The legendary Paul Wight recently spoke with Shakiel Mahjouri for ET Canada and confirmed an urban legend from his early days in pro wrestling.
Wight, formerly known as The Giant and Big Show, was asked about an urban legend that says he used to perform moonsaults while training for his wrestling career.
“Totally true,” he said. “It’s probably gone by now. That was done probably with VHS tape, it was so long ago, that hung around the training room… I had athleticism that was crazy for someone of my size in the game. I could do kip-ups, I could do dropkicks, dropkicks off the top. I could do a moonsault. Believe it or not, the way the industry was then, because it was still transitioning, nobody really knew what to do with me because I was unlike anything anyone had seen before.
“There were rumors of me doing it in Japan. It wasn’t in a match. It was screwing around in the afternoon. And then I was told immediately not to do it ever again if I wanted to continue working [around the] world. I was thinking, ‘Japan is a great place to break it out. Here we go.’ And it was shut down immediately by those that had the creative control.”
After making a name in WCW, Wight joined WWE in February 1999 and stayed there until February 2021. He signed with AEW that same month to do “Dark: Elevation” commentary and work as an in-ring talent. As of this writing, Wight has worked just four matches for AEW – a win over QT Marshall at All Out 2021; a Handicap Match win over VSK, RSP and CPA on Elevation in September 2021; a Handicap Match win over Cole Karter, Carlie Bravo an Arjun Singh on Elevation in October 2021; and a win over Austin Green on Elevation in March of this year.
Stay tuned for more.
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