Written By Hart Editing

When it comes to changing the game and representing England abroad, who do you think of? Dynamite Kid, British Bulldog, William Regal – but perhaps the most prominent such talent, who has influenced and inspired multiple current day top stars and is recognised consistently as one of the best wrestlers to work around the world in his day, would be Nigel McGuinness.

Considered by many to be one of the best in-ring performers to have never wrestled in WWE, McGuinness stood out as one of the few men that had the ability to match the technical wizardry of Bryan Danielson. The two engaged in a multi-year rivalry that produced some of the greatest performances to grace the squared circle during the 2000s.

The likes of Claudio Castagnoli, Kurt Angle and Seth Rollins have praised him for his ingenuous understanding of professional wrestling and ingenuitive in-ring style, which McGuinness then took abroad to Japan, where he would compete against some of Pro-Wrestling NOAH’s best, such as Go Shiozaki and Akira Taue. He also famously defeated Takeshi Morishima back in the United States to become ROH World Champion.

Real Honor

The modern era of wrestling hadn’t been too kind to his old home of Ring of Honor, with the company seemingly looking as though it was going to go out of business following the rise in popularity of not only AEW, but New Japan’s own undertakings in the United States. The once flourishing promotion was left in a precarious position among those newly formed US-based competitors.

January 2020 saw the re-establishment of the title that McGuinness had made his own, the ROH Pure Championship, which Bryan Danielson famously unified with his own ROH World Championship in Liverpool in 2006. The current Pure Champion is Katsuyori Shibata, who was able to get a second chance as a wrestler through the belt after an almost certain career ending injury at NJPW’s Sakura Genesis in 2017. 

With the company being bought by Tony Khan in March of 2022, the relaunched Ring of Honor has brought back significant attention to the promotion for the first time since 2018, ushering in a new era that brings purpose back to the phrase Honor is real.

“I’ve been very closely watching the new Ring of Honor. Truthfully, I never realised how close it had come to going out of business in the last few years.”, said McGuinness, speaking on the re-launch of the company to which he made his return at Supercard of Honor 2022 as part of the commentary team.

“Much like everyone else who had worked for ROH at the time, I’m certainly grateful that Tony Khan not only bought the company, but also its historic catalogue”, he continued. “I think that it’s great that he’s continuing to use ROH as a platform for wrestlers to develop, perform and make a living in an industry that they love.”

New Faces

With the historic legacy of the brand as its backing, the new ROH, nicknamed ‘nuROH’, has seen many wrestling standouts grace its squared circle since Death Before Dishonor in July 2022, such as NJPW World Television Champion Zack Sabre Jr., former World of Stardom Champion Utami Hayashishita, as well as indie wrestling mainstays Trish Adora, Blake Christian and Willow Nightingale. Now that the promotion has a variety of new faces appearing on its weekly show, McGuinness had some advice to give to performers who have opportunity to work for ROH:

“The most important thing would be to stand out. Every company needs stars and it’s important to find your voice, style and your place.”

The former World Champion also brought up several names that caught his attention in recent months, both in ROH itself and at PROGRESS’ yearly Super Strong Style 16 tournament, where he provided commentary for tournament matches and refereed the final.

“There are certainly some that have jumped out to me. The presence of Mr. Charles Crowley is one of those people, but another name is Mark Haskins, who has impressed me with how he’s developed into such a solid main event calibre wrestler, too.” remarked McGuinness. “Someone I’d love to see get higher profile matches in the future is Lee Moriarty.”

Encountering the Arc

In the mid 2000s, during McGuinness’s time as an active wrestler for ROH, the company shared their talent with Pro Wrestling NOAH, leading to once in a lifetime matchups between top stars in the United States and in Japan. Wrestlers like Go Shiozaki, Naomichi Marufuji, Takeshi Morishima and KENTA all made the trip to the USA to show the world what they were capable of.

In November 2005, McGuinness had the opportunity to work overseas, locking up with many prolific names in puroresu during his time there. One of those names was Akira Taue – someone highly associated with the Four Pillars of Heaven and the Holy Demon Army. “It was a huge honour to wrestle Akira Taue,” recounted McGuinness. “I saw it as an opportunity to show to the world that I could be seen as a main event talent, and it gave me the chance to be able to kickstart my career in Japan.”

Beyond the world of the Four Pillars also saw McGuinness test his mettle against numerous other wrestlers of the arc, some of which would end up coming over to the United States to wrestle in ROH, like McGuinness had done for NOAH.

In what is often regarded as one of the best pro-wrestling matches to ever take place in the United States, Samoa Joe took on Kenta Kobashi at the aptly named ‘Joe vs. Kobashi’ in New York City. But McGuinness also found himself wrestling names that would no doubt go down as some of the all-time greats of Japanese pro-wrestling.

“I loved my matches against Naomichi Marufuji and KENTA, and I believe if I had continued wrestling after 2011, then I likely would’ve had more matches with the next generation of stars, both in America and Japan.”

Sound and Magic

The London-born wrestler, who used an elevated cutter called the Tower of London as his signature manoeuvre, witnessed a rise in popularity at a time when it was commonplace to hear copyrighted music at shows and on streaming services, allowing him and many others to come out to recognizable songs without issue. Although that era may be gone now that ROH mutes most of its usage of copyrighted material, McGuinness did share which of the songs that he entered the ring to were his favourites: “Oasis. Although Blondie is a close second.”

Since retiring in 2011, McGuinness has found a knack for performing magic shows in front of interested wrestling fans. He cites his time in Japan back in 2006 for being his gateway into the magic world: “To be honest, the reason I started to learn and develop my skills in magic is the same reason that guys do anything — to impress girls, haha.” He noted that magic and pro-wrestling are similar, explaining how his late friend and highly influential magician Max Maven often spoke of the similarities between the two art forms: “The big covers the small, the building to moments. He would compare magic to pro-wrestling so much.”

One of the former world champion’s more notable jobs in recent years has been as a colour commentator, applying and developing his craft at the announce table for many different promotions: Ring of Honor, WWE, and PROGRESS Wrestling. During this time, he’s been paired with numerous different people behind the booth, but stressed that the “unknowing” is what differentiates a magic show performance to calling the action in the ring.

“Once you’ve done the preparations for the show, you can relax and let things play out the way that they do. You’ll always find things to improve on but there’s not a lot of anxiety associated with it”, McGuinness explained. “Doing commentary is different in the sense that you’re going in largely without knowledge of what is going to happen, whereas with magic shows, there is much more you’ll know ahead of time. The little unknowns that lead to the adlib and adaptation are both there, which leads to the real magic.”

His magic shows and unbelievable tricks may have impressed his colleagues and fans in attendance, but AEW’s newest commentary team member doesn’t think that his performances will be posted online or shown to the public anytime soon. “If I’m able to perform the show enough to where it’s able to reach enough of an audience and that it’s at a level to hold up against real pros, then maybe. I think that’s a long way away for the time being, but never say never.”

As All Elite Wrestling looks to achieve the highest recorded paid attendance in wrestling history at the historic Wembley Stadium back in McGuinness’ home of London, the retired wrestler seems to be playing coy online about his involvement since his on-air presence for the show’s announcement back in April. 

The event will be “a night to remember” in McGuinness’ own words, but there’s no telling whether or not he may have another trick up his sleeve in time for August 27.

This article is a collaboration between Hart (@hart_editing), who conducted the interview, and James Carlin (@mrjamescarlin), who wrote the surrounding text.

We want to thank Nigel McGuinness for taking time out of his day to let us interview him. Special thanks to AEW & ROH for approving the interview as well. Make sure to keep an eye out for future shows by Nigel and follow him on twitter @McGuinnessNigel to keep up with any future updates or announcements by him.