Brendan Schaub: From UFC Fighter To Comedian & Podcaster

**Brendan Schaub** (0:00)
Back to the point of, you know, getting tossing the deep end, you know, I'm doing stand up for about two years. I think I'm the fastest comic to ever get a network special at showtime. So I was like, no, for the most part, people were like, oh, this guy's been there two years, this is good for him.
No, man, when you do that, what happens is, it actually pushes you further away from them.

**Sam Parr** (0:30)
We're live now. Brendan Schaub, what's going on? I'm Sam, this is Shaan.
We just get right into things, but we, Shaan and I have been huge fans of you for a long time. You were both huge UFC fans. We go to a bunch of those shows. Been watching you on Fire the Kid for a while.
Then the show with Theo Vaughn. That was awesome. So we've been fans forever. I think we each actually might have a Thickboy shirt.

**Brendan Schaub** (0:54)
I love it. I don't have the shirt, just the body actually.
I'm a real fan.

**Shaan Puri** (1:01)
I went all the way.

**Brendan Schaub** (1:02)
Thick's in the heart, fellas. Thick's in the heart.

**Sam Parr** (1:04)
I don't drink. Otherwise, I would have your whiskey.

**Brendan Schaub** (1:07)
Whiskey, yeah.

**Sam Parr** (1:09)
But you do lots of stuff. I'll give what I know about you. But basically, you're from Colorado, played a little bit in the NFL. I don't know if you actually made the cut entirely, but you were very serious for the Broncos.
Went into the UFC. You did awesome. You knocked out some great guys.
And then you got into show business via podcast. So you originally were just on Joe Rogan a bunch, eventually launched your own thing. And now you have Fighter and the Kid, but you also have like three or four other podcasts, right? That I don't know, how big are they? I mean, I know that you have hundreds of thousands of subscribers and each video gets like hundreds of thousands of views, but I actually don't know like how big the empire is.

**Brendan Schaub** (1:51)
Yeah, sure. So just going back to like the football. Yes, I played at University of Colorado for the Buffs, who they just got Deion Sand or something, excited about that.
And then I had a cup of coffee with the Buffalo Bills and I got there and they're like, we're all set on slow white guys. So that broke my heart.
And then I, yeah, then from there, I was selling supplements door to door, like pursuit of happiness style. And then I started training in jujitsu and boxing. And then next thing you know, I'm fighting grown men in a steel cage in my underwear. And then two years after I started training, I was in the UFC. I made it through the Ultimate Fighter where I was a finalist there.

**Sam Parr** (2:36)
With Kimbo Slice, right?

**Brendan Schaub** (2:37)
Yeah, it was the biggest season with the Sean Evans and Rampage Jackson. So yeah, then shortly after that, there's a common theme in my life. It's like I get put in the deep end, man. It goes zero to a hundred in every aspect of my life. It's just this common theme throughout my entire career, whether it's comedy, football, fighting, whatever it is, podcasting, I get thrown in the deep end and I got to figure it out. So I was in the UFC and then probably two years in the UFC, next thing you know, I'm ranked top 10 in the world, you know, and it was terrifying.
But then slowly after that, I moved to LA because I grew up in Venice Beach in the summers at my uncle's house when I was a young boy, my dad would always bring me out here for the summers. So I always felt, you know, a weird connection to Los Angeles. So once I could make the move, I made the move. And then I started a podcast. This is damn near 11 years ago, 12 years ago, I started a podcast called The Fighter and the Kid with Brian Callan.
And yeah, that thing took off. And then now fast forward to 2023, I own a podcast network. So the ThinkBoy Network where we have, you know, probably around seven shows, you know? So yeah, so between The Fighter and the Kid, The Schaub Show, Food Truck Diaries, Fight Companion, The Golden Hour, you know, it's going well, it's a lot of work, it's a lot of work.

**Sam Parr** (4:00)
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