Roman Reigns was interviewed by ESPN and had a few things to say about his friend Jon Moxley / Dean Ambrose.
He gave his thoughts on Jon Moxley’s criticism of WWE’s creative process:
ESPN: Seth Rollins has been vocal on Twitter lately in speaking out against Moxley’s comments after leaving. How do you view the situation?
Reigns: That’s my boy, man. He’s passionate. He’s always been like that, you just don’t always hear it. Seth is strong, he’s hard-headed, he’s stubborn. That’s how he’s always been. He’s an ultra-alpha male. He wants to be the best all the time. That’s why he is where he is. That’s why he’s at that position — because he has that drive.
He is emotional — of course, he is. Because we bust our ass, man. I love this place. I’ll tell you straight-up: I disagree with what [Dean] Ambrose said about the creative process. I love the guy. I love him to death. He’s my brother. And wrestling ain’t gonna stop that. On a personal level, me and that dude can hang out, have a beer or two and just talk. And even when we don’t talk, that’s just our relationship.
When it comes down to it, creative-wise, that’s on you. Communication is communication. When you go in there and you talk to boss, you gotta let him know. He even made comments about the things I had to say, but that was in a different place. I was brand-new.
We’ve worked our asses off for Vince [McMahon] in this company, and he respects that, and he wants to know our opinions. You have to speak up for yourself. I’m in a position now where he listens to everything I have to say, what I’m feeling.
Early on, when you don’t have any equity, when you haven’t put in any time, you should do what the boss says. But once you earn that equity, once you got the keys to the car — which Ambrose was clearly in that position because all three of us [were] — you have to speak up for yourself and do what’s right for you.
Regardless, I love the dude, man. We came from the bottom and got to where we are now, and he’s a huge part of that. No type of business rivalry or any of that crap will ever affect the personal relationship I have with either Seth or Dean. We’re all gonna do our thing. We’re having fun. I’m enjoying where I’m at. I enjoy being with the WWE. I’ll never be anywhere else.
During Moxley’s interview on Jericho’s podcast in May, he also said that there was one line that WWE wanted him to say about Roman Reigns’ cancer that he refused to say because of how bad he felt it was, saying that someone would have been fired and WWE would have lost sponsors if it actually got on the air. (Moxley never revealed what the line was.) Reigns had this to say about that:
ESPN: Jon Moxley (formerly Dean Ambrose) said on the Chris Jericho podcast that he refused to say a couple of things about you and your illness that they wanted him to say. Do you know what he’s talking about?
Reigns: No. And that’s the thing. If you refuse to say it, you refuse to say it. You didn’t say the stuff, and nothing happened. You didn’t get fired, so you don’t have to do any of that stuff. If you don’t really want to do it, you have to speak up for yourself. That’s the key to this business. That’s a bit contradictory in my mind right there. If you chose not to say that one thing, why can’t you choose to say another thing?