Samoe Joe Reveals That He Was The Number Two Merchandise Seller In All Of WWE After NXT Debut
Samoa Joe was a guest on Sam Robert's podcast, Not Sam Wrestling, and talked about his journey so far in WWE. One of the concerns he kept hearing before he signed was whether or not he would be used right. He then explains why he and AJ Styles have been able to breakaway from those concerns.
"We're better than everybody else," Joe said. "I'll be honest with you. A lot of fans believed that we wouldn't be used right, we're not looking at it from that perspective. We're not looking at it like we hope to go to WWE and we hope they use us right. I looked at it like I wanted to go to WWE and I wanted to kick the door in and I am going to make them use me right. I think a lot more people need to use that attitude. If you are going to do things in your life and be responsible for your career then be responsible for your career. You are responsible for your success. Anybody that got in your way or stopped you or barred your success, you either push through them or work around them. I don't have enough time for excuses or crying about people saying how someone wasn't given a proper opportunity. Nobody gave me an opportunity.
"Eighteen years ago I was shut off from this company. I was told that I would never step foot in it ever, and subsequently afterwards I heard a ton of reports stating that they would never hire me. When I left my old company, they were rest assured not to worry because I would be back, they will never hire him. They said that I would be back and be hired for less money. I was stupid and insane to believe that Vince McMahon would ever hire me. Thankfully Triple H was around and he hired me right away."
Not long after signing with WWE and making his debut in NXT, Joe quickly made his way to the main roster. Joe revealed that after making his NXT debut, he was one of the top merchandise sellers in the company.
"I think after the first week, [the] main roster was already happening," Joe said. "When they got the merch and viewership numbers... I think the simplest way to describe it was that I had debuted with NXT and I had gone to the next city for tapings and Triple H had walked out of his bus and he came up and shook my hand and said to me, 'congratulations,' and I said, 'for what?' He said that I was #2 in merchandise last night. I said, 'oh, #2 in merch for NXT is pretty impressive' and he said 'no, for the entire company.' I was like, 'who was #1?' He said Kevin Owens, but that was because he had just debuted against John Cena and I said, 'okay, fine I will take those numbers'."
Joe is getting set for a WWE Championship match against Styles at the Hell in a Cell PPV on September 16th. You can listen to the entire interview with Samoa Joe here.