- Nobody knew what was
happening to me
and I didn't know
I didn't know what to do.
- My stepdad, Joe, had
me live in the backyard
for a couple of weeks.
And it was the first time
where I really was hammered
by the situation.
And I had all my belongings there
'cause it was like he wanted me to leave,
he made me take everything out of my room
and all my toys, and I just
remembered sitting there
under a tarp, under the
fricking clothesline
and just watching my
"Star Wars" stuff get rained on,
all my toys.
And I'm like, what am I doing,
I'm living in the backyard.
And that was, yeah, that's what happened,
that's what he would do.
And it was just frightening
and cold and damp and dark.
I was just kind of laying there.
And so I could smell the gasoline.
It was right next to me on the mower.
And I thought,
"Wow, that smells really funny."
And so I just started sniffing it,
and it wasn't really like any conscious
thing in the beginning,
but it would just knock me out
and it would just wipe me out.
And I would just have these
crazy hallucinations
and I would fall asleep.
And I'd do that when I
lived in the tool shed,
'cause it was so hard.
And then I would go to school
in the daytime,
and I'd be all emotionally f****d because
nobody knew what was happening to me.
And I didn't know,
I didn't know what to do.
One second.
Well, Joe had a myriad of punishments.
Scariest one for me was
getting locked in the closet.
That's when my brain started turning on
to what was going on in
my social environment.
I was about seven,
seven and a half, eight.
- When you were in the closet
and you would get out,
I think it was your stepdad
would watch boxing.
- Yeah, we didn't have a TV in our house.
So TV was only in the parents' room
and it was only on a special night.
And so the only TV I
saw as a kid was boxing.
I would massage his feet
and I would watch boxing.
It was the only experience
I had outside of books
and outside of school.
So that was my, you know,
that was the thing,
the champion had the belt
and they gave the speech
and everyone was like,
there was that guy,
was the guy I wanted to be
when I was in that closet as a kid.
And it just became my dream.
That was my dream.
That's what I dreamt about
when I was in there
and I was sad and I was just like crushed.
And I was like, it's okay, 'cause someday
I'm gonna be that guy.
And it wasn't until I
threw rocks at the train
and got arrested and sent to juvenile hall
and was sitting in juvenile hall
and talking to all these bad kids
that I heard all the rumors about.
And I'm telling 'em what's going on,
and they were just like,
"What are you talking about?"
They're like, "That's insane."
And I was just blown away.
Like I started pulling back, I was,
"Well, I can't tell them all this stuff,"
because they were just shocked.
And I remember going back
to my room and just sitting there
and going, "Wow, maybe it's not me."
And that's when I was like,
"I gotta get outta here.
I gotta get out."
And then when I went and saw
my counselor at juvenile hall,
and she was very poignant
and said, "Listen,
if you keep doing this, they'll
take you from your home."
And I was like, "That's how I get out.
That's how I do it."
And so I was like,
"Wow, I figured it out."
But it basically ended
when I was robbing that Taco Bell.
I know that sometimes they
leave the window door open
for the serving window.
And I get there and it's totally open,
so I literally just walk in.
The door to the safe is open,
the door to the office is open.
I'm like, "Wow, this is amazing."
There's a huge bag of cash,
I just stuffed it under my thing.
I'm only in there maybe
seven or eight minutes.
But as soon as I come out,
I can see cars come in and cops come in.
So I ran around the back,
and behind it there's a creek.
And it was frozen because
it's the middle of winter.
And I jumped into that creek
to get away from the cops.
And as soon as I hit,
I could feel the money come out.
And then I could also feel
that I was stuck under ice.
'Cause when I came back up,
the ice was there
because I went in at an angle.
And so I had to kind of crawl
in and push through the ice.
And then I just started running.
And I ran and ran and ran.
I still remember
just the sound of my breath,
because everything else
had gotten super quiet.
And I could just hear myself breathe,
it was really like labored breathing.
My mind was really just about,
I needed to get somewhere.
I was so cold and it was so painful,
the cold was so painful.
And then all of a sudden it
just got the warmest warm
you've ever felt.
And I was suddenly at
peace and I was like,
"Wow, this feels amazing."
I felt euphoric and wonderful
and I laid down on the
tracks and I was like,
"Ah, I'm just gonna take
this tiny little nap
and then I'll pop right
back up, keep running."
And I laid down and things
started to kinda warm up,
and then all of a sudden
I went, "Holy s***,
I have hypothermia," 'cause I'm a nerd
and I read everything.
And I read, this is what happens
when you have hypothermia.
And I laid there and I
was like, "I'm gonna die."
And then I got up and I was like,
"Oh hell no, I'm not gonna die."
So I know where that moment is.
And so I popped up and I just
kept running and running.
And I finally got to my friend's house.
And then we got busted.
And then I was sent to this crisis center.
This is when I met Bob Shamrock,
and it was the same thing,
I was sitting in juvenile hall
and another guy came to interview me.
And this guy was just totally different.
He was just no nonsense.
He looked crazy, he had gold everywhere,
and he looked like a
rockstar or something.
And he just sat down and
I went to give my spiel
and he just goes, "Nope, nope.
Because we don't do bulls***."
And it was the first time
I'd met a father figure
who stood up and was like, "Wait a minute.
This is how young men act."
And it was the first time I got a lesson
in what a father does,
'cause I never had a father.
So I never understood the
value of that leadership,
the value of the lead warrior.
I never knew.
And he told me, "Listen,
what you're doing is wrong.
The way you're acting is wrong."
And he set down a baseline of rules
of how normal people should act.
And then he's like, "If you come here,
that's what'll happen."
From the moment he picked me up,
I was just like his son.
And there was 20 boys.
But he ran a big family in
the Shamrock Boys Ranch.
I loved him, I instantly
fell in love with him.
And he was my one person in this world
that cared about me and my success.
And he's a man I have no relation to
who just showed up one day
because I needed him.
And he said, "You could be a fighter.
You can be a warrior.
There's a new sport coming on,
your brother's doing it.
There's all this opportunity right now."
And that dream
I had when I was a little boy
of being a champion, of being recognized,
that thing that I always
wanted, fell right into my lap.
The fact that he cared about me
and the fact that there was a place for me
allowed me to show up.
I was in college and my dad called me.
He would say, "You gotta meet this kid.
He's a good kid, he's got some problems,
but man, I think if you
can hook up with him
and maybe mentor him a little bit,
you guys are kind of the same."
- This is my brother's new fighting school.
And my dad is basically positioning it
like it's a martial arts learning academy.
So he's kinda pepping me up the day before.
When he dropped me off,
he told me two things.
He said, "Don't ever give up
and don't show him you're afraid."
Usually I did the initiations,
and I beat the crap out of people.
I would beat the snot out of them.
And I was gonna have the other guys do it
because I just didn't know
if I could do it
because I knew how much my father
cared for him.
But I knew that I had to be the one,
because he had to respect me.
And so I did it.
- The first minute I thought, "Oh,
I'm actually kind of competitive."
And then he just blasted me.
And then I was like, "Holy s***,"
'cause no one
had ever knocked me down
in a fight before, ever.
And then he just jumped on me
and just started twisting me
and bending my arm, tore my knees out.
He's put me in all these holds
and just tearing them
because he's expecting me to give up.
But I don't know you can give up
'cause no one's explained that to me.
That's maybe seven or eight minutes in,
and it was 20 minutes.
It was horrible,
I thought I was gonna die.
Honestly thought that I was
gonna die in that trial.
They helped carry me in the car.
And then I lived in the top of
Ken's two story house.
So they carried me upstairs.
But then I couldn't get down the next day
because I was so sore,
my knees were torn out.
So I spent a week upstairs.
And then I scooted down.
And then after about a week and a half,
I was hobbling pretty good.
Two weeks, I was back in the gym.
Dad sat me down, he had his
big pep talk with me,
and he says, "Listen, son.
You've built up this great body.
And you built up your mind
and you built up your spirit.
And it's like, you're ready
to go try something.
You're ready to apply yourself."
I got the invitation to go to Japan
and to finish my training in Japan,
and then to enter the King
of Pancrase Tournament.
I ended up fighting Bas Rutten
as my very first match.
I didn't know who he was,
to be honest with you.
But every time I told
somebody who I was fighting,
they would all look down.
They were like,
"Shamrock son, combate?"
and I'd be like, "Bas Rutten."
They'd look down,
why are they looking down?
- You know Bas Rutten, he's such a savage.
- He once knocked out a Rottweiler.
- Yes.
- Bas Rutten, the one and only.
- He's almost apologizing to the guy.
- Bas Rutten's game plan in this fight.
- People who have never
seen Bas Rutten fight,
just watch this.
- I'm sorry, bang, bang, bang, no I'm not.
- I was just deathly afraid.
The fight was 10 minutes.
It went by for me
in what seemed like a minute.
And I just remember tiny segments.
One where he has my head
and he's choking me.
And I just remember his words.
That voice started saying, you can't do this.
You're gonna lose.
Everything you worked for is gonna be gone
in just a few minutes.
And so I started thinking to
myself and really started to
hyperventilate and really
started to get freaked out
because this was my entire
dream in my life.
Everything in my life
revolved around this moment.
And I was about to lose it.
I was crushed inside.
My spirit was down here.
And his was just way up here,
his energy was this big.
And I thought, "Oh my goodness, this is it.
I'm gonna lose."
Laying in that closet, I was like,
"That's what I'm gonna become,
I'm gonna become a champion.
And I'm gonna use that voice
and that power to do stuff
and help people like myself,
'cause this is terrible."
And so I always envisioned
that I was gonna become that person.
So there was only one answer.
Move forward,
that's what you do when you're a warrior.
I remember cross facing him really hard.
And then I remember us both
having heel hooks on each other
and thinking, "I'm gonna break his leg
and he's gonna break mine."
And then I remember the bell rang.
I looked over in my corner
and Ken was like, "Yes."
And they announced that I'd won
and I was just blown away.
The whole thing was just so overwhelming.
It was so much.
I definitely walked out of
that ring a different person.
If you're not creating a mental picture
of the life and future you want,
then you're wasting your brain power
on a daily.
For me, it's every single
night when I go to bed.
What's my future?
I'm praying, I'm meditating,
I'm visualizing my future.
And to me it's about living like a warrior.
I wanna provide for my family,
for my community.
I wanna be a person of
strength when they come to me.
I can live that if I'm
living this warrior's code.
And that is living with honor,
living with discipline, living with respect.
I think we're all warriors.
And you need the proper tools,
you can train your mind,
your body, and your spirit
and be ready for those moments.
Be ready for those moments
when your commitment
will be ultimately tested.
And a warrior never gives up.
And a warrior always finds a way to win.