MLW World Heavyweight Champion Alex Hammerstone has come a long way since he missed out on signing with WWE.
Given his remarkable strength and impressive look, Hammerstone always seemed like a likely candidate to make it to WWE some day. But he has remained a featured member of the MLW roster in recent years, and he is set to stay with the company for the foreseeable future.
Speaking on Cafe de Rene with Rene Dupree, Hammerstone recalled his WWE tryout and how it seemed like he was on the verge of signing with the company. He noted that, after the deal fell apart, he felt like he might be done with the wrestling industry because he was struggling to make it.
"I had a tryout with WWE and it was like all green lights, everything’s good to go, you’re our next guy, let’s get this process going. Then a couple weeks basically before I was supposed to move to Florida, I was called and [they were like], ‘Oh no, we hired too many people. Never mind.’ And it was just like, to them, it was just another phone call. But to me at the time, it was like my whole world shattered, and that kinda put me in a spot where I was like you know what, maybe I’m fucking done with this. I’ve been doing this a decade and I’m still struggling to pay my bills, you know? I was driving a car with no AC in Arizona. So I was kind of over it," said Hammerstone.
Hammerstone continued, recalling how having one foot out the door prompted him to shake things up, which led to MLW contacting him. From there, he signed with the company, and he's grateful for the way MLW has taken care of him.
"I was like, you know what, I’m gonna just kinda try some new stuff out, and if it works and gets the buzz going, then cool. If it doesn’t work and everyone hates it and it ruins my career, I don’t care because I got one foot out the door anyway. Then, in that couple months, MLW got in touch with me, and they [said], ‘Hey, we wanna book you for a couple dates, what would your rate be?’ Kind of a couple feeler questions, and then next thing I know, they sent me a contract. They were like, 'Hey we wanna sign you, we wanna get started. We have all have these plans for you.’ It went zero to hundred super quick, and I was like okay, let’s go for it, and they’ve been really good to me, man. That first contract was very entry-level. I was not getting rich or anything like that, but before that had reached its full length, they were already offering to renegotiate new deals to extend, to increase my money and extend my time. They’ve done that a couple times now, and I’m very well taken of at this point. They’ve always just had a plan for me, and they’ve always done other little things. They’re always putting out new merch for me, and they helped get my foot in the door with NOAH and all these things like that. So it’s been really good for me working over there," he said.
MLW recently aired Hammerstone's title match against Richard Holliday on MLW Fusion. The results are available here.
You can find results from around the world of wrestling at Fightful's results section.
