Kevin Bennett Recalls Facing Andrade In WWE, Being Praised For Selling His DDT

Kevin Bennett has held the Smash Wrestling Championship for over 1500 days, but before he was the face of Smash, he worked as an enhancement talent on WWE SmackDown. 

On the May 22, 2018 episode of WWE SmackDown, Bennet faced Andrade Almas (Andrade El Idolo in AEW) in a short bout. 

Speaking to Jeremy Lambert & Joel Pearl, Bennett reflected on the contest. 

“That was awesome. We had tryout matches earlier in the day, and I guess I was the guy that they liked the most for the match. Really cool experience. I always wanted to wrestle on TV and working with him was really cool. There were moments where I couldn’t really understand. We had agents, I believe it was Dean Malenko. He was doing the communicating. That was the only thing I was scared about. We were going over some things, and there was miscommunication at some point, and we had to go up in a couple of minutes. It’s not like there was too much to remember, but you have to remember you’re on TV in front of millions. It’s nerve-racking, no matter what. I remember the bell ringing, and I totally forgot it was WWE TV. Once the bell rings, you’re back to being a wrestler. After the match was over, I was like, ‘that was sweet.’ The referee was like, ‘you’re good man. That was fucking awesome.’ It was a cool experience. He was really cool,” said Bennett. 

Asked if he got any feedback from anyone, Bennett said that he may have helped Andrade put a stamp on his hammerlock DDT finish. 

“A bunch of people came up to me. I remember when I came back to Gorilla, Vince McMahon waved to me and said ‘thank you.’ I thought that was one of the coolest things. A bunch of people came up to me and complimented my selling. A little side story, I think they were thinking about changing Andrade’s finish at the time. From what I’ve heard, I think it was a local talent he wrestled the week prior. I guess they didn’t like the way the DDT looked on that guy. They were probably going to scrap the move. They actually had me take the move four or five times before the match. I just basically plant on my head. I remember people going like, ‘that was amazing. You do that on television, it’s going to be golden.’ I sold it the same way I did in practice. I felt good and I remember somebody telling me to stand aside, and I hear these stories all the time. ‘Stand aside somebody is going to come talk to you,’ and no one came to talk to me, which isn’t really a surprise,” he said.

Though Bennett has not been back in WWE, he has also done enhancement work for AEW. 

Bennett became the Smash World Champion on June 2, 2019. 

Fans can watch the full interview with Bennett in the video above.