Indie star and new MLW signee AKIRA recently joined PW Mania for an in-depth conversation about all things pro-wrestling, including how the great Shinsuke Nakamura was a huge inspiration to him growing up. Highlights from the interview are below.
On the signing with MLW and the online reports:
So I mean, it’s been like a goddamn thing for a couple of weeks, like two or three weeks before Christmas. It never it never really settled in. I talked to Sean Ross, who is a friend of mine. And he messaged me the page I think, like a day or two before and he said, ‘Oh, cool. It’s a design bubble, blah, blah, blah.’ I wasn’t even awake. I was like, ‘okay, cool. Awesome.’ That’s probably going to pop out at some point, you know, in the next two weeks or so. Then I had that match at GCW, I had those two crazy matches the rest of all that people said were disgusting and I’m like, ‘That’s what I do.’ Then… was it two days later… Mosh (Masha Slamovich) is getting ready to do a match and all of a sudden, like my Twitter’s just exploding. That’s how I found out that it was officially official, even though MLW hasn’t really said anything. But you know, it made my interview and everything else.
Says he’s always looked up to Shinsuke Nakamura:
I wanted to be Shinsuke Nakamura because Nakamura was God to me. Nakamura was the reason I got back into wrestling to begin with, the reason I went all the way down to Mexico, you know, on a hope and a prayer. This led to my first death match where they said, ‘Hey, you, you look good. But we have a spot on the card for you, a death match.’ In my head, all the red flags went up, but mentally I was like, ‘I’m in Mexico.’ I went all the way down here. I really didn’t care about my well being I said screw it. Why not? And literally that all led to here, because then they came back to America. People heard how great that match was. I actually started to have more death matches but I was also having matches with than regular matches with guys like Tony Deppen. Suddenly it dawned on me that my death matches have helped elevate my regular wrestling career to new levels. It all is like yin and yang it all goes in a circle. It all fuels itself so I’m never gonna be that guy that quits doing death matches because I’m not here without them. But it led to me going to the East Coast kind of getting a name for myself.
What to expect from him in MLW:
I’m not here at MLW to waste my time. I’m not here at MLW to you know, just ‘oh, I signed a paper. I did it Mom and Dad. That’s cool.’ You know, it’s great. You know, the young guy from Indiana that everyone wrote off, you know, then he became a death match guy. And everyone said, that’s all you’re ever going to be. I signed a paper. I did what a lot of other people said I would never do or what a lot of death match guys would never do. That’s great. It’s wild. I want to go in there, look everyone in the eye and have them know I’m coming for your spot. I’m coming for your head. And if you’re complacent, and if you’re lazy, I’m going to run you over because my mind is going at 100 miles an hour.