EC3 Interview: Signing With ROH, Jay Briscoe, Controlling His Narrative, Leaving WWE, More
How familiar with the Ring of Honor product were you before coming over?
EC3: Prior to last year, I was very familiar [with Ring of Honor] as a student of the game, catching up with everything and watching everything. Probably a year prior, though, I was so desensitized and abhorrent with the industry because I was in the midst of the most miserable I had ever been in my entire life that I couldn't watch any of it. I couldn't watch any of my wrestling, the company I was in or other companies. I had no interest in it. It pained me to watch how the business degraded. When you know how the sausage was made, too, when you're in the midst of it and there's nothing you can do about it, when nothing you do matters, it becomes a job.
The second this became a job, it became not passionate and not fun. I reaffirmed myself with the Ring of Honor product upon the relaunch, so I didn't know a lot going into it and apparently a lot of the changes that needed to be made were made. Morale is super high. I would put this product above anything. When I watch this product compared to other products, it's far more suitable to me and it's tolerable. I think it's doing the business and the industry in a better way, so I'm proud of that and what everyone is bringing to that table. The reason I call for a rapture in the industry is because I believe it needs a drastic change and you can't talk about it. You have to do it.
What contributed to your decision to sign full-time with ROH?
EC3: Freedom. They're aware that a free EC3 is a very valuable EC3. I'm free to create, I'm free to speak my truth, I'm free to perform in the way I think I prefer to perform and show as long as I back up what I say and what I do. They provide me with a great amount of freedom, so I think you'll see more of that as I release other things. At the same time, my focus is with them and whatever I do on the side is only to better my position here and to better this company.
Freedom was the biggest thing. Every time I come here, they give me a canvas and it's blank. You know how many words they told me to say? None. You know how many things they told me to do in matches? None. Having that trust and that faith from just being here without having established it prior is a great show of respect and I hope to reciprocate what they've given me as an open forum to create and became the man I'm supposed to be.
CONT'd...