Bobby Fish Says His Future Is Up In The Air

[cero2k]

Source: 411mania.com

– Free agent Bobby Fish recently spoke with sportingnews.com, here are the highlights…

On Still Working For ROH: “I’m back taking some independent dates,” explained Fish. “That does not mean that I’m not doing Ring of Honor dates moving forward. We are. I’ve been exclusive to them now for going on three years. The only real change is that at the moment, I’m not exclusive anymore. In no way, did I not want to continue working with Ring of Honor,” said Fish. “Under an exclusive deal, you don’t have that ability to test the market, so to speak. Because of that, this was a decision that started to make more sense. I don’t know, time frame wise what I’m looking at. I’m really kind of flying by the seat of my pants. It’s kind of nerve-wracking but exciting at the same time.”

On His Future: “At this point, if I’m being completely honest, I have no idea,” said Fish. “I can’t think of a time that I’ve been more up in the air as to what is going on. There’s still a lot of stuff that needs to be sorted out and settled. “It’s like my professional life mimics my personal life because my lease is up at the end of this month, with the untimely passing of my mother in November, I have her house that I’m still dealing with and dealing with all that stuff. I got this whirlwind of personal s— going on and now it’s kind of a setup of who knows what professionally. Let’s just take it all at one time.”

On Where He May End Up Next: “I’m doing the best I can to say as much as I can without actually saying it. I’m a professional liar.”

[Big Red Machine]

MOre and more it's hitting me that the problem is ROH not wanting to use people who won't sign exclusive contracts (the only ones recently have been Daniels, Kaz, and Lio Rush, and Kaz & Daniels now are exclusive and Rush is pretty much out the door.

[cero2k]

MOre and more it's hitting me that the problem is ROH not wanting to use people who won't sign exclusive contracts (the only ones recently have been Daniels, Kaz, and Lio Rush, and Kaz & Daniels now are exclusive and Rush is pretty much out the door.

that has been the problem for a while, the amount of indies and exposure has really made it hard for promotions trying to take it to another level, Impact and ROH can't keep their guys because of the restrictions, but at the same time are reluctant to push the ones that will take the benefit to other promotions

[Big Red Machine]

MOre and more it's hitting me that the problem is ROH not wanting to use people who won't sign exclusive contracts (the only ones recently have been Daniels, Kaz, and Lio Rush, and Kaz & Daniels now are exclusive and Rush is pretty much out the door.

that has been the problem for a while, the amount of indies and exposure has really made it hard for promotions trying to take it to another level, Impact and ROH can't keep their guys because of the restrictions, but at the same time are reluctant to push the ones that will take the benefit to other promotions

It's more than that, though. I think the way ROH acts shows an inherent distrust of the wrestlers. Like they're afraid guys will just up and leave in the middle of an angle without doing business first on the way out. That's got to be bad for morale. Then there is the whole Scurll thing and how they won't let him do anything against anyone who is actually under contract unless they're on their way out the door (Lio, Cole, Dijak) so they keep bringing in non-roster guys like Sonjay and Juice to get title shots because they're so afraid of Marty leaving with wins over contracted talent, but at the same time, doing it that way both takes opportunities away from guys who are actually on the roster plus it doesn't give Marty anything to sink his teeth into to make make him actually want to stay.
Then you factor in the way they treated Keith Lee when he was 100% willing to do business on his way out but they wouldn't let him... it's so paranoid, and for no reason. It can't be good for locker room morale, and the fact that so many guys have decided that they don't want to be under exclusive contract to ROH and/or just straight up left the company, it's clearly having some sort of negative effect because so much talent is deciding to leave because they're not happy.

[cero2k]

It's more than that, though. I think the way ROH acts shows an inherent distrust of the wrestlers. Like they're afraid guys will just up and leave in the middle of an angle without doing business first on the way out. That's got to be bad for morale. Then there is the whole Scurll thing and how they won't let him do anything against anyone who is actually under contract unless they're on their way out the door (Lio, Cole, Dijak) so they keep bringing in non-roster guys like Sonjay and Juice to get title shots because they're so afraid of Marty leaving with wins over contracted talent, but at the same time, doing it that way both takes opportunities away from guys who are actually on the roster plus it doesn't give Marty anything to sink his teeth into to make make him actually want to stay.
Then you factor in the way they treated Keith Lee when he was 100% willing to do business on his way out but they wouldn't let him... it's so paranoid, and for no reason. It can't be good for locker room morale, and the fact that so many guys have decided that they don't want to be under exclusive contract to ROH and/or just straight up left the company, it's clearly having some sort of negative effect because so much talent is deciding to leave because they're not happy.

yeah, definitely agree. And I don't necessarily blame them either, they're the promotion that have constantly lost more talent to WWE (now EVOLVE) in the last 10 yrs. What baffles me is how they haven't figured out the way to fix this, even a newcomer LU and Impact of all people figured out a way. Don't use our promotion's gimmick, and if you do, let us know and give us a cut of the money. It's shady, but it kinda works sometimes.

[Big Red Machine]

It's more than that, though. I think the way ROH acts shows an inherent distrust of the wrestlers. Like they're afraid guys will just up and leave in the middle of an angle without doing business first on the way out. That's got to be bad for morale. Then there is the whole Scurll thing and how they won't let him do anything against anyone who is actually under contract unless they're on their way out the door (Lio, Cole, Dijak) so they keep bringing in non-roster guys like Sonjay and Juice to get title shots because they're so afraid of Marty leaving with wins over contracted talent, but at the same time, doing it that way both takes opportunities away from guys who are actually on the roster plus it doesn't give Marty anything to sink his teeth into to make make him actually want to stay.
Then you factor in the way they treated Keith Lee when he was 100% willing to do business on his way out but they wouldn't let him... it's so paranoid, and for no reason. It can't be good for locker room morale, and the fact that so many guys have decided that they don't want to be under exclusive contract to ROH and/or just straight up left the company, it's clearly having some sort of negative effect because so much talent is deciding to leave because they're not happy.

yeah, definitely agree. And I don't necessarily blame them either, they're the promotion that have constantly lost more talent to WWE (now EVOLVE) in the last 10 yrs. What baffles me is how they haven't figured out the way to fix this, even a newcomer LU and Impact of all people figured out a way. Don't use our promotion's gimmick, and if you do, let us know and give us a cut of the money. It's shady, but it kinda works sometimes.

I don't think it's an issue of "don't use our gimmicks." It's an issue of "don't use our talent" because we don't want our guys getting hurt working for you and/or because we don't want our guys doing jobs on your shows (which is mostly idiotic in today's world)." And I think a lot of the disconnect is that ROH seems to see themselves as having made their talent, whereas the talent seems to see themselves as having made themselves, with ROH as the company that they are working for because it pays the best and/or has the most exposure and/or best reputation.
ROH is definitely the promotion that has lost he most regular talent to WWE over the past decade (or more) but until recently there was never a question about talent finishing up, first, no matter who was booking. Sometimes it would be rushed, like Kendrick in 2005, but they always got time to finish up what they were doing. You might say that the issue is that WWE's attitude towards ROH changed in 2015, but even so I don't think that is any reason for this situation to have changed. Why couldn't ROH has asked Kyle to sign a short-term contract to appear through the Anniversary Show that also explicitly allowed him to negotiate with WWE (or TNA or whoever else)? Wouldn't that still let us have a real Kyle O'Reilly title reign (and just have Kyle in ROH for a bit longer, period) while giving Kyle and WWE the legal freedom to negotiate with each other? The whole Keith Lee thing really seems to shine a light on this mentality that "it's not enough to just be with us: you also have to be against everyone else (that isn't an approved international partner)," and that's an extremely self-destructive attitude. Hell... even WWE has learned that that isn't always the best approach.

[cero2k]

I don't think it's an issue of "don't use our gimmicks." It's an issue of "don't use our talent" because we don't want our guys getting hurt working for you and/or because we don't want our guys doing jobs on your shows (which is mostly idiotic in today's world)." And I think a lot of the disconnect is that ROH seems to see themselves as having made their talent, whereas the talent seems to see themselves as having made themselves, with ROH as the company that they are working for because it pays the best and/or has the most exposure and/or best reputation.
ROH is definitely the promotion that has lost he most regular talent to WWE over the past decade (or more) but until recently there was never a question about talent finishing up, first, no matter who was booking. Sometimes it would be rushed, like Kendrick in 2005, but they always got time to finish up what they were doing. You might say that the issue is that WWE's attitude towards ROH changed in 2015, but even so I don't think that is any reason for this situation to have changed. Why couldn't ROH has asked Kyle to sign a short-term contract to appear through the Anniversary Show that also explicitly allowed him to negotiate with WWE (or TNA or whoever else)? Wouldn't that still let us have a real Kyle O'Reilly title reign (and just have Kyle in ROH for a bit longer, period) while giving Kyle and WWE the legal freedom to negotiate with each other? The whole Keith Lee thing really seems to shine a light on this mentality that "it's not enough to just be with us: you also have to be against everyone else (that isn't an approved international partner)," and that's an extremely self-destructive attitude. Hell... even WWE has learned that that isn't always the best approach.

well, don't use our gimmicks is more LUs approach, but for ROH I always seen a bit of wanting to have character/wrestler exclusivity, not for fear of injury, but like WWE, to assure that if you wanna watch someone, you HAVE to go to ROH. I totally agree with what you're saying, ROH has always thought really high of themselves and that whole "we made you" mentality is really there, and maybe they do put people on the map, but aside from Cheeseburger, there isn't a single gimmick that ROH owns there, even The Briscoes did Briscoe things outside of ROH before starting in ROH.

As for the Kyle O'Reilly thing, WWE will not negotiate with anyone unless they're 100% off from certain promotions' contracts, primarily ROH and Impact, so even if ROH's contract would allow it, there is no guarantee that WWE would go for it. I can imagine KOR wanted out to push for a post-mania season debut on NXT, but again, I agree, ROH could have handled it better, or for the hell of it, destroy him at Final Battle and write him off there instead of doing a 1 week title reign. it looked more like when WWE gives the title to the Usos so AA can have a big win at WM>

[Big Red Machine]

I don't think it's an issue of "don't use our gimmicks." It's an issue of "don't use our talent" because we don't want our guys getting hurt working for you and/or because we don't want our guys doing jobs on your shows (which is mostly idiotic in today's world)." And I think a lot of the disconnect is that ROH seems to see themselves as having made their talent, whereas the talent seems to see themselves as having made themselves, with ROH as the company that they are working for because it pays the best and/or has the most exposure and/or best reputation.
ROH is definitely the promotion that has lost he most regular talent to WWE over the past decade (or more) but until recently there was never a question about talent finishing up, first, no matter who was booking. Sometimes it would be rushed, like Kendrick in 2005, but they always got time to finish up what they were doing. You might say that the issue is that WWE's attitude towards ROH changed in 2015, but even so I don't think that is any reason for this situation to have changed. Why couldn't ROH has asked Kyle to sign a short-term contract to appear through the Anniversary Show that also explicitly allowed him to negotiate with WWE (or TNA or whoever else)? Wouldn't that still let us have a real Kyle O'Reilly title reign (and just have Kyle in ROH for a bit longer, period) while giving Kyle and WWE the legal freedom to negotiate with each other? The whole Keith Lee thing really seems to shine a light on this mentality that "it's not enough to just be with us: you also have to be against everyone else (that isn't an approved international partner)," and that's an extremely self-destructive attitude. Hell... even WWE has learned that that isn't always the best approach.

well, don't use our gimmicks is more LUs approach, but for ROH I always seen a bit of wanting to have character/wrestler exclusivity, not for fear of injury, but like WWE, to assure that if you wanna watch someone, you HAVE to go to ROH. I totally agree with what you're saying, ROH has always thought really high of themselves and that whole "we made you" mentality is really there, and maybe they do put people on the map, but aside from Cheeseburger, there isn't a single gimmick that ROH owns there, even The Briscoes did Briscoe things outside of ROH before starting in ROH.

Well... for the Briscoes, they were really just spotfest guys everywhere before their 2006 return in ROH when they came back a lot bigger and that's where the current Briscoes redneck character started, so that's definitely a thing that was made into a big thing in ROH, but from what I understand, that's pretty much just them being their shoot selves.
As for the injury thing, I'm dead sure that was the reason they started pulling guys from places- because everyone would got to PWG and do crazy sh*t and get hurt.

As for the Kyle O'Reilly thing, WWE will not negotiate with anyone unless they're 100% off from certain promotions' contracts, primarily ROH and Impact, so even if ROH's contract would allow it, there is no guarantee that WWE would go for it. I can imagine KOR wanted out to push for a post-mania season debut on NXT, but again, I agree, ROH could have handled it better, or for the hell of it, destroy him at Final Battle and write him off there instead of doing a 1 week title reign. it looked more like when WWE gives the title to the Usos so AA can have a big win at WM>

But if ROH's contract specifically allowed him to talk to other companies WWE shouldn't have a problem with it because they're legally protected.