If you want to know how long Mike Beltran has been refereeing mixed martial arts fights, you need only to take a look at his face. It is there that you will see, swinging off the sides like the great vines of Sturgis, one of the most recognizable mustaches in all of the Western Hemisphere. He has never officially measured its length, but as of early-2020, his facial hair clearly extends well south of his beltline, and it reads like tree rings to tell you just how far back his time in the cage goes.

More than fifteen years.

That’s how long he’s been growing it, and that’s how long he’s been officiating. The first whisker broke through when Beltran began refereeing smoker shows out in California in 2004. He hasn’t shaved since then. If he lasts another 15 years in MMA, those whiskers will drag at his feet, becoming the greatest trip hazards to ever end up in the Smithsonian.

Why does he have such a mustache?

“I started growing it because I hate shaving. It’s the one thing I despise,” Beltran says. “I’ve been clean-cut my whole life. Plus I have no hair on my head, so I got really fucked in that department, and I just thought I’ll just let this shit grow. But honestly, the real story is — I just hate shaving. I really do. And this is obviously who I am.”

Needless to say, Beltran’s appearance in the cage is a conversation starter. Twitter loves to see him standing between two fighters, not because he’s the greatest referee going (of course, he’s damn good), but because it communicates the niche so well, the range of personalities. The eccentricity. It’s the perfect asides for a sport that so snugly embraces the absurd. In fact, the very idea of the mustache ever being trimmed so much as an inch is enough to make people squirm.

It actually happened at UFC 241 in Anaheim this past August, when Beltran showed up for the fight between Ian Heinisch and Derek Brunson sporting a pair of poodle legs on his cheeks rather than the glorious braids we’ve come to distinguish him by. There was a genuine fear that he had chopped off his ‘stache, which struck some as not only disheartening, but sacrilegious.

Would General Burnside have ever cut off his venerable sideburns? Hell no!

And it turned out neither did Beltran sever his own free-swinging jowl whips. He just tucked everything in that night. Sometimes, depending on the commission, he does that. Sometimes he wears it like a braided hogtie, plunging into a single, hellacious braid straight down his midsection, while other times he wears the mustache unbraided, just a cascading waterfall of facial hair running down the sides of his mouth. No matter how he wears it, people take notice.

“Some people are kind of like, they look and don’t know what to make of it,” he says. “Or they don’t know what to make of me, or I scare them or intimidate them, or they just don’t like me. But for the most part, people welcome it. And the more that the sport’s growing and the more I’m doing bigger shows, people recognize it more. They recognize your mustache before they recognize me or whatever. They ask me, ‘Hey, aren’t you the referee?’ I get more of that than I do people looking at me sideways.”

Beltran isn’t in a biker gang, and nor is he some kind of high priest of darkness. He’s a former Marine. He was honored during a segment on Bellator’s USO show in Hawaii in December for his service, which brought a tear to his eye. He is a family man first and foremost, with a son whom he raised by himself into becoming a stud wrestler out of powerhouse St. John Bosco High School in Los Angeles, eventually landing him at West Point. His fiancee is a bodybuilder, which he says helps him stay away from the beer taps.

Congrats to my son @BeltranMichael8 on grinding his way and qualifying to wrestle at the California State Finals in Bakersfield, Ca next week. Also congrats to all of our 8 @SJBwrestling boyz that made. Special thanks to his coaches and everyone that supported my son. Proud Dad! pic.twitter.com/G6aKPhdruL — Mike Beltran (@RefMikeBeltran) February 17, 2019

He has become a regular on the MMA circuit, and the mustache — swaying majestically whenever he asks fighters if they’re ready to throw down before a fight — runs as a page count in his biography.

That biography is interesting, too. On the advice of his friend and MMA fighter, the late Joe Camacho, Beltran began training in jiu-jitsu with John Ouano — the originator of the MMA glove — in Santa Fe Springs. That led him to striking and wrestling, and ultimately falling in love with the sport. It eventually led to getting to know reffing great “Big” John McCarthy.

“I figured as I got going I was just too old to fight. That’s not my thing, you know what I mean?” he says. “It was just, I’m just too old, and I had a family and kids, and I just was too fat and out of shape to do it.

“But I was actually training with guys, and then when I would go to the shows, I would end up watching the referees. I was watching the fights for my friends, and obviously I was a huge fan of the sport, but my attention was drawn toward the referees. And I was thinking to myself, ‘I could do this. I know I could do this.’ And I hit up Ouano. I go, ‘You know John?’ I go, ‘I’d like to be a referee,’ and he goes, ‘I think you’d be a great referee, and I know ‘Big’ John McCarthy. He’s a good friend of mine.’ So that’s how it all started.”

That’s right around the time he threw away his razor and began his tutelage under McCarthy.

“I did a shitload of smokers, dude,” he says. “They were uncensored, and it was normal back then. You know, you have clubs, teams, squaring off with each other and barbecuing and having fun, and making a couple of bucks out of it at the gate at each other’s gym. And the camaraderie. And a few beers. Hey man, sounds like a party to me.

“But yeah, ‘Big’ John is the one who has been my biggest mentor. He is like a big brother, whatever you want to call it. If it wasn’t for ‘Big’ John McCarthy, I definitely would not be here.”

This pic captures @JohnMcCarthyMMA schooling me at an event. He’s always been honest. My most memorable quote from Big John right before my 1st biggest fight several years ago when I was nervous as hell was, “Don’t F-ck It Up” right before the fight started. Now that’s John. 😂 pic.twitter.com/ENWX2GBumA — Mike Beltran (@RefMikeBeltran) March 17, 2018

Over the years the mustache has morphed from one fascinating form to another. There was the handlebar phase early on, which was quickly gotten through. There was a time about eight years ago when it was like two Shetland pony tails dangling off his nostrils. By the time he was refereeing Fedor Emelianenko’s fight with Frank Mir at a 2018 Bellator show in Chicago, only Kim Winslow could rival his magnificent braids in the broader sphere of refereedom.

That mustache is more than a curiosity; it’s an in-cage companion.

“I’ve refereed some good fights,” he says. “Some of the best fights are the fights you’ve probably never seen, that are in the clubs. The smaller level shows, those are some amazing fights. However, that one with Fedor completely stands. Fedor Emelianenko. That to me was — wow. Wow. I’m still speechless. Fedor is someone who I have looked up to, admired, respected. To be there, still, even years later, it was an honor.”

Of late, the mustache has opened doors for him outside of the cage. It has essentially doubled as his agent for Hollywood pursuits. Beltran is showing up in television roles.

“It’s taking a different direction,” he says. “So long as I’m representing ‘clean,’ because my parents look at this, my family, my son, and obviously the sport of MMA. If it’s something that’s done tastefully, and it’s something that I know I can represent myself well with and the sport, I’ll do it.”

Recently it was a Geico commercial, as an arm wrestler. Before that it was in the “Sons of Anarchy” spinoff, “Mayans M.C.,” as a biker named Ibarra. And before that, it was Byron Balasco’s criminally unsung series, “Kingdom,” which remains the best depiction of MMA out there.

“I did some small B-movies back in the day, as a referee, because they needed some guy to jump in there, so I did it,” he says. “But ‘Kingdom’ was the first breakthrough for me, which got me introduced to the world of Hollywood. Jonathan Tucker, Matt Lauria, Frank Grillo and all those guys. Actually, Jonathan Tucker came out to see my son wrestle for the first time as a freshman, see him get his first victory.”

Beltran holds down an important day job (which he says he’d rather keep out of the public domain), but his mustache has grown along with him. You might think having facial hair that hangs so low would present unwanted dangers. That it might get into his soup while eating, or get caught in the garbage disposal, or stuck in drawers as he’s closing them. If any of that has landed Beltran into some trouble spots, he keeps those moments private. Really, he treats the mustache as a tenant on his chin. A tenant that gives him minimal fuss, that he allows (and respects enough) to do what it wants.

“Honestly, I don’t do anything special with it,” he says. “I just tie it up. I just need five or 10 minutes, and I’m good to go. Sometimes it’s even, sometimes it’s not. I clean it. I’m very clean freakish, you know, so I’m very clean for the most part. I don’t measure it. I don’t do anything special with it other than tie it up and go to work.

“Oh, and I condition it, and I use my fiancee’s hair products. That’s the secret right there. I use her shampoos and whatever she uses in the shower. Whatever she has in there, it works for her, and it works for me.”

And that’s the story of Mike Beltran’s famous mustache, which has grown with him into one of MMA’s most recognizable referees.

(Top photo: Jeff Bottari / Zuffa)