DDP sat down with Chris Van Vliet for an in-depth interview on the latest episode of the popular INSIGHT pro wrestling podcast.
The following are some of the highlights.
On when he thought it would be possible that he would start walking again: “I don’t really know. I told you this story, when Lex went down, it was in San Francisco. I went to take this because I heard he was born again, and I had to see that for myself, because Lex is the one who taught me about the four degrees of celebrity. And I said, Really, what is that? Well, number one, anticipation. Back when I played for Green Bay, I wasn’t a starter, or any of that. I was at the bottom of the totem pole, but is anybody going to ask me for my autograph? And then there’s avoidance, you wear baggy shirts, you wear sunglasses, wear hats, you never look at anyone eye to eye in an airport, because it’s going to be [attracting attention]. I said. So what’s number three? He goes. That’s where I’m right now. Back then he was married. He’s like, My wife hates it, because recluse like I am. I don’t go to the mall, I don’t want to go out to dinner, I don’t want to go anywhere, I have to do what I have to do to get on the road, to do what I do when I come home, I want to be home. I go, Okay, I go, what’s number four? He goes, Well, we hope we never get there, but at one time or another, we all do. I go, what is it? He goes, aggression. I have this favorite story of mine. Me and Lex are going through Terminal C in the Atlanta airport, and it’s 1997 or 98, paparazzi, and me and Lex are just power walking, and there’s this one kid just clicking and clicking and clicking, and Lex goes, ‘Okay, that’s enough.’ He just knocked the camera out of the kid’s hands. I go, ‘What the f*ck are you doing?’ He’s like, ‘I told him, that’s enough.’ And that was Lex back then, the Lex that I would later be with in San Francisco, complete opposite, like the antithesis of that guy. Now we still got Lex in him, but the bottom line is, he’s one of the nicest human beings on this planet.”
On if he has seen the comparisons between his career and LA Knight’s career: “I love that kid, man. I love the tenacity of the stick to it, it took him a long time to get to that character. And he was good before that, but now he’s great. Hopefully at some point he gets a chance to really get that ball, because he can run with it, give him that damn ball, because that cat, he’s got it all. And people who say that he’s mimicking this character, that character, that’s so wrong. He’s a piece of all that. He grew up on all of us coming up wanting to do what we do, and now he’s doing it at its highest level. So I saw that article actually sent it to him, because it was really cool the way they [did it]. I thought it was just going to be a little blurb, but just comparing our careers.”
