At age 13, the Los Angeles native started on his path to the wrestling business, skipping school and crossing the border to Tijuana to take part in lucha libre shows. For the past 18 years he has been performing around the world living his dream.
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There were times that were more like nightmares, including a period where he was homeless during the recession. Little by little, though, he pieced his life back together and got back on track.
Though he has had a very good career, Perkins was still hoping for that one moment — his moment. That finally came Wednesday when he won the WWE Cruiserweight Classic tournament, outlasting 31 other participants from around the globe, including world-class wrestlers Kota Ibushi and Gran Metalik on the final night. With WWE re-emphasizing the division — which will be a regular part of its flagship show “Raw” starting Monday — the victory made him the WWE’s first cruiserweight champion since the title was “retired” in 2007.
Sporting News spoke with Perkins the day after his triumph about his career, the Cruiserweight Classic and what else he hopes to accomplish.
SPORTING NEWS: Has is sunk it yet?
T.J. PERKINS: No. I don’t know if it ever will, to be honest. It’s weird, it’s surreal. I’ll just hit you with cliches because … (laughs). It’s weird. When you’re outside of it or before you do something like this, you look at other guys and they all say the same thing. It really is beyond words. It’s surreal. I wake up in the middle of the night last night and I would check the edge of the bed to see if the title was still there. It’s like I’m going to wake up from a dream and this isn’t going to be real. But then I roll over and feel my busted cauliflower ear and I’m like, no, it’s definitely real.
SN: What was the moment like in the ring? You win and they’re getting ready to officially announce you. What was that moment like following two very physical, great matches?
TJP: It’s crazy. For me, it’s been such a long road. The bell rings and it’s like this weight lifted off your shoulders. You just think about all the things that you went through to get there. And I think it’s the same for a lot of athletes in that position. Then the ceremony starts and, for me, I thought about a lot of my heroes when they had their first big one. I thought about (Muhammad) Ali when he won his first world title against (Sonny) Liston and I thought about Shawn Michaels when he won his first world title. Eddie Guerrero, same thing. I could replay those celebrations in my head, like, I remember everything they did. I remember how the crowd looked, how the atmosphere felt, all those different things. Shawn Michaels, for example, I was there live, which was pretty cool for me. So before you know it, yours has unraveled and there’s other people watching yours and you’re like, wow, it’s hard to believe it’s real.
SN: That’s your moment, it’s something you’ve been waiting for your entire career. Does it mean more now or do you appreciate it more now considering that it happened at this stage of your career where you’ve already been in the business for 18 years?
TJP: Yeah, I definitely think so. A lot of the ups and downs for me, especially the downs, I feel like it came in a lot of indirect ways because I didn’t appreciate what I had. I got thrust into some great things when I was really young. Part of the reason why Kobe Bryant is such a big inspiration to me is because he was shipped off to the Lakers right out of high school. He went from English class to the Great Western Forum. I was already wrestling in high school but I went from English class to the Tokyo Dome. You feel the pressure but sometimes if you’re young enough and immature enough you don’t realize the pressure is there because you don’t appreciate your career. You don’t even know what a career is. I didn’t. To have this now as opposed to when I was having nice things before, it made me realize in the middle when times were bad what really means a lot to you. Part of it is being a better man, being a better person, a better businessman, being a professional. And then you learn to appreciate the nice things like this. This is not just a kid playing games any more.
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SN: When you talk to a lot of professional athletes, many times they’ll remember the down times more than the good times. Is that the case for you, or now that you’ve won this tournament against 32 competitors and are the first WWE cruiserweight champion upon bringing it back, that this moment can stand out more than the darker moments?
TJP: Yeah, it’s true. People ask me all the time, “Do you have a favorite road story for all this?” I have a ton and I don’t think I’m old and senile yet. I’ve been hit in the head a lot but I don’t think I have any problems but I can’t, for the life of me, remember a lot of my road stories and good times. When times are bad enough, that’s all you can ever think about. Even when you get away with it, you still think about it because you never want to go back there. What I said after one of the matches in the ring was very real. I thought about that key to the apartment I was evicted from for years and I still had it for a reason. It used to remind me of a place I could never go back to. Now, it’s like I can finally throw that stupid thing in the garbage because all it does is remind of a place I don’t have to go back to because I’ve come so far. It’s true, you really do think about the tough times.
SN: How did you feel when you woke up this morning, physically?
TJP: I was beat up. My neck and my chest and part of my face is all purple.
SN: Seeing you in the ring afterward and looking at your chest . . .
TJP: It was tough and I busted one of my cauliflower ears open again. That will swell up over the next day or two and I’ll have to get that drained. I wish I could say that was the worst of it but I also swallowed a big piece of confetti during the celebration so I’m probably dying right now. I don’t know.
SN: You get put in this situation where fans have expectations, you have expectations being in the semifinals and then the finals of this tournament against two guys that, correct me if I’m wrong, I don’t think you’ve been in the ring with either of them, correct?
TJP: Metalik, I briefly was able to share the ring with him in a tag match during the Super Juniors tournament in Japan but extensively, no. When I was coming up in CMLL, he was just a student. I was doing main event matches and he was still in the gym. We hadn’t crossed paths a lot, yet. Kota, I’ve never been across the ring from, ever.
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SN: You get done with the match against Kota Ibushi and then you have about this 15-, 20-minute window. What was going through your mind during that down time of trying to get focused for that finals match against Gran Metalik?
TJP: I came into all of this without any expectations. I’m very big about staying in the moment and after my first match I quoted a Zen proverb: “Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.” There’s a lot of interpretations for it but a big lesson to be taken away from that is stay in the moment. Things will happen, things will come and go. Sometimes you life will change but at the end of the day, there’s certain things that are constant and you have to stay in the moment and still do those things. For me, as big as this moment is, God willing, I’m going to have thousands more. I have to remember to take each moment as it comes.
SN: How does it feel to be kicked by Kota Ibushi?
TJP: It feels like death (laughs). Some people had commented about my blocking and catching the first few. My only return comment is I wish I had done that for the remaining 20, as well. It’s pretty rough.
SN: Triple H has been such an influence for so many with NXT and with the Cruiserweight Classic as well as helping put it together. Did you have a moment with him?
TJP: Yeah. It’s been such a pleasant experience being here as a professional. I’ve had such great open and casual and professional interaction with all of the office and administration, all of my peers and everything. What I was stressing to a lot of the guys — and it’s weird because I’m young but I’m one of the senior members in the locker room already — I would stress to a lot of the guys that, I’ve been everywhere, I mean, everywhere, and you go places and you have a wonderful locker room and just a nightmare of an office. Or you have a wonderful office but a nightmare locker room. I’ve never been in a place, until now, where you have both. This is the first place I’ve even been where it’s across the board that everything’s so wonderful. Everybody is so supportive; it’s a family atmosphere. Everyone is so helpful and approachable. Triple H, everybody has been really wonderful.
I was able to speak with him the first week we were here for the first round. I spoke to him in the span of five days more times than I spoke with any other person of administration or boss I’ve ever had anywhere else in the span of five years. I spoke with him more within five days. That’s how engaged he is and how passionate he is about it. He encourages that in everybody and I think that’s a healthy atmosphere. That’s the way it should be. He’s a workaholic and I think he respects when other people are, too.
SN: Wrestling fans have now seen you work for 18 years. You are a very good performer but, to me, it felt like there was something different about you in this tournament that brought out the best in you. Did you feel any different in this tournament as it went on?
TJP: You know, life and the things we do, so much of it is about narratives. There’s circumstances beyond your control and you can’t hit a pitch that isn’t thrown, that sort of thing. I feel like I’ve always had this to offer. Of course, you improve every day or at least I strive to. I’m always trying to learn and doing things. I’ll be a student for the rest of my life. I feel like a lot of this is stuff that I was always capable of but the opportunity’s not right or the timing is not right and the circumstances aren’t right. That’s part of the reason why my first match with Mack in this tournament was so important. For the first time, it felt like I got to set my own table. I’ve never had that before. Life’s a game of inches, man, like (Al) Pacino says in “Any Given Sunday.” It really is. The smallest change and smallest opportunity, the smallest narrative, can do wonders. I just think sometimes it takes the right thing. You have to be patient. You have to wait for your pitch.
SN: When did you find out that the finals match was not just going to decide the winner of the tournament but was the cruiserweight champion?
TJP: Pretty much when everybody saw the belt along with me in front of everybody. I didn’t get a chance to see it or understand that that was what the stakes are. You get a feeling that a lot of this stuff is going to be correlated and, definitely, winning the tournament is going to mean something, but until everyone has a chance to see it … I found out like everyone else (laughs).
SN: I think now everyone is very interested in seeing the cruiserweights officially returning to WWE television. What do you think it will be like for you and everyone else involved to bring it back to that stage where it hasn’t been for years?
TJP: I always liked being able to do things that my heroes did and accomplish certain things and being in those atmospheres because that’s what my heroes did. I like following in their footsteps. Now, to be the first of something, to be at the start of a new path that’s going to define and inspire a generation, that’s opening gates for something. I don’t want to make it sound too epic but I don’t know how else to describe it. That’s kind of what it is. I can’t even begin to describe what that’s like and the magnitude of that. It’s a special time. I’ve been saying it this whole time: This is a special time. This tournament is going to be something that history looks back on and it’s going to be more than just a footnote. To have gone this far and come out of it how I did, I couldn’t have imagined that in a million years.
SN: This is something we haven’t seen before and people were very curious to see how this was going to be presented, using 32 competitors from around the world. What were your expectations going into the tournament and what are your thoughts looking back on it now?
TJP: Coming into it, I try not to have expectations and, like I said, try to stay in the moment. Going into it, I was a free agent and had an opportunity to do this. I didn’t know how it would go. I don’t think a lot of people understood or even knew where this would lead everybody and how it would turn out. I didn’t think anything about past Round 1 or anything. What I really wanted to do was coming away from it having inspired Filipino people. We don’t have a lot of heroes and that was important to me and with each passing round, it just became more and more important to me. To have gone all the way through and to win the whole thing, for me it’s special because it bring validation to my original motive. Now the magnitude of my message is bigger. And it’s not just about me. Like I said after the final, I said this trophy, all of this, is not about one guy, it’s about 32 guys. Well, the Cruiserweight Championship and being in this position is bigger than just me. It’s for all Filipino people. We haven’t had a lot of heroes and I’m happy to inspire them to become heroes in their own right.
SN: You didn’t already have plans for Monday, did you?
TJP: (Laughs) No. I never do. Wrestling has dominated my life for so long now. More than half my life is being in the ring. I don’t remember what life was like before having to think about what I’m doing for my job. I started this when I was 13. I don’t remember what life was like. Waking up and not thinking I have to pack some gear or catch a flight or get in a car; I don’t know what that’s like anymore. I forgot. I didn’t have any plans. This is what I do.
SN: When you talk about moments, what do you think that moment is going to be like on Monday when you’re on “Raw” and you’ll go out there as the cruiserweight champion?
TJP: I’m in such incredible company being there. I’m going to Memphis Monday night and with the locker room that “Raw” has and so many of them are my friends from before and people that I came up with. Seth Rollins, Kevin Owens, these guys — they’re so incredibly talented. I think that adding the cruiserweight division to that, it’s kind of overkill. I don’t know that there’s ever too much of a good thing but if there is, we’re getting pretty close to it because that’s incredible to have all of that. And to be at the forefront of representing this on a show like that, that I grew up watching, it’s incredible. I don’t even know what to expect even if I was about expectations.
SN: Do you think you surprised a lot of people by winning the tournament?
TJP: Oh, I think I shattered pretty much everybody’s bracket. Everybody should have put money on me.
SN: When it comes to goals, what’s the goal now?
TJP: I think the goal is still the same but you have to take it to another level. I still want to inspire Filipino people. All we have is Manny (Pacquiao) and, as of right now, I’m no Manny but there’s an opportunity to get there and I want to keep pursuing that until I reach as many people as possible. And if this is to be the benchmark of a new generation for the cruiserweights, I want to be that. Same with everybody else that’s representing what they’re doing proudly. We had a Women’s Revolution and they have aspirations to main-event WrestleMania and I think that’s amazing and that’s great. I honestly think that’s something we’ll see. And the tag teams are going through a renaissance. I would love for it to be a perceivable idea that cruiserweights might main-event WrestleMania. Cruiserweights will represent in a bigger way than they had been in the past. For me, that’s my goal going forward is to represent this division and this culture, my people, in a bigger way than ever before and hopefully create new heroes for other people, people that will inspire me back.
Brian Fritz can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @BrianFritz and listen to his Between The Ropes podcast on Blog Talk Radio.
