Forrest Griffin: The meaning of 100

Prior to UFC 100, SI.com had the chance to speak with many of the promotion's elite fighters -- past and present. Here's what Forrest Griffin had to say about Saturday's card, his career in the cage and much more.

UFC 100 is a marking point of how far the sport's come since the good ol' days, and it's kind of a middle point for where it'll go.

When I saw the UFC, around 2000 or 2001, I was a big basketball, football fan, but I didn't understand why everybody didn't love MMA. I didn't understand how people were watching other sports and I was thinking Why don't other people know about this? This is great, it's better than all those other sports.

Predictions? I mean, I do predict that interest rates will continue to fall, inflation will continue to rise and unemployment will continue to rise. Those are my financial predictions, but I am an admittedly bad sports gambler. Every time I think I know something, I'm wrong. My only saving grace is Randy Couture. I bet on him every time he was an underdog, and I won. I've definitely lost more gambling on fights than I've won.

I wouldn't take my advice even if I had predictions. I would just completely devalue it.

I don't know that the promotion needs to do much of anything else to be successful. Being exposed to people is all they need. There's a saturation point of people that are actually going to watch fighting, and I think the UFC realizes that.

"It's all [bull]." Somebody told me that one time, and I found that to be very pertinent, because it is. It's all [bull]. Not just fighting -- life in general.

The thing I'm most proud of in my UFC career so far is that I haven't become jaded. I haven't let my financial status or my lifestyle change me. My friends keep telling me I've changed, but I just got new friends.

The Stephan Bonnar fight -- that was definitely a turning point in my life because it was the point when I realized I would never have to have a real job again, which was important to me.

As a UFC fighter, you're not just another guy in the gym. People expect a lot of out of you. It's kind of like you almost have to be on your game every day when you're getting ready for a fight.

Of course, you have to hear from the guy at Starbucks on what you should have done right, how you should have done this or that.

Chuck Palahniuk changed my life. I realize now that Tyler Durden in Fight Club was not intended to be a role model, that he was actually just a fictional character. He was kind of almost the same thing as Gordon Gekko from Wall Street. He was the villain, you weren't supposed to like him, yet every guy in college wanted to be Gordon Gekko and kept touting how greed was good. So instead of taking Fight Club as a satirical or humor piece on what not to aspire toward, I thought Man that's a great idea, I should get rid of everything I own and fight people in basements for 50 bucks a pop.

I'm really sick of people coming up to me asking if I'm gonna kick Anderson Silva's ass. First of all, ass-kicking is not that effective of a technique. Second off, I can't handle that kind of pressure. All the people I'm fighting turn out to be pretty good, so don't tell me to kick their ass.