Christopher Daniels Talks TNA Release, Feast Or Fired, TNA’s Management Issues, NXT – ROH Comparison

I recently spoke to ROH talent and X-Division legend Christopher Daniels ahead of last night’s ROH/NJPW Global Wars PPV. In the first part of the interview, we talked his match with Cheeseburger, his role in ROH, and much more. In this final installment, we delve into his other projects, and his run in TNA.

You can hear the full interview in the video player above, or the audio player at the bottom of the page.

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You also participated in the Universal Studios Waterworld stunt show. How has that been?

“My degree is in theater, I’ve always wanted to be a performer in that respect. It was always an avenue that I couldn’t really turn down. Since I signed with ROH and became exclusive it really opened up my free time to be able to pursue this. Living in southern California and being close to Hollywood, I would love the opportunity to be able to venture into the world of stunt work and acting. I’m working with a lot of great stunt coordinators on this show. I’ve been wrestling for 20+ years, but now I’m the rookies, I’m learning by working with a lot of veteran stuntmen and women. For me that’s a new challenge to be the rookie again. It’s been a lot of fun and I look forward to the days I go down and perform.”

You were a part of Feast or Fired, can you explain your feelings on the concept?

“There were discussions to put my face on the ‘fired’ briefcase instead of the word ‘fired.’ Using it to end somebody’s contract I thought was distasteful. If you’re going to use it as an annual thing, you sort of limit the amount of times you can use it to introduce a new character like they did with me. It certainly painted you into a corner. I felt that unless it was a heel who had run his course.. the concept of firing a babyface as far as the fan reaction, what good is that? I certainly didn’t enjoy it. I got the idea of trying to think outside the box and lend some real life stakes to this. At the same time, there was only a certain number of scenarios that could play out before it got uncomfortable and not entertaining, and that’s not the point.”

How long into the Curry Man character did you know you were getting the second Feast or Fired briefcase?

“The first time I’d pitched Curry Man to them, they responded with Feast or Fired, so I knew that going in. The second time I didn’t know I was going to get the pink slip until I wrestled the match. I didn’t know what was going to happen to me. There was a discussion about that being the end of my TNA contract as well. Circumstances changed as far as me staying there and working as Suicide for a bit and then continuing as myself. A lot of times they don’t really tell people that’s the plan. They didn’t tell Chavo. I heard Shawn talk about how at the very last minute ‘this is it.’ That’s low-class in my opinion.”

“He was trying to make a story out of it if I recall, to get Cody to stick around. It’s sort of entertaining if you’re going to fire a hated heel. Then there’s a consequence that fans can be entertained by. I commend Shawn for volunteering to be that guy, but then for them to fire Cody at the end, it was a poorly handled situation.”‘

Was there ever a time you thought TNA was going off the rails?

“Not until I left, honestly. Even when things were going bad and looking back at the last two years of my career, I held out hope that they’d give us a chance to get back to the top of the mountain. Not just as being champions, which at that time made sense, because we were really the only tag team that were established until the Wolves came around. Just being a cog in the machine that was paying attention to you. I was holding out hope for that and in the end I realized they had no plans for that at all. If they wouldn’t have strung us along for that last 6-8 months…I was …

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