Kevin Owens recently spoke with The Wrestling Compadres Slamcast (viawrestlinginc.com), here are the highlights…
On Going to WrestleMania 30: “I didn’t go [to WrestleMania] for years until [WrestleMania 30]. [WrestleMania] 30 was the first one I went to because I wanted to see Daniel Bryan on that stage, but every year before, I kept thinking, ‘I don’t want to go to WrestleMania because the next time I go to WrestleMania, I want it to be as a WWE employee.’ I broke that rule for 30 because I couldn’t miss Daniel Bryan in that environment. And also at that point, I had been talking with WWE, so I almost felt like ‘I think I’ll be there soon.’”
On Becoming Fully Dedicated to His Wrestling Career: “A couple of years ago, I had a kid. I had a wife. I had a job that I hated and I wanted to stop working because I wanted to dedicate my full attention to professional wrestling to hopefully make it to WWE, but also to make as much money as I could as a wrestler to support my family, so I decided to, I don’t know how to describe it, I made the decision to kind of change. Not change who I was in the ring, but just turn everything up in a way. I don’t know. Like, if you look at my stuff from Ring Of Honor, for example, I think you can pinpoint the moment where I just kind of went crazy and that really helped. And I think without that moment, I wouldn’t be here [in WWE] now.”
On His Time in ROH: “I remember I was in Ring Of Honor and I lost a match that meant I was to go away from Ring Of Honor and at that point I didn’t know if I would ever go back. And I think, for about two weeks, I considered just not wrestling altogether and I remember looking at the paper, like in the ads, for work, like a regular job. And then I realized, like, ‘none of this is going to work. I have to change.’ I think that’s the moment almost.” Owens continued, “I had a PWG show in California. At that point, I hadn’t wrestled in PWG for like a year almost. And I wrestled [Akira] Tozawa, who was just announced in the Global Cruiserweight Series for WWE. I wrestled him and that match made me realize, ‘oh, I can definitely still do this’. And I guess if you had to pinpoint a match where I think everything turned around, that would be the one, but it was off of Ring Of Honor basically firing me at that point. I don’t know. That’s when things kind of took a turn that I feel ultimately led me here [to WWE].”
On Fans Relating to Him: A lot of people see themselves in me I guess because I’m not chiseled out of stone and tanned and 6’5″.” Owens added, “I had people tell me that the fact that I’m here [in WWE] gives them hope for their own lives and I’m never going to claim to be an inspiration for anybody because I find that very egotistical, but if I can help people in such a way, just like the one thing I always said when people ask me, like, I don’t know, I’ve had kids ask me like, ‘what’s the best advice for me? I want to be a wrestler one day.’ As corny as it sounds, it sounds like a John Cena t-shirt catchphrase, but I say, ‘just don’t let anybody tell you [that] you can’t do it.’ You know what I mean? I’ve heard that my whole life and it never mattered. And here I am now.”
