NWA President Billy Corgan says Tyrus has been a model employee for NWA.
Tyrus, the reigning NWA Worlds Heavyweight Champion, is a polarizing figure, as he regularly appears on FOX News and shares some opinions that may be controversial. Putting that aside, some fans are also critical of Tyrus’ abilities as a wrestler.
Speaking on Under The Ring, Corgan was asked to share his thoughts on the criticism of Tyrus.
“Let’s separate the wrestling and the personal, which isn’t always easy to do,” Corgan said. “On the wrestling side, I’ve been very, very happy and very satisfied. I think he’s done everything I’ve asked him to do, and he’s been great to work with. As far as Tyrus as a public person, I knew Tyrus when he was working at TNA, basically standing with his arms crossed behind Matt Hardy and holding one of the babies. I saw when we first started working for FOX, and we’ve stayed in touch through all these years. We have our own relationship. Like myself, when you’re a public person, you say things that not everybody agrees with. But look, he’s on one of the biggest networks in the world. He knows what he’s doing, and so for better or for worse, he writes his own checks that way.
“As far as I’m concerned, he has never crossed the line to the point where he’s been detrimental to the NWA. Now I know not everyone agrees with that opinion, but I think people have this kind of weird sliding scale because there’s lots of blame to go around the professional wrestling, where people look the other way at different things. Most of the heat around Tyrus is political, and as a person who’s been through some of those things myself, I tend not to pay a lot of attention to that stuff. Not because it’s not important, but because I think a lot of that stuff is, there’s a lot of energy behind it, which has other agendas, and it’s not really down to the individual as much as it’s like a culture war kind of thing. As far as I’m concerned, we’re a professional wrestling company, and we’re here to wrestle.”
Corgan continued by describing how Tyrus brings old-school heat, and giving people someone to boo is what wrestling is all about.
“What people don’t understand is I grew up in a time where wrestling heat was different,” Corgan said. “This world we live in, it’s like fake heat or a five-star matchup. To me, Tyrus brings that old-school heat, that an Ernie Ladd brought or an Andre the Giant brought. There’s not a lot of guys who can, at that size, bring that level of heat. So look, it’s professional wrestling. Come and boo, come and hate him, come and wish that this guy, in this case Chris Adonis, is gonna take him out.
“That’s what wrestling is for. When we try to overly bring life into wrestling, I think that’s kind of an uncomfortable thing because you and I could spend an hour talking about where somebody did this and then people looked the other way, and they still have a job. At some point, look, as far as I’m concerned, he’s been a model of an employee for the NWA and I don’t have anything else to say about it, other than he’s been great to work with.”
Tyrus will defend the NWA Worlds Heavyweight Championship against Chris Adonis at NWA 312/
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