Enzo Amore On Why His Time With WWE Was A Blessing, Becoming Friends With Big Cass Again
Former WWE Cruiserweight Champion, Enzo Amore (now rechristened "nZo"), recently took some time to speak with Wrestling Inc.'s own Andy Malnoske about making the transition to the indie pro wrestling scene. Enzo noted how his years in WWE were ultimately a blessing but he's ready to move forward and apply what the company has taught him.
"Six years under the WWE umbrella was a blessing, a huge blessing, because I learned how to do things the right way and didn't have much of a choice in the matter," Enzo said. "Now that I see some of the greatest wrestlers in the world like CaZXL (Big Cass in WWE) and Jon Moxley (Dean Ambrose in WWE) getting in the ring and kind of just working things out there with no guidelines, no rules, just doing what they want to do and what they're great at. It's easy to see why someone like me would get the itch to want to try something new like this. All I achieved in the WWE that's behind me was – I can't even believed that it happened to me, you know what I mean? It's crazy to think."
With comments from both Enzo and his former tag team partner, Big Cass, supporting the idea that the duo would never reunite in the ring, pro wrestling fans didn't expect it to occur. Things have changed since then and the team has been traveling together to perform at indie wrestling shows around the country.
"We've had such a crazy whirlwind of events over the past year of our lives to kind of rekindle a friendship, get back together, become business partners, best friends, and hit the road again. It's that Willie Nelson song, dude, 'On the road again,'" Enzo sang. "It's a great song – we were actually listening to it on the way here like, 'This is us, right?' So, it's just fun. I'm meeting a whole new group of wrestlers and talking to these guys, and I'm enjoying myself, man! It's just freedom at it's finest."
Enzo made his long-anticipated return to the ring against Brian Pillman Jr. on August 16th in Poughkeepsie, NY. Enzo pointed out that the venue he performed at that night was the same one in which he had his final match with WWE's 205 Live show.
"I think [I took] 572 days in-between wrestling matches; I just had a match two days ago with Brian Pillman Jr.. Yeah, my return to the same place that I had my last wrestling match for 205 Live," Enzo noted. "The last match I had was in the Mid-Hudson Civic Center in Poughkeepsie, NY and the crowds were pretty much the same, man. I can't tell you how many people I met in the meet and greet that were like, 'Yo! I was at your last match.' It's so cool to see the turn over."
One memorable segment from Enzo's time as WWE Cruiserweight Champion saw him take turns going around to each member of the 205 Live roster and roasting them for certain character attributes. At the time, the storyline supplied Enzo with a contract where the 205 talent couldn't touch him, thus allowing him to insult them freely without fear. Amore looked back on this segment and mentioned how he had prepared promos for each performer prior to being told what his role was that night.
"You've got to watch nZo's career because [even though] Enzo Amore had a microphone, he was very generous when the bell went ding, ding ding," Enzo said. "You could hit him with whatever you wanted, do whatever you wanted, and I'll let you hit me with the Kit and Kaboodle and try to make it look as violent as I can for you, pal. That cruiserweight roast was because the women in the segment before us went short in their match, and so we had four minutes added to our segment. And I'm like, 'What am I going to do?'... We just went out there and ad-libbed for four minutes and, luckily, that's what doing your homework is. If I'm on 205 Live, you better believe I wrote promos for each and every one of those guys extensively before I ever got handed a microphone on TV. You got to do your homework, man."
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