Ryan Nemeth took an unusual path to All Elite Wrestling. The Hollywood Hunk had a cup of coffee in the early days of WWE NXT before working on the independent circuit for nearly a decade. A happy coincidence landed him in his current role.
Nemeth says his friendship with Amanda Huber and her husband Brodie Lee led to a fortunate encounter. He was going to a birthday party for Brodie Lee, Jr. (Dark Order’s -1) when he met Tony Khan. Ryan told the story on the latest AEW Unrestricted podcast.
“I showed up to surprise her and the boy for his big birthday party. I was great friends with Amanda and Brodie back in Tampa in NXT times. They were trying to tell me for a few months that I should come for, they were doing a birthday party for Brodie Jr, and that I should come and surprise Amanda and say Hi. I was listening to this thinking that I don’t want to show up at a wrestling promotion I don’t work for. To me, it’s bad etiquette and it’s weird. It will seem like, ‘Hey guys, can I have a match?’
I know everybody does that, but I just didn’t want to do that. I showed up. Brodie Jr didn’t recognize me at all. Back in Tampa years ago, sometimes I would babysit. He was the funniest little monster ever. He used to run around naked. He would tear his clothes off, start running around and jumping off things. That was when he was freshly hatched.
I remember Brodie sitting in a chair thinking, ‘There he goes.’ To see him as Negative One, and people being like, ‘Yes, be that all the time, was insane.’ Amanda said, ‘There’s Ryan. Do you remember him?’ He’s like, ‘No.’ I was very flattered and excited that Tony Khan decided that I would then wrestle Hangman Adam Page on Dynamite the next day.”
Ryan Nemeth made his debut in AEW in January in a losing effort to current AEW World Champion Hangman Adam Page. Since then, he’s aligned himself with The Wingmen, Peter Avalon and Cezar Bononi. He is the brother of WWE superstar Dolph Ziggler.
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