Former WWE superstar, Simon Gotch recently spoke with Chris Van Vliet about a range of topics, including if he would want a return to the company. Below are some highlights with a H/T to Rajah.com for the transcriptions.
If he wants a WWE return:
“Under different circumstances, yes. It’s hard to predict it. I will say this, unlike some other people that got released recently, I did get wished well in my future endeavors, so there’s always the door open for me to return. My whole thing is I wouldn’t want to go back to do the same thing and to be unhappy. My logic is I can work in an office and be miserable, I don’t need to get beat up and be miserable. I wrestle because it makes me happy, I enjoy doing it. It’s fun for me. So in my mind if were going to go back I’d want to work with the guys I’d want to work with. I’d want to be able to have the matches I want to have.”
People disliking him:
“I think a lot of people have a solid opinion on me based on nothing. The reality is that even when I’m honest and open with all of this stuff, they maintain that I must be lying and that’s unfortunate. My thought is I’ll be honest and open with everything that’s going on and that will fix it, but they’re not interested in it being fixed.”
CM Punk’s UFC career:
“I think he got to do something he wanted to do and he got to do it on the biggest stage that he could do it on. That’s great for him. At the end of the day if he’s proud of his work and he’s proud of what he’s done he has no one to explain it to or apologize to. I could see why people have their opinions on it because he’s in an awkward position. The guy’s been a main eventer at WrestleMania, the guy’s been all over the world, it’s hard to tell him ‘Ok, we’re going to need you to fight in this King of the Cage Tournament in Altoona, PA. And you need to do these for the next 6 years before we decide to give you a fight.’ That’s what a lot of guys in UFC have to do. So it’s hard to do that. It’s hard to get a guy who’s been at that level of notoriety and ask him to step that far back. And they also know as a company that the longer CM Punk’s out of wrestling, the less name value he might have so for the money they’re paying him, you can see why UFC wants to get him on those Pay Per Views and want to get him out there. Even if it’s just to watch him get killed, people will pay attention to it. The reality is Jose Canseco did an MMA bout in Japan and I tracked it down the second I heard about it.”
Chris Van Vliet