MLW star Alex Kane recently spoke with Post Wrestling’s Andrew Thompson about a wide range of topics, including how American Top Team’s Dan Lambert helped negotiate Kane’s deal with the company, and what his relationship with MLW CEO Court Bauer has been since he signed. Highlights, including the full video interview, can be found below.
Alex Kane says American Top Team’s Dan Lambert negotiated his MLW deal:
“And then with signing with MLW and Dan Lambert negotiating my contract, that was pretty awesome. I should be going to train at the [American] Top Team facility in Atlanta here in the next month or two. I’m trying to — me and Mo, me and King Mo are trying to arrange everything so everything went smoothly. But having King Mo in my corner is like the greatest thing ever. I always say he’s like the uncle I never had. Our chemistry is insane. It’s like we’ve known each other forever and he’s super knowledgeable as far as like presenting yourself, what to say, what to do. He’s always — anytime we meet at tapings and stuff, he’s always showing me something new, some new hold, some new way to get into something, so that’s really, really dope, and then just talking to him on a daily basis has been awesome. Like I never would have thought like seeing King Mo in TNA years ago and then being — having his number in my phone today is insane to think about.”
Creative freedom with promos that talents have in MLW:
“Yeah, it’s kind of like they [MLW] give you bullet points but you don’t — and they have them written. They have the bullet points written out. They’re not like, ‘You have to say it like this.’ They’re more like, ‘This is kind of like the gist of where we want you to go with it but we want you to say it in your own words’ which is really awesome and I wish that in other companies it was like that for the performers and stuff because being able to say it in your own words because like — yeah, being able to say it in your own words, in your own way I feel makes it a lot more relatable than regurgitating somebody’s typed out lines. But yeah, we really do kind of have a good bit of freedom of what we say because we’re all professionals, we know not to say anything stupid or anything like that but there’s ways to say things or whatever to get whatever heat or praise that you need to get without being an a-hole.”
Alex details why he signed with MLW, discusses how the negotiations went:
“I’ve always liked — from what I’ve seen from the new MLW, I’ve always liked how everything is presented. It’s presented in like — it’s presented kind of like a UFC in a sense, just with like a pro wrestling twist to it. A lot of the gaga stuff is cut. MLW feels like anything could legitimately happen. It feels like Raw used to feel back in the day, like anything could happen and then the fact that they have so many guys, it’s kind of like a variety show in a sense. They got luchadores, we got MMA fighters, we got wrestlers, we got pro wrestlers or whatever. We kind of got a little bit of everything so you can kind of — I think we’re hitting every demographic that’s needed and now we’re adding a women’s division. So, and just like… even now, before I didn’t know anybody there but, just talking to people in the office or whatever and being able to ask questions and not be shamed for asking any questions. There’s no stupid question. The only stupid question is the question that isn’t asked. But it was kind of, I guess going into my signing itself, I was literally checking my email one day. I was just checking my email and I saw an email from MLW and it was like, ‘Yo, were you ever interested in wrestling for MLW?’ And I was like, ‘Hell yeah,’ because three months before that, I did an interview and the interviewer was like, ‘Yo, if you could go anywhere, where would you wanna go?’ And I was like, ‘MLW’ because it fits my style, and then three months later, I get an email and the contract negotiations and stuff was really easy because they kind of took into account that I’m young in the business but like when we were talking about it, there was literally no downside to me or whatever. It was all upside. At the time, being two years in, having a contract from a major company, no pun intended. But to have a contract from a major company this early in the game for me, it’s only going to increase my reach as far as social media and stuff goes. I’ve gained so many followers and so many fans and so many people watch the product. People come to shows and be like, ‘Yo, I saw you on the Battle Riot. Yo, I saw your debut, sh*t was nuts. You f*cking rule.”
Court Bauer constantly telling Alex how grateful he is that Alex chose MLW to be his home:
“The day that I was announced [to have signed with MLW], me and Court [Bauer] have been talking since then. I talk to Court on a daily basis and he always — it’s really, really dope. He’s constantly encouraging me, he’s constantly feeding me ideas; different ways to move, different ways to act. He’s really, really fun to collaborate with. But like, he constantly tells me how special I am and how thankful he is for me to have chosen MLW to be my home.”
