AEW's Chris Van Vliet discusses his new role, his dream interview and THAT interview with MJF (Exclusive)

Modified Aug 15, 2019 19:21 GMT

I know that, at this stage, you haven't even gotten into the first role yet, but might we ever hear Chris Van Vliet in another capacity, or even see you in the ring at all in AEW?

Oh, God, I have no idea. I think we should leave that to the professionals, you know? I did train briefly when I was... It was my goal, it was my dream to be a pro wrestler. I trained when I was 20, I trained in college but something had to give. I couldn't be all in on wrestling and all in on going to college so something had to give and for me, it was wrestling training. I figured that could wait till another time so I went in on the broadcasting and I've been really fortunate to have this great career - but I know how to take a bump. If you watch my interview with The Young Bucks, they Superkicked me, so I wouldn't be opposed to it but let's just say, let's leave that to the professionals.

Try and put it off as long as you can anyway.

And the question on everyone's lips since the announcement has been - how exclusive is your role? Will we still be seeing Chris Van Vliet interview everyone from across the world of wrestling, or will it be solely AEW talents now?

I honestly don't know. So, for now, I'm going to keep interviewing everybody that I can interview, nothing's changed for me. I just did interviews at an Impact Wrestling show at the weekend and it was great. I was welcomed there by everybody, so I'd like to continue doing things as I have. I've been doing wrestling interviews for 12 years. I've had a YouTube channel for eight and a half. I don't plan for that to change.

As well as being an interviewer extraordinaire, you're unashamedly a wrestling fan. So, putting your fan hat on, what are you looking forward to most about from AEW?

I just think it's the most exciting time to be a professional wrestling fan. Everyone's talked about how, now there's competition or now there's an alternative - and that's great - but it's just exciting that now we have... We can go online, this is why it is so exciting to be a wrestling fan right now, you can go online and watch any match that's ever happened in the history of wrestling!

I love that AEW seems to be listening to the fans as well. I think that... Unfortunately some other organisations across the board, I think, have done what they've wanted to do and I think here, what I really appreciate is you're getting a match with this guy and this guy, and there doesn't need to be a ton of storyline there, it's just two great wrestlers working each other because you know it's going to be a great match and everybody benefits from that - the wrestlers benefit because they have a great match and the fans benefit because we get to take it in.