AEW Star Swerve Strickland Recalls Mindset Ahead Of Hell Of War Match With AR Fox

For many people, Swerve Strickland's match with Bryan Danielson this past weekend at AEW All In may have gone down as the defining match of Strickland's career, even though he lost the AEW World Championship to Danielson in the process. But for fans of the gone, but never forgotten promotion Lucha Underground, the greatest match Strickland had remains his Hell of War match with Dante Fox, aka AEW star AR Fox, at Ultima Lucha Tres, still considered one of the most violent matches in wrestling history.

In an appearance on "The Rich Eisen Show," Strickland was asked about the notorious bout. He proceeded to explain the philosophy he and Fox had when it came to putting the match together, and remarked on how the match has continued to endure with fans even after nearly a decade.

"First, we're like 'Do we have enough?'" Strickland said. "I don't know if we have enough. I think we have enough,' cause we're trying to...we're at the point of 'Okay, this is Ultima Lucha Tres.' And we're like 'There's been some crazy matches. The bar is already high enough. What do we do to not only just raise it, what do we do etch our name in it, where people want to...they can't copy this, because it's us. There's no way they can copy this feeling and this energy.' 

"So we're just coming up with concepts, like 'This only works if Fox is in this position. This only works if Killshot is in this position.' And I think that's what clinches that match so close to us, and why the fans are attached to us so long, even years later. They still talk about it, because it's like 'Man, those guys are like...it had to be them. There's no other way.'"

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit "The Rich Eisen Show" and provide a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription