Joe Hendry Wants To Compete At Josh Barnett’s Bloodsport, ‘It’s The One Indie I’d Do If I Could’

Joe Hendry discusses his Judo background and his aspiration to compete one day at Josh Barnett’s Bloodsport.

Although Joe Hendry’s fun-loving presentation contrasts with the grit of Josh Barnett’s Bloodsport, both Hendry and Bloodsport have been committed to breaking down barriers in the wrestling industry and are key players in WWE’s recent initiative to collaborate with other promotions, allowing their talent to wrestle outside the WWE Universe occasionally.

Additionally, Joe’s Judo background has played a significant role in his professional wrestling journey, as he shared in a recent interview with Fightful’s Sean Ross Sapp about how that experience has aided him. 

“I started Judo at like six years old. I quit around 13 to do acting classes, and then I got into music. When I was about 18 or 19, I got back into judo pretty seriously. I was one of the training partners for — there was a really high-level team there,” he said. “I never went to the Olympics or anything like that, but I was trained with those guys fairly frequently. I got to a pretty decent level at judo, got my black belt, moved on, did university, and then, after becoming a pro wrestler, I was very dissatisfied with the way I was being booked at the time. I was like, ‘Right, I have to go out there and legitimize myself.’ At 26, 27, I went out there and started amateur wrestling and won the freestyle and Greco-Roman championships in Britain. Competed in the Commonwealth Games as well.

“Yes. I knew how to bump immediately because of Judo. That was a huge advantage,” he continued. “Just the way that I wrestle now, it is very much for the biggest reaction from the audience and to drive the story forward. I do a lot less of the mat wrestling that I used to do, and I miss it sometimes, and I’m just waiting for the right moment to reintroduce it to show people what I can actually do with grappling. It certainly did help with professional wrestling. Also, just having the confidence to handle myself if things ever go south in the ring as well.”

Joe Hendry says there was a time that he would have liked to parlay his experience with Judo into an appearance at Josh Barnett’s Bloodsport. Unfortunately, though, when he was looking for that spot, Bloodsport wasn’t ready for him. Still, he says that he and Josh Barnett have spoken about it for years, and Bloodsport is the one independent wrestling show he would like to do.

“Yeah, I would love to have done it. Unfortunately, there was a period of time where I wanted to do it but Bloodsport wasn’t ready to have me. Then, everything blew up and then we just couldn’t make the dates work out after that. My plan to convince Josh Barnett to allow me in Bloodsport. To be fair, he did say, ‘You’re on the list man.’ We just didn’t get to the point where it matched up. I’m super sad that I didn’t get to do it. I would love to do Bloodsport if I could do — if there’s one independent booking that I could do, cause right now I’m super busy, but if there’s one independent wrestling show that I could do, it would be Bloodsport. Me and Josh Barnett have been talking about this for years now. I would love to make it happen. I think people would see a different side of me, I think it would be super fun.”

Elsewhere in the interview, Joe Hendry reflected on wrestling Randy Orton at WrestleMania 41 and the advice he received from Triple H that night. Read those comments here.

Check out the full interview with Joe Hendry embedded above.