JRE MMA Show #125 with Aljamain Sterling

Joe Rogan (0:04)

The Joe Rogan Experience.

Joe Rogan (0:14)

Undisputed, the undisputed champ, ladies and gentlemen.

Aljamain Sterling (0:17)

It feels amazing.

Joe Rogan (0:18)

God, how good does that feel for you?

Aljamain Sterling (0:20)

Oh, top of the world, liberating.

Joe Rogan (0:22)

After all that shit you had to take from people for so long, how many months was it?

Aljamain Sterling (0:28)

13 months before I could get back in there.

Joe Rogan (0:30)

13 months of people talking shit.

Aljamain Sterling (0:33)

Yeah. It's a long time.

Joe Rogan (0:34)

It's a long time. But how sweet must it have been when they raised your hand and you got the W and still.

Aljamain Sterling (0:44)

It was kind of a mind fuck a little bit because it was a split decision, which I was like, wait. I mean, like going back now, I could see why people were saying that, but in my head, I thought I had that thing locked up, easy, dead to rights, and I was really confident going into the scorecards. And then when that happened, I was like, you gotta be kidding me. They're really trying to take this away from me. After 13 months, I worked this hard, but.

Joe Rogan (1:05)

You got it. Yeah, that was a weird split decision. I mean, it was a very good fight, but you definitely won the fight. I watched it again today, actually.

Aljamain Sterling (1:13)

I haven't, I've watched it one time with people.

Normally after the fight within, I usually watch it that night, and I usually watch it a couple of times and I analyze it and I break it down, take notes, wins losses, because that's how you grow. But for this one, I just wanted to break and just get away from the sport a little bit and just kind of decompress, because like I said, man, 13 months is a long time to just have people just chirping at you and you can't physically do anything because you're healing. So I was just really happy that I got it done, but now I need to go back and start to get back on that horse a little bit to get ready for the next one.

Joe Rogan (1:47)

Yeah, go back and watch it. You're gonna appreciate it.

It's a great fight. It's a very good fight, but you're just different. You're so much different than the first fight, which made, you know, for someone who's had neck injuries myself, I was wanting to ask you, like, how bad, was your neck fucked up before the first fight?

Aljamain Sterling (2:06)

Yeah.

Joe Rogan (2:06)

So going into the fight, it was fucked up.

Aljamain Sterling (2:08)

So just to give a kind of a storyline, college wrestling, freshman year, me and this guy talking shit to each other. We call each other out. He's upper weight class for me, but he, last year, he wrestled the same weight class as me.

I'm very competitive. That kid was competitive. We're both from New York. So we go out there, he slams me, spikes me on my head. His name is Dave.

Spiked me on my head. I had stingers. So anytime I would turn my head, I would find like a radiant pain from like the crown of my head, all the way down to like somewhere around that C, C disc, like right around that area.

And then each year, it got progressively worse. Like that got better. But each year after that, wrestling, pulling on the head, we do hand fighting drills where we put our hands behind our back and you got to keep your head up in a wrestling position. And someone of your partner is just pulling on your neck and yanking it, yanking it. So that didn't help.

Jiu-Jitsu didn't help. All these other things. So over the years, it got progressively worse. I have MRIs dating back from, I think 2014, when I had my UFC debut. And every time it was about my neck. Almost every single fight, I had an MRI about my neck because I kept thinking, okay, this is the time I'm gonna have to get it fixed. This is the time. And we were able to just let it heal, do PT. And then before the first yawn fight, when he pulled out, I was contemplating on pulling out because my neck had a really bad flare up and I thought I wasn't gonna make it to the fight.

And thankfully he pulled out, gave me some time to do some PT at the UFCPI. That helped out a ton, everyone over there. And then I got a shot. But the funny part about the shot, the quarter zone shot, they put it in the wrong spot. But the doctor said, oh, but you'll still get the effects. He put it like a disc level too high.