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Catching Up With WWE Hall Of Famer Jim Ross

Posted: Sep 24th 2016 By: Kevin Eck

WWE Hall of Fame announcer Jim Ross and his special guest, legendary pro wrestling manager Jim Cornette, will be sharing road stories and answering fans' questions during "Ringside: An Evening With Jim Ross And Jim Cornette" at Jimmy's Famous Seafood in Dundalk, Md., Sept. 23. The following day, Ross will appear at MCW Pro Wrestling's Tribute to the Legends pro wrestling convention at Joppa Market Place in Joppatowne, Md.

I spoke with Ross about his current work as a pro wrestling and boxing announcer, his upcoming show with Cornette and a variety of topics in pro wrestling.

Kevin Eck: Where can fans hear you announcing pro wrestling these days?

Jim Ross: As far as new content, they can hear me on Friday nights on AXS TV. Josh Barnett and I do a one-hour New Japan Pro-Wrestling show. AXS TV is not exclusively on satellite. It's on some cable companies, but it's not mass distributed. Right now, it could be challenging to some degree to find it, unfortunately. It's a little different than most wrestling presentations because we don't have to promote live events or pay-per-views or anything else. All we do is call the matches, which is great. The audio you hear matches up with the video you see. I'm having a great time doing it. I'm able to accomplish being on weekly TV by going to L.A. eight to 10 times a year. We'll call anywhere from six to eight shows over a two-day period. It works out really good on the wear and tear and the travel, and the product is really fundamentally sound.

KE: You're also announcing boxing for CBS Sports Network, correct?

JR: Yes. My next boxing event is Friday night, Sept. 30 in Las Vegas. We're doing a series called "Knockout Night at the D." I'm working with Al Bernstein, a boxing Hall of Fame color analyst. I'm finding my rhythm in boxing. It was a challenge to find it in the beginning, but it's a fun sport to broadcast. It's a lot easier to do than pro wrestling.

KE: In what aspect?

JR: You only have two people you're dealing with in boxing. There are no tag matches or run-ins. The fighters, 99 percent of the time, are only using their right or left hand. There's no kicking; there's no jumping; there's no bumping. It allows you to focus on the two guys. It's a lot like doing baseball. You're telling a real narrative. One of the things I enjoy most are the fighters meetings we have a couple days before the fights. We get to know who they are. We're featuring high-level young fighters with terrific won-loss records against each other.

KE: A lot has been made about how Vince McMahon produces his announcers in WWE. We've heard some former WWE announcers say how difficult it was to work with Vince screaming in their headset during live broadcasts. Do you think it's a case-by-case basis, in that some announcers need to be produced that way, but others don't need to be as micromanaged?

JR: First of all, the fact that Vince is hands-on isn't going to change. For those who have stock in the company, you really don't want him not be hands-on. Producing talent is a very subjective thing. To say he produces everybody the same way every time would be a misnomer. He produces based on what he perceives the talent needs to hear in the moment they're in. I've had shows where he rarely said a word to me. So many guys had very little experience or formal training in broadcasting, so some needed more help than others. As I said earlier, announcing pro wrestling is a lot harder than it seems. You've got athletic content, showbiz content, episodic TV content. Some of the guys that had issues with how they were produced had just never experienced that, so they're trying to process all kinds of information to do their job and they're not prepared for the coaching or the producing they're going to get. You worked there, so you know how it is. Vince is a very passionate guy and very hands-on. You know that when you sign on. It's not a surprise.

KE: Tell me about the show you're doing with Jim Cornette in Baltimore. What can fans expect?

JR: There will be plenty of laughs. The stories we have from our experiences in the territory days and moving forward into the corporate world of wrestling are just too damn funny not to share. He's arguably one of the best managers in history and he was one of my favorite broadcast partners. Really, the keys to these shows are the Q&A's with the fans. So you'll get humor and you'll get every question that's asked answered with no restrictions. Cornette and I will have some good exchanges that are totally unrehearsed. It harkens back to the old days in wrestling when you called it in the ring and did it based on what the audience was reacting to. Neither of us are stand-up comedians, but I think both of us could be considered humorists.

KE: I want to get your take on some of the current topics in wrestling, the first being Seth Rollins and the fact that some have said he's an unsafe worker. Is that a fair label to give Rollins because of the injuries guys have suffered in matches with him, or do you think it's today's style of wrestling that isn't as safe as it should be, and are fans' expectations contributing to that?

JR: I don't think this is a Seth Rollins issue. I think it's an industry-wide issue that's only going to be heightened as time goes on. Guys are taking too many big bumps that have very little meaning. They don't get beat by these big bumps, they don't win by these big bumps, and often times they don't sell these big bumps, so you wonder why they do these bumps. Unless they're so obsessed to hear a crowd chant "this is awesome." If that's the motivator of the talent, that's their call, but they're going to shorten their career. Talents, including Seth Rollins, work at a pace that is not totally advantageous to them. The pace needs to be more deliberate, but not slow. I'm not advocating people grab a rear chinlock and sit in it for 10 minutes. The No. 1 drill in any wrestling school is learning how to safely and effectively take a flat-back bump. Now you see guys taking bumps on their shoulders and necks. Everybody's looking for something new to do, and they're not always thinking about doing things that are actually safe and judicious. I don't think Rollins is any more dangerous than a lot of other guys in a lot of different promotions. I'm not looking to debate anybody who thinks Seth Rollins is guilty. I know Bret Hart's made that comment and I have the utmost respect for Bret and his opinion. It's just that I think it's a bigger issue than Seth Rollins. I think it's a dangerous trend that needs to be addressed by management in all companies.

KE: The current world champions in WWE are AJ Styles and Kevin Owens, and we had Finn Balor briefly before Owens. None of them have the size or look of a prototypical top guy in WWE. Do you think we're seeing a true shift in philosophy in WWE, or is it just a matter of time before Vince McMahon returns to having bigger guys on top?

JR: I think WWE has made an effort to embellish the best workers they can find, regardless of size, which I wholeheartedly applaud. I think it's a sign of the times. Who are the best talents that you can get in the game right now? Well, we've identified who they are and where they are, and they're not in the stereotypical WWE size range. The match quality in WWE has increased immensely, in my opinion. WWE is working diligently to get some guys over. Right now, WWE has two stars who are truly over: John Cena and Brock Lesnar. So you have a wide-open horse race for the next group in those main event spots. I'm really happy with the choice of the two champions. Of all the bookers I've worked for in my career, there's not one who wouldn't be very positive about booking Owens and AJ. They can have good matches with pretty much anybody on the roster. And they have the most important trait that any main-eventer can have: they're reliable.

KE: There's been a lot of discussion about the finish to the SummerSlam main event last month when Brock Lesnar busted open Randy Orton "hardway" with stiff blows to the head. Do you think intentionally getting blood to add drama to a match still has a place in wrestling today, and if so, is the old way of using a blade, which some may consider barbaric, actually preferable?

JR: I'm a proponent of using pre-determined blood very sparingly. I think we've moved on from that. I know a lot of guys from my generation still have a clenched first around that blade. They think you have to have blood for wrestling to be effective. As far as the Lesnar-Orton match, I'm not so sure the idea was to bust Randy open the hard way and stop the match. I have a hard time thinking that was the game plan, but maybe it was. Maybe it was a deal where he was taking so many unprotected head shots that the referee stepped in and stopped the match like you would see in boxing and MMA, but along the way, a couple of those shots were errant and they busted Orton open. I just don't think that with the issues we face in society with tainted blood or blood issues in general that we need to go down that road much anymore. I'm not a proponent of the inexact science of "hardway," and like you described, as barbaric as the blade is, people don't understand that sometimes the blade can be a very good facilitator for that if you really feel like you need it. And it can be controlled and sanitary. I just don't know that we really need blood anymore or if it's comfortable for the audience.

KE: Switching gears to TNA, what's your take on the stuff Matt and Jeff Hardy are doing?

JR: It's certainly a departure from traditional pro wrestling, but I have no issues with it. Is it something I'd want to see every week in the mini-movie production vein? Probably not, but to see it sporadically and where they do it episodically and it takes you somewhere, no issues. I'm assuming Matt Hardy had a tremendous amount to do with the creation of this presentation, and I applaud him for thinking outside the box. The editing and some of the special effects were very creative. I'm happy that Matt and Jeff were able to use their vision and creativity to pull something off. It was smart of TNA, which isn't known for making of overabundance of smart creative decisions, to let that thing roll. It's probably the only thing you and I are going to talk about regarding TNA other than whether they're going to sell the company, so it must be OK.