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When he signed his new WWE deal:
"I don't think they would ever have allowed me to even be on television without signing something. I literally like on the phone with the lawyer, Okay. All right. Sign. Okay. Okay. I signed and then walked into Gorilla. It was like the most crowded elevator. There was just everyone and everyone just turns and looks and the, jaws drop on the floor and people are like, what? And then, the world saw what came next.
How many people knew:
"I'd be surprised if you needed, more than two hands to, to count."
WWE teasing his return and if there was a plan:
"No. I was in the same boat as everybody else, where like the weeks leading up to it, they were doing all these weird little things that seem to be, that happen too often to seem to be coincidences. Oh, somebody uses the GTS. Yeah, somebody says, 'Best in the world" and on the face you go, ah, that doesn't matter. But I'm sitting at home going, should I be tanning? Like I haven't spoke to anybody. I don't know what's going on. People are messaging me and they're like, Oh, you're coming back. We're so excited. I'm just like, it's just another day in professional wrestling where, you know, For some reason I'm like a magnet for that stuff, but I didn't tell anybody and I think that's why it was a secret. It was such a shock. My wife knew. Nick. Triple H. Lawyers. That's who knew on my side. I text My family, like my sisters and stuff, while I was, don't text and drive. There's voice text voice, whatever, voice to text. I was in my car driving to the Allstate, which is the Rosemnt, it's always going to be the Rosemont Horizon to me. Tat's when I said, hey guys heads up, I'll talk to you all about it in-depth tomorrow, this came together really fast. I'm on my way to the building right now."
Whether he was hoping to return when he did:
"The wrestling booker in my head was like, Oh, this is the sweet spot. This is the business. This is what you do, but I wasn't desperate for, like a job or anything like that. Which makes it sound like I'm not grateful for where I'm at right now, which is the exact opposite. Like it's been an absolute dream thus far. So yeah, like I can't turn that part of my head off the wrestling Booker, I'm always doing, Oh, this is, so that part's always going to be in motion."
Walking out at Survivor Series:
"No, I can't put it into words. I can almost tell you just how what we do is like ephemeral, right? It's gone. It happens and it's gone. What we leave people with are like lasting memories and moments. And I have been fortunate enough, no matter what anybody says, like how overrated I am, how sh***y I am, how I don't deserve whatever. Man, I've made some great moments, and just when I think, okay, that's the top, it can't get any better than that. I have another one. And then when I think, wow, that's cool. I squeaked out another one. What, how, how lucky am I? It happens again. And that was one of them, like when it's so loud in the building and it's your favorite building in the world to perform in, you can't hear your entrance music...and we're all performers. We all have cues based on our music. How long the song is, what you can do. And I didn't have any parameters of, okay, we're crashing to break. So I'm like, I'm milking the whole song. And then I went out there and I went, I can't hear the song because people were so loud. It was like watching a Blackhawks game in the Chicago stadium and 1989 or something like that. It was pure magic."
The reaction backstage after:
"There's cameras in my face the entire time. I'm sure at some point. Everyone will see that footage, but everyone's hooting and hollering and you're the bell of the ball, people are slapping you on the back. They're kissing you on the mouth. They're hugging you. Everybody's stoked to see you. There's everything's welcome back. Everybody, it is very infectious. Like I still do it. Like I very much, even if I'm not involved in something like say rock coming back, like I don't want to get in the way, but I want to be in that room just because I want to feel that energy and that's I might learn something, even just standing here, fly on the wall. Like I might learn something because a lot of times when it's you and you're the one creating that buzz and you're creating that moment and that energy, it might get lost on you or you're thinking about performing. So I like being the fly on the wall where. I ain't got sh** to do so I can just watch stuff, but yeah being backstage after that that's 100 percent a moment that you just don't want it to end. "
Whether WWE feels the same as it did a decade ago:
"So somebody said this to me, and I get uncomfortable when I'm talking about myself, my contributions. It's very hard to do without sounding supremely egotistical, right? I'm always trying be humble and stuff, but there's a lot of people who wouldn't be in the industry if it wasn't for me...and I'm not saying that I'm just talking about inspiration...I'm not saying that I helped them in any way, you know it's the same way that I wouldn't exist if it wasn't for Bret [Hart] or Roddy Piper or You know the guys that paved the way for me, wven if I was just a fan of them on television. Without Developing relationships with them, like they're the reason I'm here. So there's a lot of that and it's hard for me to talk about, like what I've done and all that but somebody explained it to me like this: They said I'm super glad you're back here So you can experience the culture backstage that you helped create. Because you were a catalyst for this, and then you left. Now you're back, and I'm glad you get to enjoy it and see the fruits of your labor. And that kind of, that hit me right here. I was just like that's really cool. And you notice it. It's palpable."
"Again, I struggle with pulling the curtain back because a lot of the times like if you were just to straight up ask me, How's the locker room? I want to say none of your business. We give away so much and a lot of the times, it hurts us as performers as pro wrestlers like we're giving away too much, you know so It's almost like I want everybody to believe all the bullshit and the lies about me because it's just gonna, it helps me make more money. It helps me draw more money. I just want all those people, if you're going to believe all that wild, crazy bullshit, believe it and then just leave me the f**k alone. But that's the thing is they can never just leave me alone. Everybody's always talking and chirping. It's different in a sense that I'm not going to say friendlier. No, f**k it, I am going to say friendlier., but you have to realize to talk about the way the culture is now, you have to talk about the way the culture was when I got there. When I showed up, and it was very much Shark Tank cutthroat. super competitive, and everybody looked at me like, f**k you, why are you here, you don't belong here. I was on television with nothing but top guys. Triple H, Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, Ric Flair, Kurt Angle, Kane there's probably five other guys I'm 100 percent forgetting, like it was brutal, and to try to scratch and claw to get recognized and noticed and to get that little bit of TV time that I was allotted, like it was a lot different. Now, I think it's more laid back. I think that's probably the best way to say it. It's a relaxed atmosphere."
Vince McMahon:
I saw him at the Towers, because again, everything happened so fast. Monday before Thanksgiving, get a phone call. Oh, we realize we can do this. And I was just, and and again, Nick Kahn. Hey man, if this doesn't happen by Saturday, we're all rumbled. And I was like, Nick. I don't want to give away any leverage in negotiation, but Saturday's the business like that. It has to happen, so hammering out a deal Saturday, debut Sunday, I'm at home. I'm like, man, this is strange. I don't know what we're doing, where this is going, but it feels right. And then I get a call. Oh, Hey, we should probably get you travel to TV. We're in Nashville. So I fly to Nashville.
I think I went home and I can't remember where I flew from there, but it was a SmackDown, and that night, they were just like, Do you want to fly to, do you want to come on the jet? Can you do NXT? And I just went, yeah, sounds great. We're flying by the seat of our pants. We're doing all this stuff, real last minute. And, I had a carry on, so I didn't have any clothes as long as you guys find me a place to do my laundry, I need a gym, I gotta work out, oh, we'll give you a tour of the new towers, you come to the gym, oh, great. It's always a badass gym. Everything was state of the art.
I was in there I was in there, and I'm, I was on the phone on a treadmill warming up, and Vince's trainer's hey, he's you gotta get off the phone, Vince doesn't like it when people are on the phone in the gym. I was on the phone with Nick [Khan], and I was just, 'Okay, alright' Then I saw him walking down into the gym. He came in for his daily workout. And what was that like? He gave me a big hug. He said, welcome home. Good to see you. Let's connect after I work out. And I was like, all right, haven't seen him since....I think some stuff came up, Ariel.
Thoughts on McMahon being gone:
There's no positivity there. There's very much I read, I didn't read all the allegations. I read text messages. And I went, oh, f**k this. What? It's indefensible. And I think, doing this I had imagined I was going to be asked about it, and I think the easiest thing for people to do is to ignore it or avoid it, but man it's there. My initial first thing out of my mouth was, I'm shocked at how dumb he was, like writing stuff down and leaving that paper trail and it's horrific. I'm not like...I think at this point all the energy should be used to somehow, I don't even know if you can make reparations or amends but there's victims here you know so what CM Punk thinks about Vince and the CM Punk Vince relationship doesn't tf**king mean anything all. That stuff takes a backseat. 'm more concerned about going forward. How do those people survive after? Suffering all that trauma. That's my biggest concern.
Is the wrestling business better off without Vince McMahon:
"At this point? How do you so anything but no? How do you say anything, but yes, the business is better without.
The biggest thing I can draw comparison to is when Chris Benoit did a murder suicide, right? I was friends with Chris Benoit, and I don't know if it's just how I process things. I'm famously on camera weeping, saying goodbye to Chris, because at the time, we didn't know. We didn't know he had, murdered his wife and his son. The week prior, we're in Dothan, Alabama, and I'm traveling with him, and we're on the road, and he grabs me and runs me into the trainer's room, and he points, and his little son is in the corner, and he's taped up his hands, and he's drawn X's on his hands. Coming to terms with, that's my friend, he did this horrible thing, obviously, f**k him, f**k that, but then, you don't have, I don't have memories of Chris Benoit traveling with me and, murdering people at the gym, so I, there was never any instances where I would, be in a room with Vince and he's sh***ng on somebody or sexually assaulting somebody, you just, it wasn't like Caligula in Rome, we just didn't see it, but there's that part of me that goes, just like Benoit, okay, yeah, okay, I can see that and that's the thing is I'm sure Jeffrey Dahmer's mother wasn't like, Oh, I can see my boy doing that. No, like people are shocked. that their friend or mentor or whatever is responsible for doing these horrible things. But I'm just more of a, I guess I'm pragmatic where I just looked and I went, okay, all okay. I can see that kind of nutty. Chris is intense, he's quiet, and then you just, you build that in your head, but the, it's very hard to reconcile. I heard what Becky [Lynch] said, where she, because Vince is a father figure to a lot of people. Vince, I think, liked to develop those father, the father relationship, and I think that's why he was always fascinated with me, because I was just like, f**k you, I got a dad, I don't, you're my boss. Let's just keep it that way. But it's been a, it's been a while, like it's just been wild, all that sh**. No, it's sad and again, like I said, it's evil. He ruined his life. He ruined his life ruining other people's lives. So there's very much a part of me that's just Alright, we got him. Good. Shuffle them into the basement. "
More to come!
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