The Steve Austin Show: Brian Cage
Release Date: October 8, 2018
Running Time: 1:36:00
Recap By: Joe Aguinaldo
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Intro
- Recap of college football over the weekend and the aftermath of the Khabib/Connor match. Austin thinks Khabib worked himself into a shoot and didn’t act smart. Austin doesn’t take it too seriously as he was entertained and doesn’t think they should go too heavy handed with the punishment.
- Guest today is Brian Cage talking about a bunch of topics.
Brian Cage and Cars
- Brian drove to 317 Gimimck Street and rolled up in a black corvette Z06. It’s Cage’s dream car and he’s wanted one since 6th grade. Tire changes on this car are expensive ($3000 a pop).
- Brian has always been a car guy and has always wanted to have the coolest car on the block. He’s also wanted a pick up truck or a four door sedan like a Lexus or Audi.
How Brian Got Into Wrestling
- Brian has been in the business 13 years and is still going strong. He thought 2014 was his best year but it keeps getting better and better.
- Brian saw wrestling for the first time when he was 5. He doesn’t remember the match but he was blown away.
- The first PPV he saw was the 1990 Royal Rumble. By the time he was 10 he was in love with it and it’s what he wanted to do. His mom thought he would grow out of it but he kept saying it through junior high and high school. He stuck to it and never second guessed himself. He wanted to get signed to the WWE by the time he was 24 (he did actually sign a developmental contract with them at 24).
- Austin has been watching Cage for some time. He’s a body guy but can also work.
- Cage never played football except one year in pop warner. He would play with his friends but didn’t have the aspiration to do it in a formal capacity.
- He did ‘backyard wrestling’ in his apartment complex…the slogan ‘it’s not backyard wrestling, we just wrestle in a backyard’. Cage was a big skateboarder as well. When he graduated high school he wasn’t that big.
- He got into personal fitness in his senior year. During summer school, he would hit the weights. Then he got into bodybuilding and it was a 10 year process to get to where he is now.
- When he went to wrestling school, he was developing his style and ability while gaining size which helped him keep his flexibility and athleticism. When he started on the indy scene he was 205 lbs whereas now he’s 268 lbs.
Training and Dieting
- Brian’s current training routine 6 days a week. He doesn’t train as heavy as he used to.
- He does Chest/Back/Quads/Shoulders/Arms/Hams on separate days
- Cage will try to prep his meals as much as possible to keep his calories up. His go to is peanut butter and protein. He’ll also use some meal prep solutions. He will at times go to a Denny’s but it’s all about prepping and planning his training and dieting. He tries to eat roughly 4,000 to 5,000 calories
Early Years in Wrestling
- Went to school to be a kinesiologist. He wanted to be an athletic trainer and his plan b was to be a trainer or in production.
- His school counselor in college ‘encouraged’ him to drop out to become a wrestler. He dropped out after 2nd year and went full time into wrestling.
- When Brian was at the FCW, Tom Prichard, Norman Smiley, Steve Keirn and Dusty Rhodes were trainers. He says being a great worker and a great trainer are two different things
- When rian was doing Backyard wrestling, he would emulate Chris Kanyon’s style who was an early influence on him. Other guys he emulated were Benoit and Jericho as well.
Chris Kanyon
- Cage tells a story about meeting Kanyon during the invasion angle. It was Austin appreciation night and Kanyon had a ‘Who’s Better Than Austin’ shirt. The WCW alliance was there and Cage had a ‘Who Better Than Kanyon’ shirt which Kanyon saw.
- As Cage and his friends were leaving the arena, he saw Kanyon walking to the side of the ramp and Kanyon gave Cage the shirt. Then they went to wait for the wrestlers in the parking lot and Kanyon saw Cage and autographed his sign and shirt. Cage sent the story to Kanyon’s website and Kanyon sent Cage an email thanking Cage for the sign, shirt and story.
- Cage saw him again at another show and they struck up a friendship and Kanyon helped Brian get into Deep South.
- Cage and Kanyon became good friends. Kanyon worked with Cage in Cage’s backyard indie promotion.
- Cage feels Kanyon was underutilized and underrated as a worker.
- Kanyon gave Cage the Mortis outfit. The Deadlift suplex Cage does is Kanyon’s move too.
- Kanyon was the first person Cage was close with who ever passed. He had talked to Kanyon a week before Kanyon committed suicide. Cage found out a week later that Kanyon had passed via text message.
Lucha Underground, Impact and Wrestling Style
- In LU, he didn’t want to change his name so they called him Cage. They also didn’t want him to wrestle in a singlet because of comparisons to Ryback.
- Since the Indies are hot, he likes being able to be himself and do his own thing. Depending on where he is, he’ll adjust his style. In LU or Impact, he’s more of a monster.
- Impact’s Bound For Glory is on Oct 14th. Brian, Pentagon and Ray Fenix vs OVE.
- Cage felt his match with Pentagon was a must see match for LU
- When he signed the developmental contract that was a dream come true but when he got to LU is when he felt like a true wrestler.
- They don’t walk out to music in LU. The Music is added in post production
- When working in AAA and LU. Sometimes language can be a challenge but not as big as you’d think
- Cage started doing superkicks because he was at an HBK match.
- Cage almost hurt himself against Apollo Cruz from missing a lionsault and fell on his head.
- Thankfully while Cage has been hurt, he hasn’t been injured
- Cage puts over Keith Lee and they have great chemistry together. Initially Cage thought Lee was going to suck because of his size but he is good.
- Cage says he likes being face more than heel which is surprising to Austin because most like being heel more. Being face gives him more depth
- Cage was in the PC for a very short period. He liked his time there. He got a call from the office and thought he might be called up but he was actually being released. The office had watched an Indie match he was in that wasn’t that good which is why he got released.
- There’s less heels/baby’s in the Indies…usually it’s this guy is popular, this guy is popular, let’s get them in a match
- He has GMSI on his trunks which stands for ‘Get My Sh*t In’.
- People always joked about Cage getting his stuff in. During a match with Alex Riley, Alex broke his wrist. Alex told Cage he was OK so they continued with the match but other wrestlers joked that Cage had to get his shit in even though Riley had a broken wrist. Finally Riley told Cage his wrist was broken so they decided to end the match. Riley tried to punch Cage with his broken wrist and crumbled. As a response to the joke, Cage made the GMSI on his trunk
- Cage has a number of appearances including the Jericho cruise.
Rating: 8/10
Austin has been on a bit of a role with Indy wrestlers over the last few weeks. Brian is an interesting character and you can tell he really loves what he’s doing. Also, when you hear a number of wrestling interviews, names like Flair, HBK, Austin, The Rock, Taker etc. are the names younger wrestlers will cite when talking about influences. This is the first time I’ve ever heard anyone mention Chris Kanyon as an influence,which was really not what I was expecting, and his story about how he met Kanyon was really cool. Definite recommend.
About Joe:
Joe is a long time wrestling fan from Toronto. One of his life goals is to be a guest host on one of Wade Keller’s post show podcasts but until that happens, he’ll keep writing for PW Podcasts. He doesn’t consider himself any sort of expert, mark, smark or IWC type. He just likes wrestling. Check him out on twitter and instagram @ja113.
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