Jim Ross was the special guest on this week’s episode of X-Pac 1,2,360; you can read a few transcribed highlights and watch the show below, or download it on iTunes and Android.
Jim Ross Talks About The Nature of the Business and Building Stories
Some matches don’t have a common denominator some matches don’t have a tent pool that you can build around. And people go ‘what does that mean?’ It means Matt Jackson’s back was injured, its been injured for a good while, with their last go around with Sho and Yo for the Junior Titles, a major facet of the main event was Matt Jackson battling through courageously through a bad back. And so it had a theme and unfortunately in the business today, I am not just talking New Japan, but in the business today so many matches are just about getting their elements in than the elements being connected and telling a story. You could take these moves and put them anywhere in the match and they’d mean the same.
Jim Ross Talks About Why He’s A Big Fan of Kazuchika Okada:
I am a big fan of Okada, he’s so damn good sometimes he may be taken a little bit for granted with how good he is because he’s had big-time main event delivery against a variety of opponents with different skill sets at real high-level matches. I told him over a little tequila the other day that I thought the way he and Naito delivered the main event at Wrestle Kingdom to follow everything on the card with nothing bad. But seriously he’s had great matches with all those guys.
JR on New Japan Commentary compared to WWE Commentary:
The thing about doing it (Commentary) for WWE is you have every whistle and bell, every amenity, everything you could possibly ever need to make your job better and to have a better chance at success in that respect. I have never worked with a better group of guys than I work with at AXS TV. Guys that you would always want to keep in touch with, guys you want to be around. Good people. But it’s a limited budget their not spending the money on the TV side that’s not their expertise. They do a great MMA show about forty live a year or maybe more… Now I have plenty of notes. I have a little inner circle of guys that help me with notes on a New Japan that are really good. They live it.
JR on Communicating with his Wife Jan after her passing:
I thought I heard her voice once. I heard her voice once I think and I woke up from a very strong dream and I thought she was talking to me that’s what woke me up. The other thing is I got these chimes that I hung on my patio. And the person that gave me the chimes said that when you hear them that’s going to be her talking to you. And you don’t hear them all the time. That’s the funny thing about it. As windy as Oklahoma is the wind comes swiftly down the plane type thing. The chime doesn’t go off all the time but they do sometimes. And I just believe that’s her. Some kind of communication. Now some atheist are going to say, “What’s that old bastard talking about? There ain’t no hereafter.” See I don’t believe that. I don’t believe that.
JR on Who Impresses him the most in New Japan:
Well, Okada is my guy. Cause I just think anytime you get a 6ft 3′ Thirty-year-old kid that’s got great looks and the charisma is natural, organic. That’s a big thing there. They’ve got several guys I like. I like Goto. Let me tell you why I like (Hirooki) Goto, I compared (Hirooki) Goto to Bret Hart. Because I felt (Hirooki) Goto was underappreciated like Bret was at times he was extremely fundamentally sound always. Bret’s always that way. So I looked at it as a compliment some people took me to task on it. But I like (Hirooki) Goto. Minoru Suzuki reminds me of one of the great heels villains ever. I said on TV I think he could be a great Bond villain. His facials are as about as good as I’ve ever seen.
JR on Vince McMahon Owning Tape Libraries and being Immortalized on the WWE Network:
Vince told me one time about the Network. Cause he and I were really big on buying (tape) libraries back in the day cause we had a vision of what that could be. Because both of us were familiar with that those big old tapes a lot of them were not recycled they just taped over them. So where you could find first generation tapes grab those things because they’re like gold. So they’ve done that. So he (Vince) told me one time, “You know JR, that crazy idea we had about the WWE Network is going to make you immortal.” I said, “well what do you mean?” For some reason I thought of (Hulk) Hogan cause he is immortal I ain’t. He said,”Well your work is going to live forever.” Then I got to thinking about it the other day, he (Vince) owns everything I’ve ever done. He owns, Mid-South, he owns Crockett, Ted Turner (WCW), and Smokey Mountain. He owns it all. I got no problem with. Because that way I know it will a home.
