Josh Barnett Thinks He’ll Never Be Inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame

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**Former UFC Heavyweight Champion Josh Barnett was interviewed by THE HANNIBAL TV. Barnett revealed that he doesn’t think he’ll ever be inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame. He said there’s too much history between the two. Barnett was stripped of his title after it was revealed that he tested positive for a banned substance again. He still appreciates the distinction and doesn’t think he’s above it. Barnett still holds the title of the youngest UFC Heavyweight Champion.

No, I don’t think so (he said when asked if he thinks he’ll be in the UFC Hall of Fame). I don’t think they’ll ever put me in the Hall of Fame. I think there’s maybe too much history between all of us and you know, who knows? But I just don’t see that ever happening and I’m not alive to necessarily be recognized by Hall of Fames. I’m not going to pretend that I don’t care about those things or that I’m too big, good for it, because I’m none of those things. I appreciate the pomp and circumstance of those aspects of the industry. I mean, hell, I’ve given Lifetime Achievement Awards to Erik Paulson and Yoshiaki Fujiwara. So I feel really honored myself to have the opportunity to recognize those individuals. Especially for the ones that I think they probably don’t really know or maybe they’ve forgotten or whatever reason that person isn’t really known to the fans… As for me being in the UFC Hall of Fame, I just don’t see that ever happening, so oh well.

** An extensive conversation with Sami Callihan is available on the Wrestling is Life is Wrestling podcast feed. Callihan spoke at length about his run in WWE NXT. Along the way, he revealed that he would be wrestling under a mask and tagging with Samuray Del Sol (Kalisto) as The Lucha Dragons. Plans were scrapped after Callihan broke his ankle.

They were like, ‘Okay, we want you to wrestle like a lucha guy or a little guy.’ Don’t do anything that makes me-me. Don’t be aggressive, don’t be a striker. So at one point I was going to be one of the Lucha Dragons. They were going to put me under a mask with Kalisto. Yeah. We were working live events, like me and Kalisto in tag matches and I remember wrestling The Ascension. We were wrestling Big Kon and — so I was like, finally, I’m going to get my shot in NXT. I’m going to be on f*cking television. This is going to be f*cking awesome, awesome. I was in a match with Konnor and Viktor from The Ascension. I did a Mexican headscissor, spun too far, landed on my feet, broke my ankle. So, back to the drawing board. Now I’m just going to be miserable for another four or five months.

Elsewhere in the interview, Callihan complimented Xavier Woods. When he was first starting out in WWE, Woods wanted Sami to look good in the ring. He called Woods one of the best people he’s ever met. Callihan thought the match with Woods went great, but when he returned backstage, he was yelled at. Bill DeMott told him he was too small to make the match as violent as it was and said he wouldn’t be appearing on shows for a while. At the next NXT TV taping, writer Ryan Ward told Callihan that they couldn’t debut anyone new due to protocols. Callihan didn’t wrestle on another show for six months.

I was the first of the new (Performance Center) class to do a live event — the coconut show — which is not televised, it’s a house show and I wrestled Xavier Woods, one of the best men I’ve ever met… He said, ‘This is everything to you. You gotta knock it out of the park or you’re going to be with the other trainees for a while,’ and I said, ‘Great.’ He said, ‘Dude, hit me as hard as you can.’ He said, ‘I’m not gonna rat you out.’ He said, ‘Be yourself.’ To his credit, he said, ‘Be yourself, dude,’ and he did the same for me when I was an extra and I had to roll around the ring with him. He said, ‘Dude, hit me as hard as you can. They like that shit.’ He’s like, ‘I’m not gonna bitch.’ So we have our match and it’s awesome, awesome. I’m on cloud nine. I get to the back and as soon as I walk through the curtain, I get yelled at. ‘That was way too violent.’ Yada, yada, yada. ‘That’s too aggressive,’ that’s this, that’s this and then Bill DeMott is like, ‘You’re way too small to be that violent. You can’t be that aggressive. If it wasn’t for Xavier, that match would have been a mess.’ Yada, yada, yada and I’m like, what the f*ck is going on? ‘You’re not going to be on any shows for a while until you learn how to not be that aggressive…’ So the next TV taping comes up. Ryan Ward is like, ‘Hey man, we can’t debut anybody new until we go through a protocol with NXT’ and blah, blah, blah. I didn’t wrestle on a show for six and a half months. Miserable, going to every live event, setting up, arranging security, doing all that stuff and I see other people getting picked to debut on NXT.

He went on to reflect on the hacker-esque character he played in NXT. Callihan stated that Paul “Triple H” Levesque told him to stop doing hacker promos because that wasn’t his character. Callihan added that the writing team was putting together verbal material for him that leaned toward a character as such.

They’re making me debut with the hacker character with just the vignettes. I’m attacking Juice (Robinson) and I’m cutting a promo and Triple H is yelling at me, ‘You’re not a hacker. Stop cutting hacker promos.’ But the writers were writing me hacker promos. They were like, ‘This is just a cool way to debut yourself. You’re not a hacker. It’s like Jericho’s Save Us Y2J. You’re not a hacker,’ but they keep writing it, keep writing it, keep writing it.

** Current Anthem Sports Group and former WWE executive Rob Kligman was a guest on EssentiallySports’ Think Tank show. He spent eight years with WWE. Kligman revealed that he created the synergy between Snickers and WWE.

I created the synergy between Snickers and WrestleMania at WWE. It’s been around for eight years. I was the first one to put it on WrestleMania. Gosh, after 30 years of not having a sponsor (for) the biggest event there is, Snickers has become synonymous with WrestleMania.

**The Masked Man Show welcomed Chelsea Green to the stage for an hour-long discussion. Along the way, Green revealed that she would be more than open to being the person to make Cardi B look good in the ring and get the pin.

At some point, people need to be entertained and it doesn’t have to be with somersaults or a UFC-style fight. I’m never going to be Shayna (Baszler). I’m never going to be Zoey Stark, some badass doing a somersault off a ladder. No thanks! But if Cardi B comes to WrestleMania and you need someone to make her look good and you need someone to move around for her and you need someone to be on the ground while she pins them, that’s me and I’m okay with that because at the end of the day, I’d just as much like to lay there and stare at those WrestleMania lights as I would pin someone. There are people who don’t like that and that’s okay too.

She dove into the trust that WWE has given her. You can see it when Green jumps on the apron during a match or just says something. She said they trust her comedic timing and she makes it work.

I’m not kidding, I don’t plan what I’m going to do. I don’t plan what my face is going to do. My face, those facial expressions, the things that come out of my mouth, the ridiculous things that — when I jump on the ring, I don’t even know two seconds before I’m going to do that. It just happens and I think that’s the difference in this era of my career, is that I don’t care — I just do what I think is right at the time and what I think is right for this character and the best thing about this character is that it’s so ridiculous, that I can do that. I can do what I want, I can say what I want. I mean, every once in a while someone will tell me, “Take it easy,” or someone will tell me not to jump in the ring at this point because it’s distracting and stuff like that, but generally they trust that my comedic timing is good and that something is going to happen that’s funny or cuttable or goes viral or whatever and I’m really grateful for that because I don’t know, man. I’ll drink half a Red Bull, maybe max, and then I’ll just go out there.

** While Ronda Rousey is hitting the media to promote her new graphic novel, she spoke with CBS Sports’ Shakiel Mahjouri. Rousey was asked what it would take to be cageside at a UFC event.

I mean, it’s just one of those things that I don’t really want to do, I don’t want to go to a stadium full of people for fun (Rousey said she might be cageside at a UFC event). I’d rather be outside, on my farm or on the beach or something. I guess I just have to have a reason to go, but I don’t know. If my kids are going to fight or something, or if someone I’m coaching, you know, is going to fight, then I would go… It’s not really my thing anymore. When I was younger, I wanted to put on a sexy dress and go to the fights and hang out with everybody, and now I’m just kind of an old lady who just wants to sit home and drink tea. I don’t know, and besides, I wouldn’t want to go just to, oooh, I wonder how people are going to react to me. I would want to have a reason to go or something, but we’ll see. I’ll do it by feel, but man, if my kids want to fight, they’re going to be really great, so that’s how my mom got back into judo and stuff like that. She quit judo and she never went to a tournament after that and then I got into it and she got really involved again, so if my kids or my kids from my dojo get into it, I have a reason.

** Bayley was a guest on Cody Rhodes for the debut episode of his new series, ‘What Do You Wanna Talk About?’ and named Candice LeRae as someone who will make the most of the opportunity once she steps into the spotlight.

Candice LeRae (is someone who will deliver when she gets her chance) … She’s amazing. I looked up to her. We’re about the same age. Because she started so young, I would go to the indie shows at the school where I trained and she would wrestle Gail Kim. I looked up to her as far as being indie and a California girl. She was all the way up in SoCal and I was in NorCal, so it’s like we never — we tagged each other once, but we never… When she gets her moment, I hope it’s against me.

** Daily Star has rolled out their chat with TNA Knockouts World Tag Team Champion Alisha Edwards. She told the outlet that she is eyeing a rematch with WWE’s Naomi.

I’ve been asked this question before and I stand by my answer. I want a rematch with Naomi and Trin. I don’t think I got a fair shake of what I should have gotten, which was that Knockouts title last September. So I would love to have a rematch with her, whether it’s in a TNA ring or a WWE ring or even an NXT ring.

**Yuji Nagata and Tomoaki Honma will appear at Haneda Airport in Japan on July 12^eThey will work together with CIQ (Customs, Immigration & Quarantine) and the Metropolitan Police Department to combat fraud, prevent illegal residence and employment, and ensure a safe and secure living environment for foreigners in Japan.

** The Attitude Era Podcast welcomed Trick Williams to the platform.

**NXT North American Champion Oba Femi was a guest on The Crimson Crunch:

** Muscle & Fitness has an article about Tyrus.

If you use quotes from the following podcasts or video interviews, please cite the sources and include an H/T and a link back to POST Wrestling for the transcripts.