Posted on 1/13/126 by Colin Vassallo
The Miz sat down with Chris Van Vliet in Washington, DC to
discuss his unlikely journey from reality TV to WWE by
entering Tough Enough, getting kicked out of the locker room
and how he was let back in, winning the WWE Championship and
defending it against John Cena in the main event of
WrestleMania 27, finally getting his flowers, whether he
feels respected from the fans, that iconic Talking Smack
segment with Daniel Bryan, how he met his wife Maryse in
WWE, a possible babyface run, and much more!
I’ve mainly seen The Miz as a heel, but there have been
moments of you being a babyface:
“My character doesn’t really work as a baby face, if I’m
being honest. It’s a person that can lose, and then the next
day, you’ll forget about that loss, because I’ll just cut a
promo and just make you believe. But with the babyface,
babyfaces can’t really lose a lot. If a babyface loses too
much, you lose [appeal]. Everyone always says winning
doesn’t matter, winning doesn’t matter. It matters. It
really does matter. Especially if you’re a babyface, because
in my opinion, if you’re a babyface and I’m a kid out there,
my kids always ask me, ‘Did you win? Did you win? Did you
win?’ I always have to go, ‘Ah, daddy didn’t win this week.
But you know, I’ll get him next week.’ You can only say that
so many times to a kid where they’re just like, ‘I want a
winner. I want a winner.’ I want to cheer a winner. People
like winners, people like first place; they don’t like
second place, they don’t like third place. They want the
guy, their guy, and they want their guy to win, so if he
doesn’t win… So that’s why I feel like my character, I’m so
good at losing and then making you forget about that loss,
and then making you believe the next day that I can beat the
biggest superstar in the world. I could lose to whoever. Guy
comes up from NXT, Je’Von Evans, and beats me. The next day,
I can be in the main event. I can go up against John Cena,
not anymore, but I go up against your biggest superstar, and
I can make you believe I can beat that person, and you will
believe that I will beat that person. But as a babyface,
it’s a little tougher. It’s been weird these past couple of
years, though. I would say this past year has been weird.”
In what way?
“So the things I do that I know in my rolodex of being a
heel and being a bad guy, I’ll do and it doesn’t get the
boos anymore.”
Because people want to cheer you:
“If you’re gonna cheer me, cheer me. If you’re just gonna go
‘Ah! He’s so good.’ I don’t want that. I don’t want that.
That’s the death, because that’s just, I don’t know what to
really do.”
But do you feel the respect?
“Yes, I feel the respect. I feel it in the locker room. I
feel it in the crowd, but I’ll hear you say it. ‘Oh, Miz has
gotten his flowers.’ You know what kind of flowers I get? I
get the ones that are half dead, that you give to me and
they’re gonna die the next day. You don’t give me a full
bouquet of flowers that are like, here are your flowers.
John Cena gets the flowers. I don’t get the flowers. I get
the half-dead flowers that are like, Here you go, here’s
your flowers. We’re giving you your flowers. It’s the half
assed flowers.”
Why do you think that is?
“I don’t know. Maybe it’s because I don’t want them.”
So you remember winning the WWE Championship so vividly.
What do you remember from WrestleMania 27?
“So I remember my entrance. I remember not seeing that
vignette. That Hate Me Now vignette is so good. I still
think it’s the best. People say Rock and Austin, My Way,
they say that one’s the best. I beg to differ, and the
reason is what that vignette did in that moment. I wonder if
that vignette was put on SmackDown, there would have been a
different feeling energy going in. Because going in, I
remember I was swallowed up. You’re the WWE Champion, I’m
going up against titans, The Rock and John Cena, titans.
Then there’s me with the WWE Championship. Back then, it
still is very, very competitive. But man, everyone was
fighting for it. Everyone’s fighting for that spot, that
main event spot. I’m like, Man, I want this main event. I
have to get this main event. This main event is everything;
we have to get it. I mean, I have The Rock, I have Cena,
this has got to be it. But there were so many great matches
and great superstars on that card. It could have went either
way. So I remember that leading up to it, the promos,
everything, oh my God. I remember the promo I cut, where I
walked out as The Rock. I didn’t think it was gonna work at
all. I went out, did the whole Rock thing, and then I cut a
promo, and I remember The Rock calling me, leaving a
message, being like, ‘Dude, that was it. That was amazing.
That’s how you step up to the plate. Blah, blah, blah.’ I’m
like, Oh man, I’m ready. So then for the match portion of
this, I remember seeing Hate Me Now vignette for the first
time, right before I’m about to go out. I remember hearing
the audience go, oh! As I walked out, I had bubbles. In my
head I was like bubbles?! Awesome bubbles?! I’m the main
event. I’m WWE Champion. People get pyro, huge displays of
pyro. I got bubbles?! I actually ended up loving the bubbles
busting out. No one’s ever done that. And then when I
remember them saying, ‘You have Pyro for 30 seconds, so make
sure you keep it there.’ I’m like, oh, man, this is gonna be
great. They’re sparklers. I’m going, I thought these were
gonna be big, huge. This is freaking sparklers. It’s like,
all right. There we go. Then I remember looking over to my
friends and telling them, literally, ‘We did it.’ I remember
being in Parma, Ohio, in Sandpiper at my condominium, and we
would watch every pay-per-view, ECW, WCW, WWE all the time.
I just remember all of us watching, and they were all there
in front row watching me with the WWE Championship that we
watched Rock and Austin fight for all the time. So I was
like, We did it. I remember Cena’s choir. I was like, Oh,
this guy gets a choir. Then he comes out, does his thing. I
remember that the heat spot, if you will, because it wasn’t
a heat spot. It was just me beating him up in the corner. I
remember that. I remember the pop of the crowd when I kicked
out of the AA. I remember Cena saying, ‘Just grab onto the
ropes kid, grab onto the ropes. We got you. We got you.’
Boom. Rock. Boom. I remember Chioda going, ‘Cover him kid,
cover him.’ I’m just like, Huh, what’s going on? 1, 2, 3,
winning. And I remember Chioda telling me, ‘Throw your title
at The Rock. Throw your title at The Rock.’ I’m like, Yeah,
okay, threw the title at The Rock. Remember The Rock coming
in. ‘I got you kid. Don’t you worry. Don’t you worry. We got
this.’ I have no idea. Boom, boom. And then it was over. I
remember, I see stuff on the internet. I was like, I don’t
remember that. I don’t remember that. I don’t remember that.
I don’t remember being backstage and me just being like,
‘Was it good?’ I don’t like seeing myself like that. But
some people are like, ‘Oh, what would you have done if they
stopped the match?’ That would have been the worst possible
scenario, the worst possible scenario, if someone would have
stopped that match. I was in good hands, and I trusted the
two people in there, and I will always trust them and always
be thankful for them, all three of them. It’s not just The
Rock and Cena, Chioda as well. They all protected me. They
all looked at me, and they all allowed me to do what I
needed to do to make that whole situation a success.”
You’ve been there so long that you’ve seen so many of your
friends, so many of your colleagues get released. Did you
ever think that maybe that call was coming for you?
“Yeah, honestly, every time there’s a release, I’m like, Oh
no, is it me?”
Especially when it’s people like Dolph Ziggler get released:
“That was a tough one for me to see him go, because it was
kind of like the last of my really core group of friends. I
have friends, obviously, in the locker room, but that was my
core group of friends. I was like man, I’ve had such great
matches with Dolph too. Him putting his career up and me the
IC Title. That whole IC title reign, he was a big part of
elevating that title as well. During that time for me, and
so to see him go is tough, but that’s the name of this
business, it happens, those type of things happen. For me,
this is going to sound very cocky and arrogant. I know how
valuable I am. I know how good I am, and whether the
audience sees it or not, I know people know. If you’ve
wrestled me, you know. So yes, there’s always in the back of
your mind, ‘Oh, is it me? Is it me? Is it me?’ But then
there’s also that other part that goes, ‘I’ve done a lot in
this business, and I still got more.’”