Ric Flair Says He Sees Himself In Top AEW Superstar

During the latest episode of the Ric Flair Woooo Nation Uncensored Podcast, The Nature Boy spoke about AEW Superstar MJF and why he enjoys the 25-year-old’s work so much. MJF has stated that Rowdy Roddy Piper made him fall in love with wrestling, but Flair mentioned why he sees more of himself in MJF than Piper.

“I’m not taking away from Roddy, Roddy didn’t brag about his clothes and stuff like that,” Flair mentioned. “This kid, what makes him different is he’s talking about the material things and he implies that he has the material things that other people don’t have and that really pisses people off, especially when it’s true.”

Ric Flair also spoke about MJF being a vintage wrestling heel and his ability to not break character outside of the ring. The 2x WWE Hall of Famer spoke about one of the things he hates most that heel talent in today’s day do, talking about signing fans autographs.

“If I saw that kid signing an autograph at the parking lot of the building, I’d never talk to him again,” Flair stated. “He’s so damn good at what he’s doing and it really catches my attention but I’ve seen so many guys in this business who go out and be a heel on TV, then they’re out in the parking lot signing autographs.

“Instead of running to the bar 100 miles an hour, they’re walking around making sure nobody speaks about what an asshole they are and signing all of their autographs. What heel signs autographs? I used to walk through the airport with Hunter and we would say ‘Bad guys don’t sign.’ Standard answer: ‘bad boys don’t sign.’ “

News of WWE being rumored to have an interest in MJF has hit the wrestling world, with the 25-year-old reacting to the news on his social media for his free agency status in 2024. AEW Owner Tony Khan reacted to the news, stating why it’s a great thing for WWE to express interest in the AEW star. Ric Flair spoke about MJFs greatness and ability to go wherever he likes and be able to continue his success as a heel.

“I think he goes anywhere he wants to go,” Flair said. “If he has a good business manager or agent, not some dumb son of a bitch like I had in the past. [I see him as a very top guy] in either company. Delivered as he is.

“He’s good enough to be good in either company. I’m not suggesting he goes anywhere, I would stay with Tony as long as Tony was paying me. And I’m sure Tony sees a lot in him or he wouldn’t be in the position he’s in. The thing about him is he’s only going to get better, and hopefully, he stays injury-free.”

Molly Holly On Why Her WWE Heel Run Wasn’t Her Favorite

Just before it was revealed that she would become the first WWE Superstar to be inducted in this year’s Hall of Fame, Molly Holly spoke with the panel on WWE’s The Bump on how far the Women’s Evolution has come since her time as a full-time wrestler. While she appreciates the flattery that comes with being one of many who have broken the glass ceiling in women’s wrestling history, she believes her time does not compare to those who sacrificed so much more before her.

“Well, I am very impressed with how far it’s come,” Molly Holly exclaimed. “I always feel a little bit weird when people say that I was a part of it because I feel like there were so many people way before me. Whether it was “Chainsaw” Liz Chase or Leilani Kai, Rockin’ Robin, Madusa, all these people were generations before me that really were the ones that were doing things that women…it wasn’t proper for them to do.

“I feel like in my generation women had more…it was acceptable to do things outside of the homemaker role. But to see how much it has changed, it’s awesome!”

The panel took a look back at Molly Holly’s very first match in WWE at Sunday Night Heat in 1998. She mentioned that at that point, this match was just a tryout. Unfortunately, she did not receive a contract following this matchup. But she was happy that two years later, she would make the cut in WWE.

“What I remember was that I really wanted a full-time job. Like, I wanted to be a pro wrestler for a living, and this was my big chance to do it,” she recalls on her first-ever WWE match. “One of the things was that I didn’t have good gear. Every time I see myself in that outfit, I go, ‘Oh, this is so bad!’

“Yes, I did want to be hired. I would say that this was a tryout. At the time, WWE decided that I wasn’t exactly what they were looking for at that time. I was really bummed that I didn’t get hired at that point.”

Prior to her WWE debut, Molly Holly spent one year honing her craft over at WWE’s biggest rival at the time, WCW, where she would become one of the three valets for “Macho Man” Randy Savage. She recalls how Savage asked her to train his other valet and girlfriend at the time, Gorgeous George, for in-ring competition and what that did for her career after.

“I lived in the Tampa Bay area, and so did ‘Macho Man’ Randy Savage, and he was looking for a girl that worked in the indie scene to teach his girlfriend, Gorgeous George, awesome wrestling moves,” she began. “So, the local people said, ‘Oh, you’ve got to meet this girl. She wrestles, and she’s nice.’ So, Randy asked me if I could teach his girlfriend some wrestling moves. We went to a warehouse, and I spent a lot of time teaching her the basics, and we all became friends. Then, he asked me to be on TV with him.

“The one story that means the most to me was we had this match with Gorgeous George, and she was going to wrestle referee Charles Robinson. I spent so much time teaching her moves, and we were really nervous about it. But at the end of the match when she won, I had never seen him so happy. We were backstage, and he had a genuine smile on his face, and he was like, ‘We did it. We did it.’ It just made me feel so good that something that we had worked so hard on that he was like, ‘That is it!’”

While many remember Molly Holly’s singles run as the villainous brunette from 2002-2003, she revealed that this wasn’t her favorite character to portray in her overall career.

“I didn’t want to be a bad guy,” she admitted. “Usually, a good bad guy has a lot of experience. At that time, I had a lot of years under my belt. The bonus was that I didn’t have to bleach my hair blonde anymore. It did become my most successful part of my career. I was able to be the champion. Yeah, I was successful at that turn, but it wasn’t like my favorite persona to have.”

Towards the end of her interview, the panel and she came full circle to talk once more about how women’s wrestling has changed from when she first started to where it is now. Molly Holly is excited to see how the women of today will influence the little girls watching around the world.

“When I started, there was just a handful of women. There didn’t seem to be a priority to hire more. It was kind of like, ‘Oh, they’re the novelty or the sideshow or whatever warms up the crowd before the show starts,’” she stated. “To see how that’s changed, really, I feel like the fans demand to want more women’s action. The women are delivering.

“I think that if the women had not advanced their skills and put in so much effort into being equally as good as the men, that now they’re finally getting to showcase all that they can do, it just opens up so many more doors for little girls all across the world that are watching TV saying, ‘I want to be a pro wrestler someday.’ Now, they have that opportunity.”

Eric Bischoff Names Who Is The “Next Really, Really Meaningful Heel”

During the 83 Weeks podcast, Eric Bischoff discussed TNT picking up AEW. Bischoff admitted that he was surprised as somebody who had previous experience working with them while he was with WCW.

“I was surprised, not going to sugar coat it,” Bischoff said. “My surprise had nothing to do with my opinion of AEW, I have been pitching and selling television shows since about 2003 so I have a pretty good feel for the thinking and strategies for a lot of cable television outlets. Prior to the announcement of TNT acquiring AEW content, the general consensus was anybody that wants wrestling has it.

“I was really surprised, wrestling outside of WWE didn’t have a great reputation within the advertisement sales community, wrestling has always been a tough sale, even for WWE. The audience is always there, but wrestling has always had a tough time having an audience that will always be there, that’s been the hurdle.”

Bischoff discussed AEW picking Wednesdays instead of Tuesdays and how he believes any show, WWE or AEW, the night after Monday Night Raw would be a bad idea. He also noted how a company has to build trust with the audience.

“I like Wednesday,” Bischoff said. “It’s easy for me to say because it’s been successful for AEW but the problem with Tuesday night would’ve been we just sat through 3 hours of wrestling on Monday night, I kind of just got my fix. No matter how much of a wrestling fan I am and I just watched three hours of WWE, I don’t want to watch another 2 hours of anything. Whether it’s Smackdown or AEW on Tuesday nights.

“Once you establish yourself with the audience, they will find you and they will follow you. That’s one thing about the wrestling audience that a lot of network executives never got, some of them found out too late. The wrestling audience is one of the most loyal audiences any television genre has ever had. Once they decide they’re into your product, they will find you. That audience will follow you and you can hold onto them.”

Bischoff also cited MJF as the standout heel who is willing to be hated and disliked by everyone. Bischoff feels that the wrestling industry is lacking more guys like him.

“This MJF dude, come on, I would’ve loved to work with that guy,” Bischoff stated. “He’s so good. What he delivers on camera is magical as a heel, very few people are capable of pulling it off. He loves heat.

“We don’t really have any heels [in today’s wrestling]. People play the part of a heel, play the part of a baby face, but there’s nobody out there that people really genuinely hate and want to see get their ass kicked. If you don’t have a real viable meaningful heel then you’re never going to have a real viable meaningful baby face. You are going to have a neutral effect. One of the reasons I think is that people don’t want to be hated. It goes against every instinct you have as a human being since the time you drew your first breath, to find ways to make people hate you and react negatively to you. WWE is even worse, WWE their entire revenue model for talent is on merchandise and as a heel you don’t sell a lot of merchandise. Nobody fully invests in being a heel.”

Bischoff used Triple H as an example of the heels and baby faces looking and feeling the same in today’s wrestling, while giving more credit to MJF as the one guy who plays his role perfectly.

“Go back and watch Triple H’s matches and compare to when he was a baby face to a heel, there aren’t any differences, he was the same character as a heel and a baby face,” Bischoff said. “If you’re going to be a heel, be a f***ing heel. Invest in it, enjoy it, live it. Learn to suck the life out of every moment so that the baby face you’re in the ring with gets the benefit of it. That’s why I am putting MJF over because he embraces his character.

“There’s only one guy that I could pick out of a crowd that could be the next really, really meaningful heel and that’s MJF,” he said. “Everyone else has this thing where I can turn at any minute, you can’t tell if I’m a baby face or a heel. It’s so grey. Good guys, bad guys, baby faces, heels, it’s all just one big fog and not enough of anybody else standing out from the fog.”

Becky Lynch On Avoiding Total Divas, Working Intergender Matches, Being A Heel Before WWE

Source: Bleacher Report

Becky Lynch spoke with Bleacher Report on a number of wrestling topics. Here are some of the highlights:

Working as a heel in her earlier days:

“When I was on the independent circuit, I always played the heel role, but I always felt that no matter what, I was able to connect with the fans. Whether I was good or not, there was a connection there because I think I just really love wrestling. If you’re a fan, you love wrestling. When you can feel that radiating off somebody, I think you tend to gravitate toward them. I think that’s the same with a lot of the babyfaces throughout WWE history. Fans pick up on that energy. It’s a passion we have for the industry. That resonates with them.”

Staying away from Total Divas:

“It’s not something I ever wanted for myself. It’s a great opportunity for the women. But I never envisioned myself in that role. And there’s a certain mystique about myself that I’d like to keep. I don’t want to give out too much of Rebecca Quinn.”

Wrestling James Ellsworth and intergender matches:

“With that match, my whole hope was that people didn’t get up in arms about a guy touching a woman. And that it just became about the storyline as opposed to ‘Oh no! What’s going on in the world?’ It was more about entertainment than making any political or social statement.”

You can read the full interview by clicking here.

Eric Bischoff On How WWE Is Presenting Roman Reigns: ‘Cowardly Creative Cop-out’

Eric Bischoff was recently interviewed by Isaac Wenzel for “All Things Wrestling Radio.” You can listen to the full interview at Spreaker.com, they sent us these highlights:

Roman Reigns being a face / heel hybrid:

“You have to make a choice and you have to commit to a character. You’re either a babyface or a character that the fans relate to, support, love and aspire to be, or you’re not. And if you’re not, you’re heel, you’re despicable and they need to learn to love to hate you. And I think when you take that safe road in-between and let the fans decide…to me, it’s a cop-out. To me, that’s kind of like raising your hands and saying, ‘look, I’ve got ideas. I really don’t have a plan, so let’s just put him out there and let the fans choose.’ I think that’s just the most cowardly creative cop-out that I’ve ever heard.”

There being too much WWE programming:

“It’s kind of like football… there’s just too damn much of it. It’s all day Sunday, it’s Monday Night Football, it’s Thursday Night Football… [there] is just so much of it out there that none of it feels special anymore and I think that’s really acute when it comes to Sports Entertainment and Professional Wrestling… I used to produce three hours of Nitro, so I know what kind of monster that is. I would think that it’s harder to watch three hours of content than it is to produce it.”

Triple H Disagrees With New Signee Saying She Won’t Be A Heel

Source: USA Today

Recent WWE signing Kacy Catanzaro most likely won’t face any speed bumps as she learns the physical side of wrestling. A former competitor on American Ninja Warrior, she has a fearlessness that should suit her well in the ring. But the real question is what will Catanzaro’s character be when she’s ready to make her debut.

Triple H, who’s had a hand in developing countless young superstars, told USA Today he thinks Catanzaro might find success as a cocky heel.

“I like to think of myself as a nice guy, (but) I made 90 percent of my career being the worst guy in the business,” he said. “She might end up being the bad guy that thinks she’s better than everybody else, because she was the hero on American Ninja Warrior.”

He continued: “She has a little twinkle in her eye. She might be the kind of person that embraces the evil side.”

As noted, Catanzaro has a different opinion and said she hopes for her character to spread positivity, the same way she does in real life.

“I’m not gonna be a bad guy,” she said. “I’m definitely gonna be a babyface (and) keep the same (positive) brand that I am in Ninja, which is honestly who I am in general.”

Vickie Guerrero On A Possible WWE Return, Why Fans Connected With Eddie Guerrero, Being A Heel

Source: The Memorabilia Guy

Former WWE star Vickie Guerrero recently spoke with The Memorabilia Guy. The full interview is at this link and below are highlights:

How did you take to being a heel?

They all hated me; no one liked me back then (laughing). No, my Mom probably liked me. To be hated was something I wasn’t expecting. I look back and see how much hate I got from the fans, it was actually pretty thrilling for me. You know you have done your job well when people love to hate you. When the fans are face to face with me they say “Oh I love you, you’re so great” but on Twitter and the Internet they hate me. It’s fun to joke with them and give them a hard time.

Why do you think the fans had such a special connection with Eddie and miss him so much?

I think the reason that Eddie has stayed with so many people after his passing is because he proved to the fans and everyone that he was a human being. He had faults, he also had demons, but he worked all by himself to get to the top of the roster. He was very true to his feelings and was honest with everyone, it showed so much character. Fans often approach me explaining that they went through similar issues Eddie went through and he helped them. He had so much character and dignity.

Will we see you return to the WWE?

I get that bug every once in awhile. I look in the ring and think – God I just want to be in there for one moment, one more time – so never say never. If Vince ever called and said “We need you again Guerrero” my answer would simply be – When? That adrenaline can only be found in the ring.

Check out the full interview with Vickie at this link.

Stephanie McMahon On Using Her Character To Make Other Talent Look Better, Enjoying Playing A Heel

In case you missed it over the weekend, WWE posted video on their YouTube channel from a Q&A that Stephanie McMahon conducted last week on Facebook, which you can watch in the video above. Like last month, Stephanie discussed being a heel on television and how her character gets others over.

When asked what her daughters think of her playing a heel, Stephanie said that while they understand that she’s playing a character and that every story has a good guy and bad guy, they don’t understand why she chooses to being in that role.

Stephanie admitted that being a heel “was the most fun” and that she liked being booed, since that’s her job. She added that the more people boo her, “the better I make the babyface – the good guy or good girl – look… The more hated I am, the more I can ultimately make that person look more like a hero.”

Dean Ambrose On Not Being A Traditional Heel Or Babyface, His First WrestleMania Experience

Dean Ambrose recently spoke with The Asbury Park Press to promote the March 2nd RAW. Below are some highlights:

His first WrestleMania experience last year:

“It’s always trippy for me to be in front of that many people because it’s just kind of hard to understand. Like, wrestling in front of 20 people or 100 people can be a little weird, but wrestling in front of a sold out ‘Monday Night Raw,’ 13,000 people, it’s kind of above your scope of understanding people. It’s just kind of this big, giant mass of noise. So actually, in a lot of ways, it’s easier. But it’s cool to feel the electricity going on in the towns right around this time, getting ready to go out in front of 80,000 people at WrestleMania, and that’s what you look forward to every year.”

“Coming out at the 50-yard line at MetLife Stadium and feeling the rumble of 80,000 people for the first time at WrestleMania 29 was something that I’ll never forget, and that was right there (in East Rutherford), so it’s a good place to be to get in the right mental state for WrestleMania.”

Not being a traditional heel or babyface:

“I’m just trying to go out there and just do what I do authentically and just be me, and do things the way I want to do them and look at the world the way I want to look at it. If people like it, cool, I appreciate that, and if you don’t, I don’t care.”

“I’m maybe the only guy who might have that attitude. But I’m the only guy who can get away with stuff that would be despicable, deplorable stuff if done by anybody else, but done by me it’s a little bit different. I’m not squeaky clean and I’m not a cookie-cutter pretty boy or anything, so I don’t want to try to portray that and I’m not going to do things that way. If you like me, cool. If you don’t, then I really could care less.”

Ronda Rousey Wants To Be WWE Heel

Ronda Rousey, the first ever women’s UFC champion, is well known for her love of professional wrestling, and takes her nickname, “Rowdy,” from none other than Rowdy Roddy Piper.

Her name has been attached to the WWE several times as a result, including an invitation on Twitter from The Shield to join them (back when they were still together, of course).

Now, in a new interview with TalkSport she has discussed being a heel in the WWE.

Says Rousey:

Oh, I would be a heel for sure.

I can’t take the name of ‘Rowdy’ and not be a heel, that would be an insult to the man I pay tribute to with my name – the great Rowdy Roddy Piper.

I would have to try and live up to his legacy as much as possible and I can’t do that being a babyface.

Rousey appeared backstage at WWE Summerslam 2014 alongside her “Four Horsewomen” mates (a name also taking from the pro wrestling world), and was seen pictured with Paul Heyman. She was also one of the first stars to welcome CM Punk to the UFC. Could a move to the WWE be in her future?

Perhaps – and she may have the acting chops, having appear in The Expendables 3 and the upcoming Fast and Furious 7, among other projects – but it’s unlikely that Dana White and Vince McMahon will ever sign off on sharing talent the way Bellator MMA and TNA Wrestling have done with the likes of Rampage Jackson, Tito Ortiz, and King Mo, so any WWE duties outside of backstage visits and ringside seats will likely have to wait for Rousey, who honestly has enough on her plate as it is.