Gary Mehaffy had the opportunity to interview ex-TNA World Heavyweight Champion Magnus on Thursday, December 4th, 2014 for almost 50 minutes about his life in wrestling, being a new dad, his future in the business, improving in the ring and much, much more.
on His current status with TNA:
I haven’t….I’m still under contract. There’s been no discussion of any of that. I already knew I was booked for the (UK) tour. I think I was one of the first names advertised when the dates were first booked. I think it was just one of those things where when they did the finalised line-up. There’s…..as of now, as of right now, I still have a contract. That’s about as much as I’m willing to discuss.
How Sting went to bat for him in a situation with Jim Cornette:
Jim Cornette – who I have a lot of respect for and get on with and now – he was not necessarily on ‘Team Magnus’ when I first showed up. And with good reason! I didn’t fucking belong there! I didn’t know a fucking headlock from a headlight!….Jim Cornette looked at me and was like “Alright kid, keep your mouth shut and your ears open and maybe we’ll get through this!” Sting kind of reprimanded him a little bit and was like “Actually, Jim, he’s got some really good ideas and I pretty much want to do the match that we’ve already discussed.” He was like “Eh, ok…alright then” It ended up being a good piece of business and Cornette was happy.
What he didn’t enjoy about being part of AJ Styles’ last match in TNA:
I don’t mean to sound ungrateful – but I don’t know if it was as much them having faith in me or…or if I was an easy person to have the heat on, at least. There were some very unfortunate circumstances around the AJ thing….I suffered a concussion when I won the title in the match with Jeff…I was pretty much on auto-pilot. I was in a bad way….I’ve never had one since…..That then meant that we weren’t able to do what we wanted to do with AJ. It’s my understanding that we were to do a straight up match, but that wasn’t possible. They did the best thing they thought they could do…..It wasn’t wrestling. It was just an angle.
His love of U.K. television in the 1990’s:
(Gladiators) was part of that Saturday night line up….Friday night was swimming, fish and chips and ‘Top of the Pops’. Saturday was football practice or a game, and then that night it would be ‘Blind Date’, ‘Noel’s House Party’ and ‘Gladiators’.
Growing up as a wrestling fan:
When I was a kid, like a small kid, we didn’t have Sky. We didn’t have satellite TV. But I was still completely familiar with the WWF and that’s really a testament to how incredible their marketing is. Even though I never really had access to it because I couldn’t see it on TV, u still knew who everybody was. …For me, Bret ‘The Hitman’ Hart was held on a pedestal with superheroes and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and stuff….He was like a real hero….Probably around 1996/97 was when I started to get back into it when Shawn Michaels and HHH started doing DX….That was where the first time it started to pique my rebellious teen interest…From the age of 13 it was formulating in ny head that that was what I wanted to do.
Here is the full interview:
Gary also had the opportunity to talk about his appreciation of wrestlers such as Sting, Doug Williams, Jeff Jarrett and Shawn Daivari, as well as how he managed to get a role in Gladiators and as a presenter of UK’s Strongest Man. We discuss the changes in his life from breaking into the business in his teens to where he is now, being a national championships swimmer, how he and Mickie juggle their wrestling lives with that of being parents, why he would love to train in a facility like they have in NXT, U.S. fans versus U.K. fans, being a heel , why Kevin Nash is so cool and much, much more. It is a great interview with some really interesting and intriguing insights, so give it a listen!
