Richard Holliday On Being Trained By Paul Roma, 4 Horsemen And The Dynasty Comparisons
Richard Holliday worked for various indie promotions along the East Coast before linking up with MLW. He talked more about his pro wrestling training when he joined The Wrestling Inc Daily podcast.
"I'm from Connecticut and when I was doing research of where I wanted to be a pro wrestler, there were only two schools with any credibility. There was one in New York and one in Massachusetts so I thought I would have to do quite a bit of travel to make this a reality," said Holliday.
"Then as the decisions are being made, Paul Roma decides to open up a school literally two blocks from my house. You can't make this stuff up. Hollywood couldn't have written it up any better as Paul Roma opened up a school two blocks from my house. At that point it was like, 'Alright, here we go. You're gonna be a pro wrestler now.'"
Roma was a staple in WWF and WCW during the 80s and 90s and Holliday discussed what it was like to be trained by him.
"It was fantastic. Paul Roma has quite the reputation in pro wrestling. A lot of people, they immediately go to these shoot interviews and say, 'Oh, Paul Roma is extraordinarily controversial. Paul Roma did this. Paul Roma did that.' But those are people that don't know the man. He's such a great guy and took such care of his students and I was actually his first student. It was great to have that one-on-one, sitting under the learning tree and I was just like a sponge with all his knowledge. He's so smart and I couldn't have been more thankful to train under him," said Holliday.
Roma was part of the Four Horsemen in WCW and many have compared that stable with The Dynasty in MLW. Holliday responded to that comparison.
"A lot of people have said that we're like a modern day Four Horseman. It's three of us, but it's the same feel and I can reason with that. To learn from Paul and use that knowledge and bring it into The Dynasty has worked wonderfully? I've always told people that you can compare The Dynasty to whatever it is you wanna compare us to. I was doing an interview last night and someone said that I remind them of Mr. Perfect. That's great, but I never try to emulate as I try to innovate. I think that's the most important thing," stated Holliday.
"With The Dynasty, we innovated. We're totally different from anybody else and any other stable you've seen in pro wrestling. It's important to learn from your past, but it's very important to set yourself apart from then."
The Dynasty is still a relatively young group and Holliday talked about the stable's origins.
"It was early in 2019 and we were in Philadelphia. I remember Court saying that this is what we're gonna be doing and that me, Hammerstone and Maxwell are gonna blend quite well. At first we all really didn't know what The Dynasty was gonna be," admitted Holliday. "Hammerstone was coming in from Arizona and I had only met him once. He's gung ho and wants to be the top singles guy in the company. Maxwell was one of the top guys in the company and I'm coming in and just trying to get my footing. So it's three different states of mind coming together.
"So, it's really quite commendable the way we were able to make this work and completely flip the script. I think they had one direction for The Dynasty and we said this is the direction we need to go. Then it was kinda more free range in that sense and it completely morphed into something a lot bigger than anyone anticipated it to be."
MJF was one of the founders of the group but since he's departed to AEW, Gino Medina has become the third member. Holliday discussed how Medina fits into the group.
"A lot of people will ask say, 'So what's it like having Gino replace Max?' Well, Gino didn't replace Max. Gino was recruited to The Dynasty in order to enhance our reach in the Latin demographic," revealed Holliday. "Max was never gonna to do that. Max just happened to leave at the same time the recruitment mode was happening. So, there was no replacing him.
"But he does bring a much different element. Gino is fantastic. He's been wrestling for 10 years and he's younger than all of us. His potential is through the roof and once he finds that Dynasty confidence, the sky is the absolute limit."
MJF has really taken off since he committed to AEW full-time and Holliday was asked if he always saw this star potential in his former stablemate.
"We all knew Max was something special and he's doing a tremendous job. He's being him to the best that he can be. I'm super proud of him and I've known Max for quite a bit before MLW. We weren't as close back then as we are now and I'm fortunate for the relationship we have. A lot of people don't really know Max the way The Dynasty knows Max. He's doing a fantastic job as always," said Holliday.
Richard Holliday can be seen every Saturday night, 9/8c, as part of MLW Fusion on BeIN Sports. For more information please visit www.MLW.com. Holliday's full interview with Wrestling Inc aired as part of a recent episode of our podcast, The Wrestling Inc. Daily. Subscribe to get the latest episodes as soon as it's released Monday – Friday afternoon by clicking here.