Former UFC fighter Seth Petruzelli recently spoke with FOX Sports regarding his current position as the head striking coach at the WWE Performance Center. Below are some interview highlights:
On how he landed the job as the current head striking coach at the WWE Performance Center:
“One of my amateur fighters who used to train at my gym, Josh Woods, he was an amateur fighter, 5-0, and he always loved wrestling his whole life,” Petruzelli said. “He was a collegiate and high school wrestler. He went to a tryout for NXT and got accepted into their developmental program. So he’s wrestling for NXT right now, but one of his coaches came up to him and said ‘Look, we know you came from an MMA background and we’re really looking to get a coach to come in here to teach MMA, the jiu-jitsu, the striking, just to get some of our guys better technique and some more realistic moves.’”
On Triple H’s involvement in getting him hired:
“Triple H really wanted them to get a real look at it,” he said. “MMA is so huge now and people know like, ‘Oh, he dropped his hands’ or ‘Oh, he got caught with a punch’, so they are catching on to the phony stuff. So they really wanted me to teach them the proper footwork, the way to turn your hand over (for a punch), the proper hand and foot combinations, the timing, speed, and about how to keep your hands up to block, how to slip, how to bob and weave. They really wanted the wrestlers to look like they knew what they were doing.”
Nick was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, and lived there until the age of 18, when he decided to pack his flack jacket and move to New York City.
