Insight with Chris Van Vliet - EC3 on testing positive for COVID, WWE release, his creative control in ROH and Impact

Episode Date: December 15, 2020

EC3 talks with Chris Van Vliet from his home in Orlando, FL. He says he recently tested positive for COVID and details what the recovery process has been like, he also talks about working for both Ring of Honor and Impact Wrestling since being released from WWE in April, he discusses the films that inspired "The Narrative" video, who came up with the Ethan Carter III character in Impact Wrestling, how he was able to keep the EC3 name when he went to WWE, working as a server at The Cheesecake Factory, his favorite Cleveland quarterback of all time and much more!   Support the show by supporting our sponsors:  INDEED- Try it today with a $75 credit to boost your job post by going to http://indeed.com/BlueWire BETONLINE- Get a FREE welcome bonus by using the promo code BLUEWIRE at http://betonline.ag Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Powerful questions. Woo! This is the Chris Van Vleecho. Chris Van Vleet Show. Ladies and gentlemen. Chris. Well, good to see you. Welcome back to the Chris Van Vleet show, my friends.

This episode is brought to you by Indeed and Bet Online, and we're in for a good one. Oh, if you've been following EC3 on social media, you know that he's been doing some pretty interesting things since he was released from WWE back in April. He was part of the COVID cuts, if you will, on April 15th. We get into that and everything else that he's been up to. But if you could be so kind as to take a screenshot and share it on social media so that we know you're on this ride with us, tag me. I'm at Chris Van Vleet.

Tag EC3. He is at the real EC3. And thank you so much for just listening to the show. platform it is that you're listening on, whether it's Apple, Spotify, Castbox, Stitcher, Google, maybe you're streaming it on my website. Maybe you're streaming it on Chris Van Vlead.com. But either way, thank you. And if you are listening on Apple, I just ask that you take a few seconds out of your day

at some point and just rate and review the show. It's the biggest thing that can help in spreading the word about the show. So if you're new here, we don't charge for shoutouts like other shows do. We don't say pay us money and we'll say your name. No, just leave a review on Apple Podcasts. It's that simple. And I'll read one out on every single episode. This one comes from Max.

Max that's spelled M-A-K-S, Max 1721, who says, Awesome Podcast. I actually listened to this podcast on Spotify, but I had to leave a review for the best in the world at what he does. Chris is the most positive person. Every conversation that he has, he makes the guest feel like they've been best friends for years. In my opinion, Chris is on the same level as Joe Rogan.

They make the day fly by and ask the best questions. Thank you for putting out amazing content. Well, thank you, sir. I appreciate the Joe Rogan comparison, but in no way is that accurate. He's, I mean, he is the actual best in the world at this. and I think that anyone who has a podcast hopes that they can be, you know, even 10% as good as Joe Rogan and make, you know, 1% of the money that he makes.

I mean, it's a really amazing what he's done with what was a hobby that he's now turned into, you know, this incredibly lucrative job, like eight figures, right? Eight figures is what he makes. Well, no, he makes nine figures as a podcaster every year. Wow! I just thought of that right now. Incredible. But speaking of 1%, I didn't even plan to do that. But today on the show, we have the pleasure of sitting down with the top 1%er himself, EC3. And he's been on a really interesting journey from NXT twice in its early years to Impact, back to NXT, then to the main roster, back to Impact.

And now he's splitting his time with both Impact and Ring of Online. honor where he's created a very interesting world with the narrative. And he's all about controlling his narrative, which is something that he doesn't feel like he was able to do with WWE. But now he has the creative freedom to do whatever he wants, wherever he wants. And he's originally from Cleveland. I lived in Cleveland for five years. I worked as the entertainment reporter for the CBS affiliate there, WIO. So you'll have to forgive us because we spend a little bit of time reminiscing about Cleveland and talking about the Cleveland Browns, because they're having their best season in decades.

Hopefully we didn't jinx it by talking about, you know, how great their season's been here. But by the way, he also admits in this interview that he recently tested positive for COVID. So don't worry. This interview was done virtually. He was in Florida. I was in California.

I am in California. But I'm certainly wishing him a speedy recovery. And hopefully we can see him back in the ring very, very soon. So here we go. Ladies and gentlemen, EC3. This is finally happening. EC3, ladies and gentlemen, I appreciate you making the time to do this. Thank you for having me, and I apologize for the cat-mouse games. I've been playing with you for six months, but this is finally happening.

Kind of an independent third party has brought us together, but I really wanted to save you for a specific time frame. And it seems like this is the right time because, first off, I don't like talking about it. myself, even though I'm a complete narcissist, demented what I would say. But secondly, you have a great reach in a vast different arena that I know nothing about, like YouTube and stuff like that. So I just thought when I was figuring out YouTube, you'd be a good play there. And, you know, I only like to do significant interviews with significant people. So like, like Sean Ross, Mike Johnson.

You did Jericho. Jericho, any of the high-level pro wrestling podcast. And you yourself, I always viewed as on that level. It was just a matter of time. And I didn't want to hammer the same points by doing three interviews. I like to spread the wealth a little bit. So yes, it's finally happening. Well, I appreciate the kind words.

I saw you in person. What was that? I guess it would have been almost three months ago. Yeah. North Richland Hills, Texas for the Independent Wrestling Expo, which it was great to see you in person. You are, I mean, we see you on TV and we can see that you're a large man. But then when you meet you in person, you're like, yeah, though, that's a,

that's a bodybuilder that happens to also wrestle. Isn't it like, yeah, I think I really dialed in pandemic. I've always been training my ass off, always. I mean, ever since I started this. So for 20 plus years, like I've dedicated my life to the gym. But ironically enough, I thought I knew it all and I didn't. And until I started hooking up with this one coach trainer, he aesthetically like made me go to a next level.

And I was already jacked, tanned, and ripped. And then now I'm just on a whole other level. And I found it via the pandemic, ironically enough, training with him, A.J. Sims, aka Cement Factory on Instagram. But, yeah, but I like, when you wrestle, aesthetics are very important, but also performance is important. So you can't let one go without the others. So sometimes being super jacked sucks because you can't move. So I try to keep a nice balance. But you asked me before we started how much I weigh.

Yeah, what do you weigh right now? I want you to guess, and then I want us to discuss it. Okay. I would guess after meeting you, and this was two months ago, I would guess you're like probably close to 240, 235? Legitimate weight this morning, and I had a sushi pig fest yesterday because it was leg day. I was 2.13. No way.

Yeah. Like, I'm real lean, I guess. I'm real freaking lean. So you have veins coming out of every part of your arm as you sit there. Yeah, because you saw me stand up with my little short blues on. If your shorts got any shorter, I don't think we'd be able to put this on YouTube. At Young L.A. Thank you for the camo swag.

But I actually bought these for Black Friday. But regardless, yes. So I'm way lighter than people think, which is cool. So my build weights like 24. If I was 240, I wouldn't fit in that screen. And I wouldn't be able to move. And you look like your body fat must be what, 5% right now? I would assume I'm walking around in the 5 or 6 range.

And how many calories are you eating a day? I would say I eat more than ever now too, working with this guy. This guy, my dear friend. I would say 35, 100-ish. And I eat. Yeah. And I used to starve myself, too, and like go keto or do intermittent fasting or things like that. And he's very instinctive, AJ, at the cement factory.

And he really dialed me in. And ironically enough, I get better results eating things like bagels, fucking rice, cereal, low fat. I need to get with this guy. My God. He's the best. It's literally the best. I've been eating chicken breasts and rice and spinach for the last several months. Yeah, I guess the key is to not serve yourself.

You have to feed the activity, which I didn't know. Like, I was always weak and emaciated and, like, angry. Now I'm just angry for other reasons. But it's with a full belly, at least. But, yeah, what was I going to say? Two in the training front, because I balanced nine million different things. And he's inspired me so much, like, I'm going to be getting into an aspect of, of training people, one via an app for like beginners and intermitting people and then possibly

taking on high level, like, you know, more advanced people as like personal clientele, project narrative, I'll call it, probably. But like only 10 people, just because I have an interest in it, I enjoy it thoroughly, but it's not why I'm here. It's not why we're interviewing, but it's just something extra I can do. And plus, the great thing about being free is you can do other things. hypothetically. Right.

Was this also you thinking about life post wrestling as well? Yeah, for sure. Yeah, so I think like that. The pandemic put that in perspective because we didn't know if we're going to have wrestling. Fortunately, everything's been able to level out a little bit. But yeah, it's just doing it for so long

and putting so many hours and efforts into it, it doesn't hurt to think on something else and think on something else. By no meaning of my nearly done wrestling, but if I could bring what I've learned through life to other people, making money. You know, making money is cool, too. But mostly to like the betterment of humanity and society

and those that have kind of followed my journey. That's cool. Yeah, well, you're in an interesting spot right now. You know, you are released with the COVID releases from WWE, but you're in an interesting spot because you showed up an impact and everyone went, ah, he's back in impact. Right. Makes sense.

EC3's back in impact. Then we saw you make some appearances in Ring of Honor. And yeah, you're kind of doing what you want to do. You literally are free. You are free EC3. I definitely wanted to be free and experience different things and kind of take a completely new direction with me. I felt wrestling itself, especially in the mainstream,

was just too much. We're trying to hide from what's going on. We're a soft distract. And that's cool. That's one way to do it, despite the fact we're firing 30 plus people during the most trying and confusing time in our history. So, you know, we're still a business and we're ruthless and whatever. It's fine. But that did change me as this pandemic has probably changed everybody. So I just wanted to tell my story of change through the great medium of professional wrestling, sports entertainment, use social media to do it. And then fortunately, when that 90 days, came up. Impact was there. Ringavano was there. They were free to allow me to kind of play around into both and just I want to do something different and different selling. I mean, look what happened with EW and Impact. Yeah. Just this week or last week, the numbers, like, people are intrigued by different things and intermingling of different worlds. And I think we'd be remiss as a wrestling

universe to not understand. There's multiple different avenues of multiple different towns, multiple different companies, they could mix and match and people will be intrigued and the business improves. Well, I think that people maybe don't necessarily realize that Ring of Honor and impact don't have like this working relationship. You're just, you're an independent contractor. You can work for both companies. I creatively negotiated and I did it on the 4th of July and I had this iPad. I had like a little office going and I was like, scratching my head and I'll do this house for the work.

And what I want to do here and what I want to do there. And I was very happy with both. So we'll see what happens in the new year because eventually one has to give, like I will have to become one with an entire organization. But in the meantime, while the world's crazy and you can take advantage changing climate on the daily, I just wanted to do something different.

I just so bad I want to do stuff that's different. Yeah. This promo that you cut in Ring of Honor, it was so good. It was almost like a monologue. And I feel like a lot of what you're doing right now is very inspired by film. But that promo that you cut felt like a monologue,

number one, because there wasn't a crowd there. But number two, just the way that you did it, the points that you hit on, it was so good. In the arena one, right? Yes. Thank you. Because having no crowd is so you don't know if something's good or bad, succeeding or failing. And then in hindsight, I think not having the crowd, like you said, it was a monologue.

It was very interesting. It was very unique. And I was very proud of that. But then doing it, like in the midst of doing it, you're always self-reflecting in the moment. I'm like, does this suck? Is this any good? Especially when you're done and you go to the back and, like, they're running a bare-bones crew because they're taking the proper precautions with COVID,

so there's not a lot of people around. There's no immediate feedback either. So you walk back and I'm like, I performed. I mean, how was it? But it seems to have gotten good reviews, so I appreciate the kind of words. And what's great about a ring of honor is they allow talent to create. So they didn't very much trust in me.

And this is our first time working together to go out there and do me. And I thank them for that. because doing me, I can do the best me possible. So uninterrupted and the trust they had and it worked out. And thank you for that because I was proud of that one. It was good. You should be proud of that. You've been doing some great work with Jay Briscoe,

which was supposed to have a payoff at Final Battle, but it doesn't sound like that's going to happen anymore. Are you talking about the rasping my voice perhaps? You've always had a raspy voice. Are you alluding that I may have been under the worst? weather and the reason my hair is so long and my beard's so misshaping is because I've been quarantined for gives or take a week to 10 days. Yeah. At this point, I have COVID and I'm at the tail end of it and it sucked a little bit. Some of it wasn't bad. I'm healthy, so I was fortunate.

In fact, my parents who were visiting me. Whoops. So they had to stay longer. So I had to stay longer. So I've had no alone time and no solitude, which drove me nuts. But besides that, we had actually a great time, spending time together. So it's cool. And then I'm at the tail end of it and we'll be healthy, but Ring of Honor caught it via the protocol in their testing. Oh, that's great. Yeah. So what they're doing is working well.

And I will miss that match. And I don't want to because I really want to fight Jay Briscoe. And I do want to find if honor is real. And I do plan on finding it founders real in January. So how do you feel as you sit here right now? Like, are you 90%? Are you 99%? How is this?

I would say, I would say a solemn 90. I would say 90% of COVID. I laughed in his face and said, but you're a healthy guy. And I think that if you're a healthy person, like it doesn't affect you in the same way. But you're not real. Yeah, I'd say about 90%.

And, uh, This is the tail end of it. I had none of the respiratory issues. Kind of felt like the flu and a moderately bad cold for some of the times. I would say one day I might have overdone it on my carb load or I was sick with COVID and it attacked my stomach because I was farting way too much. I would say one day I had like a real bad set of chills or I had double hoodie. I talked about how cold floor it was. It's not cold.

You're right. I'm a coward for St. Florida cold. I like to call it Florida cold because if it gets like if the temperature begins with a seven, everyone in Florida is like, ooh. Yeah. It began with a four, believe it or not. So I had some shows. You're in central Florida. So I guess that's okay.

And then one night I woke up and had a 10 minute respiratory cough that was like, I get why this sucks now. And it was like, whoa, I felt like I was breathing fire for like 10 minutes. And then I've been fine ever since. I guess the hardest thing, though, for you is like the gym is so much a part of your life. And now you can't go to a gym. I will tell you what. I didn't miss only one day of training. Fortunately, before you guys break out, I have access to private facilities where I trained aloud.

So I was able to keep some semblance of my routine. Plus, if I don't work out, I don't get to eat the way I like to eat. So I kind of have to force myself to work. out. But, and I didn't feel bad through the workouts. Like I took it easy. I took it easy. I took it light. Just moved around, sweated it out a little bit, but it was completely 100% alone.

Social distance by miles upon miles in the dump. And my garage, my garage cardio room, which I call the, what I call now the pig trough? Because you do cardio when you feel like a pig. And, yeah, I was able to keep some, I needed to get out. I'm glad you're on the men, though. I'm glad that you're feeling better. We're going to see you back in the ring, hopefully in January to figure out if honor is real in Ring of Honor.

Yes. It's a dire question we need answering. So out of all the promotions, out of all the things we talk about within the wrestling world and the art form or the pure combat sport that is wrestling, Ring of Honor is the best wrestling in the world. And is there still honor within the ring? I don't know.

I'm dying to find out. I know this is not honor outside the wing. I've been in many places that have shown me that fact, but his honor still exists within the ring. Right. We'll see. It's very interesting to see this version of EC3 because the EC3 that's sitting here with me right now

is not Ethan Carter the 3. And did that transition happen when you left Impact Wrestling? Is that when it really changed? Yeah, I think leaving impact, I like to change. And I don't like to rest on the world. So coming from Impact, going back to NXT, although I had a brand and an identity,

it was a little difference that I kind of wanted, I don't know, I would call the character the idea sort of a... It's called when a movie relaunches. You have the Fantastic Four. It sucks. I'll reboot it a little bit because, obviously, some of the intangibles with the character will have to change being in the WW universe,

but also at the same time, it's Nome, it's popular, It's brandist identity, and I could expand on it within the realm, so it would be cool. But then again, I'm just rehashing the best of, and I never felt right and comfortable, and I had this idea that I wanted to do, this kind of this nohistic psycho boy, that won my website, www.freec3.com, sort of Durden-esque, culty kind of leader talking about the evidence of truth and your purpose and finding yourself and within the realms of combat and fighting and stuff like that. So I pitched that.

Instead of that, going with that, I wound up getting called up. And then now we're rebooting a reboot that nobody has a vested interest in. And the rest is a mediocre history. Yeah, you went from this, I mean, this deep character that we're seeing now with the narrative to them basically telling you you couldn't speak. Yeah.

It doesn't make any sense. Whatever. You don't need to talk about this too much, but you're such a great promo guy. Who was it that thought you shouldn't speak? Vince. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah.

I would have thought somebody within the thing of being, I mean, it's probably what he's good at. I don't know. Maybe they wanted to see something else. maybe they want to take away your best tool to make you rely on other things at the same time to rely on other things you need to have them behind you to do it. So I don't know, it sucked. Do you feel like maybe the way that you look being a body guy, if you will, kind of worked in your detriment in WWA?

Maybe to an extent, but yeah, I don't know. That's not a bad way to look at it. because as a body guy, you know, a body guy is more predominantly a heel. It was kind of like a white meat, baby-faced body guy, and it just wasn't going to work, especially going in there against guys like Ambrose at the time,

who's had an illustrious seven, eight-year run, being on top. The audience identifies with him. They've been with him. Since day one, they've seen him fight through battle, all these things have great matches and he's supposed to kind of portray an antagonist

why would they want to boo a guy they know and love over some jacked up guy who can't speak so yeah I mean it was just kind of a weird situation that sucked and maybe I could have done a better job fighting

for myself maybe I could have done something else or brought something else to the table immediately I mean I tried to pitch things but regardless it did not work and that's okay because that set me up to do this now, which kind of what I wanted to always do, I had the freedom to do from the very beginning by myself

before somebody else became involved. Control your narrative. I was able to tell my story through, unfortunately, a world-changing pandemic and job loss and an economy crash and millions of people becoming sick or millions of people becoming unemployed. I mean, it sucks. Hopefully we're at the time.

tail end of it to be determined, but using that real world to push an idea I had a while ago that I bleed in heavily, revamp it, kind of create what I'm doing now. And to have that idea be sought after as opposed to what I did in the past, my both impact and Ring of Honor was very encouraging. I've noticed it resonates with people in a different way, but I also, my platform's only so big where I need to expand upon it via other platforms. And And therefore you add in other people that are now controlling part of that narrative. So some of it will get lost in what you actually want to do. But at the same time, it's a creative battle.

And hopefully the best answers win. What path do you think you were headed down if the pandemic hadn't happened? If you weren't released because of COVID, what was going to happen at the EC3 character in WWE? I was going to force her hand to do this. Or I was going to, I don't want to be the guy who's like, oh, it's going to. I was going to ask for my release anyway. I was fired me, thanks. Like, no, I mean, the only thing that kept me there was the fact that I'm like,

oh, man, there is a pandemic. My parents own a small business. My family might need it. Like, I can't pass up money. That's, we don't know what the world's going to be like. Be careful for anything. But around that rest of the time, I was coming back from a pretty serious concussion that cost me about five or six months and really changed my life and really made me think on this character

because I felt everything I said for real during that time as kind of a case study in myself creating that and writing eventually things I said in promos but I would have tried to force my hand doing this or doing something different like I pitched this idea I pitched this idea like well too I mean a well-rout thing that looks like a I mean I'm a decent I was typing it up. Real great thing. And I included a promo with it. And I sent it in on a Wednesday.

And two hours later, I got fired the day I sent in this magnificent, in my estimation pitch. So, I mean, the first thing was, oh, I'm actually okay with this. This is fine. Don't worry about it. I'll be okay. And then I just posted the pitch and the promo to the world. So at least, worst case, the only thing I didn't want was people to think I sat around and did nothing. because that's who I am, and I don't think anybody should do it.

Whether you win or lose, as long as you try, if you put everything into it, it's a success. You don't fail unless you quit, and I would never quit. So, yeah, I think that's a... Are you paid out during those... Are you paid out during those 90 days? Yeah. Oh, okay.

Well, then you're able to find a spot to land. You've found a few places to land, which is great. I heard you mention a few times this concussion. What specifically caused this? this. Is it a match we can go back and check out? It was a live event that caught the last one. We can start. It's kind of a three-pronged story. Okay. One was takeover, Brooklyn, with a Velveteen Dream, where I was DDTed on a ramp, and I don't remember anything until I woke up in a trainer's room and just staring at Michael

Hayes's jacket. And they're like, do you know where you are? And I vividly remember this. I was like, Oh, shit. No. Like, oh, no. Like, not one of these. Because, you know, they're bad, but sometimes you get knocked and it comes right back. And I'm like, this sucks. So I don't remember the match, which sucks, because that's a big platform.

A couple, maybe I come back from them, maybe six weeks later, I got caught with a knee in the back of the head. In an NXT match, which, I mean, that's the second one in two months. and how we're going to be really cautious. And then that's the point where I really started to put this together. Like, maybe this thing's snakebitten, my revamp of a reboot, let's try something completely different. I have all these great ideas. And I'd love to do anything else for what I'm doing because I want a new challenge.

I know how to do this. It's easy. Yeah. But let MJF do it. He can have. Fine. That's fine. But while I was out, I got called up with the concussion.

And it felt weird. But anytime I've been. injured. It wasn't how long until I'm healthy. It's always how long until I could be back. And I probably came back too soon, but I was getting called up. This is the moment I waited for my whole life. This is all I've ever wanted.

I get called up with it. The run is what it is. I think a few months down the road, a live event match. I got caught with a luchador flying forearm or something. It kind of knocked me silly, but I kept trying to work with it because I didn't think it was what it was. And then one day I showed up

the TV. Fish white, ghost white pale, and if I'm not tan, something's wrong. If I don't have my lovely human glow and then, are you all right? And I'm like, I don't know. This is kind of feel like this. Take the test. I'm concussed. I'm like, oh, it doesn't look, no.

Go through the protocol. But coming back through the protocol, I couldn't pass the test these times. It was very difficult. So there was, they actually have a physical therapist available, which I'm very grateful for, to help you with sensory things to get through this after a while if you can't come back

and then a psychiatry too because there was something like dopamine not releasing in my brain so I was just a mess and then I was just alone in this sweet one-percenter apartment in downtown Orlando like living

I am now at the king of the world but then I'm just living there like a recluse sitting on my couch miserable and like brain dead. And in the dark, right? In the dark, for sure. Yeah. That's a big concussion thing. Yeah. TV couldn't even stay on because it hurt my brain.

Yeah, so it sucked for a long time. Do you still have residual effects now? Because, I mean, that's not something that just disappears. I would say the only thing I would ever notice is if I go to Universal and go on a ride, I feel like, but I would see the residual effects. I don't know if there was a change in psyche. and mentality and stuff like that, perhaps.

But I would say as far as physically being able to perform within the ring safely to myself and to an opponent, I have no residual effects. I've been able to do that fine. So did it make me crazier? Maybe. But like I'm not risking myself performing. Yeah.

I got to say, I was very, very impressed with the narrative. The extended narrative, it's like a short film. 20 minutes long, beautifully written, incredibly shot. How long after your release did you start taking the steps to make this thing happen? And clearly you must know some sort of filmmaker

because this looks amazing. Well, it's, no, it's me and my buddy. But thank you for that. Originally, because we started creating this character using a wall to shoot the promos, I knew it in 90 days something would have to give

because we had a countdown on the website. And I didn't know what that was to be. Am I going to show up somewhere? Does this even align with anybody's programming? What if it aligns with this show and I don't show up there? What if this 90 days goes by and then nothing happened? So as a fail state, my friend and partner within the narrative, JC, suggested we do a cinematic match. And I was like, that's a good idea.

Yeah. We do a match. We do a match is ideas to make it look like a music video in the first half to sell our theme song and all the stuff we've done and kind of tell the story. the next half is just basically, in my view, was to have my debut match because I don't know where I'm going to go or who I'm going to be with, but sometimes fans need to see what this guy does

when you debut a new character. There needs to be that one match with the guy. Here's the shit I do. This is what makes me different. Here's who I am. And I knew that if I go back to Impact, I'm right in a main angle probably. If I go anywhere, I'm right involved with somebody

where you're going to have to have have 50-50 kind of matches. So nothing you do special or unique if you never establish it. So I wanted to establish what the character did. So upon the 90 days, we shot a long entrance, the bunch of stock footage. We shot two matches and we shot other people, like how people were joining the narrative and just reciting some of the horseshit we would say. upon the release of it,

it fell on the same day as Slammiversary for Impact. So I was like, if I release this at midnight on Friday, that's the 90-day end. People could talk about it. And then by the end of Saturday night, on the last thing on Impact, people could talk about that. That's kind of a cool bookend way to do business.

So we released it and it's cool, but we definitely kept it a short version because, let's be honest, attention spans are not what they used to be. And I'm as guilty as anybody. I'm actually shocked if anybody's still watching this from the initial five minutes. They're going to watch and listen to this whole thing. Yeah, long when YouTube interviews do good,

especially when they have some charismatic host. So they'll probably watch this. But basically, it's a demo for what the character is, a recap of all the story of myself I was telling, and then hopefully the direction going in the future. So we released the initial one at six minutes, just selling the music, selling the music video vibe with the get overmatch.

Then I'm in Impact, and there's plans to keep doing stuff on the side with this. That's why we filmed the second match, which was part of my deal with going back to Impact, was I wanted to use Moose within the universe, because I know I'm going to go work with Moose, and Moose is a human being. I have a lot of faith and value in,

and I think could be a very high-level superstar within wrestling. I just think he needs somebody to get it out of them. So knowing what I can do for myself, I was like, I think I can do this for other people. Hopefully I can do that for him. So I know I'm going to work with him in impact. Why doesn't a couple months down the road before we actually work, he comes into my world, learns a lesson about finding himself and his purpose,

and then we pay it off with a match at Bound for Glory, but they wanted to change things up so we just had to match a ball for glory, which was sort of a cinematic style match. So now we're sitting on this match and we never see the end of the light of day. We have all this extra footage. We have this giant story

that could kind of encompass it, why not put together a master, master demo reel of what the narrative is and then sell that to people and create something that could be content that exists within this wrestling world. Yeah. but we kind of

manipulate and create. So maybe people want to come within here. Maybe indie guys starving for an opportunity want to come to the narrative. It's basically a project mayhem. Yes, we stole from Fight Club. Who cares? Everyone else has.

I can lie to you. But yeah, creating that was really important. We have a cinematographer named Manuel and my partner and slash director, JC, spent a lot of time creating it. And I kind of wrote the story to kind of fit what's happening within the world, but my happen to me within it. And then they made me look like a super fucking hero origin story.

And I'm very proud of them for putting in the war because they busted their ass. And then if people could see it, that would be great. Yeah, I mean, you keep referencing Fight Club, but I don't feel like it's just Fight Club that influenced this. I feel like there's a lot of different films that influenced the look of this. For sure. 100%. That was the main basis at first, but I noticed we've gone far away from it, which is good because we, I mean, nothing is original anymore.

Everything's kind of a copy of a copy. At some point, so you find something you like, you take that, and then you expung upon it and make it and create your own. It's the same thing with wrestling. I'm not original or unique. I'm the combination of my five favorite wrestlers, and I pick and choose certain things from each one, but I make it my own, and then I'm a unique entity. So, yeah, it's definitely not a complete ripoff.

I'm very curious to know how... Well, underground is a complete rip-off. There it is. I'm very curious to know how inspired you are by American Psycho. I mean, your first character's name was Bateman. You're wearing Psycho Boy on your shirt right now. Did that really factor into things? That always has been, just the book and the character, have always fascinated me,

especially the movie. Christian Bales is a stuff. I noticed not the serial killer parts of it, but like the personality traits. I'm like, I got them. Unfortunately, I like this person. I'm a terrible human. My mom, you're always in a bad mood.

I'm like, jeez, Emma. But yeah, it's very heavily influenced a lot of the stuff I did. But what I really loved about that is the ambiguity. You don't know what's real and you don't know what's made up. So it's kind of like to portray it the narrative. Make your own decision. take it in for what it is and then think of it, however you want.

Every time I watch American Psycho, and I watched it maybe six months ago when this pandemic was just getting started, and it ended and I went, oh, yeah, what actually happens there? It's a book, the book's real weird, too. I haven't read the book. Oh, if you can get past the 40-minute descriptions of his outfits every chapter, The actual, like, Brett Eastonel's words are, they're beautiful.

Like, it's really quote worthy. And a lot of stuff, like, I'll take certain things sent from certain places and kind of manipulated to make it my own. And then that's a big influence. I don't know if I should show you this, but I probably should. Now you have to. Okay. Oh, here we go. We're going on a tour of the 1% apartment.

Well, it was. Now it's the dungeon of filth. I gave up the 1% lifestyle up. All right. So I'm going to walk in my bedroom, right? And I wish this was hung up correctly, but I'm going to be in my bed. We're not judging. We're not judging.

So if you could see that. Oh, wow. My bed. Yeah, Patrick Bateman. Blood splatter framed. Yeah. Wow. I know, right?

Yeah, that's badass. So obviously I'm going to hit up the ladies and come over and this far. Well, it's better than being like that scene in American Psycho where he's looking in the mirror right before he kills them. Yeah. Oh, that's great.

Yeah. And I imagine you just have Huey Lewis in the news playing all the time. Nonstop. We got my five-disc CD player switching it over. Occasionally Whitney Houston comes on. It's a studio by Philips. Collins, you know the hits.

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yeah, this film or that film really influenced my character, really influenced my wrestling style. I love hearing this because now it makes so much sense. Yeah. And I think, too, with wrestling, there's so many... Wrestling has a tendency to be one-dimensional,

you know, especially with character development, and especially when other people are involved creatively. So finding something you can take of that has depth and overrelevant and originality and making it your own. I think it's important, you know? I think wrestling fans are smarter than offices, let them believe. Oh, absolutely.

And wrestling fans are way smarter now than they were 20, 30 years ago. I think they crave something with some depth and originality. Yeah. I, like, it's shades of gray. It's not black and white. There are times it can be black and white. Like, I think great storytelling is done. through. I reference Marvel in a different interview, but it kind of makes sense. Like,

if I watch Avengers, I get it already because the characters are pretty one to two dimensional. But if I saw the movies leading up to it, now I know the intricacies of each one, and there's a lot of depth for me as a person that's really paying attention. So playing to both those audiences, I think, is important. Did you always want to be a pro wrestler as a kid? Unfortunately, yeah. I don't know. I couldn't hit a baseball. I would rather have been a baseball player. But no, it's something I wanted to do as a kid.

And then I wanted to do still in high school. And in high school, like, I was still cool. Played sports and did other things, but I was secretly like this giant wrestling nerd on the side. I just didn't tell a lot of people except for my. I mean, we're the same age, so this is the height of the attitude era. Yes. Very much so.

And then going to college aimlessly, and I'm like, really sucks. I'd rather try wrestling. So, yeah, like it never left me. And then still to this day, after all the hell and furies and pains and aches and tragedies and successes and pluses and minuses and heartbreak. I still love it. Where in Cleveland did you grow up? I lived in Cleveland for five years.

I was right downtown. I was on West 9th Street. But where did you grow up? east of it, Willoughby. Okay, yeah. When were you there? You mentioned 2013, I think. I was there 2010 to the start of 2015.

And I saw you wrestle right before you debuted for Impact at AIW. I went home for that one show, I think. Was that where the beach falls were coming out? That's it, yeah. And you still had the long hair, like the Derek Bateman hair. And I just remember you... I know I just cut it because I just cut it right before I got... Oh, okay.

first time. So it was normal here, not this. I sort of being like, that guy's jacked. Yeah, not looking at me. I'm even more jacked. It's incredible. Even more grizzled. No, but yeah, that was a good show and it was fun to go home and I knew where I was going. So it's cool to at least have one return home moment before the next chapter starts. So it was nice to go back to the roots of where it started, which was Cleveland and very interesting enough in that same building. Yeah.

My first matches ever took place in that building, and then here I was, kind of defeated and kind of mad at the world and upset and broken and beaten, but at the same time, know that I'm not going to let anybody tell me what I can and can do, especially these psychos and took over FCW. There's a lot of people that come out of AIW that are doing big things now. I mean, you were wrestling there with Johnny Gargano, you were wrestling there with Matt Cross. Of course, they didn't wrestle there, but the Ms. Dolf Ziegler, also from Cleveland. Like, what's in that Lake Erie Water? It's produced so many great wrestlers.

I wonder myself. I think if you notice every one of those has like a quirk and a unique personality. Yeah. Me included, I feel my honest assessment is that when you grow up your whole life, being disappointed in your favorite teams, always, you know, sucking or blowing it when it matters the most that you are unflappable. You can take anything. You can withstand the absolute worst because you've already been through it. And you can kind of like shrug it off. But you also have like, you know, being a Midwestern, there is a work ethic that comes

with it. Like there is a grinded out blue collar style. Like there is a independence. Like I'll take it upon myself to make something happen. I'm not going to let anybody else tell me how to live my life and do my thing. I'm going to do it. And I think that encompasses the Cleveland attitude. And our river caught on fire.

Like, who does that? There's a direct correlation between how cold the weather is and how much you watch sports and love sports. I mean, think about it. Green Bay, Cleveland, Buffalo, Detroit. The list can go on and on and on. Great sports city. Chicago.

Great sports cities. Tampa, Arizona, San Diego. Not much. Yeah. I remember when I moved to Tampa, I was like, 40,000 people in this football stadium, and they just won a Super Bowl. Yeah.

You know? Because there's other stuff to do there. Yeah, but like, what's more fun than baking in the sun, tailgating? I think a lot of people would say going to the beach is more fun. Yeah. I guess. I'll never forget.

So I lived in Miami for five years. I'll never forget getting into. an Uber. I had tickets for, I think it was week three of the Dolphins, got a new an Uber, and the Uber driver goes, oh, go to the stadium. What's going on there? Like, the Dolphins game? You know, I remember, yeah, I went to a Miami-U game, and I'm like, college football rules. This is going to be awesome and chaos. And it was like half full. And it was like the second game of the season, so they weren't, I was like, I've been to Ohio State like games and Big Ten matchups and freezing cold and Ohio State went in and we're flipping cars over and getting tear gas.

Like I've done that. That's awesome. This is, yeah, right. Well, look, I'm still a Browns fan and the Browns are giving us something actually cheer about this year. At this juncture, they are nine. Nine and three. Yeah, that's crazy, right? And up until the Tennessee game, I said this is the worst. eight and three team of all time. But then they had the blowout first half and I'm like, you know what? All right.

And then it came pretty close and I was like, I'm not sold on them. But I've been heartbroken so many times like until they beat Baltimore and Pittsburgh. That's it. Pittsburgh, yeah. I saw some stat the other day that Baker Mayfield just beat the record for the most wins in First Energy Stadium. And the record previously held by Ben Rothlessburg. burger. That sucks. Do you think Baker's the real deal?

I'm undecided. I had to interview with Kevin Eck, who's a huge Baltimore fan when I was in Ring of Honor and we talked about, he's like, so how matter you passed on Lamar Jackson? It's like, honestly, for his sake, I'm glad the Browns didn't take him because if the Browns took him,

he would have been catastrophically ruined by now. I think Baker had the makeup to deal with the chaos more so than Lamar. And Lamar's more finesse Baker could handle more shit, hypothetically. I'm not saying Baker's better or worse, so don't freak out people. I'm just stating an opinion. But I think the great first season where he was disciplined,

and then for some reason they wanted to change coaches, even though with the new coach who was not Hugh Jackson, and they were, they played well. Like, why changed it there works? Because for Cleveland and we suck. That's why. Get out of here, guy that's doing well. Let's bring this unproven guy from Alabama.

Okay. Then, like, I think there was a regression because Baker was given too much too soon. Now I was like, I'm the king of the castle. Guess what? People figured you out. It's harder. Now we're on season three where there's flashes of brilliance and then there's kind of like, so I still think there's time to decide whether he's,

for real or not, but I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt. Because a lot of people turned on him until he threw four touchdowns in the first half last week. I always knew he was the number one pick. Cleveland fans are hypocrites, too. Big time, huge. Really bad sometimes. So, yeah, he can be upper level.

Who's the best Cleveland quarterback, in your opinion? Of all time, Bernie Cozard. Yeah. Well, that's because we grew up with him. Otto Graham was probably the best. Okay. Yeah. I lived very close to that storefront in downtown Cleveland that had the jersey.

All the quarterback since 1999, and it was like 10 feet long, this list. Who did you think was going to be good that turned out to be as awful as possible? Oh, my gosh. I was... When everyone was getting on the Derek Anderson train because of that one season, he's got a cannon. Yeah? Look, no.

And then I'm like, he's going to throw an interception when it matters the most. and then, I mean, they're 10 and 6 and didn't make the playoffs because he blew it. That was their best season since they, you know, move back to Cleveland. I would say Brady Anderson, I thought should have been better than you. Brady Quinn? Yeah, Brady Quinn was a baseball guy. I thought Brady Quinn should have been way better than he was. I think, too, he was a victim of the circumstances.

I think he would have been better sitting a year in a functional program. So I think he got screwed because he was fun to watch Notre Dame and talented. And a leader, he seemed like a leader, which I do think Baker is too. He's kind of got a I mean, we can go down the list. I also thought Johnny Mansell had a chance to be good. I remember when he was drafted and my dad's like, oh my God, they got Mansell. And I said, well, he's an asshole, but he's our asshole now. He's like, you know what, you're right? And then a year later, he's like, no, he's just an asshole. He's sorry. Yeah, you're right. I think that Who was the, why can't I think of his name?

Who came after Brandon Whedon, who was from Cleveland, shaved head. Oh. You know what I'm talking about? The one that backed up Tom Brady for so long? Yes, and he was like, and they were seven and four or something. Why can't I remember his name? I can't. Yeah, everyone, like, listening to this right now is like, come on, you know exactly who it is.

I'm going to Google it. By all means, that's what the Internet is for. That is what the Internet is for. It's amazing, the wealth of human knowledge and information is your palm your hands. Well, it's so funny because I heard someone reference this earlier. It used to be what you know. Now it's what you do with what you know. Oh, that's good.

Because think about it. In the 80s, 90s, 70s, anytime before that, it was, oh, call up Uncle Tom, Uncle Joe, whatever. He knows everything. Now we all know everything. It's just, what do you do with that knowledge? I'm going to steal that quote. I'm going to tweet it after this interview.

I'm going to do hashtag control your news. narrative and free C3, and I'm going to give you none of the credit. That's fine. Brian Hoyer! Yeah. Also, you know, RG3 was on the team. From suffering ACL surgeries, like, I really wanted him to come in and he had that year off.

He has all the potential of the world. Like, I really wish it worked out. But I think every name mentioned besides Hoyer, Hoyer was maybe a mid- level talent who just excelled because he's leader and smart, but a guy like Mansell or RG3, like seemingly not like crazy talented, but

bad system, just bad system after bad system. It's hard to fault them unless you know the full story, I guess. Yeah. I think. Growing up in Cleveland, did I hear you referenced that you worked at the Cheesecake

Factory? Yeah, you did. Cracker Park? Yeah, no. That was the west side one. I went to the east side one in Linnhurst, Beachwood, Legacy Village. Were you a server? Oh, yeah. Okay.

I mean, it's so difficult going into Cheesecake Factory because the menu is like a Bible. It's like 40 pages. Absurd. What is the top item? What was the top item that got ordered the most when you worked? I feel, first off, let me harken back to me working. working in white pants, a white apron, a white shirt, and a poorly tied tie.

Okay, I'm a pro wrestler on the weekends, but I'm also serving hot tea to old ladies on the weekdays. What a weird life I'm living. I'm working double shifts. I'm doing two days in the gym across the street between shifts to become this wrestler, to save money to go to tryouts and things like that. Chicken Madeira, I feel like was a big seller.

The chicken Madeira. I would say cheesecake-wise anytime the pumpkin stuff came out was a big one but yeah the regular cheesecake and what was the other cheesecake

that was so popular it was disgusting Trace Leschet maybe Oh yeah okay I'd go there and just eat the bread I'm like I'll take five loves of that please I had a tough time especially on Saturdays

working doubles like it's socks it's hard but you're making good money and then you don't get to eat. And I'm like, guys, like, I'm trying to grow. I'm trying to bulk up. A little bit of the fed. And they had this chicken artichoke soup on Saturdays,

and I would pour it a little thing, and I would take a half a load of that brown bread and just dip it in there. I'll show me in my face, wipe it off, and then serve people gigantic portions. Do you know how many calories is in a piece of fudge cake there? I did the math. I'm going to guess it's well over a thousand.

It was 2,500. Oh, my God. I don't know. I think I might get a cease and desist from CCF Incorporated after letting that out. We did the math in the back. I'm like, oh, my, oh, my, good, yeah. Wow. And then think about eating that off of, first off of, you come in, you're getting a drink possibly.

Maybe it's a Diet Coke. Maybe it's a strawberry lemonade. Then you're getting the bread with the butter. then you get an appetizer. Oh, let's get the Buffalo Blast. That sounds delicious. Or the mac and cheese balls? Oh, yeah, four of them.

Oh, good. Boom, down the hatch. Boom, now our big-ass entree comes, and it could feed an army, but it was going to feed me, and eat this, and now I'm going to top it off with the 2,500 calorie dessert.

When people can motor through that, I'm like, this isn't human. How does this happen? I'm originally from Canada. When I first moved to the States, I went to cheese to me back to. But the Cheesecake Factory for the first time, and I went, these portions are gigantic. Like, these don't exist in Canada.

The lunch portion at Cheesecake Factory is a normal portion in Canada. Yeah. Hey, how are they doing business-wise? I thought a bunch closed got hurt by pandemic, too. I don't know. I mean. But I'll say I went in there maybe six months ago. Maybe it was eight.

Why did I even bring it up? Who cares? But I got so mad because I walked in and all the servers had blacked. pants on. I'm like, you know, come on, walking around these skiddy, tight white pants. I'm a freaking joke looking at me. Begging for 20% of your tab. Probably getting 15. Probably getting five. Who knows? With that said, what is the best and worst tip that you received as a server? Okay, the best tip was probably really busting ass for like a family that was having a great time. And they just, maybe it was graduation or something.

But, you know, there was the dad who's probably, who's done pretty well. And, like, you know, he's the patriarch and he's overseeing. And he's just, he's just real happy that everyone's getting along. Everything's going well. He's drinking. And he just, you know, come. There's the old high roller come here. I'm like, you know, what's up?

He's just like, kicked ass, and he just slips me a hondo. And I'm like, wow, upon whatever tip they were going to get, having a party,

gratuitize, I'm like, all right. Yeah. Then the worst one was a Sunday. And when I was in OVW, I also worked at the Cheesecake Factory

to supplement, to make money to pay to learn how to pro wrestle from Rip Rogers. So working at a cheesecake factory on Sunday in Louisville, I don't know. I always did. I did fantastic. Great. Everybody. I double shift it. Whatever. Killing it on Sundays. I move up to Cleveland. Blow my knee. Get surgery. Come back to weight tables because I can't wrestle.

And my first Sunday in there, I'm like, yeah, I'll do a double man. I do so good on doubles on Sundays. And two six tops. You're allowed to gratitize 18 percent a party of six or more, which I never did because I felt like my skills as a server are going to dictate. They're going to tip me more than me. Yeah. It's a risk. So these two back-to-peck parties killing it. Great, great vibe.

Everyone's good. Everyone's happy. Perfect service here. They enjoy themselves. Perfect service there. They enjoy themselves tabs of probably 150. And I'm like, all right. And they both leave at like similar times.

And I collect them. I open it. Five bucks. I'm like, oh, whoa. Oh, man. Well, sometimes,

you know, sometimes you get stiff. That's fine. I mean, they're good people, whatever. Go to the next one, pull it out

and open it. Five bucks. Now I'm like, no wonder everyone hates working here on a Sunday. This sucks. Wow. The back-to-back fibers

for people that were really cool and really nice and we had a good vibe. You should have auto-tipped them. Lesson learned. Yeah. I do want to bring it

back to wrestling here. Okay. What a great divergence there into Cleveland and pro wrestling and Cheesecake Factory. I feel like we're

going to do a round too, so it's cool. We'll do several rounds. In fact, we'll do the next one in person when that's a positive program. I don't like that. So after I saw you at AIW,

you get signed with Impact, did they sign you knowing what your gimmick was going to be? For the... Yeah. For the first time... in the plan or they just wanted to they wanted to sign Derek Bateman?

I think they were going to they had interest in me because one of their headwriters, Dave Lugano was watching NXT and knew I had some talent, some charisma and some potential. And then also John Gaborg came over from WWE to be kind of the head

of creative and T&A wanted to bring in new people to create new stars and saw something in me as well. So I was fortunately, sometimes you're in the right place at the wrong time, sometimes you're in the right place at the wrong time. Sometimes you're in the wrong place at the wrong time, I was in the right place at the right time, which is the only time that matters. What a quote. I hope I said right. But, uh, so they were going to, I think, there was interest in me,

regardless, I actually had to try out when they were on the road in Cleveland, like a dark match before the show. And it went well. So if I didn't totally butcher that, I was probably going at least get a shot. I was probably at that show too. Yeah, Hogan was there. It was at the CSU. and I get a call and I'm back in Florida and for the very first time because I've been very particular about never having whatever shitty, awful, creative idea

I'm like I, ugh, this sucks, I'm going to try my best to make it work. For the very first time, John called me, he's like, how are you doing, Ethan? I was like, what? He's like, Ethan Carter the 3rd. E, C. and I was like,

all right, I'm in, kind of tells me the whole idea with Dixie. I'm like, this, this is, this is great. And this is something, not only as like a basic shell, but something I can make

awesome and meaningful. I can incorporate my Patrick Bainman tendencies to be this socialite psychopath on one end, but at the same time as Smarby, prick, who talks a lot of shit.

And at the same time, I've never met a nice Ethan in my life. anytime I met in Ethan, dickhead, total dickhead. Ethan Page? Total dickhead. Put that out of your YouTube show, Ethan. You probably love it. But yeah, so they came up with that idea,

and I think, too, the idea caused conflict between people within the office, I believe Eric Bischoff and John. John was very on board for the idea. Eric said it would never work, and there was some sort of conflict. I had no idea my future was responsible for. But then I think Eric eventually saw it in action and saw how I did it and was like,

okay, you're right, it's going to work. But he didn't think it was going to work. And it very well couldn't have. I think it was right place, right time, right person to do the right character with the right amount of freedom to explore it on my own, but at the same time follow their vision for it. So they wanted a shitty, smarty, fucking heal.

who gets fed tomato cans until he has to face a real challenge and find ways to win, perfect, let's rule. Did Bischoff eventually come back and go, you know what, I was wrong? You made it work. This never involved me,

but to somebody, he did. And I think shortly after I got there, he was gone, too. So we never really worked together either. And it was never anything about me. It was just he thought of the idea more. Yeah. You were the face of Impact Wrestling

for so. long. I was actually surprised that they let you go. I mean, great for you to be able to go to NXT, but I was surprised that they let you go. I think at that time, they were, it was in the fourth regime in a year at that time. I think they realized they had to scale back a lot. So whatever was going to happen when my contract was up, it probably wouldn't have been for what I was making. Sure. And I'm also looking at the landscape and I'm like, you know what?

Personally, I wasn't in a great spot. Like, I need some change in my life. I'm doing this. I'm doing the same character. I've always done. Now I feel like we're rehashing what I already did. Like, because we had the major, you know, all the way to like a pretty good baby face run.

Now we're kind of bouncing back and forth because the regimes keep changing. It's just, I'm not exploring myself and doing something challenging. I'm resting on my laurels. and I don't like that. So I talked with him when they took over to Scott DeMorra, and he agreed and said, you know, probably we have to take a bunch of steps back to be able to move forward.

And I'm like, I mean, we'll keep the door open, but like, let's end it now and I can go try something new and we'll see what happens. And some of it was good, some of it was bad, but then when the time was right, I came back and hopefully did him a good service, making moose into the mad he should be. I was so,

surprised that you were able to keep EC3. You trademarked that yourself? Yeah, when the chaos started going on, I secretly trademarked it just in case. I'm surprised I used it, though, but at the same time, I don't know, wrestling, nobody knows what's going on ever on anything. So I don't even think they knew I had a trademarked. Did they, did WWE try to pitch a different name to you? When I came in there with Ricochet and the War Raiders, they weren't going to use War Rating. for obvious reasons. Sure. And then Rickshaw and I, they asked us for different names.

And I was dead set. Like, I don't want to be Ethan Carter the 3, but EC3 is such a marketable name to sell merch and easy to say. It's easy to say. It's easy to chant. It's sort of a brand. It's sort of an identity. I'd like to keep it.

I wrote the shittiest fucking names that started with E and C on it. So I, like, forced to keep them. But I don't think it needs a name. I like the idea of it being nondescript, and then someday a name arrives. Like, you never know what Kramer's first name is, but then now you know, like, there can always be in-chewing to go with it.

So I threw a bunch of names on a piece of paper, and there's, like, eh, I was, keep it. Well, I like that Ring of Honor is referring to you as the essential character. That was a big part of the change, too, is like, especially when the term essential became a thing, we were all fired.

I was looking at E.C. And I'm like, dude, I'm an essential character. And I changed my Twitter name to that. And I was like, something completely to run with. I'm glad Ring of Honor asked me, like, do you want to? Like, what are you? E.C. Like, I'm the essential character.

And I think it fits with the change. Now it means something different. It's the ability to evolve and try something new and be different. I could very well fall back into what I'm, done in the past, but right now I'm an essential character, and I think it fits with the time and the character. Yeah, I think that unfortunately, there's a lot of people that are only really familiar with your work in WWE, which is too bad. But you had so many great matches in impact. So for someone like that, what impact matches should they go back to to see what EC3 is really

about? I think top of my head, it's hard for me to pick a favorite match, but I have two. one got me to the second one. So I give the second one my favorite match credence based on the opponent and the circumstances of the culmination. But part of me thinks my favorite match of all time would be me versus rockstar spud, Hair vs Hair from Wembley, because we never should have been paired together.

We never should have had the success we did as a unit. We never should have been friends. None of that should have ever happened, but it did, and we continuously fought for it. And when I was going to go my separate ways, they were kind of just going to throw him aside. But I'm like, this could be the catalyst for me to become a next level threat as opposed to smarmy little dickhead heel that can't, like, fight for himself.

Like, this is the point, like, this is the, like, the culmination I need to get to where I'm going. Spott was very much understands the business He's one of the smartest guys in the business I know So he understood it too And we had that opportunity To tell that story

And we got to really tell it Unimpeded from the segments we did The promos we did building it up To the match Telling the match the way we wanted to tell it And right before the match Because I suck I tore my bicep

So I shouldn't have even been working the match, but I was so dead set. I'm making sure I worked that match in that arena at that time to get to where I was going, and it worked pretty well. Like, if you watch the match, you can see I'm, like, hesitant to do things so that this giant brace in my arm, and I'm not, like, in my peak physical condition. But the story told, facially, emotionally, dramatically cross the board.

One of my favorite thing. Second one would be that brought me to Kurt Engel one-on-one for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship. When I was growing up, people were like, What's your dream match, dude? And I would say to wrestle Kurt Engel for a World Heavyweight title. Wow. And I did. And you beat him clean.

I did. Yeah. And I won. So what a great service and honor he did for me. And I'll never forget that match, nor I'll ever forget the things he told me before and after. So it was like, especially for a very rough time going through

FCW and shitty version of NXT and the starts and stops and the lies and the misdeeds like never taking yourself out of the game and sticking with it. Yeah. And never saying no, never quitting. It paid off for that. So that was cool.

And then maybe the double term with Matt Hardy and myself in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. because we, again, another guy I learned so much from creatively, especially what a creative maniac genius one would say. But like, we never knew if it would work because he was such a popular good guy. And I was getting sort of good reactions because people were appreciating me, but I was still the villain in the scenario. But we worked and matched completely.

And the story told made the switch happen. And there was some really great symbolism because I had never lost yet, but I sacrificed everything I ever could as a person to become a champion. And like the last, I thought this was cool, the last thing. Then like put me out. It was last man standing. It was just like simple belt shot after just going through hell and knowing I've been screwed over by everybody. And the last thing to beat me was what I love the most. And then the turn works.

So I think those are three. Three great matches. Now, all right, it's one of your immediate goals. now to win the Ring of Honor World Heavyweight Championship? My immediate goal is to have this match with Jay Briscoe, because he's certainly one of my

I say this and it's not a joke. Jay Briscoe is one of my favorite wrestlers. And if one person can tell me if honor's real, I think it's him. I just respect everything he's done. I don't know him. I don't personally know him at all. I don't have his number. I don't know a thing about him. I know I met him

once in like 2012. What I do know is his loyalty to that company and his work ethic and his ability to take himself out of the rustling bubble. And I'm very envious of this and jealous of it, but be able to live his life outside of all the kids. Everything we're always talking about and complaining about social media and we're doing none of that face. He's completely out there doing his thing with his family and he shows up and he kicks ass, whoops ass, beats ass. it leaves it there. And I think that's great. And I wish I can do that.

So from there on, yeah, I think the Wing of Honor Championship is an accolade I desperately want to achieve. You'll bring some honor to that championship. Maybe. Maybe I'll set it on fire like I wanted to the TNA World Heavyweight Championship. What? We can go a lot of ways. Wow.

Well, look, I want to be really respectful of your time. I think we went way over because you have another one that you are very late for now. But thank you. This was amazing. And I'm so excited to see the shape that you're in right now. I'm excited to see that you are free to do what you want to do and that you're controlling your own narrative. And I feel like you have a lot of gratitude in all of this. And I end every interview by asking you, what are three things that you're grateful for in your life right now?

That is a question I should ask myself every day, and I never do. I'm always on edge. I'm always what's next. Losing my mind about something. Let me take a step back. What am I grateful for? Well, the first thing is my family. My mom and dad especially, we had a quarantine together,

and there were times I'm bashing my head against the wall, trying to, like, I can't hide from anybody. Like, I like to hide and be in solitude. but having them I mean this room we're sitting in it's just an empty room with the TV but them binge watching some terrible Netflix show and me sitting on the floor

like I'll never forget that because I'm ever since I followed this journey I lost touch with being home a lot so it was nice to have them and very grateful for that I'm very grateful for everyone that's making the narrative take place

my partner Jedediah J.C. The staff we've assembled from Manita Huntley, working the cameras, Tom Schaffner making us music, everyone that wants to come knocking on our bay door, looking for an opportunity, the vision that we have, the places we want to take it and the things we want to do with it, it's very hard with a very short staff in a pandemic era. The fans that have made it possible and actually see it for something more than just simple, like, it's pro wrestling, whatever, like trying to do something different and unique

can hopefully substantial, but at the same time it is pro wrestling. So I don't know, just be the avenue to create something to tell us a story and someone that's making that possible. The friends from Willby, Ohio, who we have other projects based on this narrative journey together that we might pull through and, oh, stay tuned. I don't know what to say, but that would be something too. Hopefully happen than third. I mean, do I say the fans?

I feel like I incorporated them in the narrative. Do I become a, do I do a heal thing and put myself over? I'm thankful for my work ethic and tired of expression. I'm thankful for being so handsome. I'm thankful. Ah, you know the feeling. I guess, no, I could be, I'm grateful that through the worst we've experienced in 2020, that not once have I missed a meal or ever felt like it's all,

the world's going to collapse around me or I'm going to desperately lose it all or anything. I don't know. It's on that perception, right? Yeah. I'm grateful that even, like, you'd think the worst thing that could happen to you is being fired in the middle of the pandemic and it turns out to be the best thing that could happen to you. So I'm grateful for that. That's it right there.

Boom. EC3. All right. Six months in the making to make this interview happen. I hope it was worth it. It was amazing. And we definitely will do part two. and we'll do part two in person.

Let's do it, brother. Appreciate it. Thank you. Marshall, Well, there we go. EC3N. I hope that he has a quick recovery from COVID, and that we can see that match

with him and Jay Briscoe sometime in the new year. I mean, hopefully January, like he said. And obviously you couldn't see the American psycho art, the Patrick Bateman art that he was holding up there during the interview. But if you head over to YouTube, you can check out the video version of this interview. And I just thank you so much for checking out this interview. And if you have a chance today, please rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts or just follow or subscribe on whatever platform it is that you're listening on because we've got some really big changes coming in the new year.

I've mentioned it a few times, but the show is getting a new name. The show is getting a name that's more reflective of what the show is actually about. You know, it's called the Chris Van Vleet Show, but that really doesn't make any sense because the show has never really been about me. it's always been about shining a spotlight on our guests and hearing their insight that you can then apply to your own life. So keep an eye out for that in the new year. Actually, you don't even have to really keep an eye out for it because, you know, it'll be very obvious when it happens. And this is not exactly a quote that I'll leave you with, but it's the idea of knowledge, you know, that we talked about during this interview. Knowledge used to be at a premium when you had to go out of your way

to read up on something or you had to take a course. Now you can literally learn anything through a quick Google search or YouTube video or, you know, if it's really something more in depth, you know, by paying for a seminar online. It's just amazing. So we talked about it during this interview, but it's not about what you know. It's about what you do with what you know.

That's the world we're living in now. Be great. be great for my friends. And we will see you on Thursday with Victoria, aka Tara from TNA, aka Lisa Marie Varen. That's her real name. You know who I'm talking about.

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