Joe Rogan & Russell Brand Discuss Conor McGregor's Greatness

Tell me, please, just briefly, is there something about the phenomena of Conor McGregor that is unique? What is it that is happening? What has happened with him? What does he mean? What does he mean in TFC? What happens to him now that our post Mayweather fight? What is he an example of? Is he a sort of an outlier, a pioneer? How will he be regarded? What does he represent? Is he an entertainment product? Is he a great athlete? Is he a combination of all those things? What does he mean for the sport of UFC? And what do you think will happen in mixed martial arts and boxing? Do you think we'll see more of those kind of events? Well, you're never going to see another one like him, right? Because he's a unique person. He's literally being himself. You're going to see a bunch of people try to mimic that. And in a sense, he's sort of mimicked the people that came before him, like the Chael Sunnens and the Muhammad Ali's and the people that were really good at talking shit. The difference is that what Conor's been able to do, he's the first guy in the UFC that's been able to do that, that's had spectacular results, and also showed his real character in losing and then coming back and winning very quickly afterwards with the same guy, like the Nate Diaz fight. I think that was a very important character exposing fight because he lost a fight, he got humbled, and then he jumped right back on the horse and then wound up winning. And then he comes back and blows Eddie Alvarez out of the water to become the first two division concurrent champion in the sport. I think he's a unique guy in a very, it's almost like we don't have a word strong enough. Unique is not really a strong enough word. So he's founded on ability in a very basic way. He's got brilliant ability. He's incredibly smart. And very, he's very innovative in his techniques and his approaches. And I think he has phenomenal coaching as well. All that animal movement stuff. What the fuck is that walk? Well, he's just getting that thing that he does with throws. It's amazing. Who does that? What does it mean? It doesn't mean anything. It blows my mind. He's started doing it. He's peacocking on me too. I do when I come out on stage sometimes. It's just an amazing thing to do with the body. Yeah. Peacocking you say. Peacocking. So it looks like, oh my God, this guy's fucking out there. Look what he's doing. He's letting the other guy know that he's so loose he can kind of strut with his arms like rubber bands, flapping around. But I mean, he's a combination of a lot of things. He has a brilliant team. John Cavanaugh is coach. He's a brilliant coach. He's got amazing jiu-jitsu coaching and striking coaching in his mind. He just, he understands how to apply these things and his ability to perform under pressure is fantastic. You saw that in the Mayweather fight. I mean, even though he lost that fight, he hit Mayweather with some pretty good shots and he won the first three rounds against the greatest boxer of all time. So that's extraordinary. I mean, you can say easily that Mayweather was taking those rounds off and I agree he was. And you could say that Mayweather was bringing him to deep water because he knew he'd exhaust him because he didn't give him enough time to train for it because he really only gave him two months. It was very brilliant on Mayweather's part. He knew that he wouldn't be efficient. He would tire all those kinetic, big explosive movements that Connor likes to do. They're very taxing. And he knew that he was not going to have the efficiency to go 12 hard rounds with a master defensive fighter like Mayweather and Mayweather was right. But he didn't want to get hit with that uppercut that he got cracked with in the first round. He didn't want to, like, you know, Connor's movement was very unusual. It took Floyd a while to decipher it. It would have been way better for him if he just blew Connor out of the water from one round on and just completely outclassed him. But he didn't. And one of the reasons why he didn't is because Connor's an extraordinary person. He has greatness. Yes, he has greatness. I mean, he didn't really have the proper opportunity. And only being able to prepare for two months and only having this one professional boxing match, there was a lot of things stacked against him. And yet I feel, although he clearly lost, he performed admirably. I don't think it hurts his stock in any way. I think it elevates him. And I think his next fight in the UFC, whoever it would will be will be probably the biggest fight in UFC history, if they can do it correctly, depending upon who it is, especially if it's Nate Diaz, because Nate Diaz is a huge name. And if Nate Diaz and him decided to do it one more time, I think that would be the biggest fight ever in the history of the sport, because I think Connor has eclipsed the sport largely, you know, and maybe for now, maybe someone else will come along in the next year or two that does it. I mean, look, Connor's only been around for a few years. I tweeted to him in 2013 or 14. I forget what it was when he had won a big fight in the UK. And I said, you know, congratulations on an amazing performance. I really hope to see in the UFC someday. That was like, four years ago, my god, most. So in four years, he's gone from being this unknown fighter that only like the really hardcore fanatics, like myself knew about to him being this worldwide phenomena. He's the the biggest combat sport athlete, not just of today ever. There's no one like him. No one like him. No one has the kind of popularity that he has. I mean, this fucking guy has 1000s and 1000s of people fly from Ireland to Vegas every time he fights the weigh ins. It seems like you're in Dublin. I mean, it's fucking crazy, man. When you look out when I when I interview him at the weigh ins in the UFC in Vegas, you look out, you see nothing but Irish flags. You see people screaming and cheering and singing Mandalay Bay during the fucking Floyd Mayweather fight, which is not even the venue where the fight was being held. Mandalay Bay was packed bumper to bumper with Irishman walking down the hallway, cheering and singing songs in sync. It was insane. There's no one like him. So first of all, you have to have the greatness. Like without the greatness, who gives a fuck is just another person. Like a Dennis Hopper said about Van Gogh, you know, like, you know, who gives a fuck if you cut your ear off if you're painting the shit. Paintings have got to be good. So his game is good. But then like, but like there are often great geniuses in sport. But to have that, like you say this, so he used like the romantic ideas of Ireland and his own Irishness that became an important part of his perception. But it's obviously resonating in a very, very powerful way to have that kind of devotion. Well, Ireland's very important. Ireland's a very important part of the equation as well, because their appreciation and love and support of him is unprecedented. I mean, I've seen Brazilian fans that love Jose Aldo, and I've seen Brazilian fans that love Anderson Silva, and you know, they're worshiped by their countrymen. But it pales in comparison to the amount of love that Conor McGregor gets. I understand. Their their myth aligns with his myth, the myth of the Irish people as being oppressed by British colonialism and having to fight for their freedom. It resonates with what this man represents. And perhaps this is always what happens with figures of greatness, whether it's within the realm of sport or within the realm of politics, temporarily, a person sort of captures a particular mood, a particular energy. And this is what I think, again, is to do with unconsciousness. I don't think people are aware of these kind of feelings. I think it's stimulated on a level that's not about thought. This is one of the things I'm very interested in, what lies beyond the rational, you know, what lies here, we can equate, we can work out, we can judge, but there seems to be some ingredient even in Conor McGregor that you can't quite pin down. Yes, there's the greatness of the boxer. Yes, the Irish people, you know, but there's also some flavor is being caught. I wonder if you can ever preempt or understand these things. I wonder if you can ever drill down. But like the sort of the work of Joseph Campbell, the work of Carl Jung, the work of these people to say, oh, there are unconscious archetypes, there are unconscious themes, there are stories that are running below the surface patterns, coordinates that can be connected to some people, well, notably the profession of marketing, know how to harness these energies. If you have enough people feeling they're not good enough, they will spend money trying to feel better, whether it's the purchase of a car or a coffee or whatever it is. One of the key ingredient is make people feel not good enough. If you can re-harness and redirect people sexual energy so that their sexual energy is directed at products and consumerism, then you will sell your product. But for me, it seems like such a shame to waste this force, to waste this knowledge, to waste this energy, just to turn people into consumers, just to turn everything on this planet into a commodity. When what we could be doing is using this energy to imagine new worlds, to imagine new systems, to use our greatness, to use our greatness to, I don't know, Joe, love one another, to create new tribes.