I think someone saw the tens of thousands of backlinks that this site has collected for over 2 decades, and saw huge SEO value even if it's kind of an odd "niche", not to mention the people that actually click on those tens of thousands of links, the domain probably still gets a good chunk of traffic.
50k, for something like 80k+ backlinks from 10k+ referring domains. 5 bucks a pop for links from unique referring domains like for links from BBC, Guardian, NY Times, techcrunch, Cnet, LATimes, Inc.com, TheVerge, SBNation, Vice, CBC.ca.... That's a S-T-E-A-L. When you factor in 80k+ links for 50k, for someone with a site about comedy, entertainment, media...? Whew, big W.
If someone owns a site about comedy and just redirects this domain to it, they'll be laughing. Trying to build it out into a popular site is probably a misstep due to the name and everything, but maybe if they just redirect it they can fly under the radar enough while still reaping massive SEO benefits.
Also, for Joe's sake hopefully he'll end up with the domain, it would be unfortunate if someone were to re-create his old email addresses @joerogan.net if he used those, and do password reminders on any of his old social media accounts or whatever else.