This week on the “Hall Of Fame” podcast, Booker T and Brad Gilmore talked about the last few days of wrestling-related news including the reaction to Sasha Banks in The Mandalorian, the rumored WrestleMania main event, AEW’s “big surprise,” Zelina Vega’s firing, Chelsea Green’s injury and much more.
Check out the transcribed highlights below and scroll down for the full show.
Booker T talking about Zelina Vega: “She definitely was one of the Fav 5 for the ladies. She was coming up and one day she’s here, the next day she’s gone. Watching her on her Twitch Channel talk about it broke my heart watching her cry. One thing about it is we move on. We find ourselves landing and keep doing our thing. I’m sad to see her go because I thought she was talent. I thought she was someone that could have really made a huge difference as far as the card. We are always looking for stars just like any other business. Like I said before, the young guys are going to have to figure out how this thing is going to work more than anything. I say this because, I pose the question to myself, what would I do? Well, I’m not from this era. I’m from the era before and things were different for me. I’m not talent on the roster anymore. I’m sure if I was, I would be in the same predicament that each and every one of the stars are right now. Guys, figure it out because at the end of the day, it’s a bigger picture. At the end of the day, you hope the pot of gold is at the end of the rainbow or you have someone like Zelina who said I created that pot of gold for myself. I can appreciate that as well but I wanted to say above all, I’m going to miss her because she was talent.”
Booker T explained one of the differences between performing in WCW and WWE: “When I was in WCW it was more of a competition than when I got to WWE. I don’t know why. The competition went out the window when I got to WWE because I started working on a lot of different things than what I worked on in WCW. In WCW, I worked on being a wrestler. I worked on being the best wrestler in the locker room. You put me in the ring one on one, toe to toe, and it was like a heavyweight boxing match. I wanted to go out and show the world what a great wrestler I was. When I got to WWE, they kind of transformed me into becoming an entertainer. They worked on me being an entertainer. I didn’t want to lose as far as what I had in my toolbox. There was a lot of talent but it seemed like we were all just performing. It seemed like we were going out and doing the show. In the WWE, the guy who was the champ, we rode with him. We had his back. We were going to make sure we did everything for the guy who had the championship because, “Thanks for the house brother”. The royalty check is in the mail. Then you put in enough work and your body of work gets recognized and you get the spot.”
Booker talked about the rock style life in WCW: “When we were running WCW back in the day, it was literally like the Rolling Stones were on tour. It was so electric coming into certain countries. We made a stop in just about every one of them. We would get off the plane and there would be so many people just waiting for us at the airport. We would get to the hotel and the hotel would be booked solid. The people literally were sleeping in the bar area and in the lobby area. It was that full. There was security around the clock as far as taking us in and out. It was a real rock star life. The people that were at the show that final night, for instance if we were somewhere in Germany, and we had to go to the next city in Germany, it’s a nice bus ride and the fans would be there before us waiting when we got there. It was unbelievable. I don’t know what it’s like now. I’m sure there is some feel to that but every arena, every week, wow. WCW was sold out to the rafters as far as television goes. The fans participation and then again the talent pool that was on the roster that you had to compete with was vast and it was fun. It was so much fun. If I miss anything, it’s the adrenaline that I got out of being a part of that. Now I’m sure it’s a lot different because of social media and the internet but I’m sure these guys are still living out their dreams but it seems to be a whole lot different than it was back then as far as how happy people were back then. Back then it was a party.”
Booker T commented on Chelsea Green’s injury: “I was just talking to Chelsea a couple weeks ago and I was talking to her about a match I was showing on film study in my classes. I was showing a match with her against Charlotte Flair. It was a match she had in NXT. I was talking about how green Chelsea was and how experienced Charlotte was and the difference between the two of them and how they were working in that same match with each other. You can see and notice the difference between the two. None of it was the big things they did. All of it was the small things. That’s what Chelsea needs to work on. I didn’t see what she actually did to get injured but what I noticed about Chelsea was how she would move and not really pay attention to where she was going before she started her trip. It seemed like she would get on a road and start going and then she would pull out the GPS and figure out on the road where she was. You can’t do that in this business. I always say navigate your way through a match. By saying navigate, you have to know where you are going before you get there before you even think about going.”
