Insight with Chris Van Vliet - Matt Striker: WWE & Lucha Underground commentary, "I'm marking out bro", his new Impact Wrestling job

Episode Date: March 12, 2020

Matt Striker sits down with Chris Van Vliet in Las Vegas, NV. He talks about his new job behind the scenes at Impact Wrestling, his transition from wrestling in WWE to doing commentary, how he got hired for Lucha Underground, working with Vampiro, the reaction to saying "I'm marking out bro" and much more! Thanks to our sponsor Bet Online! Use the code BLUEWIRE at BetOnline.ag to get a 50% welcome bonus on your first deposit.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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for your 50% sign up bonus. Bet Online. It's your online sports book experts. It's Chrysomania, brother. That's a great question. Look at you, man. What's the powerful questions. Woo! This is the Chris Van Bleet Show. Chris Van Bleet Show. Ladies and gentlemen, Chris Van Fleet! Welcome back, my friend. Thanks for joining me on another audio adventure on the Chris Van Fleet Show. This episode is brought to you by Bet Ones.

online and untuck it. And a lot of great feedback for last week's interview, last week's show with Excalibur. I mean, there really aren't a ton of interviews out there with him. So we were able to find out a ton about him. If you haven't checked it out yet, either look it up on here. It is the last episode we did, so it's pretty easy to find. Or you can, of course, find it on our YouTube channel, which is quickly closing in on a quarter million subscribers. 240-ish-thous thousand as we record this episode right now.

let's do this thing. $250,000 by the end of the month? Yeah, I think we can do this. Let's do this one. And this chat with Matt Stryker is a great one. He's now working behind the scenes at Impact Wrestling. I'll let him tell you specifically what he's doing with Impact. We also talk about his transition from high school teacher to wrestler to commentator.

Now a little bit back to wrestling and behind the scenes stuff. Of course, he worked for both WWE and Lucha Underground. And now, like I said, he's working for Impact. wrestling. I got a bunch of tweets last week telling me that the show is on the Apple Top 200, which blows my mind. This is incredible. I'm just a dude with a pair of microphones putting this podcast out into the world, while almost every other podcast on the Top 200 is expertly produced in a studio with a booking producer and lots of money. And we do not have any of those things. And by we, I mean

me and you. And I'm with Blue Wire, which is an incredible network that's really helped the podcast grow. So a huge thank you to Blue Wire. They're one of the big reasons. I'm in the Apple Top 200 right now. But you're the main reason, though. So thank you for listening

right now and continuing to listen and to continue to make these reviews on Apple Podcasts. Like this one from Jamie Turner in Scotland. The title is the Podfather. I like that, the podfather. I ended up messaging Chris personally to let him know how brilliant his podcasts are.

When it comes to interviews in the world of wrestling, Chris is the man for the job. The David Benoit episode was my personal favorite. I will also add that he's very in touch with his fans on social media. It's true, I am at Chris Van Fleet. Let's be friends. Great podcasts, great conversations, and a genuinely good guy. Keep him coming. Chris, Jamie Turner in Scotland.

Wow, that's so nice. In Scotland. That's the extent of what my accent will be. I don't want to offend you, Jamie, or anyone else listening in Scotland or anywhere else in the UK. Wherever, Great Britain, wherever you happen to be, listening to this and thinking my accent's terrible because it is. But thank you. And reading comments like that, I mean, they warm my heart. I'm super thankful.

It also makes me wonder what your favorite episodes are. Because I've been getting a lot of comments lately about the David Benoit interview, which, man, what a... incredible conversation that was cracked, you know, cracked into that whole thing. I mean, David Benoit hadn't talked about any of this stuff, really, in 13 years. So how's it really interesting one? I also get a lot of comments about the MJF interview, if you can call it an interview. Also, a lot of people talking about the big show interview I did. It was like almost four years ago, but it has almost four million views on YouTube.

One of my most watched interviews of all time. If you haven't checked it out yet, please go. go check it out. Also let me know at Chris Vanfleet what your favorite interviews are because yeah, I'm very responsive on there. I'm just a wrestling fan like the rest of you guys. I just happen to be able to sit down with some of our favorite wrestlers

and have these conversations. So if you're listening on an iPhone, please take a few seconds to leave a review. It's the most helpful thing you can do for the show. So Matt Stryker was a high school teacher before getting his big break with WWE. Remember when he made his debut

against Kurt Angle and Kurt was doing those invitational matches. Yeah. The whole series of matches. Kurt Angle, Matt Stryker. He went on to become a big part of WWE's version of ECW and then really made his mark on the commentary team. Remember,

I'm marking out, bro. We talk about that. We also talk about how he got his job with Lucha Underground and he wasn't the first choice. They basically brought him in at the last possible second and basically just threw him to the wolf, said it's going to be you and Vampiro, boom, go. And they did an amazing job.

We also talk about why Lucha kind of just faded away and how Matt's been working on the indie circuit and also working backstage for Impact Wrestling. But enough from me. Let's do this. Let's get to it. Put your hands together for Matt Stryker. Well, I figured I had Vampiro on the show recently.

So he had to have his broadcast partner on the show as well. I'm doing great. Okay. That was good. That was it. Take care. Bye. You're a broadcast.

professional. I should. Yeah. I play one on TV. Yeah, you do. I saw that that thing with, with Vamp. I thought it was great. I thought it was great for people to see sides of him that maybe only us know. Right. No. And that happened like the very last minute, basically. I was in Las Vegas. Someone tweeted out, oh, Vampiro lives there. You guys should do an interview. Ten minutes later, we were like, okay, yeah, we'll make this thing happen. He's like Uber. That's it. Yeah. I wish all the interviews were like that. Your interview is three minutes away. I wish it was like that. Although this was, this was good. This was three minutes way.

Yeah, kind of. It was like, hey, we should do an interview sometime. And you're like, let's do it. And it's funny. I said to you, I'll be honest. I'm nervous. What? Because when you watch someone and you like, like or you admire someone's work with

them, you want to be your best. You know what I mean? There's certain times where you control a situation as an interviewer. I'm standing here with John C. and whatever. But in this world, you're the Gene O'Kerlin, the guy. And I'm like, I've got it. I don't know. Weird. Whatever.

You're working with Impact now. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's, I mean, so we're here in Las Vegas, Samstown Casino for the impact tapings. And you're working backstage as a producer. Yeah. It's funny because that term, so people will associate producer with what used to be called the agent.

Yes. But in like, I guess the sports truck world, the producer actually sits in the truck and produces the entire show from open to here comes so-and-so's music in three, two, one. Lose that. Roll this graphic for seasons. eat downs and let's get out on a commercial. So that's what I'm doing in the truck there and that's fun. So you're, yeah, and I think there is a distinction needs to be made there because the term

producer is often a match agent or coach. Yeah, you're like, you're on the production side of things. Complete total aside. Yeah. I should be like a union guy and have like black jeans. Oh, they're blue. They're blue. But no, and it's funny because people don't realize and I've done now enough shows across

the board from WW to Lucha Underground. These are MGM productions and WWB productions. The grips and the guys that run cable and the guys that work the truck should be paid what the top guys are paid because nothing happens without them. When you sit inside a control room or a truck for a wrestling show, it blows your mind what goes on. Yeah. And just for all sports. So for all television. For television in general.

Take a step back and see how we view media, especially now. From television now, it's like people record stuff. this isn't so much directed but on television there's someone pushing a button taking this angle calling this coloring of this particular background it's amazing to me and it's like watching a director do their work

like ready one and take it ready four no ready three take three ready five nope take two it's insane that was good thank you yeah I would be a terrible director actually like every camera was ready and then you took someone else I did right ready five oh we're going to take two instead yeah zoom it on

three. Did your time in WWE prepare you for this production side of things? So I spoke for a living. I became Sean Connery, evidently. When I wasn't wrestling, when I wasn't doing anything, I could slip out to the back truck and the door is usually wide open. They're huge trucks. And if you find the right spot, you're standing behind like Kevin Dunn. And in the wrestling world, in the media world, that's standing behind Martin Scorsese. It's standing behind insert great director-producer here. Sure. So I just was able to be over his shoulder watching.

I did it because I enjoyed it. Did I have the idea, the travel in time that it would prepare me for this? No, but I guess taking a genuine interest and then having the, being fortunate enough to look over the shoulder of one of arguably the best, having the interest and having the experience of seeing him prepared me. So it was just out of curiosity at first.

Like everything. Really? Yeah. So it was just like... What's this button do? What's this button do? Oh, no! So it just had a curiosity, like, I kind of wonder how the machine works back here.

Did you have a curiosity for other aspects of the wrestling world, too? Take away the wrestling part just for how, like, this goes on here in Boston and a truck sends a satellite to my house in Long Beach, New York, and I can see that. Yeah. How that works. And I also realize there's a huge value in that. If you know how to do that skill, then that skill is, you know, it's supply and demand. A lot of people don't know how to do it. it becomes a commodity they will pay you a lot of money for this skill yeah so that to me is the biggest thing like what what skill can i learn love wrestling can tell you about it with my eyes closed to sleep and sometimes i do i talk about wrestling in my sleep oh wow you know and and enjoy it and

make some make some money where was the transition from in ring to you know from the outside looking in for me as a fan to you moving to commentary there's a moment it's fucking this is how life is nuts because we try and plan, plan, plan. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. And you never know that one person mentions you. Hey, you know who's really good? That's so-and-so guy.

It's August 5th. Joey Stiles mentions in a meeting. They needed a commentator for ECW. And he just piped up. Hey, you know who? And I've said this. Pretty much knows a lot about wrestling and won't shut up. I'm about Stryker.

And Vince was like, okay, next thing. That's how it happened. Wow. And I remember Bruce Pritchard came to me. He's like, yeah, you got to be in Atlanta. I want to say the next. day and I didn't prepare. I still brought my boots.

I still bring my boots. It's just it's a habit. I'm working in a production truck. I do not need giant like wrestling boots to go through the airport. But it just was less and less as far as the punching and kicking and more and more. So when when they moved you into the commentary spot was there an audition? Was there like let's try you out, you know, kind of like on these televised, untelevised matches? It was never put to me as such.

It honestly was. So I'm making it up. The doors open at six. the show starts at seven at four, I sat down with, I want to say, Todd, maybe, I don't remember, and they put a match on. Yeah, they put a match on, and they had us call it on the monitor to the truck. Yeah. And then I got one or two things from the producer, hey, don't say this, try that.

Okay, that was it. And I think the trial is by fire. Wow. If I was as awful as sometimes I thought I was or people tell me I was, in the beginning, they wouldn't have kept me on. So I guess each week went by, you were passable, passable, or you weren't hard, unoffensive. Cool, you're something I don't have to worry about.

Let me worry about John Cena's match with Adrian Adonis. That match never happened. You know what I'm trying to say. Isn't it funny, though, that you say, oh, you know, people tell me I was bad all the time. The funny thing about commentary especially is you're either the best or people like, you're the worst. I mean, listen, everyone's entitled to thing,

but I think the thing is so, it's funny you say that because I've met, there's been a handful of people that have come up to me at convention and stuff like, oh, what's up? I'm, I fucking hate you. Don't tell you that? And I'm like, cool. Like, I've never met you.

And I'm like, okay, give me two minutes in my head, give me two minutes. And if you still hate me, I'm still not playing a character, then peace out, I'm good. Yeah. And two minutes, three minutes go by and like, ah, you know what?

Like, it's just, it's a character. Yeah. Every word, MVP is a friend of mine. He says an interesting thing to me. I think Rick Flair said it to him. I don't know. When you see Tom Hanks walking down the street, you don't go, yo, dude, Forrest Gump.

You go, no, Tom Hanks. Yes. You see Rick Flair walking down the street. You don't go, yo, yo, Richard Fleer or whatever. You know, Rick Flair. Yeah. We wrestlers are the only people that are their secret identity. Yeah.

So if you hate that guy, he's doing his job. But please don't hate, you know, Matthew. You know what I mean? I'm a regular dude in a fucking sweater. But yeah. And you are actually are wearing a sweater. I'm totally. Yeah.

Showing off. the yes thank you very much when you're when you're working for impact in the role that you're working right now do you think you have to wear a sweater it's part of the gimmick yes do you think like well i'd like to do some commentary you know it's funny i can listen to josh and don't continually like in my ear yeah and people don't realize i i learned from josh my josh was there when i got there and when i started doing commentary josh and i came like this if people knew what Josh does. I put this tweet out. If you understand what Josh Matthews does for impact, you would, every time you ever see him, you would shake his hand and say, hey, man, how about your drink?

Because, dude, he does so much. Yeah. And his commentary is innately good because he came from the factory. You know, he knows how to put things over. And Don is so unique in his references that people don't get. And his monotone and his pedigree in the sport. That's important. Someone else to have a pedigree in the sport to have credibility of the listener. So I look at those guys and I'm like, yo, right now, Now they're good. If an opportunity pops up somewhere, fine. Yeah. Do you miss it?

Sometimes, and what working with impact is done for me, though, look, there was a minute where I didn't not love it, but every match was kind of the same. And every, like, you know, I was stuck in this quagmire of calling not so good wrestling, not so great wrestling, wrestling that wasn't done so well. I don't know. I have a degree. I promise. I know how to speak.

But now I see... Your master's agree, right? Yeah. Now I see, like, all the stuff these guys are doing on every channel. And, dude, I would love to call that stuff. Love to. How did the role with Lucha come together? Blah.

I'm sitting at home. Lost my... No, because I have to take these memories back in the card catalog of my brain. Sitting at home, the right side of the couch. The fireplace is there. Bugging out because the W.W. thing was over. And, you know, you do men.

How much money do I have? How long can I live with this much money without having to work and die? And I was bugging a little bit. And for me, it's just for me. I go to like faith. Faith is like just my thing. Dude, and I prayed. I was like, if it is, if it's your will and it's something, give me an opportunity,

give me something. And I prayed that prayer and I'm not being funny or whatever. It was like 45 minutes later. Phone rings. It was Krista Joseph, who's a friend of mine from WWU's a writer or whatever. And he was straight up honest. He's like, hey, what are you doing?

I'm like, yeah, sitting on a couch. What do you mean? He's like, well, listen, he's like, we wanted Josh and either Josh didn't want to do it or Josh couldn't do it, so you weren't our first choice, but seriously, that's how it's what he said. It's like, if you can get on like a flight to L.A. tomorrow, be there. And one thing in wrestling I was always taught, you know, yes is always your first answer.

Even if you can't do it. Just say yes, and figure out a way because you're supposed to do it. It's going to be awesome. Yes. Got on the plane, flew out there, six hour flight, landed, got to the building. and I think it was Eric Van Wagoner came up and shook my hand. He's like, yo, you're coming in and on pinch for us. We appreciate it.

Wow. And right there, I was like, all right, do my job. Yeah. And leave them, like, wanting more. Costanza. Like, just, you know what I mean? So, and I remember, dude, I wore like the stupid vest in the shirt. That's the first episode.

Go back and watch that. In contrast to Vamp, it was just like, an odd couple. But that's how that came about. That was crazy. I'm actually surprised that they didn't have this plan. planned out weeks or months in advance. I think someone bailed. Yeah, I think it was just as far as casting.

Someone couldn't do the role. Yeah. And then they called the next actor. And I was the actor that they called and they got the role. I was such a big Lucha Underground fan. And I thought that you did, you did such amazing work there, not only caring the story, but like making us care about what was going on in the ring, too. Yeah.

Yeah. I appreciate that. That's like the nicest compliment you could say. That's true. And I think that it was the chemistry that you and Vampiro had that I think that really carried the show or the hatred that you guys had for each other. I don't know. Come on. Come on. You have me on the ropes. Yeah. No. No, I know you guys really. You do like each other. Oh. So anything in life, you have chemistry with someone or you just don't.

Sure. Just you and I could, could not. We'll know when this is done. We'll see what it looks like. Yeah. Someone once explained to me something called a spiritual familiar, meaning if you believe in it, you knew this spirit somehow in your, in your previous life, somehow, in cosmic dust world. First time I met Vampiro was, I want to say 2002 for MLW. Just, hey, what's up? How are you? Cool.

Whatever. The next time I saw him was at Luch Underground. And I'm telling you, when we sat down together, it's like, don't I fucking know you some somewhere? Aren't you my brother? Something? Huh. Lights camera action. Go.

Working, working, working, working. you know, everything works. And then from there, we just became interesting, interesting friends. What ended up happening with Lucha Underground? To my knowledge, it started as needing a new home. And do you mean physical home as the studio or on the TV station? For presentation and platform. So I think it was not the L. Ray.

Or if anything, El Ray maybe couldn't finance the production or that they couldn't agree to get the price of production down to a number. I was assuming that this particular company was comfortable with. I understand it was shopped around some other places, whatever. I don't know what happened with the Netflix thing, but I honestly think it just comes down to money and blah. Because it just kind of... Money and blah. It just kind of...

It just kind of... It dribbled out. It wasn't even good in the end. And then you started having guys working elsewhere, and then you started having more guys working elsewhere. And it's like, I guess this isn't a thing anymore. You know, when I... So I guess all of us hold on to something.

We all I believe is true. And when I decided, all right, that's probably going to not be something. It was fractured when a lot of the talent and the company had, like, legal issues. And I try not to pay attention to, like, gossip. I heard you did this. I don't know that. That to me was the first fracture. I was like, fuck, this ain't coming back.

At least not for now. So... Right. Are you still wrestling? Yeah. Yeah. I just wrestled from this taping a week ago at NYWC. Oh, so you're still taking a bunch of indie bookings?

Not a bunch. Okay. No, I do like to be at home. I really do. I'm at a point in my life where I enjoy being at home. I think that's interesting, though, because if there's, like, some younger fans watching this right now, they might not know Matt Stryker, the wrestler. That's true.

And, like, is there a divide in your career? It might be good for them. No, come on. Is there a divide in your career when you started to realize? they're like, oh, I think people are realizing me more as a commentator than they are a wrestler. It's an interesting question. I guess I'd have to have like an awareness or cognition of when people. So when I get stopped, I get so, I'm fucking socially awkward.

Matt Strikers are like, hey, how are you doing? Whatever. Matthew K. I'm super nice. Hey, how are you? And look at Matt Stryker. What's your name? And people will always do this.

They give me their full name, which is the weirdest thing in the world. It's the weird, like for a little kid, Hey, Matt Stryker, hey, what's your name? Jeffrey Johnson. Oh, hey, Jeff. For a grown guy, like, hey, what's you? Hey, Donald Jenkins. Hi, Donald.

Nice to meet you. So I don't really take an inventory of how people, how people approach that. But I could see how more would. There's a more widespread body of work for me as an announcer. Also, you know, when you're an announcer, your voice is on the show for the entire show. When you're a wrestler, you wrestle for a few minutes.

See you next week. I can never, I can never really do like crank calls or anything because ever, like the, I know this voice. Who is this? So. We also hosted NXT when it was in a, you know, very different version of what it was. Yeah. You did a lot. Thanks. That's great.

It's fortunate, you know, and I think in any, in any walk of life, anyone that's, you're an accountant, you work at a gym, whatever. If you can learn how to learn, right? Yeah. You can do a lot of different things. So I just learned how John Lorne, I said, I learned how to learn. And I just learned how to learn stuff. And that makes you versatile and valuable. But you walk in the door as a wrestler.

Yeah. When are you able to allow yourself or be allowed to start to learn those other things? I took it upon myself. I didn't wait for him to go, okay, you're now allowed to go sneak to the back of the truck and stand behind the executive vice president who may or may not even know your name of production. And if he does turn around, he backs his chair, he farts, he knocks a coffee on me. I'm fired. So no one said, yeah, go sneak around the back. No one said it.

I used to sit. There's different rooms back in WWU backstage. And one of the rooms is called like pre-tapes. And then there's this audio room that just has all the audio that's going on in the building. Michael Cole and, you know, so-and-so's headset, whatever they're shooting over and things, sometimes even Vince's office. I would put those fucking head things on and just listen. No one said, go ahead, do that. It's okay.

So I don't know. I just didn't. I was weird. And I also didn't like to hang out and talk to people. I can go hide in this room and put on headsets to be like, oh, he's working. Leave him alone. Do you? I'm not working.

I'm avoiding you. Do you think your background in teaching made you want to be a student yourself in this stuff? Yeah, definitely. What exactly was it that you taught? Social studies. Okay. What age? What grade?

Grade seven through 12. So it's just adolescent education and educational psychology. how people learn. I was always fascinated with that. Huh. And then look at you. Hey, and look at you.

A student. A student. So obviously the teaching job has to come to an end when WWE hires you? It has to. Did it? Yeah. Yeah. No, it was a choice.

Everything was happened for a reason again, back to faith. However, I lost that one job. It coincided right with that WWE contract. Like that. So again, to me, divine wind And I'll just jump in the boat and go for the rat With all the knowledge that you had in WWE And learning from a little bit here and there and everywhere

Why didn't they renew your contract? I mean, if you're asking me, you're asking that. I watch a lot of things where people will say, Oh, you know, well, they this, they that. So I put myself, my dad was smart to this for me. He said, put yourself in their shoes from business. So if you understand business and stocks, sort of black is made money red has lost money sure what was i doing for them at that time i was

doing backstage interviews and maybe i was calling main event like i don't even remember i was doing stuff for like the app in its infancy and they were paying me i was there you know almost 10 years so i was on like a second or third contract i was doing well for the amount of work i was robbing them blind so when they wanted to do they came up to renew the contract if they would have said listen here's the straight up. You do this much work. We pay you this much. We'll try to find work for you, but we got to bring you down here. I'd say, okay. Yeah. You're WWE. I love you. Hold me. But they didn't give me that option. They just said, listen, we're not renewing. Like, I remember I had to go up for like a contract talk. I was so young and stupid. I got put on a suit. I had to go

to Stanford. I've likened it before to that scene in Goodfellows where Joe Pesci walks in. I walked in. right, the guy we were supposed to meet with wasn't in the meeting. It was someone else sitting on a desk with Lex Matthew. Come in. Oh, fuck me. All right, cool. And he's like, yeah, we're not going to renew it. Da, da-da-da.

I was, that was a punch in the gut. Especially they flew you to Connecticut to fire. I drove up. I drove up. All right. So they bring you into the office to go, yeah, we're not going to keep you around. Cool. You could have called me.

Yeah. But regardless, the opportunity to say, listen here's business let's talk money yeah you do this we'll give you that yeah hey guys thanks yeah still have a fucking job still on whatever da da da so that was what it was but i think that there's a reason that again i'm a faith guy god took me from there for a reason and now that i'm older i can try to do inventory of the way i was the person i was the things that i was doing and how they were negative to my life maybe sometimes it's better that i'm not there at and that carnation of it, as I remember it.

Let's take a quick pause from this chat with Matt Stryker. To thank our sponsor, Untuck It, and you ever wonder why traditional button-ups look so long and baggy? Well, that's because they weren't meant to be worn that way. Untucket shirts were specifically designed to be worn untucked, hence the name. No matter your size or your shape, their shirts are the perfect untucked length. With more than 50 combinations, untucket shirts look great on tall, short, slim and athletic guys, whatever your shape is, and no matter what your age is.

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Yeah. To now being at home, you know, what was that transition like for you? Well, at first, you have to, I had to get over the feeling of a failure. I did something for them to say, we do not want you. Yeah, yeah. That's rejection. That's whatever. So, okay, let me, let me deal with that internally and mentally.

And I'll be honest. And I've spoken about it. I have, like, everyone has, I have to believe everyone has, like, just anxiety and situations like that fucking inner monologue that monkey on a unicycle banging symbols in your head when you talk to people you go somewhere that's all the time for me that's why fucking vamp i get along uh so i had to navigate that and then from there my surrender goes to just a prayer all right listen take where take me take me i'm alive thank god i'm good i've got some money i've got a roof over my head i got food in the fridge i'm going to sleep upstairs tonight okay god i want to see what i can do

for you tomorrow. Right. That's where that's at. It was faith something that was always part of your life from a young age. Yeah. Yeah. I remember my dad on, he lived in a tall apartment building. He was out on a terrace in the morning early and I must have woke up and went to look for him and he was outside and I saw his mouth moving. I'm a kid. He comes back in. I'm like, can I have gum? I've said this story before and he's like, I don't have gum. What do you talk about? I said, no, I saw you chewing gum outside. It wasn't chewing gum. I was talking. He was on a 17th floor of a 17 story building. over them. I'm like, who you talking to?

Yeah. So I was talking to God. I was like, what is that? Come my son, sit upon my lap and let me tell you these tales. And the good thing about how he did it was he showed it to me. And then he let me, he never pushed anything. No one ever did.

He's like, just, you want to go read about that? Experiment? Think about that. Go ahead. And from there, I just grew to organize religion. I couldn't tell you. I don't know. Stand up, sit down. Six Hail Mary's. Here's your bar mitzvah. You win. I don't know how it works. but whatever. And I'm not mocking it.

But beyond all that, what I arrived, and then I started taking classes at college, what I arrived at is regardless of what they tell you you are, you're Muslim, you're Christian, you're a Christian, do you believe in right and wrong? Do you believe in good and bad? Do you believe that there is some feeling between humans and animals and nature?

Then, okay, that's what the world calls God. But to me, I was like, okay, you believe in that good. How much you choose to do outside of that. that is on you. So that's what I started to develop. So faith has been there from that beginning. Does that something that works into your wrestling in any sort of way? Lord, grant me the strength to punch this man with an amazing Superman punch in the crowd pop.

I've seen guys pray before they go out. But that I think is more for, I know for me when I do it, it's A, oh my God, thank you so much that this is my life. This is gratitude. B, I want to be safe and I want him. usually him to be safe. And I do this weird thing. I'm like, and please, if his family there, is anyone that's there where he can, you know, shine for them.

Let me, I, Johnny Rods is my trainer. So the term is jobber or carpenter. He's like the ultimate, go in and lose guy. You know, the guy who gets his introduction when you're not on television. But that's a very noble thing. What can I do for you? It's almost akin to the servant in most faiths, whether it be Jesus, whether it be Muhammad, whether it be Buddha. They have some type of servitude to something.

Right. So how can I serve you in this match? So there's that. And then please don't let me fucking die. Every time some of these guys pick you up, dude, I'm not a big dude. I'm not six feet tall. I'm at like 215 now.

But dude, when Bobby Lashley picks you up, all you can hope is to land right. And I mean, bless his heart. For his strength and stuff, he's such a professional where he just puts you where it's perfect. I think one of the things that I appreciated so much about your commentary is you came across like such a fan.

Like you were so, Well, you were obviously, obviously very knowledgeable about what was going on, but you came across, like, genuinely interested in what was going on. And, of course, the moment of, like, I'm marking out, Stan, I'm marking out, bro. Fans love that. What was the reaction from Vince or from production on that? The only reaction, I think I recall, was Michael Cole. And the good thing about Michael Cole is he would always give you these, like, visuals. so it's either a wink or I don't matter.

And that's, you, those are silent cues. Sure. And when I said that, he looked at me for a split second and then it's like, cool, and went right back to it. So that was the only reaction I got. I think the reaction is more on the outside than on the inside. I mean, people are still talking about it now. I don't know. I don't know.

Cool. And that was just, that was in that moment, that was just a genuine reaction from you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm just trying to think because so many of my, when I'm left to my own devices, I don't know. I'm all right. Most of the stuff that people like hate are things that were either fed to me or were mentioned

in a meeting. And I'm not saying that's just to, you know, exonerate myself because a lot of times I do stay stupid shit. But that one, yeah, was just an organic moment that I think people could relate to. Yes. We're all marking out, bro. So. But I don't think people realize that a lot of time when you're on commentary, you're,

you are having stuff fed to you. And you're trying to call the match while someone is in your ear telling you what to say or suggesting something. There's conversation going on. Yeah. And sometimes it's as, you know,

as harmless as, hey, let's not forget that the story here is, you know, Jenny's arm. Right. And then sometimes it's, why would you say that about so-and-so's neck when the blah, blah, blah, blah.

And that's not the time for that conversation. Yeah. That conversation should come. later, but I didn't really get a lot of that. I know from working in TV my entire career with an IFB in. Excuse you. Sorry, yeah, my hair's a long. I'm going to do that.

Yeah, with that in your ear, it's so hard to concentrate on what you're doing when there's another voice speaking to you. So I had to, and don't ask me why, I think it was like a rib or a joke. I mean, I had to read teleprompter with an IFB in with someone talking to me. Oh, that's so hard. Don't ask us. Don't ask me how. I'm sure you do it too. You don't know how you get through it. But at the end, you go back. You're like, yeah, I did that and I had a 96% success rate. I maybe flubbed one line or I missed a point somewhere. I feel like in those situations, there's failure's not an option. In those situations, especially when you're live, you're reading a teleprompter. Make it happen. You just have to. And if you flub up, you mess something up, you just make it sound like that's what you were supposed to be doing. No choice because it's presentation. Television, just presentation.

Just go out there and say some words and maybe we'll throw some graphics over your face and we're out. That's right. Here's some money. In the job that you're in now and the role that you're in now, what are some of the mistakes that maybe you see people making in the ring? I think I'm going to say what's some of the mistakes you've made? And I was like, how much time do you have? But that's, it's interesting in my thought process one right there because making mistakes is great. Great, are great.

It's great. And we, we, we moan and lament, oh, I shouldn't have done that, shouldn't do that. Dude, sometimes I love, like, seeing mistakes, because if you can learn from there, you get better. Mistakes that I see out there, I don't think I can critique it as a whole. I think for the most part, it's just what anyone would say. It's not about, it's basic psychology. Basic psychology. You have to have an emotional investment in me.

Otherwise, no matter what I do, you don't give it. Right. So that's the first thing. And how do you do that as a pacing? if guys would make believe, sorry, that sometimes some of those shots hurt more than they do, and sometimes the ones that fucking kill you don't even look like they were anything,

but if a guy would sell, just a touch more, there's still sympathy left in this world. The world's changing, but there's still sympathy. Humans still have a heart. So if you could play on that, your matches and the products will be so much better because instead of sitting here and watching it, we sit here, oh yeah, yeah,

Dude, I love so-and-so as opposed to. I've seen Stryker. What is you going to do now? That rolling on bar thing? Okay, cool. All right. Point to your head. I know you're smarter than me.

Hey, listen, can we go? Yo. If your brain immediately did go to the mistakes that you've wrapped up, what do you think is the biggest mistake that you've made, and what did you learn from it? In this producing thing? Just in general, maybe. In life?

Sure. Or maybe it's in the ring. Maybe it's in commentary. Okay. I think biggest mistake or one of for me at this point in my life. And if it can help anyone, hold your tongue two seconds longer than you want to. Even the fool seems wise when he is silent. William Regal says a still tongue keeps a wise head.

There are times where I literally in situations where people are talking and I want to jump in. I want to say, I go, mm-hmm. Because it gives me time to think. What was I going to say? Process what they said. let them finish what they're going to say. And it just allows me to be a better part of the interaction as opposed to jumping in and missing everything they were going to say.

Hmm. You can't do that on commentary, though. You know something you can. J.R. taught me there are times Vince, too. It's called laying out. There are times where silence tells a brilliant story because the natural sounds of the ring. Hearing Michael Elgin's clothesline thawed against Eddie Edwards' chest

tells everyone in the world, independent of language, culture, race, creed, diversity, that shit heart. Yeah. And there's nothing I can say that's going to, you know, expand on that. Yeah. Are you still teaching at this moment? I mean, at this moment. Yes.

I just finished a degree in educational psychology. So there are opportunities if I, you know, what kind of degree? So it was a master's in educational psychology. Wow. It's good. I mean, I had to get it and I wanted to get it. So I can, it allows me to like pursue other things.

And once you start getting like certificates and degrees and da-da-da-da, they go here. You know, like money. Oh, just put on this shirt and point to this and say this. Cool. I can go home. Cool. But yeah. So that's, that's fun.

It's fun to see how people learn and how kids are coming up these days. It's cool. Do you mean the opportunities to maybe be a professor at a college or something? I'm halfway there with the, you do wear the sweater, yeah. I thought about it. And there's like, I want to say there's over a dozen. in four years and two years community colleges

or in my area. So if you imagine, you can imagine a tire to be like a professor of European history at National Community College. And I teach Tuesday and Thursday. What do I teach?

Let me think. You know what would you teach? Two to four. Now, the summer, I'll teach summer and I'll go to the beach. Yeah, I'll teach two to four. I let you out at 3.45. Don't tell anybody.

What a professor. Maybe we do Friday, one to three. But sometimes on Fridays on Thursday, I'm like, y'all this and we're not coming in. Everything's email. I appreciate that these are all afternoon classes. Yeah. Yeah.

You want to take a 745? Everyone's breath smells. I don't get who you are. I don't know. I'm watching this right now knows you don't go to a class before like 10 a.m. But I'm just saying, like, anything to me that happens early in the morning, I feel that I smell this mixture in the air of like hot hunger and coffee breath. And no matter what you're saying, who you are, I, you're so fresh out of the shower.

I smell your cologne just a little bit more. Your hair gel. mornings are very weird to me because the senses are heightened and I'm a germapha. People are, I don't know. I don't want to breathe your hair. Fuck. It's just, you know, some people, some people smell, have bad breath. All right.

So you're going to have afternoon classes. Afternoon classes to avoid that. But for real, do you think with the extra education you've been getting, the opportunities, are they in education? Are they in teaching or are they in other jobs? It's a great question because I think the goal was to let me have as many have and of opportunities as I can because I was once at a point where the only avenue really closed. And I had to like, you know, literally fall to my knees and turn to prayer.

And in that reward of here's a new avenue, I was, something said to me, yo, man, dig out a few more avenues so that if these close off, wrestling goes away that you have these. And right now, I'm fortunate, thank God, that these avenues are open and these avenues are open and I can take streams of income or experience and get to where I want to be in my life. It's like you said, you've learned to learn. Yeah. It's the only thing I've learned. So if we, what degrees do you have?

Um, I have, I have degrees. So what is it? It's a bachelor's in secondary ed history and then it's the master's in educational psychology. So there's another, you know, Luchessaurus talks. about having a master's degree. Matt Stryker has a master's degree too. It doesn't mean anything with online courses these days. You can do it too.

I guess anyone could do it if they wanted to. Who was it that approached you about the current job that you have now? Oh, that's Scott. Scott to Moore. And it's, you see the same people that you're saying in wrestling as I, you see the same people going up the ladder as you do going down. You know, you're on your way up.

You should be nice people because you ain't going to be there all the time. You don't know how high up that ladder you're going to get. Sure. If you're a dick, you're coming tumbling down. Scott and I have always gone along swimmingly. And he's always tried to find positions for me at impact. And then finally this came a boot. And it just, it seems to work because I think you kind of got to know wrestling,

know what the announcers are doing, know what the TV audience is going to see. And time is a big thing. You know, in any kind of televised things, segments of time as we look at the clock are important. So those things are all that comes from Scott DeMole. And was he the one who trained you how to do this? Trained you? Trained you? Listen, they go, hey, do you think you can't?

And you go, yeah, sure, I can't. Because yes is always the first answer of wrestling. But to his credit, sometimes being left to your own devices is a good thing. Sink or swim. And having the knowledge to do it. And I was super fortunate to have certain people like the director, Dave Zahadi, and, you know, because of Josh Matthews and Jimmy Jacobs. and the relationship with Scott and being able to talk to people.

And there's a few other guys in the truck that are just so valuable. So you learn to learn. Hey, how do I need to learn how to do this? Instead of going, excuse me, can you press that button for me so I can talk to Josh? Hey, man, you got two seconds. Can you show me which button allows me to talk to Josh? Oh, you got to flip that one over there. Why did you do that?

Well, you got to put on monitor three. You got to make sure his monitor's on. You got to flip. You know what? That fucking makes sense. It doesn't have to be circle. Give a man a fish. He'll eat for a day.

Teach a man of fish. He'll eat for a lifetime. Thank you for teaching me to fish. peace out. Yo, Josh, it's mad. Yada, yada. Yeah, yeah. So you're the guy in the announcer's ears.

Yes, now I'm the guy. I'm going to yell. I don't yell ever, ever, ever, ever. That's all come full circle here. And interestingly enough, though, you, sometimes things happen in your life and you say, hey, I always want to be like that. Or you know what? I'm never going to be that way.

So some of the things that I've heard more than I've experienced, to be honest, some things I didn't like, I am very aware of not being that guy here. Sort of, hey, you know, excuse me, camera, too, or please thank you. I mean, I was raised, say grace, say ma'am, say thank you. That's just me. So I think it's nice. I don't know. Fuck you.

If you've learned to learn, what do you think is the biggest lesson that wrestling has taught you? You're proud of that question. You gave that one. I just came around to that way. Yeah. Wait, what was the question? What do you think is the biggest wrestling lesson that you've learned?

What's the biggest life lesson that wrestling's taught you? I mean, that's definitely the first one of the still tongue keeps a wise head. Yeah. But, um, fuck, there's so many. I look back on it. It blew by and I was super fortunate. It's not done, though.

It's not. It's not good. I mean, listen, it's half my life. Literally half my life. I mean, it'll be 22 years. Like, yeah. Half of my existence is this in some regard. I have to have some awareness of how has,

that changed me as a human being from before I ever got into it. Had that changed seven-year-old Matthew? I started watching around seven. So maybe I did this metamorphosis, this change from catapalida butterfly, has been this, this, this, you know, journey. And now I have to say, well, how much more time do I have? I have no idea. And no one does.

And will this thing be with me my entire time or will there be a portion of my life where that was? So, yeah, I mean, fuck, I'm lucky and I'm great. grateful, not the biggest guy, not the best wrestler. I could talk. Yeah, I could talk. Yeah. And if that's enough, thank, thank God.

But kid comes from fucking Queens, New York and does that and wrestles Kurt Angle and all that shit. To me, it's got to be, I just give it up to, I don't understand it. Thank you, God. What can I do with this opportunity to serve you? And I think that I look back, a lot of times people come out to me, dude, I talk to a lot of kids, a lot. and when you say like stupid shit like hey man stay off drugs you know don't beer's bad for you all right i'll see you man do good in school okay do well that means more to them than their parent telling them every day yeah so if there was one kid that was like you know what i'm not gonna do

heroin because match drinker told me not cool there's the big lesson don't you know what i mean that's what we got but i also think that i think your character worked so well when you first came into WWE because it was so much of who you were. You know, it was you were basically teaching people. And I think that because you were so good at that, it then made your character. The jury's still out on that last part. It made your character work that much better. I think to Vince McMahon's credit, to Stephanie's credit, they borrow from real life because it's the easiest thing to emulate. A lot of times, and you see it now with a lot of the wrestlers, They look great and they're awesome

But when they're asked to be this character It comes it's hard to watch It's I'm embarrassed for them And when I get you the 23rd in Shreveport It's gonna be your end Like okay I get it yet Fuck does everything have to be so like that And the lighting cue and you hit your pose

And you say your phrase and you wear your t-shirt I don't know there's a part of that That I think is just feels wonky. I don't know what the hell I was talking about. No, but it's it makes sense though because for you it wasn't wonky because it was like, oh, you just want me to take this classroom

type persona and then turn it up to 11 and kind of act like an asshole. And they let me write a lot of my own like pieces. That very rarely happens. That's Stephanie. I was fortunate.

After like a second or third one, I remember I was working with Dusty Rhodes and Paul Heyman in Buffalo, New York, locked away in a room working on a segment for like dot com. But sometimes you look back and you're like either A, that was a test or B, I just happen to be locked in a room with Dusty Rhodes and Paul Heyman working on like, are you kidding? I'm going to come out so much differently than I went in. Yeah. And if you look at the learning tree of wrestling, which is my favorite thing to do, but Paul learned

from Dusty, right? So Tommy Dreamer is one of my dearest friends. So Tommy learned from Paul. Paul learned from Dusty. Dusty learned from Eddie Graham, and Eddie Graham is arguably one of the greatest bookers in all the world. So when I think about that, I was in a room with these two walking dudes.

Yeah. After that night, several was like, all right, you can write stuff, submit it, we have to prove it, and we can move from there.

And I had fun with that. Man. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Wow. Yeah. I've talked to so many different people

that talk about how great Dusty was and how much Dusty developed their characters. It's like he was just, so special. That's the right word. Dusty reminded me and my dad. Dusty had a soul.

Like a soul. You believed that he loved you to death. When he hugged you, he hugged you. He didn't, you know, what's going on?

Yope. He didn't give you that hard, but you were enveloped in Dusty, that love. And yeah, he definitely was a special human being. Hmm.

Yeah. When you look back at your career, what's the one match that you really love that really stands out for you. So the right answer is, you know, the stuff with Kurt Angle. Sure.

At the end of the day, I will be a wrestler. And I'm coaching junior high wrestling at one of the local high schools by me. So, you know, all that stuff has always been in my DNA. So the fact that I was able to go in there with him. Yeah. And roll to the point where he would, you know, allow me to make it look like I was hurting him for a little while. I got him, right?

Fucking ankle, not. But after a while, you have to get better, just touching him, touching his rope. But there are other matches that people may not. So there was this guy, Josh Daniels in New York and New Jersey when I was first starting out.

We wrestled each other every weekend, and it's not right, but we beat off out of each other in a loving way. And we just had these matches that were great. And then I had a matcher, with Loki once, who to me still to this day, and he also had a hand

in training me. 22 years later, the world should know his, just his character, his talent, his ability to captivate the ability for you to put down the remote and everything professional wrestling is supposed to be, Loki can bring you for not just eight to 12 minutes.

He can bring it for like 30, 45, 60 minutes, and that character is so real, and it's one of the last one. So Matches, Matcha had it with him also stands out. He works in such a believable way. Because it's real enough to not be considered what. It's just, he's special.

He has some special people in the world. I'm not saying, key, key if you're out there, he's hitting you. And there are times where if this is the place where you're supposed to hit him and you're not there in a way that is believable, you're not hitting him. We talked about it in the back. I was supposed to hit you.

Oh, you left me standing there for 16 seconds. Your voice isn't deep enough to be. I will kick you now. And to me, that commitment to the integrity of what this sport still is and what it was, in a way, found it on, was bastardized for a while, but has and will always be about. It's just that suspension for one little second. That, yo, either A, if I ran into him out on the street, I wouldn't want to fuck with him. And B, he's kicking that guy's ass. And that guy's got to kick his ass back.

To me, Loki is one of the few that has maintained that throughout the trajectory of his career. He's never departed from that. He never, even when he did Caval, he was never fun, Loki. No, he wouldn't never compromise his integrity for his commitment to the integrity of the sport. And I always admired that. I think that any time Loki's in the ring, all lies are on him because, yeah, You're right. He does some special work in there.

What's your take on everything that's going on in Impact Wrestling right now? I feel like you guys are making some real waves. Yeah, I think it's the ability to think forward and to understand that, you know, why the people, this is the thing that gets me. They'll say three ways to talk about wrestling in a promo. And it's my favorite because you'll see some of these wrestlers, you know, they get into their promo stance. and they'll either say industry or business. In this industry, I'm the top guy. Okay, or you know, I'm going to get you out of this business.

Sport. I think Impact understands that it can be sport. And the ebb and flow of the storyline of sport has to develop based off of the ability of the athlete. So with guys like Michael Elgin and a guy who's become one of my favorites, Josh Alexander, he's, again, in the vein of the Kurt Angle. And I grew up loving William Regal, fit Finley, Dean Melancho, you know, these guys, Josh Alexander's right there.

You have to think about what it means for the wrestling. The wrestling is very good right now in impact. And that's what I first thing I was. No, and I think that. Not that it wasn't then, but it's, you know. Yeah, and I think that, I mean, Tessa Blanchard made history. And I think that it's not just, it's not the men's championship or the women's championships,

it's the world championship. And Tessa is one of the best wrestlers in the world. See, that's the thing. And when you look at it as a sport, from an athletic point of view, from size and weight and whatever, then you would just have to put Tessa in a category of world champions, independent of gender, that are at her height, at her weight, with her style. Sure. And, I mean, immediately, I mean, I would think maybe a younger American dragon, Brian Danielson, you know,

a different kind of style, but still the same make and mold. And look at it as an athlete. Forget gender. And other wrestlers, I think not so much. style but Jody Flesh. You know, think of the smaller, thinner wrestler that was still incredibly effective. Zach Saber's a little taller, but he could also

be a version of Atessa. So she has the abilities. The thing about her, I think is there's that I want to you. There's two words that are coming to my mind. I can't use either of them because I have four sisters. But I'll use one. She has bitch in her. And that's a little

something that if you want to put it on the gender thing, man can have you I'm a dick but what do you what would you less rather deal with lack of a bit like I don't want to deal with that guy he's a dick or yeah I don't want to deal with she's a bitch so there you go and I have four sisters and I love

the three that are alive remaining it's a certain and the last one I love you too I miss you it's a certain aggression that Tessa brings a certain I mean obviously passion that she brings yeah and yeah I think that that is a

that is an endearing word also to describe her, I think. It's the right word. Yeah. You have to search for the right word. Yeah. I've really enjoyed this. Have you? Yeah. I'm happy. Thank you. I was a little nervous too at the beginning. Yeah. Why? Tell me things about me. Nice. You ever guess people that you have to be aware of that in casual conversation, I often look for when people fish for things. Yeah. So a lot of times people, some people are great about it. They can bring a conversation back to being about themselves. Sure. And sometimes in wrestling, you see that with like wrestlers and stuff. So that just reminded me.

There are definitely times in those wrestling conversations when you're like, uh-huh, okay. Yeah. You know. You know. You know. Matt Stryker. Thank you so much. I appreciate you.

Yeah, I appreciate you. Well, there we go, my friend. Thanks for hanging out with me and hanging out with Matt Stryker for this one. If you're listening right now, snap a screenshot, tag me. Tag Matt Stryker. Let us know what you thought about. this. Let us know what stood out the most for you. And in case you're wondering, no, I am

no longer Chris Van Beard. Yeah, if you've been following me on Instagram, or if you watched my last interview on YouTube with Excalibur, I've had a beard for the last 30 days. And if you're a guy, you know that you can't just shave the beard off. Like, boom, you can't just shave it off like that. You've got to shave it down. Have some fun with it. So I shaved it down into ridiculous sideburns,

a goatee, a hool-a-hole. Kogan mustache, a Freddie Mercury slash Rick Rood mustache. And now I'm Chris Van Cleanshaven. But check it all out. At Chris Van Fleet, you'll see the ridiculousness that I'm talking about on there. So big thanks to Matt for joining me for this chat. Big thank you to you as well. I think we learned a lot in there.

I think that we figured out, you know, Matt's whole path to how we got into WWE, Luch Underground, where he's at right now, his whole mindset about everything, which I love. It's amazing. Speaking of mindset, have you heard of the author Simon Sinek? He wrote the book called Start With Why, which I highly recommend. But I saw this quote from him earlier, which really spoke to me today, especially if you're someone who can't enjoy a Sunday because you know that Monday's coming up

and you've got to go to a job that you don't like. Or if you're one of those people that when you're walking down the halls of your job and someone says, hey, man, how you doing? And you go, well, it's Thursday because you don't want to be there. That shouldn't be the way that it is. You shouldn't have to dislike your job. So this quote speaks to that. Working hard for something we don't care about is called stress.

Working hard for something we love, it's called passion. Boom. What are you passionate about this week? Let me know. At Chris Van Fleet. We've got some big interviews coming up. We will talk to you guys soon. The Hammer Alley podcast, an 80s flashback mockumentary.

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