Last week it was revealed that Abyss would be this year’s Impact Wrestling Hall of Fame inductee. On Saturday, October 13th in New York City at McHale’s Pub, Abyss will take his rightful place in their Hall of Fame.
Abyss has had a storied career as a former World Champion, X-Division Champion, and World Tag Team Champion. Not to mention that he has been a staple of Impact Wrestling since Day 1.
He appeared as a guest on Busted Open Radio to talk about his time with the promotion. Here is what he had to say (Transcription credit to Bill Pritchard for Wrestlezone.com):
“I know Tommy [Dreamer] can relate with the ECW thing; Impact to me is and was ‘home.’ It’s where I started, it’s where I practically spent my entire adult life there. This coming year, almost half my life, 50 per cent of my life I’ll be in the wrestling business. Impact took a gamble on me when I was a nobody and I was coming out of Puerto Rico with a decent name, but nothing to where—nobody really knew who I was stateside. TNA gave me that chance when nobody else was biting at the time.
To see the growth and be a part of it, I always tell people that meant the most, that’s one of the reasons I didn’t want to leave because I was there since the beginning, man. I was part of the original ‘ground floor’ of that company. On those Wednesday night pay-per-views in ’02-03, we didn’t know if there was going to be next Wednesday or not. We came every week not knowing what was going to be the future of the company in 2003, and a lot of people said we were going to close up the doors in six months. They said that for about twelve years. To me, I’m so proud of what the company has done—there’s been a lot of ups and downs, no doubt, it’s been well documented—it’s a great company. We’ve struggled and plowed through some obstacles along the way, but it’s been home. It’s something that I can never see myself leaving. I’m very, very proud of it.”