Kevin Nash: The Big Sexy Chat

[Pardeep 619]

Source: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage...cle1142300.ece

KEVIN NASH has forgotten more about the wrestling business than most grapplers will spend a lifetime learning.


The 48-year-old was WWE champion for a whole year – forming the all-powerful backstage Kliq with Shawn Michaels, Scott Hall, Triple H and Sean Waltman – but then sensationally jumped ship to WCW and formed the nWo.


There he reached heights few in the industry ever have, before politicking, infighting and bad business decisions killed the company.


But Nash was far from dead himself – returning to the WWE for a main event run and then heading to TNA in 2004 where he’s been ever since.


In our world exclusive interview below, Big Sexy talks frankly about the psychological pressures of being champion, slams rival show Smackdown, reveals the power structure of TNA and jokes that there is still always room for him to politick.


Hi Kevin. We last met at TNA Lockdown, watching Samoa Joe beat Kurt Angle for the title in an incredible match. You and Joe have become very close, so you do think he’s ready to carry the ball?


Yeah.


But the thing is, being in that position myself, it takes a while for the fans to build that love affair with you as champion.


They’re in love with you as the underdog, but once you take that next step and become the champion all of a sudden the perspective is different.


A lot of times you’ll get an initial pop but then there’ll be a bit of a lull.


But it just takes fans time to adjust.


And as a company, if you make that decision you have to stick with it.


I remember chatting to Eddie Guerrero after he’d won and lost the WWE championship and he said he found it really hard to cope being champion, as there’s so much pressure on you. Is it a totally different experience between being a top guy and being a champion?

Yes, because it doesn’t matter who you’re against, people are buying the tickets to see the champion.


If you go out there and the house is half full, you feel responsible for that, you’re like “I’m not drawing”.


You take that personally and it is a lot to drag with you from town to town, especially on that WWE schedule doing 300 days a year.


If business is down and you’re in that position you take it personally.


It can wear on you.


I’ve seen strong guys completely crack in six months - psychologically just break down from it.


You know the saying: “Watch what you ask for, because you might get it.”


It’s exactly like that.

You’ve been in and out of TNA for quite a while now. Tell us a bit about working there and the differences between TNA, WCW and WWE?


TNA reminds me of WCW when I first got there, in a growing stage.


I think it will take us a few more years, but I think eventually this company will be able to go head-to-head against McMahon.


A major part of the success of WCW was you, Scott Hall and Hulk Hogan all coming in from WWE. Does TNA need something like that to really compete?


At that time, those stars were so well-aligned.


Scott and I were both on top in the WWE and then our contracts ended six days apart. Hogan was finishing a movie and was available.


So the synergy that just put that thing together was just the perfect place and the perfect timing.


And the thing is, people bought it as a shoot.


It was like: “Wow, those two guys from New York have come down, they’re taking over.


“Oh my God. Another guy, Hogan. He’s a New York guy, they’re definitely taking over the company.”


And it was believable because WCW was perceived so far below the WWF, that three guys could basically beat up their company.


If you really think about it, the psychology of it was for the first eight weeks it was just Scott and I.


Scott and I would hold their whole company off and Eric would say: “This is great.”


I’d reply: “No, man, this is horrible. You’ve got two guys from the other promotion and these fans think these two guys can beat up your whole company. That’s not good.”


But, you know, it worked. And it worked for a long time.


I don’t think there has ever been an angle that just went that long, it was like three years.


Or had that amount of amazing success because it totally turned a company that was a distant second into a strong first?


Within eight weeks we were ahead of them and never looked back for, I think, more than 120 weeks.


There were times we were doing ratings of 7, and they were doing 2s.


But they made some adjustments, started the Attitude Era, did that WrestleMania with Tyson – and all of a sudden it became a dogfight.


Then we had infighting and all of a sudden the dot com bust hit the stock market and AOL, who was now our boss, started selling things and we were one of them.


The infighting in WCW was obviously a major problem. In WWE Vince is such an all-powerful figure that it stops it happening to such an extent. But what is to stop TNA becoming another WCW?

I have two bosses – Dixie Carter and Jeff Jarrett. Jeff creatively, Dixie more on the business side.


With creative, in WWE, people would always go back and forth about something and finally someone would say: “You know what, let’s just go talk to Vince. I’m tired of talking to a horse’s ass. Vince what do you want?”


Vince would make a decision and it would get done. And in TNA, it’s like that with Jeff.


Anytime there’s infighting just grab Jeff and say: “What do you want? Tell these guys what you want.”


On the business side, you’d ask: “Dixie what do you want done here? You want that? Fine, that’s done.”


The problem with WCW was you had Eric Bischoff running operations, but then you had Brad Siegel, Dr Schiller, all these guys.


As soon as it got hot, everybody from TNT wanted to get their hands on it.

So am I right in thinking that if Jeff came to you and gave you an idea or a finish you didn’t like, you’d have to do it?


I mean, if I absolutely didn’t like it, I would try to somehow make it more appealing to me.


I think there is still room to always politick.


But at the same time, I don’t sign my own cheque.


It is a job and his decision is final, I’m cool with that.


Jeff’s not going to do me wrong. He’s not going to purposely do something that’s gonna upset me.


There are a lot of times we disagree. We had a disagreement a couple of weeks ago about something on TV.


I looked at him and said: “I disagree with you but I’m happy to do it, because you’re the boss.”


So he’s got the same sort of authority Vince has on the creative side.


Right, and as long as you have somebody who will take the heat like that, which Jeff doesn’t have a problem doing, I don’t have a problem with it.


As long as you are telling me that it’s your decision, and you’ll live with it, that’s fine.


One thing I have to ask you about is these reports I always read in the dirtsheets or on the Internet along the lines of: “Kevin Nash got ‘injured’ before this match he was meant to lose.” How do you feel when you hear or read things like that?

They’ll always come up with stuff.


There was this one thing that said: “Kevin Nash was going to do a job to Chris Sabin, and he came up with an injury.”


I came up with the injury so well that I actually went and got my shoulder operated on!


I don’t just blow a match off, I go ahead and get put out and have a chance of dying on the operating table.


That was pretty real to me!


I also remember, back in WCW, when they said I wouldn’t do a job to The Giant.


I was like: “Wait a second, I’ve been on the road for the last three months putting him over every night. What do you mean I won’t do one?”


If I lived my life for the approval of other people I’d be miserable.


I live my life for me. I make my own decisions.


I haven’t always made great decisions, but I’ve never done anything against anyone in this business with malice. I’m just not that kind of person.


People say: “Oh, he’s calculating, he’s cunning, he’s a politician.”


I don’t have that much real estate in my brain!


I think you were the only TNA employee at WrestleMania 24. How was it?


The WWE treated me and my eleven-year-old boy, Tristan, very well. He said: “Wow, Dad, you’re like a Don here.”


He enjoyed it, but the night was very long and he got bored.


You’re friends with Triple H (Paul Levesque), Shawn Michaels and Vince McMahon. What do they say about TNA? How aware are they of guys like Samoa Joe and what you’re all doing?


You know what, we don’t really talk business.


Especially with Paul, we talk family stuff. Sometimes he’ll ask my opinion on a match or if someone is getting over, and I’ll ask the same of him. But it’s rare.


I do a little more with Shawn, as he’s removed from the office structure.

You must miss Shawn and Paul. Are you not tempted to go back to WWE?

I think it’s more important for the industry for there to be a viable No2, for TNA to be as competitive as possible. And that’s why I enjoy being here.


We’ve already turned so many corners. We are definitely on the map now.


We’re getting a head of steam, Joe’s going to hopefully take us to the next level and then we’re going to have so many great guys behind him.


Whether he stays face or turns heel, whatever he does, we’ve got enough seasoned guys to feed him for a year and have some really good main event matches.


The girls have got their thing going right now and they are amazing too.


Then I think we need to bring the X Division back up and make it more of a centrepiece. Maybe every three PPVs, the X Division should be the main event.


We need to have more of those matches AJ Styles and Christopher Daniels do, because they match that in the WWE. They don’t have the ability and they don’t have the athletes.


Then get the tag thing going. People love to watch tag matches. Get some really strong, solidified teams that fight back and forth, make that belt mean something. Old school.


This thing is going to continue to grow, and continue to grow, and sooner or later we’re going to move to Mondays and go head to head against the WWE.


So you’d go head to head with Raw rather than pick Smackdown?


I wouldn’t want to go against Smackdown. It’s like beating a guy with one leg.


That show isn’t even watchable - sorry Take!


Finally where do you see yourself fitting in with the future of TNA? Do you want another run with the belt?


God, that’s up to creative.


They could pit stop the championship with me for a month while they decided what to do if things weren’t working, but at my age I think my days of running with the belt are over.

[Indifferent Clox]

Nash

[BigDaddyCool]

Nash is awesome.

[St. Jimmy]

lol, beating a guy with one leg. amazing.

[Dave Youell]

He speaks a hell of alot of sense there. Nash is the man

*awaits BDC rep*

[The Mackem]

Yeah good stuff, he seems to have more sense than he gives himself credit for.

[Fabien Barthez]

The first sentence had me a little skeptical, but then it showed him to be a good professional, with a good mind for the business, and clearly a wrestling fan at the same time.

I have a higher opinion of Big Sexy now, than I did 10 minutes ago.

[DaVe]

Yeah, a pretty nice interview. I have got a couple of points to mention, though:

1. Surely he doesn't believe it is going to be that easy to beat Smackdown head-to-head? And recently Smackdown has been the better WWE show on a few occasions (in my opinion, obviously).

2. He reminded me of that promo he did about drawing more than Rock and Austin by saying "Within eight weeks we were ahead of them and never looked back for, I think, more than 120 weeks. There were times we were doing ratings of 7, and they were doing 2s." Stretching it a little, wasn't the record 82 or 84 weeks, and Nitro never did anything more than 4s when Raw was doing those 2s.

[Dave Youell]

Yeah, but he was making $100 million dollars a year, he had graphs and everything, why would he lie.

Well that was $100,000 after taxes of course....

[Impeccable]

Doesn't that 8 come around the time Own died?

[Impeccable]

Also, it's a shame some people will look at that interview and pick out one line, when in actual fact, it's quite a good interview and he came across well.

Originally Posted by Kevin Nash I think there is still room to always politick.

[Volchok]

Originally Posted by Impeccable Doesn't that 8 come around the time Own died?

I know it was for the " This is your life" segment. Idk how far apart they are from each other.

[Xerzes]

That was surprisingly rational.

Still not sure I buy the bit about the injury when he was feuding with Sabin, but oh well.

[Impact!]

I think it’s more important for the industry for there to be a viable No2, for TNA to be as competitive as possible. And that’s why I enjoy being here. We’ve already turned so many corners. We are definitely on the map now. We’re getting a head of steam, Joe’s going to hopefully take us to the next level and then we’re going to have so many great guys behind him. Whether he stays face or turns heel, whatever he does, we’ve got enough seasoned guys to feed him for a year and have some really good main event matches. The girls have got their thing going right now and they are amazing too. Then I think we need to bring the X Division back up and make it more of a centrepiece. Maybe every three PPVs, the X Division should be the main event. We need to have more of those matches AJ Styles and Christopher Daniels do, because they match that in the WWE. They don’t have the ability and they don’t have the athletes. Then get the tag thing going. People love to watch tag matches. Get some really strong, solidified teams that fight back and forth, make that belt mean something. Old school. This thing is going to continue to grow, and continue to grow, and sooner or later we’re going to move to Mondays and go head to head against the WWE.

My respect for Nash went up after reading this