Dana White: UFC, Fighting, Khabib, Conor, Tyson, Ali, Rogan, Elon & Zuck | Lex Fridman Podcast #421
- Khabib beat Conor, Putin was on FaceTime before he even made it to the locker room. Trump, sitting president, ex-president, watching all the fights, calling, wants to talk about the fights. Valentina Shevchenko,
every time she goes home, she meets with the
president of the country. The list goes on and on and on. The most powerful, Elon Musk, Zuckerberg. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. The most powerful people in the world are all obsessed with fighting. - The following is a
conversation with Dana White, the president of the UFC, a mixed martial arts organization that revolutionized the art, the sport, and the business of fighting. And Dana is truly the
mastermind behind the UFC. This is the "Lex Fridman Podcast." To support it, please
check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here's Dana White. Do you remember when you
saw your first fight? - I think so. I remember being at my
grandmother's house, and I think it was an Ali fight, and all my uncles were going
crazy during the fight, and there was just this buzz
and this energy in the house that I liked at a very young age, and I'm pretty sure
that was my first fight. - Ali was something special. - Yeah, incredible. I mean, when you look around, not just here in the
office, but at my house, Ali and Tyson are everywhere. - Would you put Ali as the
greatest of all time, boxing? - Well, I would put Ali as the greatest of all time human being. I mean, when you, it's easy as a fight fan to
focus on him as a fighter, but when you focus on him as a human, and you think about what he
meant at that time and place, the things he said, the
poems he came up with, you know, just the overall
brilliance of Muhammad Ali, the guts, the guts to have
the strength mentally, physically, and emotionally
to go against the grain at the time that he did it. It was a very dangerous time
for him to be who he was. Yet, because of how smart he was, and because of his personality, and how if you sat down with him, you could be the biggest
racist on the planet. It's hard to get in a room
with Ali and not like Ali. - Yeah, he's all love, humor, all of it. - 100%. - And had the guts in the ring, and the guts to take a stand. - 100%.
- When it was hard. - He might be one of the
all time greatest humans. You know what I mean? Just an impactful, powerful human being who happened to be a great boxer. - And sometimes the right moment meets the great human
being, that's important. - I agree with you. And he was the right
guy in the right place at the right time. And he's also a guy who used his platform for all the right things. - So that might've been your first fight, but when did you fall
in love with fighting? The art of it, the science of it? - Yeah, I would say I
really fell in love with it. So I was a senior. It was 1987, and Hagler-Leonard happened. And I watched that fight, and I taped it. And I watched that fight
like a million times. I was a huge, huge Hagler fan. And I like Sugar Ray Leonard too, but I was a huge Hagler fan. And I just remember, I watched
that fight a million times because I was pissed off, and I felt like Hagler
got robbed in the fight. You know what I mean? But that was really what made me start to love the sport of boxing. - The battle of it, like-
- Yeah, I was 17. And then after that,
USA's Tuesday Night Fights came out on television, it
was on every Tuesday night, religiously, never missed
Tuesday Night Fights. I was there, watched all those fights. And a lot of the things
you see in the UFC, not necessarily just the production, but I would say the feel and the style and all those things
are all things that I, things that I loved about boxing and things that I hated about boxing, right down to the commentary. - You loved and hated?
- Hated, yeah. - [Lex] Hated the commentary. - Certain things that
I loved about boxing, I incorporated into the UFC. Things that I hated about boxing, I made sure that the UFC
stayed far away from. I think, I can't stand Larry Merchant. Can't stand Larry Merchant. And I used to watch HBO
Boxing and mute the commentary so that I didn't have to listen to them. Lampley too, you would spend
this money for the pay-per-view to watch these people that you idolized, to hear these idiots rip 'em apart while the fight was happening. - Oh, they were criticizing.
- Yeah, 100%. - I've gotten used to the UFC, so I don't, I'm trying
to remember looking back. - It was bad.
- It was bad? - It was really bad. - But the sweet science, the art of boxing was beautiful still. Like the stories they told.
- 100%. I wanna do this with you right now. Hey, will you bring your
cell phone over here and pull up YouTube? I wanna do this for you so
that you can understand this and understand where I was coming from. - For the commentary.
- Yeah, at this point in time. - I have all good memories. You're gonna ruin it for me. - Yeah, no, there are
nothing but great memories about boxing, but the presentation
and a lot of the things, but it's how fucking weird is it that I even cared about this
shit at that point in my life, and that time in my life? Like what impact could
I possibly have on it? So think about Tyson and how
much everybody loved Tyson at the time, and listen to
this, listen to this entrance. - [Announcer] Of the former
undisputed heavyweight champion, and here he comes, Mike Tyson. As he heads toward the same ring, he made his disgraceful
exit in June of '96. - Wow. One of the baddest motherfucking
walk-ins of all time, by the way. So what this guy should be doing, and this is one of the Albert brothers. Shut the fuck up. Stay out of the way. - [Lex] Maybe build him up. - Or that, or don't say anything. Just let the fans, that's
why we blocked him. That's why we paid our money. - You don't need to say anything. - [Announcer] Scary, imposing music. Will he be able to intimidate
his opponent tonight? Will it even matter? I really thought there'd
be more of an explosion by the crowd here, but very mixed. Even with a win tonight,
no matter how one started, he will still have his detractors. Following the two fights with Holyfield, his stock plummeted, the
pundits came down hard, feeling they were duped. That is knockouts for
over second-rate fighters. Now the crowd erupts more
as he gets into the ring. But it's certainly nothing overwhelming. - What a dick. You're right. I don't remember that. You're right. - Imagine, you paid your
money to watch Mike Tyson, and you gotta listen to
these fucking jerk-offs talk shit about him the whole way to the. First of all, one of the
coolest walk-ins ever. You know, first time
anybody had heard DMX. - Yeah, that's right. - He's walking into some
scary, imposing music. Will it even matter? You know, it's just
all that kind of stuff. I literally used to analyze
every ounce of the production that would happen on television. And at a time when I didn't
even know why I was doing it, but-
- But it's in there somewhere. Like you were thinking about it. - Right? So yeah, I hated HBO commentary. I thought, you know, at the time, HBO boxing was obviously the
gold standard for, you know, but when you really think about boxing at that time, their production, the only thing that changed
over 30 years was like HD. I mean, even the commentators
were the same for 30 years. And then you had the time
when Larry Merchant gets up and literally starts fighting
with Floyd Mayweather during the interview and says, "If I was 30 years younger,
I'd kick your ass right now." - Oh yeah, I remember that, yeah. - I mean, these are the interviews that we have to listen to when we're trying to watch a boxing match. - The level of boxing was good. - Think about a fighter. Fighter has been gone for months, away from their families
and away from everything, training, cutting weight, sparring. Then they go in and they
have to fight that night and then you have to, you know, if you watch your fight back, you gotta listen to this
bullshit from these guys and then you get interviewed
and your interview is this. It's just- - And it's not just about
the pay-per-view money. It's about like, these
are legends of humanity. Like we should celebrate the highest form of like accomplishment. 'Cause these are like Mike Tyson. - So you know who goes in
there and interviews fighters? Joe Rogan. Who has trained and done everything and has the utmost respect for
the sport and the athletes. Or you got like Daniel Cormier, who was a former world champion himself and has actually been
through it, done it, knows. And those are the type of
people that we put in the booth, people that are actually
experienced in it. Not these people who've
never been in a fight in their fucking life. - Yeah, but they're also both DC and Rogan are like big kids. They love it, they really love it. - Well, everybody does. I mean, if you look
at, it's the difference between our commentary and what
I feel their commentary was. We don't hire paid talking heads. We hire people that have
actually been in it, done it, love it and are super
passionate about the sport. And I would say that none of them that ever covered the
sport back then were. I don't know if that was Marv Albert or what Albert brother that was, but he sounded like he's a
fan of the sport or anyway. You got me on this and once I
get on this, I lose my mind. - Maybe we wouldn't have a UFC if they didn't fuck it
up so bad for the Tyson. - It would be different. You're not wrong, you're not wrong. It would be different. There's no doubt about it. All those experiences
growing up being a boxing fan helped create what the UFC is today. - You know, it's interesting 'cause humans have been
fighting for millennia and it seems like with the UFC, the rate of innovation is just insane. In these last three decades, it seems like we've discovered
how to do unarmed combat faster and better than at
any time in human history. - I agree with you 100%. The first UFC happened in 1993. Martial art versus martial art. And now over the last 30 years, martial arts has evolved faster
than, you know what I mean? And like you just said,
combat sports, fighting, whatever you wanna call it, martial arts, it has evolved so much in 30 years, more than the last 300 years. - What did you think when
you saw UFC 1 with Royce? - I remember everybody talking that this fight was gonna happen and there was gonna be no
rules and all this other stuff and we're like, there's
no way that's bullshit. And then we ended up at
some guy's house that night in Boston and watching
it and it was happening and it was fun and it was
exciting and everything else. And then I sort of fell off after that. The first one I watched, but
I was too big of a boxing fan. Plus once grappling started taking over and you know, by grappling
meaning the wrestling and the jujitsu guys had just laid there, you know, I completely lost interest. It's funny that I'm
having this conversation with you right now because last night, I was out last night with my friends and we were talking about, 'cause one of my buddies
who's a host here in town just did jujitsu for the
first time yesterday. And he was like-
- Did he get his ass kicked? - Yeah, yeah, but when you first go in, our first jujitsu lesson, me, Lorenzo and Frank was with John Lewis. And I remember thinking, holy shit, I can't believe that I'm,
you know, 28 years old and this is the first time
I'm experiencing this, that another human being could
do this to me on the ground. It is such an eye-opening,
mind-blowing experience when you do it for the first time and then you become
completely addicted to it. And we were training
three, four days a week, trying to kill each other
and me and the Fertittas and that's how we fell
in love with the sport. I think that first time
that you do jujitsu, it's like the red pill and
the blue pill in The Matrix. Do you wanna believe that this
is the world that you live in or do you wanna see what
the real world looks like? - It's just as a real red pill. - It really is. - You realize, holy shit, all that shit talking I've been doing about me being a badass,
you realize you're not. You get dominated by another
human being, you realize no. And I mean dominate. I mean completely treat you
like you're a little kid. And then we had the opportunity to roll with a lot of different guys at the time because of the whatever. And we don't have a
good relationship at all but I'll tell you this, Frank
Shamrock came in one day and Frank Shamrock had me in side control. The pressure that this guy
put on my chest made me tap. Felt like there was a car on my chest and with zero effort from him. It was absolutely effortless. And when you train with
somebody that's at such a level when you're not, it is the most humbling, mind-blowing experience you
can have especially as a man but as a human being. - Do you remember, just for fun, do you remember what your
go-to submission was? - Yeah, so when we first started
out and started doing it, I had a pretty good
guillotine in the beginning so I'd catch a lot of
people in guillotines and- - So you're okay being on bottom? So like your guard is pretty good? - Yeah, I was okay with the bottom. Yeah, I was okay with being on bottom. I was comfortable there. But you know what I never liked? I never liked gi. Like we started fucking around
with a gi in the beginning. That's how we started. And then once I took the gi off, I felt like I had no submissions 'cause I couldn't grab onto anything. So after that, I went all no gi and I never wanted to wear a gi. - And it's fascinating 'cause
no gi has become big now and there's a lot of interesting people. I got trained with Gordon Ryan and the level there is just fascinating. It's become like the science and it looks like fighting now. It looks more like fighting as opposed to with the gi, sometimes it doesn't
quite look like fighting. And I feel like it's transferable to actual MMA fighting, no gi stuff. - Or street. - Street, yeah.
- Right? I mean, if you start
off in your first year, you're in a gi, man, you better hope guy's got like winter
jackets on or something if something happens in the street 'cause in my opinion, I know all the jujitsu fucking people are gonna go crazy over this, but in my opinion, no gi
is way better than gi. - That's why I also do judo. So in the street scenario, if you're comfortable on the feet and you can clinch and you can throw, because most of us wear clothing, especially in Boston in the winter. - Right, exactly. - So if you're comfortable on the feet, you could still do well there. The problem with jujitsu is most people are not
comfortable on the feet, the sport of jujitsu. Most people kinda wanna get to the ground as quickly as possible. So what'd you think of Royce at that time? Like in the early, like what, 'cause it blew a lot of people's minds that there's like more to this puzzle. - 100%, and the fact that you had like these guys like Ken Shamrock that were jacked. And you had all these wrestlers or the big, massive guys that they had in the
different weight classes and this skinny little dude like Royce was out there beating everybody. I mean, if you look at the
way the Gracies played that, you couldn't have a better advertisement for Gracie jujitsu at the time. - But also like for MMA, because there's just a lot
of surprising elements. A lot of people's prediction was wrong. - Right.
- They didn't think the skinny guy would win and they're like, "Oh shit,
there's more to this." - What's the real beautiful
thing about jujitsu? It's like when you talk about, if you wanted to get your
daughter into a martial art, should I put my daughter into karate or should I put her into this? You put your daughter into jujitsu 100% because it's not about size or strength, it's about technique. And you give your daughter
a bunch of jujitsu and a little bit of Muay Thai, you know? - Yeah, she becomes dangerous. - It's like the perfect combo. - Yeah. - 'Cause you can put
your son into anything. Your son can get in some, you know, boys are gonna learn how to fight and they're gonna do whatever,
but girls are different. And the other thing, I mean, this is the biggest selling
point for jujitsu for women. I mean, when a woman, no
matter how big, how small, can put a guy to sleep in
three and a half seconds. - What's the origin story
of the UFC as it is today, as you have created it and you and Lorenzo and
Fertitta brothers built it? - It started with John Lewis, you know, and seeing him, Frank
and I were out one night at the Hard Rock and John Lewis was there. And he's like, "Oh, that's
that ultimate fighting guy." And I was like, "I know him." And Frank's like, "I've always wanted to learn ground fighting." And I said, "Yeah, I'm
interested in it too." So we went over, we talked to John Lewis and we made an appointment to
wrestle with him on Monday. - And we told Lorenzo
and Lorenzo came with us and that was the beginning of the end. We started doing jujitsu and started to meet a lot of the fighters. And we were like, at the time, there was a stigma attached to the sport that these guys were despicable,
disgusting human beings, which was the furthest
thing from the truth. These kids had all gone to college, had college degrees, most of them, 'cause they wrestled in college. And we started to meet some, we loved the different stories. You had Chuck Liddell who had this Mohawk, looks like an ax murderer, but graduated from Cal Poly
with honors in accounting. Then you had Matt Hughes,
who was this farm boy, literally lived on a farm. And so there were all these cool stories with all these good people that weren't what people
thought they were. And Lorenzo and I always felt
like there's something here. If this thing was done the
right way, this could be big. And what was crazy was I was
in a contract negotiation with Bob Meyrowitz the
old owner of the UFC, over Tito's contract and Chuck Liddell. They didn't even want
Chuck Liddell in the UFC. I was trying to get Chuck in the UFC and they didn't even want him. And we got into this contract
dispute over Tito's contract and Bob Meyrowitz said, "You know what? "There is no more money, okay? "I don't even know if I'll even be able "to put on one more event." And he flipped out. We hung up the phone, I
literally picked up the phone and called Lorenzo and I said, "Hey, I just got off the phone "with Bob Meyrowitz, the owner of the UFC. "I think they're in trouble
and I think we could buy it "and I think we should. "You should reach out to him." So Lorenzo called Meyrowitz
and I don't know how, I don't remember the timeline, but within the next two months, we ended up owning the
UFC for 2 million bucks. - And you've said that you
fought a lot of battles during that time. - Uh-oh. I mean, the early days
of building this company and building the sport, it
was the wild, wild west, man. It was crazy back then. Yeah, I was literally at war every day with all different types of people. Plus, traditionally, there's bad people that are involved in fighting, man. There's lots of bad people. And we had to sift our way through that for the first seven, eight years. - So in general, there's like corruption and people kind of steal money. They're thinking just about themselves, not the bigger business. - Well, let me tell you about this. I mean, I wanna say it
was the Netherlands. I don't remember exactly where. It could've been Amsterdam. I mean, MMA promoters were
like car bombing each other and then the other guy shot
up the other guy's house with machine guns. And that's the kind of
shit that was going on. I'll tell you the story. So Affliction, do you remember Affliction? - Yeah.
- So there was a guy. I wanna say his name was Todd
Beard or something like that. This guy used to text me every day when they started their MMA thing, telling me he was gonna kill me. - [Lex] Like legitimately death threats? - Legitimately gonna kill me. You punk motherfucker. I'm gonna fucking kill you. You don't understand who
I am and what I've done and this and that. I think this guy would get
drunk or do drugs every night or whatever his deal was. This guy would call me, text me and threaten my life every day. I used to go, "Fuck you." - You said, "Fuck you." - Oh yeah, especially back then. Yeah, but I mean, this is the type of shit that went on in the early days. This guy who was one of
the owners of Affliction was like one of the, you
know, not a good human. Let's put it that way. - What about the business side of it? It's tough to make money in this business. - Yeah, we weren't making money. So, you know, trying to
build this thing, corrupt, the guys that work for In
Demand Pay-Per-View at the time were not good dudes, you know, and that thing was a
fucking total monopoly. God, I wish I could
remember his name right now. He used to run In Demand and
he was a fucking bad guy. Then he comes over and
starts running DirecTV who we always had a
great relationship with. He's the reason we left DirecTV and said, "Fuck it, we'll just go streaming then." Yeah, I don't remember his name. I'd have to ask Lorenzo. - So in general, just in this whole space, there's a lot of shady people. - Everybody you deal with is dealing with a lot of different forces and your hands are in a lot
of different businesses, you know, from the venue business to the merchandise business
to the video game business, the pay-per-view business, you know, the list goes on and on
of all the different types of the production business,
of all these different, you know, when I first started this, we had a production team
that was the production team that was in it before we bought it. So there was this
incident with Phil Baroni where Phil Baroni, we
did an interview with him and Baroni flips out in the interview when they're interviewing
him and goes crazy and I thought it was awesome. So I'm like, "We're gonna leave this in. "We're gonna leave this interview in." And the production guys
were arguing with me. They're like, "We can't leave this in. "This is totally unprofessional." And I said, "I don't give a shit. "This is what we're doing. "We're gonna do this and clip it like this "and do it like that." We're sitting in the venue that night and I lean over to Lorenzo
'cause the fight's coming up. I go, "Wait 'til you see
this fucking interview "with Baroni." They didn't fucking do it. They didn't do it. These guys were guys
that were freelance guys that worked for Showtime at the time or something like that.
- I would say, yes. - I literally went, got
up from my fucking seat, went back there, kicked the
fucking door of the truck open and I said, "You motherfuckers. "You ever do that again "and I'll fire every fucking one of you. "Let's just put it this way." Ended up firing every one of them anyway and going with a whole new crew. But these were the type of things that early on, there's so much stuff. I mean, I could sit here
for fucking three days and walk you through all the stuff that used to go on back in those days. But it was the wild, wild west, man. - But how'd you figure out, how'd you know how to
deal with all this mess? First of all, to fire people, to fire people that aren't
doing a good job, all of that. Like how to be a leader, how to be- - Well, that's the thing too. I mean-
- Business leader. - Getting in, in the early
days, there was two employees, me and another girl that
worked for me, for my company before I started doing this. And then we slowly
started to bring people on and you start to build a team. Then before you know it, we had 10 people. I mean, we used to do our
Christmas parties back then too. There'd be eight to 10 people
at our Christmas party. But a lot of it is you learn as you go. You know what me and the
Fertittas knew about production when we bought this UFC? We had like, I wanna say
we had two or three weeks to pull off an event. This is what we knew about production. - Really?
- Jack shit. So we had to dive in
and we had to learn it. We had to figure it out
and we knew what we wanted. We knew what we liked. We knew what we were looking for. It's just about building a good team. And I think that's one of the things, if you wanna talk about
what I've accomplished in the last 25 years of my life, I've been really good at building teams. - Already have a vision of what you want the final thing to look like and then build a team that
can bring that to life. - 100%. Well, you have to have the vision. Without the vision, there's nothing. So that's sort of what I do. I am the vision part of this thing. We're gonna open a PI in Mexico. We're gonna do this. We're gonna do that, you know? And then you build the team
to come in and help execute. - A lot of people that do
fighting promotions fail. You succeeded. Again, it's the long odds. What's the secret to your success? If you were just looking
back over the years. - Well, the secret to
success, I would say, first of all, is passion and consistency. You have to love what you do. You have to get up every day. And I get here every day
at 9:30 in the morning. When we sold in 2016, a lot of people in the
company made a lot of money and they all took off and they retired. Other than the Fertittas,
I made the most money. I'm still here. I get here at 9:30 every morning. Last night, I left here at 8:30, you know? And I don't know how late
I'm gonna be here tonight, but I love what I do. We get up every day and grind. I work just as hard
now as I did back then. The difference between back then and now is I don't have to do a bunch of the shit that I don't really like to
do, like budget meetings. I don't like budget meetings. I sat through enough
fucking budget meetings. Horrible budget meetings. Horrible. We're losing millions of dollars a year and I'm in these budget meetings. So I get to pick and choose
what I do these days. Back in the early days, you
don't get to pick and choose. You have to be involved in everything. - So costs, you're just
looking at costs and stuff. - You literally go through line by line every fucking number in the company and where did the money go
and how can we save costs? How can we do this better? How can we, you know, they are brutal and they're multiple times a week and- - Probably helps to deeply appreciate how much this shit costs though. - 100%, well, you have to know that. In the early days, when
you start your business, you have these people
who, when I hear them say, you know what, I wanna work for myself. I wanna create my own schedule
and I wanna do all this. It's just, if that's your
thought process going into it, you're never gonna be successful. You have to pay attention
to every single detail of the business early on. You're involved in everything. There's no days off, there's no birthdays, there's no fucking Christmas,
there's none of that shit. I literally moved the
birth of my second son for a Chuck Liddell fight. We had a Chuck Liddell fight coming up and they're like, yeah,
your son's gonna be born on this date and I'm like,
yeah, that's not gonna work. (laughing) We're gonna have to take him earlier. So they literally gave my wife a C-section and took my son early. - You're all in.
- All in, yeah. - And the fascinating
thing, like you said, you've said that you could
care less about money. You're doing this for the love of it. - Yeah, I was doing this when I was broke and I'm doing this now when I'm not broke. I'm doing this because I love it and I feel like there's so much more to do and this is truly my passion in life. It's like the sphere. We're doing the sphere, why? Why would I do the sphere? It's gonna cost me a bunch of money. It's really challenging. Most people think it can't be pulled off and you're looking at weird angles, different things going on
inside other than the fight and all this other stuff, but yeah, I'm doing it because it's awesome and it's challenging and it's hard and I think that if anybody
can do it right, it's us. So why not take that challenge? - It's actually why I'm here. I'm going to the sphere for the first time 'cause I'm hanging out
with Darren Aronofsky who put together the
thing that's in there now and I can't believe you're thinking of, I don't know how you're
gonna solve that puzzle. - There's many puzzles
to solve for this one. Many puzzles. - So how, can you speak to that? Like what are interesting challenges that you're encountering? - Yeah, so there's a lot. So you have the octagon. And then behind it is the world's biggest screen ever. So what is the theme? How do you program it? First of all, it's
super expensive to shoot and the format for the sphere. Angles, we were talking about today, I just had a big meeting today about the sphere this afternoon and making sure that all my departments, all the details that I want all start to come together
here in the next two weeks. I want the creative, the commercial. I have some goals. I will tell people as we get closer what I'm looking to achieve with this other than putting on one of the greatest, most unique sporting events of all time and probably the greatest combat
sporting event of all time. But yeah, I mean, there's challenges. There's a laundry list of
challenges for this thing and not to mention the fact that it's on a Mexican Independence Day and we're gonna weave in the whole history of combat in Mexico. - Yeah, nice.
- Into this event. - But the production, I
mean, this is hilarious 'cause you were just talking about knowing nothing about
production so many years ago. - And now I'm tackling the sphere. - The hardest production-
- Ever. - And that will be live? - It'll be live. It'll be live on pay-per-view. It'll be live in the arena and it will also be in movie theaters. - Nice. So there'll be a, it'll be shown, will it be shown at the sphere later too? Like will you try to create an experience? - ESPN's doing a doc on it.
- Nice. - The making of the sphere, yeah. - Are you feeling good about it? - Oh yeah, I feel incredible about it. I can't wait, it's gonna be fun. - I can't wait to see
how you solve the puzzle. - Thank you. - Another guy that I
feel like could care less about the money is Joe Rogan. How important is he to the
UFC, to the rise of the UFC? And what in general do you love about Joe? - It's a fact, he
doesn't care about money. And he did the first 13
shows for free for us. - Yeah.
- You know what I mean? That was at a time when we were hurting and he's like, wait a minute, you want me to do the commentary? You're saying that I get
to sit in the best seat in the house and watch
these fights for free? - Yeah.
- Yeah, I'm in. So, and then obviously when
we turned things around, we made it up to Joe. But Joe is one of the things
that I loved early on about, so I'll tell you the story. So we buy the UFC,
they're based in New York. We're moving the corporate
offices to Vegas. So I have to fly out to New
York, go into the offices and start going through everything and figuring out what
needs to come back to Vegas and what we can just throw away. So they literally had
a VHS machine and a TV and there were a million
tapes in this place, man. So I didn't know what tapes were, these definitely we have to
keep or these we don't need. So I had to sit there and go
through every single tape. And I popped in a tape
and there was an interview on the Ivory Keenen Wayans show. The oldest Wayans brother
and he had a talk show at the time and he had Joe Rogan, the guy from "Fear Factor" on the show. And he was promoting "Fear Factor" but all he would talk about was UFC. And he was talking about how people think that these guys in the
martial arts movies are tough and he was talking about
what UFC fighters would do to these martial arts guys if they ever got their hands on them. And I was like, this
is exactly what I need. A guy who isn't afraid to speak his mind and knows the sport inside and out but more importantly is
super passionate about it and loves it. So when you see Joe Rogan on camera and I was talking about
the paid dock talking heads that they had in HBO
boxing that were terrible. Joe Rogan does not come
off as a paid talking head. He comes off as a guy who loves this. And so early on, no media would cover us. So I had to buy my way onto radio. So we do these radio tours. And they would drop us in. You'd have to get up
at 3:30 in the morning in Vegas on the West Coast. And they, 'cause there
at 6.30 in the morning in New York and Boston and Florida and all these other places. So they drop you into
these markets to do radio. And the fighters were horrible at it. Fighters getting up at 3:30 in the morning especially leading up
to a fight, never good. They sound like they're tired. They act like they're tired and they definitely act like
they don't wanna be on there. And it's bad radio. What you can't have is bad radio. So the only two people that
could pull off these radio tours were me and Joe Rogan. So me and Joe Rogan would alternate doing these radio tours
all over the country. - Just talking about fighting, talking about what this whole thing is. Like getting people excited. - Two guys that are really into it and passionate about it and love it. And it's one of the
things about Rogan too. Early on, nobody
understood the ground game. Joe Rogan would walk you
through what was happening literally before it would happen. He would tell you the setup, what was gonna come next and everything. He just absolutely articulated
perfectly, brilliantly and people at home started to understand. And the impact that Joe Rogan has had and continues to have on
this sport is immeasurable. He's the biggest podcaster in the world. And he is on the UFC
pay-per-views 14 times a year. And he's always talking about the sport. It's immeasurable what this guy has done for this company and the sport. - Yeah, still to this day. Like I'll have dinner with him offline. He'll just talk fighting. Just loves it. Loves every aspect of it. - Yeah, Joe Rogan is one of those guys. I saw that early on when, why would you go after
the Fear Factor guy? You know, to be such a key component to not only the company, but to the sport. I saw it in the fucking
interview on Ivory Keenen Wayans. - I value loyalty a lot. And I remember there was a moment, not too long ago, maybe a year ago, when I was sitting with Joe and he had a phone call with you. Joe was getting canceled for something. And they didn't want him
commentating the fights. And you on the phone offered
your resignation over this. I got teary-eyed over that. That's such a, you're
a good man, you know? - Thank you.
- That was powerful. - Anybody who is with me,
has been with me, knows. When you're with me, you're with me. It's a two-way street. It's not a one-way street. I'm not one of these guys
that is gonna roll over. And it's like going through COVID. I wasn't laying any of these people, some of these people have
been with me for 20 years. We're gonna lay 'em off? This motherfucker will burn. Burn before I would do that to my people. It's just never, none
of that type of stuff. - Yeah.
- Is ever going to happen while I'm here. I can't say what's gonna
happen when I leave, but when I'm here, the
people who are with me and have been with me, they
know exactly what's up. And Joe knows what's up. And again, it's a two-way street. Joe Rogan has been very loyal to me, and I am very loyal to Joe Rogan. - Lorenzo, another guy you
have close friendship with. You seem to have been
extremely effective together as business partners. What's the magic behind that? - Yeah.
- How can you explain that? - I love 'em. Lorenzo and I work really well together because we have two
different personalities. I'm the guy that always, I'm going here. Lorenzo is always here. You could walk in a room and say, "Lorenzo, you just lost $10 million. "Lorenzo, you just won $10 million." It never changes. And I'm a guy that goes like this. So we almost balance each other out. There's a lot of things that
he's really fucking good at, and there's a lot of things
that I'm really fucking good at, and they're both on the
opposite sides of the spectrum. - So that level-headed thing was useful when the UFC was losing money, and it was unknown
whether it's gonna survive those low points.
- 100%. What's incredible, when you
think of the story of the UFC, at the time, the casino
business was cranking. And Station Casinos was killing it. And Stations, their money from Stations is what was funding the UFC. Then in the '08-'09 crash, the UFC was killing it in '08 and '09, and the casino businesses were hurting. So timing on everything, the
way that it all worked out, couldn't have worked out better for them, and obviously for all of us. When you think about the
UFC and how big it is and how far it reaches and
how many people it touches, the Fertitta's brothers made
a $2 million investment, then put in another 44 million, and look at how many lives
that investment has changed over the last 25 years. It's fascinating. - And it's also crazy, just
forget the business of it, just the effect it has on
the history of humanity in terms of this is what we do. We're descendants of apes that fight, and this is like the organizations that catalyze the
innovation in how we fight. It's crazy. It created a whole new sport. - That people all over the
world participate in now. Literally, there isn't a place on Earth that we can't get a fighter from now. - You said in the UFC 299
post-fight press conference that sometimes fighters might complain that they get matched up on even odds, but that's actually when legends are made. I think you gave Dustin
Poirier as an example. Can you elaborate on that a little bit? Like what makes a legend, what
makes greatness in a fight? - So behind the scenes, fighters are a very
paranoid bunch of people. They're very paranoid, and there's been this theme with fighters where they're trying to get me beat. We don't determine who wins and loses. If we did, we'd be the WWE, okay? You do. I'm the bells and whistles guy. I make sure that as many people that we can possibly let know that you're fighting on Saturday know that you're fighting on Saturday. Who you are, who you're going against, and why people should give a shit. That's what I do. Then the night you show up, I put on the best live
event that I possibly can, and I put on the best television
show that I possibly can. Once that door shuts, it's all up to you. You determine whether you lose or not. And if you get into a position
where you become so paranoid that you think that the powers
that be here are against you, and you try to steer yourself
away from certain fights, and that's one of the big things that happens in these other organizations. In these other organizations, the inmates run the asylum. So if they don't wanna fight bad enough, these other companies don't push, and they don't do this, and they don't. We put on the best possible
match-ups that we can make. And in this business, you
might be an older fighter, but if you're still ranked in the top 10, there's young guys
coming for you, killers. Young killers are coming out, and they want your position. So you being the veteran that you are, have to prepare yourself to go in. And everybody was saying, when we made that fight with Saint Denis, that Poirier was in big trouble. That's awesome. That helps build the
entire thing, that Poirier. And then Poirier goes out and
does what he did that night. That's what makes fucking legends. - It's interesting, 'cause
sometimes being the underdog is a really good thing
for the long-term story of who you are as a fighter. - Especially when you're a big name, and a name that people recognize, and a name that people know. And they're like, oh man, I remember Israel Adesanya
and Sean Strickland. 100 out of 100 people knew for a fact that Israel was gonna win that fight. And here comes Strickland. And we could go on for days with this, you know what I mean? That is what creates legendary moments, legendary fights, and it's
what builds stars and legends. - I mean, arguably, Conor
McGregor with Jose Aldo. - Yep. Conor McGregor with a bunch
of people in the beginning. People said he couldn't wrestle. People said he wouldn't be
able to defend a takedown. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Nate Diaz against Conor McGregor. You know what I mean? - And Conor McGregor against Khabib. Underdog, probably. But if you won, there's
an opportunity to win. If you won, that's legend for me. He's now in the conversation with the greatest of all
time without argument. - And if you look at the way that Khabib ran through so many people, Conor hung in there, you know. - Yeah, it could've been. - Made a fight of it.
- It could've been. What do you think about that matchup? It's one of the great
matchups that you've made. Conor McGregor versus Khabib. - Yeah, I mean, at the time, I was incredibly criticized
for putting together the spot. That had the scene with the bus in it. You know how the fucking media is, but they were saying that I was pandering to the violence that happened. I'm telling you a story. Telling you a story of how we got here and how big this fight is and how bad the blood
is between these guys. And I mean, I think that's
what we do the best job at is telling the fucking stories of why. We go into Monday, it's fight week. We got a whole list of
things that we do fight week. And then you get right down
to the press conference on Thursday, the weigh-ins on Friday, and then the fights on Saturday. Now, my people fly back home. They go to bed on Sunday
night and it's Groundhog Day. We wake up again on Monday
and it starts all over again. Every weekend, every Saturday for a year. So there's lots of stories
that need to be told. There's lots of, when you think
about what I compete with, whatever takes your
attention on a Saturday night is my competitor. - So you're always trying
to build a foundation for great stories. And like if the fighters step up, they step up and they can
together create greatness. - That's it, that's exactly right. So when we are online, like
when you get to the UFC, I mean, you just saw it with MVP. You're gonna see it with Kayla Harrison and so many others that have
come from other organizations and they get here. They notice immediately the difference between fighting here
and fighting wherever they were before. It's not even comparable
to the impact it has on you when you leave whatever
organization you're with and you come to the UFC. And I think that it gives them a sense of, "Holy shit, I can really." I mean, MVP, when he came, I mean, there were probably more people at the press conference than
any fight he'd ever fought in Bellator, you know what I mean? And you feel that energy
and you feel the difference of the impact of being here. And I think it takes a lot of
these guys to another level. - Yeah, just the aura of it, like this is where you're
supposed to step up. Yeah, it's the way people
feel about TED Talks and give lectures. This is your moment, you get 15 minutes and you better say some interesting shit. And Kayla Harrison, by
the way, is a badass. I can't wait to see what happens there. - She was walking around
with this sleeveless shirt the night of the fights and holy shit. She is jacked, man, it's crazy. - Two-time Olympic gold medalist. You don't fuck with those people. You win a medal, you're
made of something special. - So true, especially in Judo. - Yeah, especially in American Judo where you don't have many
training partners that are great. - That's what I'm saying. - So you better fucking work for it. Ridiculous question, but
who's in the conversation for the greatest of all time? - [Dana] Jon Jones. - So you've talked about Jon Jones, but what are the metrics involved here? - He's never been beat. He destroyed everybody
at light heavyweight, which at the time was
the toughest weight class in the company, in the sport. And then I moved up to heavyweight, won easily at heavyweight. And when you look at a guy and you look at what he was doing outside the octagon at the same time, which shouldn't be part of it, shouldn't be part of the equation, but when you do, wow. Jon Jones, there's no debate. Nobody can debate who's
the greatest of all time. It's absolutely positively Jon Jones. He's never lost. He's never been beaten
in the octagon ever. - So that's one of the
metrics, pure sheer dominance. But there's others. You could losing sometimes
is a catalyst for greatness. - I don't disagree. But when you've never lost. It's this, you've never lost. We've never found somebody. And the other thing is that
you have to factor in too is longevity. How long he's, 'cause sometimes
with a lot of these guys, the sport passes them by. You get younger guys that are faster, this, that, and the sport evolves. Nobody's been able to beat Jon Jones. Oh, and the other thing that you measure is when you said dominance, it's true. If you're this guy that
has unbelievable power and you're just going in and you're just fucking
knocking everybody out and nobody's ever pulled you
into the deep water before. That was when my opinion of
Jon Jones started to change. Gustafsson took him into the deep water. Gustafsson hit him with some
shit he'd never been hit with. Gustafsson tested him and
put Jon Jones in a place where I bet if you sat down
and interviewed Jon Jones, going into the deep rounds of that, Jon Jones thought he was gonna die. You know what I'm saying? - [Lex] He's willing to go there. - And he kept going. He was willing to do whatever
it took to win that fight. - And it breaks my
heart because he beat DC and DC is one of the greatest of all time. - That's the thing too. And I believe that DC doesn't
get the credit he deserves because of the Jon Jones thing. When you look at DC and
what he's accomplished. And Jon Jones beat him twice. It's undeniable. You can hate all you want. Jon Jones is the greatest of all time. - Do you think Khabib was tested enough? - I think that Khabib had the potential to be in the running for that. He just didn't stick around a lot. First of all, he had
injuries that, you know, he should have been
where he got a lot sooner had he not had the injuries that he had and the setbacks in his
career, but there's no doubt. Khabib is one of the all time greats. - What's the good, the bad and the ugly of your relationship with Conor? - There's literally no ugly. Conor McGregor has been an
incredible partner to work with. Everybody thinks that Conor, if Conor showed up to things on time, there wouldn't be one fucking bad thing I could say about Conor,
you know what I mean? - [Lex] Only being late to shit. - If you fucking said, put a
gun to my fucking head, right, and said, "Don't lie, motherfucker. "Tell me all the bad things
about Conor McGregor," I'd say the guy doesn't show up on time. That's it.
- That's it. - If Conor McGregor
showed up to shit on time, and sometimes he does, sometimes he does, he's been a great partner. If you look at what a
huge superstar he became, the fights that he was involved in, let me tell you what
Conor McGregor never did. He never walked in a room and said, "Conor, this guy just fell out. "We want you to fight this guy." And he was like, "No way, I'm
not taking this fucking risk. "I'm at this point in my
career where my money, "my this, my that." He was like, "Fuck it, let's do it." You know, he'd always say, "Let's do it." The other thing that
Conor McGregor never did, no matter how big he
was or whatever it was, when we were heading into a fight, "Oh, Conor, this guy just fell out. "Aldo fell out. "We were looking for another. "Yeah, I'll do it, "but I'm gonna need
another fucking 200,000. "I'm gonna need another million dollars. "Conor McGregor never did
that kind of chicken shit, "you know, bullshit kind of stuff. "He never did any of that." Conor was as solid a guy as
you could possibly work with. - Just fuck it, I'll do it. - I'll do it. Literally would, there's actually a scene, 'cause we were filming something, I don't know if it was embedded or what we were filming at the time. Me and Lorenzo walk into his house that he rented here in Vegas. And I'm pretty sure it
was when Aldo fell out. And we're telling him this, that, and we're looking at some options. He says, "I'm going to the gym. "When I'm done working out, let me know." He just woke up out of bed,
he's in his fucking underwear. And he gets hit with this. And he's like, "All right,
I'm going to the gym. "Let me know when I get
out who I'm fighting." Doesn't care, doesn't wanna know, doesn't want any more money, nothing. Fucking shows up and he delivers. - Yeah.
- Yeah. So, you know, Conor has
been incredibly successful. He's made a lot of money and, you know, he's had his ups and downs
outside and inside the octagon. But as for a guy who was, you know, on the dole and was a plumber, he's actually a really smart businessman. And he's been one of the best partners that I've ever had in
the history of the sport. - And an important part
of the history of the UFC. - Big. - He opened it up to
all kinds of new eyes. - Yep. He literally, you know, set
Europe, Australia, Canada, and many other parts of
the world on fire, man. He was our first legit megastar. - And I personally think he
doesn't get enough credit for just how good he was as a fighter. And people love to talk shit about Conor. I suppose that's part of his magic. - But it comes with success. When you're successful, there's always people out
there that are gonna talk shit. You know, you always have
a bunch of know nothing, do nothing fucking losers
that love to talk shit. - You think if you were
to do it all over again, Khabib is the right matchup? - Yeah, listen, the
thing that you can't do is avoid matchups. You know what I mean? This is what we're talking about. When you talk about being a legend, Conor McGregor needed Khabib. Khabib needed Conor McGregor. You can hate each other
as much as you want, but you have to fight
these other legendary bad motherfuckers to
yourself become a legend. I mean, it's like Jon
Jones needed Cyril Gaunt. And Cyril Gaunt needed Jon Jones 'cause if Cyril could have beat John, the first guy, if anybody
can ever figure it out and beat Jon Jones, it's a big deal. And it's almost like your
obligation as a fighter. And when you think about Jon Jones became who he is today and the
reason I'm sitting here telling you how great he is, because all these other guys
gave him the opportunity to beat them. Or they beat Jon. It's all about giving these
other guys the opportunity. Saint Denis. Poirier gave him the opportunity
to come in and beat him. That's how this all works. - It's the two of them together,
the two fighters together. - You have to have them both. Listen, I could line up
a bunch of no-name bums that Jon Jones could run through. That's what they do in all
the other organizations. We would have nothing to
fucking talk about right now. - That's why luckily a
perfect record in the UFC is not as important as who
you fought, how you fought. - But when you have a
perfect record in the UFC, holy shit. That's what you would, when you can have a
perfect record in the UFC, you are absolutely one of
the most special athletes on planet Earth. - You and Trump are friends. I just talked to Ivanka last night about her experience in the Miami event. She loves it. She's training too. You were talking about
getting girls to train. She's training too. - And the kids are training, yeah. Her father's the biggest
fucking fight fan on the planet. Calls me all the time to
talk about the fights. And Don Jr. said that I'm
like the only guy on Earth that he bros out with. It's funny when you talk about
how powerful fighting is. This last Miami event, the president of Ecuador
and the president of Spain both posted about the fights. Khabib beat Conor. Putin was on FaceTime before he even made it to the locker room. Trump, sitting president, ex-president, watching all the fights, calling, wants to talk about the fights. Valentina Shevchenko. Every time she goes home, she meets with the
president of the country. The list goes on and on and on. The most powerful, Elon Musk, Zuckerberg. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. The most powerful people in the world are all obsessed with fighting. - When did you first discover
that Trump loves fighting? - So I first discovered that
Trump was a big fight fan. Obviously, you saw him
a part of all the big, you're talking about how
big boxing fans we were. He was a part of all the
big fights back then. But when we first bought the UFC, this thing was so bad,
venues didn't even want us. And we ended up doing our first event in Atlantic City at the Trump Taj Mahal. Now think about this, at that time, Trump brand here, UFC brand. I mean, I can't go low enough. And he had us at his venue,
two times back to back, showed up for the first fight of the night and stayed till the
last fight of the night. Then after that, any good thing that would ever happen to me in my career, Trump would reach out. Whether it was, we were on the front page of the New York Times at one time, and he said, "Congratulations, Dana. "I always knew you guys were gonna do it." Little things like that,
but that are big things and mean a lot, especially
coming from a guy like him. - So he saw something in
you, like this is gonna be- - 100%, he definitely saw it. And then comes '15, '16, whenever
it was, I don't remember. But he called me and he said, "Listen, "if you don't wanna do this,
I completely understand. "But I would be honored if you would speak "at the National Republican
Convention for me. "And I'm not a very political
guy, you know what I mean? "And everybody told me not
to do it, do not do this." But I was like, "Why would I not do this? "This guy's been great
to me, and I did it." And our relationship is just
like, you know what I mean? I consider Donald Trump to be one of my very, very good friends. - Any favorite stories? - I mean, there's so many stories. I mean, once he won the
election, I'd be at work and I'd be down the hall,
was in the matchmaking room or whatever, and my secretary would tell, "The President's on the phone." Fucking come running down the
hallway and grab the phone. And he'd wanna talk about
the fight that was coming up or the fight that happened. Or I'd be in my car and
I'd answer the phone. It's like, "Hi, this is the White House. "We have the President of the
United States on the phone." That's a trip when that
first starts happening. And then just to sum him up, this is the kind of guy that, you wanna talk about a fighter? This is the most resilient
human being I've ever met. If you see the shit that this guy's going through publicly every day, and I'll call him on the phone as a friend and be like, "Hey, you good? "How you doing?" Unfazed, unfazed, like nothing's going on. And he'll start talking
to me about this and that and all this other shit. One time, there's only been one time, I've never talked about this publicly, but one time I called
him and he was not good. He was a mess. And I've never heard him like that. And I've never seen him
like that when Ivana died. The only time I've ever
seen him fucked up. Obviously, as soon as I
heard it, I reached out and I have never. They look at all the stuff
that's gone on with Trump, all the bad stuff that they say, they're trying to attack him, they're trying to ruin him, unfazed. I called him that day and he was, that's the first time I've
ever seen that guy busted up and not good. - But that says something
that that's the only time. That guy is, I mean,
walking through the fire. - He does not get rattled. He will walk through fire. He's an absolute savage. - You think he wins the
presidential election? - I don't know, man. It's gonna depend on how this whole, politics is the most
dirtiest, scummiest thing on planet Earth, man. And who knows how this
is all gonna play out. It's all dirty, it's all ugly. And obviously, I'm rooting
for him and I'm behind him and I hope he does, but we'll see. - What's dirtier, the fighting
game in the early days or politics? - There's nothing dirtier than politics. Nothing, there's
literally nothing dirtier. It is the dirtiest thing on planet Earth. - Just wanted to get that on record. Another guy who doesn't seem
to be fazed by the fire, I've gotten to know him as Elon. I have to ask you, it's a bit of fun. You were a part of thinking
about putting together Zuck versus Elon. I trained with both. I did a phone call with Elon and you when we were training on the mat. You really think that could
have been a good fight? - It would have been the
biggest fight ever done. - The spectacle of it. - Two of the most powerful,
wealthiest men in the world. Lots of guys talk shit
and go back and forth and sue each other and do all this. These two guys were
literally talking about facing each other in the
octagon and fighting. There's nothing, and they're in a business that's looked at as geeky,
you know what I mean? They're tech nerds,
they're this, they're that. These are two dudes that
were willing to throw down and fight and you know as well as I do. There's a lot of public
speculation about this. I was taking serious real time
and working on this thing. I mean, I had projections, I had numbers. I was looking at venues. I was on the phone with the
fucking Colosseum in Italy. You name it, I was in it. These guys were serious
and this was something that was really gonna happen
and I'll tell you right now, in the short amount of time
that it was going down, it was fun, I was having a blast with it. - What do you think about Tyson? Tyson fighting Jake Paul. - I love Mike Tyson and I'm not a fan of anybody fighting at our age, but he's a grown man obviously and he's gonna do what he's gonna do, but at least I know, I talked
to his wife a couple days ago and he's taking it serious
and he's training for it and you know, so we'll
see how it plays out. - Why do you think he fights though? Like what is that about, is
there a broader lesson there about fighters, about great fighters? - I think that Mike Tyson is actually one of those unique guys who has crossed over. Any of these other boxers from his era, they have no way of making
money other than fighting. Mike Tyson has made a lot of
money outside of fighting. I mean, Tyson still has that aura. You could be at a
restaurant and he walks in and you're like, holy
fuck, Mike Tyson's here. You know, he still has that type of aura and energy in a room and
he makes lots of money outside of the ring. I just, I think that he
ends up getting these offers that he can't refuse. - Oh, you think it's financial? So how much, I mean, that's
a good question to ask. You work with a lot of fighters. For how many of them is it about money and for how many is it about the fact, the pure love of fighting? - Well, the guys that get
into it for the right reason are the guys who get into it for greatness 'cause you wanna be the fucking best. And when you're in it
for that reason, right, you love it and you wanna be
looked at as the best ever and you have the talent,
the money happens. Then you have other guys who get in. I believe me, I've dealt with fighters who just wanted to be famous and just wanted to make money. You know what I mean? And it's, you know,
listen, it is what it is. It's your life and you live
it the way that you want and do your thing, but
the ones that are beloved are the guys who really
wanna be fucking great. And they're the ones that are remembered. And I mean, when you look
at Tyson in his early years when he came up under Cus D'Amato, I mean, he was a student of the game. He loved everything. He became completely
infatuated with the fight game. Then he became such a massive superstar. It's almost like the whole
thing starts to turn on you. You know, all the things that
come at you at a young age and that kind of money. And it's tough, it's tough
to navigate and get through. And you know, you say something like that, and people are like, oh, poor him. He had fucking $100
million and couldn't, eh. At that age and with all
the shit that people talk and all the things that
you gotta put up with and the fame, a lot of
people deal with fame. Some people handle it really
well and some people don't. And the perfect example of that was Forrest Griffin and Stephan Bonner. You know, they fought
that unbelievable fight on "The Ultimate Fighter." Everything blew up after that. Forrest dealt with fame really
well and Stephan did not. - That was a special fight.
- It really was. - What do you think attracted
people to that fight? So that made, that was
a big leap for the UFC. - It was everything.
- It was everything. - It was everything. - Why do you think
people loved that fight? What attracted people to that fight? Why did they change everything? - Well, what happened that
night is that the rest of the show was a disaster. You know, we had the co-main
event and the main event. Diego Sanchez ran through
Kenny Florian in seconds. Oh my God, that was terrible. And the fights that led up to that weren't anything to talk about either. Then Stephan and Forrest got in there and just went toe-to-toe in
this unbelievable slugfest live on free television
when cable still mattered. And what I heard was at the time, you know, you had people
picking up the phone going, "Are you watching this show?" The numbers just started climbing. Then you got a razor thin
decision, who's gonna win? You got the crowd stomping their feet. It sounded like a train
was going through the place and everybody's chanting one more round. Me and the Fertitta brothers
get together and we talk. We're gonna give 'em both contracts. So we give 'em both contracts
and the place erupts. It just, it couldn't have
been a more perfect fight at the most perfect time. And it just, it all came together. So it's almost like this was meant to be. You know what I mean? So we had so many problems
with Spike TV at the time. Because halfway through the season, the president of the company got fired. All the things that we thought
we were gonna get that year, you know, we had this runaway hit show. And normally at that time, when you would see runaway hit shows, there'd be commercials,
it'd be on billboards, it'd be on the side of
buses in L.A. and New York. Eh, we got none of that. We didn't even know if we
were gonna get a second season coming out of that. And when that fight was
over, I swear to God, I was like, I don't even give a fuck. We're gonna end up somewhere
now after this fight. And we didn't even make it out
of the building that night. The Spike guys did the
contract with us in the alley on a fucking napkin after the fight. - So you already saw the
magic of the fight itself. It captures everything.
- Once that happened and all the shit, and at that time, I didn't know what the ratings, it's not like we were streaming and we could see what we were,
we had no idea, but I knew. - [Lex] You just knew this was coming. - I knew.
- What is it? It's like just two people being
willing to stand toe to toe and just go to war. - And when you think
about what was at stake, there was a car, remember the Kia? The winner got a Kia. That's what was the fucking... And Stephan and Forrest, the will to win, they both wanted to win that fight so bad. - It was bigger than the Kia probably. - You know, Forrest drove that
Kia to like 200,000 miles. The biggest mistake Kia ever made was not doing a fucking commercial with Forrest Griffin about that car. Forrest Griffin loved that
car so much he drove it. I think he still has it. It's got like 200,000
miles on it, that car. I mean, you couldn't have
a better fucking commercial than that. And we reached out to him too. I said, "Kia should know about this." They fucking blew it. You got a bunch of,
you know how those guys are in the business world. They don't fucking get anything. - Maybe it was about the Kia then. - It was about winning. They both wanted to win The
Ultimate Fighter so bad. It's the Kia, it's the win, it's the contract you
get, the whole thing. - But I think at that point,
you even forget all of that. When you're in there, you probably just, there's a primal thing where
like, I'm not backing down. - They're both bad dudes. They were both real fighters
at the end of the day. That's why the fight was so great. - Yeah.
- You know what I mean? - Just throw all the caution
to the wind and just fight. Those are some of the greatest
moments in the UFC too when the technique is
not, kind of falls apart and you're just like- - Because you're in those deep rounds. You've been through a war. Now it's all about heart and dog. Who can dig deeper and who's
got it and who wants it? Who wants it? I mean, we all know when that
moment happens in a fight, when you see that both of these
guys are fucking exhausted. And for people that are watching this, people that don't know a lot of, everybody thinks they
know a lot about fighting. 99.9% of the people out there
don't know fucking jack shit about fighting or what it takes
to do what these people do. But when you get into those later rounds and fatigue sets in, and then fatigue makes you
start to fucking doubt yourself. And then you start to wonder, can I even make it through
the rest of this round? And then you start to think, am I gonna fucking die right now? And these kids dig fucking deep. And they just, like you said, all the other shit flies out the window and now they're just on fucking
autopilot to fight and win. Those are definitely the best fights you'll ever see in any combat sport. - I mean, that saying is true. Like the exhaustion
makes cowards of us all. I mean, there's something about, 'cause I've competed a lot in jujitsu. So there's the violence of being hit too. But even just exhaustion, it
makes you question everything. - So true. - It just takes you to some weird place where your brain starts to think you're going to die for sure. Your brain starts to think like, why am I doing this? All these excuses, all this stuff.
- I love that shit. - And then the truly heroic action is to say fuck it in that moment. And just to get in there. - When you think about these fights that you see in the UFC
every fucking Saturday, when these men and women get to this point where they've been in a dog fight, yet they keep fucking going
and you keep trying to win. You can't imagine what's
going on inside their heads. Self-doubt and all these other
things that come into play when exhaustion sets in and they fucking power through it. - Yeah, those moments,
sometimes they're not, they don't have a glorious
knockout at the end, but your decision in the
third round or the fifth round to still keep pushing
forward, not running. - [Dana] 100%. - That doesn't matter what happened. That is a person winning
a battle over themselves. - So true. It's so true and it happens
every fucking weekend. It's so impressive. I say it all the time. The people that are involved in this sport are this much of the population. The people that make it to the top five are incredibly unique,
special human beings, man. It's fucking awesome. - You love gambling. - I do. - What's the biggest win
of your gambling career? Maybe psychologically, if not financially. - Well, two things. I won a million dollar hand one night. It's happened one time. A million dollar hand
one night at Manila Bay. And then one summer, I
beat Caesars for 12 million throughout the summer. - Throughout the summer.
- Yeah. And then I'm on a pretty
good run right now too. - This is blackjack?
- Yeah. - What's the biggest loss? - Biggest loss was, I would call this the biggest loss for many different reasons. This is what, you live
and you learn in life and you figure things out as you go along. So one night I'm over at the Rio. And they got big suites over there. So I go over there with some buddies and we got one of the suites
and we have some dinner and we start drinking. So we're having some drinks at
dinner and blah, blah, blah. Starts to ramp up, having a good time. And I make my way down
to the Thai Limit Room. We start gambling and I continue
to drink, having a blast. I end up leaving and going home that night and I lost like 80 grand. So I wake up the next morning, I'm like, "Fuck, those motherfuckers
got me for 80,000 last night." So I'm at work the next day and
the host over there calls me and he says, "Hey Dana,
are you coming back? "Do you still need the
room that you guys had "where you ate and all the shit you used?" And I said, "No, I don't need the room, "but don't get too comfortable
with my fucking 80 grand. "I'm coming back for it." Dead fucking silence. And he's like, "Dana, you
lost $3 million last night." (laughing) I said, "What the fuck
are you talking about? "I only have a million and
a half dollar credit line." He goes, "Yeah, you made
us call the GM of the hotel "and you started calling
him a fucking pussy "and dah, dah, dah, dah." And I went, "Yeah, no,
that sounds like something "I would do, yeah." - So that's the real number. - That was the real number. And then there's been a lot of cases where people are in
Vegas and they're like, "Oh, I lost all this money "and they were giving me free drinks "and I drank too much and
I was taken advantage of." No, you stupid motherfucker. Man up, you got fucking drunk. Alcohol is free, but you don't
have to fucking drink it. You know what I mean? And this was a huge
learning lesson for me. So I never drank again
when I was playing cards after that night. But yeah, when you ask me, that's the one that stands out in my head the most as far as having a bad loss. And then of course I said, "Call the GM," and I started calling him a pussy at three o'clock in the morning. - [Lex] Of course you did. - That is something I would absolutely do. - How do you deal with
those psychologically? Do you, when you gamble,
maybe this applies to fighting too, do you love
winning or hate losing more? - They go hand in hand. So the way that I play
is, I live in Vegas, so 2024 is a war for me. I go to war in '24, okay? All these nights that I
play are little battles inside the war that I will fight in '24. Now, at the end of the year, we will tally up all these little battles and see where I stand on wins and losses. And there's lots of talk
out there about my gambling, places that I've been kicked
out of and things like that. And I do pretty well. I do pretty well, but
it's what I like to do. I don't gamble in a way that
I would ever hurt myself or hurt my family or, you know, I'm sure you've heard the
Norm Macdonald stories. Norm Macdonald lost like
his entire personal wealth four times or something like that. Yeah, that's not gonna happen to me. - So you manage it, but
just psychologically, you're able to be even-
- Yeah, yeah. So when I win, it's awesome. It's always great to win. Winning is a great feeling
in business, in sports, in life, and definitely in gambling. Losing is never fun, but
it's part of the game. You know what I mean? If you wanna be in the
game and it's sports, it's business or whatever, there's gonna be wins and
there's gonna be losses. And you have to take them both in stride and you have to be able to, you know, there's a lot of people, when you gamble. And you lose and you go into
a deep, dark depression. I've seen this with guys
that do it, get depressed, gambling isn't for you, you know? If you are the type of
person that's on social media and people say horrible things
to you and you get depressed and you shouldn't be on social media, you know what I mean? These are all part of being in the game. When you're in the fucking game, great things happen and
really bad things happen. And you gotta take it all in stride and you gotta pick
yourself up the next day, strap your fucking shoes
back on and get out there and go to fucking war again. That's how it works. - That's some goggin' shit
right there, all right. I love that motivational speech. - It's the truth though,
it's the truth though. Listen, every day when you get out of bed, life's standing right there to kick you in the fucking face, man. Could be anything, could be you get up and you walk downstairs,
you got a fucking flat tire and you're late for work
and you got this and that. Life is gonna throw all
kinds of crazy shit at you. And you have to be ready for it and you gotta fucking deal with it. Can't curl up into a ball,
you can't run away from it, you can't hide, you have to
take all this shit head on. You have to get up, every
day when I get up out of bed, I strap up and I'm getting
ready for fucking war. 'Cause I know I'm coming in here, I know a bunch of bad shit's gonna happen that I'm gonna fucking deal with. And if that's not bad enough, when I finally get out of here, I'm probably gonna go to the casino and I'm gonna get into
another fucking war. You know what I mean? I thrive in chaos, I actually love chaos. Everybody talks about
retiring, fuck that shit. What am I gonna do when I retire? What would I do? What would I, I like to go
to war, I like to battle, I like to win, sometimes I lose, but then I have to come back from the loss and I love to build brands, I love to set short-term
and long-term goals and then knock them all down. This is just the stuff that excites me. And whether it's business or gambling, or I like being a fan of things too. I like live music, so when
I find a band that I like, I get excited to go watch the
band live or the Celtics game. I love the fucking Boston Celtics and I love going to the
games and watching them. This is the year, hopefully we're gonna
fucking win it this year. These are all things that make me happy and excite me in my life. And it's funny because there's this post that I post maybe three,
four nights a week. I also love the city. I can't tell if the city of
Las Vegas was built for me or I was built for this
fucking city, but I love it. And there's this turn
on Summerlin Parkway. Every night and it's dark. And from there you can see
the entire fucking city and it's all fucking
lights and it's badass. And I'm usually driving home after a fucking incredible day. This amazing day and this unbelievable
fucking life that I have. And I have this just moment of gratitude. Every time I take that turn and I'm like, "God damn, I love this fucking city." And just every night when I go home, I'm just so happy and grateful
for this life that I have. - So you're grateful, you're celebrating, even if the day is full of shit, full of problems you have
to solve all of this, you're still able to put that behind you? - I love that too. I love problem solving. I love taking things that seem impossible and fucking, what's been shit on more than this fucking company right here? Power Slap. - Yeah. - This thing's a fucking beast. It's an absolute beast. In 13 months, that's the
most successful thing I've ever been a part of. And I love every fucking minute of it, especially the negativity. I love negativity. - Oh, so you almost feed on it. That's great, that's great. You're a build for this. - I eat that shit for
fucking breakfast, man. I love it. - What's your favorite movie about Vegas? "Casino?" - Yeah, it would have to be "Casino." No doubt about it. Do you ever see a movie
that changed your life, that actually impacted
your life in some way, shape or form? - Probably.
- Which one? - That's a good question. I have to think. Well, I have a lot, a lot. "Casino" could be one of them. Probably taught me about women. You know, "Forrest Gump,"
for me, it's a simple movie, but it was a really good movie to show. It reminded, 'cause I've been
really fortunate in my life, like over and over and over, and I don't think I deserve any of it. So I just always felt like Forrest Gump. So when I finally saw it,
it really connected with me. It was like, okay, this
universe works in weird ways and stuff just materializes. And you just kinda be good to people, put that good karma out
there and it happens for you. So that was a movie like that. - I'm actually very
superstitious about that. I believe that what you
put out, you get back. And I believe that when you have, you should take care of other people and you should always try
to bring people up with you and all that kind of stuff. But the movie that changed the
whole trajectory of my life was "Vision Quest." - [Lex] Oh, yeah. Well, yeah, that's a good one too, yeah. - "Vision Quest," man. I fucking love that movie. It's basically, it's
telling the story of a kid who really wasn't anybody in high school and nobody kinda knew who he was. He wasn't popular or any
of that kind of shit. And he decided that that was the year that he was gonna make his mark. And he was a good wrestler at 178 pounds, but he was gonna move
down to 160 something to take on the shoot, the
scariest guy and the whatever. But there's all these
little things in the movie that really lay out
what life is all about. One of the parts is he's in a class and he's talking about, the teacher's talking about some poem. And he says, "What does
this poem mean to you?" Well, this little girl's
walking through the park and all the leaves are
falling off the trees and she realizes that
she's gonna die someday. And that a lot of people
think they have all this time so they fucking waste it. And they never go out and do
what they really set out to do or accomplish or do anything
great in their life. That's one meaning. Then he's got the guy that
he works with at work. He's cutting weight and
his nose is bleeding and all this shit. And this guy keeps going, "Why
the fuck are you doing this? "Pick that thing up and eat it." Like a fucking man. "This is ridiculous. "I don't know why you're
doing this to yourself." Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So then when he meets the girl and he gets to the point where he feels like he wants to quit. Where does he go? He goes to that guy's fucking apartment because he knows when he shows
up at this guy's apartment, he's gonna go, "Yeah, fuck this shit." No, he went to work. He went to work to talk to
him and he wasn't at work. He took the night off. So he shows up at the fucking house, at the shitty little fucking
apartment that the guy lives in and the guy's putting his
suit and tie on and shit. He's like, "They said you called in sick. "What's going on?" He's like, "Well, yeah. "Aren't you wrestling this guy tonight?" And he's like, "Yeah, but why would you? "You're gonna get docked a nice pay." And all of a sudden she
says, "You know what, man?" Then it all gets laid out. I get the goosebumps even
telling you this fucking part. - Is that the Pele speech? - Pele, yeah. When he's saying about, "I'm fucking cooking in an
overnight hotel fucking thing "and I live in this shitty apartment." A human being can lift himself
upside down and backwards and kick a ball into a fucking net and the whole stadium goes
crazy and this guy runs around and I'm sitting here in
my fucking apartment alone and I start crying. Yeah, I start crying. So the guy who's been shitting
on him the whole fucking time actually really respects
him for what he's done and sees what this kid is capable of doing and all this shit. This fucking movie spoke to
me on so many different levels and I think it's probably
the most underrated movie of all time when you really
break down the meaning of what this movie is about and it fucking really spoke to me. - That's probably the greatest movie on one-on-one combat. - I would agree.
- Ever made. - I would agree. And especially if you can
really hear the messages that it's given you in
this movie, it's excellent. You know what's funny? They just did like the, and
I saw this after the fact which completely fucking pissed me off. They did like the 25 year
or the 30 year thing. It was filmed in Spokane, Washington. They showed the movie
at a movie theater there and the cast members came
out and spoke about it. I would have fucking flown there for that. Are you shitting me? I'd have been there in fucking
30 seconds to go up there and be a part of that. That movie literally changed my life. - Yeah, I suppose me too. It made me wanna wrestle. I mean, probably the reason I was, maybe it made me love, fall
in love with wrestling. - Well, you know what's funny? I wasn't even into wrestling at all and I didn't have to be for that movie to. - [Lex] Yeah, it's this basic human story. - It's such a great movie. - I mean, that's what fighting does. It brings out the basic,
like the humanity of a person and really like if the,
for the people that choose to step up and step in the
ring and then chase greatness and actually do it from
like against the long odds, that's why it's a beautiful game. - And it's so true. I mean, when you think about, like I'm 54 years old
right now, like that. I mean, it just fucking flew by. And you think when you're young
that you have all this time, you have no time. There's no time. I mean, one of the quotes on
the wall in the gym in there's, "There is no tomorrow," from "Rocky III." There is no tomorrow, fuck that shit. Let's get all this shit done today. - Do you think about your death? - I'm not afraid of death,
not even a little bit. I'm not afraid of it. I don't know if that'll be
the case when I'm facing it, when I'm looking down the barrel of it, laying in a hospital bed somewhere. - But for now, just
squeezing as much as you can out of every day.
- 100%. I literally, I don't even like to sleep. My life is so fucking awesome. I don't even wanna go to bed at night. I don't even wanna go to sleep. I wanna stay up fucking, I wish I could fucking do 24
hours and never have to sleep. That's how much I love my life. - What has watching thousands
of fights over the years taught you about human
nature, about us humans? - I don't care what color you are, what country you come from,
or what language you speak, we're all human beings. Fighting's in our DNA,
we get it and we like it. And it's true, fighting is in our DNA. It's a part of who we are. And no matter where you
are, if a fight breaks out, it creates this fucking energy, this buzz, this sense of fear. I mean, a lot of different
emotions happen in people when fights break out. But one thing that is always the case, everybody's watching, man. Everybody's fucking, all of
their eyes are on the fight. I mean, we were just in Mexico. Fucking fight broke out,
like in the good seats, like right here, these
seats are super expensive. And security never fucking came. They just let these guys
fight until they gassed out. And then everybody put
their chairs back together and sat back down and fucking, I literally got up from
my table, walked over, and was watching this fight at the fights. - At the fights.
- Yeah. - Humans fight and humans
love watching fighting. - Absolutely. And that was my thought process
going into buying the UFC. And I believe that this
would work everywhere. And thank God we were right. - Well, Dana, thank you for bringing this very human thing of fighting, the art of it, the science
of it, the heroic stories, the Vision Quest stories of it all. - Boom. - Really appreciate you
talking to me, brother. - Thank you. Pleasure, buddy. Thank you for the kind words. - Thanks for listening
to this conversation with Dana White. To support this podcast, please check out our
sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with
some words from Muhammad Ali. "Impossible is just a big word
thrown around by small men who find it easier to live
in a world they've been given than to explore the power
they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact, it's an opinion. Impossible is not a
declaration, it's a dare." Thank you for listening and
hope to see you next time.