Ricky Starks discusses his in-ring style and inspirations.
Speaking with Wrestling Perspective Podcast, the AEW Superstar was asked about his "style" as a wrestler, saying that he pulls inspiration from a lot of different eras. According to Starks, it's a cultivation of everything from Japanese and Lucha Libre wrestling to 1990's boxing, which he uses to study selling and body movements. The Team Taz member doesn't want to shoehorn himself into any one thing. He added the following:
"I was coming up during the period where Ricochet was really big on the indies, right. You had people just recreating that, so there was a period where I was like, 'what is my style? What am I good at?' I'm not good at Lucha Libre. I can't fly around. I can base, but I can't fly around. I think what happened is, there's a method in art called pastiche, or in filming, which is essentially you take, there are certain things that you pull from other people that have already, you're copying in a sense, but it's through your own lens. That's what happened with me. I think growing up and watching things and liking certain things and being so observant that it kind of just came by accident. Everything just moulded together, so I don't think I necessarily have a style that I can give a definition to. Though I would love to, I just don't."
Starks would go on to name The Undertaker as his favorite wrestler and someone that influenced him a lot. He also cites Undertaker versus Bret Hart at SummerSlam 97 and Shawn Michaels versus Mankind at In Your House: Mind Games as his earliest wrestling memories.
"My favorite wrestler is The Undertaker, by far. Undertaker is my favorite wrestler so there's a lot of things that I pull from him when it comes to selling. My other favourite wrestler is Shinjiro Otani. I love Otani. Those two are the biggest influence that I have just because there's a lot of emotion that they have and there's something unique about them."
On Sunday, March 7 at AEW Revolution, Starks and Brian Cage will face Sting and TNT Champion Darby Allin in a Street Fight. Fightful will be providing live coverage of the event.
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