AEW star Claudio Castagnoli has explained how his Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal trophy got destroyed after just one day.
In the lead-up to WrestleMania 30, WWE announced that they would be paying tribute to perhaps their -literal – biggest star of all time, Andre The Giant. The Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal has been a fixture of WrestleMania weekends ever since but the first one remains the most high-profile.
On that occasion, the man then known as Cesaro conjured up visions of Andre The Giant and Hulk Hogan as he scooped up The Big Show and slammed him over the top rope to claim a breakout victory.
Speaking to Chris Van Vliet on Insight at Starrcast, Claudio Castagnoli explained how the giant trophy that went with his victory lasted less than a day:
“So I don’t know if you remember, but the trophy I had got destroyed the very next day. What happened was, that thing is heavy, it’s huge. The base is completely solid. Until Corbin picked it up the other day, no one had picked it up. I don’t know if you remember but every time someone won the Andre the Giant Battle Royal after me, they stood next to it and did the pose next to it, and they had it ringside.”
“They brought it in for me, and this is my second match of the night. I’m like no I want to lift it, it will look cool and I want to have pictures and everything. And I lifted it and it is so heavy, I was like [makes strained face], and I wanted to carry it to the back as well.”
“So the next day they just kind of carted it around for me, and they have those little baby ramps that goes over cables. Someone pushed it, it went this way and the trophy just absolutely shattered. So they fixed it as good as they could, they still have it at the warehouse. The broken parts I was supposed to get them, I never did, but I still have the plaque.”
Since then, the likes of Big Show himself, Jey Uso, and Matt Hardy have all won the match with Madcap Moss winning the 2022 version ahead of WrestleMania 38.
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