Tom Hannifan recently spoke about being a commentator with Impact Wrestling, and what his run with the company has been like so far. Hannifan also spoke about reuniting with his long-time commentary partner, Matthew Rehwoldt. The two worked together in WWE on the NXT UK and 205 Live brands.
Hannifan, formerly Tom Phillips of WWE, became a regular commentator with Impact at their Hard To Kill pay-per-view event in 2022. Speaking with SP3 of the Tru Heels BTR podcast, Hannifan spoke about that debut, his emotions for this year’s show, and his reunion with Rehwoldt. You can read highlights of his comments below:
His emotions before his first Impact show: “I don’t get anywhere without my color commentator Matthew Rehwoldt, my producer Josh Mathews, and then Scott D’Amore, who has been amazing to me over the past year. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little emotional and definitely fired up going into this year’s Hard To Kill. Debuting at last year’s Hard To Kill was extremely emotional. I was unsure what the landscape of IMPACT was gonna be like. I knew I’d have a lot of familiar faces around and some new faces as well, so it was nerve-racking.”
How that changed for this year’s show: “This year, it was like, oh this is not, you know like old hat or anything, but it’s like, ‘We’ve been here before, but let’s just kill it.’ To open and close the show, kinda like you said: we book-ended the show so well with Bully Ray and Alexander, and then Mickie James and Jordynne Grace… you can’t ask for a better show. Then everybody else on the show just absolutely brought their A-game, so I said it a moment ago, but when IMPACT Wrestling is live, they don’t miss. It’s the best.”
Working alongside Matt Rehwoldt in WWE: “It’s been a long road because it’s funny just how things work out. In WWE, he was on the heels of the whole Rusev angle and wasn’t really doing much. I remember speaking to Michael Cole and a bunch of other people saying, ‘Hey you know Matt can talk, Aiden can talk’. At the time, Aiden English, and they gave him an opportunity on 205 Live, and eventually he and I did NXT UK together as well.”
Being reunited with Rehwoldt as the new Impact commentary team: “So, fast forward a number of years and we’re both in IMPACT Wrestling, my former co-host D-Lo Brown was transitioning into a strictly an off-camera and backstage role, so it was like, ‘Okay, who’s gonna be the new color commentator?’ So I had D-Lo for literally one night, and then I think I worked with a dozen partners the night after. Then fast forward a handful of weeks, and I’m working with Rehwoldt again.”