During an interview with CBSSports.com, WWE star Rusev addressed his lack of matches while working for AEW as Miro…
“I wrestled Jey Uso in Japan. I had to light a fire behind him because I wanted to go, man. I told him, ‘I’m going so hard, and I’m not going to apologize, because I had a period of time where I’d have one match, not knowing when the next match is coming.’ That’s a very scary situation. Now we have this hot crowd in Japan. Let’s freaking go! Let’s give it 150%.”
“In the past five years, I have had 20 or 30 matches. Back in the day, I had 30 matches in 30 days. The dead time sticks out the most. We only have this body and age for so long. We can’t do this job forever, so we must take advantage of it while we’re young. I sat on the sidelines for so long, unable to do what I love, which is performing for people in professional wrestling.”
“You go out in the wild, in the dark, in the abyss, and have to figure everything out for yourself. You don’t have the producers or the creative team. I dug deep inside myself to find out who I am and what I wanted to stand for. From there, we started developing ‘The Redeemer’ character.”
“Again, I was pushed against the wall with nowhere else to go. I remember that very vividly… After having that meeting about, ‘You have this much time left here,’ I once again went back and started revisiting my character. What could I do better? If you ask something of me, I’ll deliver.”