WWE Hall of Famer Rob Van Dam recently appeared on Steve Fall’s Ten Count to discuss a variety of topics. During the discussion RVD talked about his ring work being so unique, the original Sheik training him and Vince McMahon resurrecting the ECW brand.
Rob Van Dam explained why his ring work is so unique:
“It’s because I’m the real deal. I don’t get in the ring and then pretend that I’m some character. I mean, obviously, there’s an exaggeration to it, especially to my ego and extra brutality. But I didn’t learn to do a sidekick and a spin kick from imitating other wrestlers that did it. You know, I was a kickboxer and I learned from kickboxing and martial arts instructors and I brought those moves into wrestling because that was part of me. That was what I did for fun when I’m showing off at some stupid party in high school, you know, backflips, running up a tree and doing a backflip, because I saw it on Chopsocky theater.”
Regarding the original Sheik who trained him:
“When the Sheik trained somebody, because he would lay that claim on so many people in the business, I discovered a lot of times they were dropped off in his mansion and they stayed with him probably for weeks and weeks at a time, and he trained with them, not that he was like the only original person that brought them into the business. He would tell stories while we’re eating dinner after training in the ring, and he would talk about how he trained Greg Valentine and Abdullah the Butcher, and even had Vince (McMahon). He said that Vince was a snotty nose brat when he had him stay at his house for a while.”
His thoughts on Vince McMahon bringing back the ECW brand:
“I have a very balanced feeling on that because I have pros and cons that I feel. At the time, especially when I was in that competitive state of mind of being in the dressing room and feeling like the writers are just, you know, fu**ing with me. You got through all this stuff when you’re right in there. For me, totally different state of mind that I have now with this happy time in my life.”
“So at the time, I really looked at it defensively from ECW. You know, I thought he’s making a mockery of ECW. I thought he might have even brought ECW back just to destroy it because he didn’t like the fans chanting EC Dub. He took credit for it, so he trained them to chant EC Dub during the shows by putting out the ECW DVD. Then I was like, Wow, man, this dude’s crazy. Maybe he brought it back just to completely wipe out the extreme theme to it, and they did completely wipe out the extreme theme to it. So it was like, you know, just like any other show except they put way less into it. Way less budget, way less advertising. The house shows at that time, you know, we’re just the old ECW crappy arenas from the mid 90s. We would sometimes film after SmackDown on the SmackDown night, and there was some kind of weird way that we were getting paid off a split of their gate which really wasn’t fair. In the end, you know, supposedly all the numbers ironed out, whatever.”
“I thought Vince looked really cool in durag. I loved it. I thought that was cool because he’s all buff in the black sweater shirt with the sleeves. I loved working with him. I had a match that was three against one. So that was pretty cool. I mean, something like that when I think back makes me think maybe I was considered in a much higher position then it felt like at the time because that wouldn’t normally be something they would do with like, a mid-carder, or whatever. Sometimes I think of it like that, like, well, that’s really cool that I got to work with Vince and Shane and Umaga.”
You can check out the complete interview below:
(h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription)
