In 2019, PCO finally reached the pinnacle of professional wrestling, capturing his first-ever World’s Championship after defeating RUSH at Ring of Honor’s Final Battle event. It was the culmination of an over 30-year journey to the apex of the business, and as he describes to us on a recent edition of Conversations With Love, the wait made the victory that much sweeter.
Please credit Spencer Love of the WCSN with any transcriptions used.
Winning the ROH Heavyweight Championship
SL: “That’s a good point to be a man. It’s a great point to be at. I want to touch back on that championship because obviously, man, being the Ring of Honor World Heavyweight Champion is a huge, huge honour. When you held the championship, did losing out on that experience or missing out however you want to phrase it, how much does that make it mean more when you finally do win the title?”
PCO: ”Yeah, it means so much more, because you feel that you earned it, you know, it’s not something that was handed to you. You really never stopped believing, you’re really - you’re achieving yourself, you know, you’re realizing a goal that a lot of wrestlers will never have the chance to achieve. It’s just, it’s just amazing. It’s such a great, awesome feeling., and, you know, there’s still work. I’m still learning, (I’m) still learning a lot of things as I go on the journey. I don’t think we ever stop learning, but I learned a lot, you know, during that experience.”
SL: ”And you didn’t even have to pay $3,000 for it.”
PCO: ”No, but all those experiences though, like, when you when the title, all those moments (flash) in your mind, you know. You have all - all this is like in a minute and 30 seconds. You see all your career unfold in front of you, and all the way up to this. You see all the setbacks, all the obstacles, all the naysayers, the non-believers, the people who trash you or didn’t believe in you. You go through all that, and then, when you get it, it’s like, wow. It’s the best feeling in the world.”
If he feels he’s accomplished his goal of growing ROH as a promotion:
SL: ”It’s cool to hear that. The first interview that I ever heard when you became this absolute freak of nature, man, you started talking about what your goals were with Ring of Honor. It was right after you’d signed, and you said you wanted to be with them and grow a territory and grow both as a professional wrestler and as a promotion. Do you feel you’ve accomplished that?”
PCO: ”Yeah, I think the pandemic kinda stopped the process a little bit, but I think - I did some major, major like podcasts, talk shows, major talk shows with over 1.5 million viewers. I was invited - I was the last guest of the night. I was like the main event of the show. I think I did put Ring of Honor’s name on every lips. Everybody that was watching and everybody was waiting for a big Championship match at the Bell Center (in) Montreal, and I had all the journalists and newspaper guys and columnists waiting for it, and everybody, they were saying all the same things, you know, ‘(if) you defend the title in Montreal, we’re selling out the Bell Center. So that would have been like an All In for Ring of Honor, Part Two. It would have been insane.”
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