X-Pac points out that NXT’s Drew McIntrye looks great right now, and he’s a completely different person now compared to what he was when he left WWE a few years ago. He sees big things in McIntrye’s future because he has a great look and a wonderful attitude right now.
Black informs that he’s always been a wrestling fan but he wasn’t able to watch WWE growing up. He grew up watching NJPW and then transitioned into WCW, but nothing was chronological because he only watched whatever was available to him at any given time. When he was finally able to watch WWE, he was shocked to see a lot of the same wrestlers he’d known from Japan and WCW now working for WWE.
He points out that growing up in the late 80’s and early 90’s he didn’t really understand the difference between MMA and professional wrestling. Around this time, a lot of MMA films such as ‘Bloodsport’ were being released as well, and the common theme of all these things were two men fighting and he knew he wanted to do that as well. As he got older he began to understand the difference between MMA and professional wrestling, but by that time he had grown to love wrestling as a form of entertainment.
Black believes that his love of MMA eventually led to him being a better professional wrestler. Training in MMA allowed him to develop good striking techniques, and now his striking looks very believable as a professional wrestler. X-Pac believes and says it’s hard to understand how to throw or sell a strike properly, if you don’t have at least a base knowledge of MMA.