The list of guys who have held the ROH championship, that's an elite group of guys.
— Adam Cole
I had a tryout when I was, like, 19 and totally not prepared. I was 170 pounds with homemade gear. At that point, I realized how far I had to go to even get looked at. Then, when I was 22 or 23, I was much more prepared, and that second tryout went way better.
There are people who are unsure, and maybe their minds can be changed based on someone's work and accomplishments. Those people are the ones I'm interested in having stay tuned and watching for the rest of my career.
I wanted to be a part of WWE and part of NXT first, as, if I went to 'Raw' or 'SmackDown' right away, I would always wonder what NXT would have been like.
Wrestling in the Midwest is always such a blast, and a favorite place of mine.
The Bullet Club from the beginning was just a group of talented guys who were having fun together and tried to make pro wrestling as exciting as it can be.
For me, travel is one of the biggest perks of pro wrestling. You get to see the world on somebody else's dime.
I got signed to Ring Of Honor because Jim Cornette happened to be paying attention to something I was doing.
Ring Of Honor was so great to me and so great to many young talents where they really give you the ball.
Nothing turned the NXT Universe upside down like The Undisputed Era's debut.
For me, it's always been a financial kind of scenario. I was actually the first one who signed the 'exclusive to Ring of Honor' contract. I was the first guy who ever signed one of those contracts. That was tough for me because I had no one to talk to. I had no examples to go on. I was the guinea pig.
For me, I've been very lucky because of my relationship with Ring of Honor. I'm very close with everyone there, and that includes the guys that negotiate the contracts.
The only thing cooler than having a dream and accomplishing that dream is getting to do it with your buddies.
The Internet, as a platform, I think is really fantastic.
The first time I won the Ring of Honor World Championship, I was a kid - I was 23 years old.
New York, specifically, has been very good to me throughout my wrestling career.
If you sit around and wait for things to happen, they're not going to happen the way you want.
There's no better way to start a year than to become the first-ever three-time ROH World Champion.
There's so many cool things that happen, where you want to kind of sit back and smell the roses and say, 'Wow, this is awesome!' But then you're already thinking a mile ahead about what the next landmark is, what the next goal is.
Any time guys move to 'Raw' and 'SmackDown,' I think that is what has kept NXT so relevant and has kept the fans so invested because they are now conditioned that whoever leaves or comes in, NXT, as a product, is going to give really exciting sports entertainment every time.
I look around and see guys that I've been on the road and traveled the world with in a WWE locker room, and we still think it's surreal. At least once a week, one of us will look at the other and just say, 'Can you believe we're really all here?'
I started training when I was a senior in high school. I trained at the Combat Zone Wrestling Academy in South Philadelphia.
Generally speaking, ROH championship matches are hard fought and grueling, and the fans are really into it. The ROH Championship means a lot to me for those reasons.
Ring of Honor is my home.
I loved working with Jim Cornette.
You realize, as time goes on, there is a certain expectation now in 2018 where fans want to see cool, exciting, hard-hitting sports entertainment or hard-hitting pro wrestling, and there are ways to give them that without necessarily putting yourself in the hospital that night or not being able to move the next morning.
When you say the word 'undisputed,' what do you think of? You think of something that is untouchable, undeniable. Myself, Bobby Fish, and Kyle O'Reilly are all of those things.
I would love, love, love, love a one-on-one match with Tanahashi, and I've never had one before. He's my all-time favorite New Japan guy. I think the guy's a rockstar. He's so cool, just in the ring and in person.
With me, Bobby Fish, and Kyle O'Reilly, I know on-screen we are these brothers whose bond can't be broken, and we are this faction. I promise you, it's very real behind the scenes, too. I've known those guys for years. We travel together all the time; we talk every single day.
I think the guys who have been on NXT and got to go to 'RAW' or 'SmackDown' got the full experience. That's what I want.
Ring of Honor has always been a company that focuses on youths and being a true alternative.
I think that battle that you have almost never goes away. You're always questioning and hoping that stuff goes a certain way, that you get a certain reaction.
I'd been told countless times, even before I got into pro wrestling, that I would never amount to anything and that I'd never achieve this dream.
I'm not just the best in NXT; I'm not just the best in the WWE: I'm the best on the freaking planet.
I think it's fun to fantasize about the idea of NXT and ROH butting heads and seeing which one will do better, especially with WWE looking at ROH guys to hire.
I wouldn't be the performer I am if everyone thought I was the best. Having people against you, or who don't quite believe in you, gives a lot of extra fuel to never settle.
I think that is when guys are at their best: when you put pressure and have something to work towards and have something to compare yourself to or try to best them, it really does make you better.
I always think back to that first night in Brooklyn, where I debuted, and it was this total surprise. I just remember thinking, 'I hope they care. I hope they remember me.' The way they embraced me that night, I knew it was the start of something special.
There are some times I'm really busy and other times I'm not, but I prefer to be really busy because I generally don't know what to do with myself when I'm not wrestling or on the road.
I am stoked to go over to Japan and experience that culture.
Of course the people in the Bullet Club will have similarities and always will, but finding what I can do as Adam Cole to be different is important.
So when you're following guys like Kyle O'Reilly and Bobby Fish or The Young Bucks or Jay Lethal or The Briscoe Brothers, and you're going out and trying to really stick out and have a very memorable, talked-about main event, or the match of the night, like the main event should be, it's really challenging.
When I was first started, when I was eighteen, I wrestled for a company that had a very hardcore fanbase and demanded a lot from its wrestlers. So, every single match, I would do every move possible. I would land on the concrete floor; I would land really high on my head just to try to impress the fans.
You don't make a statement unless you make noise.
Ring of Honor always has a great general idea of what they think I need, and generally, we agree pretty quickly on what I want to do.
I do feel in 2018 that pro wrestling has gone in such a different direction. Before, things were so black and white; now, it's shades of grey. It's not so much good guys and bad guys: there are people who are put in situations who do the right or wrong things, but people react to them like they are stars.
I've been in a lot of different factions my whole career, and all the guys who made up those factions are different performers. For example, if you look at the Undisputed Era as a whole, I'm very different than Roderick Strong, who's very different from Kyle O'Reilly, who's very different from Bobby Fish.
There are good wrestling journalists and bad wrestling journalists. That's for sure.
Bobby Fish and Kyle O'Reilly are seriously like brothers to me.
My grandmother played a huge influence in my life and helped raise me, and she and my mother saw how much I loved pro wrestling and how much I wanted to go after it.
