Although the decisions he made outside of the ring were the cause of much contention during his tenure with the WWE, there was no denying that when he was in the ring, Matt Riddle was one of the company’s most solid and entertaining performers.
So who does Matt Riddle consider one of the best wrestlers he’s gone up against in his near-decade of professional wrestling experience? Surprisingly, it’s not a WWE wrestler who’s at the top of his list. Rather, it’s someone from rival company All Elite Wrestling (AEW).
“Swerve is one of the best guys I’ve wrestled probably in my life,” Riddle said on a recent episode of “SHAK Wrestling,” referring to former AEW World Champion Swerve Strickland. “Don’t get me wrong, there’s other guys on that list, like Roman’s really good, Randy’s extremely good, Seth Rollins, Sheamus, but Swerve … I’ll say this, there’s different generations and Swerve is very talented and he’s of that new generation of top tier wrestlers that are not only strong enough, big enough, but can actually go and go at a certain clip. Swerve’s cool, he’s good; I can’t say enough good things about him, for sure.”
Riddle and Strickland faced off against one another during their time together in the New Rochelle, New York-based professional wrestling promotion, Major League Wrestling. On April 12, 2018, Strickland defeated Riddle at one of MLW’s first major shows, winning an eight-man tournament and the vacant MLW World Heavyweight Championship.
Strickland is known for his ability to combine athleticism, technical wrestling, and personality in his performances, making him a standout performer in the modern professional wrestling landscape. In addition to being AEW World Champion and MLW Champion, Strickland previously performed under the ring name “Isaiah “Swerve” Scott” in WWE’s NXT brand, where he was a former NXT North American Champion.
What do you think of the fact that Matt Riddle considers Swerve Strickland ‘one of the best’ he’s wrestled in his life?
