Jon Moxley was recently interviewed by PWInsider to talk about several professional wrestling topics.
Here are the highlights:
Putting together a match vs. putting together a fight scene:
Complete opposite ends of the spectrum. In the movie, it’s all written out and constructed, and with the fight coordinators and guys, and go back and forth, and you rehearse it a million times, and do it a million times over and over from different angles. Doing a movie, while it’s fun, it can also be very tedious because you just got to do the one little scene over and over and over from every different angle. And it can be challenging to keep your energy up and stuff like that. Especially when it’s a physical scene like a fight scene.
The match with Hager was just like, we started to film three weeks worth of stuff on that day, and we had only a few hours because you got to wait until it gets dark to film at Daily’s Place where they film at. So we had to figure out… And I’m choking. Right. We had figure out what we wanted to film, and how we were going to build to a title match. Because we didn’t really have any plans when I got to Jacksonville. I was like, “Well this, you’ll attack me, you’ll choke me out. We’ll do this. And then we’ll just do the match.”
At that time we were like only 10 people in the building. We didn’t know when we were going to get to film again. Should we save it? I was like, “I don’t know. Because who knows?” I was like, “Let’s just get it in the can. Let’s just do it right now.” So we just did the whole kind of Hager angle all in one night. And that’s the exact opposite where it’s just like, “Yeah. I’ll just see you out there.” Just talk a couple of words about the finish, and me and him just wrestle for 20 minutes, which it was really fun actually.
You have that nice humidity in Jacksonville outdoors. So it’s getting nice and loose. And there’s no audience there to pump you up. So I just put my mindset to where, all right, this is real. And for the first bit of that match, we were really kind of struggling and really making me sort of earn everything. So I was really lost in the moment. It was a really fun match to be a part of, especially the privilege to kind of be on a mat with a such a esteemed wrestler like Jake Hager, he’s an All American.
So it was really fun. I really wanted to kind of show some of his skills off. And we beat the absolute shit out of each other, right? Because there’s no hiding nothing, there’s no extra noise in a empty arena. So you got to go for it which I try to do anyway. And he hits harder than anybody I’ve ever been in the ring with. He’s so freakishly strong. Right? You can’t even believe. People take for granted how strong he is. So then we’d beat the absolute tar out of each other. So I thought that was pretty cool little piece of work.
How he’s feeling after putting himself through more physically after leaving WWE:
Good actually. I’ve had a obviously some time off like everybody has recently. And had time kind of to slowly over time rehab various injuries. My lower back have screwed up for a really long time. I had, what do you call it, a pinched nerve in my neck between my C6 and 7. It was making my left arm go numb, and that was really horrible and painful, and so forth. And obviously I had all this mess with my elbow that hopefully is over forever now but all in all, pretty good. I was able to kind of after leaving WWE kind of figure out the things that were wrong and kind of fix them over time.
And I had time to do that and to train properly and rehab things properly and stuff. Because really for me, what ran my body down in the grounds over time was the travel, because it’s that and getting put there two tables on house shows five nights a week for years straight. But it’s like, I go through the table, but then you got to jump in a car and drive 300 miles, or get on a plane, or get on a charter, or do this. And I went so hard for so long, and wrestled so many matches so consistently.
And once I had gone a couple of years straight without missing a day, and everybody else at one point had been hurt, or had taken a vacation or whatever, and I realized kind of the mark I was getting for consistency and kind of being the iron man, then I kind of started to take pride in that. I was like, oh, okay. So even when I started getting rundown, I should have taken some time off, or I should have been like, I’m injured, I shouldn’t do this, or whatever, I just kept pushing through. Foolishly, I might add because there was no gold star for that.
I didn’t make any more money for that other than the fact than the more shows you do or whatever, I guess you get paid more. So it’s not like I got a trophy that said you’re the iron man or whatever. You know what I mean? All it did was just kill my body and my brain and so forth, but also that did lead to opportunities. Because all this stuff I got and I kind of figured my opportunities will come because I’m the guy who’s here. Because I’m the guy who was over, and when they need somebody to fill in for somebody who falls down, or it didn’t work out, I’m the guy that steps up or fills in or whatever. And that’s how I’ll get all my opportunities and stuff. It kind of did work out like that.
For me though, my body now is I feel like it’s good. And I want to wrestle as long as I possibly can. I look at two guys who’ve had, some of their biggest moments this year, Chris Jericho and Minoru Suzuki. I’m 34. I could have another good 15 years in me. So I’m looking at whatever I can do to elongate my career, whether that’s go a little more wrestling, and not doing anything super dangerous or anything like that. Because at this point I’m like I got nothing to prove by taking some horrible bump off a roof or anything like that…and just being aware of my neck or my back or injuries, I got to keep healthy.
And now, I have the experience and the knowledge to know that, all right, if I’m hurt, take a week off, take it month or whatever. I’m not going to wrestle hurt unless it’s a dire situation and I feel like I need to. I’m going to prioritize my health kind of thing…and even if that means in the future, it means take six months off here, or take a year off here. Jericho’s taken lengthy absences from the ring, and that I think has probably helped extend his career. And it keeps you fresher.
So I’m going to take the opposite approach that I took in WWE where it was just pedal to the metal, and kind of try to really be smart about the risks I take and stuff like that. But that being said, when I get in the ring, if I’m getting in the ring, I’m going full bore. So I’m going for it, especially in TV, a pay-per-view, or New Japan, I’m not going to go out there and half ass nothing.”
Tony Khan:
He’s really good dude, man. I think he’s a friend to a most everybody in the roster. Real easy and approachable, and not in a bad way. A lot of people probably at first wanted to be like, oh, he wants to hang out with the wrestlers. He’s just going to be one of those too friendly with the boys type guys. But he’s not that at all. I mean, right now he’s worked in analytics for the NFL draft and doing all this other business stuff. I mean, he’s a really smart guy.
He grew up in that family where they have this empire. So he’s got a lot of business sense. He’s business savvy, but also just an incredibly passionate wrestling fan. He’s so easy to get excited, if I go up like, “Dude, I got this idea. What if we did this?” And he’d be like, “Dude, that’s awesome. What if we did this then? And then we can do that.” And he’ll get all excited like a little kid. And I’ll be like, “Hold on, tone it down. Tone it down.” Which is cool. You want that. Whereas sometimes, I come in and talk to Vince and I’m all excited.
I’m like, “Dude, okay, here we go. We’re going to do this, this, this. Then this. Then we do this on Raw. And then on pay-per-view this. What do you think?” And it’s like talking to a door. Dude, hello, I’m giving you awesome. They’re like, nope. We’re just going to do the same old crap we always do. I’m like, whatever. But yeah, it’s a real good experience where I am. He’s an honest dude. He’s not a carny, and even though he’s business savvy, he’s not like a shark. He’s just an honest, straightforward, good dude.
Also Read: Jon Moxley Says Working With Minoru Suzuki Was a “Dream Come True”, More
