August 28, 2023 • 56 mins
The Burn Factory podcast is with no other than UFC Legend Din Thomas! Din Thomas is a former UFC fighter who competed in three different weight divisions. Din Thomas is a UFC 41 Lightweight Tournament Semifinalist. He holds a Black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu under Ricardo Liborio and currently runs two successful Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and MMA academies in Port St. Lucie, Florida. Din Thomas is now on Dana White's Lookin' for a Fight and a cast member of the UFC Live Weigh-in Show!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to The Burn Factory Podcast with Priest and Phoenix Rivera.
Listen as the voice interview the biggest names in sports
and entertainment. The Burn Factory starts.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Now, what is up? Guys? Welcome back to another episode
of the Burn Factory Podcast. I'm your host Priest, drawn
by my co host, my brother, the one and only
Phoenix say it stuff for the camera. What's up?
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Y'all?
Speaker 2 (00:27):
This is called the Burn Factory for a reason. I
was literally caught on fire fifty percent chances to survive,
but through that started this podcast because I believe every
single person out there on this planet goes through burn
moment somewhere in their life.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
You heard pre say a burn moment. So a burn
moment is a super hard time in your life that
you just have to fight and to get through to
ultimately get you where you are today. I mean, Priest,
believe that every single person on this earth go through
burn moments every single day that truly build to who
you are. But what an amazing guest we have today.
This is a guest that I've been wanting for a
(01:01):
very long time. He is a pioneer of mixed martial arts.
He is now one of the most intelligent coaches in
the game. You have seen him on Dana Whites Looking
for a Fight. He's also a UFC and ESPN analyst.
He's also on Serious XM as the host of the
Fight Nations show. And to top it off, this man
is an actor and a comedian.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
So please give a welcome to Dean Thomas. I had
to you have Deen Thomas, and you gotta wow.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
I almost feel like I'm being a pump because this
is too nice. I feel like someone's will jump out
and choking even behind what's going on.
Speaker 5 (01:40):
This is way too nice. This is amazing.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
To be honest, were you shocked whenever you came in.
Speaker 5 (01:45):
I was shocked, you right, I was.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
Shocked because I mean I just met you guys at
the fight last time. He's like, come on the podcast.
I'm thinking, oh, here we go. Just want to be
in a little hotel room, little stick mic. But this
is this is I'm blown away by the production here.
This is amazing.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
Thank you appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (02:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
If you guys know, we met Dean Thomas back at
UFC two eighty nine in Vancouver. We told him about
the podcast and he said he's down to do it
and look at us now. So you're a comedian.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Yes, well I'm not very funny, but okay, I've seen
every episode of Dana White's Looking for a Fight.
Speaker 4 (02:19):
You're pretty damn I mean, you know, I just you know,
I've done comedy improv. Not I've done some stand up,
but I've done a lot of improv. You know, we
get on to pretend to do be different things. I've
done that for over a decade. So that's where my
comedy comes from.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Can you tell us a joke? Well, you got, you
just gotta be fly with it. I guess yeah, when
did that kind of start?
Speaker 4 (02:46):
I started doing improv? Well, first off, I started acting
in like two thousand and five as just a way
to get more comfortable in front of a camera because
as a fighter, like that's part like performance is performance.
It doesn't matter whether you're fighting, public speaking. Acting, performance
is performance being able to focus and deliver. So I
(03:07):
figured that acting would be a good way for me
to work on that performance muscle.
Speaker 5 (03:13):
And so I said, you know what, I'm gonna start acting.
Speaker 4 (03:15):
And I started doing that, and then during that time,
my fight career started to take off a little bit.
So then I had to put the acting aside, but
I still liked the performance side of that.
Speaker 5 (03:26):
So improv you don't have to remember scripts.
Speaker 4 (03:30):
You just go out and do it. So I said,
I'm gonna do improv because I don't have to remember anything.
Speaker 5 (03:35):
I just show up and learn how it works.
Speaker 4 (03:38):
And so I started doing that, and that's kind of
how I got in that improv.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
Do you do any school plays?
Speaker 5 (03:43):
No, I never did. But I've done a lot of
theater though.
Speaker 4 (03:45):
I've done a lot of theater, like community theater, stuff
like that, and I've done a lot of improv.
Speaker 5 (03:50):
I mean embarrassing improv. I mean like when I say embarrassing, embarrassing.
Speaker 4 (03:56):
But that's part of doing improv though, is not being afraid.
Speaker 5 (04:00):
And that's and that has carried me.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
All the way to where I am now, like doing
things for Dana White and everybody's like, man, you got
you got you know cohona is you're doing this?
Speaker 5 (04:09):
I'm like, man, it's is improv.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Do you think if you didn't do improv your life
would be totally different.
Speaker 5 (04:13):
It'd be totally different, for sure, It'd be totally different.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
And you know, we I've done gorilla improv and that
is where you go on the street.
Speaker 5 (04:21):
So we I live in West Palm Beach, just where.
Speaker 4 (04:23):
Where I do my stuff at. We go on the
street downtown and we just when people are eating it,
like out outside the bar, we just do improv for them. Really,
we just walk up and go, all right, we're gonna
do some improv for y'all. Give us a suggestion, and
then we just start doing improv.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
You said you've done some embarrassing improv. What's probably the
most embarrassing.
Speaker 4 (04:42):
I mean, that's pretty embarrassing just walking up to people,
like and they're just trying to either eat a meal
and we're like we're and they're like, get out of here,
you know. So yeah, so that's pretty embarrassing. And the
one time, so another story I had is when my
son was really young, he was probably about seven or eight,
I did a show in Miami and it was so embarrassing.
I mean it was like, no one laughed. It was
(05:03):
just so And then my son was there. It was
his first time being there, and when we got done,
we get in the car, he's like, Dad, you guys
were so bad. I was like, I know, it's embarrassing, Well.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
Does it at the moment whenever you tell something no
one laughs, what do you do? Do you just like
kind of like fold or.
Speaker 5 (05:17):
No, you just I mean, it's part of the part
of the games, part of the territory, you know.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
So so when I did some stand up to and
same thing, I mean, I was just kind of used
to it. Like you tell a joke and it doesn't
go for a while, You're all right, move past to
get past it.
Speaker 5 (05:30):
But you know, I doesn't stand.
Speaker 4 (05:31):
I was a comedy special on Fight Pass with Adam Hunter,
so that was cool. So it was me is Adam
Hunter's comedy special on Fight Pass, Me, Henri sa Hudo,
Chall's Sonning and Adam all went up and did a show.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
So we'll have to go check that out. I don't
think i've seen it.
Speaker 5 (05:47):
No, you check it out fight Pass.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
It's don't fight It's out there.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
We'll have to go check We'll go check it out.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
But so on this podcast, we do use the acting
and burn. So each letter is a different time in
your life. So B stands for beginning. Take us back
to the beginning your childhood. Were there any burn moments
that you had to overcome that ultimately got you to
where you are?
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Today.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Well, I mean so b and then the U is
the which one unfortunately unfortunate, and then the R is
the ridiculous ridiculous and then and then now I'm kind
of the same, right, yeah, in their own way way,
So yeah, take us to the beginning. In the beginning,
I was, I was born, and I grew up in Delaware,
(06:29):
a small town. I just went back the other day
sell some my old buddies, so I mean that was cool,
but yeah, small town. Then I eventually moved to Florida
when I was thirteen. So and I moved to Florida
because my father and my mother split because he was
an alcoholic, so they you know, they separated. I moved
to Florida with my mother. Me and my brothers and
(06:52):
sisters moved to Florida and then grew up in the
sticks of Florida. So essentially, I grew up in like
these small towns, and I think that helped me personally
because I had to figure things out on my own,
so I was very independent. I had to figure I
had to figure stuff out on my own. So even
when I first moved to Florida, I had to teach myself.
(07:14):
I taught myself how to cut hair.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Me and my brother.
Speaker 5 (07:16):
Me and my brother, we needed it.
Speaker 4 (07:18):
We need a hair because I taught myself out of
ca hair. So all through high school I was a barber.
I had a barbershop in my mother's garage. And that
was how I put I mean for.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
A high school kid, I was banking too, but.
Speaker 4 (07:30):
I was banking in high school because I was I
had a barbershop.
Speaker 5 (07:34):
I taught myself out to cut hair and taught myself
how to.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
Have a bar and you know, run a business.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
Yeah, high school, how did you even like know how
to cut hair? Just watching shows or I went.
Speaker 4 (07:45):
I was like, you know, when we first moved, we
didn't have a barber. I was like, man, we need
to go buy some clippers. And then it just starting practicing.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
It's hard.
Speaker 3 (07:52):
It's like our entire family as a hair stylist as barbers.
My mom was a hair stylist. My cousin are barbers.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
I can tell.
Speaker 5 (08:02):
Yeah, yeah, it got the nice little locks.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
Yeah, he just lets it go. But it's very difficult.
Like I've tried it once on like a little mannequin.
This hard, like it takes a lot of practice to be.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
Able to get good at it, Yeah, and so then
and then when I first started fighting, I was, you know,
I was a licensed barber, so like I had went
to school, got my license to cut hair, and that's
what I thought I was going to do. I thought
I was going to open a barber shop and just
be a barber. That's what I thought. But at the
same time, like I was fighting. So and then the
UFC did what it did, and now.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
Here we are, what age did you start fighting at.
Speaker 5 (08:36):
As soon as I graduated high school?
Speaker 4 (08:37):
That probably goes into my unfortunate situation though, So that's
what I'm saying. It's all kind of intertwined. Yeah, you know, so,
but in the beginning, it was just, you know, I
was just a shy, quiet little kid who uh very introverted,
but introspective from being introverted. So that's why it was.
I don't want to say it was easy for me
(08:58):
to teach myself how to cut hair. But being not
you know, not being not being so influenced by my
external stimuli, just being always like internal, it was I
was able to teach myself, like I hard, teach myself
how to do a lot of things like fighting. That's
how I even got started in fighting, Like, I didn't
have an instructor.
Speaker 5 (09:17):
I didn't go to a school or gym.
Speaker 4 (09:19):
It was like I bought tapes and me and my
boys was in the backyard practicing. That was the beginning. Yeah,
that was the beginning, and I was winning fights off
of that.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
How long until you finally got into a stable like
team or like Jim.
Speaker 4 (09:35):
I had actually did do what I was doing until
I was and I was even teaching. Wow, So like
that's like as a coach now I'm not. Just like
my entire career, I had been teaching and coaching guys
because like I had to teach all my sparing partners
how to do it, so I have sparing partners. So
I didn't really join the team until I had already
(09:57):
fought in the UFC. I had fun like right after
I fought Bjpen. Yeah, after I fought Bjpen.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Wow, So you're completely so.
Speaker 4 (10:06):
Up to that point, Yeah, I was pretty much self taught,
just going to different like every cell often go to
different gyms and beat up guys in different gyms.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Is it true that you say that you're a better
coach than you're a fighter.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
Yeah for sure.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
What makes that.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
Just because I think I could have been a really
good fighter, but I didn't have someone like me to
validate what I was doing because I was so out
of the box. Me and al Jamine Starling was talking
about this yesterday that like he does things so different,
but everybody wants him to do things the traditional way.
(10:40):
Like he's like, man, I can't box like a boxer.
I'm not going to do it, and they're trying to
get me to box like a boxer, and I said,
you absolutely cannot do that, because that's what happened in
my career. In my career, I was so out of
the box because I taught myself how to do things,
and then when I started working with more traditional people,
they put me back into this box in which I
was no good. And then I can recall losing fights
(11:04):
by trying to fight a style that didn't suit me.
So for me, I was like, you know what, I
got to stay and do what I'm doing. So as
a coach, I don't try to put anybody in a box.
I find out what I think they're good at, and
I fix it. I think of myself as more like
a scientist or a doctor, and when you go to
a doctor, you know, you got to figure out what's
(11:24):
wrong with you.
Speaker 5 (11:25):
You know, if you got this.
Speaker 4 (11:27):
Ailment, you got to take this prescription, you got that one.
Some of them might look the same, but you can't
take the same thing. So as a coach, I look
at that and go, this is your problem. You can't
just go to a boxing class and fix it. You
got to fix it with this. So that's why I
think I'm a better coach than I onet fighter.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
Do you think more coaches need to kind of develop
that mindset?
Speaker 4 (11:47):
It's hard because their ego gets involved, and their ego
and their tradition of where they where they came from,
their upbringing. So like you, if you come from a
wrestling background, you're always going to filter the game of
MMA through wrestling, which is why so you know, I
work on the broadcast with DC, and DC is always like, they.
Speaker 5 (12:07):
Gotta get up, they gotta get up. They're on the back,
they gotta get up.
Speaker 4 (12:10):
It doesn't work, they gotta get up because he's always
going to filter the game of MMA through wrestling. Me
I never had a background, so I don't filter it
through anything. I filter it through what works, what works
at the highest percentage, and that's how I filter the game.
Speaker 3 (12:26):
I feel like that affects fighters too, because you see
sometimes they're bouncing around gyms continuously trying to just find
that coach that's gonna take them and develop their style better.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
And it's hard to because like, but that's a problem too,
because a lot of fighters don't want to be accountable
for their own thing. And what they're doing is they're looking,
they're seeking the answer, but really the answer might be
within themselves that they just need to sit down and
listen to somebody. Anybody.
Speaker 2 (12:48):
Yeah they did that extra support, Yeah, different eyes.
Speaker 4 (12:51):
But yeah, but oftentimes, you know, they'll go to one
gym and then it doesn't work out, and then they'll
blame everybody at the gym and then go to another
gym and blame everybody, but the reality is it might
be themselves. So and that's the one thing I always
tell fighters is you have to be accountable, like everything
you do, there's every So I was in Philly, I
was working with Sean Brady and before he got hurt,
(13:12):
and even when he got hurt.
Speaker 5 (13:13):
I was like still teaching the classes.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
I was like this, I just want to teach and
I and my main thing is this when you're out
there and fighting that you have to be accountable. You
can't be like, oh this guy was too strong, he
was too fast. You got to be accountable. You got to.
Speaker 5 (13:25):
Find a way to make it work. That is it.
There is a way, you gotta find it. You just
have to be accountable.
Speaker 4 (13:32):
But when you start pointing the finger at everybody else,
you can't be accountable and you can't fix your problems
because you're already relying on somebody else to fix it
for you. You got to be accountable, and that goes
for anything in life.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
How many fighters do you coach?
Speaker 4 (13:44):
Not many? Now I work with just a couple, you know.
I just work with a couple now, Like I still
work with Gillian Robertson. I've been working with Sean Brady,
a couple of guys in Bellatoor, JJ Wilson and Darien Caldwell.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
But just a couple as a as a hard bouncing
around from different states while they're in camp somewhere, and
someone else might being camp.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
No no, And I mean that may just be me
not want me and my commitment issues, and I don't
want to I don't really want to be committed to anybody.
I've done that for a long time and that thought
and that was a problem for me too. That was
one of the reasons why I wanted to leave American
Top Team because I was a coach for Like I
had American Top Team gyms for a long time and
then when I was a coach for him for about
five years, just a full time coach. It was a
(14:27):
problem for me because I always wanted to work with
different people and in this game is information based and
I just feel like it's education and information just like
going to school, and to hold on to it is selfish.
So I was like, well, I don't want to just
sit here and just like coach these guys, Like there's
other people out there that could use this information, and
if I can't get it to him, you know, I'm
(14:48):
not doing the world of service. We're not going to
see the best of the best. Like that's what I
want when I see a fight. I love watching Volkanovski
fight because he delivers and he gives you stuff, and
like I love to watch that performance and if I
can be a part of helping somebody fight that way,
I'll do it.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Fulkanowski is a bull man. He's not scared to take
a fight.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
Yeah, no, he doesn't. He doesn't point the finger anyways.
Like when he lost to Islam, he was not pointing
a finger, like, oh, he was bigger than he's heavier
than me.
Speaker 4 (15:17):
He was like, he's the better man, yea. And that's
why I like watching him fight. He's accountable for his actions.
He does what he gotta do and and he's a
great fighter because of it. And pound for pound right now, yeah,
for sure, for sure.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
All right, Dan, it's time to go to you and burn.
It's unfortunate. There's a lot of unfortunate burn moments that happened,
but through those unfortunate burn moments, some of the best
burn moments come out of it. Unfortunately, I was caught
in a school science experiment by my teacher. It was
a fire, blew up in my face. Spent a week
and ICU had seven surgeries and a fifty percent chance
(15:51):
to survive because if burns, the swelling around the neck
it's so bad and that they're worried that I was
gonna like my breathing was gonna stop. But in the hospital,
I found my burn moment. So I'm a competitive golfer
and I had my family, go get my putter all
hooked up to all the IV's. My face swelled shut,
couldn't even see out of my left eye, and I
(16:13):
would put three balls into a glass star for hours
and hours. And that's when I was like, you know what,
I'm gonna get out of this hospital and I'm gonna
go take this unfortunate burn moment and make it into
the greatest comeback ever. And now I got a Burn
Factory podcast.
Speaker 5 (16:31):
So look at you. I mean, that's all inspiring.
Speaker 4 (16:34):
I mean, that's kind of the reason why I'm here
because when y'all told me that story, I was good
and I was.
Speaker 5 (16:37):
Like, ah, I got to do the show.
Speaker 4 (16:40):
But but yeah, So my unfortunate story goes back to
when I was in high school.
Speaker 5 (16:44):
So I was dating a girl and.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Like, I don't know how old are you, seventeen, I.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
Was your age. Okay, I was your age, but I
have been dating her for a couple of years. And
when you're seventeen, you dated to go for a couple years.
That's a couple of decades. Understand that that's a big
portion of your life. So, like we were in love
and but then as my senior year in high school.
You know, we thought we were going to break up
because we were going to go in different directions. So
she started seeing another guy. And and when you're seventeen,
(17:10):
somebod I started seeing another guy. That's like life and death.
That's like, you know, it broke my heart. It killed me.
Broke my heart. So, like any juvenile delinquent, I had
to take matters into my own hands. And like your
situation was an unfortunate situation, mine was totally wrong on
my part. So I took it upon my own self
(17:30):
to hit the dude in the head with a wrench.
Speaker 5 (17:32):
Oh yeah, I hit him in the head with a wrench.
Speaker 4 (17:35):
And I ended up going to jail and having to
do a little time, and I couldn't go to college,
couldn't do anything from it, so I had to stay
home and eventually did fifty weekends in jail. We're going
on Friday, spend the night, spend two nights in there,
and then come out on Sunday. I did that for
a year.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
How hard is that?
Speaker 4 (17:55):
It was very difficult because it was like, partially I
was like, yeah, I should just you know, I should
just do three months straight.
Speaker 5 (18:04):
But then I don't know if I can.
Speaker 4 (18:05):
Do that either.
Speaker 5 (18:06):
So I was like, all right, I'll do the weekends.
Speaker 4 (18:08):
So but but during weekends, it taught you a lot
about time and patience, right, and learning how to just
be like being able to sit with yourself and be patient.
Speaker 5 (18:16):
But going to jail every weekend for a year sucks.
I mean it sucks.
Speaker 4 (18:20):
And it was to the point where like it was
so boring you look forward to like they allow you
to have like going out and picking up trash, and
I was like, just go pick up trash. It sucks,
but it sucks. But yeah, but that was my unfortunate situation.
I had to deal with that, and I had to
sit and live with myself knowing that I did that
for like no reason, for like a really stupid reason.
(18:40):
But this was about the same time where I first
saw the UFC, So really at the end of the day,
having to sit with myself really kind of drove me
towards the UFC a little more.
Speaker 5 (18:56):
And then that's when I was like, I'm gonna learn how.
Speaker 4 (18:58):
To do this. So I coudn't leave, couldn't do nothing,
couldn't go to work. So I was use that unfortunate
situation kind of learn how to fight.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
Yeah, so you're saying, if that whole situation doesn't happen,
you won't be in the UFC.
Speaker 4 (19:11):
Right if that situation doesn't happen, I'm not here right now. Moment, Yeah, crazy,
that's my burn moment.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Was during the toughest time of going to juvenile jail
over the weekends. Was there one particular thing that just
made you happy that brought joy to you during that
toughest time.
Speaker 4 (19:33):
No, not really, no, I mean it was nothing about
that that made me happy, But looking back, it was necessary.
It's necessary because I needed to sit in it. I
needed to sit in it, and I needed to be like,
all right, this is how you focus. Otherwise, like you
(19:53):
get distractions come easy, You can get distracted easily.
Speaker 5 (19:57):
But having being forced to.
Speaker 4 (19:59):
Not leave the county, couldn't leave the county, had to
show up to jail every Friday, I had to sit
in it. So having to sit in it forced me
to learn how to focus.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Were you in school during this time?
Speaker 4 (20:13):
This is This was in the summer of I had
planned to go to college, and this the year right
after I graduated, so I was out of school and
that happened as soon as school ended and I was. Yeah.
So like I spent my first year out of high
school dealing with legal issues. So yeah, but again necessary
(20:34):
because I had to sit in that and I had
to learn how to be by myself, and I had
to learn how to do things by myself, which I
already had, you know, felt like I was pretty good at,
like I said, teaching myself, like I heard doing this.
Speaker 5 (20:46):
But so then I just.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
Used that time to just study fighting. And I was
studying fighting way back then.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
What was that last day? Like last day, I.
Speaker 4 (20:57):
Was like, y'all can kiss my plea.
Speaker 5 (21:00):
Yeah, that last day was great. I mean I was like,
I ain't.
Speaker 4 (21:03):
But also to I guess, if there's any one good
thing about it is that people who go to jail,
they know right away like either jail either you can
do it or you can't. But once you walk in there,
you're like, I.
Speaker 5 (21:14):
Can't do it.
Speaker 4 (21:14):
The same for me. And now I know, like I
don't do nothing. I'm not spitting on the sidewalk, I
won't do anything illegal because I know I don't ever
ever want to go back because it's not for me.
Some people don't mind. Like I used to see people
come and go and they just don't care. And that's
how it is for some people. Some people don't care.
But for me, once you step foot in that place,
that is it. I ain't never.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Going back, for sure. I can't even imagine that I'd
be the same way if I went, I would just
obey by nothing. I don't even throw kind of what
you say, gum on the side, I don't even do nothing,
roof follower. Yeah, exactly what was the what was the
go to meal after right when you got out? Was
this some fast food restaurant?
Speaker 5 (21:53):
Probably know I was poor, you know what I'm saying,
so like Burger King was my thing?
Speaker 4 (21:57):
You know, Burger King?
Speaker 2 (21:59):
Yeah, what's to go to at Burger King.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
At the time, even still kind of now, at the
time it was it was chicken sandwiches.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Chicken in fact, that my.
Speaker 5 (22:07):
Whole my whole fight career, that was my go to.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Really.
Speaker 4 (22:10):
Yeah, like you know nowadays, you know, everybody's scientific, everybody
got nutrition. Listen, back in the day I was, I
was going through because I used to live across the
street from the University of Central Florida, and there was
a McDonald's or Burger King, like right around the corner.
Speaker 5 (22:27):
And after practice hit up that Burger.
Speaker 4 (22:29):
King and they were a dollar at the time. I
was like, give me three of them, some barbecue sauce.
That was my.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
Meal, barbecueways. It's like twelve bucks.
Speaker 5 (22:39):
Yeah, nowadays it's expensive.
Speaker 4 (22:41):
Yeah, it's expensive now, so like I might as well
just eat I might as well eat decent now because
it's you know, expensive to eat. Uh, your fast food.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Yeah, he's like that.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
He's he's all in the McDonald's and like that.
Speaker 5 (22:54):
Did you ever get the.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
Chicken fries from Burger King? I never had, never had
got try.
Speaker 5 (22:59):
I gotta do.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
You like spicy food sometimes, Okay, get the spicy ones.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
They're not too hot. You gotta try them. They're really
really good.
Speaker 4 (23:06):
I gotta try to.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Was your chicken what your chicken sand much better than
the sheet balls you ate on Dana White Contender series
actually didn't.
Speaker 4 (23:14):
Work that bad. You like, you can fry anything. Listen,
you fry anything. It tastes pretty good. Like I said,
you just fry it and it just you don't even
taste it. You just taste like it just tat like fried.
Whatever you do everything on that show. Yeah, well, I
mean I have to, you know, like that's my thing.
That I have to because Dana ain't gonna do it,
(23:36):
and Matt that Matt is the most Matt won't do anything.
He doesn't want to do nothing, nothing, He won't do
anything he doesn't want to do.
Speaker 5 (23:45):
You can't talk him into anything.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
The peer pressure won't work.
Speaker 4 (23:48):
Nope. You know it was it was so weird, like
and this is so we were on we did Rogan
a few weeks ago.
Speaker 5 (23:55):
Okay, so yeah, so we did Rogan a few weeks ago.
Speaker 4 (23:58):
And when we got the opportunity to do that, Like
I was talking to Joe and he's like, yo, you
think Matt will come on?
Speaker 5 (24:03):
I was like, I don't know, man, Matt don't go nowhere.
He doesn't. He doesn't leave Long Island. He's like, Matt,
don't go nowhere.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
He's just all isolated. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (24:10):
So then so then Joe Rogan texts Matt and say, hey,
you want to do the show? If Matt text me's
like yo, who is this just really? I was like yeah,
He's like, man, I'll do it. So I'm like Joe Rogan,
you know, so it had to talk him into that?
Speaker 2 (24:25):
Was it awkward being with Matt? Sarah though, since you
fought him in the UFS.
Speaker 4 (24:28):
No, no, no, no, I mean Matt's like my best friend. Yea,
for sure, He's my best friend for sure. I mean
we have we have a lot of history that goes
back over twenty years and just you know, because he
was his roommate was a Hadrigo Gracie, and I had
a grappling match with Hardrigo Gracy and Danbury, Connecticut in
(24:51):
I think it's like year two thousand and he broke
my elbow obviously lost the match. Yeah, And then that
same year Matt Sarah had a grappling mat from my
roommate Paul Rodriguez for in the Abu Dhabi Trials to
go to Abu Dhabi, and he choked my roommate out,
so like Matt had already. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (25:09):
So Matt has always been like one up.
Speaker 4 (25:11):
On me for you know, all of our careers. So
when we fought, it was a split decision and they
announced him as the winner inside the octagon. Then ten
minutes later they came back and told me that I
had actually won, that the judge got it wrong, he
had scored it wrong. He scored his, he put his,
he put the scores for Matt on my side.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
And yeah, he switched the speak the car.
Speaker 4 (25:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
So were you already in the back at that time.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
Yeah, we were in the back when anyone else me
as the winner.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Oh, that's gonna be crazy. I was talking about emotions.
Speaker 4 (25:40):
Yeah, I know. It was like because I'm down, I'm
like yeah, but they announced him to win.
Speaker 5 (25:44):
I was like I couldn't believe it. I was like,
how did this happen?
Speaker 4 (25:47):
Couldn't believe it? And then when they told me I one,
I was like yes, So then that's why I only.
There was an episode of Dana White looking for a fight.
We were in Sturgis. I went and got a tattoo
on my arms right here and says, hey, Matt, I won.
Speaker 3 (25:57):
So like, yeah, hey Matt.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
What was the reaction to that?
Speaker 5 (26:03):
He was like, man, you're so stupid.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
When did you get this year?
Speaker 5 (26:08):
I just got that that it was a couple of
years ago.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
I didn't hurt it.
Speaker 4 (26:12):
Oh yeah, you.
Speaker 5 (26:14):
Know I got.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
I got like the worst tattoos because they hurt. People
get tattoos and like I'm like, I don't know how
to I don't know how these people get tattoos. It
hurts so bad. And they're like you're going to get
that finished. I'm like, it's finished.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
How mad you have?
Speaker 4 (26:29):
Oh one? I have about five, but they're all small
and and cheesy. They're like prison tattoos. Yeah yeah, Like
if I told you'all got it in prison, you believe me.
They're all small and cheesy.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
That's crazy coming from a fighter though, because people think
fighters are so tough because they just get hit in
the head constantly. They're bleeding, but getting a tattoo it
still hurts.
Speaker 5 (26:49):
No. See, that's the misconception about fighting, is it.
Speaker 4 (26:51):
It's not that painful really, and if you're doing it right,
it shouldn't be that painful because your job is to
protect yourself. Like that should be your as a fighter,
your number one job. I know how it looks on
TV where guys are killing each other, but that's because
like they just have a hard time protecting themselves or that,
you know, that's whatever their training is. But your number
(27:13):
one job should be to protect yourself. That's why I
won't do pro wrestling, because your job in pro wrestling
is to get hurt. So like for fighting, it's my
job is to protect myself. So I'm trying not to
get hurt. So they yeah, I'm not getting hurt.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
I see, did you ever get knocked out? Feeling?
Speaker 4 (27:31):
Oh? It felt great, It was amazing. It was actually
it was actually my very first fight in the UFC.
It was against BJ Penn. And you know, so because
I was the I was the dude at that time.
I was the I was the big deal, like BJ
was just a jiu jitsu guy, so like I was
the favorite. It was in New York. It was the
(27:52):
co main event and the main event was Tito Warts
and Elvis CINISI so is UFC thirty too, So I
was the big I was the big deal at the time.
And uh, I go out there, I'm fighting BJ Man.
I tried to take his head off. I threw the
biggest punch I've ever thrown in my life because I
thought I tried to fake with the right, I'll try
(28:12):
to move his head over, and I threw the biggest
left I was.
Speaker 5 (28:16):
But I missed, and he because he.
Speaker 4 (28:18):
Didn't fall for the fake.
Speaker 5 (28:21):
Yeah I didn't. I didn't sell a fake good enough.
And I threw the punch.
Speaker 4 (28:25):
I missed, and then as a jiu jitsu guy, I
was expecting him to duck under the punch and try
to shoot. So at that moment after I missed, my
natural reaction was to stop the shot, so I put
my head down and instead of shooting, he's gonna throw knee.
Speaker 5 (28:42):
Why he ain't throwing me? So he so I had
a boom and knocked out.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
I was out, like I just I do remember like
the world kind of spinning, and then I just then
I remember waking up in the back.
Speaker 5 (28:58):
I don't remember walking out.
Speaker 4 (28:59):
I don't. I had to watch that on TV. I
don't remember walking out of the octon. I watched that
on TV, but I do remember being in the back
and the doctor going what month is it?
Speaker 5 (29:09):
And I was like, it's March, but it was June. Oh,
I remember saying.
Speaker 4 (29:14):
That, and then I and then it goes blank again,
and then I remember being in the ambulance going to
the hospital going Then that's when I really woke up,
and I remember going, oh, no, what happened? And all
I can think about was, oh, we got to do
this again. This can't be real. We got to go back,
and I was like, tell him, call him back and
tell him I'm ready to go down right now, go down,
(29:37):
Tell Murdy to go down. But then then I think
about it going. Man, that felt pretty good, girl, you know,
I felt like a good rest. It was amazing.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Do you think it's true that people that like don't
get knocked out for so long in the UF and
then they finally get clipped, they just keep getting clipped
after that, or.
Speaker 4 (29:52):
Sometimes that happens, like you you can lose your chin,
and I mean we've seen eventually you lose your chin,
and we've seen that happen over and over again, like
Chuck Liddell is a prime example. Like you can pluck
him now and he'll go down, but eventually, like once
you start, but once you get knocked out the first time,
it's like opening Pandora's box, it becomes easier after that.
So like that's why it's important to.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
You feel like relieved after yeah, like almost like almost
like I know, like now like there's no fear going
into the fight, but.
Speaker 5 (30:20):
Of getting knocked out.
Speaker 4 (30:21):
No no, no, no no, Like I mean you kind
of want your chin, like you kind of you kind
of want a chin.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
I feel like once you get knocked out, though, it
completely changes you, Like you become a little bit more
reactive than proactive.
Speaker 4 (30:33):
You absolutely, And I remember so when I was on
The Ultimate Fighter. I remember Mikey Burnett, who actually fought
in the house. He was talking to me and he
was like, man, ever since He's like, before you knock
bj out, you were a killer that afterwards you kind
of stopped and that's what happens, like you get a
little gunshot because you don't want it to happen again.
And that's what it was. And it wasn't the feeling
(30:54):
of gett knocked out. It was just the embarrassment. Yeah,
that's why, Like when God's get knocked out, like you
see like Michael and get knocked down and he's like,
I'm like, man, how does he come back from that?
These guys come back from the Like for me, I
was like, if I get knocked out like that one
more time, I can't go back home.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
Starts so hard mentally too, Like just the embarrassment, like
you say, of letting your team down and letting people down.
Speaker 4 (31:19):
Yeah, because like everybody's watching, Like that's how it was
for me because this was in a time like right
now the UFC is accessible, we watching.
Speaker 5 (31:26):
On I watched it on a plane.
Speaker 4 (31:28):
I'm like what, But when I had thought it was
the first time it was back on TV back on
pay per view because it John senator John McCain had
gotten it off TV. This was the first one back
on TV. So I'm like, Yo, watch the show. I'm
fighting this dude, watch watch it. And I remember even
like I was hype. I remember, you know what's his name,
Dennis Rodman was at the arena and I'm like, I
(31:48):
was like, Dennis, I'm about to go fight.
Speaker 5 (31:49):
Go watch this fight. And then afterwards I was like, oh.
Speaker 4 (31:52):
Man, I can't believe everybody saw it. I was like
everybody saw. I was like, how do I go home
from this? It sucked?
Speaker 2 (31:58):
Yeah, I can't even imagine what the next day, Well speak,
what is it like the next day after Afriget? Not yet? Oh?
Speaker 4 (32:04):
Your weekend is ruined. Like you're just like, you're just
you don't want to do anything. How do you come
out of that? It took me a couple of months.
It took me a couple of months to come out
of that. Really, it took me a couple of months
because I remember I was like, so, but this was
the first time where I actually so like. After that,
I went to SO I got another fight book. So
(32:24):
that was in June.
Speaker 5 (32:25):
I got another fight booked in Vegas.
Speaker 4 (32:27):
It was the first fight in Las Vegas history, so
and that was in September. So I spent September, the
first part of September in Los Angeles training for the
first time. And then on September eleventh, nine eleven was
the day wore my ticket. I was supposed to come
(32:48):
back go back home to Florida. Nine to eleven happened.
I got stuck in Los Angeles for a week. So
I'm in Los Angeles, stuck in Los Angeles for a week,
trying to prepare for a fight that it was happening
in September twenty eight.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
So they ended up getting pushed at all or no, No,
we still did the fight.
Speaker 4 (33:06):
We still still got to fight, but I could there
were no flights leaving during that time for a whole week,
so I got stuck in Los Angeles.
Speaker 5 (33:13):
I had to hang out in Los Angeles for a.
Speaker 4 (33:14):
Week, just kind of bumming around training when I could,
And it kind of sucked.
Speaker 5 (33:18):
But again, but like I was prepared.
Speaker 4 (33:21):
You know why I was prepared because I did fifty
two weekends in jail, so like nothing at that. So yeah,
that's what I'm saying. So like every time something bad
happens now. But man, I did fifty two weekends in jail. Yeah,
this is nothing.
Speaker 3 (33:33):
Yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Cl kind of like I was saying earlier, the unfortunate
burn moments can really help you in the future.
Speaker 5 (33:39):
I always draw back on it, so I'm thinking, oh,
this is nothing. You know, this is sure better than
being in jail.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
This portion of the Burn Factory podcast is sponsored by
Phoenix Salon Suites. Please visit Phoenix Salon Suites at p
H E n i X Salon's s A l O
N Sweets s U I T E S to find
one near you. We are gonna move on to r
now our sands. For ridiculous you kind of alluded a
(34:07):
little bit Dana White looking for a fight and eating
those what were they sheep testicles?
Speaker 5 (34:11):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (34:12):
And uh so were there any more ridiculous burn moments
that you have gone through in your career?
Speaker 4 (34:17):
I mean, my whole career is pretty ridiculous, Like just
to be to be doing this now. I find it
to be ridiculous because you know, the game now is
so different than it was before. I mean it was
so wild wild West. To see where it is now,
to see everybody making a life style happen because of
this game is crazy. It's tremendously ridiculous. But the fact
(34:40):
that I got on Dana White looking for looking for fight,
it's pretty ridiculous, because I mean, I don't even know
how I really got on that show. I remember I
was training Amanda Newness to fight Valentina Chefchank or No,
she was fighting me Shoulit Tate for the title. I
was training Amanda for that, and I got a phone
(35:01):
call from a seven oh two number and I'm like, man,
who is this? I don't know who that is? Hung
up on him, and then Matt Sarah sends me a text, Hey, man, listen,
Dana's trying to call you. Dana Who Dana White.
Speaker 5 (35:13):
I'm like, what did I do?
Speaker 4 (35:16):
Yeah? I was like what did I do? And then
he goes sitting and I'm like all right. So then
I called him back. I said what's up. He's like,
He's like, Deane, what's happening. I'm like, what's up. He's like,
you ever seen the show looking for a Fight? I
was like, of course I have. I didn't, and he's like, well,
you know, our third guy can't do it. Anymore, would
(35:37):
you like to do it? I was like, of course,
you kidding me, and he goes, all right, but the
catches you gotta leave tomorrow. I was like, I got
my bag packed in the car. I had the bag
packed in the car because I'm always ready, always ready,
And he sent me a ticket. I was on the
show the next day. I was on the show.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
It was the first episode.
Speaker 4 (35:55):
The first episode was Los Angeles, and that was the
first time where I actually did stand up comedy because.
Speaker 5 (36:00):
That was the episode where we did stand up. Three
this we all did stand up comedy. And I was like,
and I ain't gonna lie.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
Man.
Speaker 4 (36:07):
That was a I mean, because I had I had
done a tremendous amount of improv, but that's different. You're
on stage where people and you're just acting out scenes.
But like to get on stage and look out in
front of a crowd and tell them listen, I'm funny,
I'm gonna make you laugh, and then and then do
it was hard. Like I was like, I was nervous.
I was really nervous. But would help me from not
being as nervous was watching Dana be nervous.
Speaker 5 (36:30):
I mean, he was back there, his hands was shaken.
Speaker 4 (36:33):
He was, and he had somebody write his jokes.
Speaker 5 (36:39):
His whole set, and he was still nervous.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
I was just already asked you that, did you already
know what you're gonna plan to say during the comedy?
Speaker 5 (36:46):
I didn't know what we were doing. I didn't know
what we were doing.
Speaker 4 (36:49):
Like so when I got there, they were like, all right,
so here's here's what's onny itinerary. And they're like, we're
going to Randy's Donuts and make donuts. We're doing this,
and then we're going to do a comedy set at
the Laugh Factory. I was like, wait, what, like so
so right a set?
Speaker 5 (37:04):
I was like what I was like a.
Speaker 4 (37:06):
Real comedy show. And it was a real show, like
they had David Spade was the headliner. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
Yeah, it was a big time.
Speaker 5 (37:15):
It was a big time show.
Speaker 2 (37:16):
Kind of like the hot dog getting contest, you and
Matt Sarah.
Speaker 4 (37:21):
Pizza, so that that whole hot dog thing.
Speaker 5 (37:25):
Man, I totally let myself.
Speaker 4 (37:26):
Eating hot dogs is a lot harder than you think, Like,
you know, Fourth of July come around. You just pounded
hot dogs and I got this. But when you when
you're under pressure, it's a lot harder than it looks.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
And you know, you probably didn't even get hungry because
there's so much pressure.
Speaker 5 (37:39):
Yeah, yeah, I wasn't hungry.
Speaker 4 (37:41):
I almost sitting there like, yeah, I got this, and
then I like two of them, was like, man, it's disgusting.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
I don't like it, and then Dan could do it.
Then Dana took you guys through a tour of the
hot dog factory.
Speaker 5 (37:52):
Oh, it was disgusting.
Speaker 4 (37:54):
It smelt like like grease and like like boiled rat. Yeah,
because you.
Speaker 3 (38:01):
Need a hot dog right now, Phoenix, not anymore, not
because you guys are talking about.
Speaker 2 (38:05):
It, Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 5 (38:05):
And those were different kind of hot dogs too.
Speaker 4 (38:07):
They were like they were called red snappers, and they
only make them in that area and it's like a
hard casing where like you bite into it and it snaps,
almost like a balloon.
Speaker 2 (38:17):
Did they taste differently.
Speaker 4 (38:18):
No, it doesn't really taste differently. It's just got a
different texture and it's like really like red like lipstick.
It's disgusting.
Speaker 3 (38:24):
Like no, I definitely don't.
Speaker 4 (38:27):
Yeah, kind of, it was kind of disgusting.
Speaker 3 (38:29):
So out of all the Dana Whites looking for the fights,
what do you think is the most ridiculous thing that
you did.
Speaker 4 (38:36):
I tell you what, the most uh for me, Like,
even when I think back to when I did it,
I'm like, why did not do that? And that was
swimming with sharks? Swimming with sharks, and it wasn't did
we swim with sharks? I remember when we were going
to do it, they were like, are you going to
get in the cage and you're gonna go down with sharks?
And I was like, all that's cool as long as
(38:56):
I'm in a cage, right, So then when we get
on the boat and we go out three miles into
the water, then you don't want to use the cage.
The cages for cages for WIMPs, like little kids going.
Speaker 2 (39:10):
Swim out there.
Speaker 4 (39:12):
Now, keep in mind I don't swim at all. I
can't swim. And I jumped in. I had the life vest,
was the first one in, and when I hit that water,
I was like, I mean, I was so scared. I
mean it was one of them times where like I was,
I really was like, all right, this this might be
it for me, Like that might be.
Speaker 5 (39:34):
I really thought I was. I was like, tell my
family I love them.
Speaker 4 (39:36):
I really thought I was like that this could be it,
and I jumped in and first it was nothing, nothing, nothing,
I'm in there by myself. I mean, it was like
so nerve wrecking. And then when I looked down, I
saw my first the first shark.
Speaker 2 (39:47):
I was like, oh my god, what type of shark
did you see?
Speaker 4 (39:49):
There were tiger sharks.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
Tiger hunt was like one of the most dangerous ones too,
tiger sharks, I think, so.
Speaker 4 (39:57):
So we're in so then finally Dana jumps in, and
then Matt jumps in, and then they start throwing chump
in the water. And then I looked and then I
looked down again and one was coming right at me.
And I couldn't get out fast enough. I said, get
me the hell out of here. I couldn't get out
(40:17):
fast enough. I was like, I'm done. I mean I
literally thought I was going to die.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
I can't imagine.
Speaker 4 (40:25):
I thought I was going to die.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
I would swing out.
Speaker 4 (40:28):
I was like, and like I said, I don't know
how to swim. So I was in there, like just
trying to get out as fast as I could. And
as soon as I got out of the water, I
was like, I felt this sense of relief, like I
couldn't believe I just did that, like that was the
dumbest thing I've ever done in my life.
Speaker 2 (40:43):
Where was this?
Speaker 4 (40:44):
And that was actually oddly enough, it was like twenty
minutes from where I live in Florida.
Speaker 2 (40:50):
Oh, in Florida.
Speaker 4 (40:51):
Yeah, it was in Florida.
Speaker 2 (40:53):
I would never swimm sharks. I don't think I could
do it.
Speaker 4 (40:55):
And like people, some people could, you know, do it,
but like to be chumming the water into to be
antagonizing these these sharks and getting them.
Speaker 2 (41:05):
With no cage, yeah, you're just in there.
Speaker 4 (41:07):
I thought like with the caves would have been all right.
I would have been like, all right, let's do it.
You know what I'm saying, what they gonna do to me?
Speaker 2 (41:11):
But no, No, if Danna came back and said, hey,
let's go redo this film of swim with sharks that
you gotta do it again.
Speaker 4 (41:19):
I'd say, after you jump off the cliff in Hawaii,
after you jump off that cliff, then I'll go swimming
with sharks.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
How scared is that?
Speaker 4 (41:29):
That wasn't that bad only because like I didn't really
give myself an opportunity to be scared, like I like
pumped myself up. Yeah, it was on situations like we're
in Hawaii, Hawaii. If you've never been in Hawaii, you
gotta go. It's an amazing place. Where in Hawaii is
such a cool place. And I was like, all right,
I'm just gonna walk up. As soon as I get
to it, I'm not even gonna look.
Speaker 5 (41:46):
I'm just gonna jump. And again I don't swim, but
this time.
Speaker 4 (41:49):
They wouldn't let me wear a vest because if you
have a vest on, the vest won't go down and
you can like break a rib by hitting the water.
So they were just like, we'll catch you when you
go down, so catch you.
Speaker 5 (42:04):
It was like, so I jumped it.
Speaker 4 (42:06):
So I just walked up, walked up, and I just
saw my spot and I jumped and I just I
jumped and I hit the bottom of the floor of
the floor, and then you did. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (42:15):
As soon as I hit the bottom, I jumped back
up and then they grabbed me.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
And I was like, how many feet was the drop?
Speaker 4 (42:22):
It's about twenty thirty feet. Twenty thirty feet.
Speaker 3 (42:24):
That looks a lot bigger when you're standing up there.
Speaker 2 (42:28):
And the rocks probably came out too, So after I
actually jump out far.
Speaker 5 (42:32):
When you're standing up there, I mean it looks like.
Speaker 4 (42:36):
But you know, the weird The weird thing is, I
would probably do that again if I had to.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
I would probably do that again if.
Speaker 4 (42:42):
I had to.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
Next time you go, I'll yeah, I need somebody where
in Hawaii? Was it?
Speaker 4 (42:46):
I don't even know, you know, yeah, okay, some wherever
wherever the Hawaiian dudes.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
And then after that, you guys went and got to
go watch some fights and stuff. What type of fights
were they.
Speaker 5 (42:59):
In the Hawaii?
Speaker 4 (43:01):
Uh? Who fought there? I remember it was a guy
from Team Alpha Male. And I mean, Hawaii's got a
lot of talented fighters, Like so there's if you've ever
never if you've never seen like street fighting videos in Hawaii,
you gotta go back and watch them because like everybody
in Hawaii can fight. It's like they grow up, like
(43:21):
they learn how to fight. So they had a lot
of talented guys. But I think the guy that we
picked up was from my team Alpha MA. I can't
remember who it was though, but any guys signed him, Yeah,
they signed him.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
It's definitely a lot bigger, probably especially with Max Holloway
being champion.
Speaker 4 (43:34):
Yeah yeah, but they but they've always had like like
good street fighters, like I said, if you go back
and watch it, look like real boxers just scrapping.
Speaker 2 (43:43):
Yeah, it's crazy to see the evolution of them and
male like. Look in Mexico right now, I.
Speaker 4 (43:47):
Know the champions three chance almost could have had four,
could have had four that Yeah, yeah, Mexico Mexico is
has really come up and it's good to see that too.
Speaker 3 (43:59):
And they're building the either, which is probably gonna help
help a lot.
Speaker 2 (44:02):
We needed to. They need to get an event out
there in Mexico someday.
Speaker 4 (44:05):
Yeah. Yeah, well, I mean they had to win to
Mexico City, but I don't think the guys.
Speaker 5 (44:11):
It was a long time King Velaska is in Verdom.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
Do you think you'll eventually go back.
Speaker 4 (44:17):
I think so, of course, Yeah, for sure, And I
think a lot of it depends on what happens this weekend.
If if Ya can pull this off, I'm sure that
would help. But if Moreno Moreno is a bona fide star,
he's a star, and if he can, if he can win,
which he should, I think I think they'll do a show.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
Who do you have in the main event?
Speaker 3 (44:37):
By the way, that's what It's hard to go against him, man, Yeah,
he's just shown and he's levels above everyone in that division.
Speaker 4 (44:45):
He solid, He doesn't make a lot of mistakes. He
doesn't leave himself open a lot. He makes adjustments faster
than anybody, so good at reading.
Speaker 2 (44:53):
You can read like.
Speaker 4 (44:54):
Once you do something to him one time, you will
never be able to do it to him again. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (44:58):
Yeah, like a lot of state.
Speaker 3 (45:00):
It switches a lot of fancy almost kind of lulls
the opponents to sleep.
Speaker 4 (45:04):
Yeah, he he and he he closed his distance really
fast too, so like he can be like snake charming
and then boom, jump on you and meet next thing
you know, he's in on you.
Speaker 2 (45:13):
And he's not scared to go down to the ground either.
Speaker 4 (45:14):
No, and he's I think he's got an underrated ground game.
I mean, trained with Greg Jones probably helps, but he's
got an underrated ground game that I think could give
Yuay your problems if he if they I think that's
the key to this fight though, because I don't think
he wants to spend too much time when he outside
would have got a guy.
Speaker 3 (45:29):
Especially because he could be nos the notes of that here.
And he's throwing a head kick.
Speaker 4 (45:31):
Yeah, he's in his kicks, man, and is he's got fight,
changing weapons on his feet.
Speaker 2 (45:37):
And the Prediction Show I talked about how I feel
like Volkanovsky needs to go down to the map against
to win.
Speaker 4 (45:44):
I agree, I agree.
Speaker 3 (45:47):
Yeah, I don't know it's gonna be a good fights all
the fight. So you're taking Moreno then in the comin event.
Speaker 4 (45:53):
Yeah, yeah, I think Moreno is a completely different guy.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
I think he's just so calmon.
Speaker 3 (45:56):
He's at such peace in his life, Like we had
him on the show and he's talks about like in
the back he's like singing his daughter's songs, like that's
how PC is in his mind.
Speaker 2 (46:04):
I think really shows in his fighting.
Speaker 4 (46:05):
He's such a little kid too, like he and did
you see the clip with him trying to use the
gen Z words. There's a clip of it, like him
and Robert Whitaker and a couple of other fighters and
they're like putting words up did you kids use? And
they're trying to trying to see what they mean. They're
trying to like give the definition and they don't know him.
(46:27):
It's it's pretty funny actually, So.
Speaker 2 (46:28):
They're kind of like slain.
Speaker 4 (46:31):
And yeah, like sus and Rizzy or whatever. Yeah, I
don't even know what I don't even I don't even
know what they are. I don't even know what they are,
much less Brandon Moreno and Brandon Rena, Like what is this?
Speaker 5 (46:43):
You didn't even know? No, no one did Bo Nickel
knew like one of them.
Speaker 3 (46:50):
He's younger, yeah, and he's a little bit.
Speaker 2 (46:51):
Yeah, he's little.
Speaker 3 (46:53):
What do you think about his last minute opponent change?
Speaker 4 (46:56):
You know, I think it's unfortunate for a lot of
other US fighters not know. Bon Nickols a special case.
I give him that, but the fact that he has
to get help in order for him to do well,
he's gonna have to get I get that, But I
think he's getting a lot of help for sure. He's
I mean because even treyshon Gore was a bit it
was kind of help.
Speaker 3 (47:17):
Like they're almost like trying to like pat his record
almost to say.
Speaker 4 (47:20):
I mean, the problem is he don't have any experience
outside of the UFC. Because it's so, it's so, that's
why you can justify it. But then if if you're
using that as justification for giving him beneficial matches, then
why didn't say, well, maybe you should have gave more
experience outside of the UFC, Because I mean, if you
look at it, so let's take a boost. No, Maga
met Off his second fight was Sean Strickland in the
(47:43):
main event, you know what I'm saying, and Aleskaroff his
second fight. His first fight was Phil Hall's. His second
fight is gonna be paul A Costa for the BMF.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Oh yeah, he actually fought in May and yeah Newark.
Speaker 4 (48:00):
Right against Phil Hall. Yeah, Phil Hall's out.
Speaker 5 (48:03):
And now we look at you know, Bo Nickel.
Speaker 4 (48:07):
His third fight, he's fighting Val would Burn, Yeah on
you know, on pay per views. So it's like, I
get what we got to give him help, but it's
just kind of it's just kind of a little unfair,
I think, you know.
Speaker 2 (48:18):
Yeah, I agree, I agree.
Speaker 3 (48:20):
But all right, Dan, it's time to go to the
last letter. And it's kind of two parts. It's now
and next. So what are some burn moments that you're
going through right now in your life? And do you
see any burn moments in the foreseeable future?
Speaker 2 (48:33):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (48:33):
For right now, you know, I'm just trying to catch up,
you know, in terms of where everybody else is. One
thing that I know is that you know, you can't
survive in any industry being the same. You have to
always evolve and you have to constantly reinvent yourself. So
I'm in the process now of burning myself, like intentionally
(48:54):
burning myself to reinvent myself more on this side where
you guys are at on the media side, because I
can't fight. I'm never going to like these guys come out,
come out of retirement and do bare knuckle.
Speaker 5 (49:06):
I am never going to do bare knuckle. I will
be homeless.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
Yeah, you watched a rock fight and uh, Mike Perry.
Speaker 5 (49:15):
Yeah, and rock Hold should never do He's not built
for that, and most most.
Speaker 4 (49:22):
People aren't built for that. Like you got to be
a special human being to do something like that.
Speaker 5 (49:26):
I'm not doing it. Yeah, I'm not doing that. I'm
not doing power slap.
Speaker 4 (49:29):
So I'm in I'm I'm intentionally burning myself now to
be better at this stuff so that this could be
my next direction.
Speaker 2 (49:40):
Do you think do you think you'll actually move one
day behind the desk and commentary or would you still?
Speaker 4 (49:47):
Yeah? I don't really. I don't necessarily like that role really, yeah,
like to be with with Joe Rogan, I don't necessarily
like that role. I like what I'm doing, and then
I like working the desk during the pre show on
the post show.
Speaker 2 (50:00):
Yeah, yeah, I like doing that. We've also Senior kind
of the way and show I.
Speaker 4 (50:04):
Like going away and show.
Speaker 2 (50:05):
These are fun. Yeah, those are fun.
Speaker 4 (50:07):
And I'm also doing After Tough the post show for
the Ultimate Fighter, and that's probably my favorite role. So
like that's really what I ultimately kind of want to
do is more stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (50:18):
What makes that so fun to you?
Speaker 4 (50:19):
I mean, and shout out to you know, ESPN for
allowing me to do it. But they're giving me complete
like control creatively, so like they allow me to bring
in my characters and they allow me to do stuff
and not be subscriptive right there, and they're just like,
that's what we want because we understand this is the
entertainment business. You know, we don't want you necessarily breaking
(50:40):
down the x's and the o's. They want me making
fun of people.
Speaker 3 (50:43):
So they want me.
Speaker 5 (50:47):
They want me.
Speaker 4 (50:47):
So you know, the very first show I did like
a economic record character, which I don't do an Irish accent.
I actually uh wrote, I wrote like some stuff down
and gave it to Molly McCann.
Speaker 5 (50:58):
She's from Liverpool.
Speaker 4 (50:59):
So if the accent is really bad, it's like it's
because she's from Liverpool, so I was likely say this
and I'm trying to say it the way you say it.
Speaker 5 (51:09):
Yeah, it was. It's just like Michael Chandler.
Speaker 4 (51:18):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, So you know, and like and and
they're and they're cool about that. They want that type
of that type of energy. So to be able to
do that and for them to have that type of
confidence in me is yeah, I like that.
Speaker 2 (51:33):
So and that's what people want to see to yourself,
they don't.
Speaker 4 (51:36):
Want Yeah, yeah, And I mean because anybody could have
did that show. They could have gave that show to
Megan o'levy or so the fact that they allowed me
to have that show, you know that, I'm like, all right,
I gotta be able to deliver. Okay.
Speaker 3 (51:48):
So looking forward to the future, do you have anything
kind of brewing that you're excited about?
Speaker 4 (51:52):
So between between doing more stuff like that, and I
have a couple of acting projects that I'm that I'm
working on as well. Again burning and burning through money.
Speaker 5 (52:02):
To make your stuff happen to ille that.
Speaker 4 (52:04):
But the reality is is that you know a lot
of actors. You know, they go through the process like
auditioning and so on, and so forth, and I was like,
and I still audition for stuff sometimes, but at the
end of the day, I'm creating my own projects.
Speaker 1 (52:17):
Me.
Speaker 4 (52:18):
I got a team of guys down in South Florida
and we're creating our own projects, doing like shorts and
different projects. Because now is instead if I'm gonna waste
money like spending time trying to go on auditions and
hoping I get this part, I'm not doing that. I'm
creating my own projects. I'm going to finance my own projects.
I'm gonna burn through that money to finance my own
projects and create the characters that I want. And that's
(52:40):
how we're doing it. So we're in the process now
of creating like a series. We want to do a
series in South Florida. So what's it like based off
based you know, I'm a crooked cop. Yeah, yeah, I'm
a crooked cop dealing with some drug dealing guys and
so on and so forth. Oh, I love it. I mean,
(53:00):
it's it's you know, it's another creative process. Even as
a fighter, I always thought of myself as more of
a an artist type fighter. I mean the look a
fighter's artist. Uh Anderson Silva, you know, easy, those are
more artist type fighters, and that's kind of how I was.
But then when I retired from fighting, I need I
need to do a place to express my art, So
(53:21):
I do it now on screen.
Speaker 3 (53:22):
Well, if you need someone to fill a role, he
can call me.
Speaker 4 (53:26):
Yeah, yeah, man, listen, everybody work around me. I like,
I like everybody to work.
Speaker 2 (53:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (53:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (53:31):
I take acting lessons with Jamie Fox's acting coach.
Speaker 5 (53:35):
No kidding.
Speaker 2 (53:36):
Yeah, well.
Speaker 4 (53:38):
Jamie Fox is hands down the greatest entertainer we've ever seen,
so you are in good hands. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (53:47):
It's so fun because it's it's something new, kind of
like with this starting this, it's new, and I'm able
just to like learn and learn and learn, and it's
it's learning to be able to take a character and
like make it yourself, put yourself into that character, put.
Speaker 4 (53:59):
Your self in them shoes, and create the colors of
this of the words on the page right to bring
it to life.
Speaker 5 (54:05):
So like that's special, Zach.
Speaker 3 (54:07):
What would be some advice that you give me as
an aspiring actor?
Speaker 5 (54:11):
You just said it, keep learning, keep learning.
Speaker 4 (54:13):
Yeah, well, you know what, keep learning and take your
yourself out of it because what we do is, you know,
we put our own baggage onto things. We got to
take ourself out of it and tell the story.
Speaker 2 (54:27):
Don't let your ego get the way.
Speaker 5 (54:29):
Basically, yeah, don't let ego getting it.
Speaker 4 (54:31):
Don't let your ego getting away, don't let your baggage
or your insecurity is getting away. Just tell the story.
Speaker 2 (54:37):
Yeah it makes it makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 3 (54:40):
But all right, Dean, you just spelt burning your life.
So thank you so much for coming on the show.
Tell the audience where they can find you at your
social media as everything.
Speaker 4 (54:49):
All my social media is the same. It's at Dean Thomas.
Dean is spelled d I N. You can hear me
on Serious Radio, on MMA Today, Serious Fight Nation, and
on ESPN during the fights, all kinds of stuff. I'm everywhere.
I'm trying to intentionally, I'm everywhere. So Dean Thomas at
d I N Thomas find me.
Speaker 2 (55:09):
You heard the man, go give him some love. And
as a gift Dean for coming on the podcast, you
will be getting the black Label edition Burn Factory hoodie.
Only guests get these. I could use. Only guests get these.
Speaker 5 (55:28):
I appreciate you, guys.
Speaker 3 (55:29):
Belt and the belt we'll get. Well, all right, that's
gonna do it from this episode of The Burn Factory Podcast.
Like always, like follow and subscribe at the Burn Factory Podcast.
Speaker 2 (55:42):
And like always, please visit my foundation as well, the
Priest James Foundation dot org. Again the Priest James Foundation
dot org to understand why this is called the Burn Factory.
Speaker 3 (55:52):
We'll see you guys for the next episode.
Speaker 2 (55:54):
Peace. All right, guys, we're here with Dean Thomas, who
just spelt burnt in his life and he is now
the Burn Factory Podcast Champion. Awesome, thank you so much
for coming on. We really appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (56:10):
You were an inspiration to us, definitely an inspiration to
a lot of people out there, So thank you so
much for coming.
Speaker 5 (56:16):
I'm the champ.
Speaker 4 (56:18):
I love it all right, man, I appreciate you guys,
Thank you, thank you so much. Appreciate yall. Thank you
very much, and y'all refer to me as a champ.
Speaker 2 (56:27):
It sir Champ. De Tom
Welcome to The Burn Factory Podcast with Priest and Phoenix Rivera.
Listen as the voice interview the biggest names in sports
and entertainment. The Burn Factory starts.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Now, what is up? Guys? Welcome back to another episode
of the Burn Factory Podcast. I'm your host Priest, drawn
by my co host, my brother, the one and only
Phoenix say it stuff for the camera. What's up?
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Y'all?
Speaker 2 (00:27):
This is called the Burn Factory for a reason. I
was literally caught on fire fifty percent chances to survive,
but through that started this podcast because I believe every
single person out there on this planet goes through burn
moment somewhere in their life.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
You heard pre say a burn moment. So a burn
moment is a super hard time in your life that
you just have to fight and to get through to
ultimately get you where you are today. I mean, Priest,
believe that every single person on this earth go through
burn moments every single day that truly build to who
you are. But what an amazing guest we have today.
This is a guest that I've been wanting for a
(01:01):
very long time. He is a pioneer of mixed martial arts.
He is now one of the most intelligent coaches in
the game. You have seen him on Dana Whites Looking
for a Fight. He's also a UFC and ESPN analyst.
He's also on Serious XM as the host of the
Fight Nations show. And to top it off, this man
is an actor and a comedian.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
So please give a welcome to Dean Thomas. I had
to you have Deen Thomas, and you gotta wow.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
I almost feel like I'm being a pump because this
is too nice. I feel like someone's will jump out
and choking even behind what's going on.
Speaker 5 (01:40):
This is way too nice. This is amazing.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
To be honest, were you shocked whenever you came in.
Speaker 5 (01:45):
I was shocked, you right, I was.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
Shocked because I mean I just met you guys at
the fight last time. He's like, come on the podcast.
I'm thinking, oh, here we go. Just want to be
in a little hotel room, little stick mic. But this
is this is I'm blown away by the production here.
This is amazing.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
Thank you appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (02:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
If you guys know, we met Dean Thomas back at
UFC two eighty nine in Vancouver. We told him about
the podcast and he said he's down to do it
and look at us now. So you're a comedian.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Yes, well I'm not very funny, but okay, I've seen
every episode of Dana White's Looking for a Fight.
Speaker 4 (02:19):
You're pretty damn I mean, you know, I just you know,
I've done comedy improv. Not I've done some stand up,
but I've done a lot of improv. You know, we
get on to pretend to do be different things. I've
done that for over a decade. So that's where my
comedy comes from.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Can you tell us a joke? Well, you got, you
just gotta be fly with it. I guess yeah, when
did that kind of start?
Speaker 4 (02:46):
I started doing improv? Well, first off, I started acting
in like two thousand and five as just a way
to get more comfortable in front of a camera because
as a fighter, like that's part like performance is performance.
It doesn't matter whether you're fighting, public speaking. Acting, performance
is performance being able to focus and deliver. So I
(03:07):
figured that acting would be a good way for me
to work on that performance muscle.
Speaker 5 (03:13):
And so I said, you know what, I'm gonna start acting.
Speaker 4 (03:15):
And I started doing that, and then during that time,
my fight career started to take off a little bit.
So then I had to put the acting aside, but
I still liked the performance side of that.
Speaker 5 (03:26):
So improv you don't have to remember scripts.
Speaker 4 (03:30):
You just go out and do it. So I said,
I'm gonna do improv because I don't have to remember anything.
Speaker 5 (03:35):
I just show up and learn how it works.
Speaker 4 (03:38):
And so I started doing that, and that's kind of
how I got in that improv.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
Do you do any school plays?
Speaker 5 (03:43):
No, I never did. But I've done a lot of
theater though.
Speaker 4 (03:45):
I've done a lot of theater, like community theater, stuff
like that, and I've done a lot of improv.
Speaker 5 (03:50):
I mean embarrassing improv. I mean like when I say embarrassing, embarrassing.
Speaker 4 (03:56):
But that's part of doing improv though, is not being afraid.
Speaker 5 (04:00):
And that's and that has carried me.
Speaker 4 (04:02):
All the way to where I am now, like doing
things for Dana White and everybody's like, man, you got
you got you know cohona is you're doing this?
Speaker 5 (04:09):
I'm like, man, it's is improv.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Do you think if you didn't do improv your life
would be totally different.
Speaker 5 (04:13):
It'd be totally different, for sure, It'd be totally different.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
And you know, we I've done gorilla improv and that
is where you go on the street.
Speaker 5 (04:21):
So we I live in West Palm Beach, just where.
Speaker 4 (04:23):
Where I do my stuff at. We go on the
street downtown and we just when people are eating it,
like out outside the bar, we just do improv for them. Really,
we just walk up and go, all right, we're gonna
do some improv for y'all. Give us a suggestion, and
then we just start doing improv.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
You said you've done some embarrassing improv. What's probably the
most embarrassing.
Speaker 4 (04:42):
I mean, that's pretty embarrassing just walking up to people,
like and they're just trying to either eat a meal
and we're like we're and they're like, get out of here,
you know. So yeah, so that's pretty embarrassing. And the
one time, so another story I had is when my
son was really young, he was probably about seven or eight,
I did a show in Miami and it was so embarrassing.
I mean it was like, no one laughed. It was
(05:03):
just so And then my son was there. It was
his first time being there, and when we got done,
we get in the car, he's like, Dad, you guys
were so bad. I was like, I know, it's embarrassing, Well.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
Does it at the moment whenever you tell something no
one laughs, what do you do? Do you just like
kind of like fold or.
Speaker 5 (05:17):
No, you just I mean, it's part of the part
of the games, part of the territory, you know.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
So so when I did some stand up to and
same thing, I mean, I was just kind of used
to it. Like you tell a joke and it doesn't
go for a while, You're all right, move past to
get past it.
Speaker 5 (05:30):
But you know, I doesn't stand.
Speaker 4 (05:31):
I was a comedy special on Fight Pass with Adam Hunter,
so that was cool. So it was me is Adam
Hunter's comedy special on Fight Pass, Me, Henri sa Hudo,
Chall's Sonning and Adam all went up and did a show.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
So we'll have to go check that out. I don't
think i've seen it.
Speaker 5 (05:47):
No, you check it out fight Pass.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
It's don't fight It's out there.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
We'll have to go check We'll go check it out.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
But so on this podcast, we do use the acting
and burn. So each letter is a different time in
your life. So B stands for beginning. Take us back
to the beginning your childhood. Were there any burn moments
that you had to overcome that ultimately got you to
where you are?
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Today.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Well, I mean so b and then the U is
the which one unfortunately unfortunate, and then the R is
the ridiculous ridiculous and then and then now I'm kind
of the same, right, yeah, in their own way way,
So yeah, take us to the beginning. In the beginning,
I was, I was born, and I grew up in Delaware,
(06:29):
a small town. I just went back the other day
sell some my old buddies, so I mean that was cool,
but yeah, small town. Then I eventually moved to Florida
when I was thirteen. So and I moved to Florida
because my father and my mother split because he was
an alcoholic, so they you know, they separated. I moved
to Florida with my mother. Me and my brothers and
(06:52):
sisters moved to Florida and then grew up in the
sticks of Florida. So essentially, I grew up in like
these small towns, and I think that helped me personally
because I had to figure things out on my own,
so I was very independent. I had to figure I
had to figure stuff out on my own. So even
when I first moved to Florida, I had to teach myself.
(07:14):
I taught myself how to cut hair.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Me and my brother.
Speaker 5 (07:16):
Me and my brother, we needed it.
Speaker 4 (07:18):
We need a hair because I taught myself out of
ca hair. So all through high school I was a barber.
I had a barbershop in my mother's garage. And that
was how I put I mean for.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
A high school kid, I was banking too, but.
Speaker 4 (07:30):
I was banking in high school because I was I
had a barbershop.
Speaker 5 (07:34):
I taught myself out to cut hair and taught myself
how to.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
Have a bar and you know, run a business.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
Yeah, high school, how did you even like know how
to cut hair? Just watching shows or I went.
Speaker 4 (07:45):
I was like, you know, when we first moved, we
didn't have a barber. I was like, man, we need
to go buy some clippers. And then it just starting practicing.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
It's hard.
Speaker 3 (07:52):
It's like our entire family as a hair stylist as barbers.
My mom was a hair stylist. My cousin are barbers.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
I can tell.
Speaker 5 (08:02):
Yeah, yeah, it got the nice little locks.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
Yeah, he just lets it go. But it's very difficult.
Like I've tried it once on like a little mannequin.
This hard, like it takes a lot of practice to be.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
Able to get good at it, Yeah, and so then
and then when I first started fighting, I was, you know,
I was a licensed barber, so like I had went
to school, got my license to cut hair, and that's
what I thought I was going to do. I thought
I was going to open a barber shop and just
be a barber. That's what I thought. But at the
same time, like I was fighting. So and then the
UFC did what it did, and now.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
Here we are, what age did you start fighting at.
Speaker 5 (08:36):
As soon as I graduated high school?
Speaker 4 (08:37):
That probably goes into my unfortunate situation though, So that's
what I'm saying. It's all kind of intertwined. Yeah, you know, so,
but in the beginning, it was just, you know, I
was just a shy, quiet little kid who uh very introverted,
but introspective from being introverted. So that's why it was.
I don't want to say it was easy for me
(08:58):
to teach myself how to cut hair. But being not
you know, not being not being so influenced by my
external stimuli, just being always like internal, it was I
was able to teach myself, like I hard, teach myself
how to do a lot of things like fighting. That's
how I even got started in fighting, Like, I didn't
have an instructor.
Speaker 5 (09:17):
I didn't go to a school or gym.
Speaker 4 (09:19):
It was like I bought tapes and me and my
boys was in the backyard practicing. That was the beginning. Yeah,
that was the beginning, and I was winning fights off
of that.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
How long until you finally got into a stable like
team or like Jim.
Speaker 4 (09:35):
I had actually did do what I was doing until
I was and I was even teaching. Wow, So like
that's like as a coach now I'm not. Just like
my entire career, I had been teaching and coaching guys
because like I had to teach all my sparing partners
how to do it, so I have sparing partners. So
I didn't really join the team until I had already
(09:57):
fought in the UFC. I had fun like right after
I fought Bjpen. Yeah, after I fought Bjpen.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Wow, So you're completely so.
Speaker 4 (10:06):
Up to that point, Yeah, I was pretty much self taught,
just going to different like every cell often go to
different gyms and beat up guys in different gyms.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Is it true that you say that you're a better
coach than you're a fighter.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
Yeah for sure.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
What makes that.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
Just because I think I could have been a really
good fighter, but I didn't have someone like me to
validate what I was doing because I was so out
of the box. Me and al Jamine Starling was talking
about this yesterday that like he does things so different,
but everybody wants him to do things the traditional way.
(10:40):
Like he's like, man, I can't box like a boxer.
I'm not going to do it, and they're trying to
get me to box like a boxer, and I said,
you absolutely cannot do that, because that's what happened in
my career. In my career, I was so out of
the box because I taught myself how to do things,
and then when I started working with more traditional people,
they put me back into this box in which I
was no good. And then I can recall losing fights
(11:04):
by trying to fight a style that didn't suit me.
So for me, I was like, you know what, I
got to stay and do what I'm doing. So as
a coach, I don't try to put anybody in a box.
I find out what I think they're good at, and
I fix it. I think of myself as more like
a scientist or a doctor, and when you go to
a doctor, you know, you got to figure out what's
(11:24):
wrong with you.
Speaker 5 (11:25):
You know, if you got this.
Speaker 4 (11:27):
Ailment, you got to take this prescription, you got that one.
Some of them might look the same, but you can't
take the same thing. So as a coach, I look
at that and go, this is your problem. You can't
just go to a boxing class and fix it. You
got to fix it with this. So that's why I
think I'm a better coach than I onet fighter.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
Do you think more coaches need to kind of develop
that mindset?
Speaker 4 (11:47):
It's hard because their ego gets involved, and their ego
and their tradition of where they where they came from,
their upbringing. So like you, if you come from a
wrestling background, you're always going to filter the game of
MMA through wrestling, which is why so you know, I
work on the broadcast with DC, and DC is always like, they.
Speaker 5 (12:07):
Gotta get up, they gotta get up. They're on the back,
they gotta get up.
Speaker 4 (12:10):
It doesn't work, they gotta get up because he's always
going to filter the game of MMA through wrestling. Me
I never had a background, so I don't filter it
through anything. I filter it through what works, what works
at the highest percentage, and that's how I filter the game.
Speaker 3 (12:26):
I feel like that affects fighters too, because you see
sometimes they're bouncing around gyms continuously trying to just find
that coach that's gonna take them and develop their style better.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
And it's hard to because like, but that's a problem too,
because a lot of fighters don't want to be accountable
for their own thing. And what they're doing is they're looking,
they're seeking the answer, but really the answer might be
within themselves that they just need to sit down and
listen to somebody. Anybody.
Speaker 2 (12:48):
Yeah they did that extra support, Yeah, different eyes.
Speaker 4 (12:51):
But yeah, but oftentimes, you know, they'll go to one
gym and then it doesn't work out, and then they'll
blame everybody at the gym and then go to another
gym and blame everybody, but the reality is it might
be themselves. So and that's the one thing I always
tell fighters is you have to be accountable, like everything
you do, there's every So I was in Philly, I
was working with Sean Brady and before he got hurt,
(13:12):
and even when he got hurt.
Speaker 5 (13:13):
I was like still teaching the classes.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
I was like this, I just want to teach and
I and my main thing is this when you're out
there and fighting that you have to be accountable. You
can't be like, oh this guy was too strong, he
was too fast. You got to be accountable. You got to.
Speaker 5 (13:25):
Find a way to make it work. That is it.
There is a way, you gotta find it. You just
have to be accountable.
Speaker 4 (13:32):
But when you start pointing the finger at everybody else,
you can't be accountable and you can't fix your problems
because you're already relying on somebody else to fix it
for you. You got to be accountable, and that goes
for anything in life.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
How many fighters do you coach?
Speaker 4 (13:44):
Not many? Now I work with just a couple, you know.
I just work with a couple now, Like I still
work with Gillian Robertson. I've been working with Sean Brady,
a couple of guys in Bellatoor, JJ Wilson and Darien Caldwell.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
But just a couple as a as a hard bouncing
around from different states while they're in camp somewhere, and
someone else might being camp.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
No no, And I mean that may just be me
not want me and my commitment issues, and I don't
want to I don't really want to be committed to anybody.
I've done that for a long time and that thought
and that was a problem for me too. That was
one of the reasons why I wanted to leave American
Top Team because I was a coach for Like I
had American Top Team gyms for a long time and
then when I was a coach for him for about
five years, just a full time coach. It was a
(14:27):
problem for me because I always wanted to work with
different people and in this game is information based and
I just feel like it's education and information just like
going to school, and to hold on to it is selfish.
So I was like, well, I don't want to just
sit here and just like coach these guys, Like there's
other people out there that could use this information, and
if I can't get it to him, you know, I'm
(14:48):
not doing the world of service. We're not going to
see the best of the best. Like that's what I
want when I see a fight. I love watching Volkanovski
fight because he delivers and he gives you stuff, and
like I love to watch that performance and if I
can be a part of helping somebody fight that way,
I'll do it.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Fulkanowski is a bull man. He's not scared to take
a fight.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
Yeah, no, he doesn't. He doesn't point the finger anyways.
Like when he lost to Islam, he was not pointing
a finger, like, oh, he was bigger than he's heavier
than me.
Speaker 4 (15:17):
He was like, he's the better man, yea. And that's
why I like watching him fight. He's accountable for his actions.
He does what he gotta do and and he's a
great fighter because of it. And pound for pound right now, yeah,
for sure, for sure.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
All right, Dan, it's time to go to you and burn.
It's unfortunate. There's a lot of unfortunate burn moments that happened,
but through those unfortunate burn moments, some of the best
burn moments come out of it. Unfortunately, I was caught
in a school science experiment by my teacher. It was
a fire, blew up in my face. Spent a week
and ICU had seven surgeries and a fifty percent chance
(15:51):
to survive because if burns, the swelling around the neck
it's so bad and that they're worried that I was
gonna like my breathing was gonna stop. But in the hospital,
I found my burn moment. So I'm a competitive golfer
and I had my family, go get my putter all
hooked up to all the IV's. My face swelled shut,
couldn't even see out of my left eye, and I
(16:13):
would put three balls into a glass star for hours
and hours. And that's when I was like, you know what,
I'm gonna get out of this hospital and I'm gonna
go take this unfortunate burn moment and make it into
the greatest comeback ever. And now I got a Burn
Factory podcast.
Speaker 5 (16:31):
So look at you. I mean, that's all inspiring.
Speaker 4 (16:34):
I mean, that's kind of the reason why I'm here
because when y'all told me that story, I was good
and I was.
Speaker 5 (16:37):
Like, ah, I got to do the show.
Speaker 4 (16:40):
But but yeah, So my unfortunate story goes back to
when I was in high school.
Speaker 5 (16:44):
So I was dating a girl and.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Like, I don't know how old are you, seventeen, I.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
Was your age. Okay, I was your age, but I
have been dating her for a couple of years. And
when you're seventeen, you dated to go for a couple years.
That's a couple of decades. Understand that that's a big
portion of your life. So, like we were in love
and but then as my senior year in high school.
You know, we thought we were going to break up
because we were going to go in different directions. So
she started seeing another guy. And and when you're seventeen,
(17:10):
somebod I started seeing another guy. That's like life and death.
That's like, you know, it broke my heart. It killed me.
Broke my heart. So, like any juvenile delinquent, I had
to take matters into my own hands. And like your
situation was an unfortunate situation, mine was totally wrong on
my part. So I took it upon my own self
(17:30):
to hit the dude in the head with a wrench.
Speaker 5 (17:32):
Oh yeah, I hit him in the head with a wrench.
Speaker 4 (17:35):
And I ended up going to jail and having to
do a little time, and I couldn't go to college,
couldn't do anything from it, so I had to stay
home and eventually did fifty weekends in jail. We're going
on Friday, spend the night, spend two nights in there,
and then come out on Sunday. I did that for
a year.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
How hard is that?
Speaker 4 (17:55):
It was very difficult because it was like, partially I
was like, yeah, I should just you know, I should
just do three months straight.
Speaker 5 (18:04):
But then I don't know if I can.
Speaker 4 (18:05):
Do that either.
Speaker 5 (18:06):
So I was like, all right, I'll do the weekends.
Speaker 4 (18:08):
So but but during weekends, it taught you a lot
about time and patience, right, and learning how to just
be like being able to sit with yourself and be patient.
Speaker 5 (18:16):
But going to jail every weekend for a year sucks.
I mean it sucks.
Speaker 4 (18:20):
And it was to the point where like it was
so boring you look forward to like they allow you
to have like going out and picking up trash, and
I was like, just go pick up trash. It sucks,
but it sucks. But yeah, but that was my unfortunate situation.
I had to deal with that, and I had to
sit and live with myself knowing that I did that
for like no reason, for like a really stupid reason.
(18:40):
But this was about the same time where I first
saw the UFC, So really at the end of the day,
having to sit with myself really kind of drove me
towards the UFC a little more.
Speaker 5 (18:56):
And then that's when I was like, I'm gonna learn how.
Speaker 4 (18:58):
To do this. So I coudn't leave, couldn't do nothing,
couldn't go to work. So I was use that unfortunate
situation kind of learn how to fight.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
Yeah, so you're saying, if that whole situation doesn't happen,
you won't be in the UFC.
Speaker 4 (19:11):
Right if that situation doesn't happen, I'm not here right now. Moment, Yeah, crazy,
that's my burn moment.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Was during the toughest time of going to juvenile jail
over the weekends. Was there one particular thing that just
made you happy that brought joy to you during that
toughest time.
Speaker 4 (19:33):
No, not really, no, I mean it was nothing about
that that made me happy, But looking back, it was necessary.
It's necessary because I needed to sit in it. I
needed to sit in it, and I needed to be like,
all right, this is how you focus. Otherwise, like you
(19:53):
get distractions come easy, You can get distracted easily.
Speaker 5 (19:57):
But having being forced to.
Speaker 4 (19:59):
Not leave the county, couldn't leave the county, had to
show up to jail every Friday, I had to sit
in it. So having to sit in it forced me
to learn how to focus.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Were you in school during this time?
Speaker 4 (20:13):
This is This was in the summer of I had
planned to go to college, and this the year right
after I graduated, so I was out of school and
that happened as soon as school ended and I was. Yeah.
So like I spent my first year out of high
school dealing with legal issues. So yeah, but again necessary
(20:34):
because I had to sit in that and I had
to learn how to be by myself, and I had
to learn how to do things by myself, which I
already had, you know, felt like I was pretty good at,
like I said, teaching myself, like I heard doing this.
Speaker 5 (20:46):
But so then I just.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
Used that time to just study fighting. And I was
studying fighting way back then.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
What was that last day? Like last day, I.
Speaker 4 (20:57):
Was like, y'all can kiss my plea.
Speaker 5 (21:00):
Yeah, that last day was great. I mean I was like,
I ain't.
Speaker 4 (21:03):
But also to I guess, if there's any one good
thing about it is that people who go to jail,
they know right away like either jail either you can
do it or you can't. But once you walk in there,
you're like, I.
Speaker 5 (21:14):
Can't do it.
Speaker 4 (21:14):
The same for me. And now I know, like I
don't do nothing. I'm not spitting on the sidewalk, I
won't do anything illegal because I know I don't ever
ever want to go back because it's not for me.
Some people don't mind. Like I used to see people
come and go and they just don't care. And that's
how it is for some people. Some people don't care.
But for me, once you step foot in that place,
that is it. I ain't never.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
Going back, for sure. I can't even imagine that I'd
be the same way if I went, I would just
obey by nothing. I don't even throw kind of what
you say, gum on the side, I don't even do nothing,
roof follower. Yeah, exactly what was the what was the
go to meal after right when you got out? Was
this some fast food restaurant?
Speaker 5 (21:53):
Probably know I was poor, you know what I'm saying,
so like Burger King was my thing?
Speaker 4 (21:57):
You know, Burger King?
Speaker 2 (21:59):
Yeah, what's to go to at Burger King.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
At the time, even still kind of now, at the
time it was it was chicken sandwiches.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Chicken in fact, that my.
Speaker 5 (22:07):
Whole my whole fight career, that was my go to.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Really.
Speaker 4 (22:10):
Yeah, like you know nowadays, you know, everybody's scientific, everybody
got nutrition. Listen, back in the day I was, I
was going through because I used to live across the
street from the University of Central Florida, and there was
a McDonald's or Burger King, like right around the corner.
Speaker 5 (22:27):
And after practice hit up that Burger.
Speaker 4 (22:29):
King and they were a dollar at the time. I
was like, give me three of them, some barbecue sauce.
That was my.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
Meal, barbecueways. It's like twelve bucks.
Speaker 5 (22:39):
Yeah, nowadays it's expensive.
Speaker 4 (22:41):
Yeah, it's expensive now, so like I might as well
just eat I might as well eat decent now because
it's you know, expensive to eat. Uh, your fast food.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Yeah, he's like that.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
He's he's all in the McDonald's and like that.
Speaker 5 (22:54):
Did you ever get the.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
Chicken fries from Burger King? I never had, never had
got try.
Speaker 5 (22:59):
I gotta do.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
You like spicy food sometimes, Okay, get the spicy ones.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
They're not too hot. You gotta try them. They're really
really good.
Speaker 4 (23:06):
I gotta try to.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Was your chicken what your chicken sand much better than
the sheet balls you ate on Dana White Contender series
actually didn't.
Speaker 4 (23:14):
Work that bad. You like, you can fry anything. Listen,
you fry anything. It tastes pretty good. Like I said,
you just fry it and it just you don't even
taste it. You just taste like it just tat like fried.
Whatever you do everything on that show. Yeah, well, I
mean I have to, you know, like that's my thing.
That I have to because Dana ain't gonna do it,
(23:36):
and Matt that Matt is the most Matt won't do anything.
He doesn't want to do nothing, nothing, He won't do
anything he doesn't want to do.
Speaker 5 (23:45):
You can't talk him into anything.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
The peer pressure won't work.
Speaker 4 (23:48):
Nope. You know it was it was so weird, like
and this is so we were on we did Rogan
a few weeks ago.
Speaker 5 (23:55):
Okay, so yeah, so we did Rogan a few weeks ago.
Speaker 4 (23:58):
And when we got the opportunity to do that, Like
I was talking to Joe and he's like, yo, you
think Matt will come on?
Speaker 5 (24:03):
I was like, I don't know, man, Matt don't go nowhere.
He doesn't. He doesn't leave Long Island. He's like, Matt,
don't go nowhere.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
He's just all isolated. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (24:10):
So then so then Joe Rogan texts Matt and say, hey,
you want to do the show? If Matt text me's
like yo, who is this just really? I was like yeah,
He's like, man, I'll do it. So I'm like Joe Rogan,
you know, so it had to talk him into that?
Speaker 2 (24:25):
Was it awkward being with Matt? Sarah though, since you
fought him in the UFS.
Speaker 4 (24:28):
No, no, no, no, I mean Matt's like my best friend. Yea,
for sure, He's my best friend for sure. I mean
we have we have a lot of history that goes
back over twenty years and just you know, because he
was his roommate was a Hadrigo Gracie, and I had
a grappling match with Hardrigo Gracy and Danbury, Connecticut in
(24:51):
I think it's like year two thousand and he broke
my elbow obviously lost the match. Yeah, And then that
same year Matt Sarah had a grappling mat from my
roommate Paul Rodriguez for in the Abu Dhabi Trials to
go to Abu Dhabi, and he choked my roommate out,
so like Matt had already. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (25:09):
So Matt has always been like one up.
Speaker 4 (25:11):
On me for you know, all of our careers. So
when we fought, it was a split decision and they
announced him as the winner inside the octagon. Then ten
minutes later they came back and told me that I
had actually won, that the judge got it wrong, he
had scored it wrong. He scored his, he put his,
he put the scores for Matt on my side.
Speaker 3 (25:31):
And yeah, he switched the speak the car.
Speaker 4 (25:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
So were you already in the back at that time.
Speaker 4 (25:35):
Yeah, we were in the back when anyone else me
as the winner.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Oh, that's gonna be crazy. I was talking about emotions.
Speaker 4 (25:40):
Yeah, I know. It was like because I'm down, I'm
like yeah, but they announced him to win.
Speaker 5 (25:44):
I was like I couldn't believe it. I was like,
how did this happen?
Speaker 4 (25:47):
Couldn't believe it? And then when they told me I one,
I was like yes, So then that's why I only.
There was an episode of Dana White looking for a fight.
We were in Sturgis. I went and got a tattoo
on my arms right here and says, hey, Matt, I won.
Speaker 3 (25:57):
So like, yeah, hey Matt.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
What was the reaction to that?
Speaker 5 (26:03):
He was like, man, you're so stupid.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
When did you get this year?
Speaker 5 (26:08):
I just got that that it was a couple of
years ago.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
I didn't hurt it.
Speaker 4 (26:12):
Oh yeah, you.
Speaker 5 (26:14):
Know I got.
Speaker 4 (26:14):
I got like the worst tattoos because they hurt. People
get tattoos and like I'm like, I don't know how
to I don't know how these people get tattoos. It
hurts so bad. And they're like you're going to get
that finished. I'm like, it's finished.
Speaker 2 (26:28):
How mad you have?
Speaker 4 (26:29):
Oh one? I have about five, but they're all small
and and cheesy. They're like prison tattoos. Yeah yeah, Like
if I told you'all got it in prison, you believe me.
They're all small and cheesy.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
That's crazy coming from a fighter though, because people think
fighters are so tough because they just get hit in
the head constantly. They're bleeding, but getting a tattoo it
still hurts.
Speaker 5 (26:49):
No. See, that's the misconception about fighting, is it.
Speaker 4 (26:51):
It's not that painful really, and if you're doing it right,
it shouldn't be that painful because your job is to
protect yourself. Like that should be your as a fighter,
your number one job. I know how it looks on
TV where guys are killing each other, but that's because
like they just have a hard time protecting themselves or that,
you know, that's whatever their training is. But your number
(27:13):
one job should be to protect yourself. That's why I
won't do pro wrestling, because your job in pro wrestling
is to get hurt. So like for fighting, it's my
job is to protect myself. So I'm trying not to
get hurt. So they yeah, I'm not getting hurt.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
I see, did you ever get knocked out? Feeling?
Speaker 4 (27:31):
Oh? It felt great, It was amazing. It was actually
it was actually my very first fight in the UFC.
It was against BJ Penn. And you know, so because
I was the I was the dude at that time.
I was the I was the big deal, like BJ
was just a jiu jitsu guy, so like I was
the favorite. It was in New York. It was the
(27:52):
co main event and the main event was Tito Warts
and Elvis CINISI so is UFC thirty too, So I
was the big I was the big deal at the time.
And uh, I go out there, I'm fighting BJ Man.
I tried to take his head off. I threw the
biggest punch I've ever thrown in my life because I
thought I tried to fake with the right, I'll try
(28:12):
to move his head over, and I threw the biggest
left I was.
Speaker 5 (28:16):
But I missed, and he because he.
Speaker 4 (28:18):
Didn't fall for the fake.
Speaker 5 (28:21):
Yeah I didn't. I didn't sell a fake good enough.
And I threw the punch.
Speaker 4 (28:25):
I missed, and then as a jiu jitsu guy, I
was expecting him to duck under the punch and try
to shoot. So at that moment after I missed, my
natural reaction was to stop the shot, so I put
my head down and instead of shooting, he's gonna throw knee.
Speaker 5 (28:42):
Why he ain't throwing me? So he so I had
a boom and knocked out.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
I was out, like I just I do remember like
the world kind of spinning, and then I just then
I remember waking up in the back.
Speaker 5 (28:58):
I don't remember walking out.
Speaker 4 (28:59):
I don't. I had to watch that on TV. I
don't remember walking out of the octon. I watched that
on TV, but I do remember being in the back
and the doctor going what month is it?
Speaker 5 (29:09):
And I was like, it's March, but it was June. Oh,
I remember saying.
Speaker 4 (29:14):
That, and then I and then it goes blank again,
and then I remember being in the ambulance going to
the hospital going Then that's when I really woke up,
and I remember going, oh, no, what happened? And all
I can think about was, oh, we got to do
this again. This can't be real. We got to go back,
and I was like, tell him, call him back and
tell him I'm ready to go down right now, go down,
(29:37):
Tell Murdy to go down. But then then I think
about it going. Man, that felt pretty good, girl, you know,
I felt like a good rest. It was amazing.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Do you think it's true that people that like don't
get knocked out for so long in the UF and
then they finally get clipped, they just keep getting clipped
after that, or.
Speaker 4 (29:52):
Sometimes that happens, like you you can lose your chin,
and I mean we've seen eventually you lose your chin,
and we've seen that happen over and over again, like
Chuck Liddell is a prime example. Like you can pluck
him now and he'll go down, but eventually, like once
you start, but once you get knocked out the first time,
it's like opening Pandora's box, it becomes easier after that.
So like that's why it's important to.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
You feel like relieved after yeah, like almost like almost
like I know, like now like there's no fear going
into the fight, but.
Speaker 5 (30:20):
Of getting knocked out.
Speaker 4 (30:21):
No no, no, no no, Like I mean you kind
of want your chin, like you kind of you kind
of want a chin.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
I feel like once you get knocked out, though, it
completely changes you, Like you become a little bit more
reactive than proactive.
Speaker 4 (30:33):
You absolutely, And I remember so when I was on
The Ultimate Fighter. I remember Mikey Burnett, who actually fought
in the house. He was talking to me and he
was like, man, ever since He's like, before you knock
bj out, you were a killer that afterwards you kind
of stopped and that's what happens, like you get a
little gunshot because you don't want it to happen again.
And that's what it was. And it wasn't the feeling
(30:54):
of gett knocked out. It was just the embarrassment. Yeah,
that's why, Like when God's get knocked out, like you
see like Michael and get knocked down and he's like,
I'm like, man, how does he come back from that?
These guys come back from the Like for me, I
was like, if I get knocked out like that one
more time, I can't go back home.
Speaker 3 (31:12):
Starts so hard mentally too, Like just the embarrassment, like
you say, of letting your team down and letting people down.
Speaker 4 (31:19):
Yeah, because like everybody's watching, Like that's how it was
for me because this was in a time like right
now the UFC is accessible, we watching.
Speaker 5 (31:26):
On I watched it on a plane.
Speaker 4 (31:28):
I'm like what, But when I had thought it was
the first time it was back on TV back on
pay per view because it John senator John McCain had
gotten it off TV. This was the first one back
on TV. So I'm like, Yo, watch the show. I'm
fighting this dude, watch watch it. And I remember even
like I was hype. I remember, you know what's his name,
Dennis Rodman was at the arena and I'm like, I
(31:48):
was like, Dennis, I'm about to go fight.
Speaker 5 (31:49):
Go watch this fight. And then afterwards I was like, oh.
Speaker 4 (31:52):
Man, I can't believe everybody saw it. I was like
everybody saw. I was like, how do I go home
from this? It sucked?
Speaker 2 (31:58):
Yeah, I can't even imagine what the next day, Well speak,
what is it like the next day after Afriget? Not yet? Oh?
Speaker 4 (32:04):
Your weekend is ruined. Like you're just like, you're just
you don't want to do anything. How do you come
out of that? It took me a couple of months.
It took me a couple of months to come out
of that. Really, it took me a couple of months
because I remember I was like, so, but this was
the first time where I actually so like. After that,
I went to SO I got another fight book. So
(32:24):
that was in June.
Speaker 5 (32:25):
I got another fight booked in Vegas.
Speaker 4 (32:27):
It was the first fight in Las Vegas history, so
and that was in September. So I spent September, the
first part of September in Los Angeles training for the
first time. And then on September eleventh, nine eleven was
the day wore my ticket. I was supposed to come
(32:48):
back go back home to Florida. Nine to eleven happened.
I got stuck in Los Angeles for a week. So
I'm in Los Angeles, stuck in Los Angeles for a week,
trying to prepare for a fight that it was happening
in September twenty eight.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
So they ended up getting pushed at all or no, No,
we still did the fight.
Speaker 4 (33:06):
We still still got to fight, but I could there
were no flights leaving during that time for a whole week,
so I got stuck in Los Angeles.
Speaker 5 (33:13):
I had to hang out in Los Angeles for a.
Speaker 4 (33:14):
Week, just kind of bumming around training when I could,
And it kind of sucked.
Speaker 5 (33:18):
But again, but like I was prepared.
Speaker 4 (33:21):
You know why I was prepared because I did fifty
two weekends in jail, so like nothing at that. So yeah,
that's what I'm saying. So like every time something bad
happens now. But man, I did fifty two weekends in jail. Yeah,
this is nothing.
Speaker 3 (33:33):
Yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Cl kind of like I was saying earlier, the unfortunate
burn moments can really help you in the future.
Speaker 5 (33:39):
I always draw back on it, so I'm thinking, oh,
this is nothing. You know, this is sure better than
being in jail.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
This portion of the Burn Factory podcast is sponsored by
Phoenix Salon Suites. Please visit Phoenix Salon Suites at p
H E n i X Salon's s A l O
N Sweets s U I T E S to find
one near you. We are gonna move on to r
now our sands. For ridiculous you kind of alluded a
(34:07):
little bit Dana White looking for a fight and eating
those what were they sheep testicles?
Speaker 5 (34:11):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (34:12):
And uh so were there any more ridiculous burn moments
that you have gone through in your career?
Speaker 4 (34:17):
I mean, my whole career is pretty ridiculous, Like just
to be to be doing this now. I find it
to be ridiculous because you know, the game now is
so different than it was before. I mean it was
so wild wild West. To see where it is now,
to see everybody making a life style happen because of
this game is crazy. It's tremendously ridiculous. But the fact
(34:40):
that I got on Dana White looking for looking for fight,
it's pretty ridiculous, because I mean, I don't even know
how I really got on that show. I remember I
was training Amanda Newness to fight Valentina Chefchank or No,
she was fighting me Shoulit Tate for the title. I
was training Amanda for that, and I got a phone
(35:01):
call from a seven oh two number and I'm like, man,
who is this? I don't know who that is? Hung
up on him, and then Matt Sarah sends me a text, Hey, man, listen,
Dana's trying to call you. Dana Who Dana White.
Speaker 5 (35:13):
I'm like, what did I do?
Speaker 4 (35:16):
Yeah? I was like what did I do? And then
he goes sitting and I'm like all right. So then
I called him back. I said what's up. He's like,
He's like, Deane, what's happening. I'm like, what's up. He's like,
you ever seen the show looking for a Fight? I
was like, of course I have. I didn't, and he's like, well,
you know, our third guy can't do it. Anymore, would
(35:37):
you like to do it? I was like, of course,
you kidding me, and he goes, all right, but the
catches you gotta leave tomorrow. I was like, I got
my bag packed in the car. I had the bag
packed in the car because I'm always ready, always ready,
And he sent me a ticket. I was on the
show the next day. I was on the show.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
It was the first episode.
Speaker 4 (35:55):
The first episode was Los Angeles, and that was the
first time where I actually did stand up comedy because.
Speaker 5 (36:00):
That was the episode where we did stand up. Three
this we all did stand up comedy. And I was like,
and I ain't gonna lie.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
Man.
Speaker 4 (36:07):
That was a I mean, because I had I had
done a tremendous amount of improv, but that's different. You're
on stage where people and you're just acting out scenes.
But like to get on stage and look out in
front of a crowd and tell them listen, I'm funny,
I'm gonna make you laugh, and then and then do
it was hard. Like I was like, I was nervous.
I was really nervous. But would help me from not
being as nervous was watching Dana be nervous.
Speaker 5 (36:30):
I mean, he was back there, his hands was shaken.
Speaker 4 (36:33):
He was, and he had somebody write his jokes.
Speaker 5 (36:39):
His whole set, and he was still nervous.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
I was just already asked you that, did you already
know what you're gonna plan to say during the comedy?
Speaker 5 (36:46):
I didn't know what we were doing. I didn't know
what we were doing.
Speaker 4 (36:49):
Like so when I got there, they were like, all right,
so here's here's what's onny itinerary. And they're like, we're
going to Randy's Donuts and make donuts. We're doing this,
and then we're going to do a comedy set at
the Laugh Factory. I was like, wait, what, like so
so right a set?
Speaker 5 (37:04):
I was like what I was like a.
Speaker 4 (37:06):
Real comedy show. And it was a real show, like
they had David Spade was the headliner. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
Yeah, it was a big time.
Speaker 5 (37:15):
It was a big time show.
Speaker 2 (37:16):
Kind of like the hot dog getting contest, you and
Matt Sarah.
Speaker 4 (37:21):
Pizza, so that that whole hot dog thing.
Speaker 5 (37:25):
Man, I totally let myself.
Speaker 4 (37:26):
Eating hot dogs is a lot harder than you think, Like,
you know, Fourth of July come around. You just pounded
hot dogs and I got this. But when you when
you're under pressure, it's a lot harder than it looks.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
And you know, you probably didn't even get hungry because
there's so much pressure.
Speaker 5 (37:39):
Yeah, yeah, I wasn't hungry.
Speaker 4 (37:41):
I almost sitting there like, yeah, I got this, and
then I like two of them, was like, man, it's disgusting.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
I don't like it, and then Dan could do it.
Then Dana took you guys through a tour of the
hot dog factory.
Speaker 5 (37:52):
Oh, it was disgusting.
Speaker 4 (37:54):
It smelt like like grease and like like boiled rat. Yeah,
because you.
Speaker 3 (38:01):
Need a hot dog right now, Phoenix, not anymore, not
because you guys are talking about.
Speaker 2 (38:05):
It, Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 5 (38:05):
And those were different kind of hot dogs too.
Speaker 4 (38:07):
They were like they were called red snappers, and they
only make them in that area and it's like a
hard casing where like you bite into it and it snaps,
almost like a balloon.
Speaker 2 (38:17):
Did they taste differently.
Speaker 4 (38:18):
No, it doesn't really taste differently. It's just got a
different texture and it's like really like red like lipstick.
It's disgusting.
Speaker 3 (38:24):
Like no, I definitely don't.
Speaker 4 (38:27):
Yeah, kind of, it was kind of disgusting.
Speaker 3 (38:29):
So out of all the Dana Whites looking for the fights,
what do you think is the most ridiculous thing that
you did.
Speaker 4 (38:36):
I tell you what, the most uh for me, Like,
even when I think back to when I did it,
I'm like, why did not do that? And that was
swimming with sharks? Swimming with sharks, and it wasn't did
we swim with sharks? I remember when we were going
to do it, they were like, are you going to
get in the cage and you're gonna go down with sharks?
And I was like, all that's cool as long as
(38:56):
I'm in a cage, right, So then when we get
on the boat and we go out three miles into
the water, then you don't want to use the cage.
The cages for cages for WIMPs, like little kids going.
Speaker 2 (39:10):
Swim out there.
Speaker 4 (39:12):
Now, keep in mind I don't swim at all. I
can't swim. And I jumped in. I had the life vest,
was the first one in, and when I hit that water,
I was like, I mean, I was so scared. I
mean it was one of them times where like I was,
I really was like, all right, this this might be
it for me, Like that might be.
Speaker 5 (39:34):
I really thought I was. I was like, tell my
family I love them.
Speaker 4 (39:36):
I really thought I was like that this could be it,
and I jumped in and first it was nothing, nothing, nothing,
I'm in there by myself. I mean, it was like
so nerve wrecking. And then when I looked down, I
saw my first the first shark.
Speaker 2 (39:47):
I was like, oh my god, what type of shark
did you see?
Speaker 4 (39:49):
There were tiger sharks.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
Tiger hunt was like one of the most dangerous ones too,
tiger sharks, I think, so.
Speaker 4 (39:57):
So we're in so then finally Dana jumps in, and
then Matt jumps in, and then they start throwing chump
in the water. And then I looked and then I
looked down again and one was coming right at me.
And I couldn't get out fast enough. I said, get
me the hell out of here. I couldn't get out
(40:17):
fast enough. I was like, I'm done. I mean I
literally thought I was going to die.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
I can't imagine.
Speaker 4 (40:25):
I thought I was going to die.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
I would swing out.
Speaker 4 (40:28):
I was like, and like I said, I don't know
how to swim. So I was in there, like just
trying to get out as fast as I could. And
as soon as I got out of the water, I
was like, I felt this sense of relief, like I
couldn't believe I just did that, like that was the
dumbest thing I've ever done in my life.
Speaker 2 (40:43):
Where was this?
Speaker 4 (40:44):
And that was actually oddly enough, it was like twenty
minutes from where I live in Florida.
Speaker 2 (40:50):
Oh, in Florida.
Speaker 4 (40:51):
Yeah, it was in Florida.
Speaker 2 (40:53):
I would never swimm sharks. I don't think I could
do it.
Speaker 4 (40:55):
And like people, some people could, you know, do it,
but like to be chumming the water into to be
antagonizing these these sharks and getting them.
Speaker 2 (41:05):
With no cage, yeah, you're just in there.
Speaker 4 (41:07):
I thought like with the caves would have been all right.
I would have been like, all right, let's do it.
You know what I'm saying, what they gonna do to me?
Speaker 2 (41:11):
But no, No, if Danna came back and said, hey,
let's go redo this film of swim with sharks that
you gotta do it again.
Speaker 4 (41:19):
I'd say, after you jump off the cliff in Hawaii,
after you jump off that cliff, then I'll go swimming
with sharks.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
How scared is that?
Speaker 4 (41:29):
That wasn't that bad only because like I didn't really
give myself an opportunity to be scared, like I like
pumped myself up. Yeah, it was on situations like we're
in Hawaii, Hawaii. If you've never been in Hawaii, you
gotta go. It's an amazing place. Where in Hawaii is
such a cool place. And I was like, all right,
I'm just gonna walk up. As soon as I get
to it, I'm not even gonna look.
Speaker 5 (41:46):
I'm just gonna jump. And again I don't swim, but
this time.
Speaker 4 (41:49):
They wouldn't let me wear a vest because if you
have a vest on, the vest won't go down and
you can like break a rib by hitting the water.
So they were just like, we'll catch you when you
go down, so catch you.
Speaker 5 (42:04):
It was like, so I jumped it.
Speaker 4 (42:06):
So I just walked up, walked up, and I just
saw my spot and I jumped and I just I
jumped and I hit the bottom of the floor of
the floor, and then you did. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (42:15):
As soon as I hit the bottom, I jumped back
up and then they grabbed me.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
And I was like, how many feet was the drop?
Speaker 4 (42:22):
It's about twenty thirty feet. Twenty thirty feet.
Speaker 3 (42:24):
That looks a lot bigger when you're standing up there.
Speaker 2 (42:28):
And the rocks probably came out too, So after I
actually jump out far.
Speaker 5 (42:32):
When you're standing up there, I mean it looks like.
Speaker 4 (42:36):
But you know, the weird The weird thing is, I
would probably do that again if I had to.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
I would probably do that again if.
Speaker 4 (42:42):
I had to.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
Next time you go, I'll yeah, I need somebody where
in Hawaii? Was it?
Speaker 4 (42:46):
I don't even know, you know, yeah, okay, some wherever
wherever the Hawaiian dudes.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
And then after that, you guys went and got to
go watch some fights and stuff. What type of fights
were they.
Speaker 5 (42:59):
In the Hawaii?
Speaker 4 (43:01):
Uh? Who fought there? I remember it was a guy
from Team Alpha Male. And I mean, Hawaii's got a
lot of talented fighters, Like so there's if you've ever
never if you've never seen like street fighting videos in Hawaii,
you gotta go back and watch them because like everybody
in Hawaii can fight. It's like they grow up, like
(43:21):
they learn how to fight. So they had a lot
of talented guys. But I think the guy that we
picked up was from my team Alpha MA. I can't
remember who it was though, but any guys signed him, Yeah,
they signed him.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
It's definitely a lot bigger, probably especially with Max Holloway
being champion.
Speaker 4 (43:34):
Yeah yeah, but they but they've always had like like
good street fighters, like I said, if you go back
and watch it, look like real boxers just scrapping.
Speaker 2 (43:43):
Yeah, it's crazy to see the evolution of them and
male like. Look in Mexico right now, I.
Speaker 4 (43:47):
Know the champions three chance almost could have had four,
could have had four that Yeah, yeah, Mexico Mexico is
has really come up and it's good to see that too.
Speaker 3 (43:59):
And they're building the either, which is probably gonna help
help a lot.
Speaker 2 (44:02):
We needed to. They need to get an event out
there in Mexico someday.
Speaker 4 (44:05):
Yeah. Yeah, well, I mean they had to win to
Mexico City, but I don't think the guys.
Speaker 5 (44:11):
It was a long time King Velaska is in Verdom.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
Do you think you'll eventually go back.
Speaker 4 (44:17):
I think so, of course, Yeah, for sure, And I
think a lot of it depends on what happens this weekend.
If if Ya can pull this off, I'm sure that
would help. But if Moreno Moreno is a bona fide star,
he's a star, and if he can, if he can win,
which he should, I think I think they'll do a show.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
Who do you have in the main event?
Speaker 3 (44:37):
By the way, that's what It's hard to go against him, man, Yeah,
he's just shown and he's levels above everyone in that division.
Speaker 4 (44:45):
He solid, He doesn't make a lot of mistakes. He
doesn't leave himself open a lot. He makes adjustments faster
than anybody, so good at reading.
Speaker 2 (44:53):
You can read like.
Speaker 4 (44:54):
Once you do something to him one time, you will
never be able to do it to him again. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (44:58):
Yeah, like a lot of state.
Speaker 3 (45:00):
It switches a lot of fancy almost kind of lulls
the opponents to sleep.
Speaker 4 (45:04):
Yeah, he he and he he closed his distance really
fast too, so like he can be like snake charming
and then boom, jump on you and meet next thing
you know, he's in on you.
Speaker 2 (45:13):
And he's not scared to go down to the ground either.
Speaker 4 (45:14):
No, and he's I think he's got an underrated ground game.
I mean, trained with Greg Jones probably helps, but he's
got an underrated ground game that I think could give
Yuay your problems if he if they I think that's
the key to this fight though, because I don't think
he wants to spend too much time when he outside
would have got a guy.
Speaker 3 (45:29):
Especially because he could be nos the notes of that here.
And he's throwing a head kick.
Speaker 4 (45:31):
Yeah, he's in his kicks, man, and is he's got fight,
changing weapons on his feet.
Speaker 2 (45:37):
And the Prediction Show I talked about how I feel
like Volkanovsky needs to go down to the map against
to win.
Speaker 4 (45:44):
I agree, I agree.
Speaker 3 (45:47):
Yeah, I don't know it's gonna be a good fights all
the fight. So you're taking Moreno then in the comin event.
Speaker 4 (45:53):
Yeah, yeah, I think Moreno is a completely different guy.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
I think he's just so calmon.
Speaker 3 (45:56):
He's at such peace in his life, Like we had
him on the show and he's talks about like in
the back he's like singing his daughter's songs, like that's
how PC is in his mind.
Speaker 2 (46:04):
I think really shows in his fighting.
Speaker 4 (46:05):
He's such a little kid too, like he and did
you see the clip with him trying to use the
gen Z words. There's a clip of it, like him
and Robert Whitaker and a couple of other fighters and
they're like putting words up did you kids use? And
they're trying to trying to see what they mean. They're
trying to like give the definition and they don't know him.
(46:27):
It's it's pretty funny actually, So.
Speaker 2 (46:28):
They're kind of like slain.
Speaker 4 (46:31):
And yeah, like sus and Rizzy or whatever. Yeah, I
don't even know what I don't even I don't even
know what they are. I don't even know what they are,
much less Brandon Moreno and Brandon Rena, Like what is this?
Speaker 5 (46:43):
You didn't even know? No, no one did Bo Nickel
knew like one of them.
Speaker 3 (46:50):
He's younger, yeah, and he's a little bit.
Speaker 2 (46:51):
Yeah, he's little.
Speaker 3 (46:53):
What do you think about his last minute opponent change?
Speaker 4 (46:56):
You know, I think it's unfortunate for a lot of
other US fighters not know. Bon Nickols a special case.
I give him that, but the fact that he has
to get help in order for him to do well,
he's gonna have to get I get that, But I
think he's getting a lot of help for sure. He's
I mean because even treyshon Gore was a bit it
was kind of help.
Speaker 3 (47:17):
Like they're almost like trying to like pat his record
almost to say.
Speaker 4 (47:20):
I mean, the problem is he don't have any experience
outside of the UFC. Because it's so, it's so, that's
why you can justify it. But then if if you're
using that as justification for giving him beneficial matches, then
why didn't say, well, maybe you should have gave more
experience outside of the UFC, Because I mean, if you
look at it, so let's take a boost. No, Maga
met Off his second fight was Sean Strickland in the
(47:43):
main event, you know what I'm saying, and Aleskaroff his
second fight. His first fight was Phil Hall's. His second
fight is gonna be paul A Costa for the BMF.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Oh yeah, he actually fought in May and yeah Newark.
Speaker 4 (48:00):
Right against Phil Hall. Yeah, Phil Hall's out.
Speaker 5 (48:03):
And now we look at you know, Bo Nickel.
Speaker 4 (48:07):
His third fight, he's fighting Val would Burn, Yeah on
you know, on pay per views. So it's like, I
get what we got to give him help, but it's
just kind of it's just kind of a little unfair,
I think, you know.
Speaker 2 (48:18):
Yeah, I agree, I agree.
Speaker 3 (48:20):
But all right, Dan, it's time to go to the
last letter. And it's kind of two parts. It's now
and next. So what are some burn moments that you're
going through right now in your life? And do you
see any burn moments in the foreseeable future?
Speaker 2 (48:33):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (48:33):
For right now, you know, I'm just trying to catch up,
you know, in terms of where everybody else is. One
thing that I know is that you know, you can't
survive in any industry being the same. You have to
always evolve and you have to constantly reinvent yourself. So
I'm in the process now of burning myself, like intentionally
(48:54):
burning myself to reinvent myself more on this side where
you guys are at on the media side, because I
can't fight. I'm never going to like these guys come out,
come out of retirement and do bare knuckle.
Speaker 5 (49:06):
I am never going to do bare knuckle. I will
be homeless.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
Yeah, you watched a rock fight and uh, Mike Perry.
Speaker 5 (49:15):
Yeah, and rock Hold should never do He's not built
for that, and most most.
Speaker 4 (49:22):
People aren't built for that. Like you got to be
a special human being to do something like that.
Speaker 5 (49:26):
I'm not doing it. Yeah, I'm not doing that. I'm
not doing power slap.
Speaker 4 (49:29):
So I'm in I'm I'm intentionally burning myself now to
be better at this stuff so that this could be
my next direction.
Speaker 2 (49:40):
Do you think do you think you'll actually move one
day behind the desk and commentary or would you still?
Speaker 4 (49:47):
Yeah? I don't really. I don't necessarily like that role really, yeah,
like to be with with Joe Rogan, I don't necessarily
like that role. I like what I'm doing, and then
I like working the desk during the pre show on
the post show.
Speaker 2 (50:00):
Yeah, yeah, I like doing that. We've also Senior kind
of the way and show I.
Speaker 4 (50:04):
Like going away and show.
Speaker 2 (50:05):
These are fun. Yeah, those are fun.
Speaker 4 (50:07):
And I'm also doing After Tough the post show for
the Ultimate Fighter, and that's probably my favorite role. So
like that's really what I ultimately kind of want to
do is more stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (50:18):
What makes that so fun to you?
Speaker 4 (50:19):
I mean, and shout out to you know, ESPN for
allowing me to do it. But they're giving me complete
like control creatively, so like they allow me to bring
in my characters and they allow me to do stuff
and not be subscriptive right there, and they're just like,
that's what we want because we understand this is the
entertainment business. You know, we don't want you necessarily breaking
(50:40):
down the x's and the o's. They want me making
fun of people.
Speaker 3 (50:43):
So they want me.
Speaker 5 (50:47):
They want me.
Speaker 4 (50:47):
So you know, the very first show I did like
a economic record character, which I don't do an Irish accent.
I actually uh wrote, I wrote like some stuff down
and gave it to Molly McCann.
Speaker 5 (50:58):
She's from Liverpool.
Speaker 4 (50:59):
So if the accent is really bad, it's like it's
because she's from Liverpool, so I was likely say this
and I'm trying to say it the way you say it.
Speaker 5 (51:09):
Yeah, it was. It's just like Michael Chandler.
Speaker 4 (51:18):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, So you know, and like and and
they're and they're cool about that. They want that type
of that type of energy. So to be able to
do that and for them to have that type of
confidence in me is yeah, I like that.
Speaker 2 (51:33):
So and that's what people want to see to yourself,
they don't.
Speaker 4 (51:36):
Want Yeah, yeah, And I mean because anybody could have
did that show. They could have gave that show to
Megan o'levy or so the fact that they allowed me
to have that show, you know that, I'm like, all right,
I gotta be able to deliver. Okay.
Speaker 3 (51:48):
So looking forward to the future, do you have anything
kind of brewing that you're excited about?
Speaker 4 (51:52):
So between between doing more stuff like that, and I
have a couple of acting projects that I'm that I'm
working on as well. Again burning and burning through money.
Speaker 5 (52:02):
To make your stuff happen to ille that.
Speaker 4 (52:04):
But the reality is is that you know a lot
of actors. You know, they go through the process like
auditioning and so on, and so forth, and I was like,
and I still audition for stuff sometimes, but at the
end of the day, I'm creating my own projects.
Speaker 1 (52:17):
Me.
Speaker 4 (52:18):
I got a team of guys down in South Florida
and we're creating our own projects, doing like shorts and
different projects. Because now is instead if I'm gonna waste
money like spending time trying to go on auditions and
hoping I get this part, I'm not doing that. I'm
creating my own projects. I'm going to finance my own projects.
I'm gonna burn through that money to finance my own
projects and create the characters that I want. And that's
(52:40):
how we're doing it. So we're in the process now
of creating like a series. We want to do a
series in South Florida. So what's it like based off
based you know, I'm a crooked cop. Yeah, yeah, I'm
a crooked cop dealing with some drug dealing guys and
so on and so forth. Oh, I love it. I mean,
(53:00):
it's it's you know, it's another creative process. Even as
a fighter, I always thought of myself as more of
a an artist type fighter. I mean the look a
fighter's artist. Uh Anderson Silva, you know, easy, those are
more artist type fighters, and that's kind of how I was.
But then when I retired from fighting, I need I
need to do a place to express my art, So
(53:21):
I do it now on screen.
Speaker 3 (53:22):
Well, if you need someone to fill a role, he
can call me.
Speaker 4 (53:26):
Yeah, yeah, man, listen, everybody work around me. I like,
I like everybody to work.
Speaker 2 (53:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (53:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (53:31):
I take acting lessons with Jamie Fox's acting coach.
Speaker 5 (53:35):
No kidding.
Speaker 2 (53:36):
Yeah, well.
Speaker 4 (53:38):
Jamie Fox is hands down the greatest entertainer we've ever seen,
so you are in good hands. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (53:47):
It's so fun because it's it's something new, kind of
like with this starting this, it's new, and I'm able
just to like learn and learn and learn, and it's
it's learning to be able to take a character and
like make it yourself, put yourself into that character, put.
Speaker 4 (53:59):
Your self in them shoes, and create the colors of
this of the words on the page right to bring
it to life.
Speaker 5 (54:05):
So like that's special, Zach.
Speaker 3 (54:07):
What would be some advice that you give me as
an aspiring actor?
Speaker 5 (54:11):
You just said it, keep learning, keep learning.
Speaker 4 (54:13):
Yeah, well, you know what, keep learning and take your
yourself out of it because what we do is, you know,
we put our own baggage onto things. We got to
take ourself out of it and tell the story.
Speaker 2 (54:27):
Don't let your ego get the way.
Speaker 5 (54:29):
Basically, yeah, don't let ego getting it.
Speaker 4 (54:31):
Don't let your ego getting away, don't let your baggage
or your insecurity is getting away. Just tell the story.
Speaker 2 (54:37):
Yeah it makes it makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 3 (54:40):
But all right, Dean, you just spelt burning your life.
So thank you so much for coming on the show.
Tell the audience where they can find you at your
social media as everything.
Speaker 4 (54:49):
All my social media is the same. It's at Dean Thomas.
Dean is spelled d I N. You can hear me
on Serious Radio, on MMA Today, Serious Fight Nation, and
on ESPN during the fights, all kinds of stuff. I'm everywhere.
I'm trying to intentionally, I'm everywhere. So Dean Thomas at
d I N Thomas find me.
Speaker 2 (55:09):
You heard the man, go give him some love. And
as a gift Dean for coming on the podcast, you
will be getting the black Label edition Burn Factory hoodie.
Only guests get these. I could use. Only guests get these.
Speaker 5 (55:28):
I appreciate you, guys.
Speaker 3 (55:29):
Belt and the belt we'll get. Well, all right, that's
gonna do it from this episode of The Burn Factory Podcast.
Like always, like follow and subscribe at the Burn Factory Podcast.
Speaker 2 (55:42):
And like always, please visit my foundation as well, the
Priest James Foundation dot org. Again the Priest James Foundation
dot org to understand why this is called the Burn Factory.
Speaker 3 (55:52):
We'll see you guys for the next episode.
Speaker 2 (55:54):
Peace. All right, guys, we're here with Dean Thomas, who
just spelt burnt in his life and he is now
the Burn Factory Podcast Champion. Awesome, thank you so much
for coming on. We really appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (56:10):
You were an inspiration to us, definitely an inspiration to
a lot of people out there, So thank you so
much for coming.
Speaker 5 (56:16):
I'm the champ.
Speaker 4 (56:18):
I love it all right, man, I appreciate you guys,
Thank you, thank you so much. Appreciate yall. Thank you
very much, and y'all refer to me as a champ.
Speaker 2 (56:27):
It sir Champ. De Tom
Host
LaVar Arrington
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