WWE superstar Kevin Owens recently spoke to Fightful to hype his showdown with Universal champion Roman Reigns at tomorrow’s TLC pay per view. During the interview K.O. touches on a number of subjects, including how Reigns is performing at the highest of levels, and his history with ladder matches. Highlights are below.
How Roman Reigns has never been better:
Roman’s never been better, pretty sure we can agree on that. He’s showing a side that a lot of people, ironically, have been waiting for him to show for a long time because the crowd reactions he used to get. Everyone wondered why they wouldn’t just embrace that. Now, he’s embracing it at a time where crowds can’t react, which is ironic as well. He’s doing really well in the new attitude and way of carrying himself and it’s awesome to see. Of course, it makes me want to match it. That’s really true of anytime I’ve worked with Roman, even when the roles were reversed because he’s very passionate about what we do and so am I. There’s different levels of passion in different people. When you work with somebody as passionate as you to create good and memorable moments and stories, it naturally brings your level up as well. It’s been really enjoyable. It’s not just him. [Paul] Heyman and Jey Uso have been so great in their roles as well. It’s really cool to do something fresh. It’s very refreshing for me to be involved with those guys and the way we’re doing it now. I hope it continues.
Discusses his history with ladder matches:
I just like to adapt the match to the situation and the story we’re having. I don’t think of things to do beforehand, it kind of comes to me as we go and the match gets closer. You can get ideas for stuff you’d like to do, but if it doesn’t fit through the framework of the match you’re trying to have, sometimes forcing it just doesn’t help and makes things worse. I try to go into every match with a clean slate and open mind and take it from there. There’s never been a ladder match or tables match or any stipulation match where I haven’t pulled out something kind of nuts so I wouldn’t expect Sunday to be any different.
On the WWE Chronicle that’s coming out on him:
Usually when they work on something like that for the Network, you’re followed for months and they condense it into an hour or 40 minutes. This time, they were only filming with me for two SmackDowns and then they came to my house for a day. They really weren’t filming with me for very much. They didn’t have time because they decided they wanted to put this Chronicle out before TLC. We did what we could, but basically, the whole crew that works on the Network documentary and the stuff you see on YouTube and all the behind the scenes footage, the crew is so incredible. Even though they are filming me and following me around or at my house, unless I’m sitting down with them to do an actual interview, I almost don’t know they are there. In this case, Joey, the guy who filmed it and put it together, he’s good at being like a ghost in the background. There was a time when he was in my house and I was getting my daughter ready for school and I forgot he was there. She started talking to him and I turned around like, ‘Oh, she’s talking to Joey.’ He was off to the side just shooting us and I was doing what I do every morning. They definitely get a glimpse of what we are before we go to work and how, in a way for me, how work has influenced my life outside the ring because I’m pretty consumed by work at all times. That’s a big part of this Chronicle, trying not to let this story with Roman and TLC match just bleed too much into my everyday life. It’s obviously a big opportunity. Anytime you get to be part of Chronicle or 24, it’s neat because it gives people something to be excited about and gives people a reason to care about the match they’re going to see. People are going to get to watch what it’s like to prepare for a match like that.