Matt Cardona Is Redefining Wrestling on the Indies

The prized free agent continues to be a huge presence in wrestling.

SI’s Week in Wrestling is published every week and provides beneath the surface coverage of the business of pro wrestling.

WWE held its Money in the Bank event this past weekend, crowning two new Money in the Bank briefcase winners. Matt Cardona was not on the card. At the moment, he isn’t even part of the WWE roster. Yet when it comes to a wrestling star with endless opportunities to cash in, look no further than Cardona.

A prized free agent, Cardona has redefined what it means to be a star on the independents.

Over the past month, Cardona has shined in matches for an array of indie promotions, including Warrior Wrestling, House of Glory, One Pro Wrestling and indie staple GCW. With a chiseled look and oozing charisma, Cardona brings an energy and excitement to all his appearances.

Cardona continues to be a star

On Saturday he headlined the Battleground Championship Wrestling against Bully Ray in the old ECW Arena, taking a bump through a flaming table in a “Loser Is Banned From the Arena Forever” match.

“Back in the day when someone was released from WWE, they’d change the spelling of their name, go to the independents and watch their career die a slow death,” says Cardona. “I credit guys like Drew McIntyre and Cody Rhodes. They used their time away from WWE to reinvent themselves. I’ve taken things from them, but I’ve added my own spin to it. I’m proving you don’t need WWE or AEW to be a successful pro wrestler.”

Cardona worked under the WWE umbrella from 2005 through ’20 as Zack Ryder. It was a unique run. Despite numerous occasions where Cardona appeared primed to explode in popularity, he would disappear for stretches of time from WWE programming. He still has plenty of enduring moments, particularly his WrestleMania 32 ladder match victory, but it always felt like he could do more if given the opportunity.

That is no longer the case. Cardona makes his own opportunities, developing a distinct, high-level brand of entertainment that would not exist on the indies without him.

Cardona takes chances no one else is willing to take

“I’m so fortunate for my time in WWE and my run as Zack Ryder,” says Cardona. “Without it, I wouldn’t be set up for the run I’m having right now. But this whole time hasn’t been, ‘What can I do to get back to WWE?’ or ‘How can I get noticed by AEW?’ This whole run isn’t about proving people wrong. It’s about proving myself and my fans right.”

Cardona was witness to the evolution of the top stars in WWE, ones like The Undertaker, Edge and Chris Jericho. He has adopted that same approach, constantly evolving. Two summers ago he won the GCW title and coined himself the “Death Match” king. He soaked up the moment in the ring with his drink of choice–Pabst Blue Ribbon, a sponsor he brought with him to GCW–then celebrated with now wife Chelsea Green at Disney.

Last summer Cardona was on the shelf with a torn biceps (an injury suffered while protecting Blake Christian, who was coming off the top rope). Even without wrestling, he continued to make dates—and created new content online—which all led to his most profitable year in wrestling.

“I don’t care how you define success—whether that’s accolades, money, happiness—2022 was the most successful I’ve ever been in my wrestling career,” says Cardona. “Now I’m determined to make 2023 top that.”

Cardona takes chances no one else is willing to take, but he does it with such high standards. His recent “President of Independent Wrestling” video—one that tied in a decades-old line from Shawn Michaels—is part of his newest venture to post compelling new video content every week on social media. And he isn’t doing it alone. Cardona is partnering with rising star Steph De Lander, a talent from Australia that had a brief cup of coffee in NXT before finding new life beside Cardona on the indies.

“You have to push yourself,” says Cardona. “I have no problem doing that. When my wife Chelsea Green got hired back to WWE, and Brian Myers signed with Impact Wrestling, I knew I’d be missing my family on the independents. They’d be part of my matches, and so would Swoggle from under the ring. You know Matt Cardona was going to win by any means necessary. I felt naked out there without them, and I knew I needed someone out there with me.

“A few months ago during a tour of Australia, I met Steph De Lander. She’s six-feet tall, she has these blonde bangs and piercings all over her and looks like she can kick my ass. I wanted to work with her. Every week since we’ve been a team, we’ve filmed a vignette for social media. They’re designed to capture people’s attention. One of them, ‘The RiderTaker,’ got over one million views.”

The presentation of the videos is at a different level, all featuring first-rate video, sound and lightning.

“That presidential one is taking a shot at all those carny indie promoters out there,” says Cardona, who added an “Up. All. Night.” reference from a classic Shawn Michaels–DX video from a Raw in 1998. “I love the callbacks. I’m a fan, too. I was a kid who grew up wanting to do this so goddamn bad. I love this, and that’s why I won’t quit. It’s the reason this indie run has been so successful. I won’t stop until I’m the best I’ve ever been.

“I take a lot of pride in being the voice of the independents—I can say what others cannot, and I’m adding my ‘Indie God’ character into it.”

I’ve been elected President of Independent Wrestling!

Thank you for your votes!@stephdelander & I promise to make some serious changes!

We love you all!

Let’s MAKE INDEPENDENT WRESTLING GREAT AGAIN!

🎥: @SHOOT_HARRY pic.twitter.com/CtsHeRpPQp

— Matt Cardona (@TheMattCardona) June 19, 2023

Cardona will do whatever it takes to entertain–like he said, by any means necessary. He is doing it as “The Indie God,” a play off Indiana Jones that was initially intended to last for just one night—until lightning struck.

“I had this GCW show where I dressed up like Indiana Jones because I call myself ‘The Indie God,’ so I had the hat and the whip, and I came out there like a tough son of a b----,” says Cardona. “I saw enough social media chatter that I decided I’d start calling myself ‘The Indie God.’ Why not come out with the Indiana Jones hat and whip, and keep winning titles? Then you add Steph De Lander to the mix, and we’re unstoppable. We’re going to Japan for DDT, we’re going to England and Australia. We’re winning titles all over the world.

“My brain does not shut off. I’m always thinking of ideas. I got into this with Chelsea Green a couple weeks ago. She mentioned how, when I was with WWE, I was able to turn it off when I wasn’t on the road. And she was right. In WWE, you’re not in charge of the show. You might have the greatest idea, but you’re not the booker or the writer. So you’ll drive yourself f------ crazy if you bring it home with you. On the indies, I’m in charge of everything, and I can’t stop thinking about all of it: my ring gear, my matches, my social media promos, the wrestling figures I want to make. I control everything. It’s a lot of pressure, but I love the pressure.”

Cardona is also a wrestling entrepreneur. Along with Major Wrestling Figure Podcast cohost Brian Myers and the creative team of Mike Kanik and Ryan Winchcombe, a new line of figures is in production that will wax nostalgia over the famed LJN figures. The eight-inch scale of the Big Rubber Guys line is designed to match up perfectly with the LJNs, and Cardona is excited to fill in the gaps in people’s collections.

“We created the Major Bendies a couple years ago as a throwback to the Just Toys Bend-Ems from the ’90s,” says Cardona. “We were sick of other toy companies because we weren’t their top priority. I get why we weren’t, so we decided to make our own line of wrestling figures. I’m going to make sure I’m my top priority. And it’s not just me—we signed all these hot independent wrestlers and WWE legends that don’t have WWE Legends contracts.

“Now it’s time to expand the line and take it one step further. Our Big Rubber Guys line took a long time, going back and forth with China to have the same look and feel as those great LJN figures. We want to fill in those missing pieces. There was Ax, but there was no Smash. So we signed Smash, and we signed Ax, too. Marty Jannetty is another guy that fits in that lineup. Every two months, we’re going to put two figures out. We’ll see a surprise beside Marty in August, then two more in October. I hope this line continues to grow and surpasses the Bendies line.

“At 38, I’m doing what I love. I grew up obsessed with wrestling, and I grew up obsessed with wrestling figures.”

Cardona would inject instant excitement back into the WWE product if he were to return. He could have programs with Seth Rollins, Cody Rhodes, Gunther and a host of others, including playing the babyface in a feud against Roman Reigns. That is not out of the realm of possibility, nor is a potential return with a longer stay in AEW.

“I love the freedom, I love controlling my schedule,” says Cardona. “When you’re in WWE or AEW, you don’t get to make your own schedule. Now I’d be lying if I said I never want to work at Madison Square Garden again or I never wanted another WrestleMania moment. Of course, I do. If I get those phone calls, I’ll have that conversation. But I’m making the most money I’ve ever made, I’m having the most fun, and I’m at the highest level I’ve ever been, so it would take a lot to get me to sign.”

In the prime of his career, Cardona has never been better. His future is brimming with endless potential. To his credit, every moment has become must-see.

“There is nobody in the history of this business who’s been counted out and came back more than me,” says Cardona. “I was written off so many times, often by myself. But I’ll never quit. I’ll die attempting to be the version of myself I believe I can be.”

The (online) week in wrestling

• As the new men’s Money in the Bank winner, Damian Priest is a believable threat to cash in at any moment. Monday was a great start, with Priest beginning to stalk world heavyweight champion Seth Rollins. 

• Rest in peace to Darren “Droz” Drozdov, who deserved a better fate than the one he received.

• Jon Moxley spent his Fourth of July working back-to-back deathmatches in Tokyo. 

• Samoa Joe vs. CM Punk is coming. In 2023. Another reminder that it is an exceptional time to be a wrestling fan. 

• “Jungle Boy” Jack Perry’s first promo as a heel was far from perfect, but his delivery works much better as a villain than it did as a babyface. 

• Brock Lesnar is back, setting up his trilogy bout against Cody Rhodes at SummerSlam. 

• To both of their credits, the Rhea Ripley–Natalya Neidhart match from Raw was fantastic. 

• Happy birthday to wrestling legend Terry Funk. 

• Congrats to Eddie Kingston, the new NJPW Strong Openweight champion. 

Bryan Danielson wrestling while hurt at Forbidden Door highlights key difference between WWE and AEW

WWE and AEW are two very different places.

A pair of incidents at Forbidden Door magnified those differences.

Danielson wrestled for roughly 10 minutes with a broken forearm, which he suffered in his match with Kazuchika Okada, and Kenny Omega was dropped on his head as Will Ospreay executed the Tiger Driver ’91 move.

“Without revealing too much, I think a lot about my health,” Omega told Uproxx about the move. “I think a lot about life after wrestling. I think a lot about my current life. I think about next week’s Dynamite and the week after that. I would never do something I didn’t trust myself in performing 100 percent.”

Whether or not people agree with Omega isn’t the point of this particular argument. For that matter, neither is the decision to allow Danielson to continue his match in the main event against Okada. Those moments highlight a major difference between AEW and WWE.

Both have enormous reach, but WWE is a publicly traded brand that will now answer to a new parent company in Endeavor. WWE has too much at stake to risk a move like the Tiger Driver, which will never be allowed in their ring. Broken bones overwhelmingly cause matches to stop. Yet that is part of the allure of AEW.

Danielson came to AEW so he could wrestle a different style from what is displayed in WWE. There are consequences attached to that, and he has certainly not been injury-free in his AEW tenure. For that matter, neither has Omega, who works an unrelentingly punishing style to put forth the matches he does as one of the absolute best in the world. The risks he takes are ones that Roman Reigns will not at SummerSlam. That isn’t to imply that Reigns’s match against Jey Uso won’t be spectacular (it will), but rather spotlights a major difference between the ethos of the two competing brands.

For many reasons, the wrestling world is a better place because of AEW. There needs to be a level of caution involved, which must be constantly monitored, but one of the major draws for talent is that an entirely different style is allowed in AEW.

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Justin Barrasso can be reached at JBarrasso@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @JustinBarrasso.