JBL Weighs In On The Challenges Of Being A Booker, Tommy Dreamer’s TNA Exit

On the latest episode of Something To Wrestle With, JBL talked about the criticism of Road Dogg and the broader question of who can run a wrestling company’s creative, and Tommy Dreamer’s departure as TNA Head of Creative. Dreamer was let go from TNA among a number of departures earlier this week. You can check out some highlights below:

On Being a Booker:

“How many guys are there who are qualified for this job? There aren’t many. You can count on one hand how many people are qualified to book a major wrestling company 52 weeks a year. That is an incredible task, and it’s not something you learn on the job. That’s why you see these guys come in with a little money — the money marks, as we used to call them — who say, ‘I’m going to book my own wrestling,’ and the guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about. You can do it for a couple of shows.

“You see some bookers come in and hot-shot it, book two or three months, and then they’re out of ideas, going, ‘Oh s**t, what do I do now?’ Because you’ve got a show this week, another next week, and another the week after. It doesn’t stop. There are very few guys talented enough to fill that role. When you look at the list of people who could possibly be the TNA head of creative, there’s four or five people in the world [and] that’s about it. I would challenge anybody to come up with a better idea of how many people are actually talented enough to do this, because I just don’t think it’s many.”

On Tommy Dreamer:

“Tommy’s a good dude. Everybody who’s ever worked with Tommy — I don’t know anybody who has anything bad to say about him. He’s a good human being, he sticks up for people, he’s a ballsy guy, he’s got a backbone, he’s willing to stand up for what he believes is right, which I admire greatly. The reason I went to TNA was partly because I’m close to Tommy. Booking and wrestling is hard; great bookers don’t just come up out of nowhere. I talk to Konnan a lot about booking, and he talks about working in Florida and who he worked under, like Kevin Sullivan. Look at Tommy Dreamer and who he worked under — he worked closely under Paul Heyman, one of the best minds in the business, who worked under others. It was all passed down.

“Look at Road Dogg, one of the few guys who worked hand in hand with Vince McMahon. These guys are very rare now. It’s kind of like second-generation wrestlers — they have a leg up on the rest of us who had to learn the business from the outside coming in. The problem is this: you have a show tonight, and it’s really good. And then it’s, ‘Okay, what are we doing next week? And the week after? And we’ve got a PLE in three weeks, and a big show in three months.’ All of a sudden, you realize, ‘Oh geez, it doesn’t stop.’ That’s why people get burned out.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit Something To Wrestle With an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.