Will Hobbs On His Brother’s Passing, Using Family As Motivation, Advice From Brodie Lee

In a recent interview on Talk Is Jericho, Will Hobbs discussed his brother’s passing, advice he received from Brodie Lee, and much more. You can read his comments below.

Will Hobbs on his older brother’s passing: “We were tight. He wanted to be in the wrestling business and he wanted to be my manager. He was a tall, lanky dude, like Slick. He can talk. We always said he could sell an Eskimo snow. He had that type of game. Just got into the wrong crowd and ended up not doing what you’re supposed to do. He ended up getting shot, and I ended up getting hit in the forearm getting shoved out of the way…..I was 22 at the time. It’s a shared dream with him and my grandparents. It’s been 10 years, and it still hurts.”

On using his family as motivation: “There’s no second-guessing anything. I have kids, and I have an older son. I look at him and my younger son and how tight they are. It reminds me so much of me and my brother. Everything I do is for them. I’ve got so many people depending on me, and I feel like I have my city depending on him. I can’t let people down. I refuse to, and it just reminds me so much of everything I have to accomplish.”

Will Hobbs on his rough upbringing: “Growing up, I had people put stuff in my backpack and say, ‘Hey, before you get on the bus, you need to go down to that house.’ Had to take out all my books, my binders, notebooks, school books, and putting stuff in my backpack and say, ‘Go to that house.’ Who’s going to look at a seven or eight-year-old kid walking down the street? The cops aren’t gonna look at me. I had people tell me, ‘When you get off the bus, go walk the other way home. You don’t want to be here when this is about to happen.’ The bus stop was about half a block away from where I lived, so I would get off the bus, walk a half a block, and go home. I had to walk eight blocks before I got home and my grandma was like, ‘What the hell took you so long?’ I had to explain to her that they told me I had to go this way. There was gonna be a big fight, big brawl, or shooting.”

On getting advice from Brodie Lee in AEW: “Right after my first Dark match with Orange, he pulled me aside and talked to me. Every match I had that he watched, he always gave me advice. That was just awesome. My whole family loved him when he was in The Wyatt Family. He was a real good person. That meant a lot to me for him to pull me aside and say, ‘Hey, you’re a big man. Don’t do this, try this, this worked, or that didn’t work.’ I remember I did a frog splash in a match, and he told me, ‘I know you can do it, but you don’t need to do it.’ I haven’t done it since.

If using any of the above quotes, please credit Talk Is Jericho with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.