That's like the really fun, exciting thing about wrestling. There's no such thing as perfecting this art. You're constantly growing and you're constantly progressing and changing up you're style and gauging an audience to make sure that audience is enjoying what you're doing.
We're more than ready to deliver. When the pressure is on, I think that's when the Ring of Honor roster does the best. Not only the main event, the entire roster feels the pressure and are ready to deliver.
What is doing the damage is the fact that the U.K. is pulling in more imports, which shows the continued strength of the economy and the strength of sterling.
There's a big difference between trolling and just attacking guys to attack guys, to get under people's skin, and to genuinely express how you felt about something. Like if I go to a movie for example, and I watch a movie, and I wasn't a fan of it. I don't mind turning to my family or some buddies I'm with and saying "oh man, I really didn't like that movie." But I've never acted or directed in my life. But I'm able to voice my opinion about whether or not I enjoyed it or not.
The only difference with wrestling is we're like a live performance. So we're feeding off the audience and if they do't like something, they can let us know immediately.
The ROH guys looking at the New Japan guys coming over, we're just psyched. We think, "oh great this is just going to make our show even better." The respect level with New Japan and ROH is at an all-time high. And anytime we get a company like New Japan Pro Wrestling on a ROH show, it just benefits our show. It has everybody all jacked up, ready to do the best we can like we always do.
However, the positive, and I mean this, Jay Lethal and Kyle O'Reilly are two of my favorite opponents. I couldn't ask for two guys I'd rather be in a triple threat match with. On top of that, creatively, if we are able to make something that's really exciting for the fans, any time there are more bodies in the ring, you can always create something that's different because there's more than two people in the ring.
I think that Ring of Honor is a true alternative in the world of pro wrestling. Some of the best in-ring pure competition in the world you will find in Ring of Honor.
Being put in this situation, where it's myself, Kyle O'Reilly and a Jay Lethal, I think it's the best main event you can have right now in Ring of Honor.
The cool thing is, when we first did our joint Ring Of Honour-New Japanies Wrestlers, I think that definitely existed. I think the ROH guys were like, "we can't let these New Japan guys outshine us" the new japan guys were ready to make a statement as it was this really big event in America. But the cool thing about this relationship is we've literally become a family now. A lot of us are friends with each. We obviously respect each other.
I remember watching Ring of Honor as a fan, going to shows in Philadelphia and New York, and I loved the guys. I thought these are some of the best wrestlers in the world, if not THE best.
Jay Lethal doing that Black Machsimo character, as good as that was, it was fantastic and so entertaining. But now Jay Lethal has turned himself into this very formidable, dominant world champion, who is having some of the best matches in the entire world. So it's really cool.
I've wrestled Kyle O'Reilly all over the world. I know how good he is, our fans know how good he is. A lot of people feel he is the next guy in line to be world champion.
Los Angles to me seems to be a little bit more forgiving. They're just as rowdy and they're just as excited but they understand a [botch] happens sometimes, and they're excited to see the show and they just want to have some fun.
I think too, Jay Lethal being apart of Ring of Honor and being in that role where he's one of the guys who has the company on his back, he's taking that very seriously, and you can see it n his work. So it's been really cool to see.
I'm so glad you brought that up Jay Lethal as a performer has grown into, I'll say this even though I'm wrestling him this Friday, he's one of my favorite wrestlers in the game right now. He's unreal. He's amazing in the ring. It doesn't matter who he's wresting. He's unreal on the microphone.
I'm very aware that pro wrestling fans can be some of the most vocal and passionate and descriptive about how they feel when it comes to pro wrestling. So I'm totally fine with how fans talk about how they feel, cause if they're not allowed to voice how they feel, then what's the point of being a wrestling fan. You gotta know what you like and what you do't like and that's fine.
We slowly work on getting more markets. We slowly work on building relationships. And over time once we gain people's trust and they see what we do and they see what we deliver each and every show, more and more people are interested in jumping on the Ring Of Honour train. I definitely think the success will continue.