Joe Rogan on Learning Jiu-Jitsu for Self Defense

the older i get i'm just a puss man i<br>need a man up i used to be so aggressive<br>you're a big dude you're strong<br>that's why nobody messes with me oh yeah<br>what it's like it's like like like you<br>you like fight and all that stuff i<br>can't even like if somebody punched me<br>in the face today i don't know how would<br>react like i don't know i used to be a<br>bouncer at clubs i play college football<br>like i was a tough dude now after all<br>apart I could get you a gym no no I'm in<br>shape but I mean like a fight gym no no<br>I'd know I'm gonna fight a little bit no<br>not to fight people why are you so you<br>don't worry about it I never worry about<br>it okay well then don't worry about cuz<br>I'm at home I saw you at the improv the<br>other night nobody's gonna jump on stage<br>I'm talking about family oh man you<br>never know people crazy<br>has anyone jumped up on the WWF and<br>attacked who did he attack<br>he attacked Brett hiring is like speech<br>that's crazy yeah always gotta be like<br>how old is you know makes do you want<br>any joke survivor so [ __ ] up when the<br>guy tackled them yeah Jesus quick but<br>Joe seriously you think anybody's gonna<br>jump on stage when you're on some dude<br>and could ease it you would [ __ ] kill<br>him no there's there's a lot of people<br>they can kill me you don't get but I I I<br>just don't see me doing stand-up talking<br>about family of love and a dude guys I<br>hate family I love I'm a jumper it's<br>that it's not rational no yeah right a<br>rational person wouldn't do that but<br>you're not worried about rational people<br>anyway okay so so say I started to go to<br>a fight gym like where would I start at<br>my mom what I do I would say you should<br>try jiu-jitsu cuz it's fun it's really<br>good exercise and you'll learn some<br>stuff okay<br>you learn how to do it it's it's a<br>technique based art whereas like say if<br>if you like there's there's guys that I<br>will do Jiu Jitsu sparring we call<br>rolling okay there's guys that I will<br>roll with that are weaker than me<br>smaller than me and tapped me every time<br>I roll with them and I'm a black belt<br>okay like that's reality like if there's<br>there's guys out there that 150 pounds<br>so that I could roll with that I know<br>will tap me virtually every time we roll<br>because their technique is sharper they<br>train more often<br>I am they're more focused they're more<br>in the groove but I also heard you say<br>like one of your podcasts you've got to<br>watch out who you train with because<br>they might just try to hurt you that's<br>true I need I need you got to go to a<br>good school with good ethics because<br>yeah a good school with good ethics they<br>get rid of those guys do you know do you<br>no one in Studio City I'll do sure I'll<br>get ya know do it I want to learn<br>there's a good spot just a little<br>further than that in Tarzana ok<br>Machado's where i got my black belt<br>so John Jacques Machado I trained there<br>sometimes and he used to have a place in<br>Malibu but it closed down because of the<br>fires but they they have an outstanding<br>gym it's like one of the best in the<br>country and it's in that area like as<br>far as teaching yeah top-notch like but<br>there's a lot of really good jiu-jitsu<br>schools now it's not like like when I<br>started in 96 it was hard to find a good<br>gym there was only like 5 of them in all<br>of California right because it was just<br>starting out I was like 93 is when<br>jiu-jitsu sort of emerged in the public<br>consciousness because the UFC and then<br>they were gym started like popping<br>popping up but I was really lucky there<br>was like Hicks and Gracie's which is<br>where I took my first class and then<br>Karlsson Gracie's I thought they were<br>like the same and the other one was<br>closer so I just switched to Carlson's I<br>didn't know [ __ ] you knows wipeout but<br>and then there was a Machado's and then<br>like a couple other places how long did<br>it take you to get to a black belt like<br>four years some guy took me a long time<br>I was a brown belt for eight years but<br>it was just because I wasn't training as<br>much as I should have liked that you<br>don't they don't give them away like you<br>have to be a real black belt but besides<br>what is somebody just watch instructors<br>yeah and you do well no okay well<br>everyone knows it's like like you know<br>when a guy is [ __ ] killing like like<br>he let's take like Theo von for example<br>like Theo I love him<br>he hit a groove some time ago whether<br>it's two years ago or whatever it was<br>and I remember being in the back of the<br>store and I was like dude this<br>[ __ ] on fire yeah he started<br>hittin that groove that where you go and<br>sit down you want to watch his set ya<br>know and I think when that happens in<br>jiu-jitsu it's the same kind of thing I<br>start talking about like - Mike has been<br>tapping everybody but he's just his<br>jiu-jitsu so sharp and you're like man<br>I'm gonna watch him roll and then you<br>watch them all like - that<br>a Sat card pass then guys start asking<br>like wait how about offer you training<br>I'm going five days a week now really<br>yeah and I'm taking to private spa then<br>you know like this guy is on the quest<br>and you'll see a guy go from white belt<br>to black belt in three years but they<br>have to be super exceptional like really<br>unusual athletes unusual mindset unusual<br>discipline it can happen most of the<br>time like a garden-variety estimate is<br>like 10 years is realistic white belt a<br>black belt for a regular person if you<br>really train hard and you really<br>dedicate yourself but freaks can get<br>there quicker like BJ Penn he won the<br>mundi Isles which is the World<br>Championships after three years of<br>training three years of training he was<br>a black belt won the world shall be<br>doing that to bj's a special guy though<br>I just also got legs that are like arms<br>he has leg dexterity like no one on the<br>planet yeah I got chicken legs oh yeah<br>that's actually good is it really yeah<br>you could cinch up triangles on people<br>with chicken legs<br>people everywhere there just think about<br>it in terms of leverage guys with longer<br>limbs like Roger Gracie is a perfect<br>example he's a really tall long guy so<br>when the best jujitsu players ever they<br>can do things with those limbs that a<br>shorter person can't do in terms of like<br>leverage from joints and stuff like this<br>like there's the advantages to every<br>frame like there's a guy like who Samar<br>Paul Hara is a famous like tank of a<br>guys five seven two hundred plus pounds<br>and just rips guy's legs apart and he<br>uses this like short style to dive in on<br>people's legs and get him in heel hooks<br>and bars and rip their legs parties<br>terrifying yeah and that that style<br>heavily favors being built like a little<br>little tank<br>whereas like that long like you are<br>you're a tall long guy you would have<br>like good Darce chokes good rear-naked<br>good or good arm bars good triangles you<br>would have lengthened leverage with that<br>length especially with triangles because<br>long-legged guys they can like sometimes<br>a guy like me with short legs like I'll<br>get my legs crossed yeah and I have to<br>adjust a lot to be able to cinch up by<br>triangle whereas you might be able to<br>just close the<br>right there so you have like more<br>opportunities for triangles because the<br>length of your limbs have you would you<br>have ever been at a point in your in<br>your career when you were doing to just<br>where you how would you have been in the<br>UFC like at your prime like I have no<br>idea I have no idea I would have had to<br>have gotten way better like when I was<br>fighting I was just kickboxing yeah I<br>was kickboxing and first of all first it<br>was Taekwondo and then went to<br>kickboxing and by the time the UFC came<br>around like on the ground I was useless<br>or there's a straight white belt I would<br>get ripped apart every day I would go to<br>the gym and if I if I tapped anybody<br>like if it was like a a week went by and<br>I tapped one guy black oh I [ __ ]<br>tapped a guy yeah there wasn't that many<br>people doing it you know so I was going<br>with like there was a couple of white<br>belts maybe and then there was like blue<br>belts and purple belts and brown belts<br>and those guys would always tap me guys<br>so that's just how went for a long time<br>when you are you know unless you're some<br>kind of freak like some big-ass football<br>player or some like super athlete you're<br>probably not gonna be able to hold these<br>guys off they're gonna they're gonna<br>choke you now was it true you're gonna<br>fight Wesley Snipes that was way later<br>though way late that was a brown belt by<br>then and I've been doing a lot toward<br>you beating him<br>I don't know cuz we never did everybody<br>there's a real martial artist I was real<br>martial arts but he doesn't know<br>jiu-jitsu the thing that must have been<br>exciting though [ __ ] excited yeah<br>because I was thinking like I knew that<br>he was a real legitimate martial artist<br>like he throws kicks and punches and it<br>looks really good like he really does<br>know his [ __ ] but I also know he never<br>fought and there's a big difference<br>between throwing kicks and I know and I<br>haven't fought in a long time but I<br>probably fought a hundred times yeah so<br>i I've been I've felt that nerves I know<br>what that's like it'll be crazy as [ __ ]<br>to do it again that's what I was<br>thinking I mean it'll probably scare the<br>[ __ ] out of me but I think I know what<br>to do I think I know how to like get in<br>there and start fainting and start<br>giving some movement see how he reacts<br>and then the worst case scenario is like<br>I'm like in a scramble I'm gonna<br>strangle this guy like this<br>this comes to a scramble yeah because<br>the average person really doesn't know<br>how helpless they are until a jiu-jitsu<br>blackbelt grabs ahold of you and then<br>you just go oh [ __ ] like I'm helpless<br>because in a fight you really think like<br>you might be able to punch a guy like<br>maybe if he's friend me and he's<br>swinging at me and I'm swinging at him<br>maybe I hit him first you really think<br>that but there's no swinging if it's a<br>jiu-jitsu fight if you guys get into<br>some sort of a tussle and that guy grabs<br>you and trips you and boom and he's on<br>the ground with his hand on your jacket<br>and knee on your chest you're a dead man<br>you're a dead man because there's no<br>lucky shot yeah a jiu-jitsu blackbelt is<br>just gonna close the distance like that<br>evil [ __ ] crab and he's just gonna<br>[ __ ] and there's no way you're gonna<br>avoid it and there's no way you're gonna<br>survive it you're just not going to<br>that's why you don't fight people like<br>people I'm just<br>you can't fight random people on the<br>streets like when you're young that was<br>the thing you could go to bars yeah feel<br>like I had some friends that like to<br>throw down when I was younger and I<br>wouldn't do I was watching but good be<br>now it's kind of like you got to watch<br>everybody because you don't know what<br>kind of training they're doing like<br>everybody so educated on and it's so big<br>right now well some guy fought off a guy<br>in the subway that was attacking with a<br>knife with some moves that he learned<br>watching the UFC never even trained<br>before he just knew what to do yeah he<br>like knew what to do because he had seen<br>guys like get the mount and drop<br>ground-and-pound he'd like knew what to<br>do based on watching it yeah I think<br>it's good like when you mention it I<br>think it's good just to learn so you<br>would feel better about yourself in case<br>danger comes yeah you want to be the<br>person that gets to make the decision<br>here's the thing right if you don't know<br>how to fight and there's some drunk<br>[ __ ] who doesn't know how to fight<br>either but he might come over and punch<br>you in the face and some to punch you<br>and he can hurt you<br>or knock you out in front of your woman<br>you want to be the one who gets to<br>decide yeah if I'm in a situation and<br>some guy and he's like reasonably close<br>to my size and he's being an [ __ ]<br>he's drunk and he gets aggressive with<br>me I can decide what to do with him<br>mm-hmm like I can it gets I don't want<br>to hurt anybody but I'm not gonna let<br>you hurt me yeah<br>you get to decide like you don't want<br>like you've we've all seen these<br>7-eleven [ __ ] parking lot lights on<br>YouTube or some [ __ ] and both of them<br>don't know how to fight but one guy<br>might [ __ ] that guy up he might kick him<br>in the face while he's down you don't<br>want to be that guy yeah but you don't<br>want to be in that situation definitely<br>walk away whenever you can always