Johnny Gargano reveals that Shawn Michaels is the only other person in the world to have any of his ring gear.
Johnny Gargano always treated NXT TakeOver like it was WrestleMania. Johnny would always special ring gear to every TakeOver that would coincide in some way with the story he was trying to tell in the squared circle.
At NXT TakeOver: In Your House 2021, Johnny Gargano was in the main event Fatal 5-Way for the NXT Championship and he was dressed like Shawn Michaels from In Your House 6 back in February 1996, the only difference being Johnny did not enter the arena by rappelling down from the roof of the staged house.
Speaking on a recent Twitch stream, Johnny Gargano detailed some of the backstories for all of his special gear and explained that his Shawn Michaels-inspired look was also supposed to be a crossover with Magneto and the House of M. Also, Johnny revealed this set of gear was made by Jonathan Davenport, who is also New Day's gear designer.
“The HBK gear for me is one of the ones where I saw and I was like, ‘Oh my god this is crazy. Like, it was amazing. that was a Davenpoe design, he does all The New Day’s stuff as well. The HBK gear is nuts. So, we did like an HBK/Magneto, ‘House of M/House of Way’ gear. It was like a crossover. But yeah, this is one of the coolest ones, I think. This was for in your house. So, one of my favorite Shawn gears from In Your House looked like this, so they were actually able to recreate that for me.”
Not only was Johnny dressed as Shawn Michaels that evening but the rest of The Way was also dressed as The Kliq. Austin Theory was dressed as Kevin Nash from his Diesel era. Indi Hartwell was dressed as Razor Ramon, Candice LeRae was dressed as the 1-2-3 Kid, and even Triple H was represented as Pawdme, Johnny and Candice’s dog, was dressed as Hunter Hearst Helmsley.
Johnny says that Shawn Michaels and Triple H were absolutely in love with the gear and even send pictures to the rest of the group, like proud parents.
“I have all my TakeOver gear the only person that — Shawn lost it for the gear. Obviously, Shawn Hunter, because Pawdme was also dressed as Hunter Hearst Helmsley, because we did the whole Kliq. "
Johnny also revealed that Shawn Michaels is the only other person in the world to actually own any of his NXT TakeOver ring gear as he gave him the headband from this set of gear, which he says, he gave to Shawn Michaels as part of a shadow box filled with mementos on his last night in NXT.
"So I have all of my TakeOver gear. The only person in the world that has a piece of my TakeOver gear is Shawn Michaels because for my last night in NXT, I made him a shadow box filled with pictures of us together. Me and him when I was a kid and I saw him at a meet-and-greet and then pictures of me in that gear and I gave him my headband from there, and I wrote a nice message on it. That was the gift I gave him for my last night."
Gargano added, “So he's the only other person in the world that has gear I've worn from TakeOver. So yeah, I was happy I was able to do that and it was such a fun little thing to be able to dress like them. When they saw us, they lost their mind. They were like proud dads. They're like, ‘Oh, let me take a picture. Let me take a picture,’ when we're gonna go and take actual professional pictures. But yeah, there was so cool because we surprised them, they had no idea we were wearing that. They had no idea we were all wearing Kliq-inspired gear. So they were like taking pictures and sending it to Diesel, Razor and Kid, and it was just, — to be able to do that for a guy that I looked up to my whole life — I mean, two guys, I mean, all of them. They were my favorite wrestlers when I was growing up, and to be able to do that for them and pay tribute to them in my gear form. They were very, very, very proud, and it was so cool to see.”
Johnny has said that he is taking a break from professional wrestling as he gears up to be a father for the first time but he is always open to wrestling anywhere and has told fans on prior Twitch streams that if they chant for “Johnny Wrestling” loud enough, he may show up.
You can learn more about Johnny's decision to exit NXT for the time being at this link.
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