In a recent interview with ‘Rewind Recap Relive’, which also featured an appearance from WWE Hall of Famer Rob van Dam, Ninja Mack discussed several topics, including his decision to sign with the Pro Wrestling NOAH promotion in Japan.

“I signed to NOAH, I really appreciate what they offered and being over there for the first time. Unfortunately, I returned about two weeks before RVD got there so I didn’t cross paths with him, and maybe on his next tour of my go around, we can cross some paths and maybe I can take you out for a drink. Growing up, I was a big fan of just AAA and NOAH, because that was what was accessible for me to watch at the time growing up, so I was able to watch a lot of that and then, you know, you see Jushin Thunder Liger and you see all of them back then, just being able to watch any Japanese wrestling, that was always intriguing, you’ve got the cool outfits and they look like Power Rangers.

When I started wrestling, I started at Booker T’s Reality of Wrestling, RVD, good friend of Booker, so I did about two years there, and then I started doing a lot of lucha, just being in the Texas scene, so I was able to get to Texas and Mexico a lot and I was able to learn a lot of lucha at the time and then, you know, life happens and I became a father and then I took a little hiatus and when COVID happened and I came back, I had the time to actually train and commit again, but I had a goal in mind, I didn’t just want to wrestle, I came back with a business mindset, I had goals and when I came back, I wanted to grow Houston wrestling with one of the promotions I was locally wrestling at, and then as that was growing, getting back into wrestling, I felt like I had the potential and the ability to do some good things.

I wrote down that I wanted to work for AAA and that I wanted to work for NOAH coming back, and I wanted to see how long that was going to take and it took six months for them to get interest, and then, within a year, I worked AAA and then NOAH was calling and it was just COVID pushing me back longer and longer, but now that I was able to get over to NOAH and I have to write three new goals down now, because this last year has really, I checked off all my goals, I stayed committed to training and grinding out some work and then I was very fortunate.

COVID pushed back my NOAH start, pushed it back about a whole year, but I was able to grind out that GCW run and GCW was there for me, so thank you GCW on that, and that’s just kind of a bonus check I was able to do to help them grow and they helped me grow so much, but I had three goals, help Houston wrestling, try and get to AAA because I was so close, and then eventually get over to NOAH and it just happened very fortunate and fast for me. I don’t know exactly where Pro Wrestling NOAH stands in the Japan rankings of wrestling, but my goal would be to take NOAH as far as I can go and take them to the top and I’d be making a good push for the GHC Junior Heavyweight Championship, that’s going to be one of my goals this next year, to get a shot and take the belt away from whoever’s holding it, that’s one of the goals that I’ve already got down.”

The full interview is available at this link.