Speaker 1: This is cut to It with Steve Smith Senior at
Speaker 1: production of The Black Effect and I Heart Radio. I'm
Speaker 1: Steve Smith Senior and I and this is cut to it.
Speaker 1: Good do it, Good do it. They's getting down to
Speaker 1: do it. Good do it. We asked the questions you
Speaker 1: always want to know, but no one ever asked, let's
Speaker 1: cut to it. You ain't heard am about it? Then
Speaker 1: we're about to let you know. It's all. Hey, welcome
Speaker 1: to the cut to the podcast. We got Chris White.
Speaker 1: That's right. How are you you? F C former UFC
Speaker 1: middleweight champion ranked number fifte Have you dropped down any
Speaker 1: Are you still fifteen? Sleep don't even know the bank.
Speaker 1: I'm guessing I'm fifteen, So that's code for he hope down.
Speaker 1: But if I if I dropped down any more than that,
Speaker 1: you don't see your name there anymore. So I hope
Speaker 1: I didn't drop down all the way. But honestly, I
Speaker 1: don't really care to be honest, I never cared about
Speaker 1: rankings ever. Ever. We'll explore that a little bit later.
Speaker 1: Middleweight Mixed Martial Arts signed to the UFC, and you are, uh,
Speaker 1: you have a wife and three kids, and for some
Speaker 1: odd reason you decided to move down to South Carolina.
Speaker 1: South Carolina. Welcome to the cut to a podcast, so
Speaker 1: you'll care, Lenny. And now two years bro, He's like
Speaker 1: you claimed, not two years Carolina yet, not two years yet?
Speaker 1: I am you know, Long Island is in my heart.
Speaker 1: I'll always uh you know, I love Long Island, but
Speaker 1: I am I love it out here. This is this is,
Speaker 1: this is home. Now. That sounds like he loved him.
Speaker 1: Prices way different and that's for me right now. Southern
Speaker 1: hospitality extends all the way into your into your pockets
Speaker 1: to Yeah, he's gonna be some random questions. Lets nothing
Speaker 1: to do with anything, but just the randomness to kind
Speaker 1: of let you settle down. You seem Michael, you seem
Speaker 1: a little nervous, very uptight' very nervous. Why are you
Speaker 1: up type next to Steve Smith, you know in his
Speaker 1: podcast room. I don't know what to do right now. Yeah,
Speaker 1: someone waked me up. Look you say that's all the
Speaker 1: podcasts they call that Patroniz's patronized, right podcast, You're the
Speaker 1: only one. Just be tutoy. This is my first podcast,
Speaker 1: being honest. If your house was burning down, unfortunately and
Speaker 1: you can only save one item, what would it be
Speaker 1: and why? I mean, at the top of my head,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with my my math book. I got
Speaker 1: my math book. You know it's got my messages on
Speaker 1: their uh you know, all my photos and videos. You know.
Speaker 1: I think that would have been That's probably what I
Speaker 1: would do. Just no right answer. What about you might
Speaker 1: be on something that you gotta grab. That computer's got
Speaker 1: everything on there, your payment information even even if you
Speaker 1: you can't there's some websites you can't go into, like
Speaker 1: if you have to change identification, order new stuff. All
Speaker 1: my crypto stuff is on there. That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: You can't do it for me access to your phone
Speaker 1: to some degree your card to say you don't here
Speaker 1: he got what about you? Backstage? Though? Probably my kids
Speaker 1: and my wife. But I thought that, I thought that
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get you're trying to get Brownie trying You're
Speaker 1: trying to I or it's the opposite. You're trying to
Speaker 1: itemize your family like we assuming they already out. Yeah,
Speaker 1: can I have a take to? Like this is the
Speaker 1: dumb button? You don't get a take to? Okay, Hey Joe,
Speaker 1: you got a little bit on your mustache A little bit.
Speaker 1: I gave it to him after being next question, Please,
Speaker 1: what's the craziest thing you've ever done? Chris Um? This
Speaker 1: is a family friendly show. You don't include me? Say
Speaker 1: this doesn't include Joe's mustache? I mean this family feud.
Speaker 1: Next you can pass come back, come back to me?
Speaker 1: All right? Like that? See fighter, you didn't have an
Speaker 1: answer right one of the minute times somebody as I
Speaker 1: was gonna say, somebody out he got. That's my issues
Speaker 1: with like adrenaline stuff, because it doesn't get crazier than fighting.
Speaker 1: You're going to a pge with another like like legit
Speaker 1: weapon and you know what could possibly happen to you
Speaker 1: every time? I'm the weapon too, But there's another weapon
Speaker 1: in there. You know someone's gonna go down and it
Speaker 1: could be pretty bad, that really bad. What does that
Speaker 1: have to do with, bro, what's the craziest thing you
Speaker 1: ever did? Like walking into how about saying just it's
Speaker 1: a little crazy? Okay, are you finished? I mean that's
Speaker 1: a good going south quickly? I mean, goodness, gracious, he's
Speaker 1: so like on his podcast he was ready to go.
Speaker 1: He got my mom's if you want to vocabulary exam
Speaker 1: right now, spelling, Look, I already know I can't, so
Speaker 1: I guarantee you can't. All right? For all right, for
Speaker 1: a high motor guy like yourself, what do you do
Speaker 1: to slow down the world around you? Uh? Man, I
Speaker 1: just I don't know. I go, I go chilled. My family,
Speaker 1: you know. My wife kind of puts me to my
Speaker 1: place when I got home, tells me what to do.
Speaker 1: I do the honting to do list. Play video games.
Speaker 1: I'm just you know, Madden. Madden is probably my favorite. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I've been playing with the same group of guys since
Speaker 1: high school, since since like oh one. That's kind of
Speaker 1: how we stay in touch. Who are you run with?
Speaker 1: Who are you playing with right now? Right now? Right now?
Speaker 1: The Cowboys, Cowboys, Chiefs. You know you're not in the
Speaker 1: playoffs though, right not the playoffs. I'm a quick play mode,
Speaker 1: all right? How you being man? Highest things been going
Speaker 1: for you? I'm doing good, man, life is good. Just
Speaker 1: focused on rehab, working out. I'm talking about Are you
Speaker 1: talking about rehab physical rehab from other rehab? No, just
Speaker 1: just physical rehab. I do have a mental coach, though
Speaker 1: you do. I do have a mental coach. Is good.
Speaker 1: I just I just had my my pop guest why
Speaker 1: do you have a mental coach? Because we always do
Speaker 1: say of of it is mental, temper cent is physical.
Speaker 1: I feel like a lot of athletes say that. But
Speaker 1: how much time do you actually put into the mental world.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of there's a lot of effort that
Speaker 1: you should be putting into that that I think we
Speaker 1: kind of skip over, and uh, we see it as
Speaker 1: a weakness to have someone help get our head in order,
Speaker 1: you know, But I think that's the most important part,
Speaker 1: is to have a good mindset and to have your
Speaker 1: your crapping over. How long have you had that coach?
Speaker 1: Right before this last fight I got I have my
Speaker 1: bachelor's degree in psychology. I always just kind of felt
Speaker 1: like I was good mental wise, and I feel like, why,
Speaker 1: what's up? Just because you said you have your back.
Speaker 1: You have your bachelor's in psychology, So you know what
Speaker 1: they say when you go you know what they say
Speaker 1: when I got my masters in uh, you know, from education.
Speaker 1: I got my doctorate in the medical field of some sort.
Speaker 1: I'll play it AFTERR on television. Do you really know
Speaker 1: so you've been doing it and so you've been just
Speaker 1: doing this recently, then yeah, can you tell a difference already.
Speaker 1: It's just you know what. It's not like I'm telling
Speaker 1: him my you know, my inner secrets. It's not like
Speaker 1: a therapy session, which I kind of expected it to
Speaker 1: be that way. It's more it's more just like kind
Speaker 1: of getting your life in order, like having you organize
Speaker 1: your goals the right way, like if you if there
Speaker 1: were certain things that you want to do in the morning,
Speaker 1: making sure you're on top top of it, on task um,
Speaker 1: and just having your y on why you're doing it.
Speaker 1: You know, oh, thirty seven, this may come across the
Speaker 1: wrong way, but at thirty seven years old, you're just
Speaker 1: discovering your why in such a dominant player in the
Speaker 1: UFC or or sportsman. And then you have you've been
Speaker 1: to school. You didn't go like, you didn't go to
Speaker 1: a school where education was not up there, very high
Speaker 1: end school, hosh University, School of Greatness, and I agree
Speaker 1: it is one of those places where it's not known
Speaker 1: to really be about sports. It's more about academic. Sports
Speaker 1: is his secondary well, and it depends on the sport.
Speaker 1: At the time when I was there, we were top
Speaker 1: ten Division one, so I went there primarily for sport wrestling.
Speaker 1: The wrestling team no, but you went there for sport.
Speaker 1: But you have to have pretty good grades. I went
Speaker 1: to a community college first, I went to junior college.
Speaker 1: I yes, I went to Scenic Route. I stepped it
Speaker 1: up and then I was Then I got into a
Speaker 1: school that I wouldn't have been able to get to
Speaker 1: UH without, you know, in out of coming out of
Speaker 1: high school, man, I stepped it up. Well, what I
Speaker 1: was saying is thirty seven years old. You know whether
Speaker 1: the ranking is true. I'll if you're off by four,
Speaker 1: off or add on too. You're pretty ranked high in
Speaker 1: the UFC, and yet you're just figuring out to some
Speaker 1: degree in a better capacity of what's your why. No,
Speaker 1: that's you got a little wrong. So see, that's why
Speaker 1: I was double checking A part of what my wire,
Speaker 1: A part of dealing with a mental coach is to
Speaker 1: figure out your why, to talk about it, and to
Speaker 1: write it down. All this stuff. I've always had a
Speaker 1: good idea of what my wires. I'm just saying, I'm
Speaker 1: always looking to learn. As a champion, you never a
Speaker 1: close minded slight flesh multiple time world champions, you never
Speaker 1: you never are done learning. You're never done learning from
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not a champion, but I'm not. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've had but I've had time. I've been thinking sometimes.
Speaker 1: So I'm just always open to learning and uh and
Speaker 1: and anybody who could teach me something. I'm always over.
Speaker 1: What kind of movies do you there? What kind of
Speaker 1: movies do I like? I like? I kind of like whatever.
Speaker 1: I'm not a big movie TV show guy. I watched
Speaker 1: yellow Stone. I like yellow Stone, Dude that I haven't watched.
Speaker 1: I like that. What is yellow Stone? Yellow Stone is
Speaker 1: basically the mafia of cowboys, but the cowboys aren't from
Speaker 1: back in the day. It is right now. And you
Speaker 1: don't realize that living where we live, that there's legitimately
Speaker 1: like ranches and there's families and it's been generations and
Speaker 1: generations of like this dynasty that they created where they
Speaker 1: only these ranches and there's other people nearby their own
Speaker 1: different ranches, and there's these like family battles basically that
Speaker 1: go down, and uh, it's pretty cool to find out
Speaker 1: that this is going on right now, and it's it's
Speaker 1: just basically like the mafia, the way they play power
Speaker 1: and everything and start taking over and people getting killed.
Speaker 1: You know, dirty things are happening. So it's fun. Where
Speaker 1: are you from in a place you call your hometown,
Speaker 1: It's called it's a town called Baldwin, Long Island, New York. Okay,
Speaker 1: how far is that from? What? What? I'm not in
Speaker 1: New York City, so I'm like, it's a it's a
Speaker 1: thirty five minute train ride, which I was like right
Speaker 1: next to the train to get into Manhattan to Penn
Speaker 1: Station to get to Queens is like, you know, ten minutes,
Speaker 1: so you're right there? Any yes, sir, yeah, right there,
Speaker 1: all right? What was your child? Uh? It was good?
Speaker 1: Had an older brother, you know he was he was
Speaker 1: a really good athlete. Whoa what do you consider a
Speaker 1: good athlete? We're gonna get into that later. Um he was.
Speaker 1: He was, you know, fast and strong. Whatever he did
Speaker 1: was what do you consider strong and fast? I'm gonna
Speaker 1: get pretty granuly. He I just well, we've had some dialogue,
Speaker 1: so I just want to see. It's kind of setting
Speaker 1: up for some other questions. I think at his peak,
Speaker 1: he was you know, he was mentioning to because he
Speaker 1: was doing football. He did five times linebacker, so six
Speaker 1: to oh yeah, he's not snot out of yeah, he
Speaker 1: was not just I mean, wait a minute, it's pretty good.
Speaker 1: I've only went seventy many times. You do one time,
Speaker 1: probably that's pretty good. But what you said, that's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: so that's why that's why I asked. Yeah, no, he was.
Speaker 1: He was bigger, stronger, and fast, more athletic than me
Speaker 1: for sure. So I was just kind of living in
Speaker 1: the shadows, working hard. Okay, yeah when he rose. Did
Speaker 1: you have growing up? Who alize you talking about your brother?
Speaker 1: But whose did you adolize? You know, my dad? I
Speaker 1: would say my dad was my idol. I didn't really
Speaker 1: like have any you know, people on sports teams or
Speaker 1: anything like that that I was super into. Maybe some
Speaker 1: wrestlers as I got older. There was some college wrestlers,
Speaker 1: some guys who wrestling the baby what about what about
Speaker 1: like wrestling wrestling prest progress. Maybe when I was a
Speaker 1: little little I was into it. But like woically he
Speaker 1: tossed that aside, broking about rddy ddy pipers like that,
Speaker 1: it's fake. Don't crush my dreams, bro, do not do that. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you go to those wrestling events. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: people that you don't want to crush your dreams. Yeah,
Speaker 1: don't don't be in a dream crush. It's real, all right,
Speaker 1: so condescending all right? So do you believe you rep
Speaker 1: New York the right way? Because you know how you
Speaker 1: meet people like Geez from Geez from North Carolina, he's
Speaker 1: from Alection to my man will rep. He will tell
Speaker 1: a about Lexington. I love he won't He want to
Speaker 1: ask stuff about Lexton. I'm like, oh, I don't know
Speaker 1: about that one, but I'm using as an example of like,
Speaker 1: you know, I love l A. I always always wrap
Speaker 1: l A. So I just wonder going backwards living here
Speaker 1: now in in in Charlotte, do you believe you rep
Speaker 1: in New York? Yeah? Always? You know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Why well born raised there, never left until a year
Speaker 1: and a half ago. Um, you know, I mean, I
Speaker 1: just what do I I think? New York people are
Speaker 1: tough people, They're resilient. It's it's a very competitive atmosphere
Speaker 1: because there's so many damn people and there's only so
Speaker 1: much there's out there, so like, in order to survive
Speaker 1: in New York is very difficult, and only the strong survive. Yeah, man,
Speaker 1: I try my best. I try my best for sure.
Speaker 1: What do you miss about it? I mean, it's all
Speaker 1: the stuff that's not that good for me, like the
Speaker 1: pizza bagels. That's the one thing in covid bro. That's
Speaker 1: the one thing about traveling. I missed like we had
Speaker 1: a New York Thursday night game and we did it
Speaker 1: from the house, got off at like there was no
Speaker 1: piece of slices waiting for me when I got off
Speaker 1: just I do like j though, but nothing is better
Speaker 1: than like uh for me, a Sicilian slice of pizza
Speaker 1: late at night, that's good, that is good. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: if I had to do I usually when I would
Speaker 1: eat like crazy bad, I would have one regular slice
Speaker 1: because that's how you kind of tell how good the
Speaker 1: pizzaree is, and that's to be legit. Then you got
Speaker 1: I got two specialty slices. Usually it'll be a ZD
Speaker 1: slice slice. So it's basically like penny. You know, penny,
Speaker 1: you said, Penny Abraham or Hardaway. That's only two pennies
Speaker 1: I know. Um yeah, yeah, so yeah, I would eat.
Speaker 1: I would I would eat half of the z D
Speaker 1: off one side of the slice, and then you then
Speaker 1: you then you can fold it in a half past
Speaker 1: on the pizza pasta samaranara. Yeah, oh so good. Yeah,
Speaker 1: yea chicken rolls. Do you ever have a chicken roll?
Speaker 1: Do I look like I eat a chicken roll? I
Speaker 1: can't judge. Nobody said roll right, Joe me here talking.
Speaker 1: Joe wanted to say something might come off, is not
Speaker 1: gonna come off? Well, that's awesome. Chris was like, I
Speaker 1: don't know what these guys are doing. It's kind of stereotypical.
Speaker 1: I like chicken, but I never had a chicken roll.
Speaker 1: Chicken roll, it's fried chicken inside of bread that's that's
Speaker 1: fried with so basically pizza dough that's wrapped the chickens
Speaker 1: wrapped inside of with mozzarella and marinarrow, cheese, marinara and cheese.
Speaker 1: Or no, it's not agg rolls, not an egg roll. No,
Speaker 1: that's not Chinese food. It's real pizza, real pizza. No, man,
Speaker 1: we gotta take a break in a minute. I love
Speaker 1: cut to It, and I love it even more when
Speaker 1: you download us and subscribe and you can follow us
Speaker 1: on social media to Smithie, where where at? That's at?
Speaker 1: Cut to it on Instagram? What about Twitter? At? Cut
Speaker 1: to It? Facebook? Cut to It featuring Steve Smith sing
Speaker 1: what about online? And you can all Louisa cut to
Speaker 1: It Podcast dot com where you can buy merch and
Speaker 1: you can subscribe to this wherever you listen to podcasts.
Speaker 1: I got all my answers questions. Um yeah, I got
Speaker 1: all my questions answered. That's what I'm here for. A
Speaker 1: brother cut to a podcast dot com, How the hell
Speaker 1: did you get into UFC? So, like I was saying before,
Speaker 1: my brother, like he would have me fight his friends
Speaker 1: all the time. It was you know my parents. Yeah,
Speaker 1: my parents weren't around that much. So you know, parents
Speaker 1: were working, so my my my brother would be physical.
Speaker 1: You just threw your parents New York streets. But they
Speaker 1: let us kind of figure out a lot of stuff
Speaker 1: on our own. So that old school, old school parenting, Yeah,
Speaker 1: pretty much. Well they was actually working as well too,
Speaker 1: they were working. Yeah, yeah, definitely. Um yeah, So I
Speaker 1: just fought a lot as a kid. And so next thing,
Speaker 1: I know when I started wrestling, which kind of put
Speaker 1: me on the straight and arrow, and I started being
Speaker 1: able to focus on something that goal. And then after
Speaker 1: I was done wrestling, I was training for Olympics in
Speaker 1: two thousand and eight, got injured right before Olympic trials,
Speaker 1: So I was kind of at a crossroads. What I
Speaker 1: wanted to do for the rest of my life, and
Speaker 1: fighting I saw it was a big thing and then
Speaker 1: so I just always felt like I always even if
Speaker 1: I lost someone in wrestling match, I was like, I
Speaker 1: know I could definitely you know, beat him in a fight,
Speaker 1: but uh and then ufuly start coming around. I was like, man,
Speaker 1: this is my opportunity. And the people that like knew
Speaker 1: me as from when I was a kid, and people
Speaker 1: that knew me from the wrestling world, They're like, you know,
Speaker 1: you're literally like the perfect fit for fit for fighting
Speaker 1: because of how you grew up and then with the
Speaker 1: wrestling background and all these wrestlers are killing it in there,
Speaker 1: like they just you know. I was like, you know what,
Speaker 1: I think you're right. And that was it. I started
Speaker 1: my my my road to uh into mixed martial arts.
Speaker 1: So when you get into the wrestling, because I know
Speaker 1: you wrestled in college, when you can do the wrestling
Speaker 1: as a youth, I wrestled in second and third grade
Speaker 1: and then stopped until yeah, yeah, elementary wrestling. Oh yeah.
Speaker 1: I got my kids in wrestling. I recommend everybody get
Speaker 1: their kids in wrestling. I don't think there's I don't
Speaker 1: think there's a better sport, you know, you get into
Speaker 1: it like middle school down here, Well you can't, yeah,
Speaker 1: my kids. Yeah, there's there's plenty of clubs out here.
Speaker 1: You got dark Horse Wrestling in Charlotte Club Wrestling dark
Speaker 1: Horse it's once terrible. So yeah, you've got a couple
Speaker 1: of clubs around here. Yeah, you have plenty of options.
Speaker 1: But wrestling is wrestling. Wrestling is one of those sports
Speaker 1: is a one on one competition, you know, and you
Speaker 1: get to go against someone your own size and your
Speaker 1: own age when it's all on you. Yeah, it's all
Speaker 1: based on weight class. So when you're getting thrown around
Speaker 1: as a young kid in front of your dad, you
Speaker 1: have no excuse other than to look at yourself and
Speaker 1: to learn how to lose, learn how to win. You
Speaker 1: have no excuse. Man, Listen, I remember in in middle
Speaker 1: school and when you're losing basketball or football, you could
Speaker 1: blame it on your teammate. There's way more one on one.
Speaker 1: This is all on you, you know, and it's embarrassing.
Speaker 1: And when you get thrown anybody get thrown around. I'm
Speaker 1: getting man handled as as a man as more. It's
Speaker 1: amistading and getting thrown around in a small tidy whitey. Yeah,
Speaker 1: exactly in front of your family. In middle school, people
Speaker 1: are already cutting to make weight, people wearing trash bags.
Speaker 1: It's like, yeah, not that that was good. That's it
Speaker 1: was bad. Like a lot of the educational weight cutting
Speaker 1: has got way better. But uh yeah, I know I
Speaker 1: feel you. I wasn't one of those kids, but I've
Speaker 1: seen it. Yeah, do you believe that the just random? Now?
Speaker 1: You think the weight cutting all that stuff kind of
Speaker 1: has a you know, maybe least possibly eating disorders or
Speaker 1: or or body shame into some degree. No, not body,
Speaker 1: I would say the only I'm just asking just because
Speaker 1: I just think, as you're saying that, I'm going and
Speaker 1: what could it look like a ten year old kid
Speaker 1: who's just naturally big, who has to cut weight to
Speaker 1: be able to participate in the sport that he only
Speaker 1: figures out, Hey, I can participate in this. I'm good. Wait,
Speaker 1: you know my size is not a deterrent anymore. But
Speaker 1: being not being the deterrent, that's still that little gray
Speaker 1: area where you know, five pounds too much or two
Speaker 1: pounds too much for a kid and ten years old, man,
Speaker 1: that's a lot. Yeah, I don't think any kids should
Speaker 1: be cutting weight um, even in high school. I would
Speaker 1: say the more of the issue with weight cutting has
Speaker 1: been happening in high school a few years. Little kids,
Speaker 1: I hope no little kids are cutting weight like you know,
Speaker 1: but there are some parents that you know, for whatever reasons,
Speaker 1: they want this kid to be successful and then lived curiously.
Speaker 1: It's crazy to watch, but yeah, for them to have
Speaker 1: their kid cut way to win, you know, some little
Speaker 1: elementary school tournament. But you no matter how big they
Speaker 1: think it is, I think it's ridiculous. Yeah, but if
Speaker 1: you just said it, you know, you get thrown around.
Speaker 1: There's one on one right, you get the wrong parents
Speaker 1: take it the wrong way. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean I was. I mean, like this is this is
Speaker 1: late nineties when I was in middle school. But I
Speaker 1: can only imagine it's it's probably gotten worse. I would
Speaker 1: imagine the ain't got better. I think the education on
Speaker 1: weight cutting has been better, like getting passed you know,
Speaker 1: down by professionals to the coaches, now to the athletes.
Speaker 1: I think the education has got better to where it
Speaker 1: it's definitely think it's definitely better than when I was
Speaker 1: in high school. What do you think about how hard
Speaker 1: is it to move up? And down in the different
Speaker 1: weight divisions. I mean, it's it kind of depends. I mean,
Speaker 1: are you're talking about like specifically in the UFC or
Speaker 1: just just well just in the UFC. I mean I don't.
Speaker 1: I know it is in Pop Warner weight, but I'm
Speaker 1: just talking about where it's is. Wight is is weight limits,
Speaker 1: but not not the moving up and down moving up
Speaker 1: in UFC or boxing or wrestling. Yeah, I'm just I'm
Speaker 1: just wondering because that's your that's that's your deal. Just wondering,
Speaker 1: you know, the different ship moving up. Have you ever
Speaker 1: moved up in weight? I moved up in weight and
Speaker 1: I lost. I lost explained that to us, Like what
Speaker 1: what's the process and going and moving up in weight?
Speaker 1: So if you're gonna do it the right way, you
Speaker 1: would have to put a muscle and take your time
Speaker 1: and go on up. I I kind of just did
Speaker 1: it out of nowhere. I was like, let me just
Speaker 1: go up and wait and see how I feel because
Speaker 1: I won't have to cut any weight. But the difference
Speaker 1: is like, so if I'm walking around about two fifteen, yeah,
Speaker 1: and you fight at five, that's about normal. You fight
Speaker 1: what you you you make the weight at one five
Speaker 1: and then about thirty hours later you're gonna be fighting
Speaker 1: at like two oh five to like to ten. It's
Speaker 1: most middleweights. How do you do? It's so it's like
Speaker 1: you that d pizza. No, So the way you cut
Speaker 1: weight is uh, I want to know howcave to to
Speaker 1: fifty in thirty hours? I mean up? So I remember
Speaker 1: it's so hard. I mean no, it's not hard to
Speaker 1: put it back on. Um, it's hard to make the weight.
Speaker 1: Put it back on. It is the best thing ever
Speaker 1: because it goes, it feels good. You could you how
Speaker 1: do you? So? You're so you're telling me you're gonna
Speaker 1: make weight thirty six hours, thirty hours, thirty five hours
Speaker 1: before you and then you're gonna fight in thirty six hours.
Speaker 1: And what is gonna be your weight? I mean there's
Speaker 1: anywhere between two oh four And how do you go?
Speaker 1: How do you go after adding that much weight? How
Speaker 1: do you go and move? Because? Bro, I mean normally
Speaker 1: that's like going to a super Bowl party and then
Speaker 1: going to fight. Yeah, like that item, that's like basically
Speaker 1: what you're saying is you know, I'm gonna lose weight
Speaker 1: to make weight, then I'm gonna go eat Thanksgiving meal
Speaker 1: and then after thanks given a lunch, I'm gonna go
Speaker 1: fight that night. How is that possible? So it's it's
Speaker 1: just water manipulation and like sodium manipulation. So you so
Speaker 1: in a training camp is about eight weeks when you
Speaker 1: get ready for a fight, and uh so I'm I'm
Speaker 1: naturally around like two fifteen ish when I'm eating healthy,
Speaker 1: and when I start training super hard and I bring
Speaker 1: the portion control a little bit and you know, be
Speaker 1: very strict, my weight will drop to like two or
Speaker 1: five is and then to get down it's a it's
Speaker 1: really a sodium manipulation where you have tons of salt
Speaker 1: leading up about two or three weeks with your meals,
Speaker 1: and then the week of the of when you're cutting
Speaker 1: the weight, you just take out sodium completely. So you
Speaker 1: still have you still have your meals, they might be
Speaker 1: a little bit smaller in portion, but the fact that
Speaker 1: you have no sodium and you're drinking gowns and gallons,
Speaker 1: So you drink on a week before the fight, I'll
Speaker 1: drink two gallons and the you know, the day after,
Speaker 1: it's three gallons and three gowns. Again the next day
Speaker 1: and then you drop it to a gallon and then
Speaker 1: twenty four hours before the winds you have no water
Speaker 1: at all. And just from doing that, I'll be like
Speaker 1: two or four to oh five and and dropped like
Speaker 1: and then from one five you just have to do like,
Speaker 1: you know, get your sweat, you get sweat out, so
Speaker 1: you do so onta work, you do, rubber suits, whatever
Speaker 1: people do, makeup removers, whatever you gotta do, open up
Speaker 1: your pores, so makeup removers. It's like they have things
Speaker 1: called sweet sweat. Now used to be albumating you get
Speaker 1: from CBS. But sweet sweat it opens up your poor
Speaker 1: so you sweat easier. So when you're so deep, sweet sweat,
Speaker 1: you said, makeup remove. Makeup removers is one of active
Speaker 1: in grease. Sweet sweat is a new Sweet sweat is
Speaker 1: a new name. It's a brand. But basically basically what's
Speaker 1: what sweet sweat can do is do it make is
Speaker 1: be a makeup remover, so opens up your pores, gets
Speaker 1: rid of the makeup I guess in the face. And
Speaker 1: before sweet Sweat came out, you would have to get
Speaker 1: makeup removers. Now that sounds dangerous, yea. So then to
Speaker 1: you gotta you know, you got doctors with you and
Speaker 1: it's really quick. You know, it's you're really dehydrated for
Speaker 1: about three hours. You want to try to cut the
Speaker 1: weight as close to the weight, as as close to
Speaker 1: the way in as possible. About three hours you cut
Speaker 1: that weight out and you have no water. You're dehydrated.
Speaker 1: It's terrible. And then you're able to replenish. And when
Speaker 1: you replenish, ela sodium and everything that you start having
Speaker 1: just sticks to you. So that's why you can put
Speaker 1: the weight on so easy and you can have like
Speaker 1: a super insolent spite right afterday. Oh yeah, well you
Speaker 1: gotta Now. Nowadays, the UFC has some really good nutritionist
Speaker 1: and they have it all planned out where there's a
Speaker 1: certain amount of liquid you're allowed to drink throughout the
Speaker 1: you know, every like fifteen minutes you have another ship
Speaker 1: and so you don't chuck it and have a messed
Speaker 1: up stomach and all that. So what does that do?
Speaker 1: Another on the spot question, what does that due to
Speaker 1: your kidneys? Uh? With that much fluid and processing and
Speaker 1: then sodium and then and then taken away. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean there's have you thought about it until you're trying
Speaker 1: to be funny, I'm just I get it. No, man,
Speaker 1: because you know that no people are that kidney failure
Speaker 1: from overdoing it. So it is something that you have
Speaker 1: to you have to get your weight down. The way
Speaker 1: I'm explaining to you is doing it the right way
Speaker 1: and doctors that's like the safe way of doing it.
Speaker 1: I know it sounds extreme. There's way more extreme ways
Speaker 1: to doing it without dieting properly. Yeah, that that's how
Speaker 1: you really shut down your kidneys and then you just
Speaker 1: go punch somebody lights out and then you gotta be
Speaker 1: in you know, the best shape of your life. You know, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, every fight is always the biggest fight of
Speaker 1: your life and you have to perform. But you know
Speaker 1: what it's like the whole fight week you kind of
Speaker 1: like it. It's so relaxing. By the time you fight,
Speaker 1: you feel is not relaxing right now, So I am chilling,
Speaker 1: like I mean, other than you're suffering with the wake up,
Speaker 1: but as far as the amount of workouts that you
Speaker 1: have to do, the fight week is so chill compared
Speaker 1: to every other week in a training camp. Wow. So
Speaker 1: we have something in common. We have Well, we used
Speaker 1: to you you're training with a jail you, sir, and
Speaker 1: so we used to train with. Why Jan was I
Speaker 1: didn't know Ja was training guys like you. You know,
Speaker 1: what is that? How does a guy who trained me
Speaker 1: and you trained me and football follose years and now
Speaker 1: he trains you? What? What are so many things that
Speaker 1: you guys are doing to help you? Uh? I don't
Speaker 1: even know if the word is a child? But like,
Speaker 1: what what do you got? A better athlete? Is just
Speaker 1: kind of making me strong? Whoa, whoa? Whoa? Rewind that?
Speaker 1: What did you just a better athlete? Okay, I appreciate you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think just kind of it's cross training, you know,
Speaker 1: so when you fight and when you're training for fighting,
Speaker 1: it breaks down your body so much. And I think
Speaker 1: the most important thing for strength training and why I
Speaker 1: think a lot of guys should be doing it and
Speaker 1: now they are, is that they're when you wait lift,
Speaker 1: it strengthens your joints and all the muscles intends around it,
Speaker 1: so less chance of injury and just helps you, you know,
Speaker 1: stay on the grind without falling apart. But jet Jet
Speaker 1: does a lot of stuff where like the serratus muscle,
Speaker 1: which is this muscle back here, which is your punching muscle,
Speaker 1: which I didn't know until Jed told me that. But like,
Speaker 1: so working specifically on that, working on lake strength where
Speaker 1: your power comes from, working on your core, where your
Speaker 1: power comes from. So, um, you know he helps. He
Speaker 1: works with the old at plus he makes it very hard.
Speaker 1: Uh and and and just like without a break and
Speaker 1: in a in a fight there's really no breaks. You know,
Speaker 1: it's just NonStop. The pace is hard to control. Um,
Speaker 1: so he helps with just cardio. What makes you stand
Speaker 1: out in the UFC? Like, you know you have martial arts.
Speaker 1: The average fan or the or a person that watches
Speaker 1: it here and there looks at it's just it's fist fighting, right,
Speaker 1: What what do you bring to the table that's different
Speaker 1: than maybe saying kind of McGregor. Well, first I'll answer, like,
Speaker 1: so martial arts uh m m A is mixed martial arts.
Speaker 1: So it's pretty much every single martial art that's ever
Speaker 1: been around, you know, uh, some of the traditional stuff.
Speaker 1: So what are some of the traditional because I have
Speaker 1: jiu jitsu, taekwondo, you know, kempo wrestling, Brazilian jiu jitsu,
Speaker 1: regular jiu jitsu, boxing, kickboxing, mutai, all those would be
Speaker 1: considered martial arts. There was a time in the beginning
Speaker 1: of the UFC, where everyone if you were a wrestler,
Speaker 1: or you were a boxer, or you were you know,
Speaker 1: a jiu jitsu guy, you felt like your art was
Speaker 1: the best and only one that needed to be done.
Speaker 1: If you did karate, you could kick everybody's ast. You
Speaker 1: don't need to worry about wrestling because you nee, that
Speaker 1: guy in his mouth is someone I had taken down.
Speaker 1: What mixed martial arts did through the years is evolved
Speaker 1: at the point where you realize that every single one
Speaker 1: of those martial arts have has this place in some degree.
Speaker 1: You gotta find which parts of that martial art is
Speaker 1: actually usable in a true fight. And so that's what
Speaker 1: mixed martial arts has have evolved to now. Now it's
Speaker 1: the point where like I started with a base of wrestling.
Speaker 1: I did karate and stuff when I was a kid,
Speaker 1: but basically my base was wrestling. In order for me
Speaker 1: to evolve as a martial arts I had to learn
Speaker 1: every single other martial art in order for me to
Speaker 1: be able to use it and utilize and like what,
Speaker 1: you know what all the train Yeah, so Brazilian jiu
Speaker 1: jitsu and black bell and Brazilian jiu jitsu slight flex
Speaker 1: other Henzel Gracie, Matt Sarah and John Danaher Well, it's
Speaker 1: more flexiing to them, like they're unbelievable. Oh, Henzel Gracie,
Speaker 1: you know the grayceis ever bring a bell? Yeah that
Speaker 1: does okay, So as he's as he's telling us to
Speaker 1: jump in. So the Graces are a family that are
Speaker 1: known for training in a certain style of martial arts,
Speaker 1: so Brazilian jiu jitsu. So what happened is when the
Speaker 1: UFC first started, it was you know, the Brazilian jiu
Speaker 1: jitsu people, which was the Graces versus you know, the
Speaker 1: wrestler versus a boxer versus a kick boxer. And it
Speaker 1: was a contest to see which art was truly the best,
Speaker 1: and the Hoyce Gracie was the one. He was the
Speaker 1: one that was chosen by the Gracie family to represent
Speaker 1: Brazilian jiu jitsu against these other fighters that thought their
Speaker 1: art was the best, and they picked the smallest in
Speaker 1: their family, this guy named Hoyce Gracie. He was small,
Speaker 1: nothing to look at and he was gonna be fighting guy.
Speaker 1: As I think one of the guys was like were
Speaker 1: close to five hundred pounds. Is it on YouTube? I
Speaker 1: think you can find all this on YouTube, thank you,
Speaker 1: Yeah you can get it or probably UFC Fight pass Actually,
Speaker 1: to be honest, so passed memberships like that. Let me
Speaker 1: jump going on the free stop. I don't I don't
Speaker 1: want to glance over what he just said. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: family took their so called air quotes weakest dude in
Speaker 1: their family and put him in there five tens. Like
Speaker 1: he's small, he's like a hundred seventy five pounds, five ten,
Speaker 1: and he's finding some monsters. And what happened he finished
Speaker 1: everybody sleep though he broke Well, so what it is
Speaker 1: is the art. It's like a jet. It's considered a
Speaker 1: gentle art, and so it's gentle knot very kind of mildly. Well,
Speaker 1: there's no knockouts. That's the That's the crazy thing about
Speaker 1: president jujitsu is it's you're not knocking the guy out.
Speaker 1: You're using like it's actually meant for smaller people to
Speaker 1: beat up bigger people. It's it's all the submission. So
Speaker 1: it's like arm bars and stuff that you've seen that's
Speaker 1: you know, it's putting one half of your body on
Speaker 1: one side of his arm, one half on the one
Speaker 1: half of your body on the other side of the arm,
Speaker 1: and now you're you're pulling that arm and you're gonna
Speaker 1: break it. There's not there's nobody who's big enough for
Speaker 1: strong enough to curl in that situation. So even a girl,
Speaker 1: if she learns correctly, will break someone's arm who doesn't
Speaker 1: know how to defend it. Oh wow, yeah, which is crazy.
Speaker 1: So that's what Brazilian just you brought to the table
Speaker 1: and the way it's evolved over the years. At first,
Speaker 1: when that came out, like no matter who was going
Speaker 1: against this guy, you know, Hoyce Grazer, one of the gracis,
Speaker 1: they were dominating and submitting them, choking people out, breaking
Speaker 1: people's arms, and nobody knew how to defend it. They
Speaker 1: started like realizing, no, I need to learn this stuff.
Speaker 1: Night night. Yeah. Yeah, but you did start to go
Speaker 1: down the path of you said, wrestling with your base
Speaker 1: and then you evolve, you learn, you have you now
Speaker 1: been able to evolve your fighting style now being um,
Speaker 1: you know, multi time champion in the UFC, How how
Speaker 1: did that fight style evolve when you as you're coming
Speaker 1: up the ranking systems as just a wrestler with some boxing.
Speaker 1: With some jiu jitsu, you could get by with taking
Speaker 1: guys down. But as as the sport progresses and you
Speaker 1: start going with higher talent, you have to start knowing everything.
Speaker 1: So would you would you say that that's as you
Speaker 1: get older, that's what's kind of you know, not to
Speaker 1: put you on the spot by him. Is that what
Speaker 1: has really slowed down kind of McGregor a little bit
Speaker 1: because I don't really see him really, he doesn't. He's
Speaker 1: not known for having the martial arts background, I mean
Speaker 1: not to my untrained ID, but he seems like more
Speaker 1: he doesn't really he doesn't really wrestle much. He's just
Speaker 1: more of a punching he's so he's more of a
Speaker 1: he started he started from a boxing base and karate,
Speaker 1: so he's more of a stand up guy. He does
Speaker 1: obviously train jiu jitsu and wrestling everything like that, because
Speaker 1: the guy sees fighting, are you know, topnox world class dudes,
Speaker 1: So he asked to, you know, but not to not
Speaker 1: to not proficient and mastering is two different things things. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't. He's not He's not going to dominate a
Speaker 1: world class guy on the floor with jiu jitsu. He's
Speaker 1: not going to dominate a world class guy in wrestling
Speaker 1: and boxing. He can, you know, And so I think
Speaker 1: that now if he could get his takedown defense to
Speaker 1: the point where he could stop takedowns and finished keep
Speaker 1: guys standing, that's kind of like how it how you evolved.
Speaker 1: He's a martial artist, but he's primarily more of a
Speaker 1: boxer inside the occagon. But now if he was fighting
Speaker 1: a better boxer than him, he would definitely have the
Speaker 1: tools to take the guy down and let kick him
Speaker 1: or whatever. It is. Good, good, good, let's getting down
Speaker 1: to good. Hey Gerard, why didn't you get that T shirt?
Speaker 1: You mean this thing? Oh yes, I got it from
Speaker 1: cut to a podcast dot com where we have exclusive
Speaker 1: merchandise shout out to our guys at seven or four shot.
Speaker 1: But yeah, you can go on, buy you a T shirt,
Speaker 1: subscribe to us wherever you listen to podcasts. So what
Speaker 1: is martial arts done done for you personally? I mean, shoot,
Speaker 1: I'm I guess uh. You know, it gave me a goal,
Speaker 1: you know, of becoming a world champion and something um
Speaker 1: and you know taught me, you know, told me a lot,
Speaker 1: told me you know, discipline and hard work and respect
Speaker 1: and you know, being humble, A lot of that, A
Speaker 1: lot of that, A lot of those, um, those attributes
Speaker 1: kind of stem for martial arts. How do you balance?
Speaker 1: Because you see guys that martial arts or m M
Speaker 1: a UFC, they're so I don't even know the right word,
Speaker 1: but they just kind of they're just quiet storms, right,
Speaker 1: you see him and you see you'll see videos here
Speaker 1: and there sometimes where someone at the bar is trying
Speaker 1: the wrong guy who ends up being a martial arts
Speaker 1: guy and just gets let me unfold this one for you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you seem like one of those guys, Like even
Speaker 1: and I met you, you're just kind of like just nonchalant.
Speaker 1: But yet you know, watching some of your stuff like
Speaker 1: get in that switch, right that switch and even just
Speaker 1: me joking around with you, it's like you're joking but
Speaker 1: then you're going like, hey, is this guy trying me?
Speaker 1: And it's just that that balance, you know, that balance? Right?
Speaker 1: How do you? How do you? How how does your
Speaker 1: mind and your body decipher between that um, that calmness
Speaker 1: and then that that that rage is in there? Um
Speaker 1: because you have more days that you're not in the
Speaker 1: octagon then you are in the octagon. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: I you know, I used to get to the point
Speaker 1: if I felt like someone disrespect me, just just because
Speaker 1: you know, that's the way I was raised. If someone
Speaker 1: disrespects me, like I had to put them in their place.
Speaker 1: And then as I got older and as I got
Speaker 1: more confident in my self, as like, you know what
Speaker 1: I could do to them and is it worth it? Uh?
Speaker 1: But also find the interest because as you got older,
Speaker 1: you acquired more steals. Yeah, but not to use them
Speaker 1: on people like you know you want to. It's you're
Speaker 1: being a bully at that point. So you know, it's
Speaker 1: not like I'm gonna get anything out of unless I'm
Speaker 1: protecting my family. You know, I'm not gonna put my
Speaker 1: hands on anybody that that would be my goal? Even
Speaker 1: what was that? What was I just saying? What we're
Speaker 1: just saying basically basically is how do you how do
Speaker 1: you basically manage that switch from where you are a
Speaker 1: naturally you're a naturally some calm guy, but then when
Speaker 1: you go into the octagon. I got to check somebody
Speaker 1: even and even practice. Yeah, that's a great question, I know,
Speaker 1: and I'm sorry I forgot. Um, it's just just one
Speaker 1: of those like you know, I met you you know,
Speaker 1: I met you and we've had some conversations even talking
Speaker 1: on the phone. You're great then, you know obviously mean
Speaker 1: you're a person even coming on here, I can see,
Speaker 1: even me joking around with you, I could see a
Speaker 1: little bit of like he he like all right now,
Speaker 1: just a little bit. But it's and and and that's
Speaker 1: part of just as being athletes are like, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: what's the angle of this person? You know? And I
Speaker 1: because we do get I believe sometimes as athletes, when
Speaker 1: we come on stuff, sometimes people uh misrepresent themselves, right,
Speaker 1: they misrepresent the authenticity of the concept of whatever the
Speaker 1: interview is. They say some things that you're like, come on, man,
Speaker 1: like we talked about this and and so that's why
Speaker 1: I was asked because I saw a little bit because
Speaker 1: I've been in that same position, like I'm waiting for it. Wait,
Speaker 1: I'm waiting for the nonsense. And so I just picked
Speaker 1: that up from you just because you're still in it
Speaker 1: and I'm not in it anymore, and I don't have
Speaker 1: anything that to some degree that's actually I feel like,
Speaker 1: but it's not the truth of any value to that person.
Speaker 1: But when you're doing sports and you been part of
Speaker 1: that sport, especially now as retired players are almost coming
Speaker 1: across like let me just feel the beans on everything now, right,
Speaker 1: And so man, I mean every every now, every time
Speaker 1: you turn on a former players talking about what they
Speaker 1: experienced and how they experienced it with this team, and
Speaker 1: let me tell you know how fraudulent this this coach
Speaker 1: was or with this team or this organization. So that's
Speaker 1: why I mean it just comes into now, is uh.
Speaker 1: I mean clickbait. It's not anymore of authenticity of the individuals,
Speaker 1: more of what is the individual? What can the individual
Speaker 1: give me that people go oh, absolutely yeah, trying to
Speaker 1: think what I said in this entity that's going to
Speaker 1: be really good clu. It's it's it's it's authentic, it's you,
Speaker 1: you know. Like I asked about McGregor, just in regards
Speaker 1: of comparing he's not the he's he. First of all,
Speaker 1: he's not nobody. He's someone that's big enough sport. However,
Speaker 1: there are other guys who seem to have a more
Speaker 1: wide range and just handle on the martial arts just
Speaker 1: by how they conduct themselves. Some people may be better grapplers,
Speaker 1: some people standing up, but but more I could you
Speaker 1: can tell some of the guys how they conduct themselves
Speaker 1: on and off off the field, and how they you know,
Speaker 1: what they do and how they do it. It's just different. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: And when you say that, do you do you remember
Speaker 1: could be before? Could be? Did you watch that fight?
Speaker 1: Kind of? I can? I can not my head, but
Speaker 1: I know he's a very disciplined, humble dude. He's from Dagastan,
Speaker 1: it's the outskirts of Russia. Yes, ye, Muslim country. He's
Speaker 1: very disciplined. He doesn't drink, he's not he's not short. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's looked like he has woken up looking for as
Speaker 1: as they say, you know, it's actually in our culture
Speaker 1: black holds. You're like, man, I'm look. I hope somebody
Speaker 1: trying me to do I wish him would you my seat?
Speaker 1: I don't hope, I wish you know, you're walking. I
Speaker 1: hope someone on my seat. Yeah, he's not the dude
Speaker 1: you walk up in the bar like when you see him, Man,
Speaker 1: I don't getting near that. Yeah, you're like, is that
Speaker 1: my seat? There's videos of him wrestling a bear at
Speaker 1: like seven years old. That a brother. So now you
Speaker 1: you're you're veteran, your thirty seven you mentioned how do
Speaker 1: you approach fights now being a more veteran fighter, what's
Speaker 1: your approach now you know, as you're as you as
Speaker 1: you send it into UFC ranks. Yeah, um, just work hard,
Speaker 1: you know, there was there's just a lot of learning
Speaker 1: I've had throughout my whole career, you know, through the
Speaker 1: ups and downs of knowing what worked for me and
Speaker 1: what didn't, and then just trying to be on the
Speaker 1: on a consistent page of doing the things that have
Speaker 1: worked for me, which is doing more and not less.
Speaker 1: You know, when I was a champion for a while there, Um,
Speaker 1: after my second title defense, I started again to the
Speaker 1: point where, um, I started doing less. You know, I
Speaker 1: was worried about getting injured. You know, so I figured
Speaker 1: less training, less chance of getting injured, because there was
Speaker 1: a couple of fights I had back out of due
Speaker 1: to an injury. So there's a lot of criticism, always
Speaker 1: injury prone and he's not gonna you know, he's not
Speaker 1: defending his title enough, blah blah blah. So then you
Speaker 1: get to the point where you want to, uh, maybe
Speaker 1: I was doing less. I you know, I had, I
Speaker 1: had money, I had you know, going out to nice dinners.
Speaker 1: You know, for the first time, all the time, you know,
Speaker 1: and I just I was loving that life. And so
Speaker 1: it got to the point of I started doing less,
Speaker 1: not more, and then I had my and then I
Speaker 1: had a victory won, and I want a title defense.
Speaker 1: Do like kind of having those habits and gave me
Speaker 1: a positive reinforcement on that, and that's where I think
Speaker 1: led to me starting to lose and having my first loss,
Speaker 1: and um, and then since then it's got to a
Speaker 1: point where like I had to be honest with myself
Speaker 1: and acknowledge that and then get to the point where
Speaker 1: I change that kind of go back to the old ways,
Speaker 1: not obviously killing myself, not as young as I used
Speaker 1: to be. I'm not training you know, you know, nine
Speaker 1: hours a day, but doing in a smart way, working
Speaker 1: on my techniques. Um. It's interesting with fighting and you know,
Speaker 1: right now there's you know, two guys over thirty five
Speaker 1: of that are champion. There's one guy's forty two as
Speaker 1: a champion. And you don't really see that in any
Speaker 1: other sports, including boxing. And it's because mixed martial arts
Speaker 1: there's so many martial arts involved that experience is so important.
Speaker 1: It's not like you could be you know that young
Speaker 1: athlete that comes in. He's you know, super athletic, and
Speaker 1: you know he has a good grasp of martial arts
Speaker 1: and he's gonna do really good. But uh, that guy
Speaker 1: is not. It's gonna be really hard and it's very
Speaker 1: rare for that guy to become a champion, you know,
Speaker 1: early on, because of because the lack of experience. Experience
Speaker 1: is really so important how to deal with the nerves,
Speaker 1: um and uh, and also all the different techniques that
Speaker 1: you've gotta learn in order to be a martial arts
Speaker 1: so almost like the the mental advantage, mental advantage, and
Speaker 1: then when it and then when it comes to me. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, I broke my leg in last April, you know,
Speaker 1: so I'm just I'm recovering and just trying to get
Speaker 1: myself back to where I need to be for this
Speaker 1: next fight. How did you break your leg? I mean,
Speaker 1: I know how you broke it, but like walking through Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna walk you through it. I can't walk. Thanks.
Speaker 1: We have a Matt set up after this. He's gonna
Speaker 1: work on in my contract. But you can take that
Speaker 1: one all you want. It's a gentle art. I got
Speaker 1: this thing after gentle. It's gentle bro, I got a
Speaker 1: medical condition, you got picks, I got tags? Oh man, uh,
Speaker 1: what was the question? I didn't ask one here? What
Speaker 1: do you think about CT? Like sometimes when I lose stuff,
Speaker 1: I like is this CT? Oh yeah? But then I'm like, no,
Speaker 1: it's miss So I mean, what do you think? What?
Speaker 1: What do you think? What do you personally think about
Speaker 1: a sport where I mean it's pretty head contact is
Speaker 1: it is pretty not as bad as of course, but yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it is brutal. It is a brutal sport. And I've
Speaker 1: seen guys who definitely have C T e UM and
Speaker 1: it's sad. It's sad to see it. I'm sure you've
Speaker 1: seen in football and you guys players. Now, I don't know,
Speaker 1: I don't I don't really think right now where I'm at,
Speaker 1: I don't really know if I would bump up against
Speaker 1: the guy who has CT. Most men, and I would
Speaker 1: say women to playing professional sports at even college high level, Well,
Speaker 1: there's some folks they just off in general. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: was gonna, how how do you know? Because they're like,
Speaker 1: think about it. There's there's movies where we all like
Speaker 1: when we laugh in joke, there's always that one family
Speaker 1: member that is the black sheep or somebody that does
Speaker 1: some things that just go man, cousin ge you know,
Speaker 1: or cousin Ricky or you know, there's always that one
Speaker 1: person who didn't play sports. It didn't play sports. So
Speaker 1: I'm just wondering, you know. And I know in college
Speaker 1: there was always one or two guys that were on
Speaker 1: the team in college that you were like, like, not
Speaker 1: that the brother got hit or anything. He didn't even play,
Speaker 1: but there was reasons why they didn't go to class
Speaker 1: or they didn't play. They were always in the way
Speaker 1: of themselves. And so I'll just you know, I can't
Speaker 1: really say that that individual the elevator didn't go up
Speaker 1: to the top the way before he strapped on a
Speaker 1: helmet and shoulder pass, that they just something was different
Speaker 1: and unique about them before they play sports. Now, sports
Speaker 1: maybe gave them my identity, but I wouldn't necessarily say, oh,
Speaker 1: that was CT or that that was a head condition.
Speaker 1: Sometimes people are just uh, you know, unique and different
Speaker 1: and odd, and you know, there's I mean, there's some
Speaker 1: people in the housing industry that me and G used
Speaker 1: to work with that brother didn't play no sports, right,
Speaker 1: and it just just something was missing in their life,
Speaker 1: and I don't want to. I don't and I don't
Speaker 1: like using like said, oh CT or this or you know,
Speaker 1: that'd be like somebody you know, just like when somebody doesn't,
Speaker 1: I can't pay attention to oh that that a d
Speaker 1: D person without knowing if they have a diagnosis or
Speaker 1: not exactly. So that's why that's why I asked. Because
Speaker 1: of you know, head injuries. Like I was talking to
Speaker 1: a doctor one time and they said, a concussion technically
Speaker 1: is when you see that little you know, when you
Speaker 1: hit your head, that little flicker, know how many times
Speaker 1: like you didn't hit your head that technically that's considered
Speaker 1: a concussion, right, or you leave the cabin open and
Speaker 1: bunk right technically that you know, So you don't know
Speaker 1: how many times one is has had a brain has
Speaker 1: had a what they call a brain injury, or you know,
Speaker 1: some sort of trauma, so something some sort type of trauma, right,
Speaker 1: thinking how many kids have fallen right learning to walk?
Speaker 1: Kids who have fallen out of chairs or falling off
Speaker 1: a chair or uh, you know, falling down the steps
Speaker 1: or whatever the case may be. You're making a good
Speaker 1: point now, is what do you think though? Do you
Speaker 1: think that there, you're just saying it's hard to diagnose
Speaker 1: who really has CT and who doesn't Like this, we
Speaker 1: don't They don't think they have a method right now
Speaker 1: until you until someone and they test the brain afterwards,
Speaker 1: and that's when you get But you also don't you
Speaker 1: also don't know how many times, Like think about it,
Speaker 1: if a kid has played football his senior year in
Speaker 1: high school, but his play soccer from four years old too,
Speaker 1: from four years all the way to his you know,
Speaker 1: middle school days, and there's an excellent forward who's who's
Speaker 1: had a thirty two goals, aheader does everything bicycle kicks,
Speaker 1: and then he goes and it becomes a pretty good
Speaker 1: football player. We don't know how many times those those
Speaker 1: headers have impacted the brain. I agree with that, Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's hard to get really like a good uh understanding
Speaker 1: of what happened to anybody individually throughout their whole life.
Speaker 1: At the end of the day, I think we know
Speaker 1: that when you put yourself in situations that you get
Speaker 1: hit in the head often it's probably not the best
Speaker 1: thing for you. But I agree to diagnose it's not
Speaker 1: you know, to diagnose it is like you know, it
Speaker 1: is hard. I have seen guys that have changed though,
Speaker 1: like you know, to the years for sure, like not
Speaker 1: that many, not a lot at all. Just repeated trauma
Speaker 1: that's gonna affect you. Yeah, just a little bit different,
Speaker 1: you know. But I will say I could probably kind
Speaker 1: of argument myself on almost every point though, because I
Speaker 1: also seen them, you know, going out party and doing
Speaker 1: certain drugs. But no one's gonna check their brain, so
Speaker 1: we'll never know. What. Would you want your kids to
Speaker 1: follow your footsteps? Man? Not really? Why not? I live
Speaker 1: I've lived a very crazy, tough life, you know. You know,
Speaker 1: I came out to the other side and it's good.
Speaker 1: But I just wouldn't want my kids don't need to
Speaker 1: do what I you know, what I put myself through.
Speaker 1: And I've had twenty five surgeries, you know. I mean
Speaker 1: I've been like my body is not the way I
Speaker 1: came out of my mom, you know, like it's it's
Speaker 1: it's changed. Yeah, I've been through a lot, So I
Speaker 1: mean I was like, just a lot, a few because
Speaker 1: my wife has them. But give it a shot, all right.
Speaker 1: I got ten knee surgeries, surgeries, m C l p
Speaker 1: C l old lateral meniscus. I'm bone on bone on
Speaker 1: my right knee for sure. It's tin on both our
Speaker 1: tin on not so eight on one two on the
Speaker 1: other around old lateral, old lateral meniscus. I got him
Speaker 1: repaired twice and then got the got old scopes. Just
Speaker 1: cleaning out, just cleaning out, non stop scope scopes. You
Speaker 1: can no more. It blows up now, huh. You know
Speaker 1: what like my I have, I have my knee. My
Speaker 1: right knee is freaking shot. I got osteo fights that
Speaker 1: came up behind the knee. Osteo fights. So basically when
Speaker 1: you have information for a while, when you get information
Speaker 1: for a while in the area, it'll start calcifying and
Speaker 1: it'll turn the bone. So I have some of those
Speaker 1: that started coming behind my knee joint years and years ago.
Speaker 1: I'm talking about college. So for since then, I haven't
Speaker 1: been able to go like full flesh and where you
Speaker 1: bring your heel to your ass. So that's that's that's
Speaker 1: the ass. Alrighty T knee, three hands. So I got
Speaker 1: my hip bone and here my hip bone. So your
Speaker 1: hip bonus connect to your thumbone exactly like it. So
Speaker 1: your hip so it took out your hip and put
Speaker 1: in your thumb. Because that's why my thumb just does this.
Speaker 1: I can't move this part that's fused. That's fused with
Speaker 1: bone infusible plate right there, and that's my hip bone
Speaker 1: in the sand too. That That was my second and
Speaker 1: third metacar bulls um that just kind of exploded in
Speaker 1: the bow start. Bone started fusing, um started fraying on top,
Speaker 1: and they had a shave roll away and fused this.
Speaker 1: It was all over time and it wasn't like it
Speaker 1: just happened this, This was over. This was the first
Speaker 1: year of me fighting. Actually, I would throw my right
Speaker 1: hand like a madman all the time, and your bone,
Speaker 1: your hands aren't meant to be punching, you know, like
Speaker 1: it's not designed for that. So eventually my bones started
Speaker 1: kind of coming up like this, and then they started
Speaker 1: man I started that started. No, it didn't come to
Speaker 1: the skin, but it was coming up. It was coming up.
Speaker 1: I had surgery before it came through the skin. This
Speaker 1: one was a one time shot. It was in my
Speaker 1: fight against Kelvin Gasolin, first first round through a left
Speaker 1: hook as she was coming in and we don't boxing
Speaker 1: gloves anything, so your thumb was exposed and so I
Speaker 1: hate him. It's not like keeping your thumb in with
Speaker 1: the boxing globe, and yeah, pop popped that. It popped
Speaker 1: the bone off the tendon. And then you had to
Speaker 1: keep fighting. Yeah did you you did you puncture that? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I punished. I won that fight. I didn't even feel,
Speaker 1: to be honest, in the fight, you know, like was going.
Speaker 1: I felt it afterwards and I thought I was all right,
Speaker 1: but then I wasn't. I had to get I got
Speaker 1: the X ray and the m R and all that stuff,
Speaker 1: and then I got a surgery the next day. Then
Speaker 1: I had to get another surgery um a few months
Speaker 1: later because the bone didn't take. When they put the
Speaker 1: hip bone in, UM there was so it was such
Speaker 1: a concussive blow. They said that the bones alre deteriorating,
Speaker 1: so there was no blood supply left in the bone
Speaker 1: in my hand. So they had a white more bone
Speaker 1: out and put more hip bone in there too to
Speaker 1: heal that hand up. M I think it's more stiff
Speaker 1: hips and it's thumb and take. He said, I need something.
Speaker 1: I got a lighthead. I got one little lighthead, all right,
Speaker 1: So you got hands? What else? Uh? Two neck surgeries does? So?
Speaker 1: I did uh one artificial disreplacement and I did one.
Speaker 1: Uh like a scope C five C six C six
Speaker 1: C seven C four C four. You had surgery. Uh no,
Speaker 1: I had natural heal burst fracture. Naturally, Oh bait birth fracture,
Speaker 1: burst fracture, explode it that much left in college? Oh jeez.
Speaker 1: So I had to harness, not drilled in my head,
Speaker 1: but harness. But I have no natural bend damn. So
Speaker 1: kind of you're saying, kind of fused. I didn't get
Speaker 1: a fused at that time. I did in ninety ninety nine,
Speaker 1: so they didn't do fusing. I was considered if you
Speaker 1: got a fuse at that time, I considered knock you
Speaker 1: out of being able to play. So it did natural hilly.
Speaker 1: So I was like that for November, December, January, February, March, April,
Speaker 1: so six months in that and then I couldn't do
Speaker 1: I couldn't do any off season um hitting. And so
Speaker 1: basically we find out in August September if I can play. Yeah, now,
Speaker 1: and after that idea shrugs. Still doing shrugs to protect
Speaker 1: my shoulder. So that's all. I will probably be eighty
Speaker 1: years old and I'll still have traps like a mother.
Speaker 1: I won't have anything else that I just had traps.
Speaker 1: Here's a secret. I never told anybody for a long time,
Speaker 1: probably for about three years after. When I would turn
Speaker 1: side to side too quick, I would get a sharp
Speaker 1: pain going up my neck. And he's like, but you
Speaker 1: know you getting paid all that money? You don't that
Speaker 1: is something. So I just did shrugs. That's all I did.
Speaker 1: They said, just got shrugs. So, yeah, that is crazy
Speaker 1: in the NFL, you guys kind of I did in
Speaker 1: college though, which is crazy because you have But so
Speaker 1: they knew about your neck injury, and so that's that
Speaker 1: took me off some boards, some folks boards St. Louis Rams.
Speaker 1: They got Tommy Polly linebacker instead of me and Travis Fisher.
Speaker 1: I love that you remember that. So with all these injuries,
Speaker 1: you got, Chris, like, do you know not all bro?
Speaker 1: The twenty five injures, with all at ease? Do you do?
Speaker 1: You do you worry about any of them? As you
Speaker 1: get older? Like, what's what's your take now? Is you
Speaker 1: as you are older, as you as you think beyond
Speaker 1: I'm screwed in terms of be honest, bro, Like, don't
Speaker 1: don't tell me, Like, yeah, I mean, at the end
Speaker 1: of the day. I'm yeah, from wrestling my whole if
Speaker 1: you know, playing every other sport I played into fighting.
Speaker 1: You know, as long as I've been fighting, the damage
Speaker 1: in my body is not going anywhere, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. Unless they come up with some stem cells
Speaker 1: that cures the whole body and you get a new one.
Speaker 1: I'll be feeling pain, but I don't mind it. I
Speaker 1: don't mind. I don't you know. I deal with pain
Speaker 1: all the time, and me and pain are cool. Do
Speaker 1: you believe USC is the greatest sport in the world? Uh?
Speaker 1: You know. To me, it is, you know, but everybody
Speaker 1: has their opinion. Now who am I to push my
Speaker 1: opinion on anybody? I like this. You know why I
Speaker 1: think it is because no matter where, it's a worldwide
Speaker 1: sport and I like it. No, no, no disrespect. But
Speaker 1: there's no matter where you are in the world, whether
Speaker 1: the richest country to the poorest country, everybody knows what
Speaker 1: the fight is. Everybody circles around that fight and wants
Speaker 1: to watch. So you get every single martial art that's
Speaker 1: ever been around in the history of man. You get
Speaker 1: to bring in with you inside of a cage against
Speaker 1: other people that are doing the same thing. The most
Speaker 1: world class athletes you could, you could, you could line
Speaker 1: coming to come into a cage and see who who
Speaker 1: could do it? Who could outsmart Who who could out tough?
Speaker 1: Who who's the toughest, who's the baddest. All The closest
Speaker 1: thing to the real, closest thing to a real fight
Speaker 1: you could possibly get is the UFC And to to
Speaker 1: put yourself and challenge yourself in that way. I don't
Speaker 1: think there's anything greater, you know, I don't think there's
Speaker 1: any sport like it. I think every every sport, most sports,
Speaker 1: and most athletes, most athletes, I'll say, have that in them,
Speaker 1: Like I think you have it in you. All athletes
Speaker 1: are not. The majority of top athletes have that in them,
Speaker 1: that that in a desire to show that they're the best.
Speaker 1: And what is better than showing that you are the
Speaker 1: toughest motherfucker in the whole on the whole damn planet.
Speaker 1: And everybody knows the rules. No matter what socio economic
Speaker 1: background you come from, you have the same opportunities everybody understands,
Speaker 1: and you get to put it on the line and
Speaker 1: there's no excuses. You don't get if you win, it's
Speaker 1: on you. If you lose this on you. You don't
Speaker 1: get to blame one of the person. And with that,
Speaker 1: my friends, Chris, thanks for being on the Cut to
Speaker 1: A podcast. Thank you. I appreciate it. Guess you are
Speaker 1: a unique person. You are well worth it, you are
Speaker 1: competent and most of all, your lovable. I'm Steve Smith, Singer,
Speaker 1: I'm Gerard Little John and this is cut to It.
Speaker 1: Cut to It with Steve Smith Senior. That Is Me
Speaker 1: is a production of Cut to It LLC, Baltol Creative Media,
Speaker 1: The Black Effect and I Heart Radio. For more podcast
Speaker 1: from I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio Apple
Speaker 1: Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows
Speaker 1: from Cut to It, Executive producer Steve Smith, singr co
Speaker 1: host Gerard Little John, talent in booking manager Joe Fusci,
Speaker 1: Social media team Wesley Robinson and John and show from
Speaker 1: Balto Creative Media. Cut to It is produced by Brian
Speaker 1: Balta Chevic and Meredith Carter, with production assistance by Alex Lebrek,
Speaker 1: Production Coordinator Taylor Robinson. Theme music by Alex Johnson, lyrics
Speaker 1: and vocals by Anthony Hamilton. If you ain't heard about it,
Speaker 1: then we're about to let you know, it's all