AEW's Swerve Strickland Names The Most Important Matches Of His Career
This Saturday at Full Gear, Swerve Strickland steps into the ring to wrestle his biggest singles match in AEW to date, a Texas Death Match against former AEW World Champion "Hangman" Adam Page. What started as a standard pro wrestling dispute has become highly personal, thanks to Swerve and Prince Nana paying a visit to Page's home that surely made Samoa Joe nod in approval somewhere backstage. During a recent interview with Swerve conducted by Wrestling Inc. ahead of Full Gear, the self-styled rap mogul was asked to weigh in on which matches have been the most important to his career so far.
Swerve first responded by rightly pointing out that just because a match a wrestler has is the most high-profile, most-attended, or most-watched doesn't necessarily mean it's the most important in the long run. With that in mind, Swerve then cited a match he had against recently released WWE star Matt Riddle in April 2018, which featured the two men battling for the MLW World Heavyweight Championship.
"That was really big. That was what made me look like a true fighter, a true competitor, not just an athletic in ring talent," Swerve explained. "I looked like a fighter and I thank Riddle all the time for truly bringing that out in me. Surviving someone as lethal as a Matt Riddle is big."
Swerve Strickland Looks Back at Lucha Underground
Before AEW, WWE, or even MLW, Swerve Strickland also turned the heads of many fans via his performances on another cult wrestling brand, albeit under a mask. Swerve's work as the Killshot character is some of the best the now-defunct Lucha Underground promotion had to offer, but while most fans of the show would point straight to Killshot's battles against Dante Fox (AEW's AR Fox), Swerve himself chose to spotlight an earlier bout pitting Killshot against the slimy villain Marty "The Moth" Martinez.
"That was what really propelled me and I capitalized off of a lot of momentum from that match," Swerve said. "That's a very underrated match in my career, and I think a lot of people should go back to really watch that one because I was fighting someone bigger than me who it was like that someone who won't give up to someone who won't go down."
"It was like a great clash of two different personalities. That's where it all clicked for me as like, I know how to do this now," Swerve continued. "I know how to do this, and I shout out to Marty, Martin Casaus, Marty the Moth. Truly, we brought out the best in each other that nobody seen coming. A lot of people knew me and Fox were going to just go balls to the wall and kill it, but it all started from the Weapons of Mass Destruction match with Marty the Moth and episode two of season three."