Shannon Sharpe and Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson are live from Las Vegas to preview Terence Crawford vs. Canelo Alvarez with special guests including: Shawn Michaels, Triple H, The Undertaker, Charlotte Flair and more!
3:17 - Shawn Michaels joins the show!
24:50 - Stan Verrett joins
28:48 - Triple H joins
47:30 - The Undertaker joins
1:04:30 - Charlotte Flair joins
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
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(01:21):
you for joining us for Daycap. It seems like I
just got up the radio just a little while ago,
but we are back this morning. Y'all know who I am.
I'm your favorite on Shannon Sharp here. He is my
partner and co host. He's Liberty City his own. He's
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a former pro bowler, All Pro. He's Chad o Cho
(01:41):
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Speaker 2 (02:16):
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Speaker 1 (02:18):
If you haven't try it, you'll know exactly what I'm
talking about. Please go follow my media company page on
all of its platform shay Shape Media and my clothing
company eighty four with eighty four being spelled out. That
link is also pinned in the chat. We got a
very jam packed show for you this early this morning.
We got Sean Michaels joining us. He'll be our first
(02:40):
guess up. We got Triple A's joining us. We got
the Undertaker joining us. We're gonna try to get Bud's
trainer Bomak to join us also. But this morning the
show is really wrestling heavy. We got a lot of
heavyweights coming in. Many believe he is the greatest wrestler
of all time. A many time champion. Harry is joining
the stage right now, the legendary Sean Michaels.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
You want him sit here, younor?
Speaker 4 (03:09):
So?
Speaker 2 (03:09):
How you doing it?
Speaker 5 (03:10):
But I'm doing Good's coming up now?
Speaker 6 (03:14):
Thank you very much. I am wonderful, appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
So let me ask you this, what's what's been one
of your biggest challenges? Now you you've kind of transitioned
running out n x T, what's what's been the biggest
transition for you?
Speaker 7 (03:30):
Uh, time of time put it, putting on the suit
looking like a corporate head. No, look, I will say this,
I don't know. You guys know, uh, probably better than me.
You play the game, but then trying to I don't
help coach it or yeah, teach. It's not always an
(03:52):
easy transition.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
It's so well, you were as great as you were.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
The patience that you need to have because things that
probably came easy to you might not come easy to
someone else.
Speaker 7 (04:02):
Well, thank you, I mean first of all. But again
the same thing, right, and and that was I will
say that's been the most challenging part was some things
I don't know. I was given a gift and and
when you're doing it and you're in the minute moment
of it, you're probably you're not thinking about that, right.
And then afterwards so many things you go back and
(04:23):
you try to teach.
Speaker 6 (04:25):
And they ask you like, well, how this, how that?
How did this happen?
Speaker 2 (04:28):
And it was just there.
Speaker 6 (04:30):
It was just there.
Speaker 7 (04:31):
So but again that's been the part where I've had
to learn how to convey.
Speaker 6 (04:38):
That in the best possible message that I can.
Speaker 7 (04:41):
And I was fortunate to be able to have some
time as a trainer and a coach before I.
Speaker 6 (04:47):
Was in the role that I'm in now and now.
Speaker 7 (04:50):
Again as they I'm able to meet them where they're
at when over the years I've learned how to do
that is understanding that not all of them are the
same and being able to again try to understand where
they're at and not to be teaching for ten years
down the road, meet them where they're at currently. And
(05:12):
that's been the biggest help for me going forward. And
again one of the things that's also an advantage to
us is we teach and then they move on, and
so I at least get enough reps because you have
a new group come in and you kind of have
to it sort of rinse and repeat, so to speak.
With the exception of small little detailed things here and there,
(05:35):
but for the most part, you end up covering the
gambit and you at least get enough reps at it
that it becomes a little bit easier.
Speaker 6 (05:42):
The more you do it.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
That's the biggest thing.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
When you talk to great great in any particular sport,
any particular thing, what came easy is hard. Those that
can do those that can't. Teat you did because you
could do. Now, how do you show patience, show grace
and says what came so easy to Sean Michael? What
a God given gift? How do I convey that? Because
(06:08):
they're asking you, well, how you like? I just did it?
Then now you got to like, well you have to
do it like this when no one really had to
explain it to you.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
You just had that god given gift.
Speaker 7 (06:20):
Well, again, that's where I go back to making them
or doing my best to have them really define and
delineate and detail what it is they're looking for and
asking about. The hardest thing for us is a very
natural feel. And also, as you gentlemen know, you almost
(06:44):
can't teach timing right. Direct timing is something that our business,
as yours, sort of hangs on.
Speaker 6 (06:56):
Through reps. You can get close.
Speaker 7 (06:58):
To it, but a lot of it is a feel
and a timing thing, and trying to get them to
understand that and to not the biggest thing with that
because that may not always get perfectly in sync.
Speaker 6 (07:11):
But the closer they can get to it, the better
chance they have.
Speaker 7 (07:14):
So a lot of it is teaching them patients in
that respect and knowing that nothing is going to happen easy,
but when everything is said and done, more REPS is
going to give you the better results. You're certainly not
going to get worse if you're continuing to hit it
time and time and time and time again and again.
(07:35):
That comes down to work ethic. And then when you
get into the conversations of wanting to be great, as
you guys know, a word that gets tossed around way
too freely now absolute and again, trying to really help
them understand what it means to try and be that.
It's one thing to say it, it's another thing to
put into practice.
Speaker 6 (07:56):
A taking.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Did you always want to be a rest?
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Did you have any idea when you got started many
many years ago that wrestling would be what has become
or as we say in the South, wrestling. Did you
have any idea because you know wrestling, and I know
you know this, but a lot of people at home
wrestling wrestling used.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
To just be regional.
Speaker 1 (08:17):
You had the South, you had the Northeast, you had
the mid Atlantic, you had to meet. That's where wrestling was.
And then somehow Vince McMahon he merged all this together.
That had to n w A and they merged all
this together and it became one.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Did you want to be a wrestler? And did you
when you started?
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Did you have any idea it would take you to
the places that has taken you and it would become
what has become.
Speaker 7 (08:40):
I'm sixty, so when I started it was Southwest Championship Wrestling.
Speaker 6 (08:47):
I knew at twelve years old. I saw it one time.
Speaker 7 (08:50):
I got to stay up late and all of a sudden,
this montage comes on again.
Speaker 6 (08:54):
Grainy again. Your production quality is hor but you don't
know it at the.
Speaker 7 (08:59):
Time, and it was the most mismerizing thing I had
ever seen.
Speaker 6 (09:04):
And I was like, oh my goodness, that's it.
Speaker 7 (09:07):
It was the perfect display of athleticism but theatrics, and
I just thought to myself, that's what I want to do.
And I can remember telling my mom at twelve years old,
I'm going to be a pro wrestler when I grew up.
Speaker 6 (09:19):
That's nice, honey.
Speaker 7 (09:21):
But in my mind by the time I was nineteen
and got an opportunity to do it. Being the Southwest
Heavyweight champion and having a one bedroom apartment and my
own car was going to be the greatest thing in
the world. And in nineteen eighty five, I had been
I just started wrestling, and that was when Vince McMahon
(09:44):
first began to go kind of global. The first WrestleMania
was in Madison Square Garden. I was wrestling in Oklahoma
City while WRES It was being shown on closed circuit
TV at the arena.
Speaker 6 (10:04):
But I was wrestling while that show was going on,
and all we did was hear about it.
Speaker 7 (10:10):
We heard about it, but then you thought to yourself, like, wow,
that's cool. But at that time, all those guys in
the territory were telling you he's going to ruin the business.
He's going to kill you, he's ruining everything. Two years later,
I'm in Minnesota wrestling, but we're on ESPN. Now, wow,
it was now on cable television. They're trying to compete
(10:30):
with Vince. But now everybody knew that New York. New
York was the place you wanted to be. So that's
the time. Again, it was probably nineteen eighty six that
you started realizing that what he's got going on there
is big, but again had no idea that it would
become what it is now. So no, I was somebody
(10:51):
that got into it. I guess to answer your question.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
You knew earlier all this, I knew that I wanted
to do.
Speaker 7 (10:58):
But a one bedroom apartment am my own car seemed
like the greatest thing in the world. And now we
have a life unlike I'd never possibly imagined.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
I was a I had sat down with a Rick
Flair sixteen time Champ sat down with John Cena. We
had ah so we had I've had many wrestlers and
talked to Minnie said, the greatest wrestler ever is Sean Michaels.
Rick Flair says, your understanding of the moment and the
(11:28):
timing and the theatrics of it, what goes into it,
there's nobody even I said, well what about you, I said.
He says, there's no one close to Sean Michaels. He's
the greatest, he says, And that's no disrespect to Hogan,
that's no disrespect to anyone. Dusty Rolls, all those guys,
there's no disrespect to them, he said, But Seawan Michaels.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Is the greatest wrestler.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
When you hear someone is established and it's as as
as well thought of as the nature boy himself say
that Sewn Michaels is the greatest.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
How does that make you feel?
Speaker 6 (11:59):
Right?
Speaker 7 (12:00):
It's the It's the greatest compliment a guy could have
to be, even be in the conversation. Yes, And I
always I don't know for me whether it was Rick.
I always tried to our business is what it is, right,
It's it's entertainment. Yes, yes, but you can still love that.
Speaker 6 (12:24):
Again.
Speaker 7 (12:24):
I was still even though because I went through my
ups and downs, you know, trials and tribulations, but when
I was in there, I was I was the most
romantic guy there was about this job.
Speaker 6 (12:39):
I was still the twelve year old.
Speaker 7 (12:40):
Kid in there every time, especially when I was in
there with Rick or some of these guys, but being
in a WrestleMania with John or I don't know.
Speaker 6 (12:48):
I was so enamored.
Speaker 7 (12:50):
I never fell out of love with the opportunity of
being able to go in there and do that.
Speaker 6 (12:57):
And so I.
Speaker 7 (12:58):
Think if there was anything that might have been able
to set me apart from everybody, is that I fully
grasp and engaged with that love and that passion and
that again that romance again again, we said this is
about killed saying that you know there certain rote wrote
(13:19):
who can't be romantic about baseball, who can't be romantic
about football? I always, I guess how wrestling was for me.
It was it was my lifeblood, and so I always
allowed myself to be in there in those moments, and.
Speaker 6 (13:33):
I think that came across to people. I think they
could see that I was.
Speaker 7 (13:40):
So enamored with what I was doing in there, and
I gave myself over.
Speaker 6 (13:45):
To that in a way that made.
Speaker 7 (13:46):
Them buy into it was real to me while it
was going on in there, because every ounce of it
was for me, and it was it was an opportunity
to be able to I don't know, to convey my
love for this unbelievable job that I had, So I
don't know. I hope that answers your question, and I
hope that kind of gets up there.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
So you know what, I have one question that always happens.
Speaker 8 (14:09):
That happens to all of us that have played a
sport with regardless of what respect the craft that it
is you do. Once you transition and you no longer
can play said sport, have you been able to find
something else that you're passionate about and that you love
that you can pour into the same way you did
Ras and that made you one of the greatest.
Speaker 6 (14:27):
I'll say this.
Speaker 7 (14:29):
For me, it's obviously my family, but it's also this again.
It is now because again I had a wonderful change
in my life with my faith and my wife and
our children. Now I'm able to do this job, but
I'm able to pass it forward. I feel like I'm
fulfilling my purpose. I do one thing well in this lifetime,
(14:52):
and it's wrestle, and I'm able to use that gift
to give other young men and women that come through
the doors of the Performance Center in order Lando, Florida
the opportunity to have the amazing life that I've been
given through this line of work and so and hopefully
have an influence on them to live that in a
positive and you know, successful way, but.
Speaker 6 (15:14):
Still be intact when they're done with it.
Speaker 7 (15:18):
You know, again, whether it's you know, the NFL, the NBA,
or wrestling, the ww we have good stories and we
have very sad and tragic stories. I want there's to
be a story that it ends with joy and happiness
and peace. And so that's something again that Hunter put
(15:38):
into the Performance Center when he started it fourteen years ago,
was a culture that was going to be unlike the
business that we broke into, and that is something that
we Yes, we want to pass the tools of professional
wrestling forward, but at the same time, we want the
culture of our business to be differ and to be
(16:00):
more positive than it was when we got into it.
We want to leave it better off than the way
we came into it, and that's one of the things that.
Speaker 6 (16:09):
We're trying to do. Obviously, you know from a culture
perspective as well.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
You know, when you devote so much of your life
and your time to something, when you give so much
to something, it takes a little from you.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Also when you travel and you do what you do.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
Because people think, well, what Seawn's only wrestling once a year,
because he's only doing the main event, He's only doing
you know, a some affairs or summer Slam.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
That's not the case.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
You guys are on the road sometimes two hundred and
fifty three hundred days a year, and yes it's entertainment,
but you're actually falling. You're falling on that match, you're
falling on those chairs, you're falling on that. And so
you played the game of football, you play the game
of baseball, basketball, long enough your body, it takes a
toll on your body.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
How have your body? How does your body.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Feel now at sixty that you look back up like
you know what because people ask o you and now
all the time, knowing what you know now about the
cushions and the toll is going to take on your body.
Would you do it again? Yep, probably would have started
earlier if you knowing what you know, not how your
body feels, Sean, would you do it again?
Speaker 9 (17:10):
Hell?
Speaker 6 (17:10):
Yes.
Speaker 7 (17:12):
I have had my back fused, I've had my shoulder replaced,
I got two knees that I'm getting replaced in probably
a month, and I wouldn't change it for anything in
the world. Again, I knew that going in, as you
guys did. I knew the price that was gonna come
along with it. When I worked on the road, we
(17:32):
did two hundred and eighty six days. When I got
a part time schedule, it was one hundred and fifty.
Speaker 6 (17:37):
Days, and I enjoyed every minute.
Speaker 7 (17:42):
I'm fortunate, again, especially later in my career, to have
a wife and children that understood that They still support
me now, as you know, that's so important to have.
But again it's a part of who I am and
who I've always been, and they recognize that. So yeah,
I'm with you guys. You know, if they had given
me a chance to start earlier, I would have. But again,
(18:04):
you couldn't. You had to wait till your nineteen to
get a license in Texas to be a wrestler, So
I waited until I was nineteen.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
You are a part of many, many blockbuster wrestling events.
This one we have Canelo versus Crawford. It's probably the
biggest event that we've had in the boxing arena in
a very very long time because you got two champions,
undisputed champions. Bud in the four bet era, he's the
first mail to be a undisputed champion two weight classes.
(18:30):
Canelo has dominated the one sixty eight division for the
longest time. When you look at this fight and you
look at it from a distance of an outside guy
that loves fighting, what do you think?
Speaker 2 (18:40):
How do you think this thing's gonna play out?
Speaker 7 (18:42):
So I guess for me, the biggest thing for me
is that I'm I'm happy to see boxing back to
where I guess I'll say, at least for me, and
I hope that comes across well back to where it
once was.
Speaker 6 (18:55):
Yeah, you know what I mean, I think that's the most.
Speaker 7 (18:58):
Positive thing out of all of this, what everything's said
and done. I will just say, I'm not the most educated,
but for me, it's hard to go, you know, against Canelo,
and I guess you know what I mean. That's just
there's so much there, a dominance there, and I guess
(19:20):
in my lifetime, every time there's been a dominance like
that in boxing, Yes, it's got to end sometime, but
I'm one of those people just think that it's not yet.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Well, I was going to ask you, but this usually
got to get both knees replaced that I guess there
are no chance of you getting back in the ring.
Speaker 6 (19:41):
Not a chance, not a chance.
Speaker 7 (19:43):
And even look, even if they were, I'm so blessed
and so fortunate to have done what I've done, but
it is I am so overjoyed to be doing what
I do now and helping, you know, the future of
the w W and to be a part of that.
NXC is just you know, thriving on Tuesday, the CW
network and to help these young men and women, you know, again,
(20:05):
to achieve their passions and their dreams is something that
I didn't know.
Speaker 6 (20:10):
I had no idea I had enjoyed this much.
Speaker 7 (20:13):
But it is so great because I think the businesses
in just tremendous hands.
Speaker 6 (20:17):
For the future.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
When did you know it was over? When did you know?
When did Sean Michaels know I can't do anymore? If
I won another title is not going to change anything.
When did you know it was time to step away?
Speaker 7 (20:32):
So my body still felt great, I still had plenty
of left in the tank.
Speaker 6 (20:40):
But I had a match again.
Speaker 7 (20:42):
It was the one with Undertaker so many twenty five
in Houston that made me feel so peaceful in a
way that I had never felt after a match my
entire life. I can remember driving home because that's when
we lived. We still lived in Texas, and we were
driving home from Houston and I looked at my wife
and I said, Honey, that might be the one I
(21:04):
ended on. And she looked at me, she said what,
And I said yeah. I said, I feel a piece
over me that I've never felt after a match before.
And that's when we began to have the conversation, and
it was the next year, they wanted to go back
with one more with the Undertaker, and we obviously, you know,
put my career on the line and all that kind
(21:26):
of stuff, and I just it was just I had
seen so many people struggle with it, leaving and walking.
Speaker 1 (21:35):
Away getting into Vision is to get that partner, and.
Speaker 7 (21:40):
I want so many guys struggle with that, and I
felt like, here I was at this opportunity where that
wasn't going to be the case, and I was still healthy,
I was still able to go, I was able to leave,
as they say on a high notes, and so I
just couldn't picture it in it, couldn't picture it being
(22:01):
any more perfect than that, and so made that decision
and have never looked back and regretted it again.
Speaker 6 (22:09):
You know, I don't know.
Speaker 7 (22:10):
I just it was something that I've had such peace with,
and again, like I said, I feel very fortunate to
have had that, because I know so many have struggled
with it in the past.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Even though you have peace, do you miss it?
Speaker 7 (22:23):
I don't not being in there, the physical aspect of it.
I don't miss the travel. I don't miss I guess
I'm able now to still kind of get that same
charge when we're sitting there, I'm telling a story to
these talents where I'm trying to convey this is what
we're looking for out of this match, and we're going
to tell this story and this is going to happen,
(22:46):
and at the end, hopefully they come on glued. And
when that happens and it all comes together, it's that
feeling once again, but it's you watching the joy in
that talent start and again when they're finally getting it.
So it's it's it's in a different aspect that I
received kind of that charge that I used to have
(23:06):
when I got in the ring.
Speaker 6 (23:07):
Yes. Laugh.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Questioned, is there anybody that's currently resling be a wwe
been an NX NXT non stop breastling? Is there anybody
that reminds you on Michael A Shawan Michael that you see.
Speaker 7 (23:23):
I'll say this from an NXT standpoint, we have an
you know, an unbelievable uh roster. I think somebody who
you have to keep an eye on. He's twenty one
years old and his name is Javon Evans. He's unbelievably dynamic,
unbelievably talented, gifted. He just turned twenty one, I believe
(23:46):
and the future is so bright for that young man.
He's going to be somebody that's going to be very
big in the WW and obviously I think probably before
long he'll probably be a flag bear in NXT. So
I'm excited to see the trajectory of his career.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
Thanks for coming on give us a few moments of
your time, the great Sean Michaels.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 4 (24:07):
Appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
Y'll thank you.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
Oh man, this is this was amazing to really sit
down and like I said, I've been a wrestling fan.
My grandfather used to take my brother and I to
wrestling matches Savannah Civic Center, We used to go to Baxley,
We used to.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
Go to Badaia.
Speaker 6 (24:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
Uh used to take my brother and I and we
see all those where it was Georgia Championship Wrestling.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
And it was great. It was great.
Speaker 1 (24:34):
And to sit down and have a conversation, Like I said,
I've interviewed Rick Flair, I've interviewed John Cena uh met
a lot of wrestlers and and to sit down with
Sean Michaels, it was It's been great and I'm glad
we got an opportunity to check to catch up with it.
Speaker 8 (24:50):
Stand what they do, baby, man, Listen, if I had
your hands, I cut mine off.
Speaker 4 (24:53):
Man McDonald's, man, you.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Know what I mean. We got legend that broadcast the
stay of a red joining us. Stand. How you doing
doing great?
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Man?
Speaker 6 (25:02):
Doing great?
Speaker 4 (25:03):
Nothing like the energy of fight night in Vegas.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
No, there's nothing like. There's nothing like a fight Vegas was.
Vegas was built on fighting. Absolutely. Yeah, we got the
casinos and we understand that. But there's something about a buzz,
the electricity that's in the air when a big time
fight hits town in Vegas.
Speaker 8 (25:19):
And then the funny thing about it is it took
a fight like this to get that magic, to get
that buzz back in Vegas. There's been many fights, but
nothing just like this that brings back that that feeling.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
Of many pack y'all. Mayweather.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
Absolutely, I was here.
Speaker 2 (25:32):
We were here for eight days.
Speaker 10 (25:34):
I was with ESPN, then we were here for eight
days for that fight. ESPN said we want to own
this fight. So I was parked here the whole time,
and you know, you could just feel it ramping up
as the week went on, you know, and by the
time we got to the fight.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
It was it was unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
Yeah, so you mentioned you and Neil Lebrett. You got
the transition. You're going to try to try to recreate
what you guys had on ESPN.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
I'm not mistaken. I think a red you're going Twitch.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
Yes, So you're taking you're taking, you're taking your talents
to Twitch.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
Exactly what was the thought process in doing that?
Speaker 10 (26:06):
So our producer Jeff Anderson is really in tune with
the digital space, yes, and so he saw that Twitch
gave us a lot of functionality to do live because
initially it was it was mostly gamers on Twitch. Yes,
and so you know exactly, so they need a lot
of functional capability to go live. You got to be
(26:29):
able to see the gamers, you got to be able
to see the action on the screen. So we are
sort of adapting that for sports now. It's already Chaid.
You probably know the European soccer guys are already on
Twitch and they're doing live shows on Twitch already. There's
a bunch of radio stations that are that are streaming
their shows on Twitch. So it's you know, we think
(26:50):
we found something something really really good in that platform
that helps us go live, interact with fans, who are
listening to the show, watching the show. They can they
can ask questions, they can comment, and we can deal
with them in real time, and then we take the
show later, we.
Speaker 4 (27:05):
Put it on YouTube and all those traditional platforms.
Speaker 6 (27:07):
I like it.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
So we're gonna get you out of here on this
one prediction. What do you think is gonna happen? Canelo Crawford,
Crawford taking a big taking a big risk, going up
basically polled voting three weight classes.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Canello is you know, yeah, it's Canelo.
Speaker 10 (27:21):
The thing is, I think it's gonna come down to
can Canelo handle Bud's ability to switch south part orthodox.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
Which is why you had Boots in camp.
Speaker 10 (27:34):
Exactly exactly h versus uh Budd's ability.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
To take a punch. I don't know.
Speaker 10 (27:43):
I don't know if sparring wise, he had anybody who's
as big as Canelo in camp who hits with the
power of Canlo, Because if you had somebody that big
who hits that home, he wouldn't be a sparring.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Partner, right exactly. Can't be wearing a belt, you know
what I mean.
Speaker 10 (27:57):
So, so I think in the first couple of rounds,
I mean, it's gonna be interesting to see if Bud
feels like I can box, I can fight him.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
I can stand in the middle.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
And fight him. No, or if if he's gonna box him,
you know what I mean. I don't think he can.
Speaker 10 (28:11):
Get lured into trying to trade and trade with him
down some heavy hands, you know. So it's gonna is
it gonna be a slugfest or is it gonna be
a boxing match? Slug fest advantage Canelo. If it's a
boxing match, advantage Budd. So we'll see Style's dictate fights.
Speaker 6 (28:25):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
Always.
Speaker 2 (28:27):
Good luck to you and Neil on the endeavor on Twitch.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Congratulations on the great success that you had the twenty
five years at ESPN.
Speaker 10 (28:33):
Thank you, man, I appreciate it. Hey man, I'm trying
to be like you guys, you know what I mean.
So if you have anybody with any more hundred million
dollars contracts, you know, telling them mother you got some
people are interested? All right, we'll do see you guys.
All right, all right, thank you?
Speaker 6 (28:47):
How you doing? I'm good man?
Speaker 2 (28:48):
How are you we're doing?
Speaker 6 (28:49):
A mate?
Speaker 4 (28:49):
Thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
Now we hear this like a like you got something
big that you want to announce.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
If there any hint. You know, you want to like devote,
you want.
Speaker 5 (28:58):
To you want to let us see it all right now,
I don't want to be the worst secret keeper on
the planet, you know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (29:03):
Yeah, we got some we.
Speaker 5 (29:04):
Got some big news today about the future and and
how things are happening with WWE. But it's going to
be exciting and uh, I'm I'm I'm thrilled we get
to do it here today in the shadow of Canelo Crawford.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
Is nice because, if I'm not mistaken, w w E
and UFC, now you guys are the same umbrella.
Speaker 4 (29:22):
T K Yes, absolutely t K O.
Speaker 5 (29:25):
It's it's WWE, UFC, PBR pro bull riding in there,
you know the few other random things. But but yeah,
it's great to be partnered with them.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
It's great.
Speaker 5 (29:35):
Dani's a genius, thrill to work with him, and uh
and and so forth. It's a it's a wonderful collaboration.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
This secret is anything to do with WrestleMania, I mean
it could.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
It possibly be anything.
Speaker 5 (29:48):
You are in the ballpark park, Yeah for sure. Yeah,
I'm just gonna say, sometimes secrets are hard to keep
around here. So there might be rumors floating around.
Speaker 4 (29:58):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
To get into sport of wrestling.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
I mean obviously you know, obviously you know your father
in law and you got your running or you do
a great job of this right now, Triple h doing
what you do. But as a kid, did you did
you did you always want to wrestle?
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Did you do other things? Or how did you? How
did you get into the sport of wrestling?
Speaker 5 (30:18):
Yeah, So it's a funny thing, is as as you
grow up, especially then, and it's one of the reasons
why I did what I did within the company of
creating what we call NXT that's our developmental system, because
there was there was never a pathway to get into
pro wrestling if you want to be a WWE superstars,
like trying to be a trapeze artist, like right, right,
where do you start?
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Right?
Speaker 5 (30:39):
And I grew up a huge fan really in the
back of my mind, you know, man that if I
could do one if you would say to me as
a kid, what's the one thing you'd want to do
be a WWE superstar? I did all the other sports,
started bodybuilding and lifting weights when I was fourteen, with
the mindset of if I want to be a w
W st you got to go to the shows. See,
(31:01):
these guys are huge. I gotta get I gotta get bigger.
I gotta you know, I gotta get there. So, you know,
you had to find a way. I was lucky in that.
I somebody pointed me in the right direction. I had
met a world strongest man tet oar Cd at the time,
and he got first guy to bench prest seven hundred
pounds and and and had a brief stint in the
(31:22):
wrestling business. Yeah, partlay that into business for himself. Very
smart guy.
Speaker 6 (31:28):
You know.
Speaker 5 (31:28):
I had met him and asked him how do I
get in the business, and he would always try to
discourage me from it, and and then eventually when I
bugged him enough, he gave me a number. I went
trained with Killer Kwalski, and Yeah, fortunately for me, it
took off. But now we've changed that game. We've tried
to make the pathway. So we recruit heavily in colleges.
We have an NIL program. We call it Next in Line.
(31:52):
It's we we have NIL kids across the country that
have an interest in WWE that that are part of
promoting us to all these events that they go to.
And then we work with all those kids that have
an interest in this, or maybe didn't know they had
an interest, but you know, you know better than anybody.
Right Like the NFL, it's it's such a small percentage
(32:15):
of folks that get in there. You can be the
best of the best and all of that, but then
there's this moment in time where you have a whatever
the slightest you know, difference, and you're not going to
make it. And this is a career choice for them
where you know, they come to Orlando, Florida, they see
our facilities, they think, wow, this is like being in
a D one college. I have that level of professionalism.
(32:39):
Let me give this a shot, and it's performance, so
it's athletic performance, and if they can make it work
for them, then then the sky's the limit, just like
any other any other sport.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
You got the base. The training center is in Orlando,
right is in Orlando.
Speaker 4 (32:52):
We're in the process of building a new one now
in Orlando. It'll be even bigger and better.
Speaker 5 (32:56):
Our main offices are in Connecticut in LA but Orlando's
the developmental.
Speaker 8 (33:02):
When I think about all you've accomplished, your thought growing
up as a kid, always wanting to, always wanting to wrestle.
Everything that you poured into the sport, it's pouring back
into you.
Speaker 3 (33:12):
Now.
Speaker 8 (33:13):
Are you able to have a life outside of wrastling
at all where you can have other hobbies, other passions
that you actually enjoy.
Speaker 5 (33:19):
Yeah, though, you know, I'm gonna get it. Go on,
a Lemons say, probably, like both of you, I enjoy fitness.
I enjoy being in the gym. That's that's my that's
my solitude, that's my church, that's my place I go
to ground and and have that. That foundation for me
is training and all of that. But then other than that,
it's my wife and my kids, right, you know, my family.
(33:42):
You know, it's not like my wife wasn't in the
business as well, my family, all of that so sometimes
hard to get away from. But I say this to
people all the time, and I think you two will
get this. People talk about work life balance.
Speaker 6 (33:56):
It's bullshit. There is no such thing you.
Speaker 2 (33:58):
Want to be great or something.
Speaker 5 (33:59):
There no and and all you can really do is
your best at whatever it is you're doing in that moment.
So when I'm at work, I try to be at work.
When I'm with my kids, I try to put work
aside and dedicate that time to my kids or my
wife or whatever that's, whatever that is that we're doing,
and not sort of be oh, yeah, I'm at my kids,
(34:19):
my kids game or or with them, but I'm on
my phone the whole time trying to do business.
Speaker 11 (34:24):
Right.
Speaker 5 (34:24):
I tell people I'm gonna be off for an hour
or two. I'll pick back up in a little bit.
Now I'm with them, And you know, that's it's hard.
It's easy to say that, harder to do it. But
that's that's the.
Speaker 6 (34:35):
Goal for me.
Speaker 5 (34:35):
And you know, I'm I'm thrilled at this point in
my life.
Speaker 4 (34:39):
I still get to do what I love.
Speaker 5 (34:42):
You know, a lot of people when they when when
they finish football, they finished basketball, they finished wrestling, whatever
it is, it all just stops, right and and that's
hard to handle.
Speaker 6 (34:51):
For me.
Speaker 5 (34:52):
It's never stopped when I couldn't do this anymore. I
was already plugged in, maybe deeper than I even wanted
to be, and and everything else. So you know, for me,
I've been fortunate that that passion that I have for
it still continues to this day. And I say this
a lot. For me, it's almost like, now as I
get to help these other kids grow and find success
(35:15):
in this business. It's almost like watching your kids do it.
You know, your own career is fabulous, your own achievements
are incredible.
Speaker 4 (35:22):
When your kids do it, when your kids reach.
Speaker 5 (35:24):
Their goal, when they have that moment, you know, it's
a different level of pride. And I think that's where
I'm at with it now, is watching these kids succeed
and do what they do, to me is almost more
than my career was.
Speaker 2 (35:37):
H How hard is it?
Speaker 1 (35:38):
Because and you had Sean Michaels before you came home,
and he was so gifted. You were so gifted at
what you did and it came natural to you. And
when you try to you try to tell someone else
how to do it, and they said, well how he
was like, why can't you pick that up? Because it
was so easy to you? How is it that you
Because I think the greater the athlete is probably the
(35:59):
heart of of for him to do it because a
lot of things would God give it and he doesn't
understand he or he doesn't understand how they did it.
He just did it. It just came.
Speaker 5 (36:07):
I find that all the time. Look, I like to
think for myself, you know, I think to some degree,
I was gifted for it, but to some degree I wasn't.
Sean is one of the most incredible athletes out every
sea right and can do stuff. And you know, one
of my favorite opponents. I've said it all the time.
I think he's the greatest in ring performer of all time.
His athletic ability second to none. I didn't have that.
(36:31):
I had to learn the other aspect. And you know,
to me, I don't know this is reference to my childhood,
but to me, I was much more Larry Bird than
I was, right anybody else, Yeah, because he wasn't the
most athletic guy, couldn't jump the highest, couldn't run the fastest,
but his knowledge is all that stuff, right, So I
had to put in the work on the other side.
(36:53):
But I have seen that a million times over where
you see guys that are incredible at what we do
and then they try to tell to somebody else and
I'm like, what are you talking about? That's totally wrong,
Like you don't even know why what you do work.
You know, and it's tough for people to get, but
it's I'm a big collaborator for stuff. So if I'm
trying to explain things to somebody or trying to get
(37:13):
them to a certain place is not working. Let somebody
else take a stab at it. Yeah, it just takes
that one sometimes buzzword or the right perspective for somebody
to go like, oh he told me, I didn't get
it at all what you just said, and get that,
you know, and that's a different it's a different take,
and sometimes they just got to figure it out for himselves.
Speaker 6 (37:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (37:35):
No.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
But when growing up and I know usfually you came
to the sport. So how long have you been in
this thing?
Speaker 3 (37:42):
Thirty years?
Speaker 6 (37:43):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (37:43):
Yeah, I started.
Speaker 6 (37:46):
Ninety three.
Speaker 1 (37:46):
Okay, Yeah, so by that time Vance had already kind
of like taken it from.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
Ww F to WWE.
Speaker 1 (37:52):
But we were talking to Sean and I grew up
in the South and so it was Georgia Championship rest
with Gordon so yes, and wrestling was regional.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
You had to meet Atlantic, you had to be west.
Speaker 1 (38:02):
You had the Southwest and so now what what Vince
was able to do was bring all of that under
one umbrella. And so now you didn't have you know,
had the nw A also, So I remember.
Speaker 6 (38:14):
A w A. Yeah it was and it was all
over the place.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
Yeah, So I used to.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
My grandfather used to take my brother and I to
all these little you know, to see Bobo Bazail and
Crush of Black Will and Andre Jackson, saw Dusty Rose,
all these guys coming up, and I remember like, man, man,
I want to be a wrestler. But then football kind
of kind of like captivated me. Was it like that
for you when you saw it for the first time?
Speaker 2 (38:36):
Did you understand, like, Man, yeah, I kind of. I
kind of liked that. I kind of dig that I
think I could do that.
Speaker 6 (38:40):
I did. I did.
Speaker 5 (38:41):
I was a kid and and and very young, but man,
it was for me and I was fortunate I grew
up and then I was born and raised in New Hampshire, right,
so Boston sports for me, I grew up in the
Larry Bird era Parish and McHale and all that.
Speaker 6 (38:59):
I also grew up in the Carl Yastremsky and.
Speaker 4 (39:01):
The Red Sox era.
Speaker 5 (39:02):
Right Like everybody, that Boston sports scene was incredible.
Speaker 6 (39:06):
But for me, I was aware of all that and
I'd go.
Speaker 5 (39:09):
To some of that, but the thing that resonated for
me was wrestling, And like you, I was fortunate when
cable came in where I lived. I got the WWE,
but I got the NWA, I got Georgia Championship, I got.
Speaker 6 (39:21):
Florida, I got text Yes, I got the AWA. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (39:24):
So I had this this well rounded sort of view
of what the business was because they were all slightly different.
Vince was a genius that saw cable coming and the
regional going away at national becoming the thing and eventually
global to some degree. For the talent, that time frame
was almost better because the guys that you saw that
(39:47):
were successful at the highest of levels, like in WWE
had been places for years honing their craft, and right,
you just read about them in magazines, but maybe you
hadn't seen them.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
Yeah, rest of the me I don't know if they
still have to Dude, they still have years.
Speaker 4 (40:02):
Than they do.
Speaker 5 (40:02):
But you used to reads magazines and now you know
what I'm saying to click to click and and and
you're there and you get all the information. But yeah,
the time was different and that ability to go all
those different places. Now we get these kids they come
in from college in a couple of years, if they
start doing this and they start training, hopefully within a
(40:23):
couple of years, they're on NXT. They've got national exposure
on the CW that you know, people could have only
dreamed of years ago.
Speaker 4 (40:32):
And it's changed.
Speaker 5 (40:33):
And you know what's an interesting thing is, like you
talk about football, if you go slightly back, just before
my generation of it, football wasn't the money making no
thing that it is now. So you had guys like
Wahoo McDaniel, Big Cat, Urny lad who were wrestling in
the off season.
Speaker 1 (40:49):
Now who played for the Broncos, Ernie La played for
the Kansas City.
Speaker 5 (40:51):
Chief absolutely, and for a lot of them, they would
play if they you know, unless they were top guys.
Like the money was better year round in wrestling than
it was for the short season of football, right, and
a lot of them gravitated out of football and into
wrestling full time.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
Some of them had to get part time jobs because
you're right, there was not I mean, we look at
it now, you see guys making fifty and sixty million dollars.
Speaker 2 (41:13):
Even it wasn't like that.
Speaker 5 (41:15):
No, there are very few guys making six figures, yes, right,
like very few.
Speaker 2 (41:20):
Very few.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
Basically basically only your quarterbacks when I got into league,
unite your quarterbacks and then you had your top defensive
line of like.
Speaker 2 (41:26):
Reggie White, and blue Smith.
Speaker 1 (41:28):
But for the most part, there were not a whole
lot of guys making five hundred thousand dollars or a
million dollars. That was just unheard us money back then,
unless you were the top, top, top guys. What do
you think is the idea? So because you have to
be obviously you have to be able to be able
to entertain which you have to be athletic, you have
to be able to scale, be skilled.
Speaker 2 (41:48):
And people don't realize that. Okay, yes, entertainment, but you
hit the.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
Mat, the table, yeah, you run into the turn vocals.
Speaker 5 (41:57):
Accumulation of that it adds up absolutely.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
You know, our business like getting in.
Speaker 5 (42:02):
The car crash every day it is, you know, and
and it's day after day and there's no off season
and and.
Speaker 4 (42:08):
So it's a it's a tough, very physical business.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
It's not for everybody, but for the people think, you know,
they think h people think because they only see the
Summer Slam and they only see the big events, that
that's all.
Speaker 2 (42:20):
There is all they do know. That thing is like
and uh.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
Sean Michael saying he traveled in the beginning two hundred
and eighty six days.
Speaker 4 (42:29):
Yeah, yeah, we all did.
Speaker 5 (42:31):
Then now it's different now, right, the it's much more
a weekly you know, you're you're wrestling once twice a week.
It's a it's a lot better family life for people.
Speaker 6 (42:43):
Right.
Speaker 5 (42:43):
We have brought that into a place when you're trying
to build a business, you got to do it different.
Speaker 6 (42:47):
You've got it and.
Speaker 5 (42:48):
Now it's in a different place and the money is
different and everybody's living different, but the physicality is still there.
It's not there. And you know, I say this to everybody.
The casualty rates on hundred percent. No one walks away
unscathed in our business. Is you're going to get injured.
It's going to have just a meta wa yeah, and
you've got to deal with that. And then if you're
(43:10):
if you're at the right mindset and you're driven, you
come back better and you come back harder. But the
thing in our business it's interesting is it's not always
the most athletic and and you said it a little
bit ago that sometimes the most athletic guys it comes
easy to them, and the when when shit gets hard,
(43:30):
they they don't push as hard. In our business, sometimes
I can make you a list of the guys, you know,
Houk Hogan love them the death, biggest star of all time.
Not the most athletic guy on the planet, you know,
John Cena, not the most.
Speaker 6 (43:45):
Athletic guy in the plan. You know a lot of
those guys.
Speaker 5 (43:48):
The list of people who are incredibly they have incredible charisma,
incredible crowd presence, incredible ability to control the crowd and
tell a story. Yes, that's more important charisma king in
our business. Absolutely so that the athleticism, it doesn't matter
how fast you can run, don't doesn't matter how much
you can bench press, matters if you look like you can, right,
(44:09):
And so it's a different it's a different mindset.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
Right, That's what made Rick special, rikk talk, Rikk talk,
dusty road guy that could talk, and like limouthy Rye.
Speaker 5 (44:22):
When when you talk about those folks in that timeframe,
when people can still quote their promos from that generation
after all these years, Like you know, half the kids
today that are running around doing the limousine ride, jet flying,
you know, relegating, they're doing all that stuff. I don't
(44:43):
even know if they've ever seen Rick Wressell, you know.
And the same you know with Hogan, people can still
repeat that his catchphrases and his moments, the rock you know,
stone Cold, all those people, but Dusty Roads. People still
talk about his Hard Times promo. Yeah, right, like those
things are iconic. That's that is what we do, right,
(45:05):
we are. I say this a lot of times when
people don't understand, Like if we're talking to network executives,
they're trying to figure out.
Speaker 6 (45:12):
What we are.
Speaker 5 (45:12):
Say we are less Boxing and more Rocky. Right, We're
not the sport. We're a movie about the sport, and
Rocky is really a love story.
Speaker 4 (45:23):
Yes, right, it just.
Speaker 5 (45:24):
Happens to have Boxing is a background and the metaphor
for all the things he has to overcome and do.
Our business, when you talk about that emotion, you talk
about the storytelling, you talk about all those things, that's
really where it resonates. Yes, and those are things. It's
why our business is evergreen. Very few people unless you're
an incredible, you know, student of the technical aspects of it.
(45:46):
Nobody goes back and watches the Super Bowl from five
years ago. People will go back and watch WrestleMania three to.
Speaker 4 (45:52):
This day, you know of.
Speaker 5 (45:56):
LA and yeah, forty years later they're still watching it.
Speaker 6 (45:59):
Right.
Speaker 5 (45:59):
It's the story, it's the spectacle. It's all those things.
That's what we're different where we're spectacle in storytelling. The
athleticism is a huge factor of it. I don't want
to negate it. The the in ring product, all that stuff,
but that ability to speak, that ability to control the crowd,
that innate charisma. You know that in other sports. If
(46:22):
Connor McGregor comes back and fights in UFC tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (46:24):
He's the biggest jow they have because he can sell it.
Speaker 5 (46:27):
And he hasn't wont to fight what ten years and
almost ten years right like, it's incredible. Mike Tyson, Mike
Tyson announces he's going to do something here, everybody pays
attention because his he has that charisma and that innate
ability to make you want to pay attention.
Speaker 6 (46:45):
Height.
Speaker 1 (46:45):
Thank you man, thank you, appreciate you, com thank you
for having me.
Speaker 6 (46:49):
Man upon it.
Speaker 3 (46:50):
He's good.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
Any time you need it, you know how to get
into Appreciate it man, just the same here.
Speaker 6 (46:55):
Thank you.
Speaker 4 (46:55):
Hopefully we'll see you at the show too. Appreciate you.
Speaker 3 (46:58):
I can wrestle if you need me.
Speaker 10 (47:00):
You know.
Speaker 1 (47:05):
That was he Actually he runs the uh took over
for his father laws Undertaker. Yeah, hey ship the Undertaker.
Speaker 2 (47:18):
I'm good good to see you, Undertaker.
Speaker 6 (47:20):
You're good.
Speaker 9 (47:21):
I'm good to see you. Good side here, man. How
you how you being? I've been good man. Busy, but
we're good.
Speaker 6 (47:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (47:35):
Busy is a good thing.
Speaker 6 (47:36):
Busy is a good thing.
Speaker 2 (47:37):
Man. You know that that means everybody should?
Speaker 6 (47:39):
That mean.
Speaker 4 (47:42):
I got I got more memes than I don't know
what to do with.
Speaker 11 (47:45):
Man?
Speaker 4 (47:47):
Is that when you know you made it when you
got memes?
Speaker 2 (47:49):
Yeah, yeah, you made it.
Speaker 3 (47:51):
You have officially arrived once you have memes.
Speaker 2 (47:54):
So how you been?
Speaker 4 (47:55):
I've been good man, Uh, really busy.
Speaker 11 (47:58):
A lot of things happening with and yeah, just trying
to trying to lend a hand where I can.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
When you got into the sport, did you have any
idea that the wwe would be this would grow to
what has become.
Speaker 4 (48:13):
Absolutely not, man.
Speaker 11 (48:14):
We we were just trying to We were trying to
fill up arenas, make a little money, yeah, and maybe
sell you know back then when we when I started,
there were four pay per views, right.
Speaker 4 (48:25):
There was the Big four, and you know that was
that was it.
Speaker 11 (48:29):
We were trying to sell pay per views, sell some
T shirts and no clue, no clue that Netflix and
was going to come along and the and the kind
of money that that you know.
Speaker 4 (48:39):
These deals are. It's crazy.
Speaker 11 (48:42):
I don't you can't imagine, you know, back in nineteen ninety, yeah,
what what.
Speaker 4 (48:47):
Twenty twenty five is going away and talking to Rick.
Speaker 1 (48:49):
Rick was talking about how he used to wrestle in
high school gymnasium and he would wrestle three or four
or five times in a single date in order to
you know, because there was no money. I mean, you
got making fifty dollars, you guys making just enough money
to put gas in the car and go to the
next locale. And here we are, guys are making real, real,
real money. They got family, you know, they got wie,
(49:10):
they got kids, they have knife owns. Now, it's it's
a it's a different era now for wrestlers.
Speaker 11 (49:15):
Oh absolutely, yeah. Those and we called that paying your
dues right when you come up. You and it's not
even like there's so many times where I would have
to go and help set up the ring just to
just to get on the card and maybe even have
to you know, sometimes chip in for some you know,
not making any money.
Speaker 4 (49:35):
But that's just how important ring time was.
Speaker 11 (49:39):
I mean, we didn't have a you know, you didn't
have a PC or all the all the uh you know,
the ways to prepare as we do now. And I
was telling a story earlier about the first time that
I went to I went to like an HR block,
paid my like I'm one year in the business, right,
And I got this bag full of receipts right that
(49:59):
I'm giving this guy and he says, uh, and he's
reading like I wrote it down wrong. He said, you
drove in eight months, you drove forty five thousand miles.
And I was like, yes, sir, And he says, and
you and you made twelve thousand, two hundred and twenty
(50:20):
six And a guy serious it was. He was the
old timer, right, And he pulls his glasses down. He
looks over his glass. He goes, son, can I give
you some advice? He said, you might want to find
a different line of work. But I mean, but yeah,
that was that was paying your dues.
Speaker 8 (50:37):
And now here we are, right, So, speaking of speaking
of a line of work growing up as a kid,
did you actually know you wanted to wrestle?
Speaker 3 (50:44):
From jump over? There's something else you want to do?
Speaker 6 (50:46):
For me?
Speaker 8 (50:47):
I wanted to be a marine biologist. I wanted to
be a veterinarian because I was in animals. I was
in the Killer Whales and dogs of that nature. And
then football came on, right, and that's that's that's what
happened right now.
Speaker 11 (50:58):
I was a big, big fan as a kid of wrestling,
But again, I thought I was gonna play football, right,
and you know, that was that was always I thought
that was.
Speaker 4 (51:08):
That was my dream, that was your way out, that
was my way out.
Speaker 11 (51:11):
I ended up playing basketball, and then wrestling kind of
came back around.
Speaker 2 (51:17):
You know.
Speaker 11 (51:17):
I was training at this gym between I think it
was between my junior and senior.
Speaker 4 (51:22):
Year of college, and this guy's working out.
Speaker 11 (51:25):
And he's like, hey, man, you ought to you ought
to go through this wrestling school with me, and man,
I think, you know, I'm gonna try and play some
some pro ball overseas, right, And every day I'd come in,
he'd hit me up, and then kind of I started
kind of catching up with the product.
Speaker 4 (51:39):
And it was a lot different even then than what
it was when I was a kid. And I've always
kind of been very like a pretty practical and I.
Speaker 11 (51:47):
Know what my abilities are my abilities aren't, and then
you know, I start thinking about it, like do I
want to be the twelfth man on a bench in
Lithuania twenty one or twenty two years old, And and
then I, you know, I'm kind of like, well, Dann,
there's not a lot of big athletic guys in wrestling
correct time, and that's kind of how it started. And
once I started training, then it was like, Okay, yeah,
(52:09):
this is it, this is what I want to do.
Speaker 1 (52:11):
But you mentioned it's a lot different now than it is.
They got n x T where they got the training program.
Just H was on, Triple H was on and he's
saying they're building an even bigger yes down in Orlando.
That's where they send all the guys that you know,
people want.
Speaker 2 (52:25):
To pass through and think they can make it into WWE.
Speaker 1 (52:28):
That's where they go through. You guys didn't have that.
So these guys not have an advantage that you guys didn't.
And they have guys that come like yourself, and they
have Sean Michael, who who's the director of that, to
go back there and help them guys out. Have you
found it difficult to be able to share what you
know with kids because those that can do those that
(52:49):
can't teach you could do, but now sometimes they ask
you to teach.
Speaker 4 (52:53):
Yeah, no, and that's a that's a great question.
Speaker 11 (52:57):
But I think the biggest thing from me is that
we have so many athletes now, like we recruit like
we we will have people like you to colleges and
yeah we go to we go to you know, uh, yeah,
we'll go to the combine, We'll go to pro days
and yeah.
Speaker 4 (53:15):
We got people there because we have.
Speaker 3 (53:17):
To continue feed the cecy.
Speaker 11 (53:19):
Right when I came up, either you had it like
this is I was a fan, I want to do this.
You have a you have a certain understanding of the business,
right even as a fan.
Speaker 4 (53:30):
Well, we're getting people that have never.
Speaker 1 (53:32):
Been y'all like the army now y'all looking for a few.
Speaker 11 (53:36):
With me, but but but not understand we're taking them
from ground zero. So they don't they're not even they
don't understand the business or any concept. So trying to
the way that I come up and the way that
my process was, Yeah, sometimes I get some blank stairs
like I have no idea what this man is talking about,
and then you have to continue break it down and
(53:57):
hopefully they feel we talk.
Speaker 4 (53:59):
Let me.
Speaker 1 (54:02):
H was saying, the big the most important thing isn't athleticism.
It's the risks being able to hold his microphone and
do what a Rick Flair could do, Do what a
Dusty Roads can do, Do what a rock can do,
Do what a John Cena could do. Captivate that audience,
Hold that audience. They're hanging on everything that you say.
People still can recite that Rick Flair jet setting, limousine
(54:25):
ride Rod Lakes where alligated he's been more, He's wasted
more liquor in the weird that you made in my lifetime.
Speaker 6 (54:34):
They know that.
Speaker 1 (54:35):
Would you say, what do you think is the most
important thing that a wrestler needs to have in order
to be what you become?
Speaker 2 (54:42):
What Sean Michael was, what Rick?
Speaker 4 (54:44):
You have to have the ability to make somebody care
a bar none.
Speaker 11 (54:49):
There's been a lot of guys that have made a
lot of money that can wrestle a liquor.
Speaker 4 (54:56):
I mean, if I'm being honest, right, but again, you
put this in their hand, you're on your edge of
your seat, like, oh right.
Speaker 11 (55:06):
That's that's that's number one you have to make and
you don't. They don't have to love you. They can
hate you, it doesn't matter. They just have to have
you have to be able to make people feel a
certain way. Yes, And if you got that, everything everything
else can take care of itself. You don't need to
be We always say Luthez is an old time, old
(55:26):
old timer that could really wrestle. You could do it
all right, So you don't have to be Luthez. But man,
if you can, if you could make somebody feel a
certain way, then you've got a really good chance of
being successful.
Speaker 1 (55:38):
If I, after you give me your mount, rushmore wrestlers,
If I get you get more head to put on
there the greatest wrestlers of all time?
Speaker 2 (55:45):
Who would you put up there?
Speaker 11 (55:46):
So again I go back to who who were the
most I guess instrumental in the history of wrestling, and
I put Andre the Giant on there, Le Cogan, Stone Cold.
Speaker 4 (55:59):
And the worth Rick Flair.
Speaker 11 (56:04):
I think those those guys are synonymous with the history
of our of our industry right now. There's been guys
that are better talkers, Yes, the guys have been better wrestlers, yes.
For for guys that had impact, those are those are
my four.
Speaker 2 (56:20):
And a lot of people don't really.
Speaker 1 (56:22):
Andre was at the very very beginning, because Andre started
I remember him. I saw him in Baxley, Georgia, uh
and went with Georgia Championship Wrestling because it was you
know south, it was you know, you had mid Atlantic,
you had the Midwest, you had Georgia, Florida, you had Southwest.
And so I got an opportunity to see him. And
I just remember as a kid looking like they ain't
nobody there's no man in the world ever been this.
Speaker 11 (56:44):
Big, right, yeah, most people didn't understand with Andre and
this is what he was doing back then. He was
in a different place every every day. Right, he would
be down in mid South or and then he would
be in California, and.
Speaker 4 (57:00):
Then he would go to Japan.
Speaker 11 (57:02):
He was He was the international superstar long before anybody else.
He was the first guy that was on Johnny Carson
all of those shows.
Speaker 1 (57:11):
Yea, and he did he didn't he didn't talk, but
he would. People were in alle of his size. Nobody
had ever seen a man that big. He had never
seen a man with a hand that wore a size
twenty three ring and whatever size he was, he weighed
five hundred pounds.
Speaker 2 (57:25):
Was seven feet tall.
Speaker 1 (57:26):
So like, am I ever going to see somebody that
size again of my life? I better.
Speaker 2 (57:31):
I better, I better enjoy it.
Speaker 11 (57:32):
Yes, yeah, and it's just a I remember going like
I grew up in Houston, and I remember him coming
to Houston wrestling with Sam Houston Coliseum there.
Speaker 4 (57:41):
I think I might have been.
Speaker 11 (57:42):
Ten or twelve years old and got close enough, you know,
to shake his.
Speaker 4 (57:47):
Hand and it was just like like I catch his
Oh if my hand was lost.
Speaker 11 (57:53):
But then ten years later, I'm in the same dressing
room with Andre the Giants.
Speaker 4 (57:58):
Right now, that's a full circle loan.
Speaker 2 (58:00):
Yes, yeah, and I remember with him and Big John
stud fault.
Speaker 6 (58:07):
Dude.
Speaker 4 (58:07):
I just say this about Andre. If he want to
be alone, he can be alone.
Speaker 1 (58:12):
Yeah, I mean, Rick was telling stories like if he
liked you, he liked you. If he didn't like you,
he didn't like you, and there was nothing nobody could
say or do, and the.
Speaker 2 (58:21):
Match was gonna go how he said it was gonna.
Speaker 4 (58:23):
Come absolutely, And what you're you gonna do?
Speaker 10 (58:25):
What are you gonna do with Andre whatever he says,
that's exactly what you're gonna do.
Speaker 1 (58:31):
Now that we see the UFC all this is under
one umbrella UFC. You know the boxing PREVR, I mean,
and you see the crossover peeling you see this big
because I guess this is like, I mean, this fight
here is as big the buzz and electricity that you
have like Pakiao and and Lowing. Yes, this is common
(58:55):
because the way you guys put on a summer slam
in you summer fair, the way you guys do that,
this is kind of like similar to the buzz that
this is creating is very similar to what you guys do.
Speaker 4 (59:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 11 (59:08):
Well again, this is a let's make it very well
be the fight of the decade, right, I mean, these
kind of fights just don't come along, no, right, And
there's just something different about this caliber of fight, right,
I mean I was at I was at De la
Hoya and Trinidad and Tyson and Lennox. Yeah, like it's
just a different kind of buzz. And then when you
(59:29):
put the machine of of t k O and.
Speaker 1 (59:33):
That Netflix flicks behind you and you got your guy Turkey.
Speaker 4 (59:37):
Yeah yeah, yeah, excellency.
Speaker 11 (59:39):
Yeah yeah, I mean, and he is such a huge
sports fan.
Speaker 4 (59:43):
Man.
Speaker 11 (59:44):
It's just it's just crazy, the buzz and the and
the attention that's uh gonna be on this fight this weekend.
Speaker 1 (59:52):
Yeah, I'm excited when you watch, when you watch the
day and I know you're still a fan of the sport.
When you watch today, do you see anybody any young
Undertaker's coming up?
Speaker 4 (01:00:07):
It's it's hard.
Speaker 11 (01:00:09):
I mean I see a lot of people that are
coming up that are gonna be that have potential to
be stars now, whether they're their their characters or whatever,
they are similar to mine. Like well, I guess the
closest within the past few years obviously was Spray Wyatt.
Speaker 2 (01:00:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (01:00:24):
We lost uh, you know, we lost him last.
Speaker 11 (01:00:26):
Year, but he was in that in that category of
Undertaker esque.
Speaker 4 (01:00:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 11 (01:00:32):
I don't know that anybody's really honed in there, but
we have a lot of young talent coming up and
and it'll probably be debuting really soon because the machine again, yeah,
you got.
Speaker 4 (01:00:44):
To run it fresh.
Speaker 6 (01:00:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
Did you pick the name Undertaker that he gave you?
That name?
Speaker 6 (01:00:48):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (01:00:48):
That that name was given to me by by Vince.
Speaker 5 (01:00:51):
Uh.
Speaker 11 (01:00:51):
He he had this, he had this envisioned in his mind,
this character and uh, basically he needed a big guy
with very limited personality.
Speaker 4 (01:01:04):
I'm your guy.
Speaker 11 (01:01:07):
Yeah, so again, but it was something that resonated with me.
You know, when he was showing you know, everything was
on these big storyboards and I'm in his office and
he's showing me this and and immediately my brain is like,
this this is Yeah. I knew, like I knew, I
didn't know what it was going to become, but I
knew it was different, and I knew it was special,
(01:01:29):
and yeah, I was like, yeah, this is this is
pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (01:01:33):
How many people over the last fifteen years have called
you by your real name or everybody just call you Undertaker?
Speaker 11 (01:01:38):
Most people call me taker, taker or dead Man, right
that dead Man was my was my nickname. And yeah,
sometimes people, you know, they'll they'll say Mark and I
don't even.
Speaker 4 (01:01:48):
Turn around, right, but if I hear Taker, I know
it was up or dead Man.
Speaker 11 (01:01:55):
But it's kind of funny, like when you're in public
places and you know somebody, hey, dead Man, and everybody's
kind of looking around, like, what.
Speaker 4 (01:02:01):
The hell's wrong with him?
Speaker 2 (01:02:02):
What do you think? The number one story that resonate
with wrestling fans.
Speaker 11 (01:02:07):
The number one they they have to Again, it goes
back to that connection that I was talking about. If
if they're invested in you and and they care about
one of the one of the things that a lot
of other guys, it takes them a while to figure
out because they're so athletic. Now, if that's what they
want to put, that's what they would want to They
(01:02:29):
want to display their athleticism, and that's great. But at
the end of the day, your audience will get desensitized
or or you have to continue to push the info
the boundary, right, Like, Okay, I've seen you do a
double backflip off the top rope onto the floor to somebody,
and I've seen that a couple of times.
Speaker 4 (01:02:47):
Now, what do you got for me? Right?
Speaker 11 (01:02:49):
But if if, if you can get them invested in
the character, and if somebody does that character wrong, now
you got them right, Because that's what it's all about.
If you love some you're gonna pay money to see
that dude kick the other dude's ass. Or if you
don't like that guy for a reason, I want this
guy to whoop his right, I can go.
Speaker 1 (01:03:08):
I will go whether he wins, whether I want somebody
to beat it or I want him to win, but
I'm gonna go see it.
Speaker 4 (01:03:13):
That's the gist of what we do.
Speaker 11 (01:03:16):
We storytell and we try to get people invested in
the characters.
Speaker 4 (01:03:20):
Wrestling, isn't it.
Speaker 11 (01:03:21):
And I tell people this a lot, especially to the
young guys when you're you're asking me earlier, Wrestling isn't
about wrestling moves.
Speaker 4 (01:03:30):
Wrestling is about telling story stories. We use the moves
to help tell.
Speaker 11 (01:03:34):
The story, but it's all on a on a connection
and that's you know, that's the biggest thing. Once that
black bulb goes off, then you then you've got a
good chance to doing well.
Speaker 3 (01:03:45):
I like that you got anything that was that was good.
Speaker 2 (01:03:49):
It's amazing.
Speaker 1 (01:03:50):
I mean to sit down and to watch like growing up,
like I said, I've been a fan and know the wrestling, and.
Speaker 2 (01:03:57):
To to to to see you an age and to
see you, know.
Speaker 1 (01:04:00):
Sean Michaels, and I sat down with Rick and sat
down with John Cena and to to to like, like
you said, to watch guys on television, and all of
a sudden, through this job allowed me to sit it
down and sit across from you.
Speaker 6 (01:04:12):
Man.
Speaker 2 (01:04:13):
It is indeed and on or.
Speaker 4 (01:04:15):
I appreciate you guys making time for me. This is uh.
Speaker 11 (01:04:18):
I enjoy I enjoy y'all. I love y'all's banter. Fancy
those career that other career you guys.
Speaker 8 (01:04:25):
I appreciate it, sir, I appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (01:04:27):
Man. It's a pleasure.
Speaker 7 (01:04:29):
Baby.
Speaker 4 (01:04:31):
How you doing?
Speaker 12 (01:04:33):
I'm better now.
Speaker 3 (01:04:35):
I like it.
Speaker 6 (01:04:36):
I like it.
Speaker 2 (01:04:36):
Welcome the night with day Camp normally day cap.
Speaker 3 (01:04:39):
So have you been good?
Speaker 12 (01:04:41):
Yeah, I'm here sackdown the night off.
Speaker 6 (01:04:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:04:48):
Look, everybody knows you're your famous father.
Speaker 3 (01:04:52):
By the legend rowing up.
Speaker 2 (01:04:55):
Watching your father. Is this what you always wanted to do?
Speaker 13 (01:04:59):
I I don't think growing up in the error that
my dad wrestled and being an athlete and seeing like
what the women were doing at that.
Speaker 12 (01:05:09):
Time, I wasn't like, oh I could be like that.
Speaker 13 (01:05:12):
They were just so glamorous and sometimes like in bikinis,
but but cream bikinis.
Speaker 12 (01:05:18):
It just wasn't like, I don't know, it wasn't a
dream of mine. But my little brother wanted to be
just like my dad.
Speaker 6 (01:05:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (01:05:25):
Yeah, and he had a really bad drug addiction, so
I thought if I started wrestling that we could wrestle together,
and he ended up passing away. But now it's like,
I'm living both our dreams. So I just thank him
for having the guts.
Speaker 6 (01:05:39):
To do it right.
Speaker 8 (01:05:39):
So if if wrestling wasn't your dream and it was
a dream of your brothers, what would you have done
if you didn't transition?
Speaker 3 (01:05:46):
Into wrestling.
Speaker 13 (01:05:47):
I don't know, I think personal training or something within
the sports realm.
Speaker 3 (01:05:51):
That's a good one.
Speaker 13 (01:05:52):
That's what I always played sports something.
Speaker 1 (01:05:56):
There that you received a lot of online hate because
you came back from an injury and you immediately got
a title shot.
Speaker 6 (01:06:04):
Yes, and how.
Speaker 1 (01:06:07):
Look because everybody probably said you got a fact, you
got fast tracked because you was Rick Flair's daughter, and
so there was all. You probably always had to deal
with hate because of your famous father, and you probably
were able to deal with it a lot better than others,
not in the beginning, but as you got older because
you had to deal with it for so long.
Speaker 13 (01:06:28):
Kind of well playing sports growing up, like no one
cared what you looked like, right, and like also if
you're the best player, you were the best player or
team captain or hardest worker in the room, Like no
one gave a excuse me, No one cared career dad
was like they might have wooted me. So like I
was used to that, but being in the entertainment industry
(01:06:50):
that also, you know it is it's sports and entertainment.
I just wasn't prepared for the online hate with like
why does she look like her dad?
Speaker 3 (01:07:02):
I don't know.
Speaker 13 (01:07:02):
I'm his daughter, Like, I'm like, why is that like
such a big deal. But I definitely obviously got in
the door easy because.
Speaker 6 (01:07:12):
Of my dad.
Speaker 12 (01:07:13):
But there's I mean, you don't do.
Speaker 13 (01:07:16):
What I do everything, Like I've carved out my own path,
but I still have that chip on my shoulder because
it's like, no matter what you do, no matter how
many first you've had or how many awards accolades are
best match of the night, it's still like, oh Rick Flair.
So but it's okay, Like, you need haters in this world.
Speaker 3 (01:07:38):
Right, you have a problems.
Speaker 8 (01:07:40):
Have you been able to deal with that and navigate
having the haters regardless of the work and understanding I have.
Speaker 13 (01:07:45):
When I first started, it was hard, but I think
it also propelled me to where I am today, Like
it made me, like, I think work that much harder.
Speaker 1 (01:07:53):
You mentioned like when you was growing up and your dad,
the women, it's not like now you and Tory Wilson.
Speaker 12 (01:08:01):
Yeah, and the women definitely paved the way.
Speaker 13 (01:08:04):
They just weren't given the opportunity or the platform to
show the world what they could do. So did I
mean they had to do all of that so we
could do all.
Speaker 12 (01:08:14):
Of this, and I'm definitely aware of that.
Speaker 1 (01:08:16):
But the women I grew up watching your dad very
young age. You know, basically they were the fabulous Molay
that was really the only vis and you know they
would they would you see one woman's match a month,
if if that?
Speaker 12 (01:08:31):
Yeah, they were just eye candy.
Speaker 2 (01:08:33):
That was it.
Speaker 1 (01:08:33):
And but now you guys, you know you and Bianca,
but Laire and all these in sky you guys get center.
Speaker 2 (01:08:41):
Stage, you guys, you guys get main events. What when you.
Speaker 1 (01:08:46):
Think about it, like, man, I got twenty thousand people cheering.
Speaker 12 (01:08:51):
Oh, I've had like one hundred and one thousand people.
So I don't know what first met life?
Speaker 13 (01:09:01):
No, I think for me, what's what's still like I
still can't believe I'm here? Is I can remember sitting
front row when my dad wrestled Sean in Orlando when
he retired, and I was a fan of wrestling, like
I was a fan of my dad, but I didn't
really follow it. I didn't have a favorite superstar. I
was like, oh, Sting, he's like super sexy or like
(01:09:22):
you know, like Triple H or Andy Jordan, But I
didn't really follow it. So to be sitting front row
and then seeing all these grown men crying over my
dad retiring and all these WU signs. I was like, oh,
my dad like means a lot to this business. Like
I had no idea. I think I was a little
sheltered from it. So to know that that little girl
(01:09:43):
who sat, well, I wasn't little. I was in my
early twenties who sat and watched her father retire. I
have now been on more Mania's I may have at Mania.
He didn't like I have surpassed the things that he's
done in the industry, but also to be a part
of the industry that he help create, not knowing that
this was like the path for me.
Speaker 12 (01:10:04):
So that's what's like crazy.
Speaker 13 (01:10:05):
And it's all happened in ten years, so like you
can just change the course of your life, like if
you put your mind to it.
Speaker 12 (01:10:12):
And I truly believe that.
Speaker 1 (01:10:13):
When I had him on my show, I talked to
it and I asked him, did he want you to
do it?
Speaker 2 (01:10:18):
He said no, he tried to talk to you out
of it.
Speaker 13 (01:10:20):
He did because it's a hard life. I mean, it's
a lot different now, but it's just like the traveling,
it's NonStop. We don't have an off season, you're away
from your family, you're away from your kids. It's like
it takes a different kind of breed to do what with.
Speaker 1 (01:10:37):
That's what he told me, he said, He said, Jannet,
if you're single, it's perfect. You gotta know you you
don't have you don't have a wife, you don't have
a girlfriend, you don't have kids. You know, you just
you just the workout said for me, I just work out,
wrestle on to the next wressele, work out on to
the next.
Speaker 6 (01:10:53):
He says.
Speaker 1 (01:10:54):
But when you get a family, you have kids, gets
a little hard with the travel that you have to do.
It's not like it was when he Everduce started, because
he was telling me there were some days it was.
Speaker 12 (01:11:02):
Harder than than it is. Yeah, it was a lot harder, he.
Speaker 1 (01:11:04):
Said, but he was wrestling two, three, four times in
a day. Now, you guys, you know you might wrestle
once maybe twice a week.
Speaker 13 (01:11:10):
If it is definitely more family oriented, yes, I will say.
Speaker 12 (01:11:14):
Right, but it's still hard.
Speaker 2 (01:11:15):
Yeah, it's to travel. It's big to travel.
Speaker 8 (01:11:18):
And yeah, you know the fact that you guys are
so busy, your schedule is so hectic.
Speaker 3 (01:11:23):
Yeah, you travel so many days we.
Speaker 12 (01:11:25):
Don't have an off season. Unless you're injured, you don't
have an off season.
Speaker 13 (01:11:28):
So when I tour my knee, right, that was the
first injury in eight years.
Speaker 8 (01:11:32):
Right, So then now I'm thinking about outside of football,
I have other other interests.
Speaker 3 (01:11:36):
I have other hobbies that I really like.
Speaker 8 (01:11:38):
When do you ever have times enjoy things that you
like outside of wrestling?
Speaker 13 (01:11:42):
Well, the business has evolved so where before we were
on the road four to five days a week, and
now we don't have as many live event shows that
aren't televised on the weekends, so really we just have
SmackDown Raw and if we're overseas, we have like the
bigger televised events like Wrestle Polus coming up September twentieth,
So we do have more time.
Speaker 12 (01:12:04):
But I think you just have to.
Speaker 13 (01:12:07):
If there's something that you're really passionate about, you have
to set time aside for it. Oh like Seth Rollins
now being on the NFL network, Like that's so great
for him, but he loves football. He's able to find
something else that he loves to do with wrestling. I
know wrestling is his passion, but to see him doing
that is really awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:12:25):
Still, being reported WrestleMania forty three is going to be
in Saudi.
Speaker 13 (01:12:29):
Crazy, right, WHOA, I don't know what's more crazy that
it's in Saudi or that it's out of the United States.
Speaker 12 (01:12:35):
That's what I mean by that, Like it's always been
our super Bowl.
Speaker 13 (01:12:40):
It's been in the United States since what nineteen eighty five,
So now that it is overseas, that's what makes it like.
Speaker 12 (01:12:50):
Like how global we are?
Speaker 13 (01:12:52):
Well, I think that for WWE, We've had so many
shows there now for the last couple of years. I
feel like it is I can't I don't want to
say home, but it is. You know, we we wrestled
there three or four times, right, So to have a
WrestleMania there, I could see it being a big deal
because we've had Crown Jewel, We're going to have the
(01:13:13):
Royal Rumble. But again, WrestleMania has been in the United States, right,
So that's I think the Wow, that's that's how big
the company has become, or World Wrestling Entertainment.
Speaker 1 (01:13:26):
When you when you you've been around this sport for
a while and now and you see what Bianca Belair,
what she's been able to accomplish. I mean, when you
see what she's done. How did that make you feel?
How proud of you?
Speaker 7 (01:13:38):
Ever?
Speaker 4 (01:13:38):
Oh?
Speaker 13 (01:13:39):
When I saw her sitting at the press conference, I
had no idea she had wrestled in Saudi nine times,
so when she came up to the main roster, she
really When I thought about it, I was like, oh,
she's right, Like she's been in almost every big show there.
Speaker 3 (01:13:53):
Now.
Speaker 13 (01:13:53):
She's the est for a reason, and she really is
a role model inside and outside of the ring.
Speaker 7 (01:14:00):
Uh.
Speaker 12 (01:14:00):
Yeah, I was like just proud sister sitting there watching her.
Speaker 2 (01:14:07):
Yeah, do you like you?
Speaker 3 (01:14:09):
Like?
Speaker 2 (01:14:09):
You like tag team? You like a partner, you like solo?
Speaker 12 (01:14:13):
Oh? Personally I like solo.
Speaker 13 (01:14:17):
Yeah, I don't like sharing the spotlight, but I am
in a tag team Yeah, with the one person I
don't mind sharing the spotlight with, and that's a LECs
of lists.
Speaker 12 (01:14:25):
Yes, and I'm having so much fun. But she's great.
Speaker 13 (01:14:27):
She brings out definitely a different side of my character
for TV, so it's great.
Speaker 6 (01:14:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:14:34):
Oh yeah, so how much how much longer?
Speaker 1 (01:14:37):
I mean, your dad, if your dad still had if
its body would hold up your dad, it would still
be wrestling. Yeah, is this something that you're like, Okay,
I got another three years, I got another five years.
How much long do you want to go with this.
Speaker 4 (01:14:49):
Charlotte, I don't know.
Speaker 13 (01:14:51):
I want kids one day, that's the thing. I can
do both, But it just depends on the time. Like
I don't know right now, it's what do I have
coming up? An XT home Coming Tuesday. We've got Russell Palooza,
Real Rumbo WrestleMania. So like the shows keep going, Yes,
whatever happens between now and five years.
Speaker 1 (01:15:11):
If you were to have kids, are you coming back
or you once you start that family, you're done?
Speaker 13 (01:15:17):
Because I think wrestling's in my blood. I don't know
any different. Like I love it, but I do want
to be a mom. But I think Trish Stratus coming
back and having all these one offs and she's fifty,
looks better than half the roster, right, She's killing it.
So I don't think that door will ever close. It's
just I do know I want to step away to
have children and when that time is so that's I
(01:15:39):
just saw.
Speaker 6 (01:15:40):
Don't know.
Speaker 1 (01:15:40):
I just saw some wrestling couple. She's stepping away because
she's having a baby. I forget who it.
Speaker 14 (01:15:47):
Was, forget oh my girl, yes, Noomi, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,
yes yes.
Speaker 12 (01:15:58):
I'm so happy for her.
Speaker 13 (01:15:59):
So she the championship and then she had Yes, but
she'll definitely come back and win the title again, right,
so or take her title back that she never lost.
Speaker 6 (01:16:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (01:16:12):
So, I mean that means you you have to be
off at least a year, and you're gonna need to
probably you know, I.
Speaker 12 (01:16:17):
Couldn't manage on the side with a little baby bump
to the ring.
Speaker 3 (01:16:22):
I like that.
Speaker 1 (01:16:24):
But so you'll so, in other words, you're gonna be
a lifer. You're a wrestling lifer. You'll do you'll do
with Jean Michael's, You'll go down to N S. T.
And then you'll teach the women to do what you do.
Speaker 12 (01:16:38):
So here's the thing.
Speaker 13 (01:16:39):
Just I do believe when you are good at something,
it doesn't mean that you're going to be a good coach. Yes,
I'm not saying that I couldn't be a good coach,
because I do love it. But right now, what I
like more is helping the girls inside the ring.
Speaker 12 (01:16:55):
My mind isn't.
Speaker 13 (01:16:56):
There yet to be like, oh, I have to be
on the sidelights helping right Like I feel like right
now it's more like, all right, you got to keep
up with me. Let me see what you got, Like,
that's the mentality. So I haven't like switched off yet
to where what that looks like. Like Triple H has done
an incredible job, like going from what he meant in
the ring to what he means now, and I'm just
(01:17:18):
not there yet.
Speaker 12 (01:17:20):
If that's something that I want to.
Speaker 2 (01:17:21):
Do, How difficult is it?
Speaker 1 (01:17:23):
Because you know, like you know, this is entertainment and
you got a script and you got to follow the
script and sometimes.
Speaker 2 (01:17:28):
You might get injured, but hey, it calls for thirty minutes.
Speaker 1 (01:17:31):
We got to give it thirty minutes, even if my
back is hurting, my knee is hurting, my elbow, my shoulder.
Speaker 12 (01:17:36):
That's life.
Speaker 6 (01:17:37):
Yeah, it's life.
Speaker 12 (01:17:38):
You just gotta do it.
Speaker 6 (01:17:40):
Yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1 (01:17:40):
Yeah have you have you ever been hurt early in
the match and like, damn, I still got thirty minutes
to kill.
Speaker 12 (01:17:47):
So I've only been injured one time.
Speaker 13 (01:17:49):
But when I tore my ACL MC and SCS, I
finished the match.
Speaker 12 (01:17:53):
I didn't stop, but I think.
Speaker 13 (01:17:55):
I injured myself more because my ego.
Speaker 12 (01:17:57):
Wouldn't let me stop.
Speaker 13 (01:17:59):
So I got end like in the first two minutes,
and I kept going and I finished the ten minute match, and.
Speaker 12 (01:18:03):
I was still losing the match, but I still have
to finish it.
Speaker 6 (01:18:07):
I was like, I'm not stopping this match.
Speaker 13 (01:18:10):
But it was in front of the troops, so I
was it was a tribute to the Troops show, and
I was like, these people will give their lives for us,
and I can't finish a silly wrestling match.
Speaker 12 (01:18:19):
So like I'm out there going like you just have
to finish it.
Speaker 13 (01:18:22):
But if you go back and watch that match, like
I landed on my head, I landed on my like
it was an It was brutal to watch, like I
needed to be stopped.
Speaker 1 (01:18:30):
Did you know when you injured yourself? Did you know
you were injured?
Speaker 12 (01:18:34):
By the end of it, I was like I can't walk,
Like I could not walk.
Speaker 3 (01:18:37):
I think it move, so you understood how severe it was.
Speaker 12 (01:18:39):
I did it well when I like.
Speaker 13 (01:18:40):
The first day, I was like, oh, that don't feel
right right, And then when I fell off the top
rope on to my neck, I was like, oh my god,
did I break my neck?
Speaker 12 (01:18:47):
And then like twenty.
Speaker 13 (01:18:48):
Seconds later I could move kept going and then I
did another signature move that I had and it like
I don't know, I started the move and the next thing,
you know, I was like flat on my face, but
all the other things that I had to finish.
Speaker 12 (01:19:02):
The match I could use on one leg. And I
was like, oh, this is this.
Speaker 13 (01:19:07):
Some not right because I've never, like you, never been
injured like broken noses, teeth knocked out, things like that,
exterior things, but not like interior.
Speaker 1 (01:19:19):
He Charlotte, you mean to tell me you was at
the end of a match with like a jacker latter.
Speaker 13 (01:19:23):
I was in Germany, yes, and Carmela knocked my teeth out,
and like I'm like walking back. Actually the referee, Charles
actually handed me with two of the teeth.
Speaker 1 (01:19:33):
I was like, to see the excitement on your face,
even though through the torn knee and the knock that teeth,
you can see the passion that you have for what
you do. And that's why you're so good at what
you do because you don't look at this as an occupation.
You don't look at this as a job. You enjoy
(01:19:55):
doing what you do, so you don't see this as work.
Speaker 13 (01:19:57):
You see this as I wake up every day grateful. Yeah,
Like you know how somebody's like, oh, I gotta go
to work today, I'm.
Speaker 12 (01:20:02):
Like, oh, I don't work. I love my job, right, yeah,
I love.
Speaker 1 (01:20:07):
It, Charlotte Flair, Ladies and Gentlemen Wrestling Royalty.
Speaker 2 (01:20:12):
Oh yeah, she's on Nightcap or Daycap. Charlotte, thank you
so much, Thank you.
Speaker 12 (01:20:17):
I appreciate it.
This episode is brought to you by Prize Picks. You
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(01:21):
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(01:41):
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company eighty four with eighty four being spelled out. That
link is also pinned in the chat. We got a
very jam packed show for you this early this morning.
We got Sean Michaels joining us. He'll be our first
(02:40):
guess up. We got Triple A's joining us. We got
the Undertaker joining us. We're gonna try to get Bud's
trainer Bomak to join us also. But this morning the
show is really wrestling heavy. We got a lot of
heavyweights coming in. Many believe he is the greatest wrestler
of all time. A many time champion. Harry is joining
the stage right now, the legendary Sean Michaels.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
You want him sit here, younor?
Speaker 4 (03:09):
So?
Speaker 2 (03:09):
How you doing it?
Speaker 5 (03:10):
But I'm doing Good's coming up now?
Speaker 6 (03:14):
Thank you very much. I am wonderful, appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
So let me ask you this, what's what's been one
of your biggest challenges? Now you you've kind of transitioned
running out n x T, what's what's been the biggest
transition for you?
Speaker 7 (03:30):
Uh, time of time put it, putting on the suit
looking like a corporate head. No, look, I will say this,
I don't know. You guys know, uh, probably better than me.
You play the game, but then trying to I don't
help coach it or yeah, teach. It's not always an
(03:52):
easy transition.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
It's so well, you were as great as you were.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
The patience that you need to have because things that
probably came easy to you might not come easy to
someone else.
Speaker 7 (04:02):
Well, thank you, I mean first of all. But again
the same thing, right, and and that was I will
say that's been the most challenging part was some things
I don't know. I was given a gift and and
when you're doing it and you're in the minute moment
of it, you're probably you're not thinking about that, right.
And then afterwards so many things you go back and
(04:23):
you try to teach.
Speaker 6 (04:25):
And they ask you like, well, how this, how that?
How did this happen?
Speaker 2 (04:28):
And it was just there.
Speaker 6 (04:30):
It was just there.
Speaker 7 (04:31):
So but again that's been the part where I've had
to learn how to convey.
Speaker 6 (04:38):
That in the best possible message that I can.
Speaker 7 (04:41):
And I was fortunate to be able to have some
time as a trainer and a coach before I.
Speaker 6 (04:47):
Was in the role that I'm in now and now.
Speaker 7 (04:50):
Again as they I'm able to meet them where they're
at when over the years I've learned how to do
that is understanding that not all of them are the
same and being able to again try to understand where
they're at and not to be teaching for ten years
down the road, meet them where they're at currently. And
(05:12):
that's been the biggest help for me going forward. And
again one of the things that's also an advantage to
us is we teach and then they move on, and
so I at least get enough reps because you have
a new group come in and you kind of have
to it sort of rinse and repeat, so to speak.
With the exception of small little detailed things here and there,
(05:35):
but for the most part, you end up covering the
gambit and you at least get enough reps at it
that it becomes a little bit easier.
Speaker 6 (05:42):
The more you do it.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
That's the biggest thing.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
When you talk to great great in any particular sport,
any particular thing, what came easy is hard. Those that
can do those that can't. Teat you did because you
could do. Now, how do you show patience, show grace
and says what came so easy to Sean Michael? What
a God given gift? How do I convey that? Because
(06:08):
they're asking you, well, how you like? I just did it?
Then now you got to like, well you have to
do it like this when no one really had to
explain it to you.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
You just had that god given gift.
Speaker 7 (06:20):
Well, again, that's where I go back to making them
or doing my best to have them really define and
delineate and detail what it is they're looking for and
asking about. The hardest thing for us is a very
natural feel. And also, as you gentlemen know, you almost
(06:44):
can't teach timing right. Direct timing is something that our business,
as yours, sort of hangs on.
Speaker 6 (06:56):
Through reps. You can get close.
Speaker 7 (06:58):
To it, but a lot of it is a feel
and a timing thing, and trying to get them to
understand that and to not the biggest thing with that
because that may not always get perfectly in sync.
Speaker 6 (07:11):
But the closer they can get to it, the better
chance they have.
Speaker 7 (07:14):
So a lot of it is teaching them patients in
that respect and knowing that nothing is going to happen easy,
but when everything is said and done, more REPS is
going to give you the better results. You're certainly not
going to get worse if you're continuing to hit it
time and time and time and time again and again.
(07:35):
That comes down to work ethic. And then when you
get into the conversations of wanting to be great, as
you guys know, a word that gets tossed around way
too freely now absolute and again, trying to really help
them understand what it means to try and be that.
It's one thing to say it, it's another thing to
put into practice.
Speaker 6 (07:56):
A taking.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Did you always want to be a rest?
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Did you have any idea when you got started many
many years ago that wrestling would be what has become
or as we say in the South, wrestling. Did you
have any idea because you know wrestling, and I know
you know this, but a lot of people at home
wrestling wrestling used.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
To just be regional.
Speaker 1 (08:17):
You had the South, you had the Northeast, you had
the mid Atlantic, you had to meet. That's where wrestling was.
And then somehow Vince McMahon he merged all this together.
That had to n w A and they merged all
this together and it became one.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Did you want to be a wrestler? And did you
when you started?
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Did you have any idea it would take you to
the places that has taken you and it would become
what has become.
Speaker 7 (08:40):
I'm sixty, so when I started it was Southwest Championship Wrestling.
Speaker 6 (08:47):
I knew at twelve years old. I saw it one time.
Speaker 7 (08:50):
I got to stay up late and all of a sudden,
this montage comes on again.
Speaker 6 (08:54):
Grainy again. Your production quality is hor but you don't
know it at the.
Speaker 7 (08:59):
Time, and it was the most mismerizing thing I had
ever seen.
Speaker 6 (09:04):
And I was like, oh my goodness, that's it.
Speaker 7 (09:07):
It was the perfect display of athleticism but theatrics, and
I just thought to myself, that's what I want to do.
And I can remember telling my mom at twelve years old,
I'm going to be a pro wrestler when I grew up.
Speaker 6 (09:19):
That's nice, honey.
Speaker 7 (09:21):
But in my mind by the time I was nineteen
and got an opportunity to do it. Being the Southwest
Heavyweight champion and having a one bedroom apartment and my
own car was going to be the greatest thing in
the world. And in nineteen eighty five, I had been
I just started wrestling, and that was when Vince McMahon
(09:44):
first began to go kind of global. The first WrestleMania
was in Madison Square Garden. I was wrestling in Oklahoma
City while WRES It was being shown on closed circuit
TV at the arena.
Speaker 6 (10:04):
But I was wrestling while that show was going on,
and all we did was hear about it.
Speaker 7 (10:10):
We heard about it, but then you thought to yourself, like, wow,
that's cool. But at that time, all those guys in
the territory were telling you he's going to ruin the business.
He's going to kill you, he's ruining everything. Two years later,
I'm in Minnesota wrestling, but we're on ESPN. Now, wow,
it was now on cable television. They're trying to compete
(10:30):
with Vince. But now everybody knew that New York. New
York was the place you wanted to be. So that's
the time. Again, it was probably nineteen eighty six that
you started realizing that what he's got going on there
is big, but again had no idea that it would
become what it is now. So no, I was somebody
(10:51):
that got into it. I guess to answer your question.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
You knew earlier all this, I knew that I wanted
to do.
Speaker 7 (10:58):
But a one bedroom apartment am my own car seemed
like the greatest thing in the world. And now we
have a life unlike I'd never possibly imagined.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
I was a I had sat down with a Rick
Flair sixteen time Champ sat down with John Cena. We
had ah so we had I've had many wrestlers and
talked to Minnie said, the greatest wrestler ever is Sean Michaels.
Rick Flair says, your understanding of the moment and the
(11:28):
timing and the theatrics of it, what goes into it,
there's nobody even I said, well what about you, I said.
He says, there's no one close to Sean Michaels. He's
the greatest, he says, And that's no disrespect to Hogan,
that's no disrespect to anyone. Dusty Rolls, all those guys,
there's no disrespect to them, he said, But Seawan Michaels.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Is the greatest wrestler.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
When you hear someone is established and it's as as
as well thought of as the nature boy himself say
that Sewn Michaels is the greatest.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
How does that make you feel?
Speaker 6 (11:59):
Right?
Speaker 7 (12:00):
It's the It's the greatest compliment a guy could have
to be, even be in the conversation. Yes, And I
always I don't know for me whether it was Rick.
I always tried to our business is what it is, right,
It's it's entertainment. Yes, yes, but you can still love that.
Speaker 6 (12:24):
Again.
Speaker 7 (12:24):
I was still even though because I went through my
ups and downs, you know, trials and tribulations, but when
I was in there, I was I was the most
romantic guy there was about this job.
Speaker 6 (12:39):
I was still the twelve year old.
Speaker 7 (12:40):
Kid in there every time, especially when I was in
there with Rick or some of these guys, but being
in a WrestleMania with John or I don't know.
Speaker 6 (12:48):
I was so enamored.
Speaker 7 (12:50):
I never fell out of love with the opportunity of
being able to go in there and do that.
Speaker 6 (12:57):
And so I.
Speaker 7 (12:58):
Think if there was anything that might have been able
to set me apart from everybody, is that I fully
grasp and engaged with that love and that passion and
that again that romance again again, we said this is
about killed saying that you know there certain rote wrote
(13:19):
who can't be romantic about baseball, who can't be romantic
about football? I always, I guess how wrestling was for me.
It was it was my lifeblood, and so I always
allowed myself to be in there in those moments, and.
Speaker 6 (13:33):
I think that came across to people. I think they
could see that I was.
Speaker 7 (13:40):
So enamored with what I was doing in there, and
I gave myself over.
Speaker 6 (13:45):
To that in a way that made.
Speaker 7 (13:46):
Them buy into it was real to me while it
was going on in there, because every ounce of it
was for me, and it was it was an opportunity
to be able to I don't know, to convey my
love for this unbelievable job that I had, So I
don't know. I hope that answers your question, and I
hope that kind of gets up there.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
So you know what, I have one question that always happens.
Speaker 8 (14:09):
That happens to all of us that have played a
sport with regardless of what respect the craft that it
is you do. Once you transition and you no longer
can play said sport, have you been able to find
something else that you're passionate about and that you love
that you can pour into the same way you did
Ras and that made you one of the greatest.
Speaker 6 (14:27):
I'll say this.
Speaker 7 (14:29):
For me, it's obviously my family, but it's also this again.
It is now because again I had a wonderful change
in my life with my faith and my wife and
our children. Now I'm able to do this job, but
I'm able to pass it forward. I feel like I'm
fulfilling my purpose. I do one thing well in this lifetime,
(14:52):
and it's wrestle, and I'm able to use that gift
to give other young men and women that come through
the doors of the Performance Center in order Lando, Florida
the opportunity to have the amazing life that I've been
given through this line of work and so and hopefully
have an influence on them to live that in a
positive and you know, successful way, but.
Speaker 6 (15:14):
Still be intact when they're done with it.
Speaker 7 (15:18):
You know, again, whether it's you know, the NFL, the NBA,
or wrestling, the ww we have good stories and we
have very sad and tragic stories. I want there's to
be a story that it ends with joy and happiness
and peace. And so that's something again that Hunter put
(15:38):
into the Performance Center when he started it fourteen years ago,
was a culture that was going to be unlike the
business that we broke into, and that is something that
we Yes, we want to pass the tools of professional
wrestling forward, but at the same time, we want the
culture of our business to be differ and to be
(16:00):
more positive than it was when we got into it.
We want to leave it better off than the way
we came into it, and that's one of the things that.
Speaker 6 (16:09):
We're trying to do. Obviously, you know from a culture
perspective as well.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
You know, when you devote so much of your life
and your time to something, when you give so much
to something, it takes a little from you.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Also when you travel and you do what you do.
Speaker 1 (16:23):
Because people think, well, what Seawn's only wrestling once a year,
because he's only doing the main event, He's only doing
you know, a some affairs or summer Slam.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
That's not the case.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
You guys are on the road sometimes two hundred and
fifty three hundred days a year, and yes it's entertainment,
but you're actually falling. You're falling on that match, you're
falling on those chairs, you're falling on that. And so
you played the game of football, you play the game
of baseball, basketball, long enough your body, it takes a
toll on your body.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
How have your body? How does your body.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Feel now at sixty that you look back up like
you know what because people ask o you and now
all the time, knowing what you know now about the
cushions and the toll is going to take on your body.
Would you do it again? Yep, probably would have started
earlier if you knowing what you know, not how your
body feels, Sean, would you do it again?
Speaker 9 (17:10):
Hell?
Speaker 6 (17:10):
Yes.
Speaker 7 (17:12):
I have had my back fused, I've had my shoulder replaced,
I got two knees that I'm getting replaced in probably
a month, and I wouldn't change it for anything in
the world. Again, I knew that going in, as you
guys did. I knew the price that was gonna come
along with it. When I worked on the road, we
(17:32):
did two hundred and eighty six days. When I got
a part time schedule, it was one hundred and fifty.
Speaker 6 (17:37):
Days, and I enjoyed every minute.
Speaker 7 (17:42):
I'm fortunate, again, especially later in my career, to have
a wife and children that understood that They still support
me now, as you know, that's so important to have.
But again it's a part of who I am and
who I've always been, and they recognize that. So yeah,
I'm with you guys. You know, if they had given
me a chance to start earlier, I would have. But again,
(18:04):
you couldn't. You had to wait till your nineteen to
get a license in Texas to be a wrestler, So
I waited until I was nineteen.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
You are a part of many, many blockbuster wrestling events.
This one we have Canelo versus Crawford. It's probably the
biggest event that we've had in the boxing arena in
a very very long time because you got two champions,
undisputed champions. Bud in the four bet era, he's the
first mail to be a undisputed champion two weight classes.
(18:30):
Canelo has dominated the one sixty eight division for the
longest time. When you look at this fight and you
look at it from a distance of an outside guy
that loves fighting, what do you think?
Speaker 2 (18:40):
How do you think this thing's gonna play out?
Speaker 7 (18:42):
So I guess for me, the biggest thing for me
is that I'm I'm happy to see boxing back to
where I guess I'll say, at least for me, and
I hope that comes across well back to where it
once was.
Speaker 6 (18:55):
Yeah, you know what I mean, I think that's the most.
Speaker 7 (18:58):
Positive thing out of all of this, what everything's said
and done. I will just say, I'm not the most educated,
but for me, it's hard to go, you know, against Canelo,
and I guess you know what I mean. That's just
there's so much there, a dominance there, and I guess
(19:20):
in my lifetime, every time there's been a dominance like
that in boxing, Yes, it's got to end sometime, but
I'm one of those people just think that it's not yet.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Well, I was going to ask you, but this usually
got to get both knees replaced that I guess there
are no chance of you getting back in the ring.
Speaker 6 (19:41):
Not a chance, not a chance.
Speaker 7 (19:43):
And even look, even if they were, I'm so blessed
and so fortunate to have done what I've done, but
it is I am so overjoyed to be doing what
I do now and helping, you know, the future of
the w W and to be a part of that.
NXC is just you know, thriving on Tuesday, the CW
network and to help these young men and women, you know, again,
(20:05):
to achieve their passions and their dreams is something that
I didn't know.
Speaker 6 (20:10):
I had no idea I had enjoyed this much.
Speaker 7 (20:13):
But it is so great because I think the businesses
in just tremendous hands.
Speaker 6 (20:17):
For the future.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
When did you know it was over? When did you know?
When did Sean Michaels know I can't do anymore? If
I won another title is not going to change anything.
When did you know it was time to step away?
Speaker 7 (20:32):
So my body still felt great, I still had plenty
of left in the tank.
Speaker 6 (20:40):
But I had a match again.
Speaker 7 (20:42):
It was the one with Undertaker so many twenty five
in Houston that made me feel so peaceful in a
way that I had never felt after a match my
entire life. I can remember driving home because that's when
we lived. We still lived in Texas, and we were
driving home from Houston and I looked at my wife
and I said, Honey, that might be the one I
(21:04):
ended on. And she looked at me, she said what,
And I said yeah. I said, I feel a piece
over me that I've never felt after a match before.
And that's when we began to have the conversation, and
it was the next year, they wanted to go back
with one more with the Undertaker, and we obviously, you know,
put my career on the line and all that kind
(21:26):
of stuff, and I just it was just I had
seen so many people struggle with it, leaving and walking.
Speaker 1 (21:35):
Away getting into Vision is to get that partner, and.
Speaker 7 (21:40):
I want so many guys struggle with that, and I
felt like, here I was at this opportunity where that
wasn't going to be the case, and I was still healthy,
I was still able to go, I was able to leave,
as they say on a high notes, and so I
just couldn't picture it in it, couldn't picture it being
(22:01):
any more perfect than that, and so made that decision
and have never looked back and regretted it again.
Speaker 6 (22:09):
You know, I don't know.
Speaker 7 (22:10):
I just it was something that I've had such peace with,
and again, like I said, I feel very fortunate to
have had that, because I know so many have struggled
with it in the past.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Even though you have peace, do you miss it?
Speaker 7 (22:23):
I don't not being in there, the physical aspect of it.
I don't miss the travel. I don't miss I guess
I'm able now to still kind of get that same
charge when we're sitting there, I'm telling a story to
these talents where I'm trying to convey this is what
we're looking for out of this match, and we're going
to tell this story and this is going to happen,
(22:46):
and at the end, hopefully they come on glued. And
when that happens and it all comes together, it's that
feeling once again, but it's you watching the joy in
that talent start and again when they're finally getting it.
So it's it's it's in a different aspect that I
received kind of that charge that I used to have
(23:06):
when I got in the ring.
Speaker 6 (23:07):
Yes. Laugh.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Questioned, is there anybody that's currently resling be a wwe
been an NX NXT non stop breastling? Is there anybody
that reminds you on Michael A Shawan Michael that you see.
Speaker 7 (23:23):
I'll say this from an NXT standpoint, we have an
you know, an unbelievable uh roster. I think somebody who
you have to keep an eye on. He's twenty one
years old and his name is Javon Evans. He's unbelievably dynamic,
unbelievably talented, gifted. He just turned twenty one, I believe
(23:46):
and the future is so bright for that young man.
He's going to be somebody that's going to be very
big in the WW and obviously I think probably before
long he'll probably be a flag bear in NXT. So
I'm excited to see the trajectory of his career.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
Thanks for coming on give us a few moments of
your time, the great Sean Michaels.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 4 (24:07):
Appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
Y'll thank you.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
Oh man, this is this was amazing to really sit
down and like I said, I've been a wrestling fan.
My grandfather used to take my brother and I to
wrestling matches Savannah Civic Center, We used to go to Baxley,
We used to.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
Go to Badaia.
Speaker 6 (24:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
Uh used to take my brother and I and we
see all those where it was Georgia Championship Wrestling.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
And it was great. It was great.
Speaker 1 (24:34):
And to sit down and have a conversation, Like I said,
I've interviewed Rick Flair, I've interviewed John Cena uh met
a lot of wrestlers and and to sit down with
Sean Michaels, it was It's been great and I'm glad
we got an opportunity to check to catch up with it.
Speaker 8 (24:50):
Stand what they do, baby, man, Listen, if I had
your hands, I cut mine off.
Speaker 4 (24:53):
Man McDonald's, man, you.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Know what I mean. We got legend that broadcast the
stay of a red joining us. Stand. How you doing
doing great?
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Man?
Speaker 6 (25:02):
Doing great?
Speaker 4 (25:03):
Nothing like the energy of fight night in Vegas.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
No, there's nothing like. There's nothing like a fight Vegas was.
Vegas was built on fighting. Absolutely. Yeah, we got the
casinos and we understand that. But there's something about a buzz,
the electricity that's in the air when a big time
fight hits town in Vegas.
Speaker 8 (25:19):
And then the funny thing about it is it took
a fight like this to get that magic, to get
that buzz back in Vegas. There's been many fights, but
nothing just like this that brings back that that feeling.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
Of many pack y'all. Mayweather.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
Absolutely, I was here.
Speaker 2 (25:32):
We were here for eight days.
Speaker 10 (25:34):
I was with ESPN, then we were here for eight
days for that fight. ESPN said we want to own
this fight. So I was parked here the whole time,
and you know, you could just feel it ramping up
as the week went on, you know, and by the
time we got to the fight.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
It was it was unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
Yeah, so you mentioned you and Neil Lebrett. You got
the transition. You're going to try to try to recreate
what you guys had on ESPN.
Speaker 2 (25:58):
I'm not mistaken. I think a red you're going Twitch.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
Yes, So you're taking you're taking, you're taking your talents
to Twitch.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
Exactly what was the thought process in doing that?
Speaker 10 (26:06):
So our producer Jeff Anderson is really in tune with
the digital space, yes, and so he saw that Twitch
gave us a lot of functionality to do live because
initially it was it was mostly gamers on Twitch. Yes,
and so you know exactly, so they need a lot
of functional capability to go live. You got to be
(26:29):
able to see the gamers, you got to be able
to see the action on the screen. So we are
sort of adapting that for sports now. It's already Chaid.
You probably know the European soccer guys are already on
Twitch and they're doing live shows on Twitch already. There's
a bunch of radio stations that are that are streaming
their shows on Twitch. So it's you know, we think
(26:50):
we found something something really really good in that platform
that helps us go live, interact with fans, who are
listening to the show, watching the show. They can they
can ask questions, they can comment, and we can deal
with them in real time, and then we take the
show later, we.
Speaker 4 (27:05):
Put it on YouTube and all those traditional platforms.
Speaker 6 (27:07):
I like it.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
So we're gonna get you out of here on this
one prediction. What do you think is gonna happen? Canelo Crawford,
Crawford taking a big taking a big risk, going up
basically polled voting three weight classes.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Canello is you know, yeah, it's Canelo.
Speaker 10 (27:21):
The thing is, I think it's gonna come down to
can Canelo handle Bud's ability to switch south part orthodox.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
Which is why you had Boots in camp.
Speaker 10 (27:34):
Exactly exactly h versus uh Budd's ability.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
To take a punch. I don't know.
Speaker 10 (27:43):
I don't know if sparring wise, he had anybody who's
as big as Canelo in camp who hits with the
power of Canlo, Because if you had somebody that big
who hits that home, he wouldn't be a sparring.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
Partner, right exactly. Can't be wearing a belt, you know
what I mean.
Speaker 10 (27:57):
So, so I think in the first couple of rounds,
I mean, it's gonna be interesting to see if Bud
feels like I can box, I can fight him.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
I can stand in the middle.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
And fight him. No, or if if he's gonna box him,
you know what I mean. I don't think he can.
Speaker 10 (28:11):
Get lured into trying to trade and trade with him
down some heavy hands, you know. So it's gonna is
it gonna be a slugfest or is it gonna be
a boxing match? Slug fest advantage Canelo. If it's a
boxing match, advantage Budd. So we'll see Style's dictate fights.
Speaker 6 (28:25):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
Always.
Speaker 2 (28:27):
Good luck to you and Neil on the endeavor on Twitch.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Congratulations on the great success that you had the twenty
five years at ESPN.
Speaker 10 (28:33):
Thank you, man, I appreciate it. Hey man, I'm trying
to be like you guys, you know what I mean.
So if you have anybody with any more hundred million
dollars contracts, you know, telling them mother you got some
people are interested? All right, we'll do see you guys.
All right, all right, thank you?
Speaker 6 (28:47):
How you doing? I'm good man?
Speaker 2 (28:48):
How are you we're doing?
Speaker 6 (28:49):
A mate?
Speaker 4 (28:49):
Thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
Now we hear this like a like you got something
big that you want to announce.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
If there any hint. You know, you want to like devote,
you want.
Speaker 5 (28:58):
To you want to let us see it all right now,
I don't want to be the worst secret keeper on
the planet, you know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (29:03):
Yeah, we got some we.
Speaker 5 (29:04):
Got some big news today about the future and and
how things are happening with WWE. But it's going to
be exciting and uh, I'm I'm I'm thrilled we get
to do it here today in the shadow of Canelo Crawford.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
Is nice because, if I'm not mistaken, w w E
and UFC, now you guys are the same umbrella.
Speaker 4 (29:22):
T K Yes, absolutely t K O.
Speaker 5 (29:25):
It's it's WWE, UFC, PBR pro bull riding in there,
you know the few other random things. But but yeah,
it's great to be partnered with them.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
It's great.
Speaker 5 (29:35):
Dani's a genius, thrill to work with him, and uh
and and so forth. It's a it's a wonderful collaboration.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
This secret is anything to do with WrestleMania, I mean
it could.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
It possibly be anything.
Speaker 5 (29:48):
You are in the ballpark park, Yeah for sure. Yeah,
I'm just gonna say, sometimes secrets are hard to keep
around here. So there might be rumors floating around.
Speaker 4 (29:58):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
To get into sport of wrestling.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
I mean obviously you know, obviously you know your father
in law and you got your running or you do
a great job of this right now, Triple h doing
what you do. But as a kid, did you did
you did you always want to wrestle?
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Did you do other things? Or how did you? How
did you get into the sport of wrestling?
Speaker 5 (30:18):
Yeah, So it's a funny thing, is as as you
grow up, especially then, and it's one of the reasons
why I did what I did within the company of
creating what we call NXT that's our developmental system, because
there was there was never a pathway to get into
pro wrestling if you want to be a WWE superstars,
like trying to be a trapeze artist, like right, right,
where do you start?
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Right?
Speaker 5 (30:39):
And I grew up a huge fan really in the
back of my mind, you know, man that if I
could do one if you would say to me as
a kid, what's the one thing you'd want to do
be a WWE superstar? I did all the other sports,
started bodybuilding and lifting weights when I was fourteen, with
the mindset of if I want to be a w
W st you got to go to the shows. See,
(31:01):
these guys are huge. I gotta get I gotta get bigger.
I gotta you know, I gotta get there. So, you know,
you had to find a way. I was lucky in that.
I somebody pointed me in the right direction. I had
met a world strongest man tet oar Cd at the time,
and he got first guy to bench prest seven hundred
pounds and and and had a brief stint in the
(31:22):
wrestling business. Yeah, partlay that into business for himself. Very
smart guy.
Speaker 6 (31:28):
You know.
Speaker 5 (31:28):
I had met him and asked him how do I
get in the business, and he would always try to
discourage me from it, and and then eventually when I
bugged him enough, he gave me a number. I went
trained with Killer Kwalski, and Yeah, fortunately for me, it
took off. But now we've changed that game. We've tried
to make the pathway. So we recruit heavily in colleges.
We have an NIL program. We call it Next in Line.
(31:52):
It's we we have NIL kids across the country that
have an interest in WWE that that are part of
promoting us to all these events that they go to.
And then we work with all those kids that have
an interest in this, or maybe didn't know they had
an interest, but you know, you know better than anybody.
Right Like the NFL, it's it's such a small percentage
(32:15):
of folks that get in there. You can be the
best of the best and all of that, but then
there's this moment in time where you have a whatever
the slightest you know, difference, and you're not going to
make it. And this is a career choice for them
where you know, they come to Orlando, Florida, they see
our facilities, they think, wow, this is like being in
a D one college. I have that level of professionalism.
(32:39):
Let me give this a shot, and it's performance, so
it's athletic performance, and if they can make it work
for them, then then the sky's the limit, just like
any other any other sport.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
You got the base. The training center is in Orlando,
right is in Orlando.
Speaker 4 (32:52):
We're in the process of building a new one now
in Orlando. It'll be even bigger and better.
Speaker 5 (32:56):
Our main offices are in Connecticut in LA but Orlando's
the developmental.
Speaker 8 (33:02):
When I think about all you've accomplished, your thought growing
up as a kid, always wanting to, always wanting to wrestle.
Everything that you poured into the sport, it's pouring back
into you.
Speaker 3 (33:12):
Now.
Speaker 8 (33:13):
Are you able to have a life outside of wrastling
at all where you can have other hobbies, other passions
that you actually enjoy.
Speaker 5 (33:19):
Yeah, though, you know, I'm gonna get it. Go on,
a Lemons say, probably, like both of you, I enjoy fitness.
I enjoy being in the gym. That's that's my that's
my solitude, that's my church, that's my place I go
to ground and and have that. That foundation for me
is training and all of that. But then other than that,
it's my wife and my kids, right, you know, my family.
(33:42):
You know, it's not like my wife wasn't in the
business as well, my family, all of that so sometimes
hard to get away from. But I say this to
people all the time, and I think you two will
get this. People talk about work life balance.
Speaker 6 (33:56):
It's bullshit. There is no such thing you.
Speaker 2 (33:58):
Want to be great or something.
Speaker 5 (33:59):
There no and and all you can really do is
your best at whatever it is you're doing in that moment.
So when I'm at work, I try to be at work.
When I'm with my kids, I try to put work
aside and dedicate that time to my kids or my
wife or whatever that's, whatever that is that we're doing,
and not sort of be oh, yeah, I'm at my kids,
(34:19):
my kids game or or with them, but I'm on
my phone the whole time trying to do business.
Speaker 11 (34:24):
Right.
Speaker 5 (34:24):
I tell people I'm gonna be off for an hour
or two. I'll pick back up in a little bit.
Now I'm with them, And you know, that's it's hard.
It's easy to say that, harder to do it. But
that's that's the.
Speaker 6 (34:35):
Goal for me.
Speaker 5 (34:35):
And you know, I'm I'm thrilled at this point in
my life.
Speaker 4 (34:39):
I still get to do what I love.
Speaker 5 (34:42):
You know, a lot of people when they when when
they finish football, they finished basketball, they finished wrestling, whatever
it is, it all just stops, right and and that's
hard to handle.
Speaker 6 (34:51):
For me.
Speaker 5 (34:52):
It's never stopped when I couldn't do this anymore. I
was already plugged in, maybe deeper than I even wanted
to be, and and everything else. So you know, for me,
I've been fortunate that that passion that I have for
it still continues to this day. And I say this
a lot. For me, it's almost like, now as I
get to help these other kids grow and find success
(35:15):
in this business. It's almost like watching your kids do it.
You know, your own career is fabulous, your own achievements
are incredible.
Speaker 4 (35:22):
When your kids do it, when your kids reach.
Speaker 5 (35:24):
Their goal, when they have that moment, you know, it's
a different level of pride. And I think that's where
I'm at with it now, is watching these kids succeed
and do what they do, to me is almost more
than my career was.
Speaker 2 (35:37):
H How hard is it?
Speaker 1 (35:38):
Because and you had Sean Michaels before you came home,
and he was so gifted. You were so gifted at
what you did and it came natural to you. And
when you try to you try to tell someone else
how to do it, and they said, well how he
was like, why can't you pick that up? Because it
was so easy to you? How is it that you
Because I think the greater the athlete is probably the
(35:59):
heart of of for him to do it because a
lot of things would God give it and he doesn't
understand he or he doesn't understand how they did it.
He just did it. It just came.
Speaker 5 (36:07):
I find that all the time. Look, I like to
think for myself, you know, I think to some degree,
I was gifted for it, but to some degree I wasn't.
Sean is one of the most incredible athletes out every
sea right and can do stuff. And you know, one
of my favorite opponents. I've said it all the time.
I think he's the greatest in ring performer of all time.
His athletic ability second to none. I didn't have that.
(36:31):
I had to learn the other aspect. And you know,
to me, I don't know this is reference to my childhood,
but to me, I was much more Larry Bird than
I was, right anybody else, Yeah, because he wasn't the
most athletic guy, couldn't jump the highest, couldn't run the fastest,
but his knowledge is all that stuff, right, So I
had to put in the work on the other side.
(36:53):
But I have seen that a million times over where
you see guys that are incredible at what we do
and then they try to tell to somebody else and
I'm like, what are you talking about? That's totally wrong,
Like you don't even know why what you do work.
You know, and it's tough for people to get, but
it's I'm a big collaborator for stuff. So if I'm
trying to explain things to somebody or trying to get
(37:13):
them to a certain place is not working. Let somebody
else take a stab at it. Yeah, it just takes
that one sometimes buzzword or the right perspective for somebody
to go like, oh he told me, I didn't get
it at all what you just said, and get that,
you know, and that's a different it's a different take,
and sometimes they just got to figure it out for himselves.
Speaker 6 (37:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (37:35):
No.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
But when growing up and I know usfually you came
to the sport. So how long have you been in
this thing?
Speaker 3 (37:42):
Thirty years?
Speaker 6 (37:43):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (37:43):
Yeah, I started.
Speaker 6 (37:46):
Ninety three.
Speaker 1 (37:46):
Okay, Yeah, so by that time Vance had already kind
of like taken it from.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
Ww F to WWE.
Speaker 1 (37:52):
But we were talking to Sean and I grew up
in the South and so it was Georgia Championship rest
with Gordon so yes, and wrestling was regional.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
You had to meet Atlantic, you had to be west.
Speaker 1 (38:02):
You had the Southwest and so now what what Vince
was able to do was bring all of that under
one umbrella. And so now you didn't have you know,
had the nw A also, So I remember.
Speaker 6 (38:14):
A w A. Yeah it was and it was all
over the place.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
Yeah, So I used to.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
My grandfather used to take my brother and I to
all these little you know, to see Bobo Bazail and
Crush of Black Will and Andre Jackson, saw Dusty Rose,
all these guys coming up, and I remember like, man, man,
I want to be a wrestler. But then football kind
of kind of like captivated me. Was it like that
for you when you saw it for the first time?
Speaker 2 (38:36):
Did you understand, like, Man, yeah, I kind of. I
kind of liked that. I kind of dig that I
think I could do that.
Speaker 6 (38:40):
I did. I did.
Speaker 5 (38:41):
I was a kid and and and very young, but man,
it was for me and I was fortunate I grew
up and then I was born and raised in New Hampshire, right,
so Boston sports for me, I grew up in the
Larry Bird era Parish and McHale and all that.
Speaker 6 (38:59):
I also grew up in the Carl Yastremsky and.
Speaker 4 (39:01):
The Red Sox era.
Speaker 5 (39:02):
Right Like everybody, that Boston sports scene was incredible.
Speaker 6 (39:06):
But for me, I was aware of all that and
I'd go.
Speaker 5 (39:09):
To some of that, but the thing that resonated for
me was wrestling, And like you, I was fortunate when
cable came in where I lived. I got the WWE,
but I got the NWA, I got Georgia Championship, I got.
Speaker 6 (39:21):
Florida, I got text Yes, I got the AWA. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (39:24):
So I had this this well rounded sort of view
of what the business was because they were all slightly different.
Vince was a genius that saw cable coming and the
regional going away at national becoming the thing and eventually
global to some degree. For the talent, that time frame
was almost better because the guys that you saw that
(39:47):
were successful at the highest of levels, like in WWE
had been places for years honing their craft, and right,
you just read about them in magazines, but maybe you
hadn't seen them.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
Yeah, rest of the me I don't know if they
still have to Dude, they still have years.
Speaker 4 (40:02):
Than they do.
Speaker 5 (40:02):
But you used to reads magazines and now you know
what I'm saying to click to click and and and
you're there and you get all the information. But yeah,
the time was different and that ability to go all
those different places. Now we get these kids they come
in from college in a couple of years, if they
start doing this and they start training, hopefully within a
(40:23):
couple of years, they're on NXT. They've got national exposure
on the CW that you know, people could have only
dreamed of years ago.
Speaker 4 (40:32):
And it's changed.
Speaker 5 (40:33):
And you know what's an interesting thing is, like you
talk about football, if you go slightly back, just before
my generation of it, football wasn't the money making no
thing that it is now. So you had guys like
Wahoo McDaniel, Big Cat, Urny lad who were wrestling in
the off season.
Speaker 1 (40:49):
Now who played for the Broncos, Ernie La played for
the Kansas City.
Speaker 5 (40:51):
Chief absolutely, and for a lot of them, they would
play if they you know, unless they were top guys.
Like the money was better year round in wrestling than
it was for the short season of football, right, and
a lot of them gravitated out of football and into
wrestling full time.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
Some of them had to get part time jobs because
you're right, there was not I mean, we look at
it now, you see guys making fifty and sixty million dollars.
Speaker 2 (41:13):
Even it wasn't like that.
Speaker 5 (41:15):
No, there are very few guys making six figures, yes, right,
like very few.
Speaker 2 (41:20):
Very few.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
Basically basically only your quarterbacks when I got into league,
unite your quarterbacks and then you had your top defensive
line of like.
Speaker 2 (41:26):
Reggie White, and blue Smith.
Speaker 1 (41:28):
But for the most part, there were not a whole
lot of guys making five hundred thousand dollars or a
million dollars. That was just unheard us money back then,
unless you were the top, top, top guys. What do
you think is the idea? So because you have to
be obviously you have to be able to be able
to entertain which you have to be athletic, you have
to be able to scale, be skilled.
Speaker 2 (41:48):
And people don't realize that. Okay, yes, entertainment, but you
hit the.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
Mat, the table, yeah, you run into the turn vocals.
Speaker 5 (41:57):
Accumulation of that it adds up absolutely.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
You know, our business like getting in.
Speaker 5 (42:02):
The car crash every day it is, you know, and
and it's day after day and there's no off season
and and.
Speaker 4 (42:08):
So it's a it's a tough, very physical business.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
It's not for everybody, but for the people think, you know,
they think h people think because they only see the
Summer Slam and they only see the big events, that
that's all.
Speaker 2 (42:20):
There is all they do know. That thing is like
and uh.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
Sean Michael saying he traveled in the beginning two hundred
and eighty six days.
Speaker 4 (42:29):
Yeah, yeah, we all did.
Speaker 5 (42:31):
Then now it's different now, right, the it's much more
a weekly you know, you're you're wrestling once twice a week.
It's a it's a lot better family life for people.
Speaker 6 (42:43):
Right.
Speaker 5 (42:43):
We have brought that into a place when you're trying
to build a business, you got to do it different.
Speaker 6 (42:47):
You've got it and.
Speaker 5 (42:48):
Now it's in a different place and the money is
different and everybody's living different, but the physicality is still there.
It's not there. And you know, I say this to everybody.
The casualty rates on hundred percent. No one walks away
unscathed in our business. Is you're going to get injured.
It's going to have just a meta wa yeah, and
you've got to deal with that. And then if you're
(43:10):
if you're at the right mindset and you're driven, you
come back better and you come back harder. But the
thing in our business it's interesting is it's not always
the most athletic and and you said it a little
bit ago that sometimes the most athletic guys it comes
easy to them, and the when when shit gets hard,
(43:30):
they they don't push as hard. In our business, sometimes
I can make you a list of the guys, you know,
Houk Hogan love them the death, biggest star of all time.
Not the most athletic guy on the planet, you know,
John Cena, not the most.
Speaker 6 (43:45):
Athletic guy in the plan. You know a lot of
those guys.
Speaker 5 (43:48):
The list of people who are incredibly they have incredible charisma,
incredible crowd presence, incredible ability to control the crowd and
tell a story. Yes, that's more important charisma king in
our business. Absolutely so that the athleticism, it doesn't matter
how fast you can run, don't doesn't matter how much
you can bench press, matters if you look like you can, right,
(44:09):
And so it's a different it's a different mindset.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
Right, That's what made Rick special, rikk talk, Rikk talk,
dusty road guy that could talk, and like limouthy Rye.
Speaker 5 (44:22):
When when you talk about those folks in that timeframe,
when people can still quote their promos from that generation
after all these years, Like you know, half the kids
today that are running around doing the limousine ride, jet flying,
you know, relegating, they're doing all that stuff. I don't
(44:43):
even know if they've ever seen Rick Wressell, you know.
And the same you know with Hogan, people can still
repeat that his catchphrases and his moments, the rock you know,
stone Cold, all those people, but Dusty Roads. People still
talk about his Hard Times promo. Yeah, right, like those
things are iconic. That's that is what we do, right,
(45:05):
we are. I say this a lot of times when
people don't understand, Like if we're talking to network executives,
they're trying to figure out.
Speaker 6 (45:12):
What we are.
Speaker 5 (45:12):
Say we are less Boxing and more Rocky. Right, We're
not the sport. We're a movie about the sport, and
Rocky is really a love story.
Speaker 4 (45:23):
Yes, right, it just.
Speaker 5 (45:24):
Happens to have Boxing is a background and the metaphor
for all the things he has to overcome and do.
Our business, when you talk about that emotion, you talk
about the storytelling, you talk about all those things, that's
really where it resonates. Yes, and those are things. It's
why our business is evergreen. Very few people unless you're
an incredible, you know, student of the technical aspects of it.
(45:46):
Nobody goes back and watches the Super Bowl from five
years ago. People will go back and watch WrestleMania three to.
Speaker 4 (45:52):
This day, you know of.
Speaker 5 (45:56):
LA and yeah, forty years later they're still watching it.
Speaker 6 (45:59):
Right.
Speaker 5 (45:59):
It's the story, it's the spectacle. It's all those things.
That's what we're different where we're spectacle in storytelling. The
athleticism is a huge factor of it. I don't want
to negate it. The the in ring product, all that stuff,
but that ability to speak, that ability to control the crowd,
that innate charisma. You know that in other sports. If
(46:22):
Connor McGregor comes back and fights in UFC tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (46:24):
He's the biggest jow they have because he can sell it.
Speaker 5 (46:27):
And he hasn't wont to fight what ten years and
almost ten years right like, it's incredible. Mike Tyson, Mike
Tyson announces he's going to do something here, everybody pays
attention because his he has that charisma and that innate
ability to make you want to pay attention.
Speaker 6 (46:45):
Height.
Speaker 1 (46:45):
Thank you man, thank you, appreciate you, com thank you
for having me.
Speaker 6 (46:49):
Man upon it.
Speaker 3 (46:50):
He's good.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
Any time you need it, you know how to get
into Appreciate it man, just the same here.
Speaker 6 (46:55):
Thank you.
Speaker 4 (46:55):
Hopefully we'll see you at the show too. Appreciate you.
Speaker 3 (46:58):
I can wrestle if you need me.
Speaker 10 (47:00):
You know.
Speaker 1 (47:05):
That was he Actually he runs the uh took over
for his father laws Undertaker. Yeah, hey ship the Undertaker.
Speaker 2 (47:18):
I'm good good to see you, Undertaker.
Speaker 6 (47:20):
You're good.
Speaker 9 (47:21):
I'm good to see you. Good side here, man. How
you how you being? I've been good man. Busy, but
we're good.
Speaker 6 (47:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (47:35):
Busy is a good thing.
Speaker 6 (47:36):
Busy is a good thing.
Speaker 2 (47:37):
Man. You know that that means everybody should?
Speaker 6 (47:39):
That mean.
Speaker 4 (47:42):
I got I got more memes than I don't know
what to do with.
Speaker 11 (47:45):
Man?
Speaker 4 (47:47):
Is that when you know you made it when you
got memes?
Speaker 2 (47:49):
Yeah, yeah, you made it.
Speaker 3 (47:51):
You have officially arrived once you have memes.
Speaker 2 (47:54):
So how you been?
Speaker 4 (47:55):
I've been good man, Uh, really busy.
Speaker 11 (47:58):
A lot of things happening with and yeah, just trying
to trying to lend a hand where I can.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
When you got into the sport, did you have any
idea that the wwe would be this would grow to
what has become.
Speaker 4 (48:13):
Absolutely not, man.
Speaker 11 (48:14):
We we were just trying to We were trying to
fill up arenas, make a little money, yeah, and maybe
sell you know back then when we when I started,
there were four pay per views, right.
Speaker 4 (48:25):
There was the Big four, and you know that was
that was it.
Speaker 11 (48:29):
We were trying to sell pay per views, sell some
T shirts and no clue, no clue that Netflix and
was going to come along and the and the kind
of money that that you know.
Speaker 4 (48:39):
These deals are. It's crazy.
Speaker 11 (48:42):
I don't you can't imagine, you know, back in nineteen ninety, yeah,
what what.
Speaker 4 (48:47):
Twenty twenty five is going away and talking to Rick.
Speaker 1 (48:49):
Rick was talking about how he used to wrestle in
high school gymnasium and he would wrestle three or four
or five times in a single date in order to
you know, because there was no money. I mean, you
got making fifty dollars, you guys making just enough money
to put gas in the car and go to the
next locale. And here we are, guys are making real, real,
real money. They got family, you know, they got wie,
(49:10):
they got kids, they have knife owns. Now, it's it's
a it's a different era now for wrestlers.
Speaker 11 (49:15):
Oh absolutely, yeah. Those and we called that paying your
dues right when you come up. You and it's not
even like there's so many times where I would have
to go and help set up the ring just to
just to get on the card and maybe even have
to you know, sometimes chip in for some you know,
not making any money.
Speaker 4 (49:35):
But that's just how important ring time was.
Speaker 11 (49:39):
I mean, we didn't have a you know, you didn't
have a PC or all the all the uh you know,
the ways to prepare as we do now. And I
was telling a story earlier about the first time that
I went to I went to like an HR block,
paid my like I'm one year in the business, right,
And I got this bag full of receipts right that
(49:59):
I'm giving this guy and he says, uh, and he's
reading like I wrote it down wrong. He said, you
drove in eight months, you drove forty five thousand miles.
And I was like, yes, sir, And he says, and
you and you made twelve thousand, two hundred and twenty
(50:20):
six And a guy serious it was. He was the
old timer, right, And he pulls his glasses down. He
looks over his glass. He goes, son, can I give
you some advice? He said, you might want to find
a different line of work. But I mean, but yeah,
that was that was paying your dues.
Speaker 8 (50:37):
And now here we are, right, So, speaking of speaking
of a line of work growing up as a kid,
did you actually know you wanted to wrestle?
Speaker 3 (50:44):
From jump over? There's something else you want to do?
Speaker 6 (50:46):
For me?
Speaker 8 (50:47):
I wanted to be a marine biologist. I wanted to
be a veterinarian because I was in animals. I was
in the Killer Whales and dogs of that nature. And
then football came on, right, and that's that's that's what
happened right now.
Speaker 11 (50:58):
I was a big, big fan as a kid of wrestling,
But again, I thought I was gonna play football, right,
and you know, that was that was always I thought
that was.
Speaker 4 (51:08):
That was my dream, that was your way out, that
was my way out.
Speaker 11 (51:11):
I ended up playing basketball, and then wrestling kind of
came back around.
Speaker 2 (51:17):
You know.
Speaker 11 (51:17):
I was training at this gym between I think it
was between my junior and senior.
Speaker 4 (51:22):
Year of college, and this guy's working out.
Speaker 11 (51:25):
And he's like, hey, man, you ought to you ought
to go through this wrestling school with me, and man,
I think, you know, I'm gonna try and play some
some pro ball overseas, right, And every day I'd come in,
he'd hit me up, and then kind of I started
kind of catching up with the product.
Speaker 4 (51:39):
And it was a lot different even then than what
it was when I was a kid. And I've always
kind of been very like a pretty practical and I.
Speaker 11 (51:47):
Know what my abilities are my abilities aren't, and then
you know, I start thinking about it, like do I
want to be the twelfth man on a bench in
Lithuania twenty one or twenty two years old, And and
then I, you know, I'm kind of like, well, Dann,
there's not a lot of big athletic guys in wrestling
correct time, and that's kind of how it started. And
once I started training, then it was like, Okay, yeah,
(52:09):
this is it, this is what I want to do.
Speaker 1 (52:11):
But you mentioned it's a lot different now than it is.
They got n x T where they got the training program.
Just H was on, Triple H was on and he's
saying they're building an even bigger yes down in Orlando.
That's where they send all the guys that you know,
people want.
Speaker 2 (52:25):
To pass through and think they can make it into WWE.
Speaker 1 (52:28):
That's where they go through. You guys didn't have that.
So these guys not have an advantage that you guys didn't.
And they have guys that come like yourself, and they
have Sean Michael, who who's the director of that, to
go back there and help them guys out. Have you
found it difficult to be able to share what you
know with kids because those that can do those that
(52:49):
can't teach you could do, but now sometimes they ask
you to teach.
Speaker 4 (52:53):
Yeah, no, and that's a that's a great question.
Speaker 11 (52:57):
But I think the biggest thing from me is that
we have so many athletes now, like we recruit like
we we will have people like you to colleges and
yeah we go to we go to you know, uh, yeah,
we'll go to the combine, We'll go to pro days
and yeah.
Speaker 4 (53:15):
We got people there because we have.
Speaker 3 (53:17):
To continue feed the cecy.
Speaker 11 (53:19):
Right when I came up, either you had it like
this is I was a fan, I want to do this.
You have a you have a certain understanding of the business,
right even as a fan.
Speaker 4 (53:30):
Well, we're getting people that have never.
Speaker 1 (53:32):
Been y'all like the army now y'all looking for a few.
Speaker 11 (53:36):
With me, but but but not understand we're taking them
from ground zero. So they don't they're not even they
don't understand the business or any concept. So trying to
the way that I come up and the way that
my process was, Yeah, sometimes I get some blank stairs
like I have no idea what this man is talking about,
and then you have to continue break it down and
(53:57):
hopefully they feel we talk.
Speaker 4 (53:59):
Let me.
Speaker 1 (54:02):
H was saying, the big the most important thing isn't athleticism.
It's the risks being able to hold his microphone and
do what a Rick Flair could do, Do what a
Dusty Roads can do, Do what a rock can do,
Do what a John Cena could do. Captivate that audience,
Hold that audience. They're hanging on everything that you say.
People still can recite that Rick Flair jet setting, limousine
(54:25):
ride Rod Lakes where alligated he's been more, He's wasted
more liquor in the weird that you made in my lifetime.
Speaker 6 (54:34):
They know that.
Speaker 1 (54:35):
Would you say, what do you think is the most
important thing that a wrestler needs to have in order
to be what you become?
Speaker 2 (54:42):
What Sean Michael was, what Rick?
Speaker 4 (54:44):
You have to have the ability to make somebody care
a bar none.
Speaker 11 (54:49):
There's been a lot of guys that have made a
lot of money that can wrestle a liquor.
Speaker 4 (54:56):
I mean, if I'm being honest, right, but again, you
put this in their hand, you're on your edge of
your seat, like, oh right.
Speaker 11 (55:06):
That's that's that's number one you have to make and
you don't. They don't have to love you. They can
hate you, it doesn't matter. They just have to have
you have to be able to make people feel a
certain way. Yes, And if you got that, everything everything
else can take care of itself. You don't need to
be We always say Luthez is an old time, old
(55:26):
old timer that could really wrestle. You could do it
all right, So you don't have to be Luthez. But man,
if you can, if you could make somebody feel a
certain way, then you've got a really good chance of
being successful.
Speaker 1 (55:38):
If I, after you give me your mount, rushmore wrestlers,
If I get you get more head to put on
there the greatest wrestlers of all time?
Speaker 2 (55:45):
Who would you put up there?
Speaker 11 (55:46):
So again I go back to who who were the
most I guess instrumental in the history of wrestling, and
I put Andre the Giant on there, Le Cogan, Stone Cold.
Speaker 4 (55:59):
And the worth Rick Flair.
Speaker 11 (56:04):
I think those those guys are synonymous with the history
of our of our industry right now. There's been guys
that are better talkers, Yes, the guys have been better wrestlers, yes.
For for guys that had impact, those are those are
my four.
Speaker 2 (56:20):
And a lot of people don't really.
Speaker 1 (56:22):
Andre was at the very very beginning, because Andre started
I remember him. I saw him in Baxley, Georgia, uh
and went with Georgia Championship Wrestling because it was you
know south, it was you know, you had mid Atlantic,
you had the Midwest, you had Georgia, Florida, you had Southwest.
And so I got an opportunity to see him. And
I just remember as a kid looking like they ain't
nobody there's no man in the world ever been this.
Speaker 11 (56:44):
Big, right, yeah, most people didn't understand with Andre and
this is what he was doing back then. He was
in a different place every every day. Right, he would
be down in mid South or and then he would
be in California, and.
Speaker 4 (57:00):
Then he would go to Japan.
Speaker 11 (57:02):
He was He was the international superstar long before anybody else.
He was the first guy that was on Johnny Carson
all of those shows.
Speaker 1 (57:11):
Yea, and he did he didn't he didn't talk, but
he would. People were in alle of his size. Nobody
had ever seen a man that big. He had never
seen a man with a hand that wore a size
twenty three ring and whatever size he was, he weighed
five hundred pounds.
Speaker 2 (57:25):
Was seven feet tall.
Speaker 1 (57:26):
So like, am I ever going to see somebody that
size again of my life? I better.
Speaker 2 (57:31):
I better, I better enjoy it.
Speaker 11 (57:32):
Yes, yeah, and it's just a I remember going like
I grew up in Houston, and I remember him coming
to Houston wrestling with Sam Houston Coliseum there.
Speaker 4 (57:41):
I think I might have been.
Speaker 11 (57:42):
Ten or twelve years old and got close enough, you know,
to shake his.
Speaker 4 (57:47):
Hand and it was just like like I catch his
Oh if my hand was lost.
Speaker 11 (57:53):
But then ten years later, I'm in the same dressing
room with Andre the Giants.
Speaker 4 (57:58):
Right now, that's a full circle loan.
Speaker 2 (58:00):
Yes, yeah, and I remember with him and Big John
stud fault.
Speaker 6 (58:07):
Dude.
Speaker 4 (58:07):
I just say this about Andre. If he want to
be alone, he can be alone.
Speaker 1 (58:12):
Yeah, I mean, Rick was telling stories like if he
liked you, he liked you. If he didn't like you,
he didn't like you, and there was nothing nobody could
say or do, and the.
Speaker 2 (58:21):
Match was gonna go how he said it was gonna.
Speaker 4 (58:23):
Come absolutely, And what you're you gonna do?
Speaker 10 (58:25):
What are you gonna do with Andre whatever he says,
that's exactly what you're gonna do.
Speaker 1 (58:31):
Now that we see the UFC all this is under
one umbrella UFC. You know the boxing PREVR, I mean,
and you see the crossover peeling you see this big
because I guess this is like, I mean, this fight
here is as big the buzz and electricity that you
have like Pakiao and and Lowing. Yes, this is common
(58:55):
because the way you guys put on a summer slam
in you summer fair, the way you guys do that,
this is kind of like similar to the buzz that
this is creating is very similar to what you guys do.
Speaker 4 (59:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 11 (59:08):
Well again, this is a let's make it very well
be the fight of the decade, right, I mean, these
kind of fights just don't come along, no, right, And
there's just something different about this caliber of fight, right,
I mean I was at I was at De la
Hoya and Trinidad and Tyson and Lennox. Yeah, like it's
just a different kind of buzz. And then when you
(59:29):
put the machine of of t k O and.
Speaker 1 (59:33):
That Netflix flicks behind you and you got your guy Turkey.
Speaker 4 (59:37):
Yeah yeah, yeah, excellency.
Speaker 11 (59:39):
Yeah yeah, I mean, and he is such a huge
sports fan.
Speaker 4 (59:43):
Man.
Speaker 11 (59:44):
It's just it's just crazy, the buzz and the and
the attention that's uh gonna be on this fight this weekend.
Speaker 1 (59:52):
Yeah, I'm excited when you watch, when you watch the
day and I know you're still a fan of the sport.
When you watch today, do you see anybody any young
Undertaker's coming up?
Speaker 4 (01:00:07):
It's it's hard.
Speaker 11 (01:00:09):
I mean I see a lot of people that are
coming up that are gonna be that have potential to
be stars now, whether they're their their characters or whatever,
they are similar to mine. Like well, I guess the
closest within the past few years obviously was Spray Wyatt.
Speaker 2 (01:00:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (01:00:24):
We lost uh, you know, we lost him last.
Speaker 11 (01:00:26):
Year, but he was in that in that category of
Undertaker esque.
Speaker 4 (01:00:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 11 (01:00:32):
I don't know that anybody's really honed in there, but
we have a lot of young talent coming up and
and it'll probably be debuting really soon because the machine again, yeah,
you got.
Speaker 4 (01:00:44):
To run it fresh.
Speaker 6 (01:00:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
Did you pick the name Undertaker that he gave you?
That name?
Speaker 6 (01:00:48):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (01:00:48):
That that name was given to me by by Vince.
Speaker 5 (01:00:51):
Uh.
Speaker 11 (01:00:51):
He he had this, he had this envisioned in his mind,
this character and uh, basically he needed a big guy
with very limited personality.
Speaker 4 (01:01:04):
I'm your guy.
Speaker 11 (01:01:07):
Yeah, so again, but it was something that resonated with me.
You know, when he was showing you know, everything was
on these big storyboards and I'm in his office and
he's showing me this and and immediately my brain is like,
this this is Yeah. I knew, like I knew, I
didn't know what it was going to become, but I
knew it was different, and I knew it was special,
(01:01:29):
and yeah, I was like, yeah, this is this is
pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (01:01:33):
How many people over the last fifteen years have called
you by your real name or everybody just call you Undertaker?
Speaker 11 (01:01:38):
Most people call me taker, taker or dead Man, right
that dead Man was my was my nickname. And yeah,
sometimes people, you know, they'll they'll say Mark and I
don't even.
Speaker 4 (01:01:48):
Turn around, right, but if I hear Taker, I know
it was up or dead Man.
Speaker 11 (01:01:55):
But it's kind of funny, like when you're in public
places and you know somebody, hey, dead Man, and everybody's
kind of looking around, like, what.
Speaker 4 (01:02:01):
The hell's wrong with him?
Speaker 2 (01:02:02):
What do you think? The number one story that resonate
with wrestling fans.
Speaker 11 (01:02:07):
The number one they they have to Again, it goes
back to that connection that I was talking about. If
if they're invested in you and and they care about
one of the one of the things that a lot
of other guys, it takes them a while to figure
out because they're so athletic. Now, if that's what they
want to put, that's what they would want to They
(01:02:29):
want to display their athleticism, and that's great. But at
the end of the day, your audience will get desensitized
or or you have to continue to push the info
the boundary, right, Like, Okay, I've seen you do a
double backflip off the top rope onto the floor to somebody,
and I've seen that a couple of times.
Speaker 4 (01:02:47):
Now, what do you got for me? Right?
Speaker 11 (01:02:49):
But if if, if you can get them invested in
the character, and if somebody does that character wrong, now
you got them right, Because that's what it's all about.
If you love some you're gonna pay money to see
that dude kick the other dude's ass. Or if you
don't like that guy for a reason, I want this
guy to whoop his right, I can go.
Speaker 1 (01:03:08):
I will go whether he wins, whether I want somebody
to beat it or I want him to win, but
I'm gonna go see it.
Speaker 4 (01:03:13):
That's the gist of what we do.
Speaker 11 (01:03:16):
We storytell and we try to get people invested in
the characters.
Speaker 4 (01:03:20):
Wrestling, isn't it.
Speaker 11 (01:03:21):
And I tell people this a lot, especially to the
young guys when you're you're asking me earlier, Wrestling isn't
about wrestling moves.
Speaker 4 (01:03:30):
Wrestling is about telling story stories. We use the moves
to help tell.
Speaker 11 (01:03:34):
The story, but it's all on a on a connection
and that's you know, that's the biggest thing. Once that
black bulb goes off, then you then you've got a
good chance to doing well.
Speaker 3 (01:03:45):
I like that you got anything that was that was good.
Speaker 2 (01:03:49):
It's amazing.
Speaker 1 (01:03:50):
I mean to sit down and to watch like growing up,
like I said, I've been a fan and know the wrestling, and.
Speaker 2 (01:03:57):
To to to to see you an age and to
see you, know.
Speaker 1 (01:04:00):
Sean Michaels, and I sat down with Rick and sat
down with John Cena and to to to like, like
you said, to watch guys on television, and all of
a sudden, through this job allowed me to sit it
down and sit across from you.
Speaker 6 (01:04:12):
Man.
Speaker 2 (01:04:13):
It is indeed and on or.
Speaker 4 (01:04:15):
I appreciate you guys making time for me. This is uh.
Speaker 11 (01:04:18):
I enjoy I enjoy y'all. I love y'all's banter. Fancy
those career that other career you guys.
Speaker 8 (01:04:25):
I appreciate it, sir, I appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (01:04:27):
Man. It's a pleasure.
Speaker 7 (01:04:29):
Baby.
Speaker 4 (01:04:31):
How you doing?
Speaker 12 (01:04:33):
I'm better now.
Speaker 3 (01:04:35):
I like it.
Speaker 6 (01:04:36):
I like it.
Speaker 2 (01:04:36):
Welcome the night with day Camp normally day cap.
Speaker 3 (01:04:39):
So have you been good?
Speaker 12 (01:04:41):
Yeah, I'm here sackdown the night off.
Speaker 6 (01:04:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:04:48):
Look, everybody knows you're your famous father.
Speaker 3 (01:04:52):
By the legend rowing up.
Speaker 2 (01:04:55):
Watching your father. Is this what you always wanted to do?
Speaker 13 (01:04:59):
I I don't think growing up in the error that
my dad wrestled and being an athlete and seeing like
what the women were doing at that.
Speaker 12 (01:05:09):
Time, I wasn't like, oh I could be like that.
Speaker 13 (01:05:12):
They were just so glamorous and sometimes like in bikinis,
but but cream bikinis.
Speaker 12 (01:05:18):
It just wasn't like, I don't know, it wasn't a
dream of mine. But my little brother wanted to be
just like my dad.
Speaker 6 (01:05:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 13 (01:05:25):
Yeah, and he had a really bad drug addiction, so
I thought if I started wrestling that we could wrestle together,
and he ended up passing away. But now it's like,
I'm living both our dreams. So I just thank him
for having the guts.
Speaker 6 (01:05:39):
To do it right.
Speaker 8 (01:05:39):
So if if wrestling wasn't your dream and it was
a dream of your brothers, what would you have done
if you didn't transition?
Speaker 3 (01:05:46):
Into wrestling.
Speaker 13 (01:05:47):
I don't know, I think personal training or something within
the sports realm.
Speaker 3 (01:05:51):
That's a good one.
Speaker 13 (01:05:52):
That's what I always played sports something.
Speaker 1 (01:05:56):
There that you received a lot of online hate because
you came back from an injury and you immediately got
a title shot.
Speaker 6 (01:06:04):
Yes, and how.
Speaker 1 (01:06:07):
Look because everybody probably said you got a fact, you
got fast tracked because you was Rick Flair's daughter, and
so there was all. You probably always had to deal
with hate because of your famous father, and you probably
were able to deal with it a lot better than others,
not in the beginning, but as you got older because
you had to deal with it for so long.
Speaker 13 (01:06:28):
Kind of well playing sports growing up, like no one
cared what you looked like, right, and like also if
you're the best player, you were the best player or
team captain or hardest worker in the room, Like no
one gave a excuse me, No one cared career dad
was like they might have wooted me. So like I
was used to that, but being in the entertainment industry
(01:06:50):
that also, you know it is it's sports and entertainment.
I just wasn't prepared for the online hate with like
why does she look like her dad?
Speaker 3 (01:07:02):
I don't know.
Speaker 13 (01:07:02):
I'm his daughter, Like, I'm like, why is that like
such a big deal. But I definitely obviously got in
the door easy because.
Speaker 6 (01:07:12):
Of my dad.
Speaker 12 (01:07:13):
But there's I mean, you don't do.
Speaker 13 (01:07:16):
What I do everything, Like I've carved out my own path,
but I still have that chip on my shoulder because
it's like, no matter what you do, no matter how
many first you've had or how many awards accolades are
best match of the night, it's still like, oh Rick Flair.
So but it's okay, Like, you need haters in this world.
Speaker 3 (01:07:38):
Right, you have a problems.
Speaker 8 (01:07:40):
Have you been able to deal with that and navigate
having the haters regardless of the work and understanding I have.
Speaker 13 (01:07:45):
When I first started, it was hard, but I think
it also propelled me to where I am today, Like
it made me, like, I think work that much harder.
Speaker 1 (01:07:53):
You mentioned like when you was growing up and your dad,
the women, it's not like now you and Tory Wilson.
Speaker 12 (01:08:01):
Yeah, and the women definitely paved the way.
Speaker 13 (01:08:04):
They just weren't given the opportunity or the platform to
show the world what they could do. So did I
mean they had to do all of that so we
could do all.
Speaker 12 (01:08:14):
Of this, and I'm definitely aware of that.
Speaker 1 (01:08:16):
But the women I grew up watching your dad very
young age. You know, basically they were the fabulous Molay
that was really the only vis and you know they
would they would you see one woman's match a month,
if if that?
Speaker 12 (01:08:31):
Yeah, they were just eye candy.
Speaker 2 (01:08:33):
That was it.
Speaker 1 (01:08:33):
And but now you guys, you know you and Bianca,
but Laire and all these in sky you guys get center.
Speaker 2 (01:08:41):
Stage, you guys, you guys get main events. What when you.
Speaker 1 (01:08:46):
Think about it, like, man, I got twenty thousand people cheering.
Speaker 12 (01:08:51):
Oh, I've had like one hundred and one thousand people.
So I don't know what first met life?
Speaker 13 (01:09:01):
No, I think for me, what's what's still like I
still can't believe I'm here? Is I can remember sitting
front row when my dad wrestled Sean in Orlando when
he retired, and I was a fan of wrestling, like
I was a fan of my dad, but I didn't
really follow it. I didn't have a favorite superstar. I
was like, oh, Sting, he's like super sexy or like
(01:09:22):
you know, like Triple H or Andy Jordan, But I
didn't really follow it. So to be sitting front row
and then seeing all these grown men crying over my
dad retiring and all these WU signs. I was like, oh,
my dad like means a lot to this business. Like
I had no idea. I think I was a little
sheltered from it. So to know that that little girl
(01:09:43):
who sat, well, I wasn't little. I was in my
early twenties who sat and watched her father retire. I
have now been on more Mania's I may have at Mania.
He didn't like I have surpassed the things that he's
done in the industry, but also to be a part
of the industry that he help create, not knowing that
this was like the path for me.
Speaker 12 (01:10:04):
So that's what's like crazy.
Speaker 13 (01:10:05):
And it's all happened in ten years, so like you
can just change the course of your life, like if
you put your mind to it.
Speaker 12 (01:10:12):
And I truly believe that.
Speaker 1 (01:10:13):
When I had him on my show, I talked to
it and I asked him, did he want you to
do it?
Speaker 2 (01:10:18):
He said no, he tried to talk to you out
of it.
Speaker 13 (01:10:20):
He did because it's a hard life. I mean, it's
a lot different now, but it's just like the traveling,
it's NonStop. We don't have an off season, you're away
from your family, you're away from your kids. It's like
it takes a different kind of breed to do what with.
Speaker 1 (01:10:37):
That's what he told me, he said, He said, Jannet,
if you're single, it's perfect. You gotta know you you
don't have you don't have a wife, you don't have
a girlfriend, you don't have kids. You know, you just
you just the workout said for me, I just work out,
wrestle on to the next wressele, work out on to
the next.
Speaker 6 (01:10:53):
He says.
Speaker 1 (01:10:54):
But when you get a family, you have kids, gets
a little hard with the travel that you have to do.
It's not like it was when he Everduce started, because
he was telling me there were some days it was.
Speaker 12 (01:11:02):
Harder than than it is. Yeah, it was a lot harder, he.
Speaker 1 (01:11:04):
Said, but he was wrestling two, three, four times in
a day. Now, you guys, you know you might wrestle
once maybe twice a week.
Speaker 13 (01:11:10):
If it is definitely more family oriented, yes, I will say.
Speaker 12 (01:11:14):
Right, but it's still hard.
Speaker 2 (01:11:15):
Yeah, it's to travel. It's big to travel.
Speaker 8 (01:11:18):
And yeah, you know the fact that you guys are
so busy, your schedule is so hectic.
Speaker 3 (01:11:23):
Yeah, you travel so many days we.
Speaker 12 (01:11:25):
Don't have an off season. Unless you're injured, you don't
have an off season.
Speaker 13 (01:11:28):
So when I tour my knee, right, that was the
first injury in eight years.
Speaker 8 (01:11:32):
Right, So then now I'm thinking about outside of football,
I have other other interests.
Speaker 3 (01:11:36):
I have other hobbies that I really like.
Speaker 8 (01:11:38):
When do you ever have times enjoy things that you
like outside of wrestling?
Speaker 13 (01:11:42):
Well, the business has evolved so where before we were
on the road four to five days a week, and
now we don't have as many live event shows that
aren't televised on the weekends, so really we just have
SmackDown Raw and if we're overseas, we have like the
bigger televised events like Wrestle Polus coming up September twentieth,
So we do have more time.
Speaker 12 (01:12:04):
But I think you just have to.
Speaker 13 (01:12:07):
If there's something that you're really passionate about, you have
to set time aside for it. Oh like Seth Rollins
now being on the NFL network, Like that's so great
for him, but he loves football. He's able to find
something else that he loves to do with wrestling. I
know wrestling is his passion, but to see him doing
that is really awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:12:25):
Still, being reported WrestleMania forty three is going to be
in Saudi.
Speaker 13 (01:12:29):
Crazy, right, WHOA, I don't know what's more crazy that
it's in Saudi or that it's out of the United States.
Speaker 12 (01:12:35):
That's what I mean by that, Like it's always been
our super Bowl.
Speaker 13 (01:12:40):
It's been in the United States since what nineteen eighty five,
So now that it is overseas, that's what makes it like.
Speaker 12 (01:12:50):
Like how global we are?
Speaker 13 (01:12:52):
Well, I think that for WWE, We've had so many
shows there now for the last couple of years. I
feel like it is I can't I don't want to
say home, but it is. You know, we we wrestled
there three or four times, right, So to have a
WrestleMania there, I could see it being a big deal
because we've had Crown Jewel, We're going to have the
(01:13:13):
Royal Rumble. But again, WrestleMania has been in the United States, right,
So that's I think the Wow, that's that's how big
the company has become, or World Wrestling Entertainment.
Speaker 1 (01:13:26):
When you when you you've been around this sport for
a while and now and you see what Bianca Belair,
what she's been able to accomplish. I mean, when you
see what she's done. How did that make you feel?
How proud of you?
Speaker 7 (01:13:38):
Ever?
Speaker 4 (01:13:38):
Oh?
Speaker 13 (01:13:39):
When I saw her sitting at the press conference, I
had no idea she had wrestled in Saudi nine times,
so when she came up to the main roster, she
really When I thought about it, I was like, oh,
she's right, Like she's been in almost every big show there.
Speaker 3 (01:13:53):
Now.
Speaker 13 (01:13:53):
She's the est for a reason, and she really is
a role model inside and outside of the ring.
Speaker 7 (01:14:00):
Uh.
Speaker 12 (01:14:00):
Yeah, I was like just proud sister sitting there watching her.
Speaker 2 (01:14:07):
Yeah, do you like you?
Speaker 3 (01:14:09):
Like?
Speaker 2 (01:14:09):
You like tag team? You like a partner, you like solo?
Speaker 12 (01:14:13):
Oh? Personally I like solo.
Speaker 13 (01:14:17):
Yeah, I don't like sharing the spotlight, but I am
in a tag team Yeah, with the one person I
don't mind sharing the spotlight with, and that's a LECs
of lists.
Speaker 12 (01:14:25):
Yes, and I'm having so much fun. But she's great.
Speaker 13 (01:14:27):
She brings out definitely a different side of my character
for TV, so it's great.
Speaker 6 (01:14:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:14:34):
Oh yeah, so how much how much longer?
Speaker 1 (01:14:37):
I mean, your dad, if your dad still had if
its body would hold up your dad, it would still
be wrestling. Yeah, is this something that you're like, Okay,
I got another three years, I got another five years.
How much long do you want to go with this.
Speaker 4 (01:14:49):
Charlotte, I don't know.
Speaker 13 (01:14:51):
I want kids one day, that's the thing. I can
do both, But it just depends on the time. Like
I don't know right now, it's what do I have
coming up? An XT home Coming Tuesday. We've got Russell Palooza,
Real Rumbo WrestleMania. So like the shows keep going, Yes,
whatever happens between now and five years.
Speaker 1 (01:15:11):
If you were to have kids, are you coming back
or you once you start that family, you're done?
Speaker 13 (01:15:17):
Because I think wrestling's in my blood. I don't know
any different. Like I love it, but I do want
to be a mom. But I think Trish Stratus coming
back and having all these one offs and she's fifty,
looks better than half the roster, right, She's killing it.
So I don't think that door will ever close. It's
just I do know I want to step away to
have children and when that time is so that's I
(01:15:39):
just saw.
Speaker 6 (01:15:40):
Don't know.
Speaker 1 (01:15:40):
I just saw some wrestling couple. She's stepping away because
she's having a baby. I forget who it.
Speaker 14 (01:15:47):
Was, forget oh my girl, yes, Noomi, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,
yes yes.
Speaker 12 (01:15:58):
I'm so happy for her.
Speaker 13 (01:15:59):
So she the championship and then she had Yes, but
she'll definitely come back and win the title again, right,
so or take her title back that she never lost.
Speaker 6 (01:16:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (01:16:12):
So, I mean that means you you have to be
off at least a year, and you're gonna need to
probably you know, I.
Speaker 12 (01:16:17):
Couldn't manage on the side with a little baby bump
to the ring.
Speaker 3 (01:16:22):
I like that.
Speaker 1 (01:16:24):
But so you'll so, in other words, you're gonna be
a lifer. You're a wrestling lifer. You'll do you'll do
with Jean Michael's, You'll go down to N S. T.
And then you'll teach the women to do what you do.
Speaker 12 (01:16:38):
So here's the thing.
Speaker 13 (01:16:39):
Just I do believe when you are good at something,
it doesn't mean that you're going to be a good coach. Yes,
I'm not saying that I couldn't be a good coach,
because I do love it. But right now, what I
like more is helping the girls inside the ring.
Speaker 12 (01:16:55):
My mind isn't.
Speaker 13 (01:16:56):
There yet to be like, oh, I have to be
on the sidelights helping right Like I feel like right
now it's more like, all right, you got to keep
up with me. Let me see what you got, Like,
that's the mentality. So I haven't like switched off yet
to where what that looks like. Like Triple H has done
an incredible job, like going from what he meant in
the ring to what he means now, and I'm just
(01:17:18):
not there yet.
Speaker 12 (01:17:20):
If that's something that I want to.
Speaker 2 (01:17:21):
Do, How difficult is it?
Speaker 1 (01:17:23):
Because you know, like you know, this is entertainment and
you got a script and you got to follow the
script and sometimes.
Speaker 2 (01:17:28):
You might get injured, but hey, it calls for thirty minutes.
Speaker 1 (01:17:31):
We got to give it thirty minutes, even if my
back is hurting, my knee is hurting, my elbow, my shoulder.
Speaker 12 (01:17:36):
That's life.
Speaker 6 (01:17:37):
Yeah, it's life.
Speaker 12 (01:17:38):
You just gotta do it.
Speaker 6 (01:17:40):
Yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1 (01:17:40):
Yeah have you have you ever been hurt early in
the match and like, damn, I still got thirty minutes
to kill.
Speaker 12 (01:17:47):
So I've only been injured one time.
Speaker 13 (01:17:49):
But when I tore my ACL MC and SCS, I
finished the match.
Speaker 12 (01:17:53):
I didn't stop, but I think.
Speaker 13 (01:17:55):
I injured myself more because my ego.
Speaker 12 (01:17:57):
Wouldn't let me stop.
Speaker 13 (01:17:59):
So I got end like in the first two minutes,
and I kept going and I finished the ten minute match, and.
Speaker 12 (01:18:03):
I was still losing the match, but I still have
to finish it.
Speaker 6 (01:18:07):
I was like, I'm not stopping this match.
Speaker 13 (01:18:10):
But it was in front of the troops, so I
was it was a tribute to the Troops show, and
I was like, these people will give their lives for us,
and I can't finish a silly wrestling match.
Speaker 12 (01:18:19):
So like I'm out there going like you just have
to finish it.
Speaker 13 (01:18:22):
But if you go back and watch that match, like
I landed on my head, I landed on my like
it was an It was brutal to watch, like I
needed to be stopped.
Speaker 1 (01:18:30):
Did you know when you injured yourself? Did you know
you were injured?
Speaker 12 (01:18:34):
By the end of it, I was like I can't walk,
Like I could not walk.
Speaker 3 (01:18:37):
I think it move, so you understood how severe it was.
Speaker 12 (01:18:39):
I did it well when I like.
Speaker 13 (01:18:40):
The first day, I was like, oh, that don't feel
right right, And then when I fell off the top
rope on to my neck, I was like, oh my god,
did I break my neck?
Speaker 12 (01:18:47):
And then like twenty.
Speaker 13 (01:18:48):
Seconds later I could move kept going and then I
did another signature move that I had and it like
I don't know, I started the move and the next thing,
you know, I was like flat on my face, but
all the other things that I had to finish.
Speaker 12 (01:19:02):
The match I could use on one leg. And I
was like, oh, this is this.
Speaker 13 (01:19:07):
Some not right because I've never, like you, never been
injured like broken noses, teeth knocked out, things like that,
exterior things, but not like interior.
Speaker 1 (01:19:19):
He Charlotte, you mean to tell me you was at
the end of a match with like a jacker latter.
Speaker 13 (01:19:23):
I was in Germany, yes, and Carmela knocked my teeth out,
and like I'm like walking back. Actually the referee, Charles
actually handed me with two of the teeth.
Speaker 1 (01:19:33):
I was like, to see the excitement on your face,
even though through the torn knee and the knock that teeth,
you can see the passion that you have for what
you do. And that's why you're so good at what
you do because you don't look at this as an occupation.
You don't look at this as a job. You enjoy
(01:19:55):
doing what you do, so you don't see this as work.
Speaker 13 (01:19:57):
You see this as I wake up every day grateful. Yeah,
Like you know how somebody's like, oh, I gotta go
to work today, I'm.
Speaker 12 (01:20:02):
Like, oh, I don't work. I love my job, right, yeah,
I love.
Speaker 1 (01:20:07):
It, Charlotte Flair, Ladies and Gentlemen Wrestling Royalty.
Speaker 2 (01:20:12):
Oh yeah, she's on Nightcap or Daycap. Charlotte, thank you
so much, Thank you.
Speaker 12 (01:20:17):
I appreciate it.
Host
Shannon Sharpe
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