American Top Team owner and former AEW talent Dan Lambert was a recent guest on Chris Van Vliet’s “Insight” podcast to discuss a variety of topics, including how his partnership with AEW started.
Additionally, Lambert called Jim Cornette the greatest manager of all time. Of course, Cornette is often vocal about Tony Khan and the way he books All Elite Wrestling.
You can check out some highlights from the podcast below:
On how the partnership with AEW started: “Tony Khan is an MMA fan. He just happened to be down in Miami meeting with Jorge Masvidal and his agent, they were talking about doing something together when Jorge was so hot after the whole flying knee thing. His agent gives me a call and says ‘Hey, what are you doing?’ I’m like well I just sat down for dinner with some friends that came to town. He says ‘Well tell them to p*ss off. I am down in Miami sitting with Tony Khan, you guys are like brothers from another life. You have got to come and meet this guy.’ I’m like really? Okay. I told my friends see ya, nice seeing you, I’m out of here. I went to meet him and we just totally hit it off and became friends. He is a total wrestling nerd, I’m a total wrestling nerd. Obviously, he is a big football guy and football is the greatest thing in the world to me. We just totally hit it off and became friends and stayed in contact. When he came down to do a Miami show, it was actually the first show they did there after the pandemic was over in front of a live crowd. He reached out to me and said ‘Hey, do you want to come to the show? Maybe bring some of the guys down, grab a mic and cut a promo on people, just for fun?’ Yeah, why not. So, I did it and it was a blast and I thought that was it. But then I get a text 2 weeks later saying ‘Hey, what are you doing? Do you want to come to Jacksonville and do a show?’ Yeah, why not? And then it just kept going.”
On having a match in AEW: “I figured that the heel cowardly manager gets somehow tricked into a match to get his ass kicked. So yeah, I figured I would. I mean Chris Jericho beating me up with a kendo stick in front of 20,000 people on pay-per-view, how cool is that? I can’t tell you how much I was having, it was the coolest thing ever.”
On if he is still working with AEW: “Not now. About 2 months ago we finished up our feud with the Men of the Year, we had Scorpio Sky drop the belt to Wardlow. Sky was going to take a couple of months off because he had a knee injury that needed to heal. Page was being repackaged so he could do what he is doing now with The Firm and with MJF. So, I thought that it was a good time to wind down, I thought that I was getting stale. The reactions were still good, but I just grabbed Tony after the show and said that I think this has run its course. I don’t want to go backwards or overstay my welcome. He was like yeah man sure. If you have an idea for something in the future then come back then sure whatever, call me. If Tony called me tomorrow and had a good idea and I liked it then sure, I’ll do it.”
On praise for Jim Cornette: “Jim Cornette is the greatest manager of all time. He just is. I think [better than Heyman] and I love Heyman, but I grew up with Cornette. A lot of it, who you remember as the greatest football player or basketball player is who you were the most exposed to when you were younger. Bobby Heenan towards the end of his run, I have been watching since the late 70’s, but it was towards the end of his run when he was in the AWA when I first started watching wrestling, so I didn’t have much exposure to him before he went to WWE. We didn’t get AWA until it was on ESPN for a short period. But Cornette was right in my wheelhouse. Man, he was just so good. I know a lot of people have said that the things I have said in your promos are what Cornette has said on his podcast, but I don’t listen to podcasts. So, I’m like oh cool, if Cornette says it, then it must be right. I always took that as a complement, I thought the guy was so great back in the day.”
You can keep up with all your wrestling news right here on eWrestlingNews.com. Or, you can follow us over on our Twitter and Facebook pages.
