Will Ospreay On What He Does Is "Art," Rip Rogers Comments, Veterans, Ricochet NJPW Match
Will Ospreay spoke with USA Today's "For the Win" section on a number of wrestling topics. Here are some of the highlights:
His NJPW Best of the Super Juniors match against Ricochet in 2016 (which can be seen above):
"I'm surprised it raised so many eyebrows. But I think people wanted to have that conversation about what is professional wrestling. I feel like there's a lot of people who have accepted that wrestling has changed and it needs to evolve. Then, there's a lot of people like Van Vader and Jim Cornette that have problems with it evolving. They don't like what I do and they don't consider it professional wrestling, and they're welcome to that opinion."
What he considers his style:
"To an extent, I don't believe what I do is professional wrestling, and I'll happily admit that. I consider it an art form. I consider the grace and athleticism of everything that I do as art. Wrestling is an art. I don't look at death match wrestling and say that's not wrestling. I don't look at technical wrestling and say that's not wrestling. Sure, in a real fight, I'd be going in fists flying, full guns blazing, but everything is different in wrestling. I align it to movies. I don't go to a movie and not enjoy it because certain aspects aren't real. I go to into it and say that I'm open-minded. I'm the Spider-Man of professional wrestling. Everything that I can do, the superhero Spider-Man would be out to do. I try to do whatever I can to maneuver myself out of a situation and using the environment to change the game."
Wrestling veterans and Rip Rogers' comments:
"These veterans hate me, I don't know why. But I agree with Rip Rogers 100%. Wrestling has become the same old, same old. But look at myself and Jay White (at War of the Worlds). It followed that flippy floppy, Humpty Dumpty formula, but look at that crowd reaction. It's what they desire and what they want. If it's making money for Ring of Honor, if it's making money for myself and my family and entertaining thousands upon thousands of fans, what's wrong with it? I do have so much respect for Rip Rogers. I have respect for everyone who wants to criticize my work. Please do. But I'm not a shy person. I do bite back."
You can read the full interview by clicking here.
Source: USA Today