Pro-wrestling star and current free agent Axel Tischer (fka Alexander Wolfe) was a recent guest on the Wrestling Inc. Daily to discuss his last run in WWE, including what the original plan was for the SANITY faction, and how much he loved working with the group’s leader, Eric Young. Highlights from the interview are below.
Discusses what the original plan was for SANITY:
“So first they told me they had an idea for a group, and I’m a part of it. William Regal at
that time told us Triple H had this idea for years. He wanted to have a crew of certain individuals. Everybody’s one of a kind, but they fit together. We wanted to know about the idea, the details and such. Do you know the movie Smokin’ Aces? In the movie Smokin’ Aces, you have a trio of brothers. They’re super crazy. They’re mercenaries. They’re assassins, but they don’t come in, and sneak in, and kill with silencer and go. No, no, they bring out the bazooka and the shotguns. They take a bullet to stab somebody. They’re totally nuts and totally crazy, and they had this weird look. They kind of look like a version of Mad Max. The characteristic were kind of like Neo Nazi, steampunk with a mohawk and goggles. And he said, ‘I want to have a group like this.’”
How the group was put together:
“WWE put me and Sawyer Fulton together, then they put EY (Eric Young) in the group, and then right at the taping, Nikki told us that she will be a part of the group as well. So we had something unique. We had two guys who need to be on television. The other guy came over from a long television run in TNA being super successful, achieving all the titles. I had the chance to present myself on NXT television after a year and a half being in the Performance Center trying to figure out what I wanted to be, what I want to become. Sawyer Fulton was sometimes presented on NXT television but also floated around, and then Nikki Cross was probably the newest signing, and they put her with us because she’s a bundle of joy and very energetic. She was so important for the whole group.”
The in-ring style changing:
“Sometimes they had to kind of pull back or push a little bit in front like, ‘Do less wrestling. You would be in a street fight so try to rip somebody’s eye out of their socket instead of getting into a rest hold or something,’ so we had to adjust. I had to adjust a lot because I like more the wrestling aspect, and they needed to tell me, ‘Hey, less wrestling,’ but in the end, it was so fun, and I loved that. It was one of my favorite times in NXT and WWE in general.”
Says he loved working with Eric Young:
“It was awesome to work with him, not only can I call him my brother now, but also, he taught us a lot. He gave us a lot of tips on how to work better on a television program, how to kind of play to the cameras more and also promo wise. From a wrestling standpoint, everybody was different, and everybody had their favorite on how to do wrestling stuff but production wise, character wise, how to work a character, how to do this and that, he helped us a lot. He helped me a lot with that. He’s a cool guy. He’s 100% EY, and you can see it right now, and I’m very happy for him that he found his way back to Impact. And you can tell he’s happy. He’s doing what he wants to do. He’s very creative. He’s very outspoken about the stuff he wants to do in promos and everything. He’s not a guy who holds back, and you can see it right now with Violence by Design that it’s his vision of SAnitY. I know it because we spit balled a lot of ideas about messages and promos, and I can see he’s using all the material right now for his thing on Impact, and I’m very happy for him that he has a chance now to express himself with his creativity in a different promotion.”