#1627 - Dan Gable

Joe Rogan (0:14)

Is that, so you're telling me that this mask is, this is a wrestling, does this have anything to do with your museum?

Dan Gable (0:21)

Yes, it's the National Wrestling Hall of Fame, but this is the one out of Stillwater, Oklahoma.

And the one we have is a subsidiary one. It's called the National Wrestling Hall of Fame, Dan Gable Museum in Waterloo, my hometown. But they own it. See, Oklahoma and Iowa are big rivalries in wrestling over history. And these museums kind of help bring us together.

These actually masks are just the ones out of Stillwater. I don't know if we have ones in Waterloo or not.

Joe Rogan (1:02)

Lex Friedman told me that you have a hard time even walking around in Iowa, that people swarm you.

Dan Gable (1:11)

You know, when they don't swarm me is when I'm going to have to worry about it. Because I'm for the sport of wrestling, and I love that sport, and it's been my life, and I want it to continue to be, and it's a little bit difficult sport. So, you know, it's something that keeps me appreciative, but it also, I promote it out there, and as long as people, I'm okay with it. It might irritate my family a little bit once in a while, but they love the sport too, so they got to expect some of this stuff.

Joe Rogan (1:44)

Well, coming from a guy that has accomplished what you've accomplished and has become this legendary feature in the sport, it comes with the territory. There's no way around it. I mean, you're a beloved character in the sport of wrestling, to the point where I told people that you were going to be on my podcast, and their eyebrows raise up. Like, people get very excited.

Dan Gable (2:05)

Well, you know, I'm glad you said that, because every time I tell somebody, their eyebrows do the same when I'm going on this show. And so, of course, you know, I knew about this show, but I had to do a lot of homework just to see, wow, you know, it's pretty big. So, you know, I'm excited to be here, because I know the effect it can have, not just on me, because, you know, but on the sport, you know, and I love the sport, and it's my hometown of Waterloo, that's why I got started in it, because it was just dominating wrestling at the time. And you know what's funny is that just from a world situation, sport brings people together, and, you know, it's like, who better than a sport with Russia, or Iran, or North Korea, because, you know, it's like, or Turkey, you know, they just, you know, especially the first two, you know, they just, we're always in conflict, it seems like, with them, but when it comes to wrestling, we have something in common, and we usually end up losing to both Russia and Iran, but sometimes we beat them too, and we are well known for good wrestling, and that has helped, I think, the country be better off.

Joe Rogan (3:17)

I had Jordan Burrows on, and he was describing to me what it's like to wrestle in Iran, and how massive the sport is over there, and he's a giant star over there, and he's like, and people are so friendly, and so inviting, and so accepting, and just so happy to see great wrestling. And just wrestling is just an enormous sport over there, and immensely popular.

Dan Gable (3:39)

Well, when I won the Olympics in 1972, their most popular athlete was the guy in my weight class, the Iranian. And I had been in the worlds a year before, but before that, he had two Olympic titles, and every world title in between.

And all of a sudden, he became so popular that the government was a little concerned about him, that the people were more appreciative of him than the government. And so when he went to the Munich Olympics, even though he had lost the year before, because I was there and I won the weight class, we didn't get to wrestle, but he was there and representing Iran in 72, and he won his first match by about 15 points, but he pulled out of the Olympics and he ended up going to the United States because of his being so popular that he was scared they might do something to him at the government level.

Joe Rogan (4:40)

I'm sure you're aware of what happened recently with the wrestler who was killed, the Iranian wrestler who was killed because he was involved in a peaceful protest, and they made an example out of him.