Issue 027

July 2007

You've seen him on TV- black shirt open at the neck, veins bulging, his throat rasping as he enthusiastically calls the action for the Ultimate Fighting Championship. Joe Rogan is the kind of guy who polarises opinion, but guess what?

He doesn't care. He gets to travel the world working for the UFC in a job that he loves and when he's not doing that he's busy with his day job presenting TV shows or doing stand up comedy. Life is good.

We caught up with Joe a few hours prior to a 'secret' comedy gig the evening before UFC 70. With his best friend and partner in crime Eddie Bravo joining us, we sat down over a coffee and discussed a few things to do with MMA and a lot of things that had nothing at all to do with MMA. Religion, aliens, the criminal activity of the US government and the effect's of a Mirko 'Cro Cop' knockout were all topics up for discussion. We delved into the mind of Joe Rogan and just about made it back out again to bring you this exclusive interview.

Comedian, TV presenter or commentator? Which is it?

 Human being, my friend! That's how I get away with all of it, I don't label myself. I just do what I do. People will ask me how I can be a comedian and a cage fighting commentator, I don't know, I like them both, I don't think about it. I also like to play pool, I like girls, and I like to eat. I'm just a human.

You've been with the UFC quite a long time now

Yeah I originally started out in the old UFC back in 1996, back in the SEG days [Sempahore Entertainment Group, owners of the UFC prior to Zuffa). I was there for the debut of Vitor Belfort. I was the post-fight interview guy.

You've seen the UFC go through some pretty big changes

I was there for the UFC's dark ages, right when it all dropped off. I was there right when the UFC lost it's cable contract, it was banned from cable and was banned from most states. It was supposed to be in Buffalo, New York and it got kicked out of New York State. Right at the last minute they flew it down to Alabama. That was the first UFC I ever did. I did a bunch of those where we were on these little puddle jumper airplanes, but you know as a fan of the sport I got to see some historic shit. I got to see the debut of Randy Couture. I got to see Jeremy Horn's debut when he almost beat Frank Shamrock until he got caught with that kneebar right at the last second. I saw Jerry Bohlander armbar Kevin Jackson, and I saw Chuck Liddell's debut. I got to see some great, great fights.

There are people who were around then that are still around now and you're one of them, but there was a period in the middle when you were off doing other stuff.

I was still a fan you know, but there was a period of time when it just wasn't that fun to travel to all those little places anymore. SEG wasn't having the kind of success that Zuffa is having. The venues were small the crowd's weren't as excited and I preferred working on television.

It was at UFC 37.5 that I saw Dana White; he was giving away free tickets for people to sit ringside and he gave me some tickets. He was talking to me about the fights and the more we became friends he realised how much I loved the sport. He asked me to do commentary and the rest is history. I didn't want to do it at first, I was like "man, I don't wanna work! I just wanna get drunk and yell!" You know what I mean? You just wanna yell "oh shit! oh shit!"

Well I guess you don't get drunk but you still yell!

Haha, yeah I still yell a lot. I don't treat it like what you would consider a professional sportscaster.

But a lot of people like your enthusiasm

Fans can tell I'm just like them, I'm a real fan. I would do this for free, and I did, I did the first four or five of them for free.

They were hooking me up! Dana was giving me ringside seats and tickets for my friends, they would fly us out and he was always a gentleman, I didn't need to ask for any money. Then he asked me to sign a contract and not to do any other MMA and now it's like my main job, it's hilarious

So how do you manage to balance this with the stand up comedy and stuff?

It's very easy, as I would be doing this anyway. I would be watching them anyway, if I didn't have a gig I would be there, I'm always following the sport. It's a job but it's not a job. I've been involved in martial arts since I was a little boy. I was doing kung fu at the age of seven, then things like karate and tae kwon do onto kickboxing and Muay Thai. I've been doing jiu-jitsu since 1996, now I train with Eddie Bravo.

You and Eddie met at the Machado Academy, right?

Yeah around '97 or '98. I started training with Rickson Gracie first, I only went there once.

Did you see him on the mat?

No. Never. I did have the chance to have dinner with him though, we went out for dinner and I went back to his house. We watched some fight tapes and broke down some positions and stuff, that was pretty cool. That was an honour, that was one of the best perks of this job.

You're a very visible part of the UFC how do you feel about the potential HBO deal and the rumours that they want to choose their own announcers. Does this bother you?

No. I think the people at the network are going to have their own ideas about what they want on there, for whatever reasons they want people who don't work with the UFC. They're after people they think would be more objective I guess, which I think is silly because I'm as objective as they come. I've never been asked not to be objective, the only thing I've been asked to do is not to give advertisements for Pride when they were in the middle of negotiations, which made sense. They said if you want to mention fighters that's fine, but if you do, don't mentioned Pride. If I mentioned Fedor or Nogueira, I would just say that they fought in Japan. As far as objectivity, I've always prided myself in speaking my mind one hundred percent, I don't hold back, I try to be very respectful, but I try to be objective about their talents.

People might not realise, but you're friends with a lot of the fighters.

I'm friends with a lot of them, but some of them no, a lot of them get mad at me! I've had a lot of guys get mad at me for saying they were tired, I'm like what the fuck were you? Your mouth was wide open and you were breathing heavy! I'm not being a bad guy, I'm pointing out what's happening. A lot of fighters are very sensitive, they don't like being criticised. Most of them are cool, but some of them are a little weird.

Let's talk about your stand-up (comedy). You're going to do a gig tonight. Is this something you try to set up before most UFCs?

I try to do stand-up almost every weekend. Stand-up is a lot like jiu-jitsu, where you have to try and stay in shape. Plus its fun: I always wanted to do stand-up in the UK and I've never been over here before.

You've come under some fire on the US comedy circuit. You confronted Carlos Mencia at the Comedy Store and were banned from performing there. (Joe stood up for fellow comedians by bringing Mencia's joke stealing to attention).

The thing about the comedy store was that it was owned and operated by Mitzi Shore, this great woman who did amazing things for stand-up comedy as an art form.

Now her son and some manager douche bag have taken over and they want people to respect the club; but no, they don't understand it’s not the club you have to respect but this woman who did so much.

Meanwhile they treat stand-up with no respect and they were happy to have Carlos headline at their club when it's been proven he's a plagiarist. The reason they didn't ask me back was because they say I threatened him on stage, which is bullshit.

One subject I want to talk to you about and it’s something you've been quite vocal about, is the use of marijuana. Now there are a lot of guys in California who have been busted for weed in the dope tests, what are your thoughts on this?

Well it's definitely a performance enhancer when it comes to comedy. When it comes to comedy it's like steroids so it’s hard to argue that it's a bad thing. It doesn't have any negative repercussions.

If you want to take steroids out of mixed martial arts and say they're taking years off their bodies and stuff, fair enough. I believe in personal freedom and personal responsibility, but to argue that marijuana should be illegal, that's ridiculous. No one is testing fighters for cigarettes.

If you've had a hard day of training and you get home and you're tired and want to smoke a joint and watch TV, what is wrong with that? Who are you hurting? you want to smoke a joint and do jiu-jitsu which is what I like to do, I always do jiu-jitsu when I'm high, so what?

Joe Rogan's CD Shiny Happy Jihad is out now.