Rick Boogs recently appeared on INSIGHT with Chris Van Vliet for an interview.
The following are some of the highlights.
So how’d you get on the radar for American Gladiators: “I just found an email address for a casting director that was involved in that. Emailed them, ‘Hey, my name is Eric Bugenhagen. I hoist, heft and heave mega loads.’ Sent some clips and stuff whatnot, told him what I’ve done in the past. They said, Okay, we’ll set you up with the Zoom call. So give me the Zoom call a couple of days later, and I don’t know what to expect. Luckily, I have the 20,000 hours of promo practice from the WWE Performance Center. If that Performance Center has done anything well, for me, I don’t know about anyone else, but grinding those promos in. Because I learned if you wanted to stand out in that business, you got to be different.”
It’s funny that in WWE your freestyle background was never talked about at all. Probably because, with great credit to you, you were so entertaining: “Well, funny enough, when I first got to the PC, I wasn’t that entertaining. I kind of leaned into being more serious and stuff. Then I kind of lost my mind a year in. I think that’s very common to the PC. And then you just are like I don’t even know what’s gonna happen, I gotta change somehow. Promo classes were great, man, they were long, but they would sometimes put you on the spot.”
How did you become The Bull in American Gladiators: “Well, I think they saw my bullish vigor at the tryout. Just like a bull rush. The main thing is, I was still promo-ing, because much like the PC at the tryout, also you had the physicality. Like I said, pull-ups, push-ups, sit-ups, wrestling, rope climb, tire flip thing, like a football-type drill, which is pretty funny. But then it was like, Okay, you’re gonna go in that room now and cut some promos. So I just went all in on The Max still, because at this point I’m The Max and I’m like, and I told them whatever you call me, just include “the” that’s all I care about. Because you got all these names, Laser, Nitro, Turbo, Titan. But when there’s “the” it’s like, wait a second, yeah, pay attention to this guy. Why does he have “the” in front of his name?”
I feel like this is a perfect thing for you to be doing in your post-WWE career. It feels like you were put on this earth to be an American Gladiator: “The funny thing is, I’m very competitive. Well, that was the thing with WWE. That was very hard for me. I get there’s definitely a competitive nature, of course, this is just an incredible art form of pro wrestling. But people would always tell me too, ‘Man, why don’t you just let loose and ragdoll people?’ Because I can’t. I’ll get fired if I do that, and I ended up getting fired anyway, so I should have just done it.”
Why did you know this was going to happen: “Well, all right. I mean, I can only speak from [my perspective], nothing factual, we’ll just put that out first. But when I was brought back, the day of TV, people were like, ‘Where’s his guitar? Where’s all this?’ Brother, I didn’t know that either, until the day of. I had a double guitar! I was like, This is gonna be the sickest return ever. Double, like freaking Jimmy Page. But this one was way more heavy metal and stuff. I was like, this thing’s gonna be so sick. Then that was stripped and I’m like, well what’s my gimmick? Because that was my gimmick. It was cut a promo on the mic, rip a little tune, because I had my own theme song, but I made sure to learn that sucker. Because I’m like, I’m just gonna play that little diddly on the guitar when I go to the ring and stuff. So then after that, it’s just like, alright, well, back to square one on the day of TV. I mean, where do you want to go? LA Knight, Boogalicious Knights. Man, that would be freaking awesome.”
So it was supposed to be you and LA Knight: “Well, for that little bit. But then when we did the filming it’s like, ‘All right, he’s gonna eat the pin, then you’re gonna beat him up afterwards, and then the next match, you’re gonna eat the pin again.’ Where does it go then? It’s done? Oh ok.”
Are you done with wrestling: “I don’t think so, man.”
Because you haven’t wrestled in almost exactly three years as we sit here right now, and when you were on the show two and a half years ago, you weren’t really sure: “I was a little soiled, sour flavor in my mouth.”
You got released from WWE in 2023 and now we see you on American Gladiators almost three years later. With great respect, what were you doing the last three years: “So before even WWE I kind of was a strength coach, but my side hustle was YouTube, and I always kind of maintained that, just not with as much vigor. So like, I’m out now. I’ll try different things, and I’ll try to go all in on this. But then also partnered with Psycho Pharm, which I’m still with them, then they’re great, and we’re growing more than ever. We’re going international.”
