Carlito reflects on his appearance in the 2021 Royal Rumble.
Carlito shocked fans (and screens) around the world by entering the match as entrant #8. Despite only lasting eight mintues, the moment was still memorable given that it was Carlito's first appearance in the company in over ten years.
On the latest edition of WWE Retrospective, Carlito reflected on the return and getting to wrestle a bunch of people that he'd never even met before.
“Something at that time I thought would maybe never happen again. When the situation presented itself, I was very excited to be back in a WWE ring. It was interesting, a little weird with the setup. No people. Bunch of flat screens there. Very happy to do it, just wishing that small, well it’s the biggest piece, that the crowd would [have] been there. I remember everybody talking about my physique, what does that mean, what did I look like before, was it that terrible? [laughs]. But it just made me laugh. You go in there, there’s a bunch of new faces. I had never met Nakamura before, it was during COVID too, so I couldn’t spit the apple on anybody. Had never met Ali, Sami Zayn, I’d never met him before. As it happens in the business, a lot of them, you know, grew up watching me, so they were kind of fans of mine from back in the day. They were more excited to meet me than I was to be there. Another guy, Elias, I’ve never been in the ring. Big E. Ziggler and Edge, the only two [people] I knew. Just seeing the reaction online and how crazy people went after seeing that, it made me happy and humbled that people still remembered me after all those years, especially after not really seeing me anywhere for so long.”
Elsewhere in the video, Carlito said that John Cena told him to use the backstabber as a finisher. Learn more about those comments here.
The 2025 Royal Rumble is set to take place at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, Indiana on Saturday, February 1.
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