The following highlights were sent to us from the interview that Chris Van Vliet did with Sammy Guevara on Insight With Chris Van Vliet.
On the infamous Matt Hardy match:
“That was scary for everybody. The tables were I think too close. That’s what it was. Yeah, they were a little bit further or we went too high on the scissor lift. Man, it was just such an unfortunate thing because we had so much cool stuff for that match, like, so much. I was actually getting thrown off Daily’s Place to end the thing. We were going to climb to the roof at Daily’s Place.”
On the aftermath:
“But man that match. You know, unfortunately, it’s remembered as one of the worst moments in AEW, but I think it was a lot of learning from all aspects of what to do in a situation like that. I’m just happy Matt was okay. I remember when I was in the back crying, I was so upset. He’s a hero of mine and stuff keeps happening because the chair thing just happened a couple of weeks before that. And I followed him to the hospital and I stayed with him until like five in the morning to make sure he was good. But I will say respect to Matt because he could have said, You know what? It is just not working out with this kid. Don’t want to work with him anymore. But he’s still working with me. We did the Elite Deletion match at his compound. And, you know, that’s respect to him to finish the story the right way. Instead of just cleaning his hands with it. He was like, Oh, we got to finish it the right way.”
On Stadium Stampede:
“That was such a crazy time for wrestling, the pandemic and everything. And then it’s like, Okay, we’re gonna wrestle in this big empty stadium, and then we’re all talking about ideas and stuff. And then it almost became a bit of like, how much bad stuff can happen to me in the match? I mean, I’m chased by a golf cart. I’m getting chased by a horse. I’m getting hit by sprinklers. I get thrown off of this thing through this platform by Kenny. I remember the day there was one idea for the horse to chase Hagar, and I knew the golf cart was chasing me later. And I was like, guys, I think this should be the bit, just bad thing after bad thing. Like, I don’t ever catch a break. It was probably one of the most fun matches, even though it took forever to film. And then, as we’re filming it, too, we find out it’s probably going to be the last match of Double or Nothing, so it’s like the main event. So that was like really cool, too. And then, you know, I was mad I wasn’t a part of this year’s. You know, I got to be a part of the first two and missed the third one, but it looked good.”
On getting concussed at WrestleDream:
“I’m cleared, I’m good. That was crazy. You know, I do the cutter so much and it’s the stupidest things, this cutter that I do all the time, this time just bumped my head on the canvas and then saw the future. And if you go back, you can tell, okay, maybe he’s not good. But I didn’t know at that time. I actually thought that they had a match booked for me that Wednesday, I thought I was good. And then it wasn’t until a couple of days later that I was like really feeling it. And then Tay contacted the doctor. [Were you dizzy?] No. Just like the lights are bothering me. [Were you throwing up?] No, no, thankfully, it wasn’t like that. But I had a headache and stuff and it was like the lights were bothering me. Like bright lights. Like my future is bright [laughs]. But yeah, then they obviously took me off and let me chill and sent me to some people to see. But yeah, that was like probably the longest I’ve been out of wrestling so far, it’s been since October 1.”
