10 Wrestlers Who Saved Other Wrestlers From Getting Fired

1. Claudio Castagnoli Saves Tyler Breeze

Dave Trips
AEW

Claudio Castagnoli is considered one of wrestling's rare, good men.

He's an affable fellow enamoured with terrible dad jokes. He keeps himself in absurd physical condition and his head down. Even when his preposterous ability was squandered by WWE, he didn't sub-like any tweets critical of the promotion. The one time he vaguely expressed dissatisfaction, he didn't say something to the effect of "Look at the size of me, are these morons f*cking kidding?"; speaking to Edge and Christian on the Pod of Awesomeness in 2018, the former Cesaro kept his perspective, believing that is was normal for a WWE act to take an eternity to break through.

It's little wonder, then, that he appears on this list.

Early in his developmental career, he worked Tyler Breeze, who at that point was just another just a guy who went through the parody '90s cool name generator. Top brass saw nothing in him until he ate a literally jaw-dropping Claudio uppercut in FCW and sold it to perfection. On a recent appearance on the Insight Podcast, Catagnoli revealed that he was asked after the match what it was like to work with him. He was naturally enthusiastic; Breeze had made him look (even more) awesome.

"I uppercutted his head off, but saved his job in the process" Cesaro said, only half-jokingly, though he was quick to mention that Breeze's bump was all his own, great work.

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Contributor
Contributor

Michael Sidgwick is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over seven years of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by former AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and current Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!