Kenny Omega discusses his journey toward becoming a pro wrestling superstar.
The Cleaner spoke about his career during a recent interview with Muscle & Fitness, where he looked back on his younger days as an athlete. Omega tells the publication that he always knew he wanted to be a wrestler and played sports that he could later apply to his wrestling skill.
I think a lot of the sports that I partook in, the sports that I really tried hard in, whether it be ice hockey, whether it be soccer, basketball, I always took whatever aspect of that sport, that I felt could be most applied to professional wrestling, because in the end, that was always the end game. I always wanted to be a professional wrestler, so when it came to being a goal tender in ice hockey, you know, you’re wearing at that time, 30, 40, 50 pounds of equipment. But I always made it a goal of mine to keep up with the forwards in any of the conditioning drills, any of the speed drills. I tried as best as I could. And, you know, a lot of times it was impossible, because our skates were different, they were more flat bladed than sharp bladed, we can’t dig in as much, I had of course an incredible deficit of having all that weight on me, but I wanted to push myself. I wanted to be the best conditioned athlete that we had on the team. When I played basketball, I wanted to be very dynamic. I wanted to be explosive.
Omega went through WWE’s developmental system, but left after disliking the way his training was going. He later signed with NJPW and went through their Dojo system, one he believes produces some of the best wrestlers in the world.
It is very much designed to test your mettle. Not only are you training at the dojo as a professional wrestler but you’re training your body, you’re training your mind, your training teamwork. You’re training how to be a better human being; you’re training how to live not only for yourself but for your fellow dojo mates.
It was announced by AEW this morning that Omega will be defending the IWGP United States Championship against Will Ospreay at the June 25th Forbidden Door 2 pay-per-view. This will be a rematch from their WrestleKingdom 17 bout earlier this year, where Omega took the title from Ospreay in his first NJPW match since 2018.