Former WWE referee Mike Chioda recently shared his thoughts on some of Rey Mysterio’s most memorable matches during an episode of his “Monday Mailbag” podcast.
Chioda highlighted Mysterio’s ability to work compelling matches with larger opponents, stating, “There’s a ton of matches. I always love when Rey worked big guys like Kane and Undertaker. He had phenomenal matches with these guys. Small guy, big guy, you know, and it’s just, there was so many times near the end of the false finishes that we had them off the seats because they thought Rey was going to go over. Those were the matches that I liked the most when Rey was always working somebody bigger with the Kane’s and The Undertaker’s and other guys.” He also mentioned matches with Eddie Guerrero and Benoit as “fantastic.”
However, not all of Mysterio’s matches went as planned. Chioda recalled a particularly disappointing experience at WrestleMania in New Jersey, where Mysterio faced Samoa Joe. “The worst match I’ve done with Rey, which it sucked because me and him were very close and sh*t went down horrible at WrestleMania in New Jersey. He had to face Samoa Joe,” Chioda explained. He described how Mysterio had invested significantly in a special costume for the event: “I know Rey got this badass costume. This Japanese dude from Japan and this other guy from Mexico make his gear, and these guys are so good at making his gear, and he spends so much money on his gear. I’m talking like 15 grand, you know. He flies these guys in, he gets their hotel, and he puts his gear together every year.”
Originally scheduled for 15 minutes, the match was repeatedly cut down. Chioda recalled, “the match went down from 15 to 12 or something, and then 12 to something like nine or eight. And when I got in the ring, and Rey Mysterio was just about on his entrance, they said you gotta go home. As soon as Rey and Joe gets in the ring, you gotta go home. You have two minutes.”
The match ended up being a short squash. “It was literally like a two or three, four minute match, man, and he just squashed Rey pretty much, and boom, and won. And I know Rey was stunned, shocked, because they didn’t take off anybody else’s match during the show basically, you know… These people went long and they didn’t b*tch at them, and all of a sudden they just pull the last second, you know, man. And I was like, ‘Are you f**king kidding me, Billy?’ He’s like, ‘you gotta go home.’ As soon as they go in, tell him to get to something, do something, go home. It was a title match too. I think it was a title match.”
Chioda concluded by touching on the emotional impact of such decisions, noting, “I mean, I know they’re going to still get a big paycheck and all that, but sometimes, you know, money ain’t there. It’s your pride.”
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