GCW Called Out For Owing Longtime Announcer Kevin Gill Money

Game Changer Wrestling is known for a lot of things. They will sometimes host deathmatch affairs, and you never know who will show up there next. GCW became the stomping ground for many as they prove themselves on the indies, but now they’re getting called out for jipping talent.

Kevin Gill claims that GCW has not paid him for an appearance fee. He kept the amount of money out of the conversation, but Gill made it very clear that they did business, and he believes that GCW did not hold up their end of the deal.

While speaking on the Business of the Business podcast, Gill detailed his GCW departure. He said that the company owes him money as well.

“This is something that I never really addressed in any interviews or anything. It’s sad, in a way. It hurts a lot. I think you’re seeing it now. At first it was, ‘It’s just Smart Mark Video that can’t get along with Brett (Lauderdale).’ Then it’s ‘Oh, it’s just Rickey Shane Page. It’s just Eric Ryan.’ Now it’s, ‘Oh, Kevin is a problem. Alex Colon is a problem.’ It makes you wonder, are all of us a problem or is the problem something else? For me, GCW is something that I loved whole-heartedly, I gave my heart and soul.”

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“I worked a lot behind the scenes with Brett and putting stuff together and the logistics of events and anything I could do because I truly felt like this was something we were doing. Like, we are the revolution. At the end of the day, my issue, I guess I don’t have a definitive feeling in the end because I have an unresolved issue with GCW in that, I’m owed money by GCW and I haven’t spoken about that. To say I’ve given a myriad of time, this goes back to the summer and fall of last year that I was inquiring about this money, needing this money. I was about to move back east and I was in a tough situation for life. You get that wake up call, ‘Oh, no one matters at all, everyone is interchangeable, commentary doesn’t matter.’ Ask anyone who watches wrestling, I’ve been watching the A&E Biography stuff. Every moment is punctuated by the commentary. Those are part of the moments.”

“To me, it’s weird to cut their throat or step on them over ego, greed, semantics, whatever it might be. Business is business. The friend side of me, the brother side of me, you want to see your friend get his head out of his ass, do the right thing, make things right. Every day that passes, you’re like, wow, this person literally wakes up every day, knowing the situation. They put out a thing saying I had signed a contract with them during this time, which I thought was mean spirited and it affected my ability to get work.”

“It’s hard for me to fully understand it all. I can say that because this is a business and people make agreements and there are terms to those agreements, I’m happy to go to use the resources available to all people when they need to resolve matters. There is a pretty clear-cut matter between myself and GCW and I find it horrific that they’ve done nothing to address it and have left it like ‘wink wink.’ They’ll tweet stuff like ‘Kevin can come by and do commentary.’ It’s misleading and bad form considering what I contributed. Even though I did a lot behind the scenes, I’m still a small part of the overall thing. The talent, to me, is always paramount. Seeing that talent, sometimes, be utilized to their maximum and explode in a crescendo of wrestling greatness, there are just as many people like, ‘Why is this person sitting at home every weekend? They are one of our core guys. Why don’t we book them?’ Now, we’re seeing more and more of that unfold because wrestlers, like commentators, they are very loyal, but the old saying is, ‘Listen when someone tells you who they are.’ If someone tells you that you’re of no value, that they have no friends, that they don’t believe in loyalty, believe them. If you don’t believe them, you can end up getting caught out there. There is a list of wrestlers and production people that were part of it, that aren’t part of it anymore. All ended suddenly or with the same core issues. It’s a blemish on what would be, otherwise, a truly incredible and revolutionary thing.”

According to Kevin Gill, many fans have a nostalgic appreciation for the early days of Game Changer Wrestling before the promotion began running shows at the Hammerstein Ballroom. During this time, GCW cemented its status as the top independent wrestling promotion in the industry.

“It is overall disappointing and I hate that I have to be put into this situation where I have to resort to business means to handle what shouldn’t need to be escalated to that level because you’re friends. You’re supposed to be friends and brothers through all this. To me, in the end, it was very hurtful and it was at a time where my girlfriend was spending alot of time in New York with her dad, who was sick at the time, I’m sitting alone at home in California, dying to work, dying to do shows. Not booked for Japan, England, LA. It just becomes, if you want to fuck me, first you have to kiss me. You can’t shit on my head and tell me it’s raining. That’s truly how I feel.”

This is an interesting story, but GCW has not publicly commented on these accusations. We’ll have to see if they finally pay up, because it’s not good business to hold payment for any reason.

We’ll have to see what’s next for GCW, because they have certainly evolved. A lot of their hardcore fans might remember the older days with a lot of nostalgia, because they are undoubtably getting a lot more attention right now.

What’s your take on GCW changing as a company? Do you miss the early days of the company with more hardcore action? Sound off in the comments!