Yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, YO!

One of the hottest tag teams in World Wrestling Entertainment the last couple of months have been Cryme Tyme.

Shad and JTG have been wrestling in the WWE since their debut in 2006 and quickly moved up the ranks as one of the most popular tag teams within the WWE Univerise.

This Sunday at Summerslam (Live on PPV at 8:00PM EST/5:oo PM PST), Shad and JTG will compete for the Unified WWE Tag Team Championship when they square off against Chris Jericho and The Big Show.

Cryme Tyme took time out before the biggest match in their young career to chat with BET.com about life on the road, Twitter Nation and the additions of Slam Master J and Eve Torres.

Word up.

On how they came up with the Cryme Tyme gimmick:

Shad: Cryme Tyme really isn’t a gimmick. It’s just me and JTG having out there. A lot of people might think just because we wear Timberlands and jeans that we are a gimmick. I wear Timberlands and jeans when I’m walking around the house and going out chillin.

JTG: We are actually ourselves with the volume turned really up.

On how they met in Ohio Valley Wrestling:

Shad: I was already down there training and JTG was riding a Greyhound bus from New York City to Louisville, Kentucky every weekend for his training. Once he was full time, we had a good chemistry so we started tagging together. It turned into what it is right now.

JTG: Vince saw it. Loved it. Put it on TV. That’s how we make it work.

On a typical day when they have a TV taping:

Shad: Normally we wake up at 9:00AM after driving two hours from the previous show. We go to the gym, work out for maybe an hour and a half to two hours depending on how tire we are or not. Go back to the hotel, shower up, make sure we are fresh and clean and then we come to the arena around 1:00PM. We talk to our agent to go over any matches we have and just prepare for the show. Its really more a mental thing than it is a physical thing when getting ready for a show.

On what they do during the down time between matches:

Shad: Honestly, we play jokes on each other. And twittering.

JTG: We literally eat and play jokes on each other. Nine out of 10 times when we are on the road, we are playing jokes on each other, eating somewhere or working out.

On who travels on the road with them:

Shad: It’s usually just JTG and me. We have a couple of guys who will jump in with us every now and then. Kofi Kingston use to ride with us. We tried to get him some flavor but you know … it’s really hard when you’re working with a guy like that.

JTG: We have our own motto, our own style, our own swagger and we don’t want anyone else interrupting that.

On the use of Twitter to communicate with their fans:

JTG: We are having a ball on Twitter. We hit them with a couple of punch lines, similes and metaphors and they hit me back. They get to know what I’m eating, what time I go to sleep, what I do for my workout.

Shad: I think it’s another way to get in touch with our fans and let them know a little more about us. We admire and respect our fans. That’s why we talk to them on Twitter and MySpace.

JTG: Last week we had a contest and the winner sent his phone number and we called him (from a blocked phone number of course).

Shad: It’s cool because that one guy, that’s his memory of us. Just like we all have memories of Hulk Hogan, The British Bulldog, Macho Man Randy Savage, The Rock, and Stone Cold Steve Austin. We have our memories. We want our fans to remember us as guys who respected and loved them as much as they loved us.

On their favorite tag teams growing up:

JTG: My favorite tag-team growing up would have to be The Pink and Black attack, the Hart Foundation. I was a big Bret Hart fan and that was my favorite tag-team.

Shad: Growing up as a kid, I was a big Legion of Doom fan. I use to love Animal and Hawk. I didn’t realize human beings could get that big. It made me want to get as big as those guys.

On their match at Summerslam against The Big Show and Chris Jericho:

JTG: This has to be the biggest match of my career. It’s Summerslam, one of the biggest events for our company. It’s in LA and it’s for the titles. I hope we can bring those titles … well we’re going to talk positively and bring the titles back to the hood and have fun afterwards.

Shad: A lot of people don’t know this but LA is where JTG and me debuted three years ago. To have it culminate where we had our first tag team victory at Summerslam, one of the biggest events of the year, would be a great, great thing for us to achieve in our career at this point. We have never won the tag titles but we hope to win them in LA, the city where we debuted, at Summerslam, the biggest event of the year.

On how doing Word Up and other in-ring segments compares to wrestling:

Shad: Some people relate just on their wrestling. Some guys can just wrestle and their great wrestlers. They don’t have the personality. They aren’t diverse. JTG and me, we are blessed to have that personality and humor that relates to everybody. Whether you’re from the hood or the suburbs, people get our humor. Doing a backstage promo like Word Up is us just having fun rather than just going out there and wrestling all day.

JTG: I would rather be in the ring but backstage gives us a chance to extend our personalities and we just have fun with it.

On which WWE superstar is most like Slam Master J in real life?

Shad: Honestly, there is nobody like Slam Master J. He’s out there. At first when they brought it to us, we were shying away from it but he’s just someone trying to find himself.

On if the dynamic of the team changes with Eve Torres around:

JTG: Eve brought a little Latin flavor to the mix. Nothing wrong with having a female helping us other.

Shad: Nothing better for a team than bringing a sexy, big booty Latino girl on board. That makes everyone look good. That’s our fly girl. That’s our Jennifer Lopez.

On what’s on their iPod:

JTG: My favorite artist just dropped an album, Fabolous. I’m a big fan of the punch lines, the metaphors, I want to give a shout out to Fabolous and to come holla at his boy and help him with a new theme song.

Shad: As an old school New York kid I grew up listening to LL Cool J, Jay-Z, Biggie, Run D.M.C., KRS-One. I would watch all of that on BET. My all-time favorite artist has to be LL Cool J.

TAGS: Access Granted, Cryme Tyme, WWE

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