A current WWE announcer does not believe that their time on Monday Night Raw was a success.
From September 2019 to January 2020, Vic Joseph served as the lead announcer for the flagship show as part of the latest commentary shake-up that saw Michael Cole announce SmackDown on Fox.
Despite what others have told him about his short stint on Raw, Joseph still feels that he failed the task that was given to him. Appearing on Cheap Heat with Peter Rosenberg, Joseph looked back on his commentary stint and stated that he views it as a failure even if Paul Heyman thought otherwise:
I look at it (Raw commentary stint) as a failure because if it wasn’t a failure, I’d still be doing the show. That’s how I look at it and so, I didn’t do my job and because I didn’t do my job up to the ability of certain individuals, they had to make a decision. I thank Paul Heyman for giving me that opportunity.
I just saw Paul recently at Raw and we always go back-and-forth and I always pick his brain but he always tells me, ‘You didn’t fail.’ Every time I see him, he goes, ‘Hey, just remember, you didn’t fail. It just was a bad situation.’ I look at it a little bit differently because I’m always a little bit harder on myself.”
Continuing, Joseph was more complimentary of his current skills as he feels that his current work far surpasses that of 5 years ago:
“But man, I can tell you if you go back and listen to 2019 Vic Joseph and you listen to 2024 Vic Joseph, it is night and frickin’ day, because when I was doing Raw, I couldn’t handle doing a graphic and a transition and getting back into the calling the match and I was working with Jerry Lawler, at the time, who’s seen it all and it was moving so fast. You were talking about football. (Jayden) Daniels is the quarterback for the (Washington) Commanders. It’s slowed down already for him.
But man, when I got in there, I was like that number one pick and everything was moving so fast and I just wasn’t doing fundamentals. I was out of my comfort zone and to get taken from that show and to do what I’m doing now, I do all the graphics, I do all the transitions, I do all the kicks, I do all the sends and all that and that is by design and that (is) what I’ve taken the most from it is people listening go, ‘Man, that’s smooth. You’ve gotten so much better.’
I had to or I wouldn’t be here and then that’s just the honest to God’s truth about it and so I took a lot from that Raw run that-that had to happen for me to get to where I am now. It had to happen.
Vic Joseph Discusses Working With Booker T On WWE NXT
Joining NXT later in 2020, Joseph was later joined by Booker T as part of the NXT commentary line-up as the show entered a new era. Also in the interview, Vic Joseph revealed the advice he was given by Cody Rhodes about working with Booker T.
H/t to Post Wrestling.