Joe Rogan Was Really Disappointed His Fight Against A Hollywood Legend Didn't Happen

When most people think about Joe Rogan, it is his podcast that they think of first. That makes perfect sense, since Joe has done everything from speak to Post Malone about weight loss to interview JD Vance on his podcast. Since Joe has millions of listeners who want to know what happens behind the scenes of his podcast, he is rich enough to pay his staff very well.

However, Joe is also a former reality TV host and former sitcom star who commentates for the UFC and is a trained fighter. As it turns out, Joe's connections in that arena resulted in his almost fighting a legitimate Hollywood legend who was known for his martial arts skills.

Joe Rogan Was Disappointed He Didn't Get To Fight Wesley Snipes

Easily one of the biggest action movie stars of all time, Wesley Snipes' movies have thrilled fans for many years. Movies like the Blade trilogy, Demolition Man, Passenger 57, and more have shown how impressive Wesley's fighting skills seem to be.

In September 2024, Screen Rant published an article looking at what martial arts training Wesley has done in real life. That article revealed that since Wesley was 12 years old, he has been training in fighting styles like Shotokan karate, hapkido, kung fu, capoeira, eskrima, and Brazilian jiu-jitsu.

Given Wesley's background, many fans would like to see him in a high-profile fight in real life. As it turns out, that almost happened since Wesley almost fought Joe Rogan for real. Not only that, it seems clear that Joe is disappointed he didn't get to fight Wesley.

In 2023, Joe spoke about the fight he almost had against Wesley during an episode of his podcast, as can be seen in a clip that was uploaded to YouTube.

A December 2023 episode of "The Joe Rogan Experience" featured the host talking about the fact that he almost fought Wesley.

I was supposed to fight, Wesley Snipes. That was real. Like, those lawyers in negotiation.

Joe also explained how exhausting the training he was doing to begin preparing for the fight was. "I was so tired all the time. And I only got a taste of what it's like to train like an MMA fighter."

After Joe brought up the fact that he almost fought Wesley, there was a very obvious question to be asked.

There is a long history of actors having fight records either before or after they rose to fame. One recent example of that is the fact that, according to a September 2022 Entertainment Weekly article, Tom Hardy entered a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu tournament and won all of his fights.

Fortunately, Joe's guest asked him why the fight fell through. In response, the podcast host explained that he believed that Wesley pulled out of the fight after realizing Joe would win.

"I think because he knew I was gonna kill him. I think in the beginning, he thought that he would be able to stuff takedowns and he would kick my a** and then he found out that, no, I'm a taekwondo champion. I'm a kickboxer. I'm way better at standing up than I am on the ground."

Joe then went on to detail how the negotiations over him fighting Wesley fell apart from his perspective.

According to Joe, Wesley kept making escalating salary demands. Despite that, Joe stated that he still stipulated all of Wesley's demands.

"I don't know what happened, but there was a bunch of different demands, like, at first it was gonna be 50/50 and then, you know, he wanted it to be 60/40 and I'd agreed to everything. I said just, 'Okay, give me just this amount of money and give him whatever the f*** else you want."

While Joe didn't provide details about when the fight might have happened, it is clear that it was being considered many years earlier. As a result, Joe wouldn't have been nearly as rich as he is now. With that in mind, it says a lot about how badly Joe wanted to fight Wesley that he didn't care if the actor got paid a lot more.

During Joe's aforementioned December 2023 podcast episode, he made it clear that he was very disappointed that his proposed fight against Wesley never happened.

While talking about potentially fighting Wesley Snipes during his December 2023 podcast episode, Joe Rogan detailed the training that he began doing. "I was building up a base. So I was kickboxing every morning, and then I was doing jujitsu every night. And I was doing it for 6 months."

While talking to his guest, Joe explained why he was so excited to potentially fight Wesley.

"I'm gonna f****** strangle that guy. Like, let me get a hold of him. And it never happened. I just was like, 'This would be a perfect thing to do. Like, he's never fought MMA before. I've never done it before. This would be fun, and it'll make a lot of money.'"

Still not done, Joe also talked about why he believed that he would have destroyed Wesley.

During Joe Rogan's December 2023 podcast episode, he spoke about why he thought Wesley Snipes was open to the idea of fighting him to begin with. According to Joe, he believed Wesley had serious money problems because he'd failed to pay his taxes and he was looking for a quick cash grab.

The reason why Joe was so confident is that he felt that Wesley wasn't prepared for the reality of fighting someone.

"The idea of this guy who'd never had any competitive fights at all ever. That he thought he could do that. Like, okay. Like, you're not gonna know what that feels like. I might have done it a long time ago, but I've done it. I know what that feels like when the referee's looking at you. Are you ready? And then that's a moment that if you've never experienced that moment ever in your life and the bell goes ding and you're like, 'Oh, s***. Is this real?' There's just gonna be too much weirdness for him to process. You know. And I guess it wouldn't be good to have that blemish on his history."

Joe Rogan Says Wesley Snipes Also Almost Fought Jean-Claude Van Damme

Years before Joe Rogan talked in 2023 about potentially fighting Wesley Snipes, he discussed the same subject in 2016. At that time, Joe revealed a fact that arguably was even more interesting, that Wesley wanted to fight another movie star.

A 2016 YouTube video included audio of Joe talking about Wesley. At that time, Joe revealed that Wesley had previously wanted to fight Jean-Claude Van Damme.

"He was desperate, in a real bad situation with the IRS. And so they were trying to figure out some way to generate money. And one of the ways they said, 'Look, let's just see if we can come up with a crazy pay-per-view fight.' And they wanted to fight Jean Claude Van Damme in some pay-per-view fight."

According to Joe, that fight didn't happen because an expert told Wesley's team that a fight between him and Jean-Claude would flop.

"The guy they brought in was this guy Campbell McLaren, who was one of the original producers of the UFC and he's like, 'Look, nobody's gonna pay to see you and Jean Claude Van Damme fight.'"

For many people who were around when Jean-Claude and Wesley were huge action stars, the idea that people wouldn't want to see them fight for real seems crazy. In 2016, Joe said he thought that people would have paid to see Wesley and Jean-Claude fight, since he knew he would have. "I disagree. I'd pay for it."