Meta leader, Mark Zuckerberg’s sudden fascination with combat sports — and MMA in particular– has led him down a completely different mindset, according to UFC commentator, Joe Rogan.
Always easy to poke fun at, the American entrepreneur was infamously mocked for his apparent alien-like appearance and mannerisms. These memes surfaced particularly during the Biden administration, where Meta and he were subject to a Senate committee hearing in Washington.
But in the time since, the 40-year-old has seemingly undergone a vast change in personality and downright appearance.
And as far as veteran commentator, Rogan is concerned, his new fandom of combat sports and practice of Jiu-Jitsu especially are responsible for all of it.
“Mark Zuckerberg is a completely different person now,” Rogan said on his podcast, highlighting grappling as the main reason for his switch.
“It’s (Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu) a really good thing for people who have too much power. Because you just get strangled all the time. And then you just get your arms bent sideways.“And after a while, you’re like, ‘Okay, this is reality. This social hierarchy thing I’ve created is just nonsense,” Rogan added.
“They know it is. Which is why they so rabidly enforce hierarchies. You know, sir and mam, and all that kind of sh*t. That’s what that is. You know, you don’t really feel like you have respect unless you say that.”
Even changing his appearance physically with a new hairstyle and bulking up, Zuckerberg appears to be more approachable than ever.
Just ask champion, Alexander Volkanovski, and his teammate, Israel Adesanya.
Zuckerberg trains with UFC stars
In his journey with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Zuckerberg has enlisted the help of some notable names in combat sports.
Last year, the New Yorker spent time with featherweight kingpin, Volkanovski, on the training mats and posed for photos with former middleweight best, Adesanya, following another training session.
This year, to boot, Zuckerberg even attended UFC 313, where he embraced former two-weight champion Alex Pereira, en route to his decision loss to Magomed Ankalaev.
Interestingly, he was then blamed for bringing the loss to fruition, as people pointed out his cornering of Volkanovski last year ahead of his title fight loss to Ilia Topuria at UFC 298.
Zuckerberg has now linked up with promotional CEO Dana White, inviting and welcoming the long-time UFC head honcho to the Meta board earlier this year.
The Meta CEO is set to help White introduce AI (artificial intelligence) to the UFC in the form of a brand new sweeping change to the ranking system.
Notably, Zuckerberg was linked with a potential Octagon debut last year – namely, in a super showdown with Tesla leader and X owner, Elon Musk. White had even urged to broker a fight between the two influential billionaires.
However, the pairing failed to make it beyond rumors. But White was insistent that the bout was real, for a time at least, before hitting the skids.
“I was literally doing conference calls with the government in Italy to do this thing in the Colosseum in Rome,” White said of the fight to Tucker Carlson.
“For the right number, the Colosseum was gonna let us do that fight there. Eventually, it started to fall apart, but while it lasted, it was fun”, White added.
Hopefully, Musk gets into shape and gives us the fight that we really want. It could certainly do wonders for his public image, which has taken a hit since he took over Twitter.
