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WWE NXT returns to Peacock and The WWE Network tomorrow for the first-ever NXT Deadline event from Orlando, Florida. NXT will close out 2022 with the first-ever presentation of the Iron Survivor Challenge, a 25 minute match featuring five competitors including former NXT North American Champion Carmelo Hayes. Hayes sat down with PWInsider.com to discuss the match, his life experiences in WWE thus far and more. Transcript by Billy Krotchsen:
Mike Johnson: Happy to be sitting down with Carmelo Hayes who will be one of the many competitors in the Iron Survivor Challenge this Saturday at Deadline NXT live on Peacock and WWE internationally. Sir, they never throw an easy day at you do they? It's always something new. How are you today?
Carmelo Hayes: [Laughs] Amazing. Thank you so much. How you doing, bro?
Mike Johnson: I'm doing good. So, you don't get to say you get to do a lot of firsts in WWE anymore. Obviously we've got decades upon decades of memories here, but there's never been anything like this match in WWE history, much less NXT history. So what were your first reactions when you heard about the Iron Survivor Challenge?
Carmelo Hayes: I was just trying to wrap my head around it. Just seemed like a lot of stuff going on. Took me a day or two. But once I figured out kind of the strategy going into it as, you know, you got the penalty box. You know, I feel like the idea is to not get into the penalty box because the longer you're in the penalty box, you know, the less time you have to get falls. So it seems...I think it seems a little bit more complicated on paper. I'm looking forward to Saturday. I think a lot of people are gonna understand a little bit better when you see all of us in the ring going after it, and the girls as well, too.
Mike Johnson: We've got a guaranteed 25 minutes of action with this match. So it's sort of an Ironman match mixed in with the penalties mixed in, so this can go just about anywhere you can imagine. So, what do you do to prepare? What tapes do you study? What coaches do you go to to get insight? How do you mentally prepare for this?
Carmelo Hayes: It's tough because like you said, like this has never been done. So there's no blueprint, there's really no, there's really nothing to look at as far as like, I mean, there's a bunch of matches put into one. So you could you know, look at it like that, but I think I have a pretty strong strategy that I'm gonna keep to myself but I do think I have a pretty solid strategy going into it that I came up with myself and I could be wrong. I don't think I am. But this is like a test, you know what I mean, this is a trial and we're and we're all going into it with different ideas and we're all gonna see what we pull out. But, you know, I know it's gonna be something special and we expect to set the bar very, very high on Saturday at Deadline.
Mike Johnson: You've been given the opportunity to set the bar literally since the beginnings of what at that point was NXT 2.0. I want to take you back to that night because that was in my mind, it was like trial by fire for every single person in the brand, because nobody knew what to expect and they had to perform with the history of the black and gold brand before them. What are your memories that night? It was a big night for you and Trick Williams coming out of the gate and obviously you've had a great couple of years since then. But what are your memories of like going out there and knowing, Alright, this is gonna go one way or the other and either way it's going to kind of define the next couple of years of my career.
Carmelo Hayes: Going into it, it was one of those things, I felt like people wanted it to fail. I remember that, like it was you know, when they changed, when they did the colors, everyone was like, "Ugh! No!", but you know, people were gonna watch but they wanted to see it fail. And I think I went into it like hey, like, I'm not gonna you know, I'm not gonna miss, you know, whatever happens happens but I'm gonna make sure that what I do you guys are gonna respect, you guys are gonna enjoy, at least you know, I can speak for myself. But yeah, that night, kind of like you said, it really was trial by fire.
Mike Johnson: You've had a long standing career of pushing yourself and evolving all the way back to the early days in New England. How do you think you've evolved since debuting on NXT TV, not even as a wrestler, but as a person, how have you changed since being given that opportunity?
Carmelo Hayes: Yeah, I talk a lot about that first year being like a my freshman year so like when I was in black and gold for the breakout tournaments, and then going into 2.0 I feel like when it's like my sophomore year, my junior year, and then you know, now I feel like I'm truly entering my senior year and I just feel like I'm mature. And again, I'm still in development, but as far as developmental goes, I feel like I'm very matured into what we're doing here. And I understand it a lot more now. I understand kind of like what this is, as opposed to the first year I was just like, I just want to prove that I'm good enough. And now it was kind of like, I understand my worth now and understand my position. I understand my role. I understand what's expected of me. But yeah no, overall, as a performer as a person, this has just matured me so much.
Mike Johnson: There's a lot of great coaches in the Performance Center from Shawn Michaels and Matt Bloom on down to Terry Taylor. Who are some of the some of the ones you kind of lean on for insight when it comes to help with developing yourself as a talent or even going into a major match like the Iron Survivor Challenge?
Carmelo Hayes: All three. Terry Taylor right now is my main coach that I work with. And he's very much, he's like the finishing coach. Because you know, I've got the moves down, no one's gonna teach me moves now. I don't care too much about that, you know, I'm more mentally, what is the psychology of what we're doing? You know, what is the story of what we're doing? And there's a lot into it, you know, there's a lot more into it than just what you see on TV as well. In the ring, I should say in the ring. But you know, like you know, Shawn gives me little nuggets every time he talks to you, whether he's trying to or not, you know, sometimes he says little things to me and I'm just like, Well, I never looked at it like that. But then you got people who are just walking through sometimes like, you know, like Booker T. Booker would just talk to you for 10 minutes, and I'll pick something from him. So I'm truly a student of the game. And I'm always, you know, trying to figure out new things from different people, you know, every conversation so I learn everything from everybody. Fit Finlay as well.
Mike Johnson: Obviously there's a strong work ethic to what you do. Who were the guys that kind of inspired you to even want to get inside, cross the rail to get inside into the business? Because everybody loves wrestling, but not everybody can make that jump and it takes a great personality and a great athlete to do it. Who were some of the guys that and even some of the women who kind of inspired you to do and become who you are today?
Carmelo Hayes: So I went a period where I... so as a kid, obviously, you know, I loved wrestling as a kid, up until about high school. And then you know, I was more focused on like, high school things. And then I ended up doing a tryout, so I don't want to say anyone specifically influenced me to do it. But I remember as a kid, the biggest people I looked up to was Edge. You know, I loved Edge. Obviously, you know, like the Rock. You know, I loved Rey Mysterio, Eddie Guerrero, Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, like all of those guys were really like the guys that I actually, you know, I looked up to those guys. Those are my superheroes you know, those are my Spider-Mans, Batmans, like when I was a kid, so I always wanted to do this but yeah, I guess you could say looking up to them but to make the jump was really just one of my friends who watched wrestling as a kid who said, "Hey, we should go and try out like at a training school one day," and we did the same one that Sasha Banks came out of, Tommaso Ciampa, New England Pro Wrestling Academy in Boston. Yeah, so but yeah, that's who really influenced me, those guys in that moment.
Mike Johnson: You've had some opportunities of late on WWE Main Event wrestling Cedric Alexander. We just saw Trick Williams get a similar opportunity just this week. What's it like getting tossed into the deep end of the pool there and what's the learning experience like working in such a big arena and doing WWE TV outside of the NXT bubble?
Carmelo: It was great. It was one of those things where you can finally see what all your hard work is like going to pay off one day. You know, you're here. We're here. We're stuck in Orlando, a lot of times, you don't really see the light at the end of the tunnel. You know it's there but like you really can't see it. So this was one of those things where it's like you get, you're there and you're like, "Oh, this is why we're working so hard," but when I did the match, the whole experience itself. It just felt right. It just felt right. I did not feel out of place, I didn't feel like it was bigger than me. I just felt like I truly belonged.
Mike Johnson: You had a great run with the North American Championship and ended up unifying Cruiserweight Championship during that run. One question we get a lot of questions about is, things that they'd like to see Paul Levesque bring back, would you like to see, maybe not even for yourself, but for others, the Cruiserweight Classic be brought back as opportunities for other talents?
Carmelo Hayes: Yeah, I mean, yeah. Even if they don't bring it back, they can bring back the title, or set up a tournament to get the title. I think that's a great opportunity for guys, but then again, I think, I don't want to necessarily say pigeonholing anybody, but you know, I would like to see guys my size, you know, not be categorized as cruiserweights only. Because they can get, not that it's a negative label or anything, but then it's like, oh well, he's a cruiserweight, what if he wants to go up against you know, Roman Reigns. Oh, boy, you know what I mean? So, I think that that might pigeonhole a guy or two. But yeah, I mean, it'd be cool to bring back, but I want to see more, like US, Intercontinental, like anyone can get those, Ali, Gunther, Ricochet, Bobby Lashley, all those guys are competing, they're not looking at Ali, Ricochet like cruiserweights, you know, they're being looked at in the same respect as a Gunther and Bobby Lashley.
Mike Johnson: Do you see the U.S. and Intercontinental titles as an eventual goal when you do make it to Raw and Smackdown?
Carmelo Hayes: I do yeah, I do. I see everything... I see everything in my future.
Mike Johnson: Before we can get there, we got to talk about the Iron Survivor Challenge. Obviously a lot of competitors there. When you look at that match, who are the talents that you look at and you go, I gotta worry about this guy. Or, you know, from an insider perspective, like I know something special can happen when we step into the ring over the course of this match.
Carmelo Hayes: Everyone, everyone, because if you look at these guys we're really the best of the best as far as in ring goes in NXT. I'm not taking this match lightly at all. JD Mcdonagh has been an amazing, you know, NXT UK Champion, he's been phenomenal over there, as well as Axiom has been over there, you know, killing it before they got over here. It's just one of those things where you see the talent and you realize that there's no one in this match that doesn't deserve this or that they can't win. Joe Gacy as well, he's wrestled against Bron [Breakker] multiple times for that championship, something that I haven't. So everybody's a threat.
Mike Johnson: One thing that you have that the others don't is Trick Williams. What's that relationship been like that you've built with him over the last year or so?
Carmelo Hayes: We have the same mind on a lot of things. Like he kind of knows, he understands. We kind of... we don't have to speak about it. We kind of know what we're gonna do. Our chemistry is crazy because you know, we can figure out kind of what we want to say, what we want to within seconds. So you know, that's one of the good things about working with Trick is we're very like minded on the entertainment aspect of a lot of things. And then obviously, like the in-ring stuff, you know, we're getting, we're working with each other to help each other. But yeah, as far as like our...what we have to do is super fun, TV backstage promos and stuff, we just go now, we've got our rhythm down.
Mike Johnson: I know we're starting to run out of time. So two more quick questions for you. First of all, you mentioned Shawn Michaels, one of those talents that inspired you when you were just a wrestling fan. What's it like having that opportunity and how do you wrap your head around having that opportunity to walk into that performance center every day and learn from him given he's one of the greatest talents the company's ever had.
Carmelo Hayes: Yeah, sometimes I have to just step out of my own shoes and realize that it is Shawn Michaels, because like you said, you see him every day. And you know, he's not acting like Sexy Boy Shawn Michaels, he's just a regular guy. He's just cool, I look up to him, more like a father figure type. But no, it's amazing. Every time he talks to me, I'm always listening because sometimes he'll be talking he'll drop something, like, oh shoot, you know, from experience, because he's done everything. It's just a blessing to be here, not just with him, but there's so many Hall of Famers and talents, it's unreal. This is really truly the best place.
Mike Johnson: Well one thing that you'll be able to say is that you're part of the Iron Survivor Challenge, which even Shawn Michaels has never done, so there's a nice checkmark on your list of accolades. This Saturday at WWE NXT Deadline, why should fans make sure that they're tuning into Peacock or the WWE Network and watch it live as it happens Saturday evening?
Carmelo Hayes: So, you got the first time ever Iron Survivor Challenge, not just the men but the women as well. So there's going to be two different styles of it. I have no idea what they're looking at going into it. You got five of the best male wrestlers on the NXT roster, five the best women wrestlers on the NXT roster. It's something completely different. It's never been done before. It's all these matches put into one match. So I think you know, just the attraction alone of it just to see how it gets pulled off is enough for people to want to tune into it and see what we're going to do. But like I said, there's so many, there's so many incredible talents in this match, something special is going to happen on Saturday. And you know, a lot of people want to see me versus Bron Breakker. I'm rooting for Bron Breakker against Apollo, man. If anybody's gonna beat Bron Breakker, I want to be that guy. So you know, love you Apollo but hey man, like you got to work really hard if you want to beat Bron. Bron's no joke, he's a serious, serious champion, and you know, and I'm not looking past the guys that I have in this match, don't get me wrong, but that is my motivating factor to get through this match is to get to Bron Breakker.
NXT Deadline streams this Saturday evening on Peacock and the WWE Network. It will also air on traditional PPV platforms.
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