Brock Lesnar is in the midst of his hilariously-titled Go To Hell tour, and Lesnar’s advocate Paul Heyman has been making the rounds to promote Lesnar’s appearances at this past weekend’s Madison Square Garden Show, the upcoming Hell in a Cell and on the Live Stone Cold Podcast. First, if you haven’t already, you’re going to want to check out our own Austin Heiberg talking NXT and the Dangerous Alliance with Paul. Done? Okay, now here’s a few other interesting tidbits from Heyman.
Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman are an unlikely duo to say the least. Where exactly did their friendship come from? Heyman delved into that in an interview with Channel Guide Magazine.
“We became friends instantaneously because when we met we were both about to become fathers for the very first time. Our daughters were born just a few months apart. We both had kept it private. We weren’t telling everybody, ‘Hey, I’m going to be a father!’ We just kept it a secret. It just came out in a conversation when we first started working together. Instantly we hit it off on that because the only people we would talk to about our daughters were each other. We both put our family first.
Professionally we push and motivate and inspire and support each other in a way that probably only the two of us understand,” Heyman explains. “Every single time I perform on television as Brock Lesnar’s advocate, I’m obsessed with making sure that this performance will be the best one ever delivered — knowing that next week I’m going to need to do better than I do this week. Then in two weeks, I want to top whatever I do the next week. A lot of that inspiration comes from Brock Lesnar, because he wouldn’t have it any other way. He wouldn’t let someone just be his advocate. You have to go out there every night as if it were the last performance of your life and deliver the best performance of your career.”
Moving on to the next stop in the Damn Hell Ass Kings tour, Heyman talked about what to expect from Lesnar’s appearance on the Stone Cold Podcast…
“Brock Lesnar has not been in a position where he had to speak for a full hour. This is a first time for Brock. Brock has no game plan walking into this podcast. I would suspect that Steve Austin is going to feel it the night that he sits in front of that microphone. While he will be profoundly researched and have all his facts and figures, I think Steve is still going to improvise it. I think Steve is going to feel it the night of the show and go where he feels he needs to deliver the best podcast for the audience.”
Speaking of podcasts, remember when Heyman was on Austin’s podcast a few months back, and they teased pretty heavily that Austin vs. Brock might happen at WrestleMania? Austin would later say there’s no way he’s fighting at WrestleMania, but what does Heyman think? Does he believe Austin won’t be at ‘Mania?
“Oh I believe it after the phone calls Steve and I received after that podcast. Absolutely.”
Finally, what are Heyman’s thoughts on the “historic” ratings depths WWE has hit lately?
“I think if there is erosion in the ratings, then we are in a cycle within the industry where fans are going and looking for or finding other interests. The key has always been to replace those who leave, to bring in more fans at any time you are losing fans. At this particular point in time there is a search to find the new fan. I am not one who looks at the ratings every Tuesday and says, ‘Well, we haven’t replaced everybody that is left. The ratings didn’t double.’ I’m not expecting that type of increase tomorrow or the next week or the week after that. Any business with longevity, and this is the one company in the business that has survived, deals with this. They survive because when there was an erosion of the audience and they had to replenish the audience, there isn’t a panic. Panic is never the answer. Panic never brings up the ratings. A long-term solution is with a number of brand-new stars, all in compelling situations with riveting storylines and new match-ups. That is what will bring an upswing to the ratings ever so slowly to where the average rating goes up a little bit each month. It’s natural evolution of any form of entertainment.”
The Brock Lesnar Go To Hell tour continues tonight on Raw and after the show on the Live Stone Cold Podcast.
(Via Channel Guide Magazine and Sports Illustrated)
