Titus O’Neil recently spoke with the folks from the Tampa Bay Times for an interview after the news went public that he will be the first WWE Superstar to be the recipient of the Warrior Award at the WWE Hall Of Fame induction ceremony scheduled as part of WrestleMania 37 Week.

During the interview, the WWE veteran spoke about his philanthropic efforts in the Tampa Bay region, his charitable contributions to his community and what it means to be the first WWE Superstar to be given the honor.

Featured below are some of the highlights of the new Titus O’Neil interview.

On his philanthropic efforts in the Tampa Bay region and working hard to make the place better during the pandemic: “Everybody knows that I’m someone who just wants to do the work. I don’t care who I need to work with, as long as the work is done, as long as people’s lives are changed, that environments have been made better — whether it be a school environment or health environment, whatever it may be. I’m about change, real transformational change, not transactional change.”

On being the guiding force behind a virtual Back-To-School Bash at Amalie Arena in Tampa back in August and paying for four funerals this year: “I’m in a position to kind of connect folks that already are either joining the work or want to do more. Some people don’t want to donate to large organizations because they don’t know where the money is going. With our foundation, they don’t have any question where the money’s going, I don’t have any overhead. I have one staff member that’s paid and so they can look at my books any day of the week that they want and they see 98 percent of the funds that we bring in and the resources we’re bringing in go right back out into the community. And that’s a great position to be in.”

On what being the recipient of the Warrior Award means to him as the first WWE Superstar to be given the honor, with past recipients including the inaugural Conor Michalek, journalist Joan Lunden, paralyzed football player Eric LeGrand, as well as Sue Aitchison, a longtime WWE employee who oversaw the company’s Make-A-Wish requests: “This first is so much bigger because it means that I impacted a lot of people’s lives, both inside our locker room, our company, but most importantly outside with our fans and our supporters and our partners. This award is right up there with being nominated with the Muhammad Ali Sports Humanitarian Award from ESPN. This has been one of those awards that really is about character. It’s about leaders. It’s about people that see you as a great human being.”

Check out the complete interview at TampaBay.com.

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