Jonathan Gresham: Modern Age Grappling Is Exactly The Way I Want Wrestling Presented

Jonathan Gresham is creating a product entirely in his vision.

Modern Age Grappling is completely Jonathan Gresham’s vision.

Both Jonathan Gresham and Baron Black have been taking the city of Atlanta and independent wrestling by storm with their unique and interesting show ideas. Whether it be the first edition of Terminus that came at the beginning of the year or the recent Battle Slam show that combined wrestling and hip-hop, the duo are making waves throughout the wrestling world.

In a new interview with Fightful, Gresham revealed that while Terminus shows are a mixture of ideas from himself and Baron Black, the upcoming Modern Age Grappling show is a show based completely on his vision.

“For a long time, I wanted to run shows and I had this visual, this way of running shows that I wanted to do. When it came time to do it, I ended up teamed with my friend Baron, so I couldn’t run fully with my vision of a promotion that I wanted to run would be. But this, Modern Age Grappling, is exactly the way I want wrestling presented. The people that, I believe, understand my vision are the people booked on the show. Just to be clear, Colt Cabana is commentating. I felt like his voice and his knowledge of the rounds system would definitely help out to explain to people what’s going on. So I have him on commentary with [Lenny.] He’s tremendous. I love him.”

When putting together the show, the current Ring Of Honor World Champion made sure to book some of his former ROH co-workers.

“The guys on the card, they lost their jobs, of course, with me with Ring of Honor. This is me trying to put this style of wrestling forward, but also the guys that lost their jobs from Ring of Honor, give them a place that, hopefully, will have eyes watching. That’s my goal right now. This is my original idea of my promotion, is this one. Rounds based wrestling.”

Whenever a new idea is presented in the wrestling world, many fans/wrestlers can be reluctant to try something new. Despite this, Gresham made it clear that every guy on the card is on board with the style and that he didn’t have to sell it to anybody.

“No, I didn’t have to sell it to anybody. All the guys I have on the card are ambitious, like I am, so they’re open to challenges like this. I’ve worked with all of them, too. They understand what I’m looking for as far as the presentation of wrestling. I also think the rounds based system gives each round its own life, its own identity. So each round you get a different feel of wrestling. It can be fast paced, it can be slow, it can be a brawl. It can be anything. I’m really interested to see how the live audience digests it. We tried it one time at Terminus 2 for the pre-show. It was Invictus Khash, who I’m wrestling, and Adam Priest, who’s wrestling Black Baron on this show. He’s really good.”

Gresham went on and revealed that he wants the show to be short and has hopes that it will be just under sixty minutes long.

“Both of those guys are really good. They really got the match over and the gimmick over. So I’m hoping that it works for an entire show. The difference I have with wrestling, coming in as a performer is often times we fly in early, call time is really early, and then the show runs late. So you’re pretty much there all day. I hate that. So what I’ve always wanted to do, definitely with a show like this, is only run about four or five matches. Hopefully the show is done within the hour. So if the fans or the boys want to go to a bar and hang out, they can. They went to a town, they can.”

Fans can check out Modern Age Grappling this Sunday, May 22nd on Fite TV by clicking here.

If you’re in the Atlanta area, you can buy tickets to the show by clicking here.

Elsewhere in the interview, Gresham talked in length about Ring Of Honor. Click here to see his full comments on the matter.