July 31, 2025 • 10 mins
Karrion Kross joins the show to discuss his powerful upcoming memoir Life Is Fighting, out August 5 — and opens up like never before about the personal struggles behind the persona. We also address swirling WWE contract rumors. Plus, we dig into the cryptic Kevin Sullivan voice message and the “world-altering” reveal he's been teasing.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the Battleground Podcast, you play and exclusive interviews
with some of your favorite wrestlers.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Podcast stop It, What's up you guys? Welcome back into
iHeartRadio's official wrestling podcast, The Battleground Podcast. At his Battle
from one oh five nine The Rock, Nashville's classic rock station.
And a guy that, uh, we've had on the show before.
We recently just had him on. We always love talking
(00:38):
to him because he has thoughtful answers.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Give it up for the one the only to carry
and cross joining us today, Karen, how are you doing, sir?
Speaker 4 (00:44):
I'm doing very good. They just let me out of
the mental institution. They said, what do you want to do.
I said, look, just get me a triple espresso and
take me back to Battleground. That's what I want to
do right now. And they said, no problem. Just don't
hit anybody with a steel chair.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Hey, you know what, We've got some people in the office.
If you want to go hit some of them, I'll
point them out. If you want to go do that.
Speaker 5 (01:02):
Yeah, absolutely no problem.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
So let me know for sure. I will do that
for sure. So let's talk about it.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Because you got a book coming out, your memoir Life
is Fighting Drops August fifth. You're narrating it yourself for
audible sharing some deeply personal struggles.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Now, I've got to ask, what do you hope.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Readers walk away from knowing about Kevin that they wouldn't
get from seeing Carrion in the Ring?
Speaker 4 (01:29):
That Kevin is an imperfect person who didn't have a
perfect handout in life, that didn't come from a privileged background,
and still achieved what he wanted to do since he
was a little kid. And I think something that people
can take from that is like you don't have to
wait for a perfect hand to jump into the game
and play it. And I don't want to come off
(01:51):
cheesy or come off like you know, like not sincere,
but like the truth is is like you have to
you have to that on yourself, and you have to
find self love and you have to be able to
find that balance of knowing when to push yourself and
when to back off, and all of that type of
stuff is in the book that you're going to find
(02:11):
out about me. Like I've made plenty of mistakes in life.
I'm very far from a perfect person, but I was
still able to find things in my life that provided
me with fulfillment and listen, man, no matter where you're from,
no matter what you believe in, that is something that
people can connect on. And I'm talking like as a
person who's traveled all over the world to different continents,
different cultures. We're all looking for a sense of fulfillment.
(02:33):
And that doesn't necessarily mean becoming like a millionaire or
becoming a famous actor. But fulfillment comes in different ways.
And a lot of what I wrote about in the
book is about me trying to find out what the
hell that even is, Like, what is that?
Speaker 5 (02:47):
I don't know how to even identify that?
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
And you know, we've had this conversation before, a big
fans of you here on our show. We've gone all
the way from the beginning, from the Veguess days to
where you are.
Speaker 3 (02:59):
Now, what was it that you decided to.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Say, Okay, this is the time, let's write this thing.
Speaker 4 (03:05):
I had so many people reaching out to me asking
me how I rebounded from being released by WWE at
the time, and everyone, as I would kind of explain
it and explain what I had been through in my life,
that kind of helped me solidify an ideology or a
philosophy to put into place on how to deal with
situations and recover. They were like, you need to write
(03:27):
a book. And honestly, god man, it was like for
three weeks. It was like five or six people consecutively
for three weeks or telling me I need to write
a book. And when something like that happens and they
don't even know each other, like this wasn't a coordinated effort,
I said, the universe is trying to tell me something,
and I think it's trying to tell me to write
a book. And all over the course of my life,
people have always told me to write a book. But
(03:48):
I'm just being straight with you, like I'm not caring
cross right now.
Speaker 5 (03:52):
I didn't want to.
Speaker 4 (03:52):
Share my life with anybody like you want me to
tell you about, like all the relationships that I blew
and all the jobs that I lost. The hell would
I tell you about? Who wants to hear about that?
Like when you think about the pressure of making a
first impression, like in life, not like you know, writing
a book, you don't walk up to somebody at a
job interview or a stranger and be like, let me
tell you all of the things in my life that
(04:13):
I've completely screwed up. You would never do that, and
that's what I felt like the book was. But then
as I kind of like spent some more time thinking
about it and actually tried to write words to page,
I was like, no, man, now I get what people
are telling me. There's a silver lining in all of
these experiences because I just didn't see myself the same
way other people saw me.
Speaker 5 (04:30):
It's just my nature.
Speaker 4 (04:32):
So it was very cathartic and it was a big
It was a big leap in self development for me,
that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
Yeah, and definitely can't wait to get my hands on
a copy of this Life Is Fighting comes out August fifth. Now,
of course, when we sit here and we talk about this,
you're an open book, and a lot of stuff that
you talk about, you know, translated it from TV real
life experience.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
I want to know, as a wrestling fan, you've been.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Teasing what you've called a.
Speaker 3 (04:59):
World old altering reveale.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
You recently dropped that very eerie Kevin Sullivan voice message video.
Speaker 3 (05:08):
Can you give us a.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Little peak what's behind the mystique here and how can
soon how soon can fans expect the full truth?
Speaker 4 (05:18):
That all really depends on how feature over the next
thirty days. We'll have to just see kind of what happens.
But I mean the book coming out. I'm in the
process of writing the second book, and where everything lands
will be very telling as to where we go from now.
That's all I can say. But in regards to the
(05:38):
Kevin Sullivan voicemail that I had put in part two
of the Killer doc that's going to be coming out,
we're in the process of filming it right now, so
a little dark, but if you've read the book, this
is probably on brand for me. So I keep meaningful
voicemails that I've gotten from people. I have voicemails that
(05:59):
I've saved over like five, six, seven, eight years. That
was a voicemail that I would go back to and
I would listen to at very low points that I
was in and I just decided to share it. I've
got voicemails from a lot of people that I've always
kept that have passed away, and that voicemail that Kevin
left me a long time ago.
Speaker 5 (06:20):
I go back and listen to it every once in
a while.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Yeah, And when I was growing through social media and
I saw that you had posted that, I was like,
oh boy, something something definitely is about to happen. And
of course, again going back to it, we're big Carry
and Cross fans.
Speaker 3 (06:35):
I mean, we go back to the Killer days and
everything else in between.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
You know, you mentioned we kind of find some things
out in the next thirty days. And of course we've
seen those reports going on online that you and Scarlett
haven't you know, really resigned with WWE yet, And you know,
I want to hear from you because of course this
is the time that you can address those rumors that
everybody's been talking about online.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
Any truth to that or you know, would you like
to clear the air a bit for the IWC.
Speaker 5 (07:04):
I don't think I should talk about any of it
right now, but I am hoping that when the time
is right, everyone will know what's going on, including us.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
It's a very solid answer.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
And you know, again I just love to watch all
the things on the IWC, of like where can you
go here? But also you look at the IWC. Sometimes
it's negative, sometimes it's good in a way. For you,
It's been good because how many times, and we talked
about this last time we want Carrion the big pop
from coming out on main event.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
We talked about this last.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Time, you getting your T shirt on the homepage getting
sold at the merch stand. So it's a really cool
thing to see this, and it's like this organic movement
to get carrying cross on TV and you're kind of
seeing that now for like they're doing that for Carmelo.
Speaker 3 (07:50):
What's it like been.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
For you and Scarlett to see just the fan reaction
of like we want Carrion seeing your shirt sold out
and not being able to deliver to the end of July,
beginning of August and you got new shirts as well.
Speaker 5 (08:03):
Yeah, the shirts selling out in the building too. Man.
Speaker 4 (08:08):
It's We're very honored and we feel very lucky to
be seen because we are standing next to so much talent,
so many different extraordinary people. We're standing right next to them,
and to be seen as unique and different and to
stand out among those people, it's just very humbling, but
(08:29):
also it's very motivating. It's very invigorating, and we just
want to give more. We are finally being seen for
what we can really do, and people haven't even seen
yet what we can really do. It's been a while,
so I'm just looking forward to giving it my all.
(08:50):
I love WWE, I love the Universe. And I have
every intention of giving people what they want if I'm
allowed to, and if I'm not, I'm still going to
find a way to give them what they want.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
I think also, by the way, we're going to get
what we want this weekend at SummerSlam. Any thoughts heading
into that before we let you go?
Speaker 4 (09:12):
Yeah, I'm one hundred percent going to attempt to punch
a hole through the back of Sandy's head.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
There you have it right there, Karen Cross is going
to punch a hole in the back of Sammy Zane's
edit SummerSlam this weekend, Life is Fighting. It drops August fifth.
We cannot wait to get our hands on the book
before we let you go. Is there anything you want
to say to people watching or listening to this right now?
Speaker 4 (09:31):
I see you all, and I appreciate you all, and
I cannot thank you enough for your support to be
seen and heard when that's all I've really ever wanted
to do for you in your form of entertainment that
is pro wrestling. I'm living out my dream and I
can't thank.
Speaker 5 (09:46):
You guys enough for that. I'm going to give you
everything I've got.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Well, Carrie and Man, it's an honor and a privilege
to get you back here on the show. Everybody right now,
if you're watching or listening to this right now, go
pre order Life Is Fighting. Go to Barnes and Noble,
your local bookstore wherever, pick up a copy, pick up
five copies, and pick up ten copies. They'll be good gifts.
And also make sure you support carrying Cross through all
platforms social media, and buy his T shirt. To buy
(10:13):
his book and a T shirt. They make good Christmas
stocking stuffers.
Speaker 5 (10:17):
Yeah, Doomsday, I'll be Doomsday.
Welcome to the Battleground Podcast, you play and exclusive interviews
with some of your favorite wrestlers.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Podcast stop It, What's up you guys? Welcome back into
iHeartRadio's official wrestling podcast, The Battleground Podcast. At his Battle
from one oh five nine The Rock, Nashville's classic rock station.
And a guy that, uh, we've had on the show before.
We recently just had him on. We always love talking
(00:38):
to him because he has thoughtful answers.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Give it up for the one the only to carry
and cross joining us today, Karen, how are you doing, sir?
Speaker 4 (00:44):
I'm doing very good. They just let me out of
the mental institution. They said, what do you want to do.
I said, look, just get me a triple espresso and
take me back to Battleground. That's what I want to
do right now. And they said, no problem. Just don't
hit anybody with a steel chair.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Hey, you know what, We've got some people in the office.
If you want to go hit some of them, I'll
point them out. If you want to go do that.
Speaker 5 (01:02):
Yeah, absolutely no problem.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
So let me know for sure. I will do that
for sure. So let's talk about it.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Because you got a book coming out, your memoir Life
is Fighting Drops August fifth. You're narrating it yourself for
audible sharing some deeply personal struggles.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Now, I've got to ask, what do you hope.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Readers walk away from knowing about Kevin that they wouldn't
get from seeing Carrion in the Ring?
Speaker 4 (01:29):
That Kevin is an imperfect person who didn't have a
perfect handout in life, that didn't come from a privileged background,
and still achieved what he wanted to do since he
was a little kid. And I think something that people
can take from that is like you don't have to
wait for a perfect hand to jump into the game
and play it. And I don't want to come off
(01:51):
cheesy or come off like you know, like not sincere,
but like the truth is is like you have to
you have to that on yourself, and you have to
find self love and you have to be able to
find that balance of knowing when to push yourself and
when to back off, and all of that type of
stuff is in the book that you're going to find
(02:11):
out about me. Like I've made plenty of mistakes in life.
I'm very far from a perfect person, but I was
still able to find things in my life that provided
me with fulfillment and listen, man, no matter where you're from,
no matter what you believe in, that is something that
people can connect on. And I'm talking like as a
person who's traveled all over the world to different continents,
different cultures. We're all looking for a sense of fulfillment.
(02:33):
And that doesn't necessarily mean becoming like a millionaire or
becoming a famous actor. But fulfillment comes in different ways.
And a lot of what I wrote about in the
book is about me trying to find out what the
hell that even is, Like, what is that?
Speaker 5 (02:47):
I don't know how to even identify that?
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
And you know, we've had this conversation before, a big
fans of you here on our show. We've gone all
the way from the beginning, from the Veguess days to
where you are.
Speaker 3 (02:59):
Now, what was it that you decided to.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Say, Okay, this is the time, let's write this thing.
Speaker 4 (03:05):
I had so many people reaching out to me asking
me how I rebounded from being released by WWE at
the time, and everyone, as I would kind of explain
it and explain what I had been through in my life,
that kind of helped me solidify an ideology or a
philosophy to put into place on how to deal with
situations and recover. They were like, you need to write
(03:27):
a book. And honestly, god man, it was like for
three weeks. It was like five or six people consecutively
for three weeks or telling me I need to write
a book. And when something like that happens and they
don't even know each other, like this wasn't a coordinated effort,
I said, the universe is trying to tell me something,
and I think it's trying to tell me to write
a book. And all over the course of my life,
people have always told me to write a book. But
(03:48):
I'm just being straight with you, like I'm not caring
cross right now.
Speaker 5 (03:52):
I didn't want to.
Speaker 4 (03:52):
Share my life with anybody like you want me to
tell you about, like all the relationships that I blew
and all the jobs that I lost. The hell would
I tell you about? Who wants to hear about that?
Like when you think about the pressure of making a
first impression, like in life, not like you know, writing
a book, you don't walk up to somebody at a
job interview or a stranger and be like, let me
tell you all of the things in my life that
(04:13):
I've completely screwed up. You would never do that, and
that's what I felt like the book was. But then
as I kind of like spent some more time thinking
about it and actually tried to write words to page,
I was like, no, man, now I get what people
are telling me. There's a silver lining in all of
these experiences because I just didn't see myself the same
way other people saw me.
Speaker 5 (04:30):
It's just my nature.
Speaker 4 (04:32):
So it was very cathartic and it was a big
It was a big leap in self development for me,
that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
Yeah, and definitely can't wait to get my hands on
a copy of this Life Is Fighting comes out August fifth. Now,
of course, when we sit here and we talk about this,
you're an open book, and a lot of stuff that
you talk about, you know, translated it from TV real
life experience.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
I want to know, as a wrestling fan, you've been.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Teasing what you've called a.
Speaker 3 (04:59):
World old altering reveale.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
You recently dropped that very eerie Kevin Sullivan voice message video.
Speaker 3 (05:08):
Can you give us a.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Little peak what's behind the mystique here and how can
soon how soon can fans expect the full truth?
Speaker 4 (05:18):
That all really depends on how feature over the next
thirty days. We'll have to just see kind of what happens.
But I mean the book coming out. I'm in the
process of writing the second book, and where everything lands
will be very telling as to where we go from now.
That's all I can say. But in regards to the
(05:38):
Kevin Sullivan voicemail that I had put in part two
of the Killer doc that's going to be coming out,
we're in the process of filming it right now, so
a little dark, but if you've read the book, this
is probably on brand for me. So I keep meaningful
voicemails that I've gotten from people. I have voicemails that
(05:59):
I've saved over like five, six, seven, eight years. That
was a voicemail that I would go back to and
I would listen to at very low points that I
was in and I just decided to share it. I've
got voicemails from a lot of people that I've always
kept that have passed away, and that voicemail that Kevin
left me a long time ago.
Speaker 5 (06:20):
I go back and listen to it every once in
a while.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Yeah, And when I was growing through social media and
I saw that you had posted that, I was like,
oh boy, something something definitely is about to happen. And
of course, again going back to it, we're big Carry
and Cross fans.
Speaker 3 (06:35):
I mean, we go back to the Killer days and
everything else in between.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
You know, you mentioned we kind of find some things
out in the next thirty days. And of course we've
seen those reports going on online that you and Scarlett
haven't you know, really resigned with WWE yet, And you know,
I want to hear from you because of course this
is the time that you can address those rumors that
everybody's been talking about online.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
Any truth to that or you know, would you like
to clear the air a bit for the IWC.
Speaker 5 (07:04):
I don't think I should talk about any of it
right now, but I am hoping that when the time
is right, everyone will know what's going on, including us.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
It's a very solid answer.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
And you know, again I just love to watch all
the things on the IWC, of like where can you
go here? But also you look at the IWC. Sometimes
it's negative, sometimes it's good in a way. For you,
It's been good because how many times, and we talked
about this last time we want Carrion the big pop
from coming out on main event.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
We talked about this last.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Time, you getting your T shirt on the homepage getting
sold at the merch stand. So it's a really cool
thing to see this, and it's like this organic movement
to get carrying cross on TV and you're kind of
seeing that now for like they're doing that for Carmelo.
Speaker 3 (07:50):
What's it like been.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
For you and Scarlett to see just the fan reaction
of like we want Carrion seeing your shirt sold out
and not being able to deliver to the end of July,
beginning of August and you got new shirts as well.
Speaker 5 (08:03):
Yeah, the shirts selling out in the building too. Man.
Speaker 4 (08:08):
It's We're very honored and we feel very lucky to
be seen because we are standing next to so much talent,
so many different extraordinary people. We're standing right next to them,
and to be seen as unique and different and to
stand out among those people, it's just very humbling, but
(08:29):
also it's very motivating. It's very invigorating, and we just
want to give more. We are finally being seen for
what we can really do, and people haven't even seen
yet what we can really do. It's been a while,
so I'm just looking forward to giving it my all.
(08:50):
I love WWE, I love the Universe. And I have
every intention of giving people what they want if I'm
allowed to, and if I'm not, I'm still going to
find a way to give them what they want.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
I think also, by the way, we're going to get
what we want this weekend at SummerSlam. Any thoughts heading
into that before we let you go?
Speaker 4 (09:12):
Yeah, I'm one hundred percent going to attempt to punch
a hole through the back of Sandy's head.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
There you have it right there, Karen Cross is going
to punch a hole in the back of Sammy Zane's
edit SummerSlam this weekend, Life is Fighting. It drops August fifth.
We cannot wait to get our hands on the book
before we let you go. Is there anything you want
to say to people watching or listening to this right now?
Speaker 4 (09:31):
I see you all, and I appreciate you all, and
I cannot thank you enough for your support to be
seen and heard when that's all I've really ever wanted
to do for you in your form of entertainment that
is pro wrestling. I'm living out my dream and I
can't thank.
Speaker 5 (09:46):
You guys enough for that. I'm going to give you
everything I've got.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Well, Carrie and Man, it's an honor and a privilege
to get you back here on the show. Everybody right now,
if you're watching or listening to this right now, go
pre order Life Is Fighting. Go to Barnes and Noble,
your local bookstore wherever, pick up a copy, pick up
five copies, and pick up ten copies. They'll be good gifts.
And also make sure you support carrying Cross through all
platforms social media, and buy his T shirt. To buy
(10:13):
his book and a T shirt. They make good Christmas
stocking stuffers.
Speaker 5 (10:17):
Yeah, Doomsday, I'll be Doomsday.
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