Josh Barnett Comments On Brock Lesnar Possibly Fighting For Bloodsport
In anticipation for Bloodsport 6, former UFC Heavyweight Champion Josh Barnett came on The Wrestling Inc. Daily today to talk about the big event that he will headline against AEW star Jon Moxley. Towards the end of the conversation, Wrestling Inc. Managing Editor Nick Hausman brought up "free agent" Brock Lesnar and asked if there's any chance we ever see The Beast in a Bloodsport ring.
"I have no access to the kind of funds to make that happen," Barnett admitted. "I've also reached out to Cain Velasquez through his management. We're just not capable of — money is too much of an issue there, and that's fair because nobody has to do anything for us. Nobody owes us any real favors that way.
"If someone like Cain, well, I could make an offer to Brock, but there's nothing I could do that would entice Brock Lesnar considering the kind of money that he makes and has made so that's totally fine. But my appeal is always that there is no better place for people that really want to just show exactly who they are in that professional wrestling ring, in the rawest environment possible with all the other stuff stripped away and just let whatever is inside their soul shine out.
"There's no place better for it than Bloodsport, and if that interests you, then we got something for you, but if you're looking at it as a business transaction, which I won't fault you either, we're working on it but some things are more important than money."
Lesnar and Barnett's paths have never crossed in UFC. However, it has been a fight that Barnett has wanted, and he spoke on whether he would be the one to fight Lesnar if he came to Bloodsport.
"Well, I'd probably send him to voicemail right off the bat because I wouldn't recognize the number, and then I'd have to call him back, something like that," Barnett noted. "There's more than a few people that I could think of capable of meeting Brock Lesnar in the Bloodsport ring. We don't lack for for capable and wanting fighters."
Bloodsport 4 and 5 drew praise for the change in production quality. Barnett spoke on the production process and how everything came together.
"I've worked in Hollywood before," Barnett stated. "I've done, I think, five feature films, and I've even done some fight choreography and things like that for a movie as well, but it's one thing to think about how you want something to look and another thing to try and construct it.
"And there's always a variance between how you think it's going to go and how it really goes. Or, how you really want it to look vs. how it really is going to look. Sometimes that difference can be actually a really pleasant surprise. Sometimes it's like, well, maybe I just need to adjust my expectations, but either way it's a process, and I'd say the biggest thing is working with 5B Artists Media.
"They have a lot of responsibility towards how the look and feel of those last two shows were. They implemented a lot of my vision there, and we sat down and cranked it out. All the graphics work, all that kind of stuff, that's all 5B Artists Media as well. I guess it shouldn't be really that surprising what you can do when you have the management company of Slipknot helping you with with your product."
Hausman also noted that Bloodsport 4 and 5 were one of the few shows that have benefited without an audience. Barnett said he would like a live audience, but he explained why Bloodsport is well positioned without one.
"That was a good reason why we did it because the overall feeling was the way that we approach professional wrestling and the way that we construct the vision and the narrative around it," Barnett explained, "It's always great to have a live audience, but we really felt that we were maybe the show that could do it without an audience best and suffer the least, and I still feel like we could continue to do it that way. Although, I don't want to. I do really like having a live audience.
"I like being able to have people there to experience what's going on, to be in that moment, but a good portion of it is just us letting the little hamster in the wheel spin in our brains and think about how we can best take advantage of a difficult situation. And I think that we really pulled it with 4 and 5. I would say between the two events those were some of the best matches that we have ever had in Bloodsport."
Josh Barnett headlines Bloodsport 6 against AEW's Jon Moxley as part of GCW's The Collective on Thursday April 8th. For tickets and more info please click HERE. You can find the full audio and video from Josh's interview below: