Nick Gage Reveals Tony Khan's Backstage Reaction To His AEW Dynamite Deathmatch

On the latest episode of Pro Wrestling 4 Life, two-time WWE Hall of Famer Sean "X-Pac" Waltman and his co-host Wrestling Inc. Managing Editor Nick Hausman sat down with Nick Gage. They discussed Gage's career and his big NO Dq match from last week's AEW Dynamite against Chris Jericho.

"In my opinion, watching all that, hats off to Tony Khan for taking the chance on that and pushing the envelope a little bit," Waltman expressed. "Sometimes, we got to step over the line every now and then."

Hausman asked Gage who from AEW reached out to him about making the match happen.

"I don't know, man. I know I didn't make the phone call there," Gage admitted. "I know someone said, 'Yo, you want to go wrestle Chris Jericho? They want to do a deathmatch.' And I made sure that it was going to be a real deathmatch. It wasn't gonna be no fake s**t. We're not gonna roll around in fake glass.

"I was gonna make sure that the light tubes were real, make sure the glass was gonna be real, and they were down for it. And I was like, 'Hell yeah!' I'm wrestling Chris Jericho, why wouldn't I? Shout out to Chris Jericho for being a tough motherf**ker. I gave it to him, man. I carved him up pretty bloody. I was stabbing him with real glass. That was real glass. That wasn't fake glass. When he hit that rana on me, and I went through that pane of glass, that was a real pane of glass.

"I checked that s**t when I was there to make sure that s**t was real, and once you hit that glass, you roll around because I slammed him on it when he tried to hit that double knee move and I slammed him on that glass. That s**t will cut you right up right away. He took all that stuff and kept fighting back. So shout out to him. I got that pizza cutter on him right away. It's bizarre, man. I was fired up right away."

Controversy arose after the match, however, after Gage used his pizza cutter on Jericho. Following that spot a Domino's commercial aired and Domino's later expressed their dislike for the incident.

"I didn't even know anything about the Domino's thing until my match was over, and someone brought it up. I was just out there focused on carving up Chris Jericho," Gage admitted. "Somebody told me once they got through the match, I was leaking out of my arm. 'There was a Domino's commercial as you were carving Chris Jericho up,' and I started laughing, man. What a coincidence. I was just so focused on making that man bleed all over the place."

"Nick, look, you didn't come home with the 'victory', per se, in the match, but you came out the winner," Waltman noted. "Mission accomplished. Now, way more people are aware of Nick Gage, and you were true to yourself."

"I just wanted to represent not only me but the deathmatch wrestling wrestlers and all the boys that did it in the past, who passed away," Gage said. "They said it couldn't come on live TV or national TV, that this s**t couldn't be worldwide or nationwide. I wanted to let them know, yes, it can, and it can be done in a right way and be an awesome match. I think it came off great. I was so proud, and I was just representing for all them guys and I can tell myself, Nick, go out there and tear that s**t up, represent the boys, and then middle finger to all them guys who used to f**king make fun of me for doing this s**t or say this is crappy wrestling and s**t.

"And I would just explain to some of them, this is a different style of wrestling. You want to go in there and f**king wrestle, I'll wrestle you, but I like to f**king have weapons in my match. I like to have the f**king sheet of glass. And to have it on national TV and not only did we have it on national TV, we drew 1.2 million people to watch it. So we did something right, and we had 8000 people, which they doubled the number of the last time they were in that building. It was a proud night. All my boys, everybody was just proud, and it was a proud moment, proud night, great night."

Some in the pro wresting world deride Gage's style of wrestling. Gage revealed what Tony Khan's reaction was to the match after it was over.

"Tony came up to me all fired up," Gage revealed. "As soon as I came back, he was in Gorilla position. He got out of his chair, came right into me. I looked that man dead in his eyes. I said, 'Man, you got something awesome going here. Thank you for f**king making me feel at home here,' and I was just fired up. And he said, 'Thank you. What an awesome match.' I just keep it real. I'm a real motherf**ker. I just speak the truth. I said what I felt at the moment, and he said the same thing to me. And he was telling the truth. He showed me nothing but love the whole time. I talked to that guy many times, and he came off as nothing but sincere to me."

A new episode of Sean Waltman's Pro Wrestling 4 Life drops every Wednesday morning on all major podcast platforms. It is also released in video form on FITE and YouTube.com/XPac Thursdays at 3 pm EST!