SmackDown Live tag team American Alpha may not have laid their hands on the show’s tag team championship titles yet but they are already being counted among the best in the business. Recently, Miami Herald caught up with one-half of the explosive duo, Chad Gable, and tried to know more about the talented wrestler.
During the conversation, Gable revealed that he has always been a big fan of the WWE and WCW and his biggest dream was to become a pro-wrestler one day. He claimed that his participation in the 2012 London Olympics just came about and once he was done with it, he decided to pursue the career that he had always wanted and was lucky that things worked out with the WWE.
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This is what the former Olympian had to say:
“I always loved pro wrestling, I always loved WWE. I loved WCW. I wanted to be a pro wrestler longer than I ever dreamed about being in the Olympics or anything like that. Just so happened that I really excelled in amateur wrestling, and I chose that path for college reasons.
I ended up training for a long time and made it to the Olympics, but when that was over, I had to decide what I wanted to do, and the opportunity was there to take a shot at this dream that I had since I was a little kid. I thought why not try to turn this into something, and luckily [WWE] had me down for a tryout, gave me a shot, and it went very well..and it all worked out.”
When asked about his wrestlers that he loved watching the most, he named the likes of Eddie Guerrero, Rey Mysterio, Chris Jericho, Bret Hart and Owen Hart but referred to Guerrero as his all-time favourite. According to him, the former WWE Champion did not allow his smaller stature to be a hindrance for him inside the ring. The former NXT Tag Team Champion said:
“Some of my favorites growing up, when I was 11, 12-years-old, I loved the guys in the cruiserweight division in WCW. Eddie Guerrero, Rey Mysterio, Chris Jericho. As it evolved, I grew to appreciate guys who had a lot of technical abilities. Bret Hart, Owen Hart. Eddie Guerrero always stayed a favorite of mine through the years. He was a smaller guy, but he never wrestled like a smaller guy. He wrestled like he was just as big as anyone he was going up against, which I thought was awesome.”
Talking about how he made it to the WWE, Chad Gable said that he contacted Hall of Famer Gerald Brisco, a talent scout for the company, but was told that they were not currently hiring wrestlers of his size. However, he persuaded to Brisco to arrange a tryout for him where he was fortunate to impress everyone and he was signed up.
Here’s what Gable told Miami Herald about him joining the WWE:
“I got in touch with [WWE Hall of Famer] Jerry Brisco, who does a lot of the amateur wrestling recruiting for WWE. He was very honest with me and told me, ‘We’re not typically looking for guys your size.’ He’s usually out there scouting heavyweights, which is understandable. All I did was ask him for a shot, and he helped me out.
I went down there [WWE Performance Center in Orlando] for the tryout, and luckily I impressed them enough or gave them enough of a reason to think that I could help the company, and they signed me.”
The superstar was also asked if MMA is the next step for him, considering his strong amateur wrestling background. Gable said that he hardly had any inclination towards the sport and didn’t even watch it and that pro-wrestling is where he always wanted to be.
“No. A lot of people ask that and think it would have made sense, considering my background, but MMA was something I...and still to this day...was not very interested in. I don’t really watch it. A lot of people assume that I do, but I don’t. For whatever reason, it just didn’t grab me like it did a lot of people in my [amateur wrestling] field. For me, it was just amateur wrestling and pro wrestling that I fell in love with,” Chad Gable was quoted as saying.
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