“It was the only time I’ve ever seen a locker room stand up and give a guy a standing ovation” – WCW Veteran On Rey Mysterio

By AG

Posted on April 8, 2021

Rey Mysterio Article Pic 3 WrestleFeed App

• “It was the only time I’ve ever seen a locker room stand up and give a guy a standing ovation” – WCW Veteran On Rey Mysterio

Old School WCW/WWF Veteran Dean Malenko was a guest on Chris Jericho’s weekly podcast ‘Talk is Jericho’, where he talked about Rey Mysterio coming to WCW and the reaction that he got backstage.

Here’s what Malenko said:

“I saw him on a tape. He was working Psicosis in Japan, I’m like, ‘Holy crap! Who’s this kid?’ I know Kevin Sullivan, at the time, was looking to kind of broaden the scope of the Cruiserweight Division bringing in people from all over the world.

We had guys come in from Europe and Mexico, and I think I talked to Eddie or Konnan and said, ‘The kid, Rey Mysterio, any chance of him coming here? I’d love to work with him,’ because it was such a different, diverse style. I’m the mat guy, and he’s the flyer.

We’re in Baltimore. It was the Great American Bash, Rey just thought he was having a tryout match and just a match. He had no clue whatsoever that he was on a PPV until after the fact, and I remember walking in the locker room and Sting, Lex [Luger] and all the big guys were almost laughing like you got to be kidding me. This kid got a driver’s license.

He’s like 12 years old. He’s 100 pounds. In their head, he’s gonna embarrass them. [Kevin] Nash was there, and [Scott] Hall was there. They were on the stage, and when he came back through, it was probably the first and maybe only time I’ve ever seen a locker room stand up and give a guy a standing ovation. At that time in the business, there wasn’t the Rey Fenix’s. There wasn’t all those guys. Rey was the guy.

One thing that I’ve always said and I’ve always talked about is that when the audience is clapping, cheering and screaming, you can’t tell if those cheers are for a guy that’s 5’2?, 6’2?, 7’2?. No, you’re cheering because the guy’s incredible at what he does.

Rey really caught on quick, and I think a lot of it was Eddie telling him, ‘If you work with Dean, listen to Dean.’ I would hold him down. ‘Not yet.’ I kind of got him so he was selling everything and taking his time in between all the spectacular moves that he’s doing so we get the maximum benefit from the audience, and man, he just caught on like fire.”

Also Read: Dean Malenko Thinks Current AEW Wrestler Is Similar To A Young Rey Mysterio

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