Matt Morgan was a guest on The Pain Clinic radio show this past week as he discussed everything from his bad first experience with the wrestling business, OVW, Jim Cornette's release, Brock Lesnar, and much more. The Pain Clinic runs live every Saturday morning at 10am and you can visit the link below to visit their website for archives and interviews with some of today's hottest stars. Also, Matt Morgan has now joined up with the Voice of Wrestling forums (along with others like Kevin Kelly, Dr. Tom Prichard, April Hunter, D'Lo Brown, and more) where he'll be answering your questions on a regular basis. Visit the link below to chat with Matt Morgan - his section is in the "Wrestlers Uncensored!" area on the VOW forums. Enjoy the interview and when you're done, head over there and submit your questions!
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Talk started with the hosts bringing up Matt's training in Hawaii prior to being apart of Tough Enough II. According to Matt, the experience wasn't all that great. "I had a guy by the name of Bone Crusher...that's a sweet name...he decided to take $500 of my money," Matt begins, "when I was still in college going to school, I saw something on TV saying 'If you want to be a professional wrestler, come here, we'll train you how to wrestle', so I took $500, gave it to the guy [and] never heard from him again..turned his cell phone off. I had no way of finding this guy and that's my first wrestling experience". This left a bad taste in Matt's mouth when it came to the Indies.
OVW was brought up next and the hosts asked Matt what he thought of the school and his time training there. "OVW is awesome," he said, "OVW, by far, is the best training school out there right now. What I mean by that is that they have the right teachers there teaching. Nick Dinsmore actually helped train me who's now playing Eugene. They teach you how to go in the ring and get comfortable in the ring first, not just go out there and have a scripted match talk about it for five hours before you get in the ring". Matt said it's about getting comfortable with who you are when you're working in OVW.
Speaking on being comfortable with who you're not, discussion turned to Matt's stuttering gimmick and the reaction from the fans. "They were happy to see me back, obviously, but they weren't happy to see me under that light," he explained. Being presented first as the next big thing and then being put off as a giant with a speech impediment, Morgan said it was tough to swallow for a lot of his fans and for him as well. The Blue Print was his gimmick in OVW and according to him, it was more of what Matt Morgan was all about. "It's just an over-the-top, arrogant, 7 foot, 330 pound monster who talks about how good he is [and] does things other giants wouldn't do in the ring. Things that guys my size shouldn't be doing and can't do, to be honest with you, and I'm the only one that can". After this, they decided to put a mask on him and Matt didn't understand that decision completely.
Jim Cornette being fired was brought up and Morgan thinks the Internet sensationalizes the issue too much. "Jimmy is an old-school teacher," he said, "and every single top...of the new top guys we have up there, have to some way or another attribute their success to Jimmy's teachings. Everyone you could think of that is in the main-event situation...that is young...has come to OVW and has directly got something from Jim Cornette". As far as the accusation of Cornette hitting or slapping the student, he said that he wasn't there, but he guesses the kid took it the wrong way and didn't understand Jim's way or teaching. "Jimmy will die for this business and that's what people don't understand. They misconstrue that". Matt said that he's not defending Jim's actions, if they're true, but says you can't come in this business expecting the world.
Nathan Jones was legitimately crazy, according to Matt, after being asked by host J-Lu. "My favorite riding partner of all time was Nathaniel Jones," Matt said laughing, "he's the best. He does what he wants when he wants and apparently that was his time". Matt continued by saying when Nathan walked out, he asked him where he was going and when Nathan responded, Matt honestly understood why. "He couldn't take the traveling schedule, he couldn't take the backstage antics, he couldn't take any of that stuff".
A caller asked Matt what his future would be like now that he's not with the WWE. Matt responded, "My future is actually going to be brighter because I'm going to get a chance not to play a character; I'm going to get a chance to be myself. I'm energetic, I'm a very confident person, and I never got that chance in WWE. I was portrayed as a stellar monster with Nathan Jones and then I got the chance to come in as a stuttering giant, which I knew from day one was going to be tough. So my future's going to be very bright, whether it be a TNA, whether it be overseas, whoever's smart enough to sign me right now is going to make a lot of money off of Matt Morgan". Matt also had a simple respond to whether he was going to pull a "Matt Hardy" and show back up on WWE television after his 90-day contract runs out: "Hell no".
The hosts bring up Charlie Haas blaming the writers for not having anything for him and asks Matt what he thinks about it. "It's your own job to get yourself over, I've always said, but when your wrists are tied...see, my situation is not like Charlie's situation. He was able to be Charlie Haas; I wasn't able to be Matt Morgan. I was some big retard popping Ritalin trying to learn how to talk in the middle of the ring. That's not me". Morgan said that after Carlito went to Raw, he asked what that would mean for him, but they said it was a chance for him to shine on his own and be the giant that they wanted him to be. However, Matt said that they didn't do anything with him from that point on.
Matt was more than candid on his thoughts about Brock Lesnar returning. "If the WWE released me because of that, then that was definitely the wrong way to go for them," he said, "I've only been wrestling for three years from first bump to now and I was picking it up quicker than anybody else is in OVW. I'm going to be a draw one day whether it's with WWE or not. It's their loss at the end of the day if they did that because of Brock Lesnar". He did say that Brock was a good guy and that he never did anything wrong to Matt.
[ Source: Pro Wrestling Insider ]
