JRE MMA Show #167 with Cory Sandhagen
Joe Rogan (host), Cory Sandhagen (guest), Narrator
In this episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, featuring Joe Rogan and Cory Sandhagen, JRE MMA Show #167 with Cory Sandhagen explores cory Sandhagen Explores Fighting, Philosophy, AI, And Future Of MMA Joe Rogan and Cory Sandhagen cover everything from the technical evolution of MMA—gloves, judging, weight cuts—to the mental and philosophical side of being an elite fighter. Sandhagen explains how his defensive, stance-switching style and leg-lock game were built, and why he’s changed his approach to training, coaching, and fight-week mindset. They dive deep into the flaws of MMA judging and scoring, the dangers of staph and extreme weight cuts, and how nutrition, recovery, and smart sparring extend careers. The conversation widens into religion, ego, meditation, AI, and even a metaphysical comic book Cory is writing, framing fighting as both a craft and a vehicle for self-discovery.
Cory Sandhagen Explores Fighting, Philosophy, AI, And Future Of MMA
Joe Rogan and Cory Sandhagen cover everything from the technical evolution of MMA—gloves, judging, weight cuts—to the mental and philosophical side of being an elite fighter. Sandhagen explains how his defensive, stance-switching style and leg-lock game were built, and why he’s changed his approach to training, coaching, and fight-week mindset. They dive deep into the flaws of MMA judging and scoring, the dangers of staph and extreme weight cuts, and how nutrition, recovery, and smart sparring extend careers. The conversation widens into religion, ego, meditation, AI, and even a metaphysical comic book Cory is writing, framing fighting as both a craft and a vehicle for self-discovery.
Key Takeaways
Elite performance often comes from extreme, single-minded focus.
Stories like Justin Gaethje playing golf 260 days straight—and winning a Ferrari at Fanatics Fest—illustrate how obsessive repetition and full commitment in any skill (golf or fighting) dramatically compounds improvement.
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MMA still needs serious structural reform in gloves and judging.
Rogan and Sandhagen argue UFC should adopt better gloves (like Trevor Wittman’s) to reduce eye pokes and hand injuries, and overhaul scoring so near-submissions, positional grappling, and damage to joints are scored more like knockdowns in striking.
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Training partners and smart sparring are key to career longevity.
Cory still spars hard but emphasizes that defense-first styles, good partners who don’t ‘blast’ each other, and better training gloves let fighters get intense work in without burning out their ‘mileage’ or brain cells.
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Camp structure and letting coaches truly coach improves performance.
Sandhagen admits he used to micromanage his camps out of insecurity; after the Umar Nurmagomedov fight he consciously surrendered more control to Trevor Wittman and his team, which he says made his life better and sharpened his fighting.
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Staph, antibiotics, and bad weight-cut habits quietly wreck fighters.
They detail multiple severe staph episodes, year-long antibiotic use (Gordon Ryan), and how post-weigh-in ‘cheat’ eating sabotages performance; Cory highlights using targeted carbs, electrolytes, and avoiding foods that wreck his digestion as critical advantages.
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Adapting mindset—from hunting knockouts to solving problems—elevates a fighter.
Cory explains he lost to Umar partly by chasing big moments and abandoning his usual layered, defensive game; he now focuses on being the best all-around martial artist in the cage and winning every exchange, not just landing highlight-reel shots.
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Fighting can be a laboratory for ego, spirituality, and meaning.
Sandhagen describes using meditation, ‘watcher’ awareness, and even an internal hero’s journey (where he symbolically lets go of Jesus as an attachment) to dismantle egos and fears, treating love, service, and self-observation as performance tools, not just life philosophy.
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Notable Quotes
“You don't get to walk around saying you want to be world champion and then not do any of the actions. Then you're just a stupid person.”
— Cory Sandhagen
“Judging a fight when you’ve never trained is like judging a Chinese spelling bee and you don’t speak Chinese.”
— Joe Rogan
“A lot of people say they love fighting, but real love is like a marriage—being committed on the days and months you don’t like it.”
— Cory Sandhagen
“If I can’t beat whoever they put in front of me—number ten or number two—then I don’t deserve the belt.”
— Cory Sandhagen
“It might be that AI is the ‘second coming’—a god we build that isn’t born of a mother.”
— Joe Rogan
Questions Answered in This Episode
How would MMA look if Cory’s proposed scoring system—separate scores for strikes, kicks, grappling, and damage—were actually implemented across a full event?
Joe Rogan and Cory Sandhagen cover everything from the technical evolution of MMA—gloves, judging, weight cuts—to the mental and philosophical side of being an elite fighter. ...
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What practical mental drills or exercises could non-fighters use from Cory’s ‘watcher’ and ego-dissolving practices to handle everyday fear and pressure?
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If UFC adopted Wittman-style gloves and more weight classes, which current champions and contenders would be most helped—or exposed?
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How might AI and Neuralink-like tech change a fighter’s preparation, strategy, or even in-cage decision-making over the next 20 years?
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What does Cory’s multi-density comic-book universe reveal about how he views violence, spirituality, and human evolution—and does that affect how he fights?
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Transcript Preview
(drumbeats) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience.
Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (instrumental music plays)
Good to see you, brother. What's happening?
Yeah, good to see you too.
I'm good.
We were talking about golf and, uh, Jamie, who's a full-blown addict-
Yeah. What's up?
(laughs) What's up?
What do you wanna know?
What's up? (laughs)
What do you wanna know? What do you wanna hear about?
I don't know, dude. I feel like everyone is now. So you're saying Gaethje's fully hooked?
Oh, fully hooked. It's crazy.
Yeah.
He, uh... Yeah, I don't know. Do you know what Fanatics Fest is?
No.
So Fanatics Fest is... I was just at it on Sunday, but it's just like a, it's like com- kind of like Comic-Con but for athletes. And Gaethje got to do, like, the Fanatics game, which is, like, a celebrity thing, where it's, like, 50 pro athletes do it, 50 normal people, and they compete in a bunch of sports or whatever. He said he won because he was good at golf, so the fucking guy won a Ferrari 'cause he got second place. Tom Brady got first, he got a million dollars. And then, like, a normal, like, non-professional athlete got third place, he got, like, 200K.
Whoa.
So it's fucking-
He got a Ferrari?
Yeah, dude, golf got him-
Holy shit.
Golf got him for this (laughs) fucking Ferrari. I think he took-
Holy shit.
Yeah. So he's... So that kinda just enforced his addiction more than...
But damn, he's that good?
Yeah, he's pretty good. I- you know, I mean, for... I don't know shit about golf, but from what I know-
Daniel told me, DC told me that he started off and he was just kinda okay. But over the time, between the Holloway fight and his-
Yeah.
... fight with Fiziev, he didn't do anything but play golf for a year.
Yeah. Same.
He played, like, 260 days in a row and he said his handicap just kept getting better and better and better and better. He said the next time he played, he was like, "Holy shit, he's really good now."
Sounds about right, yeah.
Makes sense, though. He's a psycho. You know?
He is a psy-... Yeah, he-
Completely dedicated to something.
And he's single. (laughs)
He's gonna, yeah, he's gonna excel.
(laughs)
If that guy gets his mind on something, he's gonna excel.
Yeah. He's a, he's a unique dude for sure. I've really liked, 'cause, uh, obviously, you know I started working with Wittman not too long ago.
Mm-hmm.
Um, I've really enjoyed getting to know, like, that crew, like Trevor, Gaethje, Kamaru.
Trevor's a unique guy.
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