Beyond the Scorpion Kick: Taekwondo's Political Reality

"We're saying what everyone's thinking." These words from a military veteran to Coach Moreno capture the essence of what makes The Warehouse 15 podcast essential listening for the Taekwondo community. Coaches TJ, Moreno, and Young pull no punches as they dissect the uncomfortable realities facing modern Taekwondo.

The conversation weaves through multiple critical topics, beginning with a comparison of old versus new competition styles. While watching footage of past tournaments, the coaches acknowledge that rose-colored nostalgia often obscures the flaws of "old school" Taekwondo. This balanced perspective sets the tone for their nuanced analysis of today's sport landscape.

International competitions reveal troubling trends, with countries like Uzbekistan, Iran, and Kazakhstan demonstrating remarkable depth of talent that outpaces American competitors. The coaches identify several contributing factors: geographic proximity allowing more frequent competition between these nations, increased governmental support following Olympic success, and the economic realities of the World Taekwondo ranking system. This system, they argue, creates an unintended form of "economic racism" by disproportionately benefiting European countries whose athletes can easily attend numerous ranking events without excessive travel costs.

Perhaps most alarming is the skyrocketing cost of participation. Coach TJ shares his shock at paying $225 just to register his daughter for a basic local tournament. Such steep barriers contradict Taekwondo's original appeal as an accessible "sport for all" and limit growth at the grassroots level.

The podcast also tackles the effectiveness of national training centers, the politics of World Taekwondo governance, and parallels with collegiate athletics' evolving landscape. Throughout, the coaches demonstrate their deep love for the sport while refusing to shy away from its troubling challenges.

Subscribe to join these straight-shooting Taekwondo masters as they continue to address the issues others won't, including next week's philosophical debate with special guest Dr. Stephen Kaepner on the evolution of Taekwondo training and competition.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 3 (00:21):
it is the warehouse 15 and for and I mean literally.
For once, tj was on time.
So, we are extremely happy.
We saw his beautiful dojang.
It cost $1.50, and I asked himwhat it cost and he said you
know it is what it is, but it isbeautiful, it is in.

(00:42):
North Carolina and if you don'tknow where North Carolina is
you're in.
New York, you make a left, keepgoing, keep going, keep going.
When you don't see any moredentist office, that's where his
school is.
So congratulations on abeautiful facility.
How are you doing today, coach?

Speaker 1 (01:00):
I'm good.
I'm good, sheldon.
Thank you, definitely excitedabout the facility they should
make you, mayor of the city,look at that smile.

Speaker 3 (01:07):
You got man, that's a lot of teeth Of Concord.
You like that?
That's good.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
That's good.
It's definitely exciting tokind of have a space and be able
to do some things out there,looking forward to some events
pretty soon.
Now you got a reason to come.

Speaker 3 (01:21):
I'm coming.
Are there any other programs inNorth Carolina, like, is there
an Olympic training center orsomething?

Speaker 1 (01:29):
There are, I don't know.
I'm in Concord.
I'll find the address for you.
I'm in Concord.

Speaker 3 (01:33):
Yeah, Send me the address, and it shouldn't.
Hopefully it's not thedirections like turn left at the
big tree, go as far as the crowcan fly and then look for the
rock.

Speaker 1 (01:44):
This is the Cali guy right here.
You got to make a ride at theStarbucks and then go down the
street till you find the bank.

Speaker 3 (01:50):
You know exactly.
Oh geez Well, Starbucks, and Icould find it.
Coach Moreno.
How are you doing today, sir?
I'm good.

Speaker 2 (01:57):
I think there's a lot of love in here.
Look, I got my San peak campthat I did a couple weeks back,
and then I'm looking at CoachJennings' shirt high performance
, mr Jensa.
I'm going there tomorrow.
So, man, it's just likeeverything just blends.
Everything is perfect.
Look, I got my nice empanadasI'm going to eat when I'm in the
middle of this training.

Speaker 3 (02:15):
Don't make me jelly, I know Jensa.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
He's never invited me to anything.

Speaker 3 (02:23):
Nothing, zero.
Oh, he sponsored you.
You finally got a sponsor.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
Shout out to my sponsor.

Speaker 3 (02:29):
Oh, remind me again, yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:30):
No, he gave it to me as a gift when I went there for
a seminar I did a while back.

Speaker 3 (02:33):
I want to thank the Budo brothers again.
I'm wearing your beautiful inthis chilly not California
weather.
I'm doing a CPR.
I was helping set up a CPRclass at my son's school today
and I said how long is the class?
They said three hours.
I go three hours.
I said I know New York CPR.

Speaker 2 (02:51):
And they're like what ?

Speaker 3 (02:52):
I said New York CPR man.
I said yo, you better get up,you're going to die.
But anyway, we'll start withtoday's joke I wanted to start
with one thing before we getstarted, because I know there's
been all this hyperbole and youknow whatever about whatever.
But I wanted to give you guysjust a sight of what I had seen.

Speaker 1 (03:14):
Oh Lord, no, no, I'm not done.
I never know.

Speaker 3 (03:16):
I'm not done.
Hold on a second, let me findit.
Let me go back.
Oh, I went the wrong way, butanyway I'll find it here.
Let me just search it, becauseI think it's always a nice way
to start.
You guys can already see in thesearch bar what I'm looking for
.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
All the school tech ones.

Speaker 3 (03:33):
Yeah, versus foot farting A new.
I'll just put new.
See what comes up.
All right, okay, here we go.

Speaker 1 (03:45):
I'm just taking a random thing and I was a good
match, though, yeah that's ashort one.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Yeah, that's not a great video.

Speaker 3 (04:09):
Not a great video Not a great video.

Speaker 1 (04:14):
I wish I had one of those buzzers Okay well.

Speaker 3 (04:16):
Here it is.
Here it is Sorry.

Speaker 2 (04:18):
Sorry, not sorry this is actually my 50th take.
Oh my God, that's okay, thoughHold on a second.
Hold on a second.
I'm going to get past.
Oh my gosh, that's okay, though, because the script isn't Hold
on a second Hold on a second.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
I'm going to get past .

Speaker 3 (04:26):
Bang holly, swing holly.
That was actually a good shot.
That was a good shot.
That actually was one of therare moments of something
beautiful.

Speaker 1 (04:37):
You're failing again.
That's just too in a row.

Speaker 3 (04:39):
I know it's too, in a row I don't know what I'm
looking at.

Speaker 2 (04:42):
That's one of my friends, carlos Sanzores, but to
be honest, to be fair, I'mgoing to go against it that guy
was horrible.

Speaker 3 (04:54):
Oh, look at all this kicking.

Speaker 2 (04:58):
Look at this beauty man.

Speaker 1 (05:00):
he's that was 68, 63, 68.

Speaker 2 (05:02):
They're falling down.
They're not hitting the chest,they're flocking.
Look at these guys.
That was 68, 63, 68.
They're falling down.
They're not hitting the chestguard, they're blocking, kick
each other in the butt.
Look at these guys.
Can't even stand up.

Speaker 3 (05:09):
Not a scorpion kick could be seen.

Speaker 2 (05:12):
Running out of bounds , falling.
Guard is all out of control.
No balance.

Speaker 3 (05:18):
Look at this guy on the floor.
Oh, look at this, look at this,look at this, look at this,
look at this, look at this.

Speaker 2 (05:27):
Oh, I think I'm going to start to cry Unbelievable,
all right, all right, I thinkI've made my point.

Speaker 3 (05:34):
All right, let me try to figure out how to turn it
off now.

Speaker 2 (05:39):
I heard you do the great bite and so I've been
ducking and dodging on someTaekwondo debates and stuff like
that.
Who's that I've been duckingand dodging them on some
Taekwondo debates and stuff likethat?
Who's that?
So, grandmaster, doctor,philosopher, buddhist Monk,
master Stephen Kaepner, if you'dlike to be on our call, I would
love to have you.
I would love to debate yourphilosophical Debate.
Yeah, yeah, I'll debate him.
Let me get this right, let meget this right.

Speaker 3 (06:01):
I just want to understand, because you're
throwing the gauntlet down soyou want to debate dr double
doctor, not single doctor to phd.
Dr stephen capner, ninth dongrandmaster, joined the club
with me and I'm going to see hisceremony.
I invited the both of you.
I think there's a limit for uhokay, that's a great resume, but

(06:24):
, dr.
Grandmaster, I only started, Ionly started.

Speaker 2 (06:28):
Hasn't seen a modern Taekwondo match in about 10
years.

Speaker 3 (06:31):
So oh okay, that sounds like the gauntlet has
been thrown.
All right, good, yeah, I'lljudge.

Speaker 1 (06:39):
I'll judge.

Speaker 3 (06:40):
He and I tried to watch one once and then he's one
of my best seniors, so I'm onlykidding.

Speaker 2 (06:46):
But second of all, actually I want to say something
real fast because I'm not goingto say the guy's name, but he
was a former military guy.
I don't know if he's watching.
I saw him at a competition lastweek and he said something to
me that made me really happyabout the podcast guys.
He went up to me and said hey,coach, he goes.
I've been watching the podcastand I enjoy you guys.
I go oh, thanks, we're tryingto have fun with the blah, blah,
blah.

(07:06):
And then he looked at me andsaid you're saying you guys are
saying what everyone's thinking,and I was just like.
It made me so happy because Idon't want to say his name,
because I didn't ask him if Icould put him out there like
that.
I don't want to do that.
But it made me happy because Iknow we do this for fun.

(07:30):
I know we talk about crazystuff, but when I hear little
things like that, I mean I feellike we're doing the right thing
, you know.
So kudos to you know both youguys for for doing all this
stuff.
But people are listening andpeople are watching and people I
think we're almost the voicefor them, so I think it's really
cool guys I think that I thinkthat's a.

Speaker 3 (07:41):
I think that's a perfect segue into that new
nonprofit that we're running foryou, the Mex I Can Profit.
So if you want to make adonation to Mex, I Can, you can
make that donation and make itdirectly to me and I'll make
sure it gets to the right place,there you go.
So Mex I Can, mex I Can, butit's good, I mean.

(08:03):
I think that's truth.
I think the truth needs to bespoken, and I think there are so
few people.
You usually start to speak thetruth at two or three points in
your life.
One is you're old enough andyou don't care and you don't
have.
You don't have anything anybodycan take from you, nor do you
care if they do take it.
And then there are those thatspeak it all the time, and then
there are those that just becomesenile, like me, and then they

(08:25):
start to speak because theycan't do anything else.
But with all that said, I heardthere was a tournament going on
somewhere.

Speaker 2 (08:33):
Yeah, there's a lot going on right now.
I mean there's the AsianPresident's Cup and then there's
also the African President'sCup.
One is in Ethiopia, obviously,the African Cup and then the
other one is in China right now,which, um, I haven't been able
I've even been able to watch allof it kind of live, but it's on
youtube.
So it's always cool to go backand see what's going on.
But I tell you what you know,tj.

(08:53):
I know one of my athletes weretalking about one of the best
guys from from the pan am unionor organization, fighting
somebody at a world cup, and itwasn't even close.
He goes, that's one of our bestpeople.
And I said, you know, I, I meanI while I agree sometimes that
some of these other countriesare are more advanced and bigger
and better than us, um, I haveto agree, man, the depth, the

(09:15):
depth of these tournaments thatI'm watching over there is a
little bit scary.
You know, I'm looking at fiveand six iranians five and six
kore.
Of course it's in China, sothere's a bunch of Chinese.
The Kazakh team is doing good.
I'm really excited.
On Monday I'm leaving toUzbekistan with the Brazil group
and man Uzbekistan looks likethey're on fire.

(09:38):
These guys are.
They look like they're on a Idon't want to say next level,
but they're definitelyseparating themselves from
people.
So we've got a lot of making upto do.
I'm not sure what you thinkabout that, tj.

Speaker 1 (09:50):
I think it's always been a little scary over there.
You know what I mean.
We've always known thathistorically that's a strong
side of the world.
I think that's a side of theworld that is, I'm going to say,
has fallen in love with thesport of Taekwondo and and push
to advance it and pay to advanceit and work to advance it, and,
and there I mean, as you, likeyou just said, they're
definitely out front.

(10:11):
You know what I mean.
I mean even when I looked atsome of the junior stuff in
comparison from the junior worldchampionships and stuff like
that, these, these kids are, orthese, these systems are
starting their professionallevels I really early, if you
ask me.
I think with the more successthey have at the Olympic level,
the more support they get fromthe bottom and they push the
bottom of the pile.

Speaker 2 (10:28):
That's what's interesting is like.
I mean, coach Young, you know,back in the day there were some
good Jordan fighters, but as acountry they haven't been big.
But in 2016, when Abugas, the68 guy, wins the gold medal, all
of a sudden, the next fouryears, boom.
Jordan's got money andresources and all of a sudden,

(10:48):
all these athletes are showingup.
Rashid Tauf wins in 68 in 2021in Tokyo, uzbekistan, just
through the roof.
But I think what I'm seeing nowis that they're showing up to
these opens deep Before we sawthem at the world championship.
Okay, there's one good Iranian,but when you start to see four
and five and some of theIranians I'm seeing over there,

(11:09):
they're older, like you knowwhat I'm saying.
They're not these young pupscoming up just trying to.
They're like these chiseleddudes that are.
They look strong.
And the same thing withUzbekistan.
I'm looking at these athletesthat I don't know, maybe they
just got a chance to to showtheir stuff because all of a
sudden, they have a littlefunding, a little bit of support
.
That, to me, is what's kind ofscary.

Speaker 1 (11:30):
So um, you know, yeah , the level.
No, the level is high.
No, obviously the level is highand, like I said, the
competition between thosecountries always high and I
think they get to stay again.
Going back to the regionalthing, they stand in front of
each other way more often thanwe probably stand in front of
them Me too, you know.

Speaker 3 (11:46):
They're a little involved with each other.
In English they say Kazakhstan,so that's a stressful first
syllable Kazakhstan.
I was just trying to help CoachMoreno.
He was stumbling a little bit.
So, I figured we got to getKazakhstan.

Speaker 2 (12:07):
Sorry about that, no, no.

Speaker 3 (12:08):
Sorry, not sorry, but those countries are strong.

Speaker 1 (12:12):
I think they come back with Olympic medals and
it's probably the highestfinishes in their country for
any Olympic games.
That's what it was in Jordan,right, it was their first
Olympic gold medal, somethingbig like that.
I think that's history changing.
Yeah, but what the countries?

Speaker 3 (12:24):
realize is this, and this is what we realize that the
olympic council of asia.
With a little bit of money youcan change your country's metal
output.
So we looked at sports.
Where does it require?
And this is the ideal of theolympics.
The olympics is what can sportfor all be?
So it means it's got to be asport that can be done anywhere.
It's got to be a sport thatdoesn't require it, doesn't have

(12:45):
a high bar of entry with regardto finance, and then it does
find correct.
Right.
And then the second one is.
The last one is it's got to besomething which the technical
component of it can be learnedquickly and mastered thereafter,
and taekwondo is perfect forthat.
You know, swimming is swimmingis not necessarily, but
taekwondo is perfect for that.
You know, swimming is swimmingis not necessarily, but

(13:06):
taekwondo isn't equestrian, notso much so when you're looking
at a country, if you have fastathletic, agile athletes and you
say what can they do?
Track and field for sure,taekwondo for another.
Um, so I mean they.
This is why I.

Speaker 2 (13:22):
I'm going to try to spoon feed you because you'll
see where I'm going with this.
Like again on the Olympicglobal movement, one of the
things that was attractive isthat it was that it wasn't so
expensive, correct?
I mean, now there's electronicsand stuff like that, and it was
open to a lot of countries thatdidn't have resources.
Like you said, it was verysimple to get in and in not a

(13:44):
short time there was resourceswhere these athletes could go up
very quickly technically.
Am I wrong or right?

Speaker 3 (13:51):
Right and now?
But now here's, you've just hitthe second part, where the rub
is right and the idea isoriginally.
The idea is, when you do asport, sport for all, soccer,
soccer is played everywhere andthe reason is you just need a
ball.
You don't even necessarily needa good field.

(14:11):
No, taekwondo, you need bodies,you don't need uniforms, you
don't need belts, you don't needtargets.
You can get, you can teach itpretty much anywhere.
But now, when you get to thesecond component of it people
trying to excel or make anolympic team with the
qualification process, you'reputting people in a place where
it's difficult, not impossible,but challenging to make an
olympic team because of theamount of money it takes to a

(14:32):
develop an athlete, b to fundthe athlete actually making the
qualification process let me askyou something.

Speaker 1 (14:38):
For me it's the ranking.
I think it's the ranking.
The ranking kind of dictatedand changed all that stuff, like
I.
I understand that.
I know that's where every all,like all the modern sports that
went in that direction.
As a ranking there's abracketing, blah, blah, blah.
But there was also somethingsaid about showing up to the
tournament and you know thebracket is what it is and I know
we can talk oh, there wascheating, there was a
manipulation of the bracket andputting people here.
There's everywhere.

(14:59):
But I think that changeseverything.
Now you gotta go get ranking,get ranking points.
You want.
There's a race to top whatever.
Top five, top six, that's mypoint exactly.

Speaker 3 (15:07):
In other words, now you have put yourself, in other
words you have economicallydisadvantaged certain countries.
You have, you've done racism,just economic racism.
So now, if you're in a countrythat can't afford it, or you
have a country that doesn't havean established Olympic
Committee funding system, oryou're in a country where the

(15:29):
Ministry of Sport funds it,which is the majority of the
countries, they say you know, wecould do this, or we can do
jump roping for our entirecountry and get these fat bodies
into shape.
So why should we spend $2million on a small sport that
when we watch, we don'tunderstand, and the most that
we're going to put on a podiumof two people?
Now, if those two people canwin ie in the case of jordan and

(15:52):
stuff like this.
But that's why these othercountries, like ubekistan,
kazakhstan and and you know, thecountries that can afford it,
that have gas reserves, the onesthat are interesting, that
don't perform, are the ones thathave money but culturally don't
have a history of sport, andthat's, I hate to say it, saudi

(16:15):
Arabia.

Speaker 2 (16:16):
But they're coming up in Teguando.
They're coming, yeah, becausenow they're doing the Aspire
Academies, but Saudi Arabia.

Speaker 3 (16:23):
Think about Kuwait.
The average Kuwaiti gets apension for life.
So is he going to go sweat in agym for six to eight hours to
become a world?
It doesn't matter to him.
He gets married, he gets.
He gets money to get married,gets a house.
He goes to college.
His college is paid forentirely.
He comes out of college, goesinto society.
Minimum of three or fourhundred thousand, that's it.

(16:44):
So you know.
Imagine that here.
So they're losing athletes tocomplacency and quality of life.
The athletes that, excuse me,do well historically are the
ones that this is their choicebetween poverty and a life.
So when they get in the ringthey're like, oh dude, I got to

(17:05):
win so I can have a life.
But I apologize, Go ahead.

Speaker 2 (17:07):
No, so I was going to man.
I got to.

Speaker 1 (17:10):
But wouldn't that be the same for other?
So you're saying other sportsdon't have the poverty or life
thing.
It still affects other sportstoo.
Right, it affects every sport.

Speaker 3 (17:18):
You can't name a sport that some of the countries
that I mentioned have.
Even you look at their watch.
The Olympic team march in.
Just watch the openingceremonies and then you see it
sort of affects every sport.

Speaker 2 (17:30):
What I was going to say because TJ, you took me in a
different direction, but I likewhat you said, like the ranking
changed everything.
Well, first of all, I want tosay that Taekwondo was supposed
to be an entry, a sport, a sportthat requires so much financial
input, and that's why it wasfor all and that's why we excel
with so many countries.
Now it's becoming in thedigital age, it's becoming more
expensive.
But, tj, you said the rankingchanged all that too, because

(17:53):
you're right, young, it kind ofdiscriminated against countries
that don't have a lot ofresources.
But I think, while it waswell-intentioned to have a world
ranking, it benefited one partof the world and that's Europe
because of the proximity and thegeography of it.
It did not help at all South orCentral America.
It didn't even help Asia,because Asia is Asia.

(18:14):
They're going to do martialarts regardless.
So when I look at this, is itthe duty of the WT to reassess
this and say you know what?
It was well-intentioned, butover the last 10 years, one
group of the world has reallydominated in the rankings, in
the results.

Speaker 3 (18:34):
They want that, though the Europeans want it.

Speaker 1 (18:36):
They want to have it, the Europeans love it.

Speaker 3 (18:38):
And the reason they love it is they are like to be
frank.
The Europeans in proximity arethe same as the United States,
with Kentucky to you knowwhatever North Carolina, and so
when you can get the majority ofthe points by just going on a
plane out two, three hours awayand not have to get on a 16-hour
flight, that's a differentworld.
So the Euros love it.

(18:59):
And the reason the Euros loveit is they don't have to run the
WTF or the WT or whatever it'scalled.
The reason they don't have torun it is they do run it.
They run the part of it thatmatters.
So Cho and his clown show forlack of a better word or
probably the most apropos word Ican think of there's nobody in
it.
They don't have a brain trustthat can fix it.

(19:19):
So rumor is Cho's going to runagain, unless you know,
cirrhosis of the liver gets him.
But and then after that it'llbe Yang Jinban and Yang Jinban's
worse.
Yang Jinban is the reason youhave pushing, because in his
warped mind of taekwondo, 20years ago, when he we had this
conversation in his room down inYongin, he was like oh, you can
eliminate, uh, a grabbing ifyou allow pushing.

(19:40):
I mean you can eliminate peoplepunching people in the body if
you let them kick you allowpushing.
I mean you can eliminate peoplepunching people in the body if
you let them kick them in theballs.
I mean, what kind of rationaleis that?
So you know his rationale, forit has destroyed the sport.
Now, if you put that guy incharge, cho's inept.
That's different.
He's ignorant and inept.

(20:01):
Yang Jinban is not ignorant,nor is he inept.
He's skilled.
He's a skilled politician.
He's got a napoleon complex andhe would use that napoleon
complex to enforce even furtherhis idea of what taekwondo would
be.
The shame of it is there was apoint where he was respected by

(20:21):
some of the best players forstrategic stuff and, if you
remember, he did the originaleducation tapes, the turk, the
educational resource channel orwhatever it was called, and he
did a lot of great tapes.
This guy I don't know whatkool-aid he's drinking, what
version of flavored sojo he'sdrinking, but this guy has
destroyed the sport but you know, I think it's.

Speaker 2 (20:43):
It's like anything.
Well, things arewell-intentioned at the
beginning.
Absolute power corruptsabsolutely.
That's the truth of the matterwhen there's no checks and
balances from these guys anymoreand they start to run anything.
It's like they're a guy andthen they get supported and it's
just here.
It's very few times where theyget people on the outside that
will chime in, and if they do,they're afraid to because

(21:04):
they're going to be looked atpoorly.
I'm sorry, TJ.

Speaker 3 (21:08):
Okay, so here's the flash quiz Ready.
And this is like.
I had a drummer in my band.
We would argue about music allthe time and he didn't like the
songs I picked.
So he loved Iron Maiden and Isaid, okay, quick, name three
Iron Maiden tunes that are known.
He got to one.
So here goes your flash quiz.
You ready, guys?
Wt quiz you ready?

(21:28):
Name five non Koreans that runthe organization.

Speaker 1 (21:35):
Yeah, silence.
Oh, hold on a second.

Speaker 3 (21:37):
Mic drop, All right great.
Now, dude, you want one betterthan that Name, one in the kooky
one, yeah, yeah, so you knowthe problem is starting to sound
similar, right?
Here's the problem.
There's a nationalism, anepotism, sycophants around him
who want to be close to the fireJay Warwick, steve McNally the

(22:17):
list goes on.
And, by the way, includingothers in the sport who, out of
respect for them as fighters, Iwon't mention their names.
They're hanger-ons because theyget to go to the show, they get
to hang out, they get to kissthe ring, they get to drink soju
and scotch and they get to hangout close to the fire.
They don't care what happens tothe sport because they're not
doing it anymore, and that'swhere the shame comes in.

(22:40):
So, fundamentally, as anathlete who's done the sport, as
an administrator who'sadministered the sport, as a guy
who continues to perpetuate thesport all of us do we have a
philosophical, moral or ethicalobligation to continue to make
it better.
The one thing I will say aboutkarate they're not trying to
make it better.

Speaker 1 (22:58):
No, no, hold on, they're not trying to make it
better.

Speaker 3 (23:00):
Let me talk about karate, for a moment At least.
With karate, whether you likeit or you hate it, they try to
hold on to what they believe tobe their aesthetic, their moral,
ethical framework of how to doit.
Now, you can love or hate it,but it's like fencing.
I could make fencing way moreexciting.
They have their way, they havetheir thing.
They didn't compromise it toany great degree and it's still

(23:22):
fencing.
And now you take that sameargument for karate, who didn't
compromise all that much.
Or you take that same argumentto judo, who compromises a
little, and then take it, andthen take it to fencing.
And then y'all go to taekwondo.
What did they do?
They did they.
They did the monkey dance.
They they're like hey, look atme, hey, keep me in the olympics
, look, oh, you don't like thecheating?

(23:44):
All right, we'll make it reallydumb and no fun, but there
won't be any cheating anymore.
And it's still cheating.
Because who controls the matchnow?
More than anyone who controlsthe match, the referee.

Speaker 2 (23:55):
Worse, because now, instead of taking three to lose,
just takes one guy I meananyway, I mean I look at my
point about this, was I forgotwhere we're talking about?
You know the entry level intoit?
But I mean one of the thingsthat I was going to bring up is
like I just I just signed updaughter, my 11 year old
daughter, for a tournamentwithin the organization, usa

(24:17):
organization, and it cost meright for this and I think we
touched on this earlier yeah,$190 to register, a $5
administration fee.
I thought I was done.
I'm like damn.
And then when I picked herdivision, her weight category,
it was $30 more.
The register is $190.
To pick your division, it's $30.
I'm like $225 to compete at atournament.

(24:40):
That's not even like a how muchwas US Open Like $160?
.

Speaker 1 (24:46):
How is?

Speaker 3 (24:46):
that Folks that website again is wwwmexi-cancom
you know what, and?

Speaker 1 (24:56):
send your checks.
I think it was like 160 orsomething like that.

Speaker 2 (24:59):
I looked the other day there was probably four or
five hundred people signed upfor a three-day event and you
gotta throw in that that's pomselittle kids.
I'm like, imagine again.
I'm just saying putting outthere I know that's not their
concern, but imagine you just asone of these weird divisions
and you're light or you're heavyand you have one or two people
in your division, maybe nobody.

(25:20):
You've been $235 plus air forepisodes and it just there's
gotta be a better way to do itand to qualify for nationals,
right you go, you qualify fornationals, I mean.
And if you you medal, you getinto the final.
Yeah, there's no, it's justshow up and qualify.

Speaker 1 (25:37):
I mean just yeah, that's what I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (25:38):
You qualify as soon as you do it for states or I
don't know man, it's just, I wasreally, I was next time, next
time you're in kentucky, that'sall I'm saying.

Speaker 3 (25:49):
Kentucky is pretty close to north, whatever car, so
I thought, this was not a thing.
It's a thing.
Who knew?

Speaker 2 (25:57):
I was a little shocked by that.
To be honest with you guys.
I was just like 235.
If I'm just you know I got twokids fighting.
If I'm doing two divisions, Imean I'm just like this is dude
just imagine if you had totravel to the event.

Speaker 3 (26:09):
You had two kids fighting you, had one kid
fighting you, your wife and yourdaughter have to get a hotel
room and then, because they cuta deal with the hotel room, you
got to do certain things at thehotel.
And so you know it's a moneytrain and I don't mind if the
money is going back to athletes,but nothing has changed, though
.

Speaker 1 (26:26):
Nothing has changed.
Forget that.

Speaker 3 (26:33):
You're definitely not going back to the athletes, but
it's not like you show up tothese places and they're like
super nice or it's decked out oryou got all these amenities or
something like that.
It's the same shit.
Definitely definitely not likea california gold medal or peak
performance gym.
What do you have now?

Speaker 2 (26:39):
like you have, I mean I think it's good, but it's
like you have virtualcredentials.

Speaker 3 (26:43):
I mean it's stuff like it's great, so they're
saving money that's my pointthey're saving my point, and
it's good to save money, thoughif you're spending the money in
the right place, I'm not opposedto saving money.

Speaker 1 (26:54):
No, I understand, but it's not.
Again, we just go back to thetop of everything.
I say You're not fundinganybody, you're not using it for
anybody.
I got a little weird nugget foryou.

Speaker 2 (27:01):
I mean kind of flipping the thing in Tijuana, I
mean.
So I heard now for the I don'tknow if you heard this, tj,
Maybe I told you For theunder-22 Pan Am Games, young
under-22 Pan Am Games isofficial sport.
In order to coach at that, youhave to have a PAT-2 coaching
certification.
Okay, so that's a regional andyou had to take it in person and

(27:24):
there was only two, one in Idon't know when it was, but it's
passed already and they justput out this requirement,
supposedly in writing on April15th.
So I'm just saying for therecord, I know that Brazil,
canada, haiti I'm almostpositive USA none of those
coaches have gone to thecertification, but they won't

(27:45):
accept the WTGOL.
I can understand if you don'thave any certification, but if
you got the highest of the highand and they won't accept that
everything else falls under it.
Yeah, but so I don't know what'sgoing to come of this, because
obviously there's a bunch ofcoaches that wouldn't be able to
coach their athletes for theircountry at this event.
So I don't know if that's goingto get fixed or not, but I

(28:07):
thought that was crazy well, letme tell you how to get fixed.

Speaker 3 (28:10):
So here's what you do .
It's like training a dog or acat.
So you get a bottle of scotchand you put it on a table, and
then every time, Cho Senor, ChoCho.
Jefe doesn't do his job, butultimately it is.
Wt has the right under itsrules to enforce rules over any

(28:34):
member nation association.

Speaker 2 (28:36):
I think this will get fixed.

Speaker 3 (28:38):
It has to get fixed.

Speaker 1 (28:40):
Take away the scotch Take away the scotch?

Speaker 3 (28:43):
No scotch for you no soup for you, just take away the
scotch.
Oh no, are we?
Bringing your beautifuldaughter here.

Speaker 2 (28:50):
I'm going to do this because I'm going to make her.
She's been wearing this goopyCome here, come here, go.
You're going to laugh.
No, don't take it off.

Speaker 3 (28:59):
Don't they send the kids to school in Florida?

Speaker 2 (29:03):
Bring your child to a work day, but I don't work
until later.
But look at this.

Speaker 3 (29:13):
I don't know, tell me , does she look like a cockatoo?
Come here, come here, that isbeautiful.
Show her pictures of you in1988.
Say, daddy, I remember yourhair in 1988.
You look like a damn parrot.
You look like.

Speaker 2 (29:23):
Ignatz from Crazy Cat .
Hey, it's because you guys didit to me.
Listen, TJ.
Oh, I saw your hair dude.

Speaker 1 (29:29):
I saw your hair dude.
That band hair dude felt crazy.
Oh, I saw your hairdo.
I saw your hairdo.
That band hairdo is crazy.
Can I go?
That's a whole different level.

Speaker 2 (29:35):
How far can safe sport go back?
Because I ain't going to say it, but I was bullied and thrown
into a dryer machine and turnedon and amongst other things, so
I don't know.
I think I'm getting PTSD fromthat right now.

Speaker 3 (29:54):
I think you can get some money.
I don't need money.
I think you can get some money.

Speaker 2 (29:58):
I don't need no money .

Speaker 3 (29:59):
Max.

Speaker 2 (29:59):
I can Max, I can no, but I just those two things kind
of caught me today or last week, the entropy into like
basically a local event and thenthinking about, here we go.

Speaker 3 (30:13):
It started with a brick.
That's all I'm going to say.
What?

Speaker 2 (30:16):
the heck is I mean?
What do you find this?

Speaker 3 (30:19):
You know, you know you know how hard it is to be me
and be creative so that I canmake you guys, you know, enjoy
your lives a little bit.
I mean it's not easy, I noticedbit I mean it's not easy, I
noticed you still haven't gottenrid of that picture if you just
slide a little to the I mean,at least my picture looks like
I'm wearing headphones.

Speaker 1 (30:39):
Oh yeah you know like that's not why he did it.
His head's just big and it fitsin the middle I do have a big
head.

Speaker 3 (30:44):
I didn't realize.
I took some pictures.
I went to the orthodontistyesterday because I have a tooth
tilting in the back and they'relike, oh yeah, I'm like dude,
I'll be dead by the time you fixthis, but the um.
And then they took pictures ofmy smile in my face and they're
like smile, not, I can't smile,I'm not a smiler.
But I was like dude, is that myface?
Is that really what my necklooks like in my face?
So I'm gonna start.
You're gonna see me.

(31:04):
I'll be like this now.

Speaker 1 (31:09):
There was a time we always thought going back to um,
yeah, you want to tell me moreabout your neck.
I don't think I can take youmore about your neck, please
like this.
But going back to like theorganization, how you know you
were benefited from all thatstuff, like that, it's the, it's
the organization of the cop.
We talk about the competitionand the level of the
competitions.
Now we can talk about thepeople entered, but it's the way
they're set up, that's the waythey're run, it's the way
they're put together.
I mean, we're we're playing ata disadvantage the whole time.

(31:31):
You know, I know, I know we'vealways said that historically a
little bit, but I'm gonna thinkI think it's worse now.
You know, we got tournamentsgetting canceled, tournaments
getting moved, tournament notenough people showing up.
It can get worse.
Literally not that much.
Going on it can get worse.

Speaker 2 (31:43):
Don't trust me to get worse.

Speaker 3 (31:45):
So, like at the olympic level, I'll tell you
what's going.
You already know what's going,but I'll tell you what's going
on at the Olympic and the Asiangame level.
The Asian games have become sounmanageable and so expensive
that only a handful of countriescan pull it off, and in fact
most of the countries don't bid.
And then when they do bid andthey realize the true cost
associated with it, they justlet it go.

(32:06):
And that's what's happening.
You'd be better served, wherethe Olympics have gone, to
designate five or four hubs forit, and they rotated every 20
years, because then you'd havethe infrastructure and it would
be in place, and so you'd havesomewhere in North America, yeah
.
And it's built every five toevery every, whatever the right

(32:29):
amount is, and you do it withthe winter, winter, summer and
the winter.
This way you have every fouryears, or every 12 years,
because 20 might be too long.
You know, you're getting anolympic property and now you
have somewhere in north america,somewhere in asia, somewhere in
the middle east, somewhere inafrica, somewhere in oceania
maybe, and those are thecountries that can afford it,

(32:52):
like Japan or Korea can affordit, kazakhstan, uzbekistan can
afford it, united States, northAmerica, mexico maybe can afford
it, and then you don't have toworry anymore about
infrastructure and peoplebidding and it's a business now.
It's a multinational,organizational business with
infrastructure that you maintainand, by the way, on the off

(33:14):
years you hold worldchampionships in those venues.
So you go, you have fiveregional ones.
You know, every five yearsyou're going to rotate the
Olympics, the worldchampionships, the Pan Am Games,
the Asian Games.
Now you've got a sustainablemodel.
Instead, we go all right, howmuch can we charge Paris?
What do we hope to make fromParis?
If we're the IOC, paris doesthe math and it says what do we

(33:37):
think we can make?
You have countries strugglingunder the staggering debt, like
Brazil when they hosted theOlympics.
Now, I guarantee you it's aboutthe right time.
Next time you go back to Brazil, coach, go look at the Olympic
venues.
See if they're still standing,see if they're still being used.
They are.

Speaker 2 (33:57):
That's good.
No, they learned.
They did an Olympic legacyprogram.
Because of what you're talkingabout how these things get all
messed up.
Every NGB has to utilize theOlympic facility, but even in a
country like ours, go to.

Speaker 3 (34:12):
Atlanta.

Speaker 2 (34:13):
Yeah, yeah 2000,.

Speaker 3 (34:14):
Go to Atlanta.
You want to know what happenedto all those Don don.

Speaker 2 (34:18):
But, tj, I think we could do this like do this, even
if it's for a cycle, or eventwo cycles.
Let's say you said the worldchampionships are going to be
here.
The Asian just literally lay itout, right, literally lay it
out.
Let each country do that.
And yeah, you're going to belike why do we always have to go
to Mexico?
Why do we always have to go toKorea?

(34:38):
Whatever it is, at least peoplecould budget for it, they could
plan for it and they can buildfor it.
And then maybe, if it's thatstructured and we know it's
going to be a good quality,it'll be able to replicate to
the next place.
I think it's.

Speaker 3 (34:56):
That's what we did here in the United States.
We looked at it economicallyand we said where is the best
place that we can situate andlocate our Olympic training
center for taekwondo?
And all the votes came in andwe chose North Carolina.
Give me a break.
So you know the United States,usa, taekwondo is.

(35:17):
Well, Colorado, first right yougot to understand what Colorado
was and the historicalperspective.
When they put Colorado there,it was perfect.
It was an old army base.
It was located, the only and,by the way, you know what wasn't
there?
No, not where they were.

Speaker 1 (35:32):
They were at some other place.
I guess I'm confused on whythey didn't try to get back into
it.
Oh, you're talking about thenew one?

Speaker 3 (35:38):
Oh, yeah, no but the original reason, no, you're
talking about Taekwondo.

Speaker 2 (35:42):
You're talking about Taekwondo?
Yeah, I'm just talking about.

Speaker 1 (35:45):
Taekwondo, you're talking about Ta the Olympic.

Speaker 3 (35:47):
Training Center doesn't work anymore in Colorado
Springs.
So the truth is that the OlympicTraining Center and I use the
word plural, I was on thecommittee for a long time that
decided what training centersshould be built and what should
be partnered and what should beremoved.
And there was a lot ofconversation about making those
regional, depending upon thesport, and that's why you saw

(36:08):
Chula Vista for rowing and allthat sort of stuff, soccer too.
And then the idea was why doyou have the business offices
which was sensible of theolympic committee in colorado
nowhere, so they move into newyork, which makes sense, right,
get a place where you're closeto where people want to come and
be and get to easily, right.

(36:28):
And so if you were looking at amodern uh structure for the
olympic committee, I would.
I would gather what you wouldguess would be this you do no
longer need an olympic trainingcenter other than to convene
athletes to go somewhere,because your best training, as
we discussed last week, is withyour current coach, in your

(36:50):
current training environment,and you should fund that to the
best of your ability withcontrols.

Speaker 1 (36:55):
So so you're saying national team systems don't work
anymore?
Then like a national, like acentralized training, pick one
that does, pick one that does sotake basketball, for example,
which is a bad example and agood example.

Speaker 3 (37:06):
Take baseball, for example.
All of our athletes that areany good or in a window of
opportunity are usually studentathletes that are either high
school to college, and ifthey're post that they're
professional none of them.
If they're a pro player,they're not coming.
If they're a college athlete,they can't come, and if they're
a high school athlete, theycould but won't.

(37:26):
So in what, in what framework,does a national training center
for anything?

Speaker 2 (37:31):
I know just saying what you're saying because the
United States is a big countryand we have you're right In
almost every discipline.
There's good coaches and stufflike that.
But I do believe, whether it'sboxing or wrestling, if you put
the right program with the rightcoach and again give people the
opportunities that Bella Caroli.

Speaker 3 (37:47):
Bella Caroli is a perfect.
Juan Moreno is another greatexample.
When people move to Miami totrain with Juan Moreno in an
Olympic or national trainingcenter where they know the
answer is yes.
And why, though?
Because it's Miami.
Well, no, and in Miami you canget good snow and you and Miami.
That combination works.
Juan Moreno, let me put yousomewhere.

(38:09):
Juan Moreno, in the newlyacquired Greenland next week, do
they come?

Speaker 2 (38:16):
I mean Greenland's pretty far.
I think they.
No, I'm going to say no, alaska, alaska.

Speaker 3 (38:20):
How about Alaska I?

Speaker 2 (38:21):
mean listen, if it was a good facility they would
come, and I mean they went withCorolli in the middle of nowhere
.
So my point is.

Speaker 3 (38:28):
I love, love my son, and my son is a good soccer
player, as we talk about everyweek.
If the training center were inthe middle of nowhere and the
education program was onlinewhich is one of the reasons we
didn't do it I wouldn't send myson because he's got a life post
post career.

Speaker 2 (38:42):
But but listen, that's for you there's there's
probably way more people thatwould say you know what?
I would do the sport.
And if I could do classesonline and when I'm done with
the sport, probably by the timeI'm 23, 24 I could, I'll have my
education, I can go get furthereducation.
I did both.

Speaker 3 (38:58):
I did both let me give you a couple names.
You ready?

Speaker 2 (39:02):
Jimmy Grazer what about him?

Speaker 3 (39:06):
where is he now?

Speaker 2 (39:07):
he's in California at martial arts school school.

Speaker 3 (39:09):
Okay, where was he before?

Speaker 2 (39:11):
Colorado.

Speaker 3 (39:13):
Colorado.
For how long?

Speaker 2 (39:15):
I know he lived in.
He was.

Speaker 3 (39:16):
Florida, whitey Ford.
Do you know who Whitey Ford is?

Speaker 2 (39:19):
Yeah, a baseball player.

Speaker 3 (39:20):
No, Whitey Ford was a judo Olympian who lived at the
Olympic Training Center, neverhad a medal performance, but he
lived there for 20 years orsomething.

Speaker 2 (39:28):
Judo was horrible back then, and the list goes on.
No, those are horrible examples.

Speaker 3 (39:32):
I like them Horrible examples, I mean.
Jimmy Grayson.
I don't have to be right, Ijust have to be loud, I
understand.

Speaker 1 (39:38):
I think there's a benefit of having a national.
I think you always have to havethe highest level, like the one
that's supposed to be thenational training center, or
like the Olympic trainers.
It works in other countrieswe're not.
It's not like this doesn'thappen in other countries.

Speaker 2 (39:48):
Yeah, that's all I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (39:49):
They do whatever, but they have training places.
I'm not disagreeing with youbecause you're right.

Speaker 2 (39:53):
There's other places, other educational things, blah,
blah blah.
But most people different thanyour son like that's all they
think.
They're like how do I go pro?
College is not an option,education is not.
I'm going pro In Taekwondo.
I wish people would do yourroute, education, because
there's really nothing for youafter the Olympic Games.
And after the Olympic Gamesit's hey, congratulations, get

(40:15):
out of the way, we'll bringsomebody else.
And so if they could do bothWell.

Speaker 3 (40:19):
College sport in general.
Lacrosse Cross gets you into anIvy League, so you want a high
chance to get into.

Speaker 2 (40:23):
They've got a pro league.
Now those guys have got a proleague.

Speaker 3 (40:26):
They don't make that much.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, but you getlike lacrosse or rowing.

Speaker 2 (40:30):
Yeah, a good example.

Speaker 3 (40:32):
Team handball.
Those things will get you intocolleges, right Volleyball will
get you into colleges, butthere's money to be made in the
pros.
But you know, one of the thingsI liked about um Northwestern
right, the program that I sawthere.

(40:52):
They had a legacy program wherethe legacy of the alumni they
start with freshmen and they,while they're doing their
athletic career, besides theacademics, which are great there
, they're working a legacynetworking thing.
So by the time they graduatethey might have a thousand or
2000 contacts and trips and sothey're.
They're one of those things andthe Olympics had it for a while
.
I don't know if they still haveit and TJ may have gone to it.

(41:13):
It was the um.
I'm not talking about old job,but the the Olympics had the
thing where they were trainingguys for post-career and I can't
remember what it was calledOlympic Association yeah, and
but there was one where it wasreally like okay, we're gonna
have workshops, we're gonna tellyou how to do a resume, we're
gonna teach you how to dowhatever, and I thought those

(41:34):
were great ideas because thereality is, as much as we'd like
to believe, we're eternal andforever and our athletic careers
will continue forever and we'llstretch them.
They just don't.
You got to have a businesscomponent to what you're doing.

Speaker 2 (41:46):
Well, Well, that's.
I mean.
Listen, you know it's funny totalk about sports, like you know
collegiate sports, because youknow I've I follow collegiate
sports for my basically my wholelife and I see these huge
programs like Alabama, Duke,North Carolina way bigger
programs than little soccerstuff, because soccer is this
big in the world.
Imagine american football.
It's just, I mean it's it'slike talking taekwondo or

(42:08):
baseball.
You know it's a big difference.
But it's funny because theworld is changing, even with the
.
You know we talked about alittle bit young the, the nil.
Now these kids are literallymaking a million dollars and
they're leaving their schoolbecause they're like, now you
know what university of miamiwill give me $4 million to play
quarterback?
I mean, you guys are leaving $2million contract College kid

(42:28):
driving up in Bentley's andRolls Royce, and you know, think
about this and they're justleaving.
I mean they open up the portaland these kids are gone after
spring practice.
They're like you know what, I'mnot playing here or I'm going
to have to wait behind.
You know, TJ, I can go overhere down the street and they'll
give me more money and I'llplay right away.
It's crazy.
Talk about contacts, Talk aboutI mean, and it's all the way,

(42:52):
going all the way down inFlorida.
Right now we have a big problemand I heard it's going
nationwide with Americanfootball at high school level.
They're paying these kids athigh school level and there's no
boundaries.
Remember when we were growingup, you had to, you had to play
in this area because that'swhere you lived.
No, these kids, they can goanywhere and now they can switch

(43:13):
like in the middle.
They don't have to wait aseason.

Speaker 3 (43:14):
It's nuts, it's not that was, you know, the.
The problem was that before allthis, you got to remember that
the college athletes had norights.
They were indentured servants,they were slaves.
So all the money that was madein big sports and the rationale
was the olympic and one of mydear friends was on the podcast
a while ago dr schiller.
Harvey schiller said you know,the way this works is, um,

(43:34):
because one year I was trainingand I got, like I don't know,
seventeen thousand dollars,right, and back then that was
like a lot of money.
The next year I got 11.
So when I went in to talk tohim they said yeah, no, you did
better.
You won the world cup, but wehave a pile of money and more
people applied for it.
We got to spread it out througheverybody, which was true,
right.
So he says you got tounderstand that the high profile

(43:55):
sports, where we get all thesponsorship dollars, funds the
most grassroots, horrible sportthat gets no money.
So table tennis or whatever thesport is, you know, the curling
thing, or whatever it's called,pentathlon nobody's sponsoring
those guys.
So the money that we make inbig sport pays for the money in
little sport and the kid who'snot going to be a pro and his

(44:16):
only thing is going to be thewarmups and the t-shirts.
So that's what the originalmodel was for college.
However, then they realizedthey're paying college coaches
five million dollars, they'refilling stadiums, they're
building stadiums.
Right now northwestern'sbuilding a billion dollar
stadium it's like 890 milliondollars or something, and it was
sponsored by a huge donor.
But that's because they thinkand they know they'll fill them

(44:39):
and that money will go intoprograms which they also split
up among the athletes who don'tget money.
So the NIL money, I understandnow and now.
I made a connection the otherday which I didn't make.
So you see all these kids onTikTok doing videos.
Well, they're trying to buildtheir NIL dollars.
Yeah, you know, and I'm justlike.
So now it's not enough just tobe a good athlete.

(45:01):
You got to be a smart athlete,you got to market, you need a
marketing thing.
Now, remember to train, becauseI can point to a guy that
apparently didn't understand.
There's no nil money intaekwondo, who was shirt off,
you know draking and kj orwhatever.
You know, he was kendall lamarand he forgot to win a
tournament, right?
So even if there were nildollars, he's got.

(45:23):
He's got sil dollars.
You know shit out of lockeddaughter dollars I forgot to
tell you.

Speaker 2 (45:29):
I mean on that.
You know I, camila, quittaekwondo last night.
Who did?
My daughter camila said you'retalking about like, because we
just had a?
Uh, one of our students, um,like sister, signed like an
eighty thousand dollar.
Uh, deal with pickleball.
So I pulled her out oftaekwondo.
I said, man, man, we signedthem called Pickleball homie
People love Pickleball.

(45:52):
I talked to a guy yesterday.

Speaker 3 (45:54):
He's all mad because they're not.
By the way, nobody apparentlywants a.

Speaker 2 (45:57):
Pickleball course by their house, come on.

Speaker 1 (46:02):
If I was still competing I'd think about it.
I ain't still at it now.

Speaker 2 (46:06):
You don't have any.

Speaker 3 (46:06):
Joker pictures you could buy If you're 11 years old
.
You could buy 80,000 Jokerpictures with $80,000.

Speaker 1 (46:14):
I'm going to send you one of these pictures.
You seem to be in love withthis picture.

Speaker 3 (46:17):
I'm going to sign it for you too.

Speaker 2 (46:20):
That's why I want you to send that money you got a
whole lot of GoFundMes man.

Speaker 1 (46:26):
A whole lot of them.

Speaker 3 (46:27):
Nobody's.
I'm the only one funding it.
Is that true?
We should actually start.
We should start.
We should do two things weshould start a GoFundMe and the
other thing we should start is arevolution.
So we keep talking aboutevolution.
It's not happening.
So the only way this is goingto happen is if the three of us
you know, it's like that bandback in the eighties two

(46:49):
Mexicans, a Puerto Rican and aDominican.
You don't know about this band.
No, are you kidding me?
Oh, I got to do another searchhere.

Speaker 2 (46:57):
Oh my, God.

Speaker 3 (47:01):
I can't do a revolution.
We need to do a.

Speaker 2 (47:03):
Mexican.
Hey, tj, you know somethingquiet Like after we've been
doing this podcast.
Things have been quiet like onthe social media front, yeah.

Speaker 3 (47:12):
Let me see if I can find it.

Speaker 1 (47:14):
I just get a lot of, I get a lot, I get a lot of the
person to person conversationsand and you know all you guys,
like you were saying that, youguys are saying you know saying
the right thing, doing the rightthing.
It makes sense this.
It makes sense that, like youknow, like I think one of you
guys said on one of them, youknow, let us know, write it
right in the chat, write in theresponses to the videos, repost
the videos, talk about thevideos.
The same thing.

Speaker 2 (47:39):
We talk about everything else, but I think
it's just for sure.
It seemed like they were alwayspopping off about something
that we said here or thereindividually.
Uh-oh, what the heck is that?

Speaker 3 (47:51):
Dude, we got half of this right now.
All we got to do is change oneof the Puerto Ricans to a
Mexican, so it's two PuertoRicans, a black man and a
Dominican.

Speaker 2 (47:58):
What is this?

Speaker 3 (47:59):
This was a house music band.
You guys don't know this.

Speaker 2 (48:03):
No.

Speaker 3 (48:05):
I am going to find this.
There's a video, I'm suresomewhere.
But you never heard this.
They have music, if I heard asong I would know.
Let me see what the songs are.
Oh my God, Apparently well.
They worked with C&C MusicFactory, who I know, the guy.

Speaker 2 (48:22):
Yeah, I know, c&c Music Factory.

Speaker 3 (48:24):
He did an event with the guy a nicest guy in the
world, by the way, really justuh, he's really not.
We had dinner at franksilverman's house, um, but let
me see dave morales.
They scored a hit in the danceclub with do it properly.
So now now we gotta find wegotta never heard.
Well, you're obviously not aDominican.

Speaker 1 (48:46):
Here you go, right here right here it's right here,
can you hear it?

Speaker 3 (48:48):
You got it.

Speaker 1 (48:50):
No, we can't hear you .

Speaker 3 (48:51):
Here it goes.
You can't hear it?

Speaker 2 (48:53):
No, I'm going to put it on now.

Speaker 3 (48:54):
Here it comes, and actually this was produced, I
think, by the guy who did C&C.
Uh-oh, uh-oh, hold on.

Speaker 2 (49:09):
I know you guys can't see me dancing.

Speaker 3 (49:16):
That's some jungle house.

Speaker 1 (49:18):
It was probably hot and sweaty and musky and heckler
.
It was like a steam bath.
Oh, you know this song?
Not sure I do.
This sounds like some RonBurgundy stuff dude.

Speaker 3 (49:35):
That is there.
You go, man, right there.
What have we been doing?
We're wasting our time.

Speaker 2 (49:39):
We could have had a rap group a Puerto Rican, half
Puerto Rican, polish, mexicanand an almost black guy.
This would be a hell of a bandrap group A Puerto Rican, half
Puerto Rican, polish.

Speaker 3 (49:45):
Mexican and an almost black guy.
This would be a hell of a bandWait what do you say?

Speaker 1 (49:51):
Almost Puerto Rican, Mexican, Polish guy.

Speaker 2 (49:54):
Who's the almost black guy?

Speaker 1 (49:55):
Me.
I guess that's got to be.
I don't know.
I think it's me.
I could be the.

Speaker 2 (49:59):
Polish half Puerto Rican, Mexican You've got to be
the.

Speaker 3 (50:02):
Dominican.
We're gonna redo the song, I'llremix it and then we can do the
vocals for it.
We'll do it almost properly,actually.
No, no, dude, what an idea.
I'm doing this for next week.
I'm rewriting our anthem.
It's gonna be sorry, not sorry.

Speaker 2 (50:21):
That's good.

Speaker 3 (50:22):
I'm gonna create the lyrics.

Speaker 2 (50:25):
Who's our next guest?
Who would be good for nextguest?

Speaker 1 (50:28):
We've only had two.
You sat down the gauntlet, yousat down the gauntlet already,
steve Kaepler.

Speaker 3 (50:34):
All right, so I'm sending him a copy of the
podcast and then I'm going tomake a time that he can make it.
You guys might have to get outof your jammies.
Tj, you're going to have to getout of your Hello Kitties Next
week's going to be fun becauseI'm going to be in Uzbekistan.

Speaker 2 (50:50):
We'll court it.

Speaker 3 (50:53):
I'll get him to give me some time because he's
retired now.

Speaker 2 (50:56):
He got up yesterday morning and was doing some
push-ups.

Speaker 3 (50:59):
Then he goes out and he plays golf, then he does a
little bit of teaching justbecause he likes to teach um,
and I'll see what time works forhim.
But, um, I might be very quieton that because he's a
formidable mind and I don't wantto be formulated so we're not
formidable minds I did not saythat, no, no I did not say that
you, you, you're projecting,you're internalizing and

(51:22):
projecting, no, no no, you know.

Speaker 1 (51:24):
No, no, that was a crazy answer.
No, no, no.

Speaker 3 (51:27):
I didn't say you are not.
I simply said he is.

Speaker 2 (51:30):
Just because somebody is something doesn't mean that
you are not, but you know what'sfunny is because I mean, again,
he's going to talk about, we'lltalk about it, but he's going
to bring'll talk, but.
I know he can only present oneside.
He's going to present the oldschool side and what Taekwondo
has changed into and why.

(51:50):
I have no idea what he's goingto say.

Speaker 1 (51:52):
I know, but I you are offending his sensei sir.
You better slow down.

Speaker 2 (52:01):
But what I'm arguing with them.
But like it's going to be funto kind of put on like okay, I
never did old school and talkabout some of the new school,
like, again, I'm not.
I can go both ways.
I can debate both sides of theargument.
You know I can make a bigargument for old school, new
school, you know somewhere whereit could be in the future.
You know I'm not going to likeHerb when you guys I I know they

(52:31):
, they never fix the problem.
I agree.
I don't think anybody disagrees.
You know they put theelectronics.
The electronics don't work.
I agree.
But oh, the electronics changewhat tequando looks like.
I agree.
But stop, don't act liketequando looked perfect back
then.
Don't act like that, becauseI'll put up some videos of some
sorry ass tequando people.
I can put up some awesome onestoo.
Sorry ass Taekwondo people.
I could put up some awesomeones too.
And it can go both ways.
So that's my point of all.

Speaker 3 (52:47):
Yeah, I think I don't disagree.
It'll be fun, but I'm going togive you a preview.

Speaker 2 (52:52):
Hello, nice to meet you.
I'm here to see you.
Oh my god, that's Stephen K,isn't that?
What are we watching here?
Oh my God, that's Stephen Cain,isn't that?
All right?

Speaker 1 (53:09):
What are we watching here?
Ready to lose the hat andregrow hair.

Speaker 2 (53:14):
This is one of his many interviews.
You can regrow your hair andyour hair.
Can I grow his hair back?
This is years ago.
Oh, you didn't say that outloud.

Speaker 3 (53:22):
We changed the scoring system.

Speaker 1 (53:24):
Oh, is this just Karen Eden person?
All techniques were given onlyone point, okay.

Speaker 3 (53:31):
And we changed it so that a turning kick is awarded
two points and a face kick isawarded three points, because we
want to reward A the moretechnically difficult.
This is actually a goodinterview.

Speaker 1 (53:43):
This is where I think that's where the issue started.

Speaker 3 (53:46):
Well, because we changed the scoring system.

Speaker 1 (53:48):
Everything was one point, should have been one
point.
You kicked people in the facebecause their hands were down.
You spot on people because theywent too slow.
It's the open side.
Now you prioritize scoring overtechnique.

Speaker 2 (53:57):
That's where it comes from.
It's his fault.
It's his fault that it changed.

Speaker 1 (54:02):
Actually it's his fault that it changed.
Actually it's my.
When you hit someone, it wasbecause that's when they were
open.
Now I'm leaving my leg in theair and trying to touch him with
my toes.

Speaker 3 (54:08):
I will take responsibility.

Speaker 2 (54:10):
You get more points for punching people in the face,
in boxing or in the body.

Speaker 1 (54:15):
Nah, same thing, they go down, they go down.

Speaker 2 (54:17):
There you go.
I'm on TJ's side.
Team TJ, team TJ.

Speaker 3 (54:21):
All right, today we're going to have to wrap it
up here, because I got to go bea responsible parent and
volunteer at my son's school,which we pay a ridiculous amount
of money for, so I'm doing aCPR course, whatever.

Speaker 2 (54:33):
I want to talk about the round-by-round scoring,
because somebody said I waslistening to a really cool thing
on Joe Rogan Try to segue.
He was talking about like atthe end of a round, if I have
you, when the round starts, weshouldn't start standing up, we
should start where we were,because you didn't get out of
that position in a real fight.
He said the fight shouldcontinue going.
So I'd like to talk about thatkind of thing next time, all

(54:53):
right.

Speaker 3 (54:54):
Well, gentlemen, thank you for this week.
Sorry we're a little shorterthan usual, but as usual, tj
brought a lot of um, meaningfulcontent and intellectual.
And then remember, if youremember nothing else from this,
juan has thrown the gauntletdown.
Juan gauntlet down and you'llbe hearing our new single sorry,
not sire, by sorry, but notsorry.
By puerto rican, the dominican,fake dominican and a mexican

(55:18):
peace later.