Xavier Woods On Which WWE Diva He Would Want To Team With, NXT Stars To Watch, Trombone Gimmick
Recently on the Wrestling Compadres Slamcast, Xavier Woods talked about his YouTube channel, UpUpDownDown, up-and-comers in the world of professional wrestling, and the New Day.
According to Woods, getting the green light from WWE for his gaming channel on YouTube, UpUpDownDown, took over a year. Woods' original concept was for a travel show featuring barcades.
"I wanted to do something where we do profiles of all the barcades around the country and I met a guy who wanted to do a YouTube channel that wasn't necessarily wrestling-based and so we kind of met and merged ideas and then brought that to the table and just pushed constantly for, like I said, a better part of a year. And then finally we got the green light to go ahead with it and I'm pleased with how it has been going so far. It has been a good time, it [has] been fun, and people seem to be into it."
UpUpDownDown often features Woods playing video games with fellow WWE performers. Woods said that one non-gamer he would like to have on his show is Chris Jericho. Also, Woods issued a challenge to Booker T to play against him in a non-sports video game.
Woods stated that Sasha Banks would be his pick for a tag team partner out of the entire WWE roster outside of the New Day. He went on to say that Sasha Banks vs. Bayley at NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn may very well be his favorite match of all time.
"They had everything, like story, moves, emotions from the crowd, emotions from both of them," Woods continued, "to me, that's the match of the year, if not my favorite match ever. It was awesome to me. "
Also, Woods put over Dash Wilder and Scott Dawson as talents to watch in NXT. Woods claimed that Wilder and Dawson are two of the coolest guys in the locker room and that they are great technical wrestlers as well.
"They're not the biggest dudes, but you don't realize that while you're watching them work."
On the subject of the New Day getting over, Woods said that the audience understanding what they are doing has really helped out. Woods recalled that the New Day began to get strong negative crowd reactions around the time of WrestleMania 31 and the trio just went with it.
"Rather than kind of trying to change things to make [the audience] go a certain way, we just go with the flow because what we're doing is garnishing a reaction. That's what our business is about. It's about getting an emotional reaction and eliciting a response, whether it's people booing, whether it's people cheering. As long as there's a response, then that's what you're getting paid to do. And so, we just kept doing what we were doing and people began to boo louder and then eventually they began to cheer two months later and now they're cheering."
Woods indicated that the trombone gimmick came from his band geek past.
"I was in a band for seven years, in a symphonic band, a jazz band. I didn't get to be in marching band because I played football, but I would sit in band class and just learn the music anyway."
To check out the entire interview, click here.
Source: Wrestling Compadres Slamcast