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PCO DISCUSSES WANTING TO WRESTLE IN INDIA, ROH LOCKER ROOM LEADERS, ALL JAPAN AND MORE

Former Ring of Honor Heavyweight Champion PCO recently joined Spencer Love.

Training with Georges St. Pierre (06:30) 

SL: “They're said so often, for a reason, right? You mentioned those leadership trees and the  people that you sort of follow. One person that I wanted to pick your brain on specifically, you  mentioned that you were training with George St. Pierre a while back. Just take me through  how he sort of inspired you and continued to motivate you, because, you know, they're very  similar worlds between the UFC and professional wrestling, but obviously very different as  well."  

PCO: “Yeah, I think George was one of the most disciplined athletes that I've seen around me.  When I trained with him, it was just training from morning to night, basically. We had done the  workout training in the gym, bodybuilding type of deal where everything (was) for the strengths,  and then we would go to his house, and then we'd run some sprints, and then we would run  like - basically a bunch of sprints. I remember it was during December, it was super cold and  [there was] a lot of ice and snow. We would go like every day. And after that, you know, I would  do my own thing. So he was going to striking coaches, and then he had his jujitsu course and  then - he had like four or five trainings per day. [He] was non stop.” 

PCO: “I trained with him for maybe three months, and I learned so much. I learned so much.  When I saw him having all the success that he had, to me, it was no fluke, no luck. A lot of  people, sometimes they think someone is lucky to have like great skills or anything like that. He  worked for everything that he had. Even on his days off, he would reinvest this money. Let's  say he had a big fight and he could have two, three months off. He would just go on a trip [to]  Thailand and just find a place to train there. Or, if he would fly to Japan for conferences and  things like that, he would find the time to train. He just loves it, though. I mean, [he's] still got to  be disciplined, but he's very passionate about what he does. When you got the passion of  what you're doing, that helps a little bit. But, sometimes I've seen other pros that didn't train  hard. I've sometimes had the feeling that a lot of guys trained because they had to train.  George I felt like he trained because he liked to train. It was just the way he was built, just the  way he built himself, because it's all about habits. It has to become a habit.” 

Ring of Honor’s locker-room leaders (09:38) 

SL: “Absolutely. I think a lot of people would look at yourself as someone in Ring of Honor who  would be an example of that. [Someone] who's constantly pushing [and] constantly trying to  better himself. Who are some people that you look to in the promotion as motivators or locker  room leaders to steal another cliche."  

PCO: “You see a lot of them but we don't really - it's hard for for me to see someone in a  dressing locker room or meeting or just [the] roster getting all together and to pinpoint the leaders. That's not hard during a meeting, but I don't have the chance to see them at home,  how they go and what they do. Like, no one knows really what I do and what - you know, pretty  much everybody's on their own once you go back home. You can go to the gym on the road,  but it's not gonna show. I think the real question is what we do when there's nobody watching  us. I think that's where the real challenge is. It's not when someone is watching you and says  like, 'okay, there's people watching. I'm gonna step in the ring and I'm gonna show them that I  work hard all the time.' If you don't do nothing at home, it's not going to - I don't think it's  gonna work. I think it's all what you do when there's nobody watching you. I like guys like Jay  Letal. He's a good leade for Ring of Honor. I believe he's very passionate about what he does  and he knows what he's talking about. So I really I really like Jay Lethal as a leader. I think he's  a cool guy, like good knowledge for the business and things like that. Matt Taven's another one  who takes a lot of lead in Ring of Honor. There's plenty. Jay Briscoe was another leader. Both  Briscoes, but Jay's a little bit more verbal. There's plenty of good leaders. I mean, Dalton  Castle, there's so many. It's hard to just - I don't like to mention names like that, because  sometimes I forget one name and someone messages me." 

SL: “Someone gets upset."  

PCO: “It's happened to me before!” 

SL: “Well, hopefully it wasn't my fault!"  

PCO: “I'm gonna blame you!” 

Working in All Japan Pro Wrestling (27:25) 

SL: “Fair enough, man, and I've already got heat from earlier so I don't want to bring any more  on myself. I do have to ask though, you mentioned MLW, working for Ring of Honor, WWF,  pretty well every promotion out there. The one that I want to ask you about, though, was your  time in All Japan Wrestling as part of the WWF talent exchange back in the late 90s. Take me  through your experience working there because personally, they're some of my favorite  matches of yours. What was your experience like working there?"  

PCO: “I really enjoyed Kobashi. The way he was with everybody. Like, he was one of the top  Japanese guys. I mean, now it has changed a lot with, you know, talent from the US and from  Canada, but back then some guys like Misawa or Kawada, the were really in their own corner  and they wouldn't mix up that much with anybody. I had matches with them where the ref was  coming to me and telling me what I would have to do during my match against them. My full  match at Budokan - what's the name of the hall with 15,000 seats?” 

SL: “Korakuen Hall?  

PCO: “No, similar like that. But anyways, it's something like that, but that's not the name. I  don't know why I can't give it to you. But, the main event was Vader and Kawada I think.  Anyways, I was like third match on top of the bill. It was me and Taue and the whole match was  called by a ref. So, it's just weird." 

SL: “Weird to say the least!"  

PCO: “Jun Akiyama was also super cool. I wrestled Jun Akiyama and Kobashi in a couple of  tag matches, so they were cool. Every time that I've wrestled with Kobashi it was super, super  nice, super cool. When he hits you with that lariat, though, every night, I'd get concussed kind 

of. My head was hitting the mat so hard that I'd seen stars. He was too cool, super cool. And,  Akiyama was easy to work, too. I had a blast. I teamed alot with Vader. It was cool. He was  super over at this time in Japan. He was one of the iconic names of Japan. So being his tag  partner was like, it was cool. So I really enjoyed a month there in Japan. It was 18 days, the  tour, but with some days in between. I was there my first time - no, my second time - for 30  days. That's cool." 

SL: “It's incredible man. Obviously every professional wrestler has got some great traveling  stories. But even just speaking to you about that, speaking about Egypt the last time we spoke,  I don't think there are many individuals who have traveled as much, frankly, but have as many  cool stories. Is there anywhere that potentially you're still looking to go to whether to wrestle or  whether just to travel that you haven't been yet?"  

PCO: “I was asked so many times to go to India. I would love to go there, but I don't think it  was the right timing when I was asked because I was under contract with Ring of Honor. It was  tough for me because I'm exclusive with Ring of Honor, I can't work for any other promotions,  so I turned it down.”

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