No Way Jose Wasn’t A Fan Of The Name, Feels The Conga Line Held Him Back

No Way Jose was among the mass cutbacks made by WWE on April 15, ending his time in the company after five years.

Jose was known for his party gimmick and conga line, making him the perfect guy to put smiles on faces. He had a decent run in NXT, getting over with the fans with his charisma and personality. But things didn’t work out on the main roster when he was called up in 2018.

Speaking to Wrestle Talk, Jose discussed why he enjoyed the gimmick, but wasn’t a fan of the name as he felt it limited him.

“The name itself, ha. I don’t know how the hell it happened, they were like ‘what do you think of No Way Jose,’ and I was like ‘no.’ I thought it was a catchphrase, and I was like ‘oh cool’… they saw something in film and somehow it came up… [Matt] Bloom was like “what if you want it as a name?”, and I was like ‘no way.’ Then a writer came up to me and was like ‘why?’ and I was like ‘it will pigeonhole me, there is a ceiling,’ all the real stuff in terms of business. Nobody goes in there and says they want to be a No Way Jose probably, they want to be, for me it was The Rock when I saw The Rock I wanted to be The Rock… We went into Full Sail and I’m walking in and you shake everyone’s hand and Triple H is right there talking to Eva Marie or someone, I’m like ‘hey, sir, how you doing?’ And he’s like ‘No Way, what’s going on?’ In my head I’m like ‘s***, is that a thing?’ And he goes ‘got it approved today, what do you think?’ And I said ‘I love it, let’s go.'”

He continued, “It’s not that I didn’t enjoy the gimmick, but the name wasn’t my first choice. What ended up happening with it was it became its own thing, it took its own form. What I loved about it was the fan interaction. We could go into the crowd and we literally do conga lines, that’s how it came to be… it was me going out into the people and getting behind me… I never got the opportunity to show a more serious side and have something I could really sink my teeth into.”

Along with being pigeonholed by the name, Jose also felt the conga line may have held him back. In NXT, the line wasn’t present for every match, but on Raw, there were always people around him.

“They wanted the conga line with me. In NXT, I only did the conga line for big events. I was like ‘alright, whatever. I’ll do the conga line,’ and then it stuck. I feel a certain way about the conga line. I love the conga line, I absolutely do, but I think that’s the line that maybe held me back a little bit,” he said.

Jose appeared on the April 13 episode of WWE Raw, losing to Bobby Lashley. He was released two days later.