Buddy Murphy recently spoke with FOX Sports Australia to promote this weekend’s NXT TakeOver: New Orleans and WrestleMania 34 events. Featured below are some of the highlights from the interview.
On being frustrated with how he was being used in NXT after his tag-team with Wesley Blake was nixed in 2016: “Sitting on the sidelines for that long, it got under my skin a lot because I had so much to offer,” Murphy said. “I felt like the world hadn’t even seen a glimpse of what I’m able to do. Being in a tag team, it’s on myself but we were the champs and we won the championships early in our careers and that kind of got to our heads a little bit. We went out there and win, lose or draw we didn’t care and once we lost them and couldn’t get a win, we slowly got pushed down the ladder. Where do you go from there? I didn’t have anything to grab onto. It’s a tough time. I was working my butt off on those live events. I was stealing the show every night but the stage is a lot smaller. There was a time I put a deadline on myself and it was WrestleMania.
“I needed to do something because I felt like I was a diamond in the rough that had all the potential in the world but didn’t get to use it. Maybe I was thinking, this isn’t for me? A lot of things were going through my head. I had a little deadline to make stuff happen and 205 was my out and how I was going to showcase to the world who I am and what I am.”
On being hesitant at first about making the move to 205 Live: “Dropping 25 pounds was something I was unsure about. It seemed like a pointless adventure in a way. I was sitting in the dark in NXT. I’d lost the championships, our team disbanded, the last time I was on television was when NXT was in Melbourne (mid last year), that was the last time I was seen. I was doing NXT live events and I was stealing the show every night. I felt like I was under-utilised and overlooked. Once that tournament was announced, I thought what better platform? I saw that as the opportunity. I was lucky enough to steal one of the 16-man slots.”
Check out the complete Buddy Murphy interview at FOXSports.com.au.
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