Jake Roberts Says Matches Need To Have A Story

In an interview with Grind City Wrestling (via Wrestling Inc), Jake Roberts spoke about why matches need to have a story, and which WWE angle he wishes he never took part in. Here are highlights:

On matches needing a story: “A match is a wonderful thing if you take care of it and have fun with it, and tell it like a story instead of going out and emptying your gun in all different places and not aiming at anything. What are you doing, man? You’re just scatter-shooting. You’re just taking a handful of crap and throwing it up against the wall and seeing what sticks. That doesn’t work for me. I wanna go out there and take those people for a ride. And, the biggest, the hardest thing about doing that is learning to read your audience. You gotta go out and read the audience, because they may not be ready to do what you want to do, so you may have to adjust. You may have to change it and go a different direction. But if you don’t go out and read the audience and see what they’re asking for, then you’re just gonna be taken off on a road that nobody’s even watching. So, reading the audience is probably the most important thing.”

On WWF using his addiction as a storyline: “It was ridiculous. That was one of the things I’d wish I had never done. The whole idea behind that was really cheap, I thought. I thought it was disgusting, actually. After everything that I’ve been through, then you’re gonna go out there and bring it up in the front, and that’s gonna be your idea? That’s the best the writers can come up with? Come on, give me a break. It was ridiculous, man. Not many times in my career I said no, but that’s one time I should have said no.”

On WWE using Jeff Hardy’s drug issues or the death of Jim Neidhart for stories: “How ridiculous is that?”