Wrestler From Viral Video Speaks Out On Controversy, Criticizes His Former Locker Room, More
Chris Dickinson, whose controversial match against female grappler Kimber Lee garnered heated debates on social media earlier this month, is the guest on this week's episode of The Hot Tag Podcast. In lengthy and candid interview with co-hosts Shaheen and Boxman, Dickinson responds to the criticism that circulated as the result of the viral video.
Asked about backlash in the wake of his controversial intergender match with Kimber Lee, Dickinson stressed that there are a number of considerations at play in the matter.
"Let's put it in the context of professional wrestling," Dickinson said. "Let's forget that it's just a 50-second video of me smashing a girl over the head with a chair and giving her a pazuzu bomb and let's look at it in the context of professional wrestling, because obviously there's a million people out there who thought it was real. What they got worked. So you put it back into context and then you say, 'Wow. They actually had a wrestling match.' So what are we going to do here? Are we just going to come out and say, 'Listen, everybody: I'm sorry. I know it was a little extreme. Guy-on-girl violence is totally wrong. And women?they shouldn't take chair shots and they shouldn't take bumps. It's completely unacceptable in professional wrestling. And you know what? Because the WWE doesn't do it, we're never going to do this, ever again because I just want to be like everybody else.' Am I going to say that? Is that what I should say?"
Dickinson maintained his chair shot on Kimber Lee was completely protected and that she didn't come close to hitting the turnbuckle. Dickinson added that Lee was not injured, there was no bloodletting involved and that he did his job in protecting his opponent from injury. He also pointed out that Triple H has a history of delivering pedigrees to women but that the WWE star has faced minimal criticism over that.
Shaheen recalled an incident in February in which Dickinson received a lot of grief from the Philadelphia crowd during a CZW show at the ECW Arena last month and the wrestler jumped at the opportunity to share his side of the story. He explained that during his match with BLK Jeez that night, they "called an audible" due to some unusual circumstances that night and Dickinson worked as a heel even though he usually performs as a babyface when he's in Philadelphia. Chris said the crowd did not receive the change well and to complicate matters, his communication with Jeez broke down during the match. He acknowledged coming unglued at the conclusion of the bout and said he doesn't like how things went down but he still likes BLK Jeez as a person.
Dickinson spoke on backstage issues in CZW, stating that he had been "politicked" out of the company early in the year by death match stalwart MASADA but that he ended up coming back for another run with the promotion.
"The company is so screwed," said Dickinson of CZW. "There's so many cooks in the kitchen at CZW. And I'm not gonna sit here and bury [CZW owner] D.J. [Hyde]. He's not this horrible person that a lot of people would want to lead you to believe. He's actually a nice guy. He's just got, you know, social things going on and he [doesn't want any] issues. I don't think really he cares if CZW is perceived by the smart marks to be good or not. I don't think he really cares if it's good or not at all. I honestly think that he is just running it like a business so he can get by making x amount of dollars off the company so he can survive off it as long as he can until he has to go back to getting a real job? That's no knock on him. D.J, if you hear this, it's no knock on you, man. We're cool. I just cannot take all of the people in the locker room in CZW. The whole locker room is fake. Everybody will shake your hand and then they'll talk a bunch of crap about you behind your back."
Dickinson also discussed his taekwondo background and his experience working a match for Ring of Honor earlier this year. He expressed a great deal of enthusiasm regarding his recent work in the independent promotion Beyond Wrestling.
The THT Podcast episode featuring Chris Dickinson airs Tuesday, March 17 at 8:05 PM EST.