The first-ever Bloodsport event took place in April 2018 with Matt Riddle putting his name on the event.
The show was headlined by Riddle against Minoru Suzuki and also featured Nick Gage vs. Timothy Thatcher, Gunther (WALTER) vs. Tom Lawlor, Eddie Kingston vs. Tracy Williams, and more.
Riddle was signed by WWE shortly after, and Josh Barnett took over the Bloodsport brand.
"I couldn't make the initial show. I paid attention and followed it. [Brett Lauderdale] reached out to me after Matt Riddle got picked up by WWE and said, 'We got this thing. Would you be interested in being the title guy for the event?' For me, I said, 'Sure, but it's gotta be my show. I have to be booking it, agenting it, producing it.' I flat out said, 'That initial show, I thought, was terrible. Nobody really knew what they were doing. It didn't actually embody the thing they were going for, which I didn't hold it against anyone because nobody in America was training for this kind of thing. Nobody had this background. They could have a combat sports background, but it wasn't put in this parameter under this concept of shoot-style wrestling. It made sense to me that this would be this way because this is foreign territory, especially in this day and age. My belief was, unless you had somebody like myself, it wasn't going to work out right. To do that, I had to have the ability to control the product in a way that would allow it to flourish to what we have today," Barnett said on Ringsiders Wrestling.
The first Bloodsport event under Josh Barnett's watch took place in April 2019 and was headlined by Barnett vs. Suzuki.
Bloodsport is now features talent from across the wrestling world, including WWE.
Elsewhere during the interview, Barnett revealed he has talked to William Regal about participating. You can find his full comments by clicking here.
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