of have that flash of not much memory too. Yeah, you know, but as you can see when I when I went down, I saw the punch coming and I dodged it, so I had my wits about me there, or maybe it was just instinct. And that's why that is one of the reasons why
we have to train so hard. We train sixty minutes for a twenty five minute fight, right, you know, forty five minutes for a fifteen minute fight, because you want your body to be able to react on just instinct, right, you know. But yeah, that was more of a body went limp for a second. But I was, I was there and then I remember pretty much everything after that.
So yeah, I mean, you're sure you're getting up too, like you're you're trying to get up. But then a ref, you contel has already made the decision. He's already putting himself in there. And I don't know what it is to be a ref, especially in all bellotore right, it was called bellator. You have seen those types of things. But I feel like when you make a decision, you
have to be very quick because there's being punches thrown. Yeah, so if you're like, I got to okay, the fight's over, you got to dive in there.
Nothing twice about it. I think if he waited half a.
Well, and that's and I think that's what it is too. I would not want that job. I mean probably the same thing with you guys.
You wouldn't want to be an.
NFL ref either, when the whole game could be on your back. Nobody wants Nobody wants to be that, right. You know, they don't get they don't get paid enough for the you know, the the position they're in. But you know, especially in mixed martial arts, like you said, yeah, they have to make a split second decision based upon what they see, and a lot of times it happened. It happened with a guy that I wrestled with, Ben asking remember him yeah, so he he had a really bad that was that was bad.
That was une flying.
Yeah, so that was bad. Bring that up, Ben Asking. But before that, he had a guy it looked like he was choked choked him out, so the ref jumped in and then right right as the ref jumped in, so he let go and the guy Robbi Lawler was just like, what happened? What are you doing?
You know, when it comes to chokeouts, I feel like you either got to tap you right, he's kind of It's super easy to tell when someone's lost consciousness, especially and choking it out.
This is bad, dude.
This isn't the flying knee I was telling you about that we should have talked about while you're yelling at me.
It's nice in the morning.
So here's the very beginning of the fight.
This dude comes, Oh he's down.
That's the beginning, you know, houck stracking him to the fight.
So it's you.
You know that dude taught at the ship out of him and he was out too. Yeah, So who's this cat?
So this is the guy that guy just knocked out? Was Ben asking? You guys wrestled together one of the greatest human beings on earth.
But you know, yeah, no doubt.
But this dude right here, man long hair, freaking braided in the backyard, you know, some shorts on, no shirt, just blaring it out, bare knuckle. And now he's been in and he's been in all the all the major organizations, even in the Strike Force. He was in BELATOI, now I was in the UFC. Honestly, he was written off for a long time. He's got like thirteen fift he losses. But that's what this sport, That's what this sport breeds.
You're as long as you can go from setback to setback or loss the loss without losing the momentum or losing the faith, or maybe you just don't have another option, you know. I mean like if I lost a bunch of fights in a row, I'd probably be like, Okay, I'm gonna hang it up, and these move on to other endeavors. But you know a lot of these guys don't have a lot to fall back on them either.
They're still fighting.
Like Arlovsky I just saw fighting the other night and I was like, Yo, what the mark is he still fighting?
Now? Dude?
He's any any just set three records twenty years Yeah, twenty years he was.
He was a champ too, like like eighteen years ago. But he's know, why is he still fighting?
He's just yeah, And I bet you know, he's getting paid pretty I'm sure he's getting paid really well. And he's you know, I don't know. Those heavyweights can always fight longer than a lot of the lighter weights because it's not as much based on speed and and cardio and that kind of stuff. You know, they're just bigger, and everything's a little slower barbaric, barbarics technical, not maybe not as not not as technical, but just everything is
a a lot slower. Like so for me, I'm going to lose my speed and my quickness compared to another fifty five Yeah, a lot faster, a lot faster than and Arlovsky who's now forty something years old. He can still hang with those those heavyweights now they all get you know, take a lot of damage to get knocked out a lot. So hopefully hopefully they're all right.
But that's a lot of information. I just close. What's okay?
So I walked in here, said, UFC, you fight, you fight for beltar BELATOI yeah, So what's the difference between belatour UFC, and what was the other one Force Strikeforce.
Strike Force is an older organization. They're not they're not around anymore. UFC bought them. There's one FC that's mainly based over in Asia. They're coming over here, opening up US US offices here. But essentially it's all the same sport. It would be just it would be exactly like the rules that you guys play in the NFL, and a new league came up with the exact same leag but it was just a different league. The main difference. The
main difference is the UFC is the biggest. It's been around since nineteen ninety three, so they've just celebrated their twenty fifth anniversary. Belotore has been around since two thousand and eight, so they're, you know, just ten years into it. So Bellotour's gaining steam. One FC is coming, you know, coming in with with taking taking kind of the may world by storm because they're paying guys better and you know, doing some big shows over in Asia. So Bellatore's taken
really great care of me. I've been with them since the beginning of my career. Really I came in. They used to do a tournament where it'd be eight eight guys in a bracket, three fights in three months. So I fought March, April and May of twenty eleven and oh that's dope, and then fought November twenty eleven. It was like one hundred thousand dollars tournament, and then I
fought for the world title all in one year. So I saw a great path to be able to get to you know, top five in the world with Belatore, and then I've kind of made myself an indispensable asset and that's always the goal.
Yeah, do you have do you want to be in the UFC?
Like what I like, what's the thought behind sitting back and being like, obviously UFC is the most popular, it's the most known, and you know the ins and outs of it. So you're like, oh, I'm gonna stay putting beltur for I know my reasons why, and they're better reasons, but it's just you.
It's like, yeall want to get in the fucking UFC.
Yeah, Just to put things into perspective too, like the NFL, Like there's there's a bunch of the league, there's the XFL. There was a a f a f L right, a aa aof or something like that. They just they seventy dollars down the drain, like didn't even get a whole season. Uh, there's this the CFL. Like there's a whole bunch of different football leagues.
But the one is the NFL.
Everybody wants to play in the NFL is with the money, is the best, publicity is the best, the best team, is the best talent and all that. I don't know if that like I think, I don't know if that is it the same or as Belts were.
Like Belt is pretty real.
But the UFC you think of like Econocon McGregor. You have the Na Diaz guy, you had all the all those dudes and.
Yeah, so here here here's what I would say. School is bro let me school you guys up real quick. And it's hard to because you know, like to be real truthful will hurt people's feelings in this kind of stuff. But but really, when you have all the power you can, you can suppress the wages. Right, So it's actually the opposite.
So the UFC is the biggest organization, yet I would say that they pay they pay less to the smaller third, the smaller you know of the guys now now well, I will say, if you go over there, you play your cards right, you when your you win your fights, you do your job, you can make millions and millions of dollars like Connor has, like Kabeb has, like like John Jones, and these person that can help you exactly
and in that they're in the top one percent. So it's it's it's hard to say, but I've I've made my decisions based upon what's the best decision for myself and my family, my future family. Whenever I was you know, just had a wife and didn't have a son. Now, but now I just signed another contract about it a year ago and have another year or so left on it.
And I made that decision based upon finances. I mean, you don't go, you don't leave your current job, your current company, your current situation for a different situation that will pay you less, that you might might get less respect and all that. Because the other thing, too is I am I've made myself an indispensable asset to it to a great organization was take really taking really really great care of me. If I go to the UFC,
I'm just another face as well. Now guy, Now there's people all over the world and I see it every day, and I would love to see you fight. I'd love to see if fight could be. But we'd love to see you fight these top guys in the world because they think I can hang with them or maybe even
beat them. But going in making less money and then having to fight five of the top five of the top ten guys just to get to that maybe title shot where they can dangle the carrot and say, hey, if you win these five fights plus this one, you'll make X amount of dollars. Blah blah blah. I'm not into that. I've proven myself, you know.
So you're even saying the bellatour like they they they can take care of guys better than what the UFC would do.
So I think I think it's just spread out a little bit more. I think I think the highest earners in the entire world will always be the UFC guys because of the pay per view model, because of how big they are and how much money they spend promoting it. But there's I mean, when you see when you see you know, myself and Ryan Bader, fad or Amillionenko, you know, all these all these big name guys, big high, high level athlete. Guys that are that are making really great
money for the sport. When it comes to the sport, we're making extremely good money up in that top one percent, but the lower half of the UFC and even the lower half of bellators not making a lot of money. This is a hard, hard business to make a lot of money in. And the older I get, the longer I'm in the sport, the more I realize how truly blessed I am to be in the sport for ten years and be at competing at a high level with all the world titles that I fought for, and then
making the money that I'm making too. So it's it's a crazy sport. And I would you know, all you young kids out there who you know, I can't wait to be an m fighter someday. It's uh, it's tough, and you got to play your cards right, just like being in the NFL, right, you know.
Yeah, man, there's I mean, I can't imagine going like I watched the UFC fights all the time, and I'm watching these dudes walk in and walking to the ring, and I'm like, I can't even imagine that feeling. Yeah, Like, well, it's probably like it's probably walking out of the tunnel. But the same thing, it's like, yeah, I got fifty three dudes with me.
Yeah, you know what I'm saying.
And if you by yourself with like your.
Your crew, your trainers, cameras and you and people is in your face, you got your song going. And it's like that's got to be such a surreal feeling. And I don't know, man, the stresses that have to come with just walking into that ring with somebody. There's got to be I mean, there's so much viewing and stuff like that. There's lots of money out there. I don't know why guys aren't getting paid.
You know.
The same thing for the NFL, Like there's a minimum for everybody, right and the older you get that eventually that minimum gets like I don't think what nine hundred, Yeah for the older dudes and the younger When I was a rookie, it was like four to twenty or something like that. But it's like there's so much money, and you would think, like, you know, you offer more money, you're gonna have those kids that want to fight.
Yeah.
Well, and that's the thing too. I don't want to make this a you know, bashing on the organizations like they should pay us more. We should get paid more
for what we do in the UFC. Rightfully, so without what Dana White and Lorenzo for Tita and Frank Furtida, what those guys did starting this, starting this sport, paving the way for all of us to be able to make a living, I'm making a living in an organization I've never I've never even spoken to Day and Dana White, I've never I've never been in the UFC, You've never
fought in the octagon. But yet what they did since nineteen ninety three has made me, you know, very financially secure to be able to take care of my family fighting in a different organization because off of the back of the biggest organization in the world and their kind of their stock inside the world. So they, you know, they deserve to to to make their share as well. It would be nice if we made more, But it's you know, going back to stepping into the cage, it's
it's pretty crazy. You know, you just have to know that you've done everything you possibly can. You have to be you really just have to be willing and able to accept the uncertainty that's about to happen, you know, just just like my last fight. Man, that's embarrassing. You know, just getting knocked out in front of.
It can end.
Yes, there go getting knocked out the Dolphins.
Last year and everything, like you work so goddamn hard to for something like like it to end that dude like that, twelve weeks twelve, you're not even.
Really out of it.
It's like you have I'm gonna fucking lose this fast, like knock me the fuck, just decapitate.
Yeah, you know, like you there.
Thinking like it's that's it. Yeah, all the however long you train like that's it just comes to an end that fast.
Oh boy. Yeah. Here's Tailor's So that's Andre Bran week one.
This is week one and eighteen season. So I'm running right there on the less other and I just get blind sided. And that's Andre Branch too.
He's like a second team slappy like not he's not anybody guy.
He's going to man.
So he's right here.
He's yelling body back.
He's a body back and ninety one there camra Wigs now on our team.
He's now about it, dude, he said.
So I talked to Kim about it and he's like honestly, dude, Like there's the boy shout out.
Yeah, that's right there.
So now and then it's a big deal and we're moving.
Now we're done.
They stopped the fight with He's like, what stopped? I mean, this is my favorite party and they got my back on this sil Man see And that's and that's the funny thing too. Mixed marshal Let is very similar. Like I'm I'm literally training right now with the with the team that I lost my first fight ever I lost. I beat Eddie Alvarez to win the world title. Work is huge, which is huge, But then I lost to him about two years later. I'm now training with the
team that that coached him. I'm now training my my head coach, My main head coach coached Eddie Alvarez against me two years ago when I lost that fight. Right, So it's just it's a weird. It's weird how it's such a big world but it's so so small. Just like you say, Cameron wakes over there, high five and his boys just laid you out, and now he's trying to.
Lay people out for you, right, you know, so that's crazy.
How was that conversation?
What did he so it was like a Regen day during OTAs and I was like, Cam, we got a problem. And Cam is like a super like soft spoken dude, nicest guy, and he's like, what's wrong? And I was like, you boy, brandch knocking with the funk out like a year high five whatever, Oh what's the deal? And his words allegedly he says he didn't know, Like he's like, I didn't know, Like I knew there's a commotions. Someone got hit, but I don't know who did it or or anything like that.
No.
I feel like if it was anybody else, Honestly, if it was anybody else, I feel like I'd be like, you're full of shit. But Cam, like you watch him play games and he's lily just there to get the quarterback and go home, yea, so locked in you look, it doesn't look like he focused on the riff raft the bullshit.
It is funny too because because people will say that kind of stuff, you know, what what did you think when this guy did that?
Or he did that?
And it's kind of interesting too because I really don't look at it like the the entity that I'm about to fight is a human being.
I just see.
I just see two arms and I see two legs. That's my size, and he's trying to take food off the off the table for my family. And I don't really look at him like it's a person his personality. Got a job and yeah you got you got a job to do, and you just you do it and a lot of times you black out, just go after it.
Yeah, you know what's that emotion?
Like, Like, obviously you trained for months at a time and it's just you're hard working and you start walking to the ring and that adrenaline dump or how much do you have to probably mentally train for something like or a young guy that you're he's probably going into his first fight, maybe the big dance walking to the octagon, Like, Yo, what are the emotions going back? Here's what you're gonna be looking for. Here's how you gotta suppress certain emotions.
Because again, like it's just you, dude, it's just you. And once you enter that ring and it's kind of dark and you know everyone's out there and the spotlight's on, like, it's got to be a different feeling. And obviously we're all jacked to go train every day, but now when you're fucking in the arena and the lights are on, You're just kind of like, what is that emotion?
Like, yeah, man, you hit the nail on the head when you talk about actually having to suppress a lot of it too, because I mean, human human emotion, human human the human spirit wants to get up for those types of types of scenarios. That's why visualizing it stepping into the cage before you actually step into the cage. I mean, I can close my eyes and I can see the walk, I can smell what the cage smells like. I can I can feel the heat of the lights. I can feel kind of the rumble of the crowd
like you guys probably can on the field. You can feel it. You got it. You got to feel it before you actually get there. And really just just realizing what where your emotion Like there's a spectrum from you know, emotion to energy, and you want to get to an area.
You want to get to that number, if it's a one through ten, you want to get to that number where you're gonna perform the best, where you're gonna flow, where you're gonna where you're gonna be at your best, and kind of fire and all cylinders for me, it should be about a five, should be no higher than a five. I don't want to I don't want to have a lot of emotion because emotion drives the heart rate up and drives all that stuff up. And a
lot of times can we make a mistake. But also too when you see people like in a fight and you say, oh my gosh, he's gassed. He's not really out of shape. He probably just got into a situation, into a scenario where his a heart rate got elevated. He didn't have his emotions in check, and he, you know, he lost that cardio. Same thing with wrestling, man, Like you know you grew up watching your brother. I'm sure, right, Cody.
I wrestled. I wrestled up until I quit have the sixth grade. Hated it.
Parents forced me to do it again in a high school or I would be grounded for the winter.
And you look like you when you look like you like I. I I played football, but I didn't really play for all. I was like, you know, I was like, wrestling is good for me because of weight classes, right,
you know so? But you know, same thing with wrestling, man, I had, you know, matches where you get taken down in the first thirty seconds of a match, and all of a sudden, you're the negativity goes to the to the to the roof, and then all of a sudden you lose that match, and you feel like your feed are in quicksand and feeder in cement blocks, you know. So as you're as you're walking into the cage. A lot of times too, I talk about talking to myself
instead of hearing, you know. So yeah, you know, because because I think if you just are sitting there, you know, the human I think they are. Our brains were wired for that, that fight or flight, that like survival mode, and you know, and you're always worried about threats, possible threats. There's a million perceivable threats. When you're walking into a cage with the manu, one s rip your head off.
So instead of thinking about that, instead of just sitting there in silence and hearing what might come into my mind, because just one negative thought can be a can be a waterfall that can send you down the wrong path.
So a lot of times I'm just sitting there and I'm talking to myself, you know, whether it's audibly or whether it's in my head talking to myself because I can because if I can feel that space, if I can feel that void, then the chances of any kind of negativity coming in or are slimming on.
That fireflight, that fight or flight is so real, like like a human being, if you bring us down, like we're still caveman times, like we still are not evolved enough to understand like it's gonna be like there's no gray area, Like if there's a situation where it's high intensity, you're gonna go a journals and start rushing. It's either gonna tell you like I get the fuck out of here right to bow up. That's just that's crazy. How you think we've evolved so much, but we're really haven't.
At the end of the day.
It's still when you get put in those black and white situations, that's gonna be one way or the other.
Yeah.
And what I've realized too, And as the older I get, the more I realize, I spent a lot of years fight or flight in in my training, right, you know, so I was I would get into a knockdown, drag out war number one in the sparring sessions number one. It's not good because I think a human being can only take so many shots to the head and channing before it's it's over right, you're.
Mush and then you got that yeah, which is I mean, we'll get into the concussion protocol here as a stuff, go keep on fish with thoughts.
So I used to train where it was fighter flight because I was a tough guys like I fought more with my balls than I did my brain, and I.
Would just go, go go.
But now the older I get, the more I realize drilling and being in more of a play fun sparring type of scenario where there is no perceived threat, where I'm actually cognitively thinking about what I'm doing, cognitively thinking about different tells, different footwork, different feints, different different movements to be able to actually break down the sparring sessions
in front of me, rather than that fighter flight. Because I know I've already proven that I'm tough, but me being tough inside of a cage number one is not the best way for me to fight. I'd rather be a technical, beat them up, walk home, or walk out of the cage and collect paycheck. Case my wife, let's go.
So I've kind of tailored my training more towards less fight or flight in the training because I know, if I get into a fight where it's like, okay, it's the fourth and fifth round I lost, I'm down around. I gotta win these next two rounds to win the fight, I'm gonna I mean, I can sack up and go, so I know I can do that. So it's more about being technical.
You were on the Joe Rogan podcast Shout Out Joe Rogan, we want you on the bus one day you're on. Yeah, I was listening to your episode, Joe, and you're huge on visualization, which is stuff we've talked about.
Before, and you're like, you go into really good detail.
I go back and find his episode on the Joe Rogan episode, but he'll probably do it on here too. You just an awesome job explaining like how you got into visualizing and how, like I want to say, you lost like three in a row and you started to take on the mental training and the visualization aspect before that third loss, and then you had to you know, continue to believe in and keep going about it. Talk about the law of attraction, your visualization, how you got into that.
And how you still used it to this day.
Yeah, you know, I mean, for me, I think I just took my I took my self image, my self worth, my confidence. I took it for granted, you know. And I think I think, just like anything, if you take if you take a certain muscle group for granted, you don't work on it, it's going to atrophy, it's going to it's going to to not be one of your strengths anymore. But yeah, so back to that, I lost three fights in it. I went six hundred and eighty
eight days without a win. You know, so your book that you're gonna ride day six hundred eight days, man, and it's going to be, you know, a catchy title, And what is it behind it? I mean essentially, you know, I grew up wrestling, and if I lost a wrestling match, I knew it was only four days, three days, seven days or the same day or same day until I can get get it back, get back on the winning track. But when you got six months between the fight or you just you know, I just got to knock down,
drag out war. I lost my title. I'm bleeding all over the place. I'll show you guys a picture like that picture.
This is awesome.
Just both eyes swollen. Shutup my lips. Are turned inside out, bleue, four or five sets of stitches, probably a concussion, and I'm limping back to my hotel room and for some reason, that self doubt just came in.
Yeah.
No, well, and that's what it was.
I think so so so many times, especially in today's society, we hear what other people are saying and we try to block it out. But then one small thing happens and it triggers that that water all of negativity. Immediately, it was Michael, I knew you weren't as good as you thought you were. You know, I knew you weren't as good as they said you were. I knew they were right. I knew the haters were right. I knew this was right. I knew you were just a phony.
You're a small guy from from a small town of Missouri. What are you doing, you know, making a bunch of money and making a bunch of money and being on the bright lights and being this like celebrity fighter guy. You're a phone, you know. And that's what happened. And then that led to another loss and another loss, and I saw sports psychologist and I started just I started to just actually look at my mental training like it was me going to the to the gym and sparring,
or me going to the gym and lifting weights. It was a part of it. And so now, I mean the mental game between the years is now pretty much half of my training. You know. When I'm down in Florida by myself, I mean, I spend you know, an hour or two a day, whether it's reading, whether it's watching different fights or whatnot, or just sitting there in silence visualizing being able to be in the fight before
I actually get to the fight. And I mean, I think that's that's one thing that's one of the greatest advices I will ever give to a young athlete or just even a young person in general. Don't take your confidence, your self image, your self worth, which is your greatest asset. Your self image is your greatest asset because a human being cannot consistently perform in a manner that is inconsistent with the way that he sees himself. So if you don't see yourself as a champion, you may be a
champion for a second. You may be a champion for a week, a month, a year, but eventually it's going to catch up with you. If you don't truly, truly believe it in your heart of hearts. So yeah, for anybody, don't take your self image, your self worth, your your confidence in yourself for granted, because eventually it will wane if you're not working.
On it, and you might not ever be a champion.
Like we were on the one with Ben Newman and I was kind of talking about standard over feelings, and you're right in your standard. Like for me personally, it was like, what is will confident as a Pro Bowl linebacker? Like I haven't been a Pro Bowl linebacker, but there's no there's no reason I should believe anybody. Just because I'm not one doesn't mean I shouldn't be telling myself I am one and be working towards that every day.
You should be not shooting for the you know, the stars, so to speak, all the time in your life and not talk to yourself that way because you want something so bad and you.
Might not ever hit it.
But the moments when say you're not hitting those plateaus and you're not hitting those results, you're saying you're still gonna use that same process and carry it back over to the next year and the next year, and then when you're doing something else in life. You carry it over to that thing, how are you the best in
that world? And you might not ever fucking be the best in that world, but you should always aspire to be something that you are fearful when you're saying it to yourself, Like, Okay, like when I'm saying I'm a pro bowl.
Is there a doubt in my mind that I ever think I'm gonna be a pro bowler? Fuck? Yeah, there is, dude.
It's like, will should you really tell yourself that you're gonna be a pro bowler when you know you're probably not gonna be? But hey that at that moment, don't fucking talk to yourself like that? Yeah, Like you just you gotta brainwash yourself, man. And I think that's awesome.
It is true, and it's and it's just like anything, you you gotta wear it. You gotta wear it down, wear it down, wear it down, and eventually you wear down that little guy inside you. I mean, for me, it's a it's a small guy from a small town. Didn't have hair on my armpits. So I was twenty one years old, so I was like like one of the but like all of that, you know that that
was my identity. That's who I was. And you know, that little guy is still in there, and I have to beat him over the head every single day because he creeps up in every single area in my life. If I want to be the best fighter in the best athlete, and the best father and the best husband, that that little guy is going to keep creeping up in there and you just have to wear him down,
you know. So it's it's it's a constant repetition every day and waking up and just beating that little dude over the head.
No doubt, because you you've you've been at the top, I mean three Pro Bowls, like you guys are at the ZOB Like I'm sure it happens still all the time.
Dude. We were talking the other day about the mad rating.
Yeah, I mean, yeah, that doesn't matter.
That's huge.
Is the thing that motivates me a lot. Like obviously my family helps me a lot. All those things you touched on definitely helps me. But a big thing is people that doubt you is such a It can be such a motivating factor if you if you let it,
do it in the right way. Like when people say, oh, you're you're terrible at this terrible at that, like you still have that when you talk about that little guy in your head that's still in your head sometimes saying yeah, you're not that good of a left tackle, like you well Madden rated.
You this where you're you're that? Like what about these and s gears?
So you got beaten practice, You're probably can get beat in the game and all those different things. But as soon as someone says a similar thing that I do and do in my brain, I'm automatically that you have fuck that guy. They have no idea who the fuck I am, and I can like I can handle of it. And but like that is a huge thing that I had to learn as well. And it's it's so important because brains and muscles just like anything else. And to sit there and I have there's a book I read
all the time. It's for the Four Agreements anybody. That's an amazing book I read every year for the past three years, and it just talks about like the four principle, four key principles, and one of those principles to be impeccable.
With your work.
Like everything you say you're gonna do, just do it and and and make sure you stay on top of those things, and the more you live a life that if you it's very simple, if you just live a life that you're not a shiite like you know, and people wouldn't be ashamed of you, even nothing to worry about. I don't have anxiety because I live my life exactly how I want to live my life, and I know exactly way I'm I'm the same person when I'm here as when I'm in the football field as when I
go home. And it can be a lot for some people to sometimes as I'm.
A high energy dude.
But it's like you have to put the investment into first love yourself. That's it's the hardest thing to do and the easiest thing to say, because if I ask you who your top five favorite people in this world, the first person you should start with is always well, me, and then my wife, and then my daughter, and then but my best friend Nick, and then you know, and then well, but it's those, it's it's those, it's those key principles that you have to keep talking to yourself.
And anytime it's funny to me, I watch people that are like that ship on themselves for humor, and it's like, that's good and I think that's that's not good. It's hilarious. But at the same time, if you keep saying something, whether it's a joke or others, that's the old saying is a truth into every joke.
And so it's okay to do that sometimes.
But it's more important than anything else, is the one love yourself, read constantly, and just do the right thing. Those are I mean, people talk about religion all the time, like you got like you know, if you go look at any different religion, whether it's Christian and Catholicism, you know, Buddhists, all that different stuff. The all the main principles is just be cool to people, be nice to people, treat people the way you want to be treated. Don't like
kill people. That's probably a big one. Take care of your body, you know those things like you only want to put things in your body that are going to help you. That's why I don't go to McDonald's or Rby's.
I can't.
I can't eat that shit even when I'm done playing. It's just not something you want to do. It's because that those are things that you put in your body and it's gonna it's gonna fuck with your brain as well. And it's still it's a crazy vicious circle that we, especially in America, get in because you know, America is such a such a bubble, and if you take ten steps outside of here. My wife's from Canada, I go
up there, it's a completely different world. Things are slower, there's no there's a bunch of not a bunch of shit, and even the fast food there because it's not allowed. You know, you go down to South America, even Europe, like it's just a different world. But America lives in this crazy bubble that we think your shit doesn't stink, you're perfect. Everyone here is perfect and it's not. But it's like people are so masked by whether it's.
Social media or you know, I'm gonna I'm an American and this, that and the other. It's it's really important to like, you got to look inward.
And so anytime I like, he goes with life too, not just with sports, but if I have an issue with somebody, you know, if I'm in a bad place mentally, I'll go off on that person. But then I'll take a couple of minutes fifteen twenty minutes later, I'm sitting there and I'm like, well, fuck, I had nothing to do with him, Like it's all it's always yourself, yeah, because everything is controllable, you know, and it's just it becomes a vicious circle and I ram away too much.
That well, I mean you're you're saying it all and you you you were saying it too. It's sitting with yourself, learning about yourself and also who you surround yourself with and what you surround yourself.
That's a big one. That's a really big one.
Like sometimes like I'll be around Taylor and the dude he's so intentional on all the things he does.
Like he was speaking real.
Quick, I hat a tink it always yeah, so to so a train and wouldn't be busting with the boys podcast that all train go on nice.
So around Taylor and he's so intentional with stuff sometimes to where you know, he'll talk about I want to be the greatest left tackle to ever play, and I'll sit there, I'm like it'll kind of like reaffirm me that I should be thinking in ways that are remind me to think that way again or continue to repeat, like don't let this little guy say something, or let the good one on your shoulder on the other shoulder, talk to you that way that Taylor's out here talking
and being confident all the time, because this dude is he's so confident to you know, he's very confident to where.
It rubs off.
But you rub you're around, you got to have a friend.
You have to have a friend, like you have to.
Like and he brings up books like four Agreements. He put me on that I think fourth four Agreements and fifth Agreement. I forget who write them, but we should. We should figure out who wrote those books. But those are those are awesome, But it is it's who you surround yourself with because again, you're gonna be in those times or you're in the gym and you're just talking to yourself, like you'll go from the best in the world to like, maybe I'm losing a step.
Yeah, and now you know, people like.
Peak like all that. Yeah, and people ask that, hey, are you still in shape?
Like to play ball?
And I'm just thinking to myself, Yeah, I'm in fucking phenomenal shape. And I don't know if I that's the answer they're wanting to hear. But I feel that way even though I'm fucking you know, twenty nine going on thirty and have been at this peak in my career, but I know, like you can find another peak given the opportunity.
Yeah, well, and it all goes back to reputation, right I What I realized is the most important thing to me in my entire life was my reputation. Not exactly what people thought of me, but knowing that people looking at me and say, man, that guy's reliable, that guy's a good dude. He does he tries to do the right things. He loves his family, he loves this, he loves that. And then more the more I realize, the older I get, the more I realize the greatest reputation is the one that I have with myself.
You're right.
So, just like what you were talking about, whether it be making the wrong decisions with what you're eating or making the wrong decisions with who you're surrounding yourself with, when you're doing those things that are kind of self they're self loathing without even really feeling like without without
even really knowing it. You're doing things that you know you're not supposed to be doing right whenever you and it goes back to being a good person when you when you're when you do something that is outside of having good character. Whether you win or lose or gain from that experience, you're losing no matter what, because because you're actually doing something opposite of what the human soul was created to do. I think we were you know, the age ol debate of our humans inherently evil or
they inherently good. So it can be debated, right, but I think I think we're all inherently good and we just get corrupted by this outside world, all people that we surround ourselves with. And that's that's always been the most important thing to me, who I surround myself with, and having trying to have a ridiculously almost annoyingly confident friend or the guy that you look at you're like, did I wish I had a quarter of that?
Right?
And like Ben Askern was that for me?
Man?
I mean the dude was undefeated until you know, just a couple of weeks ago for a reason. I mean, the dude and he was actually one of the most untalented men I've ever been around in my entire life. Like I came in as a freshman, he was no no, what I'm saying physically, I mean, like, do you look at the dude, and he's actually making a gimmick out of it. He's like, he talks about his dad, bod
and that kind of stuff. He does not look like a professional athlete competing at the highest level, yet between his ears, I've never met a more confident person. You have to have a person, a couple of those people around you, because they're just going to level you up, you know, no.
Doubt before we get into the next level. Let's go, let's read you. But let's read these ads. Now we'd be quiet, and now we're going back and we're back. Yeah, yeah, because we never know. We backlog everything.
That money somehow bro like that. Speaking of banks, Let'm just kidd what a little bit really I'm with Willis Fargo now Wells Fargo. I'm a little bit everywhere.
Actually I actually was still little bit with Chase, but mostly will Fargo.
There you go, there's your uh. There's the book Galleries like that.
That guy's awesome.
Man.
He's got he's got another book about love. It's The Love Agreement or something like that. It's all it's really good and it talks about the foe agreements.
In that book. There's another book called the Uh it's the.
Links the Art of War. Art of War.
That's an amazing book.
I'm reading a book right now called Ego is the Enemy because, like myself, I don't know how much George football or even the Tennessee Tians or anything like that, but it doesn't really matter.
He was supposed to going to a game last year. I got him a silie passed and he said, hey, man, got your satellite pass. He takes back, thanks, and then gave me the middle finger.
Never showed up middle middle finger. Okay, thanks, appreciate.
I thought you nevers, but he made it for this season. They're coming out of season, hopefully coming out.
Yeah, we'll get you. Sideline passed.
You and Wilkinsons to each other. We got a oh my god, we gotta But anyway, it's all about confidence, right.
Yes, exactly.
What's all about building people up around with you?
No, but going back, I'm reading a book right now called Ego is the Enemy And how much like the ego can really like debilitate you in life.
And uh, it's kind of taught.
Me a lot because I've always been very like vocal on the field, very loud, like I'm a big chirper I talk about the ship very ego. That's awesome, very very ego a lot, And I'm still going to do those things, but it's really important.
Like sometimes, like you guys gotta still laughing about there, um.
Trying to get serious now then they're still living at that joke was actually Marcos.
Goddamn Marcos.
Just take pictures and stuff fucking laughing.
By the time this episode drops, I'm gonna fucking be somewhere.
Ball linebacker dem Is Gain. How about you two twenty? I knew that.
Seventy pounds you could be the best left card in the league. How's all you six two?
Say your six to one, you'd be the best center in the league.
Dude, dude, I'm smart as fuck. I could easily do do that.
Yes, Senner, you gotta be really really smart to do Yeah.
Oh, in all these books, guys, the links will be in the YouTube bio and shit like that, so you guys can find it.
There you go.
What you so you watch, guys like you watch? Was Connor I first UFC fight ever went to.
For our first fight, I will say I ever went to was Connor McGregor versus ideas the first one. Oh, dude, I was the guy Richie and Coda in Vegas and we went in there. It was me, my wife who was my girlfriend at the time. We just met in Richie and he took us this fight and he was like,
you got to look up this conn McGregor guy. He's in the same So I started watching him and he talks so much shit, so much he's getting it, just getting after its in dude's heads, knocking dudes out, going up wey classes, knocking dudes out, like it's just just killing people. And I watched an Adist fight. He lost an Adis fight. A year later, he fights in eight d's again in August and wins. It was like a split decision right at the end, and then he goes.
He just keeps talking shit, and he he literally talks himself into this boxing match against Mayweather and fights him, doesn't stand a chance, but actually does a good job.
Boxing for the first few rounds. Loses that.
A year and a half later fights could be loses that, and it's like you start to look at him and the way he operates, and he literally used his mouth as a business like he talked himself into every single one of those things. And now he's got a whisky that I haven't tried yet.
I've heard it's it's good. Okay. So I have two.
Opinions now, one DC one of when one not so and he's he's like killing it. His whiskey is all over the place.
It's it's unbelievable.
So like, do you ever did you ever look at him or look at fighters like him and think to yourself, Hey, that might not be me. But from my business standpoint, I can you lay a lot of these things to either get clicks, my name, get out there more, get a big fight, maybe get a Bellator versus UFC championship fight or something like that.
Yeah, I mean there's that that part of the business. And and the guy who kind of originated with Chill Soning back in the day, and the originator of at least, you know, talking themselves into fights that they shouldn't have been in, and Connor did. Connor's now done the best at it as far as lucrative, lucrative whise making as much money as possible and then spending off in the brands. But I think I have But I also know it's hard.
It's hard when the message that you want to put out there is the opposite of that, you know, and that's that's where my cognitive dissonance came in, as far as not my values actually not lining up with the situation at hand. And I've done it a little bit. I've talked a little bit of trash, and it just it doesn't it doesn't come natural to me. It's not who I am. I'd rather, you know, I'd rather do. I'd rather be more positive or more inspirational than you know,
kind of coming at people. And there's been other guys like a guy like Randy Gatour Randy gatur Will is a Hall of Famer and he'll be known as one of the greatest fighters of all time, fought into his forties and he never talked trash. Gsp never talked trash. So there's the other guys who have who have done just as well and arguably could have made more money if it was right now in twenty nineteen than Connor did. But Connor also had Connor got taken care of because
he had a whole country behind him. You know. I was just I was just at a party last night with a guy who DJs for Jason Alden. So he he does the DJ thing right before Jason Alden goes out, and we were talking about how he's in Vegas almost every weekend. He was there for two of the Connor fights, and the whole you probably noticed, the whole city turns out a little Ireland, right, you know, And they got
the Tricolor flags all over everywhere. These people in Ireland, who probably didn't have much money, saved up for an entire year to get those those flights came over staying in the hostels like trying to like, you know, just to watch their their sportsman, you know. So he it was a perfect storm of everything. Everything he was doing, everything he was saying, and he was winning.
You know.
I always said, he's not as good as he thinks he is, but he's better than other people think he is. I think a lot of us said, oh, he's not that good, but he's better than we thought he was. But he's not quite as good as he thinks he is. But that mental game is no joke, man, that mental game he did have people broken before they even stepped into the cage of them.
So you don't you don't think he's like the best, like one of the best ever to do it, like do you think if he, if he took the time, didn't just from a talent perspective, right South Paul, everything I hear is this guy's got this unique skill set,
the way he moves his body and all that. Do you think if he just focused on the nuts and bolt of being a UFC fighter, MMA fighter, then branding and focusing on other stuff, do you think it could have gone a different way where you we be have a different conversation.
If you're saying, yeah, maybe he is one of the best of all time.
Yeah, Well, I mean I think that's I think I think any of us can do that, though I mean any of us. I mean you have to have a certain level of skill level, level of talent, level of ability. But I mean him from his his physical attributes. Yes, he has a long, tall southpaw. For the for the for the weight class, the one fifty five, he was at one forty five before and he's got up to one seventy, and he went up to one seventy by the way, and fought another one fifty five or so.
They went up a weight class, but they were both one fifty five or so. They essentially fought the same guy. Yeah, he would have fought at one fifty five, so because that was a big thing, and they did a great job market at it, you know, like going up a weight class, you know, and all that kind of stuff. But I mean what I will say is he has it because really, like we just talked about, ninety percent of being the greatest in the world is between the ears,
you know. I mean, when it comes to physical attributes, he's got enough of it. When it comes to the power, he's definitely got enough of that. And when it comes to the confidence, he's definitely got that in droves. I think he just he ran into kabeb Kabebe has never lost could be.
Yeah.
Yeah, he's like and he literally was born in Chernobyl. You knew that. No, in the radio he was he's all fucked.
He's uh yeah, I mean he's he's as close to unstoppable as as you have seen.
And we will make a couple unstoppable. He's just so locked in.
Well, he just it's there's a there's a certain rule set that we play by, and it's striking and it's scrappling and and there's a mixture of everything, and there's a there's a time clock and and and those a lot of amount of times. He doesn't finish a lot of guys. He really finishes very few of his fights. But he's able to pick guys up, put him down, be on top of him, hold a wrist, and just punch him for for twenty twenty five minutes, fifteen minutes,
for as long as he wants to. He's probably gonna do the same thing to Dustin Pooria here in September and Abu Dhabi he did it. And his you know, his last his last fight to Connor, the fight before the fight before that. You know, he we saw some chinks in his armor against Ala Aquinta, but that was a crazy fight where he got switched the night before,
so I think he wasn't mentally there. But the sport, it's just funny because when you really break the sport down into just the nuts and bolts of it, it's it's a very it's a very simplistic sport. And if you can become really good at a certain skill set that guys that even when guys prepare for it, they can't stop it, You're you're going to be successful. And that's what he's done, you know, barring barring any knockouts or you know, like me, the flash, knockout, knock down,
whatever you want to call it. That kind of stuff happens, or crazy split decisions where the refs, you know, the refs called the fight the other way. So it's just a crazy sport he's for him to go in the feed it for as long as he has is nothing short of amazing. So I would never take anything away from him. He's just very good at grappling, wrestling and punch of people.
You're to call the malls that we want you to fight.
I always take it.
Well, yeah, I think, well, I think that's the greatest fight for me because I think I can out wrestle him. I also think I also think I have better cardio than him. I also think he's but it's hard for me. It's hard for me to go there because I've said I I can be, could be before, But then people say, well they why don't you come prove it in the UFC And it's like, Okay, well, I don't want to take a pay cut to go fight could be. You know, I don't want to.
I don't want to have all this all this risk and what if bellatur and UFC got together. Have they ever have they ever talked about joining, not joining, but maybe like doing a dual fight, like here our guy versus your guy.
Yeah, they kind of each other.
I don't hate each other. It's probably it's a business.
It's a business.
And any business like if i'm you know, your Apple and Microsoft or something like that or whatever, it's like it's kind of yeah, you're you're your competition.
Yeah, it's true.
Well it well number one, I will say it is a possibility because if it makes money, it makes sense. And in this in this industry, right in any industry, if if if they knew they could make a billion dollars on a pay per view because they have all the fight, all the best fighters on the fit on the same card, they would probably do it. But the problem is there's there's a lot of risk involved for
the UFC. If if I came over and beat Matt to meat kabib Or, and then if our one seventy pounder came over and beat the ones pound and then Bellotour wins a couple of those fights, the UFC all of a sudden loses their little notch of the greatest organization. With the greatest fighters and.
Bellotour the UFC have the money to be like, hey, come come fight for us and money they do, but they do, but they don't.
They don't need to. And that's and that's the thing I mean. And and I'm and I'm I'm self aware enough to realize I'm not I'm not a huge draw either. There's guys, there's guys that have been in the UFC who have barely cracked the top ten who may have a bigger name than me in that UFC crowd and the bigger mainstream crowd.
I mean.
The amount of guys that have been in the UFC and and gotten great followings and and in great respect in the sport, but are very very subpar fighters is just mind blowing just because they fought in the UFC under the UFC banner. But it's it's it's the nature of our sport. In ten years from now, it will be I think it'll be a lot different. I think
there'll be other organizations like Bellotour coming in. One FC is now growing, you know, there's gonna be another organization come in with probably a big a lot of money, a lot of backing, and uh, it's going to just keep keep happening. And competition is always good. You know, competition is.
There's a lot of fighters out there too.
Yeah, there's a lot. I mean there's enough fighters to to be you know, you got Pro Fight League. Pro Fight League is. You know, they have a million dollar tournament. If you win, like you know, six fights or whatever, you get a million dollars or however that works. But you know they're doing you know they're doing they're doing their thing.
Does Beltre still do that tournament style that you're talking about the three fights in three months and ship like that.
They do a tournament, but now it's more like three fights over a year. God, which is which is still cool? Remember one yeah no weight classes. Yeah, your guys are going in there wearing GE's no no weight classes.
Huge tournament and it was all done but in a in in like a weekend, right yeah, well in one night.
They used to have a fight a couple of times in one night too, I mean yeah, it's it's crazy, man. Yeah, So they did it. They did it in Belotour a couple of years ago. Or it was a four man tournament two fights in two nights or to you know, each guy fought two fights and two nights. Yeah, so who knows. I mean, it's the entertainment business.
Yeah, but you get your ass knocked up a little bit all that. What's okay? You get knocked out? What's what's a concussion protocol for you guys in the UFC or not?
So I keep saying UFC, I'm sorry, that's just mixed martial arts next martial mm A.
You know, trust me, trust me, Like five years ago, it would it would have bothered me. But I know that I've made the right decision, you know, Like that's that's the thing. I know. I know that I've made the right decision.
The UFC is just a lack of the how much intelligence, like I educated myself, but also you know, fight exactly but any of that stuff.
But also kudos to the uf C for branding the u f C to make people think, because people say, what's is is that? Like uf is that like UFC?
Is it like m m A?
And I'm like it is m m A. You know, just like you guys play football in the NFL, I fight mixed martial art. It's in bellot or in UFC. What was your question again?
It was like it's like it's like cushion, it's like cleanexxally Q tip exactly.
Kleenex is like the best branding company of all time, greatest look it.
Up concussion protocol. So so we always get so so bellotoor UFC, these fight promotions don't actually govern themselves. They are governed by the boxing commissions. So my last fight was the Illinois State Athletic Commission or Boxing commission, so they will suspend you. So depending on no matter what, if you win your fight, you're going to get a seven day or probably a fourteen day suspension that says you can't fight in fourteen days, which you shouldn't be anyway.
But when you lose a fight, it's pretty much like an automatic thirty day. If if it's a TKO loss or something like that, it's an automatic sixty day, no contact, no nothing, which is it's only two months. I mean you should definitely be taking two months off. If you get knocked out or TKOT or whatnot.
You really exercise or anything during that No, you're allowed to.
You just you just cannot get a it's SAI like you can't be licensed in any other state. So I could go spar the next day. If I wanted to, I can go get in a stryified if I wanted to, I can go do whatever I wanted to. But until that sixty days suspension is lifted, I can't get another I can't go to Nevada and get a boxing license to box or or fight because because I am currently suspended.
Just the same thing with like, if I failed a drug test, that would be suspended for two years under the you know whatever sanction, and I wouldn't be able to get a sanction anywhere else in any other state, or you know, flagrantly whenever it could be jumped out of the cage and drop kick that guy during the CONIFI Like he got suspended, so he Nevada suspended his license for X amount of days, he wasn't able to get another license in any other state to compete until that suspension was lifted.
Damn, that's crazy shit.
You thought about starting a podcast on your own?
I have?
Yeah, if I'm a book, are you have you started on the book six hundred and eighty eight days now?
I mean I've I've gotten a little journal stuff here. I mean I journal a lot and kind of write some stuff down because I mean, one of the biggest things is just forgetting.
You know.
The great thing is I got I got a brother who who like my brother and I live together for years. Like he can recall memories, remember that time, this and that and the other thing, and I can ask no question. He'll go off on a tangent. So I think he will be my ghost writer, or at least my ghost remember of all this stuff. Right yeah, I mean a book. I would love to do, a podcast. I'd love to
do some I'd love to do online training. I'd actually love to be I'd love to be the guy who who teaches or informs the young mixed martial arts fighters. Because just like the NFL, now there was five year old kis who want to be in the NFL day someday. Now there's five year old kids, six year old kids and their parents who want to see their kid come up and become mixed martial artists. Right right, These these kids need guidance, they need they need a way to go.
How do you get a manager, How do you get sponsors? How do you how do you decide to take how do you choose between organizations? How do you choose the right gym? How do you choose the right coach, how do you do this?
How do you do that?
And just educating kids and just be able to I know, I've been given a lot of gifts, so I want to be able to.
To pass that.
BA. Yeah. Yeah, you have your own gym right Yeahshville here in Nashville.
Yeah, so do we should go? We should go train there one day.
What's name of the gym?
Training camp? Training camp? So? Yeah, so we we do ten thousand square foot facility. We're right right down the road from you guys stadium on the right by the go karts and all that on David story. Yeah, so we ten thousand square feet. We have thirty five hundred square foots a roller rubber turf for group fitness and personal training that we have thirty five hundred square foot of mats for boxing, boxing, grappling, all that kind of stuff.
So that's awesome.
Man.
What's that called training camp in Nashville?
Right about? What about recovery?
Recovery? Man? I mean, now that I'm on the other side of thirty, recovery is so important. I'm on my roller every day. I Uh, I get bodywork every day. Uh. Supplementation when it comes to you know. So every day I'm I'm waking up and I'm drinking. I'm drinking uh Cover three, which is a brain supplement for my brain.
It's all the all the anti inflammatories, antioxidants, omega's d p A, e h A, all that stuff you need for your rain for y'all that are getting hit and met me as well, b C. As I saw one protein and then just a just a ton of downtime and realizing that if I can work smarter rather than harder all the time, because I mean we I get beat up just like you guys. You guys are going to fight for eight seconds every single play, right, So just just recovering now that I'm on this side of thirty.
What what else are there? Anything else do you do? Like red light therapy or a cryo or anything like that.
I have a I have an infrared sauna that I've been that I like. Yeah, my wife got me that for U for my birthday. So that's cool. We got that in my basement, so I'll do that. I'm working on getting a cold tub because I like like cold tub.
Cold tubs, red do you mean like real start trying it? Plumbing down and everything to have one like in your house.
As far as the cold cold tub, I would love to do that. I think I'll probably just get a deep freezer or like one of those.
I wanted to trying to supply company. Get one of those tubs.
Yeah, you gotta get a big one.
And sixty bucks. That's really.
No, no, no, this is a legit to like a trough. You got nice and you just but I still I fll up with water the gas station, get like five.
Bags of ice, man, put it in there. I go ahead.
I had infer its on up my place too. Had a concept to rower, So I'll try to hit the rower. You have to hit the sauna and then go after.
And see how many it how many grams of like fish oil or BCA's.
Are you super into that? Are you kind of just.
Yeah, I'm not into like the actual you know, milligrams of this. I mean one thing. I actually just when I was at the Damatized headquarters, I sat down with the chief science officer and he was talking about the the RDA of all of these different supplements, which is recommended daily allowance or whatever. It's all very very very low. It's essentially when we read you know when we read you know, the minimums of what we should be taking of all these supplements, it's just enough to to not
get like a exactly. So I pretty much double everything. I mean, they got kril oil in the morning, you bick one all co q ten uh, carnetine? Do you ribos? A lot of that stuff has to just do with the brain getting the body going. I hired a coach out of California. Yeah, he's called the Training Lab. It's a Sam Calavita. He's a he's a science teacher by by trade, or no, sorry, a math teacher. He's a mathematician by by that's his profession. But he's just a
he's a big time endurance athlete coach. So he does iron Man's himself. So, I mean, the older I get trying to break the body down to a cellular molecular level and try to realize that if you treat the body the way that it was it was designed, that it will give you much much more, you know, And if I can just get one extra year of fighting, that's a nice chunk of change for my family. So being able to prolong that as much as possible.
What do you think about doctors saying, like I've heard, I've had doctors tell me that, oh, the only you don't need to take supplements, what you need to do is as much rest as possible and eat right.
Yeah, I think that's rubbish. I think, no offense the doctors, but I think I I don't even listen to doctors much these days. Like if if I got an orthopedic problem, I will listen to a doctor. If I gotta, if I have like a cardiac problem, if I have a heart of problem, I'm listening to a doctor.
But it has to be a very specific but general general doctor.
Yeah but sorry, yeah, mds. And it's just it's just I mean, my wife will tell you too. She she took the medical route. She was a physician assistant, so like she she crushes it in the e er so we're savannahbielt Er and all that kind of stuff. So she's but she even understands that the way that they are trained, it's just it's just to treat the symptoms and not make them make people more healthy human beings, not the calls. Not get to the room of everything.
So I mean I'm more of like a I mean, some people can get out there and kind of weird but homeopathic kind of doctors, like the the Eastern type of medicine stuff, the roots, the you know, the Yeah, so that's what that's what I take every morning. It's it's actually a company based out of California, and it's got kirk Human trans trans res veratal alpha GPC all these anti and it's an anti inflammatories, especially for the brain, just to increase the neuroplasticity.
Flamatory is the biggest thing, right, like especially joint elf and his biggest cancer.
Yeah, crazy freaking lots and lots of milligrams and turmeric or cuman and all that kind of stuff which never too much.
Right you in there.
I mean if you if you pee out out, you pee it out, you pee it out, who cares at least at least you you put a buffalo. It's like my pee is orange.
Cuman pills.
I take every day, man, And if I'm wearing like a white pair of shorts, I'll I'll take you. I'll wipe my hands and then halfway the dead be looking like, you know, I have orange spots on my pants.
You know it's to washes.
I know you have you ever like got the extra root and cut it up and like put it in either so you can you can buy the room the.
Whole foods, right, the turmeric root itself.
Yeah.
So I'll get them and I juice them. I have like a certain juice RECIPI U. I like. I like two American turmerican ginger.
It's acquired, kind of weird.
I just take them and just chew on them. No, but you know, and if you cut if you cut them up, you get that orange on your hands and then he doesn't get set there for twenty four hours. If when a doctor says that, or people say that because it's easy to say, because it's easy to shame people. You should be eating better and you don't need supplements. It's easy to do that. But it's just not it's
not very practical, right, you know what I mean? And especially with what we do, we need way more protein than is recommended.
Even something as simple as vitamin D. Like, Okay, you live in Alaska, Okay, well like six months out of the year. It doesn't even sound sunlight like you're gonna need some D.
All right, you live in Nashville. Yeah, you're here. You're a sick o broll. Yeah, I said, I said, you're gonna need that.
In the lines of work.
We do too for vitamin D four players. You know, you're banging for what six months out of the year, you have m m A.
Guys almost did it, almost swung on it.
You know, Guys that are.
Physically exerting themselves all the time, they get deficient and vitamin D. I want to say, in the NFL, you're like, I think even the national ranking two, like seventy to eighty percent of all people are vitamin D deficient. And like, when I consult with my guy, he puts me on like ten thousand to twenty thousand VYUD if I'm deficient in it until I get back to that next blood test and I'm good, then I'll go back down to
like five or ten. But yeah, I'm I feel the same way, like doubling shit and doing stuff where I'm like, I thought only on the back of the thing and so to do this, And they're like, oh, that's bullshit. Will, Yeah, that's how I talk. You're like, oh, that's bullshit, don't listen to that.
Yeah, It's it's true. I mean, And that's what's great is in twenty nineteen, you know this day and age, there's no reason to not seek out all of this information. Seek out these these type of doctors. Seek out. Don't just read what the FDA puts on the back of bottles and read all that that stuff, because yet it's not enough for optimizing human performance. You know, and you guys have access to to a lot of great people.
Everybody has access to a lot of great people. And we all have access to a lot of great the.
World wide Web.
Yeah, to be able to you know, and some of the stuff you read is going to be bs. But a lot of the stuff if you deep, if you dig deep.
Understand why.
And we're not telling you guys to go to your cathins right now and just start double trip everything with your doctor.
That's the thing I'm also saying, listen to your doctor.
I mean, I know I can't, I'm as but.
That's say you know, I just just because I don't listen to it doesn't means give you they put bullshit in your system, give you pills and all this, and it hurts here, Okay, take a viking in and all that.
It's like the same yeah, it goes yeah.
Well, and that's the same thing as you know, the treating treating the symptom instead of the actual root problem. I mean, it's uh, and a lot of it has to do with diet. When you go when you went back to like why America is failing at health, it's because we have so many options and so many horrible options, and the fact that that we can like they're they're able to pump gluten and all these outside agents into everything that we're eating is is kind of a tragedy.
But yeah, it's all about educating yourself and trying to once again continue to surround yourself with the right people who know what they're talking about. Doubt, surround yourself with people who help you make the right decisions, no doubt.
We gotta do run an hour and eight. Where can people Where can people find you? On the web? Anything?
Social media? I have Michael Chandler dot com is a website. I'm not doing a tune with it right now. Instagram is where I do a lot of my speaking to people, my workouts, all that kind of stuff at Mike Chandler m m A. So yeah, so just uh, that's why that's where I do a lot of my stuff and a lot of stuff coming soon, so we'll see.
Well, until you do your podcast, you're You're always more than welcome to come. This is great.
Come sit on the bus, d dude. I'm just sit on the bus and watch the show.
Yeah. Whatever fighters want to be, whatever fighters are like, let's just go wrap on the bus man.
There you go.
Yeah, man, I'll I'll do that. I want to win the next show. People are coming in town for dude.
Are you connected to shap Brendon Shaw? I am.
I just haven't been out to l A to do his show yet.
Yeah, he's coming out. He'll be out here next weekend for uh Zany's Comedy Club. He's gonna do some stand up. Well, he should get on the bus, That's what I'm saying now a video thinking that because the boy you're gonna he'll be in training camp.
I'm not anywhere yet. I'm still waiting on a call, patiently waiting. Uh huh.
But yo, we could run this thing, dude, there you co host. It might be an easier way for it for him to be comfortably. Want to come on, dude, that could be cool. We can maybe rocking a app.
We can rock and we have a rocking app.
Shoot, I got a dude, I got a bachelor party next weekend.
I think you do. So you'll be out of town.
No, I'll be in town.
Oh, he's gonna be here in Nashville. Shoot, maybe you get up, will recover one day. You're recover in the morning.
Day. Boys, I gotta fail out for two hours. Drive down the road. Maybe we can.
Figure something out. But no, it's it's here. Though, it's here, he's here. I think it's August first through third. I kind of want to just go see this. I kind of want to just go see a stand up too.
I'm a big fan of he's good and he's he just started his his podcast with the bon Yeah.
Pretty, he's got a fighter and the kid and this king and the sting.
Yeah.
But he'll be out here. I think August first through thirds.
So well, we should all send him a message.
We'll talk about it all right out anything else.
He needs to be on the bus.
He does need to be on the bus with the merch too. Yeah. There by the way, you can go find our merchant Busting w t B dot com. Go buy some merch.
We got our neon signs, we got our shirts, we got hats by the time this comes out, hats probably be on there.
Go go buy stuff. Support the boys. Get on this thing with this helps us thing keep moving.
Get you guys should do your own Vitamin D supplement A.
I appreciate you.
I appreciate you guys,