Insight with Chris Van Vliet - Mr. Kennedy: WWE's Biggest "What If", MITB, Brutal Undertaker Chair Shot, Training Tiffany Stratton

Episode Date: May 22, 2025

https://cvvtix.com - Get your tickets for INSIGHT LIVE in LA and NYC with VIP Meet & Greet!Ken Anderson (@mrkenanderson) is a professional wrestler previously signed to WWE and known by his ring name Mr. Kennedy. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet in Indianapolis, IN to talking about his wrestling school "The Academy" and to discuss his WWE career highlights that included winning and losing the Money in the Bank briefcase, nearly being named Mr. McMahon's illegitimate son and feuding with The Undertaker, his signature microphone entrance, why he never returned to WWE, winning the TNA World Championship, training Tiffany Stratton and more!Give Ken a call or text: 507-722-2776Quote I'm thinking about: "You can have results or excuses. Not both." - Arnold Schwarzenegger  Please support our sponsors!   PURE PLANK: The future of core fitness! Use the code CVV to save 10% on Pure Plank designed by Adam Copeland & Christian: https://gopureplank.com/?ref=tibcloux  SEAT GEEK: Use my code for 10% off your next SeatGeek order*: https://seatgeek.onelink.me/RrnK/CVV Sponsored by SeatGeek. *Restrictions apply. Max $20 discount   TIMELINE: Go to https://timeline.com/insightto get 10% off your order of Mitopure!   VUORI: Get 20% off your first purchase! Get yourself some of the most comfortable and versatile clothing on the planet at https://vuori.com/cvv   ROCKET MONEY: Join Rocket Money today and experience financial freedom: https://rocketmoney.com/cvv  HUEL: Get 15% off plus a FREE Gift for NEW customers with the code INSIGHT at https://huel.comMIRACLE MADE: Upgrade your sleep with Miracle Made! Go to https://trymiracle.com/CVV and use the code CVV to claim your FREE 3 PIECE TOWEL SET and SAVE over 40% OFF   ZOCDOC: Instantly book a top-rated doctor today at https://zocdoc.com/insight   BONCHARGE: Use the code CVV to save 15% off your infrared sauna blanket at https://boncharge.com/cvv   BLUECHEW: Get your first month of BlueChew for free with the code CVV at https://bluechew.com   PLUNGE: Get $150 off your Plunge with the coupon code CVV150 at https://plunge.com   For more information about Chris and INSIGHT go to: https://podcast.chrisvanvliet.com If you have ever enjoyed any of these episodes, could I ask you to please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcast or Spotify? It takes less than a minute and makes a huge difference in helping to spread the word about the show and also to convince some hard-to-get guests.    Follow CVV on social media:  Instagram: instagram.com/ChrisVanVliet Twitter: twitter.com/ChrisVanVliet Facebook: facebook.com/ChrisVanVliet YouTube: youtube.com/ChrisVanVliet TikTok: tiktok.com/@Chris.VanVliet Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ladies and gentlemen, Chris Van Fleet. Well, here we go. Welcome back to another audio adventure here on Insight. I'm CVV, Chris Van Fleet. I understand there are a lot of podcasts out there. So thank you for hitting play on this one. And thank you for helping to make Insight the number one wrestling podcast on the planet. Hit a skull-crushing.

finale on that follow button, wherever you're listening right now, then hit an additional skull crushing finale on that rating on Spotify or on a review on Apple. Thank you in advance. That would help the show so, so much. The bigger the show gets, the bigger the guests can continue to get. I will see you guys in L.A. and I'll see you in New York for our upcoming live shows. L.A. is on June 6th the day before Money in the Bank. New York is August 1st. the day before the first ever two-day summer slam, grab your tickets and grab those VIP tickets, which include a meet and greet after the show.

They're going to sell out. So grab them now at CVV-V-Tix.com. That's CVV-T-I-X.com. Today we've got Mr. Kennedy. Say it with me. Kennedy. Back on the show, his real name, of course, is Ken Anderson.

This is the first time that I've sat down with him in person for an interview in, I think almost exactly 10 years. He's got an incredible story. I mean, you saw the title of this episode. He really is one of the biggest, if not the biggest what ifs in wrestling. Think about it. He was red hot. He won the money in the bank briefcase at WrestleMania 23. Then because of a misdiagnosed injury, they took the briefcase off of him. He lost it to edge. He was also supposed to be Vince McMahon's son in that whole angle that ended up being turned into a little. a joke with Hornswoggle. There's just so many missed opportunities with him. He had the

charisma, he had the look, he had the in-ring ability. He had it all. Of course, he went on to impact wrestling, became a two-time world champion there, but there were so many chances in his career where it just didn't pan out. But I'm so impressed by the way that he looks back on it now and how he takes ownership of the mistakes that he might have made along the way. Also, if you didn't know, Ken now runs a wrestling school in St. Paul, Minnesota called The Academy, where he has trained some notable names like Tiffany Stratton. Check out the website. It's the academy, sopw.com. So that's the academy school of pro wrestling.com. Snap a screenshot and let us know you're listening to this. It was amazing when I posted the other day that he was coming on the show, how excited

you guys were for this episode. Me and you both. I love Ken. And I always love being able to sit down with him and catch up. Tag us when you post that screenshot. He's at Mr. Ken Anderson spelled out, M-I-S-T-E-R. Mr. Ken Anderson on Instagram. He's at Mr. Ken Anderson, Mr. being MR. M-R, just M-R Ken Anderson on X. I'm at Chris Van Fleet.

Let's get into this. Please welcome Ken Anderson, aka Mr. Kennedy. Kennedy. Well, it's good to see you again, sir. I see you, man. Yeah. Was that a, oh, was that Mike? check you got there. Let's get ready. Oh, wait. Somebody else's. Give me. Here's could be,

Mr. I remember we did an interview in Toronto right before your movie came out. So we're going way back. Like 2009, I think, right? I think the movie came out in 2007 or 2008. 2008. So we did this interview in Toronto in 2008. And I was like, yeah, I'm Chris Van Fleet and I'm here with mister. And I like yelled it. And my cameraman's like, No, now stop, stop. What are you doing? We got to adjust the audio if you're going to do that. Oh, geez.

I vaguely remember that. Like, sorry for ruining the moment. Like, geez. So did we have to do it again? Yes. Did we explain to him what? Yeah. And I'm like, all right.

So this is the thing. I'm going to yell really loud. And then he's going to yell really loud. Oh, okay. All right. Thanks for letting me know. Thanks for watching. And it's like, you ruined our moment.

It's trying to impress you like, hey, I watched the thing. Because when you're doing, when you're doing the movie interviews, you're assuming people aren't wrestling fans, right? Yeah, like most of those people weren't wrestling fans. And I think at the time, you know, wrestlers hadn't really crossed over into that world. So it was like almost like they looked down. I felt like they looked down on you a little bit. Oh, he's a wrestler.

He does that wrestling stuff. And it's like it's a WWE studio film. So do we take it as seriously, you know? Yeah. But they're getting paid to take it seriously a little bit. So, yeah. So when we talked, was that like a press junket for that movie? You would come to Toronto doing a press tour.

It was me and Joe? I think it was just you. Oh, okay. Yeah. So I did this big one with Joe Mangonello. Actually, I think that was in Philly. And everybody kept, it was Joe Mangonello. Yeah.

Who's like a big star now. Yeah. But he hadn't really done much. And people kept pronouncing his name wrong. So that was a big problem all day long. Yeah, he's a huge star. know. Did you think about doing any other acting after that? I did. It's something that like literally has always been like that's, I don't want to say my passion because otherwise I'd be doing it

if it was my passion. But that's what got me into wrestling in the first place. When I was a kid, I did plays and I'd make little movies with my friends and stuff like that. I always wanted to be in the entertainment industry. Well, it's never too late. I know. You can still do it. Yeah, yeah. And my, My wife and I just watched because she'd never seen my stuff, my wrestling or my, my movie. So we watched behind enemy lines like three, four weeks ago. What'd you think? I think she liked it. I actually, I actually thought it was okay.

Like, it's not a bad movie. No. It's got a good story. There's some pretty big actors in it. There are certainly much worse WWE studio films. Well, I don't know, because I haven't seen many of those. So I can't. Well, I'll just take my word.

I'm not trying to bury any of them. I'm just saying yours isn't bad. Yeah. Yeah. I had a ton of fun working on it, you know. It was a different world. Why not do a little more acting? I will.

I think it will. It's the great thing about acting is you can do it at any age. You could act till you're 120. You're like, look at the big stars that you see now, too, that didn't start until later on in their lives. I love those stories. Brian Cranston. Nobody knew who Brian Cranston was before. Malcolm in the middle.

He did some other things before that, but that was like a real breakout role for him. Samuel L. Jackson didn't get his break until his late 30s. Yeah. There's a thing there. I'm almost 50. Next year, right?

Yeah. Yeah. 49. How's that feel? I don't feel different. People look at me differently. Like they don't card me when I'm at the bar yesterday in the airport.

But I don't feel like I'm 50, you know, or 49. Are you still wrestling? Mm-hmm. Yeah. How much longer do you think you can do that? You know, it's funny. When I was in TNA, I had a really bad attitude about the business.

I had sort of like, severed on it. And somebody asked me in an interview, and I was like, if I'm still doing this in five years, somebody shoot me. And I kind of look back on that and I just like, I can't believe I said something like that, you know? I don't know how long, but I'm going to go until, you know, you know, know, until the wheels fall off. And I mean, not like, hey, he should have retired 15 years ago, wheels fall off, but I still feel like I have some juice. Well, you still have the passion for it too.

And that's why you run your wrestling school. Which you're wearing the t-shirt of. I love that. Yes, sir. Yeah, you've had some big names come through there. We've had some successes. Yeah, Tiffany Stratton being probably the biggest name right now. That's right.

I hope that when you go into the school, there's just pictures of her, everywhere. No, no. Maybe, maybe, you know, maybe I should. Yeah. Like when the current WWE women's champion is one of your graduates. Yeah. Someone you worked with. It's amazing. Yeah. And, and, you know, we've had some other ones come through. And I think we have some that have all the potential in the world. They just need reps. They need the experience, you know, and it's going to take several years for most of them. There's like every once in a while we get Tiffany Stratton. We have a guy right now, Alex Finley, who is just like, you know,

I usually wait till third week to start bumping, maybe fourth, fifth week before we do flip bumps and stuff like that. I take my time, right? What are they doing before that? Chain wrestling, footwork, ring awareness. um you know cardio conditioning things like that you know so when we get the bumps like because the one of the other things i feel like is and and this my my wife she's great with this kind of stuff like there were several classes where we would bump on day one

and there were a couple times where people bumped and then they hurt way worse than i thought it was going to and they'd bounce that would be it And, you know, it was her idea. Like, let's just, let's show them that there's more to it than that. Then maybe they'll enjoy it a little more. And that's, that seemed to work. What are you looking for when a student comes through the door? Like, how do you know someone's going to be a success?

I don't. I really don't. Because the ones that I think, I look at them and go like, you know, we all, we judge people. Sure. We just do. Yeah. The ones that I say they've got a lot of potential, oftentimes don't pay. pan out. For whatever reason they fall off, it's not their passion. And the ones that have

three left feet are the ones that like figure it out. You know, and there's one thing about the academy is we, we train people from all walks of life. We've got, you know, people who are athletes. We have, Gable Stephson was one of our, who's an Olympic gold medalist to somebody that gets in their ring on day one and has never done a forward role in their life. And we sort of meet people where they are and work with them. And it's interesting because you can see like those moments where they figure it out. And they go, oh, if I did that, I can do more. You know, and you look back to one of my favorite instances, DDP, there's the guy that's on the crutches who can't walk.

who now holds his leg above his head and, you know, he runs, anybody can, anybody can figure it out. Yeah. It's just, so what I look for is, is that, I guess. It's just do you, are you coachable? And, uh, we have this list of rules on the board. Number one is safety because it has to be number two is don't be a dick. Which, if I could just replace all the other rules, it would be that, right?

Just don't be a dick. It's a good life rule. And somebody wrote, one of our students wrote on the board, believe in wrestling and have fun. Or believe in yourself and have fun in wrestling. And I was like, who wrote this? And nobody knew, like, how I was going to react to it. If I was going to be upset or whatever, he was like, I did.

It's like, we're leaving that there, you know? Nice. Yeah. Do you remember the first day Tiffany Stratton walked in? Yeah. Yep. So she was friends with Greg Gagne. Her family, Greg is a family friend.

And Greg reached out to me and said, hey, I've got this girl that, you know, she's a power lifter and she does gymnastics and stuff. She's a super athlete, really good look. And I want to train her. Can we come? So she started coming and like right away day one, she's one of those people. I was saying earlier, like, well, we take our time to get to the flip bumps and stuff like that. but like Alex Finley and Tiffany Stratton, day one, they're doing perfect flip bumps, landing perfectly, you know,

Gable Steve's and show him how to get up, you know, bump and then get up a certain way. And he did it. I said, you know, get up this way. And he started getting up the wrong way. And I said, uh, uh, and he went and he reversed himself back down and got up perfectly the right way. But yeah, Tiffany, day one, doing stuff that there's some stuff. people just have instincts for it, you know.

I think she's one of those people. However, the funny thing was, it's like, she had no, I don't mean this in a negative way. Like she didn't have any charisma as far as she just did the work. She didn't have the character stuff down. So then fast forward to, I have her first, her first promo is,

I'll have to ask her someday for her permission to put it out there, right? Because it's not good. Yeah, rated on a scale of one to 10. Zero. Like, like, I would say that to her, and I think she would probably agree with me. And everybody's, everybody's first interview is terrible. Sure. But to see how far she's come in that regard is pretty awesome.

But that's great to know that charisma can be taught. And I think that a lot of people think you either have it or you don't. And I think to some extent that's true. But like someone like you, who just oozes charisma, that stuff comes easy for you. It does. Yeah. I guess I think it's just, it's just, she's laughing at me over here. It's, uh, it's just practice, right?

It's putting yourself into positions to fail, failing and then figuring out like, what caused me to fail and then. But a lot of people don't want to fail. Exactly. A lot of people are scared of that idea of like looking stupid in front of other people, looking stupid to themselves. Like they, they're just so. scared of failing that they never try anything.

I think once you put yourself in a few positions like that, you just bite the bullet, the ones that do, and they realize like, oh, that sucked, but it wasn't that bad. I'm okay. And they'll, you know, I see that at the academy all the time. Those people that are just, they can't talk, they don't want to talk, they freeze. And then slowly, but surely, they start to get their. their footing underneath them. Gable Steveson, such a gifted athlete,

what do you think was missing from him being a great pro wrestler? I don't think that he loves the wrestling business. I mean, one of the things, like, WWE has done the NIL thing for a while. I remember back when I was, I think when I was there, there, you know, there was always these rumors are like, WWE is only taking guys that are six foot one or taller.

Yeah. And it, we're only taking, then for a while they wouldn't take anybody that had independent experience. And I just think like, there's a, the guys who are successful love this. Mm-hmm.

Like he had one match. Mm-hmm. One match in NXT. Yeah. And then that's it. Yeah. Yeah. And I,

you know, And another thing is, you know, maybe it just wasn't his time because look at how it's just, Steve Austin said it a long time ago. It's just a machine and work gears in that machine. And sometimes you've got to pull some gears out and replace it with some new ones and see how that goes. Yeah. There's guys that, a lot of guys that got fired under Vince who are back, who are major players now. Cody, well, he didn't get fired.

You know what I mean. Yeah. I'll see Munk's back too. Yeah. A lot of people. Drew McIntyre. Yeah. But when you think about Drew or you think about Cody Rhodes, they went, reinvented

themselves and then came back and said, like, I'm a better version of myself now. Totally. Yeah. Yeah. And they like wrote their own, they like wrote their own script. Yeah. It's pretty cool to see. Did you see a path for you to go back to WWE after getting let go?

I didn't want to. I swear to God, like I had no desire. And I think that I never wanted to like blow the bridge up completely. But I really, I had no desire. When I was at TNA, I was like, I'll never go back there. I'll never work for them again. Yeah, just no way. No, no, it's changed.

I mean, I would definitely. I would definitely know. But was it, was it animosity? It was just you were so upset with how things ended? Yeah. And I think the animosity was like instead of looking at myself, I was looking at, you know, this person did this and that person did that. And like they screwed me.

And, uh, and then I, you know, at some point I realized like, I, I played a hand, a huge hand and all that. But how long did it take you to get to that point? A long time. Like how long? Almost my entire time at TNA. And what was it? Was there like a come to Jesus moment where you're like, man, the common denominator here is me?

Yeah, I don't know. I don't exactly know what it was, but it was like, well, you know, those guys who went to Vince and said, hey, we can't work with this guy anymore. Like, had I been doing all the right things up until that point, that conversation would have gone differently. Well, you know what I mean? The fact was that like that was just a straw that broke the camel's back. And Vince was tired of, you know, it was, there was a lot of negativity around things that I was doing, saying my attitude. And then that, like, get rid of them. That's got to just, that's so unfortunate that other people are saying things about you that causes you to get then

get fired. Like I said, had I, you know, I have to take credit for that because, like, that's on me. That takes a lot of self-reflection to be able to get to that point. It just is. That's just a reality, you know. I read a book in the last couple of years. I can't remember what the name was, but like, you know, this, this, he's like a self-help guru, and it's, uh, it's on the tip of my tongue. Um, It's like something responsibility, like ultimate responsibility or something like that. You know, like every instance you can look at it and go, I could have done something different and that wouldn't have happened.

And I got to that point before I read the book, but then reading that sort of like cemented it in my brain. How do you feel when people say that you're the biggest what if in wrestling? Nobody's ever said that. You've never heard that before? Uh, yeah. And I guess like, you know, there's a ton of mistakes that were made along the way. And the one thing that I can't go back, can't change any of that, I can just move forward.

And what I can do is hopefully show my students, hey, don't do this. You know, and to some degree, we all think that about our kids too. Like, well, I'm just going to tell my kid not to do it. and he's going to listen to me, right? But they don't touch the stove. They got to touch their stove at some point. Yeah. But hopefully they don't have to put their own hand on it.

Yeah. That's, there's just so many, when you look at your career, there's so many times where you were so close. Like so close. And then whether it was by your own doing or not, things didn't come to fruition. My friend MVP likes to remind me that I was a misdiagnosis away from the World Heavyweight Championship.

like by a day, something like that. Yeah. Jeez. Did I, are you aware of that story? Did we talk about that? This is years ago, so,

you know, refresh our memories for someone who might not have heard that. So I had the briefcase that I had won at WrestleMania. By the way, the match, the,

the, the, people in that match, it's like, they're all Hall of Famers. It's crazy. Like when you look at it, it's CM Punk,

Edge, Finley, Jeff Hardy, Booker, Mad Hardy, Randy, Randy, What a lineup and you won.

Yeah. Yeah. Crazy. So I had won the briefcase and they had me say on TV that I was going to catch it in next year at WrestleMania. Yeah. And that was the plan. Ish. You know, like at the time, I don't know if things have changed, but like it's literally

week by week the writing for the most part because things change so rapidly. So you just kind of like, hey, we're thinking about doing this, but you never know what curveballs are going to be throwing at you. So then one night after Smackdown, I got a call from Michael Hayes. He said, Vince needs to see you in his office. So I walked in and Vince and Stephanie laid out a scenario, hey, takers hurt. He's got to, I think he torn his biceps. He was the champion at the time. He needs to have surgery.

He needs to go away. and then they laid out the scenario for the next next week on smackdown he was going to have a cage match with like Mark Henry or Batista or somebody like that he was going to barely squeak out somebody else was going to come out and do some more damage to him and then I was going to come out and pick the bones cash in the briefcase cover him one two three yeah and uh so then I remember that night going out with nobody knew about this except for like they tell a few people and Michael Cole and Mark Huron were the only two that knew. And for some reason, I wasn't like, I didn't make it habit or I just generally didn't hang out with these guys, but we went out to the bar that night and they were kind of like, you know, toasting me like, here, here's the hard work kid, you know. And I just had this weird feeling. And then the next week, we did a double shot in Poughkeepsie on a house show on a Saturday. First show, I'm in like a eight-man tag. Batista gives me a little clothesline and I went down and I felt something popping my tricep and I rolled out to the

floor and it just started swelling up like right away. And I remember Finley standing there going that doesn't look good. And by the time I got downstairs, my arm was swollen, was starting to change colors, which is weird because that usually takes a couple days. Hornswoggle drove me to the to the ER in, I think it was Erie, Pennsylvania. I think Erie, for some reason, was close. And then I went to the hotel room. Next day, Stephanie called me. She said, Ken, you tore your tricep.

Off the bone. You're going to have to have surgery. You're going to go away for nine months. We still need to get that title off a taker, though. So we're sending the jet. I'm going to come pick you up. you're going to come to Penn State. Edge is going to challenge you for your briefcase,

and then he's going to go on to do what you were supposed to do. I just, okay, that's, that's the way the cookie crumbles, you know, whatever. Yeah.

That's business. Flew there, got wrapped up. I couldn't move my arm. You know, it was kind of like, what can you do? Not much.

So Edge beat me up right out of the, right out of the, I think he jumped me on the ramp, rolled me in the ring, ding, ding, ding, spear one, two, three. So then the next day, I go down to Birmingham, Alabama, sitting on Dr. Andrew's table, and he just feeling my arm.

And he goes, that's not a tear. I don't think that's a tear. Like, excuse me? No, I don't think that's a tear. Then he took another MRI. It was just a large hematoma. It was just a bunch of blood vessels that popped. So MVP says you were a misdiagnosis away from.

And you were back to wrestling in a few weeks, right? Like maybe five, six weeks. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my gosh Yeah Think about like how you're How much different your run would look

Mm-hmm But what if you know It's the butterfly effect Right I think about that all the time You know Back to Future is my favorite movie of all time Yeah Because of that very thing

If this doesn't happen Then this doesn't happen Then all these other things Can't happen after that If that wouldn't happen I wouldn't have met my wife Yeah You know what I mean

Yeah I think about those types of things all the time. I wouldn't have the kids that I have right now. Right. So it just, I don't regret any of it. You know,

I don't, it just is what it is. And gotta keep moving forward. Yeah. You won the championship in TNA. I know that's not the same thing, but like, you did reach the pinnacle in that company.

Yeah. And, and, you know, I've said this before, like, It didn't, not the same, you know, like you just said it. It's not exactly the same, but like, that doesn't mean that I wasn't proud of that,

you know. And at the end of the day, like, it's a prop. If you don't understand that, the rock just put out that tweet. Yeah, it said it's a complete work. It's a complete work. It always is. It's fiction, you know, like, if you don't understand that. Yeah.

So I didn't really win anything. But at some point, it's like these people, all these people, like, felt that you could carry the... Yeah. It's, there's a, it's a funny thing, right? Because, like, wrestling fans hate hearing that it's fake, right? Of course, it's not fake. It's pre-determined, right? But then when someone within the business goes, hey, you know, this is just pre-determined, right?

They're like, well, what about K-Fabe? What happened? It's such a fine line. You know, I think... I understand the that rosy retrospection where we wanted to be like it was

in the 80s where you hear like I just think they believed it right like but Hollywood like you can go I don't people don't buy DVDs anymore but once upon a time you could buy DVDs and they'd have all these extras on there

yes the behind the scenes how they did it and I don't remember anybody ever watching that and going like, well, well, fuck. Now I know it's not, now I know that Jurassic Park really didn't happen. You know? Yeah, like when there's the green screens or you can see the wires, I'm like, that's cool. That's cool. Yes. I love seeing how the sausage is made.

It makes me appreciate it that much more. I, I, we at the academy, we will have TikTok, we'll put on matches on TikTok. Yeah. And they're just practice matches. And then we do the critiques after. You know, and I've gotten some like, you're exposing the business a little bit too much. And like, I get that, but they can watch hours upon hours upon hours of me or anybody else exposing all the secrets of the business and they still won't be able to do it.

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Go to CarGurus.com and make sure your big deal is the best deal. That's C-A-R-G-U-R-U-S dot com. The interesting thing about wrestling is if you and I watch a baseball game right now, we've all thrown a baseball. Watch a basketball game. We've all dribbled a basketball, shot it out of a hoop. Same thing with football, right? You've thrown a football.

Most people watching wrestling have never even touched the canvas, touch the ropes, taken a bump. Yeah. I went to wrestling school years ago when I was in college. I get it. I get how it feels. But there's a lot of people that have never experienced that. And somehow they're the Monday morning quarterback.

Yeah. And it's funny that you say that about not touching the canvas or touching the ropes. Most people that come to the school are wrestling fans, have been wrestling fans. Their whole lives knew that they wanted to get into business some form or fashion from very early age who the one thing that we see people do every day is run those ropes hit the ropes duck clothes on and duck this and the minute they get in and i show them how to run the ropes it's like watching uh bambi take his first steps on ice it's seriously like it's one of the hardest things to to figure out yeah well it's very unnatural running the ropes is not a natural movement even just

getting in the ring sometimes you've seen people do this. And I do I go into the bottom rope? Do I, they trip? And I, for me, that gives me so much more respect for what you guys do. And that's what I hope. Yeah. I really, when I'm, when I'm exposing this stuff, when I'm talking about, I hope people

look at it and go like, oh, I never, well, this is art. Tell me, Ken, how did you always catch the microphone so perfectly in your hand every time? I didn't. There's a really funny, there's a funny video of, because they used to mess with me, you know, like they'd drop it real slow sometimes

or sometimes they'd just drop it. There's one time where they dropped it fast and I missed it. The thing goes swinging. I meant to do that, you know. But you were always perfectly centered under it somehow. I just look up, there it is.

I just knew where my mark was. It's amazing. It was one of those things, too. I think for the most part, every day, it was different in every ring. Sure. Or in every arena. Yeah. So I'd just get in there and check it and make sure, or they'd come up and say, like,

hey, it's a little farther to the back today. But it's coming all the way from the ceiling, right? So like 100 feet up or whatever it is. The thing was is that thing's a pain in the ass for them to load because it has to be like a special truss that whole. holds it. The pulley has to be rigged just right. The weight of the microphone has to be, they have to add some, some weight to it. Because otherwise the, the cord gets stuck in the pulley. So, yeah, it's a, and then somebody's got to be up there, like, letting it down and then to pull it right back up again. Because I'd throw it. Yeah. And if they didn't, if they weren't, you know, checking their time or whatever, hit somebody in the head. Did you ever think that saying your name would be your catchphrase? I scratch my head all the time And I tell people

When they're trying new things Like somebody will be like, I want to try this. And rather than I don't, you know, If I don't get it or it doesn't sound right to me, well,

we can still try it. Because you just never know. I mean, who would have thunk that I started saying my last name twice. And five weeks later, I was debuting on Smackdown. And it was a,

like a whirlwind. The next four years was a blur. And that was the only thing that changed is that you said your last name twice? I mean, and then I got, I was able to get better at wrestling and doing the stuff. Like as I worked on the road, I worked,

you know, you work every day, you were four days a week. And it's just reps, getting in reps. But yeah, like, that was really the only thing I did.

Paul Heyman told me at OVW, go out there and cut the ring announcer off. cuss him out and do your own introduction, do it big. And I just, I recalled back to, I used to do it in, on basketball games when I was in high school. I used to say the last name twice. So I just hit it. And when I came to the back, everybody was like,

that was awesome when you said that. And keep doing that. And then I just started doing it. And five weeks later, four weeks later, Dreamer called me, hey, they want to see you at SmackDown this week. you've interviewed Tom Dreamer yet years ago yeah he's a lesson that was a really good dreamer impression you might even have even had too much excitement in your voice yeah i think so but it's amazing though

that that's the thing you said your name mr kennedy kennedy and then like when i started it was people in the back all from the time that i would walk in the building people in catering yelling, Kennedy and like the boys and Vince even, you know, the crew guys, the guys in the truck. So.

And then it started, I started noticing within a few weeks, you know, when, when people start filing into the arena, they're, who, Kennedy,

who! That started happening. you know. It reminds me a little bit of L.A. Knight now. You go into an arena early. A lot of, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

There's been a lot of comparisons between the charisma he has and the charisma that you have. I hear you that a lot. I guess you guys, yeah, kind of look similar too. You guys can be like brothers. Two handsome men? Two handsome men. That's a tag team name. L.A. Knight and Mr. Kennedy.

Two handsome men. I like it. I'll do the. But same thing. Like you go to the arenas back then, it was Canada. Right now it's, yeah, there's something to that. It's defined in that catchphrase. Just singular, you know, monosyllabic chance.

Wrestling fans, we are a simple bunch. I think people in the United States are, like, it's funny, I go to Packer games and it's go, pack, go, go, go. And you go over to like England and you go to a football game over there and it's like there once was a man from Kentucky and they go through this whole soliloquy, you know. And they all know it. And they all know it. Exactly.

It's amazing. You're so right. It's like do, do, do, do, do here. Yeah. U.S. A. U.S. A.

That's very funny. How that all worked out. So just find one word that you can throw out at the audience and look at. Look at Daniel Brian. Yes. Look at Stone Cold. What? They still do that.

Yeah. It's so annoying. It's the worst. But there's a way to break out of that cadence. You can break the audience. You can figure it out. Yeah. It's just interesting.

It messes you up, though. Yeah? Especially, like, I remember when I was at WWE, they sometimes hand you a two-and-a-half-page script. you got to go memorize this thing and say it pretty much verbatim right yeah and then they so you're like you know you only have a couple hours to commit that to memory in the first place and then you get out there in front of a live crowd and they're doing that it's like sometimes it throws you off and then you end up with Dave Batista saying give me what I want he told me he forgot his line yeah

and he's just like uh give me what I want and that was what it ended up being hornswagel sat in that very chair when we did this interview last year. And he walked me through your big moment at Russell Many 23. How did you know you weren't going to kill Hornswog with that move? I didn't. I was hoping to. No. It was something that I had. So when I first, when I made my debut, it was supposed to be a dark match against Funaki. He was going to super kick me, one, two, three. It was just going to be dark. Dave Laganah walks up. This is that right after Dreamer called me and said they want to see you. And, you know, Vince walked by me. Dave walked by me. He goes, hey, there's a change. And I immediately thought like, oh, they cut the match. That's cool. Whatever. And he was like,

we need to come up with a finisher for you because you're going over. And this is going to be televised now on Velocity and welcome aboard, you know. And so right away, way, it was fit, Fit Finley was our producer. And he's like, what kind of finisher can you do? And I was like, I do the Finley roll off the second rope. And Funaki's eyes got like, uh, and I was like, please, if you just hold on to me, like squeeze tight, I'll take care of you. I'll set you down gently. No problem. I promise. Okay. And he trusted me. And when we came back through the curtain after doing it, he was like, oh, I didn't feel anything. Like, it was, great. So I knew that I could do it safely. I knew that I could,

Hornswoggle is probably one of the heavier guys that I've done that too also. What? What do you mean? I'm kidding. He's a heavy little guy. I could see that. Sure. And then you're in an awkward position trying to get him, scoop him up the other ladder. So we had to, we had to really walk through that a couple times. Luckily, it's a WrestleMania. So they always I'm sure it's the same way now, but they would have like a big ballroom with couple rings,

crash pads, extra ladders and stuff like that so you could go practice and try, try some things. Was Hornswoggle down for this idea? It was his idea. It was his idea. They wanted me to like power bomb him off the ladder

and he was sitting there. Hey, do you think you could give me your thing off there? I think so. Let's figure it out. So we just figured out how to make it somewhat believable. I mean, ladder matches are ridiculous, right?

They just are. So it's like you have to, but if you always think, what would I do in a real situation or how can we make this so that the crowd is able to suspend their disbelief a little bit more? So walk through it a couple of times.

Got it. I hit him with it on the day in front of the crowd. And I remember I hit it and he sort of rolled under the turnbuckle and I couldn't really go check on him because usually you do something like that with somebody. If I hit it, even just standing in the ring, I'll check on him. You okay?

Yeah. And I couldn't do that. I had to go do something in a little spot. And then I got bumped and I ended up over by him. I was like, you okay? Yeah, I'm good. Like he was quittling his thumbs. Like he was playing his DS or something, you know?

Yeah, I'm good. You okay? Yeah. Isn't this fun? Punk and I had another similar, so read at the very tail end of the match, punk and I are on top of the ladder, trading blows, and he's like, hey,

remember when we were in Whitewater, Wisconsin? Because that's, we, we were on the- As you're punching each other. Yeah. You remember when we were on that show in Whitewater, Wisconsin? Never thought we'd be here, right? Yeah. Okay, see you later.

You know, because we were, I think it was his first match, my first match, my second match. We were on the same show together. This episode is brought to you by Rocket Money. With prices going up on just about everything lately, being smart with your money isn't just a good idea. It's essential. But managing subscriptions, tracking spending, and cutting costs can feel overwhelming.

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Follow and listen on your favorite platform. There's a chair shot from The Undertaker at Survivor Series. Mm-hmm. That it's not just a chair shot. He wraps the chair around your head. Yeah. Yeah, that one was brutal. It wasn't, though.

It wasn't. It didn't hurt. Didn't hurt. That looked like the, that looked like CTE right there. Right. Like, I feel like WWE has erased that from there. You can only find that on YouTube. Every once in a while, it gets scrubbed and taken down.

Because I've tried looking it up a few times and it's actually something, it's kind of hard to. find her to get a good copy of it. How did that not hurt? Because he just, instead of holding both legs, you hold just one set of legs, your thumbs inside. Then when you hit it, it just opens up. It just kind of folds.

It wasn't bad. And then after that. He was one of the lightest guys I've ever worked with on anything. Nothing he ever did connected. After that, he hits you with a tombstone that looks like it was like one of the most devastating tombstones I've ever seen. Oh. really? Yeah. Like, you're not tucked in that much. It's just kind of like, you're just kind of

hanging there and the drop down. It's like, so that chair shot, then this? Like, man, is Ken okay? Hence, that's been the question all ever since. It's can okay. Well, is Ken okay? Yeah, I think so. What's the thing you did in the ring that hurt the most? Um, I will this uh I worked patista it's a heck of a screid American bash and he posted me he sent me he was supposed to like he was just coming back off an injury mark henry had injured him taking him out and uh he was you know making his comeback it was supposed to be he was supposed to be working against mark at the great american bash mark broke his kneecap in half like that saturday night's main event before the pay-per-per-view a couple of

weeks before. So he's out. Vince came, put me in that slot. So they want him to be like, you know, he's an enraged animal. He's been caged up for nine months. Now he's going to take out his aggression on Mark Henry on me. So they wanted him to like lose his cool at the end and just not relinquish the, he just keeps beating me up, keeps beating me up. So that first, he, he loses his cool and he runs me into the post. And I'm, already going. I'm already putting my... And it was just like a little excitement, I think, on both of our parts and gave me a little extra. And I could not move and take it with my shoulder. And I just... You can... It's almost like you can see the ring move. And my head just

starts pouring blood, which is one of the best things that's ever happened to me in my career. What do you mean? It just is, like, because... I had already gotten busted open, like in the first minute of the match, he already busted me open because he ran my head in the steps. And I just actually hit the edge of the steps with my head right here, which is also another little sky. And I was, I had a good mask going throughout the whole match. And then that happened. And then he's supposed to, he was post me, post me again, three spine busters and then a power bomb. And he, after he hit that first time he took me, he was.

Oh my God, are you okay? And he was like legit. We can, we can stop right now. Nope, nope, keep going. Keep going. It's like posted me again. Are you sure you're okay? Yep.

Give me another one. Give me another one. Give me another one. And then when I came back to the curtain, you know, Vince was like, you okay? Yeah, I'm fine. Ah. You know?

Yeah. Which I don't think that there's anybody in the business that would have done any differently, really. There's something about when a guy with bleach blonde hair gets busted open because it's everywhere there. You know, you see it everywhere. There's a point where he's like, you know, I'm underneath the turnbuckle and it's just pouring off my head. It's awesome. I'm gushing blood and it's awesome.

I don't know. There's something about sometimes I like to get color. I do. Like it amps it up. It turns the. In that particular instance, I remember, too, I had asked, can I get color? It just feels like that would be the right time. No, because Taker is working, Taker was working in the Punjabi prison match earlier,

and he was supposed to get color. And he ended up like, or maybe it was, Khali was supposed to get color, and he ended up getting like, he looked like he cut himself shaving, he shaved too high or something like that, right? It was a little trickle of. But they had told me no. And so it, you know, it was just an accident. The hard way.

But it fit. I remember going back and reading some of the dirt sheets. Because at the time, too, I would like, you know, we'd get done wrestling and immediately get on our phone and see what people had to say about it for some reason. And I remember somebody, you know, oh, of course, WWE gives us to this blood. We don't need it. And they agree with you, actually, in this case. How many stitches was that?

It was like eight or nine. That's it? Right on the spot. Just zip, zip, zip. That's a huge, it's like a four or five inch, maybe four inch scar. Wow. Yeah, it's big. I mean, 10, maybe, yeah.

I've had a lot of stables. I've had a lot of stitches in my head, a lot of staples. Well, it comes with the job, right? Yeah. What's the story behind you supposedly being Vince McMahon's son? Well, where was that leading to? Yeah, there was, uh, I remember Stephanie pulling me aside saying, hey, Vince has something he'd like to share with you.

It's pretty cool, a little storyline. And then he laid it out for me. He said, I'm going to, it's going to be revealed that I have an illegitimate child. And we're going to try to, we're going to, we're going to, we're going to, we're going to figure out who it is and we're going to narrow it down. It's going to be you. We don't know where. we're going with it after that, but that's what we've got so far.

And then over the course of the next couple of we did little things. And I remember, like, one of my favorite vignettes that I ever did was like, Vince and I bump into each other backstage. He says something to me. And then I walk away. I did the Vince walk as I was walking away. And, you know, just little stuff like that. And then I remember.

So the next Smackdown was, I don't remember where Smackdown was, but the next week we were going to be in Green Bay and the next week was going to be the review. It had been whittled down to me. It was a male and it was blonde. So it was me, Hornswoggle. They were Caucasian. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

And blonde. So it was me, Hornswoggle or the Sandman, right? Like those were the options. Right, right. And I got home. I literally walked in my door and I got a call from Johnny. Hey, Vince needs to see you in Stanford this afternoon. And then just go to the airport.

We don't even have a flight book for you. We'll figure it all out. We'll keep in touch with you. So jump back in the car, went right back to the airport. I'm like, here we go. Yeah. This is it. Big time, baby.

Things are going to start changing. And I get the car, Lincoln car comes, the town car comes, picks me up, takes me to Titan Towers. And as I'm pulling in, I see, like, Chabo and Funaki and a couple other guys. Like, what are you guys doing here? I don't know. They told me I had to come. And then I think it was Chavo said, I don't think he's good.

Whatever it is, I don't think it's good. Okay. And I'm trying to think what it is. Yeah. And then there was 10 of us, I think, sitting outside Vince's office one by one. And we were like, whoever goes in, you know, come out smarting everybody up. tell us what, what it is.

And, Edge was the first guy to go in. He went and he was in there for about five minutes and he came back out and he goes, I can't say anything. It's not good. And he just kept walking. So then I was like fourth, fifth to go in and,

uh, that was the signature pharmacies thing. Oh. And they're, the idea, the thing was is that like, you know, when they instituted the wellness policy,

you get all these people who are like, you know, there was a lot of us that had been using PEDs for, a long time. And you just suddenly go cold turkey, you know, so like there were people, like, you can see it if you watch video from, from then people shrinking, shriveling up. Yeah. We're still running that hard schedule, though, too, like four or five days a week or doing

overseas tours and stuff. Like, it's tough on your body. And it's also tough when you're, you go into, you know, this, especially with testosterone, like you go from this synthetic testosterone until your body is shut down making testosterone. testosterone on its own. So now you're in, you know, your testosterone is depleted. Yeah. So, you know, we would ask, like, what can we do? Hey, as long as you go and get a prescription, a doctor's prescription, you're good. Oh, okay. Yeah. And then, you know, all these, wellness clinics around the country, you can go. And so that's what I did. That's what a bunch of us

did. And there was a, so I actually, you know, I went and I had blood work done. The doctor prescribed me these things. And I started taking them. I didn't even fail a test. It wasn't even like a, it was just because my name was attached to this thing. Yeah. And because it became a news story. Yeah. And it was on like ESPN. I remember. But, but the thing was, the problem was that, because I explained that in the office to Vince. She's like, why are you, we instituted the wellness policy on this day. Why are you still taking this stuff? I was like, I explained it to him.

And then he goes, yeah, but you can't have an online pharmacy failure that was in the, in the wellness policy. And I was like, I didn't know that it was like my doctor filled it. Yeah. He was using an online pharmacy. So that was the. Was this just TRT? Pretty much.

Yeah. But they're just trying to say, look, we're distancing ourselves from all that. They had to at the time. It was really, really bad. It was right after the Chris Benoit stuff. The Chris Manwa thing, baseball at the time, Congress was. Yeah. He said, my hands are tied, I have to do something.

So I'm suspending you for 30 days and I'm finding you $10,000. And you're not going to be my son anymore. Yeah. And then the next week, Green Bay, they switched it to Hornslog. Which I'm happy for him. Me too. But I, and I love, I love, Dylan, but it just feels like they took this storyline that was building to something huge,

and they just at the end went, ha, ha, just kidding. It's this other thing. That's just the, that's the business though, you know, like that's, that's, I said something about it earlier. Like, you, here's loosely what we're building to. Yeah. But you know, somewhere along the way you're going to get thrown curveballs. And I swear creative for WWE is one of the hardest jobs in the entire world. Really, because like 52 weeks of TV, you don't, you know, not only do you have raw smackdown, all these secondary shows, online content now, paper views, and it just, yeah, there's no off season. And you're dealing with injuries and you're dealing with maybe flights that get missed. You're trying to figure it all out. Yeah. Yeah.

How did you, how did you do the exploding microphone? with Undertaker? Magic. No, there was a guy in WWE who that was his job, magic department. If you go backstage. It said magic department? Yeah, magic.

And it was like he was in charge of anytime there was a special effect that needed to something needed to explode or blow up, he was the guy that did it. But you holding pyro in your hand does not seem safe. Well, it was, you know, the way he rigged it. He just said, like, you know, as soon as you go to pull it back, we're going to set it off.

I think we tried it during the day. It was fine. It didn't hurt. You know. It's the magic of the undertaker, too. It's like, you know, Vince riding down the zip line to sometimes you, you take risks. No, it came off really cool. And it plays into the Undertaker character.

He had the, I always wondered how he turned the, or how he, shot lightning out of his hands. And he's been so open about everything, especially with his podcast now. And he goes, yeah, that's one thing I won't reveal. Oh, really? What?

Reveals everything else. I thought it was just like a, like a overlay, like the. No, I think that if you were in the arena. Oh, you saw it happen. I think. Oh, right, right? I thought it was just for TV.

Like they just, you know, laid it over the. Well, I'll never know because they didn't take it. He won't say it. That's the one secret. He's like, I will not. Come on. You've told everything else.

I love doing that kind of stuff with him. Like the, just that, the magic stuff, the, the, you know, wrestling is one thing,

but yeah, it's, it's the stories that we tell in between the wrestling moves that, that means something to me. Like, that's my favorite part. It's the,

you know, I don't know if you remember, but like we had a, the casket match for the, um, the hearse the last ride and at some point I jump in the seat and the thing opens up and he pulls me back through the I can see him in the rear view mirror yeah that was uh you ever you ever see phantasm phantasm there's a movie called phantasm it was like this ball this silver ball

no no anyway there was a scene at the end of the movie uh phantasm two i think where they're in a like the back of this. I don't know. It wasn't a hearse. It was a like a limo. And they're like, it's okay. It's all right.

It's over. And then the window to the driver's seat like popped open and the guy said, no, it's not. And then he pulled them through the. So that was like sort of my idea. Yeah. But like just stuff like that,

the blood, he dropped blood on me one time for the first blood match, which is actually when you, if you go back and you watch that, I, the area that the blood fell was, you know, like three feet by three feet. And the fact that I just stand there and don't move is crazy to me. It's one of those things that drives me crazy about wrestling.

Well, what are you supposed to do? Right. That's the logic of wrestling. But, you know, it would have been like in hindsight if I stand there, a couple drops, move, a couple more drops over here, no matter where I go, it's getting me. but they're dropping this from the ceiling, right? So I've always, that's always been so impressive to me that they can figure out the exact spot.

Except for when it happened on WCW. When Kevin, where was that, was it WCW or was it? It was WCW, right? Like Kevin, there's a video of Kevin Nash standing and he's supposed to get dumped. And it happens like right next to him. And it gets a little splatter on him and it's like, he just looks over. This year is the 20 year anniversary. of Eddie's passing.

And his final match is with you. There's a lot of fans online that they love Eddie so much. And they're like, well, it's because of how hard that chair shot was from Mr. Kennedy. That caused all of this. You did put a little extra in that chair shot, it felt like. He told me to, like going into it, he said, hit me. Like, don't hold back.

Hit me. Yes, sir. I hit him. And then we came back to the curtain and he goes, maybe a little less. Just a little. Oh, it was good.

No, but no, I don't believe I caused Eddie's death. I don't believe you did he. Yeah. No, I've heard that from people. Isn't that crazy?

Yeah. And I get it. It comes from a place of love. They love Daddy so much that they're like, it couldn't have just been his heart. Well, unfortunately it was. Mm-hmm.

Where did things go after that? After that conversation you have backstage, guys go back to your hotel, like it's a normal night? Me, Benoit, Eddie, and Kevin Fertig went to a steakhouse in Indianapolis. It was here. Oh, wow. I think that last match was here. We went to a steakhouse, and I remember Chris and Eddie talking to me about,

you know, my first European tour was starting the next week. After Raw, we were doing like a combined show, a combined Raw Smackdown. in Minneapolis and then we were going to go to the airport and go start an overseas tour and they were like, we're going to mess with you, we're going to shave your eyebrows when you're... You know, it's just...

This is your first tour. I'm going to fuck with you. But... Yeah, just a normal, normal night and then and then like fast forward a week later, I'd get dropped off at the building and...

The guy who was parking the cars told me. He's like, do you know about Eddie? What do you mean? What about him? He passed away this morning. That was a rough, rough day at the office. I remember my dad was there.

So there's all this stuff going on, right? And my dad had cancer and he was doing bad. Like, you know, he wasn't going to be around for much longer. I'm sorry, Ken. No, I knew it. No, but, uh, so he had never seen me. You know, he'd seen the shows. Yeah.

But he hadn't been there live? It's so like I wasn't on the show. And I went to Vince on this day. You know, not wanting to be selfish. It's like the worst thing that could happen has happened. Hey, can I have a match tonight? No. And he said, yeah, he put me in a match with Bell.

Sorry. Oh, it's beautiful. But then we had to go on, you know, It's just like the show must go on. So after the show that night, go to the airport, get on a plane, fly to wherever our first tour stop was in London. It was like a nine-day tour or a 10-day tour. It was pretty lengthy. I remember there was a couple guys that stayed back to go to the funeral.

And then they came in, as soon as they're done with Eddie's funeral, they jump on a plane, come back over. What a, what a, like a, a night full of emotions, right? Yeah. That's great that you, dad got to see you live. Uh-huh. Yeah, that's really cool. With all of this and everything we've talked about in this conversation, in your entire

career, who thinks the biggest lesson wrestling's taught you? Biggest lesson. You know, it's just a, you, you know, it's the winger. Gretzky thing. You miss 100% of the shots you never take. And I probably still, to this day, like, I should take my own advice sometimes, you know, like all the things that I've swung for the fences on, I was able to do, you know, and it's just like, you know, things that being afraid to fail, not being afraid to fail, knowing that, like, it's just going to make you better.

and just never take no for an answer. And the other thing is like they're not going to call you. So if you want to be involved in this business, if you want to do anything, you need to go out there and try to make it happen. And you're going to get no, you're going to get told no, you're going to get ignored. We won't hear anything at all.

But no today just means no today. day, you know, it doesn't mean no indefinitely. That's good, just life advice. It really is. Right. And the other thing I always hear from wrestlers is like, the answer is always yes. Like, can you ride a horse? Yep.

Yes. Do you own a motorcycle? Yep. Yep. Like, figure out a way to do it. Yeah. Like, just figure it out. There's a funny episode of friends where, like, Joey says he can dance or something

like that on it. You can do jazz. and then they're like, okay, do it. You can't do it. That's because he's an actor, right? It's so funny when you fill out the acting resume, you're ticking all the boxes of your skills. Yeah.

Yeah, equestrian, sure, yeah. Professional swimmer, yeah. Absolutely. These things. Yeah, afraid of water, actually. Terrified of horses, but we'll figure it out. Thank you for being so open sharing this with us. I we lost my sister at the end of last year.

So I very much can relate to the story you're sharing. It was so, so hard. So thank you. It never gets easy, right? And that's so amazing. It's not something that goes away. It's, uh, I heard someone put it so beautifully that grief is like walking around with a rock in your pocket.

And like at first, like, what was this rock doing? in my pocket. This is so weird. And then you just kind of get used to the fact that it's there, but it's still always there. Well, that's crazy. It's good. Yeah, I definitely feel that. But thank you. And great to see you. Where can people check out the Academy? You can go to the Academy, S-O-P-W. The Academy, sop-W.com is our website. And, you know, I'm on Instagram, Mr. Ken Anderson. I regularly I regularly put my phone number on there

so people can contact me directly. That sounds very scary. Yeah. What are you doing? You know what? You know what? I heard Ashton Coutcher

did it. He's the first person I ever heard. Like he got a line devoted to like just fans. and said, here's my number. And people will text him. And he'll respond back to him. He'll talk to him.

And I thought, like, what a better way to, like, you know, hey, I'm, I'm interested. If you want to book me, contact me. So this is your actual phone number? Yeah. It's the academy, it's the academy line. It's not my, like. So you have two phones. Yeah.

Well, it all comes to the same phone. Oh, I see. It's like a Google voice number. Yep. Wow. So your number's out there. Yeah. Yep.

And every once in a while, like, I'll get some crazy stuff. I'll get some drunks late at night. And it's actually really funny. I got one a couple weeks ago. That was just, oh, it was awesome. But they didn't leave a call. I was going to call them and leave a message and say, like, that was really funny. Thank you for, you know, the entertainment.

But I couldn't because it was like an unlisted number or something like that. Do you know the number off by heart? Yeah. 5.07-722-276. Your phone's about to blow up. Good. I want to get one of those little, somebody to do a little jingle. 507.

722276. I think we got it now. Can they text that number too? Yeah, your phone's prefer the text. Yeah, your phone's about to blow up. Don't call me. It's going to be a lot of people watching this interview or listening to this interview. All right.

They're just going to be like, hey, man. Ken, you're awesome. If you're interested in, if you're interested in getting in the business, give me a call. Or if they're interested in, just calling you drunk one night. Yeah. It's going to happen as well. Let's see what happens.

I'll be messaging you in a couple of weeks. After this interview comes out, I need to hear back from you. I should have listened to you, man. We should put a code word out. This is going to ruin it. That if they listen to this interview, they can text you this word. What do you want the word to be? Blue violet.

Blue violet. You're going to get a lot of blue violet text again. you want to sing the song again? 507. 722-27-7-6. Blue-violet. Again, thank you. And I end every interview with the same question.

Gratitude's such a big part of my life. I wake up every day, say out loud three things I'm grateful for. And my wife Rachel and I do it before we go to bed. What are three things you're grateful for right now, Ken? My wife, my kids, and my health. I love it. That was so easy. It's quick. Great to see you. I've seen your interviews before. You were prepared.

No, I forgot. Thanks, man. Thanks. There we go. What a great conversation with a great guy, someone I am honored to call a friend. And I feel like he's going to get a lot of phone calls after giving his phone number out there. So, yeah, give him a call. Let him know that you heard this episode. episode 507, 722, 2776. I'm going to put that in the show notes too. I hope we just blow his phone up, just as a result of this episode going out. Also, check out the Academy Wrestling School on their website, the academy, sopw.com, the Academy School of Pro Wrestling.com. Snap a screenshot and tag us.

He's at Mr. Ken Anderson spelled out on Instagram. He's at Mr. Ken Anderson, M.R. Ken Anderson on X. I'm at Chris Van Vleet, and I'll leave you with this quote from Arnold Schwarzenegger. It's such a short quote that I love so much. You can have results or excuses, not both. Be great and be grateful, my friends. We'll see you on the next one for some more insight. Ask. CVV number 84 is tomorrow. If you've got a question for that, leave a comment on Spotify, shoot me an email, CVV at Chrisfanbley.com, or leave it on social media. using that hashtag Ask CVV, but we'll see you right back here tomorrow to wrap up the week. The Hammer Alley podcast, an 80s flashback mockumentary.

Back in the 80s, there were a thousand bands trying to make it in the world of rock, but there was one band that had it all. Hammer Alley. Whatever happened to Hammer Alley? How did they go from top of the rock? I'm looking for a music video. They're a band from 1987, Hammer Alley. Ever heard of them?

To Rock Bottom. Dude, I was born in 1987. I can't believe he's doing this. Hammer Alley. Follow and listen on your favorite platform.