Ex-UFC Fighter Brendan Schaub releases stand-up comedy special to savage reviews
Last month saw Brendan Schaub release his ‘comedy special’, which was named Gringo Papi. At 30 minutes in length, this was given savage reviews by online critics. On the review website IMDB, it had a rating of a paltry 1.1/10 across thousands of votes. Even more damning were the reviews which didn’t hold back. One reviewer named Dave-930-756001 wrote, “So, doing 20 minutes at an open mic night and then posting it on Youtube constitutes a “Special”? A 20 minute blend of not-so-subtle racism, mostly aimed at his wife who he clearly hates, and some jokes and mannerisms stolen from other people. This is actually, by some margin, worst than his first.” Whilst another simply said “Not one laugh.”
Back in 2019, Schaub debuted with his first comedy special named You’d Be Surprised. Over 5000 IMDB votes later and its average score is 1.5/10 which at least hints at being better than its predecessor. So, why did the viewers hate it? Apparently, with Gringo Papi, the laughter was edited to make his jokes appear funnier, whilst some even claimed he suffered from boos. Even without these theories, the overwhelming majority believed Schaub just wasn’t funny, with a number of his jokes lazily prodding at Mexican culture.
So, how did an ex-MMA fighter somehow become a stand up? Well, firstly it’s not like Schaub is awash with comedy gigs and arguably, he’s more of a Youtuber these days. However, every now and then he seems to try his hand at jokes.
Back in 2015, Brendan Schaub officially retired from MMA. At this point, he retired with a respectable 10-5 record and although he wasn’t the best fighter in the world, he wasn’t the worst either. In fairness to Schaub, he never ducked tough fights and could have easily padded out his record more. For instance, he lost to the likes of Travis Browne and Andrei Arlovski who are both great fighters, whilst the pinnacle of Schaub’s career was probably knocking out Croatian great, Mirko Cro Cop.
However, his MMA career came to a screeching halt. Whilst he was still in his early 30s at the time, his good friend Joe Rogan warned him on his podcast that he should quit MMA and focus on other things. According to Rogan, Schaub was in danger of suffering serious brain damage and should have quit whilst he was ahead. Eventually, Schaub would take this advice which eventually led to him re-inventing himself as a Youtube presenter and stand-up comic. Whether we’ll ever see another ‘special’ of Shaubs again remains to be seen, but we won’t bank on it.
