Wade Barrett has admitted that there is one match that could have gone a lot better.
While newer fans of WWE know Barrett best as the SmackDown commentator, most will associate the Brit with his work inside the squared circle as Barrett won the Intercontinental Championship 5 times, is a former King of the Ring and was the winner of the first season of NXT when the developmental show was in its gameshow era.
Making an impact shortly after his NXT victory as part of The Nexus, the group decimated the ring on their arrival on the main roster and targeted the top stars in the lead-up to their match at SummerSlam. On July 20th, Barrett faced off against Mark Henry on Raw and admitted that an instruction from the producer caused a major issue.
Speaking with AceOdds, Barrett stated that he has a lot of respect for The World’s Strongest Man and admitted that he had reservations over hitting his finisher on the 400-pound athlete:
“Mark Henry, 400 pounds, fantastic human being, great performer, locker room legend, a guy that a lot of people looked up to as a leader and I was the new guy coming in and I had to go and have a match with Mark Henry. Now my old finisher was called The Wasteland and it was a fireman’s carry where I’d kind of flip them off onto their back afterwards. I was used to doing that against guys who were about at most 250, 260 pounds, something like that.
“Mark Henry was way too big and I didn’t want to do it. But at the time management was insisting, “Here’s how you make a huge impact Wade, we need you to do this”. “I don’t want to do it guys”. “Too bad, you have to do it.”‘
Continuing, the former Intercontinental Champion added that while in rehearsals they were able to execute the move, but on the night Barrett dropped the Hall of Famer on his head:
“We tried it during the day, it worked pretty well. And then we tried it in the match and it did not work well,’ he said, admitting it was almost disastrous. I almost broke my spine, I landed Mark on top of his head, and he was very upset with me afterwards and this was on live TV, getting beamed around the world.’
‘It is the new guy coming in trying to make himself good with the world of wrestling in the locker room and veterans like Mark Henry and I came in and dropped him on his head,’ he said. ‘So yeah, very embarrassing.”
At the risk of angering more people, Wade Barrett has claimed that all of the members of one of his factions were “equally crap.”
Wade Barrett Praises New Leadership
Now a part of the broadcast team as opposed to an in-ring competitor, the former Intercontinental Champion has experienced life in WWE from multiple angles and under various leadership. Speaking in a separate interview, Wade Barrett praised the changes implemented by Triple H.
In other WWE news, one former tag team looks set to make their debut for Ring of Honor imminently.