Posted on 8/13/126 by Colin Vassallo
Amazing Red sat down with Chris Van Vliet in Orlando,
Florida to discuss being inducted into the TNA Hall of Fame
and why he didn’t expect it, returning to TNA after 15 years
to compete in an Ultimate X match, being one of the most
influential wrestlers of the past 20 years, how he invented
the Code Red, having a dark match with CM Punk in WWE in
2005, why he started House Of Glory, breaking his leg while
doing mocap for a WWE videogame, if going to WWE or AEW may
still be possible, and more!
Let me be one of the first to congratulate you on becoming a
TNA Hall of Famer.
“Yes, sir. Thank you.”
You looked legitimately surprised.
“Yeah, I didn’t know what was happening. All I was told by
Frankie was, ‘Stay here. There’s gonna be a shot between
both of you.’ That’s all I kept hearing. Then before the
last part of the match was happening, Frankie said, ‘Stay
close. Stay close.’ As soon as people were powdering, he
grabs the mic. As soon as he grabbed the mic, I instantly
knew something was happening. Something’s up.”
What do you think it was?
“I thought he’s gonna cut a promo on me. So the last couple
of matches I’ve had were dream match-type kind of things,
and a lot of the guys would take it upon themselves to grab
the mic and big me up and put me over and very grateful of
it, and I thought this was one of those things that he was
gonna do. But I’m thinking this is not an indie, this is
TNA. You can’t really do that here. Then when he started
talking he said, ‘Pay attention to the monitor in the back.’
Oh man they got me. They reached out a couple of times
before about this situation about Hall of Fame, and I just
kind of, I’m good, I’m good. Thank you. I’m good.”
Why’d you say no?
“To tell you the truth, man. I’m not that kind of a guy. I
just feel like I’ve done one thing in my life, wrestled, and
I think I’m good with doing that. And I think when people
come up to me and say all these great stories, it just kind
of like puts me in a box. I’m like, I’m just doing my own
thing in my own lane, and I’m very appreciative I helped you
out and stuff like that. But I think Hall of Fame is such a
big [thing]. I don’t know. I just didn’t want to accept it.”
Also because Hall of Fame feels very final, and you’re still
doing this. You’re still active:
“Yeah, that’s actually a good way of thinking about it for
sure. A lot of times, I don’t feel like I’m old. I know I’m
older. I don’t feel like I’m Hall of Fame bound yet. It’s
kind of the same thing you’re saying, because a lot of times
I did feel like I called it quits, and then I came right
back to wrestling. So I think from here on out, I’m never
gonna retire. I’m just gonna let it happen. Let it just
happen. Let’s see what happens.”
John Cena does a Code Red.
“It’s John Cena’s move. Ain’t no way I’m taking that from
John Cena. I got to ask him for permission.”
But how crazy is that? You invented this move that John Cena
does.
“Again, man, no words. I have no idea. It was a lot of
people doing it where I don’t know if it was the move looks
cool, or if they kind of took a liking to how I did it, or
they just wanted to make it their own, which is all cool.
But the amount of people, even Sting- Sting did a Code Red.
Isn’t that crazy? But what wowed me the most was the John
Cena thing because my phone was blowing up. John Cena just
did Code Red! I’m like, that’s kind of cool. But it’s kind
of cool to see the things that you come up with that sound
and look impossible be a thing, and even S.A.T. [Spanish
Announce team], it’s called Spanish Fly. Every time someone
does that move, Spanish Fly, and I think that’s also cool
for them that they get like recognition by that alone.”
How did you invent the Code Red?
“So the Code Red was my younger brother. I had this on
social media, you can check it out. I was literally 16 years
old. I used to pick him up for a power bomb, and he always
rolled behind me like a sunset flip, and I would always jump
into it; it just felt like a power bomb. So I would call it
the baby power bomb. In order for my little brother to feel
cool, he’s gonna power bomb me, but I would beat the crap
out of him. I would beat the crap out of him. Did all my
moves on him. My mother hated it because we ruined all our
mattresses. I have this all on VHS, by the way, which I’m
gonna plan on releasing on YouTube soon. He would power bomb
me, and I kept seeing that. So I was thinking, you know
what? What if this is a wrestling move? You just go for a
power bomb, roll back, pull him. It worked. Then I saw
Tajiri come out of a sunset flip, like in a bridge kind of
fashion, and I was like, let me see if this works.”
You had a dark match in WWE with CM Punk in 2005. What do
you remember from getting the call for that match, and what
do you remember about the match itself?
“I don’t remember. One of the things about me doing stuff
like this is that my memory has been jacked, and yes, I can
jot it down to pro wrestling and getting concussed and
knocked, but I don’t remember how it started. But I know it
was through friends looking out for me. I’ve never wrestled
CM Punk at this point. It was supposed to be a squash match.
It was supposed to be me versus Matt Morgan, maybe. I was
supposed to lose in like two seconds.
I was like, that sounds cool. I was still ready for it, and
I think it was Sgt Slaughter. Somebody called me by my
government name and said, ‘Come here.’ I came over there,
and one of the referees said, ‘Hey, Red’s got something else
coming up. So Red’s gonna be pre-show, and you’re gonna have
a dark match, and you guys do this.’ So they gave Matt
somebody else, a different kind of wrestler. So then my
cousins were there, and Jimmy Wang was there, and they were
like, ‘Yo, when they give you dark matches, that means
they’re looking at you to get signed.’ So I was like, all
right, cool, cool. I’m nervous. I see CM Punk. I’ve known
him from ROH, but we never chatted as much. He was very cool
with me. We came up with cool ideas. Ricky Steamboat was the
agent. Can I be transparent? This is how things went in my
eyes, right? Ricky Steamboat wanted CM Punk to get signed.
He needed CM Punk to get signed, obviously, right? So, right
before this match, what I was hearing is that CM Punk, this
was his last-ditch effort to be signed. I’ve heard he just
wrestled with Val Venis and it was not good, and he was
blown up. Or CM Punk told people he was sick, and they were
like, Red, this is his last effort. So that’s added more
pressure to me.
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So then we go to the agent, and Steamboat was just giving
him everything, ‘CM Punk will do this, this, and this.’ Then
he asked me to do a heel thing. He said, ‘You ever wrestled
heel before?’ I was like, yeah. Because at this point, I’m
thinking he’s telling me to be a heel so CM Punk could be a
face. I’m like yes, I wrestled heel before, but look at me
and look at him. It’s not gonna work. He walks away. CM Punk
respectfully tells me, ‘Listen, we’ll do whatever you gotta
do.’ Being very transparent here, the moves that I wanted to
do, Code Red, my flatliner, my standing shooting star. I
wanted to get that out in the world that I made this up at
that point, because you’re on WWE. Once this happens in WWE,
it is officially yours. Every time I mentioned something to
him, I don’t know if it was him, but every time I mentioned
something to him, it came back and got vetoed. ‘You can’t do
a shooting star. Kidman does it, and Paul London said
Kidman’s gonna get hot.’ ‘You can’t do Code Red because Rey
does it, and he’s gonna get hot. You got this move, you
can’t do that move.’
So Jimmy Wang is my boy. He’s like my brother, and he’s not
gonna lie to me. So he’s coming up and he’s like, ‘They’re
kiboshing all your stuff, bro, purposely.’ It felt like no
one wanted me with a job here. I’m like, okay, that sucks. I
wrestled with CM Punk at the time the match didn’t feel good
at all. We just kept messing up and botching and going to
different things. We go to the back. CM Punk gets taken by
Johnny Ace. I’m there like waiting for CM Punk just to say
thank you. I know the match wasn’t that good, and
Steamboat’s just following him, saying, ‘Give him one more
chance. Give him one more chance.’ Damn, I’ll get some
receipt for this. Johnny Ace comes out of the room with CM
Punk. He was in the room. He comes out of the room. He goes,
‘Hey, have you ever wrestled in a big ring before?’ I said,
Yeah. He said, ‘Where?’ I said, All Japan. When I said All
Japan, that blew his mind because that’s where he came from.
It was all Japan. He was touring there. He was like, ‘You
were in All Japan?’ I was like yeah, I was in All Japan.
‘How long?’ I said like three months. He was like, ‘Well,
you look blown up, so we’ll give you a call.’ I did the
unprofessional thing of saying, ‘I look blown up?’ Because I
was just wondering. I know what he means because when we did
mess up, we didn’t go to the different positions right away.
We kind of had this like deer-in-the-headlights moment, so I
guess he took that as you look blown up. He told me that, I
said, ‘Anything else I have to work on?’ He said, ‘Yeah, get
bigger.’ He walks away. I see CM Punk come out the door.
Walks away. What’s going on? Jimmy Wang comes up to me, and
he goes, ‘Bro, you could tell wholeheartedly that was all
him. You did all of your stuff. You sold well, blah blah.
Everyone loved you in the back, and it sucks.’ That’s how it
has to be.
Fast forward to when I got my second chance at the WWE. I
was supposed to get squashed by Ryback. He was supposed to
beat up three jobbers. I don’t remember the year. I know
that it was a lot of controversy that I showed up at No Way
Out. It was like ‘Amazing Red and somebody pulled up to No
Way Out.’ It was like he was having a dark match, and I was
just there because they asked me to pull up. I was one of
the jobbers supposed to get beat up by Ryback, get thrown
through a table. Ryback said, ‘How much you weigh?’ I was
like, why? He said, ‘Because I’m gonna throw you through the
table.’ That’s the first time I ever met him. I’m like,
okay, I’m getting thrown through the table. Somebody shouts
out, ‘Red’s not doing that. Red has something,’ and I got
taken away from that. I didn’t do that either. From that
moment, I was thinking I wanted to tell CM Punk something,
like talk to him, and CM Punk shows up. I’m at the doctor,
and I felt someone hugging me from behind, ‘Red! What’s up,
man? What’s up?’ And I turn around; it’s him, and I don’t
know what belt he had on, but he had on a belt. It was
probably the world title or like one of the biggest belts.
And I’m like, you know what? I’m not gonna tell him
anything, because it’s just so much at this point; it’s
water under the bridge. But I was very bitter about that
day, just because I feel like it was my opportunity also to
be signed, and I didn’t get that. But I was bitter about it,
where I felt like he ruined it for me. But I’m grown now to
understand he had a job too. This was his thing, no hard
feelings. That’s why a lot of my guys who find out the
story, they’re like, ‘Oh, CM Punk, you probably hate him.’ I
said, ‘No, no, I don’t hate him. I love that dude,
honestly.’”