Joe Rogan reacts to Sage Steele’s Dana White podcast mixup

Joe Rogan had a good laugh about Sage Steele’s recent podcast flub with UFC CEO Dana White.

Why does Rogan, one of the world’s most popular podcasters, have empathy for the new-to-the-podcasting-game Steele? He’s been there – making mistakes and getting mistaken for bald UFC employees.

“People call me Dana,” Rogan said Thursday on the JRE MMA podcast with co-hosts (and regular UFC contributors) Din Thomas and Matt Serra. “I’ve been called Dana before. Some dude goes, ‘Yo, Dana!’ I’m like, ‘No, I’m the other dude. I’m Joe.’

“It happens all the time. I think she just made a mental flub. ... When you’re doing a podcast and you’re interviewing someone, especially if you haven’t done a lot of them, and it’s like a high-profile thing, you’re doing Dana White, you’re always thinking of what to say. Even the question, ‘What’s your dream?’ That’s a crazy question. That’s like, I don’t know what to ask you, so I’m going to just going to do, ‘What’s your dream?’

“So she was probably floundering a little bit there and doesn’t know what to say. It’s f****** weird having a conversation with someone live.”

Steele was wrapping up her interview with White when she asked the UFC exec, “What’s Joe Rogan’s dream?”

A confused White responded, “Joe Rogan’s dream?”

“Joe Rogan ... Dana White,” replied Steele. “What’s Dana White’s dream?”

“Did you just think I was Joe Rogan?” White said. “She just called me f****** Joe Rogan! You thought I was f****** Joe Rogan! I was bald before Joe Rogan was ever bald! I just did a two-hour podcast, flew here from Vegas, and she thought she was interviewing Joe Rogan!”

White later posted the clip of the mixup, indicating he took the whole thing in stride. Rogan was impressed that Steele, a former ESPN anchor, didn’t try to cover her mistake in post-production.

“She handled it the right way, too,” he said. “She kept it in there. She didn’t edit it out. It’s funny. It’s just a flub. I’ve done it all the time. It happens. People f*** up.”

Serra, a former UFC welterweight champion and bald guy, could also relate to getting mixed up.

“At UFC events, or the weeks of events, when I’m doing a ‘Looking for a Fight,’ you’ve been there – [Someone will say], ‘Hey! Can I have a picture?’” Serra told Thomas. “I’m like, ‘Ah well, alright.’ And then [they’ll say], ‘Thanks a lot, Mr. White,’ or, ‘thanks a lot, Joe Rogan.’”

“They always think he’s either Joe or Dana,” Thomas said with a smile.