Since Chael Sonnen drew up the villain blueprint and quickly rose to title contention, there’ve been plenty of fighters who tried to follow his path to stardom inside the UFC Octagon. 

Although some have tried and failed, others have garnered huge attention for their careers, and as they say in the business: No publicity is bad publicity. 

Not much for trash talk himself, UFC 226 competitor Max Griffin is still no stranger to it. Having fought two of the most prominent villains currently in the sport in Colby Covington and Mike Perry, Griffin has heard it all. 

Griffin sat down with the Top Turtle MMA Podcast on FloCombat ahead of his bout vs. Curtis Millender to discuss how he, somewhat surprisingly, has no issues with that aspect of the fight game. 

“Man, I’m used to it. I heard shit talking from the best of them,” Griffin said. “Mike Perry, Colby [Covington]; we’re cool, man.”

There are two reasons why the California native feels so at ease with the amount of hate coming his way pre-fight. The first is his long history of hearing it, even on the regional circuit. 

“I want to say that it’s from earlier in my career [too]... My whole career people been talking shit,” Griffin said. “I feel like they don’t mean it.” 

The second reason is that he knows it’s just a sign of weakness. To Griffin, trash talking is a sign his opponents are worried about him. 

“I think they know that I’m a bad dude and I have a strong mind. They have to know that,” Griffin said. “Anything they can do to try to take me off my game and try to give them an advantage.”

And with one small exception, it’s not a plan that works. 

“Nowadays, apart from the Colby fight, I’ve smashed every person who’s said anything negative to me,” Griffin said. 

Even though Perry and Covington didn’t really get to him, there is something that gets Griffin hot under the collar. It just so happens his next opponent got right to doing it.  

“I don’t like this Curtis guy, man,” Griffin said. “I don’t like people calling me out. You can talk shit or whatnot to pump the fight and to get that attention, but don’t call me out. That’s personal.”

In his mind, one is part of the job and the other is to hunt him down—and that’s not something he finds acceptable. 

“People talk shit all day, but I feel like if there’s 80 guys on the roster and you want me then I got a problem with that," he said.