Joey Ryan Addresses Jim Cornette’s Criticism of his Persona
Speaking on the latest Talk is Jericho, Joey Ryan spoke about the criticism that he gets from Jim Cornette and recalled when Mick Foley volunteered to take his “penis flip” maneuver. Cornette has, of course, been outspoken about his criticism of Ryan for a long time, slamming him over his comedy spots among other things. The two have gone back and forth on Twitter at various times over the whole thing, and Cornette said at the time of the Foley/Ryan spot that it was “sad to see a real star [Foley] stooping to give credibility to an a**wipe nobody like this. Sorry, have to tell the truth.”
Highlights from the discussion, as well as the full podcast, are below:
On people like Jim Cornette who say Ryan’s antics like the penis flip are killing the business: “I mean, sometimes because you know, I know how hard I work. And I know the schedule I keep, and I know the effort I put into everything, so — it doesn’t feel great when someone [criticizes him that way]. I mean like, if someone would have told me that when I started wrestling school, that if I got really successful at this, someone would call me a piece of s**t on a daily basis, you know? And I get it from [Cornette], and I get it from a lot of other people. You know, it doesn’t — once I figured out that like, you know, it’s just words on Twitter or whatever. Like, Jim Cornette can’t affect my bookings, he can’t affect my pay. No one of any consequence pays really him any mind these days. He’s not influencing any promotions. I kind of had to just let it slide and let him have his opinion.”
On accepting that people out there don’t like what he does: “I don’t need everyone to like it. I don’t need everyone to be on board and buy Joey Ryan T-shirts. I’m happy that people have their own opinions of it, but it just kind of sucks, because I think you could probably find a lot of hokey stuff that Jim Cornette did.”
On Mick Foley taking the penis flip: “Mick took the flip … he pitched it to me, by the way, which is mind-blowing to me. I was wrestling in Ireland, and he was the commissioner for the night or whatever. And I got there, and the promoter was like, ‘Hey, Mick’s over in this other room over here,’ he was kind of in a separate room, said, ‘He wanted to talk to you.’ And I was like, ‘Oh, okay.’ And I’ve known him, I’ve met him a couple times previous to that. And I go in there, and he’s just like, ‘So feel free to say no, but I have this idea. After your match is over, we’ll have the heels come out and jump you, and I’ll come out and save. And I’ll pull Mr. Socko out, and Socko this guy, Socko this guy. And then we’ll bump into each other and turn around, and I’ll think you’re one of the heels, and you’ll think you’re getting attacked again. And I’ll go to throw Mr. Socko, but you jump, and Mr. Socko catches your d**k. And blah blah blah, and then you fire up, and you fire up and you flip.’”
On being worried about re-aggravating Foley’s hip injury: “It’s the first bump he took after hip surgery too, so I’m like, ‘Am I gonna re-injure Mick Foley. But like, here’s this millionaire Hall of Famer calling my d**k spot to me, which is mind-blowing. I’m like, ‘Uh, yeah. Whatever you wanna do, Mick, we’re fine.’”
