Ken Shamrock On Childhood Abuse, Becoming a UFC Legend & Finding God

In this episode of the AJ Confidential Podcast, I sit down with MMA pioneer Ken Shamrock for one of the most personal conversations he's ever had.

This isn't just about fighting.

Ken opens up about growing up in extreme poverty, childhood abuse, being abandoned, juvenile detention, meeting Bob Shamrock, discovering discipline, becoming one of the founders of modern MMA, and the psychological cost of living as "The World's Most Dangerous Man."

We also explore trauma, memory loss, fatherhood, masculinity, faith, success, fear, identity, competition, and what it really means to become a better man after surviving unimaginable circumstances.

Whether you're interested in combat sports, personal development, psychology, or resilience, this conversation goes far beyond fighting.

Chapters

00:00 – Introduction: The Story Behind "The World's Most Dangerous Man"
01:47 – Ken's life today & staying disciplined
03:23 – Growing up in poverty in Georgia
08:58 – Violence, abuse & surviving childhood
20:05 – Moving to California & culture shock
35:59 – Running away from home & juvenile detention
46:47 – Meeting Bob Shamrock & the boys' home that changed everything
57:00 – Learning discipline, responsibility & purpose
1:00:00 – Bob Shamrock's impact as a father figure
1:10:00 – Developing the mindset of a champion
1:20:00 – Building strength, confidence & becoming an elite athlete
1:40:00 – Fame, identity & the psychological cost of fighting
1:50:00 – Money, promotions & the business of combat sports
2:00:00 – Injuries, recovery & the sacrifices of greatness
2:10:00 – Family, faith & defining what it means to be a good man
2:20:00 – Legendary fights, opponents & unforgettable moments
2:30:00 – Religion, morality & controversial conversations
2:36:00 – Final thoughts & life lessons

If this episode made you think, share it with someone who needs to hear it. 

Subscribe to the show, leave a review, and stick around. The real conversations are just beginning. 

This is Stallion Confidential. Real talk. No filters. No noise. Just truth. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hey guys, welcome to AJ Confidential Podcast. And today is a guest that you guys will be astonished to find out about the whole life journey from when he was a kid to when he was adopted to the point when he was made and forged by hard work discipline to become one of the elites. Most men spend their entire lives trying to find themselves. Some are forced to become something just to survive. Before the lights, before the arenas, before the world called him the world's most dangerous man. Yes, the most dangerous. There was a boy running, fighting, trying to make sense of a world that gave him nothing. No structure, no safety, no identity, just pain and a choice. And somewhere along that path, pain became power. He didn't just enter the fight game, he helped build it. From the raw brutality of early MMA to becoming one of the most feared names in history of combat sports, he wasn't just fighting opponents, he was fighting himself. Because behind every dangerous man, there's a story most people never hear. The victories we see, the battles we don't, the identity the world creates, and the man trying to live with it. So today, this isn't about fighting. This is about pain. This is about identity. This is about what it really takes to become a man that rebuilt himself when everything fell apart. Ken, welcome to you to Confidential.

SPEAKER_00 1:47

Hey, appreciate that. Nice introduction, thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:50

Well-deserved introduction. Well, how's the day been so far, Ken?

SPEAKER_00 1:54

Good, man. Just uh got to come down here and and uh uh Raymond Berninga, who promotes the Jay Cutler Desert Classic, uh, I usually come down every year to to support some of these athletes that are uh up and coming and and really trying to um build their bodies up. So uh it's a great for men and women uh to jump into that and really uh find themselves and help them, even in a regular life, living life, being able to have discipline enough to be able to make sure that your body functions the way it's supposed to.

SPEAKER_01 2:28

I know, like having an athlete's lifestyle isn't a piece of cake. So I started, long story short, I started amateur boxing about three years ago, and two years I dedicated myself to sport, and I had to come to this conclusion, as you said, having a heart. Either you have a heart, you can continue, or you're gonna talk yourself out of it, and the weak ones talk themselves out of that. And I I was I was at that point where I had to make a decision, either if I continue this for a decade of my life, might not come out with anything, no money, might just be 35 years of age, a lot of brain damage, and nothing to take and just have to restart my life at 35 or build something up until that point. And it takes something special, it takes a character that either you something's born with or you're not. So you tell me, take me back. What did your childhood actually look like?

SPEAKER_00 3:23

Well, let me let me uh let me kind of get set here for a minute and bring myself back there. Uh I I've said this and my wife um pulled me out of the the depths of depression because I had to I had to do this because um at the end of your career, when you when you start getting towards the end, people start wanting to really dig in more because you're they're not so much about the fight anymore. And now they just want to know more about the person that became great in that fight. And so uh people are always coming in and trying to dig deep and trying to to find out where I came from and and what kind of story is there to be able to you know do some sort of movie or or a documentary. And it's like everybody wants to know, especially as you get towards the end of your career and you've done so well, people want always just trying to keep lifting up and trying to find out what's underneath there. Where did he come from? How'd he get there? What kind of problems did he have? You know, all those things. And so I remember uh the first time when uh they came to me uh and I would say I was probably at 42, 41, 42, still fighting. Um they wanted to do this deep dive uh and do a documentary on my life.

SPEAKER_01 4:43

So that was like what, three years ago?

SPEAKER_00 4:45

Yeah, I wish. How old are you, Ken? I'm 62. Come on. This dude, guys, do he does he look 62? Come on. Well, so um I started to dive into it with no knowledge of of how you know that can mentally really get to you. Uh it's you know, it's the same thing as when people are working for 50 something years and they retire, or military, where they've just got something that they do repetitiously for many, many years, and then you walk out of that and then you get depressed. You don't know why. Um, this was kind of a different thing where I've done things so much, but now I had to go back, something I completely put behind me and forgot about. I had to go back and start talking about my childhood, which I almost forgot. So I started digging down in order to try to make this documentary one of the best things uh that could it could be because I felt like it had an opportunity to reach out and help a lot of kids that have of are going through or have gone through what I was going through and some of the decisions that I was making along the way. And so I remember the first thing that I went back to was when I was in Georgia, Macon, Georgia, and I was between I I think I was around five years, six, five, six years old. I had um two older brothers, which um obviously they I didn't grow up with them. They they grew up in one went to prison, uh, another one uh into the dark streets. But now they're um doing okay, but we didn't grow up together. We are in contact. Um, but I just saw how their lives went and how my life was going. And I remember trying to go back to that point. And um being in Macon, Georgia, we didn't have uh a home that uh was um where we were being raised. My mom, biological mother, because I didn't grow up with her, I ended up getting adopted, as we'll get into later. My my bio my biological mom uh had three boys, and and again, at the time I was five, and my uh next brother was six and then seven, so we were right in line. And she was a young woman, um, I think 1920, 21, she had three kids already. Um, didn't have a father around at the time. Um so you can imagine her during that time uh having to raise three boys um and having to be able to work and get babysitters or people to watch us, and that wasn't really a good thing either. So um trying to bring people into that where it was just me and my brothers, we barely got to eat. If if we were lucky, we got to eat once a day. We didn't have toys. Um, we had uh, I think it was a one or two bedroom home, I can't remember, which is another problem. Um, but we didn't have beds, didn't have dressers, basically very minimum of anything in there. Uh and we were left home a lot by ourselves uh because uh my biological mother would bring somebody in to watch us, uh, and they were young, and we were abused, obviously. Um just a lot of not in a good neighborhood. So me and my brothers were were abused a lot. Um, these people would end up because of our rebellion and how tough we were to be raised, we weren't good kids, um, they would leave. They would just leave, leave the house and leave us alone. Um, and uh we would get into obviously lots of trouble. We would be stealing things from from different houses, like toys in the front yard or bikes or um even food. Like if we saw something there that looked good, we would take it. Didn't matter if it was out on this garbage or whatever, but it was bad. Like I said, it was it was going back there, like I said, having to rethink those those journeys that we had and then fighting because we were predominantly in an African-American neighborhood. Um and uh it didn't it didn't matter to us. We were too young to know any kind of racial tension, we didn't understand that. We were just like they were just we just and this is where we were. We grew up there, we were born there, so there was nothing new or different for us, but there was definitely things that um were implemented in that neighborhood because of the tension during that time. You know, we're talking, you know, so what is it, 19 uh 64? I mean, you're you're 64, so that would be uh 69, 70, 71. Um, so there was a lot of that tension. And it was for whatever reason, there was fights going on, and I remember going to school and being trapped in a bathroom and having to fight my way out. Uh and I was five and six years old. And so this was stuff that constantly happened in this neighborhood, and it was something that we we had been grown accustomed to. It was just the way it was. It wasn't like I was afraid or feared. And I go back to one time, and again, when I talk about this young neighborhood stuff uh in my life there, I don't even remember it watching TV or having dinner. I don't remember a whole lot. It's all blocked out. But there's there's impactful things that I talk about because those are the things that I remember. And I remember one time that uh my mom was, my biological mother was, we were, and again, very vaguely, was I was holding her hand, we were walking down this pathway, and we had just gone into a store and she had bought some stuff, and we were walking back home, so it must have been somewhere in that neighborhood. And as we were walking down the pathway, um, there was there was uh on this side there was houses, on this side there were bushes. And as we were walking down this pathway on the sidewalk, this and I kid you, this is clear as day, this this man jumped out, had a beard, and he had underwear pulled over his head, and he was completely naked, and he starts running towards us. And my mom looked and she grabbed me and she started running and and and basically dragging me and didn't she into bag ribs and drops stuff, and she's running, and we finally get to the house and we lock the door, and I remember getting my knees were all scraped up and bloody. Um, and then I go blank. I don't remember anything after that. Now, obviously, I I believe that you know we obviously we got in a house and locked the doors, so I'm sure the police were called or whatever was happening, but I don't remember. It just blocks out. Um, and then the other thing that I remember was uh me and my brothers were at a park. And again, these are blotchy things, it's like I can't put them together. Um, we were at a park. And um the uh and and I don't know how I got there, I don't remember the transitions of anything that happened prior to this. I just remember I was being kicked with about six or seven people around me, and they were all just putting the boots to me and kicking me and kicking me. And uh all of a sudden I feel this instant pause, and this person grabbed me and yanked me and started dragging me and said, run. And I remember when I got up and started running, I turned and looked, and it was my older brother Richie, who was seven, five, six, seven. He was seven years old. And so we start running, and um I remember turning and looking, and as I turned and looked, I saw this crowd chasing us of kids, not men, but kids around our age or a little older. And they're chasing us, and I remember I'm running for my life, and in my head, this is like like we're gonna get we're gonna get killed, right? I mean, I'm a little kid, I'm afraid, so I'm running. I remember turning and looking, all these people running, and there was this one person that was running that I actually saw, and they were running, and imagine this young kid being able to do that, they were tough as nails, had blood running down her face. And we get into the house, and uh we and again, so we get into the house, but I want to, as I remember, when that when we the girl that was running that was kicking me, and there was girls and boys, when I turned and looked and that blood was running down, I didn't know how it happened. But the reason why it paused was because my brother had picked up a rock and threw it and hit this person in the face with the rock. And then everybody started, you know, like that pause, and that's when he grabbed me and started pulling me. And we took off, and then even after that, they still came after us. So we get into our house and there's nobody home, right? It's just us three. And we locked doors and all that. And I remember we had this one sliding window that went up and down, the old school one, and uh there was no lock on it. And so if they were kicking and throwing stuff at the house, and this is broad daylight in the neighborhood. So I jump up onto the windowsill because they're trying to pull the window up and get in, and I jump on it, try to stand on it, and kid steps back, picks up a rocket, and throws it through the window. Window breaks. The noise of it startled me. I slide off and I landed on a uh window piece and it went through my foot, and I still got the scar, it's about that long on the bottom of my heel, and blood just covered everywhere, and I just like went into shock. And I remember dragging myself into the bedroom, and and I remember because like I said, we didn't have any beds. My mom had a bed. So I I go into into my mom's room and I slide under the bed because I'm scared. And I'm down the hall, you can see straight into the hallway. We had this big window and a door on the side here, and the one sliding window was already broken, my brothers are fighting people, throwing stuff at it because they can't get in because there's still glass all around. And uh all of a sudden, as I'm watching, the police show up and starts to calm everything down, and they're telling us to open the door, and I'm still under the bed. I'm like, this is like crazy. And so um they calm things, they're talking to people, and this one woman screaming and yelling, and has the this young kid, which was a girl, um, standing next to her. She's blood running down her face, and her mom is just mad. And the police are trying to calm everybody down, and then it was, and again, I can't tell you the time frame, but it it wasn't a whole lot of trans, five, maybe ten minutes. My biological mom shows up, and as she walks up, and all these people are around just mobbing her house. Um Wow, the lady stands there, and as my my biological woman walks up and she says, What's going on? What's going on? The the police officer's trying to explain it, and this lady's so angry and screaming at my mom, and this and that, and the next thing you know, this lady reaches over and punches her. And it's just like it just went off. And in front of the police, everything just went off. Like, off. Okay. And so um, I remember just closing my eyes, and I I don't remember anything after that. The next thing I remember is that we were in a 67, 69 Camaro. Uh, it was a Camaro. I don't remember what year it was, but it was a Camaro, and we had this U-Haul on the or this thing pulling all of our stuff down the road, and we were with this man. And I don't remember ever her ever having a relationship with someone, or uh someone being around, or even someone that was around long enough for her to have a relationship. But here we were in a car driving down. And he he actually was in the military and flew helicopters and he had gotten out, and uh he was going back home to California, and uh somehow or another they got a relationship together, and we started heading three thousand three thousand miles to uh good old Cali, and we'd never been anywhere else before. Like this was our neighborhood, and we had no understanding what the rest of the world was. So here we are heading to California with somebody that we didn't even know. But again, maybe we did, but like I said, I don't have, and and this was probably it it because I'm when it's five, six years old when it happened. When we actually moved, we were I was about nine or nine or ten years old when we actually moved. Um so I don't remember, I don't remember anything else. And that just don't happen unless there's you know there's some stuff that and again I remember some other things, but I don't we don't I don't want to talk about those things, but it just being in that atmosphere and starting your your life with that it just it scars you and we'll get into more as you start diving more into the the questions and stuff like that, but those are those are things when you when you go back there, and now I'm better because I've done it a few times, but when I first did that back when I was 40, 40 something years old, and people want to know who I was, where I came from, and we start doing this document. I went into the I didn't know it. My wife saw it. She's like, What's wrong with you? I was like, What are you talking about? She was like, You're you're like going into the bedroom, you're separating yourself from people, you're not talking, and it's like I didn't know that, but it was affecting me having to bring myself back to something that I completely blocked out.

SPEAKER_01 18:29

It's so it's so interesting, as you mentioned, like the the term block out, and especially if you see a pattern from what you just told me, it only happens when the shit hits the fan and something traumatizing traumatizing is expected. So, like a formula that happened is like the chaos with the police, with your mom dragging you, and then you just blackout after that, and like other incidents that you for some reason cannot share, which is fine. But which tells me, and even Harvard scientists have discovered your brain blocks out the bad memories and trauma that wasn't supposed to be part of your life. That's how like weirdly how human brain functions. And I was actually talking to the Navy SEAL, and you know, he has uh from the Buds training from Hell Week, he has like one of the things in his like gastritis where he has reduced his lifespan by like a few decades. So and he's like, I don't remember that. It's like, yeah, I remember the glimpse of that, it's like a far-fetched glimpse, but I don't know if that was me that went through that. So we'll we'll and then yeah, we'll we'll just dive dive deeper into that. Like there's some scientific terms on why that happens. Very interesting, as you mentioned. But so at what point in your life would you say you met the man who made you the legend, Bob Shamrock?

SPEAKER_00 19:55

Yeah, um, wow. Uh there's a whole ocean uh between the time that we moved to California and I ended up at the Shamrock boys' home.

SPEAKER_01 20:06

So you were about 10, 11?

SPEAKER_00 20:09

I was I was probably nine, eight or nine, because at 10 I was in Juvenile Hall in California. Okay. My first experience. Uh I had gotten uh locked up for for um obviously stealing and running away and you know all that stuff, but there was so much more that happened prior to that. Um, you know, we got there in California, um, and we're with the guy who had just retired out of the military, and and he was a brass of something, I don't know the status, but he was he flew helicopters, so he was up there. Um and he was a medic, uh, whatever they do with those medic helicopters and stuff. So he was one of those. Um, and very disciplined, and we were not disciplined, so it was like uh two trains on the same track going towards one another. You just knew there's there's you it's gonna happen. Um and uh so we get to California, we're in this this Camaro, nice Camaro, and we're driving all that way, and and and this was our first experience of even being out of the neighborhood, right? And so here we're going across this this the country, and and you you you got this newly wed couple. Um, I don't know him. I really don't remember any relationship, and he's just there, and then all of a sudden we're driving down, and me and my brothers are in this small back seat, and we're told to sit still. And we would be good for 15, 20 minutes, maybe. He would tell us, stop, you know, stop, you guys behave and we and we I don't know him. And uh he would reach back and smack us like BAM, I told you. And he, of course, he's driving the car, and then he's yelling, not yelling, but But um talking to my biological mom and saying, hey, make sure get them in control. And she was hey, kids, come on, stop. But he we would get smacked 15, 20 times before we reached where we were going.

SPEAKER_01 22:13

Were you guys feel like fighting in the back? We were just kids.

SPEAKER_00 22:16

And we were not normal kids. We were bad kids. We were rebellion kids because we hadn't been raised. And we were in a rough neighborhood and we survived. Like, so that made us, you know, not easy. And so here he is. He didn't do anything wrong. He's just trying to teach us. Like, I told you this, I mean what I say, right? Um, so we got smacked quite a bit, and and and it was one of those trips where I don't rem I don't remember, you know, how we got there. I just know that I don't remember even stopping ever. I don't remember being in a hotel. I know we did, but I don't remember it. And uh so we end up getting to California, and obviously the there's a lot of things that have to happen because he's got to find a place to live. You know, we got to do all this stuff. So we go to his parents' house. And uh this is where it's just like you just think like, is the whole world like this? Because we get there and it they seem nice, they seemed very, you know, normal, um, a lot normal than us. And so our first night there, we eat dinner, and there was a little bickering a little bit, you know, at the table between them two. Uh, there was a lot of drinking um between the two. Um, and then we end up going to bed and we were all put in it, we had a bed. I mean, that was pretty cool, but we were all in the same bed, and then my uh uh biological mom and the and and and his name was is is Bob. I'm not gonna mention his last name, but so we we we get there and so they're in another room, and then of course um the his his parents uh they're in their room, which I don't believe they actually slept together, but they did that night. Um so we get in there and we're excited, we're new home, got a daddy, you know. Even though we're getting hit and all that, this was an exciting journey for us. And uh especially from where we were at. And so we get there and we start getting ready to go to bed. And uh, so I don't know, maybe 30 minutes max, maybe, we start hearing stuff going on like they had gotten up or something. I don't know, but all of a sudden there was this screaming and yelling, and then all of a sudden we heard this big crash, like a glass or something was broken, a plate or something, and the screaming, yeah, stop, get off me, stop hitting me. This is a woman, and we were like, When then we know it's not our our mom, like that's not her voice, and but you don't hear anything from the man, and it's just the woman, uh-huh. And we're like, All right, well, I mean, it's not like we haven't heard any of this stuff before, right? Like, this is kind of the world we came from, but it was like we had just gone all of this way in this place that seems so normal to like this, and we're like, God, and in your head, you just like not, and I'm not subconsciously thinking that I don't know. It's just like this is normal, like this is everywhere, and so we get up in the morning and obviously find out later on, not even then, but later on, we found out what happened was she basically just threw herself on the floor, started throwing dishes and glasses and screaming and yelling at him to stop hitting. He didn't he's standing in there having a drink. He never touched her. Like, it's like we're like, and again, this wasn't we didn't find it the next morning. This was later, later on. But it just like I I just how do we like go all of this way and we end up there, and then we're the same thing. So in our heads, like you're saying, it's nothing different. I don't know how long we stayed there, maybe a week, two weeks. We get a house, and it's right up against this school called Pueblo Vista, which is uh elementary school. And uh so now all of a sudden we're in this neighborhood. Now we're in a neighborhood, and we got a house, and we each have a bed, same room, but we each have a bed. That's like we never had. And it just seems like we hit we struck gold. We got three square meals a day, we got a refrigerator, we got TV, we got, I mean, normal. Like this was like like we were rich, you know, um, even though we weren't, but to us we were rich. But it it but a lot happened when we started getting into the school system or getting into the neighborhood because they were different. They were white, and that's not what we were used to.

SPEAKER_01 27:07

Very quiet.

SPEAKER_00 27:09

It was almost like everybody acted differently, and we just weren't that way. We were the way what we grew up with, yeah, with like African American neighborhoods. Yeah, it's just like that wasn't that wasn't normal to us. And the same thing happened when we went into the elementary school that happened when we were in uh the school in Macon, Georgia. They came after us because we talk differently, we walk differently, we dress differently, and their kids came after us. Even in California, even in California because we were different. And what they were hearing at home, and the things that were being said at home, and the way that we acted and the way that we carried ourselves contradicted on the way on what they were used to seeing. And you know, that led to us because we weren't the wimps, we weren't the ones that they were gonna pick on. Like they they found out real fast that we came from a place to where you don't lay down because you ain't getting up, right? Um, so and I remembered this uh uh one, and again, I don't remember my classrooms, I don't remember my teachers, I don't remember any of that stuff. I just don't. But I remember it was I was first week of school, um, I was out on the playground and my my brothers were in a different recess period. And uh so I remember when out on recess and I didn't know anybody again. People were always pointing at me and and doing this because I I talked differently, much differently when I was younger. More like uh like a slang, yeah, just more I and again I don't know, but it it I was different. I just they were different, and I dressed differently, and the atmosphere was different. And uh it just seemed so foreign, wimpy. Like it just seemed so weak, uh, which it wasn't, but to me, because of where I came from, everything was strong, like, and uh and it was physical and aggressive. Uh and this was like just like like Sunday school, like Yeah, I see what you're saying. You know, it was just like weird. And uh so I remember going out on the playground and and uh a few of these kids started pointing at me, and it was about three or four of these boys, uh pointing at me and laughing, and and I had once I saw that, because of where I came from, I I I could read uh an area uh uh and things thing that that just starts to not feel right. And uh so I immediately found a wall um that I could walk up and kind of put my back on. And so I found it, and I went over and kind of leaned on this wall and watched everybody else in the playground and the the ones that were starting to notice me, and it got worse, and they started pointing more, and then they started walking towards me. And it was about four, four or five of them. They're walking up, and I'm thinking to myself, and I've been here before, like this is I got trapped in a bathroom uh when I was a making and uh and I made my way out, but it's not like I had a fear because I had done it enough times to where it happened, I get beat up, it's whatever, right? But but it's happening. And I got two choices, right? Either run, and there's nowhere to run to, or I fight. And so in my head, it was like I already got the wall. I was like, okay, it's happening. Kids start walking up, and all this other things are all going on as normal. Why they're fucking up, and then I remember the first word that came out, which shocked me because normally in this situation, I wouldn't know it was coming. Right now I seen it, I watched it, it's coming. I never had that opportunity most times. Yeah, like normally it happens and you don't see it.

SPEAKER_01 30:59

See, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:00

But here they're just telegraphing, it's like saying, We're coming after you. And in my head, it's not, it's not like I'm thinking, like, wow, you guys are stupid. I'm just thinking to myself, well, I got a heads up.

SPEAKER_02 31:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:14

So I get a bet, uh, my back's wall, they come walking up, and I'm trying to figure out which one is the actual man, the one that's leading this thing, because that's who I'm going first. Yeah. And as they come walking up and they start laughing, and this one kid says, What do you think? You're tough. And I'm just like, I it's like, maybe they don't want to fight me. Like I'm like, I'm truly trying to figure out what just happened. Like, because when they're coming up, they got the numbers. I mean, like we're off, right?

SPEAKER_01 31:47

At this point, you're like swinged. Yeah, I'm waiting for it.

SPEAKER_00 31:50

I'm not even saying that. I'm just like confused. Like, are you maybe they maybe they, I mean, again, I I'm not experienced at this, but do they want to be friends? Like, are they coming up to talk to me? I'm hitting them because they want to be friends. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 32:02

Yeah, the place you're from at this point, they probably would have thrown hands.

SPEAKER_00 32:05

They would, I would have, yeah, it would have happened. Like, there's you're not coming up and saying you want to fight. Uh like, and so as he keeps talking, and he says, at three o'clock after school, maybe behind, and first of all, I don't even know where the gym is, but maybe behind the gym. And I'm like, in my head, I'm like, I'm working through this really fast. You want me to meet you at three o'clock behind the gym so that you can bring more people to beat me up.

SPEAKER_05 32:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:36

And I'm like, I don't think I want to wait that long. And I just hit him, bam, he goes down, I kick him, and I'm waiting to get hit so as I can throw that direction, and nothing happens. And as I'm kicking them and kicking them and waiting to get, you know, head, wherever they I look up and they're running. They took off. Oh, wow. I was like, that's new. I said, All right. That's powerful. I got suspended. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 33:04

So I go home and what age are you at this point?

SPEAKER_00 33:07

Oh man. Middle school? Gotta be 10.

SPEAKER_01 33:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 33:10

Yeah, 10 years old. Nine or 10 years old, because I know it was the first week that I was in school.

SPEAKER_03 33:17

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 33:18

So it wasn't too long. And the time we left till we got there, I was still pretty, pretty young. And our our house was backed up. We had a fence right there where that playground was. Um, so I didn't have to walk far. Um, but when I got there, I obviously this is new to me because we we'd fight all the time and nothing happened. But we got this time, I had to pull weeds, mow the lawn, pull, pull, and I didn't even know what a weed was because I was pulling flowers too. I didn't know what a weed was. Clean toilets. I didn't know how to clean it. I didn't sweep. I remember sweep trying to sweep a floor.

SPEAKER_05 33:56

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 33:57

I never used a broom. How'd you do it? I I I he told me to sweep a floor, and I'm like, he's like, he goes, so he grabbed the broom, but then I'm now I'm trying to sweep this. Like, I'm a young kid. I ain't got no effort, no determination to do what someone tells me to do.

SPEAKER_02 34:17

Correct, correct.

SPEAKER_00 34:18

Um, so I got the broom, and I'm just whiffing and whiffing, and and and then I put it away. And this was almost in everything I did. And and even when I pulled weeds, I got smacked because I pulled a flower. I was like, it was growing out of the ground. I didn't know. Like, I mean, that's how ignorant we were. We really didn't do anything at this point. We had no knowledge of how to make a bed, which I got smacked for not being able to make a bed. Um, so it was, and for him, he thought we were being arrogant and and just being disrespectful and not listening. Truth was, we didn't know. Like, we never had to do anything, right? So now we're being told to do all these things as chores and stuff like that. And and for us to say, like, well, I don't know how to do that, we didn't have a knowledge of doing that. Like, oh, I don't want no, it just, okay, uh, you know, we get through it. And it was always wrong. And so it created so much chaos, so much physicality, uh, with getting smacked all the time, which was no big deal for us, because that's that that's normal, right? So it wasn't that wasn't in that wasn't really that impactful, but it just it was just a constant, everyday struggle for us to try to live up to a standard we didn't understand. And so we got to a point where it was just really bad. It was there was no comfort in it, and where it really reached a pinnacle, where it reached a point to where um I I was done, and I and I wasn't going to be there anymore. I was just made a decision. And this, and I've I've spoken about this in a lot of my testimonies, it was that I had I we sat down to eat dinner and they made some food, and I mean it was all right, food was awesome, but there was this one thing I didn't like, which was peas. I hated peas. I just didn't like the texture, the way they popped, it just made me a zit. Just hated it. And so we had to eat everything on our plate. And I said, you know, I'm not eating those. Didn't say that out loud. But I ate everything, and I remember because in the military they eat a certain way, right? They got to get their food done, especially when they go through boot camp. They're like, ah, you gotta wolf it. So he ate that way. But um, I would sit at the table and he was sitting at the far end, and my brother was in the middle of that, and then my mom, and then my other brother, and so we were all sitting down, and I would time him when he started eating his food, and because he would like get down and he'd shovel food on my and he would just start chewing, and he would have his head down, right? So I would take a spoon of the peas and I'd act like I was eating it, and then I would have my hand down and I would just drop those peas when he would dip down together. That's very strange. Man, we came up with a lot of things that were clever, uh, especially when you have to.

SPEAKER_05 37:16

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 37:16

Um, and I got away with it about two times, and then he caught me. And then he just went off like boom. And uh sent me to my room screaming and yelling, and he eat you food, and then I couldn't even hear just chaos. So I go to my room, and you know, this was really again. We this was like we were rich. Like we had food, we were eating. I just didn't like the peas. We got dessert, like cookies, and then it had milk, and there's things that we would do. We get to watch TV. Where is it coming from? Where was it coming from? What's that?

SPEAKER_01 37:53

The facilities, the school, the three meals a day, the bed. That's coming from him.

SPEAKER_00 37:58

Like he was a provider, like he had the money. We felt rich from where we lived.

SPEAKER_01 38:04

But why was he doing that for your biological? Did your biological mum was with him? They were married. They got married. That's part of this.

SPEAKER_00 38:12

I didn't even, I didn't even I never saw it. But I don't remember it. I really don't. I stay were there.

SPEAKER_02 38:18

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 38:19

And uh, and I know we were, because my brothers had talked about it when we had uh got together, and and I don't I don't have any pictures of it either, like no pictures. Um so it was just there, and that's kind of when I tell my story.

SPEAKER_01 38:32

I it's like it's like you as a kid just started praying to God, God please fix this, fix this in one night.

SPEAKER_00 38:38

Snap, yeah. No, but it was I think a lot of it it has to do is I don't have the my mind didn't have the capability of trying to store that much, and I just just maybe I hated it that much.

SPEAKER_01 38:51

It's isn't it like okay, so it's very curious that you mentioned it's like when you're in a fight and flight, like out of your entire career, you don't remember the fights when you were fighting the opponent. No. It's the same no sparring, nothing, you remember nothing, and you look at the footage and you like I don't remember that.

SPEAKER_00 39:07

Yeah, I did that when I heel hooked um Don Fry when he caught me with a left hook and I went down and we were rolling around from it and I ended up in a heel hook um and and fractured his leg. I don't remember that. I literally that from that point where I didn't remember going to the ground, I don't remember rolling on the ground, I remember getting the heel hook, and I don't remember when I stood up, then all of a sudden I remembered like, how did I get there? I don't remember. Yeah, I just was instinct from that point, but I also took a shot.

SPEAKER_01 39:36

Comes with it.

SPEAKER_00 39:38

There's Don't Fry. Yeah, but in life you don't take shots, but your mind still does that, does that, does that?

SPEAKER_01 39:45

It's very, very curious. We we should definitely dive deeper into that. Well, so were at this point in your life, were you ever feeling like you were just alone? Like by yourself, as in like, yeah, you had brothers, you had like all of that, like friends, school, like fights, whatever. But did you truly when you sat down with yourself, we did you felt you were alone?

SPEAKER_00 40:07

Yeah, I I mean, you know, as a kid, um, and especially the journey that I had already traveled, that was normal of just feeling alone. And and I wouldn't even say decisions, but I would just say actions uh that we took were uh uh ones that we uh uh had to make those decisions on our own. Like there was no influence um of of of trying to make decisions or making good decisions. It was just felt like we were in this bubble and we couldn't get out. Like this we're stuck here. Like if the world would just keep turning and we just keep doing the same things over and over again, and nothing was getting better.

SPEAKER_01 40:57

It's like a like a miserable cycle of misery. That's that's what we call it.

SPEAKER_00 41:01

Just waking up uh every morning and knowing that you're gonna do the same things and nothing's changing. You're not happier, you're not mad well, you could be madder, but I don't not sure how much more that you could be being in those situations, you're there. And um, I'm not sure where or how you could go any lower. You're you're there, you're stuck. Yeah, and that's that's what I felt. I just felt that. And then when that thing happened at dinner and and I didn't get to finish that, but really how that ended is what made the decisions, because when I when I was sent to my room, I got up in the middle of the night because I heard him watching TV and and and all of that stuff, and I was stuck in the room there. I was I was I was angry and I was like, yeah, okay, whatever. So when everybody went to bed, I got up at night and I got my cookies. I got my milk. Um, the only problem is that he measured everything. Like he knew exactly how many cookies he had, how much milk was in the refrigerator. I mean, he he knew everything. Everything was organized, right? We never had never had that. So he gets up and you know, all I mean, just it, I mean, just like at the dinner table where he's like, Why do you? I mean, this was the bigger, just just all it was all hell broke loose. Bam! And he put us all in a room and he asked us, Who stole the cookies? And he's looking right at me. Yeah, and I'm like, in my head, I'm a kid. I'm like, okay, I'm done. I I'm gonna catch a beating. And he keeps asking, I'm gonna ask you one more time, looking right at me, who stole the cookies? And I'm thinking, I can't I can't understand what he's uh what he's doing. I was like, okay, I know he knows I did, everybody knows I did it. If I say something, he thinks I'm a smart ass and won't get beaten, so I keep my mouth shut. He says, I was all right, turn around. He takes his belt off, bend over, makes all three of us bend over, and he starts one at a time whack, whack, whack. He turns like turn around, and we get up. He goes, I'm gonna ask you again. Who's and at this time I'm like, I'm completely confused. Like, who stole the cookies? And I'm like, I ain't saying a fucking word, man. Uh, because I'm like, he knows, like, I he knows, I guess. I mean, everybody everybody knows it was me, and I don't understand that what he wanted me to do was say it. But in my mind, I'm saying, if I say it, I'm gonna get killed, right? So it's I'm stuck in this rockin' hard place because I don't know what he's meaning.

SPEAKER_03 43:46

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 43:47

And why is he beating my brothers? And so finally he sends my brothers out and he looks at me and he goes, pull your pants down. Turn around and bend over. And I'm like oh shit. You know, I don't know what's gonna happen. But I've been through some horrible stuff. So I'm shaking and I do it and I turn around and he starts beating me, which was a relief in a sense. And he starts hitting me and hitting me and hitting me, and then he drops the belt and he picks it back up. But this time when he picks it up, he's got the other end and the belt buckle on the uh far end and he starts swinging, bang, and he loses his temper, he lost it and hits me, and I finally crawl up on the uh just crawl up into a bowl and he starts beating me bang, bang, bang. And then finally I don't know how long, but it it stops, and I just stayed it. He walked out of the room and I just stayed there and just curled up and I just like I'm done. Like I can't do this anymore. Like some people uh have two ways to go about this. Some people do things that they can't come back from, hurt themselves really badly, maybe to a point to where they don't live anymore. I never had that thought. My thought was like, I'm out, I'll find my way. And I was young. What age? Ten years old. I'm sure we were probably around ten years old because I got locked up after this. I ended up running away. And I got caught for stealing because I was stealing food. I was living out of a car. I did that a couple times with a car.

SPEAKER_01 45:22

Um and uh I ended up getting locked up and so this was the moment basically when you were running away from this.

SPEAKER_00 45:33

I ran away four, five, six I'm a lot. I ran away. They never came looking for me. Oh never came looking for me.

SPEAKER_01 45:41

Not a mom, not this guy, not a brothers, no, no.

SPEAKER_00 45:43

Nobody came. My brothers ran away. They ran away. Um my brothers actually, I think during this time, one of them was in Juvenile Hall and the other one was in uh a place called Borough Work Camp. Uh-huh. Um it was boys' camp, but they they would work them. Um so I ended up running away and I got caught for stealing. But later on, when I and I ran away again later, uh, when I brought me obviously got caught for the stealing, they brought me back. Um I ran away again. Um this time I got stabbed uh behind a 7-Eleven. Uh, ended up in the hospital, um, and then they hand I woke up handcuffed to a bed. Um, and then I went into juvenile hall again. Um, I must have done that probably four or five times before I became a ward of the court and uh they took me out of the home. Uh that's when I started going to placements. I went to uh Fort Bragg placement, I went to a St. Helena uh group home, a couple different places, and I ran away from those places. Um I ended up at the Shamrock Boys home um at the age of 13 uh after going through being taken out of the home and going through all these different places. And I remember the first time I was interviewed uh by Bob Shamrock while I was in Juvenile Hall. And he was telling me and uh kind of interviewing me about you know who I was and whether I would fit that home. And he would tell me about some of the things that they had done in them homes, and and I I didn't believe them. Like they had pool tables, video games, um, they had boxing matches, um, they had uh athletics that kids could participate in. I didn't believe any of that because of the other homes I went to, they didn't care um because they were house parents. They didn't own the homes. And they come in on shifts, so they had no investment in us. But he said that he owned the home and he showed me pictures of the home, and I thought he was full full of shit. I mean, I thought he he was like no, this is a mansion, like whatever. Why would he lie to me? Like but I obviously I'm this thing's in my head. And he showed the home in the inside of the home, and I was like, No way. So I remember and I wasn't a good kid and I was like I said, I was 13 um when I went into that home after failing all those other ones. And it it just seemed the same kind of sh kind of spiel, but this time there was actual pictures. There was a guy that actually owned the home, it was his home, and he was talking to me before. I never talked to any house parents, nobody ever came to see me. Uh he came and interviewed every kid to see if they were gonna fit into his home. They said they had church, it was did I have anything against that? And I was like, No. I mean, I went to church one time, and that's another story that I had. Um so I ended up going there and uh I was going with two other kids, one that wanted to uh put me in a hospital and uh like me too. Yeah. Okay. One and he was 17 and I was 13. And then there was another kid who I was roommates with in Juvenile Hall, who's a pretty good dude. Uh his name was Sean Green.

SPEAKER_04 49:06

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 49:07

Good dude. Uh at least we were good dudes then. I don't know, I don't know who he where what he's done after that, but um good stuff, right? Um, we go there and it was a long trip because we're going from Napa to um Susanville, which is on the other side of Reno, Nevada, in California side. We drive through all these things and we start getting into Susanville, and we're like, where are we at? Like, there's no houses. Yeah. It's like we're they're gonna put us in a hole. So we're getting out there, and and and and Susanville's about three miles outside of the small town. So we're driving out there, there's no houses.

SPEAKER_01 49:45

No, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:46

So we get up to this house, we pull in, and there's a couple other houses around it, like two or three houses around it. They're huge. So we pull in, there's these big old pillars with these iron gates, and they open up, and we drive in there, and we're like, hey, we're in the wrong place. Even though we saw pictures, it does nothing when you drive up to it. So as we're pulling in, we're like looking at one another, you know, all that we never said a word to one another. Me and Sean did, but most of the time it was just quiet because we didn't have a lot to say. Probation officers driving into this place, and we're just looking at this place, and we're like an all like get the out of here. Like, what do no? What is going on? Like, then as we're driving up, they had this big old center with this uh rocks that were in a circle. There's this big old American flag up in the middle of the driveway. We drive in the circle, and we pull up into there, there's all these cars. There's a Corvette, um, there's a Riviera, meaning just suite cars. Wow. Then there's a van and a station wagon. And we're like, that resembles a little bit. And there's a big old bunkhouse on the side, and then there's big old house sitting right there in front of us, and he says, nah, this is the place. It's like, because there was a lot of other kids from Napa there, which I we didn't know. So we get out and we walk up, and there's this big old wood oak door, and all this rock granite. I mean, just elaborate. The only time we ever get close to a home like this is if we were robbing it. I mean, like, you're just like, wow. So we knock on the door, and Bob Shermack answers the door.

SPEAKER_01 51:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 51:23

And yay, hey, it's all bubbly and all that. And my instincts first was stay away from me. Like, I know you're kind. Like, that's that's how they do it. They want to befriend you. You're a good person, and I love you, and I want you to be my friend. And I was like, yeah, yeah. So we walk into the house, and I've got my antennas up, like, very up, like something's wrong. Like something is really wrong.

SPEAKER_01 51:51

Even though, like, from the point of to drive, you enter the gates, you saw the house. It felt like a scene out of a movie the way you described it. Something ain't right. This ain't right. Like a gut feeling.

SPEAKER_00 52:02

Yeah. This is not this, this we this doesn't happen to us. This is not the only, like I said, we don't get close to this unless we're robbing it, period. So we go in and we walk in, and then there's this grand piano, it was a white grand piano, and there's this big old fireplace that went up from the ground into the ceiling, open beam ceilings. Uh, and there's an um uh this marble table with these silk floors, and so there's this there's this um uh stairway that goes up into the second level of the house as we walk in the door, and there's kids up there, there's a pool table, we hear dinking and like the sounds of video games. Uh, and so then when we walk through the hallway, and then there's this this display of of different types of um dishes and different things like that that are antiques. And then we make a left, and then we make a right, and then all of a sudden now we're into the uh living room where there's couches and and there's a fireplace, and then there's a kitchen that has a huge counter, and then there's a lady in there actually doing some sort of cooking, and then there's a bar uh right next to the actual counter, uh the actual couches and TV and everything. And then he brings us around where the bar is and he sits us down, and there's like there's candies and and there's a soda machine. It's like he pinch me. Like, what's going on here? So we sit down on these stools, and he's he starts talking to us, tells the probation officer, hey, um, you want some coffee or something to go? The the cook will take care of the cook like the cook will take care of you and you know, get you cookies or your coffee or whatever. I want to talk to these the kids.

SPEAKER_03 53:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:49

Which they already knew the scheme because they had already placed a bunch of kids there already, right? This is our first time, like, like so we sit down and I'm like sitting the farthest away. The others are kind of like, okay, I can dig this. Like, they're all I'm but maybe they haven't had the same experience as I had. But I'm like, there's no way this ends good. There's just no way. And so I remember sitting there and he starts pulling out our files, and he starts going through them and literally targeting every single one of us on where he thinks um we have these different types of issues and problems, and that how he wants to help us. And Sean had some other things that he did. He was more of this guy that loved to hit all this stuff and get high and have a good time, and you know, happy go lucky. Wasn't a violent guy. Um the other guy, Jeff, uh, and I still know their last names to this day. Um, Jeff was the one that wanted to put me in the ground. Uh, he was more of the vicious kind. Still did the entertainment stuff, um, but was vicious. And uh, and uh, and I and I was the same, but I was young. So we were Sean was more introvert, you know.

SPEAKER_01 55:15

How many kids were there at this point?

SPEAKER_00 55:16

I would say 18. Oh wow. 18 kids, and I would say 12 of them were for Napa. Um so it was it was interesting because that had never happened. We normally would get shown around by a peer counselor and show us the ropes and get our stuff put away, and then we just were there. Yeah. He was literally breaking it down to us on what he expected from us. But he also told us that he's you're not just here to be a number, but you're here to improve yourself. That's something that we had never heard before, like I had never heard before, to where someone was like literally saying, you know, let's figure out how we can help you direct that anger into something positive. And and and and and and and others to be able to help direct whatever theirs blow-ups or anger, whether it's in or out, how do we how do we get that curved, how do we get you to use that in a positive way? Of course, that's all foreign to us, but we kind of figured it was it was a step in the right direction. But at the same time, what's it cost us? Like, what is it that you truly want from us? Because nobody pays attention for free. And so after I was there about probably a month or so, I'd gotten into a fight instantly. Uh, I had jumped on this dude. He was laying in bed uh because he used my razor blade. And he was in it was in the morning, and I had complained about it to Virtus, who was another one of our counselors, and complained about it to him, and then he told my dad, and my dad didn't know me that well, Bob Shamrock, it wasn't my dad yet. So, well, that's your problem. What are you gonna do about it? Bob Shamrock said that to me, the group homeowner. It's like, I looked back at him like, huh? Like, and this kid was a pure counselor, he was 18 years old. Uh he was laying in bed and he had the blankets over him, and he like said that like I wasn't gonna do anything. I was 13. So I said, okay, all right. So I go and Vertus is following me. He's a counselor, and he's a wrestler at the Susanville uh college. He wrestled there.

SPEAKER_05 57:32

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 57:32

Uh big, strong black dude. I mean, just and a good guy. So he starts, he's laughing, he starts following me out, and I was there less than a month. I've opened, opened the door, I jumped on him. I clamped my legs down on him so he couldn't get out of the blankets and started pounding on him. Bang, bang, bang. Verdict's eyes just lit up, like, did he just do that? And he grabs me and he pulls me off. Yeah, then he goes, Okay, okay, okay, okay. He goes back in the house, and I told him, I just I was I was hot because I get to a point to where I know I just see black. I'm like, that's it, I'm gone. So he pulls me back, and then and I have to walk away, and I'm trying to calm down. And so we walk into the house, and everybody's like, What just happened? And Vers like the he said he did, he did it. Carl comes running in the door, it's like busting through the door, and Bob Shamrock says, That's enough. Yeah, like that's enough. And the dude probably could have beat me up. He's 18 years peer council, he's probably gonna beat me up, but I wasn't letting that go. Because if I let that go, everything else gets done. Yes, sir. Right? So instantly that spread through the house. Like, I am going to do something.

SPEAKER_01 58:38

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 58:39

Um, I think I was 15 years old, I was running the house.

SPEAKER_01 58:43

Wow. Yeah. You're like the man. That was it.

SPEAKER_00 58:46

Never looked back.

SPEAKER_01 58:47

At what point uh did he adopt you? Um did he just adopt it? Tell us more about that.

SPEAKER_00 58:51

Yeah, 18 years old, uh, I got adopted because at 16, I believe it was, I was trying to get adopted, but my biological mother wouldn't sign the papers.

SPEAKER_01 59:01

And uh even though I They didn't come looking for you, then why the hesitation?

SPEAKER_00 59:08

Again, I don't know. I just I can't still make sense of it.

SPEAKER_02 59:14

Right.

SPEAKER_00 59:14

Right? Uh who knows? Maybe there was leverage, something. I don't know what the discussions were. Um my dad never told me, right?

SPEAKER_01 59:24

And when you turn 18, he's like, Well, now you're capable to make your own decisions. Right. You signed him up as a guardian.

SPEAKER_00 59:30

Well, I told her, like, literally, because I would go home on home visits during holidays, and I would bring big old 50-pound meat things that he would have for the boys' home, and he would let me bring it home to be able to have food for the family. So there was always things that were being, you know, given to try to make things more comfortable. But I just I don't maybe she just had a different I uh motive and he wasn't gonna do it.

SPEAKER_01 59:58

Did you did you have like that father-son dynamic with Bob Shamrock?

SPEAKER_00 1:00:03

I I wouldn't again, I don't know what a father-son truly is. I don't, but I know when someone cares for somebody and they they want the best for him, that's the relationship that we had. He truly wanted the best for me. Um, he had a lot of his own skeletons in the closet, a lot of things that he was dealing with as a man, um uh that could have overflowed into our relationship, but I I wouldn't allow it. Um so I would say that, you know, he was the there was no doubt in my mind he was the only one that was able to handle me and be able to help me understand who I was and what I needed to do to become the best me. Because everyone else kind of looked at me and saw this angry kid and was getting into trouble all the time, and he looked at me and saw potential. Uh, and especially when he led me in a direction because there was a lot of things I tried. But football was what really got me over the hump because I was knocking the piss out of people in school. Wow. Uh and coaches were like, dude, who's this kid? Uh, and then became a um this this this kid that people thought I'd be dead before I was 18 years old, to now all of a sudden I'm the super athlete. You know, um obviously there were other kids in my school that were great athletes too, but I was one of those kids now that was relevant, as prior to that I was irrelevant.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:36

Yeah, it's everyone's like looking down on you, it's like it's a troubled kid, so they'll put a mask and a label on you and they just treat you that way. And now you're like in the big leagues at high in high school, that's pretty big achievements. Did how was like attention in terms of like teachers, maybe your fellow peers, or like women, like did you have a dating life, early dating life at that point?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:00

Yeah, it was um it was hard at first because my vision of women uh wasn't good. Um at a very young age, you know, I became very sexually active, ten years old. And even probably even more younger than that, but not because I knew I was doing anything, right? Um so my world was opened up tremendously. Um sometimes not with my consent, sometimes that was my consent. Um and uh for me it was just a way for me to do whatever it is I wanted to do. Wow. Right? Um and even in high school when I started dating, and I had a girl uh who was a freshman, and I started dating her, and you know, it it it I didn't know how to treat a woman. You know, obviously I didn't hurt him, it's not like that, but I just didn't know how to do flowers or or say kind things. I i i it was it was just physical. That that's that's it.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:22

Like, and there was I didn't know how to handle it or like maneuver things around a woman.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:28

How to how to how to have a relationship with somebody and and talk and say things. I just didn't know how. Um so I didn't hold relationships really long because in my mind I didn't understand how they worked. Like uh it's not just all about me, you know, and so all through my high school I struggled with that, but it was because of the way I grew up.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:55

I didn't know Yeah, it's very much it very much has to be because uh I believe just for a woman, her first experience is her own father. For a guy, it's the mother. And if you if you if your mother, let's say, from what you told me, never had the feminine side to her that she could provide and show to her because you grew up in a neighborhood where you were like fight or flight, survival, you know, had to make the food, didn't eat sometimes.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:18

So from that, that has been your first experiences with like Yeah, and it wasn't like we didn't have we weren't friends or anything like that, or in that it wasn't, you know, a good thing for both of us, but it was just like I knew I wasn't I I mean I didn't give flowers or take them to dinner or open the door for them. Yeah, uh you know, all the things that you do to develop a relationship, I had no understanding. I understood that uh with with my dad and and his wife, uh Didi, who who is my mom who's still alive, God bless you, my mama. Um, but it it was really hard because I saw this for a very short time, and then I grew up from the start of my life to not good. Like it was abusive. It wasn't kind. And then I moved into a group home where I saw nothing but kindness and love and caring for them too, and how they worked with each other and never screaming or yelling at one another. And obviously they had their distance, but they always went into the room and they never heard them. Was always kindness, opening the door and saying I love you and all those things. And here I'm in the middle of that, and I'm trying to figure out what was right. And so when I got a girlfriend as a freshman in my sophomore year, I didn't understand how what the intricate of that was to develop relationships. It was all physical. Yeah, it was just the sexual stuff.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:50

Um, and it became the focus of that. Yeah. And and because that's all I knew. But as I got to my junior and senior years, I started. I started to understand it more, just like I did with my faith. Right. Um, and I started to really understand what it meant. I remember my my senior um uh prom when I went to the dance, and my dad had all these Cadillacs convertibles, and they were like um 67, 68, 69, 70s, something like that. All the old I'm sorry, they're 55s, that's right, 50s. And he had four of them, and I got to take one of them. And so I had this girl I was going with, and we get we were at the house and we did all our things, and we go out to get in the car, and I go to my door and I go to get in, and she goes to get into her car, and he screams at me and he goes, Hey, Ken, come here. I was like, Okay, yeah, I thought he was gonna give me some more money. Yeah, so I close the door, I go run up to him and he punches me. Boom, right in the stomach. It's like, and we had a thing, like anytime we walk around the house, he punched me in the stomach trying to keep my abs tight. Yeah, yeah. I didn't, I wasn't ready for this. And I dropped my knees in my the girl's car, it's like what happened? And he looked and he goes, Don't you ever let me see you see a woman get in the car and you don't open her door?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:08

Chivalry is not that to this day.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:10

I still open my wife's car. I'll never forget that. Life lesson. Yeah, my abs tighten up every time I open it.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:19

That's that's funny. But at this point, like, okay, life is looking like a whole another day from which where we just came from, like from a tunnel, and there was like light at the end of the tunnel, and it took you like almost a decade to get to the tunnel, you know, with it with your dad living in Napa, I assume, and like now seemingly days. Living in Susanville. Susanville, sorry, and then being a super athlete. At what point did you realize I'm just different?

SPEAKER_00 1:07:52

Uh well, and it's kind of uh funny, but uh even as well, I think it was probably my junior and senior year. Um, you know, obviously in wrestling I went undefeated until I broke my neck, and we'll get into that later. But but I was destroying everybody, and I was just freakishly strong, and I had this like you put a wall in front of me, I'll break through it. I mean, that's the mentality that I had at a young age. You can't stop me.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:20

But when you go on into fighting, was it like just fighting for you or was it like survival?

SPEAKER_00 1:08:26

No, it wasn't. Um again, it for me it was it and then even going back when I said I knew who I was, um it if it it gave me more as time went in through life that uh the all the other experiences that I had done, everything I tr uh I went to go do, I succeeded. Whatever it was that was physical, I did it. And uh I was freakishly strong. I mean, I would go into and and it's in Mooreville, North Carolina. Um I did a this this in the in the gym, and uh I benched 605 and I weighed 237 pounds. That's almost like a record. What? I was freakishly, I was deadlifting 500, 600 pounds. It wasn't my thing, but I was still lift anything. Squat, same thing. Wow, didn't have big legs, but I could squat a lot. What age is this? I was 24, 25. Yep.

unknown 1:09:25

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:25

Uh oh.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:26

I'm I was again, I was I was determined, and I started lifting at 13 when I got into Shamrock Boys home. Once I found weights, that was my desire, besides the sports. And just like I mentioned in high school, when I realized that there was this thing that I was different. Uh, even though my my body, because I developed, I didn't even get hair under my arms until I was 20. So I developed a little bit slower, even though I was strong and all those things. I I didn't really totally mature until I was in my 20s. And that's when those that strength and everything just exploded. Um, but I hadn't even realized my potential, but I still had the mental mindset, even at 18 years old, 17, 18 years old, that I if you gave me a task to do and it was a physical task, I would achieve it. Period.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:19

Wow, and that made you realize you were different.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:22

Yeah, well, I was different than everybody else because I there was there there was nothing that I would not do to get there. Like I am going to achieve that goal, period. Like on a football field, on a wrestling mat, uh, even in a fight. Um, you're gonna have to put me on conscious in order for me not to keep coming.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:45

At this point, wrestling, you know, got into that. Let's take me through when were you dominating in Pancrase and what was going inside in your own head? Like at that point, because you know, weights are lifting, body's maturing, wrestling, undefeated streak. How did you make your way up to this? And like how were you so dominating in that?

SPEAKER_00 1:11:09

Well, I think it's just fate because it wasn't like I was searching for anything, but there was just things that came up that were put in front of me. And when those things were put in front of me, they were exciting, there were things that I could grasp. Like, for instance, I was doing pro wrestling in Mooresville, and it was fun, but it didn't have that competitive edge that I was looking for at that age. Um and so one of my friends, uh Dean Malanko, uh had showed me this videotape of this thing that they were doing over in Japan, uh, which was called the UWF. And when I watched it, they were palm striking one another in the stand-up, they were kicking, kneeing, elbowing, throwing suplexes on the ground. They would start doing all these different joint manipulations. And I've been sitting there watching it, and I just I was glued to it. Like, literally, like, what is this? And I remember asking him, I says, What is that? And he goes, Those are that's uh what we call a hybrid pro wrestling, like the ending's predetermined, but everything in between is very physical. It's not like they're trying to, it's like sparring. Like you're not trying to knock them out, but they're hitting you. It's not like wrestling. And I was like, I want to do that. And he looked at me and he's like, No, I'm telling you, they they that's real. Like they're hitting each other, they're just sparring one another, but you gotta, and I was like, Yeah, he didn't know me. Like, we were friends, but he don't know my history, he don't know what I am. Yeah, and he's like, Okay, because his dad ran the school, and there was a guy named Sammy Saranaka who was the promoter for UWF, who was getting fighters brought over there. So I said, Yeah, man, I want to do that. So I flew to um uh Florida and uh ended up going to their gym and did a tryout. And these were all American guys, and I destroyed them. Just my wrestling background, street fighting. I had the combination of the ground and the standup, right? Um, not professional, but good enough and the mental mindset. And I was always in great shape.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:16

Was it was it like uh the story with John Jones when he was like at the gym and like he had like top of the top, heavyweight, middleweight, lightweight, all of these champions spawning with him at the gym, and he's like tapping everyone out. Was that yeah?

SPEAKER_00 1:13:28

That's not quite that level because I was going with these guys that weren't champions. These guys were guys that had gone over there and they had fought over there in this this thing, yeah, but they weren't any level of top guys. Gotcha. Like they were in the middle somewhere. Gotcha. But the idea that I went in there and just basically destroyed them really gave them an uh opportunity because they Sammy and literally what Sammy tells me, he goes, Hey, good job. You know, he did a good job. And I didn't feel, you know, even though I did all that, it just didn't feel like I got my own because I flew right in and went to the gym and did it. Um so he they put him back on a flight and said, We'll be in touch. And in my head, I'm thinking, uh, I thought I did well, but I guess not. Well, two weeks later I get a call. Samuel said, How'd you like to go to Japan? I was like, Yeah, like for what? Like, you're gonna throw me in there and beat me up. He goes, No, just go up there and do some training. Uh they want to uh see what you what you can do. Uh I said, Yeah. And so I ended up flying over there a week later. I jumped on a plane, went to Japan, and uh, I believe that's the first time I was ever out of the country. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:38

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:38

So I jump on a plane, I go there, and they pick me up. This airport was crazy, couldn't speak. I'm like, and then of course, some they there's a guy there to get me. So we get in this van and we drive for two, three hours traffic everywhere. We I think we're going to a hotel. I got my bags and stuff with me. We pull into this place and it looks like a warehouse. It's like, uh, this is the dojo. And I'm like, it's a tin building, and it looks like a car shop. Yeah, but we open the door, and here's this ring and bags and everything, and then there's all these kids running around, which what we know now we're young boys, they live there. So they go, uh, you ready? And I'm like, Yeah, like I'm not gonna say no, right? Like, yeah, uh, get your gear on. And it's like, I had to go through all my bags and get my gear on, and then so I get on the mat. And uh the first two guys they bring in, um, they were a little younger, right? And so I roll with them for about 20 minutes each, and and they just mat just you know, wasn't a challenge. And I'm thinking to myself, something uh what I like, this can't be it, right? Come on. Well, I see the door open and two guys walk in, and it was Finaki and Suzuki. They come walking into the dojo, and I'm like, I seen those guys, those are the two I watched on film, and like next thing I know, they're getting dressed, and and I'm still rolling with these guys, and they come walking up, and Sammy goes, Can you go a little longer? And I was like, I mean, I'm like jumping all over it, but in my head, I'm like, damn, I wish you would have told me before I started. Yeah, so they jump in there, and Suzuki goes first. He's a smaller guy, about 170 pounds, maybe 5'10. Um, real good wrestler, but can't strike, you know, not really good at any of that stuff, but just wrestling and submissions, which I didn't know at the time. Uh so I stuffed him, you know. He tries to take me down. I stuffed him and uh I got him, and I'm controlling him, and like I'm thinking, I got your ass. Like, this is not a problem. And I wake up, take him like what happened? I got my ass choked out. Oh shit. No idea. Like, didn't know, I didn't know anything. Yeah, singing all I'm waking up, and so he's okay. And I'm like, my pride is disproved. I was like, Yeah, I'm fine. And he said, You get more warning. I go, hell yeah, yeah, but still. So we go again, and he puts me in an arm bar and a heel hook, and I've never been handled like this ever.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:11

By a dude who's smaller than he. Any dude never been handled like this, but but but it hurts you even more when you're like dudes like probably half your size and he's like man handling it like that.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:22

So I go, I don't know, 20, 20, I don't even remember, but it's it's quite a bit. Yeah, so it's again, it's like, oh man, I feel so down. He goes, and I was depressed, and so Sammy, you want to go again? And I was like, Yeah, I need a chance to redeem myself. So Finaki comes in. Finaki's like 200 pounds, and he's like six foot, right? I'm like, let's go. Because if Suzuki just beat the heck out of me and he was going with him, and they had a heck of a fight, Fanaki beat him. So I knew I was in for it, right? Um, so I go in there and I go after him, and the same thing. I got choked, I got heel hooked, and I just got just torched. And uh I just felt so depressed. They kept patting me on the back saying, Good job. And I went a you know, hour and a half, maybe longer. Like I went a long time and I would always keep going, and I never ran out of gas, even though I got tired. I would never run out of gas. I kept going.

SPEAKER_05 1:18:18

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:19

And uh so they kept patting me on the back and said, Good job, good job. And it sounded genuine, but it just felt pessimistic. Like, get you out of here. Good job, go. Um, so I go to the hotel, I had to stay a night, and then I flew back home, and I was just I I just thought I blew it. And uh, so I get a call later, it's a couple days, it wasn't long. How'd you like to fight? It's like again, kind of that first call is like, yes. Who why? Why? Um, I didn't say that, but in my hand, like I just got beat up.

SPEAKER_05 1:18:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:56

And uh he says, we want to bring you in uh for a couple weeks and maybe teach you a few things before you fight. And I was like, okay, like I'll go and train first. So I went up there for a while and trained a little bit. I learned a lot in a small amount of time. I picked it up fast, though. I mean, I was in quick. Um, I was able to defend a lot of things that happened to me in that one session. What I was able to stop it in just two weeks of training, be able to stop what they were doing to me. Because I was strong. All I needed to know was how they were doing it, like how'd I put myself there? And I would learn that very quickly. The first thing I learned was a heel hook. I picked that up really fast, and that was very dangerous. And uh, and I was able to win my very first match. It was a mid-card guy, they didn't throw, which was a thought was going to be just used as a piece of meat, but they put me in there and actually built me. They gave me opportunities and had me fight guys that were not at the lowest, but somewhere in the middle to try to gauge where I was at, and I succeeded. And so it felt like it wasn't six months before I was competing with all the top guys. That's how fast I was picking this up. But I I attribute most of that with the weight training I did when I started at 13 years old. Whereas I developed my body to a point to where I became very, very strong, and then I added technique to it, and I was always in great shape. So I had all three elements. Um, I do I wasn't really well versed in the technique of it, but what I didn't have in the technique, it made up for in the strength, um, especially at that level at that time. But within six months, I mean because it came so naturally to me with the movements that I was able to pick it up really fast.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:42

Wow. So you're basically at this point like an all-rounder. Now, where does the UFC come in? Like you step into Ultimate Fighting Championship with no rules, no blueprint. What did that feel like?

SPEAKER_00 1:20:58

Uh well, going into uh Pancras, I'd already established I was a world champion, you know, um number one fighter. And then this thing comes up uh with uh kind of the same, almost the same story that how I got involved with the first um pancreas and all of that, to where I was now with the the world that UFC was starting to come into was one of my students.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:28

Well, around what time is this?

SPEAKER_00 1:21:30

So let's say what year ninety, I think your first UFC was in '93, right? Yeah, yeah, 93. So I would say in 90, it had to be 93, right? Because the first UFC was 93, and it wasn't but a few months. Once I saw the flyer that was brought in by one of my students and said, hey, check this out. Uh, no holes barred, anything goes, you know. And I remember thinking to myself, that can't be true. Like, that's like pro wrestling. Yeah. No holes barred. Yeah. Come on. Yeah. So I ended up calling a number on there, and Art Davies picked up. And I kind of started picking questions at him. He said, Hey, I'm a world champion over in Japan. You know, I captured title there. It's a uh mixed martial arts um thing. And he says, Yeah, in that pro wrestling. I said, I laughed. I said, No, no, no. No, no, we no, this is the real deal. I said UWF that I was with prior to that was pro wrestling. We turned it into being real.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:32

Real, okay. Um So the only the the only part with that was the ending was predetermined. Rest everything was like for real, for real.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:39

Well, yeah, but it's like sparring. Sparring, okay. UWF's like sparring. You're kicking each other, you're hitting each other because you're trying to push them to get them to where they can get in shape and work. But you're not turning your punches over, you're not turning your kicks over, you're not plying the submission holes to try to tap them out. You're applying them and allowing them to skip escape to try to keep working with one another, right? Right. So that was UWF. Finaki said, hey, Suzuki said, Ken, we're doing this new organization called Pancras. Pancras. We want you with us. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, and so they said, we want to turn this hybrid pro wrestling into a shoot, which is real. I said, sign me up. I thought that was elite. I thought that was the highest you could go. And it it was, it's just was different when UFC came around. Because now somebody like a wrestler could go in there and do well and not have an inkling of submission skills. Just being able to take them down and ground and pound them, win. So it was different to a point. So when I first heard about it with the flyer and called art Davies and kind of explained to him who I was and and why I was inquiring because I didn't think it was real. And he chuckled and laughed and said, Oh, it's real. So and I said, Really? So you can kick a guy in the head when he's on the ground? And he said, Yes. And that just took me back. Like, take me to good old days. I was like, get out of here. Like he goes, No, seriously. I was like, how, like, how is that? He says, We're we're doing it. I says, Well, what about sanctioning you? And I was like, we don't have a problem with that. Man, I ain't buying this, I can't wrap my head around it, but I'm not walking away from it. And I said, I want to do it. He goes, Well, we only want, you know, top-notch fighters, people that are qualified or world champions. I says, I'm a world champion. And I told it what it was, and he didn't know what it was. And then so we got off the phone, pretty good conversation, but I still wasn't convinced. And he called me back after he checked on me and said, You're in. Which for the people that keep talking about how they didn't want the best of the best in this tournament, they got who would do it. They went and approached every single boxer that was a world-class boxer. Everybody had the same opportunities as me and everybody else in that competition to fight. Right. They chose not to. That's the only reason why people like Michael Tyson, uh, any of these other world-class fighters all had the same opportunity to challenge in this competition. They did not. So when people start talking about oh, they worked it and rigged that, they opened that was an open challenge to everybody in the world to come beat Hoyce Gracie or beat the jujitsu system.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:40

And that's what they came up with. That's the people that accepted the challenge. Yeah, they didn't turn a world-class fighter away because I was a world-class fighter.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:49

Well-established.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:50

I went in and said, This is what I do. You what you do guys are doing, I do this. Like I'm it, and I'm a champion. They took me. I was the worst one for them to choose because there's nobody else out there because I'd already proven it that could beat me.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:04

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:05

I was the world champion in mixed martial arts before UFC. So they took the guy who was the best mixed martial arts champion and accepted into their ring. And now you're telling me they're not going to allow a wrestler or a Greco Roman or a kickboxer in? Shut the door.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:23

Come on.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:24

That's why it frustrates me when I hear people start talking like that. They didn't get in because they didn't ask. They didn't want to. Because it was no holes barred. They heard it's no holes barred, bare knuckle. Anything goes.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:38

And no, well, who's who's willing to risk that much on their? Why would they?

SPEAKER_00 1:26:41

If I was in their spot, I wouldn't either. But obviously, Mike Tyson and a lot of other guys are under contracts. Their managers and stuff like it'd be insane to let him do that. I wasn't that way.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:54

I managed myself.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:55

Who what are some big names that you know were offered this? Like Mike Tyson's one of them?

SPEAKER_00 1:27:00

Well, I don't what do you mean everybody was?

SPEAKER_01 1:27:03

Everyone who was the world champion, the boxer.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:09

Wow. They and again, I'm not a big, you know, supporter or or or or fan of Gracie Jiu-Jitsu. I think it's very effective, but I think that the way that it was put out in the beginning was to teach people to be passive but still be able to defend themselves. Right. Right? It's not that way in today's world. Even though they call it jujitsu, it's not that. Right. Because it's not defensive anymore. It's aggressive. Right? So understandably, but they they wouldn't turn away a world champion. I I'm the worst because I could beat all those guys. Every single one of those guys, whether they're a kickboxer or a wrestler or any of those guys, in my prime, I beat them. No problem. Because they don't have the ability to stop the submissions. Right? So to think that they let someone like Myself, who is doing what they do to not to the full extent, but similar to what they're doing, where I can strike and I am a great submission guy to allow me into that tournament and then say no to a striker?

SPEAKER_01 1:28:17

Yeah. Okay. Well, and that happened. You went in there. What what what did the pre-fight cam look like for the UFC?

SPEAKER_00 1:28:30

Confusing. It's like, how do you train for that? That was the first question. Like, okay, no time limit, no rules. Okay, so where do we start? Because this is not what I was doing. I mean, uh, the the movement, the takedowns, the stand-up, yeah, but how do you plan for no time limit? And you know, the only thing that that and then why Lions didn't did so well was because I focused on the conditioning. Especially in the very beginning when there wasn't a whole lot of skill set other than jujitsu. Um, so really it was more of a focus of being able to go an hour, you know, hard, just go, and be able to physically put guys through tests that no no normal human being can pass. You got to have a mental mindset that you know you're gonna fail, but you're gonna keep getting up and go. Because you're not gonna pass this with flying colors. You are going to fail, but you're gonna keep going. And if you can do that, then I can train you. And once I can train you that with that mentality, I can get you in good enough shape with enough skill sets to be able to bring people into deep water, which is you know, 15, 20 minutes into a fight. Yeah, and then it doesn't matter what skill you got, you're done. So, really, a lot of our guys won through being able to just drag. We had Jerry Bollinger beat a five-time uh black belt jujitsu guy out of Abu Dhabi. Beat him. Only because Jerry was able to be in better shape and literally defended most of the fight of not getting himself a bad position, pushing him enough with his wrestling ability to exhaust the guy to where he could beat him. Skill sets was even close to the guy.

SPEAKER_03 1:30:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:30:12

But he knew enough to be able to push him and stay out of danger and bring it to where it needed to be, to where it evened everything out, to where who was going to be the toughest guy? And Jerry was the toughest guy.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:24

Well, your rivalry with Roy's Gracie, was it something deeper or was it just competition?

SPEAKER_00 1:30:35

No, I think it was deeper. It's and again, I think it's because of the language barrier with you know the the communication language-wise and and how you perceive um their culture and and and an American culture. Um it just it it it was a it was a roadblock because I don't I didn't understand the idea that they just kept saying that they're the best athletes, the best conditioned, uh, the best skilled, you know, all of this stuff and just shoving it in your face. And I get it at that time, but to me, I kept saying to myself, uh, how do you say you're the best conditioned athlete? Like, how does that work? How do you say that? Like, it hasn't been proven yet. You know, you're just talking, and it just was frustrating to me. And then whenever anybody would do something that would maybe put a chink in their armor, uh, where you would start seeing some weaknesses, they would lash out aggressively and just really try to put you down. Um, like even like in our our second fight, where it was damn straight obvious he lost.

SPEAKER_04 1:31:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:53

Even though it was a time limit, right? But who would you rather be in that fight? And if you're not prejudiced for one side or the other, you're gonna look at it and go, I don't want to be like him. My face don't look good. And and and and my only thing is, and even in that third fight where I got hit in the groin, I sent pictures to the commission, which was not something I felt comfortable doing, but I had black and blue bruises all through my groin, showed them because I wanted a rematch, and they just absolutely denied it, just wouldn't look at it. And I'm just thinking to myself, how much more proof do you need? Like, and I've got the pictures, I still have them. And it just to me is like, how do you like, okay, so how do you explain that? Like, tell me how that how you explain that. How do you stop a fight when it's clear a low shot, but you're saying it's not a low shot, but clearly on there you could see it is. And then even if you're saying, well, no, it hit him up right above the pelvis, it didn't hit him right in the grind, and then you show pictures right after the fight, you send it to them, and they still ignore you got the shot on TV where you can deny it didn't, it hit him right at the pelvis bone, didn't actually hit him in the grind. Uh, and then you show pictures to back up the shot that was thrown with the bruises and crickets. Like nothing.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:33:18

So those are things that are deeper than just the rivalry, right? They're deeper than just the rivalry, even in the second fight, deeper than just the rivalry, because I am always willing to say the things that are reality that, you know, without the Gracie's and the opportunity and Horian and all of them presented to us, none of us would have this. We would not have this sport. And that's what made my life, besides Pancras, UFC was a big part of that. And then WWF being them would go into the WWE. All of that stuff was stuff that was made possible by opportunities I was given through fighting. And the Gracies are right up front in that. And and I I've always, even in some of these conversations I've had, it's like I'm I'm disgusted a lot in a sense that there's there's whenever there's praises to be sent, it's never, ever Horian. Ever Horian or Bob Meierwitz. It's never. And these guys are the ones that created it. And there's just crickets. So I've always been that way with that. But again, with that, just one thing there, it's just like have the guts and the honor, at least acknowledge somebody that has done something positive. You don't always have to win every single argument. I mean, and that you don't have to win every fight because you did lose that fight, even though there was a time limit put in and you lost. You still got dominated.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:34:47

Uh, and then when you talk about sitting in the guard and didn't do anything, well, I guess you were a part of that. And then when you stood up, I think I like what I see when you say I didn't do anything. Imagine if I'd have done something.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:00

Yeah, definitely, definitely. That's that's the case. If uh if you look back at the fight, did you ever talk to him off the like when you were done with competing with him?

SPEAKER_00 1:35:09

Yeah, actually, I've called him once once, I think, and then he called me not too long ago because he's got some film stuff that he's doing. So it's not like we hate each other, I don't think. I don't hate him, but I think it's just the uh knocking down that barrier that you don't have to defend you being great. Like you are great, I'm great. We can both exist, right? So uh that's my only issue with that. Uh uh but my appreciation outweighs any of that for what the Gracies and Hoyan Gracie and Bob Meyer has done for the sport. He has allowed that for us to be a part of that and be able to succeed in that and build our reputations on that.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:56

Gotcha. Yeah. It's it's quite an ego trip at that point because you you're just like hyper competitive sport, and you just want to be the one of the one like Muhammad Ali great. And I think if you can't do that, the only way you can do that is putting other people down who are just as good, if not better, than you.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:14

Yeah, but he was the Muhammad Ali, right? But then I came up and I became the one that knocked Muhammad Ali out. Yeah, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:36:22

Joe Fraser.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:23

Yeah, but but understand it, he's still the greatest. You know, in that time where we were first starting out, man, he beat it was a it was a shock to the world that this guy that came in at 180 pounds was choking everybody out there with 200, 200 plus pounds. I mean, like, it was an amazing I mean I I wasn't gonna go there when I was competing. I'm not giving him any props, I'm not propping him up, I'm gonna tear him down because I'm competing with him. Yeah, I want to break his mindset, I don't want him to be confident. But after all of it's over, you got to say what it is. And like he winning four tournaments, it's insane in his at his weight and what he was able to do. It's insane. Um, but there's other people that came in also that had done insane things that have been really great, and you got to be willing and opened enough to say, yes, you did. Like that was good. Like, yes, you did. Um, doesn't degrade anything that he's done because he's always going to be great, no matter how he deals with things, he is going to be great, but so am I. So is Mark Coleman, so is you know, Don Fry. I mean, there's lists goes on, right? But those guys are all got replaced. You know what I mean? Like there's somebody coming. Like Tito jumped me, yeah, like literally put me in a box, right? And there's it's okay to say that, like, because it doesn't diminish your accomplishments and what you did.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:51

Correct, correct, correct. Yeah, as you said, you and I could both exist in the same world. And that's part of the.

SPEAKER_00 1:37:58

But it's in existing, in accepting the consequences of the the things that had happened. It's okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:38:06

It's okay to say, yeah, that fight I lost, even though it was you know, when it goes down in the books, it's a tie. Yes, that we do not argue that it is a tie. Yeah. But in the reality of it, you know you got handled, period. And doesn't degree doesn't take away the dominance that you had all the way up to that point.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:25

True. True. It's it's more like uh you would you say with age you develop this sort of wisdom of accepting things as they are. Like, did you like have this shift in your life when you were strengthening your faith and you realize a lot of things that helped you with like when you were in your prime career, when you know you had this fight and all of the different concepts in life, like to let go of that, like the great, the world's most dangerous man alive in this world. That title, did faith help you from move to to move on to a different phase in life from that?

SPEAKER_00 1:39:04

Yeah, I would say there was an early time, and again, it's there's a different uh level of things that happen to you um as you start becoming more mature. Um, but there was at one point, it was about just right as I'm climbing the mountain, it was about that time when it happened, was that uh uh because I had started being successful in the UFC, and um I was going to church, and and it seemed like when I would go to church that people were looking at me side-eyed, and and there was even some messages that were being delivered during service that kind of hit me wrong, like um love thy neighbor, you know, violence is a sin, you know, these things that you're hearing in your and they're definitely true, but you're talking about people that are non-willing, that are being violently beaten or taken advantage of, right? It's not the same thing. Yeah, at least in my mind, I was like, but how is it like I was confused, but it was weighing on me, and I had to ask questions, and I'm not one, I'm not one. If I'm lost, I'll pull over and ask somebody on the corner. I'm not one of those people that like, I'll find it. Um, I'll I'm I'll ask. Um, and even when I'm confused about something, I'll ask a bunch of people, like, what are your thoughts? Because I want to know from the opposite, opposing side, or the same side, or someone in the middle, and figure out what that how that all comes together. Right. And so that's kind of where I was with this, whereas like here I'm being preached that you know fighting is a sin. Like, you don't hurt your brother. And I didn't see it that way. I didn't see like I was hurting my brother, I saw it as I was competing with my brother, although I was angry. My my mindset was definitely there, which is what caused me to feel guilty because I wasn't thinking properly. So I remember asking a pastor one time when I said, Man, I uh God wouldn't have given me these talents and bless me being able to, and remember I told you how I pick things up really fast. This is a gift, like this is something that I do naturally, it just comes to me. Somebody show me, I watch somebody do something, I go in and I can do it. And I said, That just can't be a that's that's that's there for a reason. God gave me that for a reason. And and I remember he said yes, he said, I'm gonna break it down to you so we you have a clear understanding of the right way and the wrong way. And I said, Hip hit me with it. And I was trying to figure out how I was gonna deflect this because I'm not stopping. I mean, I I love it. And he said, What do you what is your mindset when you go in to fight? Like when you walk in to fight, what are you thinking? Immediately right there, I was like, Oh, this ain't gonna sound good. I was like, I want to hurt him. So I wanna I wanna hurt him. He's trying to take food off my I where I came from and how I got here, I fought every tooth and nail to get here, and nobody taking it away from me. And I will hurt anybody that tries to do that. And he looked at me, he's like, I knew it though. He goes, Yeah, that's that's not that's not good. And I was like, but I'm not stopping, like I'm not quitting. I know that this is God given. And he said, but he said, if you approach this from a different perspective, your thought process has to be different. He says, if you go into a fight and you're fighting somebody and your main objective is to hurt the individual, you're in a sinful mindset. I said, Well, well, how else do you do it? He says, in every and he must have been an athlete at some point in time because he says, in every sport, there's a plan, there's an objective to win. And then there's certain ways that you go about to do that. And he says, that should be your mindset. Your mindset isn't about going in there and trying to hurt somebody or trying to bury somebody because they're trying to take food off your plate, it should be going in there strategically trying to figure out the strength and weak, which I was already doing, but I wasn't focusing on that. I was focusing more on the aggressive part of it. And he said that the thought of you wanting to hurt somebody badly has to leave your mind, and it has to stay focused on the technique and the training and how you get to where you want to go. You want to take a guy down, you want to strike a guy, is his weaknesses and his strengths. These are all things that your mind should be taking up with and not the violent part of it. That's all it was.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:47

But at the same time, you were also given the title World's Most Dangerous Man. How did that feel like in the moment?

SPEAKER_00 1:43:56

Well, at first I didn't like it. Because when they did the shoot, the footage stuff, um, I was very uncomfortable because we were painted as these convicts and these killers, uh-huh. And there was no skill set to this, and just barbarians. And that's everything that was coming out before this piece they wanted to do on me. And I remember questioning a guy, and I said, What are you guys trying to get out of this? I said, Because I've got my family involved. Now you want to shoot my family in this. I said, I need to know what this looks like. He says, We were trying to do a personal piece. We want people to know who you are, and we want them to know where you come from and what you do every day. Um, you know, taking your kids to school, sitting down at dinner. They need to see the personal side of you so that they see that you're no different than they are. I was like, I'm in. The first piece they opened with, which was I was sold after that, was they had my son, and he was probably maybe 10, 9, 10 years old. They put headgear on him, they put these big old boxing gloves on, big old headgear on, and they put my wrestling shoes on him. And they had him stand in the corner and they had the shade of these lights that shaded, and they shot this this shadow of this seven-foot tall giant person, and then the camera would pan up to the shoes and then up to the legs, and the legs just kind of like kind of took you back a little bit because they were smaller, but you couldn't really tell hardly, and then the glove, and then up the arm, and it's still kind of weird, and then all of a sudden it pans back, and there's my kid standing in the corner, and they go fight, and then I would come to the middle of the ring and he'd just start punching bang, bang, bang, bang, go to the ground and roll. Uh-huh. Right then, I knew that the piece they were trying to do was they were trying to connect us to the mainstream audience, yeah, and to really see that we're no different than they are. Correct.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:42

Yeah. Correct.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:44

So in the moment, it weighed down on you, but after the piece came out, like they wanted to show you, like, okay, these people are just like me and you, but just come from a different background. They they it the their life shaped them to be who they are. It's not who they choose to be.

SPEAKER_00 1:46:03

Well, yeah, but I could have been a doctor, you know, I could have gone to college after, you know, and done something else. I could have been a teacher. I could have done a lot of things. I chose I could have chosen, I could have gone into the NFL. I mean, I had that chance. Um I had opportunities to do certain things, but when I started to roll and I was being taught these moves, there was no doubt in my mind that this is what I was meant to do because I just did it. I could watch somebody do it from ten feet away, watch them do something, and I could almost similarly do the same thing. Like, just do it. It meant my mind and my body connected. So that's not that's not normal. So I know that's my blessing. That was what I was blessed with.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:54

Really, really glad to like hear all about that. Did you ever meet Dana White? Of course. And how was how's your relationship with Dana White?

SPEAKER_00 1:47:02

Um, we had our uh bumps in the road, you know. Um obviously it's just business. But right now I've got no issue. I've never really had an issue anyway. I never take I've never taken anything. People keep saying you take I did that because it was entertaining. That's the way I fought. I had to get up for that. So um Dana White, as far as I'm concerned, has done a tremendous job. Um you put this uh on where people can actually make some good money, make a living at it. Um, I'd like to see him get paid more, obviously, but everybody does. So, but that's the business side of it, right? We don't know the things that they're going through and what they're having to deal with on the business side of it.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:39

So And now your transition from UFC, you dominated wherever you went, the pancreas, the the UFC, you know, and now you move to the WWE, WWF at the moment. Yep. How did that transition happen?

SPEAKER_00 1:47:54

Yeah, that that was uh desperation, really, uh, to start out with, because um, I couldn't get the money I needed in the UFC because they were going through these court dates all the time. People were trying to push them out and say it was illegal to do those things, and they were always going into court.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:11

Would it would it be safe to ask you? I mean, you can choose not to answer this, what was the most amount of money that you made from UFC?

SPEAKER_00 1:48:18

Me?

SPEAKER_01 1:48:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:48:19

Uh I made a lot. I made a lot in WWE and I made a lot in UFC. A lot. So um I was very fortunate and blessed. Uh and and very appreciative of the organizations and me being able to have that chance to carry those organizations.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:38

And now you're like, okay, UFC isn't paying me much, so I'm gonna go to WWF. Was that the mindset?

SPEAKER_00 1:48:44

Yeah, but but let's be truthful. I didn't make the money until I came back to the UFC. There's a there's yeah, yeah. We're talking a whole different different playing field when I went back. So uh Dana paid me well. Um again, it there's a lot of speculations on numbers and things, and that's where we had our problem. Whereas that, yeah, you you get paid a lot, but was it what I was did the full amount of what I was supposed to get? Again, those are things that happened a long time ago and they're not relevant to me now. But you as a business person and a fighter, you've got to protect your interests, um, no matter whether they're friends or not friends. And and if you can't get the answers you need, then you gotta keep pushing. And that's all I was doing. I was all I was doing was trying to make sure that I was getting what I was supposed to get, not what you think I deserve. Um and there's a big difference there, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:49:41

Tell us what's the difference between uh that if you have to give advice to a fighter who's listening and watching this, what's the difference between what you're supposed to get versus what you deserve?

SPEAKER_00 1:49:51

Well, you don't deserve anything as far as that goes, right? The deserve part is just weird when they they kind of say, okay, that's they're handing you something because you deserve it. No, man. What am I supposed to get? Like, for instance, if you pay me a million dollars, right? But yet you made triple the amount on pay-per-view numbers and you're supposed to get paid off numbers. How is it that you get a flat fee when the numbers are skyrocketed?

SPEAKER_01 1:50:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:50:20

It doesn't make sense. So and I'm not this is not correlating to anything. Don't put don't label this on anything. But for them, they have to protect themselves and they have to make sure that that they're not just getting what someone says they deserve, right? No, it's what you're supposed to get, not deserve. But what are you supposed to get when it comes to the numbers in the business, the plan, the contract, the earnings that you're that you're supposed to get, not that you earn, because when people talk about earning something, you're already there. How is it that you got to earn it again? Like you're already there. You've put yourself in a position to have that opportunity. You've earned it, right? But now all of a sudden, they're gonna give you something and say this is what you earned. And it's not the same thing as this is what you should be getting with the business and the agreements that you have. Right. And sometimes getting paid something that's that large can make you want to accept it right away. It's like, oh wow, yeah, thanks. But wait a minute. That's why you have agents and attorneys, so that you don't get caught up into the eye candy. And uh, I was well surrounded with very good people to you know put myself in a position to where I didn't have to, you know, struggle with those things. I didn't have to think about it. So again, like I said, when it came to all the stuff with me and Dana, all that stuff was handled through people that I had representing me. It wasn't personal between me, even though it became that, but I didn't want it to be. That's why I held attorneys and and uh agents and people so it shielded that I didn't have to personally get involved with it.

SPEAKER_01 1:52:08

Makes sense. Well, now let's talk about W2B. What made you want to make that transition and how was your days in WTB so far? Because you dominated, you had a wrestling, pro-wrestling background. I'm sure this must be like a piece of cake for you, but again, then you end up realizing, oh, this is a show business and has it has a whole different side to this.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:27

Yeah, but I had already done that when I was over in Japan. Japan, yeah. Yeah, so for me, it was obviously it'd been years and years, and I was at a different level. These guys were all phenomenal. I mean, being in on if you're in the ring in WWE, you're great.

SPEAKER_05 1:52:43

Right?

SPEAKER_00 1:52:43

I don't care if you're down lower, you're still good. Um so just going into there um and and being out of it for so long, uh I was a little bit hesitant when the when the offer came in, but we were looking in different opportunities to do different things, and this came up. Um, my dad actually wanted to say, hey, how about you know, see me get into WWF? And I was like, uh Yeah, I guess I don't know, we can look into it. It wasn't something that jumped right at me. I was looking at more maybe getting into a another contract, maybe overseas somewhere, or finding somewhere where I could make something, but it just couldn't. I had to find something that was going to be able to keep what I had built.

SPEAKER_02 1:53:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:29

You know, I had a fighter's house, I had a group home with six kids living in it, I had my house, I had a gym that had a boxing ring, had a boxing uh studio, had a grappling studio, and they had a gym, three different buildings all connected. Yeah. So I had a big, big, big nut at the end of the month. And uh so I had to figure out how to keep what I had built going because I had responsibilities to fighters and kids and family. And so I need to figure out how do I cover this and where do I go to do that. So I searched in a lot of different opportunities, but wrestling just kept right there, kept coming right back in front of me. So I went ahead with what just felt was the natural things that was I was moving towards. It didn't try to force anything. And um, so I remember making some calls and then got a call from a guy from Canada, and he connected us with WWF or E, I don't remember what it was at the time. And uh next thing I know, I'm flying out to sit down with some representatives from WWE.

SPEAKER_01 1:54:37

Did you ever get to meet Vince McMahon?

SPEAKER_00 1:54:39

He was the one that was there when I walked in the building. Oh, wow. He was the one that met me. He literally called me on the phone before I flew out and explained to me how excited they were to be able to bring me into their organization. Wow. And they had some really great ideas for me. And I was like, Vince did that, right? I didn't hear from anybody else but the dog. And uh himself. Yeah, and I didn't know when I flew in that he was actually gonna be at the meeting either. Um, but when I got in there, he was there along with his marketing team, and they literally ran me through how they were gonna, you know, dress me, which was gonna be the same as I was when I was fighting, and you know, the angle that they had. Um they didn't want me to um, which they didn't say that to me, but they they they wanted me to try to implement what I did in in UFC into the pro wrestling room. But the one that really stuck with me when I trained with him was when Brett, when I worked with Brett, when he told me Brett Hart, yeah, don't be a wrestler. That's not who you are. That made more sense to me than them saying, I want you to come in and I want you to, you know, do what you, you know, bring your moves and stuff that you did in the UFC. Even though it's the same thing, right? But when he said, Don't be a wrestler, it was like, okay, it's the same, same words, but it just didn't hit me the same way.

SPEAKER_02 1:56:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:56:00

Like, that's like, yeah, okay, so don't do that. So I didn't. I literally went in there and and did what I did. It was rough because I broke Vader's nose. Yeah. And I had to learn how to bring it down to where I could work with everyone. Um, but it gave me a a really good opportunity to really see where I was at. Um I went with Vernon first and and did his kind of this uh seminar, I guess you would say, where we went in and did this match and everybody watched it and he got blood. Um and uh and then Vader. And uh it was a good transition because it helped really help me know that where I was with Vernon and then even lesser with where I toned it down a lot with Vader, it still wasn't enough. Um, because of the way that we were moving, and I had to get back into that knowing that people are coming into you and setting yourself up for you, they're not defending it. Yeah, where I have to set you up and then do it. Uh so people were moving into me, and then I was trying to throw something and I would hit them because I'm not thinking they're not gonna move.

SPEAKER_01 1:57:03

Yeah, yeah. It's like especially like big brawlic dude like yourself, like who is trained to do that, like accidents happen.

SPEAKER_00 1:57:10

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 1:57:10

Yeah, like even though you try to tone it down, that wasn't enough.

SPEAKER_00 1:57:13

So they're what they're used to that's not tone enough.

SPEAKER_01 1:57:17

Did anyone like tell you while wrestling, or like backstage, hey, like Ken, take it, take it down, take it easy.

SPEAKER_00 1:57:23

No, I again uh no one ever said it, but I think that there's this thing in wrestling where if you do something to somebody, um they're gonna they're gonna come back and give you a receipt. And I got a few receipts. So yeah, okay. Yeah, but I didn't take it personal. Yeah. I I didn't take it personal because I knew that they're telling there's they're they're sending a message to me, you know, ease, ease up, or we're not finishing this match. Like one of us is gonna get hurt. So um I had to tone it down, and I like again, there were certain things that when these guys would do certain things, I respected that. I knew where I was at on the totem pole, and I was at the bottom. And I needed to learn what they were doing. And so whenever I would get a receipt and understood what it was, that I listened. And I didn't go in and say, I'm gonna break your legs or I'm gonna beat the I was like, nah, okay, I get it. Like, you got a you got a career and and a family to support, and I don't wanna I don't want to mess that up. Yeah, so I would rather they do that than me go and keep doing it and nobody say anything, and I don't need them to come to me and say, Oh, you're a little stiff. No, no man is gonna come to you and say, Stop hurting me. But in wrestling, there's a man, there's a manly way to do it, and that's called a receipt. And if you take that personal, you ain't gonna be around long.

SPEAKER_01 1:58:45

Yeah. Like this is the same thing that happened with Brett when he got his back broken in the match, and then like he was basically like the I forgot the wrestler that I was fighting. If he basically took Brett's career away, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:58:58

Yeah, again, that one there, I don't know a whole lot what happened on that, but things happen in wrestling, yeah, and um mistakes are made. And so you hate to see it happen, but part of the game. I just can't. It's like football when you hit somebody and you break their neck. Is it your fault?

unknown 1:59:19

Right?

SPEAKER_00 1:59:20

I mean, you're you're trying to make a play. Yeah. Same thing in wrestling. I don't like it when someone gets hurt. It's when you do something dumb, like trying to take somebody who's 300 pounds and you're you're 230 pounds, and you got a guy that's 280 or 300 pounds, and you try to do a suplex off the top rope, yeah, or that you try to pick him up and do a pile driver, yeah, and he's twice your weight. That's stupid. Like, that's not moves you should be doing on a big guy. So those are things like that where I look at it and go, yeah, that is your fault. You don't, that's not what you should be doing.

SPEAKER_01 1:59:52

That can be prevented.

SPEAKER_00 1:59:53

Yeah, it's not you, it's not your it's not, it's not your move. It's not something you should be doing when you're trying to make sense of a wrestling match.

SPEAKER_01 2:00:01

That makes sense. And that rem reminded me of a match that Brock Lesnar was doing with Kurt Angel, and he had his move go over the top rope all the way to the other rope, or like in the corner, his name was shooting star, and he almost broke his neck while hitting his head on it. Uh, and we never saw Brock Lesnar do that after that.

SPEAKER_00 2:00:16

There's just like I said, there's there's just things when you're a big man that small guys don't do to you. Um, and then as a big man, there's things that you just you don't I mean, and unless of course there's certain things that very athletic that they do that just they're gonna make a part of who they are, okay. But if you try to tell me Vader, you know, and even though he he's done that, is gonna do a moonsaw off the top of the rope on you, I'm not there. I'm not gonna be there when you land.

unknown 2:00:47

True.

SPEAKER_01 2:00:48

Well what were some names would you say that were so welcoming in let me read what were those names that were so welcoming to you when you were in the WWE locker room?

SPEAKER_00 2:00:59

Um, I would say obviously everybody's it's hard to tell who's who's got the jealousy in their blood. Yeah. It's really hard because it's pro wrestling. Uh-huh. Everybody can put on a face. Um, so it's really hard to find out who those are. There were some guys that just didn't, we just didn't get along. Not because there was something said or done. It was just there's different characters and personalities that just clash. It's just nothing you're gonna do about it. But you learn to work with that. You learn to be able to still go out there and do things because you're trusting one another. And in wrestling, that's all you got.

SPEAKER_01 2:01:33

Could you tell like like a few group of people like what when you were climbing up your way in WWE that oh, these guys are really supportive, and then genuinely mean, even though it was like not that many, but I see the support.

SPEAKER_00 2:01:45

Well, I think all of them were because whenever we had to have matches, that's the whole thing everybody wanted was a great match. So I think you got support there. I think but when you're talking about supportive as as far as trying to get you to that next level, uh-huh. Uh I think Bret Hart was a big part of being able to try to do that. Obviously, it got nixed because he wanted to do a title shot with me. That got nixed. Um, JR um was always um told me straight, you know, um AKN, you're screwing up. Get your ass back in line. And I respected that, you know, because a lot of times you get going and you're having fun and you you just don't see it. Someone comes to you and say, Hey, you're screwing up. Uh and it's like, be here on time, do this, do that. It's like, okay. Um, so and again, there's I think Steve Blackman was really not just like uh anything positive, anything like to get lifting me over that, but just a good person to be around. Um always like hanging with him. Um I thought that you know the opportunities that Shawn Michaels, uh Bret Hart, Stone Cold, Steve Austin, The Undertaker, I could go on. I mean, I got to go with all the greats, gave me an opportunity to wrestle with them. They don't have to. Like, and with my background and where I came from, a lot of those guys are like, I'm not going. So being able to build up the trust to be able to work with those guys meant a lot to me.

SPEAKER_02 2:03:11

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 2:03:12

Yeah. That's that's like living legend at that point.

SPEAKER_00 2:03:17

Yeah, yeah. These guys are all stars, man. They're they're they're up there, you know, the the greatest of all, all time. And then to be in the being with with Brett and Stone Cold in the greatest match in WWF history, just down in the Hall of Fame, and to be a part of that is um, I mean, like, I'm just blessed. Like, it was awesome. All I had to do was be a referee. Like, I got those guys were tremendous. I mean, they were unbelievably, and they went in and kicked the tar out of one another.

SPEAKER_01 2:03:48

Would you say like in WWE babyface, whoever the whoever the babyface of that like era or like that storyline is, is treating other people differently than if he wasn't that if he wasn't in that position because he's this face of the show at that point, and then now he's like, Oh well, I just made it. Look at me, I'm like better than everyone else.

SPEAKER_00 2:04:09

Explain that to me, I didn't get that.

SPEAKER_01 2:04:10

So let's say you're the baby face of a company and you starve the show, and everyone's supporting you, you you're the WWE champion, and you're carrying that for like hundreds of days. So when a wrestler who has made it at that point in WWE treats start treats treating other wrestlers differently, or it's not the case with that. Like mostly they know they've been put into this position to entertain people, to bring in the numbers, to bring in the business, and it can be taken away from them at any time, so they stay kind of humbled with that. I just want to know like what's the mindset of a babyface who is in that position.

SPEAKER_00 2:04:48

Yeah, I think you got both sides of that. Sometimes, and I've been guilty of that. Um sometimes you get to a point to where your your confidence starts to bleed out into cockiness. Um because you're you're pushing yourself to a level of being the greatest. And um sometimes that that confidence starts to creep out into being cocky, and sometimes you're snapping a little bit at people because you're you're trying to keep yourself at a certain level and you want others to keep to s to help you get there. Don't hinder me from getting there, don't get in my way of getting there. So sometimes there's some of that where you know your your your confidence has been so so intricate in getting you where you're at that it it can sometimes real quickly turn into being cocky and being mean to people. Yeah, yeah. And you have to have somebody, and and my dad told me this, you have to have somebody around you that you know you can go to, because this is before I became you know famous. Um, and he member mentioned to me because he said, you need to make sure uh that you have somebody around you that's going to tell you, hey, you're getting out of line, you're letting this get to your head, the ego's becoming bigger than what you're accomplishing. And uh he said, make sure you have somebody around you that gonna put you in check and that you're gonna listen to. And I had a few, I had him, obviously, but then my wife um always trusted in whatever she would say. Like when I went into depression and I didn't know it, she pulled me out of that. And my dad was always there to say, Man, you need to stop. Like there was no reason for you to say or do that, and there's no reason for you not to do that. You should always make yourself available. You should always sign autographs. I don't care where you're at, whether you're with your family or you're here or you're there, some kid comes up, you sign it. And I've always done it. Like, I've always understood that. But there was a time where there was a split between when I was in in in UFC and I was in the WWF where it just became easy and I lost myself. I lost myself in thinking that I could do whatever I wanted to do. And I had to pre-put in check. And there's one thing that I don't know if I'm gonna pat myself on the back for it, but but but I I know I am not perfect, and I know that um I have a uh a character in me that can't be nice and I can be bad. I I was there, I was lived most of my beginning life that way. That when someone tells me something, I know they see it, and I need to make sure I pull that back and not become that person.

SPEAKER_01 2:07:32

Very, very wise of you to actually reflect on your life like that. You said you got to the point, got comfortable. When things started slipping out, what changed?

SPEAKER_00 2:07:43

Um, I would say just being more loose with money, more loose with relationships, um, more loose in in taking care of your body, um, spending more time having fun than working, um, all those things start to overflow, and then your character turns more abruptly into brushing everybody off, not paying attention to people, um, not wanting to do the extra mile for someone. You cut it short. Um, so yeah, those things, and it and when you start not paying attention to your body and paying attention to putting work effort in, you start lacking in your abilities, and then you blame it on other things. Like, well, you know, I don't get the rest I need. Well, whose fault is that? It's like I don't feel good today. Well, whose fault is that? Yeah, you know what I mean? Like all of it comes back to you.

SPEAKER_01 2:08:35

Yeah. It's very nicely put that way. So who are you? Who's Ken Shamrock when no one's watching?

SPEAKER_00 2:08:46

I don't know. Uh I mean, you know, I was asked one time when I went to this event, and I hadn't seen this person in years. I mean, years. It'd been 30 years, 40 years, probably longer, 42 years. The first thing that he comes down and does and is asks me is, am I a good person? I'm like, what? Like, I didn't say that out loud, but I'm like, I haven't seen you in how long? Like, what makes you say that? Like, if I just come, it's like, hey, so I know we so you're a good person. And it's like, my what would you first answer? Why would you ask that? Like, did I do something? Yeah. It's like, what is what's that?

SPEAKER_01 2:09:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:09:34

I I just, and then you know, it's just like I my my and my answer was I don't know. I I hope so. I'm a God fearing man. I'm I've made mistakes, you know, but I like to believe that I correct those things. I like to believe I'm trying to live uh a good life. Uh I I I I love my wife, I love my family, I love my kids. Um, you know, uh what else more, what more is there to be a good man? Is a good man following an agenda uh or or having some sort of idea or logic or belief? So when someone asks that, it's like, yeah, but what is what is your good man look like or good person look like? Right? Uh but so I I would it's for me as if if I was to ask somebody, I I would I would feel bad because it's like dude, I I I don't know you. Like I don't know you, I haven't seen you in 42 years. I don't know you, so how would I know? I could tell you whatever I want to tell you.

SPEAKER_02 2:10:41

Correct.

SPEAKER_00 2:10:41

Say whatever I want to say, correct? So but is there anything that you have seen in my career or me? Because I'm a very upfront person when it comes to people knowing who I am. I'm not hidden. Yeah, people know me. Yeah, it's like, is there anything I've ever done in my career that would say to you I'm a bad person, or that I need to explain myself that I'm a good guy? So it's just to me, the the the a question like that just it doesn't make sense. Uh because I think I think that that the if a question like that happens, it has to be when you're gonna have a conversation with somebody that you're trying to help and that you've been friends with for a very long term long time and been around somebody that you're you're trying to mentor or help them get through something. What do you think? Do you think you're a good man? Like, and and if so, what are they? Or if not, how how do we fix it? Something like that, that's to me where that would come in.

SPEAKER_01 2:11:41

Gotcha. But the question, the original question was like, who's Ken Shamrock when no one's watching?

SPEAKER_00 2:11:46

Yeah, yeah, no, I'm going to that because when I was asked that. Gotcha. That that's but again, like with me as Ken Shamrock, uh, I think it's really hard, like I said, because I could tell you anything I want to tell you, right? True.

SPEAKER_01 2:11:57

But I totally understand where you come from.

SPEAKER_00 2:12:00

That is, is that I'm there's nothing in my life that people don't know.

SPEAKER_01 2:12:04

Right?

SPEAKER_00 2:12:05

It's open book. I mean, I've told my documentary, I don't know, four or five times. People know where I've came from. Some most people, if they've paid attention, know some of the things I've gone through, the successes that I've had. I've been on TV, I don't know how many times I've lost fights, I've won fights, the way that I reacted in those things. Um, so but for me, I just think that you know Ken Shamrock is just a person that's same as anybody else, man. I live life. Uh I love my family. I like to be around my family. I love good food. I don't eat as much as I used to. I like I like to stay fit, you know, and I respect people. I respect people's ideas. And I want to, and and like we talked about earlier, I like to know what other people think. I don't want an answer that's gonna that's gonna appease me or or or make you look good. Yeah, or to say something that that isn't in line with what I believe. Correct. Because it does nothing to help me understand you. It helps me, it doesn't help me to really understand how I can i i uh uh broaden my thinking. Right, right. Um so I just like I said, I like to hear what other people and other sides of thoughts to be able to try to ground what I'm thinking. And as far as Ken Shamrock, like I said, I I just don't see myself as anything other than just being uh an American like everybody else, like anybody else that's living and uh having a good life, man. That's I don't and I've never looked at myself as a a celebrity, uh, and I've never lived that way either.

SPEAKER_01 2:13:40

Well well you talk about anger. You talk about how anger was like how you got into fighting and like it was that was like a basic like driving force in that. Would you say anger was your weapon or anger was controlling you?

SPEAKER_00 2:13:59

No, I think anger was a way for me to vent. Um like when people you most people when you try to cover something up inside of you, uh it's gonna come out. Yeah. Like at some point, it's gonna come out. Um so I would use anger as a tool to accomplish something. Um and I did it all the way through my career. I would find uh something in a in a fighter that I had to fight, and I would find something and I would pick at it. Pick at it until I hated it and it would just because I I can't punch somebody I like. Right? I can't get in and I that's why Lion's Den and most people never got an opportunity to understand who we were when we had that group of guys because it was a close-knit family type thing, and I didn't want to become comfortable with somebody else, especially if I had to compete against them. Um because I didn't have the same edge. Uh like when I fought Oleg and I fought him in the gym one time and just um he ended up having to go to the restroom and and take a breather. Um because I went after him and and and beat him enough, but that was in training and hadn't really at that point really developed uh refriendship because it was new at the time and he was from Russia, correct? And it was brand new, and I was kind of like establishing the dominance in the gym because he was a very good sambo guy, and he had beaten everybody else pretty much at the other gym that he was with, and Guy Mesger told me he's really good. And in my in my mind, it was competition, and I just found something I was angry at him, and I went in and I did that and was in the in the in the gym just because he was gonna train with us and I need to establish that dominance. But then uh uh six, eight months after that, uh he had beat um take Abbott and I had to fight him. Wow, and I told him you can't train here anymore, you gotta go to Dallas. And so he went to Dallas to train. Because I couldn't I I had to separate that that that because I couldn't I can't, and I I know it's not a big deal. Most people can fight their friends, and and and I can spa with guys, like no problem. But to really go in there and do that, and and and this I was in a different place in my life before the pastor thing. Um I I I had to hurt him. I had to Yeah. And so my mindset was like, you can't be here anymore. And that hurt. Yeah. Um, but I couldn't, he chose that fight because he got offered, and I don't blame him. I was a champion. He he was in next in line because he won the the ultimate ultimate and beat Tank. Um, so he earned that. But he chose to fight me because they offered, said you want to fight Ken, even though we were trained again. And he wanted to, and I got no problem with that because that was his opportunity. But you ain't training with me, you ain't gonna be around me because I am going to build up animosity towards you because I cannot train with you and then go in and fight with you and perform my best. So I have that, that's where my weakness is. Whereas that um I do have loyalty and I do have friends, and I can't get there with that.

SPEAKER_01 2:17:29

I don't think that's uh weakness, if you if you ask me, because that's the same as the best in the world, like yourself. I've heard this same sort of concept from Mike Tyson himself. It's like you're coming after me, you're coming after my wife, I haven't seen my children in so long. You're coming off to take food off my table table, give me brain damage, and you think I'm gonna go gentle on you just because you're my friend. No.

SPEAKER_00 2:17:52

Well, that's different though, because you have to get into a mindset where you well, and I don't have to, I changed that, but more technical and things like that. But I didn't know that at the time. But I couldn't. I mean, I probably would have had to do it, but it's not comfortable. So I don't want to be uncomfortable, so I sent him away. It's like I can't, you can't be here.

SPEAKER_01 2:18:15

It's just a part of you. It's simple.

SPEAKER_00 2:18:18

But it's a weakness in fighting. It is a weakness for me. That's a weakness for me in fighting.

SPEAKER_01 2:18:23

How is that a weakness?

SPEAKER_00 2:18:24

Because I don't I don't exert as much determination and anger, and I wouldn't say anger, but then it was, to go out there and destroy you. It's softened.

SPEAKER_01 2:18:38

If the guy trained with you or if he went away.

SPEAKER_00 2:18:42

But now he went away. No, he went away. So now I could build up that animosity toward him. How dare you want to fight me? You should not have taken that fight. You know I'm gonna crush you. Those things. Like that's the mindset I was going to get in and and and did. And then I, you know, when I fought him. There was a little bit of a there was a disconnect because I didn't finish him. I mean, I beat him to a pulp. Um but I wouldn't go for leg locks, I wouldn't go for any submission holes because I I I knew who he was, he's like me, that if I got it, I'd have to break it. And he was part of our team, and I he was gonna go fight over in Pancras in two months uh after this thing. He was gonna go fight over in Japan, and and that was a business thing we had um where he's under contract with me. Oh, and he would go over to Japan and fight, and then I would get my piece and he would do his thing, and because he was living in the house at the time.

SPEAKER_01 2:19:42

You put him on in Pancras.

SPEAKER_00 2:19:43

Yeah, yeah, and so um I felt like I could just knock him out and not try to do the submissions. And I could, I mean, I did knock him out, but if I'd have just walked away when I had him on the ground, I hit him and his holes were rolled back in the hands, I hands dropped, and then I hit him again and he woke up and he started fighting again. I did that twice. Yeah. Uh and I should have just left him. Like, okay, he's out, leave him. But I hit him again and he came back up and he fought. He's a tough son of a gun, but his head blew up to like an elephant, man. It was bad next day. I thought, like, oh, I'm so sorry, bro. Like it was bad. Um, but yeah, I never went for one submission holding that that fight because I I just knew him that he wasn't gonna tap.

SPEAKER_01 2:20:28

Yeah, he was gonna go to sleep straight up.

SPEAKER_00 2:20:30

Yeah, it was either that or you know, they break his leg, and I thought, well, let's try to knock him out.

SPEAKER_01 2:20:37

But it's it's it's like you you can't you can't you can't like tease that if you have to be the best in the best of the world, like something like yourself. And well, we talked about a lot. We talked about your childhood, your stages with your prime. What did you have to let go to become this person? This Ken Shamrock, because those were phases of your life. You were born into a certain neighborhood, survival, juvenile home, you know, Bob Shamrock to you know, Japan, UFC, WWE, then back to the UFC again, and now your father, your good husband. I don't know if you have grandchildren though. Yes, lots of grandfather. Well, you're a grandfather too. Yes. What did you have to let go to become this version of yourself?

SPEAKER_00 2:21:24

Nothing. Nothing. Uh it's just the transition in life. There's yeah, I I I don't understand that because you don't have to let go of anything. Like, you just grow and you become a man that you're supposed to be. Like, so you're a fighter. You like myself, I became dominant. I became the greatest fighter. I was a number one fighter in the world. Um, you go through the transition where you start deteriorating, um, you get slower. Uh, you don't want to let go of it. Uh, I fight longer than I probably should have, but I was gonna do it as long as I wanted to because I enjoyed it. Um, and then I would quit when I was ready. That was a struggle because I fought a lot longer than most and wasn't at my best, but I still enjoyed the competition. So I did it. Um, and then there's a point in time where you have to come to that point where you go, now it's becoming dangerous. Now I'm putting myself in a position where I could get hurt, and that affects my family. That affects my fan base. So now I have to make a decision, the right decision, to hang them up, to start doing something else. You don't have to give up on anything, but you have to be able to make transitions into other things. And for me, it was going into promoting things, it was doing, it was an opportunity to go out and meet fans by doing appearances, um, you know, doing some like this, a lot of talk shows, documentaries, helping people understand who I was, an opportunity to be able to use my voice, use my my I guess my life uh to be able to help others transition into whatever they're going through into a normal life or whatever normal is for them. Yeah. Um, that's a very simple way, right?

SPEAKER_01 2:23:19

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:23:20

So it wasn't like at one point I had said I had to let go of something, it was a transition.

SPEAKER_01 2:23:24

It's a very wise perspective because most athletes who come out of NBA, NFL drugs, you know, they they lose all their bag. Um, like people come out of Navy SEALs, like army, because they they're always in the war mindset, and I interview them, the highest profession with the highest divorce rates, most suicides. So all of that, like, because they can't let go of the version they were in their prime. And as you said, you just grow like like it's time, like a tree grows, like a flower grows, like it's just a natural course of life. You looked it that way, yeah. Which is why you won't you didn't have like problems with that, from what you're telling me. It's very wise. This brings me to our final and last question. Thank you for being with us. Yeah, if everything you built, your legacy, your fights, your fan base disappeared from the world, and you only had 60 seconds to give advice to the world, what would that be?

SPEAKER_00 2:24:23

Oh, I would see gotta be the number one. Uh, and it's something that for me, uh I had to learn and failed many, many times. But the one thing I would say is that you have to be able to be patient to be able to understand other people. That's the one big thing that I think in especially in today's world and the world that I grew up in, it seems like decisions are made so fast. Uh, you don't think about them, you don't analyze them, you don't listen. You don't listen to what other people are saying, even though it may not align with you, um, and be able to find that middle somewhere where you can understand them and they can understand you. Um so I I think patience is a big part of that, is allowing people to be able to, I don't know, express themselves or or try to understand one another instead of immediately jumping to a point to where um you think that you you you are all knowing and that you'll what you think is the only way to think. So patience for me, I think, is that underlying you gotta have it. And I think that if we can all do that more, be patient and listen, I think that you're gonna have a better understanding of how the world and everything is moving, especially with the kids and the way the kids are growing up, they think so much differently, they have so much more knowledge than what we were used to, what we were we we actually had the opportunity of having. So a lot of them are a lot more advanced than you're giving them credit for, uh, in good ways and bad ways. And the only way that you're able ever gonna be able to understand that is by having patience and listening.

SPEAKER_01 2:26:09

Wow, very well said. And uh what about your faith? What what what are some things you would like to leave a message to people for like that you're a man of faith now?

SPEAKER_00 2:26:19

So yeah, I I've been a man of faith for a while. Um but when you say a man of faith, it's it's uh boy, I want to be careful with this. Uh don't it just because you have faith and you're a Christian doesn't mean that you're perfect, doesn't mean that you don't do wrong, doesn't mean that you don't sin. In fact, is some of us sin more. Uh the problem that we have in the world today when you say that you're a Christian or that you're you know you have uh faith in Christ, people who don't believe in Christ immediately look at you as trying to be privileged. They have this all of a sudden, like, oh, you think you're better than us. And it's like it's because of the way that some people, not all, but some people act as Christians. Um, and acting like because they have a relationship with Christ, I wouldn't say relationship, I would say because they believe in Christ and they profess to be Christians, that somehow or another that puts them uh in a class above everyone else.

SPEAKER_01 2:27:23

You're so right. I can keep go on this all day long because it happened with most fates and people believe like they they have like this reserved spot in heaven for that. That's that that's how they act like. I'm sure in your in your lifetime you've you've seen people who put other people down and they talk down to them just because oh, I'm Christian, you know, I have like a cross on my neck, you know, I go to church on the Sundays, etc. Whatever. Like, why? Like, why that sense of superiority?

SPEAKER_00 2:27:50

Well, and it bothers me um because I hear it so much now today, especially in the political world, of people uh using Christianity as a defense. You know, uh oh, I'm a Christian. Well, um, okay, what does that mean? Like, God bless you, and I'm so happy for you, but that don't make you right. So, um, yeah, I I I just for me, just that that Christians are no different than anyone else in the world, except for the fact that you have a relationship with Christ and that when you die, you're going to heaven. But that doesn't make you in the world that we're living in right now and today better than anyone else. It's just that you do you have a relationship with you, you have understanding on what's going to happen. And when you talk to a person that isn't a Christian, it you should never make them feel less. You should always make them feel like they're they have opportunities in life to be better, to opportunities to improve their lives. It doesn't even have to be under the banner of Christianity. This isn't the banner of just eating healthy and taking care of yourself and being respectful and having a communication and propping one another up. And then if the opportunity comes where they can have an opportunity to accept or reject, that comes later. But to kind of lead out, like saying you're gonna go to hell if you don't become a Christian, or like, wow, you you really need to get your life right, you need to get with Christ, you know, using it as this tool, it should never ever be used that way. It should be Christ should be something that people want to be involved with and reach out for, not something that you're shoving down their throats.

SPEAKER_01 2:29:37

Correct. And um, I don't know how much you know about like Eastern history, the part of the world I'm from, there were a lot of like there were there was a lot of Islamic regime. Let's just say, I don't know if you know about a religion called Sikhism. No, so yeah, it's like a small tribal religion, whatever. But like, so it was based on when Islamic regime was in power, they were making people like do forceful conversion, as you said. Why? Because the religion, if you spread it, doesn't matter how you do it, not with love, but with even brute force, you get more blessings, therefore you go to heaven, and God likes you more, therefore you can act superior and act like the God of this world and do whatever the fudge you want around. And so these little group of people who kind of rebelled against the idea that no, God can't be that brutal.

SPEAKER_00 2:30:30

God, if God is brutal, God has been brutal, God has allowed people to die. They literally, back in the old days where they had to paint their door, and if you didn't have that, this you your born was dead. Um, the wars and the fights that they had, how in the world can you ever imagine a Christian being weak, living in those early times where anybody could walk up at any time and stab you and get away with it because there's nobody. How how in the world could you be weak knowing that if you couldn't take care of your family by digging up ground and plowing ground and planting seed and and cultivating your land, and that's all brutal work. How is it that you can think people are weak or Christians would be weak in those cases? And Christians have had to stand up and fight, they had to go to battle. So it's and again, I don't think it is much now, but it used to be 10-15 years ago, you mentioned the word Christians, people thought you could slap them and walk away. You slap me, I'm knocking you the heck out. That's just the way it is. And it in the Bible, it says turn the cheek, but it doesn't say how. There is repercussions, right? Yes, yes, and there are always consequences. Doesn't mean after I knock you out, I don't give you a hug and say, bless you, brother. Right? But it's just like the the word that the Christian, it just seems like it's it gets so watered down and it's such a powerful word. Uh and it it's it's being used too much as a weapon instead of a saving opportunity.

SPEAKER_01 2:32:14

Do you think uh it has a lot of political influence behind it to water down the word Christian?

SPEAKER_00 2:32:20

They do it, they're doing it now a lot, and you're seeing a lot within the the political world where they use the word um the American people like somehow they're on your side. Like the American people really don't want this. It's like, how in the heck do you know? Like there's there's split. How is it you're clumping all of them together? You know, stuff like that. They use Christianity as a way to make someone feel like they're wrong. And uh to me, it's this it's so wrong right now with the way it's being used that it's but it but it but again, if you know the Bible, that's the way it is. Right is wrong and wrong is right.

SPEAKER_01 2:32:59

So I want actually for I want advice from a person like yourself. Uh seems like you're very well educated on this, more than me in this case. What do you say to people who say Bible has been like altered so many times, so you don't even know if it's real or not? What's your answer to those people?

SPEAKER_00 2:33:19

Well, I would say this. I would say that people that are saying that have never read the Bible. And if they have, they haven't read it with faith. Because uh, when they say it's a living Bible, it means that when you read the Bible, it speaks to you different ways all the time. So when I open up and I read a certain scripture, and I'm not well versed in the Bible at all. I've read it, uh, but I can't remember half the stuff I read. Um but um when you read it, and I've read it at different times, um, where there's something going on in your life, and there's something happening, and it seems to hit you differently, uh, depending on what verse it is, right? Or what scriptures you're reading. They could hit you differently and speak to you much differently than they would speak to someone else. So I believe that, but I also think that, yeah, maybe who knows? Like maybe has it? I don't know. I can't speak to that. I don't I can't say 100% that they're not wrong, but I know when I read the Bible, it speaks to me. So um you call me crazy, but I don't have those tendencies to be that that kind of crazy. Um so yeah, I would say people have their own thoughts, and and I'm not gonna just like I've told you before, I want to hear all ideas and I want to hear all thoughts.

SPEAKER_04 2:34:34

Right.

SPEAKER_00 2:34:34

Because uh that helps me get a better understanding of where my thoughts are. Are they grounded? Are they, you know, so far off, or or is there a middle ground somewhere? But with the Bible, like I said, I read it, it speaks to me, um, and it's it's done a lot for me. But at the same time, when people say it's been translated so many different times in English and this and that, and it's been changed, maybe I don't know. I can't speak to that, but I know uh most Christians will I shouldn't say Christians, but most believers who read the Bible will tell you it speaks to them.

SPEAKER_01 2:35:08

Yeah.

unknown 2:35:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 2:35:10

Well, we'll definitely get on to the second time if that ever happens and talk more about like politics and Bible and the faith. And because I'd really love to go on those topics because that's what I go into on my free time. Yeah. So, but Ken, really appreciate for coming by, and it was truly an honor to have you over here. Can you tell pe people where they can find you?

SPEAKER_00 2:35:32

Like, yeah, you can get me on kinshamrock.com. Uh yeah, uh, and uh Ted will have to get you all that because I'm sure they're gonna want to promote a lot of the stuff that we're doing outside of Yeah, yeah. We'll put the put in the description. We have a lot of stuff, so I'm sure you guys are gonna talk, right? Yeah, yeah. Okay, yeah, because I know he's got a whole package. Okay, awesome.

SPEAKER_01 2:35:52

Yeah, uh, so guys, thank you very much for coming up, listening, and watching Ken's story, you know, it was really fascinating for me. He likes to sit across him, it's kind of surreal, you know, a man who's lived so many different lives. Uh yeah, but please go down in the description, drop a follow to his officials and mine, and drop down comments, like, subscribe, share, and just keep supporting the channel. If you support the channel, we can bring amazing guests like himself on. So, thank you very much.