Powerhouse Hobbs has opened up about the dire straits he was in looking for work when out of the blue a text message from QT Marshall changed his life forever.
Hobbs joined AEW in July 2020 working primarily on Dark and joining the ranks of wrestlers making noise at ringside in lieu of fans. An outing in the Casino Battle Royal at All Out in September seemed to be the catalyst for Hobbs officially signing with AEW later that month.
It wasn’t long before Hobbs found a family in All Elite Wrestling as he joined up with Brian Cage, Ricky Starks, and Hook in Team Taz. Now going by Powerhouse Hobbs, Taz’s hired muscle has made waves and impressed many in his matches.
Things were not always so easy for Will Hobbs as he explained to Renee Paquette on her Oral Sessions podcast. The father of three was brought in to AEW at a time when he was struggling to find ways to put food on the table.
Hobbs explained:
“So I actually started off training at APW, which is All Pro Wrestling, here in the Bay Area. Cody did a show at the Cow Palace – so that’s where I first met Cody, and then I ran into Cody again at a couple more Bay Area shows. He got pretty tight with the owner and promoter of the company. Out of nowhere I get a text from QT Marshall, I looked at my phone, read it, I let it sit for two hours because I thought someone was messing with me. I just got laid off from work and I thought somebody was messing with me, I responded back and that was it.”
“[…] I got laid off in March and I didn’t go to APW in July and my daughter was born in May but it’s like ‘whoa, man, what am I going to do?’, But I gotta do whatever I got to do to put food on the table. Fast-food restaurants wouldn’t even have me like they wouldn’t even call me back.”
Since joining AEW, Hobbs has gotten involved with The Icon Sting as Team Taz hounded Sting and Darby Allin for months. More recently he stepped into the ring with Christian Cage, falling to defeat at the hands of a Kill Switch.