Enzo Amore Discusses How Bayley Really Improved Her Promo Ability
Former WWE star Enzo (also known as nZo) sat down with SportsMattersTV to talk about wrestling. One of the subjects that was touched on was talent developing at WWE's Performance Center. Enzo pointed to Bayley as a talent who came into WWE with experience and who really improved in one area, an area Enzo feels most young wrestlers should focus on.
"It's really a gracious opportunity to see the world if you get into pro wrestling," Enzo said of the profession. "If I was a young pro wrestler in any walk of the world from anywhere you know, man focus on that character stuff. And sometimes a baby promo isn't your strong suit. I know you can work on it, learn it and be great at it because I can give you a great example with a person who's admired a lot is Bayley. When Bayley got into the WWE she didn't have a character and she kinda developed because she wasn't a strong promo at the start. She wasn't very comfortable speaking on a camera and holding a microphone or talking to a crowd, but she worked really hard at it. Dusty Rhodes worked with her and a lot of great people helped her and she took on a character like holy shit, I don't really know what I am doing here, I don't know what I am supposed to say right now, you guys have a camera here. I don't know what to do with my hands, so you wanna give me a hug.
"I don't know what else to do, so she goes a hug and runs off. Guys, that chick got over and she got better on a promo and now she's on the main event on the stick on Monday Night Raw and Smackdown and I am sure she's opened segments of television with a microphone and you guys gotta realise that was not natural for her. So I have seen that some people can learn this thing okay. Not only that, if you work on it like I did and write as much as I did and focus on it in the mirror, I initially thought I was gonna be a manager. I did not think I was gonna get an opportunity to wrestle with the direction they were going with me and Cass."
Enzo also detailed his own experiences when first signing with WWE. He particularly went into detail about former head training Bill DeMott's way of running things, and also revealed the controversial DeMott was no fan of his.
"I just thought I was so green they didn't wanna throw me into the fire," Enzo recalled. "But they threw me right into the fire and I had to learn how to wrestle right in front of everyone's eyes, it was unbelievable. I think when you look back on it, I came into a class with 26-30 people into the WWE. Walked through the door with a big class and Bill DeMott, brand new head coach. First recruitment class of Triple H. So Triple H, this is his first recruitment class, we'd held off on hires for a few months now, and the reason we were holding off on hires is because there is gonna be a transition of office. They are taking Dr. Tom, Tom Pritchard and they are bringing in Bill DeMott. When they bring in Bill DeMott he's a drill sergeant.
"They are bringing in this big class of recruitments and they are gonna fire a lot of talent because Triple H and Bill DeMott brand new staff. Triple H is now the head of talent development, we haven't created a performance center and its old school Florida Championship Wrestling. I tried out in front of Dr. Tom, Dusty Rhodes, Steve Keirn, Norman Smiley and Joey Mercury.Dusty Rhodes was the guy that gave me the nod and got me hired. Now I walk in the door and Bill DeMott is the head coach and it's straight drill work baby and it was weeding out the herd. And I understood why they brought in a coach like that to say if you are weak minded if you can't take a shit sandwich and learn to taste it, you aren't going to make it in this business. They fired a lot of people man. My name was always on the chopping block and was never a guarantee so I would show up at 5:30am waiting on the steps for Bill and I am pretty sure that was the reason he hated me most."
You can watch the full interview here.