Matt Cardona Comments on Wild Fan Reaction From GCW Homecoming

Matt Cardona was the talk of the wrestling world on Saturday night when he defeated Nick Gage in a [...]

Matt Cardona was the talk of the wrestling world on Saturday night when he defeated Nick Gage in a blood-soaked deathmatch to win the GCW World Championship at the GCW Homecoming event. Cardona has fully embraced the anti-WWE sentiment while portraying a heel in Game Changer Wrestling, and his victory over the beloved Gage had fans so riled up that they started pelting Cardona with garbage as he celebrated the victory (this managed to draw comparisons to Hulk Hogan's notorious heel turn at Bash at the Beach 1996). Cardona didn't appear at the second night of GCW Homecoming on Sunday but he did pop up on Busted Open Radio to address the wild crowd reaction.

"I'll be honest, there was some fear," Cardona said (h/t Fightful). "Walking through that curtain, you can watch the replay, I couldn't get through the curtain and there were fans in my face. Luckily, GCW had some security for me because I think someone would have taken me out, or tried to. I finally get (to the ring) and you can feel the genuine hate (from the crowd). Not just, 'this is the bad guy we're supposed to boo,' but hate. During the match, the atmosphere was exciting. People just wanted me to die in there. I was getting tweets about people wanting me to die and for Nick to kill Chelsea. Human beings are really typing this, what is wrong with people? Then, when I win, you saw the video. They are just throwing stuff. Bottles, full bottles. Someone threw a fucking pizza cutter. Jesus, come on. I tried to enjoy it, but I was genuinely concerned. This wasn't like NWO with a couple of bottles and you stand there and smile. I didn't know what was going to be thrown. I was in there for as long as I could and tried to get the money shot with the title. The GCW security was like, 'we gotta go, run out the front.' They brought me out and fans were still chasing us out. It was wild."

"It's 2021, we all know the deal," he added. "To get that kind of reaction, there have been similar reactions before, but I personally have never seen anything like that. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Do I wish fans would have shown me more respect? Cool. Do I wish someone didn't throw a pizza cutter? Cool, but man, I don't regret any of it because it will live forever."

Photo via Nick Karp

0comments