With Payback rapidly approaching, fans of WWE in Tennessee were treated to something special on RAW when, after watching Sami Zayn and Damian Priest work a solid opening match, the music of the “Megastar” hit, and they all started cheering on their favorite performer, LA Knight.
… only, it wasn't LA Knight who appeared in the ring but instead The Miz, doing an uncanny impersonation of the “Megastar” that received less than glowing marks from the fans in attendance.
“Let me talk to ya, yeah! I got my wannabe tough guy big bass voice on, so you know I mean business. Because papa don't play that, yeah! Nah Nah! Yeah! I'm a dangerous man! Yeah! So dangerous, yeah, that when I walk into the ring, I start flubbing my words, yeah! I mean what? I mean yeah! I mean what? I mean yeah! I mean yeah! I mean yeah!” The Miz said, mocking the Tenessee crowd.
“But let me talk to ya straight, yeah! Yeah? But let me talk to ya straight. I know it takes more than a catchphrase to gain your support, yeah! You are not sheep, yeah! You are smart, you're sophisticated; you are discerning fans. And we need to earn your cheers. That is why I brought this bag out here; this is a bag full of free LA Knight t-shirts. So if you want a free LA Knight t-shirt give me a h*ll yea… I mean yeah! ”
After urging the crowd to cheer for a free t-shirt like it was the end of Being The Elite, The Miz dropped the shirt to the floor and laughed at just how “pathetic” it made the crowd look.
“You are so pathetic. You will cheer for anything, which means your support means absolutely nothing. Yeah, yeah – that was easy, anyone can do that; anyone can be LA Knight. He's generic, it's vanilla; anyone can pander, anyone can think of some phony name you can find somewhere on Cinemax at 2 am back in 1997,” The Miz said.
“I don't do catchphrases. When I say I'm awesome, it's not because I want you all to applause me, it's because it's the truth. It's not a catchphrase, it's reality, and the reality is when I beat LA Knight, when I expose LA Knight, when LA Knight is beaten and battered, the party's over: everything is done. Because you'll cheer free t-shrits, you'll cheer catchphrases, but you don't cheer losers and that's exactly what LA Knight will be in five days time at Payback. And when the dust settles, with everybody not only saying but immortalizing whose game it really is, M-I-Z, yeah!”
Though LA Knight didn't ultimately come out to defend his case in the “Home of the King,” Jerry Lawler – who made an appearance in the venue with KO and Owens – it's safe to say fans in Hershey, Pennsylvania will be afforded one you-know-what of a response from the “Megastar” on the go-home show before Payback.
LA Knight defends wearing an unbuttoned vest in WWE.
While The Miz – and basically everyone else in professional wrestling – has been throwing shade at LA Knight for his similarities to stars from the Attitude Era like “Stone Cold” Steve Austin and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, did you know even his choice of attire, namely his open leather vest, has drawn criticism from some as just another “Rattlesnake” rip-off?
It's true, as he noted in an interview with TalkSports, some have even taken issue with his vest. Fortunately, that particular piece of clothing isn't what some might think, as it instead draws inspiration from another “loose cannon.”
“If anybody wants to put my name in with those guys that's cool because that's a h*ll of an elevation right there. But beyond that, my motives are to move above and beyond both of those guys, “LA Knight said via TalkSports.
“So with all the respect in the world to both of them, I am influenced by both of them, those are the guys that I cut my teeth on in a certain sense when I was in high school and those were the guys.
“Also heavy influences you're looking at [Roddy] Piper, [Hulk] Hogan, [Ric] Flair, Jake the Snake [Roberts], all these guys and other pop culture influences… actors, musical artists, all these kinds of things are influenced in here – you've never once heard me steal somebody's phrases, dress like somebody. Although some people go, ‘Ah he's got the Austin vest', by the way, if you look at that vest that I wear it's actually modelled after Brian Pillman.”
Do you believe that LA Knight based his vest look on the Brian Pillman Sr., or is he simply deflecting from yet another “Stone Cold” tribute to the “Rattlesnake?” Either way, it's clear nothing Knight does won't draw some sort of comparison, so he might as well just lean into it and keep doing what's working, yeah!