Gangrel Comments On AEW, Fan Backlash To WWE Hell In A Cell Finish

Gangrel has over 30 years of pro wrestling experience and is still wrestling on the indie scene. He had his most notoriety during the Monday Night Wars as he led The Brood which also featured Edge and Christian.

Many see similarities between that period in pro wrestling and the one today with the rise of AEW. Gangrel was asked how much of today reminds him of that era when he spoke to Wrestling Inc. on our WINCLY podcast.

"I don't know. It feels like the start of it. I'm not real good with numbers but I heard AEW did a higher number than NXT on Wednesday. But AEW is new and anybody that's interested in wrestling is gonna check them out," said Gangrel.

"So I'd say give it six months and then let's reevaluate that question."

AEW has reached out to many veteran wrestlers to assist with backstage or producing roles and Gangrel revealed if he's had any talks with them.

"I have terrible communication skills and I'm surprised just to get this interview [laughs]. I'm friends with a lot of those guys but I've never been asked for anything," stated Gangrel. "Nobody's approached me but I would love to do something like that. But I think it's really cool for pro wrestling as I train students and it gives them another avenue to go."

As the owner of his own wrestling school, Gangrel said it's great to see more places for students to work and he wouldn't mind if some of his students ended up in AEW.

"Not everybody is WWE-structured and not everybody will be AEW-structured or ROH or MLW. There's a good melting pot out there and everyone has a place in wrestling just as everyone has a place in life. Hopefully some of my students will find a place in wrestling and life at the same time," said Gangrel.

Gangrel was a dark, somewhat spooky character and the same could be said about "The Fiend" Bray Wyatt. Gangrel was asked what he thought about the controversial Hell in a Cell finish between Wyatt and Seth Rollins.

"I've heard things?I don't know, what is no DQ or no contest? How do you get DQed? How do you justify that," asked Gangrel.

"I think they confused everybody. I didn't see it so I can't give an honest opinion but I'm definitely gonna watch it? Sometimes you just put things together on paper and it sounds good and when you relay it to the wrestlers it sounds good, but it doesn't get across to the fans?Sometimes you can be too smart for your own good and confuse the hell out of everybody."

As a trainer and also a performer, Gangrel is always busy so he talked about the difficulty in keeping up with mainstream pro wrestling today.

"I'm guilty of getting one match in and then I have to turn it off and run," admitted Gangrel. "I am super busy. Between doing the school and working every Friday, Saturday, Sunday and then being in October it's ridiculous and I'm out Tuesdays-Sundays?"

With him portraying a vampire character, he gets especially busy in October with Halloween at the end of the month. But he said pretty much every month is hectic with his full-time job at his wrestling school.

Gangrel will be appearing at WrestleRex on Thursday October 24th in Pittsburgh. The show goes down one day after AEW Dynamite's Pittsburgh show. So, if you're in town for AEW... stick around for WrestleRex! Tickets and info can be found here. Gangrel's full interview with Wrestling Inc aired as part of today's episode of our WINCLY podcast. It can be heard via the embedded audio player at the bottom of this post. Featuring Gangrel discussing his upcoming match with LA Park at WrestleRex in Pittsburgh, working with Sam Adonis, backlash to WWE's Hell In A Cell finish, his brief dabbling in the adult entertainment business, recently guest coaching at the WWE Performance Center, his match with Orange Cassidy and more.

You can check out past episodes of the WINCLY here. Subscribe to Wrestling Inc. Audio on iTunes or Google Play. Listen to the show via Spotify here or through TuneIn here.