Sam Roberts Wrestling Podcast
Release Date: January 11, 2018fru
Guest: Dalton Castle
Recap By: Matthew Wilkinson
DIRECT LINK TO LISTEN/DOWNLOAD
Noteworthy Items
- Dalton was frustrated there was no shows after winning the title.
- Dalton has one year left on his ROH contract.
- Castle wants to work more in Japan this year as ROH Champion.
- Sam believes that Royal Rumble week will be brilliant.
- Sam thinks if Daniel Bryan keeps being a heel, he won’t wrestle again.
- Sam thinks Ronda Rousey will be in the Rumble, but should not win.
Subjects Covered (With timestamps)
00:00- Sponsor Ads
4:30-Dalton Castle Interview- Winning ROH Championship
16:40-Bullet Club
19:30-International Work
23:00-Focus On Wrestling
32:20-Future Plans/NXT
35:05-Production Values
42:00-Learning When He Would Win The Title
49:40-Wanting To Do More
1:05:30-Radio Work
1:15:21-State of Wrestling- Monday Night Raw
1:25:00-All In Show
1:30:50-Raw 25
1:38:30-SmackDown Live/Daniel Bryan
1:41:10-Ronda Rousey/WWE
Dalton Castle Interview – Winning ROH Championship
Sam welcomes this week’s guest, the new Ring Of Honor Champion, Dalton Castle. The new champion reminds Sam that he is also technically the co-host of this podcast.
Dalton joked that it’s almost like the show is World Champion right now and Sam wondered if that’s the first thing he thought about when he won.
Dalton said yeah, you can see his lips, as soon as they hand him the belt his mouth just mumbles Sam’s going to be so happy.
Sam admitted he didn’t expect it and he think’s a lot of people didn’t expect it but it’s a good thing because now a ROH guy has the strap. Dalton agreed and said they are the first company to give him a bigger stage to perform on and he would say that they are the reason that anybody in the majority of the world knows who he is. He is an ROH guy and nobody else built him up, but them and Castle are very happy to carry that brand and he’s very proud of it. Now to be at the very top and be the pinnacle guy on their card, it’s cool.
Sam mentioned how the last time they spoke it was more about the character and it was like he was an attraction match on a ROH card and those characters don’t often become champion. Castle agreed that you don’t normally get to be the main guy. That’s the way he found himself cutting through at that time, he didn’t expect them to just put the title on him, he had to earn it.
He had to build himself up to a point where they trust him on every show and once he had the acceptance as the attraction match, Dalton had to prove there was more to him. He wasn’t just a one song guy where you would go there’s the guy with the fancy outfit and cool entrance. That was the struggle for a couple of years.
Sam mentioned how beating Cody was a surprise, as it’s like when WWE brings in The Rock, you don’t expect him to be beaten as he can bring so many eyes to the product. Dalton agreed but reminded Sam that he’s not as strong as him, that’s important. He added that ROH has never been the company to do that, they don’t rely on the popularity of others to excel the product.
When guys get released from WWE, ROH doesn’t pick them up and make them the next champion straight away. Cody was a unique case in that he decided to take a step out and was putting a lot of effort in reinventing himself. He put eyes on Cody as the performer and not a former WWE guy.
ROH appreciated it and Dalton thinks the fans did too, he was a Bullet Club member, which only helped elevate him so he came to ROH and brought a lot of eyes with him, which is great.
You see that on small indie shows when they bring in a former WWF star and you see a name or face that is familiar, but if you go to a super show, people don’t come back to the next show but that’s what ROH has always been good at, making the card from top to bottom be splendid.
The Bullet Club
Sam mentioned how in WCW, back in the day, everybody wanted to be in the NWO because they are the only guys making money and getting wins. He sometimes wonders about Castle, especially as this guy who is making this reputation for himself on his own merit, when he sees Bullet Club in ROH and it does amazing things for Marty Scurll and Adam Page, does he think is there a version of Dalton Castle that works in the Bullet Club?
Dalton said he would be lying if he didn’t say he looks at those guys and doesn’t have a little bit of envy in the amount of success and the overwhelming popularity they have, it’s insane how the Young Bucks have taken themselves to a different level without that machine behind them. Because they’ve done that, he feels like they have elevated wrestling with them, but nobody is on the level with them.
Dalton said they went to Dublin the week before Final Battle and it was him and the Boys vs. Marty and Young Bucks and 2,000 people are yelling catchphrases from the Being The Elite show. It blew his mind. They have made an impact without anybody helping them.
They are immediately at an advantage to everybody else, but with that being said, Dalton thinks about where he came from or as his wife constantly reminds him, of where he started, that he built himself to this point without coasting alongside somebody else.
Sam said he would have to imagine now that you can look at that and that’s the thing with success, there is always somebody to look at.
Dalton said that looking at people’s success is what moves people forwards, he always feels like he should be doing something more. He won the Championship in December, it felt great, but it’s also been frustrating that he had this amazing moment and now he wants to start doing more, but he’s not working, as they had a month-long break.
International Work
Sam mentioned how the only thing he could really do was more international dates and asked if he gets The Boys booked when he does go places abroad.
Dalton wants to do more international dates. He doesn’t often get them booked as he has Boys everywhere. He mentioned how they were excited when 6-man titles were announced.
Focus On Wrestling
Sam asked if there was a moment when he decided he needed to remind everyone that he was great in the ring and not just this brilliant character. Castle said he thinks he struggled with that the first 6 months to a year, when he first got to ROH. He didn’t want to mess things up and allowed people to give him advice and write stuff.
He found himself doing things that he didn’t think his character would be doing but he did them because they had been there for a long time and he thought they were right. But they don’t know who Dalton Castle is and what he wants to portray. Dalton admitted he needs to be confident one way or the other and found himself doing more silly things, which he focused on too much.
There wasn’t one moment, but he thinks he just started coming into himself more. Part of it too, he wanted to be taken more seriously, he liked the contrast of this Lady Gaga guy walking down but once the gear comes off, he is still that guy but he can kick ass too.
Future Plans/NXT
Sam wondered if people laughed at him when he first joined as ROH isn’t known for gimmick heavy characters.
Dalton said he had already been hanging around for so long that he made friends with everybody on the roster. Anytime Bobby Fish was booked he would travel with him to shows until he got his chance.
Sam asked if he has any plans to parallel the route that Fish has taken to NXT or if he simply wants to ride his current wave of momentum.
Castle said he has about a year left on his contract, guaranteed for ROH and to think past that would be unfair to the company and the effort he has put in himself.
Production Values
What he sees now, is wanting ROH to grow and be bigger, get larger shows and bigger production, Sam has seen him rehearse, Dalton called himself a mad man. He said he micromanages everything and he always has. He built his own chariot to get to the ring last year in his apartment.
He is ambitious and won’t leave until things are correct, he is thankful of the people around him who put up with him being such an arsehole all day, they are willing to help whilst he is being rude.
There are things Dalton can’t control such as lighting and camera angles, and he always thinks of things as a theatre but the camera isn’t always the same.
ROH is growing so quickly right now and they are doing the best they can to keep up with the growth to take on the bigger set and deal with him as a diva and they have never done this.
One of the problems with growing quickly, it is evident, you will do something that is bigger than you are used to you will mess up and that is caught by more eyes. As time goes they will kick the kinks.
Learning About The Championship Win
Sam asked when did he realize he was going to get the title and Dalton said he didn’t remember how early, it was one or two months, but he didn’t tell anybody as it didn’t feel real.
It felt like the second he said it, then it would be taken away because that is pro wrestling. He has seen friends be told one thing and then they are at the hotel and find out through a third party it isn’t, which it shouldn’t affect you anyway but you have prepared mentally for one thing.
The only thing he could do in the months leading up was wrestle like he was going to be a champion and not leave any doubt that he was going to be.
Sam asked what Dalton thinks of Cody’s 10,000 seat show? He gave the date and a picture of him.
He said he thinks it’s the Elite guys, all of them, it’s another step of these guys who built this name without the help of a major company is taking wrestling to a different limit where now they can fill an arena just using their names.
They have the drawing power and he thinks it will motivate people to do a lot bigger thing but states he has not been booked on the show as of that moment.
Wanting To Do More
Dalton said that he always wants to do more, no matter what he has achieved and he wants to be a true traveling World Champion. He admitted earlier in 2017, he felt like this was the way it should be going, but when he looks back he wasn’t ready at that point and wasn’t upset that it didn’t happen then.
Dalton also claimed that he doesn’t feel like a champion just yet because he hasn’t done anything worthy of being a champion since then.
He said he hopes when they next talk that won’t be the case, but right now he just feels like a really good wrestler.
Castle said the next step is to do more stuff in Japan, as he he has yet to make a real impact there and the next logical step as champion is to do more there.
Sam mentioned how good a potential Dalton Castle entrance at Wrestle Kingdom could be and Dalton agreed.
Radio Work
Sam asked about his early days, mentioning Dalton did a lot of radio work and interviewed many WWE guys and wondered if he got advice.
Castle said he just wanted to turn off the microphones and ask about the business and pick their brains but he would ask a few questions afterwards and said the best advice came from CM Punk and Paul Heyman.
State of Wrestling – Monday Night Raw
Number five is how good Monday Night Raw was this week. Sam thought Raw was great this week, and it did a lot for a few people, all these people fit in to story number five.
One, Sam loves watching Braun Strowman destroy things, you would think at some point they would bring him up on some manslaughter charges, although he hasn’t killed anyone that we know of.
Roman Reigns did try to kill him, in the truck, and he almost died in the garbage truck with the help of Kane, so that’s twice that he has almost died. This week he tried to kill Brock Lesnar and Kane, so that definitely counts twice.
Sam just can’t believe the skillsets some of these guys have, the secret skill sets. Who knew that on top of being country strong, Braun Strowman has incredible grappling hook skills, he would never think in his life that he would have to have a reason to use a grappling hook.
This dude knows how to use a grappling hook and used it to almost kill Brock Lesnar. Any time big things come crashing down it’s a good thing and that’s the secret, because all of a sudden, Sam finds himself caring about a triple threat match he would otherwise never care about.
It feels like a filler match, that is just existing to get us to WrestleMania, but after that segment Sam wants to see them kill each other.
Also, you had Woken Matt, who did awesome, laughing at Bray Wyatt was great, it’s really not doing a service for Bray at all but Sam loved Woken Matt this week.
Here’s the thing, Sam doesn’t know that he will ever be as popular as Broken Matt, but the thing is in TNA he was one of the only entertaining things on that show.
So, when Woken Matt shows up and captures our attention, of course we are all going to be excited, but with that said, he is a brilliant character portrayed by a brilliant performer and Sam is glad that the evolution is swimming with the big fishes. It’s a very good thing.
He is loving watching him survive in WWE’s shark infested waters, the WWE’s portrayal has been good so far.
He is never going to be a Universal Championship contender in the way that he was a top title contender in TNA, but he is something people will talk about, it’s a thing that will get people interested.
Also, successful this week on Raw was Jason Jordan. It really boggles Sam’s mind that people still think that he is being shoved down our throats. He is supposed to be the guy that we all think is a weasel, he is way too cocky, he asks for matches that he ends up losing, he costs Roman and Seth their match so they end up mad at him. He is the little brother than none of us wanted and he is portraying it brilliantly.
Jason has been great at owning this character, it feels natural to him, it doesn’t feel like he doesn’t know what he is doing. Sam believes that character.
At some point, of course he is going to turn on Kurt Angle, it is very obvious and Sam is loving the way it is going. This sort of entitled obnoxious millennial thing is not something we have seen in recent memory anyway.
It’s not like Seth Rollins was happy to team with him. He wormed his way into the title and they are stuck with him, he is in the good guy locker room because he is technically not a bad guy but nobody wants him in there.
Finally, on Raw, story number five is the Balor Club. Talk about good things come to those who wait, the best use you could have right now for Finn Balor, Karl Anderson, and Luke Gallows.
Even though it was because of Jason Jordan, it didn’t matter at all, their win over Rollins, Reigns and Jordan was so strong, Sam has high expectations. He hopes they keep going with it and they can hear the reaction they are getting. You can see in their matches they are so fluid, it’s like they have been waiting to do this all along.
It looks like three guys having a good time that don’t care about pissing anybody off, which is relatable. I’s something we want to see.We want to know that they are still having fun and they are, and you’re right Deano, they are trolling the Bullet Club, but now’s the time to do it.
WWE has the creme de la creme of the history of the Bullet Club, that is the foundation of the Bullet Club. Not to take anything away from the Elite, that is a different evolution of the Bullet Club, it is almost a different club.
All In Show
Speaking of the Young Bucks, Cody Rhodes and The Elite, we talked about it with Dalton Castle, the All In Show, it’s the show that Rhodes felt challenged to put together.
It all started when Dave Meltzer talked about 10,000 seat arena and Cody felt challenged so they are now putting their own money up because they want to draw 10,000 people.
All that they have announced so far is Kenny Omega has hinted at being there and Stephen Amell has been hinted. It will be on September 1st, we have a date.
Sam would imagine that the whole Bullet Club will be there (something that has since been confirmed) and he would think that the ROH guys will be there.They should get guys from New Japan, all these guys should be there, hell, call up WWE and see if you can work up a Terry Funk retirement deal and see if you can get a few guys there.
Maybe get the Balor Club to show up, if they were mad at the Invasion that time when they showed up in the parking lot, Sam doesn’t think it would be the worst idea to have the Balor Club show up. Don’t let them touch them, but have them show up, let people remember they were there first and then split.
CM Punk is a name that has been brought up. Sam thinks that the lawsuit is still happening between WWE and Punk but doesn’t think that would affect other shows.
Raw 25
The number three story this week is one that has been brought up multiple times, it is Raw 25. A lot of names have been brought up this week.
We don’t know what is going to be happening at each show specifically, but both will be used for live content, when it was first announced they announced Undertaker, Shawn Michaels and Kevin Nash.
They will have interaction between the two and there are so many legends that will be there and they won’t be wrestling so you will have to have some at each. It was announced that Undertaker, Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler, who Sam would imagine will be doing commentary for some special matches.
We will have Ric Flair, the Bellas, DX, The New Age Outlaws, JBL, Ron Simmons, Dudley Boyz, The Godfather, Brother Love, The Boogeyman, Teddy Long, The Million Dollar Man, Sgt. Slaughter and the man himself, Stone Cold Steve Austin.
It will be an amazing week. You have Raw 25 on Monday, SmackDown on Tuesday, NXT on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, catch up on your sleep because Saturday is NXT TakeOver: Philly and that Sunday is going to be the Royal Rumble.
You can never say WWE doesn’t give us enough content, it’s amazing. The Royal Rumble is probably going to get close to 7 hours.
PWInsider is reporting that Eric Bischoff is going to be there, Sam doesn’t know if that’s true but that’s a pretty good website.
Plus, there is going to be a lot of surprises, Sam wouldn’t be shocked if The Rock showed up.
There will be a plethora of people there, anyone you can think of there will be a possibility that they can be there.
It’s funny because clearly the power of Bruce Prichard’s podcast has helped get him on there. Brother Love’s time of being over was pre- Monday Night Raw, but it’s going to be a great show. Sam doesn’t think Goldberg will be there, he has a lot to do with Raw, but he guesses not.
SmackDown Live/Daniel Bryan
The number two story brings us to Tuesday night and SmackDown. Daniel Bryan primarily, they did a lot on SmackDown to shape the Women’s Rumble match.
But, the Daniel Bryan and Shane McMahon story is getting very interesting. In the last two weeks Bryan has very obviously taken on the role of the villain, which is interesting to note.
Sam is going to give him a couple more weeks but if they keep drifting him down this road of being a bad guy it makes him think he isn’t going to wrestle.
He has made an abrupt turn and has made it so he is obviously a bad guy and his favoritism seems very apparent, he really wouldn’t be surprised if they are trying to put the heel juice so Shane can turn and if he does turn then Daniel Bryan is coming back.
But, if he keeps going down this road as the obvious heel, then Sam doesn’t know if he will be back. It doesn’t bury him to turn him heel.
People are saying it buries his stock to turn him heel, but his contract isn’t up until September and Sam gets turning him heel because they want to lower his stock. However, if they wanted to do that before going to the indies, they wouldn’t put him on so many segments in the biggest story on SmackDown every week.
If you are trying to bury someone and make them less valuable for the purpose of contract negotiation and make them stay in WWE by punishing them, Sam doesn’t think putting them as a central character is a punishment, even if you are the bad guy.
You are making him more of a star by putting him on TV. WWE knows the wrestling business, they know how it works.
Ronda Rousey/WWE
The number one story of the week, the secret lunch or dinner or something between Triple H and Ronda Rousey. We were all watching SmackDown and whilst we did that, HHH was yip yapping about something to Rousey.
Sam does think she will be at the Royal Rumble, if he had to guess. Will she win it? Sam would hope not.
People said they were so upset about James Ellsworth getting involved in the Money in the Bank match, people said it ruins the legacy of what that match could mean, okay.
If you are doing the first Women’s Royal Rumble match and the woman who wins it isn’t on the active roster, isn’t that worse?
Doesn’t mean it won’t happen, there are a lot of ways we could go about it to make that not happen.
We could see Charlotte vs. Ronda Rousey at WrestleMania and if you are telling me that Rousey is wrestling at Mania Sam, would match rather see her go one on one with Charlotte than any tag match.
Maybe you shape the thing to what they were trying to do three years ago and have Rock and Ronda vs. Triple H and Steph but he doesn’t think so, Ronda should be used to highlight the women in WWE.
Put her in the Rumble and have her be eliminated and still give her the match with Charlotte. Have Asuka win the Rumble, which Sam knows doesn’t stand against an undefeated streak but he would have her win the Rumble and have Charlotte get the Rousey match at WrestleMania, that’s the way to do it.
Sam doesn’t mind Ronda winning at WrestleMania, he would rather have Charlotte win but he doesn’t think it hurts her to lose to Ronda Rousey, but it does hurt everyone to have her win the Royal Rumble.
You have to realize, there are 18 women altogether, plus two are champions so you have around 14 spots that are left open. You are going to have some legends, Eve Torress and Lita could be making an appearance, but there could be a celebrity.
Sam also thinks you will see women from NXT and the Mae Young Classic. There is room for all those women, Ivory is a good shot, she is still in shape.
Rating 8.5/10
Another brilliant episode which follows on from last week’s ,making 2018 a great start for the Sam Roberts Wrestling Podcast. Dalton Castle is always entertaining to listen to because of his humor and that was a major factor in this interview. Because Sam managed to get Dalton before anybody else since winning the ROH Championship, it meant all his answers were fresh, which you haven’t heard in previous interviews, making the conversation engaging. Once again, Sam’s new method for delivering the State of Wrestling worked well and flowed.
About the Writer
Matthew Wilkinson is from Bradford, England. He’s been a fan since the late 90’s with the Attitude Era and was then heavily invested again through the rise of CM Punk and Daniel Bryan. He can be found on Twitter at @MC_Wilkinson1
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