Gangrel is incredibly proud of how far Miro has come in his professional career and his life in general.
Gangrel spoke about his relationship with Miro, the current AEW TNT Champion, on his Fangin’ N Bangin’ podcast. Gangrel was one of Miro’s trainers back when he broke into the business more than ten years ago, first meeting after Miro emigrated from Bulgaria and moved to California, where he trained under Gangrel and Rikishi at the Knokx Pro Wrestling Academy. Gangrel explained how one of their new trainees, Meto, knew Miro, and explained how they also shared a similar work ethic.
“Miro—he gets mad when I say Rusev because he’s moving forward, Rusev’s in the past—The Best Man. I was super happy last night, I was in Magic City and I was worried because Miro, he asked me to look out for a fellow Bulgarian, he either comes from his village or just outside his village. Now, Bulgaria has towns and villages, no super major cities, but one day I’ll take a trip over there. I was really happy to see ‘Meto’ show up—we call him Meto because [his real name] Metodi is really hard to pronounce—but I was super-happy to see him show up because I’ve been over there [working as a trainer at Magic City Wrestling] for a week, and he didn’t come the first week.
Gangrel explained that they had morning and night classes at Knokx Pro in California, and Miro was in both classes.
“Miro, I first met him at Knokx Pro with Rikishi and the Black Pearl, the Samoan Dynasty. I met him when he came in and this guy is the epitome of dedication and hard work,” Gangrel said. He was literally bouncing or driving a taxi at night, he was delivering food on lunch shifts. So he’d do the morning class and and he would work all night, pull in there and get an hour nap in the car, train—and back then when I trained it was some boot camp stuff. I’ve evolved as a trainer now, but every trainee is different and they all don’t respond to that commando style, but he did.
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“This is a guy that would work all night. You know, he came from another country. His dream was to be a wrestler. He left Bulgaria to come here to be a wrestler,” he explained, “and Meto is the same thing. Metodi is the same as Miro. He left Bulgaria and came to the United States to become a pro wrestler. Imagine that.
“You’re in another country, probably barely have TV, I don’t know—don’t get mad at me, Bulgaria, you must have some if you’re watching wrestling—but you come all the way [here] and you gamble on you. He bet on himself, he believed in himself, he left Bulgaria, and he came to the United States to become a professional wrestler. Look at him now,” Gangrel stated. “And that didn’t come because he was being lazy, that didn’t come because he wasn’t dedicated. No, it’s the opposite. He was a workhorse, and he was super dedicated, and he was super focused.”
Gangrel said he watched Miro’s recent match against Dark Order’s Evil Uno and saw everything click, including the basics and foundations they’d taught back then.
“People think you have to go in and be [going] 100 miles an hour, and this is maybe a lesson to other wrestlers, but it’s not about being fast. It’s being in the right place at the right time, no wasted movement. Sometimes you’ll hear ‘less is more’, others like the Samoans say ‘less is best’, but really it comes down to being in the right place at the right time. So when I’m watching his match [against Evil Uno] I see where he was just miles ahead,” he noted, “but not by being fast. He just knew his way around the ring and I was super proud of him. I know how hard he worked to become the professional wrestler, the human being he is and the man he is today. I’m super proud of him.”
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