Grayson Waller talks his SmackDown debut vs Edge at Madison Square Garden.
Last year, prior to Adam Copeland's WWE exit, he faced off with new SmackDown star Grayson Waller at Madison Square Garden on the July 7th, 2023 edition of Friday Night SmackDown. Waller would come up short on that night, but many considered it to be a sink or swim moment for Waller where he in fact swam.
While speaking on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, Grayson spoke about his match with Edge, noting his nerves beforehand.
“The weird thing is, and I’ve talked about it before, I was coming off breaking my leg against Melo. I got cleared maybe two weeks before, but we were in London for a bit, and then we did something else, I’d had maybe an hour in the ring. So I’ve been cleared, I had one hour. Then I was going to do the talk show with Edge, and all of a sudden, I find out the night before that I’m wrestling him. That’s stressful because I don’t even know if I can wrestle, I haven’t really done anything on my leg. That’s the first time I’ve really felt the pressure and felt nervous, and usually I don’t. But then I watched a bunch of clips of McGregor in MSG fighting Eddie Alvarez, watched all the videos for the entrance, and just his vibe. I watched the fight three times, and all of a sudden I was feeling myself. I was like what are you going to do? Not do it. And then from that moment, I felt completely comfortable. The match went great, and I came backstage and I could barely walk. My leg wasn’t as good as it needed to be, but I got through it and now I’m very glad that I went in with that type of energy. To get in there with Edge who is one of the best of all time, and to do it in that kind of venue is very cool.”
Grayson continued, commenting on Edge putting him over after the bout.
“That’s not something he has to do. As much as I’m the kind of guy who doesn’t want to kiss ass of the legends, my way of saying thank you to them is saying really horrible things and going at them. I want to be on your level. I feel that’s the biggest respect I can give you is coming at you like everyone else, I don’t want to sit back. But little things like that, at the time, it didn’t mean as much as it does now. Now I look back and go that was pretty cool.”
Since his debut on Friday Night SmackDown, Waller has gone on to capture the WWE Tag Team Championship alongside Austin Theory.
You can check out the full interview with Insight above.
Thank you to Chris Van Vliet for the quotes used in this article.
