JRE MMA Show #172 with Gable Steveson

23:07So it's a true opportunity. That's awesome. That's really awesome. So when you were in camp with him, you're going through the camp. Were you planning on MMA then? Or, like, how does it work? Like, what were you thinking? Were you just, like, the moment you started training with him, is that when it really started the fire in you? Yes. I had a little bit of burn for it. Like in the back of your mind? Yes, but a little burn, you got to have the heart. You got to have the heart. So kind of what was the stamp on it was I went to Madison Square Garden with him, and John was just doing John things, you know, just being a superstar.

23:43Everybody knew who he was. And I was like, man, you know, I got an Olympic gold medal. You know, like maybe I should be getting some too. Like, you know, like John showed me the way a little bit. So I'm trying to have him show me the way. He's bringing me to every place, meeting every person, you know, showing me the opportunities that he has. And he looks at me and he was like, you can have this too. And that was kind of the cherry on the top. But we can put another cherry on the top and do a double one when he won the fight And then I'm holding the belt with him. And I see this guy face to face.

24:11And, you know, he's just the most popular man on earth for that day. And it's kind of like, wow, like you don't get you don't really get to see the backstage moments. You get to see the guy go out there on TV and fight. But I got to see the backstage of everyone taking the pictures with him, the superstars. You know, I'm walking out the Knicks game and I see Queen Latifah. And I'm like, damn, that's Queen Latifah. And I'm taking a selfie with Queen Latifah. I'm like, yo, can I take can I send this to my mom? And she's like, yeah, go ahead. and I see Fat Joe talking to him and everybody. And I'm like, wow, this is what it is to be a real fighting star.

24:43And fighting is one-on-one, and people want to watch someone fight. But I think in other sports, like we talked about earlier, there's a full team with helmets on, with jerseys on. But in fighting, people want to meet that badass dude, and they want to meet the champ. And that's what I want to be. Yeah. So what is training with John like? What is the training camp like? Like when, you know, you obviously haven't gone into training camp with any other elite fighters, but one of the more interesting things that separates John from everybody else is like, John doesn't take no short notice fights.

25:17John game plans for everybody. He studies tendencies. His fight IQ, I mean, obviously he has everything. He obviously has all the skills. Obviously has all the drive and everything else. But the fight IQ is the big one. That's the big one. Because if you don't have a good driver, who gives a fuck how fast your car is? True. It's really the mind behind it that puts it all together. He's sitting in a Ferrari with Ferrari gas. A lot of people sit in a Ferrari with 87 gas and a car don't work. So when I got to see those tendencies of him watching people, and he does it to me now where he'll send me videos on Instagram of the top UFC guys.

25:59Be like, oh, watch how he steps. Watch when he throws a punch how he comes back and he doesn't reset this certain way. And he's kind of already installing those tendencies in me. And so now when I was wrestling, I never used to watch people wrestle. Like I went out there on a limb and I was just beating guys. Even in Olympics, I never watched anyone wrestle. I never watched their film. Really? Never. I told coaches, don't show me one video because I don't want to focus on that one thing he did. And that was me being hardheaded. Like if a guy had a great double leg and I'm like, damn, how do I stop this double leg?

26:31And I'm worried about stopping a double leg instead of doing my offense. And so I never watched anybody. I went to the Olympics and I said, show me the guys I'm wrestling. And I said, let's do it. You know, we guys right now are just banging their head against the wall, listening to this. I was like, damn, he did that to me? That's crazy. I said, let's do it. I said, it's me or you. Let's do or die. And this tournament, I'm not dying. Like, you can't beat me in any way possible. And that's when I was at my best when I had that mindset. And he's kind of putting that back into me. And I feel really good about it.

27:02That's amazing. It's amazing. So when he's sending you videos like do you have like a do you save all this shit? Do you have like a folder where you have all these different fighters and different moves? Because you're you're basically brand new at something. But it's like this. Let me just tell you what I said. You had a fight an MMA fight where you hit that dude with a left hook and then took him down while he was out cold. I sent Dana White a text message. I said everyone's fucked. I did. Well I appreciate it. Because I was like that kind of speed is crazy. Like that kind of speed and incorporated with elite wrestling is crazy.

27:37I'm like, what do you – the heavyweight division is so shallow right now. You got Tom Aspinall, Cyril Ghosn, John Jones if he chooses to fight again, Francis if some – by some miracle they can work something out and bring him back to the UFC. Other than that, there's no one compelling for like a championship caliber fighter. There's basically four or five guys on earth that are in this championship caliber class. And you're already there, which is nuts. And you haven't even fought in the UFC yet. When I watched you move and I watched you fight, I was like, okay, how do you stop that? Who's got the skills to be able to stop that?

28:21And in my mind, there's only a few guys where it's going to be a problem. It is like the Francis Ngannos, the Cyril Gans and the Tom Aspinall's. That's it. There's like a few guys and everybody else on the way up. The only problem is going to be you getting fights. Like that kind of speed is just bananas for a 250-pound man. And when you have that and you're 25 years old, it's like this is a very rare thing that you see in MMA. And it's kind of crazy because the heavyweight division is, of course, the most prestigious division in the world. The heavyweight champion of the UFC is the baddest motherfucker on the planet.

29:02And, you know, right now it's kind of a toss-up, right? Because Cyril Ghosn had this fight with Aspinall. John is kind of semi-retired. Whatever he decides to do, you know, it's kind of up in the air. He'll probably have one more fight, right? I want him to. I think he's got the juice in him. The White House. He would love the White House. He's told me many times he wants to be main event on the White House, and he wants me to be a couple slots behind him and kind of have us both win, and that's his last leg right there. I would love for him to do one more. If he really wanted to in his heart, he should.

29:37But if he doesn't, John's not going to do it. They should do Alex Pereira and him at the White House. I told people. I said Alex Pereira would be a great matchup for Tom. A heavyweight version of the BMF belt. You know what I'm saying? It'll be perfect. There's nothing else to it besides two guys going out there. It's Alex Pereira, the baddest light heavyweight. And that's Jon Jones' baddest heavyweight right now. Yeah. And regardless if someone else has the belt, Jon Jones is still the baddest heavyweight out there. The belt doesn't mean jack shit when it's Jon Jones. It doesn't mean jack shit.

30:04It doesn't. There's so many fighters could do that. They could just step away from the belts, abandon the belts, and then come back. It's really just about the fighter. Everybody knows who Jon is. Everybody knows what Jon does. It's like people will pay. You don't need a belt. A belt doesn't mean anything. Yo, this is a crazy story. I had a French Bulldog that passed away. So I like to go out there and I adopt French Bulldogs. And I kind of give them a better home. And I either ship them to a new home or I keep them. And so at the time, I had a baby French Bulldog. He passed away. And I told John, I was like, yo, my dog died.

30:35I got to go home. He let me go home. I came back. And I came back on a Tuesday. I didn't see John until Thursday. And mind you, this is a week before he's going to go out there for Stipe. He's sick. like super sick and i watched this guy do five rounds on a thursday and they sent they shark baited him five new people and he's dead tired and this is when i knew he was unstoppable he went out there nobody could touch him and i'm telling you high class pfl fighters ex ufc fighters ex glory kickboxers were going in there after him and he was just mopping them and i was like damn this dude is beyond next level and that was like you know you got to see greatness and i see it at the fight but you also got to see it when how does this guy be great before the fight and I saw that and I was like god damn um I said excuse me John um you think I can go in there with you and he was like no and I was like why you think so um he was like you don't know how to defend and it was kind of a funny joke because a guy a partner got hurt and I was like I raised my hand I told Greg Jackson I said Greg let me in there and Greg was like not today Gable and this is when I didn't know how to defend or anything he was like hey not today and I was like man why you know I can go in there and take him down and he was like this is different and when I saw that that was like the epitome of like super greatness in my eyes because I like hard workers I like guys that beat on guys I don't like guys that go out there and and and do the little extras that they to look cool I mean just go out there and dominate and let's go home and I saw that and I was like yeah it's over with for stipe it's gonna be a long night well unfortunately they met when stipe had already had a lot of miles on the clock a lot of john was still elite it's crazy that john essentially developed a spinning back kick a real spinning back kick when he's 36 years old crazy it's so nuts because i mean he tried it earlier in his career but it was like he would spin instead of go straight you know what i mean but when he hit stipe it was perfect it was perfect that picture we we showed a video of it and then freeze froze the heel.

32:36It was like boom. It was halfway into his rib cage. It was crazy. I wouldn't have got up either. Well, very few people would. Very few human beings can talk. That kick is so powerful. And when it comes from a big guy like John with those long-ass legs and all that leverage with perfect technique and it goes right into the sweet spot like that, like good luck. But it's such a brilliant thinking on his side because he's like, Like, okay, I have to fight heavyweights, and I need something that can take them out with one shot. Like, what is that? Well, it's the most powerful kick, which is the spinning back kick.

33:09And so he trains it constantly. Constantly. Which is just very few people have the mindset to be able to do it. Very few guys develop new skills late in life, you know, late in their career. They start incorporating new skills like that. I think that's a thing where he's always all ears, too. and that's kind of what he's putting into me also. I watched him do a spinning back kick the night before at midnight when we were practicing in the hotel lobby. So he was just planning on that. He was planning on it. Being the showstopper. He told me he wanted to take Stipe down, and then all of a sudden he does a spinning back kick, and I was like, you sly motherfucker.

33:49Did he bring in a Taekwondo coach? How did he develop that technique so clearly? He's got a – there's a kickboxing Taekwondo coach named Alex. He's got a long last name because I think he married a Thai lady. So I think he changed his last name. Oh, okay. But he's from New Mexico. He works out at Jackson. He's got a lot of tattoos on him. And if you saw him, you would never know. But the dude can kick hard as shit, and it's crazy. And so he worked with John on that? Yes. Yeah. The only other guy that I would say developed a crazy new technique late in his career was Vitor. When Vitor was like 35 or 36, he developed a wheel kick.

34:27It was crazy out of nowhere when he fought Luke Rockhold. All of a sudden he's throwing wheel kicks. Like Vitor never. Crazy. Vitor never threw wheel kicks. Crazy. But I think it's honestly got to be cool from, because you sit right next to the cage. So it's got to be cool to like see people grow up through their career. And then all of a sudden at the end you see like a guy does a spinning wheel kick or a guy does a spinning back kick. And you're like, damn, like where'd that come from? And I feel like does it give you a high to kind of see a person grow through a new stage of seeing a new move from them?

34:57I just love excellence. That's what I love. I love when someone shines, when they just figure a way to eclipse everyone else, when they figure a way to—when they just—like the Piotr Jan-Murab-Dwavishwili fight. When you see a guy like Piotr Jan who loses the first fight to Murab and comes back and dominates in the second fight. Like, I love that shit. I love it. I love watching someone put in an insane amount of work and dedication and then shining on fight night. I love it. It's cool, too, because you see Peter Yan is the new, like, blueprint for guys that are coaching kids to do moves. I mean, he went out there and threw a fake hook and liver kicked Marab.

35:43And then he goes out there and hits a Soto Gauri and trips guys. I mean, what other film tape blueprint can you use from someone else? I mean, he's done everything in all of his fights. His flow state is amazing. His flow state's incredible. And he's so good at mixing up trips along with, like, inside fighting. His stand-up is so good. He's so hard to hit clean, too. I think the only guy who really hit him clean was Sugar Sean. Sean hit him with a knee, like a really good knee, timed it perfectly in their fight and dropped him. But other than that, he very rarely gets hit. And when you do hit him, you're hitting him, and he's kind of rolling with it.

36:22You know, he keeps that super high guard. He does the high, yeah. Uh-huh. Yeah, he keeps his hands straight in front of you. He's something special, man. And, you know, that dude's still only 32 years old. He's only 32? Yeah. Ooh. I know. It's crazy. What do you think if he doesn't lose it? 32 or 34. How old is Piotr Jan? He's either 32 or 34. But, you know, we've seen him in, I think he's 32. 32? Yeah. I mean, we've seen him in the UFC since he was like in his mid-20s. Yeah. If he doesn't lose to Merab that first time, where do you think his path goes? It's a good question. You know, I mean, because he did lose to other guys as well.

37:00He lost to Sean and he lost to, the Al Jermaine fight was fucked. The first fight was fucked. But the second fight, Al Jermaine dominated him. But I think he probably overestimated himself in the second Al Jermaine fight. It doesn't seem like he was just prepared. And the thing about Al Jermaine is like his wrestling is very good and his back control is the fucking best in the business. When Al Jermaine gets your back, you're in deep shit. He's so good at back control. He's so good at rear naked chokes. And, you know, Al Jermaine just really struggled to make that 135. It's got to be hard. But if he got it right, and he got it right in that second fight, and he just did what he does at his best.

37:42It was one of his finest performances. So he lost that fight, but it didn't mean that he was done. It just meant he realized, okay, he had to have a camp like he had for Murab in order to beat Aljamain. And I just don't think everybody's willing to go through that kind of camp every fight. Murab went through four? Yeah, four in a year. yeah do you um for blueprint how do you like that because i know guys kind of take the two fight the two fight a year approach maybe three if you're doing well i think that's more more sustainable alex perera did the same thing like he's he's fought a lot of fights and he's fight fought fight short notice you got to admire that mindset of a guy who's like i don't give a fuck let's fight you know and but alex has fought with broken toes and everything he fought with a norovirus and you know he had a fucked up hand the first time he fought on khalayev but then you know same thing like he comes in for the second fight with on khalayev fully healthy and just smokes him smokes him in the first round if you if you um what do you think about if you gave alex perra like a solid great wrestler like an islam of light heavyweight heavyweight how do you think that he does it'll be a problem yeah i mean i think less of a problem certainly now than early in his career.

38:53Like if you see his first fight in the UFC with Michaelaitis, he gets taken down in the first round. That's not going to happen now. And if it does, he gets up. You know, it's different. But it gets up against who? Does he get up against a guy like you? You know, there's different levels, right? You really saw that with Jack Della Maddalena in Islam, right? There's levels. And when you got a guy that's at Islam's level, that's just a super elite grappler, unless you've faced that before you don't know what to prepare yourself for i think people all the time that's the thing with pure to yan he had been in there with marab for the first fight and so he knew what to expect and he had seen all those crazy fights he saw the fight with san hagen he saw the fight where this was the rematch with sugar sean where he submitted him he's like okay this guy's a fucking monster he's a monster now you got to prepare for a monster and he was ready.

39:47But unless you've experienced that before, there's really no one like that in the light heavyweight division, unfortunately. There's not some super elite grappler in the light heavyweight division. And I think that's one of the reasons why Hamzat is thinking about going up to light heavyweight. And I think he should. I'm a big fan of Hamzat. I love his style. I love his intensity. His intensity is the best thing ever. Oh, it's an animal. It's the best thing ever to watch. Because when I was wrestling, I liked to go out there and just put the hammer down to dominate. And he's got it. He's got that touch.

40:15Oh, yeah. He's an animal. And, you know, that that animal part of him almost killed him because he refused to stop training when you have covid. When he had covid, he was just showing up at the gym and putting in two and a half hour sessions and vomiting blood. Like it's a nut. That's crazy. Yeah. They said the real problem with Hamzat was that you you couldn't get him out of the gym and he was always overtrained. So then he brings in Sam Calavita and Sam Calavita. From training lab, right? Right. Yes. So he's monitoring his heart rate. He's monitoring his recovery. And he's working on him with his strength and conditioning, and they're doing it scientifically.

40:51And then you've seen the Drickus Duplicy fight. I mean, he just didn't gas at all. That was the same thing as Islam and Maddalena. Very similar. They tried to do the, you know, maybe what if. What if he can outbox him? But it's hard when you've got to worry about so many things. And I think Islam did a great job of showing the leg kicks, making Jack switch. Oh, yeah. Jack didn't really push forward, and Islam, when he did, shot the double, or he shot an outside single. And that's hard. It's hard when you've got to think about so many things. Yeah. Well, you know, Khabib is, without doubt, one of the all-time greats, one of the greatest to ever do it.

41:22But the difference between Khabib and Islam is Islam is elite stand-up-wise. Like, Khabib was a very good stand-up, but Islam knocked out Volkanovsky with a head kick. You know, that's not in Khabib's repertoire. Islam is on another level. It's like one more level above he can knock you out standing he can knock you out on the ground He could submit you he could take you down. He's fucking huge for the weight class, especially 155 It's like there's so many aspects and you're always thinking about that grappling when you're striking So when you say like oh, you know who's better striker Islam or Jack Della Maddalena?

41:58Well, it depends because if you got to worry about that takedown your striking is not gonna be the same It's just not going to be the same. Because everything he does, you're always looking for that takedown. And that factor leads to guys getting hit all the time. Like if you go back and watch old fights like Kevin Randleman versus Cro Cop. Kevin Randleman knocked out Cro Cop because Cro Cop was worried about the takedown. He was worried about the takedown. All of a sudden, Randleman comes with the big left hook. And Kevin Randleman was an NCAA champ where? Ohio State, I believe. Wasn't it Ohio State?

42:30I believe he was an Ohio guy. 184 or 197? How was he heavyweight? I don't know. Oh, yeah. Three-time Big Ten wrestling champ at Ohio State. He never won the tournament?

42:45Heavyweight. Wow, who did he lose to in the tournament? Oh, it says heavyweight in the one. I'll look that up real quick. Okay. But that was the thing about Randallman is like the speed and the takedown was always this big threat. And so because of that, you're thinking about one thing and boom, you get hit with a big shot. I've seen Kevin Randall wear shoes in his matches. What's the difference? What's the difference of wearing? I've seen a guy wear shoes now. I was on Instagram and I saw maybe a kickboxing match or something like that. Why can't they wear shoes now? Is there a rule that you can't?

43:16It's not now. All those things are old. Those are old? Yeah, those are all old. Pride used to allow you to wear shoes. Early UFC used to be able to wear shoes. I saw that. I remember the first UFC video I seen was that big huge dude and that little dude that knocked him out. Was he the big black dude? Which guy? It was like an old video. Super old. That's not descriptive enough. Okay, I'm sorry. Give me a second. Big huge dude, little black dude. Bob Sapp maybe? No, that wasn't UFC. Who was the big video? And then the white dude came out there and he was just whooping him and the big dude tried to grab him.

43:48I might be tripping, but I saw the video. Well, I don't think you're tripping. I mean, there's been so many fights. It's so hard to figure out what fight you're talking about. But there's an advantage to wrestling shoes for sure, without a doubt. I mean, the grip on the ground. I mean, how many times have you seen guys? Yeah, this one. Oh, Keith Hackney. Yeah. And Keith Hackney had a very strange style. It was like, I think he was a Kempo guy. And he hit him with a bitch slap. You know what I'm saying? You ever see how he knocked him down? Look at the difference in the size. Emanuel Yarbrough, who is a sumo wrestler.

44:24But Emanuel was probably like, look at that. See, he overhand bitch slapped him. This is crazy. He basically stepped in and palm-striked him to the head. You think he looks, if he's still alive, you think he looks back at this video and be like, damn, I got slapped? Probably. Damn. I mean, Emanuel fought a bunch of different things. He fought, I think he fought in pride as well. if I'm oh oh they forgot to lock the cage you got flew out the cage look at thin big John McCarthy he lost to Mark Ryland Mark Ryland of Iowa okay there you go that's random what we're talking about yeah yeah the old days were wild man it's wild it's wild to go back and watch those fights it's like since you since you've been kind of like a huge figure your whole life have you gone back and like watched Fear Factor I watched it because my kids were watching it.

45:20My kids were watching Fear Factor because there was like a whole Fear Factor channel. Was it True TV or one of those? True TV. Or Spike TV. One of those things. They had Fear Factor on like all day long and my kids were watching it. I thought it was hilarious. Man, I was watching it too. I'm just going to tell you right now. And all the shit they was doing, hell no. Yeah. A lot of it is in your head. Like a lot of the stuff that they had to eat is not that bad. Some of it was fucking disgusting. Were you trying some while they were trying some? I ate a bunch of things. What was the worst thing?

45:51None of the things I ate were that bad. You know, like I ate a Madagascar hissing cockroach. It's like a cockroach the size of like this lighter. Damn. Yeah. Yeah. That wasn't bad? It was just crunchy, huh? Yeah, it doesn't have much flavor to it. Yeah. It's more in your head than anything. I'm sure. Being on that show, what was the worst thing you saw someone tense up about? The worst thing was what they had to eat and watching people throw up. I watched people throw up every day. You know how the smell of throw up makes you want to throw up? That went away after a while. It was that bad? Yeah.

46:28I saw people throw up every week. Every week I was watching four or five people throw up. It was totally normal to be around puke. It was like a candle for you. Because they were throwing up in front of me, and I was telling them that they'd keep going. I'm like, don't worry. You can keep going. You can keep going. Don't put that out of your head. This is a task. Just you want to win? Okay, you can do this. I can help you. I can talk you through this. But you just got to just, you are in control of your body. Force yourself to eat it. Chew it. Swallow it. Get it down. Let's go. But that was the worst, is the eating shit.

47:01Holding your breath underwater was hard. There's a lot of things they had to do that was hard. It's a crazy fucking trail. There was one where they had to jump out a helicopter and swim and grab some while the helicopter propellers were blowing the water so they couldn't. We did a few things like that. Were you ever scared for some of them? I was worried when they had to ride bulls. That one scared the shit out of me. Because I was like, you know, the stuntmen are animals. If you ever meet stuntmen, they are some of the bravest, toughest dudes alive. and the stunt guys had this attitude about the bull.

47:36They're like, oh, that's a stunt bull. That's a practice bull. And I go, does a fucking bull know he's a practice bull? I bet he doesn't. I bet he didn't get that memo. He don't know that. He's just a bull. That's a fucking huge animal, and you're going to get a 100-pound lady to ride this huge animal. That's crazy. It's over with. And they got launched and almost got kicked. They rolled the dice a lot and got lucky that no one got seriously injured, I think. And the bull one was the big one for me. I was like, you can't predict that. Like you can, if you got a car stunt, you got to jump a car off a building into like this big cushion.

48:09Like, okay. Cool. You kind of know what's going to happen. You know, this is the thing. This could go wrong and this is how we're going to prepare against it going wrong or prepare for it. But you can't prepare for a bull. Like there's not much you could do. If the bull decides to stomp this person, that person could die. Like that's a real possibility, especially people that have no business riding bulls. bull riding is hard for bull riders bull riding is tough and they got a good 7 seconds on that bull if they're great if they're great and when you're watching it you're like oh my god you watch the bull kicking and jumping up in the air it's crazy I know their lower back kills after that we had one guy on Fear Factor who was a professional bull rider and his shoulder was so destroyed he took his shirt off to show me he has scars all around his shoulder he's like my shoulder pops out all the time It just would pop out a socket He'd go reach for something His shoulder would pop out a socket It was just destroyed It was hanging on by a thread Jeez, that's disgusting Ugh How do you live like that though?

49:09I don't know, man I guess you just deal with it I guess you just That's the price you pay for greatness You know? Gotta pay something Yeah, well they all pay Every bull rider pays You see those guys later in their career They're all stiff Because they got fused discs And fucking Messed up Bolts in their back and shit They're all fucked up Spines rubbing Oh yeah, it's a terrible It's messed up Terrible way to live I can't believe that Bull riding is a real thing I know It's fascinating though Because you can really see Guys go out there And be like You're facing the devil Literally The bull is going to win All the time Every time Even if you get back The best you can do Is hang on for seven seconds There's no goat Who can just hang on The bull as long as possible I'll hang on that bull For 30 minutes Keep kicking the bitch He's going to get you off Everybody goes flying eventually Everybody Everybody It's going to happen One way or another Yeah there's no human being that could just stay on a bucking bull.

50:00No. And just like, when I decide, I'll get off. Have you rode? No. Okay, I haven't either. Fuck that. I don't think black people do that. I think there are. Is there a couple? It's got to be. Yeah, there's got to be. Oh, look at that dude right there. Bam. Ezekiel Mitchell. Look at the size of that thing. And look at his angle. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. The bull is so athletic that he's damn near doing a handspring. Exactly. With the dude on his back. Right, and he weighs 2 ,000 pounds. He's just throwing his body up and through the air. That is, fuck all that. Like, right there. Like, you easily could get stomped to death right there.

50:40It's game over. You fall wrong, he lands on your face, and that is a wrap. Your fucking head is pulverized. I wonder what the. The size of that thing. God. I wonder what the numbers are on, like, if a bull stomps, like, the velocity and the mass of it. Like, what is the degenerative force from it? Oh, it's got to be insane. How many guys have died? None that I know, hopefully. None that I know. But, I mean, there has to be, like, an enormous number of guys that have died bull riding. What's, like, the, since, like, we're on a crazy topic, what is, like, the craziest thing outside of, like, maybe fighting Taekwondo that you've done that you're like, damn, like, that shit felt good?

51:18I never did anything other than I had three kickboxing fights, but other than fighting, that was the scariest shit that I ever did. Yeah, I mean, I've never done anything. I'm not like a parachute. You're not a jumpy for it? No. Okay. I'm not a bungee jumper. I mean, I've done bungee jumping on vacation. I did zip lining. I was like, what am I doing? This is stupid. I don't like doing stuff like that. I don't like dumb risks. No. I'm big, so I went on a zip lining one time. You know, you got to jump off the thing. Right. You got to jump off the platform. I thought I was going to fight Joe. I'm kidding.

51:49That might have been my last day on earth if that line didn't hold me. Right. Because what do you weigh, about 250? Like 255 and it bounces. And you're like, ooh. I was in Thailand and I went to do this thing. It was a bungee cord thing. And they said I couldn't do it because I was only 200 pounds. And I was like, that's crazy. Like what happens if you get a guy that lies about his weight? It's over with. Yeah, because people lie about their fucking weight all the time. I've seen the ones where the guys, they got the squirrel suit on. Oh, God. And they jump off the building or they jump off the rocks and they go down and they come up.

52:20And sometimes they don't. Sometimes they don't come up. My friend Andy did that jumping out of a fucking plane. He made it? Oh, yeah. Okay, good. He held the world record at one point in time for the longest squirrel suit flight. What are they called? What do they call those things? Wingsuit. Wingsuit. Wingsuit. He held the record for it. It's ridiculous. But Andy's nuts. He's a Navy SEAL. 18 miles. 18 miles. 18 miles? What do you think he's thinking at like mile nine? Maybe I drop? He's a psycho. I don't know. 18 miles is crazy. Yeah, that's crazy. I would never do nothing like that ever. Uh-uh.

52:55No, I'm not interested in parachuting. I'm not interested in any of that shit. I might get on a wakeboat and surf. That's about all. You fall in the water. Yeah. Not that big a deal. With a life jacket. Yeah. Yeah. That sounds reasonable. That's a reasonable thrill. Falling up the sky is crazy. Falling up the sky is crazy, But at least falling out the sky, you have equipment. You check the equipment. You make sure you double check. You've done it before. It's done. You know when to do it. With a bull, there's no safeguards. You know? I mean, you have some sort of a chest protector on some people.

53:28You have a helmet. There's no safeguards. He could land on your hip. You're never going to walk again. It's over with. Fuck that. It's game over. I can't fathom riding a bull. Yeah. Doesn't Donald do it? Does Donald Cerrone? He rides bulls. See, he got the name Cowboy. He better do something. He's out of his fucking mind. You got to do something with the name Cowboy. That's a dude that has a real adrenaline problem. He's got a real— I mean, rightfully so. He looks crazy. He's got a real adrenaline problem. He told a story about getting trapped in a water—he was diving, and he got trapped in a cave.

54:00And the guy he was with panicked because his cords got tangled up, and the water was cloudy, and he couldn't figure out how to get out. That was one of the most—I knew he was okay because he was right here telling me the story, but it was one of the most terrifying stories that anybody's ever told me. But that dude loves that kind of shit. He loves, like, thrills. I can't. I don't think I can get behind thrills. I can't. No. It's too much. And especially your heart be like... Mm-hmm. It's just not worth it. Is today my day? I mean... It can't be my day. This episode is brought to you by Athletic Brewing Company.

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55:13Go to athleticbrewing.com slash Rogan to find stores near you or get brews shipped right to your door. Use code Rogan to get 15 % off your first online order. Near beer, terms and conditions and certain limitations apply. Athletic Brewing Company, fit for all times. Was fighting for the first time? was that what it was the different in the the difference in the way it felt the first time you fought versus wrestling my when i when i wrestle i'm not really nervous i'm more anxious to like perform and put on a good show when when i went out there for my first fight my heart was beating on my chest because that pin drops and it's like it's me or you and i always had the mentality of like it's me or you it's do or die today's not my day you gotta go but um that first time you're Like, I kid you not, my heart was, like, jumping.

56:04And John had to, like, look at me in the eyes and be like, yo, you're good. Rely on what you know. We've been here before. You've done this before. There's 2 ,000 people here. You've wrestled in front of 20. Just think about it like that. And when I thought about it like that, my heart rate calmed down. You know, you kind of get, like, shaky a little bit. You kind of feel like your legs are not there. And that was kind of my first time fighting. After that at Dirty Boxing, I wanted to kill that dude. which is really crazy because you couldn't even rely really on your wrestling in that which is what i wanted right i wanted to i wanted to go out there and show you that that i can throw punches without having to look down at that leg and that's exactly what we did was that a calculated decision to try to do that as well as just like to just have a pure striking fight just just so you could show that you could do it and then in your own mind not have your your main skill set to rely on yes i really wanted to handicap myself because i wanted to show the people to and i and i kind of hopefully i did show him a great show and we definitely did i want to show the people i want to show the the people at home that are a casual viewer that who doesn't know gable like hey can i turn on dirty boxing and the mom and dad and kids are sitting there watching saying hey what is about gable steveson that's special and he's a wrestler so what can be special besides wrestling and then i go out there and i get this knockout and i jump over the ring and And I'm doing the Arthur Jones sack dance.

57:27The crazy thing was the way you leapt over the ring like it was nothing. That was banana. What does it feel like to not have... Oh, there it is. Boom. But this is the nuttiest part right here. The big jump. Like it was nothing. Like it was nothing. I mean, that is crazy athleticism. But what's wild about that is you look like a really good boxer. And you have only been boxing for a very small amount of time. I've always had very good confidence in myself. I've always spoke about myself highly. I've always like wanted to be over the top you know like a WWE you know when he gets on the microphone and John Cena's like you can't see me or Roman Reigns like acknowledge me you know when I go out there I don't want to have to say those things I want it to when you see me that's him and I've always tried to be that's the bigger than Gable person but also like if we have like a routine combo you can see like man he's real human you know you can talk to him he does real things we put on the we put on shoes the same way we put on pants the same way and i feel like a lot of superstars don't really show people that side of them and if it's up to them if they want to or they're not but i've always really like showing the families and the kids they're like man look at gable you know he's a normal human being but when you compete it's special it's different but it's just crazy to be able to do that in a sport that you're relatively new at i mean just man just think big about yourself i get it every kid i tell everybody what's crazy about that honestly is like i know you're just going to get better at it that's what's crazy when you watch someone strike that well early in their striking career like your striking journey is so new that the sky's the limit as far as your your potential joe and in the nicest way possible i really want to say this that's the worst i'll ever be the worst i'll be yeah and and and for whoever who's going to watch this that's the worst i'll ever be just think about it um 14 seconds and then now think about if you're going to put some time into me some effort into me and I'm putting effort into myself that that dirty boxing is probably the the weakest I'll ever be in the sport of MMA I believe you I believe you I mean it only makes sense if you've been training that short amount of time of striking now when you train striking are you training boxing are you doing Muay Thai like what kind of striking training you're doing are you incorporating it all together in MMA I do it all um so a lot of days I go in so I kind of have like a really good schedule right now since I'm not going to go into a fight so I do every day besides Sunday some days or two a days like because I go to Lifetime and play basketball I go to Lifetime and sit in a cold tub and sauna and stuff but when I strike I go in there one round's maybe boxing next round is kicks, teeps, knees, everything elbows the next round is what the blueprint I have of what moves I need to really do to get in to kind of get to my shots or I'm gonna fake shoot and punch and then I probably go 10 rounds 12 rounds that five minutes each.

1:00:28So you do you You always incorporate all the MMA skills together in a workout. I try to. It's interesting when I was talking to Ilya Tapuria, particularly when he's not training for a fight, he doesn't do that. He is very rare in that when he goes and he works on his boxing, he'll just box. He just boxes. When he works on his jiu-jitsu, he just does jiu-jitsu. When he works on his wrestling, he just does wrestling. Then he puts them all together with MMA training. But he spends an exorbitant amount of time on each individual skill by itself to really like hone and tighten those things out, which is it's an interesting choice.

1:01:08And obviously for him, it's worked out spectacularly. Yes, it has. But there's no real like I guess if you want to be like an elite soccer player, I'm sure there's a program that they've kind of devised. Like this is the very best way to become a good soccer player. They have, you know, coaches and they game plan. They know what to do. With MMA, there's all these different approaches. Everyone, Alex Pereira's approach is different than Marab's approach, which will be different than your approach. Everybody's got a different thing. Yeah. It's just, like you said, it depends a person and it also depends the team that you have.

1:01:43I'm just really big on, I'm still very new, so I'm really big on just trying to make sure I can absorb all the information possible. and kind of when I go into these fights, these first few fights, kind of showcase what I can. And sadly, they have ended early. Not sadly, but in a good way, you know what I'm saying. But just go out there and showcase who I am. And when I go train, I don't mind sitting in there all day. Sometimes me and John will practice for hours just sitting there repeating, repeating. And then all of a sudden we go in at 8 o 'clock, it's midnight. But I like that, though, because it makes me feel good.

1:02:15It makes me feel like there's someone invested in me that makes me feel like I'm here for a purpose. and it makes me feel like this is what I'm – there's someone out of the country, there's someone in Russia. When I'm asleep, he's up. And I don't like that. He's up working. So when I can get all the time possible, I'm making sure I get all that time because I don't want that dude to show up one day and he's got a little inch on me. And I just can't – I can't think about that happening. I always have that thought in my head in terms of, like, UFC fighters. Like, there's such a shallow division.

1:02:46The heavyweight division is so shallow. I'm like, there has got to be some elite Russian wrestlers that are thinking about going the Fedor Emelianenko route. Like, they're thinking about. I know Nemkov, who just won the PFL title. He's a very high-level guy. But there has to be some, like, really high-level wrestlers that are considering going into MMA. Right now, Russian heavyweights are really not as good as people think in wrestling. Really? They got a guy named Abdurah Seasad alive. I don't know if you've heard of him. I have. DC told me about him. Man, he is crazy. If he came to fighting, it's over with.

1:03:20Not for heavyweights, for the other groups, because he's got to go through me if he comes heavyweight. But Iranians heavyweights are really good. I think that's where the heavyweight field should start coming from is Iran. They got a lot of good. They got two good guys. One's my age. I'm 25. And another one is, I think, 22. They battle for the Olympic spot of a year, but the older one wins just by a little bit. But the time is going to pass where that guy steps up and he's going to take the spot. So I would watch out for him. You know, what's interesting with MMA is some guys have a background in wrestling.

1:03:56And then they learn how to strike and they fall in love with striking. And then they hardly ever wrestle when they fight. You know? It's kind of weird. It is weird. You would see that a lot in the early – like Josh Koschek is a good example, who's a very good amateur wrestler. and then when he fought in MMA, very rarely wrestled. It was mostly striking. He could knock guys outstanding, and I think guys kind of fall in love with that. And then there's also the amount of effort. It's so tiring to wrestle along with all the other things that sometimes guys just put that aside and they just decide to stand and bang with people.

1:04:29I really like wrestling. I grew up wrestling, and if I had a chance, I would love to go to the 2020 Olympics and win a gold medal. That's how much I still love wrestling. But right now my path is MMA. and I knew the first couple of times that I would get those knockouts like like you look at your hands and it's like you you spider-man you got superpowers like I got I got lightning in my hands like right I would have never thought in my 25 years of life that I would go out there and I would left hook somebody and he would be out cold and I would double leg and flip him who would have ever thought that would ever happen and so like you're right you get obsessed with knocking people out but I still think my base is wrestling I just haven't used the best base yet and that's just I I just want to show people that my best base doesn't need to be used because the second best one is just as good as the first.

1:05:13Well, and the second best one is getting better all the time. That's the thing. And again, I keep going back to this, but if you can get that good at wrestling, you can get that good at anything. It's just a matter of putting in the time and dedicating yourself to that thing. But it's the mindset that allows someone to become an Olympic gold medalist in wrestling. Boy, if that person, that's a scary person. That person decides to focus on whatever the fuck it is, fucking pickleball, who gives a shit, they'll be elite at it. They just have to put their mind on it. It's a 100 % mindset thing. It ain't nothing else.

1:05:46You can have athletic ability. You can hard work all day. You can be so disciplined in the world. But if your mind doesn't think it, I feel like that's why I beat a lot of people before I even walked out there is I knew it. You just got to know. Championship mindset. Some people just don't feel it, and you just got to feel it. I know. Well, you know, it's like I was talking to a friend of mine. I don't want to mention any names because then you'll connect it to the fighter. But he said, man, he goes, I don't want to fuck with anybody anymore that needs a mental coach. And I said, really, why? He goes, it's just like this is too much.

1:06:18He goes, I want a dude who don't need that shit. You don't need it. It's interesting because some guys do and some guys that mental coach takes them over the top and then they find a way to win where, you know, maybe they'd have mental hiccups in the past. you know but his his mentality was i i want a guy who has no problems like if i'm gonna coach a guy i don't want a guy who's a head case i want a guy who goes in there and already has this i'm gonna fucking dominate and if i don't i'm gonna learn why i didn't dominate and i'm gonna come back i'm gonna get him next time yeah and i feel like that's the person i am i just want to go in there and dominate and i also think that a lot of people kind of rely too much on a lot of outside things to kind of make them feel good about themselves to go out there and perform instead of just putting that switch on and just saying, hey, we're here.

1:07:06Outside things like what? Like what do you mean? Just, you know, mental coaches. You know, you've got to get someone else to be maybe a breath-working coach, another coach, another coach. There's so many labels for coaches out there that you don't need. And when I was wrestling at Minnesota, I had Brandon Eggum, Luke Becker, who's the assistant and head coach, and Trevor Bramble. That's all I had. I didn't have nobody else. because I didn't want anybody to interfere with the connection that we had. And I feel like when you get a great bond with somebody and then you bring in more people, the bonds get mixed up.

1:07:37People are paying attention to too many different things. Instead of practicing, maybe I've got to work on my mind. Instead of working on my mind, maybe I've got to go do something else. Maybe I've got to take care of something else. Sort of like when you were talking about not watching video on your opponents because you're thinking about his double, how am I going to stop his double, instead of thinking about what am I going to do. Yeah, I would rather be productive for the team instead of productive for eight different people, and maybe three of them don't care about you as much. You know, they're there just to get a little something from you.

1:08:04Right, right, right, right, right. Where are you training now? Right now I'm still in Minneapolis. I'm having a baby girl this Sunday. Oh, congratulations. This Sunday my little girl is coming. I appreciate it. Thank you. That's awesome. She's going to pop out. My lady is hopefully going to deuce that day. If it comes early, it comes early. So that would be really nice. So I'm in Minneapolis right now. But when I do all the main training, New Mexico, Jackson Wing. Okay. So in Minneapolis, where are you training? With that guy, Billy Simon in Prior Lake. Same guy. Yeah. I've been with him forever.

1:08:33So you're in this little tiny gym? I'm in that little gym. Nobody sees us. We got partners that need to come in. But rather than that, I don't want the big lights. When I was growing up in Portage, Indiana, I had a wrestling mat in the garage. And me and my two brothers would wrestle. And that's where we got the most work in. My dad said, go in there and hand fight. and whoever comes out comes out. And it was definitely not me at the time. But maybe right now it was me. But we would go in there and hand fight. My dad's philosophy was we had Iowa-style wrestling, and Iowa-style wrestling was brutal.

1:09:06If his face needs to be run into the wall, run his face into the wall. And that's how we grew up. And if you don't want your face ran into the wall, you better put his in first. Right. And so when you're training with this guy, are you training like, I could get a call in a week to fight, and I'm ready to do that? Or are you training just developing skills constantly? I just religiously train to develop skills constantly. I try not to never stop. I don't like stopping because I'm kind of a—this is crazy. I'm a thicker body, so if I sit for a little bit, I feel like I'm getting fat. And I want to feel that way.

1:09:41So I just try to always keep myself in shape and try to keep the best look possible. So if you need me on one week, which I don't want to do any short notice, just how me and John do it, no short notice. Like, if you need me in a week, I look good, I'm ready. But we just take our time. So did John coach you about that, like give you some thoughts about that? Because I think that's a giant mistake that guys make, you know. And like the Alexander Volkanovsky fight is a good example. The Islam Makachev fight, he took that fight on 11 days notice. He's just been hanging around, drinking, partying, just being himself, just chilling.

1:10:14And then all of a sudden he gets this opportunity for a rematch. First fight was razor thin decision. He lost and he's like, I can do better, but you can't do better without a camp. You've got to have time to be yourself. Yeah. You have to have time to peak. And one of the things I really always admired about John is even a fight like the Chael Sonnen fight. They offered him Chael Sonnen on short notice. He was like, nope. Nope. And they're like, we need you to do this. He's like, nope. I'm a professional world champion. I prepare for my opponents, and I don't want to fight unless I'm prepared for my opponent.

1:10:49Period. It's the smartest way. Look at him. He's the GOAT. He is. I mean, it's just so many guys, they get 10. And I do appreciate that Alex does take those short notice fights, and he wins some of those short notice fights. But how many times he's fought injured, like really injured? Like the first Yuri Prohovska fight, he had a fucked up knee, man. And when he stopped Yuri, there's a moment when he's on top of Yuri and he's beating on him and the referee stops it and he goes to step up and he rolls off of him. The reason he rolled off of him, he couldn't support himself on his knee. That's how fucked up his knee was.

1:11:23And he was in a world title fight. It's bad. Crazy. Well, I feel like this is the only sport where they would let that happen just because football, you sit on IR. Yes. We don't have no IR. Right. It's either you do it or you say no. Right. And if you say no, they get upset at you. A lot of people get timid. And I mean, once you get past that barrier of, I think right now, since I'm going to have this daughter, I think my tone and mindset has changed to kind of really be more of a father figure for her, but also for like if kids want to look at me and be like, wow, you know, Gable's normal also.

1:11:57But I think just you've got to say no to a lot of people. You've got to be generous in a lot of ways, but you've also got to be able to go out there and say, I don't like this. I don't feel this way about this and this is why. And be cool on both sides. But some people get scared about that moment. Are you doing – what kind of strength and conditioning are you doing? So I still lift with the college team. So everything they do with wrestling – The college wrestling team? Yes. Everything they do at the University of Minnesota, I still do. I still got the same strength coach with them. Bike sprints, aerodyne sprints, Watt bike, Versa Climbers, everything.

1:12:33We try to mix it in all. rowers everything just to just to stay active and if it's not where we're getting close to a fight just maybe just take longer breaks in between just to keep the heart rate up but i don't like when my heart rate takes a takes a break i like to kind of keep it consistent so when i ramp up it's already ready to rock you already have a very high baseline yeah and like when you're doing strength and conditioning as far as like weight lifting and stuff like that like are you trying to put on weight at all no no i like you like 250 i like to stay where i'm at i do a lot of band Band work, a lot of explosive work, a lot of jumps, a lot of light weights with high reps just to kind of keep the body moving and kind of keep the cutness and the strength there but not also put too much where you're stiff.

1:13:16And you're naturally a large guy anyway. It's not like you have to put on a ton of weight. But, like, when you see a guy like Francis who's 265 natural, you know, and he used to have to cut a little bit of weight to make 265, which is kind of crazy, isn't it? Isn't it crazy? But it's also crazy that the UFC has a weight limit that you have to make at heavyweight. You have to cut weight to make heavyweight. How different do you think it would be if they didn't have 265 and it was just maybe 300? It should be no weight. It's heavyweight. It should be – what they really need is more weight classes.

1:13:48The UFC – there's gaps that are just enormous. Like the gap between 85 and 205 is crazy. 20-pound weight gap in between categories is – that doesn't make any sense to me. 10 pounds 10 pounds is still a lot but at least it's reasonable how many weight classes boxing have like 30 shitload they have so many boxing has so many weight classes boxing got like eight champions for each weight too that's a problem that's a problem MMA does as well right if you think about it there's the one champion there's the PFL champion but the difference is is really only the UFC champion in terms of the public perception like we talked about Nemkov who's an excellent fighter nobody knows who the fuck he is not in america you go to a regular kid you know some kid on the street and you know you say who is vadim nemkov and they're like what but i bet you that kid knows i show speed i bet they do right i bet they do right they do right they know i show speed they probably know who alex pereira is they probably know who islam makachev is they know who the ufc guys are the ufc that that title is worth so much it's so it's you know it's a it's the name it's the it is the combat sports leader and if you're not in the ufc i don't care i mean you look you can go to the pfl and you can win that million dollar tournament and you can make money and i'm all for that and i'm very happy for those guys they get to feed their family and they they provide and they make a great living and they can retire with some money in the bank but the reality is part of what you're doing is you're trying to be the best and if you're going to be the best, you kind of have to be in the UFC.

1:15:28Agreed. I mean, that's just what it is. That's just what it is. There's so many great leagues, but like the most prestigious people, you can say PFL, you can say anything, and you can go to any place and make a shit ton of money, but once you get that stamp of he's a UFC champ, people are like, damn, man, that's him. That's it. That's him. Yeah, that's it. They put that UFC belt on you, and it's on ESPN, and everybody sees it. That's it. The PFL is just another belt. It's like, you know, boxing has so many. They have the IBF, the WBA, the WBO, the WBC. It's just like so many fucking organizations.

1:16:04It just gets so crazy. It's like. Didn't they try to make Terrence Crawford pay for his belt? Ridiculous. How crazy is that? Terrence Crawford's like, fuck you. I'm the champ. I just beat Canelo. He just won a 300 ,000? Everybody saw it. Is that what they wanted from him? 300 grand? Can we get a look on this? Because I might be tripping. But I don't think I'm tripping. They stripped him. I know they stripped him. It's like percentage of purse. And I think it was like 3 % of whatever he made. So it was. That's so nuts. That is so nuts. That is so nuts that they get paid that much, just be a sanctioning body.

1:16:35And what are they doing? They're not doing anything. It doesn't mean anything. Well, they just get the best looking guy to maybe throw a belt on you. That's about all. They don't really get nothing else. You get nothing. You get a belt. but everybody knows he beat the brakes off Canelo Alvarez. That's it. Man, I love Canelo. He's the champion. I love Canelo as well. But, you know, I love what Terrence did because what Terrence did was crazy. He goes all the way up from 47 to 68. He had one fight at 54, you know, wins the title at 54, and then goes all the way up to 68, and everybody's like, Canelo's going to be too big.

1:17:13Canelo's going to be too big. No way. Nope. Skill. Skill. He's next level. Skill is king. Yep. And he's 38. He's 38. He could do a couple more if he wanted to. I don't think he does. But he don't want to. I think he's done. He's done. And I love it. I love that he's done. $300 ,000. Dethroned over a$300 ,000 fee. Wow. That's crazy. Do you think that's right? No. No? No. Unpaid fees and brief reign as undisputed chairman. It doesn't matter. He's the fucking champion. You can't take the guy's belt because he's not willing to give you money. Fuck you. He won. It's crazy. He won. Fuck off. Fuck off.

1:17:50He won. Well, now I see, is there going to be a new boxing promotion? Zuffa? Zuffa? Yes. Sorry. Yeah. So the UFC is doing something with the Saudis. And they are, I think they're launching their first event in January. I think they're launching their first event the night before the big UFC on Paramount event. So it'll be the 23rd. Yes. I don't think they've announced anything in terms of the card, who's going to be on it. I mean, that's not a lot of time. You know, that's only not even a month from now. So I don't even understand how they're doing that. But they're probably going to do the same thing that Riyadh season is doing, you know.

1:18:29Which is really smart. Riyadh season is great. I mean, it's putting guys into that next level category of, hey, you are a star. And Turkey All Shake is throwing crazy money. Rightfully deserved it for a lot of these guys. Oh, yeah. They deserve it. Oh, they definitely do. but it's you know if you you do that you're going to get people to fight that would avoid each other or ordinarily you know and you know we've seen that already the Saudis have already been able to do that get guys to fight and you know you're going to put on the most exciting fights you're going to put on the best matchups and so I think the UFC is trying to do that same kind of model and now that the Saudis own ring magazine so they have the ring magazine belt which has always been the most prestigious belt.

1:19:14There's always a bunch of different champions in different weight classes, but if you're a fan of Ring Magazine like I am, when you would get Ring Magazine and they would have the ring champion, Marvin Hagler, well, that's the fucking champion. That's him. Yeah, that's it. There might be a WBO guy out there, a WBA guy out there, but the reality is that's the guy. That's the guy. That's nice. The boxing needs a unified champion thing like that. So when you see Terrence in there with five belts, it's great that he's got all those belts. But why? It should be one belt. It should be like, this is the super middleweight champion of the fucking planet.

1:19:51Period. Fuck all your sanctioning bodies. That's the guy. That's it. One belt is all he needs. And they all have different colors, too. They're all cool looking. They're all cool looking. It's cool that he's got them all. I mean, you go over his living room, it's probably dope. The Instagram picture look cool. Yeah, it looks great. I mean, he looked great when he was in the ring and he's got him on his shoulders and shit, one on his waist. I wonder if they fight over who gets to be on the waist. I'll give you an extra$100 ,000 and put it on your waist. But the reality is it's like the belt doesn't mean anything.

1:20:21The fighter means something. And we all know who the champ is. We all know it's Terrence. If this other guy gets the belt, it's like, okay. You didn't beat Terrence Crawford, so you're not really the 168-pound champion. But isn't that a hard – do you think for a boxer like that, is that a hard shadow to live in? Or do you think it's a shadow to – or is that labeled as a shadow? Because Terrence leaves and then you step up. Well, that's different. When Terrence leaves, if he gives up all the belts and he really does decide to totally leave, which I'm not totally convinced. Because I think they wanted him to have a rematch with Canelo.

1:20:56And I think he threw a big number at them. This is all I'm reading rumors online. I don't know what's – see if you find out if that's true. Did they offer – did Terrence Crawford demand like a certain amount for Canelo Alvarez rematch? Because he's coming in soon. I'll ask him in person. But I feel like you could probably entice him for one more big fight. Probably could. You know, one more big fight at 68 or maybe even at 54. I mean, really, he could fight at 47. When do you think there comes a point where people need to just stop? And like, you know, there's always going to be money thrown at you.

1:21:34But when you think there's a point that like money's— It's a different favorite person, you know. Yeah. So here it is right here. So Bernie Davis revealed that Terrence Crawford's price for a Canelo rematch, and it's massive, according to Davis, Crawford won't return to the ring with Canelo Alvarez unless he's paid$100 million. And he deserves it. Rightfully so. But Crawford earned$50 million for the first fight in September, but after a tactical low-action bout that disappointed many fans. Fuck off. Who the fuck did that disappoint? Who did that disappoint? You got to be a casual if that disappointed you.

1:22:05Tactical, low-action bout. Who wrote this? I don't know. Fuck off. I think I could write a better one than this. I think boxing has some very disrespectful journalists. I see some disrespectful shit they write about boxers. Go back to that little thing that it said there. So anyway, pressure now on Turkey Al-Sheikh to decide whether the rematch is worth that kind of money. Fans already calling for other opponents. Benavidez, Barabiev, Bivol, fighters they believe bring real action. Oh, so this is kind of a disrespectful real action. It's kind of messed up. Why is he dissing him like this? I don't know.

1:22:41They do that a lot. There's a lot of shit talking in boxing, which I guess is fine. I like that there's not that much to that in MMA. MMA is much more respectful. Really standard and respectful. Yeah, and that guy deserves everything. He's one of the greatest to ever do it and one of the best switch hitters in the history of the sport. Are you putting him above Floyd? It's hard. It's hard. They never fought each other, which I think would have been amazing if they were both in their prime at the same time. That would have been fantastic to watch. Because ain't Floyd supposed to fight Mike? Am I tripping?

1:23:14Yes. I think I'm tripping. But I mean, I feel like that's going to be like Floyd versus, or excuse me, like Mike versus Roy or like Mike versus Logan. It kind of looks more like the firing. A little more like sparring, really, than a fight fight. How is Floyd going to fight Mike Tyson? Have you ever spoke to Mike Tyson? Yeah, I've had him on a couple times. Yeah, man. He's my favorite. He's my favorite. Bro, when he was in his prime, there was nobody like him. There was nobody like him. Because he had that speed. That speed. And that's something that you have. The speed of a lighter person in the frame of a heavyweight is an extraordinary gift.

1:23:53because so many of these heavyweights, man, they got big power, like Francis, big power, but they don't move like a lightweight guy. They don't move like a 170-pound guy. When Mike was in his prime, he was so fast. You could see guys trying to calculate and calibrate because it was different. They were used to fighting heavyweights, and all of a sudden you got this guy bobbing and weaving and moving towards you and like, ah! It's crazy. Your brain is being overloaded with all the possibilities. It was a totally different thing, man. He's by far my favorite. Oh, yeah. In his prime, he's the most extraordinary heavyweight that ever existed.

1:24:32And every show was an execution. It wasn't like, oh, my God, is Mike going to lose this one? No, in his prime, it was just all executions. And I think the best thing about that, like being popular back in the day, like he was such a big-time fighter. I was watching a lot of videos like Will Smith and Magic Johnson were showing up and Jordan and stuff. oh you know how crazy it is nowadays that we have social media that you don't have to go and and watch someone live but back then like when you see the videos of michael jackson in this hotel and you look out and it's like wow it's michael jackson like that wow factor is like super cool and he had that oh yeah to a the highest degree yeah everybody dressed up in the best clothes they all showed up chains on watches on everything everybody it was a it was an event to be seen at And if you were one of the people that was ringside, you were an elite celebrity.

1:25:23And that was the Mike Tyson era. That was, I mean, it was different. It was different than any other heavyweight since Ali. So you had Ali and then Larry Holmes, who doesn't get the credit that he deserves. He was fantastic. I watched all these videos too. Amazing fighter. But he lived in the shadow of Ali. You know, and a lot of people hated him, too, because he beat up Ali when Ali was already done. Yeah. That was tough to watch. And, you know, he had been Ali's sparring partner when Ali was younger. You know, and everybody knew how good Larry Holmes was. And everybody knew that Muhammad Ali was older.

1:26:00Would you do that? He was older. What's that? Would you do that if you was a sparring partner for your homie? That's got to be a difficult combo because you burn a bridge. Yeah, you burn a bridge with the whole society. but part of it is like you kind of have to right because if you are the heavyweight champion of the world and they want to set up a fight with muhammad ali muhammad ali wants to fight you and they want to give you 10 million dollars and it's going to be on tv and everybody's hyped up about it like what are you going to do say no i won't fight him i'm gonna relinquish my crown what are you going to do like i don't i don't know if he had any opportunity to do anything other than fight him but it's just like he was muhammad ali was so beloved not just as one of the greatest fighters of all time but also as a cultural figure that watching that man beat him up like that just beat the shit out of ali and then seeing ali afterwards when he was he had the shakes and he had parkinson's and everybody knew that that was trauma related parkinson's and knowing that larry holmes dished out a lot of that i think in a lot of people's mind that always And I think that to this day is why Larry Holmes does not get the credit that he deserves.

1:27:12He had one of the greatest jabs in the history of the sport. Crazy. I just saw a video of him. He was flicking it. Even when he fought Mike. When he fought Mike, he was way past his prime. He had been out for a long time. Mike did his thing. But there was a round in that fight where Larry Holmes was popping that jab where it made you think, man, what would this fight have been like if Larry was in his prime? It would have been very interesting. I think Mike was on another level though He was When I see him he just had the veins That's my wow for people He was a tank He was a speedy tank And just the skill too And also that style That peekaboo style was just so different Than anything else anybody was doing So it was so hard to prepare for Most of these heavyweight boxers Were standing straight up They were throwing jabs Moving like Foreman or moving like Ken Norton or whoever they were.

1:28:06But Muhammad Ali was the only guy that moved like a lighter guy. He was different. But Mike Tyson was crouching and bobbing and weaving and coming at. It was a totally different thing to prepare for. You can't prepare for something like that. That's like when someone is too athletic. That's like preparing for Miles Garrett right now. You just can't. He's going to have 25 sacks this year. It's like how do you prepare for something like that besides try to psych yourself into maybe I can do it. but this is not going to happen. There's always going to be freaks. There's always going to be these athletic freaks that can just do things that no one else can do.

1:28:40Now there's more than, now there's even more because you see high school football guys, 6 '5", 280 going to Ohio State. I'm like, man, what they got going on? People are bigger. Also, people are doing things for their kids at an early age to optimize their growth and making sure that they come out bigger and stronger and faster. Getting them training younger, strength and conditioning, and, you know, plyometrics and shit when they're real young to get them prepared for things. I mean, look, you know Vasily Lomachenko? Yes. Little guy, man. He was fast. That dude's dad took him out of boxing for two years to have him learn Ukrainian dance so that he had better footwork.

1:29:18And he was dancing on people. Oh, my God. I watched his highlights on Instagram. Footwork was insane. Usyk's the same. Mm-hmm. Same coach. Usyk's the same person. Same coach. I really like Usyk. Yeah. Oh, my God. Usyk's crazy. Again, one of the greatest heavyweights of all time. And not a big guy either. He just knows where to go and when to go, which is nice. Also, he's constantly moving. He's never right in front of you. He's constantly stepping and stepping and stepping. And he's setting you up. And he's always downloading and calculating your movements and your reactions to things. It's so skillful.

1:29:51That, to me, is the most beautiful thing about boxing, is that someone can stand in the fire and be so skillful. that, like Crawford, that, I mean, standing right in front of Canelo, there was one point in the fight where he was pity-pattin' him. Here's Lomachenko when he's in his prime. Like, the movement was bananas. And it was just his ease of footwork. And it wasn't footwork, like, trying to get away from you. It was footwork standing right in front of you and stepping off to the side and cracking, like, that kind of shit. Like, these angles is just, unless you have tried to do that, You don't know how ridiculously difficult that is.

1:30:28The conditioning on that is crazy. Oh, yeah. Yeah, your legs have to be in peak form. Super peak form. It's just there's so many guys out there that you could learn from by watching, and they set the bar so high. And that is the difference between watching like Keith Hackney versus Emmanuel Yarbrough way back in 1993 versus watching, you know, John Jones in 2025. It's like we get to see now these guys that have seen it all, the Piotr Jans, the Ilya Toporias, the Islam Makachevs. You get to see the elite of the elite today. And these young kids that are coming up now, they get to see that and learn from that and incorporate all these things.

1:31:09And you're seeing these guys that are fighting on Dana White's Contender Series that are, they look like world championship caliber fighters. And they're not even in the UFC yet. Most definitely the latter guys. Most definitely the latter guys. Yeah, there's so many good guys now. But in the heavyweight division, it's still fairly shallow. I know. Which is where Gable comes in. It's funny. I think I heard you say shallow about three times. And, you know, Joe, in the most nicest way because I like to be humble with the words and I like to talk with the confidence. I really think I can go out there and do right better, this big promotion, and go out there and just be fantastic.

1:31:49I think you can too. And I think you can do what Mike Tyson did, which is revitalize the heavyweight division. Because, I mean, other than John, who's, of course, a superstar, but he's kind of semi-retired, the Tom Aspinall, Cyril Gaunt thing was a fucking disaster. I mean, that's a disaster. I mean, Tom Aspinall still can't see. He's got a fucked up right eyeball still. It's really bad, right? I mean, the reality is he might not ever fight again. Like, who knows? Like, if he has surgery on his eye and it doesn't go well and he can't see out of the eye. Apparently, he's still fucked up in his right eye.

1:32:22There's some tendon damage or something. And, you know, eyes are so tricky, you never know. Unless you're a fucking complete psychopath like Michael Bisping, who fought 11 fights in the UFC blind in one eye, which is so crazy that he did that. Do you know what he did, that crazy motherfucker? What did he do? He memorized the eye chart. Like? He memorized it so that he could cover his left eye. Oh, my God. So whenever he went to do an eye exam, he knew the letters. They would say, all right, read the third chart. And he would say, A, B, C, D, E. He knew what the letters were. Oh, he's smart. He's crazy.

1:32:59He couldn't fucking see out of one of his eyes and still fought world-class fighters. I think 11 fights he had, only being able to see out of one eye. Yeah. I'm not really sure how to engage with the eye talk on Tom Aspinall. But I think he's a fantastic fighter. What do you mean by engage with the eye talk? You know, I feel like getting poked in the eye sucks. And I just don't know how he feels that he got, you know what I'm saying. So I'm not going to. We don't know what he was experiencing during the fight. Yeah, and nobody ever knows. But, you know, critics are going to go online and say X, Y, and Z.

1:33:33But I'm just going to stay in the middle ground. I think Tom's a fantastic fighter. Cyril is great also, and I think a lot of them are also great also. You're going to always say it's really shallow. And I believe it's shallow too, and I believe I can go out there and do the best I can and really dominate when I need to. But just when I see Tom Aspinall, you know, Tom Aspinall reminds me of a guy from Turkey that I wrestled in the Olympics. He was a 2016 Olympic champ. His name is Taha Agul. He was 6 '4", same size as Tom, same build, same everything. And I went out there and I beat him 8-0. And I was in his face for that six minutes.

1:34:09And I let him know that I was here. And I feel like in that instance, that's when the tides change. And I feel like with a guy like Tom, I think I look at him as like a guy like Taha Agu. You know, he's on top. He's the leader. You know, he's still fresh. But I think there's a there's another hungry guy that's going to come. And hopefully it's me that's going to come and go out there and do what I need to do. Well, listen, I hope Tom gets back in because, again, we don't know what's going on with his eye. And for all the critics need to know this, the right eye, that's the problem. But if you look at when he fought, his left eye, the finger went deeper in his left eye than it did his right eye.

1:34:45So if you think he's faking it, he was knuckle deep in that fucking left eye. He was all up in that eye. Yeah. I mean, it's horrible to see, to undergo multiple eye surgeries, multiple eye surgeries. And God. That's horrible. By the time a statement goes out, I'll probably have surgery on one eye already. Next surgery is coming mid-January. Next surgery. So he's having surgery on both eyes? You know, it's really messed up. But I think the way the post-fight interview went, because I like to look at how people approach the world also, too. And he was just upset how the people were reacting, you know, saying, why the fuck are you booing?

1:35:22Why are you doing this? I mean, there could have been a great approach to that of him saying, man, you know, I got my eye poked, but I'm going to come back stronger from this. Well, the problem is people are always going to doubt you when you get poked in the eye. You know, there's always going to be a bunch of people like, oh, you're fine. Because people have gotten poked in the eye and they have continued fighting. But is that smart? It's a foul. First of all, I think every time a guy gets poked in the eye, one point deduction immediately, instantly, maybe even two points. You should never do that to a person.

1:35:53Never. One thing you notice about Pyotr Jan's fight with Merab, he fights like this. His hand is in a fist. So when he's got his hand up like this and the front hand is extended, he's not doing that. He's kind of guiding you. Yeah. Honestly. Well, he's letting you know this motherfucker's coming, you know, and he's also like in a shell, very well protected. By having that one hand up like that and have that shoulder, he's got the chin blocked and then he's doing this with this hand. It's a very good defensive position. Also very skillful because he's so good defensively in terms of his movement and the way he's able to roll with punches and get out of the way in time.

1:36:30But he never pokes in the eye. He's not doing that. Cyril Ghosn has a habit of doing that. Why do you think that is? You could speculate. You could speculate all day long. You could say he wants to do it. I mean, ask John. John's poked people in the eyes. He does it all the time. Yeah. I mean, even if you would have took the points from him, he still would have won. Yeah. I know. It's just one of those things. It's like, here's the problem. Why are the fingers out in the first place? Like, why don't they cover that shit up? Like, why don't they have it like one of those Everlast bag gloves? Like a mitten.

1:37:03Where it's like a mitt. Yeah. I mean have the thumb out because you don't grapple with these anyway. You don't do this. You never do this So why did why do the fingers have to be loose if you grapple? You're grappling like this or like this like if you're clenching your hands together You're you're never clenching your hands together like this. You never interlace your fingers together So why the fuck are they open in the first place when it only causes problems if they developed an MMA glove that Covered the tips of the fingers like like a mitten we would have way less problems with this shit You'd occasionally probably have a thumb in the eye every now and again, but you would have at least eight less possibilities for each fight of things going into your eye.

1:37:43True. It just makes sense, and it wouldn't hinder grappling. You just have a thin piece of leather that the padding goes over the knuckles, the piece of leather goes over the tip of the fingers, and have it come down like this like a mitten. It's not hard to design. If it was a mitt and I'm on top and I grab wrist control, do you think the leather of the mitt sticks harder? Probably. Yeah, probably aid grappling. It'd probably make fights better. It'd probably do stuff like you'd probably be able to get more takedowns, maybe. I don't know, man. Maybe when the leather gets wet, maybe it becomes slippery like a finger.

1:38:20We'd have to find out. But at least we would have less eye pokes. And it's not going to hinder the striking at all. There's no need to have these fingers exposed like this. No, there's no need. But two great fighters. I mean, accidents happen. Accidents happen and also purposeful fouls happen. And I'm not saying that Cyril Ghosn did it on purpose. But he did it like five times in that fight. I rewatched that fight a couple of times. And every time Aspinall came towards him, he was doing this. Every time. Fingers outstretched, pointed towards the face. It's just illegal. You're not supposed to ever do that.

1:38:58Your fist should always be balled up when it's moving towards your opponent's face. But we don't have to have these goddamn fingers covered like that or open like that. They should be covered. It's not impossible to do. It could be really easy to design a glove like that. I don't understand for the life of me how the sport's been around since 1993 and no one has introduced gloves like that. True. No, you're right. a really good thing I wanted to ask you is for someone new coming in to a sport that a lot of people know how do you think they should bridge the popularity of the sport and also the real life of who the person is I might be saying this in a hard way No, I know what you're saying How do you think they should because I've been around a lot of people but it always gets bigger and always gets bigger and how do you bridge that gap of keeping that same mind frame of like, man, you know, I'm the guy, but I need to reset.

1:39:57I always need to reset. I need to make sure. Yeah. Well, it's going to be dependent upon you, right? And it's going to be a rocket ride that you're on. And the pressure and just the overall, like, not being able to go to the mall is going to be weird. You know, it's going to get weird. It'll get weird. You know, you're going to get mobbed at the airport. It's going to get weird. And, you know, you're going to have to figure out a way to have your own private time. That's very important. When guys never have private time, they're always surrounded by people. You could lose yourself. You could lose your way.

1:40:30And just fame itself. Fame itself is very complicated. It's very complicated for people, especially for fighters, when your entire identity relies on the way other people perceive you. That's not good. It feels good when you're on top because everybody's like, oh, there's Cable. He's the fucking man. Whoa, you're the man. You're the man. But if you rely on other people's opinions of you for your self-esteem and your self-worth, then the moment you have a stumble, you know, what if you get eye poked? You know, what if you get eye poked and then also Gable's a bitch, Gable fuck, and you're like, what?

1:41:06What? And you're dealing with the opinions of morons and they're affecting your own feelings about yourself. and then there's all the other pressures that come with money and people trying to scam you and business deals and bullshit and this and that and they want you to do movies and that kind of shit you know like look that's the that's the the bane of fighters existence when hollywood gets involved that kind of in a lot of ways led to the decline of ronda rousey in a lot of ways conor mcgregor people start fucking, you know, throwing everything at you. You're doing cell phone commercials and all this different shit.

1:41:43And that stuff gets in the way. It gets in the way of your training, but it also gets in the way of your ability to have that deep pressure time to be yourself and to be alone with your thoughts, which I think is very important just to solidify your own, your own understanding of who you are as a human being, you know, and you don't want to be defined by other people's opinions and perceptions. And then there's also like, the UFC does a fantastic job of showing who a fighter really is, you know, the countdown series, you know, the UFC embedded series. So when they're doing stuff like that, and you get to see this person interacting with their family, going through training camp, going through the weight cut, and you get to see who they are, joking around with people, hanging out with their friends, laughing.

1:42:37That's important, too, because people really want to relate to you. They don't want this guy who just appears every five months. You don't know shit about him, and then all of a sudden, there he is in the ring again. You're putting all these things on him and imagining what he's like. The more they can get to see behind the curtain, the better it is for you, especially if you're a good person and you're an interesting person and they get to see. It's also inspiring for people. They like you like to talk about yourself. You're a regular guy. You put your shoes on one foot at a time like everybody else.

1:43:09But like, wow, look at the greatness this regular guy can accomplish. Maybe maybe I can do this. Maybe I can do something like that. Maybe in whatever I'm doing in life, whatever if I'm a fucking skier i'm a whatever whatever your job is maybe i can be great and be a normal person like this guy is true no 100 well that's a that's a fantastic answer because you know i just feel like at some point i'll get to that spot you know of like how do i how do i know if someone's not real how do i know if someone is in that in that space of things change and and there's leeches there's bad people there's bad people so you know it's always a nice thing to have someone that has surpassed that level that you can finally see and be like, man, how did you change direction?

1:43:54Well, John's a great guy to talk to about that. Most definitely. Obviously, John's had his stumbles, which is, you know, when people talk about John and the things that John's gotten in trouble with, I'm like, listen, do you want a wild motherfucker or not, okay? If you want a guy to be the greatest of all time in fucking cage fighting, he's going to be wild. That's one of the reasons why he's great. When John was, what is he, 22 years old when he won the title? 23. He's fighting. 23. Mauricio Shogun Hua, who's an all-time great pride legend, he opens the fight with a flying knee. Who does that?

1:44:29John Jones. You've got to be wild. You've got to be crazy. You've got to be a wild fella. That's John. I mean, and, you know, obviously there's stuff he shouldn't have done. There's, you know, a lot of extracurricular activities, a lot of partying. It's not healthy. It's not good. but that is what comes with being that kind of a guy and you know John could probably tell you more about this than anybody that's ever lived like what what were the stumbles what could I have done differently and he he probably could help prepare you more than anybody ever most definitely he's already kind of put a big foot into it and man he's he's amazing with a lot of now you know he talks so well now a lot of things are are um in a in a sense of he's trying to look out for me in in business opportunities and places that i need to go and it's uh it's amazing you know a lot of people don't do that especially when you see the peaks and valleys of that person and their public info also and a lot of people don't want to give people the chance because you see something about someone until you finally meet them and it's like man like this guy's a whole different person you would have never expected and so man with john he's just he's just opened a lot of doors and kind of he is doing that that guiding um of me well that's great too because john is essentially guiding his replacement you know which is really hard for a lot of people to to have that kind of self-awareness know that there's only a certain amount of time that i can do this for and i see this young great man who's coming up and i'm going to help him and i'm going to give him some advice that maybe would have been amazing if someone gave me you know because john didn't have some heavyweight champion training with him that could teach him those things no he's out of Especially not someone at that level, the level that he's at.

1:46:07Man, I know he's honored. We're both honored. Yeah. Like I said, he called me today. He was just, man, I really think you should just let the world know who you are and just kind of give people the real feel of who you need to be. Yeah. And I've always loved to have, like you just talked about with the UMC abetted, you see the real human being. And I've always liked people seeing a real human being because we all do shit the same way. There's nothing special. Some people just have more money. Some people just have more status. But at the end of the day, hopefully we can all sleep in a bed. And I know some people don't, which is sad to see.

1:46:38But it's just some people live different lives. And I want to live a life where it's happy and healthy with the people I have. And I can meet so many people. And I feel like I'm doing a great job right now. So, man, any input I can get on how to be better, how to be more mature, how to be more sound, especially from John. I'm getting a lot. But to hear from you, you know, you get different perspectives of you were in a different realm than John also. But you guys are also in the same place. Like you do the podcast and John's semi-retired. But you see the two different lives of two different well-respected people.

1:47:11So it's nice to see. Well, it's that mindset that you have to really want to acquire that information and really sort it out and know that these challenges are coming your way. The money and the fame and all that stuff is the thing that everybody focuses on. But really the focus is on excellence. Excellence is what brings you the money. Excellence is what brings you the fame. And the moment you start thinking about the fame and the money and not thinking about the excellence, you've lost your way. You've lost your way. And a lot of people lose their way. A lot of people, that money and that fame, it starts coming and all of a sudden you're just thinking about numbers.

1:47:48You're thinking about the house you're going to buy and the car you're going to drive and all that stupid shit. And you lose your way. And, you know, one of the things that I always try to tell people, I try to tell young comedians especially, is that think of the attention that you have like it has a number value. Like the attention – like let's imagine – like if you had$100, you know you can only spend$100. Let's imagine your mind only has 100 units of focus. You have 100 units of focus. Any focus that you have on other shit outside of the thing that brings you excellence is just robbing from excellence.

1:48:25That's all it is. If you're concentrating on haters on social media or if you've got a crazy bitch in your life that's ruining everything or you've got some friend who's a hater and you think he's maybe hoping you fail. All that stuff that's distracting is just robbing attention from excellence. You know, and some of it's unavoidable and some of it actually strengthens your resolve to have a certain amount of like shit in your life just to understand how to maintain and still be excellent. Despite of all that, there's probably some resilience building that comes from that. But protect your focus.

1:49:04It's precious. Protect your time. Protect that energy that you have to invest in things. It's so precious. The mind, your focus, and your drive, that is everything in your life. That's everything. And anything that steals from that, I remember there was this one fighter, and he was a very good fighter that was fighting in pride, and he had this crazy girlfriend. And every time he was going to fight, like the day before the fight, the girl would start problems. And she would start fights, and she left the hotel, like 1 o 'clock in the morning and went down to the bar. She wanted him to fail. She wanted to be more important than his fighting career.

1:49:45And his fighting career was so important and so overwhelming that she felt like she wasn't getting the attention that she needed. So she would go get attention from him and she would steal from him. And it was crazy. And this guy, he never wound up being a champion. He was a very talented guy, too. I don't want to say his name. But it was one of those things where it's like, man, there are people in your life you've got to recognize when you're dealing with that kind of a person. You got to recognize that. You got to cut them out. You got to get rid of them. They're stealing. They're stealing from your focus.

1:50:17They're stealing from your ability to create excellence. And that's what you're in the business of. You know? You're in the business of excellence. And anybody that's trying to steal from that, like, those are liabilities. They're, you know, that's like you got a hole in the bottom of your boat. You got to patch that shit up. Yeah. Well, it's just like Mike Tyson kind of said, you know, once you're favored by God, you're also favored by the devil, too. Ooh, that's so true too. Yeah, the temptations will come. Yeah, and then also you start believing your own bullshit, you know? I mean, look at John when he wasn't training, you know?

1:50:51But luckily for John, he was so much better than everybody in the division that all it took was like a readjustment. Like the Dominic Reyes fight, he almost lost that fight, you know? And Dominic Reyes, as great as he was that night, should not have been beating John Jones. I think Jon Jones, with a real focus and a real drive towards destroying Dominic Reyes, would be on another level. I think so, too. He is the best guy to be in your corner, man, because he's made all the mistakes and still come out the goat. Who better to tell you how to do it right? There's no one better. Man, probably the greatest, of course.

1:51:35The greatest by far. Yeah. What do you do for chill time? Like, what do you do to unwind? Honestly, right now, I like Call of Duty. I play a lot of Warzone. Ronnie 2K, you know who that is? No. The dude that made the basketball game? Okay. So I got my own player on 2K. And it says, like, so when I load into the game, it says my real name. And then people know you're playing against me. Oh. So it's either I'm playing Call of Duty or 2K. I mentioned before the French Bulldogs. I mean, I like to take care of French Bulldogs. I feel like I don't. Jamie's got one. You do? Yeah. Oh, he's so cute. Should have brought him today.

1:52:09Should have brought him. What? We didn't know. We didn't know you were into French Bulldogs. So I had, sadly, I had two pass away. I just had one pass away. He had IVDD in his neck. And that's a bad, it's a disc disease that happens in French Bulldogs because they're bred so bad. And so my first one had it in his back. He was playing all day. And then I turned and he was, like, paralyzed in an instant. And I was like, oh, man, like, that's not good. So I had to put him down. Oh, that's horrible. And then I adopted one after. This is like I adopted one a year ago. He just passed away a couple weeks ago.

1:52:44His name was Archie, my little guy. He had it in his neck. And I had him on painkillers for like six months. And I looked. And one day he kind of rolled wrong and he kind of yelped again. And I was like, we got to take him in. Oh, that's horrible. So it was bad. You know, I got bad attachments to friends' bulldogs. Like they're like my. Since I'm having a real baby now, that's like my second baby. you're going to be amazed how much you love your real baby more than you love your dogs. As much as I love my dogs, it just... There's just another level. Oh, it's beyond. It doesn't even compare. One of my dogs went to surgery today.

1:53:19He had a hernia. I have a Golden Retriever, and I have a King Charles Spaniel. He's the cutest little dog. He's so fucking cute. He's seven months old, and he was born with a little hernia. It's like some of them get that little hernia. in their tummy. So they had to stitch him up. But when I was playing with him last night, I was so scared. I was like, what if something happens to him? I can't take it because I love him so much. He's so sweet. When I pick him up, he kisses me constantly, and he makes noise. And sometimes he barks while he's kissing you. And you're like, I love you too. I love you too.

1:54:01And his little tail's wagging. He wags his tail with his whole body. Like his whole body's wagging. Just wiggling all over. Oh, yeah. Mine would go after the ears. Yeah, he does that too. And he would like put a whole nibble on the ear and then he would switch sides. And then he would switch sides. Yeah, mine does that too. Let me live for a little bit. But I'm his whole world. Yeah. And I feel like sometimes we forget that. Yeah. Well, they're little love devices. They just want love from you and they want to give you love. They never have bad days. They're never shitty. They're never in a bad mood.

1:54:32They're always cool. You know, every day is the same thing. Every day I see him in the morning, I'm like, good morning. And he's ready. They feel crazy. And I get on the ground with him on the carpet and roll around. Just letting him roll all over. I love dogs. If it was up to me, I'd have 50 dogs. I wish we could make him live longer. I know. Making him live longer would be crazy. Like cats are like 20 years. Why can't a dog be 20 years? Well, I think they are working on that. I think there's actual startups right now that are working on animal longevity. Which would be cool. Yeah, they're working on different medical interventions that can allow dogs to live longer, which is fascinating.

1:55:10And then sometimes people, they clone their dogs. Tom Brady just did that. Yeah. I don't know how he did it, but I mean. That's weird. Hey, have a good time. That's pet cemetery shit. That is. That might be hereditary. I don't know if I'm into that. I don't know how I feel about that. I feel like every dog has their own unique personality. and as much as I love the dogs that I have now, like, look, I had my dog Marshall. He's almost nine, or he just turned nine, rather. And I've had him since he was a puppy. I love him to death. But then I got this new dog, Charlie, and I love him to death, too.

1:55:45He's a totally different personality. Like, I don't mind new dogs and new personalities. I don't need the same dog over and over and over again. You know what I mean? I think that's weird. You should try Friends Bulldog. They got, like, 12 different personalities. Oh, I love Carl. Jamie brings Carl in. He's a little psycho. He's got too many personalities. Oh, he runs at you and just wants to play. They got that bowling ball head. I know. He's a little ball of muscle, too. Carl's jacked. Carl's got it. He's built. I need to see a picture. You got pictures of him? Pull up a picture of Carl. He's adorable.

1:56:17He plays at my Golden, and he just, like, throws himself like a meat missile at my Golden. Because my Golden's like so gentle Which is great because the You know Charlie is only 15 pounds My little dog And so my Golden is like playing And he like gently puts a paw over him when they play That's Carl, look at that inner face Look at that inner face I just know he does Everything extra Oh look at him sleep He's really nice He's adorable But when he plays with Marshall it's really crazy We got a video of him playing with Marshall Did you get his nose done? Nope. No? Wow, that's perfect. That's really good.

1:56:56Some of them have fucked up noses. Well, they come out like this. Oh, no. And then they can't breathe, and so they breathe out their mouth, and sometimes they got to get... They like solder. Mm-hmm. They clean that out. They make like a bigger hole. That's awful. But some of them have it where like you have to go in and kind of help the esophagus because their face is flat, so you got to help like the back and kind of cut it to where it can go down the pipe. Oh, no. Crazy. Crazy. I wish people, I wish those dogs could live forever. Those dogs got a million different characters. I know. Well, I love all kinds of dogs, man.

1:57:29I love working dogs. I love German Shepherds and Belgian Malinois. Can't Corso be cool? They're a little dangerous. But that's what I'm hearing. They only lower it to one person, if I'm not mistaken? They don't like to listen. Yeah. Well, never mind. My boy, Mark Della Grate, from Sit Yotong Muay Thai, He coached a lot of UFC fighters, coached Kenny Florian, great Muay Thai coach, great guy. Works for the UFC. He had a Connie Corso. They had to put him down, bit his hand, like chomped down on him. Yeah, and he had it for years. Out of nowhere? Well, you know, he was testing him. Like sometimes those dogs, and not all of them, but some of them, they will test you.

1:58:09You know, and you just can't have a dog that's biting you. No, because what else? What if it bites your kid? Yeah. What if it bites your wife? Facts. What if it bites the mailman? You never know. Yeah. It's just like those, and it's not all of them. Like I've had pit bulls and I never had a pit bull that even wanted to bite a person. They were always like the sweetest with people. But then you hear stories. You hear stories. Which is crazy. I know. Because how can I go online and see a pit bull just not letting go of somebody, but all of a sudden the next video I see a pit bull wearing a Christmas sweater.

1:58:42I know. With paw shoes on. I know. So it's weird. I know. It doesn't make any sense. It doesn't. But it's just like people. Some people are born crazy. Some people are born crazy. Yeah. Are you big into anything? Like, what do you believe in conspiracy-wise? Like, what's your big one right now? Don't open up that door, Gable. Oh, my God. Don't open up that door. Oh, my God. Yo, I've got to tell you this one. I love a good conspiracy. My dad's diehard conspiracy. If you and him had a talk. Uh-oh. What is his big one? What's the big one with him? I don't even know. but I know he's really bad. I think the biggest one right now, he just said it, but I don't even know.

1:59:21I don't even want to say it wrong, but that's my thing, but I'm big on conspiracies too. What is the subject? Do you remember the subject? Some about... I don't even want to say it. Okay. I don't even want to say it right now. Okay. We'll talk off air. Yeah. Okay. But I believe there's a lot of things we don't know as people. And I believe there's a lot of messed up shit. A lot of conspiracies are real. That's the problem. The problem with conspiracy theories is some of them are crazy and ridiculous. But the reason why people entertain crazy and ridiculous ones is because some of them are real.

1:59:53And they're so nuts that you go, they did what? Just when you find out about U.S. history alone. You know, you find out that the reason why we got into Vietnam was— I don't know this, you can tell me. Okay, it's called the Gulf of Tonkin incident. The Gulf of Tonkin incident was supposedly the North Vietnamese, the Viet Cong, attacked one of our ships. But it was fake. They faked it. It's not real. It's called a false flag. And they did it just to have a story so that we would have an excuse to invade Vietnam. So we sent all those people to Vietnam for nothing? A lot of people died for nothing.

2:00:26A lot of people died for nothing. And a lot of people made a lot of fucking money. And it probably had to do with drugs, too, because they were moving heroin out of Vietnam. I mean, it was control of the heroin trade was a big part of it. That was also one of the reasons why we were in Afghanistan. While we were in Afghanistan, heroin production in Afghanistan was 94 % of the world's heroin. And it ramped up after we invaded Afghanistan. It went up. Heroin production, not only did it go up, but we were guarding poppy fields for the Taliban. Why do we need a guard for the farmers rather? Why do we need to guard them?

2:01:02Well, that's a really good question. Are we using them for medical here? Or they're just getting used to fuck people up? It's money. It's money. There's people, there's dirty money that gets moved around for sure. When you're dealing with something like the drug trade and billions of dollars are going all over, people want a piece of that. And there's high level people that are dirty. and they get involved in that and they make decisions based on that and and they put people's lives at risk and people die because of it and that probably happened in Afghanistan it definitely happened in Vietnam and people don't want to believe that he people are hearing this right now oh stop with that nonsense but it's true I mean there's a video of Geraldo Rivera interviewing these military guys that were guarding poppy fields in Afghanistan and the guy who's interviewing is very reluctant to talk about it but they it was on fox news and he had to talk about it because everybody was aware of it it was becoming a big conspiracy online and they were coming up with some sort of a rational reason why they needed to guard their heroin production because you know we need them to tell on the taliban and like really really so we're letting the farmers poison young people and and heroin addicts all over the world because we want them to give us information about this?

2:02:25Is that really what's going on? Or are you motherfuckers making money out of this? They've got to be making a lot of money, too. A lot of money. A lot of money. Well, I just saw the story about that guy from, he was a football player from Australia. He was selling drugs. What was that story? He's not from Australia. He went to USC, quarterback. He was selling drugs? He was selling drugs out of an apartment in Australia for a cartel that was from Tijuana. I forgot his name. It's his quarterback. I feel like a lot of people know it. It's a real recent story? It's a real story. A recent story? From recent, from what I've seen, it might be like a couple years older.

2:02:59But, yeah, he got caught because someone along the way was a middleman for a lot of— Wild true story behind cocaine quarterback, signal caller for the cartel. Wow. And they said he was making like a million dollars a day. And cash. And he was trying to move it through Las Vegas casinos. But the middleman, someone messed up the bet, and he lost the money. So he had to loan money from someone, and that someone was like an undercover waiting firm like a year later and caught him at a McDonald's before he went across the road to Tijuana or something. It's crazy, yo. You know how drugs control a lot of things, and it's messed up.

2:03:37Well, it's the money. When you think about how much money gets moved around in the drug game, and people get tempted by that. and then you get a hold of some legitimate businessman and you say, listen, there's a way for you to get 10x return on your money. You invest in this and we do that. It's simple. You'll never get dirty. All the money goes to offshore accounts. No one will know about it. You can retire when you're 45. Crazy. And then people start getting roped in. It's also the excitement of doing something naughty. That's part of it too. Some people like to ride bulls. Some people like to do some shit they're not supposed to do.

2:04:14They get addicted to doing things that they are not supposed to do. They get addicted to the life. DEA agents. A lot of DEA agents become drug dealers. Well, it's just like that show Narcos Mexico. Yes. It's the same thing. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Or Cocaine Cowboys. Have you ever watched that documentary? No. What's that about? Amazing. Cocaine Cowboys 1 and there's Cocaine Cowboys 2. There was so much corruption in Miami during the 1980s during the cocaine time that one graduating class of the police academy The entire graduating class either wound up murdered or in jail How you do that? Because they were all corrupt They were all involved in cocaine dealing all of them because there was so much money Everybody's driving a Corvette.

2:05:02Everybody's living large. Everybody's doing blow and wearing diamonds. It's crazy It's like you get caught up in that life. And if you're involved in, like, if you're a police officer and everybody around you is dirty, you know, it's more likely you're going to be dirty, too. Well, now aren't they kind of blowing the Ecuadorian ships up that are coming to here that are having a lot of drugs on them? Yeah, Venezuela, right? Venezuelan ships. Yeah. They're just blowing them up? I don't even know. I'm not educated on stuff like that. But I wonder if it's for to keep the trade here. No, I doubt it.

2:05:38I think more likely what it is is because Trump genuinely hates that they're bringing drugs into this country. Is there other things involved, too? I don't know. I mean, I'm sure some of it has to do perhaps with politics. I mean, I think that's a reasonable assumption. But, Jamie, I just sent you something. Here's what's interesting. One of the things that Trump was saying is they're poisoning our kids and 100 ,000 people are dying every year from drug overdoses. We have to put a stop to this. From the time Trump's been in office, deaths by overdose have dropped off a cliff. Look at that. Look at 2024 and leading into 2025.

2:06:20Look at that. These are all deaths from overdoses. I mean, that's kind of crazy. Like, look at that. From all drugs, which is the top one, look at that drop. I mean, that's crazy. So you see the peak was in 2022, or it looks like actually between 2023 and 2024. That's the peak where people are dying. And then from the time Trump's in office, it's taking a fucking sharp downturn. And why is that? Well, part of it is because they're blowing up these fucking boats that are bringing in all the drugs. And not just drugs, but drugs that are tainted with fentanyl. Fentanyl is terrible. Terrible. Because a little piece can kill you.

2:07:05Exactly. It's smaller than a penny and you're dead. And people are snorting lines of it. And they don't even know what's in there. And the cartel, they're buying, you know, they're taking shitty drugs and mixing it with fentanyl so it has an effect. And people are getting it from what they think is a Xanax. And it's not a Xanax. It's fake. And it's got fentanyl in it. And they're dying from that. They're dying from Coke. They think it's Coke and fentanyl's in that. You know, it's horrible. there's so much access to things in this world right now that i feel like is uh there's there's so many attainable things that that people don't even think about that a lot of shit happens in this world that we just have no clue and it's kind of weird and i just don't know like kind of the variety that i'm bringing to the combo but um i'm just saying it like out of just to say it but it it's different just like a social media you can meet so many people and and and just going to random places and meeting people and then you can get roped up in the wrong things and it's just the The downhill of starts.

2:08:04Yep. You take a bad turn, and next thing you know, you're on a bad road, and you keep going. You're like, eventually, I'm going to get out of this game. You can't. No. Then you're in jail, or you're dead. Ed Calderon is a guy who's been on this podcast many times. He used to work for the Mexican military. Now he's an American citizen, but he's a cartel expert. And the stories that he's told us about the fucking cartel and the amount of money they have. I mean, essentially, they have giant military operations. It's all cartel. And they go to war with each other. It's crazy. Is it Pablo Escobar that had the money in the walls of his house?

2:08:39I mean, probably. I don't know. Or who died and he buried it all over in different places? I'm sure they all do that. I'm sure Escobar did that. I think they all do that. They have so much money. That was one of the things of cocaine cowboys was this pilot. They had millions of dollars buried in his backyard. He would just take garbage bags, fill it with millions of dollars of cash, dig a big hole in the backyard and bury it there because you couldn't bring it into a bank. Why not just give it away? Oh, fuck, give it away. Because they're doing coke and they want more money. They just don't know what to do with it, you know, and they can't just have it all laying around their house and someone will break into their house and kill them and take their money.

2:09:14It's like then it's over with. It is a crazy game, but I can't recommend that documentary enough, Cocaine Cowboys. Cocaine Cowboys. You watch it. You go, what the fuck? Where's the stream at? It's probably on everywhere. where is cocaine cowboys can you get it sounds like amazon i'm sure it's on everything it might even be on netflix but it's it's incredible because you realize like wow like cocaine built miami miami had more banks per capita i don't know if it still does but at one point in time more banks per capita than any other city in the country and it's because those banks were laundering money damn they were laundering cocaine money it was all coming in and miami He never sleeps either.

2:09:53So it was all night affair. Yeah, that is a crazy fucking town. That is not a good town if you want to be a fighter and live like a low-key disciplined life. No. You can all of a sudden you're here. Then you end up here. Then all of a sudden it's 8 a.m. Right. You're at the beach at 12. Can't be right. No. Can't be right. That's a dark hole that a lot of people should not be in. But how do you get out, though? I don't know. Ask John. I mean he seems to have navigated those waters better than anybody because usually it ruins everything in your life he's obviously had some missteps but still comes out the greatest which is not everybody's path but obviously John is smart in that he spends a lot of time doing the things that he wants to do spends a lot of time training his dog, doing tactical stuff he's always shooting guns and training And, you know, you got to have things outside of that life, you know, that you enjoy other than just partying.

2:10:52Yeah, you got to have fun. You got to have some type of gap. Some release. Yeah, and he's got a good release and he's got a good mentality of what the release should be and how it should go and where he needs to go with it. And then, I mean, I've been with him now since we have this close connection. I've been with him to places and he's always kept me on a straight path, which is really, really nice. You know, a lot of people that may have, you know, like to take shots or like to do something like that. You know, there's always a little, man, do you want one? Right. But there's never been a time where he's like, man, I think you should try.

2:11:25And it's great because as an older, as a younger kid that's coming up, he sees the potential. And that's all that matters. And I just need someone to see it. And, man, he's been great with it for sure. Yeah. When you're around a bunch of people that party and they drag you into that world, it's so easy for people to get hooked. It's so easy for people to just get roped into that lifestyle because people essentially, for the most part, imitate their atmosphere. And if you're around that kind of an atmosphere, those are the type of people that you're with and those are the type of thrills that they're seeking.

2:11:55You can get caught up in that. And it's the bane of every fighter's existence is women and partying. Yeah. He's always been like, hey, you got to stay clean. Go home. And that's been the best part about it. That's great, man. That is fucking great. So what is the timeline right now? Have you signed a deal with the UFC? I know they're talking to you. What's going on? Yeah, they've reached out many times, but I told them just I'm kind of on the lines. Right now I'm waiting for my little girl to give, my baby girl to give, to come out. So January is kind of a dead month for me. But are you signed with the UFC?

2:12:29No. No. I'm not signing anybody. But have they offered you a fight yet? Yeah, they've reached out about a couple of things, but no one specific. They just offer dates. Do you want to have fights in other organizations first? One of the problems with a guy like you is that you're so talented that you could have one, two fights in the UFC and all of a sudden be fighting a top contender, which I think you would do well. Yeah, I would like to. If I was a manager of like a boxer and a guy with your potential, I would do what Customato did with Mike Tyson. You have them fight a bunch of different guys like you did with Dirty Boxing, small organization MMA fights.

2:13:02Build up those skills. Get a lot of experience while you're constantly training and growing and getting better. And then once you enter into the UFC, you're essentially already the champion. There's just nobody knows it yet. I would really like to debut at the White House. Debut. I would like to debut at the White House. I would like to do one or two more fights before then, and then if I can sign, do a big release. Hey, he signed. Good job. And then debuted at the White House. That's my perfect world. Is it hard to get fights right now? Maybe a little bit. Maybe a little bit. I don't ask. I just say yes, and then just keep moving.

2:13:40I kind of leave it up to John to kind of watch the people and all the coaches to kind of watch and see what goes on. But, I mean, if a guy says no, there's no hard feelings. I mean, just keep it pushing and hopefully I can get to the guy that says yes. That's the problem is that when a guy gets so much hype around him, there's a lot of guys who want to eventually be a world champion and go, oh, I'm not ready for this guy yet. You know? That's okay. Even good guys are still like, ah, this guy's not – he's on another level right now. But just – if they do think that, just whenever you think you are ready, I will be there waiting.

2:14:17that's terrifying I will be there waiting that's terrifying a lot of people heard that like I don't want to wait I don't want to wait but also the smart move might be to get a hold of you now before you get better you can try now too but you know what I'm saying pick your poison I mean like I said dirty boxing and that last fight in November with that double leg that's the worst I'll ever be and it's kind of neat to repeat that to the world to kind of let them get a refresher. That is the worst Gable Stifson will be and the best is when he'll come back his next time. But after that, that's the last worst I'll ever be after that.

2:14:57Do you have a blueprint, like a map of what you'd like to accomplish in your career? Yes. Long term? Yeah, long term I'd like to be champion, UFC champion. I think Stipe has about five defenses if I'm not mistaken. I would like to try to beat that record if I can. And if I can't, die trying. I played in the NFL. I won the Olympics. I would just like to be just an overall good man. A lot of people want to look at, like we just talked about, a lot of people want to look at the success, the money. I just want to be an excellent man. I want to look back and be like, damn, Gable did that. And I saw Dana White, he had a picture, and he said, let your last name be the reason that people remember you.

2:15:42And I want the Stevenson last name to be something that people remember. And I want them to look at me and be like, damn, through the peaks and valleys, Gable stood up and he became someone in his life. And he provided for his family and he went home healthy. And that's what I want. Championship's going to come. But I feel like a lot of people are so obsessed with I got to do this. But I'm obsessed with being the best version of Gable because if I'm the best version of Gable, you're not going to be able to beat me. Keep that mindset and you will accomplish these things my man. I believe it. Thank you very much for being here Yes, you're right.

2:16:13Thank you. And I can't wait to see you fight in the UFC man. I can't wait gonna be fun. Thank you All right. Thank you. Bye everybody