WWE Monday Night RAW commentator Corey Graves discussed various topics with TV Insider, including the valuable lessons he has learned as a broadcaster.
Graves said, “It’s funny now because it feels like yesterday. We’re around the 10-year mark where I was called up to RAW. I remember I was living in Tampa at the time, but my first RAW was in Pittsburgh. So, to be able to do it in my hometown, I remember waking up and staying in the hotel looking out and seeing Mount Washington with a tear in my eye. Man, I’m on RAW. It wasn’t how I envisioned it. I wanted to be a wrestler for all those years, but I’m on RAW and doing it at home. To your point, I’m just a head-down, grind guy. I will outwork people who are more talented than I am. That has kind of been my MO. Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard. That’s been my motto. I got it from my mom. My mom is one of the most tireless workers to this day I’ve ever known. My work ethic is second to none. I don’t say no to anything. I rarely did, if I ever have. It’s really been cool that the world has been able to watch and grow and develop. Oftentimes they notice things I don’t. To me, it’s just my job. I show up to do what I think I’m doing. When I do go back rarely and listen to what I’ve done in the past, even back to my NXT days. It’s entertaining, but for all the wrong reasons. I was pretty rotten. It’s just like anything else. The more repetitions you get, the more comfortable you get the more experience you get, the better you get. It has gotten to the point now where I’m as confident as I’ve ever been and had to occupy different roles throughout my career. I’d like to think I am more of the complete broadcaster on the team now. I can do color commentary and analysis. I can do play-by-play. I’m no Michael Cole, but I’ve been in the chair on SmackDown as the lead broadcaster. The company trusted me, and I didn’t crash the train. So, I take that as a positive. Everything from hosting to all these various events WWE has put on has given me the opportunity to sink my teeth into different aspects of being a broadcaster than I never in a million years have looked for. A million dollars wouldn’t have bought this experience. It’s really on-the-job training. It has been invaluable.”
On compartmentalizing his work and his personal life with Carmella:
It kind of caught us both off guard at first, but I think it has been a blessing in disguise. She has been able to dive into other projects she has been wanting to work on for a while. Obviously, she has two baby boys keeping her busy all day, every day. She is an incredible mom. Her leaving WWE actually helped me in that I can come home and turn off work. That’s something I’ve always struggled with throughout work and life. I’m a workaholic. Now I come home and when I walk through the doors it’s no longer, ‘Hey, how was your day at TV. This happened. How was your day?’ There were the constant comparisons with wrestling being nonstop. It’s sort of forced me to think that when I walk through the door, all that stuff stays in the truck. I’m going to come home and be a dad and a husband and focus on that. There are still nights where she gives me crap for sitting through wrestling on nights I’m not working. You can’t kill my passion for it. At the same time, it has been helpful in that respect where I have a little delineation between work life and home life where before it was a messy blur.
On if he sees Carmella wrestling again:
“You’ll have to ask her. I can give you what I think, but I don’t want to speak for her. I think time will tell. “
