Joe Rogan Experience #1598 - The Undertaker

1. 0:00 – 15:00

   (drum roll) Joe Rogan Podcast,…

   1. THTony Hinchcliffe0:02

      (drum roll) Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out.

   2. NANarrator0:04

      The Joe Rogan Experience.

   3. JRJoe Rogan0:06

      Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night. All day. (instrumental music plays) WWE royalty, ladies and gentlemen. The Undertaker and the biggest fucking wrestling fan on planet Earth. Like I was saying, uh, before the podcast, if I did not bring Tony Hinchcliffe on this podcast, I would have never heard the end of it.

   4. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway0:27

      (laughs)

   5. JRJoe Rogan0:27

      No one loves you more than that man. Like, being right next to you right now is probably ... He's tingling.

   6. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway0:31

      He's tingling a little bit?

   7. JRJoe Rogan0:32

      Might be lactating.

   8. THTony Hinchcliffe0:33

      This is the highlight of my life.

   9. JRJoe Rogan0:35

      (laughs)

   10. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway0:35

       That, ooh-

   11. JRJoe Rogan0:36

       (laughs)

   12. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway0:36

       I don't, I don't know if I'm happy or sad about that, really.

   13. JRJoe Rogan0:41

       (laughs)

   14. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway0:41

       (laughs)

   15. JRJoe Rogan0:41

       But anyway, thanks for coming on here. I really, I really appreciate it.

   16. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway0:43

       No, thanks for having me, man. Yeah, it's an honor, really.

   17. JRJoe Rogan0:46

       Oh, my pleasure. Honored to have you. So, what is it like, uh, being in Austin, Texas right now? You, are you enjoying it? And you're from this area, right?

   18. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway0:53

       Yeah, well I'm, I'm from Houston.

   19. JRJoe Rogan0:54

       Right.

   20. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway0:55

       Uh, but I've been here since about '04. Um, you know, it's crazy, man. We got this influx of people from California right now. It's just-

   21. JRJoe Rogan1:01

       I know. We're trying not to fuck it up.

   22. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:02

       (laughs)

   23. JRJoe Rogan1:03

       What should we do? Tell us what to do.

   24. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:04

       Uh. You know, uh, it's fine. Bring the money, leave the values, and we'll all be good.

   25. JRJoe Rogan1:09

       What values do we need to leave behind specifically?

   26. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:11

       Well, fuck, everything that fucked up California. You know?

   27. JRJoe Rogan1:13

       'Cause I think that's the government, man. Speaker2: Yeah. They know nothing about-

   28. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:15

       No, it really ... Uh, what, the government gets voted in though, right?

   29. JRJoe Rogan1:18

       Yeah, but, uh, I don't think we expected them to do that.

   30. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:21

       Exactly.
2. 15:00 – 30:00

   Nuts. …

   1. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway15:00

   2. JRJoe Rogan15:00

      Nuts.

   3. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway15:00

      ... man. It really is.

   4. THTony Hinchcliffe15:01

      And from the fans' perspective, you know, they don't tell you when these guys are getting surgery and things like that. You know what I mean? And, uh, so f-

   5. JRJoe Rogan15:09

      What do you think happened?

   6. THTony Hinchcliffe15:10

      Well, we don't... What do you mean? No, we don't, we don't know when they're getting surgery. So my point is, is like, for example, you know, you're watching the Undertaker, right? Who's already been doing it years longer than all of his peers and all that. And maybe you could tell that matches not necessarily are different or slower, but they're just, they are, they're different than obviously headlining an hour-long WrestleMania match, right?

   7. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway15:35

      I think you just dissed me. I'm not sure.

   8. THTony Hinchcliffe15:37

      No.

   9. JRJoe Rogan15:37

      I think you did.

   10. THTony Hinchcliffe15:37

       I felt it.

   11. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway15:38

       I think, I think you felt that, right?

   12. JRJoe Rogan15:39

       I didn't like it.

   13. THTony Hinchcliffe15:39

       But the return on that is that people say like, "Oh, this must be it. This must... We're coming towards the end of the Undertaker."

   14. JRJoe Rogan15:46

       Right.

   15. THTony Hinchcliffe15:47

       "He's... It's different than it's always been." And then he would come back from one of these hip surgeries, and it would literally add to the mystique of the Undertaker, because all of a sudden he's faster, stronger, right?

   16. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway16:01

       Yeah.

   17. THTony Hinchcliffe16:01

       And it was just-

   18. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway16:01

       Yeah.

   19. JRJoe Rogan16:01

       It adds...

   20. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway16:01

       For a while there, that was the, yeah, that was the template. I would, uh, you know, I would... At the end of my career, I had to kind of... almost like a fighter, you know, when a fighter goes into camp. You know, 'cause I would get ready for, like, one event for years. Like, I had an eight-year stretch where I averaged 270 dates a year.

   21. JRJoe Rogan16:18

       (Inhales) Whoa.

   22. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway16:20

       And that's what a lot of people don't... they don't, they don't get that part of what we do.

   23. JRJoe Rogan16:23

       Right, they don't get the live events-

   24. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway16:24

       Yeah, hea-

   25. JRJoe Rogan16:24

       ... town to town, flying everywhere. That is bananas.

   26. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway16:28

       Yeah. Uh, uh, easily, easily eight years, 270 dates, with, at the beginning of my career in the early '90s with WWE on the weekends, we'd do two shows a day.

   27. JRJoe Rogan16:38

       Booom.

   28. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway16:40

       Yeah. You know?

   29. JRJoe Rogan16:40

       Oh, my God.

   30. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway16:41

       (laughs) So, you know.
3. 30:00 – 45:00

   (laughs) …

   1. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway30:00

      him up out of a d- he's just standing there naked. And everybody's like, "Uh, we're here to train?" And he goes, "Oh, fuck, is that today?"

   2. JRJoe Rogan30:10

      (laughs)

   3. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway30:11

      Yeah, you know. And, uh, so he, he gets a- another guy that was staying there with him, his name was Perry Jackson, who I'm friends with to this day, uh...He says, "Go out there and warm him up," right? So, he goes out there and we run and do all just, I mean, everything they can do to blow us up and run us off, right? Totally gassed out about two hours, just nothing but cardio shit, right? Finally, Buzz comes out. "All right. Everybody line up." You know, "All right. Everybody get down, amateur position." Right? So, you know, everybody gets down. Fucking he just stretches the shit out of everybody, right? Like, cross-faced, just fucking, you know, chicken wing and just, just hooking everybody and rolling them around in the f- in his front yard, right? (laughs) It's just...

   4. JRJoe Rogan30:58

      (laughs)

   5. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway30:59

      And that, yeah, that was it, right? Then he goes in the house. He's like, "Y'all come back, you know, a couple other days." So this goes on for weeks.

   6. JRJoe Rogan31:06

      Mm-hmm.

   7. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway31:06

      And, like, every time I show up, there's, like, one less guy that shows up. They just, like, fucking ... Until I was the last one there.

   8. JRJoe Rogan31:13

      Mm-hmm.

   9. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway31:14

      So I'm the last one there, I knock on the door, knock on the door, fuck. He never answers, right? So I start peering in the windows, fucking all the furniture's gone, everything's go- he's gone. He'd gone to a different territory to work. He just left, right? Never, never learned any pro wrestling.

   10. JRJoe Rogan31:34

       (laughs)

   11. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway31:35

       Ne- (laughs)

   12. JRJoe Rogan31:35

       He was just teaching you wrestling right now.

   13. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway31:36

       He was just teaching me, yeah, eh, uh, obviously he, we-

   14. JRJoe Rogan31:39

       Yeah.

   15. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway31:39

       ... signed up for pro, you know-

   16. JRJoe Rogan31:40

       Right.

   17. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway31:40

       ... to, to teach us how to pro-wrestle, but he just came out there, and his whole goal, and this is the way it was back then, is they always tried to take your money, and then they try to run you off, you know?

   18. JRJoe Rogan31:49

       Uh-huh.

   19. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway31:50

       Most of the guys at th- in that era were all shooters, you know, they were all, you know, they were all good amateurs.

   20. JRJoe Rogan31:56

       Right.

   21. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway31:56

       And that was what they would do. They would take your money, then they'd hurt you, twist you, hurt, you know-

   22. JRJoe Rogan32:01

       Mm-hmm.

   23. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway32:01

       ... try and get you to quit. Then they got your money and they're, you know, they didn't have to worry about it.

   24. JRJoe Rogan32:05

       There's some wrestling trainers that were famous for, eh, like, crazy physical training standards before they ever taught you anything, like Karl Gotch.

   25. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway32:13

       Oh, yeah.

   26. JRJoe Rogan32:14

       I'm sure you know who Karl Gotch is.

   27. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway32:15

       Yeah.

   28. JRJoe Rogan32:15

       Karl Gotch who was a, not just a, a wrestler, but one of the, he's like one of the legends of catch wrestling.

   29. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway32:22

       Yep.

   30. JRJoe Rogan32:22

       And catch wrestling is like a, uh, eh, so it's a lot like submission wrestling that you see in the U, in the UFC or in Jujitsu, but it's, uh, a very, like, wrestling oriented. So instead of, like, whereas Jujitsu maybe would be, uh, mo- I, I don't wanna say it's le- it's less technical, but it's more violent.
4. 45:00 – 1:00:00

   Wow. …

   1. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway45:00

      and, you know, they sit there and talk, alright, who's gonna make it? Who's not gonna make it? And, uh, a- and we get, yeah, we get- we send ... We go all over the world now. They- they went- they s- recruit in China, the Middle East.

   2. JRJoe Rogan45:14

      Wow.

   3. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway45:14

      Everywhere we- you know, everywhere we have TV programming, which makes sense as- as well, they- they're looking for that hometown star like when we go to like if we go to Saudi or- or somewhere in Dubai or someplace. If you've got somebody local, that's just great business.

   4. JRJoe Rogan45:30

      How did you become The Undertaker?

   5. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway45:33

      (laughs)

   6. NANarrator45:35

      (laughs)

   7. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway45:36

      So (laughs) so that- that's- that's Vince's brainchild. So I went to another company, WCW, where I was, uh, mean Mark Callous. And, uh, right there, check that young-

   8. JRJoe Rogan45:47

      (laughs)

   9. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway45:47

      ... stud out right there. That's terrifying, isn't it? (laughs)

   10. NANarrator45:53

       (laughs)

   11. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway45:53

       That guy is, uh-

   12. JRJoe Rogan45:53

       You look like an enormous hobbit.

   13. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway45:54

       Yeah. Uh, just, uh-

   14. NANarrator45:57

       (laughs)

   15. JRJoe Rogan45:57

       (laughs)

   16. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway45:57

       That's, uh ... Yeah, we can take that down any time. Uh-

   17. NANarrator46:03

       (laughs)

   18. JRJoe Rogan46:03

       (claps)

   19. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway46:03

       (laughs) So- so I go there and, uh-

   20. JRJoe Rogan46:10

       (laughs)

   21. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway46:11

       ... I- I was about, I was there about eight or nine months, and, uh, my contract was coming up. And I go- I go in to renegotiate my contract and they were like, "Look, you're a great athlete, kid. But no one's ever gonna pay money to watch you wrestle." Like, I- I'm just looking for a little bit of bump, right? A little bump in my paycheck. I'm not looking for the mega-deal, I'm just looking for a little bit of bump.

   22. JRJoe Rogan46:36

       Wow.

   23. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway46:36

       "Nope. We're gonna give you the same deal for a year." I mean, it- it you just, you know ... "You do great things in the ring, but no one's ever gonna pay money to see you wrestle."

   24. JRJoe Rogan46:46

       Did they give you advice on how to get someone to pay?

   25. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway46:48

       No. No.

   26. JRJoe Rogan46:48

       Wow.

   27. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway46:49

       Tha- yeah, that was it.

   28. JRJoe Rogan46:50

       They didn't tell you anything wrong.

   29. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway46:50

       That was it. So I'm like, okay, I've- my ceiling, I know where my ceiling is here, right? So, uh, just through a- you know, a few different people, I get connected with some people in the- in the W, which was WWF at the time, it's WWE now. And, um, I had a match coming up and my hip was already bad at that point, even back then.

   30. JRJoe Rogan47:12

       Really?
5. 1:00:00 – 1:11:44

   Oh, Jesus. …

   1. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:00:00

      you know. But once again, we don't have cellphones back then. So I give up, I'm gonna go back to my hotel. So I'm driving and, uh, I pass this hospital. I said, "You know what? I'm gonna... Something just ain't right." 'Cause every time... You know, I'd just... Like that and my face would just pfff. My face would just blow up. And, uh, I'm gonna just go in and get to sh... If there's nobody in there in the emergency room, I'm gonna go in and get this thing checked out. So sure enough, I drive through. I don't see anybody in the emergency room, so I go in. It's midnight. I go in and they do a CAT scan, doctor... (laughs) He comes out and he goes, uh, he says, "Do you have an ophthalmologist?" And I was like, "No." He goes, "Well, you need to find one."... and, uh, "You're gonna need a surgeon, too." And I'm like, "What are you talking about?" He goes, "You've lost 50% of your orbital floor, is gone." I'm like, "Really?" (laughs) I'm like, "Okay." So, I go home and I call and say, "Look, I gotta go home. I f- I had this injury." So they go, I get home, they do another scan, another CT scan. They said, "No, you've lost more like 70% of it."

   2. NANarrator1:01:07

      Oh, Jesus.

   3. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:01:08

      So, they end up doing the surgery, two surgeons. One to ... So, they- they, you know, they go inside the eyelid, make the incision. One surgeon holds up the eye and the nerve while the other one picks out all the pieces and puts in the, in the mesh kind of thing that's gonna be your eye socket. Come to find out I'd lost 90% of my orbital floor, and my optic nerve was sitting right on top of a piece of jagged bone.

   4. NANarrator1:01:36

      Oh, Jesus Christ.

   5. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:01:37

      If I'd have took another shot to that side of my head, I'd have probably lost the eye.

   6. NANarrator1:01:41

      Wow.

   7. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:01:42

      Or- or my sight.

   8. NANarrator1:01:43

      Yeah.

   9. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:01:43

      And it's just ... 'Cause we didn't, you know?

   10. NANarrator1:01:45

       So, your eye was just hanging on by a thread.

   11. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:01:46

       It was just hang- it was just sitting on a piece of jagged bone.

   12. NANarrator1:01:49

       (sighs)

   13. THTony Hinchcliffe1:01:51

       And that woulda been it, you couldn't have-

   14. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:01:52

       Yeah, I mean, I woulda been ... Yeah, I'd a been done and, you know. So, I had the surgery. So, the mask, uh, I healed, I don't know, maybe six weeks. Went and had the mask made, and wrestled in that for a while and made it s- part of the story and ...

   15. NANarrator1:02:07

       So, wh- what do they put back there instead of the mesh?

   16. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:02:11

       It's a, it's a, um ... So, my other eye that I did, they have a, it- it's titanium. But this is a, it's- it's a, it's, uh, I don't ... It's not titanium, but it's kind of a, a wire mesh that's, that's just, it's screwed into my, in- into the bone, and it w- works as my orbital floor.

   17. NANarrator1:02:32

       So, you don't have an orbital floor in that eye anymore?

   18. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:02:34

       Mm-mm.

   19. THTony Hinchcliffe1:02:34

       Mm-mm.

   20. NANarrator1:02:34

       You just have this wire mesh?

   21. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:02:36

       Yeah.

   22. NANarrator1:02:36

       Is what it looks like?

   23. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:02:37

       Yeah.

   24. NANarrator1:02:37

       That's what it looks like right there?

   25. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:02:38

       Yeah.

   26. NANarrator1:02:38

       Do you feel anything back there sometimes?

   27. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:02:40

       No.

   28. NANarrator1:02:40

       Nothing?

   29. MCMark "The Undertaker" Calaway1:02:41

       Never.

   30. NANarrator1:02:41

       Holy shit.

Episode duration: 2:43:06