Tyler Bate, the 19 year old wunderkind who won a tournament last month to become the first ever WWE United Kingdom Champion, told The Buzzards Wrestling Podcast that he's gotten a lot of helpful advice from people in WWE since becoming their de facto ambassador to the UK.
“Everybody that I have met has been a huge help, like Triple H is a wonderful man," said Bate. "He’s really helped me with adapting to the WWE style of performing. All the guys behind the scenes that you don’t really see on TV (very much), like Matt Bloom, who’s the Head Coach at the PC, he’s been a huge help and William Regal as well. They’re all fantastic and amazing at their jobs.”
But the real question is what did Vince McMahon say when he met him when he was backstage at the Royal Rumble? Because that did happen, right?
Right?
As it turns out, wrong.
“I walked passed him briefly when I was at the Royal Rumble show but hopefully someday soon, I’ll get to sit down and have a chat with him and get to talk to him properly, because everybody who gets into professional wrestling dreams of meeting Vince McMahon. I’ve had the conversation in my head thousands of times, when I’m lying in bed, thinking ‘What am I going to say when I meet Vince McMahon?’ Because he’s ‘The Man’ in wrestling, he owns wrestling.”
Well, to be fair, Bate is like 5'9" and 175 pounds. Unless someone brought him up to Vince and introduced him, Vince likely would have thought he was part of the ring crew.
However, if he keeps having matches like the one he put together with fellow Brit (and occasional tag team partner) Trent Seven on NXT this past week, the Chairman is going to have to sit up and take notice.
Right now, though, Bate seems focused on growing the visibility of Brit Wrestling all over the world, and he he feels like the the UK Championship can accomplish just that. “It means we can get more eyes on what we’re doing, whether it be more eyes on British wrestling or more British wrestling fans to watch the WWE, to watch us. It works both ways really, it’s a vice versa thing. WWE will help British Wrestling and British Wrestling will help WWE with its hotbed of talent right now.”
You can listen to the entire interview at this link.
