WWE backstage authority (as stated in the podcast description), Adam Pearce was the most recent guest on the After The Bell podcast. Here are the most notable talking points from the episode.

On his early love of wrestling

“I grew up loving wrestling. I grew up in Chicago so I was an AWA kid growing up. In high school I started training in 1995, I was a junior. I just fell in love with the opportunity and the craziness of what we watched on Saturday mornings when we wake up. Much like so many from our generation, we all have a similar story. With independent wrestling, I remember cards being advertised in suburbs where I live, featuring guys I have never heard of. There was a guy on this cable access show called Sonny Rogers. I had seen him on WWE and AWA getting his butt kicked a thousand times. He was advertised on a card in my hometown. He was wrestling at the high school gym. I went, I met him, here we are.”

Unorthodox training

“Sonny Rogers “school” I put that in air quotes, was on the third floor of an office building. The bottom floor was a bank. The ring barely fit in the room. It had two ropes. I walked in November 1995, and Ace Steel was there putting the ring together. Every county fair I could drive to, I would work. I put 270,000 miles on my car by the travelling.”

The Love of live events

“It’s a huge part of our industry that fans that watch on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays doesn’t see. Between what we do on TV and what we do on international settings is night and day. You have a lot more freedom in live events. That’s where you have the opportunity to apply your trade, learn new things and fail. So you learn how not to fail in the future.It’s a challenging environment on TV tapings.”

Getting to WWE

“I had my tryout in 2012 in Los Angeles. It was the same tryout that Bayley came to the company from. All credit to Gerald Brisco. They called saying we want you to try out but not as an in ring talent. In the weeks leading up to it, I realised what it was leading up to. They wanted to see what I might do if given the opportunity to be a coach. Had the tryout, and I sat on hold for however long it took to build the Performance Center. I travelled from Tampa to Orlando nine times, it was the longest job interview ever. I come for a week and go home. In May of 2015 I officially started.”

Becoming a producer

“All I really needed was to know what my marching orders were and terminology. When I was able to slide into that chair, WWE have always said there’s the fire, jump in and see how that feels. And then you do that, and you burn a little bit. It’s very important to hit your time. Imagine we need ten minutes for a segment. But the guy before us has six minutes but goes ten. We lose our time, then that’s a problem. I look back and Dusty says to me “you’re going to be just fine kid. AS a producer, I do pretty much everything. Producers days start before everyone else. I’ll be at the Thunderdome three hours before anyone else. We will sit in a meeting and go through the day. I will roll with the punches, they will come fast and furious. Producers are on their toes constantly. We are responsible for the segments we are in charge of hit their time and are responsible for providing the content. Sometimes it means I might have to get in the ring and teach someone something. When the broadcast is on I am sitting with the headset on, communicating what we are seeing to producers and directors, so we can have cameras in position and catch the action.”

If he had one more match

“I want Randy Orton, to rile up WWE Official Adam Pearce so he can eat a right hand. Maybe he has to make that match between Adam and the viper. And then he hits an RKO in thirty seconds (laughs).”

Image credit

wwe.com