Triple H spoke with Pwinsider.com about the Global Cruiserweight Series, which will air on the WWE Network starting in July. Here are some highlights…
On Talents That May Be On The Show: “I would say the vast majority [of talents on the series] will be non-contracted or long-term contracted WWE talents, ” explains Levesque. “We haven’t finalized the selection process, watching tapes and seeing who we want to work with and all of that. It’s going to be a discovery process. Look, I want to have the best in the world. I don’t want to negate anyone from that process because they are under contract to us. At the same time, I’m looking for the best in the world and the brightest around to give them a platform that they’ve never had. I’m certainly looking at the vast majority from being from the outside [of WWE.] When I say Global, I mean Global. We are recruiting from everywhere. UK, Japan, China, to find the best talent. That doesn’t mean we are going to find someone everywhere, but we are really trying to turn things over and really find someone from every part of the globe to be part of this and show the world who they are and what they can do.”
On Why He’s Doing The Show: At the end of the day, I was just having this conversation with my wife. I kind of approach this as I’m just a huge fan. I started out that way and I will be that way my whole life. I kind of do what I think I’m going to dig and that I’m going to like and that’s the way I approach it. There’s this talent that I like and I’d like to go and see what they can do. So, I push for going to see what I can do with that. I think it’s important for everything to always grow and become bigger. I’ve looked for a long time at that population of talent in that under 205 lb. category, the Cruiserweight category and thought, ‘Man, there’s a lot of really talented performers’ and I don’t mean guys that can just do flips. Really talented performers that have characters and can speak are really good. They are underutilized to me and they don’t have the platform to show what they can do. I feel like that’s a miss. Not intentionally a miss, but just something that we’ve left sitting on the table, and I don’t want to leave stuff sitting there on the table.”
On Wanting to Make Stars With The Show: “This will be in-ring [series]”, said Levesque, “But there will be a lot of….if you just take talent that you don’t know anything about and it’s someone no one has heard of before, they can do anything they want in the ring, but it’s just not as exciting. You aren’t as emotionally invested into who they are as characters as performers, as people, as performers, as where they are trying to go in their careers. I want people to learn about these talents and learn about who these talents are. This is not just me saying I’m giving you a platform and you have eight minutes in the ring and ‘Go get ’em, kid.’ This is, ‘I’m going to tell the world who you are. I’m going to tell them what you do. I’m going to tell you bits and pieces about your journey so far in your career and I’m going to give you an opportunity with someone else to really shine in the ring and show everyone who you are and what you can do’ and really allow you to learn about these guys in this tournament.”
On Making The Show Now: “There’s different ways at looking at things but the world changes on a daily basis and if you aren’t willing to grow, then it passes you by. I think we all have to grow and the look changes and the approach changes, ” said Levesque. “The guy that taught me that is the guy that everyone says can’t do that and that’s Vince [McMahon]. People don’t know him and they don’t know what they are talking about when it comes to him. We are…to do this business and to do it very well takes a long time and there’s a lot of reps. To have guys go and have places to go and have reps and show what they can do. It’s a wonderful opportunity. I’m selective as to who we want to associate with….I don’t even want to say ‘associate with’…who we promote and who we define things with. I know that if I go to certain groups, there are talents there working a certain style and genre and that’s what we are looking for and that’s what I’m going to gravitate towards. It’s good for the health of the business and the more people that are excited about the business, the more people want to get into it and the more people that want to work hard to excel at the business, the better the business is going to be as a whole. I’ve said this about NXT. Without college football, the NFL loses it’s feeder system and its a similar thing for us. I want that feeder system to be there and I want it to be healthy. I want them to have places to work and when they are ready, if its the right fit for them, if its their passion, and they are the right talent and right performer, we can give them that bigger global platform to get them to do what they do in front of the entire world. If that means making the independent undercurrent healthier, then that’s what we do. I just look at it as helping the business to succeed long-term.”
