Apollo Crews Admits He Wasn't Given Anything He Could "Dig His Teeth Into" In WWE Until Recently

WWE US Champion Apollo Crews became the new champion this past Monday by defeating Andrade. Since then, he spoke with Alex McCarthy of talkSPORT about Paul Heyman's efforts to round him out as a complete WWE Superstar and finally having something that fans can latch onto.

Crews was asked if Heyman had been a big reason for his recent push on WWE TV.

"One-hundred percent, Paul Heyman is fantastic to work for," Crews said. "He's been very hands-on with me and he's helped me a lot, especially a lot in areas like my promos. And that's one thing I feel like I can always improve on. I can improve on all areas of my game and make sure I work on becoming the complete superstar. And I won't stop until that happens.

"I feel like human beings in general, we never see ourselves as perfect, but we always strive for perfection. I feel like just the fact that you strive for perfection, never feeling like you've reached it is what keeps you going. It's cool for me to go out there and work with Aleister Black because I don't remember the last time anyone has seen me in the ring for that amount of time, not even in NXT I don't think I was in the ring that long. It was awesome.

"The funny thing about that is I was driving my kids around earlier that day trying to get them to fall asleep in the car and I get the call if I could be the Performance Center to have that match. And I was like 'Yeah, not a problem.' For me, I was like I'll drop everything I'm doing right now because that's just who I am. I do what I'm asked ? as long as it fits my morals ? and I don't see it any other way. It worked out very well for me and I'm very proud of the decision I made."

Now with a title around his waist, the champ says this momentum allows fans to become more invested him, where as before he was just a guy who smiled and performed well in the ring.

"It felt like I was doing a lot of floating around," Crews stated. "I did stuff here and there but nothing I could ever really dig my teeth into or show what I'm really capable of. I was given opportunities, but I don't feel like I was ever given anything I could, or even the fans could latch onto.

"There's no reason for them to really like me. Its like 'Oh yeah, here's this cool guy. This big guy who can do cool moves and cool stuff in the ring, but why do we want to like this guy?' You know what I mean? But now I feel like I'm in a situation where I can show how I would react in a certain situation and show I do have more than a smile or cool moves in the ring. So, it's a great opportunity I'm taking full advantage of."

Crews is set to defend the US Title against an opponent of his choosing on this Monday's RAW.