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S7: E5: Guy Mezger (UFC, PRIDE, Pancrase) Transforming Turbulence into Triumph
Date: September 3rd, 2024
Name of podcast: Backstage Pass Radio
S7: E5: S7: E5: Guy Mezger (UFC, PRIDE, Pancrase) Transforming Turbulence into Triumph
SHOW SUMMARY:
Ever wondered how a relentless pursuit of passion can shape one's life? Get ready for an inspiring conversation with decorated combat sport fighter, Guy Mezger, as he shares the extraordinary journey from his tumultuous childhood in Houston to becoming a revered martial artist. Guy’s story is a testament to resilience; despite frequent relocations and a challenging family dynamic, he managed to form lifelong friendships and develop a deep commitment to wrestling and taekwondo. You’ll hear about his early inspirations, the iconic 1976 Rocky movie, and how his brother’s judo practice set him on a path to master various martial arts styles.
Imagine transforming a troubled past marked by frequent street fights into a disciplined life of martial arts excellence. Guy takes us through his fascinating martial arts journey, including his experiences with traditional Chun-Li Kwan Taekwondo and the invaluable lessons from mentors like Doc Parker. He opens up about the competitive spirit required to train with world champions and how these experiences not only built his physical prowess but also shaped his character. Guy’s philosophy on the transformative power of martial arts extends beyond personal growth; he passionately discusses his mission to empower others through teaching and mentoring, aiming to instill strength and resilience in his students.
Get a behind-the-scenes look at the evolution of mixed martial arts and an insider's perspective on the financial disparities within the sport. Guy offers candid insights into figures like Dana White, Tito Ortiz, and Ken Shamrock, revealing both their contributions to MMA and their personal stories. We explore the unique environment of Mezger Martial Arts in Dallas, where elite trainers foster both fighting skills and personal integrity. Balancing his martial arts school with a medical practice, Guy shares practical advice on fitness, emphasizing the importance of pursuing passion over fame. This episode is a treasure trove of wisdom, humor, and inspiration for anyone fascinated by combat sports and personal growth.
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Your Host,
Randy Hulsey
I am joined in the studio this evening by a decorated combat sport fighter based up in the Dallas Texas area. It's Randy Holsey with Backstage Pass Radio, and I hope everyone tuning in is doing well this evening. My guest this evening is an MMA fighting champion, a world full contact karate champion, a world kickboxing champion and a world freestyle fighting champion. He has been a commentator in the fight game, an author and has a doctorate in holistic medicine. Don't go anywhere and we'll jump into the ring for a few rounds with my friend Guy Mesker when we return.
Speaker 2:This is Backstage Pass Radio, the podcast that's designed for the music junkie with a thirst for musical knowledge. Hi, this is Adam Gordon, and I want to thank you all for joining us today. Make sure you like, subscribe and turn alerts on for this and all upcoming podcasts. And now here's your host of Backstage Pass Radio, randy Halsey.
Speaker 1:Guy, welcome to the show. It's good to see you, man. Well, thank you. I appreciate being invited on Right on. So how's life up in the Big D these days for you?
Speaker 3:It's good, life is good. To be honest, I mean no real complaints. It looks like I could find some. But to be honest, man, life is good. I'm fortunate.
Speaker 1:They say, if you complain, nobody's going to listen anyway. So what's the point, right?
Speaker 3:Exactly. I don't know if you have kids or not, but they get to a certain age. You know your wife. At a certain point in the marriage, your wife doesn't pay attention to you. At a certain point in children's age, they don't pay attention to you either.
Speaker 1:So yeah, it's funny that you say that. I worked in the oil field for a while, and there was an old petroleum engineer that I worked with and he said you know, when my wife and I got married, I was number one, we had our first kid and I became number two, and so on and so forth. He said, god, I hope she doesn't bring a dog home anytime soon, right, because I'm going to go down even further on the list. So I feel your uh, I feel the pain there, for sure, but speaking of um, of wives, a quick shout out to your wife, michelle, for uh, connecting us. She's a uh, a business partner of mine. So, michelle, if and when you're listening, thank you so much, uh. So, guy, let's go back to real quick. Let's go back to Houston, texas. This is where you were born, right? Yeah, I didn't spend that much time there, though, so you went straight to where Dallas from Houston.
Speaker 3:No, no, we moved to the East Coast. We moved to Connecticut for a couple of years and then we moved to Pennsylvania for a couple of years and then we moved back to Texas and just basically bounced around the Dallas area for most of our life. We moved back to Richardson, and Richardson Texas, is a people that are paying attention. It's a suburb just north of Dallas and Dallas proper and it's often referred to as North Dallas. Then we moved to Plano and a brief time between a year and a half we lived in the state of Washington, which was one of the best years of my entire life. It was awesome.
Speaker 3:We moved back, which is interesting. We were able to maintain our friendships with our things way before there was the Internet and Facebook and stuff like that. We lived there a year and a half, but I maintained friendships with those people. That was in 1982. And we still manage to maintain those friendships with those people to this day and see each other every couple of years, which is pretty wonderful. And then we moved back to Texas and basically, even though I've traveled most of the world I've been on every continent except for the Antarctica, but I always come back to Dallas home.
Speaker 1:Were you a military brat? What were the moves for? Was dad in oil and gas or military, but usually I hear that on the show People that move around a lot. As they were young, they were probably, you know, military brats or something like that.
Speaker 3:No, my dad was just a jerk, you know, and he was hard, you know hard to stay employed. I got you. He's actually. I mean, I say that he was very successful at what he did, but he was a difficult man, and you know. And and so we moved every couple of. In fact we did not live in the same house for more than two years until our families, until my mom and dad, got a divorce and we moved to Plano. We lived two and a half years in Plano, then we moved to Washington for a year and a half. We came back to Plano and lived another two and a half years and then went off to school.
Speaker 3:But I traveled a lot with my career. I was a security contractor for a number of years before there was any money made in the fight business. You know, when you start off in the fight business, it's a very poor-paying second job until you make it into the big time. And you know which was television back then. Now it's pay-per-view and you know I had to supplement my income. And being a security contractor was easy to do because I could go there and work some far-off country mostly Africa area for a couple months, two or three months and make a whole bunch of money. And you know, when you're 22 years old and you have no real responsibilities and no real bills, you know making $30,000, $40,000, you know you live like a king.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah. Well, I guess the taxes were a little bit different over there too, right? You probably didn't have to pay the high taxes over there either. We didn't pay nothing, yeah.
Speaker 3:You know I was paid through the security company itself, okay, and we just paid. Basically, you know, we got back with our job and they just added our bank account, so it was pretty awesome.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what was special about Washington State for you? You mentioned that. You know you spoke highly of Washington, of all the places. What was special about it?
Speaker 3:Well, you know it was. Besides, it was beautiful. We lived out in the country. So if you took a straight line West from Seattle, we were just before the mountains and it was just an interesting time in our lives. It was, you know, I was a freshman in high school. Although I was really young back then. You know what I mean. I, I was in high school at 13.
Speaker 3:It was a an old logging town called sultan washington. You know, the logging trade had worn itself out there and there was a someone with a depressed economy, but they were just good people. You know when, when you talk about like, just like, what we would think of is like, uh, you know, the good old country people. You know, most of the time we think country, now we think redneck, of course, you know, but uh, but these people were anything but rednecks, they were just good people, you know. And it was interesting because you know I was used to. I didn't live extravagantly when we lived in plano or nothing, but we still lived in plano, texas, you know. And um, you know it was interesting because there were people there that did not have running water.
Speaker 3:I'm not kidding you, they, they would pump the water from a well well, yeah, of course a well water and and they would, you know, have to live like that, you know, because they were giving land away, basically up there, you know. So all you had to do was, you know, show improvement every year, and they gave you I forget how many acres, but and then you could buy it really cheap. So there were people that just had no real money, you know what I mean. They would literally put a mobile home up there yeah Well, there's well water and stuff like this and then slowly build a house and then we build, you know, get, get all this stuff it was. It was real amazing because it was the first time I really saw poor, poor people, but they were healthy and they were happy and they were willing to give. It was really crazy, you know. It was really a great time well, I think it.
Speaker 1:I think it goes back to that old adage money can't buy happiness, and you find that some of the happiest people on the planet are probably a little less fortunate than most of the people that have money. Would you agree with that?
Speaker 3:I would say they're probably more fortunate because they're happy. They're just less wealthy.
Speaker 1:Exactly.
Speaker 3:And they were just good people and we made an impact on them. You know that they never met anybody. You know, especially my mother. My mother is an amazing woman. You know, just, absolutely the kindest person next to my wife that you'll ever meet, just, you know, just made an impression on these people. And you know, hell, we're from Texas. Everything's a little bit larger than life, even at 13. Yeah, you know, I excelled as an athlete, always did and I was kind of like you know it was the first time I was one of the popular kids because I was never a popular kid.
Speaker 3:It was the first and only time I was popular in high school was my freshman year there, and it was just a great experience just meeting these people and maintaining the friendships over the years and people telling us, you know, it's amazing. People tell us the impact that we had on them. You know, and it's funny, you don't even really realize it, you're just being yourself, of course, and especially as a kid, you know it just was great and it's just been a been a wonderful thing, even more so now that we have, uh, facebook and things like that, where we, you know, I get to see the growth. You know, these kids grow up, their kids grow up. They can see my kids grow up, they hear the day-to-day uh things that go on.
Speaker 1:So yeah, the social media thing is certainly a blessing and a curse all at the same time, as you probably well know it's. It's a time suck, but yet you know, if you've got family scattered all around the planet earth, you know it's good to be able to stay caught up with close friends and family that way. But yeah, it can, it can be a hindrance as well. It's a necessary evil for guys like me and you. Right, being a public figure, you know you, you have to have some kind of internet presence, right? I mean, it's not uncommon for guys like you have to be on the internet.
Speaker 3:Well, you know, as a doctor, you know you, you know especially the type of you know I'm involved in an integrated medical practice type of stuff that we do is, you know, it is not, you know it's not essential stuff. I mean, I say it's not essential, I mean it depends on who you talk to, but it's, you know. It's basically, you know, male healthcare and geared more towards women, I mean more towards men than women, you know. So, you know, the having the Facebook and the internet and stuff like that allows us to, you know, get our message out to people 100% and I want to come back to that here in just a second.
Speaker 1:But if we, if we, bounce back, let's see if I can do the math real quick almost what 20, 20 years was. It's been almost 20 years since you've retired and I wanted to talk just a quick minute about the fight career now. You came up wrestling, you were, you were a wrestler and you were a practitioner of taekwondo, right, and I was wondering why, of all the martial arts, that you were drawn to those two as a young kid well, you know, to be honest, I'll tell you this story.
Speaker 3:But well, okay, so wrestling came about, because people think this is a. I tell people all the time how I became a wrestler and they think it's a joke, but it's the truth. It just happened to be a funny one. In 1976, the Rocky movie came out. I was eight years old, and those of you guys who are old enough to remember the Rocky movie, I remember people literally cheering in the movie theater is if the cheering is going to change the outcome of the movie. And people were cheering Rocky and all this other stuff like this. And and I was one of them man, I'm eight years old, I'm literally standing on my on my seat and I'm cheering Rocky on. I'm literally standing on my seat and I'm cheering Rocky on, and I realized, oh my gosh, this is my destiny. I'm going to be a boxer. You know, I'm going to be the next Rocky Balboa.
Speaker 3:And so this is in the 70s. So every rec center in every town had a boxing program. You know, everyone did. And so I joined the boxing team. Three weeks into it, the coach said do you want to spar? Of course I want to spar. I'm Rocky Balboa. I get hit in the nose, you're done and literally bled for three days straight, and so, when the nose healed, I joined the wrestling team.
Speaker 1:So that's how I became a wrestler. That's a good story, but I was always a good.
Speaker 3:I was always I'm naturally a good wrestler. I was just just was. You know had a lot to do with my brother. He studied judo, which is basically a Japanese form of wrestling, and you know, we just kind of grew up doing it. You know, I was good at it and, to be honest, it was a different time. You know it was a different time back then. You know, I mean kids fought a lot. You know what I mean. And when you were a new kid, every two years you fought a lot. Yeah, I mean a lot. Every time you moved you had to thump somebody. One or two guys had to get thumped in order for you to leave you alone. And, to be honest, wrestling is the superior Out of all the martial arts. Wrestling is superior.
Speaker 3:There's a reason why everybody who wins in the UFC has a wrestling background or trains hardcore in wrestling because it works. And so, you know, I was a year or two younger than everybody in school because my dad for some reason thought it was great for me to start school early, which it wasn't, but it was what it was. And so I, you know, was faced with guys like I was four years old in kindergarten, I'm faced with kids that are six years old, you know, literally a third of the time older than me and bigger, and so you know, I mean literally you know I never really lost a fight. I tell people all the time I lost a fight. People ask me because you'll get tough guys all the time coming to the gym. They'll be like, I don't mind if you have that, I'm going to be the next UFC champion.
Speaker 3:You're like oh okay, what's your background? Oh, I don't have any formal training. I just never lost a street fight. Oh, okay, that's great. By the way, that is a horrible thing to say. Anybody that's listening and that's interested. Do not tell people that, because you immediately will know that you are a jackass and you know. So. I always tell people like, yeah, well, actually I had my ass kicked once in a street fight. I was four years old and I got my ass kicked by a six-year-old. I had such a profound statement a profound… Impact on you right.
Speaker 3:Impact yeah, impact on me that I was like this shit ain't ever happened again. I was like I went and did something about it and that's really what happened. That later on down the road I just, you know, realized how things were going to be.
Speaker 1:And tired of, like you know, taking the crap. You know, my mom, you know I'm like you're, like you know, so I always had to kind of back down stuff and then then I just one day just stopped yeah it, uh getting your ass kick. Uh, you gotta not let that be too habit forming, right? You, you want to figure out how to uh defend yourself, because that gets old after a while.
Speaker 3:Yeah, anybody who doesn't mind to have their ass kicked never really had their ass.
Speaker 1:Or they're, or they're weird in a weird kind of way, I guess.
Speaker 3:Well, you find it a great deal yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, I think you know you mentioned wrestling, I think you what were? Seventh, seventh Dan, black belt in Taekwondo and it seems like you know, speaking of Taekwondo, it seems like Eighth Dan now.
Speaker 3:Okay, but yeah, it's actually a Chun-Li Kwan, which is, See, taekwondo is the term. Taekwondo means by way of smashing a hand in a fist, okay, I mean by smashing a foot in the hand, okay. And so basically it's like saying karate Karate itself is just a term, for, you know, it means open hand, means open hand fighting. Taekwondo means open hand fighting. There's types of karate, all right, there's shotokan kishin, there's um ishinryu, there's, you know, all sorts of daijouku, all those sorts of different types of karate, just like jiu-jitsu. Jiu-jitsu is the thing. There's all kinds of types like jiu-jitsu, jiu-jitsu is the thing. There's all kinds of types of jiu-jitsu and taekwondo. Back in the 40s and 50s and 60s there were types of taekwondo. So the style of taekwondo I did was called chung-deok-kwang. And then in the late 70s the Korean government figured out there was a ton of money to be made in this and so they started the you know, the Taekwondo Federation. Okay, so they looped all the other programs, all the other different sides. They basically did away with the individual system, because most of the individual systems were like family systems, family martial arts, things like that, you know, started by a certain group of people and became successful. And so, you know, so they did that with taekwondo and then so, and then eventually there just became you know, really, unless you're an old school taekwondo guy like me who does shonda kwan, which really there's no difference anymore. But uh, you know, you're all looped under now that one thing is taekwondo, but originally taekwondo was just saying, you know, by way of smashing hand and foot, okay, you're all looped under now that one thing is taekwondo, but originally taekwondo was just saying, you know, by way of smashing hand and foot, okay, you're basically telling you this type of fight.
Speaker 3:And the reason I got involved in that was I was a big chuck norris fan, big bruce lee fan, and my mom's boss was a guy named doc parker, and doc parker was a dentist and a really good guy and I was I was running a while at about 14 years old, just not making right decisions and stuff, and and you know my mom did her best, but she was raising four boys all on her own, you know what I mean, and it was not an easy thing to do, man, you know. And so you know she did the best she could and so she kind of enlisted Doc because I had a lot of respect for him. You know she did the best she could and so she kind of enlisted Doc, because I had a lot of respect for him, you know. So Doc said, hey, why don't you start coming to do martial arts? And even at 14, I was a pretty frisky kid man. I could handle myself, even with adults, and so I was never scared of adults, physically scared of adults, even at a young age.
Speaker 3:I got to into training the gym, gym that I was taken to. I didn't realize this so much later on that I was actually in an amazing gym. I just thought that all the gyms had these badasses like this, but my gym had four world champion kickboxers and karate fighters in the gym. Like nobody had four world champions. Yeah, I didn't know any better man, I just thought, oh, wow, man, this is the greatest. So I was always scared to death of the all the guys in taekwondo until I realized that, yeah, there's a huge difference between my gym and everybody else. But uh, you know it was, it was good for me and I wrestled at the same time. So between wrestling and karate it kind of kept me out of trouble. Well, it's actually an interesting fact about Doc Parker. Not only is he a great human being who I still to this day stay in touch with. Oh nice, he is the only guy to ever beat me twice without me beating him back.
Speaker 3:In karate I was undefeated. Okay, I lost my first three karate tournaments and because I didn't know the rules, I just wanted to fight, I just wanted to get out there and do it. Once I figured out the rules, I didn't lose a single tournament for four years straight. Then I fought Doc Parker I'm still age-wise in the kids' division I was 16, but I'd fight in the adult division. I would just say I looked like I was 18. I fought in the adult division. I would just say you know, I looked like I was 18. And so you know I would go fight in the adult division. So I fought Doc Parker and he beat me. And then I went another two years without losing and then I fought Doc Parker again and he beat me again and then I turned pro as a fighter.
Speaker 3:You know he's a dentist, a professional martial artist and so anyway. So it was always interesting I always point that out to people that whenever we talk about Doc Parker like, people are like this like yeah, I lost to a dentist and I explain to people that to be a martial artist, to be a serious martial artist, without necessarily doing it for a living. You know what I mean, you know. And yeah, and I find how doc parker, you know, beat somebody who won six world championships. You know what I mean, you know, yeah well it's.
Speaker 1:It seems like you know there's so many kids that are put into taekwondo at a young age. Why do you think that that is the de facto martial arts for parents to put their kids into? I mean, it seems like every kid I know you know that grew up in the neighborhood was in Taekwondo. Why not? You know why not judo? Why not? You know jujitsu Like? Why do you think that is? Is it just what's that? Oh, the others are too hard.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, you go to Kyokushin school, man, it's a hardcore, full contact school. Yeah, okay, it's a hard-ass style of karate. And you know judo and wrestling and all those judo wrestling, now Brazilian jiu-jitsu, they're very tough and, to be honest, man, taekwondo got so watered down it's like it makes me want to throw up. They give black belts out to kids. Kids do not have the capacity to understand what it is to be black. I don't care. Yeah, I mean, listen, it wasn't like I wasn't good. Yeah, like when I was a kid I was pretty badass. I mean I went four years without losing a tournament. I mean I went four years without losing a tournament. I was state and national world karate champion from age 14 to age 20, right, you know what I mean. It was like it wasn't, like I wasn't. But my experience at 20, when I got my black belt, I was fighting under the black belt. Before I was a black belt because I just beat everybody and so I would wear a black belt into the. You know, dale, my instructor, you know, I mean this was, with permission, my instructor, just because I was winning all the time and I was still winning back then young kids. But you know like my black belt experience changed my life. Okay, literally it changed my life. The reason being is that this is an old school, beat down kind of stuff that you would go to jail for today, all right, but back then it was tough. You know, it wasn't about winning a black belt exam, it was about how well you lost it and when you didn't quit, you didn't give up. That made the, made the difference.
Speaker 3:And when, at age 20, I was not in a good place, but from the age 17 and 20, I got kicked out of two colleges, I got shot, I was stabbed on three separate occasions and I had my arm broken with a baseball bat. I was intentionally run over on my motorcycle once, and I've been in four motorcycle wrecks and I almost lost my life. In other words, I was like a bad Miami Vice rerun and it was like I was having this terrible time. The only thing that was really good in my life was my martial art practice, and so I just kind of buckled down.
Speaker 3:I started doing it and at the time it was one of the toughest things I ever did in my life. I mean literally one of the toughest things that ever did and I literally thought I was gonna die out there, and I'm not exaggerating. It was interesting because I failed my first black belt test and it's funny because I I've never seen anybody do as well. I've seen people do as good but not as well, better than me. I'm the one that I failed, you know.
Speaker 3:but they figured I could do better, which I'm actually grateful for, because I was so accustomed to winning and so accustomed to you know being the thing that all of a sudden I was like what?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:I didn't get my black belt. I mean, I mean, nobody was, nobody was more surprised than me about that, and so you know. So the thing is is that I could did is I literally had to buckle down and really search my soul, because this is a miserable experience. When I say miserable, it is absolutely miserable. I mean you fight, you fight until I mean you'll fight one-on-one matches, two-on-one matches, three-on-one matches.
Speaker 3:At one point I fought 20 guys at one time. They beat the crap out of me. You know and you know you just keep fighting, you don't quit. And I literally thought I was going to die out there and I remember just going to myself F it yeah, I don't care. And when you release that self, when you let that go, when you no longer have that fear, it is the most spiritual experience you'll ever have in your life. As if there was a burning bush right there speaking to you. Sure, I'm not kidding, and it was amazing. And I realized, holy shit, if I can do this, I can do anything. Now, when you decide that becoming a professional fighter is a good thing in life, you're probably in a pretty shitty place, and I was in a pretty shitty place In fact nobody in my family. When I told them I was going to you know I was going to fight nobody put up an argument or tried to talk me out of it. That's how bad off I am.
Speaker 1:You talked a minute ago about, you know, the belts being watered down. Like you know, they give a promotion in taekwondo for anything, and you talked about probably the more brutal sports like the wrestling and the jiuondo for anything. And and you talked about the probably the more brutal sports like the, the wrestling and the jujitsu. I know you know to go from white belt to to a blue belt in jujitsu it'd probably take you three years, four years to get to that level. Right, I mean, there's not, first of all, there's not as many belts and and in jujitsu, but it just seemed like the people I knew that were in Taekwondo and I'm not sliding them because I'm not a martial artist it just seemed like, you know, every few months it's like, oh, my kid got, you know, got a promotion in Taekwondo. Oh, my kid got another promotion.
Speaker 3:It's like let me slide them. Okay, All right yeah you can.
Speaker 3:It's bullshit. You know things. And the reason I get so adamant about it and why I get pissed off is that this changed my life, the reason that Guy Metzger is here alive, probably. And when I say changed my life, it probably saved my life because it gave me some focus. And so you know, and cause I was a disaster, I mean seriously, I mean I was a disaster. I'm not exaggerating about being shot, I'm not exaggerating about being stabbed or this other crazy stuff.
Speaker 3:All this happened right between that time period. And I'm not saying I didn't do stupid shit stuff afterwards. I did, but I was focused in doing something, however far-fetched it was, that would be successful as a you know, as a combat athlete. But it changed my life. And the reason that I teach martial arts out of the least amount of money that I make in my career, what I do is teaching martial arts. Yeah, all right. And the reason I still do it and I've been doing it for 36 years now Actually 38 years total, but 36 years of owning my own gym or running my own gym is because I owe it. I owe the blessing that I got to other people, because in my life, you know, I had a lot of people step up, people like Doc Parker I was telling you about. But there's tons of guys, doc parker I was telling you about, but there's tons of guys. And, to be honest, I was such a short-sighted, selfish little jerk that all I could focus on is what I didn't have in life, which also kind of sucks because you live in plano.
Speaker 3:Plano in the 80s was all new money, so every dad that was that hit 40 years old was driving a red corvette. You know, 1984 Red Corvette, that was the dad car of the you know struggling middle-aged man. And you know, and so everyone had, you know, at least the pretense of money and we didn't, you know, and we didn't. You know like, I wore hand-me-down clothes and it made me self-conscious. You know, my mom drove a junkie car car and I didn't realize it was junkie car, I just thought it was a cool car until later on in life. Yeah, it was pointed out to me and you know, and so you know I, I was very, very self-conscious about stuff, very insecure, yeah, and um, and so create certain issues, right?
Speaker 3:You know what I mean and what it was is I was always wondering about. You know what the next best thing is, instead of realizing I had a good, and I feel guilty because there's so many people that did so much for me that I didn't even really get the opportunity to really thank, and some of them aren't on the planet anymore, yeah, you know. So I feel like it's my obligation to give back as best as I can. So, you know, and one of the best gifts I can give people is this gift, because it is and it's funny, because and you can probably say this as a man, cause you know, you're a man like this and you seem like a very reasonable, thoughtful man. Some people are just too sometimes unintelligent or unaware. You know to be self-reflective, okay, but you seem like a man who's capable of being self-reflective. Well, I'm a man who's capable of being self-reflective and every now and then I I would hit with this Did I do the right thing with my life? Right, you know? Did God do the right thing with this life?
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 3:I don't know about the fighting or anything. You know I think I did the right thing because it allows me to have a vehicle to do other things in life that I would never have had. You know what I mean? I've been on it, but this Antarctica because of fighting. You know, I have great opportunities to do stuff that most people never have. But you know, when I'm being self-reflective like that, I wonder if I do the right thing, and then almost invariably, something will come up and answer.
Speaker 3:Not that this was a situation, but this last Saturday I was asked to be, you know, a celebrity guest at this 5K walk and jog for mental health, and I have worked in the mental health. I worked as a clinician at Cerebrum Health Center, which is for brain trauma and stuff like this, and of course, obviously the UFC champion, all that kind of stuff. You know this, and so you know I volunteer my time to do things like this because I like to support them, and so I was there and this girl walks up to me and she's probably about mid-20s, something like that, and she goes. She introduced herself, she goes. I don't know if you remember me. You know which sad part is, I didn't, but she goes. She goes.
Speaker 3:15 years ago I was competing in a tournament that you were at and I got hit in the nose. It was bleeding and I was crying and everyone's freaking out. You walked up to me, you started talking to me. You talked about the legend like this, and you ended up writing me a letter telling me how brave I was and stuff like this. And I remember her now because I remember doing that right, yeah, and she goes. I want you to know how much that meant to me. She goes. I still have your letter.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 3:You know, and so, yeah, so I know that I did the right thing because I know that I impact people. I want to impact people to have better lives. I want them to have things like that, and this is, this is the vehicle that you're not going to sit on the couch and have me analyze you that way. Yeah, I'm not that kind of you know, that's not me, you know, but I, I want to teach you how to be strong. I want you to be able to stand on your own two feet, whether you are five years old or you're 50 years old, it doesn't matter, you can still learn these lessons.
Speaker 1:You know it's important to be impactful and you have a platform to do that with through the fighting and the martial arts. I'm a local musician here in Cypress, texas, you know, northwest of Houston, and I have people come up after shows saying, oh my gosh, you know that that song you played tonight, you know I remember I was in a really bad place in my life and that song pulled me out of it, and so I feel like I I'm impactful in those ways by by playing these songs.
Speaker 3:Right that we're take these people back to a point in time, but real quick back back to music has an interesting thing that music has a way of pulling your heartstrings that, like almost no other thing, I agree with that More than anything else you know, and so, yeah, you definitely do have this opportunity.
Speaker 1:If you were to advise parents out there on which you feel is the most impactful martial art for self-defense? Okay, let's. Let's speak from a female perspective. Right, A young girl is what's that?
Speaker 3:I mean, that's one, an easy one, with a female perspective, having a, uh, like a judo or jujitsu background, just because it's all about leverage, sure, and uh, you know, and I don't and I know some of your women viewers will be mad about this, but there's not a single one of your women viewers are gonna punch me in the face that I would even notice it, and it's just the way it is. I mean, I, you know people, it's just the way they're built. Now she kicked me, that would be different. Okay, yeah, because women are much stronger. Kids, right, but the punch me not.
Speaker 3:So most self-defense situations is very difficult to bring the feet into the game. Anyways, yeah, all right. So you're going to be punching somebody. So, having you know, you know, it's not that women can't knock out a man, it's just that it's very, very highly unlikely. Yeah, that's going to happen, correct, go ahead. But a woman can wrap her legs around my arm and break my arm, sure, right, and I'm a pretty strong guy, obviously, you know what I did. I'm a very strong guy, but I can still have my arm broken by a woman who is a good 100 pounds less than me, sure, and so having that in judo. Judo has the ability to throw people, which is, you know, introducing people to the concrete at 90 miles an hour is an excellent way to end a fight, and you know, having that ability to do that is good. And also, you know, judo has a ground game that is very you know, which is, you know, brazilian jiu jitsu is based off judo.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Well, I wanted you to validate my thought process right and I thought jiu-jitsu myself, and the reason I said that is because if there's ever an attack on a female from a male perspective, nine times out of ten the man is going to be able to push the girl down or take her down. The man is going to be able to to push the girl down or take her down, but it's it's jujitsu that levels that play and field when you're on your back, Right as you, as you mentioned, because there are submissive things or submitting ways that you can overcome those adversities, Right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, at the very worst you have the capacity of stretching out the situation. You know, the longer that a confrontation goes like a male-female assault, something like that, the worse it is for the guy assaulting. You know he's going to want to get out of there and get away, yep, and so, yeah, so you know that's it, you know it's still. You know, just, the physical disparities is always going to be a problem, yep, but the physical disparities is always going to be a problem. But the physical disparity, I mean that's why they have weight classes, even in the men's division. Yes, you know what I mean. There's a reason, so you know there's bigger, stronger people. So there's not a, there's never a really like an absolute and stuff. But there's also too, you know it's like there's all sorts of different factors that come into play in a self-defense situation. That you know that gives them the opportunity, you know. So, yeah, as a woman, you know Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Judo are what I usually recommend, and you know, for men it has a lot to do with the kind of personality. You know what they're capable of doing. Like, if you, if you don't mind punching people in the face, yeah, learn the box, you'll, you'll knock. I mean most guys can't take a shot. I mean they just can't. I mean you know they think they do, cause they watch Rocky movies and stuff, but they can't, you know, and, um, you know, you barely touch. So if you're not, you don't got a problem. Punch people in the face yeah, then go ahead, of course. But the problem is that is is most people do.
Speaker 3:Yes, you're a nice guy, probably. Right, you're going to hesitate to do that, you know now. Now I'll be honest, I'm a nice person too. I hesitate less in that because of the fact that I've been all over the world. So, like I said, I've been. I've been to security in parts of countries where you can't unsee some of the stuff that you go to, right, you know, you see, and so I understand the capacity of how evil people can be, of course, and so I'm a nice guy. So I explain to people that I will stop being a nice guy if you get any closer. Now, some people are stupid enough to to try that of course I don't got a problem putting them out.
Speaker 3:The only time I go to a grappling situation is if I don't want to hurt them, of course. All right, you know, if I want to which again is is an option for me because I'm you know, I won the world's championships in, you know, jujitsu. I was a national level judo player, a wrestler, so there's very few guys, even at my age of 56, are gonna be able to handle what I can do. Um, and you know, and so you know the thing. So I tell people, if you're gonna hesitate to throw the punch, then do jiu-jitsu. Yeah, and the older you get, the more jiu-jitsu you want to do, of course, because what you won't lose as long as you keep training, is your strength. All right, you know scapulpina, which is age-related muscle loss. You know that only happens if you sit on your ass and don't do anything.
Speaker 3:All right, now I've seen jiu-jitsu guys in their 70s that do good jiu-jitsu. All right, you know, we're not talking like geriatric jiu-jitsu we're talking about they're 70 years old and they're actually moving around. They're like, are they moving slower than the other guys? Yeah, but the nice is you can slow the gang down. You know, grappling slows the gang down, and so you know that's where I go. So I talk all the time it's like. But you know, depending on you, know why you need it. Like police officers, you know jiu-jitsu is a good one, but they also need to know how to strike and know how to avoid being hit. So it would behoove them to learn some boxing or kickboxing or something like that. You know what I mean. And so that's like with the children's program. We teach both stand-up and the ground. In order to be part of the program, you have to learn to kickbox and box and you have to learn how to wrestle and do jiu-jitsu, because learning those things is a young man's deal.
Speaker 3:Now, if you were going to do jiu-jitsu, I would say if you said, hey, I want to learn wrestling or I want to do judo, I'd go nah, you probably want to do jiu-jitsu because it's a little less throw-oriented, it's a little less you can pull people down to the ground and stuff like this, versus having to do it. And what you do not lose with age as long as you're working out, is strength. Now you lose speed, you know. You know you'll lose endurance, you'll lose other stuff like that, but your strength is the last to go.
Speaker 3:If you, if you work it right, I think most of us will recognize the fact that working out is super important. It does not matter what you do in life, working out is absolutely important. It does not matter what you do in life, working out is absolutely important. And what I tell people all the time is one of the best advantages of doing a combat, sport-oriented training is that you're going to be in the best shape of your life. There's no athlete that is in better shape than a combat athlete. Now, some athletes are in good shape, but nobody's in better shape, and so you're looking at doing that. At whatever level, you're capable of doing it. You know skill wise and the one thing that you can always do even if you're not very skilled, you can still put one foot in front of the other, sure, and get a workout in. You get in great shape as you're learning a skill 100% Nate.
Speaker 1:you talked a little bit about age and slowing down, you know, of course, as we get older, and totally off topic, but it's kind of on topic and I have no, there's no right or wrong answer and I certainly have no dog in the fight and I could care less. But your thoughts on the Tyson Jake Paul fight, what do you? What do you think? I mean there's so much age discrepancy there. What do you think, from Guy Mesger's standpoint, who would win that fight, if it's real?
Speaker 3:which I doubt it is Tyson will kill him. That boy had never been hit like Mike Tyson can hit. I was thinking the same thing. The one guy that he thought that was like a true heavyweight. He lost to and to be honest and I'm not delusional, I'm very self-aware I could beat that guy that he fought if I got in shape right, I mean at 56 years old, right. And you know, like I said, you know I'm not sure if they have some kind of agreement or something like this, but if it's a legit fight which it may or may not be, you know what I mean then he'll lose handily. All he has to do is get hit with that one. Mike Tyson throws a right hook to the body, right uppercut. Let me give you some perspective about how hard Mike Tyson hits. Mike Tyson was in a physical confrontation 100 years ago, back back back when he was still the champ.
Speaker 1:Is this the Mitch?
Speaker 3:Green thing.
Speaker 1:No, no, okay, different Okay, gotcha Go ahead.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's been swept under the rug because people don't want to talk about it, but he was basically. These guys wanted autographs but he was walking into a thing with his wife I think it was Robin Givens at the time they basically started calling the N-word and all this other stuff because he wouldn't sign autographs, because, you know, he's going into a restaurant. So what happened is is that they got, you know, these guys grabbed weapons like they were going to do something to him. Mike Tyson punched one of them with a jab Okay, your least powerful punch jab in boxing, but it's not not that it's not powerful, it's just the least powerful and he broke the guy's jaw in five places. He punched the other guy with his right hand and broke the guy's neck.
Speaker 3:That's how hard Mike Tyson hits. That's what happens when a normal human being gets hit by Mike Tyson. Now, granted, I will give Jake Paul some credit that he's. When a normal human being gets hit by Mike Tyson, now, granted, I will give Jake Paul some credit that he's not a normal human being. He trains hard. You know he does his stuff, but you know his skill set. You know he's a good amateur boxer.
Speaker 3:He's not a very good pro boxer yet and it's not that you know. I'm sure he'd get upset if he heard that from me, but that's just the way it really is. He hasn't fought anybody and any guy that he really fought. The guy he fought who was a real boxer, he's not a really skilled boxer, not going anywhere in his career. He's not going to be the champ. He's not going to get world ranked. I doubt it very seriously. Out of all the divisions that get world ranked, heavyweight boxing is the easiest one to get ranked in. If it, but yeah, if it's remotely real, then you know Mike is. You know Mike will knock him out if he just throws a punch close enough to him. That's how much velocity Mike can punch with.
Speaker 1:I've seen some of the short video clips of Mike training at 50, whatever he is, 56, 57, however old and I mean Jesus Christ. I would not want to be on the receiving end of any of them. Whether it's a jab or a punch, he just looks like a scary individual to me.
Speaker 3:You're a smart man.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3:And all these guys I mean all these guys are sitting there talking. I heard some other fighters, you know that really didn't do anything in their careers, you know, and stuff they're going. Yeah, well, I wouldn't fight Mike Tyson, because beating up an old man I'm like Mike Tyson would beat the crap out of you, you know? Yeah, of course.
Speaker 1:You were a very prolific fighter and a couple of stats. You can correct me if any of them are wrong here, but I wanted to throw a few of these out for the listeners. An MMA record of 46 wins, 30 losses, two no-con or two, was it?
Speaker 3:48-17 on Sherdog, but the reality is I've had fights before that, so I'm more like 65, or 50, 52, 17, and 3 in MMA.
Speaker 1:In MMA, okay, and then kickboxing a kickboxing record of 22 and 3. Does that sound correct?
Speaker 3:Yeah, 22 and 3 with 19 knockouts.
Speaker 1:Okay and a full contact karate record of 42 and 1.
Speaker 3:Yeah, with 40 knockouts.
Speaker 1:That's a pretty impressive track record there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, my boxing. I'm an 11-0 boxer with eight knockouts. My boxing career. I only fought one tough guy. Everybody else was pretty much a tomato can my mom could probably beat him Glass jaw. My mom is is, but she's 84 years old, right right.
Speaker 1:What is the main difference between kickboxing and karate?
Speaker 3:uh, one is fighting wars with uh flintlocks and the other one's fighting war with a with uh and the other one's fighting war with an M4. Okay, I mean, you're looking at an AR-15. How about that? Yeah, okay, that's the military version of the M4. So, yeah, you have an AR-15 fighting war with the flintlock.
Speaker 3:Karate works, but it's very primitive, you know, and not that that doesn't work, it does. But old school karate no one's really doing old school karate anymore. You know, no one's. Like I said, taekwondo is so watered down it makes you want to throw up Even a lot of stuff with.
Speaker 3:I see guys that are getting their black belts in jiu-jitsu now who do not, I don't believe, deserve it. You know what I mean. You know, when money comes in, money corrupts a little bit. Oh, of course, money potentially, money potentially corrupts things. And so, yeah, there's guys, I know that got the black belt, said I'm like, please give me a break. You know my, you know, you know it's like again, my mom could beat them and uh, and so, um, but the thing is, like I said, is like really, it comes down to who's teaching you and how you're learning it right. You know what I mean.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like the average, like I would say, taekwondo is a waste of time unless you had a badass instructor, right, you know? Yeah, good stuff, but just as a whole boxing okay. So boxing is by far the most most efficient modern fighting system for stand-up fighting, but bar none. Bar none why? Because there's money in it. You know people make these odds. It went from guys doing this, you know, in the 1900s yep, two guys you know doing this, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, moving like this. Right, in less than 100 years you know what I mean in less than 100 years it went from like in really, in like 30 years it went from this to head movement and all that other stuff. Why? Because there's money in it and so there is a. We know there's a staggering amount of money in it and so that you know that made people you know want to get better at it, refine it, make it better.
Speaker 1:Excuse me a second? Sure, Well, I know that you've been part of at least three fight promotions, and probably more, but the most notable ones for you are what the UFC pride and pan trace, correct, yes, and what would you say are really the distinctive differences between those three organizations? Because, if, because, if you, if you follow fighting mma at all, you've heard of all three of these at some point in time yeah, yeah, I mean, well, pancreas just had a ton of rules.
Speaker 3:Pancreas really was pro wrestling, that was real, you know. It was just, you know, without a pin, you know what I mean, they didn't have pins, but basically that was that. That was, you know, was the old pro wrestling. There was a legitimate form of it wasn't called pro wrestling back then, but it was called catch wrestling. Okay, and that was a legitimate form of wrestling. That became professional wrestling and then professional wrestling became theater and so Pancreas was basically those know, with a little more emphasis on the striking, you know, but you know, basically you had rope escapes, like if I got caught in a submission, uh, I could grab the rope and you had to let me go. Yeah, I lost the point, but I had to let go. If I, if I hit you and I knocked you down, I couldn't jump on you and knock you out like you can't ufc a.
Speaker 1:It's more like boxing. You get a standing eight or something like that.
Speaker 3:Well, there was a 10 count.
Speaker 1:Oh, 10 count.
Speaker 3:Okay, right, but you lost a point. So you know, and depending on how long the fight was, how many points you had. Like a 30-minute fight had five points, you can lose four, the fifth one you lost A 20-minute fight had. It's funny, I can't remember. I think 20-minute fights had three rope escapes. You know, a 15-minute fight had three rope escapes. A 10-minute fight had three rope escapes, or point losses actually, because you get knocked out and then. So you know, that was the main difference. Pancrase was mainly different, much more different than the UFC. Originally there were no rules. I mean, there were no rules.
Speaker 1:No, holds barred. Yeah, of course.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so they started adding rules. And so they started adding rules. Really, the difference between UFC and Pride was time limits and, like in Pride you couldn't use elbows, you couldn't elbow somebody in the head. And also, well, when UFC became the version that it is now, there's like no kicking people when they're bad. Yeah, and in pride you could. You could stomp somebody in the head, you kick them in the head when they're on the ground, eat somebody in the head when they're on the ground, but you couldn't elbow. Okay, it's funny, that's gone, but you call that versus USC. You couldn't do. You couldn't do any of that stuff, but you could elbow a guy, okay.
Speaker 1:So they're basically the same.
Speaker 3:I mean, it's basically the same. It's all kick, punch, punch Wrestling.
Speaker 1:Yeah, does my memory serve me correctly, wasn't Ken Shamrock a founder or co-founder of Pancrase, or no?
Speaker 3:Well, he was one of their biggest stars. Yeah, okay, he was one of the original wrestlers that went over to the Pancrase organization Because they had other shoot style organizations too. That's what they call it. They call it shoot wrestling and stuff like that, because the term, the old pro wrestling days they would have. They had works and they had shoot. A work was a fake match and a shoot was a real match.
Speaker 3:And so what happened was all these pro wrestlers were in japan. They make you learn, actually learn, how to do real wrestling. You know, and even though they theater it up, they you used to have to learn real wrestling. And so these guys that would really put out the effort, that were really good, you know, were, uh, you know, athletes. They weren't getting the push that they wanted, right, you know, they weren't getting the push that they wanted, right, you know, they weren't getting coming to SARS. They had these old-timers, you know, that were, you know, and they had to carry these old-timers.
Speaker 3:So back then they would have real matches every now and then, like every time, someone, oh, this is fake, then they would wrestle, and there would always be, you know, four or five guys who were badass shooters. The term shooter was meant okay. So you had a hierarchy in wrestling. You had a worker and that guy only did work matches and he was called a worker. A shooter was a guy who could do real matches and a hooker was an elite version was it was elite like a shooter, he was like, he was like the master shooter and they called them hookers because they called submission holds in pro wrestling and catch wrestling. They call them hooks. So instead of saying submissions, they call them hooks.
Speaker 1:That makes sense. I always thought of shoot, like you know, when I think back way back. You know Lions Den days, ken Shamrock he was always labeled as a shoot fighter Right. Ken Shamrock he was always labeled as a shoot fighter right and I always thought of shoot fighting. As you know, in jujitsu if you shoot right, you're going for a takedown. That has no correlation to what he is as a shoot fighter right.
Speaker 3:It means he's a real fighter. Shoot means real. Okay, I had no idea that's how they defined. That's how they define it because this started in the 80s. They started doing. They started doing uh, shoot style wrestling, like basically they had guys who could really do it.
Speaker 1:So they started really doing it. Yeah, how, in the 20 years that you've kind of been, I wouldn't say out of the fight game you're not completely out because you teach and whatnot but as a professional fighter, yeah, I meant I was going to preface it by saying a professional competing fighter. Right, how, other than the rules, how have you seen the fight game change in 20 years? Has there really been a big change in 20 years other than the rules? Of course, the money, I guess would be another one, right?
Speaker 3:yeah, well, money is always good. Well, okay, so the big change is that this has really become a mainstream sport. Now you know where before we were. You know, probably the biggest thing is that I'd say Dana White has done is this by adding the rules and the time limits and all that stuff like that, they created a real sport and it's now mainstream. These guys are doing endorsements and all kinds of stuff like that, and you know, and then they're doing that. So that's changed. But the spirit of the game is a little bit different too now. You know, when it was no holds barred, there were no time limits, so you had to finish the match. Yeah, gotcha.
Speaker 3:And you were also in a tournament. So you know, at least the UFC did tournaments and so you would have. You know you didn't want a match going 10 minutes because you had other fights to do. Yeah, yeah, there were fights to do, so there was an urgency to finish the fights. And so today there's not Like guys will intentionally go for decision wins. You know they'll stay away, they'll keep. You know they'll throw some kicks and punches, they'll get a couple of takedowns, but you know they're not trying to finish the guys. And so I think some of the spirit of the game is kind of taken away now because of that.
Speaker 3:You know Dana White has done a really good job of encouraging people because he gives a staggering amount of money in these bonuses now for knockouts and fight of the night. And Pride did too. Pride did a good job with, like you had a win bonus and it depended on what it was, but you had a win bonus and you had a knockout bonus or a submission bonus like that. You know so. You know so, you, you know, you got, you know, and they and they paid really good. I mean, they pay, they pay better than you know, okay. So now you know the UFC is like like pro boxing like 99% of the money is in 1% of the hands, right yeah, is like pro boxing. 99% of the money is in 1% of the hands, right yeah. And so back in the pride days, they spread it out a lot.
Speaker 3:Like everybody, there was nobody that walked away with a million bucks, but everybody got paid close to $100,000 or so. If you were a known fighter, you know $100,000 plus for a fight, and then you were given a win bonus of usually about 50% of that and a knockout or submission bonus of about 25%. So, if you may, if you had a contract for a hundred thousand dollars and you won the fight by knockout. Well, you walked away with $175,000. You know, to be honest, that's a that's a good living, especially when you fight. You know, like, you know to be honest, I and you know, to be honest, I mean, I didn't quite make that.
Speaker 3:I made that money in pride. I didn't make that money in Pancrase, but Pancrase I fought every six weeks. I was making a stupid amount of money.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 3:And you know, in pride, yeah, pride, I'd fight usually three times a year and my contract was, you know, I like talking money, but it was significantly, a little bit, significantly more than a hundred thousand Of course, and uh, so it was uh, um, you know, it was a good, it was a good day for me.
Speaker 1:Well, you had some very notable opponents and, I guess, training partners over the years and I I wanted to drop drop a couple of names of some people that you've been connected with over over time and I wanted you to kind of share with the listeners with over over time and I wanted you to kind of share with the listeners your thoughts or what comes to mind with each of them, and the first one I'd say Tito Ortiz.
Speaker 3:That's a good question. You know it's funny because we never really had any beef, it was just all part of the. I mean, what he did was kind of a dick move, but you know. But you know he apologized for that a long time ago and you know it was kind of a dick move, but you know he apologized for that a long time ago and you know it was kind of weird. You know it was like he was just trying to push himself and stuff.
Speaker 3:But Tito, to be honest, tito, you know, is really one of the all-time best at what he did. You know, I mean there's, you know, whether you like him or not and like now, he's kind of in this political thing and I think he's kind of lost his mind a little bit. I lost some of his direction. But you know, whether you like him or dislike him, you can't begrudge the guy Literally. You know he was good at his trade, you know what I mean. And he knew how to sell, because he wasn't the. But he knew how to sell it because you know he was Huntington Beach bad boy.
Speaker 1:So you know he did good by himself on that Yep, ken Shamrock.
Speaker 3:Ken's a beast. He's one of my best friends and you know he revolutionized MMA because he was the first guy to be able to create a system of training for it, because before you didn't know how to train when you had no rules, no, nothing. I mean, how do you train for that? Right, there wasn't a platform for that. But he developed it mainly off the Pancrase platform because Pancrase had 30-minute time limits, so there were these long matches and it was kick punch, wrestle and submission, so it was.
Speaker 3:You know, pancrase was the forerunner of the modern MMA fighter, you know. And so you know he had to develop a system, you know, in which he should train people. And a lot of people came to train with us. You know, mark Coleman, mark Kerr, you know A ton of people came and trained with us over the years, you know, and he's a good guy. I mean Ken has a story of like that should have turned out bad. I mean you know he had an unbelievably shitty upbringing and was headed to jail and because of his adopted father, bob Shamrock and stuff really guided him out of trouble and he became a success story instead of the typical. Typical what happened to kids like him?
Speaker 1:Yeah, Do you feel like Ken was one of the first fighters early on that really knew how to adapt or handle a fighting system like Hoist Gracie had brought to the UFC in the early days? You know, I think I think he's surprised Nobody knew how to handle him. I don't think Right. Well, is that true or not? I?
Speaker 3:mean I mean kind of, I think Ken made always made the mistake of trying to fight boys. I mean, literally, ken should just help sit up and beat him down. That wasn't Ken. Ken liked to try to beat you at what you do best, you know, and that's kind of his ego, you know. And so I don't think he actually performed as well as he should have against Hoist. I mean, you know, like me, I mean Hoist couldn't take me down if I gave him my leg. You know what I mean. You know he couldn't take Ken down if he did that, right, you know, and I would just proceed to knock him out. You know what I mean. He tried to pull me down. It would be very difficult to do it because I'm not wearing a gi. You know what I mean. Yeah, you know. I mean I would fight him a lot, like Sakuraba did, even more stand-up. You know Ken was such a tremendous athlete. You know that he brought. He brought a physicality to the game that very few people could match.
Speaker 3:Antonio Nogueira Phenomenal, he's a really good human being too. I like him a great deal. He's atypical of being a great fighter, but his jiu-jitsu in the jiu-jitsu world isn't that great, but he's a great fighter, he's very smart, you know, he's trained, he's smart. He went to Cuba, started training with the boxers over there, you know, real dedicated, and you know he's another one of the success stories. His family was not a wealthy family, you know what I mean. They weren't exactly super poor, but they were not. You know, it wasn't like he was going to go to college or something like that. Right, you know what I mean. Him and his brother, you know, took to the jiu-jitsu and the boxing and really just started, you know, made something of themselves, you know, and they give back a lot, they do a lot for a lot of the people over in Brazil, which I find admirable.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's cool to hear you say that they're good guys or Antonio's a great guy, but to hear Chael Sonnen say it. He doesn't have nice things to say about the Noguero brothers at all. Right, but that's Chael Sonnen too. At the end of the day, he is very.
Speaker 3:I mean, chael doesn't have usually nice things to say about anybody, yeah, but that's also kind of part of his deal. Chael's a really super he, you know chill is a really super smart guy. We're, you know, very caustic, you know, by nature. You know I mean that's, that's not a gimmick, that's, he's real caustic by nature, sure, you know, but it's also kind of his gimmick. Listen, he can back it up or he's willing to back it up. You know what I mean and I kind of respect that. I mean I've never had a problem with him, but I can see how other people do.
Speaker 1:What about Chuck Liddell? For you, what comes to mind when you think of the Iceman?
Speaker 3:Dude, the hardest punch I ever took in my entire life was from him. He was a tough motherfucker man. I mean, I'll be honest, I wobbled him twice and I knocked him down once and usually people don't get up when I hit them like that. And he did and came back and beat me and, like I said, he's another good guy I'm a little concerned about. Last time I saw him I felt like he'd probably taken way too many shots and, being a doctor now, it's like I'm a little more apprehensive about sending guys into the fight business just because I see the results of them and I think that's one of the results of it. You know is what he's dealing with. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Speaking of injuries and whatnot, you know I mentioned earlier that you stepped out of the competitive portion of the game back in 2005. What drove you to the retirement guy?
Speaker 3:Well, a couple of things, but the main reason was, um, I had a stroke. I was taking a medicine called biox and it was for, basically, it was an anti-inflammatory, and I ended up uh, getting uh, uh, well, it worked real well except for caused people to have heart attacks and strokes, and so I ended up having a stroke. I was very fortunate. Type of stroke I had was in an area of the brain that really didn't affect much. Maybe my mood, like when I doctor said yeah, it might affect your mood, you might be a little bit grumpier, you might, you might like this and my wife would start laughing. She's like no one will ever notice she's the grumpiest man we know. You know that was a motivation. But, to be honest, man, I had been a professional fighter for 17 years. Like I said, I had.
Speaker 3:I had two full careers of fighting before I even stepped into MMA and, uh, you know, and so it was like I was, was I was done with the business side of the fight, business, you know, and you know, when I I switched over the back to the ufc, I was gonna plan on beating tito, hopefully get a title shot, and then retire after that. If not, do another fight, then try to get a title shot. But I only really felt like I had three fights left in me because of all the like people realize I had 145 professional fights. That's a lot, man. That's not my amateur career, that's okay. Yeah, between boxing, kickboxing, full contact, karate and, uh, mma, you know, that's a lot of fights. Yeah, where's that? You know, even though obviously I'm resilient, doesn't mean that I didn't take damage.
Speaker 1:I going to ask you, specific to MMA what's the worst ass whooping you took in?
Speaker 3:the ring over the MMA career, specific Chuck Liddell. That's the hardest I ever got hit. Yeah, I've never been knocked out out. He knocked, you know, I've been hurt before but never really knocked out. You know I've been stopped to like sometimes the fight felt like they shouldn't have. But whatever, right, you know I don't argue that point anymore. Yeah, um, you know, being some cold beaten that that he's some cold. He knocked me out. That was even though I lost a chuck like that. I was winning the fight up to that point. You know what I mean.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know there's only one fight that really got handled start to finish and it was I fought a Japanese guy. I fought this Japanese guy in full contact karate. He was an old champion and he came out of retirement to fight me. You know, in a karate fight he whooped my ass. That was my one loss in full contact karate.
Speaker 3:Okay, and when I started going back, that was in 91, 92, something like that. So when I went back to Japan in 95, I called that guy out all the time. I was like I will fight any freaking rules Because I was a lot better back then. At that period I was a much, much better fighter, of course, no matter what the rules were. I said you name the rules like this and I was trying to. You know, I was trying to be respectful. I didn't want to be. You know, the term gaijin in Japan means foreigner, but it really means direct translation is barbarian. So I didn't want to act like a typical gaijin, so I was trying to be respectful, but I would call that guy out all the time.
Speaker 1:Well, be honest with me and yourself on this next question. Michelle whips your ass at home, doesn't she?
Speaker 3:That's the best ass-whiffing you ever got right. To be honest, my wife is the nicest person you'll ever meet. I remember when I first met my wife I was like nobody this good looking is this nice. She's got to be working. It's got to be a work.
Speaker 1:There's a catch, right, there's a catch here.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's a catch. You know, people say that marriages are tough and that you really have to work at them, and stuff like this. I beg to disagree. I think if you treat your, I think if you treat your woman with respect and she knows that you love her, that it's easy. It's easy. Yeah, my marriage is easy. Things in the family is not easy. I've got three children. Raising three children is never easy. No Right, you know at best, but I literally had four major arguments with my wife in 20 years. Yeah, that's it. It all has to do with children. You know what I mean. Sure, you know the focus on children. Like you know, we disagree on. You know how to handle certain situations and you know that caused an argument.
Speaker 3:You know I consider myself a good man. I'm not perfect by any stretch of imagination. I'm not even that nice sometimes, but I consider myself a good guy. I try to do the good thing. I try to be this. I'm an honorable guy. I don't steal. I try to do my best to be an honest, good person. But I've never been this good to deserve what I got and heard.
Speaker 1:There's going to be disagreements in any relationship, whether you've been dating or married. I've been married 37 years and there's always some disagreement, but it's how you handle those disagreements right. It's what makes the relationship either good or toxic. It's called respect 100. Talk to me real quick guy about medsger martial arts. What can you tell me about it and the listeners? It's the best martial arts gym in dallas. Of course it is. Of course it is. You're not biased at all either, are you?
Speaker 3:no, actually, no, actually, I can probably prove it on there. I mean, to be honest, I mean it depends on, like you know, we shifted a lot of stuff, like we shifted away from doing a lot of competition Before I was always more interested in creating athletes, you know, and stuff like that, and then that kind of shifted over the years and it had a lot to do with the fact that becoming a doctor and stuff like this and I'm also a functional neurologist and when you, when you deal with this and you're dealing with people with severe brain injuries and stuff like that, you know you're like man, is it worth it? Yeah, Is it worth it. And so I'm real selective on who I take into the rings these days.
Speaker 3:You know, before you had the stones to get in there, I'd give it to you. Now I'm like, now you gotta you know you, you gotta kind of like pass a test that makes my I know you can handle yourself, I know that you're being good, gonna be disciplined enough and and all this other stuff. So you don't get, don't, don't, don't get to uh, go home with permanent injuries, you know. And but to be honest, man, we, we have a great program. I mean there's very few gyms that have trainers that are, you know, like we have a great program. I mean there's very few gyms that have trainers that are, you know, like we have three world champion jujitsu, you know black
Speaker 3:belt jujitsu instructors we have. Uh, our boxing coach was uh, assistant boxing coach for the national boxing team. He was a pro boxer, he was. He was, uh all army boxing champion. He was a runner-up for the Olympic trials Great guy like that. One of our instructors was world amateur boxing champion, on top of being the number one female ranked MMA fighter. Before she retired from MMA, she was the four-time world karate champion, united States kickboxing champion. I mean. So there's nobody that has the credentials that we really do, especially in Dallas, for you know this. So what we really want to do is create good human beings. You know what I mean. If you're good enough, we'll train you to fight. You know, I've got two or three guys that fight now, but you know, before we'd have more like 15. It's just like I said, I'm a little more selective on who I want to train for that.
Speaker 1:So is it safe to say it's full MMA? It's a full MMA school then, right? Or are you just specialized in certain disciplines?
Speaker 3:Well, yeah, yeah, I mean, we teach individual disciplines.
Speaker 1:We have boxing, kickboxing, wrestling, jiu jujitsu and then, of course, mma. How did the listeners go about getting information on the school If they were up in the greater Dallas area? Where do they go to find you guys?
Speaker 3:They go to Mesger Martial Arts. Just Google that or they can go to GuyMesgercom and that'll take you to our website. But also see we're inside another gym. So there's a gym called Hidden Gym which is a badass I mean badass fitness gym. And you know we're teamed up with them and literally we have an amazing facility and I'm not just saying that as a promoter of this thing, and I'm not just saying that as a promoter of this thing.
Speaker 3:You will not find another gym like this, with the type of equipment and everything and the quality of instruction. I literally don't think you can find it anywhere else. Yeah, and you know I've never been to another gym. The closest gym that did that was was the Couture Gym in Vegas, the Couture Gym in Vegas. Even there they have a little bit more stuff for martial arts, but their fitness side of it is not even comparable to what we have. You can go to Hidden Gym and it's called HiddenGymnet and that will get you there. I love to have people come by. I love teaching, like I love. You know. You know we, I love teaching. You know, like you said, out of everything I do, it's the one thing I will do when I'm done doing everything else, I'll still be teaching Sure.
Speaker 1:I don't know if I'm framing this question right, but you you correct me. All right, you're. You're the expert on this, but you know, for years you were associated with the lion's den, right? Yeah, does your school have any principles or practices of what you guys were doing in the lion's den, or is this something completely not lion's den related?
Speaker 3:Okay, so the lion's den… uh, well, okay, they had a lion's den gym in in, uh, san Diego. Well, they had it in Lodi and then but that, but it really wasn't a commercial gym in Lodi, it was just for fighters and it was a warehouse and everything like that. And then they opened a commercial gym in San Diego when they moved down there and but lion's den has always been the team Gotcha Okay there. And but lions has always been the team gotcha okay. So you know. So, yeah, so we were lions than dallas, because we were the lions then team out of dallas and uh, much like america.
Speaker 3:Like much like america top team or whatever right uh, yeah I'm not sure exactly how their business structure is but, yeah, I'd assume it's somewhere that yeah, you know and uh, but you know only lions and athletes that, only guys that pass the lions and test. Could you know? Teach lions that you know.
Speaker 1:Use the term lions, sure how are you personally involved in that business? Are you more on the business side now? Are you? Are you in the in the school teaching as well? Yeah, you don't want me on the business side of stuff. That's not my special.
Speaker 3:You know your place right I, I still teach, I teach uh. You know, I teach uh four, four classes a week and then I teach uh our combat athletes and uh I also do uh a few problems. You know, part of my practice with my medical practice is that we work with people on teaching them how to train, how to be athletes. I do a lot of that too.
Speaker 3:I usually spend about probably five hours a day teaching martial arts or something similar, training people like that, and then I probably spend another three to four hours doing medical stuff.
Speaker 1:So yeah, so you fast forward your fight career to your what? Late, late 30s. You go back to school after you, after you've been kicked out of 500 colleges or whatever. It was right. You were not the epitome of a college student, apparently. But you go back, you get a PhD in holistic medicine. Give the listeners the 50,000-foot view of what is holistic medicine.
Speaker 3:It's just naturopathic medicine. I mean, you know the term holistic. People think of it as being like holy or something. No, it's not Theropathic medicine, I mean, you know. I mean you know the term holistic. People think of it as being like holy or something. No, it's not. The whole means whole body. So a holistic practitioner is basically a naturopath. That is kind of like your general practitioner they're going to be looking at like like our man, but like I, I don't. I don't fix broken bones. You don't come to me to have the flu. What you do is you come to me so you don't have the flu, so you don't get this.
Speaker 3:So we work on a lot of nutrition-based stuff. You know, interventions, natural interventions, stuff like that. We use things like exercise and stuff exercise, nutrition. I'm a master supplementer, you know so for me. You know I also makes it a lot with, obviously, with allopathic medicine. So, as you know, we have a medical director that oversees that and we have nurse practitioners that work for us. And so we, you know we, we, we do the medical side of stuff too, like diagnosis and naturopath. You know they look at things like your nails and your lymph nodes and your eyes and stuff like that your mouth, your tongue which are good ways of being able to analyze some stuff. I'm not particularly good at that, but what I'm really good at is reading your blood work and reading your neural analysis and all this other stuff. What I'm really good at is reading your blood work and reading your neuroanalysis and all this other stuff. So you know, I'm really, you know. So what I do is I, you know. So, like our practice has is an integrated practice. I mean truly integrated practice. So we have a lot of natural path and stuff. So, as I get people on the correct diet, we do proper like. I do most of that. I'm actually really good at hormone. You know balancing and stuff like that. So I'll do the trt, you know. Uh, we have, you know, our medical director oversees all that. We have our nurse practitioner, who also she works with me on that. But you know, what we do is we try to get people. You know, we try to keep people as natural health as we can.
Speaker 3:Again, Herpocetes, who is the father of modern medicine. The Hippocratic Oath is his name Dr Hipp. This guy performed brain surgery in 500 BC. A total badass. You might want to pay attention to that guy. The number one thing he says for your health is food, is your medicine. You know how much the average medical doctor spends on nutrition Minimum Three semester hours.
Speaker 1:Yeah, three semester hours.
Speaker 3:That's it Versus. I spent a huge amount of time on it, and so it's just a different focus on different practices. You don't come to me with a broken arm, of course not.
Speaker 3:Yeah, practices like you don't come to me with the broken arm, of course, yeah, other than the fact that I'm also a trained paramedic. But yeah, I mean outside of that like this yeah, you don't come to me for that. You don't come to me for cancer. What you do is you come to me so you don't get cancer. You come to me so your bones are strong, so you don't get that. It's you know. But and in our practice we don't treat that kind of stuff. We, we still keep everything is still basically metabolic oriented and physiological. You know physiological, metabolic oriented stuff.
Speaker 1:Well, you're, you're the proactive guy, not the reactive guy, right you? You want people to talk to you before they get all of the things that hinder them.
Speaker 3:Naturopathic medicine is going to work much better if you go to them before you say, now is it good to come in. Yeah, I mean, if you got issues, it's good to come to me because I can, depending on, like, really, what a lot of people do is, they'll come after they've been to the allopathic doctor because they've done like cancer treatment and their bodies are completely shot from all the chemo and all that other bullshit they have to do for that and they come to me to get back into real health.
Speaker 1:Well, I know there's different types. You know different types in this focus. I think there's a doctor of osteopathic medicine, there's a doctor of chiropractic.
Speaker 3:Osteopathic medicine is very much allopathic. Now they're a mix and I have a lot of trackers. You know what they'll do is they'll have like, okay, michelle has a hard doctor right, like you know. Or Jake, and he's a DO, which is a spastic, you know. So they are actually pretty mixed. They spend time doing stuff. You know a lot of MDs will oh, they're not real doctors. No, they're phenomenal doctors. They just don't focus on the same stuff you do. You guys prescribe medicine because that's what you know. They prescribe medicine because that's what you know. They prescribe medicine because they know that. But they also know how to do other things. But, yes, there's, there's osteopaths. If you're talking about the natural side, there's osteopaths. There are naturopaths and there's several things in there that there, uh, uh, yeah, there's a bunch of them. Yeah, you, yeah, there's a bunch of them, yeah.
Speaker 1:You know there's a lot of things that we could talk with you about. You know you've been an author of books. You know you had a production company at one time for documentary and reality TV so we could go on forever. But I was wondering for the listeners is there anything like new and exciting for you that the listeners might tune into, like what is going on with Guy Metzger outside of the school, right? Is there anything exciting for us to know about? Here's your platform, right.
Speaker 3:Well, I'll be honest, I mean it's nothing new. I'm just kind of changing up some of the stuff I did. It's like we're changing our practice. Nothing new, I'm just kind of changing up some of the stuff I did. It's like we're changing our practice. I mean, what we're going to do is because the the they have new regulations that came in effect last November. The way that we practice most of our medicine is going to be we can't do it anymore. So I'm actually going to have to sit down and do like a bricks and mortar style practice, which I'm going to be opening in january the first part of january, and it's going to be in. I'm opening a practice inside of the current gym, at the hidden gym.
Speaker 3:I want to create a deal where people can get, you know, get their health needs and and health and wellness needs taken care of while they're at the gym. You know what I mean. Yeah, cause it's great cross promotion. Sure, you know it. Also because the way we advocate, we advocate working out, like I won't take a patient who will not work out. Okay, yeah, just, I mean I'll give them advice and stuff like that as a favor, but I won't take them on as a full-blown patient because it's people.
Speaker 3:Okay, and this is actually, you can look this up and people are, because they're going to think I'm full of shit but I'm not. But they actually have studies that show legitimate studies with real, real stuff. Cause some of these studies they're they're kind of clown studies, but this is a legitimate study published. You know they're kind of clown studies, but this is a legitimate study published in the Lancet, which is one of the most prestigious medical journals out there, that it is better for you to smoke. They consider that being a pack of cigarettes a day up to a pack of cigarettes a day, which I think is a lot. That's a lot. I don't know, I don't smoke, but a pack of cigarettes under a day is considered moderate smoking. It's better to be a moderate smoker and working out than not be a non-smoker that never work out.
Speaker 3:You will live longer, you'll have a better lifespan. You'll have a longer lifespan and longer health span if you work out. That's a better lifespan. You'll have a longer lifespan and longer health span If you work out. That's how important working out is to you. And this is a published study in the Lancet. Okay, I can't appreciate it. This is a major major medical journal. Right, that's a significant. To have that published there and knowing with your common thought process would be no, that can't be, but it is. That's how important working out is for you in your lifespan and your health span, cause there's two different things there's lifespan and health span.
Speaker 3:Really, what people need to focus on is their health span because you can be 90 years old, but if you spent the last 15 years in a freaking wheelchair, that ain't living. Yeah, all right. What you want to do is you want to learn how to expand your health span so, as you get older, that at 56 years old, that you can do the things that I can do yeah, all right. And it's not impossible, everybody can do it. It's not because I'm superhuman, it's because I just never stopped working out and I stopped training. Now have I adjusted to what my body can do now? Yeah, can I train like I did at 36? No, but I still train pretty hard, still be able to push it. Because, you know, I doubt I'll live long enough to see great grandkids, but I want to be. I want to be that granddad who plays with this, with grandkids my mother.
Speaker 3:My mother used to wrestle with my son when my son was eight years old. I just said that was 11 years ago. My mother is 84 years old. Okay, so my mother was wrestling with my son when she was in her 70s.
Speaker 1:Wow, all right that's how I'm gonna be I'm 58 and I wrestle getting out of bed every morning. Man that's what I?
Speaker 3:that's what I'm not without my injuries. You know what I mean. Yeah, you know I get up. I sound like microwave popcorn, but here's the alternative, the alternative is living a much shorter life and a much more miserable existence.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and to be working out guys. And when I say working out, I'm not telling you to work out like I work out. I get it. I get that my working out is going to be more difficult than most people, although I think it's very capable for most people. I think in their heads they just go. But getting up and walking, doing progressive resistance twice a week, progressive resistance is weightlifting, but you can do, like I do, a lot of calisthenics.
Speaker 3:I do very little weightlifting anymore. I'm in a weightlifting kind of right now and spend the next four months doing a weight training routine because I'm changing up my workouts, but normally, like I said, I'm not quite as muscular as I was when I was lifting a lot of the heavy weights. But it's not like people look at me and go you're out of shape. You know what I mean. Sure, I'm still roughly about 10% to 12% body fat, you know what I mean, which, without trying too hard To work out and be healthy, doesn't mean you have to do a bodybuilding routine.
Speaker 3:It doesn't mean you have to do CrossFit. It doesn't mean you have to do all this stuff. It means you have to get out and be active. You have to sit down and do a push-up or two. You might do a pull-up or two. You might need to do some stuff like that. You know, go to the gym, spend 30 minutes doing a pretty brisk workout, you know, uh, weight workout. Then spend, you know, another hour or so on the treadmill, you know, uh, you know. But again, what people don't realize is that if you spent 30 minutes you know 30 minutes four days a week, you'll be in good health for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, tough enough, right you know yeah, if there was one piece of advice you could give to an aspiring fighter, what would it be? Don't do it there, you go kids okay.
Speaker 3:So really, what I tell people is do it because you love it, not because you think you're going to be famous, or you're going to be the champ, because good chance you're not going to be either one the three things that these guys that get into it expect. Now they can have a real passion for it and that's really where you want to be. But everyone of them thinks they're going to be famous and you need to believe that in order to have to believe in yourself.
Speaker 1:Everyone thinks you're going to be the champ, everyone thinks you're going to be making a ton of money now. They may, but most likely not. Yeah, they're a small percentage, probably right oh, very small.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, I mean, that's what I tell people. People look at my career and they think, oh well, you know he's not that smart. I can recreate that. Yeah, I'm not that smart, but it's very difficult to recreate what I did. And and I'm not the guy who walking away with you know the, the a hundred million dollars in the bank. You know, I mean, I lived a great career and I made a lot of money, but not the. You know the type that you know. You know not the the the Conor.
Speaker 1:McGregor's yeah.
Speaker 3:Yes, and so it was just timing to where I was in my career at the time when the sport was going on. But I would tell them just they do it because they have a passion for it, because that way you'll never be disappointed. Yeah, whether you have a great career or you had a not so great career because you did something you loved, it's never not successful. It's never not successful.
Speaker 1:I was going to say. I would echo that. And you know, if you take your widget which is fighting, I take my widget which is playing a guitar or whatever. I think the first thing you have to do is you do it because you love it, not because somebody puts the guitar in your hand or not because somebody puts the boxing gloves on your hands. There has to be a desire to want to learn and if there's not ever that, there you're nobody's going to be able to instill that, you know, and somebody that doesn't want to be one of those things. Right, so you have to love it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, it's like I said, the time being great nobody's ever accidentally great. It's a concerted effort to do something that other people are unwilling to do, 100%. Yeah, and I can't speak for the music world, but I can speak for the fight business. One of the reasons I was successful was I would do stuff. I was willing to do things other people were not willing to do. I was willing to train harder.
Speaker 3:I was willing to do without, you know, when all my friends were, you know, going off doing others doing stuff like this. You know, like with all my friends, like I didn't start making money it's a lot of really like real money until I was about 26, you know, I, I was kind of self, I was supporting myself by 24 like I could. I could support myself totally by by fighting, but uh, you know, and living a poor life. I mean I also did another job because I like money and I like living a certain lifestyle. Yeah, at the fight at that time wouldn't support, but I was willing to do stuff that other guys weren't. Where my friends were all working and partying yeah, that wasn't me. Yeah, you know, that just wasn't me. And you know I was out doing things that other guys wouldn't do.
Speaker 3:I was fighting for next to nothing, you know, because it was going to further my career, and you've got to be willing to do that, you've got to be willing to make sacrifices. That you know things is because it isn't going to be easy. It's just like it's. It's like anything that's artistic oriented, whether it's fire, music or painting or something like this. You just simply got to do it. Now you may have to grow up at some point and go. You know what. I can't do this anymore, because I've got a family and I gotta be able to support this and I'm just not making it. And you make that decision and then it becomes a hobby and it does this stuff, and there's nothing wrong with that, because as long as you sat there and
Speaker 3:you did it because you were passionate about it. It's never a loss, it's never not successful, because most people spend their entire freaking lives doing shit they don't want to do. Working for people they don't like, doing this, all this other shit that they wish for a split second. They could be you or they could be doing something that they, they were passionate about and that's why, to be honest, that's why I enjoy uh, I enjoy medicine, because I enjoy helping people. Fact, I enjoy it. You know, I mean, I enjoy my fight career a great deal, but I prefer helping people versus hurting them. Yeah, and you know, I have a greater impact with this potentially have a greater impact by helping people like this. So you know, my life is about trying to help people.
Speaker 1:Now, I think that's the humanness in all of us, like whether you're a badass fighter for a living. At the end of the day, you want to be a good human, you want to help people. I think that's again the humanness in us, right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, I would say I would agree with you, other than the fact that I feel, like you know, that people today are selfish and short-sighted and they help people to the extent that it doesn't infringe on them, and that needs to change. You know that thought process needs to change. I think it's very much and it may have been and I didn't notice back in the day, but it's very much on like, what can you do for me lately, and it needs to be in a situation where you know that's not the case. You know that people like I said, you know they get in there and do stuff because they love doing it, and you know we have more people doing things that they love doing. Life, the world's going to be a better place.
Speaker 1:I agree with you 100% and I'm not going to go down that rabbit hole with you because that's a whole nother podcast in and of itself. The whole people wrapped up in their own agendas and just yeah, we could go on for days. About that I agree with you. 100, 150. Where can the listeners of backstage pass radio find you guy on social media if they wanted to look up you, or I mean?
Speaker 3:mean they always do my. I have two things. I mean the easiest one is just Sky Mesger. You know, just on my Facebook, Okay, and of course I'm always in the gym. Come by the gym, you know. I'm either fixing on patients or teaching an arm bar.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this has been a absolute pleasure for me, guy, you're the third, but no less important. I had a couple of buddies that also fought in the UFC, who've been on my show and those episodes did really well. I think there's a lot of people that are intrigued by the fight game so many that will never be in the fight game but would love to understand it more, and I appreciate your insights. What a career you've had and I thank you for your contributions to the sport. You know you were an early UFC. What four or five UFC four or five back when it all began in Colorado. Right, four, five, 13, 15. Yeah, so I appreciate that. I appreciate you taking the time. I appreciate Michelle letting you know about me and getting this set up.
Speaker 3:My pleasure, I appreciate it. I hope we weren't so off topic about music that people will tune in. I appreciate artists of all kinds and uh, you know, uh, it's like, okay, like golf. I'm not a fan of golf, but I appreciate golf because it's so difficult to learn how to play, right, it's so this, it's just not my sport, right? You know, it's not my. I don't find passionate, but I have utmost respect for the guys who do it, you know, who are good at it.
Speaker 3:Stuff like this and, and you know, music is one of those things that I really wish I spent, believe it or not, I used to play the violin. Uh, not very well, but I did. And uh, you know, and I really wish I stuck with it. And uh, it was one of the one of the things I look at a lot and I was like, yeah, man, I would have been great if I had done that. Sure, and I'm glad that my son is taken back up. You know, we tried to get him interested and he just wasn't at first, but now he's picked up playing guitar. That's awesome, and so it's, you know, kind of cool. He plays the drums, so it's really cool. I love seeing it.
Speaker 1:Well, it's nice to get off the conversation of music. You know I've done a lot of interviews over the past three years with local, regional and Hall of Fame artists and bands that you grew up listening to, have been on my show, and it's always nice to break away from the norm, right, and go. I call these bonus episodes where we just go completely off the topic of music and I think it's a nice treat for people to hear something come out of my mouth other than something music related. It's totally off topic for the listeners and what they expect out of my show, but it's no less important or interesting to them. So again, I appreciate your time. I know I called out 45 minutes at the beginning, but here we are almost two hours later, right, so that might be two hours You'll never get back. So I really appreciate you being here with me.
Speaker 3:I enjoyed it.
Speaker 1:I asked the listeners to like, share and subscribe to the podcast on Facebook at Backstage Pass Radio podcast on Instagram at Backstage Pass Radio and on the website at Backstage Pass Radio Podcast on Instagram at Backstage Pass Radio and on the website at BackstagePassRadiocom. You guys remember to take care of yourselves and each other and we'll see you right back here on the next episode of Backstage Pass Radio.
Speaker 2:Thanks so much for joining us. We hope you enjoyed today's episode of Backstage Pass Radio. Make sure to follow Randy on Facebook and Instagram at RandyHulseyMusic, and on Twitter at rHulseyMusic. Also make sure to like, subscribe and turn on alerts for upcoming podcasts. If you enjoyed the podcast, make sure to share the link with a friend and tell them Backstage Pass Radio is the best show on the web for everything music. We'll see you next time right here on backstage pass radio.
