When COVID shut down touring and traveling for wrestling, WWE created its own arena in Florida called the ThunderDome.
The ThunderDome looked like a normal WWE arena, but the fans were on video screens and crowd noise was piped in through the speakers. For the most part, only signed WWE talent wrestled in front of the ThunderDome, but rare exceptions were made.
Bobby Flaco was one of those rare exceptions, competing on the September 18, 2020 episode of 205 Live inside the ThunderDome. Flaco teamed with Jason Cade & Eli Knight in a gauntlet match against Ariya Daivari.
Speaking to Jeremy Lambert & Stephen Jensen on The Spotlight, Flaco reflected on competing in the ThunderDome.
"The infamous ThunderDome. It was cool. It came from just a point in my career where I was getting a lot of extra work. I dropped a hint that I would be in town a little longer. I never lived in Florida, but I was there for a long time. I told the dude I'd be around a little longer and it came that they needed somebody for 205 Live. They needed three people for 205 Live. I was able to do it. It was sick. I learned a lot. I had no business being there. It was cool. I got to learn a lot, I got to take in a lot. The ThunderDome is wild. Not a lot of people can say that they got to work in the ThunderDome, so that was cool," he said.
When what he learned, Flaco said, "I got a crazy lesson in selling. It was huge for me. I was just making it too hard, doing the weird face thing and I was knocked out all the time. Weird flipping around and doing weird shit with my body when you can just touch whatever hurts and have a good face on you and look into somebody's eyes like 'dude, this fucking shit hurts.' I was able to get that lesson at a bigger stage, so it was cool to sink it in."
While Flaco didn't say who in WWE gave him the advice when it came to selling, Leon Ruff was someone who reiterated things to him, which helped the advice sink in.
"It was people who watched it and watched me. I don't want to talk about who was backstage, but it was a guy who said it again, I have to hear everything twice, the person who said it the second time was Leon Ruff, and that's my fucking guy. I've switched gears since then. It wasn't directly after 205 Live, but I was doing that same shit. When two people say someting to you, it really clicked," he said.
Describing what it was like to wrestle in front of video screen fans, Flaco said, "It was different. It was during COVID, so it was better than nothing. It was like when I was wrestling in front of no people at some times. It was like [white noise yelling] a little bit. It was definitely better than nothing, so I appreciated it."
Flaco is a regular in the southeast scene and recently won the Scenic City Rumble, earning him a spot in the Scenic City Invitational.
Flaco is a student of AR Fox at WWA4. Fans can check out his comments about training under Fox by clicking here.
Watch the full interview with Flaco in the video above.
