If any of the quotes from the following podcasts or video interviews are used, please credit those sources and provide an H/T and link back to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
** The latest guest to appear on Comedy Store Wrestling is Rocky Romero. As the interview rolled on, Romero recounted chatting with Finn Bálor ‘years ago’ and Finn saying that he was going to try and talk to Paul ‘Triple H’ Levesque about coming back to NJPW to heat himself back up before returning to WWE TV.
I’ve had a couple fun conversations with him (Finn Bálor) over the last couple of years of like, him kind of fantasy booking and you know, ‘I’m gonna talk to Triple H and see if there’s an opportunity here for me to come back.’ This was years ago. But yeah, just to come back and do a couple matches and just kind of reheat himself up before going back to WWE.
Elsewhere in the conversation, Romero stated that he would be up for challenging Katsuyori Shibata for the ROH Pure Championship. Romero said he’ll be traveling with AEW over the next month getting prepared for Forbidden Door.
(Katsuyori) Shibata would be obviously a dream for me too. I’ve never wrestled him. For sure never wrestled him in a singles. I’m trying to think if I’ve ever wrestled him in a tag that I can remember but, nothing comes to mind but you also do 150 matches in Japan and little towns everywhere too so like, I don’t think so though. I don’t think I’ve really gotten to wrestle with him so, that would be huge to wrestle Shibata for the (ROH) Pure Title. Maybe somewhere down the line. I know AEW is coming to Las Vegas. You know, that could be a possibility maybe. I’ll be around. I’ll be traveling a lot with AEW the next six-to-eight weeks getting ready for Forbidden Door.
As of this writing, Rocky is in possession of CMLL’s NWA World Historic Welterweight Championship. He said he has suggested the idea of defending the title in AEW or Ring of Honor and has not been told no, but thinks it’ll take some convincing considering that AEW is partnered with AAA.
I mean they (CMLL) definitely care and I brought up defending it (NWA World Historic Welterweight Championship) in AEW or maybe ROH and they didn’t tell me no, but I think it would take a little bit of coaxing and it’d obviously depend on the opponent and it would depend on who was on the show maybe and a couple other variables. But, not saying that it couldn’t happen. It would just take some ‘azucar’ magic to make it work, to be honest.
Romero expressed that he has no desire to wrestle for AAA but wants to see if there’s any room to establish an understanding between AAA and CMLL. He thinks it would make things smoother for all parties and it would create leniency for him as World Historic Welterweight Champion.
I’m definitely not working with AAA, I have no interest in working with AAA. I worked there in 2010-ish or something like that. I jumped from CMLL to AAA and I can’t say that — I mean, never say never because wrestling but I can’t say that I ever wanna go back to be honest. Not my favorite place to wrestle. But even with that being said, I know that the politics between AAA wrestlers who are even contracted to AEW has been an issue in the past. Even last year, Andrade (El Idolo), who is a contracted AEW wrestler who wrestled in AAA three or four times that year, it was like an issue for him to be on Forbidden Door. It sucks but, it is what it is so, but I’m doing my best to try to bridge the world of professional wrestling and try to get some of these old ideas and the way that they kind of been practicing business for the last, you know, 30, 40 years, I’m trying to see if there’s a little leverage or a little opening there to — the real forbidden door is this, CMLL and AAA but not saying that they need to work together but just like, smooth things over a little bit, just so there’s a little more leniency especially with something like this (NWA World Historic Welterweight Championship).
** Mick Foley’s run in TNA/IMPACT Wrestling was the focus of the latest Foley Is Pod episode. Foley recalled receiving a phone call from Vince McMahon which was to inform him of Luna Vachon’s passing. After they discussed and reflected on that, the conversation turned over to wrestling and Foley told McMahon that TNA had more stars on their show than WWE did.
I may have already talked about this conversation I had with Mr. McMahon. It was the first time I had talked to him since I had left (WWE) a year-and-a-half earlier. He was letting me know that Luna (Vachon) had passed away and he said, ‘I know you don’t like me but, I know you love this company’ and so I called him back and within 15 seconds, I said, ‘I like you’ and then we talked for about an hour-and-a-half on the phone and I told him, ‘One of the most frustrating things –’ they were going into Elimination Chamber. I said, ‘Vince, no disrespect but, we’ve got –’ aside from when I name like five people — I said, ‘We’ve got more stars on our show than you have on yours but you are the Jell-O brand gelatin of professional wrestling. We’re the Knox flavored gelatin.’ It doesn’t matter if it’s as good or not. What matters is no one knows it’s out there.
There was a time when Foley and his family were going to have a reality show but it was nixed because there was not enough conflict. Foley stressed to those who pitched the show that his family is not like that.
We did a reality show called ‘Wrestling My Family’. Not Fighting my Family and it was approved for — it went to script, we did a pilot and they ixnayed it, largely because they said it wasn’t enough conflict in the family and I said, ‘When you asked me if I’d be interested, I said, well, we don’t yell at each other’ and they, ‘Well, that’s passé.’ But I think when push came to shove, they were like well that’s what’s worked for every other reality show. At that point, the only other reality shows you had to base it on were The Osbournes, Hogan Knows Best and Anna Nicole Smith was basically it and you needed some conflict in the family.
When Mick came to TNA in 2009, his contract required him to wrestle three matches per year. Foley ended up wrestling 18 in year one and wrestled four times in year two.
The original (TNA) contract I had just called for three matches a year. I end up doing far more than that but, I did a lot more to the point where they became progressively less meaningful. But, it was still pretty meaningful heading into this thing with Sting.
** On the ‘Ask Me Anything’ edition of Grilling J.R., Jim Ross expressed that he’s glad AEW President Tony Khan is featuring Julia Hart more. J.R. feels Hart is making strides to get better.
I know cheerleaders are great athletes. We got the little jezebel gal from House of Black and she’s amazing (Ross said about Julia Hart). Yeah, she’s getting better all the time. She wants to be better. She’s a student of the game believe it or not and I’m glad that Tony Khan is putting her on television more because I think she adds to TV. She’s got a great look, great facials and her game is improving.
While the topic of conversation was officiating, Jim Ross said he’d be open to hosting a refereeing seminar, adding that he was a referee early on in his career. J.R. feels AEW’s refereeing crew gets a bad rap.
I’d be interested in doing a referee seminar someday down the road. For the right money (Ross laughed). Yeah, why not? I refereed for a long time and that’s how I started. The reason I got so motivated about being a referee — that was on my mind all along but it was a way to get more pay. The more work you did, the more money you made and as you (Conrad Thompson) know, we’re both on the same page on this deal, it’s all about the bottom line and how much money did we make and without sounding overly capitalist or whatever, yeah, referee, it’s a key position. They can screw up a match real good and I just think our guys get an unfair rap sometimes. But, if you look at what they’re doing, they’re working their ass off and that’s where it starts.
** One of the newer members of the Monday Night Raw roster, Zoey Stark, joined Busted Open Radio and spoke about being drafted to the brand. She knows saying goodbye to NXT will be difficult but she’s excited about her new journey and is happy to see her colleagues in NXT get drafted.
Well exactly like what you just said. They’re family (talents & staff at NXT) and especially, it’s been an emotional weekend and even today, everybody saying, ‘Thank you’ and then knowing that I’m not gonna be here every Tuesday seeing the people that I love so much and that I respect so much. That’s gonna be the hardest part. But they’re all excited for me, I’m extremely excited. But yeah, the goodbyes are gonna be hard but I’m so happy, so happy that Alba (Fyre) and Isla (Dawn) are going up and then J.D. (McDonagh) is on the same brand as I am, Indi Hartwell’s on the same brand so it’s not like I’m going up alone plus, I’m sure there’s gonna be more tonight, more NXT superstars going up so it’s an exciting day.
** Phil Strum welcomed Santos Escobar onto his Under the Ring podcast. Escobar feels he’s ready for the newly introduced World Heavyweight Championship.
I just saw Triple H announce a new championship. I feel ready for that. That’s how high my note is right now.
** NJPW Road to Wrestling Dontaku Results (5/1/23) Beppu B-con Plaza in Beppu, Japan
– Boltin Oleg vs. Oskar Leube – 10-Minute Time Limit Draw
– YOH, Toru Yano, YOSHI-HASHI & Hirooki Goto def. House of Torture (Dick Togo, EVIL, SHO & Yujiro Takahashi)
– United Empire (Aaron Henare, TJP & Francesco Akira) def. Ryohei Oiwa, Kevin Knight & KUSHIDA
– United Empire (Great-O-Khan, Jeff Cobb, Kyle Fletcher & Mark Davis) def. T.M.D.K. (Kosei Fujita, Zack Sabre Jr., Shane Haste & Mikey Nicholls)
– Jado, Master Wato, Tama Tonga & Tanga Loa def. BULLET CLUB (David Finlay, Gedo, Taiji Ishimori & KENTA)
– Tomoaki Honma, Togi Makabe, Tomohiro Ishii & Kazuchika Okada def. Yuto Nakashima, Minoru Suzuki, El Desperado & Ren Narita
– Taichi & DOUKI def. BUSHI & Shingo Takagi
– Tetsuya Naito & Hiromu Takahashi def. SANADA & Yoshinobu Kanemaru
** A feature on Hiroshi Tanahashi is in edition #85 of Setagaya Life Magazine.
** Joining Taylor Wilde on her Wilde On podcast was M.J. Jenkins.
** May 1st birthdays: Joe Hendry.
** The Daily Item has a story that includes quotes from Gangrel and Samu Anoa’i.
If any of the quotes from the following podcasts or video interviews are used, please credit those sources and provide an H/T and link back to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
