Top NXT Star Was ‘Shocked’ By Pat McAfee’s Debut Match

NXT North American Championship Damien Priest recently appeared on the Gorilla Position podcast. The former Ring of Honor star discussed a number of topics during his time on the show, including Pat McAfee’s debut match against Adam Cole at NXT TakeOver: XXX.

“Absolutely outstanding performance, I mean he excelled” Damien Priest began on the podcast. “I’ve seen people wrestle for years that can’t put on a match like that. I’m just being honest, I have wrestled around the indies. And in the end? These guys can’t do what he can do.”

“He [McAfee] actually telling a story and wrestling a good match? And then doing some high risk maneuvers that are just outstanding? I mean like i said, I was surprised. I mean, I knew he had been training, I knew he trained with Rip Rogers. There was no way a professional athlete was going to come into this unprepared.”

Damien Priest would then praise McAfee further, saying how he dedicated himself to the match. “He’s a perfectionist. Like he has to be good at everything he does. He doesn’t do something just for views you know? Just because it’s cool? He’ll do it for that reason…but he has to do it well. He can’t just walk, he has to run across it.”

“I wasn’t surprised that he took it as seriously as he did” Damien Priest would continue. “But just because you take it seriously? It doesn’t mean you’re going to get to THAT level of performance, especially without a track record.”