5 real-life stories about WWE Superstar The Miz

In 2004, a reality television star called Mike Mizanin signed up for WWE competition Tough Enough in a bid to live his ambitious dream of becoming a pro wrestler/sports entertainer.

Fast forward 14 years and not only has Mizanin, better known to us as The Miz, fulfilled his lifelong dream, but he has wildly exceeded anybody’s expectations of what he could achieve in the wrestling business.

He has held almost every title there is to hold in WWE, including the WWE Championship (x1) and the Intercontinental Championship (x7), while he defeated John Cena in the main event of WrestleMania XXVII.

It was recently announced that Miz and his wife Maryse will star in their own docuseries on the USA Network later in 2018, so let’s take a look at five real-life stories about “The A-Lister” to get a better idea of what the man behind the character is really like.

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#5 His school show-and-tell didn’t go as planned

An eight-year-old Mike Mizanin travelled to Atlantic City, New Jersey with his father George to watch WrestleMania V in 1989.

While they were there, George treated young Mike to the official WrestleMania program, personally signed by the two headline stars of the show, Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage, as well as The Honky Tonk Man.

Mike was so pleased to have autographs from three WWE Superstars that he showed it off to all of his friends and took the program to school for show-and-tell class.

However, speaking 28 years later in a YouTube video with his parents (at the 02:55 mark of the embedded video), the man we’ve come to know as The Miz revealed that his father conned him and actually forged the autographs himself.

#4 He asked The Rock for acting advice

The Miz & The Rock battled in a tag match at Survivor Series 2011

The Miz has featured in several movies for WWE Studios and has become the lead star of The Marine franchise, most recently missing Monday Night Raw for seven weeks to film The Marine 6: Close Quarters.

Before starring in his first movie for the company in 2013, The Marine 3: Homefront, Miz sent a text to fellow wrestler-turned-actor Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson asking if he had any tips about moving from the squared circle to the silver screen.

The seven-time Intercontinental champion revealed to Inverse in April 2017 that not only did the WWE Hall of Famer call back within a minute, but the two spoke for the next half an hour about acting.

"He was just educating me and giving me so much advice," said Miz, who grew up as a huge fan of The Rock's WWE persona.

#3 His mother handed out 50,000 Tough Enough flyers

The Miz finished second in his season on Tough Enough

The world has changed a lot in 14 years. If a competition took place now in WWE – the Mixed Match Challenge, for example – and fans were encouraged to vote for their favourites online, everyone can quickly pick up their phone or switch on a computer to make their choice.

However, things weren’t quite that easy when The Miz appeared on Season 4 of WWE competition Tough Enough in 2004, so his mother Barbara thought of an ingenious idea to help spread the word about her son’s involvement in the contest.

She revealed in a video on WWE’s YouTube channel that she went to every library in her town and “passed out probably about 50,000 flyers” in a bid to help Miz win, explaining that she was not cheating but simply supporting him.

The flyers must have helped because Miz ended up finishing runner-up, ahead of future WWE Superstars Nick Mitchell (known as Mitch in the Spirit Squad) and Ryan Reeves (later known as Ryback). Daniel Puder was the eventual winner that year.

#2 He was kicked out of the WWE locker room

During The Miz’s early days on the main roster, he was spotted eating chicken over referee Scott Armstrong’s bag while sitting around backstage. Is that a good way for someone to introduce themselves to their new colleagues? No. But does it really warrant being kicked out of the locker room?

The incident infuriated Chris Benoit so much that he told Miz he had to get changed in the hallway and he was never allowed to change with his fellow Superstars again.

A general rule among WWE performers is that the person who was kicked out of the locker room is only allowed back in by the person who kicked them out in the first place. However, that wasn’t possible due to the Benoit tragedy and Miz continued to change in the hall 6-8 months after Benoit’s death.

John Morrison, Miz’s former tag partner, revealed during an interview on But I Digress (embedded above) that one day The Undertaker asked “kid, why are you changing by the garbage?”. When Miz explained the story, ‘Taker allowed him to change in the locker room again.

#1 He suffered a concussion in his biggest match to date

The Miz defeated John Cena at WrestleMania XXVII

When a WWE Superstar is asked in a media interview about their dream career goal, it’s usually that they want to main-event WrestleMania one day and either walk in or out of the match as WWE champion.

While the likes of Randy Orton, John Cena and Roman Reigns were all expected to reach that lofty goal and succeeded in doing so, very few people would ever have imagined The Miz defending the WWE Championship in the featured match at “The Show of Shows”.

However, “The A-Lister” was able to accomplish the extraordinary feat in 2011 when he walked into WrestleMania XXVII with the WWE title and, thanks to interference from The Rock, defeated John Cena to retain his championship.

The only problem? He suffered a concussion when Cena tackled him from the fan barrier to the floor and he barely remembers anything from the biggest match of his entire career.