- Messages
- 380
- Points
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3/13/24
Within an industry like professional wresting, there are certainly many enigmas that exist. Men and women who are hard to gauge, goals and motivations unable to measure, masked behind empty, or purposely misleading words and actions…
but that has never been me.
Admittedly, in a career that spans well over a decade, there have been times where I’ve been lost, confused, unsure of the direction I wanted to take my career, but I’ve never been intentionally deceptive. Good or bad, truth and openness have been pillars on which I’ve built my career on, and I am immensely proud of that.
And yet… and yet, and yet…
My word is not taken for what it is. It’s— interesting, flattering, but equally frustrating. Me being who I am and what I’ve achieved in my career, there is a certain regard and esteem associated with it. There must be more to it: A deeper meaning, a hidden message… it can’t be as simple as it appears. Admittedly, I get a kick out of people trying to figure it out… but the lack of belief means I often find myself in circles, a spiral that seemingly never ends, repeating the same things over and over to reiterate once again that yes, it really is that easy.
Damien Kutcher wants to know why it is that I’m still here… and as I have said many times over, I’m still here, because I can’t leave.
Maybe I’m spending too much time focusing on the words of a man already losing a fight to a bottle of Jack Daniels… but it’s clear that what we have here are conflicting outlooks. I’m not going to ridicule you for yours, I think it’s a natural one for someone in your position. Someone new, fresh— hardly anything behind them and everything in front of them. You think you know how your career is going to go, a steady progression upwards: first a monumental victory against a high caliber opponent that squarely puts you on the map, then you further establish yourself by winning one of the abundantly available mid-card championships that we have here, and then— before ascending to the very top and becoming world champion, perhaps you win one of the principal matches or tournaments like The Grand Rampage or The King of Elite…
… that’s the “idealistic” EAW career and it’s a path that many have followed to success… but then what?
Of course— one could argue that I’m projecting everything here, after all, in your Jack induced ramble… you never really offered me your perspective on things, just dreaded the thought of having to face me. But clearly— given how and what you think of me, you very much see a career in EAW as a finite thing. In theory, of course that’s true… every career has to have a beginning and an end, but you see a definitive start and a definitive end, but rarely— if ever, is that ever the case, especially for me and others like me who have, in your words, “done it all.”
There is so much left that I could do— I’ve never won The Grand Rampage, I’ve never won Cash in the Vault, I could definitely do with another world championship, I would ideally like a couple more victories at Pain For Pride because my record at the event is downright horrific… but yes, those would just be extras on top of an already great, absolute Hall of Fame worthy career. I know that— I know that I’ve already done more than enough to solidify myself as one of the greatest elitists who has ever lived, and I’m not solely driven by those things in the same way I would’ve been a decade ago, but they’re far from being deterrents. If fame and glory was all that I was grasping for, I could have stepped away from this company and industry long ago and found myself in Hollywood— but that’s not what I’m after. All of those things I just mentioned, they’re wants… additions to a baseline need, a need to compete.
I crave competition, it is my sustenance. And I’m far from alone in this— for all that I’ve done there are people who have been longer than I have, who have accomplished more than I have, and they have the same craving. Really— calling it a craving isn’t doing it justice, it’s an addiction. It exhibits all of the qualities of one and I believe it exists, buried deep within every single man and woman in this profession. You Damien, you can’t recognize that now. For you, professional wrestling is still very transactional. I don’t doubt that it’s a passion of yours, but it still follows the very basic pattern of you compete, you get paid. The more you compete, the more you get paid. The higher you compete, the higher you get paid. It’s a way of life and it’s admittedly a great one. But now that you’re in, now that you’ve reached the top— in the sense that there exists no company bigger than EAW, it can only go one of two ways… I promise, you are not so special as to be an exception to either.
First, you fade away into obscurity, forgotten to time like so many others. This could mean accomplishing nothing, no championships, no glory, a squandered career— but it doesn’t exclude the possibility entirely. In fact, and I realize this contradicts the whole meaning of obscure and being forgotten, but I could name you multiple world champions whose names no longer hold any weight or have any meaning within these walls… but those are special, rare examples… men and women who were disgraced and exiled for conduct issues, their hard work forgotten… all of it turned to rot. The other option is that this addiction that lives deep within you begins to bore itself outwards until it is all consuming and you are completely and entirely at its mercy. It’s a harsh reality to face, but that is how an ordinary elitist turns into a legend. Ideal doesn’t exist, not here. It’ll do you good to remember that.
I say all of this not to scare you away, but to prepare you for what you’re truly getting into. Consider yourself lucky, game like this is offered to very few. Don’t waste it.
…
And… while I still have this camera on… a very special shoutout to Jon Kelton…
… I knew you couldn’t do it.
