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.
** Episode #64 of the Swerve City Podcast is a sit-down conversation with The Young Bucks (Matt & Nick Jackson). Nick shared that he fantasizes about running a small independent promotion and he once tried to purchase Pro Wrestling Guerrilla. He added that Super Dragon did not bite on the offer. Matt and Nick joked that they got him back for lowballing them. Super Dragon was present at AEW Dynamite at The Forum in January. He sent Matt a supportive message after their match. Matt did not know he was there.
Nick: I fantasize about running a small, little indie one day. How fun would that be? You know what I mean? I don’t know. Buy PWG from Super Dragon (he laughed). You know what’s funny is I tried to buy PWG once and he didn’t go for the offer. One day Super Dragon.
Matt: You lowballed him… We’re getting him back for all those years. 10 guys in a hotel room.
Nick: He did lowball us. So I got him back but he said no right away.
Matt: You know what’s funny? Is I actually heard from him recently — it was not recently. It was about six or seven months ago now when we did The Forum show. We had that Ladder match and that night, he sends me a text message. He goes, ‘Yo, great match.’ I go, ‘You watched it?’ He goes, ‘I was there.’ I go, ‘Excuse me Super Dragon!?’ He’s all, ‘It’s crazy that you’re still tearing the house down after all these years.’ I said, ‘Dude, you have no idea how much that means’ because I looked up to Super Dragon. He was like this weird, immortal wrestling God. Especially in SoCal.
The topic of Being The Elite came up and Nick admitted that he’s tried to end the show many times. He stated that it gets tough to continuously come up with ideas for it. Matt adds that it’s cool that their kids will be able to watch those videos. He jokingly explained why he doesn’t want his children watching the first 100 episodes of the series.
Nick: At this point, I’ve tried to end it (Being The Elite) so many times (he laughed). I get burned out. Just coming up with ideas every week is tough for it. The fans like it.
Matt: I think the fact that we can go back one day and watch these with our kids and be like, daddy, what were you doing around this (time)? I’m like, let me show ya. Just don’t watch episodes one through 100 where an entire storyline is about a penis. Let’s watch this stuff where we’re just traveling. Some of this stuff is very inappropriate.
The two-time AEW World Tag Team Champions opened up about their struggles early in their careers and having little to no money. Matt said those times are romanticized now but back then, it was bad. Nick feels they’ve helped create a sense of entitlement within some wrestlers today because they’ve helped make it easier to get a contract in wrestling. Matt also has the mindset of the newer crop of talents don’t have to struggle as bad he did.
Matt: It was tough and we all love to romanticize. I remember being 23, freshly married and I remember looking out — I’d make coffee every morning. I’d look out and see if they took my truck. Is my truck still here? Truck still here? Okay, good. I remember being on food stamps, I remember all that. So it’s like, yeah, I like to look back now because I overcame those days but those days were brutal, and at least it gave me perspective and I would never have done anything differently now that I feel like I have made it. I’m glad I struggled, I glad I had to go through that because now, I appreciate what I have, you know what I mean? And if that’s one thing I could teach the younger guys, like we were talking about earlier…
Nick: The value of a dollar is so important.
Matt: And appreciate, be grateful for what we have.
Nick: There’s a lot of entitled wrestlers that have came up nowadays and I think we’re part of the blame because we’ve made it easy for people to sign contracts because we helped create an entire company.
Matt: A lot of times as a father I go, I want things to be better for my kids. Not to say that we had things bad but I’m like, I want them to even have a better childhood than I did and it’s the same thing for wrestlers, right? Hey, if they don’t have to struggle as bad as I did, great. But there’s also a part of you that goes, but you don’t know what you’re missing.
** There’s a feature on NJPW1972.com about Aaron Henare’s Mataora face tattoo that he got to pay homage to his heritage. He said the pain he felt getting the ink is far beyond what he felt when he tore his Achilles in 2017.
No doubt, it was the worst pain I’ve ever experienced (getting Mataora). My Achilles tear (in 2017) would probably be about a 1.5 on the pain scale compared to 9.5 for the tattoo around my lips.
** Joining a live episode of Women’s Wrestling Talk was creator of Wrestle and Flow and former WWE digital content creator Josiah Williams. He recalled receiving advice from Paul Heyman and Heyman telling him to be undeniable with what he does in WWE.
So further expanding on the Paul Heyman situation, there was a time where I was kind of in-between (at WWE). When you think of WWE announcers, there’s a certain — you know, Kayla Braxton, right? Alicia Taylor. There are people who are identified as announcers. For a while, I was not officially listed as an announcer but still a part of the roster in a way and so, I was talking to Paul Heyman of just like, ‘Man, how do I get over this hump?’ Because I didn’t get signed as an official announcer. That’s true. I didn’t get signed as that. I got signed as an on-air talent which is closely, more so like Cathy Kelley, right? As someone who you see on-screen, you see on TV, on social media but not necessarily in a official announcing capacity. Cathy Kelley went through this route of creating pretty much her own position. She was the first of her kind. Lilian Garcia was an announcer. Cathy Kelley started WWE Now and all these other things that kind of made it her own. So I was brought in kind of like, okay, here’s this dude who’s creating this stuff online. How can we help that to make that his own? And to start his own thing? So he told me, ‘Just find a way to be undeniable.’ I said, ‘What do you mean by that?’ He’s like, ‘No matter what you’re doing, right? Because you’re someone who you’re editing your own stuff, you’re filming your own stuff, camera and audio. You’re on the mic, you’re off the mic, you’re interviewing talent, you’re supporting talent. You have all this stuff. Keep doing that. Create a position so that you’re literally — they can’t say no and if something happens when they do, they miss it.’
** New Japan Pro-Wrestling uploaded a video of Eddie Kingston meeting five-time AJPW Triple Crown Heavyweight Champion Toshiaki Kawada:
** Sporting News Australia has a piece on Robbie Eagles.
** Newest episode of the UpUpDownDown Summer Games:
** Ahead of the 8/7 Monday Night Raw, Natalya did local media.
** Maxxine Dupri was interviewed by T.K. Trinidad of Women’s Wrestling Talk.
** Episode #313 of Straight Talk Wrestling featured Jack Cartwheel.
** PEOPLE.com published their chat with Carmella.
** August 8th birthdays: Shayna Baszler and Scott D’Amore.
** An interview with Samoa Joe via Sports Illustrated.
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.
