WWE Champion Drew McIntyre recently appeared on Chasing Glory With Lilian Garcia. He discussed several topics, ranging from the COVID-19 pandemic to his victory at WWE WrestleMania 36. Here are some highlights:
On how the COVID-19 pandemic has influenced his opinion of social media:
McIntyre: I generally didn’t like social media in the past, like I’d just see so much negativity and whatnot on there and then, during this time, I’ve seen everyone kinda come together with fitness challenges and supporting individuals and maybe with mental health and mental health problems and, you know, people that haven’t spoke to friends and family [in] a long time are downloading like Zoom, like we’re using right now, and they’re all getting on there and talking and I’ve been on with my friends from Scotland, I’ve been on with my family and everyone’s kind of reconnecting, and so yeah there’s a lot of good going on, and I finally see that, okay, social media is good for the job but the other stuff I used to not like, the negative stuff, has now become a positive. And I said, okay, this is what social media was made for, everyone coming together and supporting each other.”
On becoming more comfortable with his in-ring persona:
McIntyre: I’ve been trying to pinpoint the moment and, I’ve done a few interviews, and I figured it was about the time I had a little injury, and that was like, man there’s something not quite clicking, there’s something missing, like I’m just big angry Scottish guy who’s done really well, wrestled Roman [Reigns] at WrestleMania, The Undertaker’s match after the Goldberg match that went really well, to get him looking good again but there’s something not quite there where I couldn’t see myself as the main guy, like just a couple of pieces left, I don’t know what it is. And then, when I came back, Ric Flair introduced me as a part of Team Flair and got me in the ring, and obviously Ric’s the most charismatic man ever, he had me flexing, we had a good time, we had a good back and forth. I had a match with Ricochet, I had Flair in my corner, he had [Hulk] Hogan in his corner, which is insane to me, but I used that situation to start showing some more personality, and Flair would kinda direct me, and I got told, ‘Keep going with that theme,’ but Paul Heyman actually let me know the time where they kinda noticed, like, wait he’s got something more to give here. And I knew about the boss, I think maybe saw this, where I did a dark match one time, this was kinda brought to my attention, and they asked me to keep buying some time, they’re setting up the cage, so I just strolled out. I’m like, yup, give me a microphone, like thank goodness, I don’t have a script, I’m not talking about eating carcasses or whatever I’ve been talking about for the past year and half that no human being does, no one talks like that. And so I just got a mic, and I was myself, and I was just ad-libbing which I’m way more comfortable doing. And I jumped up on the wall, and I sat there, and I just had a laugh with the crowd, and they were all engaged and we’re kind of having a good banter back and forth, just with me as the conductor with a microphone.”
“And I guess they saw that and went, ‘Oh wow, I didn’t know Drew could do that,’ basically, and I think that’s, by the sound of things, what Paul told me, that’s where it stemmed from, was the promo where I just sat on the wall and just interacted with the crowd, and he saw the real Drew. He’d seen the real Drew in real life, but he hadn’t seen it on-screen, and he went, ‘That’s the guy, I need to put that guy on television.’”
The full episode is available below:
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