Swerve Strickland Opens Up About What It Meant To Dethrone Samoa Joe At AEW Dynasty

Swerve Strickland looks back on his massive win over Samoa Joe.

After a hard-fought battle against Samoa Joe at AEW Dynasty, Swerve Strickland now stands as the new AEW World Champion. Before he looks ahead toward his first title defense, though, Strickland takes a moment to look back on the magnitude of his win over the aforementioned Samoa Joe.

During an interview with Renee Paquette on AEW Close-Up, Strickland opened up about what it meant to dethrone “The Samoan Submission Machine” at Dynasty.

“[Joe is] a legend, a force of a champion out of all the champions in All Elite Wrestling, which there aren’t many we can count him on two hands. He was probably the biggest task out of any of them. They’re all great performers. They’re all legends in the making but Samoa Joe just felt different. He felt like a titan,” Strickland said.

“He felt like the dude from House of Dragons, the mountain. What do you do to take this guy down? And shout out to him for holding it down for the last couple months, just being the dominant champion. If I can take him down, there should be no asterisk next to my title win.”

Swerve Strickland Continues To Get Back Up

“If I can take him down on my own, no help, no interference, no nothing else outside of that, people understand like ‘Man, this guy literally went through hell just to get here. Now, this is the last gate he has to cross and this guy’s guarding that gate.’ He beat the hell out of me, but I’ve taken whoopings all year,” Strickland continued. “Last 12 months, I’ve taken everything, and I’m relentless. I keep getting back up. That’s my life, that’s my struggle, that’s my story. Not everything has gone your way, but you always have to find a way to keep getting back up. You never stop going forward. You can slow, you can speed up but you never stop. And that’s what got me here.”

As Strickland alluded to, his previous encounters with Joe have resulted in him taking some of the hardest hits of his career. Despite that, Strickland continued to persevere, and eventually, knock Joe off of his AEW throne with a Swerve Stomp.

With Joe officially unseated, Strickland now looks ahead at AEW Double or Nothing, where he will be tasked with defending the AEW World Championship. The identity of his challenger will be revealed on tonight’s episode of AEW Dynamite.