NWA World’s Heavyweight Champion Nick Aldis joins Spencer Love to discuss the return of NWA Powerrr, “The Question Mark” Josephus, the rotating cast of the National Wrestling Alliance, Trevor Murdoch, All In, Mickie James and more!
VIDEO
AUDIO
HIGHLIGHTS
Why Aldis vs. Cody didn’t headline All In
SL: “It’s nothing against any of the other matches that were on the card, but you’ve said before, and it’s a statement that I would agree with, that you and Cody was the real main event, the NWA World’s Heavyweight Championship is on the line. Why didn’t you guys main event? Was there a particular reason? Or was it just that you got a bevy of riches on that card, you can put anyone there pretty well.”
NA: “It never bothered me. There was never really any discussion. Cody, obviously, was helping run that event with Nick and Matt [Jackson]. I think that Cody was being gracious, and I also think that we understood that on that night, it wasn’t going to matter. We didn’t try to go and sort of steal the show from anyone, and make it hard for anyone else after us. Every match on that show was very unique and different. We knew what we had was special. And, if you look at that show, the thing that doesn’t get brought up very much, but, you know, that there was some time issues. None of it to do with us! But, it’s like in hindsight, it’s a real blessing that we didn’t go on last, because there’s no way we would have been able to achieve what we achieved.”
SL: “To build that story, I would assume.”
NA: “Yeah. So, I don’t know. Maybe Cody had a premonition! I don’t know. But, it’s never been an issue. Maybe it’s just me. I don’t know about that many guys in the business who are that concerned about whether they go on last or not.”
SL: “That’s really wonderful to hear.”
NA: “Obviously, it’s a pride thing. It’s not a sort of – I’m not saying nobody cares. But, I think on a situation like that, where it’s not like, ‘if we’re not on last, the whole thing’s ruined.’ We were just kind of like, ‘hey, man, I know this is special. We’re gonna rock it.’ Hogan and Rock wasn’t on last!”
His change in mindset on becoming a professional wrestling star and the build to All In
SL: “You said it best, it’s a who’s-who! I like that you bring that up because one point that I did want to touch on [that] you maybe did answer there a little bit, but you’ve talked about having a shift in your mindset from ‘I want to go to the WWE,’ to ‘I want to be a professional wrestling star.’ Like you said, was it around that 30 age? Was there a particular event that kicked that in?”
NA: “Yup. I mean, I think that probably really settled in and it was really sort of fully formed and articulated toward the build for All In. In the build for All In, I flew to London just to walk in the ring and go face-to-face with Cody to set the match up. It just immediately set the tone for the whole thing where people went, ‘well, no one expected that.’ People were already starting to feel that maybe the match was gonna happen. But, for me, they’re like, ‘wow, this guy flew all the way to London, [and] comes out in a three-piece suit,’ you know what I mean? This is high-level execution.”
SL: “And people give a shit.”
NA: “So then, that starts, then people start going ‘this event is going to be different from every other event.’ That was the specific motivation behind me doing it like that. Because I went ‘no one will expect me to show up in London. Because who would do that? Who would fly all the way to London just to accept a challenge?”
SL: “It’s like you said about your promos earlier, you want to take them this way, and you go that one.”
NA: “Who would do that? I would do that. So then people go, ‘okay, I’m going to commit to this guy and this situation. That night, we left the building that night, and I just saw the buzz, and the level of – I mean, I was like, ‘okay, this has taken off.’ I knew months before All In, really, pretty much after that whole encounter, I knew that no matter what, on that night, on September 1, I was going to be in the biggest thing happening in wrestling. I knew that my match was gonna be the biggest match happening in wrestling. You know what I mean? So I go, it’s gonna be bigger than-‘ on that day. I’m not saying bigger than anything WWE’s ever done or anything. I’m not comparing arrogant. What I’m saying is on that day the wrestling world was watching me. Once you achieve that once, you go, ‘hey, it can be done.’ I work out at my gym here in White House, Tennessee. My coach at the gym, I like to call him Paul, he’s the owner of the place. He’s held, like, 20 different world records in powerlifting. The guy’s a massive beast. He got his hands on me and was like, ‘you’ve got to come lift with us,’ and I’m like, ‘ahh, I don’t really like powerlifting, it’s not really for me.’ He’s like, ‘bullshit, come on, and come in, I just want to train,’ because he wanted to just – he respects what we do, and he respects me, and he just wanted to sort of, you know, it’s like a project for him, right? We were bench pressing, and he said, like, ‘what’s your max?’ And I said, ‘oh,’ I said, ‘probably, I don’t know, 315.’ I say, ‘you know, I’ve had a few injuries like my shoulder is not great anymore. My bench is not quite, you know, my elbow’s a little wonky, shoulders, you know, typical wrestling stuff. Not injuries, just wear and tear.”
SL: “The nicks and stuff.”
NA: “We’re just going through, and he’s doing the plates. He’s working with me on my technique and this and that, blah, blah, blah. And he says, ‘okay, right, we’re gonna go up one more, and then the next one, then we’re gonna go one more after that, and then that’ll be a lot, that’ll be good. We’ll be done for today.’ I said ‘okay.’ So I do this one, and I bang it out, clean, boom. Then, he said, ‘okay, we’re done.’ I said, ‘wait, I thought we were doing one more?’ He said ‘no, I just told you that so that you would do that one. That was 385.'”
SL: “Holy shit!”
NA: “So, it’s that mental thing of like, once you understand it can be done. Now, I’m like, ‘well, I did 385,’ you know what I mean? Like, now I want to go for 400.”
SL: “Yeah, it can be done, it can be done again.”
NA: “That happens a lot in powerlifting and strongman. No one can benchpress 500 pounds, until someone does, right. And then, it’s like, well, no one can squat 1000 pounds until someone does. Then, suddenly three people do it in the space of six months because it’s that thing of like, ‘yeah, it can be done.’”
SL: “They’ve got the motivation.”
NA: “So for me, the moment that Cody and I are standing there after Earl did the instructions and we get the big standing ovation in that moment, it was for me, it was validation. I’m good at this. I know what I’m doing.”
FOLLOW NICK
Twitter: @RealNickAldis
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