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What's the story?
The 'Bulgarian Brute' Rusev recently spoke to ESPN about several topics within the WWE. Among them was discussing the stereotypes of foreign wrestlers along with the gigantic rise in popularity of Rusev Day.
In case you didn't know...
Rusev signed with the WWE in 2010 and worked for Florida Championship Wrestling before it started to transition to NXT. He was then known as Alexander Rusev before the name was shortened to just Rusev once he made the main roster.
During his early days with the WWE, they would book Rusev to be an unstoppable machine, showing very little personality. He would destroy many wrestlers in his path at FCW and NXT, though never held a championship on either brand.
The heart of the matter
ESPN talked to Rusev about receiving the biggest chants of the evening at the Royal Rumble from the crowd in Philadelphia. Rusev would talk about that reaction with the quote below:
"I had no idea this was going to happen. This was supposed to be a one-time 'Rusev Day' thing. I never thought in a million years it was going to be what it is today. It was something we planned to do, but just for one day. But it just caught on fire ever since then. Nobody expected that."
Rusev Day was created in October to celebrate his victory over Randy Orton in only eight seconds. I think when Corey Graves mentioned on commentary that every day should be Rusev Day, it caught on and became a running gimmick that the WWE Universe fell in love with.
Rusev mentioned that this is the most fun he's had in his career because now he's breaking away from being a 'bad foreigner guy'. He mentioned that being this bad guy doesn't have to be his destiny any longer, but being that stereotypical evil foreigner was all he had ever known since he started wrestling.
The ESPN article mentions that Rusev was one of the few men who have been trusted to work inside the ring with The Rock and Stone Cold Steve Austin, and he would mention how he learned from The Rock during the time he was there a few years ago.
"The Rock taught me you don't always have to talk or move all the time. You can just stand there and soak it in. Let the crowd just do what they do. Looking back at the segment, I could tell what he was talking about."
In the end, Rusev would say, "I want to be remembered as the guy who broke that mold for other foreign wrestlers."
What's next?
The next pay per view for the SmackDown Live roster will be Fastlane when it takes place live from the Nationwide Arena in Columbus, Ohio on 11 March. At the time of writing tis, only the WWE Championship match is set, so it is unknown what will be in store for Rusev on the final pay per view before WrestleMania.
Author's take
When you watch shows like Total Divas and Southpaw Regional Wrestling, you just know that Rusev is truly a hilarious guy. Before Rusev Day, you could get glimpses of this in small doses, but the WWE never ran with it.
Now that the WWE is allowing Rusev and Aiden English to run with Rusev Day, the sky's the limit for both wrestlers. The t-shirts are selling well and the Rusev Day calendars sold out rather quickly on WWE Shop. Those are two big messages that the WWE Universe has sent to management that they support what Rusev Day is all about.
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