Donovan Dijak discusses his various name changes.
Throughout his seven year stint with WWE, Donovan Dijak used ring names like Christopher Dijak, Dominik Dijakovic, T-BAR, and Dijak. These frequent name changes came after he used the Donovan Dijak name on the independent scene for years.
While speaking to Fightful for a new interview, Dijak went into detail about dealing with a name change coming into NXT.
"When I first came into WWE in 2017, my last match on the indies was as Donovan Dijak, which by the way was a five star match at PWG with Keith Lee. I came into WWE and for whatever reason, I wasn’t on TV for six months. That was at a time when they were loading on Indie talent. I came in with Undisputed Era, Lio Rush, a bunch of people who were ahead in line. I kind of get put on the backburner for a little bit. Once I got on TV, they debuted me as Chris Dijak, which is my real name. I was standing in Full Sail and the tron was coming up. It flashed and said ‘Dijak.’ I was like, ‘Oh, just Dijak.’ It slid down and said ‘Chris,’ and I was like, ‘Ugh.’ My real name is Chris, but almost nobody calls me Chris. My wife and mom, that’s the end of the list. Almost everyone calls me Dijak, no one calls me Chris. This was at a time where, for whatever reason in NXT, you have to bide your time and really wait and make a bunch of pitches, and nothing happened quickly for me or for most people who weren’t like a Ring of Honor World Champion. I made a bunch of name pitches over the course of a year, which is a long time in the grand scheme of things when you’re barely on TV and you’re just at the Performance Center training ever day. Days just drag on. I’m 30 at this point, the prime of my career. ‘Let’s get this thing going, please.’ Finally, we settled on Dominik Dijakovic."
Dijak went on to note that the Dominik Dijakovic name was not his choice.
"It was not my choice. I’m going to try to keep names out as best I can. We all know who it probably was. The thought process is that I have a Croatian heritage. The root of Dijak is Diak. We were having conversations of ‘how can we make this sound more European?’ The thought process being like a Stipe Miocic thing where you think he’s this European Ivan Drago, but you hear me speak and I have an American accent. I was cool with Dominik. I liked that Dijak was still incorporated. I thought Dijakovic was a mouthful, and seven syllables was way too long for a WWE name, but that’s what was presented to me. ‘Sure. Please, just put me on TV, please.’"
Dijak also went on to note that he took some aesthetic inspiration from Mirko Cro Cop.
"I took some inspiration from Cro Cop, more aesthetically than anything else because I’m not shoot fighting people or beating anyone up. In terms of the look and aesthetic, I stole some of the Croatian patterns and tried to do more kicks and shit. That was the general idea. I think it grew on people. By the end of the Dijakovic run, most people were calling me Dijakovic as opposed to Dijak. Obviously, with the T-BAR switch, people were like, ‘What the fuck. Just call him Dijak.’ When I switched back to Dijak, there was a three or four month buffer where people were like, ‘I miss Dijakovic. We want Dijakovic back.’ I don’t think you do. I think you’ll like this name better."
Elsewhere in the interview, Dijak recalled finding out that he'd be wrestling on Main Event. Learn more here.
Also, check out Dijak's full interview with Fightful in the video linked at the top of this article.
