History’s longest-reigning WWE Universal Champion, Kevin Owens, was recently a guest on his best friend in the world’s podcast, Talk is Jericho. He spoke to Chris Jericho about a whole bunch of things, as you would expect, but the two lifelong pals made sure to talk about Finn Bálor’s injury, which opened the door for Owens to win said Universal Championship.
Owens talked about the camaraderie that so many people have backstage in WWE after having come up through the indies together, which makes people like Owens, Sami Zayn, Neville, Seth Rollins and others very close. He has become extremely good friends with Bálor since coming to NXT, which made the Demon King’s injury so much more difficult for him and everyone else who was close to Finn. But Owens was able to give his friend a pep talk after the injury about focusing on his sure-to-be-dynamite comeback.
“It was really heart-wrenching because, so, I saw him get hurt. I knew he was hurt. Yeah, but I didn’t know it was serious because he kept going like nothing happened. And then, he won the title and I got emotional because we’re very close friends,” Owens admitted. “Yeah, it was really heart-wrenching to see, but I feel like, at the same time, it’s kind of like what I told Rollins once he hurt his knee: ‘you never lost the title. You’re going to come back stronger than ever. People are going to be so excited for you to be here. There is a silver lining, as hard as it is to see for now.'”
Of course, since Bálor’s injury opened the door for Owens to win his first world championship in WWE, he understandably had “conflicting emotions” about the whole affair, but his family and noted world’s nicest dude, Finn Bálor, helped put him at ease about kicking that door down.
“When I heard, officially, that he was relinquishing the title, obviously, that opens a door and I was like, ‘well, I’m going to kick that door [in].’ You know what I mean? ‘I’m going to kick that door in.’ I don’t know. So it was very conflicting emotions, but I think what made me feel better about the whole thing, because when I won the title, he [was] one of the first people that I thought of. Like, I thought of my wife, my kids, my parents, my grandfathers who died before they could see me wrestle in WWE, but I thought of [Finn] too, who was at home. I honestly had to hold back throwing up the ‘too sweet’ for him just as a little wink, but I came back, I talked to my wife, I talked to my parents, and then I FaceTimed him. And to see his smile and how happy he was, and even his parents were there too and they were all happy, it just made me feel so much better. Do you know what I mean because we all know, eventually, he’ll come back.”
Of course, many of us are hoping that Owens will hold that title for the next six months and that the two men will reprise their NXT wars on the main roster for Raw’s top prize when Finn finally returns. That’s probably wishful thinking, but we certainly know anything is possible in today’s WWE.
