Nigel mcGuinness Interview

michael.etc...

In Dublin last week, I was lucky enough to be able to grab a few minutes with Nigel McGuinness, which resulted in the following interview. Feedback is appreciated!

The Cynical (Inter)View

With Nigel McGuinness

By Michael Campbell

Welcome to a very special edition of “The Cynical View”. Roughly a week ago, I had the pleasure of speaking with current ROH World Champion, Nigel McGuinness, during an Irish Whip Wrestling show, in Dublin, Ireland. Despite having only a few brief moments, Nigel was a fantastic chap ….


How do you enjoy doing these tours of the UK, and Ireland?
They’re fantastic actually. This is only the second time I’ve been here with Irish Whip and the first time was great as well- it’s just the crowds here are just brilliant. If you compare them, especially to the Ring of Honor crowd‘s in America- they‘re really demanding, they have such a high level of expectation. And you know, arguably, they deserve it… they pay for it, and they expect more from Ring of Honor than any other show they’re going to go and see. So we feel a certain pressure to give that too them, whereas here, it’s mostly kids, and they just love wrestling, and it’s nice, really enjoyable.


Do you find that they respond to you differently now over here, especially in England, since you’ve turned “bad-guy”, in Ring of Honor?
( Chuckling) I don’t know, I haven’t actually wrestled in England, since I’ve been a… “Bad-Guy” in the states, so we’ll see next week. But I hope it’s the same. The only reason I was a bad guy in the States is because it’s the way people took to me- they took umbrage to the fact that I took a night off when I had a concussion, and was trying to prolong my career in this business…


Do you think then, that those fans are too demanding off you?
Sometimes… yeah some of them are. Yeah, in a shoot, yeah, some of them really don’t give a damn if you wrestle in six months or six weeks, or if you ever wrestle again, just as long as they get to see some sort of insane spot or whatever it is they happen to want to see. It’s a shame, because there are lots of real, loyal fans out there, there are a lot of decent respectable fans who do care. After what happened, there were lots of people who emailed me, and said that they understand, and support me, and that meant the world to me…
At the end of the day, it’s a small proportion, and they want to make their voices heard, and I guess that’s their right, they say it’s their right, they’ve bought their tickets and they can say what they want. I’m not sure that’s really the truth… I can buy a Big Mac at MacDonald’s, but it doesn’t mean I can call the guy a wanker just because I don’t like it.


Is there anything you think you can do to change what fans expect- is there even a need for that?
Not necessarily, it’s not about why the people boo you or cheer you, just as long as they do boo or cheer you. That’s the bottom line, and as long as they’re reacting to me in some way, shape or form, I’m not really concerned with stuff like that, all I can do is go out there and have the best matches I possibly can.


How about your injuries? Have you had any thoughts about scaling back on your actual work at all?
No… not really. It’s just the nature of being a professional wrestler, that you’re going to get injuries. They’re going to come along and some of them you just gut through- I’ve wrestled with a torn bicep, I’ve wrestled with a pulled groin, I’ve wrestled with broken this, and broken that… and all these other injuries throughout my career. When you have a concussion now, we’re starting to understand, after Benoit, that concussions are one of those things that you have to take care of, because if you don’t, it could very easily end your career.


Do you think then, that the promotions, and especially the WWE, are doing enough to protect their wrestlers?
Well I can’t really speak for the WWE, because not wrestling there, I don’t know how that works behind the scenes. But when a guy gets a concussion now, my only experience is with Ring of Honor, as was the case when I got mine, they were very understanding and supportive. They said if you need to take the night off, you take the night off. They were great, and I felt like it was a very important thing for me to do for the business. You know… I could have gone out there, maybe I could have wrestled, and maybe I would have been okay, but maybe I wouldn’t. And the point is, by taking a stand, by saying I’m not going to risk my future life for this one match, maybe in the future, someone else might say the same as well.


Yeah back in the day, you could go months at a time without defending a title, and there would be no complaints…
(Laughs)… Yeah, that’s right, absolutely…


Supposedly drugs are a major problem in the WWE, how do the Indies compare? Have you any experience of their being problems?
Well, my knowledge of the WWE is kind of limited, I only know of what I hear from guys I talk to who have worked there in the past, and guys who are at various different levels in the company now. I don’t think there’s a great deal of difference really, except maybe, that a lot of times guys get fired over drug problems, but they’re given more free reign in the Indies and various companies than they would necessarily get in the WWE. I do believe that they are really trying to cut down now, after all they’re a publicly traded company, and after the whole Benoit thing I don’t think they have any choice really.


Back to Ring of Honor, what’s the next step you’d like to see the company take?
I think everybody’s looking for TV really. We’ve tried the PPV route, we had limited success with it really. We really looked at it as a way to expand our fan base, more than make money in itself, with new fans buying DVD’s, or coming to more shows, but thus far that hasn’t really happened to a significant amount. But we haven’t lost out on it either, we still get some respectable numbers compared to the amount of exposure we have as a company. But yeah, it’s TV we’re looking for- ever since the 1950’s I think, it’s almost impossible to make a very successful wrestling company without television exposure, and arguably we’re the only wrestling company in the States or even the world that’s done that…

And you’re heading to Canada next…are you looking forward to that..?
Truthfully…no.. (chuckles a little…) every time we go anywhere near Canada, the crowds for whatever reason seem to be very… they seem to go in the opposite direction. It’s like.. Whatever people tell us whether to cheer or boo, we’ll do the opposite. It’s like Uber-Smart fans…


Yeah the WWE announcers for example, even call it “Bizarro Land”…
Yeah I’ve wrestled there a couple of times, and I haven’t really enjoyed meself on either occasion, so we’ll see… maybe I’ll be pleasantly surprised. I think I’m actually wrestling Kevin Steen when we’re there, who I imagine will be quite popular amongst those Canucks…


So, where do you see yourself going over the next couple of years?
Tough to say… a lot of it depends on what happens in Ring of Honor over the next 8-10 months. If they can get a TV deal, if they can get to the stage where they’re a comparable force to TNA and the WWE, I think that all of us there would like a situation where we can make almost comparative money. We have a lovely schedule there in Ring of Honor now, we’re not away four or five days a week, we’re usually only out about forty days a year, we’re taking other bookings when we choose… it’s nice. And they supported me with my concussion, they support you with your injuries, they’re a lovely family to work in. There’s no problems, no egos… it sounds like Utopia, and to a certain extent it is, except for the fact that we just don’t have enough exposure, we don’t have enough people seeing the product.


Why do you think it is that you guys have such a tight locker-room bond?
I honestly don’t know. I think perhaps that from the beginning, there wasn’t a lot of money there. Very few of the guys were making sort of… “wrestler” money. There wasn’t really any spots to fight for. I mean, the guy at the top of the card was obviously making a lot more money than the guy at the bottom, but it wasn’t to the extent where people were backstabbing each other. It was a lot like I heard ECW was like, where people just went out and had the best match they could.


What do you make of TNA’s product? Is that something that interests you at all?
Well, you never say never about anything in the wrestling business. I know a lot of guys in TNA, and there’s such a tremendous pool of talent there. Some people would say that a lot of the direction, and the booking on TV isn’t to their liking, and that’s really just a matter of taste, and at the end of the day you’ve got to look at ratings, and at buyrates, and at how well the company is doing financially. I understand that this is going to be their most successful year
It’s very easy to look at something and say, “that’s the ****s and I hate it!”, but its not so easy to say what to do instead. I’m certainly not someone who could be put in that position of booking the show, and necessarily do a better job.
Never say never… there’s a huge amount of potential there, and I think everybody would like to see them do well.


Is Japan also a priority for you at the moment?
Absolutely, if it wasn’t for Japan, I probably wouldn’t be a professional wrestler now, you know… I’d been in the job for about 5 years, and I said to myself, if I can’t do this for a living, well, I shouldn’t be doing it at all, after 5 years. If it wasn’t for NOAH coming along, and giving me 3 tours a year, I couldn’t have done it for a living, because I just wasn’t making enough in the States. So I’m eternally grateful to them for doing that, and they’ve always been there every since. They’re very understanding when it comes to other bookings, and stuff like that, and it’s just a great company to work for. I’d be crazy to have anything that was a bigger priority than them… they’re a very loyal company, you treat them right, and they’ll treat you right, and it’s nice to be a part of that.


So you’re looking forward to next week’s show then…. ( NOAH European Navigation)
Oh yeah, yeah, it’s great to have that show in England, I think I’m teaming with Doug against Sugiura, and Suzuki, so it should be a fantastic match, and I’m really looking forward to that. Hopefully it will draw a good crowd, and be a night to remember.


And finally, if there was one thing that you haven’t achieved yet in the business, that you’d like to do, what would it be?
Well…. Hmm, I’d like to be a legend I guess… Well, I don’t know if “legend” is the right term really, but I want to be able to step away from it, and be able to say that I did something, that I was somebody.
Many years ago, I sat in the crowd, I was at Summerslam 92, face-paint and all, I said, “ I want to be a professional wrestler one day…”. I guess I wanted to achieve that dream, whatever that dream was, and at the time, I didn’t really have a specific idea of what that meant, but I am a professional wrestler now, I do, do it for a living. At some point, I don’t know when that is, whether it’s going to the WWE, or just being known on a National, and International level, I guess I’ll just know when I know…


Thank for reading this piece. Full reports of both the NOAH show in Coventry, and the Irish Whip Show in Dublin, are also available elsewhere on the site. My sincere thanks to both Nigel, and Simon Rochford and Irish Whip Wrestling for enabling it to take place at all. Nigel is a true gentlemen, who was both patient and talkative. If you have any comments/questions/queries/or anything to say, get in touch at bazilalfonso@hotmail.com, whether you agree/disagree/hate me, or whatever if may be, I welcome all correspondence. I have also finally got on MySpace! So give me a yell at www.myspace.com/michaelwrestlingetc



if you visit the site, It can be found at..
http://www.pwinsider.com/ViewArticle.php?id=31799&p=1
along with all my other recent non-WWE columns.

the flananator

Very enjoyable read. Well done

EdK

Good read yeah, only problem was you refered to WWE too often,even after he said he didnt know too much about them, but otherwise it was good

SuperWoody101

Good work, well done.

michael.etc...

EdK wrote: »

Good read yeah, only problem was you refered to WWE too often,even after he said he didnt know too much about them, but otherwise it was good

Yeah, the second question in which i referred to them, i wasn't intending to come off as it did. T'was bad phrasing be myself, apologies. I should have put it more along the lines, of "you don't hear much about these problems in Indy Wrestling, just the WWE, how do you feel about drug use in the Independent scene.." well, something like that anyways...
We were seriously rushed, so it was a bit muddled in general.

Thanks for reading guys.