Insight with Chris Van Vliet - Zack Ryder opens up about his WWE release, what's next, AEW, his biggest regrets, Chelsea Green

Episode Date: May 6, 2020

Matt Cardona (Zack Ryder) chats with Chris Van Vliet from his home in Orlando, FL. He opens up about being released by WWE on April 15, his thoughts on AEW, Impact Wrestling, Ring of Honor and  New Japan, his fiancée Chelsea Green, the true story behind the Z! True Long Island Story, how it lead to the Major Wrestling Figure Podcast with Curt Hawkins aka Bryan Myers, his emotional Intercontinental Championship win at WrestleMania 32, meeting the Macho Man as a kid, 3 big regrets he has from his time in WWE and so much more. Thanks to Bet Online for supporting this episode. Use the code BLUEWIRE at BetOnline.ag to get a Welcome Bonus on your first deposit at http://BetOnline.ag to get a Welcome Bonus on your first deposit. Also a big thank you to BlueChew! Visit http://bluechew.com and get your first order for FREE when you use the promo code BLUEWIRE. Just pay $5 shipping. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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That's a great question. Look at you, man. What's the powerful questions. This is the Chris Van Gogh. Vleet Show. Chris Van Vleet Show. Ladies and gentlemen. Chris.

Well, here we go, my friend, for another episode of the Chris Van Fleet Show. Thank you for being with us on this one. It's brought to you by Bet Online and Blue Choo. And I have to thank my podcast network, Blue Wire, and my editor, extraordinaire Donald Paz, who mixed and mastered and edited this episode in record time so that you can be enjoying this right now. I also can't tell you how grateful I am to Matt Cardona for this conversation and super grateful to you for spending this hour with us. Take a screenshot.

Tag me at Chris Van Vleet. Tag Matt at the Matt Cardona and let us know that you're hanging out with us on this one. Obviously, a lot has happened with him. A lot has changed over the last three weeks. I mean, the fact that we're calling him Matt Cardona, his real name, instead of Zach Ryder, is just the tip of the iceberg. And there's a ton of ground to cover with him, especially since this is the first interview I've ever had the pleasure of doing with him.

We met in person once. We told the story very briefly in this, but it was the Saturday night of WrestleMania 32 that weekend in Dallas. Little did I know that he was going to win the Intercontinental Championship so epically the next day. Now, thanks for helping to share these interviews with your friends.

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These reviews are so nice. It's so nice to be able to see these and read these. So thank you. These, along with subscribing to the show on Apple Podcasts, and subscribing on Spotify is so, so, so helpful. So I really appreciate you. Helping to get the word out there, and I just appreciate that we get to hang out together.

Whatever you're doing right now. If you're just sitting around, maybe you're on a run, maybe you're driving somewhere, whatever it is. I'm super glad that we get to hang out. And there's a lot in this interview with Matt Cardona. And, you know, I mean, so much has happened. You know, in the last 15 years and so much has happened since April 15th since he was released. But like he always says, he's always ready.

So I'm excited to see what's next for him. And he's so incredibly excited for what's next for him as well. He has such an insanely positive attitude about everything. And it's so infectious. How can you not smile when you hear the way he talks about it? this stuff. So he talks about his release and how he survived other releases where he was magically not released and some of his co-workers were. What he wants to do next, he talks about his thoughts on AEW, Impact Wrestling, Ring of Honor, New Japan, the true story behind the Zee, true

Long Island story and how it led to his major wrestling figure podcast with Kurt Hawkins, aka Brian Myers, his emotional intercontinental championship win at WrestleMania 32 and celebrating it with his dad in the ring, which he did not expect to happen. The three big regrets he has from WWE and so much more, it's such a good one. Ladies and gentlemen, Matt Cardona. I am so happy that this is the background for the interview for you.

Well, I mean, this is just, I call it my office, but it's really Toy Room Part 2. I have good lighting here. I do a lot of stuff for the major wrestling for your podcast. Nice little plug for the podcast.

It's a nice little set up backdrop, you know? You also sound great. Like you're like, for everyone who's just listening and not seeing you, you're wearing like

an air traffic controller. Oh, yeah, baby. This is what we wear for the podcast. I think these are supposed to be for video games. I'm not a big gamer, but I have these.

I got these to me by Turtle Beach. These custom major wrestling figure podcast headphones. So yeah, usually no one's watching me while I'm doing it. So right now I'm looking at myself. I look kind of ridiculous, but... No, you sound great. You sound great, which is most important.

We're 30 seconds into this and you've already pulled the podcast twice. I appreciate you. I can walk out of the shirt also and the hat. Available on pro wrestling t's.com slash major to ripod. pro wrestling t's dot com slash mac cardona just you know check it out i'm glad we got that all the way i'm a hustler you'll you'll you'll you'll learn in this interview that i'm so excited to be free because i love the hustle i love working hard i love being creative the hustle it's like oh it's like i'm waking up every morning i'm like ooh what can i sell today look how jacked up you are about that that's great so how are you

holding up. It's been, you know, it's been about three weeks since the news, you know, came out when you were released. How are you holding up? You would think that I would have so much time on my hands, but there's not enough time in the day because now I can do all these things. I'm pursuing all these other opportunities. The podcast is blowing up the major wrestling figure podcast. But yeah, so it's just, you know, all these business calls, you know, doing things that I should have done, like clean my garage. You know, so I don't have any free time. Did you have any idea that you'd be on that list when they released all those people in April 15th?

Okay. So let's talk serious for a second. Okay. So we all, that morning we got, I say we, everybody in WWA got this group. You can tell it was a group text message like, hey, check your talent app. There's a video to watch or something like that. The verbiage might be, you know, it was something like that. Sure.

And it was a video from Vince McNeum. man talking about the state of the company and the state of the world and you know basically saying that that layoffs uh would be coming so i mean i'm a smart guy i'm like okay pro wrestling t's dot com slash macawdora let's set it up right now like i already had it set up i had my logo guys making logos pro wrestling t's making logos for me like i i i knew it was coming um i mean i didn't know but i had a pretty good idea right um but the thing is i my company is i my company contract would have been up in August. I had never resigned.

And for about, I guess, over a year, we'd been in contract negotiations and the anxiety that I was living with, like, do I stay? Do I go? Do I stay? Do I go? Because I grew up wanting to be a WWE superstar, of course, right? But my career has been up and down, up and down. And with all these new opportunities out there, it's like, do I really want to stay here or

do I want to go somewhere else? And the anxiety of like, do I stay, do I go? when the decision was made for me, like, oh my God, it was like, thank you. Thank you so much. Like instantly relieved, instantly. And it was weird because, you know, Hawkins got the phone call. Heath, Gals, and Anderson. I'm like, why aren't they calling me?

I'm like, are they going to make me sit home until August and just let me rot? I'm like, oh, my God. No, please. Please call me, please. And actually, I had a call to get released because I got a text. Oh, can you please, can you please call us? We got to talk. I'm like, okay. So I actually called to get released. Funny. I thought that's backwards. I mean, there's certain things we're not going to get into. But like, yeah, like I knew something was going down because, you know, a couple of my texts and emails had been ignored for the days before.

It is what it is, right? It's business. There's no hard feelings. I'm so grateful for my time in W. I mean, I was, I was time when I was 20 years old. Yeah. I'm 34. My entire adult life has been literally living my dream, being in WWE, being a superstar. I mean, my only jobs were working at a deli, working at a pizza place, gold's gym, personal trainer with no clients, and WW superstar. So I have nothing to complain about. So grateful, you know, WrestleMania moments, action figures, just being, you know, in the

business for so long at the highest level. So leaving, you know, being told you're released, like, I guess, I guess for some people, yes, they see it as a negative. Like, you don't have a job. You don't have money coming in. Yeah, that's bad. Right. But, but I see it like, okay, now it's time to do stuff I want to do. Now it's time, you know, not saying there was any handcuffs or anything, but there's handcuffs are off. Right. I can do whatever I want. And I keep saying this, but I really believe it. Right now, it feels like it's Christmas morning. I'm just turning that corner.

I see all those gifts. They're all wrapped up and I just want to go. I want to go open them. You know, I want to go rest. I'm going to go do my thing. I'm just so excited because now I can, the sky is the limit. Since I was 20 years old,

I've been, you know, kind of told what I can and can't do. And now it's like, I can do this. I can do this. It's great. I'm so excited for what's next for you. But with your Christmas morning analogy on Christmas morning, when you see those gifts there, you know, maybe this one is a bicycle-shaped gift that has wrapping paper on it. Or maybe this one is, you know, is a large box that you might guess what's in it.

Can you guess what's in any of these boxes that are sitting under your Christmas tree right now? I mean, like right now, obviously, you know, Ring of Honor, Impact, AW, all great places to go, right? But I've never really been to Japan. I've been there with WW, but I've never got to go. and, you know, experience. I've never been in the Tokyo Dome. You know, I've never wrestled in the ECW arena. Stupid things like this guy,

I don't know if you know, I'm Rapid Delivery, Roy Fox from the MTV True Life back of the day. Yeah. Yeah, I ripped his trunks off on ECW, the WW ECW, strip to naked, right? I would love, you know, to build to a big tuxedo match with rapid delivery. You're so right, though.

The sky is the limit here. And what's so exciting about this is you say you're always ready. And it sure seems like you were ready. You've been way ahead of this. Like as soon as, you know, the news came down, you had the T-shirts up already. You were ready to do with this. Like the store was set. And I just needed to say, hey, Ryan for Prosotees, let's go.

Like make it live now. Like you got to be ready. You got to be ready for anything, not just in this business, but in life. And, you know, I've made a career out of making the most of opportunities. So the always ready thing, yeah, it's a. cool catchphrase. I don't even know if it's cool, but it's my catchphrase. It's my hashtag, but it's how I've had to live my entire life.

Like, okay, we're going to use Zach Redona now. Okay, well, I better be in shape. I better, you know, be able to go. And that's, and that right now, it sucks that I can't wrestle right now, but I'm so ready to go out there at wrestling. There's been so many other, you know, big layoffs, big releases in the past. With any of those, did you ever feel like, oh, this is, this is going to be it, you know, three years ago, five years ago, whatever.

This is going to be it. For me? Yeah. Oh, bro. Like back in the day, when I first started, it was like cut city all the time. You know, it was like sink or swim. There was so many guys who didn't really even get a first chance, you know. And I remember vividly it was right after the edgehead thing like died down.

Like they put out the new program. And Hawkins and I, we weren't in it. We're like, oh, no. We're going to get fired. But I always seem to, I called myself the cockroach of WW. I always seem to survive everything, you know? All those cuts. I always made it, except for this time.

Well, that's why you had the shirt this. I'm still here. Still here, you know, literally, like, still here or not there. But I'm still here, not just in WW, but in this business. Like, I'm still kicking. I'm only 34. I've been around for so long. People think I'm this old man.

I'm 34 years old. You know, like, oh, my God. I haven't even hit my. prime yet. Well, there's been a lot of people that have been in a similar situation that you've been in and now they've gone on to have, you know, crazy successful careers. Do you look at any of your colleagues or any of your friends and go, wow, what that guy's done since he was released, that's impressive. I mean, I mean, you look at obviously Cody, you know, uh, Moxley, uh, Hager, Dillinger, like, they all left. They're all like on top of their game right now. And you can go back

through the history of time, people who have left and reinvented themselves, Hall and Nash. You ever hear of them? I've heard of them. Right? So it can be done and it will be done. At what point in your career did you realize I've got to start kind of stepping out on my own and doing stuff on my own and trying to help put myself over?

Yeah. So I guess it was Christmas 2010. I talk about Christmas a lot. I love Christmas. my parents got me a flip camera. I don't think kids these days even though that is. Oh, wow. They don't make those things anymore.

But I'm like, what if I got to do with this, this thing, right? And a couple months later, I'm like, well, what if I form like this YouTube show and I'll just, you know, I'm not really doing anything on TV. And I'll just kind of, you know, I didn't know what the game plan was. I said, maybe I'll just show it like my personality. And the first one is me just sitting in front of my living room wall, just kind of talking and trying to make jokes. And it snowballed into things. I would, you know, ask my friends to be in or other superstars or my dad. And then I started filming little skits.

And it really took off the Zee Trulag Island story. And that's, I think, where, you know, I don't think we'd be talking today if it wasn't for that show. Because that show, I think, I mean, it definitely kept me in WWW at the time. But I think it made me who I am like, okay, you know what? Like, whatever you want to do, you can do it. Just put in that hard work. And like if someone says no, just just keep working and working and working and working and working. And eventually the hard work will pay off.

When you started doing stuff like that, did WWE ever see that as like, oh, this guy is trying to like make a name for himself without us? Like did they ever try to hold hold you back from that? See, I don't know if they held me back, but they definitely weren't acknowledging it for a little bit. You know, so I started the show in February and like, okay, people were bringing signs. they were chanting my name to shows I wasn't I wasn't even in the building my merch was was one of the top selling stuff on WWE shop but I wasn't really on television in a featured role and I think eventually like we got to do something with this guy I wouldn't say they were holding me back

I just you know they just didn't want to use me I guess or they weren't right well I guess that you know they could see this from a standpoint where they're going look here's the stuff we're giving this guy and then he's kind of going behind our back and doing all this other stuff over here maybe maybe Maybe they would see that as being a bad thing. Yeah. And, you know, I was, you know, I was not burying the company, but I was saying, you know, I'd be climbing over a fence and someone say, what do you do?

I'm trying to get over or some meathead would be pushed me. And I say like, nobody pushes Zach Ryder. So I was like, you know, taking digs of the company, but in a funny way. I wasn't complaining on the internet like people do these days. Yeah, no, but it's exactly what kept you around, which is ironic that it was like you saying those things is what kept you kind of going, giving you the momentum if you weren't getting it from them. And when I started the show, and I said this before,

like I wanted to get noticed or get fired. I just wanted some buzz. You know, I needed some buzz. And if, you know, I got noticed by WWE, like, well, that's what I really wanted, obviously, was to be on television, right? But if I got fired, the buzz would have been insane. My indie bookies would have went up. I probably could have went to TNA.

You know, so I was very, you know, aware of that, that I needed to create buzz and controversy. It must be so tough with, you know, this state of the world right now. We're all in quarantine. Like, you're so ready to go right now. Like as soon as your 90 days is up, I'm sure you're ready to go, you know, start working some many matches, which unfortunately won't be happening at that time yet. Well, see, that's the problem, right? Is that this world is, you know, it's in this state that we have never seen it in.

And it's not safe to go do these shows, you know? So I'm not going to take bookings right now. Let's say, let's say August, right? Matt Cardonaverse rapid delivery Rory Fox. It's promoted. We have the poster. We film the cell phone promos. And then it gets canceled. Right. Right. So the fans are disappointed. You know, then I owe this promoter a booking. I got a, you know, now I got to, I don't have a calendar yet. Then I got to

start making a new calendar. It's just a mess. So I'd rather just wait until, you know, the world is normal to start taking bookings because I don't want to leave the fans disappointed. And I honestly, I don't want to mess up the schedule I don't even have yet. Right. So, so you're going to be taking bookings. I'm guessing as Matt Cardona moving forward. Always ready, Matt Cardona. That's my little nickname. What do you think? Okay. I like it. And that shirt is available on pro wrestling t's dot com slash major WF pod. Oh, Ellen, sorry, that's the podcast. There's so many pros and T's stores.com slash Matt Cardona. There's the podcast store,

the Matt Cardona store. So how different is Matt Cardona going to be from Zach Ryder? Honestly, I think, you know, like it's going to be an evolution of, you know, I grew up in WWE, not as a, only as a wrestler, but as a man as well. You know, so there's certain things that I look back on, I'm like, oh, I can't believe I was doing that. You know, so like it's an evolution of just who I am right now. And I think now people are, you know, I can't, I can't just be on the Indies and be Matt the barbarian.

It's like me. Like, people know who you are. You know, it's reality base, right? People know. It's see-through. So people know who I am. and I'm going to be me. Will the volume be turned up a little bit as the old saying goes?

Sure, probably. But I'm just, you know, I have a lot of things in my mind. I'm not going to reveal everything, of course. But it all depends. You know, where I go, what the circumstances are. I think I've proven over my, you know, my career that I can evolve to different situations. So my plan going in, you know, may have to switch. And I'm always ready to capitalize on that and just change things up.

your dad has been, you know, such a big part of everything in your life and fans have seen it, you know, in your big moments in your career. What was the conversation like with your dad after you found out the news on April 15th? So that's another funny one because my dad, he is like the biggest Zach Ryder, Matt Cardona fan 100%. So when I was, like I said, I made the call to get released. I knew I knew what the call was going to be. When you see that text on that day, we have to talk. Well, that's like when they changed. We need to talk text.

Right. I knew what was coming. And I don't know. For some reason, I have this painting in my house. Rob Schenberger painted it. It's of when my dad hacked the guardrail at WrestleMania, which was legit, by the way. Ziegler waved him over, said, come on in. He said, okay.

That was not storyline. That was not written in. You know, people think that was part of the show. Like, I'm literally on the ladder looking down like, what the F are you doing in here, dad? You know? And then he tries with that WrestleMania cowboy hat on my head. Ruin my moment.

Well, he's a doubt. But anyway, I have this nice painting of us hugging. You know, you see the cowboy hat. And when I made the call, I stood right in front of that,

that photo. And I looked at it. And I was like, I was smile. I was ear to ear smiling the whole time. I was getting released. Wow. Like,

I'm like, you know what? Like, it needed to happen. It absolutely needed to. to happen because things weren't going the way I wanted them to go. Obviously, not the way WW wanted them to go. And this is, I truly believe this is, this needed to happen.

And you know what? Like sometimes my dad, he'll call me up, like, did you win tonight? Did you lose something? He just doesn't get it. But this he got. He knew also. It's time to go. I'm imagining you're probably sitting next to Chelsea as you get this text going.

Yeah, it's happening. Honestly, I was, this is going to sound crazy, but I was kind of pissed because I just order these Jimmy seafood crab cakes. They got sent in and I was finally cooking them. And then like this call ruined my crab cake experience. Because if you've ever had the Jimmy seafood cramp cakes, they are delicious. They're unbelievable. The crab meat in there are to die for.

So I'm cooking these things. They're in the oven. It's like home alone where he's about to eat. And then like the robbers come. That's what it felt like. So I still ate them, but I wasn't really enjoying them. I'm like, all. Was there, you know, was Chelsea at all worried that,

She was going to get a text like this? I don't think so. I think she was more worried for me to see my reaction because I don't think anybody expected me to take it how I took it, you know? Because, you know, I don't reveal my whole life to everybody. So like not everybody knows I hadn't even resigned yet. It's not like I had this huge contract that I just signed like, oh, my God, what's going to happen?

Like my contract would have been up in August anyway. I didn't know what I was going to do. Of course, part of me wanted to stay. Pardon me, wanted to go. That was the anxiety. that was literally eating me up inside every single day. Like, I couldn't sleep at night. And sometimes it'd be subconsciously like, why I'm in a bad mood?

Why am I, like, irritable? Oh, because you're thinking about this, this life-altering decision. You don't know what you want to do. I just love how positive you've been about this whole thing, though. Like, I think that's- I mean, I get to go out and like wrestling is booming right now. Yes, the world is at this odd spot. But when it, when it opens back up, oh, my God, the fans are going to be excited,

the promoters. it's going to be insane. There's a lot of opportunity on the other side of this, not just in wrestling, just in life in general. I want a lot of people to see that there is a silver lining to this. What's interesting about your situation is your identity for the last 15 years has been WWE superstar. And now it's going to make this slight pivot from being WWE superstar

to being wrestling superstar. Right. I'm fine with that. I switch those Twitter handles that day. Yeah. I was like, done. Zach Ryder, RIP, baby. you know, like, I don't want to be, you know, I love the honky talk man.

I don't want to be the honky talk man. I don't want to be doing the headband and the glasses and the woo, woo, woo, like it's it's over, it's over, you know, Zach Ryder's done. Will I ever go back? Never say never in wrestling, right? Everyone's been back. Sure. My goal right now is like, my goal is not, oh, how can I get back to WWE right now?

That's not my goal. My goal is how can I, listen, proving people wrong is great, right? but I'm more concerned about proving my supporters right. That is like my main focus in all this, is proving everybody who has believed in me, proving them right. Like, see, we were right about this guy. That's what I want to do.

I don't care about the haters, whatever. I don't care. If I prove them wrong, great. That's not the goal. And you've been all about the supporters. Like when you put out over the weekend that you were going to call every single person who bought something on pro wrestling teas and think. What a mistake.

You're setting yourself up for a very, very busy time. So I have like over 500 calls to make, which is great. I thank you very much to anybody who bought the mug, the hat, the shirt, available now in ProSentees.com slash Matt Cardona. But that's a lot of phone calls to make. And I'm just like, oh, my God, these people care. And like that was just from this weekend. The amount of shirts I sold, you know, the week, you know, I was released up until now has been crazy.

So the thing is, do you think these phone calls are going to be like one or two minutes? What's going to happen when you get someone on there? They just wants to talk to you for, you know, like, I've been. like I'm doing right now. So Hawkins and I, or Brian Myers and I, should I say, we've done this a couple of times for the podcast. We stole it from Bruce Pritchard. So it's a good little sales thing,

but it works. And you talk to these people, these fans, and you connect with them. And I think the connection you make with these fans, you know, like if the headbangers called me, I would have,

my life would have changed. Oh, yeah. I talked to Mosherrash, today. You know what I'm saying? So if you're making just a little impact in somebody's day, they're weak, their month, maybe their life.

I mean, it's worth the two minutes. Well, and this is the thing. That's the thing, those two minutes are going to be how they remember you for the rest of their life. Sure. And I'm sure you've had these interactions with someone that you look up to and, you know, they didn't go the way that you wanted them to go. And for the rest of your life, you go, oh, so-and-so is just not that nice or whatever. Right. I mean, the ability to carve out these great moments with these people.

Right. Now, listen, like when I was a kid, I remember, I try to get an autograph for, for Mr. Perfect that he was like in a rush and he wouldn't do it. And I always thought like, oh, man, that was kind of, that was kind of mean. And then like I realized like years later when you're at the airport and there's all these people shoving eight by 10 in your face, like I probably want to catch his flight or something, you know? Was Mr. Perfect your guy growing up?

No, Mr. Perfect was definitely one of them. But my guy was was macho man 100%. My, my dad was a judge for Vince McMahon's WBF. I remember the World Body Building Federation? Yeah. Yeah. So he connected with macho man there. So I was a fan before. And then when that happened, I was like, oh, super fan. And my dad kept saying, oh, I met the macho man. And one time the macho man called me on the phone. I thought it was like my dad's friend. I'm like, there's no way this is the macho man. Because Sting came to my birthday party, but just my dad's friend from the gym. It wasn't Sting. So when he said, the macho man called. And I'm like, okay, yeah, I'm talking to macho man.

He's like, oh, yeah, we're going to pick up the macho man from the airport and take him to the NASA Coliseum for the show. And then we really did. I was like, oh, my God. You know, so that's the time I saw Mr. Perfect. But then, like, we got to go backstage. We met all these wrestlers. I have all these pictures. It was, it was like, I'll never forget that day.

Now, was that the moment when you're like, I want to do this when I grew up? Or had it already happened before? I think it already happened. I think, you know, little kids like, I want to be an astronaut. You know, I want to be a cop. I was always, I want to be a wrestler. And it just, when you're five, six years old, sure, you can be whatever you want, Matt. But when you're like 15, 16 and it's time to go to college and I still want to be a wrestler.

My mom was, and I understand, I was 160 pounds my senior year in high school. It's not like I was this big, jacked up guy. It wasn't the most athletic guy. It wasn't like, you know, a football player. or anything like that. So she was very, like, hesitant. And the deal was that if they paid from my wrestling school, then I would just go to community college for them.

You know, I'd go. I'd show up the class. And I did. I got my associate's degree. But I didn't care. It was wrestling. That's all I ever wanted to do. And, like, when you started training, did you go, this is it?

I'm making this happen no matter what. Before then. Before then. Like, that was it. There was no, like, I am not a naturally positive person. but like for some reason I just knew it. I'm like, this is going to be what I'm doing. Like there was no doubt.

There was no plan B. There was no second option. This is it. Like I was going to be Matt Cardona or Brett Matthews, my backyard day. Brent Matthews is going to main event, WrestleMania against Edge one day. Like that, like there was no other doubt in my mind.

There were no doubt in my mind. I think that a lot of these, a lot of what you're saying here, it rings true in that message that Cody put out after you were released. And, you know, When you saw that, what was your reaction to the very kind words that he had to say about you in your career? It's super cool to see somebody who's not only your friend, but obviously, you know, he's got a little stroke at the business, you know what I'm saying? So to see him put it at that message, it was very, you know, it was that message and a couple other texts I got that, like kind of got me a little emotional.

Like, because I was so like amped up, amped up. And then like to read somebody else's perspective, like, oh, like, damn, I actually, you know, I'm pretty good. I have done some things here, you know? Of course. Well, when you look back on your career, I mean, you even cut a promo about this. It's had the highest of highs, the lowest of lows. If you were to take a year's slice of your career

that you were most proud of your work during that year, what year do you think it was? It's hard to say because I think, like, my in-ring stuff, I would be most proud of, like, late 2015 to, like, maybe late 2016, like while I won the IC title, because I was having all these, like, kick-ass matches on, like, main event and superstars with Cody and all these other guys that nobody was ever watching.

And what happened was Vince one day just happened to be watching one of those matches and said, why aren't we doing some of this guy? And that's how the snowball effect where I all, I was like, okay, so the Royal Rumbles in January, not booked for the Rumble, not in it, whatever, had one of those matches. Vince says in a meeting, why aren't we doing some of this guy? two months later I win the IC title WrestleMania like things can just change

did you ever think did you ever think at any point along that path that maybe you were going to get that main event status maybe you're going to get a title shot maybe a title run I do I did think like after the IC title thing I'm like okay now we're like cooking like now

I think now people were taking me a little more seriously because I think like when you're I think any job when you start people look at you how you started then so people were still viewing me as this 20 year old kid At the time, I was a 30-year-old man, you know. And I think they were finally starting to realize, okay, this guy can go. He's still popular.

Like, after all these years, we haven't done anything with them. They still, like, love them. You know, if they make, if they put me in a situation where the fans can, you know, believe in me, they do. You know, and I thank the fans for that. Like, I even, like, went to Kevin Dunn and get my music changed and updated. So it was like a rock version. I thought, like, this was really going to be it. It wasn't.

But to answer your original question, like what year am I the most proud of? Excuse me, definitely 2011, starting the year as an absolute nobody, doing the YouTube show, and then end in the year, you know, winning the U.S. title, the Rock at MSG's talking, they're chanting my name over. Like, that was a pretty cool moment. What can I say? But that year, I was so proud of that because I proved that, you know what? You're not going to use me? Yes, you will. You will use me.

and I proved a lot of people wrong that entire year. And I think, you know, I'm very proud, like this internet title that I have hanging here. It's like, yeah, it's not real. It's not a real. But to me, this is the realest title there is on this wall. That's why you're in the position that you're in right now. For what it symbolizes, it, you know, they said, we're not going to use you. And I said, yes, you are.

And I kind of forced their hand. You know, I made them use me. It didn't work out. the way I'd hoped but hey well let's take it back to WrestleMania 32 you know

you brought it up a few times now the Intercontinental Championship win the ladder match I actually met you the day before in the hotel lobby at the hotel I was hanging out with Ziegler and Ziglar had to go to the bathroom

or something he's like hey he did talk to Ryder for a second all right I'm like hey you got a match tomorrow I'm excited and you're like yeah I'm in the ladder match and that was it Like I didn't think anything of it.

And then you win the title at night. And this reaction was insane. I want to ask you at what point had you been told the plans for that match? So I think I've told the story before. I was not supposed to be in the match. There was like a list going around backstage and my name was on it. I was like, I'm in this ladder match. Like, because like I said, I was doing nothing on TV.

Like I was on superstars, main event. Also at the time, I'd been going to NXT on my off days. do the hype bros with mojo right so i had this weird schedule where i was like you know the hype pros with mojo and then i'd be regular me you know on the weekends and you know at tvs and i heard i was on this list and then i of course i heard i was off the list i'm like you know what's even be considered to to be in this russomania match is wow okay maybe you know maybe vince did see that match and maybe you know things will turn around for me um because it was after like i said he saw the match and said why aren't we doing something with him um and then you know

know, so the match is about to be made, and Neville, uh, Pock gets injured, which is on a Monday. And I said, okay, this is my, my shot. And I'm the worst politic or ever. And that's like, the worst. But that day, I'm like, this is my mission. I'm getting in this match. And I found Road Dog, who was, you know, the top of, uh, the creative team. And I don't exactly remember what I said to him, but I just spilled my guts.

And I think he could just feel the passion, just coming out of my, you know, my mouth. And one of the things that he told me, I said, and I'm sure. I said it, but I have no, like I said, it was like, I went blank. I was just like spitball and everything of why I deserve to be in that match. And I said that I had never heard my music play at WrestleMania. And he said, like, that's the quote that stuck with him. Like, okay, he needs to be in this match. And he, you know, he went to bat for me. So I thank him for that, which is true. I never heard my music play at WrestleMania. My first WrestleMania, we, Hawkins and I, or Brian Myers and I, we ran in during, Take Her and Edge. Awesome. Awesome. I was in every battle royal

lumberjack, Andre the giant, battle royal thing there was. At WrestleMania 28, it was Team Teddy versus Team Johnny. I came out to Teddy Long's music. You know what I'm saying? So this is the first time I can hear my music. So that's the win right there. Just walking down, WrestleMania, my own music. And I believe it was the Tuesday before I was told I was going to win.

And I was like, I didn't want to get excited because the typical me fashion, I'm like, it's going to change. It's going to change and didn't. Did they tell you you were going to win and then lose the next night on Roth? Yes, they did. And people always say, like, you were only a check for one day. Thank God. That is my story, right?

That's my career. You think of Matt Cardone. You think of Zach Ryder. He gets it. Oh, no, he doesn't. He gets it. No, he doesn't. That is how it should have been.

Like, why lose the title to the Mizut backlash? Right? Like, who cares? Everybody remembers that one night. And then the next night I lost it. My dad is the reason I lost the Intercattle Championship. So like I love it. I'm glad it was one night.

If we could redo it, if we could redo it, I would have lost the same night. What was when they pitched this to you? What was their reasoning in going and tomorrow you're going to lose it to Mike? I think, I think the plan, the original plan was for Ms. to win. But it wasn't really a good, feel good, you know, moment. They're like, well, why don't we get a quick? cool shock you know shock value feel a good moment and then take it away i mean that's the heat right then you cut this great backstage promo sit down promo with michael cole and you basically said

look i'm ready for the world title run uh which i was like i was bought into i'm like yes this is gonna happen the fans are behind this and then it just kind of fizzled out from there yeah you know it's one of those things where it was a like i said i was doing the the hype pros with mojo in nxte so I was told, Triple H came up with the idea for me to go to NXT team with Mojo. And if it was coming from Triple Age from NXT, I'm going to work for it. I'm going to make it work. Who cares? Like, NXT wasn't as big as it is now, but I'm like, you know what?

This is an opportunity. We're going to make this hyperosting work. And the plan was to just go down there for a couple months and then get called up. So we went down there, which turned into over a year. So like, they weren't doing anything with us in NXT because the plan was to move us up or move Mojo up with me. So we were just there doing nothing. Mojo finally came up, nobody cared because we weren't like this hot

NXT act. And when Mojo came up, it was like right in the, I had just lost the I see title. Then I was wrestling Rousse at the US head. Like I was still going up. And I'm like, oh, wait, we're still doing the hyperest thing? Why? I didn't understand because I thought like

I had proved that I don't need to be in a tag team. They saw it differently, you know? I just want to take a quick pause to thank our sponsors for this episode. A big thank you to betonline.ag. And with currently no MBA, NHL, or MLB, you might be thinking, there's nothing to bet on. Well, that's where you'd be wrong, because our exclusive partner, BetOnline, still has hundreds of events, games, and props to wager on.

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Again, that's bluechew.com. The promo code is BlueWire. Do you think there's any adjustments that you need to make now as Matt Cardona to be seen on that main event level in another company? Yeah, I do think, you know, I think now I am a lot wiser with what, you know, there's certain things that you do on the internet and are funny. And then like when the bell rings, the games are over. You know what I'm saying? It's all business. And I think I have the ability to flip that switch. You can watch, you know, I'm entertaining in this interview, I hope.

Or on the major wrestling favorite podcast. I've had a lot of having a while. But it's, you know, when the bell rings, it's not fun in games. And, you know, I've had a lot of kick-ass matches. And what sucks, I mean, it doesn't really suck. But because I know I've had them, my, some of my favorite matches have been on live events or on overseas tours that people will never see unless you were there that night. But now this is my opportunity to show, hey, this guy can go 15, 20 minutes, 30 minutes.

So I'm so super excited for that. It's not like, oh, you versus Bobby Lashley, get it done as fast you can't. Right. You know? I really enjoyed the work you were doing on YouTube with The Last Resort. And I felt like that would get. You might do you laugh. Last Resort, for those who don't know, is the sequel to Zee Trulong Island Story.

It's a trilogy. There's only three episodes. Yes. It was supposed to be a more serious version of Z. True Long Island story, again, on my own. But I realized that I wasn't trying to come off bitter, but people were taking it that way. And that's not the vibe I want to put out there.

So I just stopped it at three. Well, you smashed the U.S. title with a hammer. I think he was thinking, you know. I'm pretty good into that how to want. Yeah. Listen, I'm very creative person. I love being creative. That's why I love when we found this podcast,

when we did this major recipe podcast, and by the way, that's something that we presented to WWE, and they gave us the past. They said, no, thanks. Blessing in disguise. Because this podcast has thrived. This podcast has, it lets me be creative. Let's Brian be creative.

And now, since we're gone, we still have it. It's ours. You know, if it would be a WWE thing and we were released, it'd be gone. Yeah. But now with this time off, we can do more shows than ever, more content than ever. One of the things about, like, the YouTube show, like, that I loved was at the first year, it was all me. There was no one editing it. And literally, I was putting it right to my YouTube channel.

There was no one from WWE ever watching it and saying, you can or can't do this because I was just doing it. Like, I was just doing it. But then it got moved to the WWE YouTube channel. And that's when it kind of fell apart. That was that. So 50 episodes on your own, 50 episodes on WWE's channel. I'm guessing when that switch was made at episode 51, you had to upload it to some sort of drop box, have them look at it. It sucked.

And I knew they said remove this, remove this. 100%. And when I started the YouTube show, my goal was not to be this YouTube guy. I wanted to get on TV. So once I had ended the year, won the U.S. title, I'm like, that's it. Thank you very much. Zeech rolling out of the story is over. And in that run, towards the end, WW tried getting me to move it to www.com.

I'm like, that's not cool. Nobody goes to www.com. You know what I'm saying? Like, people go to YouTube. I'm like, no, I'm not moving it. And I can't believe I had the boss to say that back then. But then when the year was coming up, WWE had just signed this YouTube deal. because before they had a YouTube channel,

but there was like clips. It was like a clip show. There was no content like how it is now. And I think the main thing that was going on that channel was the only proven thing that was out there, Zee trolling on story. So if I could, I don't have regrets. Don't live in regret, right?

I wouldn't have done it. Because it just killed the whole show. It ended up killing me. You know, so then I was the worst part was doing all this hard. I was still doing all the editing, filming. There was no, I was still my money. They gave me a little camera and a laptop. That was out of the box.

Wasn't even brand new. And I was still doing this on my off days, but now I had a deadline and I'd send it to somebody. And they had to review it. And there was a lot of times things were cut out. There was one time an episode wasn't put up. So like it wasn't, it wasn't the same. And people saw that. And there were a couple hidden gems in there in the last 50.

I'm very proud of a couple of them, especially the last one, the last episode 100, I'm very proud of. But it just wasn't the same. Are we going to see this lost episode? It's funny because we just talked about this on the major wrestling figure podcast. So we will not see the lost episode. And I'll tell you why. So I was doing something called Where's Trent? Trent Beretta was out injured, good friend of mine.

So I would give him like 30 seconds to a minute each show to just be weird, do his thing, right? And then he'd been doing over a couple weeks. And then he sent me like the finale, which was like 10 minutes, over 10 minutes of just weird stuff. And the big finish to this is him as his alter ego foil man with a head covered in tinfoil, taking on box man, who is John Sina with this giant cardboard box on his head covered in Dolph Ziegler. versus Zach Ryder stickers for this WrestleMania match we never had. It's this big blow off. And I uploaded it to WWE and they said,

yeah, we're not using that. Just make us a new video by this afternoon. I'm like, what do you think? I'm just taking out my cell phone like selfie style. And that's how I make these shows. I'm like, no. That's not how it works.

Like, no, we need it today. I think at the time the videos had to be three minutes. So I said, hey, this. So I filmed it. I said, hey, Zach Ryder, welcome to Zee trolling on story. I don't know, episode 75. WWE rejected the episode and each minute needs to be three minutes. So here you go.

And I just walked off and it was the set for two minutes and 30 seconds. And that didn't get put up either. I got a phone call about that one. When you went off on your own and did the podcast, obviously, you know, they said no to it being one of their products. You went off and went off and your own. Did you, for the first few weeks ago, I'll see how long we can get away with doing this thing? Well, one thing that I was doing as Zach Ryder was the Z-Trolling on story. So we made sure like, hey, this is Matt and Brian doing this podcast.

Listen, I'm not a lawyer. I know nothing about that stuff. I'm like, we're not being Zach and Kurt doing this because then it 100% is WWEs. But if it's Matt Cardona and Brian Myers, and, you know, we weren't hiding it. We were tweeting about it, posting about it, doing it. And no one ever said anything. And, you know, and I'm glad we did it because. I never really used my real name Matt Cardona anywhere before.

You know, if you go on Wikipedia, you see, I'm Matt Cardona. You know, in real life, when you go to the doctor, I'm Matt Cardona. But it wasn't really out there, like publicly really. Like, I was never calling myself that. So to get the podcast more, you know, more eyes on the podcast, I switch all my handles, not the handle, but on the top of the header to Matt Cardona. I wanted people to be familiar with it. So it's funny because when I got released, people were like, well, what name

you're going to be. Well, duh, I'm going to be Matt Cardona now, you know, whereas before I would have been probably some weird, you know, ICE Z guy or so, you know, or Brett Matthews, my backyard name, but now I have this name, which is my real name, you know, it's not like this fake name. That's a good name too. Right. And enough people are familiar with it, which made me comfortable to go ahead and use it. As if I never started the podcast, I might have been a little hesitant to just be Matt Cardona. I love the idea of begging for forgiveness instead of asking for permission because I've lived my whole life like that. Right.

Well, this time wasn't even this, we're doing it. There's no forgiveness. There's no permission. We asked to, you know, do it. We wanted to do Zach and Kurtz wrestling figure podcast, whatever was going to be called. They said, no. Okay. Matt and Brian, the major wrestling favorite podcast.

And I'm so glad we did it that way because we have all our own merch, live shows, the stuff we do. There's no way WW would have allowed it. if it was a WWE property. What are you most excited about, you know, with what's going to happen the rest of this year and then into next year? Uh, man, what am I not excited about? You know, like I wake up every morning and there's always something to do this morning. I didn't do your interview that now I have to go design some more stuff for the pockets that we got to sell. There's always something.

Honestly, I grew up wanting to wrestle. I'm excited to wrestle again, to get out there in front of the people again to, you know, I have new music that I've been blasted 24-7. I can't wait to walk out and hear my new music. I can't wait to just feel the energy of the people. I can't wait. It's like, what am I not excited for? It's a better question.

I think what's great in everything you're saying here is you're really laying the groundwork for what's next. And I don't mean what's next in your wrestling career. I mean, what's next after your wrestling career? Because you've certainly started to become an entrepreneur with all this. Oh, my God. It's like I say crumbs make crumb cake. You make a little here, make a little there.

It's a big cake at the end. You know what I'm saying? Did you always have this entrepreneurial spirit? You know, were you shoveling driveways growing up or mowing the neighbor to world? I've always been, I think, like a hustler. And I've always, I've always believed in hard work. And I think, you know, especially with the YouTube show, the original YouTube show, the amount of work that went into that.

I mean, editing it all. I'm not going to say the same thing over and over again like I am doing. But it was all this stuff. But there was no, like I wasn't getting, you know, I wasn't getting paid from the YouTube show. I made sure purposely to turn off like I didn't want to get anything from the YouTube show because I didn't want WWE say, oh, you're making money off our name. So I wasn't getting anything. So now with this YouTube show and this podcast, wait a minute, we can get ads, we can get money. What?

Like, what else can we do? Wait, we can sell T-shirts and get money. We could sell backscratchers. scratch that figure, if you say, and we get my, like, I just love being creative.

And then I love just, the best part is seeing your hard work pay off, right? And there's some things we do and it fails, but I'd rather, you know, try and fail than to not try. And I love that now,

I have the opportunity to fail on my own, as opposed to just sitting in the back, eating salt and pepper, shitty catering chicken, you know? I want to go out there. I want to get the chicken parm, baby.

You know what I'm saying? And look, I think you say, try and fail. I really don't know if there's any failing in business. I think it's you try. and then you learn something. You grow 100%.

Do you think about, you know, 10, 15, 20 years from now, whatever it happens to be after you wrestle your last match? Do you think about what you're going to do then? You know what? I honestly don't. I probably should. It's crazy because I was just telling Chelsea this the other day. It's like life has gone by so fast like in the past couple of years.

I feel like as I get older, time just flies faster and faster. Like the IC title, WrestleMania thing feels like a couple weeks ago. It was five years ago already. You know, so who knows what's going to happen? But then I see someone like Dustin Rhodes still killing it. Killing it.

I remember when I wrestled him like 15 years ago, I'm like, oh my God, this guy still got it. That was 15 years ago. And he still got it. He would still blow me up. Yeah. So what's a normal day look like for you?

If you're not doing an interview like this one here today, you wake up and then what happens? Oh, wake up, have a little break. Chris, I have a nice little home gym in my backyard. I say nice because it's not nice. I'm jealous. I'm just like any, you know, because I was kind of like in denial about this, like a lot of us where I'm like, oh, this isn't going to be so bad.

Then the gym shut down. And then, of course, once the gym shut down, there's no equipment anywhere. So like, for the past couple months, I've been buying, you know, a pull up thing here, a dumbbell here. So it's like, this makeship gym. But I work out in the back and then, like, you know, like, it's been a lot of planning, whether it be designing gear or listening to my new music and saying,

oh, change this, change that. Or the podcast stuff, now the handcuffs are off. We're doing whatever we can. Now we're talking about the AEW figures. We just had Jericho on the podcast interviewing him about the figures. We couldn't have done that, you know, four weeks ago. But now we can. Are you still planning to keep Orlando as your home?

Listen, New York, 516, L.I., right? I love it. But I love Orlando. moved to Orlando a couple years ago because just one winter I hated shoveling the snow. I said, that's it. And I was living in all these apartments in New York. I want a house. I want a toy room.

And I just went and did it. And I was thinking between Orlando and Tampa and I'm a big theme park guy. So why not Orlando? And that's another thing. I'm so glad I did because I went to Orlando. That's how I met Chelsea was because I was here. I was here. I was injured.

and Cody and Brandy, they were doing impact at the time. And we met up for dinner in Orlando and said, oh, there's some girl that was there today. She was complaining about being single. You're single. Why don't you guys? You know, I'm like, I'm like, oh, I don't want a date a wrestler. I'm like, oh, I've been there, done that.

It doesn't work out. I'm like, oh, no way. And then I think they said, oh, she likes Disney. I'm like, oh, she likes Disney. Okay. So I did the typical slide into the DMs. I think the first thing was I heard you like Disney. and we went on a date like two weeks later.

She tried avoiding me, but then I finally got through. I had no idea that Cody was the one that set you guys up. Yeah, Cody and Brandy, that's right, yeah. So it's all because I lived in Orlando. I wouldn't have dated this girl who lived in Orlando. So I'm super glad I moved to Orlando and have a pretty cool toy room too. Well, now you can't. Now you can't leave Orlando because there's so much.

I did it. So you mentioned Disney. So what's the greatest ride at Magic Kingdom? Oh, Magic Kingdom? I'm not a big Magic Kingdom guy. Oh, okay. So what's Steve and Parker we're going with? All right.

Well, I like Hollywood Studios. Okay. My favorite, I think, is, listen, I'm a big nerd, right? So I'm judging this based off, okay, you see it from a distance, right? So I'm the outside, the exterior, then the line, the cue, as we call it in the business. I know what you're going with there. So I'm saying you see it from a distance, you do the cue, and then the ride, The triple threat, baby.

And then you added in the souvenir shop at the end. Oh. And that's got to be Tower of Terror. Of course. Gotta be. It's got it all. You see it from a dis, what is that, right?

Especially at nights all lit up. You hear people screaming from it. You're like, holy shit. What is that? Then you go through the queue, you know, the haunted hotel. You do the ride. And then you're out in that gift shop. It's beautiful.

Didn't they just rebranded? It's no longer Twilight Zone. So in Disneyland in California, it's Guardians of the Galaxy. But still in Orlando, they still got Tower Terror. Yeah, see, this is one of those differences between, you know, the Anaheim Park and the Orlando Park. I might need to make a theme park podcast now. I think that there's no, there's no question. I've all the time of the world, right?

You've been a guest on these shows, haven't you? I have, yes. I know a couple of people in the business who like theme park, so maybe we can do a little, another show. No, Hawkins doesn't like theme parks. I might need to find a new co-hosts. You're not going to, let's be honest. Once everything kicks back in, you're not going to have enough time to do another podcast.

You know what? I just, I love, I keep saying this, but I love working hard and getting results. You know what I'm saying? And I love working hard and if I fail,

okay, I fail, but I try, I love trying. You know, you have to, right? We only live once.

And like, why not go for anything you want to do? Why not follow your dreams? It sounds, ugh, me just saying, that sounds so cliche, but it's true.

Like, if you want something, why not go after it? Yeah. You're like, you're like Gary Vaynerchuk with spiky hair and a beard.

I love I love I love Gary me I wish I was like him he's the bad no you're you're saying a lot of the same stuff which I think that anybody who's in you know in business for themselves anybody who's an entrepreneur should be applying those principles right you listen you be realistic you know if you're if you're not you know if you're not an entrepreneur if you don't have that that mindset like hardworking the hustle then don't just be an entrepreneur you got to find something you're passionate about and make it thrive like trust me there's not like millions of dollars in the major wrestling figure podcast. But we get that niche

and we go after it and Crumbs Make Crumb Cake. You know what I'm saying? And then who knows if that sponsors it to something else? You never know. I think you got a new t-shirt here. Crumbs make Crumb cake.

I like it. I think that you can get that one. Chelsea hates what I say that and Brian hates what I say it because I say it a lot. That means you got a good shirt, though. Like I know how instrumental

your dad has been in your life and in your career. Is there one piece of advice that he said to you that you've kind of held on to and it's helped you along your career. My dad was never the, you know, the sit down and pep talk kind of guy, but he was the guy who was the most supportive, like, whatever you want to do.

I got your back kind of guy, you know what I'm saying? So my first ever wrestling match, I was in some battle royal and some high school, he's there with the camera, right? You know, every title I ever won, he was there. Every time the show was in town, he was there. my first ever WWE thing. I was wrestling Matt Morgan on Smackdown in Madison Square Garden. Before I was signed, I was just local extra talent.

So this is a funny story. So Hawkins and I, we walk in. I think we're 19 years old. We have no business being there. We walk in. We have no idea. We don't even have like the roller bag. We have like the big Nike duffel bag.

We have no idea what we're doing. And we see the sign that says male talent. Okay, just walk into male talent, put our bags down. We see like hardcore Holly giving us a death stand. You know, like you guys aren't supposed to be here there, right? And then it was Morrison who was just debuting as Eminem. He's like, hey, there's a locker of you guys over there. And he showed us the way.

But back to it, my dad, he was a cop. And he flashed his badge to get backstage. And he found me like, Dad, you can be back here? What are you doing? But he just wanted to see me and support me. So the amount of support is like, it's, Like it's unbelievable. So that's what I would say.

Like he's never given me the old pep talk, but it's the amount of support, the overwhelming amount of support has drove me because, you know, like I don't think I'd ever let him down, but I definitely don't want to. Yeah, I mean, you had an amazing run in WWE 15 years,

which I think I love it. I have, I have no regrets. I think everything that has happened has made me who I am as a person, uh, made me who I am as a performer, my character, if you will,

you know, like, yes, a title here for a day, a title here for two days, you know, or two weeks. And I think that's what's made me. And it's what's made me cherish those certain moments, you know, if I was a five-time I-C champion, who cares if you win one at me, you know, but for me, oh, my God, I'm finally here, you know, like, to me, it's better like that for me, personally.

Well, you say you have no regrets, but when you look back to you go, I really wish I had the opportunity to do this, or I really wish I could have done this thing. Okay, so there's three regrets. Can you see the three? Okay, there's three regrets I've had. And one of them I fixed. And here are the three regrets. Some are kind of like joking regrets, but one is actually serious.

One regret is, it was like in the middle of the year of the Zee-Tru Long Island story thing. It was Nassau Coliseum where my hometown Long Island. And at the end of the night, it was like Sina and Austin doing like the beer bash. One of my biggest regrets is I didn't just run out there. I just drink beer with them. I should have because I was like sitting, I was in guerrilla for something. I should have just went out.

What were they going to do? Yell at me for drink, like, and Austin and Cito would have been cool about it. That's one of my biggest regrets is that, and that's a ridiculous regret to have. But I should have just went out there. My other regret is the downfall of this Zee trolling on story

when everything was happening like the push off the stage and the back brace and all that. I regret not, you know, just knocking on. Vince's door and being like, what's going on here? Why is this happening? I don't understand. I'm, you know, one of the top merch selling guys, hard work or doing all this. Why is this happening? And so people say, oh, Zach Greta got buried. I only blame me for that because I wasn't mature enough, man enough to find out why or ask. I don't blame anybody else. That's me, you know, looking back, I blame me for that. Not making any excuses. Was I too young? Was I scared? Probably.

immature, probably, whatever it was, I didn't do it. So that's on me. I don't blame anybody else for why that went down. That's, that's on me. And that's, that's the, that's a serious regret. And then the other regret is after winning the IC title at WrestleMania, Edge and Christian were there. And I didn't take a picture with them with the title.

And I, like, that ate me up for years. Because those were the two guys growing up, like, okay, they were my favorites in high school. Like, if these guys can do it, I can do it. because there was guys like them and Jericho who were kind of, you know, smaller, you know what I'm saying? At the time, now they're huge. But at the time, smaller guys. So I always regretted that.

But then this year or last year, WrestleMania, when Hawkins and I won the tag team titles, they were there in guerrilla again. I'm like, that's it. We're taking the picture. So I really believe, like, I didn't take that picture that one time to take it with all four of us. And I had that frame to my house. So that one regrets gone. So did you tell them the story? Did you tell Edgy Christian?

Oh, yeah. Edgible before. Yes. Yeah. Those two guys, I mean, edge, obviously with the edgeheads thing. I mean, you talk about getting cut years ago. If we weren't the edgeheads, we would have been gone 2007. No doubt about it.

We were on Smackdown at the time. And we were in OVW. It was a weird dynamic. We were deep south, deep south closed. So they moved us to OVW. And in that week move, we debuted on TV. So like, do we still have to go to OVW? They're like, yes, you do.

I'm like, okay. So we were doing like nothing on Smackdown as the Major Brothers. And the writers were coming down to OVW that week. And I think it was Hawkins who said to Michael Hayes like, what are we doing? Like what should we show you? We're already here. And he said, show us something different. And we're like, okay.

And we had this idea because Edge was just coming back. And we were big fans of that show, Entourage. So we wanted to be like his turtles, like his little minions. So we came out to Edge music, dress his Edge. And we cut some little promo. We're on the phone, like getting him coffee or something like that. And the writers loved it. like, well, now you got to get Edge to love it. And we didn't know Edge. Like, hello,

goodbye. That was it. And then Hawkins got Edge's email and emailed him this idea. Luckily, Edge went with it. He didn't need to bring us up, these two Gibronies, right? But he was smart enough to realize, okay, I could teach these kids. They could take my bumps. It's heat. You know, I could steal the title. Because that was another one of our ideas is to come out like, me as Edge. And then Hawkins's Edge. And then the real Edge comes out. But he could have just said no to that. And he did it. So like, I'm forever grateful for that. because we would have been gone 2007, early 2008, if it wasn't for Edge. Have you heard from Edge since you got released?

First day. Wow. Yeah. Did he say something that maybe you could share? I mean, it was very just, he knew, he said something like, you know you got something like the very uplifting, motivational, like, you have nothing to worry about, you know that, something like that. I don't want to quote the man.

I'm sure some website will quote it. But guys, I'm not quoting Edge right now, okay? Lloyd's of Pain. I'm not quoting Edge. Too late. They already made the headline, I'm sure. I'm just so excited for what's next for you. And I feel like you.

I feel like you're standing there, like waiting for the floodgates to open, waiting for the rest of the way to happen again. Christmas morning, baby, I see him. My dad, he's too busy putting the tape in the VHS recorder. He doesn't have it. He's like, wait, hold on. I'm not ready yet. You know, so once those 90 days are up, once this world is back to normal,

here I go. Well, the difference between this and Christmas morning is, you know Christmas morning is December 25th. Right. Right. We don't know. I keep telling people that the quarantine feels like someone tells you to go for a run. And then you're 10 minutes into the run and you're like, so how much longer you want me to run?

You just keep going. We'll let you know when you're done. Well, that's the thing about this, always ready thing. Like, okay, let's say I'm not going to wrestle tomorrow. Obviously, I can't. But let's say on day 90 or day 95 or 105, I have the gear. I'm in shape. I have the music.

Always ready, baby. And I got the merch to sell. Gimick table, baby. Who has a ring in your area that you can get into to get the rock? So luckily, Tyler Breeze and Dillinger. That's right. I've been in that ring. Yes, I've seen the videos.

So they have invited me a couple times. And I will go down. It's weird because I want to get in there with, I keep telling them, like, I just want to go in there by myself. You know, I just want to be in there by myself. I just want to run the ropes take bust by myself. And they're like, you know, we have a school here. There's students like, yeah, I don't want anybody there. What can I come with nobody's there?

You know, I don't want to, I just want to run the ropes. I want to blow up, you know, listen, I just got a treadmill. It's not the same, right? There's no, there's no way, you've heard this before. There's no way to duplicate ring shape. You know, so I want to blow up. I don't want these kids see me blow up. Let me blow up on my own.

Well, I think on Wednesdays there's nobody in there. Okay, so I'll talk to them. We talk, those guys are great. just everyone who's been supporting, whether it be fellow colleagues or the fan support has been unbelievable. And I thank you all so much for that. If there's somebody watching right now

that wants to be able to have the career that you had, wants to chase after this, and there, you know, on the verge of about to apply to wrestling school, what do they need to do from here? Work hard and not stop. That's it. It's not, you can't just work hard

until you get it. it because when you get there, you got to work harder. And when you get to the next thing, you have to work harder. It doesn't get easier. It gets harder. And that's, I guess I live for that. I live for the next challenge. Okay, now, what do I have to overcome next?

I love proving people wrong, right? But I love proving people right. So everyone who's been, you know, from day one, whether it be from the handful of Indies I did, or it's when we were the major brothers, or the edgeheads or the woo-woo guy, or, you know, if they saw me win the I see title, or if they were a YouTube guy, or they just found us from the figure podcast. I want to prove all those people right. Forget the haters and the doubt.

Sure, it would be cool to prove them wrong. I don't care about that. And for all the people out there who want to just accomplish their dreams or the wrestling, whatever it is, like you have to put in the work. And it's just, it's never going to stop. You hear like 24-7, 365, blah, blah, blah. I'm sorry. That's how it is.

You know, you got to be on all the time. Do you realize that with that said, it's about to get that much harder for you? you're going to have to work that much harder moving forward. I love it because I feel like towards the end of the WW run, like I wasn't, not that you can always work hard, but I had nothing to really work for, you know,

you can't, you know, if you're not in a certain situation, you know, you can't, you can't, people are like, why don't you just turn here.

Oh yeah, I'm going to run out there and beat up all the good guys. It doesn't want, you know, like you can only, you know, do what you want to, you can only do what they allow you to,

you can't, you know, if you're on television, I don't care if it's a five minute match or a two segment match. put my heart and soul into it, making the best I could possibly, you know, make it. But you can't, there's only certain things you can control in this business. I think your gear, your physique, and your attitude.

I'm a firm believer in that, right? You can't, you know, you can pitch things and you should, right? At the end of the day, you don't write the show, right? You're just a character in this show. So whatever they give you, you need to make that the best you can do. You know, like even like, so the Monday before I got released, it was a raw in the performance center. And Hawkins wasn't able to come down here.

We were supposed to come down, you know, we got to travel or Hawkins did. But because of like the New York to Florida, like he couldn't come. Right. So I said, so then my travel got taken away or my travel. I said, I would have drove 20 minutes. But I emailed Paul Heyman. I said, hey, listen, I know Hawkins is going to be here. I'm available for singles, whatever you need me for.

You know, like, I'm ready to work. I'm willing to work. I want to work. What's your last match in WWE? My last match is. Um, Jesus. So it's the last live, raw with people.

Um, I wrestled Bobby Lashley and if you blinked, you would have missed it. What kind of? Bobby Lashley is one of the best. What could I? I love Bobby. He was a better man that night.

You know? And this has been, uh, this has been a great conversation. Thank you. It's a lot of fun hanging out, man. I really appreciate it.

I don't know if we put over the podcast. enough so let's do it all with you know the major wrestling figure podcast now people here yeah yeah people people here like oh toys listen this this this i promise you you'll you'll watch something whether you watch something on youtube i just put something up where i'm giving figures a figure bath i'm in the bath with a lufa right uh you know you got clean those babies up you got light a candle get that lufa out clean those figures up so there's weird stuff like that right but then if you actually listen to the actual podcast listen you can't get i wish we can get in a time machine right get that delorian go back in time you can't yeah right but if you hear us talking about maybe that that hasbro

hulk hogan you're like oh man i had those right let me check out eBay oh you know what i'll get one oh these are really cool i'll get another one and then it just it brings you back to your childhood you can recreate moments maybe your favorite birthday you got the ultimate warrior or maybe you know what mom and dad couldn't find you that ultimate warrior. Well, now you go on eBay by yourself. You know, so you're recreating history and you're recreating this this childhood feeling and the nostalgia

it's in, right? Not just wrestling, not just wrestling here, it's in life. You know, it's a happy place and people that, you know, like the Miz was just over the other day or a couple weeks ago. He saw the toy room. He said, what is this? I'm like, dude, you don't understand. Like, I'm in here, I'm happy, you know?

I'm not sitting on the floor playing with these guys, you know? But if I'm reorganizing something or playing Tetches with them, I'm trying to make fit like that's the adult version of playing with with toys i think it's just having them all set up and and it's very entertaining it's incredible your podcast is very entertaining well thank you very much and one of the main goals you ask like what i want to do next now we do these live podcast shows i would love to do live wrestling podcast shows with like the story lives and the characters we've built on the shows well if you ever need a host for one of those let me know well we might have to call you

i don't know if you saw live five available down on youtube youtube dot com slash major WF pod. Our live show in Tampa obviously got canceled. So we said, you know what? We're still going to do it. So we still did it. I say live, but we had people film stuff. We filmed stuff.

We edited it. And the big finish is that someone broke into my toy room, attacked me from behind with a bat, spray painted my major wrestling favorite podcast championship, and stole my holy grail, rhythm and blues, Greg the Hammer Valentine. Now, what if we could pay off that in a big match? Greg the Hammer and Valentine on a poll match.

Wow. Well, they came in with a bat, so I'm guessing it's you versus Sting. Well, if you go to the YouTube channel, you'll find out. We put the video up. It's so ridiculous, but I love it. It's fun, right? Look, man, this has been really great. And I'm just, I love your positive attitude here.

I would have loved to be able to do this interview in person, but with, you know, the way things are going. Sure. In the world, it's obviously not possible. But your positivity oozes through the screen. here. I'm glad. Speakers for anybody who's listening to them.

Listen, like I said, like I was not a naturally positive person. Like I watch a lot of things and, you know, I wake up every day and say the, the five things. I just say five things I'm grateful for. And I list like my goals before I get out of bed. First thing I do every morning. It just puts me in a good place, you know. I would say, I'll be honest. Like after, you know, like the YouTube show fell apart and my whole, you know, the career fell apart.

for that short time. Like, I was, you know, kind of bitter. And I'm sure if you, you look, you can see some, some negative tweets like, Zach Ryder versus catering and stuff like that. And like, you know, like, I'm not proud of that. But I needed to go through that to like realize, hey, life's not so bad, right?

You can make the best of any situation. And I'm living proof that you can hit rock bottom and come back up. Look at you now. Look at me the host of the major wrestling for your podcast. Matt, uh, super. grateful for this time with you. And I'm so stoked for what's next for you. Well, there we go. It's Christmas morning for Matt Cardona. I love that analogy. I'm so excited for what's next for him and so excited for him to unwrap those Christmas presents whenever he's able to unwrap them.

A huge thank you to Matt for trusting me to do this interview because I know he's received hundreds of interview requests. So it means so much to me that he would trust me to be able to have this conversation with him. I loved it. I'm sure you loved it too. If you did, please take a screenshot. Tag me, tag at the Matt Cardona, and let us know what you enjoyed about this. There's so many great little nuggets in there. And I know that wherever he goes, whatever he does, he's going to be super, super successful. He's such a star. And like he said, the handcuffs are off now, and he's free to do whatever he wants to do with the major wrestling figure podcast,

which I don't know if we promoted it enough during this interview with his pro wrestling T's store and with the indie dates that I'm sure he's going to be able to start announcing, you know, as soon as things start getting a little closer to normal. But man, the positivity here, the gratefulness here. Ah, I love it. So infectious. And it reminds me of this quote I saw from Jim Quick last week. that really spoke to me and I know it'll speak to you as well.

Don't wait for a greater life to be grateful. Be grateful and you'll have a greater life. Make sure you're subscribed on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, on YouTube, because I've got a bunch more interviews with recently released WWE superstars coming up soon. Who could they be? I'll just tell you, the next one's with Hurricane, but who could the ones be after that?

Hmm. 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 then? 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.