Jeff Cobb Addresses United Empire’s Status, Says He May Need a ‘Change of Scenery’

Jeff Cobb is looking for change in NJPW, and he says if he doesn’t get it he may need to look elsewhere. Cobb spoke in a backstage promo following the NJPW New Japan Cup night seven, where he and Great-O-Khan defeated Tomoaki Honma & Toru Yano. You can see some highlights below, per Fightful:

On the United Empire’s status after Will Ospreay went to AEW: “Now listen up, pay attention. I’m only gonna say this one time. I’m gonna address the bulls**t. Knock this s**t off, alright. Social media, X, whatever, stop tagging me in stuff because I don’t care. Social media, X, it’s not a real place. This is not where I live. You all say, ‘Hey, Jeff, who’s the new leader of the United Empire? Who’s the new captain? Bottom line is, Jeff Cobb doesn’t give a s**t. You see, yeah, I was offered the role. But you know what, me looking back, do I need a title by my name to prove my point, to prove what I want to do in this industry, to prove what I want to do in this company? I don’t need a title. I don’t need a title by my name because I’m gonna do everything I want when I want, without a title, with a title, it doesn’t matter. So yeah, if you want to be a captain, be a captain. Because the bottom line is, and I’m gonna put every single champion on New Japan’s roster on notice. You see, people talking about getting overlooked and passed by, the one man that’s been passed by, has been overlooked is me. Again, like I said, I don’t need a title near my name. The only title I want is around my waist.”

On wanting to see change in NJPW: “So we can captain the ship whichever way we want to go, but if I see something off in the great distance that I want and we’re not going in that direction, you can bet your bottom dollar that I’m gonna jump in a life raft and swim and swim and swim to what I want, and that’s some championship gold. When the time is right, I’m gonna take it. I said this many moons ago, when the United Empire was starting to gain steam. We are going on an uphill battle against the monster that is New Japan because they don’t want guys like us. They don’t want guys like us on the cover of magazines. No, they want to keep it for their poster boys. But the bottom line is, it’s falling upon deaf ears. New Japan, listen, pay attention. Because the people, they want it. They want the Great-O-Khan. They want TJP, they want Jeff Cobb, they want Francesco Akira, they want the United Empire, they want Callum Newman. They want all the brothers that we’ve had, past and present. The bottom line is, I said that I wanted some change in New Japan. If I don’t get the change that I want, or the change that I think we need to go in, then maybe it’s not me that needs to change. Maybe the fact is, there needs to be a new change of scenery.”