TV Tango: As host of OFF THE HOOK, you're using your wrestling name, but are you using your wrestling persona or your own real-life personality?

'Showtime' Eric Young: I think it's kind of a mixture of the two. It's not totally me, but it's not totally my crazy wrestling persona. It's a good mix -- a mix that almost anybody can follow, not just wrestling fans. It's probably more my real personality than my wrestling personality.

TV Tango: Did you consider using only your wrestling persona for the whole show?

'Showtime' Eric Young: I don't think anybody can sustain that craziness for that long.

TV Tango: Prior to this series, how much experience did you have fishing or as an outdoorsman?

'Showtime' Eric Young: As an outdoorsman, lots. I grew up in the country in Canada, and my dad took me fishing and stuff a lot.

As far as fishing goes, novice, at best. Just catching small catfish and pickerel -- just little things like that with bobbers and stuff. I got out of it when I got into wrestling training and that got me down the other path of pro wrestling; so I didn't have the time, nor the money, to fish. If you want to do it at a high level, it's a full commitment.

This [hosting job] kind of fell into my lap and I went after it. It's been awesome.

TV Tango: What rod and reel do you personally own?

'Showtime' Eric Young: Actually, I don't own any rods and reels myself.

A lot of the [fishing] styles that we do don't even involve rods and reels -- it's really kind of fringe stuff that most people haven't even heard of, which makes it impossible to own all of the equipment for it anyways. I've been spear-fishing, and some of those guns can run up into the $2,000 range.

TV Tango: While filming the series, which fishing excursion was your favorite?

'Showtime' Eric Young: I think so far my favorite was free-dive spear fishing. That was the thing I enjoyed the most -- just the physicality of it. I like to be challenged. I'm not a competitive person, like one-on-one against people, but I like to compete against myself. I like to challenge myself. Learning to hold your breath long enough to be able to do that -- to be able to dive down and learn to shoot the gun accurately. That was my favorite so far.

We did that in the waters of New York in the Long Island Sound. There's a current there called The Race, and there's a huge ledge in the ocean -- I want to say it goes from about 200-feet to about 70-feet -- and the water just rips across it. There are waves in the middle of the ocean, but it looks like you're standing on a beach.

TV Tango: If that was your favorite, which adventure was the most dangerous?

'Showtime' Eric Young: It could've been that one -- free-dive spear fishing. The current was unbelievable at The Race. Where I trained it wasn't, and where I got one of the fish it wasn't that bad. But when I dove at The Race, I was probably about 40 feet in depth and the current was just unbelievable. One time it flipped me end over end.

That one, and sharks from a paddleboard is nothing to laugh at either, I suppose. From the paddleboard, we caught a six-foot lemon shark.

And we did shark fishing with ladies' pantyhose, where we caught a seven-foot nurse shark.

TV Tango: The promo for the series mentions urban fishing. Did you do that in Long Island Sound too or was that something entirely different?

'Showtime' Eric Young: Urban fishing was actually right in the city of New York. The skyline is right there. Ferry boats are coming out and shuttling people back and forth. We were right in the middle of the city, I believe on Pier 5. We were fishing for striped bass, but we caught an assortment of stuff: bluefish and all kinds of crazy stuff.

TV Tango: Are you done filming all of Season 1?

'Showtime' Eric Young: No, we have three episodes left. I leave to Peoria, IL on July 27. Then I'll go home for like a day. Then I'm going to San Francisco, where I'm going free-diving for abalone. Then I'll go home for another day. Then I'll go to Cape Cod, where I'm going kayak fishing for bluefin tuna. In the middle of August, the shooting schedule will be done. We'll actually be working the day the show premieres.

TV Tango: Thinking ahead to Season 2 -- let's assume the show does well and it gets picked up -- what crazy stuff would you want to do next season that you haven't already done, or have planned to do, in Season 1?

'Showtime' Eric Young: They have all kinds of stuff lined up -- one of them is under-ice free diving. There's a place in Canada where there's a tournament that they cut a hole in the ice with chainsaws, and then they use a line that goes under the ice so you can follow it back to the hole. But you do free diving under the ice. That just sounds insane to me.

All kinds of other stuff lined up, and I don't remember [all of them]. They kind of showed me that they had 12 episodes loosely lined up -- all these ideas that they had in mind -- but that is the only one I could really remember.

TV Tango: On Twitter you told fans every time you were filming. What were some of your fans most outrageous suggestions for extreme fishing outings?

'Showtime' Eric Young: A lot of the time, they just want to go with me. They just want to know where I am, and then go "Man, I want to go fishing with you so bad." A lot of times they say "We should go here and we can catch catfish."

I say the show is about fishing, but it's about crazy kinds of fishing and styles of fishing. It's not so much about what you catch as it as about how you catch it. It's about American ingenuity and the most inventive ways to catch fish.

TV Tango: Right, the show's clearly not about a guy with a rod and reel traveling across America catching catfish.

'Showtime' Eric Young: Yeah, I have nothing to offer in that kind of a show. I'm a novice fisherman, at best, and that's better for someone who is a professional fisherman. This [series] is just a good television show, and if you like fishing, then it's a plus.

TV Tango: Now that you're a certified diver, are you going to use that skill on your own personal time?

'Showtime' Eric Young: Absolutely, yeah. Scuba diving is actually something I've always wanted to do.

I took it in gym class in high school. We did a short class where we did an introduction to diving, where you dive in a pool. I wanted to pursue it, but it's an expensive sport, as well growing up in the middle of Ontario, Canada, where the closest ocean is miles and miles and miles away.

Now I'm advanced certified, and it's definitely something I plan on doing outside of this show.

TV Tango: Do you plan on getting certified for wreck diving or anything else?

'Showtime' Eric Young: Yeah, that's next on the list. I want to be able to do wreck diving. I heard there's a really cool one just outside The Outer Banks. It's like an old warship.

TV Tango: What about the series will surprise your wrestling fans?

'Showtime' Eric Young: That I can be normal, I think. That I can be normal, according to me, I suppose. I've never been normal, but they're used to crazy wrestling Eric Young. That's the only person they ever see. A lot of them expect me to be like that all the time -- that would just be exhausting and that would be very difficult, in life, to be like that.

I think that will surprise them the most -- the fact that I can kind of blend in to actual society.

TV Tango: Speaking of your wrestling, what initally attracted you to wrestling when you were in high school?

'Showtime' Eric Young: I've been a fan since I was six. I just liked the personalities, the big characters, and the storylines. I would like somebody, and then I would start to care about them,  and then you don't like this guy. Stuff like that. That's what really attracted me to it.

As I grew up, I had always been a pretty good athlete. I played hockey at a pretty high level. If I had concentrated on it, I probably could've played professional rugby overseas -- that will always be my "What if?" I think in my life. I was going to choose that or choose wrestling, and I chose wrestling.

Just the physicality of it. It combines my two loves of athletics and entertainment. It's a perfect blend for me.

TV Tango: Did you choose wrestling over boxing because it's more athletic? Based on one of your tweets, it seems you think boxing now is fake enough to have entertainment value.

TV Tango: So what are your thoughts about the Pacquiao-Bradley bout?

TV Tango: How'd you get your nickname 'Showtime'?

'Showtime' Eric Young: When I first started wrestling, I had this grand idea that I wanted to be 'The Director' Eric Young. I was going to be a bad guy, but the name didn't flow and it didn't stick.

At an independent level, it's very difficult to have a really designed character like that because they don't know you. The first time they see you is the first time they've ever seen you -- so either you're a good guy or a bad guy but you're really just kind of a wrestler.

So a group of fans in the Niagara Falls area that I wrestled for almost every month kind of coined me 'Showtime.' It just kind of started then and it stuck.

TV Tango: You're filming OFF THE HOOK through the middle of August. When can fans expect to see you back wrestling on Thursday nights?

'Showtime' Eric Young: Mid-August to the end of August, I'll be back to wrestling full time, and me and my wife will be up to something, I'm sure.

TV Tango: Talking about your wife, how's married life?

'Showtime' Eric Young: It's interesting, I haven't seen her in five months. Apparently, I'm not good at being married.

TV Tango: Any lingering issues from your surgery last month?

'Showtime' Eric Young: Nope, none. That was number 15 or 16. I've lost track.

It's just a day surgery. It's in and out. It's a nuisance, but it could be way worse. There are people who have to go through way worse than that. I count my blessings in that I can go in and out. My voice came back really quick this time.

TV Tango: I know you're a fan of European football. Any predictions for Olympic soccer?

'Showtime' Eric Young: I would say Brazil or Spain. [Editor's note: Eric made these predictions before soccer started at the Olympic Games, and, unfortunately, Spain has already been eliminated, but Brazil is still going strong.]

[For the women,] it's hard to go against the USA.

TV Tango: What TV shows are currently on your DVR?

'Showtime' Eric Young: HATFIELDS & MCCOYS I haven't watched yet. SO YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE is one of my favorite TV shows because people have dedicated themselves to something and it's their big chance. I don't know, there's just something about the athletics of dancing, and the way they can tell stories with dancing is super cool. FALLING SKIES is definitely on there -- I haven't seen any of this season. 

TV Tango: If you could portray any character in TV history, which one would you choose?

'Showtime' Eric Young: I've always dreamt of being in a Western movie; so I would be Doc Holliday or Wyatt Earp. I guess they're real characters but they are fictionalized.