Jeff Cobb Says ROH is in a Good Spot Right Now, Talks Being Seen as Face of the Company

– Jeff Cobb spoke with CBS Local in Baltimore for a new interview discussing the state of ROH and more.

On fans that perceive him as one of the faces of the company: “Yeah. I mean, I see it from the fans’ perspective as well, but from my perspective, I don’t see it that much. I don’t feel I carry the pressure to carry companies on my shoulders per se.”

On where ROH is as a promotion right now: “I think we’re in a good spot. A lot of people kind of have their naysayers, as when we had a core group of guys leave, and that’s totally fine. Every major sport has had that. Every major wrestling company has had that. Like LeBron left, “What we going to do?” So you start rebuilding. When they got Kyrie [Irving] and Kevin Love and all this. So I think for that, in the short term, it’s not good. But in the long-term it’s beneficial, because now we have a new influx of talent coming in, like myself included, guys like Bandido, and RUSH, and Dragon Lee, and Brody King, and PCO, and all those guys. Now they’re stepping up into more prominent roles. And now, we’re giving our ring a modern audience, a brand new roster to play with and see new guys, and new wrestlers, and new matches, and just new everything. Where we’re at, I think we’re going to find spot, because now we get to showcase some more people who may have not had a chance before because we had star-studded lineup prior and we have a star-studded lineup now.”

On the wrestling industry right now: “I think it’s a great time in professional wrestling, not just in the indie scene, where I came from, but from top to bottom, from the indies to actual companies. For example, you mentioned… What was that word you used? [Coopetition.] Coopetition! I think it’s great. I think it was in April when we had Ring of Honor entering the Crocket Cup Tag Tournament and we had a Ring of Honor representative win the NWA Tag Team titles. So I thought that was pretty cool. We have a great roster, but it’s also cool that we can wrestle our own guys and then also work with guys like CMLL or New Japan or NWA. And that’s coopetition. It fuels us, because we get to see guys in the NWA, we get to see guys in CMLL, in New Japan and it kind of forces our group, our core roster, to step our game up. Because at the end of the day, we’re going to see them every so often, but we’re going to see our guys every show, every tour, every pay-per-view. So I think it’s good for us, because we step our game up, and then it just makes our product even better.”

On if he sees it as a benefit to have so many different promotions and styles on his resume: “Definitely. As a performer, I never want to stay stagnant. I don’t want to be me all the time. I love doing different styles. It’s the same with food. If I had to eat the same thing over… If I had to eat chicken and rice and broccoli over and over and over, I would hate life. So now, it’s the same thing. If I had to just wrestle one style over and over and over, I probably wouldn’t be wrestling. So, it’s a good thing digging over here. It’s a good thing to have different tastes and flavors, get different spices thrown into your soup.”