George Mizanin: “I Never Really Thought My Son Was The Greatest Wrestler, But Lately He’s Shining”
Mr. Miz is in full support of his son but did not shy away from saying he did not believe in the dream.
Michael Mizanin, known in the world of professional wrestling as “The Miz” has had his story told from all accounts — he was not supposed to make it to WWE, endured the difficult times of being in a WWE locker room and dealt with not feeling respected by the fans and has gone on to main event WrestleMania, become WWE Champion, an 8-time Intercontinental Champion and recently came off a SmackDown Tag Title run earlier this year and is now involved in a program with Shane McMahon.
The Miz has stated during various interviews himself, that he does not know how he got to where he has gotten and his father, George Mizanin has been able to share a piece of that journey with his son as George was a part of the storyline involving Miz and Shane McMahon to set up their match at WrestleMania 35. Mr. Mizanin spoke about The Miz’s journey to success when he joined the ‘Jobbing Out’ podcast and reflected on the transition from Michael Mizanin on Tough Enough to The Miz in WWE.
“From there of course, then he wanted to go into wrestling, and he was on that ‘Are You Tough Enough’ and he came in second place on that and that’s how he got his million dollar contract with WWE, and, from there… ‘Are You Tough Enough?’,that was the surprise of my life because never in a million years — I didn’t think he was all that tough, and no, the competition he had…. Every time I looked [at the show] when they were eliminating people, [I thought], ‘Oh, they’re going to eliminate him’ and they were down to two people and I go, ‘What!? Daniel Puder and him?’ And Daniel Puder was an MMA fighter, this and that.” George Mizanin continued, “I go, ‘He is gonna kill Michael’ which he wind up doing but for him to last that long, what an accomplishment. He’s definitely a great speaker and lately… I mean I never really thought he was the greatest wrestler, but lately he’s shining. I think he’s really shining. Like I said, I’m very critical of him. He gets mad at me all the time because he asks, ‘Who’s your favorite wrestler?’ The Michael Jordan of wrestling is who?” John Cena and Dolph Ziggler were names thrown at Mr. Mizanin by the podcast hosts, “Oh hell no. God. I think Mike is better than both of those two.”
George Mizanin has made it clear in the past that his favorite wrestler of all-time is Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Mr. Miz shared that his son is not too fond of that and recalled having the opportunity to meet Dwayne Johnson at the hospital after WrestleMania XXVII where The Miz defeated John Cena to retain the WWE Championship by way of a “Rock Bottom” from Johnson.
“I actually met The Rock. Michael wrestled John Cena and beat him at WrestleMania. The Rock was the referee, and Michael got hurt very bad. He got a bad concussion, and when we went to the hospital, a lady came up to me and she said that, ‘Your son is gonna be okay’ — very, very nice. Very nice lady and I said, ‘Thank you, I appreciate that’. [She goes], ‘He’ll be okay, my son was a wrestler too’ and I’m walking away, she goes, ‘Yeah, he refereed your fight’. I go, ‘No, The Rock did’. She said, ‘Dwayne Johnson? Dwayne’s my son’. I go, ‘What!?’ So she turns around and I say, ‘Is he here?’ She goes, ‘Yeah’. I say, ‘Dwayne!’ and he comes from the back room and I go, ‘Oh my God. Can I take a picture?’ Michael got all mad at me because I was taking pictures while he was in the hospital in the room being checked out.” Mizanin recalled.
George Mizanin revealed during this very interview that he broke a rib at WrestleMania 35 and to read more on that, click here.
If the quotes in this article are used, please credit the ‘Jobbing Out’ podcast with an H/T to Fightful for the transcriptions.
