"Filthy" Tom Lawlor Chides Brian Pillman Jr. For Being A Coronavirus Skeptic Prior To Falling Ill
The coronavirus pandemic has affected everyone, especially like Tom Lawlor who is a multi-sport athlete. He is an MMA fighter and also wrestles for MLW and he discussed the pandemic when he joined The Wrestling Inc Daily podcast earlier today.
"To be honest, it's not too big of a departure from my normal routine. There's nowhere to go train martial arts or wrestle on the weekends, but other than that, I've kinda realized that I've been living like a hermit for the past five or six years," stated Lawlor.
"I lost my mind the other day and trained on the grass with somebody and did some jujitsu out in the park. I'm not quite sure what's gonna happen in the future at one moment it sounds like the apocalypse is upon us and other times, things are improving. Day to day, minute by minute I'm just trying to figure this out like everybody else is. But it hasn't really ruined my life as I just have to be more creative with where I'm working out."
While some promotions like WWE and AEW have held no-crowd shows, others like MLW have gone dark. Lawlor talked about his employer suspending production.
"They kind of have to at this point. This whole thing was starting to take shape a few weeks ago when myself and the rest of the MLW contingent was going down to Mexico for the MLW vs. AAA show. We were told by the management that if you don't feel comfortable going down there, then let us know as it's not an issue," said Lawlor.
"They and Impact were some of the first to cancel future shows as they saw the writing on the wall and were proactive. It sucks but I can't be upset with anything from MLW's point of view in this situation."
Brian Pillman Jr was also down at that Mexico show and ended up getting sick shortly thereafter. That forced Pillman to self-quarantine and Lawlor was asked if anyone else from MLW got sick.
"No, he is the only one that I was aware of. I hate most of the roster so I wasn't asking them how they were doing," Lawlor said before noting he did check on his fellow Team Filthy members but everyone else can "screw off."
"Pillman got sick because he made some dumb comments about the virus and questioned how serious it all was."
Lawlor was then asked if he thought Pillman got sick because he "angered" the virus.
"I can neither confirm nor deny that being the case, but that would be my guess. It didn't hurt me as I didn't get sick," said Lawlor. "All of the skeptics of the virus end up getting it: Boris Johnson, US Senators, the NBA guy [Rudy Gobert] was the worst one. If you treat this like a joke, you become the joke."
Tom Lawlor is affectionately known by his nickname of "Filthy" which doesn't exactly seem appropriate at this time. He was asked how Filthy Tom Lawlor stays clean and hygienic during a pandemic.
"I have picked up the urgency in which I clean myself and my training products. I get at least 20 seconds of hand-washing 50 times a day," revealed Lawlor. "So, my routine has changed and I may have to forgo the filthy nickname. I may have to come out of this with a whole new persona, but we'll see how long it lasts.
"I would be 'The Cleanest' Tom Lawlor."
As mentioned, WWE and AEW are running no-crowd shows much to the chagrin of many. Lawlor was asked his thoughts on those.
"From what I know, most of them have been shut down. I think Wrestle One, maybe, is running their last ever show without a crowd," said Lawlor.
"I was gonna do one of the shows this upcoming weekend but I can't because of a shelter-in-place order. But what happened was a show in Arizona, one of the wrestlers there ended up testing positive after being on one of the no-fan shows. Once that happened, it put the fear into the hearts of promoters. Despite the fact that there are only 20-30 people in the building, it can still spread easily."
The show that Lawlor was going to do this weekend was with Black Label Pro and he's unsure if it will be postponed.
"I was very excited and was gonna wrestle Ben Carter from the UK in a British rounds contest. But unfortunately, it doesn't seem like that's gonna happen. I know that show has been looked at to be rescheduled, but it's pretty uncertain times as to when things will get back to normal," stated Lawlor.
Late last year Lawlor re-signed with MLW for a few more years and why revealed what brought him back to the company.
"I didn't really feel like going anywhere else. That's pretty much the crux of it," said Lawlor. "Myself and MLW, we came to an agreement to keep me there and also allow me to pursue other avenues that I've been involved with for a long time and before MLW. They gave me a little bit of leeway as far as commentary gigs and none of the other wrestling companies that could give me full-time work were gonna do that. So it was almost a no-brainer when I looked at the lay of the land and thought about the goals I want to accomplish. It was the perfect setting to re-sign and stick with MLW."
"Filthy" Tom Lawlor can be seen every Saturday night as part of MLW Fusion on BeIn Sports. For more information visit www.MLW.com. Lawlor's full interview with Wrestling Inc aired as part of today's 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.