Ben Askren: Wrestling and MMA | Lex Fridman Podcast #242

00:00:00.000 | The following is a conversation with Ben Askren,

00:00:02.560 | wrestler, MMA fighter, and a brilliant, opinionated,

00:00:07.560 | and fun personality in the world of martial arts.

00:00:10.360 | And yes, he occasionally likes to talk a little trash.

00:00:14.600 | Given his wild online antics

00:00:16.680 | and his boxing match with Jake Paul,

00:00:20.780 | some people may forget just how dominant he was

00:00:23.920 | in the sport of wrestling and in MMA for most of his career.

00:00:28.940 | In wrestling, he is a two-time NCAA Division I

00:00:32.880 | national champion and four-time finalist.

00:00:36.280 | In mixed martial arts, he went undefeated for 10 years

00:00:39.540 | with a record of 19 and 0 before losing to Jorge Masvidal

00:00:44.480 | with the flying knee that caught everyone by surprise.

00:00:47.320 | He's also into cryptocurrency, disc golf,

00:00:50.400 | and is the co-host of Flow Wrestling Radio Live.

00:00:54.840 | This is the Lex Friedman Podcast.

00:00:57.140 | To support it, please check out our sponsors

00:00:59.460 | in the description.

00:01:00.720 | And now, here's my conversation with Ben Askren.

00:01:04.920 | Before we talk about your incredible wrestling career,

00:01:10.280 | your MMA career, let me ask you, I have to ask you,

00:01:13.880 | what did you think about the Jake Paul

00:01:15.580 | versus Tyron Woodley fight?

00:01:17.340 | Well, I thought, I mean, I'm obviously unbiased.

00:01:20.800 | I thought Tyron won.

00:01:22.060 | I had five rounds of three.

00:01:25.280 | And again, maybe this is my bias in the way I was seeing it.

00:01:27.940 | I thought he was more effective with the striking

00:01:29.820 | and he was more aggressive and Jake had more volume.

00:01:32.560 | But that was the only thing I would give him.

00:01:35.980 | And I guess a lot of people just didn't see it that way.

00:01:38.100 | They thought he landed more, significantly more punches.

00:01:40.140 | I just didn't think he really did any damage.

00:01:42.780 | It was a split decision?

00:01:44.420 | Split decision, yeah.

00:01:46.180 | Were you surprised?

00:01:47.180 | Well, it was the thing, so the thing I said

00:01:51.220 | when I went in to fight him, I said,

00:01:52.580 | we don't really, maybe he's good, maybe he's not.

00:01:54.820 | We really have no idea to this point, you know?

00:01:57.800 | And so I knew Tyron was a lot better at boxing than I was.

00:02:02.020 | And so I thought, okay, Tyron's,

00:02:04.520 | I think it's a good likelihood that Tyron beats him up.

00:02:08.000 | But there's a chance that Jake's kind of good at this.

00:02:10.480 | And I think that's kind of what played out is

00:02:12.800 | he's kind of good at it.

00:02:13.640 | Even if you saw it the way I saw it,

00:02:15.000 | he still was impressive in his showing

00:02:16.960 | and he's obviously put a lot of time into it.

00:02:19.340 | So he's not bad.

00:02:21.920 | We'll say that much, you know?

00:02:23.480 | But isn't it surprising to you that like

00:02:25.300 | a elite level athlete, combat athlete,

00:02:30.060 | lost to somebody who just takes it really seriously

00:02:33.020 | but is nevertheless not elite level?

00:02:35.340 | But I think boxing's a really specific rule set.

00:02:40.380 | So I'll speak about Tyron, not myself.

00:02:41.920 | Tyron had good striking, but obviously

00:02:45.020 | it was his first boxing match ever.

00:02:47.500 | And within mixed martial arts,

00:02:49.220 | you have the fear of the takedown

00:02:51.580 | and the fear of the kick and fear of other things

00:02:53.460 | to go along with the punching.

00:02:54.940 | And so if you look at Tyron

00:02:56.580 | throughout his MMA career, a lot of times

00:02:58.000 | what set up his punches were like

00:03:01.300 | level change fakes at a takedown.

00:03:03.180 | They dropped, boom, and then something

00:03:04.540 | comes over the top, right?

00:03:05.900 | So there's many more elements to worry about

00:03:07.740 | in mixed martial arts.

00:03:08.580 | Whereas boxing, there's only one.

00:03:10.440 | It was his first fight.

00:03:12.100 | Yes, I thought Tyron was gonna win.

00:03:13.780 | I thought this was gonna happen.

00:03:14.700 | But like I said, I mean, it's pretty evident that Jake's,

00:03:17.740 | he's not bad at boxing.

00:03:19.340 | He's pretty solid, you know?

00:03:20.460 | He gets in there and works hard at it, I guess.

00:03:23.340 | - Out of 10 times, how many times do you think Jake wins?

00:03:26.460 | - Against Tyron?

00:03:27.420 | - Against Tyron.

00:03:28.260 | They fight again and again and again, like iteratively.

00:03:32.020 | - Yeah, so I mean, part of the thing is,

00:03:35.260 | okay, so Jake's corner said you need a knockout

00:03:37.420 | going into the eighth round, right?

00:03:38.580 | So I think they thought,

00:03:40.700 | maybe they're trying to motivate him,

00:03:41.860 | but I don't see it that way.

00:03:43.060 | 'Cause if they were actually thought that he was winning,

00:03:45.940 | why would they encourage him to take a dumb risk

00:03:47.900 | when Tyron has clearly has knockout power, right?

00:03:49.700 | It's a really stupid coaching philosophy

00:03:51.660 | if that's what you're thinking.

00:03:53.020 | So you obviously are thinking,

00:03:53.980 | hey, this is actually in the balance, it's competitive.

00:03:57.220 | And I feel like Tyron thought maybe he was winning

00:04:00.180 | and didn't have the urgency necessary.

00:04:02.620 | And so I think there's a chance he turns it up a lot.

00:04:05.860 | Man, I would wanna watch him again before I...

00:04:10.100 | - So I have this problem with my personality.

00:04:12.660 | Here's my personality, Lex.

00:04:14.620 | I have an issue with not being able

00:04:16.100 | to give really exact answers.

00:04:17.580 | So I hate giving you an answer that like,

00:04:20.140 | I don't feel like is 100% calculated.

00:04:22.300 | So I would like to see them go once more,

00:04:24.780 | 'cause I would like to see,

00:04:25.620 | hey, can Tyron, 'cause if Tyron can turn up the pace

00:04:27.900 | and Jake can't handle it,

00:04:29.260 | then I think it's an eight, one or nine, two, right?

00:04:31.860 | If it goes the exact same way

00:04:34.420 | and maybe Tyron wins a close split decision,

00:04:36.060 | I'm saying, oh, it's probably gonna be close

00:04:37.540 | every single time.

00:04:38.380 | We're probably gonna get a five to five type of thing.

00:04:41.060 | So it's like, I feel like out of one match,

00:04:44.940 | it's not totally indicative

00:04:46.180 | of what the future is gonna look like.

00:04:47.540 | - I feel like Tyron would get a knockout

00:04:49.340 | and then you would still be in the same place

00:04:52.060 | like not knowing what to predict.

00:04:56.180 | Okay, so your fight with Jake Paul,

00:05:00.060 | looking back, you had a little bit of time now.

00:05:03.460 | How would you analyze that fight?

00:05:05.100 | - Well, I mean, the fight specifically,

00:05:08.920 | I got cracked with an overhand right.

00:05:10.780 | So I mean, it kind of sucks.

00:05:12.640 | I would say, you know, and this is where I was like,

00:05:16.980 | I really don't care.

00:05:18.660 | And everyone's like, why would you,

00:05:20.380 | it turns your reputation.

00:05:21.860 | It's like, well, I wanted to do it.

00:05:23.700 | I had an enjoyable time training it in the buildup.

00:05:26.380 | Obviously, I wasn't skillful enough to get the win.

00:05:29.740 | But even despite the fact that I know

00:05:31.980 | what's gonna happen, if someone asked me to do it again,

00:05:34.660 | I probably would have done it again, you know?

00:05:36.820 | And so the way I was thinking about

00:05:38.660 | when I was deciding whether to do it or not,

00:05:40.920 | 'cause I got the offer, it's like, okay, is this money,

00:05:43.540 | it can change my life.

00:05:45.180 | Yeah, it could, right?

00:05:46.020 | It's not gonna double my net worth,

00:05:48.340 | but it's gonna add significantly, make my life easier.

00:05:50.900 | Number two is like, when I was in high school,

00:05:52.300 | we used to do boxing matches for free

00:05:54.140 | just 'cause we thought it was fun.

00:05:55.180 | We didn't have something going on Friday night.

00:05:57.060 | Me and my buddies would get together

00:05:58.420 | and we had some boxing goals at base

00:05:59.860 | and we'd punch each other in the head.

00:06:01.740 | So it's like, for something I think is enjoyable,

00:06:03.340 | not gonna pay me a whole bunch of money.

00:06:05.260 | Yeah, sure, I'll do it.

00:06:07.340 | - Would you, do you think if you got the rematch,

00:06:10.460 | if you did the rematch, would you,

00:06:12.340 | what are the odds you win?

00:06:13.660 | Okay, let's see.

00:06:14.500 | - Probably not very good.

00:06:15.340 | I think he's pretty good, actually.

00:06:16.340 | And I'm not very good.

00:06:17.700 | Now it's probably at a low point for me

00:06:20.020 | because, so when I started training for that,

00:06:22.020 | I was like 215 pounds, which is the heaviest I've ever been.

00:06:24.100 | I came off my hip surgery.

00:06:25.260 | I literally, like when I said, yes, like I'll do it,

00:06:29.820 | like I literally started working out like the week before

00:06:32.020 | for the first time in my, you know,

00:06:34.020 | instance of surgery 'cause I wasn't able to do anything.

00:06:37.140 | So could I perform better?

00:06:39.820 | Yeah, but now after watching him box Tyron,

00:06:41.940 | like if you ask me, Ben, can you beat Tyron?

00:06:44.660 | Probably not.

00:06:46.180 | I don't think I can beat Tyron.

00:06:47.980 | So-- - In boxing.

00:06:48.820 | - In boxing, yeah.

00:06:50.540 | So my chances of beating him, you know,

00:06:52.260 | and watching that card, it's like, damn,

00:06:55.220 | like can't it be fun to box someone who I know sucks,

00:06:58.100 | who I know can beat?

00:06:58.940 | That's what would be fun, you know?

00:07:00.780 | 'Cause like the training, the preparation was fun,

00:07:03.940 | but then obviously I got my butt kicked.

00:07:06.140 | That sucked, you know?

00:07:07.740 | Can I swear on this podcast?

00:07:08.820 | - Yeah, of course.

00:07:09.660 | - Okay, well, I was gonna drop an F-bomb,

00:07:10.500 | but I wasn't quite sure.

00:07:11.340 | - I think that sucked is a swear.

00:07:14.100 | You could drop all of the F-bombs you want.

00:07:16.820 | So preparation-wise, do you think you were more prepared

00:07:20.460 | for that fight or the Jordan Burroughs exhibition?

00:07:25.340 | I mean, like how did you approach it mentally, you know?

00:07:31.420 | - Well, the Burroughs thing, I obviously,

00:07:33.060 | so okay, so when I retired the first time in 2017,

00:07:36.260 | Burroughs was the only current, like we'll say,

00:07:39.420 | really elite level wrestler that I'd never trained with.

00:07:42.140 | I was really good friends with Nebraska's

00:07:43.980 | head of the system coach, still am.

00:07:45.540 | And I said, "Hey, I'm gonna pay my own way.

00:07:47.460 | "I wanna come down and train with Jordan

00:07:48.540 | "'cause I wanna see what it feels like.

00:07:50.080 | "You know, I wanna get in there and mix it up.

00:07:51.520 | "I'm mixing it up with David Taylor and Kyle Dake.

00:07:54.000 | "I mean, there's just something about wrestling that I love."

00:07:57.300 | And so I flew myself down there in January of 2018,

00:08:00.460 | and I spent four days training with Jordan.

00:08:02.220 | It was a really good time.

00:08:03.660 | It gave me some great insight into how he thinks

00:08:06.420 | and what a great champion he is.

00:08:09.100 | - What was it like training with him?

00:08:11.020 | Can you give some insights?

00:08:12.140 | - Yeah, of course.

00:08:12.980 | - Like what the, like how hard is the live training?

00:08:17.980 | Is it more drilling?

00:08:19.500 | Is it technical?

00:08:20.340 | Like how does his, it seems like his style

00:08:23.860 | is very different than yours.

00:08:25.380 | So how does that match up in the room

00:08:26.980 | in terms of like what you learn from each other,

00:08:29.260 | that kind of thing?

00:08:30.100 | - We only went full live for one,

00:08:31.740 | I think it was like a 12 or 15 minute go

00:08:33.540 | where we would just go wrestle.

00:08:35.500 | We did a bunch of simulated live.

00:08:38.700 | But obviously he had, so I was a senior in college

00:08:41.940 | and he was a freshman at Nebraska.

00:08:43.340 | And so we, our teams had dueled each other.

00:08:45.060 | He was obviously a lot smaller at that point in time.

00:08:47.460 | But he had followed my career.

00:08:49.140 | And so when I went in there, it was like,

00:08:51.900 | "Hey, I know you're really good at this position.

00:08:54.300 | "What about this position?

00:08:55.260 | "What are you trying to do?

00:08:56.100 | "How exactly does it work?

00:08:57.660 | "And then let's wrestle there."

00:08:59.340 | You know?

00:09:00.180 | And then, "Hey, what about this position?"

00:09:01.700 | And so we would spend 30 to 40 minutes

00:09:05.500 | talking about that position.

00:09:07.580 | - On the ground or?

00:09:08.940 | - It was like, one was a chest wrapper,

00:09:10.860 | one was a headlock,

00:09:11.700 | one was a, I don't know how to really,

00:09:13.340 | it's called, we call it the lightning dump,

00:09:14.780 | but it's a--

00:09:15.900 | - The lightning dump?

00:09:16.980 | - Yeah, I named, my buddy's name

00:09:18.420 | was Lightning Luke Smith in high school

00:09:19.900 | and he was the first person I saw do it.

00:09:21.300 | So usually when I see someone do something,

00:09:23.260 | then I name that move after them.

00:09:24.940 | - Got it.

00:09:25.780 | - I know, right?

00:09:27.740 | Great name.

00:09:28.580 | - It's a good name.

00:09:29.420 | - Yeah, but so what I said with that is like,

00:09:32.020 | he was still trying to be the best in the world.

00:09:33.540 | I was just trying to go work out with Jordan Burroughs

00:09:35.020 | 'cause I enjoy wrestling.

00:09:36.260 | Is like someone who, at that point,

00:09:40.180 | what he has five world titles at that,

00:09:42.220 | four or five at that point a lot.

00:09:44.380 | And so I used it with my high school kids.

00:09:45.460 | It's like, hey, this is a guy who's the best in the world

00:09:47.980 | who's bringing someone in and saying,

00:09:49.860 | well, how do I do this?

00:09:50.740 | How do I do that?

00:09:51.560 | What about this?

00:09:52.400 | What about that?

00:09:53.220 | And so the level of inquisitiveness,

00:09:55.660 | that's a hard word, inquisitiveness he has,

00:09:58.380 | is really impressive.

00:09:59.460 | And then it's obvious why he got to the level he did

00:10:01.660 | because he's figuring out all these little situations.

00:10:04.180 | And that's honestly one of the biggest things

00:10:05.820 | I think wrestlers,

00:10:07.740 | a lot of wrestlers fail to do as they get older,

00:10:09.900 | even when they get to early college age,

00:10:11.740 | they say, this is my style, this is what I do.

00:10:14.140 | I'm gonna lift and work out hard

00:10:16.260 | and I'm not gonna add anything to my game.

00:10:19.260 | Whereas you've seen many progressions

00:10:21.580 | in Jordan Burroughs' game,

00:10:22.420 | he just made his 10th world team.

00:10:24.460 | And if you have a really keen eye,

00:10:27.540 | you've been able to watch him change.

00:10:30.220 | I've been watching him since he's done seven.

00:10:32.220 | He's changed so much

00:10:34.180 | and obviously still maintained a world-class level

00:10:36.620 | almost the entire time.

00:10:38.780 | - When you say change, what changed?

00:10:40.900 | 'Cause he's got that double leg.

00:10:42.980 | - But he doesn't have that double anymore.

00:10:44.500 | - What's that?

00:10:45.340 | - He hit his double leg for the first time

00:10:46.260 | against Alex Deirdre, he hadn't hit it in years.

00:10:48.780 | Yeah, so that's like,

00:10:49.860 | when people think about Jordan Burroughs,

00:10:51.220 | they think about the double leg

00:10:52.260 | 'cause in his early years,

00:10:54.260 | fire, he had a great double leg.

00:10:56.380 | So in those years, I would say

00:10:57.940 | the biggest thing with Jordan Burroughs' double leg

00:11:01.540 | wasn't his level of explosiveness,

00:11:04.100 | it was his level of persistence.

00:11:05.780 | He would shoot and shoot and shoot and shoot.

00:11:08.300 | And a lot of times it would be from fun, creative angles

00:11:11.020 | and out of scramble, boom, all the sudden he's on you.

00:11:13.380 | And he was just super persistent with it

00:11:15.500 | and I think that was probably the key.

00:11:17.460 | And then you saw,

00:11:19.700 | when he came out to win the first World Championship

00:11:21.500 | in 2011, it was kind of that type of mentality.

00:11:24.140 | And then shortly after then,

00:11:25.340 | obviously everyone was starting to lower their stance,

00:11:26.940 | getting lower and he developed a really good

00:11:28.940 | Mantis go-behind series

00:11:30.420 | where he would go one way, the other way.

00:11:32.340 | Then he started developing a really good

00:11:33.700 | low single ankle pick type thing.

00:11:36.580 | And then his hand fighting got really tremendous,

00:11:39.700 | like 15, 16, 17, his hand fighting was really good.

00:11:43.140 | And now I just commented at the 21 trials,

00:11:45.940 | a few of the defensive sequences he got into,

00:11:47.820 | it's like, holy shit, just not from an athletic standpoint,

00:11:50.740 | from a technical standpoint,

00:11:51.900 | the things he were doing were just tremendous.

00:11:53.820 | So I've seen him as someone who's continued

00:11:56.460 | to reinvent themselves over the course

00:11:58.660 | of the last 10, 12 years.

00:12:00.740 | - Especially as a junior and senior in college,

00:12:04.540 | you're exceptionally dominant.

00:12:06.620 | If you were to face him at both of your peaks

00:12:09.540 | of NCAA wrestling, could you beat him?

00:12:13.160 | And if you can beat him, of course you can beat him.

00:12:16.880 | How do you solve the Jordan Burroughs problem?

00:12:20.660 | - Well, so for a folk style wrestling standpoint.

00:12:23.140 | - Folk style, yes.

00:12:23.980 | - Folk style, so he had some competitive matches

00:12:27.140 | as junior and senior year, he had a 2-1 win over,

00:12:29.700 | or maybe it's 3-2 over Michael Chandler,

00:12:31.460 | who is my teammate who's fighting UFC now.

00:12:33.820 | He had a 2-1 win over Tyler Caldwell.

00:12:36.700 | So I think you can glean some insight into that.

00:12:39.540 | He got so mad about this up on a podcast.

00:12:42.580 | So during corona, we had to make up all kinds

00:12:44.260 | of bullshit to talk about.

00:12:45.860 | And we were doing like the last 10 years, best 165s.

00:12:49.260 | And I said, Kyle Dake would ride him for over a minute.

00:12:51.980 | He got so mad, he wanted to come on the podcast

00:12:53.700 | the next day, so hopefully he doesn't listen to this.

00:12:55.820 | Fuck you, man.

00:12:56.660 | But you know.

00:12:58.900 | - When was this?

00:12:59.820 | This is during corona.

00:13:00.780 | - Corona, last year.

00:13:01.940 | He got mad, we were talking about--

00:13:03.260 | - Before the trials.

00:13:04.260 | - Yeah, correct, yeah.

00:13:05.260 | So Michael Chandler rode him for two minutes plus,

00:13:09.260 | and that was his junior year, not his senior year,

00:13:11.060 | sure, right, but it's close.

00:13:14.100 | So I think there's some things there.

00:13:15.660 | I think the interesting thing would be

00:13:17.020 | if I would have stuck around, right,

00:13:19.260 | so I chose to go into mixed martial arts after 2008,

00:13:22.180 | I would have been 74 and he would have been 74,

00:13:23.860 | so we would have had to wrestle.

00:13:24.780 | And then I think that the freestyle Jordan Burroughs puzzle

00:13:27.300 | is a lot more difficult to solve

00:13:29.220 | than the folk style Jordan Burroughs puzzle.

00:13:31.060 | And I think he would acknowledge

00:13:33.540 | that he's much better at freestyle

00:13:35.580 | than he was at folk style.

00:13:37.260 | Although he was very good, he's better.

00:13:39.180 | - Does his raw speed, explosiveness,

00:13:42.940 | present a problem to you?

00:13:44.300 | - Well, so he was never,

00:13:46.060 | I mean, he didn't really excel on the mat

00:13:48.500 | in kind of either style.

00:13:49.780 | In freestyle, he has got some good lace transitions,

00:13:53.140 | but in folk style, his entire college career,

00:13:55.740 | I think he has like 10 pins, which is almost nothing.

00:13:59.380 | So he was gaining no value off the top position.

00:14:03.180 | He was good enough on most people to get off bottom

00:14:05.500 | without it being an issue, but it wasn't like,

00:14:07.740 | oh my gosh, this is an area where we really have

00:14:09.500 | to be careful, there's a lot of things here.

00:14:11.780 | You know, it's just, he wasn't gaining value there.

00:14:13.920 | Whereas in freestyle, I don't wanna say never,

00:14:17.380 | but the amount of times he gets turned is incredibly rare,

00:14:19.940 | very, very rare.

00:14:21.220 | And he does have like lace transitions,

00:14:23.020 | so he gets a lot of points there.

00:14:24.100 | So, and obviously freestyle is,

00:14:27.660 | it can be geared way more in the neutral position, right?

00:14:30.220 | Where we're only doing takedowns, so yeah.

00:14:32.780 | - Were you surprised that he lost to Dake in the trials,

00:14:37.220 | to Kyle Dake?

00:14:38.900 | - Oh, Kyle's so, he's so good, right?

00:14:41.140 | I mean, I think his performance in the Olympics was,

00:14:44.440 | was his loss then was shocking to,

00:14:47.660 | I mean, we never seen that happen to Kyle Dake.

00:14:49.820 | You know, he's been a guy who's competed

00:14:52.020 | with Jordan Burroughs forever,

00:14:53.620 | and obviously he was on the losing side for a while,

00:14:55.300 | and now he's on the winning side.

00:14:57.940 | But I think a lot of people thought it was a coin flip,

00:15:00.700 | and I think actually Kyle Dake made it feel like

00:15:03.700 | it's not a coin flip.

00:15:05.060 | Now, to me, it feels like Kyle Dake is gonna win

00:15:07.700 | that match significantly more times than he isn't,

00:15:10.220 | is what it feels like.

00:15:11.420 | - Yeah, I forgot which trials it was.

00:15:14.260 | Was it four years ago where Kyle Dake threw him,

00:15:19.260 | like he, you saw inklings of like,

00:15:23.540 | "Oh, wow, there might be eventually a changing of the guard."

00:15:27.060 | - Yeah, so at 13, Kyle came out and he had the one throw,

00:15:31.900 | but then he lost one of the matches decisively.

00:15:34.620 | And then he was hurt in 14,

00:15:37.820 | and in 16, Kyle Dake actually went up to 86 kilograms.

00:15:41.260 | So in actually in 16, at the trials we had,

00:15:45.140 | so Jake Herbert was number one seed.

00:15:46.500 | He was former, as Guy Russell,

00:15:47.980 | I was a former world silver medalist.

00:15:50.220 | So you had David Taylor, who had not made a team yet,

00:15:52.700 | who is now a world champion, Olympic champion.

00:15:54.780 | You had Kyle Dake in the bracket,

00:15:56.420 | who was a two-time world champion now.

00:15:59.020 | And you had Jaden Cox in the bracket,

00:16:00.500 | who had not made any teams yet,

00:16:01.740 | but is now what, a four-time world medals,

00:16:03.900 | two-time world champion.

00:16:05.020 | So, and then obviously Jaden came out on top of that,

00:16:07.460 | won his first Olympic medal, Olympic bronze medal.

00:16:10.660 | So Kyle didn't wrestle Jordan in 16.

00:16:14.020 | And Kyle's contention the whole time,

00:16:17.440 | and they argued about this.

00:16:19.380 | So I actually did a little bit of backstabbing.

00:16:21.300 | Well, it's not backstabbing.

00:16:22.420 | Both of them or just one of them?

00:16:23.500 | I didn't tell any of them.

00:16:24.500 | Okay, so Jordan got mad.

00:16:25.980 | So we talked about this fake match during Corona, right?

00:16:28.420 | Yeah.

00:16:29.260 | We had to make up something to talk about.

00:16:30.460 | Yeah, of course.

00:16:31.300 | 'Cause there's obviously no matches.

00:16:32.420 | So we talked about this fake match and--

00:16:34.420 | Do you stand behind that statement, by the way?

00:16:36.180 | Listen, here's what I said.

00:16:37.620 | Kyle Dake's four-time NCAA champion.

00:16:39.700 | Yes, I said, you gotta pick a winner.

00:16:42.340 | I said, Kyle Dake wins two-one on a minute and six ride time,

00:16:45.620 | which I mean, is literally, we're talking as close as it gets,

00:16:49.300 | as close as it gets for Kyle Dake,

00:16:50.860 | who's a four-time NCAA champion.

00:16:52.620 | I'm sorry, we're talking--

00:16:54.420 | Over Jordan Burroughs.

00:16:55.420 | Over Jordan Burroughs.

00:16:56.500 | In a folks style match.

00:16:57.340 | In a folks style match.

00:16:58.380 | Hypothetically.

00:16:59.220 | In college or now?

00:17:00.060 | Completely hypothetical.

00:17:00.880 | Now or in college?

00:17:01.720 | In college.

00:17:02.540 | Both of them at their peaks at 165 pounds.

00:17:04.740 | So completely hypothetical.

00:17:07.020 | And so Jordan called in, he was all pissed at me

00:17:10.580 | for picking Kyle Dake.

00:17:11.820 | He wants to come on the next day and argue his point.

00:17:14.740 | So I said, "F that, that's dumb.

00:17:16.940 | "We need to pick a winner.

00:17:17.820 | "We need to do something hypothetical."

00:17:19.140 | So then I called Kyle Dake and I said,

00:17:20.460 | "Kyle, Jordan's gonna come on and argue his case

00:17:22.180 | "in the morning.

00:17:23.140 | "If he's gonna do that,

00:17:24.080 | "why don't you come in and argue your case?"

00:17:26.360 | So no one else knew Kyle was coming on the podcast.

00:17:29.700 | So they both show up and they went at it.

00:17:32.500 | But one of the contentions Kyle had for years,

00:17:34.900 | and there's still this rule,

00:17:36.300 | if you win a world level medal,

00:17:38.880 | the following year, you sit out until the very end

00:17:42.640 | of the American trials.

00:17:44.700 | And they do a best two or three.

00:17:46.660 | So every time previously that Kyle had wrestled Jordan,

00:17:49.900 | he had to come through a tournament on Saturday,

00:17:52.860 | okay, probably three matches.

00:17:54.620 | And then on Sunday, he would wrestle Jordan

00:17:56.860 | in a best two out of three, right?

00:17:58.220 | So his contention was,

00:17:59.300 | "I'm only wrestling Jordan at a disadvantage

00:18:01.200 | "'cause I have to compete on Saturday."

00:18:02.860 | And then competing on, which it's a fair argument.

00:18:04.900 | It really is.

00:18:05.720 | But I also see USA Wrestling's point is like,

00:18:08.500 | if someone wins a world medal,

00:18:10.140 | we're gonna reward them

00:18:11.060 | 'cause we want that person on the team again.

00:18:13.540 | - It's crazy though that you're,

00:18:15.220 | like Kyle Dake had to wrestle,

00:18:16.860 | 'cause he's not wrestling bums in that division.

00:18:18.900 | - Not bums, yeah.

00:18:19.740 | - And then, yeah, I don't know.

00:18:22.260 | I don't know how wrestlers do it.

00:18:23.580 | 'Cause you have to go to war like three matches

00:18:28.340 | and then face Jordan Burroughs.

00:18:30.060 | - Yeah, especially a few of those years

00:18:31.600 | with Dake had the name Andrew Howe,

00:18:34.660 | but those were really competitive matches.

00:18:36.760 | David Taylor had really competitive matches with him.

00:18:38.620 | Isaiah Martinez even got in there, Deiringer.

00:18:40.340 | So he had some really competitive matches

00:18:42.140 | before he ever got to Jordan Burroughs.

00:18:44.720 | So I never answered your initial question was,

00:18:46.920 | how did I feel?

00:18:47.860 | So the Jordan Burroughs match,

00:18:50.020 | I was not in wrestling shape at all.

00:18:52.380 | Meaning wrestling's heavily dependent,

00:18:53.660 | especially neutral positions,

00:18:54.580 | heavily dependent on timing and other things.

00:18:56.540 | I was wrestling very, very minimally

00:18:58.500 | 'cause I started fighting again.

00:19:00.700 | So like my athletic shape was great,

00:19:03.860 | but it was mainly for fighting, I wasn't wrestling.

00:19:06.140 | So I think they were actually trying to do Burroughs-Dake

00:19:11.140 | beat the streets.

00:19:12.680 | It's the biggest fundraiser in wrestling every single year.

00:19:14.800 | - In New York?

00:19:15.640 | - In New York City.

00:19:16.760 | They usually raise like a million dollars.

00:19:18.200 | They started all these programs in New York City.

00:19:21.480 | I really wonder what they're doing with the money now

00:19:22.640 | 'cause they probably can't have the kids wrestling

00:19:24.080 | because New York's crazy.

00:19:25.840 | Anyway.

00:19:26.680 | - I think New York figures out a way

00:19:27.680 | what to do with the money.

00:19:28.840 | Hence Michael Malice complaining

00:19:30.720 | that they're corrupt and all that.

00:19:32.280 | - But it goes to the Beat the Streets organization

00:19:34.240 | who then starts the clubs in New York.

00:19:35.640 | So I don't know what to do with the money.

00:19:36.720 | Anyway, so I was called like, I don't know,

00:19:39.680 | two weeks before the event and said,

00:19:41.800 | hey, someone wants to wrestle Jordan Burroughs

00:19:44.840 | that fell out, would you wrestle him?

00:19:48.320 | I said, yeah, sure, why not?

00:19:49.720 | You know, and it's like, listen,

00:19:51.640 | I trained with them for four days the year before.

00:19:55.520 | I had a pretty good idea how the match was gonna go.

00:19:57.520 | Wasn't gonna go so well for me.

00:19:59.240 | But it's like, okay, you're missing a main event.

00:20:01.040 | I can bring, because of where I'm at right now in my life,

00:20:03.720 | I can bring a lot of attention to wrestling.

00:20:05.200 | I can help you guys raise a bunch of money

00:20:06.840 | for Beat the Streets.

00:20:08.280 | My goal is I think I thought I could get one takedown

00:20:11.000 | or turn on him was kind of my goal for the match.

00:20:13.880 | I didn't get there.

00:20:15.480 | - You went kind of hard.

00:20:16.640 | - He went hard, yeah, that asshole wouldn't give me a point.

00:20:18.640 | - Yeah, that--

00:20:19.480 | (laughing)

00:20:20.440 | - I said, this is bullshit, Jordan.

00:20:21.720 | I told him during the match, like, this is bullshit.

00:20:23.680 | You're fucking going too hard right now.

00:20:25.480 | I'm not a wrestler anymore, I'm a fighter.

00:20:27.440 | I'm coming in here, so.

00:20:28.640 | Yeah, so I had a really good idea.

00:20:30.200 | I mean, we wrestled together.

00:20:31.480 | I think, and he'll probably get mad,

00:20:33.400 | 'cause I think in the live go,

00:20:35.520 | we did like the 12 or 15 minutes.

00:20:36.960 | I think I actually scored a takedown in that, I believe.

00:20:39.360 | Maybe, or maybe it was a turn.

00:20:40.880 | He'll probably say, no, I didn't, but whatever.

00:20:43.560 | Yeah, so I knew what was gonna happen.

00:20:45.840 | I knew what the outcome was gonna be.

00:20:47.920 | I knew I could probably,

00:20:48.760 | I was hoping I could stay competitive

00:20:49.960 | and maybe lose like 10-2 or something, like, yeah.

00:20:53.720 | - Well, let's walk back, 'cause I think

00:20:56.480 | I originally brought it up in terms of

00:20:58.320 | how prepared were you against Jake Paul

00:21:01.520 | versus Jordan Burroughs.

00:21:03.520 | So did you prepare for Jake cardio-wise?

00:21:07.360 | - Yeah, I worked hard.

00:21:08.840 | Yeah, I did.

00:21:09.680 | But it was, I told you, I started training for my,

00:21:13.400 | I mean, once I had my hip surgery,

00:21:15.760 | they said, you know, for the first six weeks,

00:21:18.040 | you can't even walk.

00:21:19.480 | And it was hard for me to listen to 'em,

00:21:20.920 | 'cause by week four and a half, five,

00:21:23.560 | I was feeling pretty good, I wanted to get into my crutches.

00:21:25.280 | But I'm like, you know what,

00:21:26.520 | this is for the rest of my life.

00:21:28.520 | And if you get the, so if you get the real hip replacement,

00:21:31.240 | there's no wrestling, there's no nothing, right?

00:21:33.240 | So that's the next step.

00:21:34.200 | So, okay, I'm gonna take this serious.

00:21:35.920 | So I do my crutches for six weeks.

00:21:37.600 | The next six weeks, it's still like really low weight bearing,

00:21:41.800 | can't do anything, you know?

00:21:43.320 | So then I get done with the three months,

00:21:45.440 | which is like January, and I'm like, okay,

00:21:48.080 | I should start working out.

00:21:49.080 | So I started riding a bike a little bit.

00:21:50.440 | And then, okay, now I'm fat, I'm fucking fat,

00:21:53.280 | I'm gonna get in better shape,

00:21:54.160 | 'cause I haven't been able to do anything.

00:21:55.040 | So I'm actually start working out.

00:21:56.920 | And then that happened, right?

00:21:59.400 | So I'm like, okay, well, now I got three months,

00:22:01.360 | and it gives me a good reason to get back in shape.

00:22:03.960 | And I knew I wasn't gonna be a full-time boxer,

00:22:08.800 | so it's like, okay, how do I put a boxing camp together?

00:22:11.400 | So I found, I had my old teammate, Mike Rhodes,

00:22:14.400 | he came up and kind of lived with me-ish kind of thing

00:22:18.200 | for three months.

00:22:19.920 | I found a couple of this guy, K9, out of Michigan.

00:22:23.080 | He came over three weeks, he was great.

00:22:25.520 | I went to Freddie Roach for a week.

00:22:26.960 | So I kind of like, you know,

00:22:28.840 | tried to get as many good ideas as I could.

00:22:31.000 | And my thought was like, okay, well, if this dude sucks,

00:22:34.200 | I can just be tough and block a few punches,

00:22:36.600 | get him tired, and then beat him up.

00:22:38.240 | If he's good, there's probably not much I'm gonna do

00:22:40.560 | about it in the next three months,

00:22:41.520 | 'cause I was never good at boxing in the first place.

00:22:44.200 | All of my stand-up and mixed martial arts

00:22:45.880 | was predicated on how do I get through

00:22:48.440 | the two or three punches that are gonna come at me

00:22:50.320 | in the time I need to get ahold of them.

00:22:52.360 | You know, you only have to make two or three of them miss,

00:22:54.940 | and then boom, you're on top of them, at least for me.

00:22:57.820 | That was all my striking was predicated on.

00:22:59.400 | It wasn't about, hey, I'm gonna do damage on the feet

00:23:01.560 | in order to make something else happen.

00:23:02.720 | It was like, how do I clear this barrier, get ahold of you?

00:23:06.680 | And I actually did the math one time.

00:23:08.520 | I think I got a takedown,

00:23:09.840 | if you include the knockout round against Miles Vidal,

00:23:14.200 | I got a takedown in every round except two.

00:23:16.160 | So it was like 53 out of 55 rounds in MMA,

00:23:18.800 | I got a takedown.

00:23:19.940 | - Wow. - Somewhere in there.

00:23:21.640 | - Okay, so you're hunting the takedown once you--

00:23:24.400 | - Right away. - Once you get

00:23:26.680 | your hands on them, you get the takedown.

00:23:28.520 | - Yeah. - Okay.

00:23:30.480 | But the incredible thing about you,

00:23:32.240 | I just recently talked,

00:23:35.520 | spent a couple of days with Jimmy Pedro,

00:23:37.960 | and he talked about his guys and just champions in general,

00:23:42.960 | hating to lose more than they love winning.

00:23:46.580 | And the way you talked about losing,

00:23:49.080 | you lost very few times in your career,

00:23:51.160 | like later, you were dominating both the wrestling and MMA.

00:23:56.480 | But the way you took these losses against people

00:23:58.760 | that are, I don't know, below elite level.

00:24:03.080 | - It's fair.

00:24:03.920 | I was gonna get pissy, but it's completely fair.

00:24:07.940 | I thought he was a bum too.

00:24:09.160 | - No, that's not what I meant.

00:24:10.400 | Oh, man, I'm in trouble.

00:24:11.480 | - It's okay, no, it's good.

00:24:13.920 | - But what, can you explain the psychology behind that?

00:24:17.240 | Is there a system behind this?

00:24:21.120 | Is there a philosophy behind this?

00:24:22.680 | - Well, so I wasn't very good in the beginning.

00:24:26.240 | And I think that's where it all starts from.

00:24:27.880 | So I didn't start getting good until the age of like 13.

00:24:31.040 | I started at five.

00:24:32.480 | I probably started competing more at age 10, 11.

00:24:35.640 | Didn't really get good till 13, and still at 13,

00:24:38.280 | I'm saying I'm great, I'm getting better, right?

00:24:41.400 | I'm pretty good.

00:24:42.920 | So actually, I have written this book on sports psych,

00:24:46.220 | but I got someone to write it for me kind of thing,

00:24:49.880 | 'cause I've had this philosophy for years

00:24:51.520 | that there has to be this balance between two things, right?

00:24:54.240 | So on the one hand, in this category,

00:24:56.560 | on the one hand, you have hating to lose.

00:24:59.120 | A great champion has to hate to lose, like you said, right?

00:25:02.080 | But on this other hand,

00:25:03.000 | you have to have someone who seeks out challenges, right?

00:25:07.920 | 'Cause if you don't have that,

00:25:08.840 | you're never gonna reach your full potential either.

00:25:10.560 | And so you have to balance these two balls

00:25:12.960 | at the same time, right?

00:25:14.320 | And so like for me, I always,

00:25:16.760 | and this is maybe 'cause I wasn't good,

00:25:18.320 | but I was always like,

00:25:19.360 | let me go find the best people to wrestle all the time.

00:25:21.520 | Let me go find, I would like literally,

00:25:24.140 | like seventh grade when I was starting to get better,

00:25:26.280 | it was like, and this is on the internet.

00:25:28.000 | Well, no one was using the internet.

00:25:30.080 | It was like a wrestling magazine.

00:25:31.200 | And be like, "Hey, dad, there's a tournament here.

00:25:32.960 | I think that, are the kids gonna be there?

00:25:34.240 | Can you take me two hours across the state today, please?"

00:25:37.760 | - You would wrestle like in competition against them?

00:25:40.200 | - In competition, yeah, yeah, in competition.

00:25:42.040 | "Hey, I heard there's this tournament.

00:25:43.560 | Here's the magazine, it says this tournament.

00:25:45.640 | Hey, dad, will you take me over there tomorrow?"

00:25:47.040 | - You weren't trying to win,

00:25:48.640 | you were trying to get the experience?

00:25:50.280 | - I was trying to wrestle the best guys.

00:25:51.840 | Maybe I win, maybe I lose.

00:25:53.000 | There's no, when you do a competition,

00:25:54.700 | there's no guarantee of a win or a loss.

00:25:57.180 | You're just doing competition, right?

00:25:58.780 | So I wanted to go, I wanted to challenge myself

00:26:01.140 | against the best guys,

00:26:02.660 | of which I thought maybe I could come out on top, right?

00:26:05.100 | So like eighth grade year, I won way, way,

00:26:07.660 | you know, I probably lost a handful of times

00:26:09.900 | in the state of Wisconsin.

00:26:11.300 | It was probably really, really minimal

00:26:12.460 | the amount of times I lost, you know?

00:26:13.940 | But it was just about getting the challenge.

00:26:15.540 | And it's like some kids, and not kids in my club,

00:26:19.220 | 'cause I'll push them very hard on this,

00:26:20.580 | are scared of challenging themselves.

00:26:22.780 | They like being the big fish in the small pond.

00:26:25.360 | They're not willing to go say,

00:26:26.840 | "I wanna go get that guy, and I wanna get that guy,

00:26:29.040 | and I wanna get that guy."

00:26:30.140 | And so that's like, so I think that's part of it for me,

00:26:33.000 | is like, I always just loved the challenge.

00:26:34.560 | I enjoyed competing thoroughly, right?

00:26:36.940 | And I understood from a young age,

00:26:38.600 | because I wasn't very good, losing's a part of it.

00:26:40.560 | You're not always gonna win.

00:26:41.880 | And that was kind of it.

00:26:43.040 | It's like, hey, sometimes, you know,

00:26:44.780 | and for my MMA career, I never planned it to go that way,

00:26:49.280 | but yeah, I didn't lose for nine years.

00:26:51.200 | And like, that's pretty rare.

00:26:52.600 | I didn't plan for that to happen.

00:26:54.340 | That was just what happened.

00:26:55.660 | - Okay, but you also didn't lose, like,

00:26:58.840 | the second part of your college career.

00:27:00.640 | - My 87, I won my last 87 matches, yeah.

00:27:03.760 | - So that didn't come along with the hatred of losing?

00:27:08.160 | You just--

00:27:09.000 | - I don't like losing, I still don't like it.

00:27:10.600 | - Yeah.

00:27:11.440 | - Yeah, I would have much rather--

00:27:12.480 | - Okay, but you don't, you don't seem,

00:27:15.960 | you seem to kind of shrug it off a little bit.

00:27:18.200 | - Okay, so like, specifically with these two instances

00:27:20.740 | that you bring up.

00:27:21.580 | The Masvidal, it feels definitely, so, okay.

00:27:25.560 | - All right, let's--

00:27:26.400 | - Let's go deep, let's go deep.

00:27:27.240 | So the Masvidal one, it feels different, 'cause--

00:27:29.800 | - So, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

00:27:31.840 | Let's, for people who don't know,

00:27:34.240 | Masvidal loss was your first loss.

00:27:36.400 | - First loss in MMA, yes.

00:27:38.000 | - Yeah.

00:27:38.840 | - Yeah.

00:27:39.660 | - Yeah, and I mean, it was a dramatic loss.

00:27:41.480 | - Very dramatic.

00:27:42.320 | - And there was this kind of buildup

00:27:44.320 | as you were potentially one of the greats

00:27:47.080 | of all time coming into this fight.

00:27:50.960 | And so, this pressure, all of that.

00:27:53.780 | - So, no, I mean, I was thoroughly enjoying it.

00:27:56.220 | I didn't feel the pressure.

00:27:58.220 | So the Masvidal fight is,

00:27:59.960 | he got one fucking move on me.

00:28:03.060 | It's not like he beat me.

00:28:04.460 | And if we do that again, I think I win.

00:28:06.440 | At that point in my life, for sure,

00:28:08.580 | I think I win way, way, way more times than I lose.

00:28:12.300 | He knew that too, that's why he didn't want,

00:28:13.860 | he didn't want to sign the body agreement.

00:28:15.500 | That's why I had to taunt him and why he got so mad,

00:28:17.060 | 'cause I had to continue to taunt him

00:28:18.220 | in order to get him to sign, right?

00:28:21.160 | So that one hurt because,

00:28:23.120 | and some people don't know my MMA career,

00:28:24.240 | I'll just go through it fast.

00:28:25.080 | I did three fights in smaller leagues.

00:28:27.500 | I got signed by Bellator.

00:28:28.600 | I was undefeated for three and a half years.

00:28:30.560 | I was nine and O.

00:28:31.500 | When I got done with that in 2012, no, 2013,

00:28:36.540 | at that point in my head,

00:28:39.560 | I was just gonna transition to the UFC,

00:28:41.400 | 'cause that's where you go.

00:28:42.400 | I was ranked like sixth in the world.

00:28:44.200 | I hadn't really had a competitive match

00:28:46.560 | at the end of the Bellator thing.

00:28:48.600 | And Dana White, for a reason still unknown to me,

00:28:51.620 | we still haven't had this conversation,

00:28:52.820 | I wish I could ask him, I should ask him sometime,

00:28:55.620 | chose to refuse me any entry in the UFC.

00:28:58.540 | He just said, I went to his office,

00:29:01.500 | and he literally said, we're not interested,

00:29:03.780 | we're not gonna make you an offer.

00:29:05.420 | - Did you mention something to, about him, about the UFC?

00:29:09.180 | - That was a year before that.

00:29:10.620 | That was a year before.

00:29:11.460 | And that might play a role in it, I think.

00:29:13.940 | So yes, what happened the year before that was,

00:29:17.540 | I called him a liar, but listen, I'm right on this one,

00:29:20.520 | 'cause he said you can't test for drugs,

00:29:23.000 | 'cause I'm all natural, which you can tell by my physique.

00:29:26.080 | And I was always put off by the fact

00:29:28.920 | that so many people cheated.

00:29:30.680 | And I was very vocal about that.

00:29:32.960 | And so he had made some statement,

00:29:34.800 | like, oh, there's no way you can test.

00:29:36.160 | I said, bullshit, very specifically,

00:29:38.240 | I said, USADA does it for all other sports worldwide.

00:29:42.040 | You can do it.

00:29:42.920 | And then it was funny, 'cause I hired USADA

00:29:44.280 | a couple years later.

00:29:45.400 | So I think he took some offense to that.

00:29:46.860 | But that was like a year and almost a year and a half,

00:29:49.760 | I think, somewhere later.

00:29:52.160 | - It's not like he holds a grudge or anything.

00:29:53.880 | (laughing)

00:29:55.280 | - Yeah, so I literally go to Vegas.

00:29:58.400 | It's a long story, you can read about it other places.

00:30:02.360 | So I got released from a belt.

00:30:03.680 | It's not like this is a negotiation.

00:30:04.960 | I got released from my belt or contract.

00:30:06.400 | I said, I'm outta here.

00:30:07.280 | I'm going to the UFC.

00:30:09.360 | I go to Vegas, and then I was told,

00:30:12.720 | hey, there's no offer for you.

00:30:14.320 | Tough shit, you know?

00:30:15.760 | So then I ended up signing with one championship.

00:30:19.420 | I spent, what, three and a half years there.

00:30:21.720 | I won the belt in my second fight

00:30:23.020 | and retained the title the entire time.

00:30:24.980 | And then I just--

00:30:26.820 | - Again, dominating people.

00:30:27.980 | - Yeah, I didn't have a competitive fight.

00:30:29.820 | And so I retired 18 and 0.

00:30:32.460 | Never, and for someone who loves a challenge,

00:30:34.700 | never getting to really challenge myself

00:30:36.260 | was incredibly frustrating.

00:30:37.940 | And I left the door open.

00:30:39.340 | I said, if I ever get the chance to prove I'm in this world,

00:30:41.700 | I'd love to come back.

00:30:42.900 | So somehow, a year later, I get traded.

00:30:45.960 | Trades have never happened.

00:30:46.800 | This is the one and only trade ever.

00:30:48.700 | I had been retired for a year.

00:30:50.840 | I got traded.

00:30:51.840 | I get to come back.

00:30:52.680 | I fight Robbie Lawler in the first fight.

00:30:54.560 | I win.

00:30:55.520 | And then essentially they're saying,

00:30:56.600 | okay, if you fight, you know,

00:30:58.800 | if you beat George,

00:30:59.760 | you're gonna get the title shot against Marty.

00:31:01.680 | And it's like, this is what I've been working for.

00:31:06.120 | I've been trying to prove I was the best fighter in the world

00:31:07.620 | for the last 10 years,

00:31:08.460 | and I have not been afforded this opportunity.

00:31:12.420 | So when I lost to George, that was hard

00:31:14.320 | because it was something that I had waited for

00:31:18.260 | for a really, really long time.

00:31:20.160 | It was something that I thought I could compete for,

00:31:22.240 | and I never got the opportunity to do.

00:31:23.080 | So that one was hard.

00:31:24.260 | At the same time, from just the competitive logistic,

00:31:27.760 | it's like, he got me with one move.

00:31:29.260 | It wasn't like he beat my ass for 15 minutes

00:31:31.120 | and I got beat a bunch of different ways.

00:31:33.440 | So that was like, fuck, if I get it again,

00:31:36.420 | I could have done it,

00:31:37.260 | but they're not gonna let me have it again.

00:31:38.720 | It's not like wrestling where you could go the next year

00:31:40.680 | or the next week or whatever, you know?

00:31:42.400 | You lose a big 10, you go to Nationals two weeks later.

00:31:45.000 | - Does that loss change you in any way, your psychology?

00:31:48.580 | - I don't think so.

00:31:50.060 | - It's the first loss.

00:31:51.580 | - I mean, had I had a longer MMA career post that,

00:31:56.380 | there definitely would have been a lot of time spent

00:31:58.940 | getting better at the entry point to the takedown, right?

00:32:01.980 | Which I'd already spent time there.

00:32:03.700 | And I hate making excuses, but yeah, the hip,

00:32:06.860 | the hinging of my hip, what I couldn't do

00:32:09.300 | was preventing me from doing some things.

00:32:11.440 | And that's why, if you look at the fight,

00:32:12.980 | I'm like bent over as they go for the double leg.

00:32:15.500 | Yeah, so I--

00:32:16.340 | - So what happened for people who don't know,

00:32:17.300 | you went in for a double leg and he went--

00:32:19.500 | - Flying knee.

00:32:20.340 | - He did a flying knee.

00:32:21.540 | - And the way--

00:32:22.380 | - Caught you well.

00:32:23.200 | - Specifically the way he did that knee

00:32:24.620 | was kind of different than the way

00:32:25.940 | anyone had thrown flying knees before.

00:32:28.380 | Most people go more just from a stand straight vertical,

00:32:31.100 | whereas he took a few like running steps

00:32:33.220 | and went more, you know,

00:32:34.340 | the trajectory of the angle was different.

00:32:37.660 | So I think that's kind of probably why it caught,

00:32:39.780 | you know, I think a lot of things in combat,

00:32:42.440 | well, probably everything,

00:32:43.280 | but I focus specifically on combat,

00:32:44.840 | happens subconsciously, like our brain is reading

00:32:47.120 | what's coming at us.

00:32:48.640 | And a lot of times it's stuff we've seen before

00:32:50.960 | so we can judge how to move correctly.

00:32:53.080 | - And you misread because it's something

00:32:54.760 | you haven't seen before.

00:32:55.600 | - I had not seen him come at that specific angle, yeah.

00:32:58.360 | So that loss was really hard.

00:32:59.840 | With the Burroughs one, I told you,

00:33:02.120 | I knew I was gonna lose.

00:33:03.240 | So it was like, whatever, you know,

00:33:05.320 | I'm taking this because I want to put

00:33:07.800 | the sport of wrestling out there in a big way.

00:33:09.600 | I want to help them raise a lot of money.

00:33:11.020 | We sold the Madison Square Garden Hulu Theater

00:33:13.340 | and we raised a whole bunch of money.

00:33:14.460 | So my goals were accomplished.

00:33:16.280 | Jake Paul fight, I took it because it paid me

00:33:18.420 | a whole bunch of money and I thought it was gonna be fun.

00:33:20.020 | Did I have any illusion?

00:33:21.060 | I was a great boxer, no illusions whatsoever.

00:33:23.700 | Would I have preferred to win?

00:33:25.180 | Absolutely, but you know, like I told everyone,

00:33:27.820 | whether I win or lose on Saturday night,

00:33:29.320 | I'm gonna be back coaching wrestling on Monday

00:33:31.180 | 'cause that's what I enjoy doing.

00:33:32.380 | And I was back coaching wrestling on Monday.

00:33:34.300 | And once a month, these middle school kids

00:33:35.900 | give me a little bit of shit about it and that's it.

00:33:38.580 | - But where were you in terms of your shape

00:33:41.920 | and how you felt in the Masvidal fight?

00:33:44.940 | Would you say you're on the, I mean,

00:33:46.580 | it's a difficult question to ask of a world-class athlete,

00:33:51.020 | but like, were you past peak?

00:33:54.540 | - Oh yeah, yeah.

00:33:55.380 | And I don't know why guys like to lie about that.

00:33:58.020 | I mean, the peak for me was really evidently

00:34:00.460 | in my late 20s and maybe they are all fueled

00:34:04.680 | by extra supplements, I don't know.

00:34:07.420 | But for me, that was evident.

00:34:09.100 | But you get this, so you get this crosshair

00:34:11.620 | where if you're smart, like I mentioned,

00:34:15.220 | Jon Burrows was, you're still gaining wisdom,

00:34:17.380 | you're gaining strategy, gaining a lot of things, right?

00:34:19.820 | And so while your physicality may go down,

00:34:22.140 | your overall skill level still may be rising,

00:34:24.520 | especially in MMA because people usually start later

00:34:28.060 | 'cause they're gaining wisdom, strategy,

00:34:29.860 | all of the, maybe more tools in their toolbox, right?

00:34:32.060 | They're getting all these things.

00:34:32.980 | So their actual competitive peak,

00:34:35.440 | despite their athletic peak going down

00:34:37.100 | might still be a few years past that, right?

00:34:39.860 | Because these things are crossing.

00:34:41.780 | No, so I felt I was great.

00:34:43.400 | Obviously the hip was an issue.

00:34:45.320 | It's funny because so that,

00:34:49.580 | I knew I had a lot of pain here

00:34:51.500 | and I knew it was because of this.

00:34:53.100 | And it was like, okay, whenever I'm done,

00:34:54.260 | I'll just get it taken care of, whatever.

00:34:56.580 | But every time I train, I have pain kind of like

00:34:58.680 | all up my back.

00:35:00.260 | And the day after the surgery, I woke up

00:35:03.140 | and there was no pain on the right side of my,

00:35:05.380 | the surgery was on the left side.

00:35:06.500 | There's no pain on the right side of my back.

00:35:07.740 | I'm like, that's fucking weird.

00:35:09.020 | Like every morning I wake up,

00:35:10.260 | there's a lot of pain there, you know?

00:35:12.160 | I'm like, okay, well, I'm on pain pills.

00:35:14.500 | Maybe it'll come back tomorrow.

00:35:16.140 | And that's 'cause I never have been back since my hip surgery.

00:35:19.180 | So it was weird 'cause it was like this.

00:35:21.260 | I thought this was affecting this,

00:35:23.160 | but it was affecting all the way across my whole back.

00:35:26.480 | So if I get to get a new hip, honestly,

00:35:28.740 | if I, I don't know if it's gonna change

00:35:31.500 | the competitive outcome whatsoever.

00:35:33.700 | If I had known how good the hip replacement was gonna be,

00:35:36.620 | I would have done it the second I retired

00:35:38.580 | from one championship in November of 2017.

00:35:41.560 | I would have had my hip surgery scheduled for December 1.

00:35:44.820 | Just from a lifestyle standpoint,

00:35:46.340 | I could only sleep in one position.

00:35:48.460 | There was a lot of things I couldn't do.

00:35:49.660 | I was in a lot of pain.

00:35:51.280 | So I would have done that a lot earlier.

00:35:52.780 | But no, from an athletic point, I was ready to,

00:35:55.780 | this shit goes wrong sometimes.

00:35:57.340 | - I don't know how to ask this, but you know,

00:36:00.460 | Joe Rogan, me, had a sense about you similar to like Fedor,

00:36:05.460 | that you are potentially one of the greatest ever.

00:36:11.120 | - Yeah.

00:36:12.140 | - Does it hurt that you're not in the discussion now

00:36:15.500 | of being in the top 10 of all time?

00:36:19.500 | - I didn't prove it.

00:36:20.660 | I don't deserve it.

00:36:21.980 | - But you had a, I mean--

00:36:23.580 | - But I didn't prove it.

00:36:24.620 | I mean, and so it's like,

00:36:25.860 | had I somehow gotten to convince Dana White,

00:36:30.220 | we go and convince him in 2013 to make me an offer,

00:36:34.060 | and I didn't even need a good offer, I just needed any offer.

00:36:36.180 | Had I gotten the offer then,

00:36:37.820 | maybe the outcome's different, right?

00:36:39.820 | But given, I would never expect anyone

00:36:42.020 | to think of me that way.

00:36:43.200 | I didn't prove it.

00:36:44.100 | I know what I was, and I'm good with that.

00:36:47.460 | And yeah, other people never got to see that.

00:36:49.180 | - Do you think, well, you don't know,

00:36:50.340 | you can't know fully, right?

00:36:52.020 | Do you think if you went to the UFC at that time

00:36:55.820 | instead of one championship--

00:36:56.900 | - I think it would have had a lot of success.

00:36:59.220 | Yeah, I mean, there's obviously certain guys,

00:37:01.060 | there's a lot of guys I've trained with

00:37:02.380 | that I had a lot of really good results against.

00:37:05.620 | And obviously--

00:37:07.860 | - Who was the Walter Waite at that?

00:37:10.060 | - Tyron was the champion for a long time there.

00:37:12.260 | So I was around, Tyron was the champion,

00:37:13.860 | Anthony was the champion at lightweight.

00:37:15.180 | I was, you know, same gym as him.

00:37:17.340 | And we had a lot of people coming through.

00:37:19.340 | Yeah, I--

00:37:20.160 | - Would you face Tyron?

00:37:21.740 | - Would I have fought him?

00:37:22.580 | I don't think so.

00:37:23.540 | I mean, so he was still the champion

00:37:24.740 | when I came into the UFC,

00:37:26.340 | and we said no, we were not gonna fight.

00:37:29.180 | - All right.

00:37:30.660 | - Hey, so he can't change history, right?

00:37:32.520 | So once something happens,

00:37:33.460 | you gotta accept for what it is and move forward.

00:37:36.460 | And obviously hope you can continue

00:37:38.340 | to keep accomplishing great things,

00:37:39.700 | which for me, obviously my athletic career is over.

00:37:42.380 | So now it's gonna be through my wrestling academies

00:37:45.380 | and who knows what else I get into.

00:37:48.180 | - You might do exhibition matches

00:37:51.300 | and all that kind of stuff, right?

00:37:52.660 | - Says who?

00:37:53.500 | - Wrestling and stuff, no?

00:37:55.540 | - I don't think so.

00:37:56.420 | So here's my thing with the wrestling matches

00:37:57.940 | is just for fun, if you said, "Hey, Ben, just for fun."

00:38:01.740 | - Yeah.

00:38:02.580 | - Would you love to go wrestle someone?

00:38:03.560 | Yeah, I would, I would, right?

00:38:05.180 | I love wrestling, I get in there.

00:38:07.620 | You know, I love, so one of my guys

00:38:10.180 | has gotten to be pretty good.

00:38:11.420 | He's in college, a guy named Keegan O'Toole.

00:38:12.940 | He just won a junior world title this year.

00:38:16.120 | And so when I'm doing private lessons,

00:38:19.220 | I have to think about the development of the athlete.

00:38:21.020 | Sometimes I can wrestle hard,

00:38:22.100 | but most of the time it's like,

00:38:23.520 | I'm just gonna help them with whatever they need help with.

00:38:25.820 | And it's still wrestling and it's fun,

00:38:27.200 | but it's helping them.

00:38:28.520 | You know, for like, Keegan comes back this summer

00:38:30.260 | and he's training for the junior world title.

00:38:31.340 | So to be able to just shake hands sometimes

00:38:32.900 | and say like, "How much do I kick your ass?"

00:38:35.300 | To you, try to kick my ass, you know, like just to go.

00:38:37.620 | - Yeah, it's a good feeling.

00:38:38.460 | - It's so much fun.

00:38:39.520 | And I don't get to do that very much.

00:38:40.780 | So if you said, "Ben, would you love to do some matches?"

00:38:42.660 | And the answer's yeah.

00:38:44.300 | The problem, unfortunately for me,

00:38:46.520 | and maybe you can talk me off a ledge here,

00:38:48.540 | is like because of where I've gotten to in my career,

00:38:50.780 | if I choose to do a wrestling match,

00:38:52.100 | people are gonna be really excited about it.

00:38:53.780 | It's gonna blow up and it's like,

00:38:56.020 | I just wanna wrestle just to wrestle.

00:38:57.380 | I'd rather just like go in a room

00:38:59.140 | where no one can watch and just wrestle and just enjoy it.

00:39:01.980 | - Well, you could also wrestle,

00:39:03.540 | so there's different kinds of wrestling.

00:39:05.340 | There's wrestling where there's an event

00:39:07.920 | and like, you know, there's a buildup and an announcement.

00:39:11.300 | - Yeah.

00:39:12.140 | - And you can also do like a Khabib style,

00:39:14.600 | like in the room there's cameras and you're kind of going.

00:39:18.620 | It's like-

00:39:19.460 | - Wait, Khabib does that?

00:39:20.280 | - No, in-

00:39:21.620 | - Marcel does that.

00:39:22.460 | He whooped my ass a few times.

00:39:23.300 | - Yeah, exactly.

00:39:24.180 | I mean, I've seen Khabib with some videos.

00:39:26.340 | It's not like set up, it's just people going hard

00:39:28.780 | and then it's more fun.

00:39:30.380 | - Yeah.

00:39:31.220 | - You know, and it's also more like

00:39:34.340 | presenting the beauty of the sport, you know?

00:39:38.380 | - For sure.

00:39:39.220 | - And like, and there's no winning or losing really

00:39:41.780 | in that context.

00:39:42.940 | - Yeah.

00:39:43.780 | - Like you're just, you're always joking around a little bit

00:39:45.900 | even when you're going super hard.

00:39:47.140 | So I feel like, especially in the modern day

00:39:49.340 | with the internet, that's a compelling way to do.

00:39:52.420 | - So I've thought about, this is the one thing

00:39:54.260 | I've thought about doing, 'cause I told you about my buddy

00:39:57.220 | who is the content thing, it's called Rockfin.

00:40:00.300 | Thought about doing, you know,

00:40:01.140 | the old really famous Gracie challenge?

00:40:03.140 | - Yeah.

00:40:03.980 | - Okay, so I thought about doing the Aspen challenge.

00:40:05.220 | You wanna hear my rule set?

00:40:06.140 | - Yeah, let's go.

00:40:06.980 | - I'm not sure I'm gonna do this.

00:40:07.980 | People are gonna show up to your, like in Wisconsin.

00:40:10.780 | - I have to select you.

00:40:11.620 | I'll start with a thousand bucks, right?

00:40:13.220 | - Right.

00:40:14.060 | - Okay, 30 minutes.

00:40:14.980 | You pin me or I pin you.

00:40:16.460 | That's it.

00:40:17.300 | No points, no nothing.

00:40:18.220 | We just wrestle.

00:40:19.180 | Camera, that's it, right?

00:40:20.500 | It's camera in the room.

00:40:21.340 | Maybe there's a referee 'cause we don't want there

00:40:22.980 | to be contention over the pin.

00:40:24.420 | So--

00:40:25.260 | - Just one pin.

00:40:26.080 | - Just one pin.

00:40:26.920 | 30 minutes, 30 minutes, okay?

00:40:28.420 | If I pin you, you don't get shit, you go home, right?

00:40:31.620 | Every person I pin, it goes up by a thousand dollars.

00:40:33.500 | 2,000, 3,000, 4,000, 5,000, and so on.

00:40:36.640 | If you make it the distance and I don't pin you

00:40:38.480 | and you don't pin me, I'll pay for your travel

00:40:40.340 | and give you 500 bucks, right?

00:40:42.160 | Just a kind of consolation prize for showing up.

00:40:44.660 | If you pin me, you get whatever the jackpot is.

00:40:47.020 | - Wait, who's adding to the jackpot?

00:40:50.780 | - I am, it's my money.

00:40:52.820 | My money.

00:40:53.660 | - But then what's the incentive to keep winning for you?

00:40:55.660 | 'Cause the jackpot's--

00:40:56.500 | - Well, 'cause I would put the content somewhere

00:40:58.300 | and people would watch it, right?

00:40:59.140 | - Oh, so you're gonna make money.

00:41:00.140 | - Yeah, so you'd make money that way.

00:41:00.980 | - But it's not exponentially growing, right?

00:41:02.700 | It's just going up by like--

00:41:04.380 | - Yeah, I really think there's probably only a couple

00:41:05.860 | of people that could pin me.

00:41:06.820 | So I would either just not choose those people

00:41:09.280 | or wait 'til I get a really large audience

00:41:11.620 | and people get really excited.

00:41:12.700 | And in that case, I'm making a lot of money, so.

00:41:14.780 | - What do you think, how many matches would go with you,

00:41:17.700 | like Khal Dake shows up?

00:41:19.500 | - I don't think he could pin me.

00:41:20.860 | - Yeah, how would that match go?

00:41:22.780 | - Jordan Burroughs could beat me, but he can't pin me.

00:41:25.180 | He was never a pinner.

00:41:26.700 | He ain't gonna pin me.

00:41:27.660 | There's only a few people who have the skill level

00:41:30.140 | to do so, right?

00:41:31.340 | It takes a lot.

00:41:32.180 | So pinning was one of my specialties.

00:41:33.560 | I had the fourth most of all time

00:41:35.460 | and I won the pinning award the last two years.

00:41:37.760 | - So you can be down on points and just pin them.

00:41:41.260 | - This is actually one of the issues I have with jujitsu

00:41:45.180 | and the point system and the Eddie Bravo thing.

00:41:47.020 | I actually think the Eddie Bravo thing's kind of,

00:41:48.300 | people get so mad at me.

00:41:49.300 | Sorry, jujitsu.

00:41:50.260 | I think it's bullshit.

00:41:51.740 | And you want me to tell you why it's bullshit?

00:41:53.220 | So if Jordan Burroughs whoops my ass

00:41:55.140 | and the score is 16 to two, but he can't pin me,

00:41:58.460 | then I get to go to overtime and get a cradle on him,

00:42:00.860 | I'm probably gonna pin him.

00:42:02.800 | So I'm better than Jordan Burroughs?

00:42:04.680 | Nah, that ain't right.

00:42:05.980 | He just whooped my ass.

00:42:07.420 | Do you know what I'm saying?

00:42:08.420 | If we can go the whole, 'cause they do submission only.

00:42:11.620 | So if Jordan Burroughs beats me up

00:42:13.800 | for what, is it eight minutes, 10 minutes?

00:42:15.340 | I don't know, what's the length of an Eddie Bravo match?

00:42:18.260 | - Yeah, I don't know.

00:42:19.100 | - Something like that, yeah.

00:42:21.100 | - So we go 10, me and Jordan Burroughs go 10 minutes.

00:42:22.540 | He's gonna outscore me significantly.

00:42:24.180 | He will not pin me, I promise you that, okay?

00:42:27.220 | So now we go to the overtime.

00:42:29.180 | - Strong words, but yeah.

00:42:30.420 | - He won't, Jordan Burroughs is not gonna,

00:42:32.060 | he's gonna beat me, I will give you that.

00:42:33.860 | - Kyle Dake won't pin you either.

00:42:35.100 | - No. - Okay.

00:42:35.940 | - Okay, they will both beat me on points very badly.

00:42:38.860 | Now David Taylor, he might pin me

00:42:40.380 | 'cause he's a very good pinner also.

00:42:42.660 | They'll beat me very badly, they will not pin me.

00:42:45.120 | But now we get to overtime and we get to pick,

00:42:47.340 | all right, so in Eddie Bravo,

00:42:48.780 | you get a rear naked choke or an arm bar.

00:42:51.460 | Okay, give me a cradle, I'll probably pin him, okay?

00:42:53.900 | A good cradle.

00:42:54.940 | You can say cradle or maybe give the,

00:42:56.940 | they're probably not gonna pin me, right?

00:42:58.220 | Maybe there's a chance, but probably not

00:43:00.180 | 'cause that's just not their specialty.

00:43:01.020 | - Yeah, so for people who don't know,

00:43:02.340 | the Eddie Bravo thing is, and it goes into overtime,

00:43:07.340 | you get a dominance position on a person

00:43:10.020 | and you get to, yeah, basically put them in a cradle.

00:43:12.220 | This is the wrestling equivalent.

00:43:13.180 | - Yeah. - But you take their back

00:43:14.780 | or maybe an arm bar, yeah, a wrestling arm bar.

00:43:17.380 | So and I don't think that's very fair

00:43:18.660 | 'cause if someone whoops your ass,

00:43:19.820 | they whoop your ass and then, you know.

00:43:21.860 | And so I think the reason why Jiu-Jitsu people

00:43:23.700 | accept that rule set is that I don't think,

00:43:26.660 | I think they know this but would admit it,

00:43:27.980 | I don't think their point scoring system

00:43:29.860 | adequately rewards what people value.

00:43:33.860 | So like in wrestling, we value takedowns

00:43:36.500 | 'cause it gets us closer to the pin

00:43:38.060 | and the most valuable scoring is a near fall,

00:43:41.220 | near to the pin because that's the ultimate goal of the sport

00:43:44.660 | whereas in Jiu-Jitsu, for example,

00:43:46.220 | like if I were to get a takedown,

00:43:48.780 | so like if I went to Gordon Ryan

00:43:50.260 | and he just didn't pull guard,

00:43:52.300 | I would probably get the takedown.

00:43:54.060 | Now, if somehow he didn't submit me,

00:43:56.100 | which he probably would, right?

00:43:57.180 | But say he got close to like 12 submissions

00:43:59.260 | but somehow I slipped out of all of them.

00:44:01.680 | Now I win two-zero, like that's ridiculous.

00:44:03.940 | Like he should very clearly win

00:44:05.220 | 'cause he almost submitted, you know what I'm saying?

00:44:07.860 | And I realize the difficulty,

00:44:09.860 | I realize the difficulty in rewarding near submissions

00:44:12.860 | but that is the most valuable thing

00:44:15.100 | is getting close to finishing the match

00:44:17.060 | and in most competitions, they don't actually reward that.

00:44:20.180 | - But okay, so this isn't about the sport.

00:44:22.460 | This is about the Ben Askren challenge

00:44:24.780 | that we're talking about.

00:44:25.620 | (laughing)

00:44:27.300 | Why 30 minutes?

00:44:28.260 | Why not unlimited time?

00:44:29.640 | Why go until whenever?

00:44:33.340 | - Well, 'cause then it's just a cardio thing

00:44:34.880 | 'cause at some point,

00:44:36.100 | then someone would just have to fall over dead, right?

00:44:39.340 | There's no more skill level involved.

00:44:40.800 | It's just who can stand up the longest.

00:44:42.840 | - You honestly don't think,

00:44:44.360 | 30 minutes is a cardio thing too.

00:44:47.600 | How do you think that's actually gonna look?

00:44:49.320 | Kyle Dade going against you for 30 minutes.

00:44:51.380 | - So it's gonna be kind of boring for the most part.

00:44:55.260 | - What position are you going to be stuck in?

00:44:58.840 | - But you just can't have a gigantic amount of action

00:45:01.480 | for 30 minutes.

00:45:02.320 | So I relate to this 'cause some of my kids

00:45:04.240 | when I'm teaching them wrestling,

00:45:06.280 | they're like, "Well, but I can't do that for seven minutes."

00:45:10.560 | And I'm like, "Well, say if I had you do

00:45:13.000 | "hang cleans at a relatively heavy weight

00:45:16.000 | "as hard as you could, you're not gonna last seven minutes.

00:45:18.340 | "Your pace will slow down."

00:45:20.640 | So my thing is like,

00:45:21.720 | well, your pace doesn't have to step here

00:45:23.000 | 'cause in wrestling, you're competing against someone.

00:45:24.900 | So if you're here at 100 and you go to 80,

00:45:27.400 | but they go to 70, that's great.

00:45:29.120 | And then you go to 60, but they go to 40,

00:45:31.360 | this is even better because the gap is growing.

00:45:34.480 | So we don't necessarily, if we get tired, that's fine.

00:45:36.840 | If they get more tired, that's better.

00:45:38.720 | So I think most people would know that.

00:45:40.440 | So they would kind of slow it down.

00:45:43.160 | But yeah, I think at 30, I mean,

00:45:46.680 | I've wrestled 30 minute goes,

00:45:48.040 | I've wrestled hour long goes.

00:45:51.400 | You're not gonna get so tired,

00:45:52.600 | you're gonna fall over in that time period.

00:45:54.020 | But at some point, if it's unlimited,

00:45:56.160 | someone will get so tired or dehydrated

00:45:58.400 | that they're just gonna freaking fall over.

00:46:00.620 | - Yeah, but you think,

00:46:02.680 | what about making it exciting and dynamic?

00:46:05.220 | You think the other person

00:46:07.600 | is always going to be going for the pin

00:46:09.840 | and thereby make it dynamic?

00:46:11.680 | - Well, if they're working that hard,

00:46:12.880 | then they might exhaust themselves.

00:46:15.040 | And obviously then if you're being that dynamic,

00:46:17.980 | then you're adding risk to yourself too

00:46:20.240 | because you're doing that.

00:46:22.680 | - Well, I love this, this is a great idea.

00:46:24.520 | (laughing)

00:46:25.760 | - Well, I figure I'd rack up like 20 pins against bums

00:46:29.080 | or not as great people in the beginning.

00:46:30.860 | And then I would start bringing in better people

00:46:32.920 | 'cause they would be enticed by $20,000,

00:46:35.840 | the possibility to win.

00:46:36.680 | - And not much fanfare, just a camera and just--

00:46:39.400 | - Just a camera, that's it, in my wrestling room.

00:46:41.200 | - Yeah, yeah, yeah, like the Gracie Challenge.

00:46:42.800 | - Yes, yeah.

00:46:44.360 | And so then maybe you have like,

00:46:46.000 | for most people, you have someone edit the 90 seconds

00:46:51.120 | of the most fun things that happen,

00:46:52.760 | and then you can watch the entire 30 minutes if you want to.

00:46:55.720 | I mean, I think most people,

00:46:56.800 | if they're not really, really elite,

00:46:59.000 | I'm probably gonna pin them.

00:47:00.400 | If they're not really elite.

00:47:02.800 | So, yeah, but I don't know.

00:47:06.640 | That's something I've been thinking about,

00:47:07.640 | this has been fun for me to think about.

00:47:09.940 | And obviously it plays to my skill sets

00:47:12.400 | 'cause my cardio is good and my pinning is good also.

00:47:15.960 | So, yeah.

00:47:17.160 | - So, like you said, you weren't very good

00:47:20.480 | in your early days until 13, 14.

00:47:23.360 | What was the switch?

00:47:24.560 | You started to dominate people.

00:47:27.120 | In your college career, you dominated.

00:47:29.080 | And obviously, you stopped losing at some point.

00:47:33.560 | - Yeah, so, well, I would say,

00:47:36.440 | so even when I didn't lose in collegiate competition,

00:47:38.040 | I would go in the summers and try to make the world team.

00:47:40.360 | So, I would lose some, not a lot, minimally.

00:47:43.620 | Okay, so when I'm five, I start playing all sports.

00:47:47.680 | I know you moved to America at what age?

00:47:51.480 | - 13.

00:47:52.320 | - Okay, so five, so at least,

00:47:53.680 | I don't know what it was for you,

00:47:55.080 | but in America at my age,

00:47:57.560 | you usually played a sport every season, right?

00:48:00.160 | So, that's what I did in the beginning.

00:48:02.560 | I had minimal success in wrestling.

00:48:04.560 | I was kind of chunky.

00:48:06.120 | And then, in fifth grade, I don't,

00:48:09.000 | and I can't tell you, I wanted to be better.

00:48:11.360 | And I told my parents, and this is funny,

00:48:12.920 | 'cause now I look at other 11-year-olds,

00:48:14.240 | and very few of them are this mature.

00:48:15.880 | And I actually think emotional maturity

00:48:17.280 | is kind of one of the key indicators

00:48:18.520 | of how long-term successful someone's gonna be.

00:48:21.160 | And at age 11, I said, "I don't wanna play baseball.

00:48:23.000 | "I like baseball, but I don't wanna play baseball

00:48:24.440 | "'cause I wanna wrestle more,

00:48:25.280 | "'cause I wanna get better at wrestling."

00:48:26.800 | So, age 11, I quit baseball so I could wrestle in a club

00:48:29.640 | for March, April, and May,

00:48:30.920 | 'cause that was all that existed at that point in time.

00:48:33.280 | You couldn't wrestle in June, July,

00:48:34.480 | or any of those other months.

00:48:35.980 | What was that desire to get better?

00:48:38.720 | What is that?

00:48:39.560 | So, it's not about winning.

00:48:40.380 | I don't know where it came from.

00:48:41.220 | I just wanted to get better.

00:48:43.240 | I wanna get better.

00:48:44.080 | I wanna be good at this.

00:48:44.920 | I wanna be really good at this.

00:48:45.740 | So, when you're looking at kids now, as a coach,

00:48:47.920 | you're looking for that.

00:48:49.080 | Somebody who says, "You know what?

00:48:50.440 | "I kinda suck.

00:48:51.280 | "I wanna get better."

00:48:52.120 | And I wanna try to also inspire that.

00:48:54.360 | I mean, honestly, I think, as a coach,

00:48:58.320 | that's probably my biggest job,

00:49:00.400 | is to get a kid and get them to believe, "I can do this."

00:49:03.920 | 'Cause if I can do this, what can I?

00:49:06.240 | I can do that.

00:49:07.360 | I can do that, too, right?

00:49:08.800 | And there's so many kids who, unfortunately,

00:49:10.680 | have shitty parents or bad teachers

00:49:14.120 | that tell 'em, "You suck.

00:49:15.220 | "You can't be anything," right?

00:49:16.760 | So, I think my biggest goal, as a coach,

00:49:18.760 | is to get someone to believe they can do it.

00:49:20.240 | So, actually, some of the ones that believe they can do it,

00:49:22.320 | they're the most fun,

00:49:23.200 | but they're not the ones who need it the most, right?

00:49:25.400 | The ones who think they can

00:49:26.400 | are the ones that need me the most.

00:49:28.400 | 'Cause they need someone to, "Fuck, let's go."

00:49:31.320 | So, I don't know.

00:49:32.680 | What inspired me, I'm not sure.

00:49:34.000 | So, age 11, fifth grade, I quit.

00:49:37.920 | So, then I started having more success,

00:49:40.520 | you know, where I'm, like, say,

00:49:41.360 | placing at the state tournament.

00:49:42.920 | - In high school.

00:49:44.920 | - So, you're right.

00:49:46.040 | So, sixth grade, I placed at the state,

00:49:48.200 | the local youth state tournament, you know?

00:49:49.680 | So, I'm having more success.

00:49:51.980 | Seventh grade was the first year

00:49:52.880 | I won the youth state tournament.

00:49:55.160 | So, I'm getting better.

00:49:56.160 | Eighth grade, I actually feel like I got pretty good,

00:49:58.160 | but when I went to the national tournaments,

00:50:00.120 | I was still having really minimal success.

00:50:02.220 | My freshman year, I decided to quit football.

00:50:04.880 | Same reason, it's like,

00:50:05.720 | well, I need to put more time into this.

00:50:06.920 | My parents, we got, my dad luckily got a mat in my basement.

00:50:10.040 | So, you know, there's no, so we have a year-round club,

00:50:12.720 | and our impetus was that we didn't have this opportunity

00:50:15.120 | to go to a club year-round.

00:50:16.880 | So, we had a mat in my basement.

00:50:18.040 | I had to go find, "Hey, you wanna come wrestle?"

00:50:21.080 | Like, "Oh, yeah, to find partners for myself."

00:50:22.840 | - What'd you do?

00:50:23.680 | Did you drill?

00:50:24.500 | Did you live wrestle?

00:50:25.400 | What'd you do in that basement?

00:50:26.720 | - So, actually, I think, you'll enjoy this.

00:50:28.600 | I think the start of my scrambling

00:50:32.000 | was kind of based around that.

00:50:34.440 | So, I got kind of,

00:50:36.320 | I think it's probably my freshman, sophomore,

00:50:37.680 | I'm kind of, the years are a little fuzzy, right?

00:50:39.960 | It's been a while. - For sure.

00:50:41.400 | - But probably my freshman, sophomore, junior year,

00:50:45.160 | I found two kids who were really consistent,

00:50:47.600 | who would come out, like, you would come out on,

00:50:49.080 | he would come out on Tuesday,

00:50:50.000 | and this dude would come out on Wednesday, right?

00:50:51.640 | And they would come every week,

00:50:52.640 | and they were really consistent partners for me

00:50:55.040 | to have in the summer.

00:50:56.340 | But they weren't nearly as good as me.

00:50:57.960 | They were way worse.

00:50:58.840 | So, it's like, okay, how do I make this kind of fun

00:51:03.840 | and compelling for them to come back?

00:51:05.680 | 'Cause if I just whooped their ass,

00:51:07.000 | they're not gonna come back.

00:51:08.880 | So, it was like, I would let them get as close as they could,

00:51:11.280 | as I thought they could do a takedown

00:51:13.420 | before not getting it,

00:51:14.600 | and then try to escape or get out.

00:51:16.920 | So, obviously, if I let them get really close,

00:51:18.360 | sometimes they get it, so they're enjoying it.

00:51:21.440 | I don't know if they ever knew I was doing this, right?

00:51:23.520 | I have no idea.

00:51:24.420 | And that was kind of the start,

00:51:26.640 | is I had to figure my way out of bad positions,

00:51:28.880 | because I had to try to make it entertaining for them,

00:51:32.280 | where they still got something out of it,

00:51:33.480 | and they wanted to come back the next week.

00:51:34.960 | And I also got something out of it.

00:51:36.440 | - Yeah, I love this.

00:51:37.720 | 'Cause that relationship is so important.

00:51:39.880 | I've had a few drilling partners,

00:51:44.480 | training partners that were really important to my life,

00:51:47.920 | and I always wonder why it's difficult,

00:51:50.680 | why it's so difficult to find them.

00:51:52.480 | - Yeah.

00:51:53.320 | - Like, if anyone's listening to this,

00:51:55.720 | I'm looking for a judo person in the Austin area, actually.

00:51:58.840 | Getting the reps with people is hard, even in jujitsu.

00:52:02.240 | It's just like, people wanna do the fun stuff,

00:52:06.520 | they don't wanna really put in the work,

00:52:08.440 | and it takes a certain kind of personality.

00:52:10.400 | And then you also have to make it fun for the other person,

00:52:13.920 | just like you said.

00:52:14.760 | If there's a skill mismatch,

00:52:16.000 | but also if you have an interest mismatch,

00:52:19.620 | in terms of the amount of drilling you want to do,

00:52:22.360 | all that kind of stuff,

00:52:23.200 | you have to figure out ways to make it fun.

00:52:24.960 | It's tricky.

00:52:25.840 | So you did.

00:52:26.680 | - So yeah, I think I did that, and no one told me.

00:52:29.920 | I get frustrated, 'cause now we have,

00:52:32.280 | just in my academy, we probably have 50, 60 high school

00:52:35.960 | kids only that are year-round, they're year-round.

00:52:38.200 | Maybe they're not as consistent in the summer or whatever,

00:52:39.880 | but they're there.

00:52:40.700 | So when they don't have a great partner,

00:52:42.160 | they start whining, it's like, "You little bitches."

00:52:44.760 | Some days I get really mad about it,

00:52:47.040 | 'cause it's like, I had no partners.

00:52:48.280 | I had to find freaking two partners to come twice a week.

00:52:50.680 | You guys, there's still 22 people in the room.

00:52:53.040 | I'm sorry there's not the perfect partner for you,

00:52:55.240 | but go work out with that dude.

00:52:56.760 | - Yeah.

00:52:57.600 | - You know?

00:52:58.420 | - So what was the switch, the change?

00:53:00.160 | Was it gradual?

00:53:01.480 | - Gradual.

00:53:02.320 | - Okay.

00:53:03.140 | - Yeah, so, let's do this.

00:53:03.980 | So ninth grade, I quit football,

00:53:04.960 | 'cause I wanted to get really serious.

00:53:07.360 | - What position, football?

00:53:08.200 | - It was actually a nose tackle.

00:53:10.440 | But at that point, so I was also,

00:53:12.120 | the other thing I kind of left over,

00:53:13.460 | I was really fat growing up.

00:53:15.680 | In sixth grade, I also decided, okay, I'm really fat,

00:53:19.320 | and if I want to be competitive wrestling,

00:53:20.400 | I shouldn't be fat, 'cause weight matters.

00:53:21.940 | I went from 130 pounds to 100 pounds in sixth grade.

00:53:24.540 | So by the time I was a freshman, I was 119.

00:53:28.440 | So I still wasn't as heavy as I was in sixth grade.

00:53:30.840 | So I was pretty small too,

00:53:31.760 | but I was also slow, unfortunately.

00:53:33.800 | So they put me in nose tackle.

00:53:35.640 | I liked the competitiveness, so I was decent at it.

00:53:38.360 | - So that's where you wrestled, 119?

00:53:41.160 | - My freshman year, yeah.

00:53:42.400 | So yeah, so then I still,

00:53:44.680 | I started having a lot of success state-wise,

00:53:47.280 | but not nationally.

00:53:48.920 | It's my national success didn't come

00:53:50.520 | until my junior year in high school.

00:53:52.980 | But yeah, I was grinding and getting better the whole time.

00:53:55.120 | And then senior year,

00:53:55.960 | I started having a lot of success nationally,

00:53:57.620 | and I got recruited.

00:53:59.380 | But then even when my freshman year of college,

00:54:01.780 | this is where I loved competing,

00:54:03.420 | I would go every weekend.

00:54:04.260 | 'Cause I knew, if you take the emotions out of competition,

00:54:07.840 | all it is is seeing your failures, acknowledging them,

00:54:12.180 | and then figuring out what you need to work on, right?

00:54:14.380 | If we take all the emotion out of it, that's what it is.

00:54:16.760 | So I wrestled 50 matches as a redshirt freshman,

00:54:19.060 | which is incredibly rare.

00:54:20.420 | I had 10 losses.

00:54:21.740 | So it's not, and like to not so great guys, you know?

00:54:24.940 | So my skill level still at that point was not that great.

00:54:28.020 | And then the next year I came out

00:54:29.220 | and I made the NCAA finals.

00:54:30.220 | So I made a gigantic jump in that redshirt year

00:54:33.980 | to the real freshman year.

00:54:35.940 | - So a few questions.

00:54:37.860 | Where did the funk style of wrestling,

00:54:41.420 | the creative style get developed?

00:54:42.820 | At which stage?

00:54:44.460 | - So I think looking retroactively,

00:54:47.100 | there was no intention to start

00:54:48.780 | when I was in high school with those kids.

00:54:50.060 | But I think that's kind of like what was happening, right?

00:54:54.740 | So what I would really say is I had one influential coach,

00:54:57.980 | my redshirt year of college named Mike Ironman, great guy.

00:55:01.820 | But then the second thing was it was just out of necessity.

00:55:04.300 | I had this burning desire to be the best.

00:55:06.460 | And when I was getting my ass kicked every day in the room,

00:55:09.180 | 'cause we had, you know, Tyron was there,

00:55:10.580 | we had All-American 157, we had All-American 184.

00:55:13.380 | So I wasn't having a ton of success.

00:55:16.020 | And very quickly I realized

00:55:18.100 | from like a more traditional athletic perspective,

00:55:21.460 | strength and speed, I couldn't keep up with anyone.

00:55:23.460 | I was way worse.

00:55:25.100 | So it's like, okay, fuck, how do I do this?

00:55:27.260 | You know, I wanna do this, how do I do this?

00:55:29.700 | There's gotta be a way, you know?

00:55:31.380 | So Mike Ironman showed me a couple of things,

00:55:33.460 | but then it was just like this creative expansion

00:55:36.540 | for the next, you know, say three to five years.

00:55:39.820 | And then even now it's like, I don't know,

00:55:42.660 | there's something, and maybe you feel this way about judo,

00:55:44.660 | or there's something that's like fun

00:55:47.420 | about the way the body moves and works,

00:55:49.700 | and exploring something new and thinking about,

00:55:52.660 | hey, wrestling's been happening at a relative high level

00:55:55.260 | for we'll say 80 to 90 years in America,

00:55:57.820 | and there's still new things being developed.

00:56:01.380 | And so when you see something new,

00:56:02.460 | you're like, oh damn, Mike, that's great.

00:56:03.860 | Or like Jason Nolte may have to win Dixie.

00:56:05.700 | I'm like, why did I not think of that shit?

00:56:07.420 | Like, why did I think of that?

00:56:08.260 | It's so easy, I should have thought of that, you know?

00:56:11.220 | So there's this like obsession with the sport of wrestling

00:56:14.900 | and positions where,

00:56:16.960 | I actually think sometimes,

00:56:19.620 | thank God we didn't have smartphones,

00:56:20.740 | 'cause I may have been distracted by my smartphone.

00:56:23.380 | Maybe I wouldn't have been 'cause I was so obsessed,

00:56:24.780 | but maybe, but you know, some days I couldn't finish

00:56:27.900 | the single leg on a specific person,

00:56:29.620 | or maybe they were finishing on me,

00:56:31.740 | and it was like, go home,

00:56:33.060 | and I was just fucking obsessed about that one position.

00:56:35.900 | Like, okay, what am I missing here?

00:56:38.740 | And not just accepting like that,

00:56:40.780 | whatever the coach says is the answer,

00:56:42.500 | but like, what am I missing?

00:56:43.860 | What ways can my body move

00:56:45.620 | that no one's told me it can move yet?

00:56:48.440 | Where can my arms go, right?

00:56:50.260 | Where can I do all these things?

00:56:51.380 | And so I would just obsess about these things.

00:56:53.820 | And then, you know, sometimes you come in the next day

00:56:55.460 | and you say, oh, well, maybe this, you know?

00:56:57.700 | And maybe it works, maybe it doesn't.

00:56:59.380 | Maybe it works twice and then it doesn't work the next time.

00:57:01.020 | And so you kind of like have this creative process,

00:57:03.140 | and it's like, you know, there's a lot of things

00:57:04.980 | that are on the cutting room floor

00:57:06.020 | that never made it to the light

00:57:07.660 | because you thought they'd be good,

00:57:08.900 | and they failed and they sucked.

00:57:10.380 | And then, you know, to the point where like my senior year,

00:57:13.280 | I got to this point where the people,

00:57:16.780 | then they were just figures,

00:57:18.260 | figures would wrestle in my head

00:57:19.860 | about positions I was thinking about.

00:57:21.300 | I wouldn't tell them what to do.

00:57:22.460 | They would just, they'd go in my head.

00:57:24.460 | And then like, oh, fuck, wait, that's it.

00:57:27.320 | That's it, like, that just happened.

00:57:29.060 | That's the move, and then I'd go try to practice,

00:57:30.660 | and sure enough, boom, that's the move.

00:57:32.680 | - That's exactly where you have alpha zero playing,

00:57:34.700 | learning chess, you have--

00:57:36.620 | - Oh, no. - It's called self plays.

00:57:38.900 | - You have, what, did the figures have like a clear--

00:57:43.420 | - No faces, they were just like--

00:57:45.140 | - Did they have a human form,

00:57:46.580 | or is it just like stick figures, essentially?

00:57:48.700 | - Oh, yeah, it was not like, yeah, it was not like humans.

00:57:50.900 | It was more like stick figures.

00:57:51.900 | It wouldn't stick figures exactly like they were.

00:57:55.020 | - They had some volume?

00:57:56.180 | - Yeah, it was like a gray person,

00:57:58.020 | and they had, you know, three dimensions, essentially,

00:58:00.540 | 'cause I had to see how the things moved, and yeah.

00:58:05.900 | - I mean, this is exactly what OpenAI and DeepMind

00:58:09.300 | at Google are, I don't know if you've seen,

00:58:12.540 | but there's something called reinforcement learning

00:58:14.420 | in artificial intelligence where you have like,

00:58:16.980 | they've done it for like sumo wrestling.

00:58:19.180 | You have like, you have these two stick figures

00:58:23.100 | that don't even know how to get up at first,

00:58:26.200 | and they figure out how to stand on their two feet,

00:58:28.660 | and then they figure out how to push the other person

00:58:31.180 | off of the pedestal.

00:58:34.300 | - But what about like, when you look at the Boston Dynamics,

00:58:37.620 | sometimes they have trouble with like jumping

00:58:39.940 | and balancing and the other stuff.

00:58:41.500 | So are they doing that same program or no?

00:58:43.700 | - No, no, no, no.

00:58:44.540 | This, everything Boston Dynamics is doing is hard-coded,

00:58:49.540 | so it's not learning the,

00:58:53.860 | all the sophisticated movements and strategies,

00:58:57.420 | like high-level strategies and movement,

00:58:58.900 | that's all something that Boston Dynamics does not do,

00:59:02.020 | and if it does it, like the parkour stuff,

00:59:03.860 | that's all hard-coded.

00:59:04.980 | - Oh, interesting.

00:59:06.420 | - People like project and think like,

00:59:08.740 | these robots have like discovered

00:59:12.060 | like how to move in sophisticated ways they haven't.

00:59:14.700 | - Well, that's why when you and John were talking about

00:59:18.380 | the grappling robot, I mean, the one thing I was,

00:59:21.740 | I was obsessing about in my head is that with the chess,

00:59:26.660 | right, if a chess piece moves, right,

00:59:28.620 | the horse can move like an L, right?

00:59:31.380 | It can only move like an L.

00:59:32.580 | It doesn't matter if it moves at two meters per second

00:59:35.140 | or seven meters per second.

00:59:36.740 | It can only move there, right?

00:59:38.740 | Whereas like a single leg,

00:59:40.420 | I can shoot a single leg with many different velocities.

00:59:43.700 | I can shoot at different angles.

00:59:45.260 | I can shoot with different amounts of force, right?

00:59:48.140 | I can shoot with my head up versus my head,

00:59:50.180 | I mean, right, all these things are gonna matter.

00:59:52.220 | We're talking about a human being defending the single leg.

00:59:55.380 | All of those things are gonna matter,

00:59:56.900 | and that's where human beings are, who wrestle,

01:00:00.140 | are calculating those things subconsciously.

01:00:01.860 | They're obviously not consciously calculating in their head,

01:00:04.700 | oh, the force is coming at me at this,

01:00:06.620 | so I need to do that, right?

01:00:07.660 | They're just doing it because--

01:00:09.380 | - But see, the thing is, so you would absolutely,

01:00:12.180 | if you're doing a robot that you're wrestling,

01:00:14.100 | you're going to have to constrain the speed

01:00:15.780 | at which it moves and the power that it's able to deliver.

01:00:19.140 | So that presumably, there'll be the limitation.

01:00:22.380 | So then it'll be just the same exactly as a human.

01:00:24.900 | - But then, but it's even, so if we go human, max force,

01:00:28.420 | right, Jordan Bro's devil, max force, right?

01:00:30.460 | That's the highest we get, then we go down from there.

01:00:33.160 | Even within that, it's like sometimes,

01:00:38.100 | I can shoot a single leg with a maximum force of,

01:00:40.180 | I don't know, we'll just say 20 is the number, right?

01:00:43.220 | I don't always shoot it at 20,

01:00:44.760 | because I feel sometimes I shoot it at 15,

01:00:46.580 | sometimes I shoot it at 12, right?

01:00:48.560 | 'Cause you feel something in your opponent

01:00:50.860 | that makes you do it differently,

01:00:52.260 | so they would have to learn how,

01:00:53.740 | and then all of these different things,

01:00:55.620 | and sometimes maybe I clamp a little harder,

01:00:57.900 | so the robot would have to learn

01:01:00.480 | all of these different incoming inputs to the system

01:01:03.380 | and then create this reaction.

01:01:04.820 | - Oh no, no, no, 100%, so this would be all continuous.

01:01:08.340 | So unlike chess, it would not,

01:01:09.460 | it's just chess is discrete, there's, it's--

01:01:11.740 | - One and-- - You move,

01:01:14.180 | it's a very specific set of moves.

01:01:16.300 | Now here, you would, those are all variables you control,

01:01:19.100 | and they're continuous variables,

01:01:20.420 | so the speed, the force, there's actuators,

01:01:23.460 | so there's all these joints, right?

01:01:24.940 | - Yeah. - You can move,

01:01:26.600 | I mean, it's just an optimization problem.

01:01:28.560 | - It's kind of, it's fascinating,

01:01:30.180 | so I've been fascinated thinking about it

01:01:31.560 | since you guys talked about it.

01:01:33.400 | It was a long time ago, I listened to it probably

01:01:35.420 | three to four weeks ago,

01:01:36.260 | and I've kind of been like obsessing about it ever since.

01:01:39.500 | - Yeah, it just changes when,

01:01:42.180 | so unlike boxing, for example, or striking,

01:01:45.780 | once you grab a hold of somebody,

01:01:49.440 | it changes, you're now one body, right?

01:01:52.280 | So it's very complicated,

01:01:53.700 | it's not just shooting a double leg without,

01:01:56.600 | like maybe doing like, like faking a double leg

01:02:00.120 | and then shooting the double leg,

01:02:01.720 | that's very doable with robotics,

01:02:03.640 | but then like doing a clinch,

01:02:06.200 | and from there, doing like a Russian tie,

01:02:09.000 | like that, that's, I think that's way harder

01:02:13.360 | than people realize in terms of

01:02:14.920 | how many things are involved,

01:02:17.200 | like the force of the grip,

01:02:19.120 | the leverage you're providing

01:02:20.400 | with all the different parts of the shoulder and the arm

01:02:23.000 | and the torso, the twist,

01:02:24.760 | how much of your weight are you allocating,

01:02:26.740 | like leaning on the other person,

01:02:28.780 | like taking weight off of one of your legs

01:02:30.540 | and the other leg, all of that.

01:02:32.420 | I think that's the really interesting thing about humans

01:02:35.420 | is we're able to do all of this calculation--

01:02:38.140 | - Subconsciously.

01:02:38.980 | - Yeah, subconsciously.

01:02:40.420 | - Yeah, and that's what I've been thinking about

01:02:41.420 | since we, it's like, how many things,

01:02:44.180 | even these high school athletes

01:02:45.660 | who are like getting medium good

01:02:47.980 | are subconsciously thinking about all the time,

01:02:50.520 | or not even thinking about, sorry, reacting to,

01:02:53.140 | but then even like for me, I'm a few orders of magnitude

01:02:57.340 | better than some of these kids that play,

01:02:58.540 | and so when I go like super hard,

01:03:00.340 | it's like I can feel their weight

01:03:02.460 | moving in the wrong direction,

01:03:03.660 | and so for me to off balance them or trip them or whatever

01:03:05.940 | is kind of easy sometimes, you know,

01:03:07.700 | because they're not feeling it the right way, right,

01:03:11.540 | or their timing's just a little bit off,

01:03:13.620 | or the way they're grabbing the hip,

01:03:15.180 | maybe they should be up a little higher, right,

01:03:16.740 | these really small things.

01:03:20.060 | - Yeah, I think that's all easy to take advantage of

01:03:22.080 | for a robot, it's just there's so many things.

01:03:24.720 | The big problem is ethically,

01:03:28.000 | I don't know how many people are willing

01:03:30.220 | to train with a robot because you're gonna get hurt.

01:03:33.820 | - Well, couldn't you make a robot train with a robot,

01:03:35.360 | or no?

01:03:36.200 | - Yes, but then it's expensive.

01:03:37.960 | So, 'cause they're gonna get--

01:03:40.520 | - Put the padding on that thing!

01:03:42.040 | - I know, but then it's not, you know,

01:03:47.960 | then you're not capturing the full--

01:03:51.200 | - Why can't you put some rubber coating on them,

01:03:53.040 | or something to that effect?

01:03:54.880 | - You could, you could, you could.

01:03:58.280 | I mean, you're talking about robots that are,

01:04:01.120 | these are humanoid robots,

01:04:02.680 | so we're talking about $500,000, million dollar robots.

01:04:07.320 | So, you would have to be motivated--

01:04:10.280 | - To spend a lot of money.

01:04:11.920 | - To spend a lot of money because you have to have them

01:04:14.640 | wrestle for a lot.

01:04:19.360 | - To get better.

01:04:20.200 | - Yeah, to get better.

01:04:21.200 | And then, the open question is,

01:04:23.620 | how long does it take to get good enough to beat a human?

01:04:29.300 | I don't think we understand, I don't know,

01:04:34.520 | I don't think you understand how hard wrestling is.

01:04:37.720 | - Yeah.

01:04:38.560 | - Like, is it a really hard problem?

01:04:39.840 | Like, what's harder, chess or wrestling?

01:04:41.440 | - Wrestling, by far.

01:04:42.640 | And I am close.

01:04:43.480 | That's, yeah, that's the sense I have.

01:04:45.600 | - So, because there's an infinite amount of moves, right?

01:04:48.560 | And possibilities, so once I shoot the single leg,

01:04:50.720 | now you have X amount of choices.

01:04:52.960 | Once you make your choice, now I have a choice,

01:04:54.840 | X amount of choices.

01:04:56.040 | Now, you have X amount of choices on the defense,

01:04:58.160 | and we can just keep going back and forth, right?

01:04:59.760 | And this number becomes--

01:05:01.280 | - Yeah, but the same happens with chess.

01:05:02.760 | - Correct, but then in wrestling,

01:05:04.120 | you have to make these movements very instantaneously, right?

01:05:08.320 | 'Cause if I shoot a single leg,

01:05:09.160 | I'm not gonna wait and say, "What's your defense?"

01:05:11.000 | - Yeah.

01:05:11.840 | - Right, you have to make it instantaneously,

01:05:12.660 | and also, again, based on the force and the vectors

01:05:15.320 | and the angles, you have to calculate that and adjust.

01:05:19.160 | So really, if you're saying, "Why can't you shoot a single

01:05:21.600 | "leg?"

01:05:22.440 | It's not like moving the chess, it's not one move, right?

01:05:24.800 | If you wanna talk about different forces and stuff,

01:05:27.120 | it could be hundreds or thousands of different moves

01:05:29.160 | based on how hard I shooted, the angle, the direction,

01:05:31.880 | all of those things.

01:05:32.720 | - Yeah, but wait a minute.

01:05:33.540 | So, robots can do this kind of stuff really fast.

01:05:35.880 | People probably know the physiology of this,

01:05:38.880 | but the reaction speed for a human

01:05:41.720 | is maybe 100 milliseconds, something like that.

01:05:43.620 | I don't know.

01:05:44.460 | From sensation to,

01:05:45.640 | like from the signal traveling up to your brain and down,

01:05:50.740 | I don't know what that number is,

01:05:52.160 | but robots certainly could do it way faster.

01:05:55.560 | You would actually have to constrain the speed.

01:06:00.000 | - Well, so the robots are already killing the chess people.

01:06:02.720 | - Yes.

01:06:03.560 | - So, yeah, theoretically,

01:06:04.860 | they could eventually beat wrestlers,

01:06:06.300 | but you asked what was hard, wrestling or chess.

01:06:08.700 | - Yeah.

01:06:09.540 | - And I think wrestling is,

01:06:10.360 | because of the time component in it

01:06:12.280 | and the physicality of,

01:06:14.960 | is it this force or that force?

01:06:18.160 | 'Cause if I'm gonna say,

01:06:19.320 | say we're in a seatbelt side by side,

01:06:21.080 | a wrestling seatbelt, not a jujitsu,

01:06:22.880 | based on the pressure you're giving me,

01:06:26.000 | I might do a bunch of different things, right?

01:06:27.560 | And so, to an untrained eye,

01:06:29.580 | they might both look like the same thing from you.

01:06:33.020 | To a trained feel, it's like,

01:06:35.040 | well, in one case, it's really evident

01:06:36.320 | I should go this way.

01:06:37.160 | In another case, it's really evident I should go that way.

01:06:39.260 | - So, the other thing to consider,

01:06:40.960 | just like with chess,

01:06:43.100 | the AI systems,

01:06:45.720 | so human versus human play a certain way together.

01:06:49.020 | They actually haven't considered

01:06:50.280 | a really large number of strategies

01:06:52.960 | that AI systems discover.

01:06:54.440 | So, one possibility with a robot,

01:06:56.000 | they'll discover certain ties and certain takedowns.

01:06:58.720 | - That's what I'm saying.

01:07:00.020 | - That will dominate no matter what the human does.

01:07:03.160 | - You think that, so you think there's that,

01:07:04.600 | so, I mean, so I'm talking about the wrestling's so fun,

01:07:07.080 | is there's, even after 80, 90 years,

01:07:09.040 | there's this continuous evolution.

01:07:11.720 | So, you think-- - There'll be some

01:07:12.560 | like low single type thing,

01:07:13.800 | like John Smith type of situation.

01:07:15.840 | - Well, like a down block go behind

01:07:17.040 | is something that has really,

01:07:18.580 | I would say really in the last five-ish years

01:07:20.560 | has really been evolved.

01:07:21.720 | - What's a go behind?

01:07:22.600 | - Down block go behind, so when you,

01:07:24.600 | well, it's head inside or head outside matters,

01:07:27.040 | but there's one for both.

01:07:28.400 | You shoot at me, essentially,

01:07:29.760 | I take my leg, boom.

01:07:31.160 | And then, so that was kind of in existence

01:07:33.320 | when I was in college, right?

01:07:34.320 | You down block 'em and you stop,

01:07:35.600 | but usually you hit on this side of their head, right?

01:07:38.120 | And now, immediately, you shoot,

01:07:39.480 | I attack that shoulder,

01:07:40.480 | and then I start hitting a go behind on you, right?

01:07:43.160 | And so, like that in its current incarnation,

01:07:47.080 | it absolutely wasn't around when I was in college.

01:07:49.080 | I would say it probably became popular

01:07:51.800 | five to seven years ago.

01:07:53.080 | So, yeah, there's these big things that are happening.

01:07:56.040 | Now, I really wanna roll back

01:07:57.400 | 'cause I wanna be ahead of the game.

01:07:58.560 | I wanna know what I'm missing.

01:08:00.360 | - I mean, one interesting thing you have

01:08:02.000 | with AlphaZero that plays chess

01:08:04.400 | is it sacrifices pieces much more than humans do.

01:08:09.400 | So, it'll give you a piece,

01:08:11.120 | and not only does it give you a piece,

01:08:12.840 | it will wait a bunch of moves before it makes you pay.

01:08:17.600 | - Because it knows that that's better for the long term.

01:08:21.160 | - Long term.

01:08:22.000 | So, like humans rarely sacrifice

01:08:23.720 | without getting the piece back

01:08:25.920 | like two or three moves after.

01:08:28.640 | AlphaZero can wait like five moves.

01:08:31.320 | So, basically, you'll have, potentially with wrestling,

01:08:35.520 | you might have a robot that puts itself in bad positions,

01:08:39.560 | but in a certain kind of way that will actually-

01:08:42.640 | - Lures the opponent in to trap them.

01:08:45.080 | - Exactly.

01:08:45.920 | - That's what my style's based on.

01:08:46.760 | (laughing)

01:08:48.480 | - You basically narrow,

01:08:49.880 | one thing to do is you narrow the set of choices.

01:08:52.480 | You put yourself in a bad position,

01:08:53.880 | but it narrows the set of choices.

01:08:55.200 | - For them, 'cause they're not used to it.

01:08:56.400 | - Yeah, they're not used to it.

01:08:58.120 | And then you drag them into your-

01:09:01.160 | - It's disgusting.

01:09:02.000 | - Yeah.

01:09:02.840 | So, but there's also,

01:09:04.760 | the problem is there's mechanical issues.

01:09:06.880 | Like, it's actually just difficult to build robots

01:09:09.040 | that are able to sense,

01:09:11.320 | 'cause we have sensation throughout our body.

01:09:13.720 | Yeah.

01:09:14.560 | It's just difficult to build that kind of robot.

01:09:16.040 | It's expensive.

01:09:16.860 | You start talking about multimillion dollars,

01:09:19.600 | and then people start asking questions.

01:09:21.840 | Why did you invest all of this money?

01:09:23.560 | - Don't ask me what moves I do.

01:09:24.880 | Duh, hello.

01:09:26.920 | - It could be better investment.

01:09:28.360 | Okay.

01:09:29.640 | So I mentioned John Smith.

01:09:31.080 | He is, if people don't know,

01:09:33.360 | one of the great wrestlers, wrestling coaches ever.

01:09:36.320 | He's also creative like you.

01:09:37.920 | He spoke really highly of you.

01:09:39.680 | What do you think about that guy?

01:09:40.680 | Do you guys ever work together?

01:09:42.200 | - Not really.

01:09:43.160 | So, you know what?

01:09:44.260 | When I was a senior

01:09:45.100 | and I had the people wrestling in my head,

01:09:47.000 | I was lucky enough to be doing,

01:09:49.840 | I was pretty much graduated,

01:09:51.760 | so I did an independent study with the sports psych,

01:09:53.720 | I was potentially gonna go to grad school

01:09:55.680 | for sports psych.

01:09:56.520 | Well, I actually did nine credits,

01:09:57.680 | and then I just decided I didn't wanna do it anymore.

01:10:00.440 | I continued learning on my own.

01:10:02.880 | But I did an independent study with the guy

01:10:05.200 | who's head of USA track and field sports psych.

01:10:07.800 | So the class was,

01:10:09.480 | I got to go sit down and talk with him for an hour,

01:10:11.520 | and he was fascinated by me.

01:10:13.320 | So he didn't let me do homework.

01:10:14.920 | It was the greatest three credits ever.

01:10:16.480 | We just talked.

01:10:17.320 | I learned so much.

01:10:18.160 | It was so awesome.

01:10:19.200 | But so I started,

01:10:21.280 | so one time it came up,

01:10:22.480 | I had these people wrestling in my head,

01:10:24.920 | and he said, "Well, who else do you think?"

01:10:26.400 | I said, "I bet John Smith happened."

01:10:27.760 | So I went and got John Smith's number,

01:10:29.040 | I called him and said,

01:10:29.880 | "Hey, you ever had these people wrestling in your head?"

01:10:32.480 | And he said, "Yeah, but as soon as I stopped coaching,

01:10:34.600 | "they went away."

01:10:35.600 | Same thing happened to me.

01:10:36.880 | As soon as I started coaching, they went away.

01:10:38.640 | So if I really force myself now,

01:10:40.480 | and I'm like, I see something in practice,

01:10:43.080 | and it's really higher level,

01:10:44.160 | 'cause high school wrestling,

01:10:45.200 | I don't wanna make you guys feel bad,

01:10:46.520 | but it's a little bit lower level, right?

01:10:48.360 | So if Keegan, for example, who won the,

01:10:50.520 | if he's struggling with a problem or asked me a question,

01:10:54.000 | and I can force myself to see the bodies moving

01:10:57.640 | and think about it again,

01:10:58.960 | kinda like I was in early age,

01:11:00.400 | but it won't just flow there anymore.

01:11:02.840 | So he said it went away, and for me, it went away also.

01:11:05.600 | - By the way, if we can pause on the bodies in your head,

01:11:11.440 | how are they generating new ideas?

01:11:16.600 | Are they just kinda?

01:11:18.000 | - I don't know, you tell me.

01:11:20.240 | - So it's just, they're just like scrambling in your head?

01:11:23.980 | - It would be specifically based on a problem

01:11:27.000 | I was struggling with, or a specific position.

01:11:30.280 | - It goes in for a single and then go from there.

01:11:32.800 | - Yeah, so I'm sitting in geography class,

01:11:34.960 | and I don't have to work that hard 'cause it's easy, right?

01:11:38.240 | And yeah, I'm just sitting there,

01:11:40.000 | like kinda acting like I'm looking at the board,

01:11:41.760 | and these guys are wrestling, and I'm watching them wrestle,

01:11:43.960 | and yeah, sometimes they come up with a really good solution.

01:11:47.960 | - Is there somebody you looked up to style-wise?

01:11:52.360 | Like Gable, John Smith, all these legend status people.

01:11:57.360 | - Gable, or it's not Gable, John Smith, but after the fact.

01:12:01.020 | So the problem with wrestling in my era

01:12:03.380 | was you couldn't watch it.

01:12:04.740 | There was no access, right?

01:12:06.220 | It wasn't really available.

01:12:07.540 | Even if you wanna say go find a bunch of John Smith,

01:12:10.580 | man, they're kinda hard to find, right?

01:12:11.740 | There's a couple of them on YouTube,

01:12:13.060 | but I've obviously seen all of those,

01:12:15.040 | but in my era, there really wasn't any of it.

01:12:18.060 | So it was hard to be a fan of something,

01:12:19.540 | and that's why wrestling has,

01:12:22.020 | the fans are going like this,

01:12:23.200 | because now you flip on the Flow app,

01:12:25.740 | and you can watch something that's happening in Europe,

01:12:29.020 | right, and we can do this easily,

01:12:30.660 | so we can be a fan of people.

01:12:32.640 | So now I'm more a fan of wrestling than I was then,

01:12:35.420 | because there just was no access.

01:12:37.580 | So now I can watch someone I like and say,

01:12:39.260 | "Oh shit, that guy's wrestling.

01:12:41.020 | "Oh, boom, I flip my phone on, I watch them wrestle,"

01:12:43.340 | you know, that type of thing.

01:12:44.380 | - You know, on a quick rant, it's really frustrating

01:12:48.380 | that you can't watch the Olympics.

01:12:50.580 | - Oh my God, so frustrating.

01:12:52.660 | - I've been, I think I'm gonna go to war on this one.

01:12:55.900 | - Go to NBC's headquarters, I'll go with you.

01:12:57.780 | You got a soldier here.

01:12:59.700 | - I was talking to Jimmy, Jimmy Pedro,

01:13:02.460 | he was surprised by this too.

01:13:03.980 | Most matches, you can't see,

01:13:06.220 | even you talk about like a comeback,

01:13:09.860 | Gable Steeles, and you can't see the full match.

01:13:13.740 | You get like a crappy highlight.

01:13:15.860 | So the two biggest things, and really the three,

01:13:19.580 | the NCAA championship's on ASPN,

01:13:22.100 | the Olympic trials are on NBC,

01:13:23.820 | and the Olympics are on NBC.

01:13:25.100 | And these companies are so big,

01:13:27.420 | they don't have a department dedicated

01:13:28.860 | to selling the rights to that footage, right?

01:13:31.960 | So the rights to wrestling footage,

01:13:34.100 | which no one really cares all that much about

01:13:35.540 | except a niche, are the exact same as track and field,

01:13:38.620 | or basketball in the Olympics.

01:13:40.860 | So yes, all of this stuff is completely inaccessible to us.

01:13:44.620 | The NCAAs, the Olympic trials, and the Olympics,

01:13:47.220 | you can't go watch old film on it, it sucks.

01:13:49.540 | - Yeah, old or current film.

01:13:51.140 | - So you can't even watch the Gable match?

01:13:54.620 | - The Gable Steeles, no.

01:13:55.700 | They do something that annoys the fuck out of me.

01:13:59.020 | - What?

01:13:59.860 | - Okay, they do like a three or two minute highlight.

01:14:04.540 | So it's like they capture the most important thing,

01:14:09.060 | but it's all about the buildup.

01:14:11.900 | - Yeah, yeah.

01:14:12.740 | It's like that very beginning when you step on the mat

01:14:15.860 | and the nerves and you walk out and like that.

01:14:19.300 | I mean, I don't know.

01:14:20.820 | You miss, then when the triumph happens

01:14:24.740 | or the heartbreak happens, it has that much more power.

01:14:28.660 | - Yeah, if you wanna go to war with NBC or ESPN,

01:14:30.860 | I'm happy to join that.

01:14:32.220 | - I think unfortunately, it's the IOC.

01:14:34.980 | - Well, I mean, is the IOC on that?

01:14:37.660 | - IOC is selling for the Olympics is the one that's making.

01:14:41.940 | - Well, so NBC broadcasts,

01:14:43.500 | so they obviously have the live rights.

01:14:45.580 | You would think they would have recorded if they,

01:14:47.660 | I mean, they're the ones recording it.

01:14:48.860 | You would think they keep the rights when you think.

01:14:50.580 | - No, no, no.

01:14:51.500 | They're getting a license of it.

01:14:53.620 | They're getting exclusive like license,

01:14:55.420 | but like the, for example, I've had this,

01:14:59.740 | I talked to Travis Stevens, the judo player,

01:15:02.460 | and there's a really sort of famous match.

01:15:06.660 | It's a heartbreak in his career from 2012 Olympics

01:15:11.580 | where he goes against a German, Oleg Bishov, whatever.

01:15:14.340 | It's a 20 minute match to go to war,

01:15:16.620 | and that's not available anywhere,

01:15:18.300 | but it's uploaded on YouTube and set to private.

01:15:22.780 | The reason I know this is on the IOC channel.

01:15:26.220 | So they've uploaded all of these matches.

01:15:28.380 | - They have it and put it up?

01:15:29.780 | - So actually, so my Olympic match, the one I won,

01:15:33.180 | got put public, and so I don't know if it was private.

01:15:37.020 | It got put up on YouTube.

01:15:39.100 | I was alerted to it the week of my Jake Paul fight.

01:15:42.020 | It was so dumb.

01:15:42.860 | I'm like, what?

01:15:43.700 | This is 13 years later.

01:15:45.620 | This is bullshit.

01:15:46.660 | This should have been up.

01:15:47.780 | So I mean, okay, so what about Olympic trials footage?

01:15:51.600 | That has to be USOC then or NBC?

01:15:54.060 | So I know, okay, so I know Flow, right?

01:15:57.300 | 'Cause I work for them.

01:15:58.260 | I know if Flow buys your event or whatever, right?

01:16:01.860 | They buy the rights.

01:16:03.380 | Generally in the contract,

01:16:04.500 | they'll have rights to both live stream it

01:16:06.420 | and then use that footage at any point moving forward.

01:16:09.420 | So those matches live on Flow's website.

01:16:12.760 | That's why I would be surprised

01:16:13.900 | that if NBC didn't have something similar.

01:16:16.900 | - Flow does a pretty good job of providing

01:16:18.980 | like a place where you can watch all these matches.

01:16:22.060 | NBC does not.

01:16:22.980 | - Does not, yeah.

01:16:23.820 | - And also there's an argument with Flow as well,

01:16:27.100 | but certainly with Olympics.

01:16:28.700 | There's a difference between what Flow does

01:16:30.900 | and what the Olympics represent.

01:16:32.620 | - What do you mean by that?

01:16:33.780 | - Like it feels like the Olympics,

01:16:35.860 | which is what the charter says,

01:16:38.100 | should be as accessible as possible.

01:16:41.300 | - Yes, that's true.

01:16:42.140 | - Like you should really lower the barrier

01:16:44.100 | for entry for the Olympics.

01:16:45.820 | - You know that's what the charter says,

01:16:47.020 | but those people in the IOC,

01:16:48.140 | those are some of the worst people ever.

01:16:50.380 | They're very bad.

01:16:51.220 | - Well, they're not bad.

01:16:52.660 | They just lost touch of the dream they once had

01:16:55.740 | when they joined the IOC.

01:16:56.900 | - Well, I would argue all the way back

01:16:58.940 | that these are rich fat cats who,

01:17:01.140 | like I get so mad about the NCAA,

01:17:02.780 | which finally now got rid of this term,

01:17:05.380 | bullshit term amateurism.

01:17:07.100 | It's like, well, there's some holy grail

01:17:08.780 | where you can't make money to be an amateur athlete,

01:17:11.180 | but the people who own the IOC

01:17:12.860 | or the people who own the institutions,

01:17:15.340 | college institutions are making boatloads of money

01:17:17.100 | off of you, that's crap.

01:17:18.340 | - So you competed, like you said, at the 2008 Olympics.

01:17:24.220 | Did you believe you can win gold?

01:17:26.340 | - Yeah, absolutely.

01:17:27.860 | - So your mental game was on point.

01:17:30.500 | - Yeah, I was ready.

01:17:31.420 | - So what went wrong?

01:17:33.460 | - I just wasn't good enough.

01:17:34.860 | That was what I said.

01:17:35.820 | - Yeah.

01:17:36.660 | - Yeah, I mean, so at that point in time,

01:17:38.460 | it was my first year of international competition.

01:17:41.820 | So when I came out in 2007,

01:17:43.340 | it was my first time making 74 kilograms,

01:17:45.300 | which is pretty small for me.

01:17:47.540 | I had some failures, but then quickly I turned that around

01:17:50.900 | and I was having success in America.

01:17:53.500 | I was beating everyone, I don't wanna say easy,

01:17:55.580 | but yeah, I was doing really well.

01:18:00.460 | I went international one time

01:18:02.420 | and there was one match I got cheated on,

01:18:05.700 | the Russians, they're cheaters.

01:18:07.900 | I think it was Ukraine, not Russia.

01:18:09.660 | I lost one real match where I actually lost

01:18:13.580 | and it was to Dennis Sargouche,

01:18:15.580 | who had gone to win three world titles,

01:18:17.140 | but he was behind as the T of that year

01:18:18.940 | and it was competitive, so I knew, okay,

01:18:20.860 | I'm going with the best guys in the world.

01:18:23.820 | I beat a bunch of other guys who were good

01:18:27.700 | and had passed decent results.

01:18:29.620 | So I knew I was right there.

01:18:31.980 | Unfortunately, I ran into this guy, Ivan Fundora,

01:18:35.020 | and I had someone who scouted reports for him,

01:18:38.140 | actually my high school coach,

01:18:38.980 | who now coaches for our academy, John Messimerich,

01:18:41.500 | and Fundora was the worst stylistic matchup.

01:18:43.540 | I got him and I lost him second round.

01:18:46.900 | So I wasn't good enough.

01:18:48.620 | Had I decided to keep wrestling,

01:18:50.980 | I probably would have gotten better,

01:18:52.060 | but at that point, I just wasn't in the cards.

01:18:53.860 | - So in your division was, like you said,

01:18:55.660 | it's the T of, vice versa, it's the T of.

01:18:58.580 | That guy is special.

01:19:01.140 | - He's very special.

01:19:02.260 | So that would be my other guy that you asked earlier

01:19:04.140 | who I enjoyed watching and that was a guy,

01:19:06.900 | again, it was kind of after the fact

01:19:08.220 | because it was hard to access footage,

01:19:10.420 | but he was a lot of fun to watch.

01:19:12.300 | - What do you think made him great?

01:19:14.060 | A lot of people talk about him

01:19:17.300 | as potentially one of the greatest ever.

01:19:20.340 | - Absolutely.

01:19:21.180 | I mean, so he won six and three,

01:19:22.980 | six worlds, three Olympics, nine total,

01:19:26.780 | which there's only one or two people above that.

01:19:29.220 | So again, it was hard to watch any live footage of him,

01:19:33.020 | but from what I've seen, his feel is different.

01:19:35.420 | He was just ahead of his time

01:19:37.060 | and the feel and the touch he had

01:19:38.540 | for certain moves and different things

01:19:40.460 | because obviously physically he's kind of unimposing.

01:19:43.300 | He's taller and skinnier,

01:19:45.780 | which is, it can work in wrestling,

01:19:47.820 | but it is by less represented.

01:19:50.600 | Yeah, he was special, so good.

01:19:54.520 | - Do you take any inspiration from,

01:19:57.560 | let's talk about Dagestan in general.

01:20:00.220 | What do you think makes those wrestlers great?

01:20:02.700 | - Yeah, it's fascinating.

01:20:04.260 | Have you read the book, "The Talent Code"?

01:20:06.300 | - Yeah. - It's great.

01:20:07.220 | And that kind of talks about these talent hotspots

01:20:09.100 | all around the world.

01:20:09.940 | So now, obviously with our wrestling academies,

01:20:12.020 | we try to take some lessons from that and apply it.

01:20:15.500 | I got to assume, they didn't cover Dagestan

01:20:17.300 | in that book specifically,

01:20:19.180 | but I got to assume a lot of the same principles

01:20:23.220 | that are in that book apply to Dagestan and wrestling.

01:20:26.360 | They did South Korea and women's golf.

01:20:29.720 | They did Curacao in baseball.

01:20:31.400 | They picked a lot of these other places

01:20:32.560 | that were really elite.

01:20:33.920 | I think it was maybe Moscow in women's tennis also.

01:20:36.760 | So I think all of these things

01:20:39.560 | that make any group great or organization

01:20:43.240 | is probably the same things that's happening there.

01:20:45.360 | - Well, the hardship, I mean, what,

01:20:47.600 | is there something specific about wrestling

01:20:49.440 | that can create so many great champions?

01:20:53.400 | - From that area, so obviously they all love,

01:20:58.020 | like it's a big deal that wrestling

01:20:59.380 | is specifically is a big deal there.

01:21:00.980 | You know, they do Sambo also, obviously.

01:21:03.660 | So that's part of it is a lot of the kids are doing it.

01:21:05.860 | They obviously are rough tumble, tough life.

01:21:08.580 | - Yeah, get in a lot of fights.

01:21:09.780 | - And then I think that also that a lot of them,

01:21:12.460 | it is a way out, right?

01:21:13.700 | They're the elite level athletes in that part of the world

01:21:16.740 | from my understanding are really well compensated

01:21:18.620 | compared to what the average person makes

01:21:21.220 | and they're treated really well.

01:21:22.160 | So people see it as a way out.

01:21:23.900 | Whereas like, and then honestly,

01:21:25.780 | if America is getting better, but in 2008,

01:21:28.420 | the reason I went to MMA was 'cause

01:21:30.600 | I didn't wanna be poor my whole life.

01:21:32.420 | You know what I'm saying?

01:21:33.260 | It sucks.

01:21:34.080 | It's like, well, I don't wanna make $20,000

01:21:34.980 | for the next four to eight years.

01:21:37.100 | So I'm gonna go do something else.

01:21:39.020 | If I could have made, even I didn't need to be rich, right?

01:21:41.020 | If I could have made $100,000 or $70,000 wrestling,

01:21:43.540 | I probably would have kept wrestling.

01:21:46.180 | So I think it's those factors.

01:21:48.220 | And obviously now they have a really like

01:21:50.980 | a bunch of really good people in one area.

01:21:52.860 | So there's probably, it's been going on for a long time.

01:21:55.380 | So there's probably been a bunch of like adults

01:21:57.100 | and coaches that are coming back and helping that progress.

01:21:59.620 | So yeah, a lot of those things that happen.

01:22:01.620 | - So I'm definitely gonna travel there as I talk to him

01:22:04.220 | 'cause I can speak Russian.

01:22:05.260 | That makes it very,

01:22:06.600 | makes me uniquely qualified to-

01:22:11.660 | - Absolutely.

01:22:12.500 | My brother can speak a little bit of Russian.

01:22:15.260 | - Your brother can? - Yeah.

01:22:16.980 | - Okay, like a little bit like two squares and hello?

01:22:19.700 | - No, no, no, no, like he would,

01:22:22.340 | oh man, don't be over so,

01:22:23.900 | I think he would be able to have a conversation with you.

01:22:25.700 | I think. - Okay.

01:22:26.700 | - Probably not like you.

01:22:28.460 | - What's the reason he knows Russian?

01:22:31.180 | - I don't know why he got obsessed with languages.

01:22:33.060 | And so his college degree is actually,

01:22:35.000 | what do they call it, interdis,

01:22:37.420 | where you have three minors.

01:22:38.660 | So you had a minor in Russian,

01:22:40.220 | a minor in Spanish and maybe Japanese.

01:22:45.340 | I'm messing up.

01:22:46.180 | It's definitely, it's Russian and Spanish for sure.

01:22:48.380 | I don't know what the third one is.

01:22:49.740 | No, but yeah, Dagestan, it's really fascinating.

01:22:52.900 | - But the emphasis on technique, the lighter drilling,

01:22:57.020 | like they don't really go super hard.

01:22:59.060 | - Yeah, and I only spent a couple,

01:23:00.660 | so I was there, I was in Vladikavkaz in 2008.

01:23:03.340 | That was where the World Cup was.

01:23:04.980 | We had to train there for like two days afterwards.

01:23:07.020 | So I didn't get to dig deep,

01:23:10.500 | did dig deep into what was going on or anything.

01:23:14.180 | But yeah, I mean, I think sparring is very beneficial

01:23:19.180 | for wrestling.

01:23:20.180 | Not like, sparring in MMA is what we fight, right?

01:23:24.460 | Sparring in wrestling is,

01:23:26.300 | so I always just describe it to be really simple.

01:23:29.380 | If we're drilling, it's relatively 0% resistance.

01:23:31.900 | If we're going as hard as we can, that's 100%.

01:23:33.900 | There's all this gray area in the middle,

01:23:35.620 | that's sparring, right?

01:23:36.820 | And so if you have a good relationship,

01:23:40.780 | like, because a colleague of mine, my brother,

01:23:42.580 | we could just go and we know where each other's at.

01:23:45.300 | We don't even have to talk about it, right?

01:23:46.500 | But like in my wrestling club, I'll say,

01:23:47.900 | "Okay, hey, I want you guys to go 50% in this position."

01:23:51.500 | Or, "I want the high crotch guy, I want him to shoot,

01:23:54.220 | "and this is for him, so I want him to go 70.

01:23:56.540 | "And the defensive guy, I want you to go 40.

01:23:58.180 | "So you're not supposed to be trying to win here.

01:23:59.900 | "You're gonna go a little lighter.

01:24:00.740 | "I want you to give him some looks."

01:24:03.500 | So I think it has really taken hold in America.

01:24:05.300 | I think it's really beneficial for success.

01:24:07.100 | And I think that's, I mean, America's doing better

01:24:09.500 | than we've ever done historically.

01:24:11.020 | - Well, that's 70 and 40, that's like an art form

01:24:13.220 | to find that right place.

01:24:14.380 | 'Cause like what the really good people I've trained with,

01:24:17.820 | they go much closer to 100% speed wise,

01:24:22.820 | or like, but without like forcing things

01:24:26.820 | the way you would when you're going.

01:24:27.940 | It's some weird combination of things that,

01:24:30.740 | like if you truly earn a technique,

01:24:33.360 | then you're given that technique.

01:24:36.540 | But like, if you don't, you don't.

01:24:39.260 | And then it becomes much less injury prone.

01:24:42.300 | It becomes somehow more fun, more dynamic.

01:24:44.580 | You don't get stuck in positions.

01:24:46.500 | It's just a lot of movement.

01:24:48.540 | - Yeah, the one thing, so you and John talked about,

01:24:51.260 | you know, like different ways to learn and get better.

01:24:54.060 | And so I think John obviously innovated

01:24:55.660 | within the sport of jujitsu.

01:24:57.380 | And so for us, and maybe there's a differentiator for us.

01:25:03.580 | I think about it like-- - Sorry to interrupt.

01:25:05.300 | You have this academy and you sent me this plan

01:25:07.180 | and you have a really well thought through plan

01:25:10.060 | for how to develop a good wrestler.

01:25:12.260 | - So I think it's, for me there's four categories, right?

01:25:16.980 | There's the teaching, which is like, you don't know shit.

01:25:20.220 | You're coming in and I'm showing you the move

01:25:22.380 | and you're literally going out there and you're trying.

01:25:24.660 | To me, that's not even drilling.

01:25:26.220 | That's like teaching, like you're trying to learn something.

01:25:29.460 | So obviously in someone's earlier periods,

01:25:32.340 | they're spending a lot of time in that phase

01:25:34.940 | because they literally don't even know

01:25:36.380 | how to move their bodies the right way.

01:25:38.660 | Once you learn the skill, then there's the drilling

01:25:40.900 | 'cause you absolutely have to get those reps

01:25:43.180 | to become really proficient in that movement.

01:25:46.140 | And then the sparring and then the live, right?

01:25:48.220 | And so like, I think obviously by the time you get

01:25:51.380 | to the kind of, I don't know, the end point, right?

01:25:53.780 | But further on, the time you spend teaching is so,

01:25:58.300 | I don't wanna say, I'm sorry,

01:25:59.580 | in the learning teaching phase is not insignificant

01:26:02.500 | but it's so much smaller because to someone

01:26:04.020 | who's really good, who I've coached for 10 years,

01:26:06.100 | I don't have to give this big, long, drawn-out explanation.

01:26:08.620 | I just have to say, "Hey, move your hand

01:26:10.220 | "a little differently," right?

01:26:11.580 | Or, "Just do this," right?

01:26:13.020 | We don't have to spend any time there.

01:26:14.420 | So I think that's like something that consumes

01:26:16.420 | for the younger kids, say five through 12 or 13,

01:26:19.940 | we're consuming a massive amount of time there

01:26:22.620 | on that teaching, learning phase.

01:26:24.780 | And then as we get older, that time wanes a lot.

01:26:28.540 | - But that makes total sense, right?

01:26:30.060 | - Yeah.

01:26:31.100 | - It's funny 'cause when you look at like jiu-jitsu schools,

01:26:34.520 | they spend a lot of time in the teaching learning

01:26:36.900 | and then the live, it feels like there's not enough drilling.

01:26:40.140 | I like how you draw a distinction there.

01:26:42.060 | - Yeah.

01:26:42.900 | - 'Cause it feels like you're always starting from scratch.

01:26:45.660 | Like people have like very crappy short-term memory.

01:26:48.840 | Like they're not, like the way teaching is done

01:26:52.900 | is you show a technique from scratch

01:26:55.060 | and it seems disjoint.

01:26:57.080 | - It is, for sure.

01:26:57.920 | Especially if you have a class that's been with you

01:26:59.380 | for a while, you don't have to start from scratch.

01:27:01.360 | You can say, "Hey, let's focus on this one little thing here

01:27:04.100 | "or after we do this, let's do that."

01:27:06.860 | You know, and you kind of start putting it all together.

01:27:09.260 | And then with jiu-jitsu, the thing that I really struggled

01:27:12.700 | with was a couple things.

01:27:14.020 | It was, and this is not speaking for all the jiu-jitsu gyms,

01:27:17.620 | my personal experience through the sport.

01:27:19.900 | And I actually found, so when I unretired,

01:27:21.900 | I found someone really great that I loved

01:27:23.680 | and I really wish it was Mark Lehman.

01:27:25.100 | I don't know if you know him at all.

01:27:26.220 | I wish I would have found him earlier

01:27:28.480 | 'cause he was just tremendous.

01:27:29.980 | But number one, there's no drilling.

01:27:32.540 | So it's like in wrestling, I can boil down to,

01:27:35.820 | I can probably name you the best six moves, right?

01:27:40.660 | So we need, as younger people, single leg, right?

01:27:43.580 | Single leg's gonna be the most proficient takedown.

01:27:45.280 | It always has been, I don't know,

01:27:47.060 | probably always will be unless the AI

01:27:48.460 | figures out something different.

01:27:50.060 | - The robot.

01:27:52.340 | - The robot figures out something different.

01:27:53.460 | We're gonna shoot a lot of single legs.

01:27:54.740 | Why?

01:27:55.580 | 'Cause everyone's gonna do that, right?

01:27:56.760 | We're gonna shoot a lot of single legs.

01:27:58.380 | So just like, say, an arm bar or some type of sweep, right?

01:28:02.060 | Why can't we go get 50 reps there?

01:28:03.940 | Hey, by the time I've been in your jiu-jitsu school

01:28:06.540 | for two years, I better know a fucking arm bar.

01:28:08.340 | I better know it.

01:28:09.480 | So don't spend 10 minutes teaching me.

01:28:11.340 | Just tell me to go hit 50 reps.

01:28:12.940 | And then if when I'm hitting my reps,

01:28:14.660 | if there's something I'm doing wrong,

01:28:16.440 | then just say, "Hey, Ben, move your leg

01:28:18.380 | "a little bit that way."

01:28:19.300 | Or, "Raise your hips up a little more."

01:28:20.820 | Right, like correct as you're drilling

01:28:23.280 | so you're getting all these reps at it

01:28:24.700 | so you're becoming more proficient.

01:28:26.340 | And then the other thing I really struggled with

01:28:27.660 | was, to your point, during live,

01:28:30.180 | so many times it's just this five minute, go, go.

01:28:32.940 | Go, and that's not the most efficient way to learn

01:28:35.260 | because when you have two people,

01:28:37.260 | especially when they're focused on winning,

01:28:39.220 | and you say, "Go,"

01:28:40.300 | they're gonna go to wherever they do best.

01:28:41.940 | Well, if I'm trying to make you good at something,

01:28:43.620 | I don't want you doing what you do best all the time.

01:28:45.900 | I need you doing some other things, right?

01:28:47.820 | If you have a great single leg,

01:28:48.900 | but you can't shoot to the other side of their body,

01:28:51.020 | we need to work on that.

01:28:52.580 | Right, you need to start shooting the other side.

01:28:54.620 | - There's some sense that you,

01:28:56.500 | it's not like you should be told what to work on,

01:28:58.780 | but you should be told to work on the thing

01:29:00.980 | that you wanna work on.

01:29:02.380 | Meaning, 'cause I don't know,

01:29:04.060 | maybe you can comment on this,

01:29:05.220 | but everybody develops a different game

01:29:07.820 | as you get better and better.

01:29:08.860 | There's a set of things you need to be working on.

01:29:11.700 | So I actually have,

01:29:12.620 | especially when I'm training very seriously,

01:29:17.180 | I'll have a specific technique that I have in mind,

01:29:21.140 | and I have a sheet of paper on the side

01:29:24.960 | where I literally, in my head, keep counting off

01:29:26.860 | how many times I put myself in that position

01:29:29.340 | and pulled off the technique.

01:29:30.380 | And that's all I care about in training.

01:29:32.940 | So I'll just, whatever it is,

01:29:35.380 | if it's a guillotine, it's a guillotine,

01:29:37.180 | arm drag, arm drag.

01:29:38.420 | But I wanna make sure I don't, I love numbers.

01:29:42.140 | So I'll say, I'll make sure I get 50 arm drags,

01:29:47.140 | and I'm not getting off the mat until I do.

01:29:49.580 | And that, if it takes--

01:29:50.900 | - In a thrilling or live contest?

01:29:53.100 | - So in the thing I'm describing right now

01:29:55.380 | is the live contest.

01:29:56.220 | - Okay, got it.

01:29:57.060 | - But drilling, obviously, drilling.

01:29:59.260 | I can't find a drilling part,

01:30:01.940 | like it's so hard to find drilling partners.

01:30:04.020 | Even-- - So boring.

01:30:05.580 | - It's annoying to me that this is boring.

01:30:07.900 | And there's nothing more annoying to me

01:30:09.860 | than the look of boredom on another person's face

01:30:12.180 | when we're drilling.

01:30:13.340 | It's like--

01:30:14.180 | - Do you really think drilling's that beneficial to you?

01:30:15.580 | 'Cause you said it's a job.

01:30:17.100 | - Yes, yes. - Really?

01:30:17.940 | - And he thinks I'm an idiot, but yes.

01:30:19.140 | - Why?

01:30:20.500 | - Why am I an idiot or why is this drilling beneficial?

01:30:24.540 | - Well, let's go with two different positions.

01:30:27.020 | Why is it so beneficial?

01:30:28.260 | - I think, for me, there's a meditative aspect to it

01:30:34.580 | where the more you drill,

01:30:36.900 | the more you start noticing the details.

01:30:41.020 | - Okay, let me push back a little bit here.

01:30:43.740 | I'm not gonna push back all the way,

01:30:44.860 | 'cause every time, if I was wrestling,

01:30:47.220 | I won't have a head-crunch thing, whatever, right?

01:30:49.700 | But even, so say at a high level,

01:30:51.780 | when I'm really wrestling, say 10 years ago,

01:30:54.980 | even during that drill portion,

01:30:56.700 | if we talk about the resistance of our opponent

01:30:58.380 | from zero to 100, it's very likely that my partner,

01:31:03.380 | at that point, 'cause it's people I'm really comfortable with,

01:31:05.380 | they're probably at least going 20 or 30, right?

01:31:07.260 | They're probably giving me a certain look with the sprawl

01:31:09.700 | or I gotta get through their hands.

01:31:11.540 | If I don't set it up right,

01:31:12.940 | they might put their arm down, right?

01:31:14.780 | So it's like, we are drilling,

01:31:16.900 | 'cause we're wrestling at a really low resistance level,

01:31:19.380 | but there's a little bit of sparring too.

01:31:20.620 | - Oh yeah, the 20%, the 20, yeah, yeah.

01:31:22.660 | So that's not all. - So that's not really

01:31:24.180 | drilling, 'cause I think of drilling,

01:31:25.660 | I think literally you're shooting and I'm just, boom,

01:31:28.180 | I'm gonna shoot, I'm gonna be your dummy, boom, boom,

01:31:29.700 | boom, boom, boom, type of thing.

01:31:31.140 | - No, but it's very hard to be a dummy

01:31:32.860 | that doesn't do 20%, so you're gonna do 20%, yeah.

01:31:36.300 | So yes, that's 20%.

01:31:37.460 | But-- - So that's like sparring

01:31:38.660 | a little bit then.

01:31:40.140 | - No, but they're not really resisting,

01:31:41.820 | they're just giving you the right frame,

01:31:43.620 | they're giving you the right movement,

01:31:46.340 | and they're being an intelligent dummy, essentially.

01:31:49.940 | I mean, but also the really important component of this

01:31:53.420 | is you pick the techniques for which it's beneficial.

01:31:56.340 | If the technique has dynamic elements to it,

01:31:59.660 | you don't want to be doing that with,

01:32:02.180 | I'm saying there's certain moves,

01:32:04.680 | and I like those moves, and I select the game base

01:32:08.180 | in those moves that can-- - So are you drilling

01:32:10.060 | to get better, or are you drilling just to work out?

01:32:12.340 | - No, to get better.

01:32:13.740 | That's what I'm trying to tell you.

01:32:14.660 | I believe you can become exceptionally good

01:32:17.820 | very fast by drilling.

01:32:19.220 | - But how?

01:32:20.060 | - First of all, let me ask you an empirical question.

01:32:25.460 | Have you actually drilled 10,000 times

01:32:28.780 | a particular move? - Absolutely, millions.

01:32:30.980 | - Millions, you haven't drilled millions.

01:32:32.900 | - Hundreds of thousands, hundreds of thousands likely.

01:32:34.700 | - I think you're just saying numbers.

01:32:36.820 | I don't think you know what 100,000--

01:32:37.660 | - The number is freaking astronomical,

01:32:39.060 | it's way more than 10,000.

01:32:39.980 | - I don't think you know what 100,000 feels like.

01:32:41.820 | - Dude, there was a 10-year period

01:32:42.980 | where I wrestled every single day, that's 3,000 days,

01:32:46.540 | so you're telling me 10,000, that's only three of them a day.

01:32:48.780 | I did way more than that.

01:32:50.740 | - Three of them?

01:32:51.580 | - Probably 30 of them a day, that's 100,000.

01:32:53.620 | - Yeah, 30. - Yeah, hundreds of thousands.

01:32:56.100 | - I doubt you did 30 a day for a particular technique.

01:32:57.580 | - I did, for sure, 100%, there's no doubt.

01:33:01.860 | 'Cause some days I might do 100, right?

01:33:04.140 | So 30 of 30's not very many,

01:33:05.860 | especially if we count all reps,

01:33:07.220 | if we're counting drilling and live.

01:33:09.340 | So our college coaches would make us just drill a lot

01:33:11.980 | and I always hated it, so I would rebel

01:33:14.300 | and just kind of give a little spar.

01:33:15.460 | You shoot a high crotch, we'll start.

01:33:17.140 | Coach wants to drill a high crotch, okay, we'll start.

01:33:18.760 | You shoot the high crotch, that's great.

01:33:20.100 | Then I'm gonna sit the corner, I'm gonna give you my hip,

01:33:22.420 | or I'm gonna try something, so then you have to react.

01:33:25.260 | And I would argue that all skill level

01:33:29.420 | past the beginner stuff is some necessity of that, right?

01:33:34.020 | I'm gonna do this, then what are you gonna do?

01:33:36.220 | It's back and forth.

01:33:37.180 | I shoot a single leg, what are you gonna do?

01:33:38.640 | I shoot a high crotch, what are you gonna do?

01:33:39.900 | And you have to start unconsciously programming

01:33:42.380 | these things in your head,

01:33:43.220 | because if you consciously think about it,

01:33:44.300 | it's gonna be too slow to actually hit it in math.

01:33:45.780 | - But the drilling is the unconscious programming.

01:33:48.100 | - But the simple movement, the first simple movement,

01:33:51.240 | the first simple movement, that single leg,

01:33:53.280 | or the high crotch, or arm drag, whatever,

01:33:55.920 | like I feel like the amount you're gonna get better at it

01:34:00.000 | is so minuscule compared to the amount you're gonna gain

01:34:02.620 | at doing other things around it.

01:34:05.200 | Do you see what I mean?

01:34:06.020 | - No, but that's the key word, you feel.

01:34:08.760 | - Okay. - That's your opinion.

01:34:09.600 | - I think if we did a study on it,

01:34:12.160 | that I would be proven correct.

01:34:13.520 | - No, perhaps.

01:34:15.220 | So first of all, your brain,

01:34:16.900 | as an exceptionally creative combat athlete,

01:34:20.860 | it's clear that you don't like the boredom of drilling.

01:34:24.540 | Like it's obvious that you have like,

01:34:26.900 | you're such a creative energy,

01:34:28.700 | that you're just not going to be somebody

01:34:31.380 | who's going to enjoy that.

01:34:32.420 | So enjoyment is probably,

01:34:34.540 | having an active mind is really important.

01:34:36.820 | So the question is, do you have the kind of makeup

01:34:39.820 | that has an active mind during a drilling on a dummy?

01:34:44.700 | And I have that mind.

01:34:47.080 | Like I can-- - But do you really think,

01:34:48.720 | okay, so if you're, let's pick a technique.

01:34:51.200 | What technique do you wanna drill a lot?

01:34:53.280 | - I would do jiu-jitsu or wrestling.

01:34:54.800 | - Whatever you want.

01:34:55.800 | - It's hard to describe with words,

01:34:58.440 | but certain guard passes.

01:35:00.380 | Let me think, just guard pass.

01:35:03.000 | - Okay, so you have a guard pass,

01:35:04.920 | and you get it to be a, I'd say 9 1/2 out of 10, right?

01:35:07.480 | Just from a technical standpoint.

01:35:09.960 | Don't you think you need some resistance to feel,

01:35:12.680 | 'cause essentially all benefit after that

01:35:15.180 | is going to be, what are they gonna try to do to me?

01:35:18.180 | And if they shift it that way,

01:35:19.380 | do I need to sink here or move there?

01:35:21.620 | So it's like, I actually think we're agreeing,

01:35:25.100 | but maybe terminology-wise.

01:35:27.180 | - Well, the split is the important thing,

01:35:28.900 | like how much of each.

01:35:30.580 | - So I think it is spar.

01:35:32.020 | I think it's a very light touch spar

01:35:34.580 | is what you're talking about,

01:35:36.020 | which is, in my opinion, really isn't drilling.

01:35:38.420 | And it's 'cause drilling past the basic proficiency,

01:35:41.500 | I don't think brings much value.

01:35:43.060 | - No, but that's what I'm trying to tell you

01:35:44.260 | is I think it does.

01:35:45.820 | I think if you're doing that same movement,

01:35:50.820 | I think you begin to learn more over time.

01:35:54.860 | Like you're saying once you get the basic proficiency,

01:35:57.700 | then there's diminishing returns.

01:35:59.980 | I don't think so. - Yeah, that's what I think.

01:36:01.500 | - I don't think so.

01:36:02.340 | I think everything has diminishing returns

01:36:04.720 | when you're learning a technique.

01:36:06.260 | - But with something as complex as wrestling or grappling,

01:36:10.380 | if you can have way more gains over here,

01:36:13.020 | why focus on going from a 9.7 to a 9.8?

01:36:16.700 | If this other area, if you're spending so much time here

01:36:19.820 | that there's other areas left unexplored

01:36:21.820 | and you can make gigantic gains over there.

01:36:23.620 | - No, but you're gonna lose.

01:36:25.220 | I think a lot depends on your style.

01:36:28.020 | I think a lot is determined by how good you are at one thing.

01:36:33.020 | And so if you wanna become a master of a particular thing

01:36:36.580 | and then make your whole game

01:36:37.740 | where it's all pulled into that system,

01:36:39.980 | then I don't know.

01:36:40.820 | - I think one is too small of a number.

01:36:42.980 | - Yeah, it's small.

01:36:44.380 | I feel like you can't be easily this, like I've--

01:36:47.900 | - Yeah, you wanna funnel, you wanna create funnels.

01:36:50.140 | - Funnels. - Funnels, right?

01:36:51.340 | Where everything goes into a few positions

01:36:52.780 | where ideally you win 100%. - And then it's all feel.

01:36:54.580 | Yeah. - Yeah.

01:36:55.540 | - But I feel that you can get like drilling on a dummy

01:37:00.540 | 80% of the time and 20% of the time

01:37:05.100 | live rolling with people worse than you,

01:37:08.580 | like a little bit worse than you or a lot worse than you.

01:37:11.220 | - Yeah, so I definitely think,

01:37:13.260 | so my buildup would be teach,

01:37:17.820 | so we're talking a complex technique, right?

01:37:19.460 | So by the time we're talking about,

01:37:21.380 | we'll say a late high school kid who's pretty proficient,

01:37:24.820 | he's probably done the drilling part.

01:37:26.700 | So then now it's like, okay,

01:37:28.460 | if I wanna get something new to you,

01:37:30.300 | I'll probably tell you,

01:37:31.460 | you'll probably be able to do the basic premise

01:37:32.860 | within five to 10 minutes if they're good, right?

01:37:35.380 | Do this, okay, they do it.

01:37:36.820 | Then it's like, okay, so now here's from here,

01:37:38.980 | what are we gonna do?

01:37:39.820 | We're gonna go light sparring, so I know you have success

01:37:42.060 | 'cause I need you to complete the task

01:37:43.500 | in order to get better at it.

01:37:44.500 | That's something a lot of people in wrestling mess up

01:37:46.540 | is they just wanna go to the toughest person.

01:37:47.940 | But if you go to the toughest person,

01:37:49.400 | you're not gonna actually execute on any skills.

01:37:51.940 | You're gonna get a workout, but you're not,

01:37:53.060 | and I need you to execute 'cause I need you to get good

01:37:54.700 | at this in order to get good at it.

01:37:56.100 | You have to get all the way through the technique.

01:37:57.500 | - Why do you need them to complete,

01:37:58.980 | just so they gain confidence in the technique

01:38:00.780 | or they go through all the steps of the technique?

01:38:01.620 | - They have to feel all the way through.

01:38:03.660 | Like if I said, learn a high crotch,

01:38:06.660 | when you're drilling with stop halfway every time.

01:38:08.700 | But you're not actually gonna be able to do it

01:38:10.620 | 'cause you're gonna stop, you're not gonna feel.

01:38:12.660 | So try it on someone, spar lightly, get it.

01:38:16.220 | Do it on someone who's not as good, you get it.

01:38:18.300 | Then kind of work your way up the ladder

01:38:20.220 | so you can get it on someone your own skill level

01:38:21.860 | or maybe better than you in a live competition.

01:38:24.960 | So it's like, I don't know, I feel like that basic drilling,

01:38:28.740 | so a kid like Keegan who I've brought up a few times,

01:38:31.260 | I feel like if there's something new,

01:38:32.580 | I could literally tell him, this is what I want you to do

01:38:34.860 | and he has such a great feel,

01:38:36.420 | he could go drill it proficiently

01:38:37.900 | within probably a minute or two.

01:38:40.160 | But then to hit it on someone high level,

01:38:41.780 | that's gonna take quite a while longer.

01:38:44.300 | - And that's a mix of drilling and--

01:38:46.740 | - Sparring.

01:38:47.580 | - Sparring on people a little bit worse than you.

01:38:49.860 | - Yeah, and then equal and then better.

01:38:52.500 | - Yeah, okay.

01:38:53.540 | - Yeah, because there's this, with grappling,

01:38:56.300 | there's such a feel component to the pressure,

01:38:58.840 | the movement, all these things.

01:39:00.300 | And there's still, like I said,

01:39:01.540 | there's so many things you can throw at someone

01:39:03.180 | out of one position, not just moves,

01:39:05.860 | but moves at different levels of force or whatever.

01:39:08.580 | - Are you and these kids developing

01:39:11.540 | like a big picture strategy of like,

01:39:14.660 | what are the main setups and takedowns

01:39:18.700 | and just like a whole system?

01:39:20.420 | - So I kind of sent you our technique book, right,

01:39:24.260 | and how we kind of go at, approach it.

01:39:26.740 | So I think in wrestling, you're going to need,

01:39:31.060 | you're gonna need a handful of things,

01:39:32.820 | just off the word go, right?

01:39:34.980 | You're going to, so I think on our feet,

01:39:37.180 | I need to be able to take this side of the body,

01:39:38.780 | I need to be able to take that side of the body,

01:39:40.860 | I need to be able to bring you underneath me,

01:39:42.860 | I need to be able to go around you, right?

01:39:44.880 | Now we can accomplish those different ways,

01:39:46.720 | but we should have all of those weapons,

01:39:48.380 | if we're gonna be really good some way, right?

01:39:51.140 | So if I neglect one of those,

01:39:52.420 | so if I neglect the ability to say,

01:39:53.780 | pull you down, right, if I had locked you,

01:39:56.360 | now if I have a good shot and you're smart,

01:39:58.460 | you're just gonna lower your stance.

01:39:59.540 | So my shot is not gonna be as successful,

01:40:01.980 | and I have the inability to pull you down, right?

01:40:03.980 | So I kind of need all of those, so I can,

01:40:06.180 | as they get better, I can point those things out.

01:40:09.220 | On bottom, my focus on bottom, there's certain things,

01:40:12.180 | like you have to be good at leg right defense, right?

01:40:15.580 | You have to, I mean, at a high level,

01:40:17.380 | or you're just gonna, you're gonna,

01:40:18.360 | when you get it in, you're just gonna get stuck there,

01:40:20.260 | not gonna be able to escape.

01:40:22.460 | But besides that, yeah, there's a multitude of things

01:40:24.980 | that you can choose from, and I'm gonna,

01:40:26.180 | depending on your body style,

01:40:29.340 | and what you're good and bad at,

01:40:30.500 | I'm gonna probably develop something a little different.

01:40:32.420 | I might give you, hey, you do the quad pod,

01:40:34.480 | you'd be better as a knee slide, whatever.

01:40:37.140 | Yeah, top, kind of same thing.

01:40:40.620 | - I have to ask you about Khabib.

01:40:42.460 | So I remember a while ago,

01:40:44.060 | Rogan said that that's the perfect fight for Khabib.

01:40:48.780 | You are.

01:40:50.380 | So let me ask two questions.

01:40:52.060 | The first, do you think you can beat him in an MMA match

01:40:55.620 | when you're at your peak?

01:40:57.340 | - I don't like, yeah, I mean,

01:40:59.140 | this is one of those people where people will get

01:41:00.740 | really mad at me if I say yes, but yeah, I mean--

01:41:02.660 | - But how would you do it?

01:41:03.620 | How would you solve that puzzle?

01:41:05.300 | - Yeah, I mean, we would grapple,

01:41:08.940 | and I think I would be better than him,

01:41:10.180 | but I, you know, I feel weird saying this,

01:41:12.380 | people are like, yeah, right, you're full of shit,

01:41:14.180 | you know, and, but that's, no one out grappled him, right?

01:41:18.080 | I mean, nobody did, and maybe I'm wrong on this,

01:41:20.740 | but if we look at the best possible candidates,

01:41:24.000 | I'm definitely one of them,

01:41:25.160 | and obviously I have a small size advantage too.

01:41:27.560 | - So in a wrestling match,

01:41:30.020 | so we can just reduce that MMA match to a wrestling match,

01:41:33.060 | what do you think is the right strategy on him?

01:41:35.300 | Like, do you understand his style,

01:41:37.220 | his wrestling style, the pressure he applies?

01:41:41.100 | Do you understand how the hell he makes that happen?

01:41:44.060 | - Yeah, I mean, see, he never, unfortunately,

01:41:46.940 | fought any real, who I would say,

01:41:48.780 | really, really high-level wrestlers.

01:41:50.500 | I was actually really disappointed

01:41:51.420 | how bad Justin Gaethje's wrestling was,

01:41:52.900 | 'cause Justin Gaethje had some solid success,

01:41:55.720 | but his wrestling was really bad in that fight.

01:41:58.160 | - Gaethje had success in CWA?

01:42:00.440 | - Yeah, I think he was seventh place, maybe, or somewhere.

01:42:03.920 | He was definitely All-American.

01:42:05.600 | He was lower, though.

01:42:06.860 | So yeah, I would like to see how he dealt

01:42:10.840 | with someone who was like, who I think,

01:42:12.360 | oh man, this guy's a really high-level wrestler,

01:42:14.480 | 'cause, you know, we saw, and this is early in his career,

01:42:16.600 | but, you know, Gleason Tebow did give him some issues

01:42:18.840 | earlier in his career,

01:42:21.220 | so I would like to see him in that situation

01:42:22.880 | and see how he does.

01:42:23.720 | I would love to, like, you know,

01:42:24.800 | I just love wrestling and grappling.

01:42:26.240 | Like, yeah, I'd love if someone said,

01:42:27.800 | hey, Ben, you know, Khabib wants to roll with you.

01:42:30.680 | I go, okay, I'm there tomorrow.

01:42:32.120 | It sounds like a blast.

01:42:33.000 | Let's go.

01:42:34.040 | - He's probably competitive as hell.

01:42:35.980 | - Yeah.

01:42:36.820 | - You're still competitive?

01:42:38.040 | - I know when to be and when not to be.

01:42:39.520 | Like, you know, say if I'm going to high school,

01:42:40.920 | kids are not gonna be competitive,

01:42:43.160 | 'cause then I'm just being a dick.

01:42:45.760 | - How would you take him down?

01:42:47.260 | - What, what were we talking about, real wrestlers?

01:42:49.920 | - Wrestling wrestlers? - Wrestling wrestlers.

01:42:51.360 | - I would probably try to take single legs and stuff.

01:42:53.720 | - Single legs? - Yeah.

01:42:54.880 | - I haven't, okay.

01:42:56.880 | Not, not--

01:42:58.560 | - No, I'd, honestly, I don't have the slightest clue.

01:43:01.080 | I'd have to feel, I'd feel him out,

01:43:03.080 | but single legs is my best take down.

01:43:04.240 | - People talk about his wrestling being really good.

01:43:06.720 | - Yeah. - The people that train

01:43:07.620 | with him. - So, okay,

01:43:08.840 | so I grilled someone, I will not say who,

01:43:12.120 | on the Ed Ruth thing, 'cause Ed Ruth is very elite

01:43:14.680 | and focused on wrestling.

01:43:15.560 | He never became that great at fighting, unfortunately.

01:43:17.760 | - Wait, Ed Ruth wrestled Khabib?

01:43:19.760 | - They were on the same team for a while, yeah.

01:43:20.960 | - Okay. - And there was rumors

01:43:22.000 | that Khabib beat him up, and I said,

01:43:24.760 | I sure can't believe that.

01:43:27.120 | And I've heard that that was,

01:43:29.500 | if they were just straight wrestling,

01:43:30.840 | Ed would get slightly the better of it.

01:43:33.040 | - Well, Ed Ruth is like one of the greats.

01:43:35.160 | - He's great. - He's really good, yeah.

01:43:38.000 | So that was what I heard, but in an MMA setting,

01:43:41.320 | because of all the tools that Khabib would get him.

01:43:43.960 | - I don't know.

01:43:47.360 | - Well, but I agree, I agree with Rogan on this one.

01:43:49.760 | That would have been good to see.

01:43:50.720 | - Yeah, that would have been fun.

01:43:51.560 | So yeah, if Khabib wants to work out, I'd love it.

01:43:53.840 | I love wrestling and grappling.

01:43:56.240 | I don't do much jujitsu,

01:43:57.080 | 'cause I just don't have time for it anymore.

01:43:58.600 | I'm at the Wrestling Academy every single day.

01:44:01.280 | But I love jujitsu, I did it,

01:44:03.560 | and if I didn't have Wrestling Academy,

01:44:05.480 | I probably would still be doing jujitsu.

01:44:06.960 | - Yeah, you do well in jiu-jitsu as well.

01:44:09.040 | But let me ask you a ridiculous question.

01:44:12.120 | Who's the greatest of all time, freestyle or folk style?

01:44:15.040 | - Oh, wrestling. - Wrestling.

01:44:17.560 | - Well, I will say my knowledge past the year 2000

01:44:22.080 | is really not that great, 'cause you can't--

01:44:25.600 | - In which direction, sorry, after 2000?

01:44:27.560 | - No, no, before, 'cause you can't find any film

01:44:29.080 | or anything, you know, and so you hear of all these--

01:44:31.240 | - So you need evidence, you need direct evidence?

01:44:33.320 | - I wanna be able to watch 'em and see 'em

01:44:35.000 | and feel the times and feel their opponents

01:44:36.720 | and all those things to really,

01:44:38.960 | I hate giving bad answers, you know?

01:44:40.920 | There's just not enough footage of any of those people.

01:44:44.800 | You know, we go back to someone like Alexander Medved.

01:44:47.760 | Like, you can't find footage,

01:44:48.960 | you can't find anything on him, you know?

01:44:50.360 | So like, who is he wrestling?

01:44:52.240 | You know, I'm not sure.

01:44:53.200 | So, post-2000, I think, and obviously just freestyle, so--

01:44:58.200 | - Americans, Russians?

01:45:01.760 | - Seteev has probably the best argument post-2000.

01:45:04.720 | I think Sadyulayev, if he could--

01:45:06.440 | - Yeah, the Russian tank.

01:45:07.440 | - Pete Snyder. - Pete Snyder, yeah.

01:45:08.960 | So who's better, Snyder or Sadyulayev?

01:45:11.440 | - So Sadyulayev just won at the Olympics.

01:45:12.840 | - Now, I understand this, I understand how that works,

01:45:14.700 | but it's pretty close, right?

01:45:16.960 | - Not really.

01:45:17.960 | - Not that match, but in general, the matchup.

01:45:19.880 | - So, well, so Kyle won the first one in '17.

01:45:22.800 | Sadyulayev pinned him the following year,

01:45:24.840 | but then Kyle lost and took bronze in '19,

01:45:28.520 | and then just lost.

01:45:30.500 | I don't wanna say fairly decisively,

01:45:32.120 | but it was six to three, and there was a late takedown.

01:45:35.200 | He kinda gave it up, and maybe,

01:45:37.440 | if it was really competitive, maybe he wouldn't have.

01:45:40.000 | They're gonna wrestle again in like two weeks here.

01:45:43.240 | So, yeah, you have to say Sadyulayev at this point.

01:45:47.140 | There's nothing else to say

01:45:48.500 | unless Kyle proves this otherwise.

01:45:50.820 | - Yeah, not enough people talk about Sadyulayev.

01:45:53.740 | Okay, well, you think that guy should go to MMA?

01:45:57.580 | You think Kyle should go to MMA?

01:45:59.140 | Some of these guys.

01:45:59.980 | - Yeah, they're making enough money in wrestling

01:46:01.660 | where they don't really feel the need to.

01:46:03.220 | It's great. - It's terrifying, though.

01:46:04.340 | As a heavyweight, Sadyulayev would probably,

01:46:06.940 | it's like Khabib, but heavyweight.

01:46:09.340 | - Well, I don't know if you remember,

01:46:10.180 | do you remember Bilal Mokhov?

01:46:12.460 | So, Bilal Mokhov actually was the Russian representative

01:46:14.960 | in both styles in 2016, grappling and freestyle.

01:46:17.800 | And he was, to my knowledge,

01:46:20.920 | the only person the UFC's ever signed

01:46:22.720 | that was zero, in modern era, signed that was zero and zero,

01:46:25.960 | and then he actually never ended up fighting.

01:46:28.320 | But weird, right?

01:46:29.720 | So, yeah. - No motivation.

01:46:31.120 | - I don't know what the story is.

01:46:32.800 | 'Cause sometimes out of Russia,

01:46:34.120 | I mean, maybe you have better sources than I do,

01:46:36.000 | sometimes it feels like dudes just disappear.

01:46:37.880 | Like they're a world champ or an Olympic champ,

01:46:39.680 | and then all of a sudden you're like, wait.

01:46:41.200 | I don't know, where'd he go?

01:46:42.740 | - You talked shit about Russia earlier in the conversation.

01:46:45.300 | - Oh, what'd I say?

01:46:46.460 | - I forgot, but I think--

01:46:48.380 | - Steroids.

01:46:49.220 | - I think somebody's gonna show up to your door.

01:46:50.780 | - I'm worried.

01:46:51.620 | Honestly, I've said enough bad things

01:46:53.060 | where I would be kind of looking over my shoulder

01:46:56.060 | if I went to the bathroom or something.

01:46:57.380 | (laughing)

01:46:59.220 | - I, for one, love the Russians.

01:47:01.260 | - What about Icarus?

01:47:03.000 | How does that make you feel?

01:47:03.840 | - What about it?

01:47:04.680 | It's fake news.

01:47:05.500 | - Oh, really?

01:47:06.340 | - I'm just kidding.

01:47:07.160 | - It's propaganda?

01:47:08.000 | Maybe it is.

01:47:08.840 | I don't know, I don't know what it is anymore.

01:47:10.380 | - Yeah.

01:47:11.220 | (laughing)

01:47:12.040 | You know, it's troublesome, man.

01:47:13.040 | I hate cheating in all of its forms.

01:47:15.080 | Any other recaps from the Olympics of 2020,

01:47:19.840 | Tokyo, that stood out to you?

01:47:21.120 | Gable Stevenson, anything like that?

01:47:21.960 | - Gable's great, yeah.

01:47:24.400 | No, I think America's coming to the point

01:47:26.800 | where we're gonna compete with Russia

01:47:28.000 | every single year in wrestling,

01:47:29.000 | which obviously, long, long time ago,

01:47:33.920 | many, many years, we were great,

01:47:36.240 | and then kind of after that Soviet Union period,

01:47:39.520 | I think there was a lot of poverty in that area,

01:47:41.820 | and that kind of led the wrestling team

01:47:43.540 | going down a little bit,

01:47:44.820 | and then obviously, a lot of those regions,

01:47:47.620 | the way they found oil and gas in the Caspian Sea,

01:47:50.580 | I believe, and they've been really kind of

01:47:53.380 | on the upswing for the last 20 years,

01:47:54.860 | and now America, really, since 2012,

01:47:58.020 | has been on the upswing in wrestling,

01:47:59.340 | and we're kind of really competing with them,

01:48:02.780 | and they're not sending a couple of their best guys.

01:48:04.900 | So for those who don't know,

01:48:06.860 | the Olympics got put back in the air,

01:48:08.580 | so they are hosting the 2021 World Championships,

01:48:11.320 | despite the fact that we just had the Olympics

01:48:12.800 | two months ago, so it's happening next week

01:48:14.340 | in Oslo, Norway.

01:48:15.640 | So Russia's not sending their number one at 57

01:48:18.280 | and their number one at 65,

01:48:19.700 | so it's like America's probably gonna win, I think.

01:48:23.520 | I don't wanna guarantee anything,

01:48:24.960 | but there's a really good chance of it.

01:48:26.640 | - If Dave Taylor, all those guys competing.

01:48:29.000 | - America gave any of the Olympians that medaled

01:48:31.620 | the opportunity to not even have to wrestle off,

01:48:33.440 | they just gotta keep the spots

01:48:34.520 | since it was two months later if they medaled,

01:48:36.640 | so the only one who's not is Gable.

01:48:38.860 | Gable's moving on.

01:48:40.020 | We have a pretty good guy behind him,

01:48:41.460 | named Nicholas Dalski, who's a world medalist,

01:48:44.180 | but then he's a Burlesfield in the 79 spot,

01:48:47.180 | Jayden Coxfield in the 92 spot,

01:48:49.140 | who's a world champion also, so we have--

01:48:52.020 | - It's a hell of a team.

01:48:52.980 | - Pretty good squad, yeah.

01:48:54.340 | - Pretty good squad.

01:48:55.180 | - Pretty happy.

01:48:56.460 | - So given your run in Bellator in one championship,

01:48:59.420 | that was one of the most dominant runs in MMA,

01:49:03.060 | what would you say was key to your dominance,

01:49:06.340 | and that long, undefeated streak?

01:49:08.380 | - Probably consistency would be one.

01:49:12.220 | The fact that I lived and trained the same way

01:49:16.620 | no matter where my life was, whereas a lot of fighters,

01:49:18.960 | once they start making money for the first time,

01:49:20.940 | they have all these obligations, and they travel,

01:49:22.900 | and they really enjoy making money,

01:49:24.760 | and that's kind of why some of them fall off.

01:49:27.980 | - So you had the same process, the same camp.

01:49:29.980 | - Yeah, I stayed at my house, I didn't vacation,

01:49:32.940 | yeah, everything, just, you know.

01:49:35.500 | And so that was a big part of it.

01:49:37.500 | Obviously, the style thing is like, no one could,

01:49:40.260 | there was only a few people who could stop my style,

01:49:43.300 | and I think I continued to get better

01:49:46.820 | as a mixed martial artist, and I wasn't as innovative

01:49:51.820 | in mixed martial arts, but there was a handful of things

01:49:55.340 | that I innovated, specifically in the top position,

01:49:58.300 | where I spent a lot of time, where it was just like,

01:50:00.900 | there was just, once I got on top of you,

01:50:02.820 | it was like in a spider web, and there was just

01:50:04.660 | kind of no way out, you know, you never felt

01:50:07.220 | the certain things I was doing, and so people just,

01:50:10.020 | they gave up eventually.

01:50:11.980 | - How's the level of wrestling in MMA, would you say?

01:50:14.860 | So, I saw somewhere like champions,

01:50:19.580 | the most popular martial art for current UFC champions

01:50:22.820 | are all wrestling.

01:50:24.420 | - So we just lost a bunch of the belts.

01:50:27.180 | Wrestling, as a sport, right?

01:50:29.420 | But yeah, one point we had, I think it was eight of nine,

01:50:32.140 | maybe, or something to that effect.

01:50:34.700 | And I think it's not just wrestling,

01:50:36.900 | not just the actual martial art of wrestling

01:50:39.740 | that contributes to our success in mixed martial arts,

01:50:44.200 | but other things like the way we're systemized,

01:50:46.580 | so most kids who have, let's say, have went through

01:50:49.100 | the high school program and the college program,

01:50:50.700 | and they know how to show up on time,

01:50:51.900 | and they know how to work hard, so when they go to ATT,

01:50:54.900 | or AKA, or wherever, they know how to show up on time,

01:50:58.060 | and they know how to work hard,

01:50:58.900 | and that's gonna get you a really long way.

01:51:00.720 | Just those two things, right?

01:51:01.940 | - Not even the techniques, it's just the discipline.

01:51:03.900 | - Those things.

01:51:04.740 | Then I think you throw on top of that the fact

01:51:06.100 | that most of us have competed 1,500 to 2,000 times,

01:51:10.140 | probably by the time we get to 20-something,

01:51:12.300 | like that's a huge advantage, too.

01:51:13.500 | Most of these other people from other disciplines

01:51:15.460 | maybe have competed 100, if that, right?

01:51:18.220 | So we have this competitive process down

01:51:20.300 | really, really, really, really well.

01:51:23.140 | - Plus the weight cut.

01:51:24.100 | - The weight cut.

01:51:24.940 | There's all these things, right, that factor into it.

01:51:27.380 | I think the fact that we're really open-minded,

01:51:29.140 | like I think if you would, I don't wanna pick on jujitsu

01:51:31.980 | again, but how many jujitsu guys have became

01:51:34.980 | highly proficient in wrestling,

01:51:36.420 | versus how many wrestling guys have became

01:51:38.060 | highly proficient in jujitsu?

01:51:39.860 | I think that number swings one way,

01:51:41.940 | and not that much the other way.

01:51:43.820 | We're open to adapting and learning,

01:51:48.260 | and for some reason, jujitsu people,

01:51:52.000 | how many of them have got high-level wrestling?

01:51:53.980 | Or even mediocre wrestling, the number's really small.

01:51:57.420 | They refuse to, it's really frustrating.

01:52:00.020 | Why won't they do this is obviously a part of it.

01:52:03.140 | I don't pick on specific guys,

01:52:04.580 | but there's certain guys in the history of MMA

01:52:06.180 | where you're like, listen, man.

01:52:08.620 | I mean, Damian Maia, who was my last fight,

01:52:10.740 | is a great example of somebody who actually

01:52:12.400 | did get proficient wrestling, right?

01:52:15.060 | But there's some of these jujitsu guys who's like,

01:52:16.740 | if you just got on top, you would submit him.

01:52:18.660 | Why can't you learn a freaking takedown?

01:52:20.500 | Like, holy moly, just learn how to take someone down.

01:52:23.740 | Once you get them down, they will not get up,

01:52:26.080 | and you win the fight.

01:52:26.920 | Like, it's so easy, you know?

01:52:28.380 | But they refuse.

01:52:29.300 | - How complicated is that journey?

01:52:30.520 | So like Donna, I heard that you mentioned, Craig Jones,

01:52:33.460 | they're big on wrestling as part of jujitsu now.

01:52:36.820 | Like wrestling, not just on the feet,

01:52:38.840 | but wrestling from the bottom coming up,

01:52:41.220 | and all that kind of stuff.

01:52:42.940 | So how difficult is that whole skill set, would you say,

01:52:46.440 | for a jujitsu person to learn?

01:52:48.680 | - Not that hard, if they really put their mind to it.

01:52:50.780 | 'Cause they already, like, when you grapple,

01:52:52.660 | and this is any grappling art,

01:52:54.340 | there's a certain part of it that you kind of get,

01:52:56.820 | and it can, might not be the exact same thing,

01:52:59.340 | but you understand how your body moves,

01:53:00.780 | and how to feel certain pressures,

01:53:02.100 | and you can adapt yourself pretty quickly, you know?

01:53:04.960 | So I don't think, I think there's just a certain level

01:53:07.420 | of stubbornness where they didn't wanna,

01:53:09.600 | certain people didn't wanna do it for whatever reason.

01:53:12.660 | I think a lot of times in MMA, it's the,

01:53:15.180 | I'm so macho, I can stand and bang thing,

01:53:17.500 | you know, where they wanna, you know,

01:53:18.860 | show how macho they are.

01:53:21.020 | But yeah, that was a frustrating one, that they,

01:53:24.020 | there's a lot of wrestlers who've became

01:53:25.380 | highly proficient in jujitsu, and really adapted,

01:53:28.460 | and it doesn't go the other way.

01:53:29.580 | And then I guess the other thing there too is,

01:53:31.860 | they can both steal from each other, right?

01:53:35.100 | As any martial art can steal from another,

01:53:38.780 | and like, I feel like jujitsu didn't do enough

01:53:41.140 | stealing from wrestling.

01:53:42.260 | Like, they should have looked at all the wrestling possibilities

01:53:44.060 | and said, "Well, why don't we steal that, and that,

01:53:47.060 | and that, you know, and like, hey, let's take that over,

01:53:48.980 | and maybe we'd make a little tweak,

01:53:50.300 | because it's different,

01:53:52.300 | but there's something we can definitely use there."

01:53:53.900 | So like, in wrestling, for example,

01:53:57.220 | you know there's a one-arm guillotine in jujitsu, right?

01:53:59.660 | Okay, so there's a move called,

01:54:01.100 | well, it's got a hard name,

01:54:01.940 | it's like the oldest move in wrestling,

01:54:03.060 | 'cause it's what they did, the cows,

01:54:04.140 | where they go around the chin,

01:54:04.980 | and they throw them on their back.

01:54:06.260 | I don't know what you call that one.

01:54:07.420 | - I don't know. - Okay.

01:54:08.940 | - Sorry, did you just ask me what I call that one?

01:54:11.220 | - Yeah.

01:54:12.060 | - When you take a cow, and grab it by the neck,

01:54:14.540 | and throw it to the side.

01:54:15.380 | - No, but in wrestling, in wrestling.

01:54:17.340 | - I don't know.

01:54:18.380 | - Okay, we call it--

01:54:19.220 | - Are you putting it under, like, while you're hooking up?

01:54:20.300 | - Yeah, so you grab their chin,

01:54:21.660 | and then you go under their arm,

01:54:22.820 | and then throw them on their back.

01:54:23.700 | - Oh, okay, gotcha, yeah.

01:54:24.700 | - Yeah, so we call that the honey badger,

01:54:26.460 | but it's got-- - Honey badger.

01:54:27.820 | - Different names, wherever you go,

01:54:28.900 | it's got different names.

01:54:30.140 | So I would always, I would say, like,

01:54:33.980 | pre-jujitsu, I was average at it.

01:54:36.140 | Like, I could do it, but against good people,

01:54:38.220 | you'd never get it for, because,

01:54:40.140 | oh, I'll tell you what, 'cause they would get

01:54:41.780 | the back of their head up, and they were too strong,

01:54:43.180 | where you couldn't collapse them

01:54:44.140 | by going over their neck, right?

01:54:45.180 | Because the forces weren't right.

01:54:46.660 | So then in jujitsu, you learn the one-arm guillotine,

01:54:48.700 | where you grab their chin, and this is more

01:54:50.580 | of running along the side of their head,

01:54:52.260 | and then you go here, and you choke them, right?

01:54:54.780 | Much more efficient way to move their head,

01:54:58.060 | because the fulcrum is way down here,

01:55:00.220 | and their head can move into that, right?

01:55:02.940 | So once I learned that in jujitsu, I'm like, wait,

01:55:06.300 | I can do this in wrestling.

01:55:07.860 | So now, once I learned how to grab their chin the right way,

01:55:10.100 | and I do the honey badger, no one ever gets out.

01:55:12.540 | I just had to steal that jujitsu,

01:55:14.700 | put it in wrestling, and boom, there we go.

01:55:16.540 | - But very few people steal any direction.

01:55:18.780 | That takes creativity.

01:55:19.940 | - Really? - And open-mindedness.

01:55:21.180 | - It's so easy, 'cause it's already done.

01:55:22.380 | You just gotta steal it.

01:55:23.780 | - I mean, same with judo.

01:55:24.900 | If you're a gi jujitsu person,

01:55:27.180 | there's so much stuff in judo that's ripe for the stealing,

01:55:32.180 | because judo is much more, emphasizes explosive moves

01:55:37.700 | on the transition, which is something jujitsu does not do.

01:55:42.300 | Because you have so-- - You mean from the take down

01:55:43.780 | to-- - From the take down,

01:55:44.860 | but also just in general, just in the transition,

01:55:47.700 | the concept of transition, jujitsu's very much about

01:55:52.700 | we're in this position, then we're in this position,

01:55:54.780 | then we're in this position.

01:55:56.740 | The judo is much more in when there's chaos of any kind.

01:56:01.740 | That's when you need to strike.

01:56:04.460 | And to learn that, I mean, that's why people

01:56:06.740 | like Travis Stevens and Jidoka,

01:56:08.020 | when they go to jujitsu, they can dominate.

01:56:10.540 | But jujitsu people should steal that.

01:56:13.700 | - It's too stubborn.

01:56:14.900 | - Yeah, but so is every, wrestlers are stubborn too.

01:56:17.500 | - No way.

01:56:18.340 | (laughing)

01:56:19.180 | There would never be any stubborn wrestlers.

01:56:21.180 | - Well, I mean, I was surprised,

01:56:23.220 | all these coaches, John Smith, Dan Gable,

01:56:26.700 | they don't really have interest in MMA or jujitsu and so on.

01:56:29.700 | - They don't really.

01:56:31.380 | - But you would think somebody like a John Smith

01:56:33.100 | would put on a white belt and roll around.

01:56:36.740 | - Yeah, I think he's just too focused on--

01:56:39.420 | - Well, he's a coach.

01:56:40.260 | - But he's a coach and what he's doing.

01:56:41.740 | Yeah, I mean, yeah, I think if you take him when he's younger

01:56:45.220 | he would have a lot of fun.

01:56:46.060 | We actually have a really good wrestler

01:56:47.100 | making his MMA debut tomorrow.

01:56:48.900 | I don't know if you, Bo Nickel,

01:56:49.900 | I'm sure you've heard of him.

01:56:51.180 | Third high level, I think he's gonna have a lot of success.

01:56:54.500 | - I mean, some people might say that like,

01:56:56.460 | jujitsu makes you a little comfortable being in your back.

01:57:01.380 | And for a wrestler that could be like really bad.

01:57:03.860 | - I hate that take.

01:57:05.020 | - Yeah, but that's the Dan Gable take.

01:57:07.260 | - It's so stupid, it's so stupid.

01:57:09.780 | For God's sakes, we know the fucking rules.

01:57:12.140 | Just wrestling, you don't go to your back.

01:57:13.780 | In jujitsu you can, it's like whatever.

01:57:16.260 | - Yeah.

01:57:17.100 | - But like, so jujitsu for example.

01:57:19.740 | So I coached, when I was at Rufus,

01:57:21.300 | I coached the wrestling for a long time,

01:57:23.820 | three, four, five years.

01:57:25.820 | So I've been taking a jujitsu guy

01:57:28.100 | and teaching them a wrestling technique

01:57:29.820 | where you needed to use your feet.

01:57:32.460 | To teach a jujitsu guy, so easy, so simple.

01:57:35.460 | 'Cause they already understand the concept,

01:57:37.100 | butterfly guard, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, right?

01:57:39.420 | To take a wrestler who's never done any of it

01:57:42.540 | and teach him how to use his feet,

01:57:43.900 | oh my God, he's such a beast, it's so hard.

01:57:46.260 | 'Cause that's not a weapon they're thinking about using.

01:57:49.060 | So it's like, we understand the rules.

01:57:51.580 | It's like freestyle folks are wrestling,

01:57:52.900 | a freestyle form on the mat, I can lock my hands.

01:57:55.140 | You don't see people locking their hands all the time

01:57:56.700 | in folk style just 'cause they did freestyle.

01:57:58.180 | It's like, they get it, there's a rule, they understand it.

01:58:00.820 | So the notion that somebody could come from on your back.

01:58:04.020 | - But pinning, that's like, it has a special meaning.

01:58:08.660 | - Yeah, I actually think, so jujitsu,

01:58:11.380 | you don't actually wanna be flat, flat very often.

01:58:16.380 | - I always wondered this

01:58:18.780 | because I did a couple of cat wrestling tournaments

01:58:21.940 | and I would put myself in butterfly guard

01:58:26.260 | and I wasn't going against good people.

01:58:28.420 | So which is why I was doing all these things.

01:58:30.340 | But I wondered if you could create a system of wrestling

01:58:34.420 | where you're butterfly guard.

01:58:37.180 | - So I think that there's a few places where I use it.

01:58:40.220 | But so specifically the elevator series,

01:58:41.900 | which my main series at bottom, it's not butterfly guard.

01:58:45.380 | It's a butterfly guard, like grip with your foot.

01:58:47.220 | So I boom, I go here, I catch your leg with my foot,

01:58:50.820 | boom and I elevate you over, right?

01:58:53.020 | And then also sometimes,

01:58:54.820 | I think Keegan does this too from watching me,

01:58:57.740 | but if I get double leg, sometimes if I'm accepting,

01:59:01.980 | so freestyle, obviously you're gonna give a point

01:59:03.420 | to me in folk style, accepting that you've already got me.

01:59:05.620 | And as I go down, I'm just gonna butterfly guard you up,

01:59:09.500 | and then I'm gonna try to flip my hip back to the mat

01:59:11.620 | and get end up in a wizard position.

01:59:13.620 | Like I've used that quite a few times

01:59:15.340 | where it's kind of like a bailout mechanism

01:59:17.740 | that gets me back to maybe not a great position,

01:59:20.540 | but obviously much better than being taken down.

01:59:23.540 | - Beautiful.

01:59:24.860 | Let me ask you quickly about crypto

01:59:26.940 | 'cause you're also, you have a show,

01:59:29.540 | you have a lot of interest in cryptocurrency.

01:59:33.780 | Why are you interested in cryptocurrency?

01:59:36.380 | Is it just a financial investment

01:59:38.060 | or is there a philosophy that attracts you to it?

01:59:40.860 | - So my friend told me about it in 2017.

01:59:44.260 | I was actually, I went to, my friend met me in Shanghai.

01:59:47.620 | I fought in one championship and he told me,

01:59:50.820 | and the second he told me, I'm like, oh, I'm so in.

01:59:54.060 | 'Cause I had read Ron Paul and the Fed.

01:59:56.580 | I had read, I had an understanding how the Fed is unfair.

02:00:02.420 | And so when he told me about crypto,

02:00:03.420 | this decentralized system that no one has control over,

02:00:07.500 | it just made sense.

02:00:08.580 | And so like we've had, you have the podcast

02:00:09.980 | with Tim Michael Saylor on it.

02:00:11.140 | And I love the way he said it.

02:00:11.980 | It's like, who do you trust more with your money?

02:00:13.620 | Do you trust the politicians or do you trust engineers?

02:00:16.820 | I think that's an easy choice.

02:00:18.260 | I don't even think, I don't even think

02:00:19.660 | I have to think about that.

02:00:20.500 | I don't trust politicians,

02:00:21.860 | no matter what country they come from,

02:00:23.260 | China, America, wherever, I don't trust them.

02:00:25.620 | - So what about in 2017, what was it, Bitcoin?

02:00:31.620 | Bitcoin, are you, what do you find,

02:00:36.340 | which ones do you find interesting?

02:00:38.260 | - Yeah.

02:00:39.100 | - There's all kinds of ideas.

02:00:39.920 | So there's the more sort of primal mechanism

02:00:44.660 | of proof of work and Bitcoin.

02:00:46.660 | And then there's smart contracts, ideas,

02:00:48.740 | and there's all kinds of innovations across the different.

02:00:52.020 | - So I can't say I'm in super deep

02:00:55.180 | where I understand the technical components

02:00:57.060 | of a lot of them.

02:00:57.900 | I understand what Bitcoin can do for people.

02:00:59.420 | And so that's probably the one I focus

02:01:01.100 | the most on.

02:01:02.100 | And I actually, I think I was talking about,

02:01:05.620 | I was trying to convince Michael to talk about Bitcoin

02:01:07.700 | 'cause he hates it also, the way he did it last night.

02:01:09.940 | And I think most of the main problems Bitcoin solves,

02:01:13.900 | people in America are so American-centric,

02:01:15.780 | they don't understand it.

02:01:16.600 | So like high levels of inflation,

02:01:18.340 | that hasn't happened in, well, it's started to happen,

02:01:20.260 | it hasn't happened in America in a long time, right?

02:01:21.780 | But someone in Venezuela is like, oh, I get that,

02:01:25.100 | you know, or remittance payments, right?

02:01:27.900 | Remittance payments to, you see it.

02:01:30.380 | So I saw this in, when I was spending all the time

02:01:32.940 | in Singapore, Singapore is obviously

02:01:34.820 | a really wealthy country.

02:01:36.540 | And so you'd have Indonesian workers or Filipino workers,

02:01:39.020 | and they would all go on Sundays,

02:01:40.900 | they would go to these places to ship stuff

02:01:42.620 | back to their families and through Western Union.

02:01:44.980 | Western Union gouges the shit out of these people.

02:01:46.860 | I mean, they're taking 8, 10, 12%

02:01:49.060 | of whatever they're sending.

02:01:50.580 | Then it takes five days and the person's gonna pick it up.

02:01:52.920 | Whereas Bitcoin, I could send you Bitcoin

02:01:55.660 | person to person, right?

02:01:56.740 | So like American people don't understand that.

02:01:59.060 | American people don't really understand,

02:02:00.300 | the unbanked, right?

02:02:01.340 | A decent portion of the world is unbanked,

02:02:03.260 | they don't have access to it.

02:02:04.620 | And a much, much, much smaller portion of the world

02:02:07.580 | doesn't have access to internet.

02:02:08.740 | So if I can put a mobile wallet on your phone,

02:02:11.700 | and we can send money person to person.

02:02:13.980 | So there's a whole bunch of those problems

02:02:15.020 | where Americans don't really think about

02:02:16.740 | that are really obvious that this solves.

02:02:19.100 | So I think that's the key one.

02:02:21.440 | Obviously the fact that the value goes up

02:02:24.380 | is really outstanding also.

02:02:25.860 | But if you look at it, I got in in 2017.

02:02:29.780 | So I got to watch it go up.

02:02:31.820 | I didn't sell shit at the top, really stupid.

02:02:34.140 | And then the majority of my time

02:02:35.740 | was spent through the bear market.

02:02:37.500 | And so I had to love it for the principles that it provided,

02:02:39.900 | not the fact that actually I actually lost money

02:02:42.180 | in the beginning and now I'm way up.

02:02:44.020 | Yeah, so I--

02:02:46.320 | And you're just holding.

02:02:47.220 | You're just holding.

02:02:48.300 | I think at the top of this bull market,

02:02:50.220 | I'll probably sell a very small portion.

02:02:52.840 | You mean like right now there's a bull market?

02:02:56.060 | Yeah, most people think say in the next three to six months

02:02:59.060 | we'll be at the top of the market.

02:03:00.820 | And so probably when that happens,

02:03:02.620 | I'll probably sell a little bit.

02:03:04.780 | You gotta hodl it, Ben.

02:03:06.340 | You gotta hodl, well, yeah.

02:03:07.660 | So one of my podcast co-hosts, he's like super rich,

02:03:12.660 | like uber rich.

02:03:13.860 | So he has lost touch with the everyman.

02:03:16.140 | So here's my argument to him.

02:03:17.380 | It's really simple.

02:03:18.660 | And listen, I'm doing well for myself in life,

02:03:20.980 | but if, say, someone buys a Bitcoin, right?

02:03:24.480 | One Bitcoin at $5,000, which it was last year.

02:03:28.020 | And this Bitcoin goes from $5,000 to $200,000,

02:03:31.900 | which is right around what a lot of people think

02:03:34.260 | the peak is going to be.

02:03:35.620 | They bought one Bitcoin.

02:03:36.900 | And they're living in a $200,000 house.

02:03:39.660 | So to take half of that, right?

02:03:42.380 | You started at $5,000 of Bitcoin.

02:03:44.220 | To sell half a Bitcoin for $100,000

02:03:47.420 | and pay off your house, your remaining house payment,

02:03:49.780 | that's life-changing to someone.

02:03:51.140 | It really is.

02:03:52.100 | And so you still have a Bitcoin.

02:03:53.740 | So if Bitcoin goes to a million,

02:03:54.920 | you're still gonna have half a million.

02:03:56.580 | And you're gonna feel really, really rich

02:03:58.140 | with that half a million dollars

02:03:59.140 | 'cause you bought it for $2,500, you know?

02:04:02.380 | - Yeah. - So yeah.

02:04:03.200 | So I would encourage anyone who's not uber-rich

02:04:06.140 | to, if you have huge profits, take a little bit of 'em

02:04:08.940 | because it could change your life.

02:04:10.640 | - And if you hold it and it goes down,

02:04:14.780 | you're going to feel the pain of that.

02:04:16.300 | Like sometimes if you're more constrained financially,

02:04:19.820 | it's much more psychologically difficult

02:04:21.500 | to ride the ups and downs.

02:04:22.980 | - Yeah, it is, for sure.

02:04:23.820 | So they have these really fascinating things.

02:04:25.900 | And Bitcoin, actually we said the guy,

02:04:27.700 | one of the main guys on our podcast,

02:04:30.020 | it's called Onchainmetrics.

02:04:31.580 | So all wallet transactions are visible, you know?

02:04:34.900 | And so they have all these fun categories.

02:04:37.420 | So I actually, I think you said you don't like numbers, but.

02:04:39.820 | - I like numbers. - Oh, you love numbers.

02:04:40.660 | - I love numbers. - So I love numbers also.

02:04:42.780 | So they have all these different categories.

02:04:44.180 | Like you can see how long a wallet has held a Bitcoin, right?

02:04:49.180 | Or how many Bitcoins are in a certain wallet.

02:04:51.660 | And so what they've seen during the downturn, right?

02:04:54.180 | So April, it kind of peaked and went down,

02:04:55.700 | is that the whales are still buying.

02:04:58.980 | So whales, people have a thousand or more are still buying.

02:05:01.860 | They've said the main group of sellers

02:05:04.040 | is the ones who held it from zero to three months.

02:05:06.340 | So like they don't have money,

02:05:07.740 | they bought it 'cause they thought it was going up.

02:05:09.420 | And now they're like, oh shit, I gotta sell it, right?

02:05:11.620 | Whereas anyone's held for a long time

02:05:13.300 | is generally still holding on to it.

02:05:15.420 | - That's interesting.

02:05:16.260 | That's a good indicator, right?

02:05:17.820 | For the whole space.

02:05:19.180 | - Yeah.

02:05:20.020 | - Well, let me ask you for some advice.

02:05:21.780 | You've been through one heck of a career,

02:05:24.160 | one heck of a life.

02:05:25.560 | What advice would you give to a young person today?

02:05:28.580 | - Well, in wrestling, I think wrestling's really

02:05:31.760 | a microcosm of what your life's gonna be.

02:05:33.820 | And that's why one of the things that I stress to kids

02:05:35.620 | is like, if we can go through this now and figure,

02:05:38.140 | I have a couple kids who are struggling

02:05:39.540 | with certain things right now.

02:05:40.380 | If you can figure it out this now in wrestling,

02:05:42.860 | it's gonna be a lot better to figure it out now

02:05:44.220 | and get over this mental hump than when you're 32

02:05:47.420 | and you have two kids and your job's not going well.

02:05:50.940 | It's gonna be a lot worse,

02:05:51.780 | it's gonna be a lot more painful then.

02:05:52.860 | Let's fucking figure it out now.

02:05:54.780 | So a lot of these things, a lot of these lessons

02:05:56.340 | we can learn from wrestling,

02:05:57.400 | whether it's persistence or perseverance or work ethic,

02:06:00.720 | or you know, I said wrestlers show up on time

02:06:02.360 | and they work hard, right?

02:06:03.660 | These things, if we can learn these things at an early age,

02:06:05.940 | those characteristics will generally carry on

02:06:09.880 | throughout our life.

02:06:10.780 | And those are the things that are gonna make us

02:06:11.840 | really successful.

02:06:12.680 | So I would say find a great coach,

02:06:15.880 | someone who's gonna spend a lot of time

02:06:17.120 | and put a lot of time into you

02:06:18.100 | and make sure they have a lot of wisdom

02:06:19.460 | and steal all the wisdom that you can from them.

02:06:22.460 | And then if you can be successful at one thing,

02:06:25.660 | generally whatever that recipe was

02:06:27.500 | that took you to be successful at that,

02:06:29.820 | apply it to everything else, right?

02:06:31.740 | Apply it to the rest of your life,

02:06:32.720 | apply it to getting a wife that you enjoy,

02:06:36.020 | apply it to living at a place you wanna live,

02:06:38.620 | doing a job you wanna do, right?

02:06:40.420 | There's so many possibilities

02:06:42.420 | and you just have to be bold enough

02:06:44.300 | to go take those chances.

02:06:45.420 | - It's interesting 'cause like early on in life

02:06:47.540 | is when you have much more time.

02:06:49.660 | Like people don't realize this,

02:06:51.220 | time to learn the lessons.

02:06:53.060 | Like somehow later in life,

02:06:55.660 | you get busier responsibilities and all that kind of stuff.

02:06:58.620 | Like high school is a magical time,

02:07:00.260 | even college. - College, yeah.

02:07:01.860 | - Yeah, there's so much time.

02:07:04.620 | - Right? - To learn.

02:07:05.820 | - But you don't have kids yet.

02:07:07.180 | - Yeah, I don't have kids.

02:07:08.020 | But that still fills up.

02:07:09.500 | Well, no, I'm purpose.

02:07:10.860 | And I did something that many people

02:07:12.820 | don't seem to be able to do.

02:07:13.860 | I walked away from a lot of responsibilities

02:07:15.860 | just by saying goodbye.

02:07:18.780 | - Oh, okay.

02:07:20.220 | - But meetings, like everybody around me at MIT

02:07:23.340 | was like meetings fill the day.

02:07:25.780 | And then you have more projects

02:07:27.500 | and you do a great job and you become successful.

02:07:30.420 | And then the more meetings fill the day

02:07:32.060 | and more responsibilities as opposed to like,

02:07:35.420 | wait a minute, do I wanna be involved in all these things?

02:07:38.940 | And instead, do I wanna find one or two things

02:07:42.540 | to really focus on?

02:07:43.980 | And that's what I choose.

02:07:46.020 | But that becomes harder and harder and harder

02:07:49.420 | as you get older.

02:07:50.380 | - No, I mean, I'm sure.

02:07:51.860 | And also the more success you have,

02:07:53.580 | you become sought after other places too.

02:07:56.060 | I'm sure that's happening with you.

02:07:57.460 | - And it's hard to keep saying no, no, no.

02:08:00.100 | - It is, saying no is hard.

02:08:01.340 | - Yeah. - Yeah.

02:08:03.020 | - You're known for roasting people with a single--

02:08:05.220 | (laughing)

02:08:06.820 | With a single boom, roasted line.

02:08:08.700 | So any ideas, maybe you wanna mention malice,

02:08:11.460 | but any ideas come to mind when you look at me?

02:08:14.980 | - Man, you know what?

02:08:17.380 | If I was gonna boom roast someone,

02:08:19.100 | I would wanna kind of like research their career

02:08:21.260 | and dissect them and figure out their biggest negative.

02:08:23.180 | - Get to the core.

02:08:24.140 | - And I didn't have that notion with you.

02:08:25.940 | I figured, I got a general sense of,

02:08:28.340 | okay, he's really successful, he's super sharp.

02:08:30.700 | He's really interested in some really interesting things.

02:08:32.820 | I bet we'll have a great conversation,

02:08:34.220 | but I had no intention to roast you.

02:08:36.860 | - Yeah, there you go.

02:08:37.700 | What about malice?

02:08:38.540 | You had dinner with him last night.

02:08:39.780 | - Hmm, for him.

02:08:40.900 | (laughing)

02:08:42.220 | Oh man.

02:08:44.520 | - How'd you get to know him, by the way?

02:08:46.380 | - Twitter.

02:08:47.220 | - Just Twitter.

02:08:48.040 | - Twitter's the most magical place in the world, right?

02:08:49.620 | I always tell people it's the greatest source of information

02:08:51.380 | if you know how to use it.

02:08:52.620 | Hmm.

02:08:54.900 | - He's insane on Twitter, actually.

02:08:56.540 | He's quite a lot of people.

02:08:57.380 | - So I had to unfollow him on Twitter,

02:08:58.660 | 'cause he--

02:08:59.500 | - It was too intense?

02:09:00.340 | - It was just too much, no, it was too much.

02:09:01.220 | It fills up, like, I wanna be able to consume the content.

02:09:03.620 | So if I wanna see something he says,

02:09:04.780 | I can go to his page, right?

02:09:06.900 | But it's just too much for my timeline.

02:09:08.640 | I want to be able to consume who I follow,

02:09:10.860 | so I try to not follow a lot of people,

02:09:12.220 | 'cause I wanna be able to consume them.

02:09:13.840 | And he was too much.

02:09:16.040 | He fights the trolls, which,

02:09:18.680 | I don't know why you would ever fight the trolls.

02:09:20.360 | There's just too many of them.

02:09:21.680 | - Well, he's the troll himself.

02:09:22.800 | He's like the big troll fighting the little trolls.

02:09:25.600 | He's the king troll.

02:09:27.160 | - There's a million of 'em, so even if you kill,

02:09:28.960 | if you kill 100,000, there's still 100,000 left.

02:09:31.440 | - Yeah, they just keep following.

02:09:32.280 | - Oh, you just gotta ignore 'em.

02:09:33.120 | - It's like the Nightwalker or whatever.

02:09:35.120 | - Yeah.

02:09:36.460 | - Well, I'll take it, 'cause you had nothing,

02:09:39.280 | you couldn't roast GSP out of respect, too, so.

02:09:41.960 | - Yeah.

02:09:42.800 | - I'm just gonna take that as a sign of respect.

02:09:43.620 | - What do you say bad about GSP?

02:09:45.760 | Now I try to roast his hair.

02:09:47.000 | Like, why is he trying to grow hair now

02:09:48.760 | after all these years?

02:09:49.880 | He looked good bald.

02:09:50.960 | Everyone loved him with his head shaved.

02:09:53.080 | Now it looks kind of strange.

02:09:54.000 | Like, why you got hair now?

02:09:55.120 | - Well, it was one of the more surreal moments of my life.

02:09:58.000 | So he was here, and he wore a black suit and tie.

02:10:01.480 | - Oh, really?

02:10:03.360 | - Yeah, we did the podcast with him,

02:10:04.180 | just mirror image of me.

02:10:06.480 | And then we also did, I haven't released it yet,

02:10:08.640 | but just a video together,

02:10:09.920 | and I was doing martial arts stuff in a suit and tie.

02:10:13.200 | That was quite, that's like,

02:10:18.200 | certain moments in your life are just like,

02:10:21.040 | I can't believe I was part of that.

02:10:22.680 | - Yeah, from, with GSP, so yeah,

02:10:24.800 | I don't think I have anything to roast him about.

02:10:27.200 | I mean, maybe the Matt Serra thing

02:10:29.680 | would be the one that you get him with, you know?

02:10:31.560 | But I would be really fascinated to really dig deep

02:10:35.760 | from a sports psychology standpoint,

02:10:37.920 | because he always talked about how much fear he had

02:10:39.620 | when he was competing.

02:10:40.920 | And I find that to be interesting, because obviously,

02:10:43.960 | so it's almost like, to me, it's almost like,

02:10:46.120 | was he successful despite that, not because of that, right?

02:10:50.640 | And because anxiety usually leads

02:10:53.160 | to really negative performance for the majority of people.

02:10:55.440 | And what was it about him

02:10:57.400 | that the anxiety wasn't super negative?

02:10:59.800 | You know what I'm saying?

02:11:00.640 | Like, it's very interesting.

02:11:02.360 | - I wonder that too.

02:11:03.180 | So I have, I wonder that about him,

02:11:05.360 | but I have a huge amount of anxiety,

02:11:07.440 | interacting especially with people,

02:11:09.200 | just about everything, yeah.

02:11:10.940 | I wonder if that's helpful or not.

02:11:13.480 | It feels like it's very helpful.

02:11:15.240 | - I think, so okay, I think intuitively,

02:11:17.820 | so I think probably your everyday life, okay,

02:11:20.860 | is different than like in a performance or a competition.

02:11:25.220 | You have to be like super in the moment of what you're doing.

02:11:28.820 | So anything that's pulling you away, like, oh my gosh,

02:11:31.740 | you know, for high school kids, right, that coach,

02:11:33.780 | oh my gosh, that girl's in the stands,

02:11:35.980 | and if I get beat, then,

02:11:37.740 | and they're actively thinking about this other thing

02:11:40.600 | when this is going on,

02:11:42.000 | and I need all 100% of your focus right here.

02:11:44.480 | - He's never, I don't think he has anxiety in the ring.

02:11:47.120 | That's the point.

02:11:47.960 | I think, like, I have the same thing.

02:11:50.220 | Like, if I have a really high performance thing

02:11:53.920 | that I have to do, I don't know,

02:11:55.840 | a lecture in front of a lot of people.

02:11:57.160 | - Yeah, that'd be a great example.

02:11:58.760 | - That, there's huge amount of anxiety weeks ahead,

02:12:02.120 | days ahead, hours ahead.

02:12:03.880 | - So you have a system to get rid of it then?

02:12:06.080 | As you perform. - No, maybe,

02:12:07.640 | but it's just the body gets rid of it somehow.

02:12:10.320 | Yeah, there's not a system.

02:12:11.600 | - Subconscious system.

02:12:12.960 | - Yeah, it's self-preservation.

02:12:13.800 | - So you don't actually have anxiety

02:12:15.760 | while you're performing. - No.

02:12:17.280 | - So that's like, so then that problem,

02:12:19.880 | somehow that problem has solved itself, right?

02:12:21.900 | The problem is when the anxiety is actually happening

02:12:24.280 | while the wrestling match is happening,

02:12:26.000 | that's the real issue.

02:12:27.520 | - Yeah, but it, like, sneaks in there too,

02:12:30.240 | is that's the difference between MMA and wrestling,

02:12:33.000 | is there's no breaks in wrestling, right?

02:12:36.700 | - Yes.

02:12:37.540 | - There is, you can look at the crowd a little bit,

02:12:39.960 | like, you can look, so maybe.

02:12:41.520 | - Out of bounds, maybe.

02:12:42.440 | - But like, there's other things we have to perform,

02:12:46.520 | well, there's more breaks, like a lecture,

02:12:48.400 | you can catch yourself thinking,

02:12:49.560 | like in this conversation, you know?

02:12:51.160 | - Yeah.

02:12:52.000 | - Like, I've said a bunch of stuff where I think,

02:12:54.440 | why the hell did you say that?

02:12:55.720 | That's dumb, right?

02:12:57.080 | That's the anxiety, because there's a pause.

02:13:00.240 | And that can be, I don't know,

02:13:02.600 | I think it just pushes me to be better,

02:13:05.280 | but maybe I could be way better if I let go of that.

02:13:07.780 | - Yeah.

02:13:08.620 | - It's scary to think that GSB if you let go of that.

02:13:10.220 | - That's what I'm thinking, could he have been better?

02:13:12.300 | Or did he have a, like you're saying,

02:13:14.940 | like, you don't necessarily feel those,

02:13:17.180 | so I think certain people that I've coached,

02:13:19.260 | like, they would describe how they would feel

02:13:21.580 | literally during the wrestling match, right?

02:13:24.180 | And you're saying, like, during the speech performance,

02:13:27.100 | it's mostly gone.

02:13:28.100 | - Yep.

02:13:28.940 | - And that's, it'd be interesting to see if, like,

02:13:31.540 | he talked a lot about that,

02:13:32.700 | but if it was all the way somehow gone,

02:13:35.180 | and it means he would have a mechanism for it.

02:13:36.960 | So, like, I had a really bad performance

02:13:38.160 | my freshman year of high school at Nationals,

02:13:41.100 | 'cause I had the ability to be anxious,

02:13:43.360 | and one of my coaches talked about,

02:13:44.860 | and a lot of A-type personalities are kind of that way,

02:13:48.140 | you know, because they're trying to consider

02:13:49.700 | all possibilities at the same time,

02:13:51.980 | and while we're actually performing or competing,

02:13:54.860 | it's negative performance, right?

02:13:57.500 | So he said he would always,

02:13:59.540 | leading up to the match within, say, an hour,

02:14:01.780 | his thing was talking about fishing.

02:14:03.460 | He would get someone to talk about fishing with him,

02:14:04.660 | 'cause it would stop him thinking about the match

02:14:06.260 | and being uber anxious.

02:14:08.020 | So I kind of really took that to heart,

02:14:09.700 | and it really helped me,

02:14:10.540 | as I would always, like, have someone to talk to,

02:14:12.460 | and just goof around about whatever.

02:14:14.780 | So I'm not thinking about this thing,

02:14:16.500 | and then once I step in, it's time to go.

02:14:18.340 | So I didn't have this, like, anxious buildup.

02:14:20.900 | Now it's how, for me, I took it away,

02:14:22.400 | but, like, you said you have a way to get it away,

02:14:25.500 | obviously, 'cause it's there, and then it's not.

02:14:26.340 | - Yeah, I guess there's a little tricks you come up with.

02:14:28.860 | Yeah, you start thinking about, it's not fishing.

02:14:30.500 | Maybe I should try the fishing thing.

02:14:32.300 | - I hate fishing, so boring.

02:14:34.300 | - Well, maybe it's good to think about that.

02:14:37.100 | All right, Ben, this is, like I told you, I'm a big fan.

02:14:40.340 | I'm a big fan of your wrestling,

02:14:41.580 | your fighting, your personality.

02:14:43.380 | Thank you for coming down.

02:14:45.140 | Thank you for talking today.

02:14:46.140 | - Appreciate it. - It's a huge honor.

02:14:48.100 | Bam, let's go wrestle.

02:14:49.820 | Thanks for listening to this conversation with Ben Askren.

02:14:53.420 | To support this podcast,

02:14:54.740 | please check out our sponsors in the description.

02:14:57.580 | And now, let me leave you with some words from Muhammad Ali.

02:15:01.380 | "Only a man who knows what it is like

02:15:04.180 | to be defeated can reach down to the bottom of his soul

02:15:08.620 | and come up with the extra ounce of power it takes

02:15:11.900 | to win when the match is even."

02:15:14.580 | Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.

02:15:18.300 | (upbeat music)

02:15:20.900 | (upbeat music)

02:15:23.500 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

Ben Askren: Wrestling and MMA | Lex Fridman Podcast #242

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