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Not many talents have made such a big impression in IMPACT Wrestling in such a short space of time as Madman Fulton. Having only joined the company one year ago, oVe's resident big man spent much of 2019 honing his craft and making the IMPACT locker room his home.
Now, with two years left on his contract and his sights firmly set on the IMPACT World Championship, Fulton opens up like never before on just why he's loving being a part of the company, his friendship with Sami Callihan, and wanting to go toe-to-toe with Michael Elgin!
The first thing I need to ask is a question I feel I can ask everyone in IMPACT Wrestling now - but for good reason. The morale in the locker room seems like it's a skyhigh, it seems like everyone is really excited to go to work which is something a few talents have said. Is that something you feel and, if so, what do you think the reason is for it?
You know, I think one of the coolest things about the locker room is based on the stigma that TNA, the stink TNA left. It really improves a lot of people, people wanted this company to succeed and they fell short, they fell short. And to see what Don (Callis) and Scott (D'Amore) did to turn this around, and to see little bits of our hard work paying off - we have bigger venues, more opportunities, there's big contracts being put out - that resonates with the locker room.
We have a group of men and women who want to build something, we want to make something special. There's an opportunity to have professional wrestling that's completely different from WWE or AEW. It's a new sort of programme and they let us go out and just have matches the way that we want to do them.
To provide that freedom, it's different to a lot of the places I've worked, there is not so much trying to step on each other's heads to put each other down. They want to have great matches, great professional wrestling, everyone is trying to lift everyone up that ladder because... It was actually Moose who said it to me, "The higher we can pull everyone up the ladder, the better opponents we'll have for matches down the road."
It's not just one or two people thinking that, it's the whole roster of people working together to build something new and exciting, and I think that's why everyone really comes together as a group and tries so hard on IMPACT.
One of the people that had mentioned it before was Dezmond Xavier. He actually name-checked you in the interview as well and said that you were one to watch and said he would love to work with you. Who do you think is going to have maybe the biggest year of their career this year?
Now I kinda feel obligated to say him. Don't get me wrong, Dezmond is a tremendous wrestler and he is definitely one to watch. His charisma and in-ring talent is nothing to be messed with, man. He is on top of his game right now.
Not to mention he's the only person who really stands up and screams with me at the monitor when we're watching matches. People need to see how excited he gets over pro wrestling. That man is one of the most passionate guys I think pro wrestling has.
When it comes to me and comes to my size and my ability, what I can bring, I really want to test what I've got against the likes of Michael Elgin. As big man in pro wrestling, it's always been one of my goals to be a monster, to be a giant. My favourite wrestler growing up was Kane. I idolised him, I wanted to be him. I want to have a career as long as him. As a big man, he's the guy to beat, and I think the first step in that is proving my mettle against the likes of Elgin.
You mentioned before about the kind of transformation of IMPACT coming from TNA. I feel like you're someone who's your own transformation. You always seemed to have immense potential and that's been unleashed in IMPACT. What do you put that down to?
For me, it's confidence. NXT can teach you a lot. They can help you out. They can show you all these things, but there's always... Whether it's real or not, or it's all in your head, there is a feeling of walking on egg shells, there's a feeling of, "Am I going to be good enough?"
In NXT, you're competing against 200 people. You get stuck in that bottleneck and, when there is no avenue for to you to travel up, you get complacent, you begin to doubt yourself and those feelings creep in.
When I was released, I went out on the independent circuit and it no longer becomes, "How do I get up there?" The cheque is gone. It quickly becomes, "How do I get good enough to eat? How do I get good enough to make more money? How do I get good enough to give myself a better life?"
I think when I started going down those roads, where I was getting a response from people in the smaller crowds, it builds your confidence a little bit, and a little bit. When promoters are calling you from out of the blue because they saw a clip on YouTube, it builds that ego, that pride in you, and I think that was something that, for me, personally, was lacking in NXT.
The more I get an opportunity to stand out there now, the more I realise that I do have this ability and I do have this potential, and there is the goal of mine to not only be a great professional wrestler but bit to be a notable big man in pro wrestling, and it's not only obtainable but I think it is definitely a path I'm on. I think it's that confidence that really moves me through to becoming a bigger and better performer.
Almost everything you said there reminded me of someone you know very well - apart from the fact you mentioned you're quite a big guy. All of the confidence, and the coming from NXT yet ending up kind of being the real deal in IMPACT, it reminds me a lot of Sami Callihan. I need to ask, what are your thoughts on Sami?
You know, Sami was one of my best friends in NXT. We met a few times in Ohio before I started three, but he quickly became one of the guys that I could lean on and trust.
He's not the type of dude... He won't do anything, he's not going to force you into things you don't want to do. He's not going to go out of his way to help you unless he knows you're really passionate and you truly love this place.
Between him and Jake Crist, and Dave for that matter, those three really helped to install that confidence and really got me out of that mindset of, "Oh, you're not good enough to make it in NXT," to now, "You are good enough, you do have these abilities and we are going to show you exactly how you can stick each and every foot back into the throats of the people that let you go prematurely." Yeah, Sami has definitely helped me out so much.
You speak very highly of him. Another man I know you've spoken very highly of, bit of a legend when it comes to IMPACT Wrestling, it's Kurt Angle, which I believe you share a kind of similar background. You have an all-American background. Was he the main inspiration growing up?
He was my inspiration to get into amateur wrestling. It wasn't until seeing him that, in my mind, I kind of clicked, like, "Oh, if he became an Olympic gold medallist to become a pro wrestler, that's obviously what I have to do." Then I showed up in my school to start wrestling and there wasn't a ring in the gym like I'd originally thought. There was just a mat.
I figured, you know, "You need to get good on the mat before you move on to the ring," which wasn't untrue, it only took 16 years.
But the wrestler I first fell in love with was Kane. Just because I had an older brother growing up and he liked Undertaker and, of course, as a younger brother, by law, you can't have the same... You've got to like the exact opposite thing and the exact opposite of Undertaker was Kane.
The more I grew, the more I started learning about pro wrestling, the more I realised that he is definitely a man to idolise. 25+ years at the top of the card, he's renowned as one of the most crucial big men in this industry, he's had several crazy good matches and he's known worldwide, and he's the Mayor of Knoxville Tennessee. There's so much good that he has done in and out of pro wrestling. He's definitely still the wrestler I idolise the most.
IMPACT currently has quite a few veterans and legends in the locker room. The likes of Ken Shamrock, Rob Van Dam, Rhino and Tommy Dreamer. What's it like getting to work alongside people like that?
It's kind of crazy, you know? It's people that you grew up watching, and you watch a guy like, say, Dreamer. I grew up watching him on the old ECW and I'd watch these guys rush down to the ring to save him, the Dudleys would come out, beat the hell out of him, they would come out as these baby faces and save him. It's kind of a feeling of alignment in that position.
Now I'm the one causing all that havoc.
We all go back to the confidence, I'm someone who has proven myself to a high enough level that I can be in the ring with the likes of Dreamer and Rhino, and Shamrock. Be able to learn from these guys and not only from their lives outside the ring but watching them and taking the time to see how they move on and up close and personal level, that is absolutely amazing.
You said you've got a lot of confidence and those people have set quite the benchmark. What are your goals and aspirations for 2020?
You know, I've been thinking about it a lot, I took a lot of 2019 to establish myself as a monster, as a threat to the rest of the roster, and I proved to everybody that I am more than just this guy who failed in NXT. I think I've done that in 2019, and I look at the landscape now of IMPACT Wrestling, and with Sami Callihan gone and just how things are laid out, I don't think a World Championship is out of my grasp. I've set my sights and my goals on that.
I have two years left on contract and I think, within two years, that is an extremely unobtainable goal.
Finally, who would be your dream match in wrestling?
I hate to go back to him, but Kane would be one of the guys I wish I could set foot in there with. I've had a few run-ins with the likes of Abyss and Kongo Kong out on the indies and, for me, I want to establish myself as one of the better big men in professional wrestling, and I know that Kane is one of those guys that is always going to have that moniker, and to be able to go up against someone I've idolised so much would be really awesome.
To this day, I still have an autographed picture that I got from when I was a kid hanging up in my house.
UK viewers can catch Impact Wrestling on Fight Network UK every Wednesday via Sky channel 192 and Freesat 161.
You can also follow IMPACT Wrestling UK on Twitter here, and Madman Fulton on Twitter here.
