TNA Wrestling star and pro wrestling veteran Moose recently appeared on Busted Open Radio to discuss various topics, including recent talent departures from the company.
Moose said, “It happens. Wrestling’s a revolving door. Somebody new leaves, somebody new comes in. I wish our fans knew that a little bit more than the boys do because it tends to be, when somebody leaves or asks for their release or their contract is up, you go on social media and everybody’s blasting TNA about, ‘Oh my God, this person’s leaving’ but, I’ve been in TNA for 10 years and I wish I could tell you it’s been different. It happens every single year. Somebody we love is gonna leave, and somebody that we get to love is gonna come in. There’s gonna be a day when I leave TNA, you know what I’m saying? I don’t know when that day is and I don’t want fans saying, ‘Oh, TNA messed up by not keeping Moose.’ No, it’s a business; it’s what happens. You get tired of staying in a place. You wanna have different kinds of matches. You wanna wrestle newer people than the people that you’ve been wrestling. There’s so many different reasons why people leave and why people come in so you can’t get mad at the company when that happens. Just know it’s a business and it happens everywhere. I mean, I played in the NFL for seven years and I was with the (New England) Patriots when we had — if I believe — 120 transactions in one year. So, it happens. It’s life; it’s a job so, just bear with us. There’s gonna be new faces coming in. There’s gonna be old faces leaving. It’s just part of the business.”
On his own TNA future:
“It feels like every year when my contract is up, there’s a conversation that I have with my family and I have with people internally closer to me… Do I want to wrestle other places? Yeah. I mean, there’s matches that I would love to have, like in WWE or AEW or in Mexico or in New Japan. There’s a bunch of matches I would love to have and it’s just one of those things that for one reason or another, I haven’t done it yet and I know fans are gonna sit here and say, ‘Oh! Moose never got hired by this company because of his past,’ and, ‘Moose never got hired by this company because he sucks,’ and just know that I’ve been offered by every company. It’s just my decision to stay in TNA is for personal reasons, for things that I wanted to achieve that I haven’t achieved yet. It’s coming down to the road. I’m older now. I’ve achieved a lot in TNA and we’ll see when that time comes, again, what I decide to do. I know a goal of mine, just with TNA, that I’ve never done — and whoever has followed my career — I’ve been World Champion three times in TNA — actually, all my championship runs in TNA, I’ve been a bad guy. So, I want to know what the experience is being a champion as a lovable character, you know? Because I’ve never experienced that. Would I be good at it? Would I suck at it? I don’t know but that’s a goal of mine, and I hope before my time is up, whenever that is with TNA, I get to accomplish that… If I don’t in TNA, maybe I’ll accomplish it somewhere else. But, there’s still a lot of Moose to show the world; there’s still a lot of bumping and giving people bumps, flipping and doing Spanish Flys; this 6’6, 250 frame. So, I’m gonna enjoy it until the wheels fall off.”
You can check out the complete podcast below.
(H/T to Fightful for transcribing the above quotes)
