I didn’t even know that my contract was coming up, to be honest. All this stuff happened with the termination of Scott D’Amore and stuff like that. And I looked at my contract, I was like, ‘Oh man, February 14? That’s like in three days. That’s weird.’

So I had to inform Anthem that my deal was lapsed and they had 10 days to pick up the option if they wanted to. And, you know, if you don’t ask, you might never find out. So I certainly asked if they could not pick up my option and we could negotiate something different, because I feel like I’ve outworked that contract I signed. But, you know, it was a team option. It’s something that the ball is in their court. I signed the deal. And it was totally within their rights to pick it up, and I’m completely fine with them picking it up. Like, it’s still a good deal. It’s not something that I’m upset about by any stretch. But just to read tweets and stuff [saying] like, I’m being held hostage and all this stuff and forced to stay here against my will – that’s not the case.

I signed that deal two years ago. I knew what I was signing when I signed it. At the end of the day, at the end of my career, I want to be able to look in the mirror, hold my head high, and say that I carried myself as a professional first and foremost above anything else I do in this business. I want to say I did things right. And I signed that deal, I’m going to honor that deal, and we’ll see what happens in the next 12 months. Something could be renegotiated for something long-term in the meantime. Anthem has certainly mentioned that they would be interested in something like that. But, at the same time, I thought it would be cool for the first time in my career to kind of hit free agency and see what I was worth on the open market and then renegotiate then and see what could happen then.

But, yeah, I’m totally cool here staying in TNA. I’ve dreamt of being in TNA since I was a 15-year-old kid and I tuned in on Wednesday nights for the first time. So for that to happen, finally get in a TNA ring at the Palms for Hard to Kill and then the next day against Will Ospreay for Snake Eyes. Man, that’s a dream come true. So I want to see this thing through and I will for the next 11 months or whatever it is and then we’ll see where we go from there. But – not being held hostage [laughs]. That’s a little too dramatic for me.