During a recent appearance on the “My Love Letter To Wrestling” podcast, Pete Dunne commented on his name being changed to “Butch”, when he learned he was being called up to the main roster, and more.
You can check out some highlights from the podcast below:
On his reaction to his name change to Butch: “It’s exciting but it’s also a little bit, I mean, it’s just different. But I think it’s time to change it up a little bit. Like I’ve said, five years, fresh start. Why not try something a little new? The thing is with me, whether it’s a name or whatever it is that changes, that’s not really what endeared me towards the audience in the first place, right? It’s the, I like to think anyway, it’s the quality of the in-ring work and that’s what I’m going to keep the same, of course. It’s going to get better. It’s going to improve as time goes, so that’s sort of my perspective on it. If I can endear the crowd with the quality of my in-ring work, that’s what I’m going to continue to do….it’s always been something that I’ve been, I’ve sort of skirted around and been on the edge of, right? Like me, Trent, and Tyler would do the promo photos in it or whatever and even before when I was doing stuff with Ridge and Oney and Danny in NXT, again, we were sort of skirting around it, whereas now it seems like we’re gonna go the whole way with it. So, why not, right? It feels right, it’s a fit, and I’m 28 now. I’m growing up even further, I’ve been in NXT for a long time. So, if there’s ever a time to try something new and just for it, it’s right now. I’m excited to see what it brings.”
On learning about his being called up to WWE main roster: “I’ve kind of had an idea of the fact that my NXT time might be coming to an end for a few weeks now. But in terms of the call-up to SmackDown and everything that came with it, that was really fast. It would have been the day before I was traveling pretty much, starting to find bits and pieces out. So yeah, I’ve known for a while that, really since the same in NXT, I’ve known that, ‘Okay I’m probably coming to the end of my spell at NXT.’ And then, especially in the last maybe month or so, things have really amped up and you start hearing things and that kind of stuff. But WrestleMania season, that adds to it. What a great time to be called up and to be in the mix. So, I’ve already been looking, even though I was in NXT, still getting to do things like the Rumble and Survivor Series, so I’m slowly ticking them all off. And obviously, Mania is the big one so it’s a great time to get the call-up and be in the mix.”
(h/t – 411 Wrestling)
