AEW star Will Ospreay discussed how he received multiple five-star match ratings from veteran wrestling analyst Dave Meltzer during an interview with Kenny McIntosh for Issue 48 of Inside The Ropes Magazine.
Ospreay said, “I just think it is a guy’s opinion. With the wealth of knowledge that he has about wrestling, it’s always nice to hear his opinion, but I don’t think everyone should hang their hat on it. I think it’s more funny when it’s kind of like, oh, I appreciate it, and then there’s this whole line in the sand where people say that’s bulls—t. I love how now it’s called the Ospreay tax. [laughs] So anything that I do now there is an extra star or an extra half a star put on top of it.
What makes me laugh even more is that there are wrestlers that are signed, that will get on their phone, hit the record button and go, ‘He’s a numpty. He doesn’t know anything about wrestling.’ You’ve got on your phone, you’ve seen something, you’ve seen a star rating, and you think it should be more! You talk s—t on the phone. The only people that I respect are the guys backstage. You can tell those wrestlers are hurt and it’s just like guys, relax, it’s just some geezer’s opinion, it doesn’t matter.”
On having higher match ratings from Meltzer than Kurt Angle and Shawn Michaels:
“Do you honestly think I think I’m better than Kurt Angle? Because I can tell you now I’m not. Do you think I’m better than Shawn Michaels? I can tell you that I’m not. He has a certain taste, and I appeal to that level of taste. I don’t really have any opinion on it. But I do enjoy seeing what happens and the discourse between people; it is hilarious at this point. But any wrestlers that say it either in promos or on their phone about how it doesn’t matter, deep down it hurts them. It really does.”
