The Sevan Podcast - #210 - Dalton Rosta
Episode Date: November 19, 2021Fighter. The Sevan Podcast is sponsored by http://www.barbelljobs.com Follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/therealsevanpodcast/ Sevan's Stuff: https://www.instagram.com/sevanmatossian/...?hl=en https://app.sugarwod.com/marketplace/3-playing-brothers Support the show Partners: https://cahormones.com/ - CODE "SEVAN" FOR FREE CONSULTATION https://www.paperstcoffee.com/ - THE COFFEE I DRINK! https://asrx.com/collections/the-real... - OUR TSHIRTS ... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Let's do something real quick. Bam!
We're live.
I wonder if you're showing up that pixelated on YouTube.
Oh, that's a good...
Can you check that?
I'm going to do...
What do I go to? Speedtest.net?
God, I love this.
Watching all these little numbers go around and
shit you know if you put the cursor over the uh view number with the eyeball it tells you where
they're all viewing from too oh it does yep we had like two people on facebook or something like
that actually you look okay on youtube okay cool and i'm running a speed test now my my ping is 11 who
knows ping stuff and my uh yeah my download is 327 i guess it's my upload that's important and
my upload is 11 who knows is that good hey i'm putting my cursor over the eyeball and it doesn't tell me shit really where it says yeah yeah oh oh yeah
yeah yeah yeah yeah oh that's cool it doesn't register twitter but we are live on twitter
every time that is really really cool no one watches this show on twitch or on facebook
well i shouldn't say no one but very few yeah very few i was gonna say we have had a
couple people watching from before it's probably an accident they left their computer on guys uh
today we have uh dalton rasta on r-o-s-t-a dalton rasta before we start uh someone said in the
comments um i was happy when someone brought up uh in OPT. Was it the OPT episode or Adam Neiffer?
But that I brought up the gender sex thing again.
And I just wanted to tell you guys something really quick about that.
I don't give a shit about gender or sex.
It's the fact of the usage of fucking what words really mean.
Definitions matter.
And the reason why this country is in the situation is it's in is two reasons and two reasons only because we live in a fucking idiocracy where people use words when
they don't know what they mean and so they conflate reality their thoughts in their head
versus what's really going on in the outside world you can't do that you make the rest of
us seem stupid and then the other thing people aren't raising their kids and so that's why i
bring up those two subjects damn it dalton rasta saw one of my temper tantrums and we just meet.
But we're having over 110,
120,000 downloads on iTunes every single week.
So someone cares about the message and we're killing it on YouTube and it's
been growing steadily for three months and the sponsors are piling in and
we're getting insane guests like Dalton Rasta.
So the title of this show should be called Jump on the Bandwagon Now.
I brought you Jack de la Magdalena from Australia.
You got to get on that bandwagon, and you got to get on Dalton Rasta.
And so we're going to give a talk to him now,
and if you don't jump on the bandwagon after this show, go fuck yourself.
Dalton, what's up, brother?
What's up, man?
How are you?
Just all fired up.
I can tell.
I left the door open to my office last night and it's not attached to my head.
So I, or to my head, it's not attached to my house.
And so I came in here this
morning and it's freezing well california freezing probably like 50 degrees in here
yeah well i'm thankfully i'm not in pa because it's like 30 there oh yeah because you're with
american top team in south florida so big change dude congratulations all right thank you
So big change.
Dude, congratulations.
Thank you.
How – just really quickly for people who don't know,
I think his total fighting career, he's 11-0.
As a pro, he's 5-0.
Is that correct?
12-0.
I'm so sorry.
Was 2-56 your 12th win?
Yes. I was 7-0 as an amateur in MMA, 7-0 as an amateur in boxing,
and 5-0 as a pro in MMA.
Okay.
Damn it.
Damn it, damn it, damn it.
Your boxing is sick.
I went back and looked at your old boxing fights,
what I could find on YouTube.
Yeah, I think there's only like one on YouTube.
So, I mean, most of those,
they're just USA boxing events,
amateur events.
Nobody really cares about them.
Oh, it's a great fight.
The one I saw, it's outdoor.
Yeah, it was at the Lawrence County Fair.
It's actually where I'm from.
My high school was straight across the street.
And essentially, it's just a fair.
They have a grandstand in the back.
And like three years in a row, they did a boxing event there.
One of the guys, one of the boxing gyms down in downtown Newcastle decided to put on an event there.
And I actually took that fight on like two days notice.
So they called me up like two days before, said somebody pulled out.
And I said, sure.
It's like right in my backyard.
I was training.
So I took it and ended ended up being really good fight and
a lot of people showed up from my hometown obviously it was 10 minutes away and uh pretty
the funny thing about it i wasn't even the main event i was a co-main event and there were still
two heavyweights that had the box after me after i got done and after i got that knockout the whole
entire grandstand cleared out
it was completely packed after my fight there was still another fight left and that you could
probably count on both hands how many people were left after that well it's probably one of the most
technical fights that they've ever had it like at a fair it was it was it was it was solid with the
the shitty part is is it took me like at least half a round to figure out who is who
because you guys are wearing headgear and it's so far away.
And I go, God, I hope that's Dalton that's winning.
I hope that's Dalton.
And then I would hear people cheering in the crowd.
I'm like, okay, that must be Dalton.
Yeah, so that's another thing about amateurs.
You have to wear headgear.
You also have to shave your beard.
And I think we were both wearing black.
So he was a little bit bigger,
but I don't remember if they announced it or not in the video who was who.
You don't seem to care if they're bigger.
Mm-mm.
No, the last fight the kid I fought was like 6'3".
That was Robinson?
Yeah, no, Tony Johnson.
Tony Johnson.
Yeah.
It's part of the game, though, bro.
In the weight class I'm in, there's a lot of taller people.
I'm only six foot tall.
There's guys that get 6'3", 6'4", you know?
And that's part of the reason why I moved down from light heavyweight,
which I was fighting at at first.
Those guys get 6'5", 6'6".
For those of you who don't know, light heavyweight is 205,
correct me if I'm wrong, and you're now in the 185, right?
Yes, sir.
Yeah, that guy, what did I call him, Tony, what's his name, Tony Johnson, you said?
I think you said Tony Robinson.
Okay, either way.
He looks, yeah, it said you were six foot and he was six two, and he looked definitely taller.
His arms were crazy. The distance from looked definitely taller his arms were crazy the distance
from his elbow to his fingertips were nuts yeah he had like a 78 inch reach too and he was actually
10 and 1 as a professional boxer i think he was 9 and 1 or 9 and 2 in mma and then 10 and 1 as a
professional boxer so he was a really good boxer as well and he trains just over he trains i live about um this is matt by the way
matt dalton dalton matt what's up man it's all nice to meet you brother you too matt lives about
70 or 80 miles uh north of me i mean i'm in uh santa cruz california and right in between us
i think is where um tony trains he trains in san jose yes at american kickboxing academy okay yeah and he's got
i mean he's got killers there yeah daniel cormier uh khabib nurmagomedov luke rockhold uh i mean the
list goes on and on there's a lot of good guys there yeah that's a that's a great win for you
congratulations thank you um uh something happened i guess well you did something to him that made Yeah, that's a great win for you. Congratulations. Thank you.
Something happened, I guess.
Well, you did something to him that made him basically gun-shy the entire fight.
Do you know what that is, like early on?
Did you punch him? Was he afraid you were going to take him down?
Didn't he seem like at some point like he's like, oh, shit, I don't want to get close to Dalton?
Honestly, kind of every fight is like that.
You know, I have a lot of power.
I've knocked everybody out as an amateur,
knocked my first three opponents out as a pro.
I mean, same thing with boxing.
You saw the boxing match online.
So I don't know if I touched him with a big shot early or if it's just part of the game plan that his coaches drew up.
Like, you know, get on your bicycle until he tires out because there's a lot of the game plan that his coaches drew up like you know get on
your bicycle until he tires out because there's a lot of people that think i'm going to tire out as
well and then uh then take your shot whenever he tires but i i really never tired i did in the
third round but it's too little too late for him and uh also he was probably just trying to avoid
a big punch so um he's he knows he's a taller guy he
knows i have to come forward to him and uh that's usually my fighting style anyways i'm more of a
pressure fighter i'm always coming forward and uh he was probably trying to draw me into a trap
as well he also uh i don't know if you watched any of his fights before that he fought joe
schilling who was a world champion glory world champion kickboxer and he knocked joe shilling who was a world champion glory world champion kickboxer and he
knocked joe shilling out joe shilling like threw a switch elbow he like switched stances and threw
an elbow at the same time and uh tony kind of covered up caught the elbow and then threw a left
hook and knocked him out like clean out and uh joe just crumbled and uh this probably might be what
he was trying to catch me with because I come in hard with my right hand.
And if you figure you can get over my right hand and being taller as well, could have did the same thing.
So that's the one big thing I was trying to avoid.
But I didn't change my game plan at all besides that.
Yeah, well, congratulations.
There was as I dug around, I think I watched everything I could find on you on YouTube, and I read a bunch of stuff.
There's a statement you say in there that in your first five fights you were having trouble finding fights or that people would accept fights and then not show up.
And I got a couple questions around that, but am I representing that accurately?
Yes.
Why is that?
Is that just people would – why do people accept the fight and then pull out
outside of injury why not just like do their research ahead of time be like nah this guy's
not a good match for me some do so i had trouble finding fights because people they'd be off the
fight and the next thing you know they wouldn't take it or in instances like uh for example my
my third fight i went through like five or six fighters before i
actually got an opponent that signed the contract um now my fourth fight whenever i fought ty
gorder i was originally supposed to fight a guy named andre petrovsky who's in the ufc now
but at time he was five you know he was fighting for the lfa they offered them
offered him the fight like two weeks went by they said that he said yes and then next thing you know
never got the fight so after that they were they offered me Romero Cotton who is also signed to
Bellator he's also 5-0 right now he's ranked ninth right above me and this was before the rankings
before Bellator brought the brother rankings and um long story short he took the fight just like you said, and he ended up pulling out.
I don't remember how much longer later, how much later it was two, three days after he
signed the contract fight was finalized.
He pulled out.
So that's when I ended up with Ty Gorder, who in my opinion was probably my toughest
fight anyways, because his versatility striking, he was a good kickboxer explosive you
know had knockout power as well whereas somebody like Romero caught and uh you know he doesn't
have bad striking he's athletic but he's definitely a wrestler he shoots every fight he's very
predictable and it's it's very he's very one-dimensional you know uh I think he has a knockout on his record with knees, but against a sloppy guy.
So that's kind of a predicament that I find myself in.
And it's it happens pretty often. that never went to uh or never went to the point where i was getting offered multiple opponents or
multiple people pulling out and then me having to accept a fourth or fifth opponent tony johnson
was person first person to uh be offered the fight and he took it um is that does that suck
when people pull out or at this point is it a compliment how do you like emotionally intellectually
and like i guess training wise react to that you know i don't really take it as a compliment because it makes
it harder for me at the end of the day because um generally you have an eight-week fight camp
where you're preparing for a specific person you know you you watch film on them at least i do you
know some fighters claim that they don't watch film. Either they're saying it's trying to sound cool or they really don't. And they're stupid.
You know, you should be watching film on your opponent. You should see what he does.
You get a feel for whenever you see it during the fight. All right. I saw this on tape.
We made a game plan for this. I'm supposed to do X, Y, Z as soon as he does this.
But I mean, that's what I do. And whenever an opponent switches up you four or five times
and you switch the camp four or five times and then you have two weeks to prepare for the final
opponent it makes things a little tougher you know what i mean on both people on my opponent
and myself but uh essentially i would i would like a eight-week fight camp to drop a game for
somebody you know what i mean whereas tony john, that's the longest fight camp I've ever had since I've been with Bellator.
And that was five weeks.
You know, which still, I mean, obviously turned out in my favor.
But realistically and ideally, I would like an eight-week camp to prepare for somebody like that.
And you said some harsh words in some interviews.
Like, hey, man, you're complaining your back hurts.
Like, I hurt my back three times in this camp. And you pulled some harsh words in some interviews, like, hey, man, like you're complaining your back hurts. Like I hurt my back three times in this camp and you pulled out for this.
And it's like, yeah, it's weird.
As a fight fan, I always wonder, like recently Luke Rockhold pulled out of that fight with Strickland, right?
Yes.
So before you go any further on that, I made the made the comments about the back and back issues my entire life.
S.I. points just thrown out my lower back. You know, my back stiffened up on me where I have to take two, three, four days off.
And then I would get back to training, you know, most of the time before my back even feels fully healed.
Granted, if you have a fight coming up, you're two, three, four weeks away.
You know, you can get through that.
Kind of with Tony Johnson, I did the same thing.
You know, I hurt my back probably two separate times and I just took a day or two off, trained through it.
Now, after my fight, I found out I had two herniated discs in my lower back, L4 and L5 S1.
And because I trained through it and never
let it heal, I ended up developing sciatica and it put me out. It sidelined me for three months.
I was out after my fight for three months before I could start training again. So no training,
no running, not even fucking walking. I couldn't even walk for five minutes. If I walked for five
minutes, my whole leg went numb. I was in severe
pain. I couldn't sit, none of that. So, uh, you know, part of that's the fighter mentality in me
that does that. And yeah, if I was two, three weeks out from a fight, if I hurt my back,
even if I'm getting sciatica, which I started with the Tony Johnson fight, I thought I hurt
my hamstring too, but it was really sciatica the whole entire time I got through it and I fought.
But after the fight, I was out for three months.
So if you're being smart, if you have somebody smart in your corner, you know what I mean?
Your coaches, your camp, your manager, whatever.
It depends, long-term goal or short-term goal you
know so some people all right i hurt my back i'm gonna take off i can fight later this year f it
you know where it's like me i'm like all right i already have this fight in place
hundreds of people are already coming to to watch me i'm not pulling out you know what i mean so
that's why i continue to fight some other fighters might not do the same thing, but
if you're asking me if I still think they're a pussy for doing it, then yes.
Dalton, I don't mean this. I mean, this is a sincere question. I often talk about what it's
like being a 16 to 35 year old male that basically like if you don't keep that.
I was dry. I was in Kenya one time and I was driving and there was this group of young men on the corner.
And my buddy goes, hey, when you see that, you know, a country's in trouble.
I go, what do you mean? He goes, you can never leave 16 to 35 year old men to their own accord.
They have to be kept busy. And when my friend said that, I was like, holy shit.
Yeah, I remember like you have 10 boys, 12 years old, standing at a bus stop, waiting for the bus.
Someone's going to throw a rock. Then someone's gonna be like, I can throw it farther. Then
someone's gonna be like, I can hit that bird. And then someone's gonna be like, Hey, I can hit that
car. Next thing you know, you're throwing rocks at cars and no one knows why, you know, it's just
like, that's what boys do. Um, this seems like it kind of falls into that category you're this you're 26 yeah just turned
26 yeah you're this 26 year old fucking bulldozer and uh you only have one gear right go and and
unless something happens like sciatica or you have someone in your corner who's like hey dude it's
time to park the bulldozer for a minute that you don't you don't do that and and your fights kind of show that your training your body your
your post-fight interviews there is no there are no kinks in you in your mentality your confidence
your demeanor your i mean i mean you're just everything is just clean every it's all consistent
this guy's going from point A to point B.
There's nothing going to stop him unless you turn, like, you can't stop you.
Exactly, man.
And I feel like, especially nowadays, everything's, everybody's going soft.
You know, every sport, including MMA.
And there's a lot of people, like I said, we just went over,
pulling out because they hurt their back a couple weeks before a fight.
You know, big difference from being put out for three and a half months. went over uh pulling out because they hurt their back a couple weeks before a fight you know big
difference from being put out for three and a half months but uh football mma everybody's
they're just going soft it's just as simple as that and uh for some for a sport as brutal
as mma that that's not something you should see. I want to, I want to visit that.
If you have any examples of what you mean by going soft,
but when one of the interviews you said you don't touch gloves.
Yeah. So my first fight or two, I did, I believe.
I actually, I don't even know if I did my first fight, my second fight.
I remember I did. And I just felt, you felt you know you say it's cliche or whatever if
you want but i just felt weird the entire fight you know what i mean like it wasn't true to who
you are like hey i don't want to do that why did i do that and i'm south there trying to show
show respect you know um whether it was my coaches or my manager or whatever say this is this is what
people want to see you know what i mean mean? So I'm like, okay,
fine. I'm go do it. It's good publicity, good PR, whatever.
And I went out and did it. Didn't feel right to me from that point forward.
You know, I didn't do it. I didn't do it as much as I don't think I ever did it
as an amateur either. I mean, I may be wrong, but I don't think I ever did.
And the point is, is I'm going in there to,
we're locking ourselves in a cage,
two men locking ourselves in a cage and trying to take each other's heads off.
And if it weren't for the ref,
somebody would die in there.
You know what I mean?
You're turning a kill switch on and you have two men locked in a cage,
going at it,
trying to take each other's head off.
It gets competitive.
And then on top of that,
it ends up getting personal.
A lot of the time with the the press conferences with talk shit talk and
everything beforehand and if the ref weren't there you know somebody's legitimately die and
this like i said this is the sport's not for the faint of heart and even this sport like i said
it's getting soft but i'm not going to be one of those people that are getting soft and my whole goal is to go in there and take somebody's head
off so the end of the day i don't want to be your friend before the fight you know uh i don't want
to i don't want to be your friend at weigh-ins i don't want to be your friend at the press
conference i don't want to be your friend as soon as we get in the cage and i don't want to be your
friend when we're supposed to touch gloves you know we can save all that all that for after when does that when does that mentality start like
right away when you hear about the fighter you're fighting are you already locked into that
individual when you're getting into that headspace or is it something that you're always it's always
right underneath the surface no it's as soon as as soon as i get the name, before the contract's even signed.
You know what I mean?
So that's why, for me, it's really disappointing when somebody pulls out.
I get a name put in front of me, and I'm locked on right away.
You know, I'm constantly thinking about the person.
I'm constantly, whenever I'm training, before training, after training, you know,
every moment of that fight camp, I'm thinking about that person.
What's he doing? What am I doing?
How can I make sure that I'm not being outworked and on,
on fight day,
what can I do to make sure I don't that I come out of here with my hand
raised.
Is there a certain level of anxiety that builds up a little bit prior to
seeing your opponent in person?
Because I imagine when you have so much focus on that, there's a certain amount of like tension that has built up.
And does that happen right away when you see them in person or is like the cage door locked and then you really get in touch with them?
So this is a hard one to answer.
Like people always ask me all the time do you
get nervous like what feelings go through through your head before the fight whatever um you know
i feel like at the weigh-ins and in the cage it's kind of the same same feeling for me you know what
i mean it's uh i don't want to say anxiety you know know what I mean? But yeah, anxiousness, if you will, and excited energy.
Yes.
And like, I don't feel, you know, comfortable until we're in that cage and the first punch
is thrown.
You know what I mean?
I thought you were going to say, I don't feel comfortable talking about it.
Fuck off.
Don't ask me that again.
I was hoping, I was hoping you were going say i don't feel comfortable talking about it fuck off don't ask me that again i was hoping i was hoping you were gonna say that and i would disappear in calling suze
ain't holding shit together fuck off switch the station okay sorry sorry someone's saying
matt's doing a better holding the show together okay sorry back to your feelings dalton sorry
um i mean it's actually like the whole and build build up the whole anticipation everything
it makes you anxious nervous whatever whatever you want to say.
But none of that goes away until the first punch is thrown, whether it's him throwing it, me throwing it, me landing, him landing, whatever.
It doesn't go away.
Even when you're in the cage staring across from him, it's like, I want to take this dude's head off.
Come on.
Bell needs a ring now.
Bell needs a ring now.
Let's just get after all. Even the walk down the warm-up it's like i just want to get in the cage and fight right now ready and uh none of that goes away until
like i said the first punch is thrown it's a weird feeling it's hard to describe and uh i mean that's
the best way i could describe it but even i feel like when I describe it like that, it's still not doing it justice.
Like it's not what I'm thinking in my head.
So there's something's wrong with your mic, buddy.
And when I maybe you've chosen the wrong mic on the settings on the computer, like it's still using your computer mic and say your microphone.
But check it out.
Dalton, don't tell him nothing's really wrong with his mic.
I just said that so he would get distracted. And I know, no, I'm serious Nothing's really wrong with his mic. I just said that so he would get distracted.
No, no, I'm serious.
Something is wrong with your mic.
Dalton, that feeling you just described, two questions.
One, do you ever start like literally not shaking like in fear but like feel yourself like vibrating?
And then two, does that feeling – is it anywhere else in your life?
Like the first time you kissed a girl, when you're about to sit down and take a test in school.
Like, is that feeling anywhere else in life or is it unique to fighting?
Out of all things, you said first time you kissed a girl.
I thought you were going to be like, spot on, buddy.
This is the furthest thing from it.
Okay.
Okay.
The only similar feeling I ever got was with wrestling, you know, wrestling matches or boxing matches.
I mean, they're both combat sports, but even with street fights, you know, like you said, you start shaking or whatever.
You ask, you start shaking.
I've been in street fights, you know, where like before, when I know something's about to pop off and I'm about to get in a fight or something's getting like super close.
I know I'm in a bad situation.
You know, like I start I might start shaking a little bit.
You know, I can't control it.
You know, I know something like your adrenaline kicking in or something.
But, yeah, it's similar for MMA fight, boxing match, wrestling, everything.
You know, it's all those were super
similar those are the only times i've experienced a similar feeling to uh like what i'm gonna do
in mma fight so definitely not kissing a girl okay um um how do you make how do you make the move
from uh pennsylvania to florida um financially like how does a how does a fighter do that like How do you make the move from Pennsylvania to Florida financially?
How does a fighter do that?
Is fighting your full-time job or do you also make coffees at Starbucks?
No, fighting is my full-time job now.
But when I first started fighting pro, I just graduated college.
I was working as a financial advisor for like two months. I got my pro contract, you know, with Bellator.
And that we've been talking about for like six months.
Before my very last amateur fight, I already knew that we were already in talks.
So I knew I was going to be on the roster.
I knew I was going to be fighting for them.
And I thought, you know, they offered me X amount of money.
It's not that great.
But if I fight four or five times in a year, you know, I can make a decent living.
I can do this full time.
And first year, I fought my first time in March.
And then I didn't fight again until the end of October.
So it was like seven months in between.
And I couldn't live off that, you know, so I had to start working part time gigs, you know, under the table jobs in between, you know, just whenever I could. And it was the same thing was with college, like I was training in college, and I was trying to go to school and graduate and everything. And I was I was working just enough to get by, I was kind of doing the same thing with mma you know just enough money to get by bills paid car insurance utilities whatever
uh gas to and from the gym that's the biggest thing and i was driving a freaking
beater and i was driving a 2004 chevy trailblazer that was falling apart gas lines going out power steering going out
i love it the gas cap rusted and falling off uh transmission blew in at once
everything was wrong with this thing and uh i was making like i said just enough money to get by i
just got to my next fight you know i got paid And then I was in the same boat once again, then COVID hit and was out for like 10 months, you know, and then
I fought again in August. And then I fought again. I got a short turnaround this time because my
contract was coming to a close and fought again after that. But this whole entire time,
I was still picking up like part-time jobs, uh, like maybe doing electrical work. Um, just like my, my cousin,
like work for like landscaping and stuff like that. Like sometimes if they needed an extra
person, I'd go jump in. I was working security every weekend, uh, Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
Uh, and then I was even working as a detailer, uh, at a, um, car lot. So I used and new car lot. I was working as a detailer there.
So I was doing all that just to get by and still train and fight. I was still doing
just enough to get my bills paid. So that way I can try and still train two to three times a day.
After my fourth fight with Bellator, that's whenever I started making like good money my fourth fight to make
a good money and then I got my contract renegotiated after my fourth fight going into my fifth fight
the last one and that's whenever I started making like really good money so now I'm like full-time
making good money doing it you know what I mean I still haven't fought since April but I'm still
good you know and I'm supposed to fight. Hopefully they're going to
keep their word on this, but they told me end of January, early February. So I was supposed to
fight this past weekend, uh, November 12th in Hollywood and couldn't get the fight. So that's
the next one they're saying. So you're healthy again. I'm sorry. I was under the impression
that maybe you, you still were licking some wounds your health you're healthy enough to fight now
yeah so i was out after my so i actually i guess i like i said uh herniated my disc before
i fought tony johnson at the time i thought i like tore my hamstring so i was just staying
away from sprints i was like i got like two two weeks left you know until the fight i'm not about to pull out so i fought started training again after my fight and it just kept getting worse
it spread all the way down to my foot and um there was actually a time in the fight too where i shot
a takedown where i felt like something in my back popped and it got worse at that moment and then i
feel like started training again after that happened in a fight.
That's whenever it just exponentially got worse.
And I was like, all right, I got to go get an MRI.
So I got an MRI on my hamstring.
They said it was okay.
So then I got my pelvis, my lower back.
They told me I had two herniated discs.
And I ended up doing physical therapy.
They told me I'd be good to go in like two to four weeks.
Two to four weeks go by.
I still can't like sit down for long periods of time.
I can't lift, bend my leg whenever I'm sitting down.
It was bad.
And did like two more months of physical therapy.
Still wasn't getting better.
And I got a cortisone injection.
They wanted to wait until that was like last resort for surgery.
And after about like two weeks after that,
just resting for two weeks,
I was good to go.
So I still do.
I have to maintain it.
Now I ice it.
Usually after every practice, I do inversion therapy,
stretch all this other stuff.
So I just got to take care of it now.
But I've been training since the very beginning of September,
maybe the very end of August.
And so I was ready to go for November. And there's actually a card December 3rd, which I'm staying ready for right now.
So if, if somebody pulls out, something pops up, I'm only like 12 pounds overweight. I can make
weight. That's the only thing I'm worried about. I'm in shape. I'm going five, five minute rounds,
really hard, really good shape right now. So waiting on that call, if somebody pulls out
December 3rd, maybe fighting December 3rd, if not end of january early february they said they're
trying to pin down the date right now how do you like that inversion stuff do you like being upside
down does it does it actually work i think it works you know uh definitely it definitely works
while you're doing it you know but i think the benefits you're going to see from it, you have to
do it frequently, you know, where I was doing it every day, twice a day. And that was part of my
physical therapy regimen. Like I, it was, I was doing it separate, but I was doing physical therapy
that I was doing that. And it progressively got a little bit better over time. You know what I mean?
But it still wasn't enough to train. So that's why I the shot but uh i'm still doing it now and like if i ever feel any tightness in my back or i feel a flare
up in my like lower butt or higher hamstring uh because that's where it really starts at uh and i
do that for like two days you know i'm usually good to go after that so i think that's awesome
do you know nick rodriguez is yes the wrestler he just turned
jujitsu to call him black belt slayer yeah yeah so he's he's coming on the show tomorrow
and so i'm researching you guys at the same time and shit's getting all you guys are very
in my mind yeah i'm probably gonna get destroyed in the comments for this. In my mind, you guys started getting all mixed up because you both have – he has this uncanny confidence and you have this uncanny confidence.
And there's the you before the fight and then there's the you like during the fight and then the post-conference.
It's just like you idle high.
Like now you're not idling high, but in a lot of your media, you idle high.
And definitely when you're out there, you're idling high but in a lot of your media you idle high and definitely when you're out there you're idling high and he's the same way has anyone ever compared you to
to you no no this is the first time first yeah it's um it's uh it was a trip and then and then
on top of that matt's like matt had you i guess matt uh matt's the producer of the show he had
you guys confused
too he goes okay so we got Nick tomorrow morning I'm like no we got Dalton and then I'm like oh
shit did I get them back switched up in my head too anyway it's it's I think it's a compliment
to both of you yeah I mean he's he's really good I remember when he first came on the scene he was
doing ADCCs he beat a black belt uh first and second round at ADCCs, and he was a blue belt
at the time. That's the
wrestling background for you. You're a good wrestler. You have
good top pressure. You hold people down.
Jiu-jitsu comes easy.
Jiu-jitsu players hate
it. They hate it. They hate wrestlers.
They hate to admit that they
develop quickly. They always just want to
say, that's not jiu-jitsu. That's wrestling.
It doesn't matter what it is. I'm still beating your ass. they develop quickly. They always just want to say, that's not, that's not jujitsu. That's wrestling. You know, it's like,
it doesn't matter what it is. I'm still beating your ass.
When you're pinned down, don't matter.
My kid's jujitsu instructor has told me that, Hey,
very soon you should get the boys into wrestling. And I said, why?
He goes, cause that's where the grid is, man. That's where,
that's where you develop the grit in wrestling do you agree with
that yeah you're never going to do anything harder in your entire life still to this day i'm fighting
mma and don't get me wrong when you get tired and people are throwing punches at you yeah it sucks
but wrestling there's never going to be anything harder that you do in your entire life as long as
you go to a like a wrestling school that has a good wrestling program they know what they're doing the coaches know what they're doing because wrestling practice can be as easy as you go to a wrestling school that has a good wrestling program, they know what they're doing.
The coaches know what they're doing.
Because wrestling practice can be as easy as you make it.
That could be with anything.
But if you're going to the right school, you have the right coach,
the right partner, it's going to be the hardest thing you do in your entire life,
by far.
You were born in Pennsylvania?
Yes.
And where in Pennsylvania?
I was born in Sharon.
I'm from Newcastle, which is about 45 minutes north of Pittsburgh. Yes. And where in Pennsylvania? I was born in Sharon.
I'm from Newcastle, which is about 45 minutes north of Pittsburgh.
Okay.
Tough area?
Tough as in how?
Economically, the schools, the family life.
Yeah, Newcastle.
Newcastle, yeah.
It's in the town. A lot of people that they grow up poor i grew up very poor but uh it's yeah it's it's it's definitely a poor
town uh definitely tough people have it tough growing up there's a lot of projects and stuff
there and uh yeah it's it's run it's pretty run down and are your are your parents still together
my dad passed away five years ago and my mom was in arizona i haven't really spoke to her since
either so how did your dad pass uh he was on his way home from work on his motorcycle one day and
a drunk driver pulled out of a bar and t-boned him at the same
time as he was driving he was going straight on the uh road uh the bar was here drunk driver
pulled out and just team both of them he flew they said 60 to 80 feet off of his bike into a
intersection uh he lived for like two weeks after that he was in the hospital you know they thought
everything was going to be okay just just a lot of broken bones.
But then something went wrong during surgery.
He was on like his fifth or sixth surgery, and then he started getting sepsis and skin slippage and all this other stuff.
So he ended up – his organs started failing, and he passed.
Were you living with him at the time?
I just – honestly, I just moved out because we just got
into like a huge fight about something oh dude yeah yeah it sucked but uh oh dude wow and uh
then that happened you know and usually me and him got gotten fights we were super close we got
in fights a lot you know we were a lot alike, hard-headed.
We'd always get in fights.
Then a couple weeks, we'd get over it.
It was probably right around the time that we were about to start getting over it,
and then that happened.
Then we were forced to get over it because he was in the hospital,
which we would have anyways, but it was just shitty timing.
Do you even remember what you guys were fighting over?
Or was it just another fight?
I honestly don't remember.
Yeah.
We fought about so much stupid shit all the time.
You know what I mean?
Just because, like I said, we were both so hard-headed.
We were so much alike.
I get it from him. someone just said in the comment damn sevan now i gotta root for this guy the rest of my life yeah uh it's kind of like out
of it's so cliche isn't it don't fight with the ones that you love because you never know when
when they're going to be taken from you or maybe it's don't not don't fight with them but like hey you better be careful you never know
when the last second is uh-huh you watch what you say because you never know what the last thing you
say to somebody will be and then every time i hear that story in my head i'm like that doesn't happen
shut up it happens you know luckily luckily we got to hash things up you know beforehand
for that two weeks in the hospital and stuff but uh yeah man it sucks
and you don't have kids no i don't but you but you have an awesome girlfriend
yes i do yeah that's cool congratulations Do you guys live together? Yes, we do.
I want to get to that, like what it's like managing a relationship when you have to be so like, you know, focused.
But so do you feel alone in the world with your mom in Arizona and not talking to her and your dad gone?
No, I mean, it sucks. Like my dad not being around and everything, you know, there's a lot of times where I find myself almost like calling my
dad. So I have his number in my contacts, you know, but, uh, you know, I, I have a lot of good
friends and stuff back home, you know, a handful of good friends that helped me get through that.
And, uh, like growing up just cause me and my mom never really got along, you know, it was always like a bad relationship and my friends and my friend's family always like helped me a lot out
a lot growing up, you know what I mean? So super grateful for them. And, uh, I mean, if it weren't
for them, I'd probably be in a worse place right now. You know what I mean? If I didn't have their
support and everything, and especially after my dad passed, you know,'t for them, I'd probably be in a worse place right now. You know what I mean? If I didn't have their support and everything,
and especially after my dad passed, you know, they were all there still.
So I don't feel alone because I have them.
You know what I mean?
Obviously, they're not down here in Florida with me.
They're all in Pittsburgh.
So, I mean, they were pretty much the only thing that was hard to leave back there.
But, no, I don't feel alone.
And I have Gina here now as well
yeah she she's a really good girlfriend she's supportive of me as well and uh you know she has
her own thing going on too with crossfit and she's trying to make it to the games and everything
and uh she's down here training full-time as well she actually just left for the gym herself no shit no shit do you so well why this is fucking hilarious uh i so dalton i was uh i
worked at crossfitting for uh 15 years i um i was the executive director of their media team
uh and um i in the most uh humble way possible I can say, I don't think that there was,
I mean, I started with the company when there were 300 gyms, I spent every day with the CEO.
I stayed there until there were 15,000 gyms. And I, I think maybe to this day, there's only maybe
three or four or five people in the world who know more than me and the ins and outs of CrossFit.
And in terms of the company and uh and and matt susan
i met because he owns crossfit livermore which is you know 70 miles north of me so that's a trip to
hear that your that your girlfriend is has uh crossfit games aspirations that's hardcore shit
yeah that that's her goal she has wadapalooza coming up wow nice cross she's at crossfit hype over in boca
wow that is that is what a what a thing so okay so she understands
man so you're you kind of found someone you guys don't fuck around there's not a bag of gummies in
your closet you guys know about eating you guys know about sleeping. You're with another person who wants to be a machine.
She doesn't.
I go on these little – you're talking about gummies and shit in the cupboards.
I go on these little stints and shit where I'll go – I'll do two cheat meals, one, two cheat meals a week.
She won't touch any of that.
She won't.
We go out to eat. I'll get a burger, some chicken, Parmesan, pizza, whatever.
You know, on a Friday night she gets salmon or gets a salad or whatever. You know, she's always
sticking to her diet. You know, I, I give myself one or two treats a week, but she doesn't give
any at all. You know? And what does she do? What's her day? Does she have a day job?
any at all you know and what does she do what's her day does she have a day job uh no she does some nutrition stuff and uh then she helped her mom owns a christmas or a christmas she owns an
ice cream store uh-oh in the cranberry area pittsburgh area and uh she helps her out with
like social media and marketing and stuff for that too does your girlfriend have big old forearms did she used to scoop ice cream uh she has big arms
period not just forms but yeah she's the real ice cream and shit yeah those fucking ice cream
scoopers the same people the the the guys who cut meat what are they called what what are
butchers butchers and ice cream scoopers those guys guys, I mean, if you put in the time, you'll look like Popeye.
So tell me about growing up in this family that was back there that helped you.
Is that why you pursued sports as a kid?
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Were you like, okay, this is my way out
or this is the way I can...
Like I had a friend who lived in West Virginia
and they didn't have running water or shower
at his house growing up.
And so he said he knew that if he was good in sports,
the other parents would like him
and that he could go to their house and shower.
I was like, wow, that's fucking... that's the hard way to get a shower.
It definitely wasn't like that for me.
It was just, you know, good friends, you know, and, uh, caring families of theirs, you know,
they, they kind of treated me like I was their own kid.
So that helped out a lot, but yeah, I definitely definitely definitely wanted to play sports my whole entire life you know uh growing up especially growing up poor and like in a like run downtown my town
is definitely not like something to be proud of you know what i mean you know i'm i'm happy for my
my upbringing and everything it made me who i am today but But there's a lot of bad stuff that goes on where I'm from.
And, yeah, man, I just – I've always – my dad always preached to me getting good grades for either athletic scholarship or – I mean, academic scholarship or getting an athletic scholarship.
And I worked hard at both, sports and getting in the classroom.
You know, I graduated high school with a 4.7 GPA.
Wow.
Yeah.
I had academic scholarships all over the place.
And then I also had athletic scholarships for both wrestling and football.
I initially went to Seton Hill because between it was Division II wrestling college, because between my athletic scholarship and my academic scholarship I didn't
have to pay a dime I was actually getting like five hundred dollars back a semester and after
going there me and the coach having to falling out you know I did very well there wrestling I was
like 23 and 4 on the season and I was only like halfway through the season and then I got hurt
tore my meniscus and and really couldn't wrestle.
Me and the coach had a falling out over that specifically.
He thought I was faking an injury at first.
And then next thing you know, I got the MRI, everything.
I wasn't.
And never apologized, nothing.
And not that that affects me at all.
I really don't care.
You know, I don't need an apology.
I'm not the type.
You were wrong.
I was right. Doesn't need to go apology. I'm not you wrong. I was right.
Doesn't need to go any. Hey, Athena. Sorry, I got a little French bulldog that's chewing.
Yeah, so I didn't need an apology or anything. It was just after that, he kind of took things more personal, you know, and every day it was just like we were butting heads going into the gym. We weren't getting along. I was originally supposed to wrestle 197 pounds. I was forced to cut the 184 because our 97 pounder couldn't make 84 after I already beat him in a wrestle
off. It was just one thing after the next. And the relationship just kept getting worse,
kept spiraling downhill. And I wanted to get out of there, you know, and essentially, you know,
I don't want to blame it on anybody else,
but I feel like he made me hate wrestling, you know?
So me and my dad, whenever I was trying to transfer them from there,
I was going to either go wrestle at Clarion,
going to wrestle at Buffalo University and New York,
or by both those are D1, I would have to sit out for a year.
Once I transferred transferred you know
because they both offered me partial scholarships for wrestling as well and I had some football
scholarships and stuff I wanted to do and my dad looked into those as well and Youngstown State was
one of the schools I wanted to go play football and stuff at after i graduated and after me and my dad talked for a while decided to switch to football and long story short that didn't work out got hurt there playing too
nothing wrong with the coaches this time that was just my injuries and uh that's whenever i got in
mma but i always knew i wanted to be in the nfl or fight professional mma i mean if i'm being
honest my goal was always
the ufc you know but i'm with bellator now paying well it's great promotion as well um who knows
what the future holds and everything don't know if you know shit could change tomorrow but um
yeah i was always want to be a professional athlete, you know, didn't want to have to work a nine to five,
didn't want to be stuck in Newcastle.
So I had to find a way out and that was my way.
What's the protocol to talk about you UFC when you're in Bellator?
What, what is the, is there things that's taboo?
You're not supposed to say what you just said,
or you're not supposed to compare the two?
Or it's not like that at all?
No, I don't really think.
I mean, I'm not sure, honestly.
I don't think so.
But, I mean, I'm with a great promotion.
I'm with Bellator.
I'd love to stay with Bellator. The reason I don't know what I said, I don't know what the future holds,
is because I could be cut tomorrow. You never know what's going on. You know what I mean? I'd love
to stay with Bellator. You know, they're, they're doing great behind me doing great, great things.
They're, um, you know, blowing up getting bigger as well. And, uh, I'd love to stay with them,
but like I said, you never know what the future holds, you know, I got to keep winning.
future holds you know i gotta keep winning uh everything gotta i gotta stay on the right path so um who knows but it's a it's a do you know the movie highlander
i think i remember it from talladega nights when freaking the french dude
ricky bobby told the french dude to watch it. I never watched it, but he was like, they were racing at the end.
He's like, by the way, I watched the Highlander. It sucked.
Uh, well, I think it was Sean Connery in it or Mel Gibson.
I can't remember, but basically it's a story about there's,
there's dudes all over the planet. And when you kill a dude,
you get their power and there, and there's,
and then eventually there's only two dudes left and whoever's going to win gets all the power and um i was thinking last
mma especially in your in your in your early years or that's even the first half of your career it's
kind of like um dreams fighting every time you step in a ring with someone, your dreams are fighting that guy's dreams.
And only one guy's dreams move forward.
And I wonder if that's true, if I'm mischaracterizing it.
But it's so intense when you see two guys who are 6-0.
Let's say they have five fights outside of Bellator or UFC that are their pro fights.
And then they have their first fight in Bellator or UFC.
And they're both 6-0 or 1-7- one six and oh and they fight you know the guy who takes the loss is uh
like his whole trajectory has been changed it's like you your dream moves you took his dream from
him i mean it's it is in in if that's true do you guys feel that pressure out there i mean it all
comes down to just one moment yeah i mean for sure i
don't know if you take the whole dream from them but yeah not the whole thing but it definitely
does change the trajectory trajectory for sure you know it whereas like if they won that fight
they were straight in the ufc or or whatever but uh if they lose now they might need four or five more wins. You know what I mean?
Yeah, four or five.
Yeah, you never know.
It's like, for example, my buddy Josh Fram, who fights in Denver, Colorado, he fights for LFA.
And he knocked out like three people in a row, like highlight reel knockouts.
And he was on the verge of going to UFC.
And they had a title fight lined up between him
and a guy named gregory rodriguez and josh is a very good fighter he very well could have won
that fight but everybody knows with mma all it takes is one punch and that's what happened josh
ended up losing gregory got his shot up to the ufc they took him to ufc next literally he i think
he fought maybe three weeks later like like on three weeks notice for UFC.
And that should have been Josh.
You know what I mean?
And then Josh just fought another fight in LFA just a few weeks ago.
So, yeah, October.
And he's probably going to have to get at least another one.
You know what I mean?
So definitely messed up his trajectory at least. I mean, he could already have two fights in where gregory already is already has two fights in ufc but instead he's two fights
in lfa again after that so maybe away away from going to the ufc yeah yeah it's so it's so it's
it's so intense those fights as a fan like you know these two guys or two gals are putting it
just all on the fucking line.
And I always wonder, maybe I shouldn't, but I always wonder, like, what's their backup plan?
You know?
And even Glover who just fought, right?
Like, you know that if he would have lost that fight against Jan, that's like.
That's it.
That's it.
He's getting cut.
That's it.
Yeah.
No, it's for a title shot.
You take his age into account and the fact that he just lost another fight even though he's on a winning streak you know
this this sport takes no prisoners it's ruthless you know what i mean it's
you can be on top of the world one second and next second you're not
do you ever feel bad you're on you're on top of a dude and you're mashing his face
like like there was a dude who was really
fucking good and I'm trying to think
who you fought maybe it was in your third fight
they're all getting mixed up in my head
but he was really good
I want to say you beat him up in the first round
you put him against the
fence
and even the commentary
you're not like oh shit man
the ref needs to stop this.
I'm really hurting this guy.
This was an amateur fight.
It wasn't this guy, even though I appreciate the image, Sousa.
You can keep playing it, Sousa.
It wasn't this guy.
It was a white guy.
He was bald.
Man, he was good, but he just wasn't nearly as good as you.
Was it a fight?
Was it what? Was it a pro fight oh honestly i can't remember because the first bunch of fights i watched years i thought they
were your pro fights and then i got into your pro fights and i'm like oh fuck this is all scrambled
in my head because i'm trying to thank you but it was like that it was a scene like this except he
had his back to the fence and he was on his side and you were mashing him that's's why I picked this one, because when you're talking about feeling bad, you're just absolutely dominating this fight from the get go.
And I can only imagine what it would be like to have just that crush pressure and those punches being thrown.
It's ruthless.
Yeah, I fought a couple, a couple of bald guys.
So it doesn't really.
Sorry, but that doesn't happen all
three of them so it doesn't really narrow it down at all for me i beat up plenty of bald dudes beat
up plenty of bald dudes ah shoot you don't know if it was a pro or uh i i think it was a pro Was it in Bellator's cage?
Oh, buddy.
Dalton, I wish I could tell you.
But either way, is there any fight where you're like, oh, man, this guy doesn't belong in here with me?
This is bad news for this guy.
I hope God's not watching this one.
Yeah, I've definitely felt like that before you know what i mean whereas in a couple where i'm like wow like i i'd hate to be this guy tomorrow you
know what i mean it's all messed up there's there's a guy i fought mark gardner after the fight
he had blood all over his entire face his one eye was swollen shut he had a hematoma on the
side of his head and it was after just one round it was just one round and i seen him after the
fight a couple hours later you know how swelling and everything sets in later it was it looked
horrible but that was post fight i mean have you ever been in there where you're
giving it to the dude and you're like shit the ref got to step in
I mean, have you ever been in there where you're giving it to the dude and you're like, shit, the ref got to step in?
No.
Good.
I'm glad to hear that.
I mean, part of me, like, I mean, I can remember the first time I saw it, I was watching a George Foreman fight.
I was probably like in high school. I can't remember who he's fighting, but he's punching the dude and he's looking looking at the ref, literally telling the ref, hey, you've got to stop this.
And then I've seen it a few times in the UFC.
We had –
He and Donald Cerrone.
Say that again?
Justin Gaethje and Donald Cerrone,
where Justin Gaethje was beating the hell out of Donald Cerrone.
He looked at the ref, and he was like, stop this.
The ref didn't stop, and he kept going.
Then he looked at him again and said, stop this.
I remember that yeah we had uh we had volkanovski on the show a couple weeks ago and
when i was reviewing his fights his first two fights in the ufc man he was fucking hurting this
dude man it was it was it was it was it was nuts it's kind of weird as a fan at that point you realize maybe this is an unhealthy um
uh pastime watching fighting like when you see that shit i mean it is it's pretty it's a pretty
barbaric sport i mean it i think it's too much rules to be barbaric honestly i oh good i would
definitely like less rules if it were me if i were uh i'm looking up the definition of barbaric relating or characters
characteristics of a group of people who are alien to another no it's not the
possessing characteristics no not that one mark by lack of restraint that one works
you want less restraint what What rule would you change?
For MMA, I would.
Biting?
You'd allow biting?
No, absolutely not.
I know.
You know what I mean?
But I would allow, like, knees on the ground.
You know, you can't knee an opponent to the face on the ground
wearing one FC.
You can.
I would definitely change that.
And then I would change the fact that the ref stops the fight so quick.
You know, I think a lot of the time, you know, there's a lot of fans
that are like, oh, that was stopped so late, blah, blah, blah.
The ones that they're usually saying are stopped late
are usually good stoppages in my mind because most fighters go in there,
they want to go out on a shield.
You know what I mean?
There are some pussies that cover up and they're waiting for the ref to stop in because they've had enough.
They feel like they can't do shit.
They feel helpless, so they just cover up and take their beating until the ref stops it.
If you look at boxing, somebody gets knocked down, they get a 10 count.
You know what I mean?
UFC, you get knocked down.
If it's a clean enough knockdown, the person on top might land one punch before the ref dives in. Right. You know what I mean? UFC, you get knocked down. If it's a clean enough knockdown, the person on top might land one punch for the ref dives in.
Right. You know, I mean, give the man a chance to recover. And if he doesn't recover, let him go.
Let him go out cold. You know, let it let it be a legit knockout.
Oh, and I'm being serious because there's I know you I know you are.
What scares me is that what I think my balls shrunk up inside me is that you call dudes pussies in the UFC.
I'd be like, man, he would hate to see – you would hate to be in my head.
Oh, my God. I'd be like the most fragile human being.
I think anyone who goes in there is not a pussy, but there's levels to this shit, obviously.
I mean you get in there. You get in there.
Listen, there's been fights where like people where people are like that should
have been stopped and the person that got rocked and they didn't stop before comes back and wins
the fight yep i've seen it yep there's those chances but then there's also a chance that they
can not get knocked out cold either way it's more entertaining for the for the fans in either way the fighter is
happier with it i promise you know like i said unless they're opposed how about bisbing coming
back and beating getting anderson silva that was nuts yeah you see it like i said you see and that
that was earlier you know what i mean where like nowadays they they stop the fight so quick where
they let it go on a little bit longer back then now
it's just like you know somebody gets knocked down it might sometimes it might even look like a slip
you know like they slipped or they were throwing a kick or or something and as they were throwing
the kick they're already on one leg you know and it's not really a legitimate knockdown but the
person's off balance and you hit them you knock them over you know it's a lot a lot of the time i i feel like i get so mad watching it especially because
herb dean he stops fights early a lot a lot of the time you know and i even i make comments on
ufc's post or mma junkie and then people as soon as I make a comment like that people were like
tearing me to shreds like what are you talking about that's a good that's a good stoppage it's
a good stoppage you know Herb Dean's a fucking great ref I don't know the fuck you're talking
about well he fucked up last weekend did you see what happened last weekend which which fight
I don't it'll take me a second for my old ass brain to remember which fight. But basically what happened is he stopped the fight, and then the guys kept fighting, and he let them keep fighting for a second.
And then the guy – oh, now it was a black guy against a white guy.
I'll look.
But basically he stopped the fight, and say it again it's a cancel culture might
get you just for that comment oh no i'm already canceled it's okay i can say black or white or
i can do whatever i want i can talk about you said black versus white so there you go you said
black versus white so they might come yeah yeah i'm good i'm good i'm i'm already i'm done that's
why i got fired from crossfit that's why I got fired from CrossFit. That's why I got fired from CrossFit. I got canceled. I go to Google. That's why this podcast is killing it. Because finally people can go to a place where it's like, it's not that I'm good. It's just that I'm not, I'm already like, I'm at the bottom. So I can just say stuff. I can be like, wow, that's a beautiful girl. And everyone's like, no, that's sexist say stuff i could be like wow that's a beautiful
girl and everyone's like no that's sexist or i can be like that's a handsome man and
i'm good okay sorry ufc schedule but basically herb stopped the fight and then he it was uh
holloway rodriguez uh yes it was it was ben rothwell oh the guy wasn't even black i got my
fuck i don't see that how fucking you guys see that's how not racist i the guy wasn't even black. I got my fuck. I don't know. That's how fucking you guys see.
That's how not racist I am.
I don't even know my black, white, Chinese or other.
I'm a confused motherfucker.
The guy's name is Marcus Rodrigo de Lima.
I guess that's Brazilian.
It's pays out.
It's my boy.
He turns the ATT with me.
Oh, you know that guy?
Yeah.
So that guy's smart as shit because he fucking knocked out uh ben rothwell herb dean
stopped it and then and then let it keep going and then marcus is like dude you just stopped it
and then he's like oh okay yeah you're right and then he goes in and stops it and i was like wow
that is some fucking sloppy reffing i don't want to hate on herb dean but like like did you stop
the fight or not like you can't i'm not gonna lie those cards those calls are probably hard to make
especially when i'm on you from people that seeing early sausages or that was yes whatever so you put a lot of extra
unnecessary extra pressure on the refs but i think at the end of the day you know they should come
together and form a rule set that makes sense you know across the board you know regardless of who's
reffing regardless of who's fighting
which would be like if he's out he's out if he's not he's still able to fight you know i mean which
is true if you're if you're in a street fight and you're not out cold and you know you're you're
going to be fighting back no matter what even if you're covering up you're waiting for a chance to
you know get a chance to fight back whatever you The fight's not over until somebody's out cold.
You know what I mean?
Nobody's going to step in on a street fight with two freaking savages going at each other like that.
Where if you step in, you might freaking get knocked out yourself.
You know what I mean?
Let them fight until the fight's over.
You had a guy, I have it written here, third fight.
I don't know if it was your pro
fight or amateur fight, but, um, Quentin threw in the towel. Yes. Quentin Schumard, uh, his,
his corner did. And does that piss you off? I mean, uh, it goes to the same thing where I think
they should, but at that point it's in their corner stand, the corner can throw, throw in
the towel whenever they want to do anything about that to right i can't do anything about that the ref can't do anything about that you know and i
was i was whooping that kid's ass back yeah yeah okay you're not like you pussy get out here and
take your fucking fight long bro there's nothing he had no room to breathe yeah so okay you're
you're okay with that he's not a pussy that was just like hey
like that was like it wasn't even his call but that he was in a bad way i was i was fucking him
up in your fight against uh zadarko there was a glove replacement that postponed the fight what
what was going on there i've never seen that in a fight just so people who don't know the fight
they basically said go,
and then the fight was stopped.
Was it you or him who had to have his gloves replaced?
It was me.
I had on the wrong gloves.
That's up to the commission.
You know what I mean?
Because there's pro fights.
The pro gloves and the amateur gloves are different.
And I didn't know the fucking difference.
I'm four fights into my fucking career.
I never even seen a pro glove.
Right.
And long story short,
the difference was is the amateur glove had a fucking thing to cover your thumb,
but they were still the flat faced knuckle pads,
you know,
and still the same thing over the finger.
It wasn't like the puffy sparring gloves.
They were still the same glove.
They just had an extra little thing over the thumb,
you know? So I don't even, they said the difference is it is seven ounces versus four ounces,
which I don't believe.
There's no way that I looked at two gloves.
There may have been an ounce difference if that, you know what I mean?
But they switched it over that.
That was an amateur fight and you were wearing pro gloves.
That was the issue.
Yes.
And that was a huge buzzkill because it took them like 10 minutes to get my gloves off and put the other ones on.
Yeah.
Oh, man.
You still mash the guy.
Oh, yeah.
Sucky's the shitty part about that is I've known him.
I wrestled him in high school.
He was a really good wrestler.
Wrestled in high school.
I beat him in high school wrestling as well.
We were actually both undefeated when we wrestled, too.
I gave him his first loss.
And then we became teammates after that fight.
But, like, we kept in contact after we wrestled in high school.
We wrestled with each other a little bit in college.
And then, I don't know, we just kind of became friends after that.
And then I had to be with my friends.
Who caught that?
And why at the last minute?
As you're walking by, the ref's like, wait a minute, what the fuck is that?
Not the ref, the commission would have did it.
The guy sitting at the side.
And there was one of the commissioners had little man syndrome, right?
He's like super attentive towards everything because he's always pissed off and angry.
Yeah, I completely understand.
Five, five, 155 here.
I totally get it.
Fuck those bitches.
Check that glove.
I exercise some power on you.
He's looking for shit to complain about.
So there's no doubt he's got some power on you. He's looking for shit to complain about.
There's no doubt he's the one who caught it.
I'm totally open to little man syndrome.
Don't forget there's tall man syndrome too.
These are all these woke motherfuckers that are
sensitive about everything because no one picked on you
when you were younger.
What's tall man syndrome?
That's when you're offended by stuff.
When you're easily offended because you weren't picked on as a kid and all the girls liked you.
That's tall man syndrome.
So now you're a grown-ass man and you need gender-neutral bathrooms and you need the right pronoun used for you.
That's tall man syndrome.
Listen, bro.
There is a – I forget the name of the fucking place.
It's like a noodle place, something noodle.
Racist, racist.
name of the fucking place it's like a noodle place something noodle and they have racist they have gender uh gender neutral bathrooms in there bro uh-huh it was so bad i said i'm never going
here ever again and it's not about that it's about like literally like they're changing the
the way things work just because they're offended for one and two. Now it's,
it's okay for a man to go in the bathroom with somebody's daughter.
Not with my daughter.
I know if you have a daughter and you have a problem with this shit, because you have a daughter and you don't want a man going in the bathroom
with your daughter,
you're,
you're the sexist one.
You're the transphobic one.
It's,
it's not even about that.
You just don't,
you have a daughter that you're fucking looking out for. You know i mean and you know men like that yeah men men do not belong
in women's bathrooms not at all any kind of man even a man who thinks he's a woman you still don't
belong even a man who thinks he's a a big bird no you don't you especially you don't belong in
either bathroom i think people people look too far into things, you know.
They read too far into them.
It's not about hating.
No, it's not about hating at all.
It's not about not wanting your daughter to be in it.
It's about not wanting a man to go in the bathroom with your daughter.
Yeah.
Somewhere of privacy.
Yeah.
And men are fucking dirt balls like we we're put on this planet for one reason to fuck and we're trying to mitigate that and be
good people while we fucking attend to this fucking desire to procreate and there's some of us who have
struggle mitigating that and for the better of all of humanity the boys with the penises should be
all p in one room together but this penis thing is fucking wild i'm not not in a bad way but it's fucking wild
and like and then it's got these balls attached to it and the whole fucking thing wants to do
its own thing just let them have their own space and keep them busy don't let them hang out on
street corners did your parents ever tell you that you shouldn't that
they didn't want you to fight your mom or your dad ever expressed that to you or your girlfriend
or your girlfriend no i wouldn't listen to anybody anyways quiet quiet i'm gonna fight
um what i had something else so um tell me um was the you started fighting as an amateur at 205?
Yes, just because I didn't want to cut weight.
I like pizza too much.
And it's crazy because you were so shredded at 205.
It's nuts to think you made it down to 185.
Does that really hurt?
No, honestly, I'm walking around lighter now i only weigh on a good day 200 pounds you know
that's me at 185 yeah that's not shredded talk about people dropping out of fights i
seen that picture and it dropped out of the fight quick wow you're built that's only for
like a night or two though i i get some pizza in me some burgers
milkshakes and you don't see any of those abs or anything anymore do you feel good right there
like are you like okay my brain's working okay my i'm not cramping like at 185 you're you you
not bro i feel i feel perfect i feel phenomenal there yeah that's awesome that's i think it's
perfect weight for me you know i feel great and you look good too like even when i saw kamaro weigh in the other day
um his face looked a little sunken in i haven't seen that from you or you know you especially
used to see it in connor when he would try to go down to 145 you're like oh shit he's got some of
that like famine look on going yeah I get it a little bit.
My face sinks in a little bit,
but nothing beyond like what seems normal.
Right.
Yeah, you look good there.
You look healthy there even after that cut.
That's 205 or that's 185, that one?
That's 185.
Do they make you wear that mask there?
Yeah.
I'm sorry
i think they are too but uh
political shit um there was in one of the press conferences that i saw you wearing american flag
over your shoulder is is that your idea and and why did why were you wearing the american flag i mean yeah that's
my idea uh i couldn't find it before i don't know what i because i i moved recently to florida i
couldn't find it before one of my fights and uh i i walked out to my second and third fight and
then my fourth fight i didn't i think and then my fifth fight i did again which is that one uh you know i'm i'm big in support of the the military my dad was a veteran uh but that's not
the only reason why i mean we wouldn't be where we are today without like all the soldiers that
put their lives on the line for this country you know what i mean and uh i mean part of this
country's i mean this country built on freedom, you know what I mean?
Which arguably is being taken away today. But, you know, that's that's what makes this country great.
And I'm in huge support of our country. And a lot of people nowadays like to say that anybody wears an American flag is racist.
You know what I mean? But you can label me that if you want to.
You know, I know it's true, not true.
All my friends know it's not true.
Anybody that knows me, not true.
I'm going to support the country.
I'm going to support the military.
I'm going to support the police.
I'm going to support everybody
that makes this country a great place.
So I feel like the flag's a good representation of that.
Yeah, in my mind, the flag's a good representation of that yeah in my mind the flag represents um liberty
and and what's cool about this country is is if you want to be racist you can be racist
and if you want to be loving you can be loving if you take one away the the if you if you take
the rights away from the people you'll lose lose all the rights. Meaning no one likes hate speech, but you can't make it illegal and still be for freedom of speech.
You have to let people be free.
It all flies under the banner of being freedom, free.
And if there's a guy down the street who owns a pizza place who's racist, none of us are going to fucking shop there and he's going to go out of business.
It's not our fucking problem yeah but you have to remember that when you start taking rights away from people
eventually your rights will be taken away someone will say hey i don't like people who wear black
t-shirts and you and and and those will be made illegal but that day that's the magic word now
they offended it's like fuck offended if i never were younger parents were like what's the match word you say please
offended i'm offended well that is the truth it is the if it is it is this is truth that being
offended is the opposite of success and it's the opposite of enlightenment it basically just shows
your ego anything that offends you just shows your weakness.
Drop it.
Quit it.
Stop it.
And like you said, we have freedom to do anything in this country,
and that goes for everybody.
I feel like a lot of the problems in the world nowadays
and most of the political topics are focused on white men
and us being
white man white men it's of course people are gonna be like of course you feel that way blah
blah blah and we're gonna be targeted at some more but if we spill the truth we're labeled as
racist sexist homophobic whatever but at the end of the day i feel like we get blamed for almost
anything which is like growing up,
you know,
people forget how people grew up.
When I grew up,
I grew up in Newcastle,
Pennsylvania and,
uh,
you know,
half the population is white,
half the population is black.
It's pretty,
I want to say at least from,
I don't know the numbers for sure.
Somebody could probably pull up numbers and fucking rip me a new asshole.
You know what I mean?
But from my own experience,
from people I hung out with, the people I was surrounded with every day, it's pretty half and half. you know what i mean but from my own experience from people i hung out with the people i was surrounded with every day it's pretty half and half you know
what i mean and i grew up experienced a lot of racism and people are going to be like this isn't
racist whatever it's not this doesn't exist because i've heard it all before you know what i mean but
growing up as a white kid in newcastle where i at least the part where I was living at, where I would go to the North Hill basketball courts and I'd be the only
white person there.
Cause I had two or three black friends I was hanging out with and we,
they'd be like, let's go play basketball. I'm like, okay, let's go.
And then I get there.
And then all the people that are already there, like, who's this white boy,
you know, white boy, this white boy, that I had to get into.
It's a point where like, they weren't letting me play basketball. people are like oh you're white you can't play basketball you know you're
not good racist racist true racist true racist but uh it wasn't even about that it was about the fact
that like they one they wanted me to prove myself because i was white two i you know many times i've
had i've gotten a fight down there because i was white. Two, you know how many times I've gotten a fight down there
because I was white? People were like, somebody get this white boy out of here, blah, blah, blah.
I got jumped. I've gotten fights down there, you know what I mean, all the time just because I was
white. And those people down there admitted it wasn't a topic of what the fights were about they would literally tell you at
the time this was 12 13 years ago they would literally tell you it's like i don't like you
because you're white you know it was like at the time they were they were okay with saying that you
know what i mean and they're probably still okay with saying it oh they're totally okay with saying
that i grew up in the same i grew up a lot in the same way in high school yep if i tell somebody
that nowadays if i put that out there and say that people are going to call me a fucking liar and people are going to say I have white privilege and also shit.
And it's like, I didn't grow up privileged.
I grew up poor.
I grew up very poor.
You know, I had to wash.
And you were harassed by the police.
Whenever the fucking washer washer broke and hang drying.
Yeah.
Dry was broke too.
You know, I ramen noodles every freaking day
during the summer you know it's like and i got free school lunch you know i everything
everybody else got you know i wore the same three pairs of clothes to school every single day
wore the same pair of shoes two three years in a row you know i i didn't grow up privileged at all
and like people like because i'm white and because I'm doing well for myself now, they automatically assume I'm privileged.
And I grew up well.
It's not how it is.
Yep.
I used to get pulled over by the police all the time as a kid.
Anytime I hear these stories about how cops are harassing black people, I'm like, dude, I could tell you a thousand stories where cops did that to me.
Cops are harassing black people.
I'm like, dude, I could tell you a thousand stories where cops did that to me.
And I have a thousand stories where I'm at a concert with my girlfriend and she's black.
And the black dudes come up to me and tell me if they see me put my arm around her, they'll fucking kill me.
I've been in a line at McDonald's and they'd be like, hey, go outside and stay out there until we're done ordering.
And you know what? My friends and I were just used to it.
We didn't even care.
That was just the way it was growing up. And, and to tell you the truth,
those words of like thoughts of racism and any of that never even entered my mind. I just thought,
Hey, this is what it's like growing up as a young man. Um, but I, I, I couldn't agree with you more.
What it is is there are these, there are these, there are these white people out there and black people, but let's focus on the white people. There are these white people out there and black people, but let's focus on white people. There are these white people out there who are racist
and feel guilty for being racist. And so they want to point it. And they're the minority.
And they want to point at the rest of white people thinking that
all white people think like that. We fucking don't. Fuck off. And for black people
who are playing the fucking victim mindset, you need to fuck off too. I think Kanye was saying it
recently. You better stop fucking thinking about black history month and start thinking
about fucking black future yeah it's fucking it's it's absolutely a waste of time it's what keeps it
alive it's what keeps it alive and and i mean on top of that there are a lot of like shitty people
there are a lot of bad cops sure a ton a ton of good ones though too right a lot a lot a lot of like shitty people there are a lot of bad cops sure a ton a ton of good ones though too
right a lot a lot of a lot of good cops but there's there's definitely where like the part
of part of what's being said is true you know i mean a lot of exaggerated a part of it's true
like people gotta like acknowledge that part of it is true i've seen i've seen it before but it's
happened to me like i said when i was younger but a lot of time cops are just fucking rude and fucking dickheads to
kids you know what i mean but then when you're an adult there's some cops that like if you're black
right away they start treating you like shit because you're black you know i mean where there
might be the other 85 percent of cops just treat everybody like shit. And you might have 10,
five,
10% of cops that are actually fucking nice and try to do their job while
coming across as a nice guy,
just doing it professionally.
But you,
like I said,
you got the,
the cops that are racist.
And anytime they see an opportunity to treat a black person like shit,
they will.
And then you have the,
the cops that
treat literally everybody like a piece of shit but it only gets um publicized whenever it's black
person you know i mean man just stay away from cops they're like bees let them do their fucking
job you know like don't mess with the flower when the bee's in it hey did you end up getting a blue
check mark nope not yet still they don't they don't have someone at bellator who just is like
okay this is our guy and they call and they do but like uh that like last time that i said something
about they're like all right we got a long line of people that have been waiting for it and we're
putting it in for this person and that person.
It's always something else.
You know what I mean?
I just figured I'm like by the time that it gets around to me, Instagram will just verify me by then.
So, you know, it's interesting about it.
You know, it's interesting about the talk we just had is I don't think most people in your position would talk about black or white or gender or not gender.
There's like this or the American flag.
And that's kind of what they want, regardless of like whether you agree with me or you agree with Dalton or don't agree.
The thing is, is that the discourse needs to be had and people just can't be scared.
And that's that's what's happening.
There's this bullying coming from the woke crowd that wants us to be scared to even talk about it.
And it's like that that's not going to fly. The problem is the woke crowd and cancel culture and everything it's not
anybody else you know we could have this conversation civilly without anybody getting
offended about it right yeah like for me um i won't be silenced i'm gonna tell you like what
i believe in whether you agree with me or not it doesn't make it right or wrong. You know, everybody has different opinions, but at the end of the day, I'm not going to change
my opinion for anybody else. I've seen it. I've experienced it myself. Yeah. Your experiences
might be different than mine, but I know what I've experienced. And at the end of the day,
it's all about perspective. So if people can't understand that, then you're never going to get
through to them in the first place. So there's no point in having a conversation with them yeah you can't complain a conversation
with hate there was nothing hateful said right an open conversation all i talked about was my
childhood what i experienced yeah that that's pretty much about it um at the end of one of
your fights i saw um and then and then the video cuts off you say you
want to fight dylan danis did i hear that right yeah did you have a run-in with him somewhere or
on on the internet that something happened where you're like this guy needs a foot in his ass
no i just never really liked him so i was just trying to call him out trying to build up a fight
you know what i mean and he's too small for you though isn't he so he's a welterweight but he's never fought at welterweight he's always fought
at catch weights of 175 you know what i mean so in my opinion until you make the 170 pound limit
170 and under so the way it is 155 is lightweight 156 you get a one pound allowance so 156.1 all
the way up to 171 is welterweight.
Right.
No matter where you weigh in at that range, that's what weight you are. So
171.1 all the way up to 186.0 is middleweight. So he's a, he's a middleweight until he makes that
welterweight limit. And even at that point, you know, he's talking like he's Conor McGregor,
Conor McGregor jumps up weight classes, jump up 10 pounds. Youcgregor jumps up weight classes jump up 10 pounds you've
been weighing in at 175 jump up 10 pounds to fight me you know what i mean i don't think he wants any
of you ma'am he definitely doesn't bro i think you're a little too much uh um uh i'm gonna say
it man for him yeah you're just i mean you're the bull and i mean, you're a fucking bull. He's not so much a bull.
Yeah.
I mean, I don't mean to disrespectful to him, but you just have a whole different thing going.
Yeah.
He at the time it made sense, you know, and he wasn't saying anything back.
He wasn't we were under the same management.
You know, he didn't want the fight.
And then now just recently he started saying shit back
you know i mean where he started he started going back and forth on instagram with me
but uh that's just as a recent and nothing's gonna come of it he's just gonna be a troll
like he always is he's gonna say he can beat people's ass and then he doesn't do anything
about it you know who is your management uh Uh, sucker punch. Oh, okay.
I did see that. How is that? How, how, how does, uh, um, do you choose them or do they choose you?
Uh, I mean, I choose them, but I, so I was with a different management before and long story short,
uh, my manager, I mean, not so much the management company, but my manager himself wasn't really
doing much. And I met Brian about a year ago, maybe a little bit longer, a year,
year and a couple of months. It was after, it was after my fight with Ty Gorder and I was with
another company. He didn't say anything about trying to, like, he didn't try to coach me.
He didn't say anything about managing me we just bullshit and have normal conversations just like two bros you know what i mean
and where at the gym no this was that uh mohegan sign at one of my fights okay and uh then i seen
him at my next fight because he was cornering somebody else on the card he had another fighter
on the card so we we talked then we bullshitted again then. And then he came down to American Top Team because Rose was doing a seminar somewhere in southern Florida.
So he stopped by because he has a couple of fighters at American Top Team, Sabah being one of them.
And when he was there, bullshitted him again.
And he always just seemed like a super genuine dude.
He seemed like he was doing great things for Sabah.
he always just seemed like a super genuine dude. He seemed like he was doing great things for us,
a ball.
And,
uh,
you know,
he's never like tried to be a snake or,
uh,
really doing anything grimy,
like towards like poaching me or from my manager or anything.
So after I left my manager,
that's when I decided to hit him up and,
uh,
ask if he would manage me,
you know what I mean?
Because I felt like that was the best move and
i felt like he was the best best person for me do you need a manager if you're going to be in
the fight game i mean it's not a necessity but it's a smart thing to do you know because
if you don't have a manager promotions are going to take advantage of you both negotiators
negotiating with money and with opponents you know they're just going to throw you
to the wolves and it's not about whether you can beat them or not it's just about you can't keep
having wars over and over again you know i mean where it's like you have a three-round war with
this person you win you have three round with war with this person you win against them too and then
you keep doing that fight after fight your career is gonna be eight fights long you know what i mean and it's all about picking the correct fights excitement wise you know you
don't want to you don't want to hurt your stock by fighting somebody that's going to be boring
and it's going to wrestle the entire time and it's not going to be any any action whatsoever
and at the same time you don't want to fight somebody that like you see it in heavyweight
fights all the time like derrick le Lewis. He has knockout power.
But how many strikes does he throw in a fight?
You don't want to fight somebody like that who's just going to be super reserved.
And, yeah, you could beat him, but it's going to be a boring fight.
You want to gain fans.
So it's about taking the correct fights, not for skill-wise,
but for building your career.
You know what I mean?
And then sponsorships and everything else
is it's, it's, they're pretty important. Uh, like Holloway just had his sixth 25 minute fight.
Yeah. See, that's stupid. That's gnarly, right? You know, but he's, he's at the top. So he's,
they're going to pretty much at that point, UFC makes the fights that make sense you know what I mean there's there's no way around it
and uh I mean they're exciting fights you know so I mean that's that's fine they're five round wars
but yeah they're exciting fights you know it but if he were to fight somebody like uh Khabib
Khabib's just gonna take him down and hold him down the entire time now granted Khabib's just going to take him down and hold him down the entire time. Now, granted, Khabib has finishing abilities,
but there's been multiple fights where Khabib just takes somebody down,
holds him down, doesn't really ground and pound him much,
doesn't really do anything.
He just holds him down.
That's a boring fight.
That's something that when you talk over your manager,
it's like you're trying to build your stock.
You want people to see your talent.
You want people to see how excited of a fighter you are.
You don't want to fight somebody that's – granted, there's going to be points in time where you have to do it. But if you do three boring fights in a row, nobody's going to watch you. Right. You know what I mean? Fight that dude. Whenever you have a bunch of fans and everything, everybody following you already.
So is there is there is there like a chip on your shoulder and actually trying to grind or is there something you use in your day to day life to keep pushing you through?
Like, hey, I am not going back to shit.
I wrote it down here.
I'm not going back to Sharon or that fucking teacher in the fifth grade said that I'll never make anything myself. I'll fucking show you.
Is there, or
you're trying to win your, your girlfriend's love. Is there something that's like your,
a pathology you have, like some sort of like psychological thing you keep compartmentalized
that you circle around to, to get you up and go hard every day?
Just honestly, for myself, I don't do this for anybody else. I don't try to impress
anybody else. It's not about trying to impress girls. It's not about trying to impress my
friends or, or attention at the end of the day. It's just, I love doing this, you know, and I,
everything I do, I'm all in, you know, I'm not going to do this if I just want to be one of the
best. I want to do this because I want to be the best and I have a long way to go. You know what I mean? There's a lot of shit I got to work on and I'm nowhere near
my full potential. I'm nowhere near as good as I want to be, you know, and I'm far, I want to go
down as one of literally one of the greatest of all time, not one of the greatest right now.
Like I want to be in talks with one of the greatest of all time and I got a long way to go,
you know, and every morning I wake up and I know that.
So it's like, what am I going to go to the gym and do today to get closer to that? Yeah. I'm
five and up. Yeah. I've never lost a fight, but that doesn't make me the greatest ever. I still
make mistakes in the gym. You know, I still, uh, I don't win every round. Like they say,
Khabib does, you know what I mean? I lose some rounds in the gym. You know, I, I, I want to get to the point where
I'm the best at everything, you know, and it's highly unlikely that'll ever happen,
but it's something to strive for and something to work towards every single day.
Is it, do you, and do you treat your life like that to your lifestyle? Like, hey, I'm no matter what I'm fucking going to bed or I'm not going to eat that or is your whole life centered around that? Are you constantly tweaking or or, you know, do you train every day? Do you miss days? Are you like, oh, I got to go to the DMV today? That's more important. Or is it just you're really on that path no i'm on that path it's
like i i eat sleep and train it you know i mean i live it i um like i said i have one cheat meal
maybe two cheat meals a week but those are one a cheat meal i feel is essential to your diet and
essential to losing weight for one and two it's a treat treat for me. You know, I need that in my life to stay happy, but I'm eating clean 99% of the week. Uh, I, I sleep nine, eight, nine hours every single night.
You know, I, uh, I've never drank alcohol a day in my life. I've never done any drugs. I never
smoked weed. I never done anything. And these are all things. Wow. Yeah. I never done any of that.
You're square as shit. Yeah. I've never, never even had a sip alcohol never smoked weed never did any drugs nothing
never even you aren't missing shit you never chewed tobacco no damn you are a good dude
fuck your parents wet dream that's awesome yeah so i never did any of that. And that's all pretty much just for the purpose of trying to attain my goals and be the best I possibly could be.
And at the end of the day, if I don't achieve it, I know I did everything possible to do so.
I'm not going to be saying, what if?
What if I wouldn't have done this?
What if I would have done this?
I don't want to be saying what if.
So everything I do is revolved around this recovery training uh sleep diet you know
like drugs all that shit everything is uh dialed in with me damn you're good how did you meet your girlfriend uh we honestly it's when when i say i don't drink
this is the funny part because i never get cars but right after covid uh like everything opened
up in covid like this was like so covid shut everything down in march they started to open
everything up again the end of may before they shut everything down again uh me and a couple
of my friends that i train with decided to go to this place called the bamboo bar because they have like uh uh sand beach in the
back where you play volleyball and like uh beer pong but it's like with lifestyle it's like
volleyballs and trash cans okay so we went there and i went just to hang out i was being the dd
and she was there with her friends so So that's how I met her.
Wow.
And, and, and, and did you know you liked her?
Like, did you know it was going to be, how long ago was that?
A year and a half, maybe.
And did you know how, when did you know like, oh man, this is the, this is a keeper.
I don't know.
Soon after.
You got to call my therapist now, bro.
Here's the part I'm tripping on.
You're 26.
Yeah.
So if you're at 26,
it's like that age where your girlfriend
shits to you like,
oh, you're looking at that other girl,
or are you cheating on me,
or who texts you,
and you're doing maybe that shit to her like i just can't see how the that mating game and those insecurities have any
and and obviously maybe you don't have those but i don't see how those have any place
with a professional athlete like do you know what i mean it's it seems like such an energy drain like wouldn't
it be better just to be a monk and be like hey i don't i'm not into girls until i'm 40
i've been in rice you know it affects you mentally and it you just you literally when
i say energy drain you literally wake up the next day underslept you yeah stressed out stress stress affects your recovery like i wear a whoop now i'm sure
you you're uh familiar with it and it will be your rest and heart rate all that now they're
coming up with a 4.0 it shows your uh your body temperature blood oxygen level all that um like
whenever you're stressed out your hrv goes way down and your rest and heart rate sometimes is spiked. It literally affects your body internally and not just your mind.
Your mind's off.
You're not focused, but it's also affecting the way your body's performing.
And then you just never want to be around that.
So you're coming home from practice or something or whether it would be class
back then or college or whatever.
And you just want some peace and quiet or to hang out with your friends or
something.
And you're coming home and dealing with that,
you know?
And then it's like,
you can never escape it.
So now I'm,
I don't deal with that at all now.
So she doesn't ever,
she doesn't ever really give me a problem about any of that.
So,
but she's a girl.
Oh God,
I'm going to get fucked up here.
Can I get double canceled?
But she's a girl.
She got to have her menses every month and she got to get like crazy once a
month.
Doesn't she?
Like,
like,
like you're still with the girl.
No,
no,
no,
no,
honestly.
And I'm not a dude that's just trying to hide relationship problems it really
doesn't happen yeah she sounds like an asset she's that she has value to you in the relationship
rather than a liability and your drain suck yeah i just think that that this is to both men and
women out there if you are going to date someone who is singularly focused and is like a professional
athlete you have to like tuck away all your insecurities so like let's say i was trying to
become the world's greatest fighter and you're accusing me of cheating on you if you're my
girlfriend either need to keep that to your fucking self or just accept the fact that i'm
cheating on you like i am who i am and i'm the train going down this path. This isn't fucking 90210.
This isn't the fucking bachelor.
This is like,
like there's a special,
it takes a special breed. I think to deal with,
to be a supporting character in a professional athlete's life,
you guys are not normal.
You're not like greatness is not normal.
Like be like all the girls in the world could see Dalton and be like,
he's so handsome.
He has this amazing body. He's such a great fighter. me tell you like but he's not it's not it's
like the same thing with the ferrari you think it's cool until you need an oil change and you
have to send your car away to italy for two months and it costs 80 000 bucks like that's how adult
like i'm getting these people aren't normal there's am i right or no you're just a normal
dude that eats burgers no you're 100 right you're right. You're spot on. And I've never seen it, heard anybody else say it besides like another fighter.
It's it's not something that many people understand. You know, if I if I were dealing with that, I I'm like I said, I'm focused on my career.
So if I were dealing with that, I just trust me, I would no longer be dealing with it.
I just trust me I would no longer be dealing with it yeah if you want to be with greatness you have to understand that greatness is going to do what it's going to do and if you you can't you
don't be the person to try to stop it it's a huge fucking mistake that's not what greatness wants
you can just I've been around really really great overachieving people and you've got to just be
just go along for the ride and enjoy it.
Get over your fucking self.
And I would see fucking people who couldn't do it just get trampled.
And it's like, hey, man, in the end, you're just missing out.
It's awesome.
It's awesome being a supporting cast of great people.
It is awesome.
It's like going to a good firework show.
Newcastle is good for fireworks firework capital of the world
one thing that's good for where I'm coming from
did you ever have any bad
like Roman candle fights
or any M-80 go off in your hand
or fucking
is your hearing all fucked up
no
I was pretty responsible as a kid
of course you didn't drink and do fireworks
when i looked up some stuff on new castle uh new castle pennsylvania literally says
world and firework it literally says it's also been rated the worst place to live in pennsylvania
uh yep literally i told you yeah 11th highest unemployment rate like crazy yeah a lot of a lot of people fake
stories and shit just to try and gain fans and all that like that's i i could say we would we
would need a whole podcast just to talk about anything that went on in my life and just about
that growing up in that town period yeah even be able to talk about any
fighting or anything else like if we wanted to literally talk about that story it would have to
be just that okay time right hey will you make a deal with me then or at least a deal with me
will you entertain the proposal that after your next fight you come back on and we talk about
your upbringing we talk about about newcastle yeah let's do it i'd love to do that yeah that'd be awesome uh thanks for the hour
and 40 minutes of your time this guy dylan vowel gave the show 40 bucks what this dude just i
appreciate the hell out of you guys getting these awesome up-and-coming fighters on can't wait to
see them at the top me neither neither, Dylan. Uh, anyway,
dude, thank you so much for coming on. Um, I got you in my Google alerts, so I'm tracking any new
stories on you. Um, I'm excited to hear about your, uh, curious who you're going to fight next.
I hope it happens, uh, sooner than later. And, um, and we'll get as well. Appreciate your time.