Cruiserweight Champion: TJ Perkins' road to the belt

The last few weeks has been nothing short of crazy for TJ Perkins.

From being one of the 32 competitors of the Cruiserweight Classic, Perkins has gone on to become the inaugural winner of the tournament in a series of upsets that showed off his 18 years of experience in wrestling.

In the first segment of this three-part series, Perkins relieves the finals of the CWC and the rush of fighting world-class matches with colleagues like Kota Ibushi.

Perkins also responds to the recent statements made by his next opponent, the number one contender to the Cruiserweight Championship, Brian Kendrick and how it would crush him to end the championship dreams of a man he considers his older brother.

When did you find out that you were going to be the champion?

When I came in, I had no expectations at all and I was prepared to go home after every single round, if that was the way it’s gonna go. But it was really like real-life Cinderella, the way that it came about, because I kept on winning and took each moment as it came, and then, before I knew it, I was standing in the ring with a trophy that was probably bigger than me. Got my first look at the brand-new Cruiserweight Championship, which I’m lucky enough to be holding, and now I’m leading the group of guys that I came in with.

Hopefully, everything is gonna keep moving forward.

Did you know that the belt was coming out?

No, I don’t think anybody really had any idea what—it kinda would feel like whoever wins the tournament was gonna represent the cruiserweights in some sort of manner. And I think some of us kinda assumed that eventually you’d have the opportunity to be the champion or maybe that would be the case at the end of it.

But all of that, with the ceremony, was a total surprise. All the fans in the arena and here it is, watching at home, we all found out at the same time.

Do you wanna talk about your matches?

Going into the first match, in the semi-finals with Kota, everybody can see the story going in. Kota’s heavily-favored, he’s very popular, he’s an elite wrestler in the eyes of all the fans, especially real die-hard, dedicated fans.

It sort of felt a little bit—it’s kinda good for my inspiration, but it sort of felt a little bit like Pacquiao vs Mayweather? Everybody felt like Mayweather’s gonna win and he’s gonna win the way he always does. And he ended up winning, but coming in to the fight, it seems like the belief in Pacquiao—that he would still be able to pull off the hero’s win—it got so big that fight week, it was 50-50.

It felt very similar coming in to the night, leading up to it. “There’s no way TJ can beat Kota”, “There’s no way he can do it”. And the support, especially from the Filipino fans, was so heavy that coming into that night, it felt very 50-50 and going into the ring, it was like anything could happen.

And then in the final, (Gran) Metalik, he’s a lot more brutal than I think people give him credit for ‘cause he’s such a graceful performer and he’s probably the best high-flyer in the world, especially for the lucha libre style. The last little bit was pretty scary, coming off the top rope and having to counter and make sure that I don’t die.

It was two incredibly defining matches for me in one night and within 10 minutes of each other. I don’t think I could’ve asked for a better performance or asked for a better scenario if I were to write my own book, I dunno that I could’ve written a better story than that.

Brian Kendrick told Michael Cole in a sit-down interview this week that he’s tired of hearing people talking about your Cinderella story. What do you have to say about that and what do you expect from your match with him?

I’m sure he’s tired of me—he’s been tired of me for 18 years. Brian and I actually go way, way, way back. We both started around the same time, and we both came in the late nineties. He was a few years older than me, so he was always the big brother to me, and he was great. I used to look up to Brian, I wanted to be just like Brian when I was younger.

I told stories about having to ditch school in order to make some of my matches because I was performing so young, when I was 13, 14, 15-years-old; well, Brian was one of the guys that picked me up from school in order to do that ‘cause he can drive and he was an adult. I needed help to get back.

Brian and I go way, way back, so if there’s anybody who’s tired of hearing about me, it’s definitely Brian ‘cause it’s been a long, long time. But personally, I’m thrilled to see him back. One of the things about Brian is that he was always willing to do whatever it takes to stay on the big stage and to get there.

And when I was homeless, for example, not only was Brian the only one to pick up the phone for me if I ever needed anything, or if I just needed to talk, but he was also a big part of my inspiration ‘cause I would think about how passionate he is. And I don’t have a lot of guys that are really close friends of mine in all of this, and he’s one of them.

I’m thrilled to have him on-board with us, and I’m thrilled to meet him again at Clash of Champions. I’m not thrilled that I have to crush his dreams, but I’m sure that he’s definitely willing to crush mine so we’re gonna have to go in like buddies do and fight it out.

What’s your goal coming forward from Clash of Champions? Who do you wanna fight next?

My first and foremost goal is to win. I gotta keep winning ‘cause if I don’t retain the title and stay in this position, then I can’t continue to lead the cruiserweights. What I’d like to do is continue what I’ve started in the CWC on the main roster, keep winning, and continue to grow as an ambassador for the division.

I wanna take on all colors, like Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels were in nineties as the world champion, and we call them the fighting champion and that’s how they refer to themselves. Every single week, they had somebody and they would take on any challengers. I think there’s so many great cruiserweights in the world and there’s so many great cruiserweights in this specific company that there should be no shortage of challengers and I wanna be able to get in there with all of them. — AT, GMA News