Wow this thread some bullshit. He's the best first round fighter of all time then he falls off a cliff. Hes lazy, eats like shit, womanizes and former editor of bjpenn.com said hes been a coke head since 16. "Motivated Penn" is as legit as "Sea-level Cain." Not as obvious as Conor's but of course BJ had cardio problems. How many times did people ask how good would BJ be if he was trained and motivated? Over a million? "There are 3 things I care about. Food. Women. And Fighting. In that order." - BJ Penn
penn is just weird, in a lot of ways.
when he first started off with jiu jitsu, he was obsessed. he did nothing but train, all day, every day. he was supremely talented, but the reason he got his black belt in less than 4 years wasn't just due to his talent, but also due to the fact that at the time, he
lived jiu jitsu. then he got into mma and trained with frank shamrock, who again said they were working like maniacs. shramrock would show him a technique, and penn would drill it 700 times that day. that's no joke, it takes a lot of effort to train like that. he was insanely focused on getting better, and again, went all in with training.
we all know he mellowed out later on, but i don't know if calling him lazy is fair. dude put in the time, at least when he was starting off. considering who he fought right off the bat and how he did in those fights... not much we can criticise there. his biggest issue was his obsession with moving up in weight. by today's standards, he was a natural featherweight, probably a small one, at that. when he fought at 155, he probably weighed about 155. he was tiny... and yet he moved to 170, then to 185, then to fucking heavyweight. imagine holloway fighting a heavyweight. it's insane! and he lost a close split decision to machida, man. you don't do that on talent alone.
i have no idea what to say about womanizing. does it have any relevance to him as a fighter? i mean, all men want a bunch of women. are we going to pretend that we don't enjoy having sex with hot chicks?
as for the coke, it wouldn't surprise me at all if he did it. rich kid that got famous for fighting, of course he did it. but a coke habit? since 16? i don't know if doing blow regularly goes hand in hand with being a world class athlete, and he certainly was that, at least for stretches of his career. so that's probably a bit of a hyperbole on the part of the editor.