Courtesy: MondayNightMayhem.com
One-half of the TNA World Tag Team Champions, "The Blueprint" Matt Morgan, was one of the special guests on this week’s live edition (03/15/09) of Monday Night Mayhem (presented by ReelWrestling.com), hosted by The Big Mosh, Blade, & "The Chairman Of The Board" Todd Vincent. You can feel The Mayhem live & in streaming audio every Monday night (at 7PM ET/6PM CT), exclusively on The Monday Night Mayhem Radio Network.
"The Blueprint" joined The Big Mosh & "The Chairman Of The Board" Todd Vincent for an exclusive interview (to preview this Sunday night’s TNA Destination X Pay-Per-View) & his return to "Your Home Of Wrestling Radio," which is now available in Windows Streaming Media or via Monday Night Mayhem’s official Podcast on ITunes:
"The Blueprint" Matt Morgan/Monday Night Mayhem Interview (MNM Streaming Audio): http://www.mondaynightmayhemarchives.com/waxfiles/031510.wax
"The Blueprint" Matt Morgan/Monday Night Mayhem Interview (MNM Podcast On ITunes): http://www.mondaynightmayhemarchives.com/mar10/031510.mp3
Interview highlights courtesy of The Mayhem’s official correspondent, Paterson From New Jersey:
On the transformation of his on-air persona into a cocky character while teaming with Hernandez as the TNA World Tag Team Champions: "As far as my cocky character it’s like this, they had no plans on making me a babyface after my series with Kurt Angle. They had no intention whatsoever, but what started to happen slowly but surely is Kurt is so good at being a heel, that people just loathe him. When he’s a heel, people hate him, and he’s the best in the world at what he does…he really is. That & people started to get my character. Whether it was cocky or not, they started to get it, and I’ll be the first to tell you, I’m very cocky when it comes to sports & pro wrestling is no different. When I first started in TNA, I had a babyface run for a little while with Abyss as a tag team, and that was good, but my character wasn’t really showing. I was holding back a lot of my natural persona & natural cockiness, and I think that was confusing for fans who wanted to get behind me."
The current TNA locker room, as a result of all the new faces showing up in the company: So far everyone who has come in has been cool. Time will tell as far as the gist of our overall locker room is. That’s something people take into concern when a lot of new people come in. When one or two come in, that’s one thing, but when five or ten come in, that could change a locker room dynamic awfully fast, but not fast enough where I could tell it to you right now whether it’s changed. Individually dealing with these people, I couldn’t deal with any better people, and I don’t know Dixie Carter would hire anybody who would rock our locker room. Morale is very important to her despite what fans may say. She wants us to have a good workplace to come to, and she wants us to be excited when we come there, and I don’t think that’s a hard request for people to fill. You should be happy to come work at TNA, and I think she wants people that is going to come to work with a smile on their face who actually want to be there, not people who are bitching about how they are booked, or being cancerous to our locker room, or say they are not getting paid this or that. I don’t think you are going to last long if that is your attitude in our locker room, and so far, I haven’t seen any of that."
TNA iMPACT’s move to Monday nights, the ratings on their first head-to-head Monday night with WWE Monday Night RAW, & Dixie Carter having "balls of steel": "That’s a tough one, because time is gonna tell. Time will tell as far as this goes being on Monday nights. My owner, she has balls of steel as far as taking risks & chances. And I remember as a wrestling fan what I liked during the WCW/WWE battles was the chances being taken, the storyline pushing the envelope risks especially. I’m just excited ours has the belief in the wrestlers, and that’s first & foremost. We don’t have a owner that craps on us, and talks down to us, and makes us walk around on eggshells. We have a owner that wants every single one of us to make a lot of money & be successful, because collectively, she’ll be successful because the company will be on top by that point. All I can tell fans of TNA is wait & see. Just take a wait & see approach and come along on the journey with us, because we are the first wrestling company that’s giving you an option & a choice, and not jamming things down your throat and telling you ‘This is what you like.’ I think it’s egotistical & rude, and we don’t do that."
The attitude within TNA since the arrivals of Hulk Hogan & Eric Bischoff: "For me personally, I love it. They came on board full bore with a positive vibe…a positive attitude, and you could sense it. When I talk to Terry or Eric, you get a vibe. You get a vibe from certain people, you get a vibe of whether they are in this to win it, or whether they’re here to make a quick paycheck and bounce. The vibe I get from both of them is they wanna come in here and make a lot of us household names to be honest, and I’m going along for the journey. I believe Hulk Hogan; I don’t believe he is a liar, and I believe what he says. As it pertains to myself, I have no doubt he is going to help me get to the promised land. And with Eric, I love watching when Eric is watching the actual product. I’ll watch him watch the screen and making notes & mental notes on what they could do different. So it’s pretty cool to see that he’s constantly trying to change our product to improve it, because we can’t stay the way we are now. We are a ever-evolving product, and to have someone with a vision like Eric is gonna be huge."
His message to those within World Wrestling Entertainment about TNA Wrestling & the competition that has begun: "Let’s all make money…period. Step your game up, because I know we are, and then in the long run, everyone is going to make money. Any wrestler, including in the WWE, wants us to do well. Of course they want us to do well, because everyone wants another place as a option to work. What’s the first thing you hear with guys that were in the WWE and came to TNA (not the guys that came here and flamed out quick, but those guys that have been here for two to three years), what’s the first thing you hear? The locker room dynamic is hugely different, the boss is different, and the schedule is easier. But most importantly, the guys are willing to help each other. Guys are willing to put each other over to create a new star, and that happens weekly."
More is contained in this exclusive interview with "The Blueprint" Matt Morgan, including why he chose to sign a five-year contract with TNA Wrestling instead of going back to the WWE or Japan, his response to those who feel that a split between himself & Hernandez is inevitable (and thus, losing the TNA World Tag Team Titles in the process), if he was upset about not being on last Monday’s iMPACT for TNA’s first night of head-to-head competition with WWE Monday Night RAW, how important his charitable work/endeavors are to him, & so much more! Follow Matt on Twitter at Twitter.com/TNAMattMorgan, and be sure to check out this Thursday night’s replay of TNA iMPACT on Spike TV (beginning @ 9PM ET/8PM CT), along with Sunday night’s Destination X Pay-Per-View. Call your local cable or satellite provider to purchase TNA Wrestling’s version of "March Madness," or log onto TNAWrestling.com for more details!
