Alex Abrahantes was interviewed on the latest “AEW Unrestricted” podcast. Alex has worked for WWE, TNA, Lucha Libre USA and TNA in various positions before coming to AEW. He has also been a guest host for HP on QVC and appeared on many television shows.
Alex described how he became an on-air personality for AEW:
“I did an interview a while back, which I thought was only going to be on social media. It was Rey Fenix and ‘The Murder Hawk Monster’ Lance Archer. Tony (Khan) wanted me to interview them both and translate what Rey said. I did it, and I thought this was so awesome and I was honored to do that because at that point, I was just doing the Spanish commentary, doing the pre show and post show stuff. I thought this was going to be just a social media thing. Then it was used for Dynamite, and I thought, wow, this is so cool. I remember seeing Tony that night or after it aired, and Tony said, ‘Penta is going to be on commentary. I’m just giving you a heads up.’ I said, ‘Ok, very cool. Great. I love Penta. This is fantastic.’ I was told the day of, and Penta and I got together. We were talking about, ok, here’s the plan. Here’s what I’m going to say. I got together and spent pretty much the entire day with him making sure he had it because this was his big moment. He’s never spoken for the most part, and never in English. This was a really big deal. I was so pumped for him, and I was obviously thrilled that I got a chance to help him out with this. I could tell he was nervous because this was such a big deal. This was live TV, Dynamite. This was his moment. We had just finished Revolution and he was going to have this match with Cody that he wanted. We start with Dynamite. Penta is sitting with us at Spanish commentary. The moment comes. Cody starts talking. Penta grabs the microphone and says, ‘Hey Alex’, so I go along with him, ‘Penta says’ essentially, ‘Cody is a thousand times better than you.’ At the moment I’m processing everything. I’m thinking to myself that if I say this just as a translator, it’s going to be flat. That’s not what Penta is. Penta is all about passion and excitement. When you see him, you automatically get amped up because the guy is just pure charisma. I said to myself that I can’t just translate this like a commentator or it’s going to be flat. I know we’re building to this, and I know there’s passion in his voice, so I have to be passionate too. So I say, ‘Hey Cody, Penta says he’s a thousand times better than you.’ I needed to match what Penta was saying. The ‘Penta says’ just came out because, well, that’s what he’s saying.’ He then says, ‘If you’re the Prince of pro wrestling, I’m the Lord of Lucha Libre.’ I said, ‘Penta says’. The second time I realized that if he continues, I’m going to have to continue this to just make sense, so we got a reaction there.
Here’s the kicker that a lot of people don’t know. At Daily’s Place, we were coming down the steps, and I was supposed to stop half way, but I was concerned that if something went wrong with what he was going to deliver at the very end, I could be there for him. I knew how important it was to get this over and for this to work. We were on live TV. I remember telling everybody that I’m going to go down there with him. I told Penta, ‘Anything you need, I’m right here with you.’ I wanted to make sure that he was comfortable there. We went down, and here’s the big moment. Here is when he’s going to deliver the big line that sparks Cody to jump the barricade and attack him. It was so bizarre. It was so surreal. He’s got the microphone and it felt like everything was in slow motion. He said, ‘Hey Cody. Are you serious?’ Then he turns to me and whispers in my ear and I’m like, here we go. I said, ‘You know what Cody? You’re lucky Penta didn’t break your arm otherwise you wouldn’t be able to hold your newborn baby girl.’ The crowd went nuts, Cody jumped the barricade, and I knew at that moment, ‘Oh my God. Something just happened.’ I couldn’t explain it intuitively, but I knew it was magic. I couldn’t believe this was happening. I was like, wow, what a moment. Then that was it and I didn’t know what was going to happen next. The next thing you know, I’m doing this pretape with Penta as his translator. The moment where I just lost my mind was I remember when we were filming Dynamite every other week in Jacksonville, the following week it was going to be Penta vs Trent. Well, the graphic appears on the screen and I’m behind Penta. I’m like what? At that moment, I was so emotional because I was like, all this work to get to this moment and here it is, and it just happened so organically. I can’t explain it. I’m just so grateful. It was so awesome. From that moment, I’ve been living such a dream. I can’t even begin to tell you.”
Alex talking about working in creative for WWE in 2001:
“It was insane because it was I think a group of seven of us. RAW and SmackDown were together. The WWE had just acquired WCW. It was such a crazy time because we were trying to figure out what we were going to do with WCW, and they’re were not a lot of people who knew about WCW. I, being a massive wrestling fan, knew about WCW, and I would speak up and say, ‘This person did this and this person did that.’ I was very grateful that I had knowledge about WCW and that I had followed the product. It was insane. I remember working from the morning I got up until the morning I went to bed, and one day there felt like an eternity. It had it’s amazing points because here I am, 23 at the time, on top of the mountain essentially. I knew that was my dream to get there. It was insane working with Austin. On my first night, I sat on the couch in Vince’s office at an arena. Sitting next to me are Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Undertaker, Triple H, and Vince. I’m literally like, I can’t believe it. This is insane. It was an amazing experience. There are some great people that work there, and there’s some ups and downs just like there are in any company. I’m really grateful to have had that experience, and that experience helped me get to where I am today, but yea, I’m really grateful that I had that experience.”
If you use any portion of the quotes from this article please credit AEW Unrestricted with a h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription
