Insight with Chris Van Vliet - Frankie Kazarian On Becoming TNA Champion, Leaving AEW, Ultimate X Matches, WWE Run

Episode Date: January 1, 2026

Frankie Kazarian (@FrankieKazarian) is a professional wrestler currently signed to TNA and the reigning World Champion. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet at West Coast Creative Studio in Hollywood, CA to discuss the controversial way he won the World Title, why he left AEW to return to TNA, how close he came to signing with WWE and why his first run didn't lead to more, being a part of the first Ultimate X match, his wife Traci Brooks possibly returning to wrestling, and more! Please support our sponsors! PURE PLANK: The future of core fitness! Use the code CVV to save 10% on Pure Plank designed by Adam Copeland & Christian: https://gopureplank.com/?ref=tibcloux AMERICAN FINANCING: NMLS 182334, nmlsconsumeraccess.org. APR for rates in the 5s start at 6.196% for well qualified borrowers. Call 866-721-3300 for details about credit costs and terms or visit https://Americanfinancing.net/Chris SEAT GEEK: Use my code for 10% off your next SeatGeek order*: https://seatgeek.onelink.me/RrnK/CVV2025 Sponsored by SeatGeek. *Restrictions apply. Max $20 discount NORDVPN: Exclusive deal! https://nordvpn.com/cvv Try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee! For more information about Chris and INSIGHT go to: https://podcast.chrisvanvliet.com If you have ever enjoyed any of these episodes, could I ask you to please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcast or Spotify? It takes less than a minute and makes a huge difference in helping to spread the word about the show and also to convince some hard-to-get guests. Follow CVV on social media: Instagram: instagram.com/ChrisVanVliet Twitter: twitter.com/ChrisVanVliet Facebook: facebook.com/ChrisVanVliet YouTube: youtube.com/ChrisVanVliet TikTok: tiktok.com/@Chris.VanVliet Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Man, thank you so much for coming in. Thanks for having me, man. Glad we've finally got to do this. Yeah, seriously. We've been talking about this for a long time. A couple years. And now there's no better time to have you in than it's a TNA world champion. Yeah, it's pretty cool, man.

Yeah, how does it feel? It's pretty cool. You know, a lot of times, you know, guys get jaded into the belt's just a prop and this and that. The belts is, you know, the company recognizing your ability and your ability and talents and you know what you can do not only inside the ring but outside the ring how you can represent the company and uh it's uh you know look it's an honor to have this title you get into this business at least i got in this business i don't want to just be a regular wrestler i want to be a world champion wrestler and it took me a while but uh here we are tna world champion man you became

the tina world champion for the first time at 48 years old yeah did you get to a point where you thought maybe it's not going to happen. Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, there was a time early on, like 2007-ish, where I was kind of, you know, on the come-up as a single baby face, you know, getting some good matches and had a lot of good momentum. But, you know, just seeing, you know, who was above me on the ladder was like, I just don't think it's going to happen for me.

And I will say at the time, from an in-ring standpoint, I think I was a very good wrestler. I don't think I had developed my personality and promo skills to where, you know, what you need to be a world champion. And then, yeah, then, you know, years went by and kind of became a fleeting thought. Like, it's just, you know, not going to ever happen. But, you know, I always like to say this, dreams do not have an expiration date. So, you know, 48 years old or 28 years old, doesn't matter. I got the job done. So, yeah.

I think people were surprised when they saw that stat. They were like, what? Frankie's 48? I mean, you look amazing. Oh, thanks, man. Thank you, man. You know, I try to live as healthy of a lifestyle as I can. You know, not only this is a very, it's obviously an aesthetic business.

You have to look the part. And I've always really gone out of my way to try to look the part and look like a star and look healthy. But more important than that, I want to be around a long time for my son. I want to live a healthy life and, you know, be able to play with him and be very, very active. And this business keeps you young. So it's like, I always say like, oh, I can be the old guy, but I'm not going to be the old out of shape guy. You know what I'm saying? So like I kind of, I kind of, you know, look, and I'm in a locker room full like, you know, 20 and 30 somethings.

And I do not want to look like the old guy. And I'll be damned if I ever do. So that's, that's just it. And it's just part of my lifestyle. And it's the lifestyle I enjoy. But when you look at footage of you from 20 years ago, you're in better shape now in your 40s. I think so. And you were in your 20s.

I am. Yeah. You know, and with like weight training, nutrition. all of that diet. It's trial and error. You know, I just in terms of like, you know, how if you want to be, you know, big, if you want to be lean, if you like all of that. And you figure out eventually what kind of works for you.

Like, like we were discussed earlier when I broke into the business to get even looked at by WWE, you had to be big, like big. And I was always told when like I would be scouted by WWB, just put on some size, put up some size. But, you know, and I would put on 10, 15 pounds. just would look soft and kind of dumpy. And it's like, and I realized after a while, after a long while, you know, my frame is only going to support so much. So it'll just look like an athlete, you know, it's better for me.

I move better when I'm leaner, you know, when I'm, when I'm not carrying extra weight, I have a lot more energy and stamina. So, yeah, so now it's just a matter of looking, looking as good as I can possibly look, as lean as I can possibly be. And it's a constant battle, man. It takes a lot of, you know, it is. It takes a lot of hard work and dedication, but it's my lifestyle. Are you the type of guy who's traveling with meals?

So I don't do the meal prep, man, because it's so much easier to eat healthy on the road nowadays. You know, I do travel with shakes and bars and that stuff, so I always have something in case I need it. Back in the day, you know, after a show, there was like a McDonald's or a Denny's or something. So, you know, that's, but even those places now have. healthy options and door dashes of things so that you know i can get i can get chicken or rice delivered to my door so um i travel with enough belts and scarves and gear and everything i don't need the meals with me um so no i don't do the meal prep and you know i i'm pretty familiar with most towns i'm in now and nowhere i like to eat nowhere has you know the good restaurants and stuff but god bless those guys

that do the meal prep because it's you know that's again that's just carrying so much extra stuff on the road you So what's a go-to meal after a T&A taping? Oh, man, we're talking if we're still eating healthy. It really, you know, it really depends where we are geographically. You know, like... But if you're in a decent-sized city? I mean, like, you know, a good steakhouse. Okay.

You know, like a good steakhouse, even like an outback. You know, like an outback, you can get a good, you know, fairly inexpensive. Get a good steak, sweet potato, you know, if you're, you know, if you're with a couple guys that want to spend some money, you can go to, like, a Fleming. things or, you know, we're one of those. We're in Canada with the keg. Oh, man. Yeah, we just last time we were at there a few months back,

me and myself and the system basically Myers and Eddie and Moose and Eric Young, we all hit up the keg and just went nuts. But, so yeah, like a good steakhouse like that, you know, and then there's times when, you know, Cracker Barrel is one of my favorites. How do you eat healthy at Cracker Barrel? Cracker Barrel is easy. For breakfast, I get the chicken tender, the, grilled chicken tinge loins with egg whites and sourdough toast, dry, no butter, and plain grits.

Oh, yeah. And same with Waffle House, too. Chicken egg, chicken, egg whites. Usually, I probably usually, sometimes I do steamed hash browns. So, yeah, I got, I got my healthy order and I got my not healthy order. Well, whatever you're doing, it's working for you. Well, thank you, man. I appreciate that.

Thanks, too. Do you think about how much longer you can wrestle? You know, it's crazy. I mean, I get asked that a lot, especially now because, like, you know, my peers and my friends are already have retired. Christopher Daniels doesn't doing this anymore, which is still blowing my mind, you know, because he's, you know, he's a little bit older than me, but he's still, looks incredible and he's still working at a high level. You know, my old pal John Cena's, you know, had maybe the best run ever, and he's finishing up. AJ has made it known that he's finishing up. And, you know, so, you know, when this all started

happen, I started to think, like, man, is, you know, is my hourglass? How is it looking? But, dude, I feel better than I have any right to feel. I'm in the best shape of my career. And I think I'm having the very best matches of my career. And I'm on top of my game from a character standpoint. And I'm having way too much fun.

So, you know, I can't really put. you know, a timetable on it, I do want to get out once I start slowing down, once I can't be Frankie Kazarian. Like one thing I'm very proud of right now is that I'm not not doing anything that I did 20 years ago. I was always very smart about having a style that could be sustainable. So like when you see Frankie Kazarian, it's not a parody of what I was doing in 2003 in the X Division.

it's, you know, it's still, I'm still doing that same stuff, you know, so. Yeah. It's a paradox, right? Right. You've gotten better as you've gotten older. And then it's like this idea of like, oh, man, if I was only this knowledgeable, when I was starting out, think of how great I could be. It's an interesting paradox, right?

It really is, yeah. And, you know, I was, my one, you know, mistake was always early on was always, you know, my wrestling will get me over. My wrestling will get me over, which is, you learn in this business, wrestling is just kind of, you know, one ingredient of what it takes, you know, I wasn't really focused on the character and the connection and the talking aspect. That all came to me, but it came to me much later because I was so focused on just being the best in-ring performer I could be. When do you feel like you flip that

switch on character work? Honestly, really when Chris Daniels and I started teaming in 2012, you know, because I could feed off of him, him and our best friends in real life, and he's this timing and his wit and just everything. It was just incredible. And, you know, we worked because the way we talked and the way we did prom was everything was just like how we were like in the car. So like I became very, very confident and very comfortable once, especially when I had him out there with me because we just fed off of each other so well.

And he, he helped me a lot in that aspect. And then from then on, I really just started to, you know, focus more on that. Man, people hate how you won this championship. Good. Good. Like there was so much emotion that went into that story of Mike Santana winning. Sure. And in his first title defense, you come out, you call your shot, and now you're the champ.

Yeah. You know, it's show business. Sometimes the Joker beats Batman. Sometimes the bad guy wins, you know. What matters to me is that they're angry and that tells me that they care, tells me that they're paying attention. man you know what what a what a heel move like i love that it's the idea if you can call your shot right but like you picked your moment perfectly why would from a character standpoint why would i not go after a wounded animal when i see one you know that's you know that's kind of bad guy 101 you know

and look at we're still we're still in the storytelling business and the business has evolved and gotten rather complex um but at the end of the day it's still kind of black hat versus white hat you know, at least that's the way I approach it. What's kind of the approach that you take to wrestling, just as a whole? Like what's the core, maybe mantra you have when it comes to wrestling? Telling stories. It's really just story-based, everything, like angles your stories, but in the ring, everything I do, I try to not have any wasted movement.

Everything I do is for a reason. I'm trying to tell the story. I'm, you know, if I'm getting, if I'm getting beat up, I'm going to, leave the ring because I'm a coward and I don't want to be there and I have a title so if I can count out it doesn't matter you know I just little every little thing little nuisancey thing and details like I'm a real details guy I'm a real fundamentals are important to me in pro wrestling um you know often today there's so many there's so many amazing wrestlers and guys that could do and young ladies could do in such incredible acrobatic athletic things but in my opinion we've gone

away from the fundamentals, you know, making just a hold look good, throwing a good punch, selling, things like that. I try to be hyper-focused on those things. When we talk about some of your friends who are retiring, or maybe I have retired, do you see this tweet from Christopher Daniels? Yeah, yeah, yeah. As of today, the three best wrestlers in this picture hold championship gold in the respective federations after years of honing their skills around the world against the best competition anywhere.

The fourth guy is proud to have shared the ring with them and see their success. He doesn't know how good he is. I almost get emotional hearing that. But he, and he's always been like that, you know, but he does not realize, he's not the fourth best in that picture. Trust me,

he's probably the first, if you ask all those guys. But pretty crazy that the three guys in that photo that are still doing it, as we sit here right now, all have championship gold. It's nuts. It's crazy, man. Yeah.

It's really, it's cool. It's really that like, and I didn't even really realize. that until I after the match happened, I went and started looking at my phone and everything. I was like, wow. Joe and AJ have bells. You know, they're my buds.

I still talk to him, but like I don't realize, oh, that's right. You know, AJ's one of the tag titles and just. So it's cool, man. It's just, it's just heartwarming. You know, that picture in particular. Dude, that's, that's my wedding party right there. Wow.

Yeah? Who was your best man? Christopher Daniels. Wow. And then Samoa Joe and AJ Styles stood up there with me. It's a pretty beautiful thing that you three are holding championships. in three different companies. Yeah.

Doing three completely different things too. Yeah. It's crazy. It's, you know, part of me wishes we were all together because that was, you know, some of the best years of my life, you know,

when we were all, I mean, that, like I said, that's my wedding card. That was our van. That was our hotel room. Those four dudes in one room for years. That's wild.

So you form, we would have a suite, but still four dudes and that, you know, close quarters, you form a pretty unbreakable bond. Yeah. But it's,

Dude, it's cool. Those guys are all so successful, no matter where they are, no matter what they do, they're going to succeed just because they're all so immensely talented, you know. How did your journey bring you back to TNA this time around? You know, so I was with AEW from before AEW was a thing, essentially. You weren't on the first signings. Yeah, yeah. You know, we were, you know, there was the group of us from Bring of Honor that was, you know, we all, coincidentally enough had. contracts expiring at the end of that year and the bucks and cody and uh hang my page myself scorpio sky christopher dangles you know we had you know been privy some information about this guy tony con

and he's huge wrestling fan and he has he's like his father's a billionaire and let's see you know many times i've heard that story like this guy has money is you're going to start a wrestling company i'm like okay i don't believe it when i see it but uh ended up meeting you know tony and uh told us kind of his vision and everything and like asked if we were interested. It's like, yeah, like, you know, all of us kind of collectively are like, we're doing this, you know, and, bam, AEW was born

and it burst onto the scene and exploded and kind of changed wrestling for a while at least. And yeah, so I was there. That was 2000, end of 18, 2019, and then you won the first ever? Yeah, first ever, yeah. Yeah, me and Scorpio Sky. They switch it up and put us as the team.

And we had teamed in Ring of Honor as well. So another one of my best dear friends and guy I have amazing chemistry with, one of my best buzz still to this day. Yeah. And, you know, had that first initial tag run. You know, then that stopped. And then did, you know, kind of just bounced around. Did a pretty cool storyline with myself and the CD where he had a match against the Young Bucks

where I put the stipulation out where like if we don't win this match, if we can't win these titles, know, we're done as a tag team and lost that. And that story, if anyone hasn't seen that story, I recommend go back and looking because it's really good. Some of our best work and the Youngbucks as well. And then kind of was starting to do my own singles thing. And then just kind of like, you know, being like used as a utility player,

kind of like, you know, for example, when Christian came into the company, who was another friend and wonderful wrestler, one of the most underrated dudes on earth. I had his first match because he trusted me. And he hadn't wrestled in seven years. So they put me in there with him and we had a great match. You know, when Adam Cole comes, his first mix. So I was kind of the guy like, I could have great matches with anybody, but that was it.

That was kind of my role. And, you know, and a lot of times I was kind of, you know, relegated to sitting the bench. And I don't do well like that. I'm not wired like that. I cannot stand complacency. and there came a point where I was, you know, thinking to myself, in my opinion, the most valuable thing you can give me or that I can give you is time because that's the one thing we're all running out of, you know, there were places.

Money, you know, possessions, all this, fine, whatever. But for you to give me some of your time, I appreciate that. And so I just thought to myself with the. time I have left in pro wrestling, and this was the end of 2022, I needed to give that time to somebody that valued it and appreciated it. You know, I don't know if I have five years, 10 years left, but I know there's more years behind me than they're in front of me. But with the time I have left, I want to give that time to somebody that is going to value and appreciate it more so than I felt it was being valued and appreciated at the end of AW. So your contract came

to an M with AEW? No. I had just I just resigned the year before. I just resigned for another three years. And then December of, I guess it would have been 22, I get a call from a representative in the office. And I'm like, hey, someone will let you know. We're going to roll you over. And, you know, we'll just see you. And I go, whoa, whoa, wait about that. I don't want that to happen. They're kind of like taking them back. And had a long conversation. I said, honestly, I would like if I could just get my release because, you know, and I, everything I just explained to you, I explain to you. I explained to the people at AEW and, you know, they were, yeah, I don't want to say shocked because it's not like I'm such a giant star that, like, how dare he?

But they were like just taking aback because nobody had left to AEW this point. Cody did. Cody had left a few months before. So it was like, wow, well, what if we do like a per show? What if we do this? What if we do this? I go, thank you, but I need to battle myself. I need to just sever ties and go.

a little bit of back and forth and eventually you know we got the message came down and okay well TK respects you as a man and as a wrestler and if this is what you want you can do your release I said can you please have it to me in writing by

today because I needed before I hadn't talked to anybody WWETNA I just need it out I needed that safety net pulled away why do you think they let you go because there's a lot of people who ask for their release and they're not granted I mean obviously they

probably didn't see anything long term in me, you know, which was astonishing because I was like, why would you resign me for another, you know, for very good money for another three years. And if they didn't see anything, I mean, that's, I get it, of course, you know, that's how it is. But yeah, you know, they were, look, and I could probably still be there today, you know, doing what I was doing. But I'm much, much, much happier where I am now. So you got your release. And then did you reach out to TNA?

Had conversations with TNA. Scott DeMore was the boss at the time. Had some conversations with WWE. They were very, very gracious and some really good conversations with them, too. But talked to Scott, and he's just like, well, you know, and I had previously the year before I'd gone over there and I, you know, did a little miniature feud with Chris Aben and I, you know, won the X title, speedball and I wrestled Josh Alexander.

So I had, you know, I had seen. what they were kind of like cultivating over there and uh i was like scott like i would love to be a part of this and you know he said well we'd love to have you um they just happen to have a pay per view coming up in like two days and i was like i could start at the pay per view and he said oh it's great like we'll fly you won't tell anybody and you can just come he's like we talked some numbers he sent a contract over got it signed and the next day flew to atlanta uh center stage and made my re-debue January of 23. So how close were you in 2023 to go into WWA?

There was conversations, you know, but logistically, it probably wasn't going to work. You know, I wasn't like a signature away, but there were a lot of like really good conversations. As a matter of fact, I can say this. When I debuted with TNA, re-debute in January of 2023, I just came out and basically promo saying, you know, like, you know, I know I was here as a guest last time, but now I'm back for good. I signed a multi-year deal.

I'm back. And they were cheering for you. Weird to hear people cheer for Frankie Cazare. Yeah, no kidding, right? Yeah, back when I was beloved, it seems like a lifetime ago. Anyways, after that, check my phone, as we do, because we're all marks when we want to see what people are saying. And I got a text from Triple H saying, like, you know, hey, man, I know things didn't work out and that's cool. I look forward to you kicking ass

and when it's time for us to do business together, let's do it. And I'm like, that's, you know, he didn't have to do that. Yeah. He didn't have to. He went out of his way to say like, hey, cool. And it's like that, you know, it's a Kualski guy too. So, but that, that holds a lot of way with me. The United States Soccer Federation present the U.S. soccer podcast.

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but we're just really excited just as the people are. The U.S. Soccer Podcast, presented by Henko. Follow and listen on your favorite platform. You made your first appearance in WWE in 2001, right? A dark match? Probably that sounds about, yeah, that sounds right. Yeah. Was that ever close to turning into something at that time?

So there was a lot of early on at UPW. UPW was a developmental run by Rick Bassman out here in Orange County. Right. It's where John's the train. Right. It's where John started. John and I wrestled a lot and trained a lot together. Spent a lot of time together with John.

They would send out scouts every month. And we had shows at the old Galaxy Theater. I don't know. It's called something different now. But yeah, the Old Galaxy. And they would say those were a big show. So they would send out. usually like a Jerry Briscoe or a Bruce Pritchard,

and they would send out like a WWF at the time guy, you know, a star, like, you know, so I wrestled Edging Christian there. I wrestled Stevie Richards, you know,

they sent out a lot of people. And I was one of the guys that, you know, was in like a group of like five people they were looking at, you know, and that was always like, you know, you look is good,

you know, your work is good, just keep at it. Get a little size on you, get a little size on you. It was always that. And I had countless dark matches. It was anytime they were in, you know, Los Angeles or the pond or San Diego or even Vegas or Arizona.

I was always brought in and used or brought in and sat around and did nothing. But I was on their radar. I was certainly on their radar. And then me and Nova, Mike Bucci, started teaming. And we had a really cool act. Good slick look. We had doing tag team stuff that was, you know, way ahead of its time. And funny enough, the match, the night after Triple H tore his quad,

they had this impromptu table ladders and chairs match. And the dark match that night was myself and Nova against Chris Daniels and this wrestler named Suicide Kid Mikey Henderson. And we had a great match. And I think it was almost too good. Like we did a lot because, you know, the old time was always like, oh, you did too much, kid. I think we may have ruffled some feathers and had too good of a match.

But anyways, that's, and then they, Nova got signed. I didn't shortly after that T&A started and all that. So, like, there was a time that I was like, you know, it felt like I was being looked at, but they never pulled the trigger from whatever reason. And I, and I probably wasn't ready. And then you signed with WWE in 2005. Yeah. And had, I think, five matches.

Yeah, they put, yeah, five matches on television. They put me on the road immediately just to, you know, let me get a little bit of money and some reps. And so I went on the road the first couple weeks and did some more matches. And then, uh, and then went home. and they're just like, well, when we have something for you, we will call you. Because I wasn't, wasn't a developmental deal. It was a deal.

And then it was like, I'm not doing Indies or anything. So times is going by and going by. And I'm like, I would call them like, hey, can I do something? Or like, at one point I said, well, do you want to move to Atlanta? I'm like, no, I don't want to move to Atlanta. Like, I didn't sign a developmental deal. But like, if you want me to, but it's, you know, like, no, just hold tight. We're working on stuff.

And I got called again. They're like, why don't you? why don't you go to OVW for a week? They sent me and Kid Cash to OVW for a week, which is cool, trained under Ricky Steamboat, one of my heroes, awesome masterclass, you know, had a match. You look great, everything's great.

Still, oh, God. Finally, I get a call from one of the writers, and he's like, okay, we've got something for you. We're going to start you. We're going to call you the future, Frankie Kizarian. It's brilliant. I don't even been calling myself that for the previous five years, but I'm like,

I've been sitting home for months and that's what you came up. It's befuddling. But anyways, yeah, you know, the whole premise of even signing me was, you know, the revamping the Cruiserweight Division and this and that. And when I got there, I kind of saw the writing on the wall very early on. And look, I was not ready to be there from, I was physically ready. I was ready as a pro wrestler, but I didn't have the business mentality, you know, WWE is a business.

And before I got there, it was just my passion. And I was having fun. And, you know, TNA was a business, but it was just a lot more, there was a lot more freedom. You know, WW is a very structured environment. And I just was not ready. I was not mature enough, just as a man to be there. It just wasn't my time. So how long did you end up being there for?

Probably in total, like 10 months, 11 months, wasn't long. It was, you know, I got, I was very unhappy. very quickly. And that's on me. That's not on WWE. That's 100% on me. I could have handled it better. Also, you know,

it's one of those things. I was a single guy. I had zero responsibility. I was like, I can quit. I'll just quit. Go back to TNA because I was also told TNA, when I did leave there,

like anytime you want to come back, you have a job. That wasn't necessarily the case. It took me a little while to get back there. But yeah, I was just, you know, when I was young, and I still to say, I have a bit of a rebellious,

spirit and um you yeah i know i know right and uh yeah and so it was like you know you know now i'm man in my 40s with a family and responsibilities you know i think things through a lot better but i was very much you know just react and just go with my gut and you know worked out pretty well for me so thank god when you signed that wwee contract did you think man i made it this is it yeah yes and no well because it's funny i remember right before i signed WWE had just put out a mandate where it's like, I don't know if this was like a weird Vince thing. It's like,

no more guys under six foot or 200 pounds. You know, you have to be over there. And I'm like kind of hovering right there. So I'm like, well, okay, you know.

And then I got a call from Tommy Dreamer. And I was, oh, you know, the time I deal with TNA had lapsed and TNA wasn't aware of it. And he told me the revamping the Cruzeway division. And they were hiring like, you know,

like, you know, like I said, Kipash and Huventude. It's like, Oseus and all these guys. And I was like, oh, okay. Yeah, it was, it was, you know, when those WWE checks start showing up, it's pretty surreal, you know. But then when I got there and started working, I was like, why am I not, this is everything I've dreamed of.

Why am I, why am I not over the moon about this? And, you know, and that took me a long time to figure out why. But TNA, he ended up becoming this amazing home for you. Yeah. Like, you're one of the guys that you've been there since almost the beginning. And when people think of TNA, you're one of the names that gets talked about. I think so. I hope so.

That's very cool, man. What was your first TNA match? June of 2003. Rope right before I'll tell you that. It's funny, in this span of like four or five days, I had just gotten back from a tour of Australia, New Zealand. I got wildly sick somehow. I had a tryout match with Ring of Honor, a dark match with WW,

and my TNA, first TNA match in the span of probably four or five days. You're living. It was nuts. It was nuts. You're like the hottest free agent. It was nuts, yeah. But they brought me in against Scott DeMore. And, you know, I had met Jeremy Barash and Jeff Jared on an overseas tour.

And my first match was the sixth band. They threw together as myself, Matt Stryker, the Unibrow Matt Stryker, not the great commentator, Matt Stryker. And CM Punk. We wrestled Johnny Swinger. I'm sorry right now. I don't remember the other two, but it was kind of just a six-man tag to see, you know, they were just looking at guys and did the match. And then, you know, it was brought in the next week and the next week and the next week.

And I was like, do I work here? Or like, I guess I work here. And then eventually they gave us, like, contracts. But it just started and started feuding me with Chris Sabin and put me in the ring with AJ immediately. So it's kind of happened. What a fun little piece of trivia that you teamed with CM Punk in your first ever TNA. A lot of people don't even remember CM Punk being there.

I had a good run. He was doing some, like, real cool stuff with Raven. Yeah. Raven, like Julio De Niro, Mickey James was part of their crew. Like, yeah, that was, yeah, that was right before he left.

He seemed like they were doing, like, cool stuff. And then, you know, he went and did his thing. We signed WWE, obviously, yeah. You were such a perfect fit for the X Division. Like, it's the style you were, because I love that idea. I was a huge TNA fan. Yeah, yeah.

So, like, the idea of, like, it's not about weight limits, it's about no limits. It's the weight. that you guys wrestled. And I also think that they said it's not about weight limits because Samoa Joe was in that. Sure. Yeah.

Yeah. That, yeah. I was super fortunate to be in there with guys that, to be honest, are way better at that style than I am. You know, I could do a lot of that, but, man, I'm in there with amazing red and low-key and God, Jerry Lynn, one of my all-time heroes and Christopher Daniels and A.J. And Chris Saban, and then you have Alex Shelley and Elix Skipper and just, it was hard to have a bad match. It was hard. You had to work hard to have a bad match. But yeah, it was, it was really cool

because it was, you know, what the WCW Cruiserweights did, you know, taking kind of to the next level. So, you know, and I watched the cruiser weights growing up. So it was cool to now be part of this division that guys I'm wrestling with now grew up watching and wanted to be X Division wrestlers. That's super cool, man. Do you remember the way they presented Ultimate X2 the first time? Yes, I do. Yeah. I remember they pulled us aside, us being myself, Chris Saban, and Michael Shane. It said, we have this idea for a match, like a ladder match without ladders.

So we're going to have the original concept was chains going in the form of an X. And the bell's going to hang in the center. And it's just like this new innovative match. And we're like, okay. So they're like, we're going to fly you in a day early so you can see the structure and kind of get used to it because they had never been done. So we all got flown into Nashville and we go down to the asylum, the Nashville fairgrounds,

and they're still figuring out how to even build it. Like the original concept, they had like steel posts, steel poles inside the ring posts. And they nixed the chain idea and it was just cable. And they finally got it, you know, to where,

you know, structurally it looked good. And it's getting late at night now. And they're like, all right, Who wants to try it? I go, I do. I'll try it.

You know, just jump up, grab, and search Shemian. So I jump up, I grab, I search Shemian. As they do, all four of the posts, just go, and then all of a sudden, I'm standing on the ground. And now, so you've got a bunch of these, like, you know, like engineers, construction guys, like scratching their head like crap. And the pay-per-view's the next day. Paperview's next day.

So, you know, uh-oh. So they try to do something else. It doesn't work. Now it's like midnight, one. o'clock, so we go, we go back. We get there the next day. Still don't really have it figured out. Eventually, they did, you know, the lighting trusses, you know, the four lighting trusses on the corners and that could support the weight and the cable and all that. But they didn't have it set up until like 10 minutes before doors open. So we had all these ideas, but had no

clue if we could pull them off. We did not get to like practice, rehearse, nothing. All that stuff happened was just in our head. Did you even get a chance to climb up and stand up there? Nothing. Nothing. So we went out there on a live pay-per-view and just like, I mean, we knew it would support our weight. And that's all we knew. But like we had these ideas and it's not a regular match.

You have ideas. One guy's climbing the other guy. He power bombs them or this guy's spirit. It's like, well, you know, thank God I was in there with two guys that were very, very capable wrestlers. And Chris Sabin and Michael Shane. But we somehow pulled it off, man. and it's become, you know, like an iconic, you know, you know, novelty match in TNA, in wrestling, really.

The great thing about the Ultimate X match is you're always trying to outdo the last one. Always. So you set the bar in the first one. What was the craziest thing in the first match? What was the craziest spot? The craziest spot we probably did was in the first one, we didn't even really, I think, I might have gotten speared

while hanging from the from the cable we tried to do one where uh somebody was climbing and i think michael shane was on my shoulders or vice versa and they tried to do like a rana and it did not work it looked like crap and just yeah but there wasn't much like you know again we didn't really have time to really go over stuff but there wasn't much certainly not what was to come you know because going forward those guys all could you know time practicing and see what we did. Yeah, you had some of the wildest spots in the Ultimate X matches.

That cutter to Christopher Daniels. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. How do you pull that off? Again, that's another one you can't practice. I could tell you how it happened. I remember going to, we're driving from the Orlando airport to the building

and Chris Daniels and I were together and we knew we were in the match. and he was going over like who was going to be the last guys because that match was a ultimate X gauntlet match so it was a little bit different and the structure was different

instead of the cables they had lighting trusses turned this way so they could support all of our weight but I would told CD in the car I go man I have this idea to do a cool move

if somebody can hang upside down on the from the X and he goes I can hang up to down I go okay cool when we get to the building I'll tell you what I'm thinking. So we get there and, you know, I tell them, I said, if we do something or something, something,

they kick you, they fall down, you hang upside down, and you're dangling. It's like, I think originally I was going to do a springboard diamond cutter. But I was like, yeah, I was like, even then I was like, you know, instead of that, I'm just going to be on the top rope

just to make sure. So, you know, he kind of went up there and just was like, and I was like, okay, right there is good, like just measured out. You obviously can't practice that. And that, so much could have gone wrong. So much could have gone wrong with that.

But if I'm going to try something that risky and that insane on a live paper view, I'm going to do it with Chris Daniels because there's nobody I trust more. And man, when he, Jay Leithel was a guy climbing. He kicked CD. As soon as CD hung, I jumped and it could not have been any more perfect. And that clip is like it's there's like a mosh pit that starts like right after it. It's so cool, man. It's so cool.

And I get reminded of that every day. And people who are, so boy, I go, no, man. no, none of that will ever, please come tell me that you watch that and you enjoyed it. Well, there's another Ultimate X match when you're suicide with Christopher Daniels. And that viral clip is called Christopher Daniels almost dies. Yep. Christopher Daniels almost died. You almost died too.

Yeah, I did too, yeah. But it was suicide, so nobody cared about him. Yeah. What a rough landing. Yeah. So what was it supposed to be? The original idea was supposed to be, again, we thought because it was a multi-man, like, you know, eight or nine guys in there.

It was, you know, we thought they were going to have the lighting trusses, you know, but they had cables because the idea was if they had the lighting trusses, Chris was going to try to, Chris and suicide, myself and Chris Ames were going to fight to the top. Chris was going to eventually hook me for Angels wings, and I was going to backdrop him off. But we didn't have the truck. He's insane, by the way, we've established that. Obviously, we couldn't do that. So we had the idea of why don't we go up there and we can both sit on the cables and we could do a like where he takes me and he gives me like a flat liner and we both go straight back.

Well, we both didn't go straight back. We both went straight down and it was we both landed pretty high like on our head and shoulders. But I hit and I immediately, I didn't know where he landed. So I'm just like through the mask. It's like, is CD okay, CD okay, CD okay. And they're like, are you okay? I'm like, I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine. I'm fine. He's fine. He's fine. He's good.

I'm like, okay, good. And, yeah, I got, I got in trouble with the wife on that one. That was, yep, that was not, I'm not allowed to do that anymore. The look on the suicide mask is almost this look of bewolderman already. Yep, yeah. So like you looking around after you land, it just fits that spot so perfectly. Yeah, because I was just, I was so concerned about him. I was like, I was just like, I don't know how we survive that one, man.

It was so stupid, looking back, associate. I remember we got in the back, smoke, kind of like grabbed CD and like, you never do that again. Like, you idiots. Like, I know, like two children be it admonish. I know, I know, I know. You said you got in trouble with the wife on that, what she said? She was, so she was at, we were living in Tampa at the time.

This was in Irvine. And she did come out. She was in Tampa. and she's getting text messages from her friends, the girls at TNA. And they're like, like, oh, wow, did you see that? Trace wasn't watching for whatever reason.

She said, no. She's like, okay, well, they're both moving. Don't we should, what do you mean they're both moving? He's like, no, it's okay. I don't think they're, you know, and she's like, so then she starts freaking out. And then I think she finally finds like a feed and sees it. And she was just being furious.

Just don't you ever do that again. What were you thinking? You know, I know, I know. I know, like same thing, you know. But at the same time, everybody was like, you know, guys, like, thank you for doing that for the match. Because, you know, we always wanted to top what had been done before and make that match as dynamic as possible. I think it's the scariest moment Tiana history. It gets up there.

It's that one for me. And AJ taking that drop kick and turning inside out. Unreal. Unreal. So, yeah. Yeah. And that was right after that was like one of our first monthly. pay-per-views when we started doing them.

I remember watching that and just, man, he pulled it off. Of course he did. But yeah, it was incredible, but terrifying. So scary. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Then in another Ultimate X match, you climb all the way to the top of the truss

and do a leg drop and land it perfectly, by the way. On Sean DeVari. Again, another one I'm trying to, you know, I did that with a torn tricep, too. That's another thing. My tricep was torn during that. My arm is heavy. bandaged and braced.

I would have surgery just a few. So, yeah, probably a few weeks later. You're insane. Yeah, yeah. Stupid is also something. But that was another one. It was one of the, you know, it was like, well, what, you know, we've done the cutter, we've done this, done AJ's bump, you know,

CD did the thing where he jumped from the trust to the center, which was incredible. You know, we always, it's always like, you prick, you top what I did. Like, all right. So this one was like, you know, and people, people got to. to give DeVari credit too because he volunteered. I'm like, hey man, would you do this if you call him back? And he said, yeah, but would you do it? And I'm like, yeah, yeah, I'll do it.

So again, we went up there and I was able to like stand up there and get my balance and just see how far out he had to be. But it's another one that could have gone terribly wrong. But, you know, just when I got up there and, you know, stood at the top and the crowds are going like, what is this? I had all the confidence in the world. And I jumped and I thought to myself, how am I supposed to land this? that never went through my head.

But I hit the leg drop and I landed as smooth as possible. And again, like the crowd goes insane. It's just one of those moments, one of those highlight real moments for TNA that's going to be around forever. And I'm actually very, very happy to be associated with those moments, even as dumb as they are and to have lived through them, you know? You landed it so clean. Yeah.

Like you landed it like you were doing it off the middle rope. Yeah. I'm a leg drop guy. I do a lot of leg drops. That certainly was the most. most risky and extreme one, but yeah, it worked. I love the way that Don West would do color commentary. Oh, so good.

And when you earn a, you have got to be freaking kidding me. That's it. It's like, that's the ultimate compliment, I feel like. Yeah, God rest his soul. What a wonderful, wonderful man. And yeah, Emma Mike Teney really, really just wrote beautiful lyrics to our music back in the day. Those guys are great.

I said this when AJ was on the show earlier this year. I said that they are the unsung heroes of the early. days of TNA, I agree. Because they were so good at telling the story and making you feel excited because they were genuinely excited. Yeah, Don West was, yeah, because Don West wasn't necessarily a wrestling guy. Not at all. And that was just his personality, man. He was just so good. And those sound bites, you know, those will live on forever. It's so cool. You know, I get kind of like emotional hearing those particular calls, you know. You've been there for so much of TNA, right? The good times, the bad times, everything in between. Other than this

resurgence that TNA has right now. What do you think were the golden years of TNA? You know, probably the like maybe 05 through about like 2005 through about maybe 2012. I mean, just when you have like the core guys there like, you know, like myself, Chris Daniels, AJ Joe, the machine guns, P.D. Williams, Eric Young, Bobby Rude, you know, all these studs. And, you know, 2007, the knockouts started, you know, with the, with the knockouts battle royal. Now we had a knockouts division. And then you have, you know, Kurt Angle, Christian Cage, Sting, Booker T, you know, abyss.

Like just, what an incredible roster that that span of time. Just, you know, and guys come in and out, even guys like Dustin Rhodes are there for a while and Judas Fasius and just, you know. But that core group of guys, we just, you know, we were all just, you know, we were all just, just like the ultimate ex-match is trying to top what we had done and just trying to trying to have the best match we can to put on the best show. We really were a united front.

Just like today's TNA locker room, we very much are a united front. And those years, those early impact zone years, the crowd was so, they believed in us so much. And we were becoming a true alternative because all there was was WWB at the time. And even to this day,

fans still just like I love what you're doing at TNNX man but I love those days and you know the impact zone and he's 2006 2007 nostalgia is a hell of a drug it really is it really is man yeah you left TNA in 2014 it felt like a lot of guys were leaving at that time right AGA left around that time Bobby Rood Eric Young a lot of like the the born and bred TNA guys were leaving what was the main thing happening at that time um so both my and Chris Daniels contracts were up that year, his a little bit before me. There was new management. Dixie obviously still owned it.

John Gubourke had taken over basically talent relations and creative, which I always thought was kind of a conflict of interest. But I don't know. That's just me. And it just, you know, they wanted to go in a different direction. They didn't see the value in myself or Chris Daniels anymore, you know, or him. and AJ Styles. And, you know, I'm very close with AJ.

And we were having discussions. And he was talking about, you know, like I can't believe I'm probably gonna leave you. Like he literally said like he said, it was all of us, myself Joe, CD and AJ. He goes, I thought we would be running this place someday. He goes, I can't believe it's, you know. So when he left, the writing was really on the wall.

Chris Daniels and I were still teaming, but we were not being used to our potential at all. We were, you know, They were pushing other teams in front of us, even though I think we were still the best tag team there at the time. And Chris Daniels' deal was up, I think, in April that year. And they said, you know, we're going a different direction. So he left.

And my deal was up, I think, in June or July. And so I finished up there and they said the same thing to me. It's going a different direction. And it was like, it was weird. It was like, you know, I was a little bit resentful. I was like, after, you know, we've helped build this place. You know, but the management team was completely different. It was revamped and it was they did go in a different direction and wasn't necessarily a good one there for a while.

So yeah, everybody all like what made that company kind of left in the span of like two years. It feels like what's happening in TNA now is a lot of that magic that existed 15-ish years ago. It is. And I always tell the locker room that. I always say that it's like this is, especially with this new AMC deal, you know, like I was there when we got the news. were going to be on Fox Sports, Fox Sports West, whatever it was at 4 p.m. We're on the Friday, whatever. But that was TV. Yeah. And it was an hour, but it was TV.

And we were thrilled. And then hearing that we're going to spike network television. That was huge. Massive. Yeah. This is even bigger. And yes, there is, there's so much excitement. And same thing.

Like I said, TNA's strength has always been its locker room. You know, the, this is the work ethic of the guys in the locker room. Management changes and all that. but that attitude has always been there. And this team, this crew we got there, the management team, everybody on the roster is just a joy to be around. And again, a united front, all one and the exact same thing. I think we're going to connect on this because back to the future,

in my opinion, is the greatest movie of all time. Greatest standalone trilogy ever. So good. And we could have seven more podcasts just talking about Back to the Future. When I saw that your finisher was called the Flux Capacity, Man, how could I not love that? Yep. I was doing that one man Spanish fly.

I was doing a long time before anyone else was. There's guys that do it way better than me now, and I don't really do it often. But one day at TNA, Mike Tenae was like, hey, what are we going to, if you're going to do that move again, what are we going to call it? And I was like, I don't really, I don't really have a name. I was like, give me a second. And I was just like, I was still the future Frank Exceria. I was like, flux capacitor is what makes time travel possible.

So called the flux capacitor. He goes, the what? I go, the flux capacitor. Come on. Like, I don't know if Mike was back to the future guy. On point 21 gigawatts. Yeah. The flux capacitor.

No, the flux capacitor, it's, you know, it's what makes time this, you know. Yeah, the thing in the back of the DeLorean. Come on. Doc Brown fell hit his head on the, come on. Yeah. So, yeah. And so, like, yeah, so that name stuck and people still, like, flux capacitor. I also used to do a move that I called Back to the Future

where it was like a guy would sit on my shoulders and I did a bridging suplex. So I tried to give a nod to all that. Were you the future, Frankie Kizarian, because of Back to the Future? 100%. So it's like a double meeting there. 100%.

If you look at the font on my early gear, it's the future font. Oh, the future. 100% the future Frankie Kizzerian. Yep. Why do you love Back to the Future so much? It's got such a charm. It's got, you know,

my father would always speak so highly of like the 50s. And I went and saw that movie with my dad and like my cousin, my mom. And, you know, and I was like, I was so enamored with when Michael J. Fox went, Marty goes back to the 50s. It's like, wow, I was like, was that what it was really like? And my dad was like, yes, it was. Like, you know, just how clean it was and how different. And there's the people and the little cafe and all that.

And then just I loved skateboarding. I loved action. I loved science fiction. It just Christopher Lloyd, I was a big fan of from Taxi already. It's just, it's like, like you said, it is like the perfect movie, the perfect trilogy. It just, I don't know if anybody that has seen that movie and doesn't love, like love it. Yeah. You know, it's just it has everything.

It has everything. And it's, it's just 40 years and it's, you know, stands the test of time. I just love the idea of like, there's, we all have regrettable moments. moments in our life. Yeah. And the idea that if you had a flux capacitor and a DeLorean and Doc Brown, you could go back and maybe change something. And then obviously there's the butterfly effect of that.

Sure. That, you know, this one little thing can change that. But I love the idea that, like, moments matter, right? Because, like, think of how Marty's parents met. Yeah. Because his dad's climbing a tree to try to look in her window. He's like, keeping Tom, yeah. Right.

He falls and then her dad hits him with a car. Like every single one of those moments has to happen for Marty to then be born, you know, down the line. That stuff I'm fascinated. I really get you thinking. And it's by far the best time travel movie. Oh, for sure. And I love, look, and I love that one. I love them all.

Two and three, too. I love them all. Two is so fascinating. Like, is that what 2015 is going to look like? I kind of wish it was. Well, they get a lot of things right. They got a lot right. Yeah, you get a lot right.

Yeah. They also got a lot wrong. But they got a lot of things right where it's like, oh, man. could we have a rehydrated pizza? And you know what? Tom Wilson should have got some type of award for those movies. Like he, like the characters he plays like seven different bif,

and he's convincing in every one of them. Yeah. So, so good. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I love them. I love that we could nerd out about that. A hundred.

We could do a full hour on that, two hours on that, yeah. Fade to black. What a dangerous move that is. It looks pretty dangerous, man. Man, yeah, it's, you know, it's one I've been doing for a long time. And it's one that looks devastating, and I could pretty much hit it on everybody. I mean, I've hit that move on Abyss. So, like, you know, size doesn't really matter.

It's dangerous. It looks more dangerous than it is, I will say that. Never hurt anybody with it. And, of course, Metallica is my favorite band. So that's the fitting name, Fade to Black, yeah. Yeah, amazing that you can do it on smaller guys and bigger guys. What's the secret to that? the matter of like, you know, it's, yeah, you're picking a guy up, but like, you know,

his body weight is evenly distributed because I have like kind of the back of his legs. So it's like, the legs down here and the torso is there. So the only time it's tough is on guys that are very tall. You know, I remember I hit it on Okada, actually when he was a, when he was in TNA, him and I worked a loop of house shows together. And I remember I hit it on him. And I had to kind of like scoot him up a little bit further because he's like very long. you know, just so his head was protected.

So, yeah, other than like real, real tall guys, you know, I can pretty much hit it on everybody. How'd you come up with Kazarian? So that's a name. My father's background is very strange. He was adopted, but he was raised by his three. He knew his real mother, and he was raised by his mother for a while and his two aunts, my aunt June and my grandma. I called her my grandma June and my aunt buddy. but never knew who his father was.

And they, I think they're weird old school Russian, like secretive. I think they all knew, but they wouldn't tell him because it was, you know, back in the day, it was like,

oh, his mother got pregnant very young and we don't want to tell who the father is, blah, blah, blah. My dad has three different birth certificates. And one of the names that he thought he was, was his father was his guy named Lester Kazarian or something. So I think he had a birth certificate.

certificate that said Kazarian. And I always remember thinking, like, that's, that's a cool name. That's what I'm going to use when I become a wrestler. Because it just has a Z in it and it just sounded cool and unique. I'd never heard it. And I was like, that's it, Frankie Kazarian. Wow. Because like some people, I think for a while when you were starting, I was Kazarian.

Yeah, yeah. I wouldn't know. So like, yeah, the name itself is Armenian. So like, and I, like, again, I don't know my, my lineage, because we don't really have a lot to go on. when people try to do the, track your lineage, whatever that's called. Like Ancestry. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Something like that. I would only have like half the information. So I've never done that. But yeah, the name is Armenian. So I may be Armenian. I'm not sure. But I've had a lot of like Armenian, like I had a magazine reach out to me.

Like, oh, we're doing this thing on Armenian athletes. And we want to include it. And I was like, I'm a fraud. I don't want to put it out there on this great, you know, Armenian athlete. But so, but the name itself. is, in fact, when I went to Beirut, Lebanon, years ago on a tour, they didn't really know who any of us were.

But then when they announced me, I was like a big baby face because there's a huge Armenian contingent out there. I remember seeing your wife wrestle for the first time when I was like 16 or 17. Okay. In a bar in Toronto called Cactus Peets. She wrestled for Ron Hutchinson. Yeah. Had this company called the AWF.

Yep. Apocalypse Wrestling Federation. Yep. I didn't know that wrestling existed. outside of what we saw on TV. And I think, there's indie wrestling 20 minutes for me. Yeah. She was the Sunshine Girl Tracy Brooks.

And maybe just the Sunshine Girl Tracy. Yeah. And I remember meeting her and thinking, you have no business being this nice. She's like just the nicest woman ever. To this day. How did you guys meet? We met at a Border City wrestling show for Scott DeMore in March of 2003,

right before I saw. She had already started at TNA, I believe. And Scott had brought me in. And that night, I remember I wrestled Jerry Lynn and Chris, Sabin and a three way. And met that night. She claims I completely ignore her and just Kay faber and all that, which is I probably not true.

But she was like, I was doing whatever I could to get your attention. You wouldn't pay attention to me. It might be true because I was very tunnel vision and focus. And I was always like, I'll never date a girl in wrestling. Yeah. So anyway, so we met there. And then met in TNA, you know, she was there. and eventually they put her with myself and Michael Shane.

She was like our manager, our valet. We had a really good act. You know, we had a great act. We were the heel tag team. She was the annoying manager. She was great at her job, you know. She got AJ Styles hit her with every one of his moves. Styles clashed her, paylay kicked her everything.

She was so good at it. And we became friends. We just became running buddies. Like, you know, the crew was like her, myself and Chris Daniels, you know. Like we'd go to the after the shows, we would go to like, you know, the ale house in Orlando and eat and drink. could just have a good time. And we were just friends, just like such a cool person. And, you know, in my opinion, that's the basis of any good relationship.

You know, if you have that good friendship first, and we did. And we just connected on so many levels and just, you know, eventually it turned into love and companionship, man. And now you have a child together. Beautiful 13-year-old boy named Rebel. Yeah, it's pretty, pretty, I'm a blessed man. I've out kicked my coverage, man. So when both of his parents are pro wrestlers, how does he feel about wrestling?

Well, up until about a year ago, you know, thought it was cool, like would sometimes go if I had a show close by, like a Vegas show or something or an L.A. show. And he's an athlete. He's a brown belt and taekwondo, a great baseball player. So he's, so he liked getting in the ring and, you know, he's a boy. He likes to be an active and stuff, but didn't really care. About a year ago, one of his other buddies is a big wrestling fan and they got involved in the video games. the video game led to him watching it. So now, you know, a year later, he is an abhoused me because he's just like I was.

He's obsessed with it. He knows everything about everything. What comes to WWE and TNA? He knows everything. So much so that I go, hey, man, who's that person? He'll tell me, oh, so and so. Because I don't have time to watch a lot of pro wrestling. And sometimes I just choose not to, but he is obsessed with it, like obsessed with it.

And as already said, maybe he wants to do it, you know, but I don't think he's, I think he's a little trepidious of telling me that, but, you know, but we've already told him, he's a very, very, very wonderful bright kid, you know, the light of my life. You know, we've already told him, like, you know, that's cool. You know, you're a very smart kid too because you're a straight-a student. Like, but if you do this, you're going to do it right because you already have an advantage over someone else training once he does start training, if he does start training. Yeah.

Because your last name, you're, you know, you're, you're, uh, you're on third base already. I says, you're going to have to work extra hard and you're going to face extra criticism. He's like, okay, I know, I'm aware. I'm aware. Um, but no, he's like, honestly, if you wanted to do it, he'd probably be really good at it. But we'll see. Like I said, he's a very smart kid. He's only 13.

So we got years, hopefully, to wait on that. Well, Tracy Brooks was one of my first ever crushes in wrestling. Mine too. Mine too. Mine too. Yeah. I have that in common. I know.

Yeah. Yeah. That you checked all the boxes, man. Well, look at you. I know. Again, I don't, I don't know. I don't know. The son even shines on a dog's ass sometimes, I guess, right?

I don't know. Does she still want to wrestle? No. No, she is very, very comfortable being a mother. And, you know, she spends a lot of time volunteering at my son's school. And she is, and that kind of was always our vision, what we wanted. We wanted her to be home with my son because I travel so much. And her doing that, it's like, well, you know, I've missed so many moments.

We both would miss those moments without her there. And the reason our son is the wonderful young man he is because of, you know, his mother being there with him. So, you know, she's last year they T&A brought her back. I'm sorry, 2012 and 23, TNA brought her back, put her in the Hall of Fame. We did one, her last match with a mixed tag match. myself and her against Alicia Edwards and Eddie Edwards. And that was real, like, closure for her. She's like, I didn't know I needed that, but I did.

So she got that. She got the Hall of Fame. And she's been back to, like, some of our bigger pay-per-views, like, Slammercery and Bound for Glory, she was part of the Hall of Fame ceremony this past year when Mickey James went in. I saw her in Irvine, California. Yeah. And she was there in Irvine.

She was there just in the crowd as a fan. Yeah. So she, I mean, she still loves it. She still follows. Her friends, you know, are still involved in it. She still, you know, knows. what's going on. But no, she's very, very satisfied with her career. She did more than she ever thought she could or would. And she's been asked to do things, you know, on a, on a, you know, smaller scales.

And it just comes to like convention stuff and like in terms of being employed. But she's just very, we are very, very blessed that she can be a mom and she can spend time volunteering. And she can spend time going home to Canada and visiting her family and everything. So, yeah, it's worked out well. Very cool. Yeah. Do you remember having a moment where you became the veteran backstage? Like, people now come to you.

Hey, man. Did you see my match? Hey, man, do you have some advice for me? Yeah. I mean, it happened pretty early on. But really, when AEW started, a lot of the young guys there would try to, like, kind of pick my brain. And when I went back to TNA, I was immediately.

like this respected veteran, which is weird because, like, in my head, I'm still like a 22-year-old kid wrestling like I, like I'm trying to get a job. I really, really approach it like that. You know, I don't feel like a 48-year-old guy who's been doing this almost 28 years. I feel like I am trying to impress a scout out there to get a job. So it's, so it's, you know, it's very humbling when people come up to me. And anytime somebody does come up and ask advice, I will give it to him. I never give unsolicited advice.

That's one thing. A lot of like the old veteran wrestlers would like, you know, just, come over your brother, you're not doing this. I'd never do that. But if somebody asks me, I tell them like seminars all the time. And I'm also always very upfront. I go look at any advice I give you or anything I tell you, I'm not saying that's 100% correct.

I'm saying that's what worked for me. Because you might get advice from someone else who's been doing it as long. And it's different. that's what works for them. So this is what works for me. And it probably will work for you. But yeah, it's cool. I'm, again, honored.

And I want to leave the business better than how I found it. So that's part of the giving back process. When people talk about some of the future faces in TNA, Leon Slater's name always comes up. And you worked his very first TNA match. You were his opponent. Yeah. And I believe that first one was in Scotland.

We did a tour over there a couple years ago. and worked him in his first TNA match, and then worked him again the last night of that tour where we actually presented him with his contract. And meeting him and wrestling him blew me away, not because of how physically gifted he is and what he can do in the ring. And, you know, that Swanton 450, it's unbelievable.

Where he is mentally and the head on his shoulders and just how mature he is and how well he listens. you tell them something one time and he fixes it. Light years ahead of where I was when I was 21 years old. And a wonderful, beautiful person and is going to be a mega star in this business. I ask every TNA veteran that sits across from me this question. So I'm curious what your answer will be. Who's on your TNA Mount Rushmore?

That's so tough. I mean, you've got to put Jeff Jarrett on there. I think you have to put Jeff Jared on there. Without Jeff, there's no TNA. 100%. You have to put Jeff on there. And now this is where it gets dicey because, like, you can say yes, thing. You say Kurt, but those guys are also, maybe on them, they came from somewhere else.

But like, it's hard to not put Kurt on there. It has to be Jeff, Kurt. Of course you have to put AJ on. Of course. Jeff, Kurt, AJ, and. probably it has to be a Samoa Joe or a

Sting I don't know I would go over with Joe just because Joe Joe made TNA and TNA made Joe Sting was already a massive global star and I'm not discounting what Sting did for our company because he's of course but he did so much in WCW exactly yeah yeah you'd have to put those for but I mean God I can you can throw Bobby Rue

you could throw machine guns just you know can we have like a Mount Rush more of like They make a new Mount Rushmore with like 18 presidents. So we don't just have this comparison because it's always so hard. Right. Yeah, those four. It's like it's always Jeff, AJ and like a variation of like a Joe and a Kurt. Yeah, and I don't know if people realized looking back the impact that Kurt Angle had like coming over there.

Because Christian Cage was the first big signing, the first person to go from WWE over to TNA. But then Kurt Engel going in the peak of his career when he was doing his best work. Yes, sir. And Kurt will be the first to tell you. that he had better matches in TNA than he ever did in WWE. I heard Kurt say recently that a match we had where it was him and AJ Styles against myself and Christopher Daniels from Bound for Glory in 2012, I believe. He said it was his favorite tag team match ever.

Wow. That's super cool to hear because I always had incredible chemistry with him. And he was so giving and just I learned so much. I always say that we had a lot of ex-WWE guys come in. some for selfish reasons. But there was a handful that came in to really help the company and to help the talent,

specifically Kurt Angle, Christian, and the Dudleys. Those guys came in with zero selfish intentions wanting to help build this brand, wanting to make guys and all of those dudes accomplish that. So glad to be able to sit across from you, man. Oh, man. Likewise, man.

So glad to have you on the show finally. It's a good conversation, dude. Yeah. Congrats on everything. And almost 30 years in this business. Yeah, it's nuts. With that said, what do you think the biggest difference is now versus when you started out? In pro wrestling in general?

Yes. There's a lot. Social media has changed the game. Is that a big part of like moments from matches can now go viral? Yeah. Yes. Building character on social media. There's so much, it's social media issues game and the fact that there's so much wrestling has really, you know, like, it's almost an embarrassment of riches, you know.

It's, there's, you have prosely on every night of the week. You can watch it on YouTube anytime you want. Social media, it's just, it's just everywhere now, which is good and bad, you know, because it can't get overexposed. You know, and, you know, I started 1998. and, you know, wrestling now, everybody's kind of in on the gag. You know, 98, they still were, but it was still very, very protected.

Like, my first day of wrestling school, Kowalski's, I walked in that room and nobody looked at me like they wanted me there. You know, it was like, who, like, who's this kid? He's coming into our world because it was very protected. And K Fabe was still a big thing and all that. And that's kind of all been, you know, blown out the window now, which is good and bad.

But, yeah, and of course, the athleticism is just, you know, the guys are doing some incredible things, but still, again, uh, people can't remember moves, but they really remember moments. When you were coming up in Southern California and working for UPW, do you remember your first impressions of John Cena or the prototype? Yep. Uh, I had one of his very, very, very first matches, one of it, not his first, but very early early on.

And, uh, I had already had a decent reputation of being like a pretty good wrestler. And, you know, I remember walking in, He goes, hey, man, what's going on? He's like, hey, look at, I'm very green. And I know you do a lot of high flying and stuff, but if you don't mind, can we please keep it? I go, hold, I don't do a lot of high flying, man. He said, can we please keep it simple?

He was very honest, very self-aware. It's like, of course, we went out, had a good one. We actually became good buds. Like, we would ride to, like, spot shows out in the middle of, like, Lancaster together, and always do road trips up to Northern Cali when we were doing this feud with APW and became real friendly. And like him and me and Samoa Joe would hang out. We'd go to Joe's house after training.

Joe's dad would cook his barbecue and stuff. And we became like a good little crew. The one thing I always say about John is I always knew he was going to be a start because of his work ethic. Every practice we had, there was a couple guys there, Samojo and John Cena and myself. And I live two hours away from where the practice feels, the facility was. But I would go down Tuesday, Thursday, 3rd. Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday. And guys, you know, guys to be mixed in and stuff, but the constant were those two guys.

And John's work ethic from day one and his attitude set him apart. And, yeah, he's had maybe the greatest run ever. I couldn't be happier for the guy. Just a good, genuinely good dude. Yeah. And here we are. It's coming to an end now. Sad, yeah.

I know. Yeah. I'll watch that one, man. That's, yeah. But he's earned it, you know. He's earned it. What a run. It's pretty cool.

to see you know it's just it was cool to like you know be a small little part of that early on yeah you know yeah i'm going to ask you the question i ask everybody at the end yes gratitude such a huge thing for me sure i love focusing on things i'm grateful for my life i do it every day when i wake up and before we go to bed what are three things in your life frankie that you're grateful for friends and family first and foremost because without them i'm nothing my wife is my everything my son the light of my life. I have such a good support group of the family I have and the friends. My friends in wrestling and my friends, my civilian friends, I call them.

There's been dudes that have been on this journey with me since, you know, I'm still friends with the guys I was friends with like in first and third grade, which is really cool. And that's like, you know, when I'm home and away from all the drama and just want to, you know, go back and have a cigar, my crew's there. So I'm so grateful to have them. Secondly, I would say, you know, the male mentors in my life, which there have been many in wrestling, like we just talked, Chris Daniels, Jerry Lynn, Christian, Raven, like, you know, Bubba Dudley, like all these guys that were that I learned from, but specifically three male figures that made me the man that I am,

Killer Kowalski, my wrestling trainer, my friend. Without him, I'm not sitting here talking to you. You know, he just instilled such a knowledge of pro wrestling in me and a focus on the fundamentals. And, you know, he wasn't just my trainer. He was my friend. I drove him places. I used to take him to church. He liked going to church.

So I would take him to church. We'd go out to eat. And I just got so much invaluable time and information from that guy. And he was such a unique, wonderful man. So he was won by high school football coach, Mark Beckham. I played four years of high school football, even though I was small, skinny, and slow. But he installed me a work ethic and a never give up and a never say die attitude that I carry to this day. And just a wonderful man, you know, I would run through a wall for that man.

He just believed in me when I didn't believe in myself. I had no business playing football, but I love the sport. And I, you know, I gave it my all. put everything I had into it. And at a very formative time, you know, when you're becoming a, that's basically when you become from a boy to a man, high school. And, you know, so having him there in those years was hugely important. And last, my dad.

My dad passed coming up on five years ago and not a day goes by that I don't, you know, something he taught me doesn't pop into my head about anything, anything and everything. You know, he would always say, you know, he goes, I know, a little, about everything and a lot about nothing because he did man he just he taught me so much just about life about everything there's not a day a second that goes by or something like i remember my dad said i remember my dad said driving here today my dad's from l a i was like i remember my dad telling me about you know pico boulevard just you know those three men you know formed this and i could not be more grateful um and last you know what i'm i'm very very grateful for

The longevity I've had in pro wrestling, in my career in general. Look, I had a dream. I wanted to be a pro wrestler. I was beating up stuffed monkeys in my pillows. And there was never the thought of a paycheck attached to it. There was never initials on the ring skirt. I just wanted to be in a wrestling ring. And I've done that for almost 30 years.

And a lot of those years at a very high level for major companies. And a lot of my peers have not had that opportunity. be it because of injury or because of, you know, just life, you know, taking a left turn. I'm so very blessed to have been doing what I love for this long and still at it. And everything I own is because of professional wrestling. Everything my, every meal my son has eaten, everything is because of pro wrestling. And that is not ever lost on me. I love that.

Man. Thank you again. Thank you, my man. Appreciate you. Thank you, dude. I'm glad we got to do this. Jim Rome takes on sports. Why? Because I have a job to do. With rapid-fire takes.

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