TNA Gut Check: Joey Ryan

Joseph "Joey" Ryan Meehan (born November 7, 1979) is an American professional wrestler from Southern California best known by his ringname Joey Ryan. He is a former PWG World Champion, PWG World Tag Team Champion with "The Professional" Scott Lost and former NWA World Tag Team Champion with Karl Anderson. He is currently performing for various wrestling promotions, including Pro Wrestling Guerrilla (PWG), Ring Ka King, NWA Championship Wrestling from Hollywood, Lucha Va Voom and as "Chase Walker" in the Wrestling Retribution Project. He worked for the short-lived MTV promotion Wrestling Society X and in Ring of Honor (ROH) in 2009-2010. He also works for WWE on a regular basis as local talent. In 2007-2008, he was a trainer at Ultimate Pro Wrestling's training school and is currently the head trainer at Mach One Wrestling's training school in Anaheim, California. He worked as an assistant trainer for the television series Hulk Hogan's Celebrity Championship Wrestling. From January 2011 to August 2011, he was the head booker of NWA Championship Wrestling from Hollywood. In 2012, he was featured as a trainer on RuPaul's Drag Race (season 4) episode 2. Also in 2012, Meehan made the top 30 finalist of 22,000 in the Major League Baseball Fan Cave contest.  

Ryan has appeared in several matches as enhancement talent for the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), competing against Rosey, Sylvain Grenier, The Gymini, Mark Henry, John Morrison, Super Crazy and two times against The Big Show. He was shown during a vignette for the Floyd Mayweather vs. The Big Show bout at WrestleMania XXIV. The video of him was from SmackDown when he faced The Big Show a few weeks earlier. He is also featured in The Big Show's titantron entrance video. On the February 18, 2011, edition of SmackDown, Ryan portrayed a security guard. On August 14, 2011, Ryan made an appearance at SummerSlam, portraying a fan during a match between Mark Henry and Sheamus. Two days later, Ryan wrestled a dark match at the SmackDown tapings in Bakersfield, California, losing to Bo Rotundo.

 
Ryan recently appeared on TNA's Gut Check after having a match with Austin Aries. The vote was split 1-1 and Taz had the final vote. In my opinion Taz made a stupid mistake and said no. Afterwards Ryan go in Taz's face about it and they looked like they were going to fight right there. 

Ryan was asked about his experience on Gut Check, here is what he had to say... 

Joey Ryan

On the feedback he has received from the fans
The support that everyone has showed me has been tremendous. It has been much more than I thought. Having this place to vent, where everyone kind of felt the same way and sympathize with me because they are not happy with the product that they are getting. It's just been overwhelming

Did he feel he did enough to sway the judges on Gut Check
I definitely got the benefit of having a match with Austin Aries. It could have been worse. The promo…there was no format, there was no “ok we are going to do this and this”. They want to do very reality type television. They want to do something that is engaging to the audience. So they wanted all spur of the moment. Just based off the Alex Silva one, I knew they were going to give me a chance to talk. But to come up with something within 30 seconds without pandering for a job because I definitely wasn’t going to do that. I just took what I had, took what I knew which was the support of all the people and I used that.

Was he shocked by the outcome
They didn’t give me any indication. I mean I know from the kind of drama for television that someone was going to say no and someone was going to say yes…And I didn’t know who the third judge was going to be until we went out there. When I got out there, I kind of felt like I was part of some kind of agenda or greater idea of Gut Check as a whole rather than one individual performance.

Is the Gut Check a work?
People are going to think what they want. Everyone is smarter than pro wrestling. At least they think they are. TNA is very gung ho about this reality based thing for at least this segment. They didn’t tell me anything. The information I knew was very minimal. They just said “you’re going to go out there and they are going to judge you.” I don’t think they expected my reaction to it because I’m sure they are used to guys who just want to do business and do the right thing and even if they get rejected they will say “thank you sir and thanks for the opportunity”. I wasn’t going to sit there and have anybody talk down to me about my career and my life because they don’t know what I’ve been through. They don’t know the struggles I have gone through. They don’t know all the times in the Indy scene that I’ve heard three no’s to 1 yes that I have gotten for any booking I have ever done. Getting told no doesn’t faze me. I always bounce back.

On his confrontation with Taz
I definitely don’t think Taz saw what was coming. It was very heated. He actually wanted to confront me after the show. He went back to commentary after and he was looking for me after the show, but a couple of friends backstage tried to calm him down. They told me it was best to avoid him. Honestly I didn’t see him after the show and I haven’t talked to him. I’ve read his tweets a little bit, but haven’t talked to him after the show since.

@JoeyRyanOnline