Kyle O’Reilly debuted for AEW in December of 2021, debuting on the Holiday Bash episode of AEW Dynamite not long after his WWE contract expired. O’Reilly attacked Orange Cassidy who was wrestling Adam Cole and reunited with his former Undisputed Era stablemates Cole and Bobby Fish. They would eventually merge with The Elite to form the Undisputed Elite but after Cole, Fish and O’Reilly turned on the Young Bucks, it appeared that may be the next big feud to come to light.
He was on a pretty hot streak teaming with Fish in their reformed reDRagon tag team but just six months after his debut, he would wrestle his potential final match against Jon Moxley. O’Reilly underwent surgery in September 2022 to fuse his neck, something he’d been putting off for quite some time. Following the surgery, he suffered a rare post-surgical complication and was only able to regain mobility in his arm with a device which he shared to his Instagram last year.
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After over 18 months, O’Reilly made his shocking AEW return at AEW Revolution on March 3 from the Greensboro Coliseum. Following Roderick Strong’s International Championship title win, The Kingdom (Mike Bennett and Matt Taven) celebrated with their fellow Undisputed Kingdom member in the ring. Soon after, O’Reilly appeared behind them and Bennett ripped the shirt off his back to hand it to him. While he held it and pondered what it would mean to join the group, he eventually handed it back to them and walked off.
In an AEW digital exclusive, O’Reilly opened up about his neck surgery and how he was unsure if he’d ever be able to take care of himself and his daughter let alone wrestle again.ย
“I had neck surgery. I was expecting that, but I wasn’t expecting to have a seriously rare complication, where I would wake up in the hospital bed and no longer have the use of my right arm,” O’Reilly said. “No, I didn’t really bank on that one. I’ve been thrown so many curveballs in life. I feel like every single moment you spend in this business is one unexpected curveball thrown your way. We learn how to deal with those, we learn how to hit a home run every single time we step up to bat. Then what happens when you don’t really get a chance to step up to bat? So that’s kind of where my mind has been for the last two years. I don’t know. I really didn’t know if I was gonna wrestle again. For a long while, I was pretty damn sure that in June 2022, my match with Jon Moxley was the last match of my career, and I was okay with that. I really was. If I could just get my arm back and I can brush my teeth again, I can wipe my ass like a normal human again, and u can take care of my daughter and be a father, that’s really all that I was focused on. That’s all that mattered.”
“It took a long time to get any of that back. I couldn’t move my arm for damn near 10 months. But I just had a lot of support, man. So many of the boys reached out. So many fans wishing me well and hoping to see me wrestle again. The fact that one person, anyone in the world wanted to see Kyle O’Reilly in the ring again, one person that gave a damn about me, that was enough motivation that I would ever need, in this lifetime or the next. I’m a kid that had type one diabetes that’s from Canada that was told he could never pursue a career in wrestling, and somehow was able to. So I have that with me, that shred of confidence. I know I’m a good wrestler, I know I’m a damn good wrestler. I know I’m technically proficient. I know deep down, I can still go, in my mind. If the body can hold up, that remains to be seen. We’ll have to see. We’ll have to see what happens when that first crack on the mat and my body hits, and all the air just shoots out of your lungs, how I’ll be able to recover.”
O’Reilly’s first match back is advertised for AEW Collisionย on March 16 where he will face “The Bounty Hunter” Bryan Keith.ย
H/T: Fightful
