Dean Ambrose has been back on WWE programming since the Raw before SummerSlam, and he’s more hard-hitting, intense, and jacked than he’s been in years. In a recent interview with The Monitor, the Grand Slam Champion revealed that it wasn’t an easy road back to the ring after the injury that took him off TV in December 2017. Fans keeping up with Ambrose’s condition heard that he would be out longer than expected soon after the injury, and he explains why, with typical Lunatic Fringe candor.
It was just one nightmare after another. It was a pretty challenging period of time to go through. I ended up having two different surgeries. I had this MRSA, Staph infection. I nearly died. I was in the hospital for a week plugged up to this antibiotic drip thing, and I was on all these antibiotics for months that make you puke and crap your pants.
Ambrose mentioned that he thought he just had “a pretty typical wrestler thing” when a bursa sac of fluid began to form on his elbow, but over time, it was obvious that something was wrong. He also says that he went into his surgery with everyone originally anticipating that he’d be out for 3-4 months, but once doctors got in there, they realized the situation was worse than originally anticipated.
As anyone who’s seen him wrestle since his return may have guessed, Ambrose says that when he started training to get back in the ring, he went back to the basics.
I was able to go back to Ohio, where I started, a few times over the summer, and get in with my guys that I’ve trained with and I started with. I brought in some guys specially [sic] to work with, guys who like wrestling and know me. I’m really just at a mental point where I’m just like, ‘I just want to take guys down, beat them up, pin them and go home.’ Hard-nosed, straightforward, aggressive wrestling. Nothing fancy. Nothing confusing. Your brain gets so melted being in the circus that is WWE for so long, you know? Sometimes it’s nice to just get back to super basics.
Before Ambrose was injured, he was the Ironman of WWE — he held the distinction of being the performer who had wrestled the most matches in a year without missing more than 40 days at a time. But although that was an impressive accomplishment, Ambrose understands “that’s a title that’s worth exactly zero dollars.”
Is becoming Raw Tag Team Champions with Seth Rollins again part of moving on for Dean Ambrose? We’ll find out Sunday at Hell In A Cell.
