WWE NXT North American Champion Roderick Strong recently spoke with Sports Illustrated where he spoke about a wide range of topics. Here are the highlights:
His win over WWE Intercontinental Champion Shinsuke Nakamura and then-WWE United States Champion AJ Styles at the 2019 WWE Survivor Series:
“That was a great opportunity to give the WWE Universe just a taste, but not everything,” Strong said. “Those are two guys that I have the utmost respect for, and obviously I’ve wrestled AJ quite a few times before and Nakamura quite a few times prior to coming to WWE. It was very, very special for me.
“After the match, I was celebrating on the ground, and I got emotional. I take a lot of pride in what I do, and that was a big moment. I was very, very happy that I had the chance to do that with guys that I have so much respect for, and ones I feel that have the same respect for me. I’m just excited to continue, until the day I stop doing this, to show the world how good I am at this job.”
MMA Horsewomen vs. WWE Horsewomen match:
“I would love to see them all have that opportunity, and it could be a WrestleMania moment,” Strong said of a possible Horsewomen battle. “They’ve been teasing it here and there for quite some time now, and I really hope, for all the women involved, that they get the opportunity to do that match. It will be a banger, that’s for sure.
“When it comes to my wife, I am so proud. This was so foreign to her, and to watch her—and I know it sounds weird to even say this—but I feel like a parent in that sense. She figured out a lot of this on her own. It’s been very interesting to see her creative side and take this a lot faster than I ever did. I am really intrigued to see how much she improves in the next year. She is beautiful, she’s charismatic, she’s a frickin’ beast of an athlete. When she gets 100 hundred percent comfortable with this, there is no stopping her.”