Rob Van Dam on Hook’s potential, whether there are plans for him to do more with Hook in AEW, old school vs. new school

By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)

The Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling Podcast with Rob Van Dam
Host: JP John Poz
Twitter: @TwoManPowerTrip
Website: www.tmptempire.com
Interview available at Tmptow.podomatic.com

Whether there are plans for more in AEW with Hook: “I don’t know, I’m not even exactly sure what you’re asking, but I mean as far as like, was there supposed to be anything more… You know, I’m not one to open up a plan-book… I’m more of a live-by-the-moment kind of a person. So, in that regard, I usually don’t know until it happens. It’s just talk anyway, so I don’t put that much into, ‘We’re going to do this and that, and that, and then maybe you are, maybe you’re not.’ You know, that’s just life in general. Hook came down and made the save when Brian Cage came in… I think that certainly leaves room for another match down the road. Tag match? Or I guess there’s three or four of them… so maybe, maybe build it for them if that’s something people would care about.”

On the potential of Hook: “He’s a very likable guy and [that’s] not just first-hand from me thinking he’s got a good vibe [and] I like him, but I even noticed first that the crowd took to him so much, and so I was trying to figure that out, like, what is that about him? I think it’s cool that he’s Taz’s son. To use a pun – that’s a little hook on his character, and makes him stand out a little bit. Honestly, when I saw him and Samoa Joe do their little promo face-off. I thought it was funny how he held the microphone up, and it made me laugh. I thought it made him look like an unruly punk that just had some things he wanted to say but wasn’t necessarily taught how, because that’s the way it came across, which should be good for, I think, the message they were doing. I like him.”

Old school vs new school wrestling: “The way we trained, if you got bloody, that was good for the match, it made it look good. And there was no air allowed between anybody, my whole training with Sheik was about grabbing each other and bringing each other in tighter. Bringing each other in whether it’s a headlock, or a waist-lock, or an armlock, it was always about coming in and squeezing. Anytime someone was on their back, boom, you better be jumping on him trying to pin him, trying to win. And that’s not the way I see a lot of wrestling today. A lot of times, it eats me up. What’s the right way to put it? Some things are less than enjoyable for me to watch just because of that mentality, old school perspective that I have because I see what’s missing and the audience might not always know what’s missing, but they just know they’re not connecting in the way they used to be, you know, back in the day with other wrestlers when it was different.”

Other topics include breaking into the business under The Sheik, Sabu, AEW, Jungle Boy, Tony Khan, Swerve Strickland, Japan, AJPW, ECW, Paul Heyman, WWE, Vince McMahon, his WWE HOF induction, and more.