Reigning NXT World Champion Bobby Roode recently spoke with Spanish-language pro wrestling website Planeta Wrestling for an interview about his ongoing run in WWE’s secondary NXT brand. Below are some of the highlights.
On what veteran wisdom he can garner and pass down while in NXT: “It’s nice to have experience on my side, and there are guys and girls that ask for my opinion, to watch their matches and help them with certain things, which is kind of mind blowing and really cool at the same time because I never thought I’d be in that position. I love to help others and I really love the business itself and whenever I can lend a hand or help anyone out with something in their matches or characters, I love doing that kind of stuff. Whenever I started I would go to any guy, and like I said earlier, you never stop learning in this business. I’m still learning, I’m not saying I’m an expert. There’s always things to improve on, there’s always things to learn. It’s king of like a domino affect, there are so many guys I can come up to that have had the experience before me that I can learn from. Of course I can bring like almost 20 years experience to NXT and help some of these younger guys who are like six months, a year, two years into the business and try to get them rolling. It’s a very unique company and fun place to be.”
On the differences and similarities between various types of pro wrestling crowds throughout the countries he has performed in thus far in his career: “They’re very similar but the only thing I can say is that the fans here in North America see us a lot. For instance, we have shows in Cleveland, Columbus, we always have Ohio. We’re in the United States and there are a lot of people that can – in a 300 to 400 mile radius that could drive and see us if they wanted to. When we go to places like the UK, it’s a once a year thing. So the fans are that much louder and excited when we go to these places. And I know the guys and the girls always look forward to going on these tours because they’re a lot of fun. You get to see a lot of the world and get to perform. One of the best things for me was the recent trip to Australia, I live in Canada so in December it was the dead of Winter, flying to Australia I’m wearing shorts in 85 degree weather. So that was the funnest part for me.”
On who he feels will be next to challenge him for the NXT Championship if former title-holder Shinsuke Nakamura wins in their upcoming championship clash: “We’ll see what happens, there are guys and everyone gets an opportunity. There’s a lot of talent that are scratching, clawing, and trying to get into the main event. Kassius is a guy that has come back to the company and has one goal in mind and that’s to be the champion, he never got a chance to do that with NXT before so I’m sure he’ll be gunning for me. Guys like Roderick Strong, Hideo Itami, who knows? Tye Dillinger is still there. I think he has some unfinished business with me as well. There’s a lot of guys that can step up and go with me and challenge me at any time so I can’t really narrow it down to one particular guy.”
Check out the complete Bobby Roode interview at PlanetaWrestling.com.