Damian Priest Says Triple H Advocated For Him To Be In WrestleMania Match

As a guest on The Masked Man Show, WWE superstar Damian Priest joined the show to talk about his WrestleMania 37 match teaming with Bad Bunny against The Miz and John Morrison. The former United States Champion revealed that he was almost taken from that spot, but happy WWE ultimately ended up trusting him being Bunny's partner.

"I felt good that they trusted me in that role and I'm sure that there was talk because how can you trust someone that you don't know, you know?" Priest asked. "There are people like Hunter, who knew I was fine and he is the one, the reason why it ended up happening, because I almost got switched out. They almost took me out of that spot.

"I wasn't upset or anything, I was like, 'that makes sense'. If I was on their shoes, 100%, that would be the way to go, and Hunter went to bat for me. And he was like, 'hey,' he was like, 'sorry that they even told you that it's not going to be you now because I'm gonna go have a conversation, you know?' And he explained why I should be trusted, I guess. I wasn't in the meeting, but I'm guessing that's what he had to have done, you know? 'No. I trust him, let's trust him. He's going to be fine'. Then they're like, 'okay, let's go with Priest'.

"And it's crazy how it worked out though because, in the process, Bad Bunny and I ended up becoming friends, and all those nerves or pressure that you were just talking about, of, you know, my first WrestleMania, and then on top of that is with somebody else who is having their first WrestleMania, but also their first match, but they're not from this world. You know, it was a lot. I think because we became friends and then like, through the training and the preparation, we were just joking around and we would laugh. We put in the hard word, you know, for sure. We were pros about that. But the other side is we're enjoying and having fun doing it. I think that took a lot of pressure off. We took it off each other, but for me, because I'm the one that's staying, I'm grateful that is the way it happened to be honest. It probably worked out better for me, and just from a pressure standpoint, I felt a lot better. Now the day of? I was a disaster."

This past weekend at WrestleMania 38, The Archer of Infamy joined Edge to form a new faction at the end of Edge's match with AJ Styles. At the beginning of the night, we also saw Triple H signify the end of his wrestling career, placing his wrestling boots in the middle of the ring and getting the crowd fired up for the start of the show. The Game announced his retirement this past week during a special appearance on ESPN where he spoke to having a defibrillator on his chest due to the cardiac event he suffered.

Damian Priest spoke about the impact Triple H has had on his career from his time in NXT to WWE and shares the advice The Game gave him that stuck with him throughout his career.

"There is no Damian Priest without Triple H," Priest said. "That's 100%. There are no ifs and buts about it. I am not sitting here with you if there is no Triple H. And then, so you have that. And then his help, his advice, encouraging you to believe in yourself more so than he believes in you. Like, 'no, no. You need to believe in yourself more.' You know, I'm someone who always consciously doubts. Like, I'm not a negative person. I'm a very positive person, but I would question myself sometimes."

Lastly, Priest continued to speak about finally hitting that point where he felt he belonged in WWE. The former United States Champion said he took inspiration from something Shawn Michaels told him down in NXT that's stuck with him to this day.

"After a match on NXT, it was my first actual match, like I had a few matches, but my first match against Pete Dunne, Butch now, I remember getting a text from X-Pac. He goes, 'you belong'. You know, I thought that was so cool because he knows the way I am and Hunter was just like that. He came up to me and he was like, 'that's the guy'. You know, when I wrestled Finn Balor in NXT, he came back and he goes, 'that is the guy I want to see every week now. That guy with that swag that you showcased out there'.

"Because before that, I've said it before, that he gave me a piece of advice, which he got from The Undertaker, which is also super cool, and he was like, 'you know, Taker told me this once and I'm going to give it to you. When you figure out how to be yourself, you're going to be more successful'. And he goes, 'I know, it's weird. It's, how do you not know how to be yourself? You're you. But it's different on camera'. I was pretending to be a version of what people thought I was instead of just being and Shawn Michaels would say the same thing. He'd be like, 'I like this guy. This guy's cool. Just be that guy on TV'."

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit The Masked Man Show with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.