Jim Ross Compares Wrestling & MMA, Trying New Things

In an interview with The Norman Transcript, Jim Ross spoke about his upcoming MMA announcing and compared it to his time in wrestling. Here are highlights:

On his approach to MMA announcing vs wrestling: “The thing that will hopefully make it transition smoothly is the fact that, when I got in the business of doing television, there was no pay-per-view. One of the first things on pay-per-view was wrestling, and so I got on the ground floor of that broadcast format, and since that time I have done more pay-per-views than anybody alive. As far as doing pay-per-view, and keeping the rudder in the water, and keeping the broadcast going, I don’t feel too uncomfortable in that arena. The beautiful part about this Battlegrounds MMA event that I’m doing is that two of the principals of the organization are Oklahomans. Kenny Monday, he’s one of the most decorated amateur wrestlers in the history of the sport. He went to Booker T. Washington High in Tulsa. He won virtually every award there was to win at Oklahoma State. He was a world competitor, an Olympian, and he’s one of the participants in this program. Also, there’s Bryan O’Rourke, he’s heavily involved, and he also lives in the Tulsa area. I have been a massive MMA fan for years and years, because before that I loved to watch boxing. I am a big boxing fan, but for a variety of reasons, boxing kind of went into a valley. That’s an interesting thing, because it ties back to WWE. WWE created their own network, so you can watch their pay-per-views and subscribe to their network. It costs you $9.99 a month. The cable providers became somewhat upset about that, and they have decided that they’re going to have a lot of promotional time for other PPV events, because of the lost revenue from WWE. The little engine that could, Battlegrounds MMA, they gave them all this promotional time, and the opportunity to market a PPV.”

On trying new things: “Absolutely. That’s how I look at this deal. The endings are not predetermined, so I obviously won’t know what they are. I think that I will do a better job, because I’m just going to document what I see, what I feel, and how I process the information. I’m excited about it. I think we’re going to have a lot of fun. It’s going to be entertaining. It’s going to be different. It could be the beginning of something really significant in the second half of my broadcasting career, or it may be that as I’m writing my autobiography now, it’s a very short chapter of my flirting with MMA. I had the chance to do other wrestling after WWE, but I wanted to do different projects. I want to say, ‘Hey, I did wrestling for 40 years, and a lot of people thought I was pretty good at it.’ I got to go to the Hall of Fame, and that was great. I’m proud of that, but I want to try something else. So we did the boxing, and I want to do more boxing. Now, the next step is what I think I’m probably best-suited for, and that’s MMA. I’m staying busy with that, and my agent in LA, we’re finalizing the next Ringside with Jim Ross tour.”

On his one man show tour: “It was a fun deal. On that tour, I played Cardiff, Wales; Glasgow, Scotland; both Manchester and London in England. I’m going to do London two days on this next trip, and we’re negotiating for me to go to Ireland, and play Belfast and Dublin as a part of this trip. It’s a real simple, straight-forward format, and I have a blast doing it. It’s just me and the audience, and we’re telling stories and enjoying each other’s company.”

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