WWE Hall of Famer and one of professional wrestling’s greatest legends of all time “The Rated R Superstar” Edge recently appeared as a guest on Busted Open Radio to talk about a number of topics, including learning from legends such as “The Nature Boy” Ric Flair, “The Heart Break Kid” Shawn Michaels, “The Phenom” The Undertaker, Jerry “The King Lawler, “The Hardcore Legend” Terry Funk, “The Immortal” Hulk Hogan and even current AEW Star Luther of Chaos Project.
Below are the highlights:
On learning from legends such as “The Nature Boy” Ric Flair, “The Heart Break Kid” Shawn Michaels, “The Phenom” The Undertaker, Jerry “The King Lawler, “The Hardcore Legend” Terry Funk, “The Immortal” Hulk Hogan and even current AEW Star Luther of Chaos Project:
“What I got from all of them, from Ric [Flair], to Shawn [Michaels], to Taker, to Jerry [Lawler], to Terry [Funk], to Hogan, to all of them, was never panic. There’s no reason to panic – we’re in control. We tell the story, we don’t let anyone else dictate the story. We tell the story, and when you have that in mind, you can do anything. You’re the one telling the story, and I think that was the thing that I gleaned from all of them.”
“And one lesson that I learned so early on was with a guy – Dr. Luther. He’s now down in AEW, and he was the like the first experienced guy that I worked. He’s been in Japan, he’s been in FMW, and all of those places. We were working and I was probably on my 50th match or something, and we’re having a Street Fight.
So, he calls this spot, and I immediately went to do it. And he went, ‘Whoa! Hold on! Pump the breaks! You got it?’ I was like, ‘Oh! I don’t have to go right away! I can actually stop and register what he says instead of just instantly go.’ I never forgot that lesson. He doesn’t even know it was a lesson for me, I’m sure, but that — the light bulb went off! There was a lot more light bulbs that needed to go off, but that was the first one that I distinctly remember going, ‘Oh my God! He just crack opened my brain. This is different than I thought.'”
On his long-awaited WWE in-ring return as a surprise entrant in the 2020 Royal Rumble Match and if it ranks as his favorite moment of his career:
“I think it might go down as one of the greatest, but I’ll try and change that coming back. But there was a groundswell of this thing happening at that point, but I don’t think anybody knew it was going to be what it became.
So, we didn’t know how special that night was going to be, or how special it was to have an audience that size, that magnitude, and how long it will be until we possibly have that again. You can’t know that stuff, right?”
“So, I knew it was special that night, but if anything, it’s gained even more of a special spot for me just because of everything that the world is going through right now. It’s kind of insane, and that being said, I don’t know if I can watch it because it makes me miss the audiences so much. As a performer, man, we feed off of those guys. We feed off the audience, and for them not to be there, man, it’s hard.
Randy and I were the guinea pig, but he tried to s–t all over it. But now, nobody even mentions it. I think it helps, and it’s a least something as some kind of remembrance of audiences. I think the ThunderDome is a massive upgrade. I get to look at that and everything, but man, I can’t wait to get audiences back and just get out there and do our thing properly.”
