George Kittle Discusses Origins Of WWE Fandom

San Francisco 49ers tight end George Kittle is no stranger to pro wrestling as he previously wiped out former WWE Champion The Miz with a clothesline at WrestleMania 39. Prior to that, he spent years watching the in-ring action from his couch.

According to Kittle, it was the couch inside his college house that marked the true beginning of his wrestling fandom. "I grew up and I loved Stone Cold [Steve Austin] and The Rock, but I wasn't watching any of the pay-per-views," Kittle told "No-Contest Wrestling Podcast." "I didn't watch any of the WrestleManias. I'd occasionally get lucky, I'd turn on a show, I'd be like, 'Oh, look, there's Stone Cold' ... but I had one of my really good friends who's a teammate of mine, his name's Steve Manders. He's actually on the indie wrestling circuit right now, the 1 Called Manders. He's fantastic. He got me hooked into it."

In the present day, wrestling fans know Steven Manders as 1 Called Manders, a notable name across the independent circuit, and formerly, Major League Wrestling. In the mid-2010s, Manders played football alongside Kittle at the University of Iowa.

As part of their conditioning, Kittle and Manders regularly worked out in the morning, with the latter getting a particularly early start, then cooling off by watching WWE Network content at Kittle's house. After Kittle later returned from his respective workout, Manders encouraged him to join in, pointing out a shared connection between him and then-former WWE Tag Team Champion Seth Rollins.

"He goes, 'Dude, just watch with me, Just watch some of these things. You should really like this guy, Seth Rollins, because he's from Davenport, Iowa, and you're an Iowa guy.' I'm like, 'Okay, I'll watch it,'" Kittle recalled. "I started watching it right at the end of The Shield. It was like the last three to four months of The Shield. I was like, 'Oh, this is sick, dude. I love this. I love Seth.' So every day I'd come back and we'd watch seasons, everything leading up to WrestleMania 1, then everything leading up to WrestleMania 2. He caught me up over the course of that summer. I probably watched like six hours of wrestling a day, minimum."

Thanks to his WWE Network viewing sessions with Manders, Kittle's appreciation for the professional wrestling business rapidly grew, so much so that he and his current 49ers teammates have now adopted Shawn Michaels' flexing pose in moments of celebration.

Kittle cited a match between former world champions Charlotte Flair and Sasha Banks as a notable one he witnessed in person. He was especially "blown away" by Flair's top rope moonsault, which she used to take out Banks on the floor. Elsewhere, Kittle found himself enjoying the comedic work of Chris Jericho, specifically his gimmick of adding his colleagues, and even celebrities, to his list of shame throughout 2016 and 2017. 

Admittedly, not every storyline Kittle has seen has been a great one. Still, he eagerly hangs on for the ones that are.

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit "No-Contest Wrestling Podcast" with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.