JRE MMA Show #178 with Dan Hardy

Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out! The Joe Rogan experience.

Good to see you, brother.

See you.

What is this? Around the neck. What is that?

Oh this is uh moldavite. Have you heard of Moldavite before?

No.

So a meteorite hit in the Czech Republic. millions of years ago. And the the particular tectite that was created from the Earth matter falling back down uh became Moldavite and it's most tectites are like a black or a gr a brown, but moldavite's green. Let me show you. Hmm. Thanks, Justin.

Oh Jamie's got some on the screen already.

We go.

So it's basically like nuclear glass.

Exactly that.

Oh

And then that's the case my wife had made for me and it's wrapped in an old chain that belonged to my dad. Yeah, keep with me all the time.

That's fucking cool.

I used to have a piece in um you know the old tie amulets with the little the little bronze. I I used to have one in that, took it out. I put it I put the took the butter out and put a piece of mold of it in it wrapped in a piece of UFC cam. And I wore it just all the time. But then my wife upgraded.

So the UFC gave you a chunk of canvas?

I have a whole canvas.

Nice.

Um it was Vadoom Volkov.

Ah.

UFC London and it's just it's covered in Vadoom's blood. He got his nose busted pretty badly. So but it had to be in quarantine for like twelve months until they gave it me.

Really?

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

What?

So does it all die after twelve months?

I guess so. I mean I guess so. It was kept in a warehouse and then they yeah, they dropped it off for me.

I don't know.

I mean I wouldn't lick it, but it looks fine.

What could possibly be in the blood? I mean doesn't everybody get tested?

That's a good point. That's a good point. Maybe there's just some kind of rule. I think they incinerate them all now, don't they? I don't think they keep them. I mean they keep the they've got the pieces with the names, but I think the rest of

Huh. Yeah. I wonder if there's any logic to that.

Ja, misschien. Het is een cool ding. Ik heb het in de wall van mijn hand. Oh really? Yeah, I had it in the gym, but then it's on the wall of my house now.

That's nice.

Yeah. It's just a nice thing to have, you know.

What happened with you in the UFC? Like I don't know the story. I I know you got into it with Herb Dean about a stoppage, a late stoppage. Yeah. And you you were upset. This was during COVID, right?

Yeah, this was I think it was Fight Island three. Um, and it was it was the second fight of the night where it happened. There was a heavyweight that had gone down. just take just took a bunch too many shots before the fight was stopped. But the the Jai Herbert Francisco Trenaldo one was the the one where you heard me shout up and yell stop the fight. Um and It was just a it was a weird circumstance and look, you know, caveat, Herb's a great referee, he's refereed me a lot.

So he was gone.

He was gone. He was out of it. And then there was this and I think of course because it was quarantine times, it was silent. The time it was like you could hear a heartbeat in the air. And there was just this moment where Trenaldo stood over him and looked at Herb. And Jai's still on the floor, kinda not fully conscious, and Trenaldo just just started cracking him with more shot.

Cods just breathing on each other, sweating and bleeding on each other.

And we're shaking hands in the hotel and everything and it it was kind of odd. Because I'm not going into the cage, I'm now turning around and my interview camera's behind So basically what the US C wanted me to do when Herb's marching over to me was to stand up, turn my back on him and put my head set up.

Very difficult.

Very, very difficult job. The thing that annoyed me though, and for me it was done then.

Was that the Connor situation?

No, that was in Bellator, but there was another one, it was UAE Warrior. And I think someone had kept hold of a choke too long and then m Goddard had separated the fight and then he came over to Mark and he's trying to push Mark and stuff and And when Dana actually made the statement about if you approach an official, you'll be gone. That was actually in reference to the other thing that happened, but it was linked in with me as well.

And then came back. Yeah. And then complained about it.

So in that moment

Hard to tell.

It's very hard to tell, but you can see Herb in that situation going, Oh man, I'm I'm sorry, I thought you were out. Like, those those things are gonna happen. I would always rather the fighter be protected than just kinda leave it for the benefit of the doubt and just let'em take a it's different with a submission of course. But the point is I was trying to create something that was quite balanced. And the other thing as well was, you know, it was fightile.

That's so weird that they could take down something that doesn't violate any laws or rules. I mean, that's kind of weird.

I don't know whether they contacted YouTube and said, Hey, you know, he's used some UFC footage. But at the Did you? Yeah, I did. But at the time I had permission to use UFC. Mm.

Right,'cause it only helps them.

That's it. I mean I w I was an ambassador for Europe as well as being a commentator So m my job in my mind was was to spread the word of MMA, right? I'm trying to educate everybody as much as I can. And I could make a lot more content through my channel than I could rely on the UFC. So I was just trying to churn extra stuff out to to keep drawing attention to it.

Yeah.

It's just an awkward situation'cause I like Herb. I would never have him referee my wife. I always make a request to make sure that he doesn't. But that's more because of the history between me and him. I don't want to put him in a position where I'm gonna get angry at him again for not doing his job. Right. You know? But I I was just I was disappointed that the UFC kinda pulled all support for me and Backed herb in that situation.

Is there a situation backstage where you got into it with someone else from the staff?'Cause that's what I had heard, that someone said something to you and you yelled at someone backstage.

I did, yeah, I did. It the in this in the scenario I just left the ESPN desk and this is like five o'clock in the morning. After the broadcast and I'd walk backstage. I won't mention his name. I I I love him. He's a he's a lovely guy. But everyone's kind of ragged and tired.

Who was the referee with Anderson Silva and Michael Bishop?

Oh that's a good question.

That was a weird one, right? That fight should have been over.

Yeah.

But Anderson hits him with a flying knee and then hops on top of the cage and they didn't stop the fight.

It might have been. It might have been. Look the thing is.

Thank you.

Herb's refereed me a bunch of times and I and I like Herb.

But that obviously was That was Anderson's issue. Anderson should have followed up. Until the referee stopped.

Absolutely.

But you could have easily said this fight's over. I mean Yep.

Yeah.

That's a a crazy situation. So Michael I think had lost his mouth. Yes, and this is also when Michael was blind in his right eye. Yes. Right. So you have to take this into consideration. So Michael loses his mouthpiece. and at some point in time he points like that he wants his mouthpiece back.

And look at the time. We're into the last twenty seconds. Right. And it's a beautiful knee that Anderson lands as well.

That's you, buddy.

One of my favourite fights to have called. Right on the belt.

The bazaar. Okay, the fight's not over.

But in this situation.

That's that actually makes sense because he was still conscious and he was still up and he had his hand down. Yeah.

For oh for sure it was. For sure it was. And and unfortunately for Anderson, he got he had the adrenaline dump of thinking he'd won the fight, got upon the cage, started celebrating, and had another ten minutes. And this is where Michael Bisbing is just a gang.

He's pointing to his mouth. And he's communicating with Herb, but Herb didn't stop the fight.

I mean the thing is this like this seconds left. Anderson Silver's got no responsibility.

Perfect fucking falling too. God, he was a master in his prime. And this is post leg break too. Yeah. This wasn't even prime

St still one of the best fights I've ever called. This and Max Holloway Calvin Cater. One of the best fights I've ever I've ever called. It was a privilege to be sat cageside for it. But like Bisping's, you know, coming out now with ten minutes left and stamps his authority on this fight, which was very, very impressive.

I do remember that one.

Not bad. Yeah. And Herb's bad habit at the end of the round, if there's an engagement, he steps in, he waves his arm. That's a signal the fight's off. Right. Right? You don't wave off the round, you wave off the fight. Right. So so at the end of the round, the j the referee's j job is to get in between the fighters. Right. Right? Seats Cowboy was on the floor, Masvidal was already one.

Yeah, but that didn't look like he was waving the fight off. That looked like he was signaling the end of the round. He didn't do the

Potentially. But then if you've got one arm in between and you're waving with the other one.

I think by his hand movements there, I don't think that qualifies. I think he's saying stop, stop, stop. putting his hands out. He's got a hand on and a hand out.

No, the other hand's waving. That right hand's waving.

Yeah, but I think it stops the fight.

I just it's just it's an unnecessary motion. And I'm I'm okay with the debate about it. Like doing the breakdown of the Jai Herbert finish, I learned something really important, which I don't know is I I've asked a lot of referees and most of them have not heard about it. Fencing response. Have you heard of this? No. It's a concussion set.

So there's one with Marlon Morat, yeah.

Yeah, look, see how I'm...

I have seen that. Yeah, you've seen a lot of that.

You want you want the judges do you want the referees to know about fence? To be able to recognise all of the different um uh tells of a concussion, right? So and I didn't know about fencing response until after the Jai Herbert fight, but I had in my video that was taken down, I had lots and lots of different Versions of from K one to football to rugby, all kinds of stuff. It's a tell of concussion, right? Like

It's very subjective.

Very

The problem is like when a referee stops too early, it's very frustrating. And we have seen many instances. And then we've also seen some instances where it looked like a fight could easily be stopped and the fighter comes back and wins. Frankie Edgar Gray Main.

What a f what I mean but fights. What great fights.

Crazy fights. Yeah. Crazy fights. But in the one where Frankie won, where he KO'd him, that it looked like he was out before. Oh my goodness. I mean Gray Maynard was a beast. He was a big, strong, powerful wrestler, really big for 155. And Frankie famously did not cut weight.

Yeah. I mean look well look at Anthony Johnson, you know, one of the Rumble. He was two fourteen on the night when we fought. We both weighed in at one seventy one. He was two fourteen. That's was before the I the days of I Vs, you know. Yeah. But like you have to crazy you have to wonder what it does to people, you know?

Destroys you. It probably had some sort of an impact on his health problems that he had. Yeah. Because he was an enormous guy. I ran into him one one time at a at a lobby at the hotel. And I go, how much do you weigh? And he goes, 230. I'm like, bro, get the fuck out of here. That's crazy. Why? You're gonna lose 60 pounds. Six zero is nuts. That's n anyway.

That's crazy, isn't it?

I think it was forty one. I think he was two twenty six. Which is bananas. That's just bananas.

I mean i even if I think about it, I was getting up to like Like one eighty six, one eighty eight, and that felt like a lot for me, cutting down to one seventy and yeah. I mean I at the time I was fairly big for the weight class, you know what I mean, compared to some of the other guys around but

Isn't that crazy? I got kicked out of a gym in Japan. Did you really yeah, I had to go back up to my room and put a long sleeve shirt on.

That's crazy.

That's nuts, the gym and the hotel. I'm like, I'm staying here. They said no, you can't have exposed tattoos. I'm like, Oh my God, that's so wild. Do you have a Yakuzia gym that I could go to?

Yeah, right.

That's what it is. It's all about uh Yakuza tattoos. I'm like, look at me. Do you think I'm Yakuza?

I know right. It's crazy. I mean I think it's changed the changed a bit now but

I don't know man, this was not that long ago. I mean, I guess it was. Maybe it was fifteen years ago. When was the last time the UFC was in Tokyo? I think it w well it was more than fifteen years ago, I believe. It might have been like two thousand nine or something like that.

Mine was two thousand seven I was out there.

Yeah.

All right.

Crazy.

Yeah.

That was back when they didn't have those options, like those small portable sauna options that they have now. Like there's some of them they have these hot boxes where it's like they have a little tiny heater in there and you zip it up and you're in this little thing and you can kinda carry it with you on the road. Check it with your bags.

Yeah. The blankets are really good. Veronica used that for our last couple of cuts. They they're really good. But people use hot bath now. No one was hot bathing in my day. Right. Like if you were sweating, you were you were working out, you were running, you were in a sauna. You know, they were the only ways people were cutting weight. Hot hot bathing came in kind of towards the end of my career. What's better?

How much did you weigh before that bite?

I cut seven pounds and that was and that was one of the reasons why I changed the way that I was doing it, because like I should have stopped that guy in the first round and I didn't have the power to That was his last fight. Like he went he passed out after the after the fight, went to the hospital, he had a bleed on his brain.

Thank you.

and he com he retired completely after that. He was

Who was that?

His name was Daizo Ishige.

Oh I remember him.

The king of pancreas. He was like twenty he was the favourite to win the Cage Force tournament, and I pulled him in the first round.

They took repeated subconcussive blood.

You know? And I don't know whether he cut weight as well, but certainly the thing that played into the damage that was done to him was my weight. You know?

That's crazy. Isn't that crazy to think of?

I just didn't want to b I mean and it but again like I have no guilt associated with that because we knew what we were doing when we got in there and I would not hold it against him if that had have happened to me. You know what I mean? But in but in hindsight, pulling the whole thing apart. Like I could have been a better version of myself as a martial artist and it would have actually probably saved him some of the damage that he ended up taking in the third.

My position is that the UFC and I think m MMA in general, PFL, all of them, they we need more than that. I don't think there's nearly enough. I think the gaps are enormous. I think the names are stupid. It's very stupid to have Welterwaite one seventy when Welterwaite has been with boxing at one hundred forty seven forever for a hundred years.

That's a that's a good point actually. I'd not thought about that. I've actually I actually developed a a a system of introducing weight classes over the next several years for the PFL. I mean obviously the problem that we have is that some weight classes are just not filling out

What do you think's the cause of that?

I I think I think the control and the and the monopolization of the sport by the UFC unfortunately

How does that stop small organizations?

Well, because anything that starts to gather some momentum they they buy'em out, they got rid of'em.

Some well they certainly did buy out a bunch of organizations back in the day, right? Like bought out Strike Force, they bought out Pride, but they sorta bought out Pride. They got fucked. Yeah. Like they thought they were buying out broad. Do you know the the whole deal behind that?

They...

All the contracts are bad.

Yeah.

Yeah, they got a fucking D V D library. Look, over time I'm sure it's been worth it, right? But I I believe they paid sixty million for pride. I might be wrong about that number, but I that's what I recall. And they didn't have any contracts. Like, you know, they the contracts were all fucked up.

Yeah. That's that's interesting. Obviously, you know, I I love the UFC and I I I've I've always held Dana and the UFC and what they've created for us in very, very high regard. But there there that has in my opinion we've passed a tip in point.

Like LFA.

Exactly. But then a lot of these a lot of those shows are now starting to get dropped off of Fire. Right.

So which shows have been dropped off five pounds?

I think LFA's just been dropped, hasn't it? Oh has it been? I think so. I mean Invicta was on there a long time ago. I think they moved away themselves, but like there are Aries was dropped a period you know, my my wife's commentator on Aries, they they were dropped a while ago.

Aries.

Uh the French promotion.

And they were dropped from Bypass? Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. I think they've been picked up again now, but you know. This this is the this is my my thinking behind And I remember back in the day when I was fighting on Cage Warriors in in the UK and the UFC were coming over once or twice, like, it started to kill off all the other shows because everyone was like, I'll just save my money, I'll wait.

Yeah.

A lot of the smaller shows. Dropped off. Died.

Do you think you so you're saying you save your money meaning as uh an audience member? Yeah. Yeah, but you can't fault the UFC.

For that. Oh no, absolutely not. And look, and what they did when the UFC landed in in Europe, they legitimized the sport. And then, you know, so so we The perspective started to change very quickly. Like when I was doing when I had my title fight in two thousand ten I would say at least half of the interviews that I did was trying to justify the sport and why I was allowed to do what I did, right? That was 2010.

This is back when everybody thought it was human.

still. And I was getting into debates with journalists about the the uh the human cockfight Yeah, I know it.

Those debates are so ill.

But but like and imagine trying to like attach power slap onto the side of of UFC when it was then. It would have just buried us, you know?

I do not like I do not like

And and the thing is, and I'm I'm very much, you know, as long as you're not as long as as long as you're not hurting anybody else or you've you're

Just sort of. And I've watched a bunch of clips. I've watched a bunch of people get flatlined and bounce their head off the podium and fall backwards and I don't like it. My whole thing about martial arts is it's human chest. It's high level problem solving. It's you're you know, you're working up to a moment and you're doing your very best to not get hit and hit them and a flawless performance like

Yeah, Reese McKee, John Phillips.

Gerald Mirchard took nothing.

That was one punch.

I mean it would that was the craziest thing about him. It's like look at this guy. He's not even getting hit. Like this is nuts. And and you would grab guys, they'd be helpful. I've w I like skill. There's no skill in having a big hand and a fat face. Yeah. And putting and I don't even understand why you have chalk on your face. Why do you have or your hand?

Right.

Is that what it is? Is it just to like the powder flies in the air? And you know, I don't get it. Maybe dunk your head in water. I don't know.

used to it in the Kung Fu movies, didn't they? Used to put talc on people so when you hit'em uh you get a cloud of Yeah yeah. And hitting the watermelons with the mallets to make the noises. Look that I again like power slap can be its thing and exist. It just away from MMA. You know, and and what I hate to see is the likes of Herzog and Mark Smith and Forrest like catching these unconscious guys as they're falling. It just it attaches the sport that we've worked so hard to develop.

Yeah, it's it's literally like taking What are those fucking smash'em up derby racing events where they crash into Demolition Derby. Yeah. It's like a Formula One driver. And being involved in demolition derby. Like that's fucking crazy. Oh indication of where the petition strike lands. Well can't you see that though? They're not like moving at the speed of light.

They're also not allowed to have excessive chalk and they can't use water. There's no

Water. The the idea is allowed to do it. They have rules. The idea they have rules is so crazy. It's so crazy.

But it is a reflection of how solid the UFC is right now, right? Because you go back to twenty ten, they couldn't have done that without having a real negative effect on the sport.

I think it has a negative effect on sport now.

I agree with you. I just I just think it's not gonna the US C is so powerful and so strong now. Like they can even take a liberty and advertise power slap off the back of it and get away with it.

It's that and then it's also we're in the TikTok era where it's just really all about clips. I mean, is is Power Slap does it air anywhere?'Cause it aired on television for a while.

But they didn't they force it into the paramount? I don't know.

I don't know. I think it's much more digestible in these very short clips. I you know, I don't think there's a person like there's some Fucking hardcore MMA fans who can tell you about guys that are competing in the amateurs and tough enough and they're making their way to the UFC and they're fighting in the LFA.

a recommendation you can do it, right? Like don't like you know wh whatever you would recommend. But

Like well, I'd also say don't do jackass. And yeah, I've had those guys on my show all the time. Yeah. Every time I talk to Steve, I'm like, The fuck are you doing, man? Why are you doing that?

Special type man, he's a special type.

Johnny Knoxville told me he's been knocked out sixteen times, out cold. Like that's way too many. That's way too many. Absolutely. I mean you have zero fights on your record. You've been KO'd sixteen times. That's real bad.

He he's got well paid out of it though. Yeah.

Yeah, right.

How much did they make?

That's a good point.

Yeah. I mean that's the other thing with these power slap guys is like they're making pocket.

How much do they make?

I know three and three, five and five. Three? Yeah. I was chatting to someone in Vegas and and she she didn't want to do it, but she was like I I don't have a choice. I can't get M Why you know? She just couldn't get MMA fights. Too she was too big for most of the weight classes. Oh, yeah.

But that's a problem. Yeah. Look at poor Kayla.

Yeah.

I'm just gotta make one thirty five every time I see her in between fights, I'm like, how? How do you get to one hundred? This is crazy.

Crazy. Yeah, I saw her I saw her the other week in Pittsburgh and she's I mean she's she's huge.

She's gigantic.

It's really interesting that they could do that now and guys go but look, Algermaine did it and came back better than ever. I mean that was d I mean, everybody was so upset at him the way he won the title with Piotr Yan. But he had a legitimate neck issue going into that fight and th that illegal knee that he took to the head really did fuck him up. Yeah. And then he went and got an artificial disc put in his neck and then came back and dominated in the rematch.

See that and I don't I don't mean to keep picking on officials, but that is a that is another situation where I actually feel quite bad for Aljo that he had to put on that performance and damage his brand. Because he didn't want to continue fighting. Right. Right? Like and and the officials are put in a circumstance where they don't have the confidence to just go, no, hang on a minute. That was bad. Light's done.

Right, right, right. Well you want to give a guy the opportunity to fight still. So you don't this is the thing about damage. You don't know looking. Some guys can take a shot like that and then they bounce back in their fight. Look, Bisping. Bisping came back and won that fight after that flying knee. You know, and you really gotta kinda like let the fighter if the fighter's conscious, you gotta let them decide whether or not they can'cause you don't know.

Crazy. I wonder how that changes the way that

Twist.

Well one thing I noticed on Yel Romero who

Oh, yeah.

But he's got his next fuse. goal. So like how do you how do you turn his head to to cause concussion?

I don't know. Well there's a good argument that it makes him more durable. Do you remember when Derek Brunson head kicked him? Yeah. He hit him with a neck kick, like right here, and he didn't even budge.'Cause you're you're hitting a steel bar.

So then s so then think, didn't Tiger Woods have some kind of eye surgery, so his eye was twenty ten, so he has better edge and d better depth perception for golf. I'm pretty sure he did. Yeah I'm sure he had something done to his Yeah.

What did they do? Did they do that? He got laced. So did he have bad eyes and he got'em better? Or did he have good eyes and said, What can you do? Can you make him have fucking superhuman eyes?

Uh

twenty fifty. So he wasn't improved to twenty twenty.

The problem with that is with these surgeries, if you have macular degeneration and it continues to progress You are going to need it again or it's gonna get worse. Like Ari Shafir got uh LASIK and he's like, Oh, it's amazing, I have twenty-twenty vision because he had terrible vision before and then it started going to shit after a while because it just kept deteriorating. And now as I saw it.

The thing is though y you know athletes. Like if I mean and I think there was a poll done a while ago with Olympians, like if if you can win a gold medal but you're gonna live to thirty or thirty five, would you take the gold medal? And a good portion of them said yes they absolutely would. Most athletes

Right. How about that Tommy John surgery that people get electively so they can pitch better? Before surgery, he was extremely nearsighted. Uh he had an eleven prescription. I don't know what that is, minus eleven. Essentially legally blind without glasses or contacts. Whoa. And one of the greatest golfers of all time, if not the greatest. First LASIK was done uh after his nineteen ninety nine PJ championship win. Um

Here you go. Resorts and impact on his goal. Wood reportedly achieved about twenty fifteen vision better than the standard twenty twenty, meaning he could see more detail at distance than the average person.

Interest. He described the cup and ball as looking larger and said his ability to read greens improved and he went on a notable win streak in winning five PGA tour events in a row right after the surgery. Wow.

But that that links into the stoned ape theory though, if we're going in a in a massive circle, right? Because uh microdose in mushrooms gives you better edge and depth perception. Yes. So then the theory was that you would have better chance of surviving. Yes. Either as, you know, not becoming prey or finding prey.

Yes. Right. Yeah, better vision, who'd make you hornier, so it'd make you more likely to breed and it also makes you more creative. And you know, um Terrence McKenna and Dennis McKenna link it to the creation of language.

Well I I used to remember when I was in Vegas I had a a room in my house which I think we talked about it before which was the mushroom and I would like once a week I would like clear the day and I would have ceremony on a Saturday in the evening. Then I'd get up on Sunday morning and go out into red rock and I'd do trail rides.

Yeah. Yeah. Joe Schilling talked pretty openly about

He's got a fight coming up.

Does he? Joe's back?

Fighting in bro.

Is he doing PFL? Yeah. Interesting.

Yeah.

Yeah. Interesting. How old's Joe now?

I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I I spotted with him at uh at Frank Mears gym in Vegas. Obviously I knew Joe Schillin who he was and you know the gym that he created in LA had a real reputation.

Forty two.

Wow. But he was just uh he was standing outside the back just smoking a cigarette, came in, put his gloves on and just beat the snot out of me, you know what I mean? Such a good fighter.

Yeah, he's a beast kickboxer, man. I I was at the last man standing event in LA when he fought. Like that was really crazy.'Cause you had to fight multiple kickboxing fights in a day.

Not Scott Coker.

No yeah, no it is Scott Coker,'cause there was a guy before Scott, right?

Yeah. Is it Bjorn Bjorn Redman?

Right. So he left and then Scott took and Scott was also involved in Bell Tor. Yeah. Or or excuse me, in Glory.

Right.

Scott Coker ran strikeforce. So who ran Bellator?

Bjorn founded it.

Right. Okay, right. So that is correct. Okay. I think he was involved in glory too. Right. And uh I think I remember I went up to him and I said, This is awesome, but don't do this. Don't have people fight multiple. Yeah. It's just like'cause you get a concussion and no one even knows about it. Like there's been a lot of fights where guys got concussions and they didn't get knocked out. And then you have to fight again in an hour and then you fight again forty five minutes after that.

But you look at some of those first round matchups when they were doing the same.

All right.

You know what I mean?

Give people easier fights in the beginning.

So they're they're all too.

But it's I think it's kinda random.

Especially with the heavyweight K one. I mean you know

Like so.

Those guys. You fight Hongman Choi or or Bob Sap, no matter how confident you are in your skill set, just the sheer size of'em is a problem. Yeah.

Those had the fucking K one tournaments were bananas. Woo they were so good.

The license.

Mine in Canada that uh used to get me VHS tape. back in the day. I don't know. I think he had like a satellite dish or some shit. I I forget how he was getting'em, but he was getting'em and and he was sending'em to me. K one, Heroes, all these uh like real obscure events he would send me.

Awesome.

Oh, I had a psh. I don't know where the fuck they are now. I think they might be in my LA house. But I had a giant box filled with VHS tapes. There were all kinds of old.

I used to have a I used to have a s like a C D like a zip C D thing that used to take with me and I had a guy at my gym and he would five pounds he would burn me Pride or K one Heroes or whatever and he was finding them online and just ripping in. you know, selling'em in the gym. But I had a whole database of stuff. IFL and all those old shows, K One Heroes I loved.

You know, that's kind of partially how I got the job at the UFC. Um, when I first met Dana. Like he just he got me tickets because it was the I was on Fear Fast. And the UFC they just purchased it. So this is two thousand one. This is uh right post nine eleven when Tito Arties fought Vladimir Matyushenko, came out with the American flag, everybody went crazy. And um

And you never thought about it before commentary? No. No.

No. Well I worked for the UFC before that as the post fight interviewer, but that was in ninety seven, UFC twelve. I remember. And so I did it from ninety seven and ninety eight and then it was costing me money. 'Cause I would make way more m money if I'd go work out a comedy club for the weekend than I would doing this.

D did you feel like it was gonna go where it went?

No, I thought w they were fucked. Really? Because you know, Eddie Bravo and I were backstage at one of these events like way b you know, I met Eddie way. So it was like this is like ninety seven, ninety eight. Eddie and I were backstage like we were like, you know

Yeah.

It was crazy'cause like, you know, uh w the one of the the first events that I did for the US I did for free. I did like the first fifteen events for free. And I just said just get my friends So it was like Eddie and I would go and uh you know we'd be like But even back then it wasn't famous. It was just it was in Vegas and it was, you know, it was kind of getting a little bit of attention. It wasn't until two thousand five that that Forrest Whitaker that the the main event um of um

I I did that on commentary, I called Robert Whitaker, Forrest Whitaker live on commentary.

I've called people I fucked up Juliana Pena's name once. I've I've fucked people's names up. It's like you have so many names in your head. That's what people don't understand. Like we w you and I, between you and I, we probably have five hundred fighters names in our head. And then plus jujitsu guys, plus wrestlers, plus boxers. Like, oh my God, there's so many names in your head.

And then project that into the history of the sport now'cause we've got the history of the sport and the history of box.

The way I describe my memory is like I have a whole bunch of boxes of folders. And if I find that box, I can open that bitch up and talk to you about Marvin Hagler versus Juan Roll Dan and it'll tell you like the the knockdown was fake and this and that and r Hagler went on to stop him. I'll I'll tell you details. But if I don't have that folder in front of me, I'm like uh Uh I don't know why. I don't know why I can't like immediately remember sometimes.

Do do you remember the first time you sat down at the commentary booth and put the headset on?

Yes. Yes. That was UFC thirty seven and a half.

London.

No.

It was.

It was.

It was just after that though, right? US E. thirty eight was London.

Well, it was thirty seven and a half because it was like a f it was an uh an event they put together for Best Damn Sport Show. Right. So remember Best Damn Sports Show which was on Fox Sports? I think. Fox Sports Net. And so um what it was was they had this opportunity to do a show and this is when Dana asked me to do commentary and I just did it as a favor.

That's kind of cool. Yeah, it's it's similar to me though really. I mean I was because I I'd been sidelined'cause you know,'cause of my heart situation and they wouldn't clear me in California, so then the UFC just wouldn't match me anywhere. Um and I'd had a I'd had a like a month or two of the wallowing and being depressed and you know, avoiding MMA gyms and uh um Lorenzo had invited me into the offices on Sahara.

Yeah.

What's going on here? And Dana got out and and and he was like, Oh, just a fucking blah blah blah. I just wanted to see. He was like I want you to go to the UK, I want you to be an ambassador, I want you to do commentary, and I said that's great, you know, let me know what I need media training. He's like, No, none of that. I just want you to be you sitting cage side. And I remember getting to the first UFC London event and sat down.

Yeah.

Very weird.

That's interesting.

And so like I would go on like the Howard Stern show and stuff and we'd wind up just talking about the UFC. And this was again, I wasn't even working for the UFC. I was there to promote Fear Factor. But I was talking about how much I love

Ha ha ha.

those guys would have killed me. They would have just grabbed me and fucking thrown me on my head. But I didn't think that. I was totally delusional. I thought I was gonna kick them into the fucking shadow realm. And no one knew what the right thing the study was. If you took Kung Fu, you thought Kung Fu was the shit. Bruce Lee, right? I'm wearing a Bruce Lee shirt. He was really the only guy that was wise enough to realize you just gotta take a little bit from everything.

So you kinda knew what was coming then.

I didn't I knew he was awesome, but I didn't know how good his hands were'cause I only saw him doing jujitsu. Right. Well, I knew he was a beast. Like in he was a black belt in Jiu Jitsu at the time and

Yeah.

This is not I mean I get it, you know jujitsu, but that was boxing. Use striking.

to be there at the very beginning and watch this evolution. There it is. There's Vito. Look at this. Boom, boom, boom.

Boom, boom, boom.

I mean my God. And look how thin Vitor was back then. That was Vitor at like, you know, 199 pounds, maybe. Maybe 190. Oh he wasn't. And so that was there for his UFC debut. So that was UFC twelve. So he fought Trey Teligman and Trey Teligman like had no idea that this guy could buy Like no one did. They thought he's a Carlson Gracie jujitsu black belt. Everyone's like, Okay, you know, avoid the takedowns. This guy's really good on the ground and he just starts tuning people up with his hand.

Yeah.

And Teligman was lions then, wasn't he? Did he have a missing peck?

Yes. He was in a car accident, I believe when he was a child.

Oh is that right?

Yeah, and he his peck was not attached on one side and he was fucking jacked dude. And then he fought Scott Farroso after that, who was like j giant fat guy. Who was also like a tank, you know, like a a huge fucking knockout artist. And Vitor tuned him up too. Just the speed he had. So this is like, you know, nineteen ninety seven. And it was it was wild. And that was in like a high school auditorium at Dothan.

The Dothan Civic Center. That's what it was. Look how small it is. Look how little that place is.

Night seven.

Yeah.

So that would have been the time when I was I was at art college.

Yeah.

And I would I went to I went to Virgin Megastore. There you are, look.

Jeff Blatnik, who's the fucking man?

I went to Virgin Megastore and uh look how you're beautiful, man. Look how look how beautiful you are.

And no one taught me no one told me what to do. No one gave me any instruction. Nothing. They gave me a microphone and then said, We're gonna come to you backstage. I'm like, What you want me to say? Like

Really?

It was fucking nothing. It was nothing.

You probably knew better than everybody else though.

Luckily, I was a huge fan, so it was pretty easy. I got the job because um they had a guy that was doing it before and they got rid of him. And Campbell McLaren, who was one of the producers, was good friends with my comedy master. And they were he was just casually talking. It's like we're looking for someone to do post fight interviews. And then he's like, Joe Love

They just hold it. beginning that seemed very strange to me too. I saw they had overtime rules.

Oh, I forgot about that. I forgot.

Called'em Laws of the Octagon.

Valide. He's a mm.

So intense.

Mad dog.

Yeah, it says

No biting, no eye gouging, no fish hooking. That was it. You could hit people in the nuts. It was

That's it. I've got a I tell you what, I've got a piece of my gum missing from someone trying to fish hook me. Oh god. at some point.

Jesus Christ. Not nice.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, that's nasty. If someone's fish hooks you, you should bite their fucking finger.

Oh, I think so.

Motherfucker.

You know there's that's interesting about commentary. I've I've always wondered because you everybody came after you, right, when it came when it comes to MMA commentary. So like like in the early days when I was first doing the job. No one knows what a colour commentator or a play by play commentator is back in the day. I think there's more of an understanding now. So so

Anyone that ever says, Oh, you you you're actually pretty good at this, the reason why is just because I listen to you religiously. Like a lot of people watch the fights and don't pay attention to the comments. Like I tuned in. I was paying attention to everything that you said. So even even the delivery and the cadence and stuff, what you did laid the foundation for me to learn. So I very, very much appreciate that.

Oh well thank you. Accidental.

Same for me. But but but it can't have been accidental because I had somebody that that to learn from, you know, w that's why I asked you because you didn't have anybody that kinda kinda you know.

Well, it was weird because um I think I was one of the first people to do it that had a real understanding of jujitsu. So when the fights would go to the ground the play by play guy would have, you know, like Goldberg, great guy, didn't train, didn't know what the fuck was happening. So I would have t and also people at home, what's going on?

I mean I I've called a lot and you've you've been doing it a lot longer

Well I don't do as many now, you know, I only do North American pay per views and I don't even do I don't even go to Canada anymore, so fuck them. I love Canadians. It's the government that fucking creeps me out. But um the the amount I was doing back then I was doing like twenty shows plus a year, twenty two shows a year. Yeah. So I was doing a show almost every other weekend. I was flying

It was a really it was a problem. But it was in in at one point in time it became really my main job after Fear Factor was over. And uh I loved it but the the traveling was brutal. You'd go to Australia, you come back from Australia, now you go into Dallas, you're going to Dallas, you go to New York, it's like

Yeah. I I was in Austin I went to Australia with the UFC out it was a fifty six hour round trip and I was on the ground for thirty

You feel like you're on drugs. You feel like like someone gave me a drug, I don't even know where I am. Yeah. I loved it though. I loved being there. I was like, Wow, what a crazy country. You guys are on the other side of the planet and you're all cool and the food's great. Yeah.

Fine. And I got all the I got all the gigs that most people didn't want to do. So like I was I was being sent to all of the farthest reaches. You know what I mean? Like I I did I mean Singapore I loved, Japan I loved. You know, going out to Australia to do those events. I did a lot of the Russian events. You know, I was even back at one time in case Bruce Buffer didn't make it, I was gonna be the Real D L C as well. Yeah.

Oh wow, that's crazy. That's a hard job.

Absolutely.

That guy set the bar.

Right.

He almost dies every event.

Really.

We're we're looking at him like one day is gonna be the last'cause he you know, Bruce has gotta be like seventy years old now, right? Yeah. So I'm like one day that motherfucker's gonna stroke out in the middle of OLES Punya Just fucking pop.

Stop.

Blood starts leaking.

But if you ask Bruce that's the way we would like to. One of my craziest.

Yeah.

I I remember I remember coming down a a a a a slide, a like a metal slide. From the Great Wall of China.

Ha ha ha.

With Bruce Buffer in front of me and Uriah Faber behind me and we're going down on these like rugs on the way down from just weird experiences that you have on the road with the UNC, you know what I mean? Yeah, that was good. I've always always looked at it. Yeah, he's a great guy. It's another thing as well is like and you'll remember this from back you know, back when I made my debut

PURDI!

Yeah. Weirdly superstitious, aren't we? We like to uh we like to hang stuff on things that aren't our responsibility.

Isn't that weird? It is strange. Especially with fighters. Fighters are super superstitious. Yeah. They get real weird about the the things they do, their rituals before fights, what they what they eat, where they like What they wear.

Yeah. And and like some of the things that they do, like I mean, like Ben Henderson with the toothpick. Mm-hmm. Like crazy.

Yeah. I was interviewing them post-vite. I'm like, y'all have a toothpick in your mouth. And he got in trouble for that.

Yeah. Dangerous though, especially if you know you get knocked out and that toothpick's going down your throat.

I just didn't understand why he did it.

Seems like a bit of a bit of a safety blank. It's like a familiarity that it's there.

Yeah. Like okay.

I like a toothpick, but not during the

That dude's still at it. Yeah.

Crazy. He's got a fight coming up in Brussels. Wow. It's a it's a rough fight as well.

How old is he now?

44 Find a kid called Patrick Habarora. Good Belgian fighter.

Yeah.

It's interesting though, I mean you know, you got a former champ with all that experience.

Oh yeah. I mean he's still in great shape. Yeah. He still can compete at a high level. Wow, these guys when they're they're competing for that long, it's so nuts.

Yeah. But a master's division. Right. You know the likes of Cowboy and Tony Ferguson and you know the guys that you you want to keep fighting but you don't want to see them just get smashed by Chamayev. You know. I would love to see some of those fairly matched fights, you know. Like w like when we add It was Nate Diaz against Chemaev, wasn't it? And then then Chemayev was taken out of the fight and Tony Ferguson.

Yeah, that it is a problem when you see those old veterans that still have something to offer, and then you see them getting thrown in there with some twenty. And you're like, Good Lord, don't do this.

I mean I'm what forty three, I'd fight someone this week. Like I love it, it's still in me. But I know I'm physically n like I mean even if I was at my my athletic peak I wouldn't be competing with these guys now, they're terrifying. But you know, like to to know that I'm getting into a fight with someone that's as game as me, right. But has also had the experience as well as the wear and tear. You know what I mean? Like

Yeah, evenly matched. Yeah. Like look at Pacquiao's about to fight Mayweather. Yeah. Makes sense. Yeah. Right? You know? Like fighting Terrence Crawford, you'd be like Don't do that. Exactly. Yeah. Like I don't want to see you get stretched. You know what I mean? But like you guys are bolting your late forties, like, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Alright. I'll pay for that. Yeah, it's as long as they're not gone. You know, there's some guys that they get to a certain point and they're like

And the thing is that's sad about it as well is and this is where I feel like the like the the community around MMA has probably changed in the last decade or two. is like the old the veteran fighters were just were carried in such high regard, whereas now y you are the highlight of somebody else's

That's interesting. Your ego really can get in the way. And it really makes you make terrible decisions. Like how many people have taken fights they shouldn't have taken? Just because of their ego. Their ego just gave them a distorted perception. There was this guy that was training with us that was really good at jujitsu and he had no striking and he was gonna take an MMA fight. And um I remember saying to him

Boom.

And head kick you. And he got T KO'd. He got beat up badly. And I think it really fucked him up too.

Well it's it's almost like you pull the curtain back and you realise there's a whole other world behind the curtain that you'd you'd not anticipated was there.

But the scariest world to not be good at is the striking world.

Absolutely.

That's the scare.

And I've I've tried to quantify this myself'cause it'cause It it is an interesting s thing because often I find myself I'm explaining the nuances of feints and movements that are opening doors for other things to land. I mean Adesanya was a master at this. Connor McGregor was a master at this.

Yeah.

You know, and and the way that they deliver their techniques, there's such a there's such an elite level of intelligence to it that it's easy to just think that it's chance what they're doing, right? Like like take collar take uh Conor McGregor Cowboy for example. And and the beaut b the beauty of inside the optican is I would download all the angles of the fight. I would watch every angle. The full fight from the whole whole whole angle. So I'd see different things.

Well that's what's interesting about people that have a real system. Like Dwayne Bang Ludwig. Have you ever trained with him?

Uh I haven't, but we've we fought, didn't we? So I've still I mean I I was a huge fan of him back in the day. I remember him TKOing somebody in cage uh King of the Cage up against the fence.

Oh yeah, and it does that

in love with him. Yeah. That was Gink Sudo, wasn't it? Yeah. Great s great system of footwork though, isn't it?

Oh he has an amazing system and his system is like he has a giant notebook filled with like techniques where everything his system is like very well thought out. And it's really interesting because he didn't fight the way he teaches.

Yeah. And th this is where I don't think we get enough people crossing over to coaching afterwards. Like whenever I see former fighter in the corner, Mike Brown, Robbie Lawler, whoever it is. Like I'm I'm filled with confidence that the sport is moving on because they're gonna pass on information that they've taken on from somebody else and refined. You know, like my Taekwondo teacher told me when I was a kid

Mm-hmm.

And that's that's such an unusual thing in a lot of martial arts schools, is the teacher being a student, right? And um That that's something that always stood out to me about particular people. Like I would never want to train a fighter and hold anything back from them because I always want to be just a little bit better.

Yeah, it'll make you better too. And that's the thing. Absolutely. But you have to have a an honest ego. Yes. Like you have to be able to really say, Okay, this is how good I am. I can't pretend I'm better than I am for these people because this is how good I am. And you have to be able to show it. Yeah. And that's one of the beautiful things about jujitsu is like you have to roll. Like if you're a teacher, you're

Right.

But if Eddie gets caught in something, he'll tell people.

Yeah.

And he'll show you. Show me what you did. And I'll everybody look what he did. And he'll bring people around. He's like he's like he'll let you know I'm just a human being. I just happen to be really good at it And even if I'm really good at this, there's openings, there's holes, there's things that I don't know and this is a constantly changing and evolving game where people are bringing in new things. And some of these new things

And he's like, What the fuck are you talking about? Like the guy it's it's a technique. Like, show me the technique. Like he just did it and he's like, No, we're not gonna h like they were holding back. Yeah. So in the early days there was a lot of holding back. You know, this is like what was that? What year was that? ninety four or something like that, right?

But then you know the but then like Everyone's reputation as a coach back in those days couldn't really be questioned too much, you know what I mean? Right. Because there was no way of them proving it. Right. Whereas you know, like the like the people that s and those those people stand out in my mind. You know, Eddie was one of those people, he stood out in my mind because because of how he he approached

Year did you start training with us?

It was legends. It was after the bomb squad had closed. I went back to the bomb squad well w what was the bomb squad to train with Paolo told me that I was a little bit more than a little Um c of blood sport fame. Yeah. But uh yeah, Legends. It was and it had just opened when I when I arrived.

So what year was that, two thousand five?

Six? Uh probably two thousand six, yeah. Yeah,'cause before that I've been training

That's twenty years ago. Isn't that crazy? That's when we met twenty fucking years ago.

Yeah, and a lot's changed.

Yeah.

I was I was just saying to the guys the guys here. Like it's funny, like the Joe Rogan experience, if you'd have asked me what the Joe Rogan experience was twenty years ago, it was getting crushed inside control.

Well, I I got obsessed with head and arm chokes.

Yeah, I felt it.

You know, I it fucked my neck up, I think. I wound up having bulging disc in my neck. It was either that or not tapping the guillotines. But uh I I got I had an armchart, I developed it where it was like if I locked it on you were pretty much done. You know, and when I started tapping like brown belts and higher level guys with that and then I just really concentrated on it. And it's one of those things where it's like you know how it is, just like with a kick.

Yeah.

Right. If I if I throw my right hand straight and I throw it over your jab or I throw it when I split your cross. That to me is three different techniques. Yes. Right. It's the same the same weapon that you're using, but the delivery system's different. Right. Right. But then on top of that complexity, you've got all of the the the the the damage that you can inflict that draws responses to

Groupers used to teach. Yeah, he taught me that. That was his thing. He really liked uh the shield, the vision with a punch, okay, and have the kick come behind it.

See, that's that's that for me is that's one delivery mechanism of one particular technique, right? And there are lots and lots of those.

Lots of

On lots of'em. But that's where it f I find it really interesting is and how how I I I s I sat one day and I thought to myself, I'm gonna I'm gonna nail down the jab. I'm gonna start with that.'Cause I I have intended on writing a a book or two about this at some point. And I started with the jab and I got to like twenty thousand words and I thought to myself, no one's gonna read this sh

But you've always been a very thorough guy in the way you analyze things, which makes you a perfect candidate for someone who's a competitor. 'Cause you you really have a very complex understanding of the mechanics of moving You're gonna have all the different things that are happening. You you're not just like uh you know, oh we hit'em hard. Like you you're looking at all the different layers and you're you're you analyze things on multi-levels, which uh I always find fascinating.

That means a lot to me. Thank you.

Yeah, you're great.

I'm fortunate enough to have a bit of the tizzy. I see the patterns in the

Touch of the tism is good.

Yeah.

Oh my god. Yeah. I don't think I have that. I have ADHD.

Yeah, I was gonna say, yeah, my my dad's ADHD, my mum's my mum's Tism for sure. You know what I mean? We're a bit of both.

weird ability to lock in on things where the world goes away and I don't need food. Yeah. And I can just I could do something for like twelve hours in a row.

Hundred percent. I forget to eat all the time. All the time. In fact Tom Hardy's just uh announced that he's he's autistic. He's just collaborated with the brand and they've they've created a whole line of of of you know, no eye contact.

Convenient. How convenient he's autistic. Come on.

You know what was really interesting.

Claiming autistic, like unless you're coding in your sleep, shut the fuck up.

Well you know what was really interesting is I I have a friend called Scroobius Pip, he's a rapper in the in the So he was in he was in taboo with Tom Hart. And he told me a story when they were driving from LA to Vegas and Scrobius Pip his his uh record label's called speech development records. He has a stammer. Um, he has a speech impediment and

Well who was such a giant Hunter Thompson fan. Yeah. Yeah.

Like certainly method actors, people that that can play a role. So like Jim Carey is another good example, Christian Bale, right? Daniel Day Lewis, oh my goodness, maybe the best. Like their ability to ab to like almost like Shang Tsung out of uh Mortal Kombat, they can absorb a bit of the person's character. Yeah and then kind of become that character. Yeah. Like I met Tom a couple of times in at Henzo's in New York.

Oh yeah. Well I I think a little bit of that is fame as well. I think so. There's a little bit of fame that just weirds you out. Like if I go places I try not to make eye contact sometimes. It's just too odd. I was just like hi, like you you might think I'm autistic, but I'm just fucking weirded out by too many people.

And I I totally get that. You know, one one of my favourite shows that you ever did was with Henry Rollins, the first one. Mm and he said something that always stuck in my mind. He said I'm very good being the party, I'm not very good being at the party.

Yeah.

Stuck in my mind. I I feel like that all the time. But I'm I'm I go the opposite way. I I've realized recently I I hold too much eye contact. I and I find it exhausting. I'm I was walking through the park the m uh next to the hotel last night. And I'm no I'm like having a conversation in my head, like stop pi looking at people, stop looking people in the eyes, stop making eye contact. I do it all the time, I like I lock in and

I have to sometimes if I'm thinking of an idea. Yeah, I look away. M my wife said that I wonder if that's all. 'Cause it it's like uh one of my daughters has my recall, my ability to like she'll talk about like uh You know, whatever it is, like she she can rattle off like information about the Titanic.

Similar like when people turn down the radio when you're trying to find where you're going. Whatever it is.

Right.

But

Oh right. Or if someone's yapping at you while you're trying to figure out where you're going and they're telling you and I tell her and they're like, We shut the fuck up. I I don't know where I am. Yeah. We have to figure out where we're going.

You know I find myself doing it when I'm walking through airports. When I'm travelling, I've got my wife with me, Veronica. Like I notice I c I consciously don't make eye And I don't know why that is. It's like I feel a little bit like there's enough to be dealing with right now. If I then open a conversation with you by looking at you, that's another layer of

Yes.

Let me just deal with the airport. Yeah.

Well y you know, people don't think about that, but when you're involved in multiple tasks at the same time, you know, you're taking away your ability to concentrate and do a great job at any one of those things. If there's multiple things going on at the same time. That's why like I used to do interviews in my car and I stopped doing'em because I sounded like a moron. And I realized this because I'm thinking about

Well you're already multitasking.

Yeah, which is why I like the sensory deprivation tank so much. There's none. There's nothing. There's no task.

Is that still a regular thing for you?

I got it right.

Oh you really yeah.

Got it right.

I've only done it a couple of times, but I I find it.

These days.

I'm in the UK. I'm right in the Midlands in the UK.

Yes. You might want to bail before they lock you up for thought.

I know, right, I know. For real. It's like I'm I'm cons I'm conscious and cautious all the time. I feel right now like I'm kinda I'm holding my tongue on a lot of things. Just purely because I I kinda I know that when I when I start talking I'm just you know,'cause that's how I am. You know, I I'm very opinionated unfortunately. And

That's good.

Well if I decide to start talking then I won't I won't shut up and I've not I've not opened that floodgate yet. But I do feel like it's coming. But I also feel like I need to I need to feel like I I need to prepare for it a little bit, you know what I mean? Like there's a bunch of books I need to consume before I'm I'm in the right place where I can

fully express yourself. Express certain things. Yeah. It's just the where it's going right now is not in a good direction. It's going it's tightening down on people's ability to express themselves. Yeah. And you've got so many issues.

It's happening ev everywhere though, isn't it? I mean even like you know Like As a c as a comedian, you know, freedom of speech is so in important to you and to your industry, you know what I mean? And mm I feel like that's changed a lot. You know, across across the world it's the same in Europe as well in a lot of places.

I think in America in comedy it w was closing down and then people realized we can't have this and it's opened right back up.

Right.

Okay. Conflate jokes with your actual opinions. Yeah. You know, I talked about on stage once. I'm like, you know, Bob Marley didn't really.

When Quentin Tarantino's filming a film nobody's dying. Okay? This is entertainment. And you say things that you don't really believe because it's an outrageous thing to say'cause it's funny. And there's this understanding of that as an audience member. You're supposed to be able to accept. But then you have these cunts out there in the world that are just looking to find words that someone said and ascribe them as if they're you know, put it put it down on paper as if this is a state.

And then take a small clip and put it completely out of context on TikTok or a

All the time, yeah. All the time about all kinds of things. People which is part of the game. You know, people love to do that. It's like it's fine. It's okay. It's okay. You know what you're i i i it's fine for TikTok minded people. The real problem is people that don't know you and don't understand you and then they get an impression of you based off of that. This is their first introduction to you and it's based off well the fuck that guy. That's just part of the game.

I I think comedians and satire is one of the last lines of defense. I really do. Like I I watch Prime Minister's questions every And I listen to just the nonsense. And we've got Keir Starmer and Kemi Badenok just going at each other over just nonsense. It's it's ab it's not nothing real, not no real

Well the Lakota had that in their tribes. They had a thing called the Hioka, which they called a sacred clown. And the Hioka would be able to make fun of everything and as soon as you couldn't make fun of something you knew it was bullshit.

That's interesting.

Yeah. Heyoka.

Yoka.

It had to actually be funny, of course, or you'd probably get killed.

But that's your new move. That's your new move, Joey. You need to settle by Haoka for the world.

I I think that's what comedy is in in in many ways. It's a test.

It's kinda similar with trash talking, isn't it? You know what I mean? And if somebody I like one of the funniest lines ever was and I remember Connor as he was saying it, he was laughing at himself and it was the back and forth with Chad Mendez. And he was Chad was saying you can't wrestle and Connor he was on a live feed at BT Sports Studio and I remember it so clearly'cause he was like as he was saying it, he was finding it funny in himself. He was like, I'll wrestle my balls on your forehead

Funny dude. How about the Jeremy Stevens one? Who the fuck is that guy?

And that's become a part of MMA law, right? Like it's amazing how he's influenced it.

He's a m he was the master shit talker. And also the master at emotional warfare. Yes. Like you like the Jose Aldo fight. I remember being there for that fight going, Aldo is out of sorts. Yes. His whole he looked fucked up. His body looked smooth. He didn't look he didn't look like he w b wanted to be there, and he just threw himself at Connor and got cracked.

Crazy.

He was so emotionally torn and like the moment was so big. And then Connor across the other side looked so relaxed and loose. 'Cause he know he knew he had won the emotional warfare. The emotional warfare was one. And that is a giant factor in fights, whether or not someone bites on emotional warfare. And I think that's a giant factor. I watched your war room, by way by the way, I love your YouTube show. It's really excellent.

But it's interesting to me that it doesn't seem like Hamzan is biting on any of it. No. He's like, This guy, he said this thing but he doesn't believe it. Yeah. And you're like, Whoa. Like he's not he doesn't seem upset about it. It doesn't seem like it's under his skin. He's like this guy he says he wants war, but I don't think he wants war or he'd be dead.

But that's how it should be. I mean Strickland would be the same. I I don't think you could say anything to Strickland that would offend him.

He'll laugh.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

Whereas like say like when I had that fight against Marcus Davis coming up, like I was surprised at how angry he got at

In the countdown show I'm like I'm laughing. I'm like, I can't I literally can't believe he's this head up and wound up about it, you know? And like you go back to the Connor thing. The you remember the press conference where he stole Aldo's belt, the last one they did in

Yes.

Yeah. So I was behind the the stage for that one to start with when they were both being kept separate and Dana was there and um and then when they went on stage I was on Connor's side of the stage at the bottom of the stairs. the the anger just emanating off Aldo the whole day was exhausting for me just to be around. And then after the the the press conference where Connor had taken his belt, as soon as they circled back and they were behind the thingy again, Aldo was like

Well it's one of the things that I really appreciate about Pereira, his stoic. He's always just stoic. You could talk all that mad shit about You know, and like the Uncle Iev, the rematch with Uncle Liv. Like Uncle Iev had talked so much shit after that first fight. Yeah. You know, and then when he blasted him out in the first round then he went like this. You know? The same thing with Jamal Hill. Yeah. You know, I mean he he's very stoic, but afterwards his celebration is even like look Look

It's so cool. I I I like the fact that his his coldness is a part of his brand. Oh yeah. You know?

Yeah, he's he's very cold. Like him and Yuri Prohaska. It's so disturbing that Yuri thought he was using spiritual warfare. Like Yuri accused him of using sorcery. He's like no magic this time.

Hehehehehehe Yeah.

You're so crazy. Such a crazy request. Yeah. Like d do not invoke spirits.

I had someone trying to get a witch doctor on me in Brazil once. Really? They thought I was casting spells, yeah they they tried to get a witch doctor.

Yeah. Casting spells is fun.'Cause if you believe it it'll work. Right. If you really b that's why voodoo works, right?'Cause if you believe in voodoo It will fuck you up. If someone says, I'll curse you, you're like, Oh no, I'm fucking curse shit. Yeah. If you really believe that, it will work.

Yeah. If you can make if you can make someone F afraid of something or sensitive to something. You know and and and you know and I I w I was always a big fan of Marcus Davis and I knew how dangerous he was in the division. But I also knew that if I poked him enough in the right direction I would get a particular version of him that suited me. Right? And there were two versions of Marcus, right? There was the Marcus that showed up and he was like

Charge like that.

Would have been so much more dangerous.

Right. You know, he probably would have tried to kick the leg. Piece him apart from the outside and find his motions. But Connor was always gonna be a problem for Aldo because he's so fast and he's so explosive and so big. Yeah. He was so big for 45. He his weight cut was hell. Have to make 145 and then stand there and he looked like a dead man. He looked like someone from like fucking the Walking Dead. It was weird.

Easy. I I'm I I I like what they've done with the weight cutting. I like the fact that it's done in the morning and people can rehydrate and stuff. The o the thing I miss is to see people facing off when they're in that feral dehydrated state. Right. That's the thing I miss because like a lot of the time I'll be looking for reads. You know, there's the picture of you looking around, you know what I mean? It's like you wanna see that face off of where people are in that state.

It's one of my favorite things to do is see the guys head to head looking in each other's eyes because you just there's a fucking smell. Yeah. There's a feeling in the air. You get a f a sense.

I wear the meta glasses when I'm doing face offs now. So you can see P PFL have made a little logo, Hardy's uh Hardy Vision. And you can see f and sometimes people are like face to face you it's palpable.

Big guy.

And he'd never been the distance. Sixteen and four he was, knocked everybody out that he fought. And I was do you remember when he fought, was it Brody Farber? Kicked him in the neck and like as he went down he like crossed his legs on the way down. That was at the palm. Yeah.

No, I do remember that.

It was brutal. Yeah. When we were we did the weigh-ins in a theatre in London and Obviously we're all on our on wait. We've I've been on wait since two o'clock, as most people have. We've journeyed into London on the bus, everyone's still on wait, no one's drinking. And like you walk through the changing rooms in the back and we're in like an old like West End theatre.

He would have already been replenished. He would have felt much better. Yeah. Yeah. It's a good point.

push that's why I always wore contact lenses as well. I always had the contact lenses on the on the stage, you know. I just didn't want people to see my eyes. I didn't want them to get a real version of me until fight night.

Yeah. Yeah, emotional warfare. It's real. It's very important.

I loved it. I mean, I wasn't very good as a fighter, you see, so I had to lean on what I could get. Look look look at the guys in my division though. I mean, John Fitch.

I know.

Mike Swit was great, Josh Koschek a bit of a prick, but great fighter, you know what I mean? Like they were gr good guys in my division at the time. Man, I didn't have the wrestling to be competing with a lot.

Yeah, and that's a factor that takes so long. Yeah.

For sure.

Because i th there's the same reason why he hits so hard. I think he's just weirdly built

But but e even even a freak athlete though, you take him back ten years and you take Glover to Share away and he he's not supplied with the information where he can he can apply that athleticism, right? And this is where Former fighters passing on knowledge like we talked about. I mean like we went Bass Rutten, Dwayne Ludwig, TJ Dillashaw, right?

Right.

You know, like Glover Toshera to to Alex Pereira is probably one of the best relationships because for me Glover Toshira was he overachieved in his career based on his age and his athleticism compared to the other people in the division. The reason why was because his game was so solid and so sound.

also missed six years of his prime. Crazy. Because he couldn't get out of Brazil.

Well you were talking about him constantly before he was signed, I remember that. I remember hearing his name a lot because you were same with Pereira, you know, you you were talking about him before the UFC signed it. But like if you'd imagine Glover Toshir um sorry, Alex Pereira walked into a an MMA gym in two thousand and five.

But he does know submissions. He's a jiu-jitsu black belt.

But that's the thing, is like is like does he know the whole database of jujitsu? Does he know everything that a normal black belt would learn? And I'm not discrediting his black belt, but uh what I'm saying is his his game has been very specifically tailored to be effective in the arra in the arena that he's fighting.

I...

That's true. But it's also the relationship that he has with Glover too, where it's a one really elite coach with a world championship level experience concentrating on a very special athlete. Whereas if you're at ATT, you know, you're And fucking Dagestanis and just a room full of assassins and five coaches.

And and Glover and you know, and going back to what we were talking about earlier, like Glover's already gone through the process of learning jiu jitsu and absorbing what's useful and rejecting a lot of what's useless. Yes. So he's not giving Pereira the useless part of jujitsu for MMA. Right. Right?

Yes. acquired all the crazy shit. I think there's a lot of these guys that like fundamentals are just like laser focus. Like Hickson. Hickson was always just laser focused fundamental. Minnetaro Noguer, laser focus fundamental.

D do you think the do you think the existence of Valitudo kind of forced them to go very specifically to what worked though for for no rules contact?

Probably. There's probably some of that because obviously Hickson created in uh competed in Valley Tuto very early on. So it's like yeah, yeah. Uh m mean a lot of stuff goes out the window as soon as you punch. Yeah. Right? A lot of stuff. Absolutely. Yeah. But including some heels.

See th this I I I often think that I'm quite I feel very fortunate that I came into martial arts before M And and the reason for that is because the way that I learned martial arts was not

But isn't that also d dependent upon matchups? Like sometimes people just cancel each other out skill wise and that's just part of the game.

Absolutely. But usually the ones where they cancel each other out skills skill wise are the are the actually the more interesting fights. Because whether it's grappling or striking it keeps moving. Almost always it's when there's a dominant skill set on one side and the other person just can't deal with it. Like look at me

Hamza and Drick.

Exactly. Right. But if I'd have been able to wrestle, I'd have forced him to strike. If I'd have been better at jujitsu, I'd have maybe forced him to to strike a bit more. Right. But because there was a way of him t completely taking me out of my game. There wasn't necessarily an an onus to to instigate a conclusion to the fight. Right. So almost always when you see one person that is so dominant in wrestling.

The Hamza Drake is.

Yeah. I think we should stop scoring control in MMA. Control is scored up against the fence. Defense is not scored in MMA, right? Defense is its own reward. Right? Control, in my opinion, is its own reward. If you're a j a grappler and I'm a striker, It's it's on you to take me into the range that suits you.

Right. But if someone's taking someone down and controlling them and working towards a submission, how do you quantify that?

Well they're not going to be able to do that. So so then if if you consider top control as you would center control, right? When everything else is even You go to octagon control as as one of the lat later scoring criteria is when the striking and the grappling, everything's even. Then we move into okay, well

So octagon control could be you're in the center of the cage and you're pressing the But what if you're a counter striker? Like what if you're Tyron Woodley versus Steven Wonderboy Thompson and you spend a lot of the time just moving away? Like remember they fought to a draw, right? Didn't they fought to a draw in one of their fights? Yeah.

Yeah, but but that that was also that was also I mean I and I don't necessarily want to criticise Tyrone, but I don't really think Tyrone liked fighting. He spent a lot of time wearing his back heel down against the fence with the crowd booing in the championship rounds. I never got the impression that Tyran liked fighting, he was just good at it.

I thought it that was the style to beat Wonderboy. Because he didn't fight that style with that Darent Hill.

Well kid.

Dan Tilly blasted him, took him down and got rid of him quick. But with with Wonder Boy You cannot stand in the middle of the cage and kickbox that guy'cause he's doing weird shit. He's doing things with his legs you can't do. Like and you know like if you see a guy like Raymond Daniels or M V P like You can't, yeah. Yeah, if you can.

I I I I hear what you're saying totally. But uh but like, say for example in the Damien Meyer fight, he defended twenty six takedowns. Right.

Right, but with the Wonderboy fight he rocked Wonderboy and he had Wonderboy hurt, where Wonderboy didn't hurt him, which is like because he forced Wonderboy to be offensive instead of countering. So by making it boring, by backing up.

Yeah. But I but I I at the same time I don't necessarily think I don't know as that was a calculation of going.

Because he fought him that way the second time as well.

But I think that was intimidation from what when the boy could do on the feet and him not wanting to waste energy trying to take him down.

Don't think he was intimidated. I think he was waiting. He was waiting for moments to explode because it's not like he was timid when he blasted him and had him rocked and hurt.

And the thing is what was interesting is I had a similar

You didn't think you you weren't a fan after the Darren Till fight?

Oh, absolutely. Right. Like and and same with the Robbie Lawler fight, you know, that was an incredible knockout. And this was the thing that was frustrating is that he had the capability to do that kind of thing. And sometimes I just felt like he he wants to play King of the Hill. He didn't want to be the smashing champion the the other fight You know what I mean?

Well, you know, you gotta think like he had some He had some fights that didn't go his way as well. Strikeforce, the Nate Marquardt fight. The Nate Marquardt fight when he got KO'd where Nate hit him with like a video game combination with those elbows against the cage like

So many names of of fighters that have just been kinda lost to time that people don't realise that

Eve Edwards. There's another one. I talk about him all the time. There's a point in time where Eve Edwards was the best one hundred and fifty five pounder on the planet. Facts. Yeah. It's just like people forget. People forget how good people

You know, interesting you the point you made about counter strike, and I've always thought this about guard playing as well. Like if you're a guard player, you've kinda got to accept that you're losing until you win. Right. It's like Machida was one of the best examples of a counter striker. And then it you know, you say Adesanya against Paulo Costa. Paulo Costa was in the center of the cage for most

Yeah, but you couldn't say octagon control'cause Izzy was landing all his shots.

But but that's that's the thing, is it that that was a very, very clear one, right? Where where you've got one person moving back and giving the centre of the cage, but clearly winning on the striking. Whereas if when it gets very even with the striking, you have to really have good judges.

But who's left that's a garbage?

Not many, right? It's kinda been cycled out of the game. But even that didn't work out for him in some times, did it? There was a lot of time he'd spend energy guard playing. A lot of the time why you know good wrestlers decide not to wrestle. Because the amount of energy

That's true, but I mean like look what he did to Gamrot and that was super

Gamrot's so good.

So good. Oliver.

Do you remember Gamrat's debut against Garam Kutate Ladze? Like both of those guys. He's in karate combat now. Both of those guys are so elite. And then when they got matched up against each other in their USC debut, I'm like, man. People aren't gonna realise how good this matchup is. Right, right. Like Sarukian I called his debut against uh against Makachev. Yeah. Like and he was five percent behind Islam in that.

I'm not. Yeah.

Yeah. Incredible flight, yeah.

Yeah. Um I am uh very curious to see how Pereira does against Cyril Gunn. Yeah. Cyril Gunn's a different

Just moves differently for a big guy, doesn't he?

He's also a real heavyweight. There ain't a fucking time since he's been fifteen where that guy's making 185. No. Right? That's a big man. And he's an incredible athlete and a really elite striker. Like a really good striker. Like and a fucking big heavyweight man. Mm. And I know Pereira weighs like two sixty now. I I get it. I get it. Yeah, he's a heavyweight. Yep. Definitely.

It was one hundred eighty five.

185 years ago. Just a few years ago. And he was a 185-pound champion and then the 205-pound champion. And I don't think Cyril Garden could even make 205. Cyril's big. Yeah. And he's big and And i and he's good man. And I'm telling you that Tom Hardy fight excuse.

Um the Tom Aspinoff fight uh in that first round before the the eye pokes were disgraceful. Like first of all, I think

Still gotta fix the gloves.

Oh God. You know, my my solution is mittens. Why why we don't do this anyway? Why why are these why are these out like this? Yeah.

It's a good point. The thing that annoyed me is like they went through all the all that the effort to fix the gloves, mm-hmm, but they never asked a fighter or a person that wraps hand

Yeah.

They are very, very good.

Absolutely. They're the best.

But that's that's an ownership problem though, isn't it?

It is. I've tried to negotiate that and broker that and maybe I still can be successful. I just talked to them, I talked to to Trevor. Maybe it still can be done. But even with Trevor's the fingers are still exposed. And I think there's certain guys who just have fucking impulse to do that and I think one point every time. Poke someone in the eye, one point. Every fucking time. Because there's a lot of fighters that have never poked anybody in the

I mean well I'm I watch I watch one championship small gloss moitai and they are in range. Right. They're not poking each other.

No, they're not.

So cool.

It's so good.

It's so

And it's so interesting. And for all these people that like hate when fights go to the ground, my God, that's the solution. And I've been trying to sell this to the UFC forever. I'm like, fuck all this slap fight shit. And I know you're really interested in Zoofa boxing, that's great. How about UFC striking? How about UFC Muay Thai? You know, like'cause and even kickboxing what they're doing with one. You know, guys like Yukiyoza and you know.

Watch out for Ben Willis. Have you seen this? He's a beast. I signed him to PFL a little while ago. Just just can't get him mad. You click on his on his Instagram and he's I mean, in my opinion, he's one of the best strikers in the world right now. There's just and and I've you know, he trained trained at Renegade for a long time with the Edwards brothers

Yeah, just very impressive.

You're gonna see him go.

Who is one doing?

Not good from what I can tell.

I mean, that's what I've heard as well. And uh that concerns me because if we have more limited options, that sucks.

But this is why I mean and I've I you know I feel very much like I'm in the right place now with the PFL because We need more organizations. Yeah. We need more organizations. Unfortunately, in my opinion, the USC's not the custodian of the sport that we need right now, you know.

Well what do you think they're doing wrong?

I mean I I think I think it's a variety of different things. I mean, underpaying the fighters, killing the sponsorship market. They they buried a lot of growth of the subculture. You know, you remember the old UFC expos that we used to do? I'd do like five, six hours a day sign in, tap out over to Silverstar, over to Zions. Like as soon as that was all killed off, a lot of that subculture died off and all those subcultures offered jobs outside of uh outside of fighting.

Wait a minute, you just said twenty twenty eight.

two thousand eight. Maybe there's a return on the cost. Two thousand eight. So I had twelve.

I was like, are you a time traveler or the fucking?

I feel like I am here a little bit with the UFO. Yeah, so in 2008, like there was where was I going?

Uh sponsors.

Sponsors. Yeah. So like we had sponsors, there was a subculture that was growing around the brand and there were there were there were shows that That would host you long enough for you to develop a brand, right? So, like I didn't have a f nearly as as big of a following as Conor McGregor or Paddy Pimlet, but

But why is that the UFC's responsibility?

Oh no I'm not saying it I'm not saying it is. What I'm saying is that unfortunately I think the US C is now kinda paying for the the control that they took many years ago. Because the industry has been stifled around it. Like the sponsorship industry for a start was massive, you know. And and

The problem with it was there was a lot of sponsors that weren't paying. So the a lot of fighters would wind up in lawsuits and there was a lot of bullshit. There some of them were and it was great. Yeah. You know, like uh you know, I'm really good friends with Brandon Schaub and there was uh a point in time where he was making X amount for a fight, but he was making like three times that in sponsors.

Yeah. I mean I I doubled my show money on the G S P fight because of my banner. I only got twenty two thousand for that fight, but

Which is great. It's crazy.

But that's what I signed up for. I wasn't doing it for the money, you know what I mean? But in hindsight, when I look at it and GSP was getting I mean you get like six million. He spent quarter of a million on his training. I I c how could I compete? Like he would book out a whole hotel and bring guys in from New York. I I I had a

Condom Depot. Oh man. Remember that?

I get that. I get that argument and I definitely agree about fighter pay. Like I'm always in favor of fighters getting paid more. It's a very dangerous job and it's the only thing that people are paying to do. They're not paying to look at the cage, they're not paying to look at the ring card girls, they're not paying to hear me talk. They're paying to watch the fight.

Absolutely. And the thing is the heavyweight division is always going to be more of a victim of the underpayment than any other industry.

Is Francis no longer with the PFL? No. How did that what happened there?

I just think it was a bad deal done by the previous ownershi by the previous CEO.

Oh, it was a previous C. aware uh so he fought Hannah Ferrara in that one fight. Yes. Is that the only fight that he had in the fight?

Yeah. It was just I mean it was it was a bad deal for the PFL. And we've done a lot of we've done a lot of bad bad deals, bad.

That guy that just knocked out Henry Ferrer.

Oh, Sergei Bilastani. Yeah.

Ooh, that guy's fucking legit.

Yeah. And very, very fast. Like him v. Tom Aspinal is an interesting. Oh yeah.

as anybody's actually

Envy Cyril Gann. He moves a lot like Cyril Gann, but he's got Sambo background and

I mean that guy's legit. I watched that Ferrera fight and I was like holy. Yeah, dude. And you know, I mean Yeah. Pull this up. Here we go. Look at this guy. I mean, he moves like Fedor too. He trained with Phedor, which is interesting. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, that's that little body shot. So third round was the t the the finish.

But it catches in with the

I'm shocked.

He looked so dominant like throughout the fight, man. Like right away.

He's a beast

Very, very legit. Oh my goodness. The speed. Yeah. So the world needs another fucking big heavyweight, man. And this is this is awesome that this guy exists. What's his name again?

Look, I the thing is, as a as a UFC fan, I get it, right? Because you want to watch one promotion where all the fighters are so you can find out who the best is. Because that's what ultimately it was about, right? It was about finding out who's the best.

Listen man, that guy can kinda compete with

Of course, of course, absolutely and we've got guys that can across the sport. I mean, you know, across the i across the the promotion we have. I mean, you know, Dakota, Thad Jean, you know, we've got some real, real good fighters and even in

Have you tried it?

Yeah. Yeah. I mean I I struggle with it. So here it is. But look at this. The key is the foot in the thigh. It's like an offside Triangle. You can see that that right foot is just hooked in. Uh-huh. And he's gonna threaten with an arm triangle. He's kinda holding Matos here. There's a bit of a hand fight going on. He's gonna keep hitting Matos and he's gonna Matos is gonna go to an arm triangle position.

Nasty.

So that is I mean I've I've had this done to me as well as I've done it. So you've got you've got compression into the neck, pressure into the lower back, your hips being lifted.

Yeah. It looks horrible.

And oh this is uh the Cheesecake Assassin demo in it. But it like and this is this is what's fascinating still to me about MMA is that I still feel like there's technologies that we're not we've not yet discovered. The calf kicker being a good example, right. Scottish Twister being another ex What comes next? Like there's gonna be some shit. I've got books and books of martial arts books, and I feel like if I dug, I might find something, but

Yeah, I don't know what's missing.

See that that is a good example'cause that's a great technique and a great setup. Mm-hmm. Because the reason why the head kick landed was because she just landed an inside low kick. Yes. So Whaley had pulled her lead leg back and pitched her head forward. Yeah. Beautiful said. I totally agree with you. I think there's a lot that's still to be discovered.

It's just stunning to me how few people get cracked with that. Mm-hmm. Like my I feel like that was a a major weapon when I was doing taekwondo. A lot of people

Yeah. Crescent kick as well. Oh, yeah.

Anderson used that a few times. Yeah. There's a cat But this is a dude who's got a video on Instagram where he knocks his t guy out with an inside crest and kicked to the face. There's a few people that are pulling it off, you know.

There's there's definitely more to come. There's definitely a lot more there there are a lot more techniques. Th I also think there are gonna be a lot more um targets on the body that can be exploited that we're not yet exploited.

Right. Well, a lot of the guys in um in kickboxing in particular in one are using that toe kick to the body.

Yes. Ap Chagi.

There's there's this cat. Yes. What is his name, Jamie? I've I've actually congratulated this guy. I apologize. 'Cause I I went back and forth with him. Jason Barry, is that what it just said? Back it up a little bit.

Before that?

See, look at those Justin Barrow.

Justin Barry.

Look at the curve in those cage warriors gloves. Mm-hmm. So they're they're basically a they're they're either they're either Fairtex gloves or they're a copy of the Fair Text gloves. Crazy, isn't it? Crazy. Very cool.

Crazy. It's just I agree with you, there's not enough of them. But it's like what does the PFL have to do to get more attention? You know,'cause it seems like they're throwing a lot of money at fighters. Like there's that is that million dollar thing still happened

No, we've got rid of the tournament. We're we've gone to regular shows now. So we have main and co main, we've got rankings now done by combat registry.

They don't have all the crazy point system where you

All that's gone. That didn't make any fucking sense. I'll be honest. I love the PFL, but PFL's been its own worst enemy for many months. Right. We've got n we've got a new CO, John Martin, who's he's been on Ariel's show a couple of times, he does great interviews, he he he he loves the sport from a fans perspective, doesn't know it quite as much as uh as other people but

All the point things were like I didn't understand any

So I was running Pf L Europe for a for a couple of three years. I I I stepped in at the end of twenty twenty two as commentator and twenty twenty three I became the head of uh head of fighter ops for Europe. So I was doing all the signing and matchmaking. I only had four shows a year but I mean it was it was a p a passion project for me to sign all these young guys and match them

I've I sent Dana all these different fights. I sent him all these uh is um uh Imangazilev, that dude Asadula Imanghazalev. Holy shit is that guy good. I'm like look at this. Like this is what people wanna see, man. Like everybody w Booze when the fights go to the ground if it gets boring. This shit's never boring. Yeah. Maybe you guys should pick up the slack.

Hundred percent look it's i I mean I've I've thrown hundreds of ideas on the table. Um I always am, you know. I mean one Yeah, I think so.

Because look how big it is with one. I mean it's essentially become most of their fights now.

Yeah. And it's accommodating fighters that have got two or three hundred fights in another discipline that don't want to learn how to wrestle or grapple, but they are the elitest of elite strikers.

So easy to translate. Everybody knows what's going on. Yeah. A kick to the face is a kick to the face.

Yeah. The one that stuck was introducing elbows. Like when I first started working for the PFL, we didn't have elbows because

Reason.

Crazy.

Crazy.

Right and I hated it.

Well it's pride. Pride didn't have elbows. Yeah. Did Bellator?

Bellatore had a big thing. Well see that was my that was my selling point. That was the way I got I managed to convince them. I said, Okay, right, we've taken on Bellator now. We've inherited Bellator and everything that

Take the rules too.

Right. Yeah. How but well this is how I pitched it to them, right? One of my biggest opponents was Ray Cepho. Like he did not want elbows added and I could not get my head around it because he's always coaching elbows from the corner, right? I'm not sure. I couldn't I couldn't get my head around it. But but the thing that pushed it over the line was me going, Okay, right, we've just in he we've just taken on Bellator, right? We've got Bellator and we've got PFL.

Yeah. You know what really needs to happen is knees to the head.

Hundred percent. Absolutely.

Absolutely. It's crazy that someone could just huddle in a turtle position and not get pummeled. Like you shouldn't be in that position.

The the only thing I can do without and I loved it in Pride and I wanted to fight in Pride for the soccer kicks as well. And the reason why

Why the ring is different. You can move. Yeah. The problem with being Yeah.

Remember Wes Sims Frank Mir stomped him, yeah. The thing with and I've and I've watched every single pride fight that's ever existed, I'm sure. I only ever see people get involved in the head when the fight's already pretty much done. Right. Right. So it it's Melvin Matt.

Manhoof and Sakura.

Exactly. It's like the it's like the icing on the cake that we don't necessarily need when you can just hit'em with one more shot. Right. And they tried something in cage rage a few uh when cage rage existed back in the day where the referee would decide

Let me ask you this. What do you think about sidekicks to the knees?

I don't mind it.

The problem with that is it's one shot and you're out for a year.

But then heel hooks are just as dangerous, aren't they?

'Cause You can tap and you can hold on to the arms before it gets to that position, you could tap. The thing about the sidekick to the knee, like uh Um what's his face?

Khalil Round Tree.

Yeah, but the the guy modesto. When you watch his knee go sideways like that, you're like I d you're done for a year. If you're ever the same again. But you can't hit to the back of the head. But you do hit to the back of the head.

because

If it's a roundhouse kick and it goes over the shoulder, guess where it lands.

Yeah. Absolutely. See the but the thing is the back of the head is more protecting from the bottom of the base of the of the skull downwards, isn't it?

Someone throws a round. Yeah. It's going BOOM right to the back of the head.

But then how many football players in a season are taken out with a a low tackle? I mean it's the same in rugby as well. It's like for me that is a that is a risk of the sport. That is that is a part of the

But it's a victory with an illegal move that we all allow.

But then

No, no, no, uh back of the head kick.

Oh, yeah, for sure. You know what I'm saying?

The back of the head kick, you win by knockout and you shouldn't have hit them there.

Yeah. But then but then also you've got to go into well did they turn their head, what was the circumstance of it, et cetera, et cetera. But I think that's a good thing. But then it was the same thing when we had elbows and I'm w like we're doing shows in France and I'm saying to the French commission We don't have elbows. And they're like, okay, so where where does the elbow start and where does the you know wh where is it where

Right. But a thing about like attacking the knee. you would have to say, well, it's gotta be a straight kick where you hyperextend the knees because you can't say don't leg kick the knees'cause you're gonna be able to leg kick the back of the knee always. That's you if you take that out, you're taking out a giant chunk of all

In my mind it's the game we play.

I agree with you. I I see your point.

No one's dying from a need.

It's very unusual too. Yeah. It's like the Modestus fight was one fight that you can name and Khalil's obviously a very elite striker.

Yeah. I I d I don't mind it. I genuinely don't. I mean I like I'm I'm more interested in making sure the fighters are protected when they can't protect themselves. That's that's where we need to raise everyone's understanding

Yeah. I agree with you. But listen, brother, um always good to talk to you. We should do this more often. We should upgrade. Separate every six years.

We should yeah. We're back in Austin soon though. We're back in Austin soon, no.

I love you guys. What you're doing?

Uh July nineteenth, Saturday. Saturday, July nineteenth, is that the right day?

Motherfucker.

You're in my own And I know where you are.

Yeah. I'm out of town.

Yeah, I know. I know where you are, I'll be there.

He'll be there?

Yeah, I think I'll be there.

Okay, well we'll talk about it afterwards. I know what we're talking about.

Yeah, we'll talk about yeah. But but that's but yeah, Jo Johnny Eblin Costello Van Steam.

That's too bad, I wanna see that. Fuck.

Yeah. And and and I w I will say like for me our middleweight division is probably the most competitive with the UFC's middleweight division, with John. our team. Like Costello Van Stinus, the current champ. Did you watch that fight? No. So Johnny Eblin undefeated in seventeen, eighteen fights, was beating the brakes off

Oh, we got submitted.

Right last year.

Yes, I did see that.

That's right. So the so Costello's defended his belt, he beat Fabian Edwards, Travis Brown elbows, and then Johnny Eblin just ragdolled Brian Battle like it was nothing.

Yeah.

Same.

No, he's a beast.

Well now they those two boys are gonna rematch. Austin at the Moody Centre, middle of July

I wish I was here.

Me too.

All right. Thank you, brother. Very very good to see you always. Uh uh Dan Hardy, what's your Instagram?