Kenny Omega’s pro wrestling career was celebrated albeit nowhere near the place it was in 2014 before becoming The Cleaner. Adding more of a persona to his work changed the trajectory of Omega’s career that launched him into the stratosphere and potentially changed the whole direction of his career.
On the most recent episode of Talk Is Jericho, Omega talks about how his career changed because of The Cleaner persona and how he credits Doc Gallows and Karl Anderson for helping him reach the heights he has. Anderson and Gallows have been long time friends of Omega and the Young Bucks and were almost part of AEW in time for the debut of AEW Dynamite until signing lucrative extensions with the WWE. Omega also talks about how they didn’t owe him an explanation for making the business decision as well.
“The Good Brothers were there for me when I was in Japan when I was trying to take on a new challenge and that was going from the indies in Japan to now taking a huge new leap to New Japan, where there’s not much crossover in fanbase. BushiRoad did a great job of creating their own universe of fans, the people that watch New Japan, they’re only watching New Japan. There’s going to be some crossover, but they developed a very new fan base and mostly women, as you know, women and children, which is incredible, that watch their product and strictly their own product.
“So I wanted to know, ‘how can I be successful? What do I do to make it good enough?’ The Good Brothers are the ones to give me a nudge with their elbow and say, ‘it’s not good enough. I want to see this Kenny Omega, the one that you show me when we go for Korean barbecue. when we go out for the sponsored dinners. I want to see this guy. I want to see this personality in that ring. I think what you’re doing in Japan with DDT, I don’t think it’s enough. I don’t think it’s going to convey your message that you want to tell these people and I think what you want to do is going to take another five, six, seven, eight years to do when we don’t have that time, we to strike while the iron is hot and we’ve got the way.’ That driving force, that broomstick engine was the Bullet Club.”
Adding to this, Omega talked about where he feels he would be had he not made the adjustments, suggesting he’d be on a path similar to his former tag team partner Kota Ibushi, who has struggled to break through and become IWGP Heavyweight Champion.
“That’s why there was the birth of ‘The Cleaner’ and that’s why Gallows, Anderson, all the Bullet Club guys they’re the ones to introduce me, to accept me with open arms and to present to the world ‘The Cleaner.’ Yeah, I got to speak with my own mouth, with my own voice on that night. But if it wasn’t for their humble acceptance of me and for them to introduce me to a live crowd and then give me the platform to then in my first match when the junior heavyweight title, who knows how long I would have taken, we probably wouldn’t be here today. I’d probably still plugging away being a white meat babyface, you know, in New Japan and I would probably be like, you know, I hate to say it, but a guy like Kota Ibushi, who’s got all the talent in the world but has yet to win the big prize, I owe that to the Bullet Club. I owe it to Gallows and Gun. Absolutely. So, do I feel bad that they kind of screwed us to take the payoff at WWE? The answer is no. I don’t need to know the reasons for doing it, what I care about is that they’re family and that when they needed me, I was there for them, like they were there for me.”
Wrestlers have found that making adjustments in their careers and evolving have only helped increase their longevity and even provide elevation nobody expected prior. Thanks to Doc Gallows and Karl Anderson, Omega didn’t just find the right evolution, but one that potentially changed the course of two different promotions. With a new evolution growing with his partnership with Don Callis, one can only wonder if Kenny can indeed “change the universe.”
h/t to Fightful for the quotes
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