Leon Slater TNA on AMC, A.J. Styles mentorship, John Cena toast

Leon Slater grew up a self-proclaimed “TNA kid” in England. Now, at 21, he is one of the rising stars in the company as it kicks off its new television deal, live weekly on AMC, starting Thursday at 9 p.m. The high-flying X-Division champion took time for some Q&A with The Post’s Joseph Staszewski before the debut show, which will also feature WWE star A.J. Styles. 

(Edited for clarity and length)

Q: How does the roster look at being the caretakers of this opportunity, where there is a greater level of exposure for TNA on AMC, and obviously, a chance to raise the ceiling on what the company can be?

A: TNA has kind of been this hidden gem in professional wrestling in the last couple of years. But I think in the last couple of years, we’ve really come into our own. Whether that was back in the Impact days when Josh Alexander and “Speedball” Mike Bailey and Jordynne Grace started coming to their own, which carried us over into this new era of TNA, where I feel like people like the Mike Santanas, the Joe Hendrys, people like myself have all stepped up to kind of carry that momentum forward. I know definitely for myself, I know definitely for the rest of the locker room and the rest of management in general, that we’re going to smash this AMC debut out of the park and show people what we’ve been working on for the past four or five years.