MMA legend Jason 'Mayhem' Miller opens up about downward spiral, homelessness — and turning his life around

Yahoo

13-03-2025

Jason "Mayhem" Miller has fought just as many battles outside the cage as he has inside of it.
The former UFC middleweight was once one of the bigger names in MMA, a fan-favorite personality, host of MTV's popular "Bully Beatdown" reality series, and coach opposite UFC legend Michael Bisping on the 14th season of "The Ultimate Fighter." Miller debuted in the UFC in 2005 then ventured around the globe, competing in the WEC, DREAM, and Strikeforce before returning for a second UFC stint in 2011. By 2012, however, Miller found himself released from his contract after losing back-to-back UFC bouts.
Miller dealt with several arrests of varying degrees in his post-UFC life, making him for a time appear destined to become one of the sadder career arcs in MMA history. It wasn't until September 2023 that the outspoken "Mayhem" found his moment of clarity, realizing that all of the trouble and antics he continued to get mired in were taking him down a road from which there'd eventually be no return.
"This is tough times right here, bud," Miller acknowledged Wednesday on Uncrowned's "The Ariel Helwani Show," pointing back to the Instagram post that initiated his turnaround. "At this point, OK, some fan had challenged me to a grappling match in a five-star hotel and I choked him out in front of the bouncers. I was really on some ruckus, OK? And I had just had enough. I had enough. And that's when I checked myself into an inpatient [rehab] and went for the whole ride, and I just cleaned up my act, put on a spiffy jacket and started smiling to Ariel Helwani in my head. And now, here, a couple years later, here we are."
Now fully retired from MMA, Miller last fought in a bizarre appearance for Italian promotion Venator FC in 2016. After initially being scheduled to face Luke Barnatt for the promotion's middleweight championship, Miller infamously missed weight by 23 pounds and instead fought Mattia Schiavolin in a light heavyweight affair, losing via second-round rear-naked choke submission.
Troubles continued for Miller after that brief MMA return. His situation worsened to the point that he even became homeless for a time.
Miller still follows and coaches MMA today, but he also works alongside comedian and podcaster Adam Carolla on "The Adam Carolla Show," which airs weekdays on various podcast networks. Miller acknowledged that the Monday-to-Friday nature of the job has given him a sense of peace and structure.
"My life was just wandering around downtown skid row, I'm getting hunted for my suitcase," Miller said. "If you want to talk [about] an AA story, like, that's it right there. I just slept on a mattress in the middle of the street. Just living feral, like an animal. I'll just straight up say it: A monster. Just living like a [monster]. Choking blue belts out at The Montage [Hotel]. I don't know, man. I had enough.
"I determined to climb up out of it and get rid of, like, the old-styled 'Mayhem' and then bring a brand new 'Mayhem.' And what the hell? I got a job."
At the worst of his homelessness, Miller recalled turning that way of life into something straight out of a movie.
"It was kind of like the Buddha sort of thing where you just abandon all things, personal possessions. I went full 'Fight Club,' dude," Miller said.
"If I would have found a run-down old house, I would have took it over — and, well, actually I did do that at one point in my life. I just had a crazy run-down house, just like a million 'Mayhem monkeys' [fans of Miller] inside of it. It was really bizarre. That's the only time the cops stopped harassing me, actually.
"People would dab me up, but I looked like a maniac," he added. "Even if they did recognize me, I don't think they'd come straight up to me."
Fortunately, Miller is now "a couple years" sober. Since that moment of clarity in 2023, his life has been on an upward swing in a way he hopes gives hope to others who are struggling with their inner demons.
"I've gotten myself together, and I'm living proof that you can do it," he said. "It's not easy. If it was easy, everybody would just fall into it. And it's easy to fall into that [kind of life], so I think the judgement with people that, they see some bad stuff on the internet — you don't realize how easy it is with the right combination of toxic people and the classic 'bad friends,' and you get caught up in a wave of negativity, where it feels like positivity. But I really feel great [now] and I feel like I can start to pull up my fellow man."
While Miller has transformed his path into one of MMA's survival stories, other icons of his era unfortunately haven't been as lucky, so he tries to help however he can.
This past week, former two-division UFC champion BJ Penn made headlines for posting some extremely troubling videos to his Instagram account. Likewise, other beloved veterans such as Nick Diaz have raised alarm bells with their outside-the-cage disturbances. Diaz was scheduled to take on Vicente Luque in October 2024 until a video of him in a questionable condition outside on a sidewalk surfaced online.
From his experience, Miller knows nothing can necessarily be done for his fellow MMA alums, at least not until they want to do something themselves — if they can.
"Somebody gave me a note that, 'Hey, look, he's getting it together,'" Miller said of Diaz. "So, you know, that's what I got. I don't know. Again, it's very sensitive to talk about these guys' journey, because I have a lot of empathy for it because it's easy, like I said, to fall into this darkness, and people do not understand how — if you're a C-level celebrity, it's super easy, where a lot of people will glob onto you and like drag you this direction, that direction. It's super easy to fall into, let alone huge superstar champions like Nick Diaz and BJ Penn. So it's hard for me to like come off without sounding negative about these guys' experience right now. But right now, look, we see that it's not going perfect. Both camps had told me that they're on the right path to get back together.
"I learned from coaching professional fighters here in Los Angeles that it's like herding cats — and not just regular cats, OK? Jungle kitties with giant biceps and traps [who] just are slicing and dicing. So you have to herd these cats gently. No champion fighter is just going to roll up, 'Mayhem, I need your help.' No, no one's going to do that. They're fighters, OK? We're all tough. Where the big part of my problem was that I'm so independent and beastly, I could not ask for help from anyone.
"When I finally, finally did, I immediately took to it like mixed martial arts — where, 'Oh, I get it. Oh, I get my discipline back. I get to focus on a goal.' It made it specific. I made it a game for myself, where, 'OK, I can win this game.' But until guys get to the point where they want to reach out and ask — no one asks the corner to throw the towel. I'll just give that metaphor. Nobody says, 'Hey, will you throw the towel?' No, no. Every guy who does the sport of mixed martial arts — even as a hobby — has a little bit of fire in them. Something that gets them determined and gets them up to meet the next bell."