Exclusive: Rich Brennan Says Now Is "A Crucial Time For Wrestling", Talks MLW Never Say Never

Former WWE announcer Rich Brennan has been busy since being released by WWE, working with MLW and broadcasting alongside Tony Schiavone.

Brennan spoke with Fightful and said it has been a wonderful experience working alongside Schiavone, who was the main reason Brennan wanted to be a wrestling announcer. The two served as broadcasters for MLW's One-Shot show back in October.

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“Tony is one of the reasons why I became a broadcaster in the first place. When I was eight, nine, 10 years old watching TBS and David Crockett, there was something about his delivery. It was the first time I kind of realized that was a job, being a wrestling announcer. I don’t think it ever clicked with me and you don’t put these things together when you’re a kid. He, along with [former Boston Bruins announcer] Fred Cusick, those were the two guys that inspired me to be an announcer, with Tony in particular. He was the voice of wrestling around 1986, 1987 in that Crockett era which I still consider to be the best era in professional wrestling, the Golden Years,” Brennan said.

With MLW returning to have another event on December 7, called "Never Say Never," Brennan looks at the talent the show has and said it is a great, yet crucial time in professional wrestling. Brennan pointed at the number of indy promotions making a strong resurgence, giving fans and wrestlers many alternatives besides WWE to watch and compete.

“There’s such an explosion of talent in guys who are breaking the mold. It’s a crucial time for wrestling. In five, 10, 15 years, we’re going to look back and I think this current era is very important and it’s another renaissance of professional wrestling. You’re kind of seeing a resurgence of smaller promotions, more localized promotions, but on top of that, promotions that are doing it differently, listening to what the fans want and delivering it. It’s not rocket science. It’s wrestling. MLW wants to be at the forefront of that and if you look at the talent of the first show and the talent for this show, you got guys who have been there, but you got a lot of younger guys (such as Sammy Guevara) and there’s so much talent out there and so many guys who are exciting to watch that maybe don’t fit into the WWE mold right now, maybe they do, but it’s cool for these guys to have this other alternative. It helps some of these other wrestling promotions,” Brennan said.

The interview with Brennan can be heard in the recent episode of "The List & Ya Boy" in the video above. "The List & Ya Boy" is hosted by Fightful managing editor Sean Ross Sapp and Fightful owner Jimmy Van and can be seen live on Fightful every Wednesday at 3 p.m. ET. MLW's Never Say Never takes place December 7. 

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