Anoa’i Family Member Says Brock Lesnar Caused Raw Match To Be Cut Short
A member of the extended Bloodline of the Anoa’i wrestling dynasty has reflected on having their Raw match cut short due to Brock Lesnar and his boombox.
Back in 2019, Roman Reigns had not quite ascended to his status as The Tribal Chief and was embroiled in a feud against the duo of Shane McMahon and Drew McIntyre. With McMahon trying to push Reigns’ buttons, he went one on one with Reigns’ cousin and MLW star Lance Anoa’i.
Speaking on The Family Business, Anoa’i reflected on his Raw debut and how he only found out he’d be facing Shane McMahon when he got to the show:
“Right after my last tryout, which was in 2019, they said, ‘Yeah, we don’t have nothing for you at the moment.’ Then I got the call in May of 2019 saying, ‘Hey,’ two days before Raw, ‘We’re flying you out to Kansas City. Are you available?’ Of course, yes, I’m down. I don’t know anything, what’s going on. I was like alright, maybe this is the deal, I’m gonna get a break. Especially because for extras, they don’t really fly everyone out at all. But they got my rental car, my hotel, my flight, everything.”
“Then I arrived into Kansas City, go to Raw, and they’re like, ‘Hey, it’s you and Shane McMahon tonight.’ I said, ‘Oh, damn.’ No idea, I just found out two days ago I was flying to Kansas City for Raw, and now I’m here getting in the ring with Shane. What an experience, man. I knew he was stiff [laughs].”
Anoa’i then explained how he and McMahon planned their match only for it to be cut short for time due to Brock Lesnar’s antics with his boombox going long:
“I was like, ‘Alright, what are we gonna do?’ Before we went, I knew Roman was doing a little feud with Shane and Drew and all them at the time. So I knew it might have been something with them, but I didn’t think it was gonna be an actual match. So yeah, once they tell us, and they pull me and Shane to go over everything, they tell us what we’re doing.”
“Shane, man, he was honestly cool. We were sitting in catering together, talking, we were by ringside talking. He was just making me feel very comfortable to get in the ring with him, and just going over spots. He goes, ‘Oh, what do you want to hit? What do you want to do?’ I gave him all my ideas, which we had in.”
“We had planned to go out there, so at first they gave us, I believe it was seven minutes they gave us in the ring, and it ended up being cut down to four because Brock Lesnar’s boombox, it was the day he did the boombox. That went a little too long, so they had to cut our time. It took out my whole shine, so all I got in was a dropkick.”
“But that was cool, man. Just to be even in the ring on Raw and a great time, and then tapping out, and then my cousin Roman coming down to make the save, and just me and him in the ring was awesome.”
At the 30th anniversary of Raw, The Trial of Sami Zayn which featured Roman Reigns went long causing a major advertised match to be cut from the show.