In my first fight, I acknowledged it. I'm a professional wrestler, this is who I am, who you know me as. But guess what, I've also been wrestling since I was 5 years old - real wrestling - amateur wrestling, Olympic wrestling.
I was just lucky to be there ahead of the curve to be the driving force behind bringing this amazing style of wrestling from Japan that combined Lucha Libre, American professional wrestling, Canadian professional wrestling and Japanese wrestling all into one beautiful mix that fans worldwide absolutely can't get enough of.
Stan Hansen is arguably the most popular, most famous, foreign wrestler in Japanese wrestling history. One of the absolute biggest names in wrestling.
My mom found a wrestling school that was in Maryland, and she told me to go down there. From there, I really got my head out of any negativity, and I focused on trying to become a professional wrestler, living my dream from when I was a kid. Wrestling saved my life.
I am into professional wrestling. Only Greco-Roman and freestyle wrestling can qualify in Olympics. I chose professional wrestling for fame and limelight and good money.
My mom was like, 'What did I do as a mom for you to want to become a wrestler?' They just didn't understand, and it's really hard to explain what made me love wrestling so much. There's something about it that made me fall in love, and ever since I laid my eyes on it, I knew I wanted to be a professional wrestler in the WWE.
If it took professional wrestling for people to recognize me as a person, then all the other endeavors I embark upon will explain me as a person, define me as a person, but wrestling will not define me.
I'm going to make an appearance in professional wrestling, but it won't be for the WWE. If I put wrestling boots and wrestling trunks on one last time - and I'm going to - it's going to be done by me and me only.
At 15-years-old, I always wanted to do professional wrestling, and at 15, I started training as a professional wrestler. It was always the plan to become an entertainer, a sports entertainer.
When I was a teenager, a friend of mine got a job on a wrestling radio show in Montreal, and he found a local professional wrestler who was able to train us.
I'm a second-generation professional wrestler. My family, the Rhodes family, has been wrestling for 50-odd years.
Triple H is a former bodybuilder. He's all about bodies. He thought that Hulk Hogan was the greatest wrestler in the world. They think Ultimate Warrior was the greatest wrestler in the world because that's what they're attracted to, but he's not really a wrestling fan like I grew up. I was a wrestling fan.
I knew I wanted to be a wrestler, so I became the best wrestler in wrestling history.
I'm a wrestler, a very polished wrestler and some of my best attributes in wrestling are my scrambling ability and my clinch.
Why don't they allow professional wrestling at the Olympics? They allow pro basketball players and hockey players. Olympic pro wrestling would be awesome. The team from Mexico could wear those Mr. X masks. The French wrestler could hit his opponent with a baguette. Or perhaps just surrender.
I have spent my last few years training and aggressively becoming the best wrestler that I can and I will continue to do that but at the same time I've been in every major locker room of the professional wrestling world.