Jimmy Jacobs Doesn’t See Himself Wrestling In Impact Any Time Soon

In an interview with Vulture Hound, Jimmy Jacobs said that he doesn’t see himself wrestling for Impact any time soon, although he’s currently in a managerial role. Here are highlights:

On if he will wrestle for Impact: “I’ve known Kongo since I was 14 years old, before I even started wrestling. We’re both from the same area. Since we worked with him on national television, international television, from being young kids and now being grown up and doing this together, it’s been awesome. Kongo is so talented. As far as wrestling with Impact goes, I don’t see that happening right now, it’s not especially completely off the table but what I do at the shows, producing the shows, honestly it’s a lot. It’s a lot to the point where even sometimes going on performing as a manager like takes me away from my responsibilities backstage. It’s a hard thing to juggle sometimes.”

On Matt Sydal’s character change: “Matt Sydal has been one thing his whole career, it’s been great, being a sort of babyface that can have great matches, who doesn’t talk much, being a good wrestler and doing high-flying stuff. That’s been him his whole career and, a few months back, we took a chance on him when we said: ‘hey I think there’s something more,'” said Jacobs. “We capitalized on what he’s in real life, with him being kind of spiritual and holistic and those sort of things. We thought why not adding that in his character and try something else. There were people even internally who thought that was a bad idea. People want to cheer Matt because he does impressive moves, they’re going to be confused by this new character of his. But over the past month, seeing Matt develop and seeing him during the last tapings session in early June, the promo he cuts that’s going to air in a few weeks and the backstage promos on Brian Cage, it was the best thing I shot from all we got, from anybody. Matt has never been a good talker, he’s never been great with promos, and this guy cuts the best promo I saw that week. To see that transformation, to see that happen, to see somebody who didn’t even know they had it in themselves and to see that come out because you believe in them, because the group of people here saw something else in him and to see that come to fruition, that’s awesome. That’s great, I love it.”

On his favorite wrestlers to work with: “I think we have such a lot of good guys. Austin Aries is awesome, I’ve known him since the independents. To see him now in Impact not only as a performer but as a person and now see how good he is at his job, I almost forgot it because in WWE they sometimes forget to accentuate a guy strength. I was working with him a few weeks ago, we were doing a sit-down interview together and I thought “this guy is incredible. I wish other kids could sit here and like see what I’m seeing about how good this guy is.” For anything you give him on every single level, I think the world is his. I mentioned Tessa Blanchard before, I think she’s going to be a big star. She’s so eager to learn and she’s so coachable, she’s so smart that you can give her something and whatever you give her, she does it and you don’t need to tell her twice. So many people are great to work with for different reasons, some because they’re just so good how they are, some because you see where they can improve and you see them improving.”