Expect to see a different yet familiar Cain Velasquez when he steps into a WWE ring for the first time.
When Velasquez faces rival Brock Lesnar for the WWE championship at Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia on Oct. 31 (1 p.m., WWE Network), don’t expect too much of the acrobatic style he displayed with Lucha Libre AAA. Instead, you will see more of the man who twice won the UFC heavyweight championship as he adjusts to his new company’s style.
“Taking the match to the MMA side now is my strong suit and that’s what I have to do,” said Velasquez, who noted he’s also working on taking his time more in the ring. “But still learning the game, the WWE style as well.”
That doesn’t mean this is the last we’ve seen of the hurricanranas, jumps off the middle rope and rolls over wrestlers’ backs. Velasquez, who said he has been training with WWE superstar Rey Mysterio at different points throughout the year, plans to put it all together as he gains more experience. He even talked about using MMA moves he never got to do in the octagon because they weren’t the best way to defeat his opponent.
“I think in the future for me when I get a little more comfortable with this is to incorporate everything, everything that you can do in combat sports, the MMA, the WWE style of wrestling and also adding the lucha in there as well,” said Velasquez, who has officially retired from the UFC but is still doing some MMA training with his AKA team.
Mysterio said he and Velasquez, who is regularly looking for new things to challenge himself with, have already been exchanging move ideas to use in the ring.
“He’s practiced them and he’s aced them right away as well as a couple of submissions that I’ve been wanting to pull out in my wrestling career that Cain has taught me,” Mysterio said.
Mysterio noted the biggest challenge for Velasquez will be learning the best way to fully connect with the WWE audience. During his career in the UFC, Velasquez was known for being able to block out the crowd and the noise to focus on his opponent. Pro wrestling involves much more audience engagement.
“WWE is a different world,” Mysterio said. “In my case for the past 30 years, I feed off of the crowd. Maybe it might work for Cain. Maybe it will work better blocking the crowd out to a certain extent and just focus on his opponent. We won’t really know that until it actually happens.”
Velasquez, who has signed a multi-year deal with WWE, received limited crown reaction during a segment last week on “Monday Night Raw” during which he wrestled Shelton Benjamin to the ground to protect Mysterio. The former WWE champion believes Velasquez will earn the WWE audience’s respect once fans see what he can do in the ring, saying they will be “mesmerized.”
“For those who don’t know who he is, they will soon find out who he is because what he brought into the octagon every time he stepped in there is gonna be 10 times better when he gets in a WWE ring and faces Brock Lesnar for the first time,” Mysterio said.
What WWE fans will get to see at Crown Jewel — which also features boxer Tyson Fury against Braun Strowman — is a rematch of the UFC title fight Velasquez won by first round TKO on Oct. 23, 2016. The 37-year-old was in negotiations with WWE, New Japan Pro-Wrestling and All Elite Wrestling earlier this year and said he chose Vince McMahon’s company because like with the UFC in MMA, when “you think of the best in pro wrestling you think of WWE.” A chance for a program with Lesnar, 42, was also a factor.
“Those thoughts for it being personal are there,” Velasquez said.
Velasquez first appeared in WWE on Oct. 4 for the debut episode of “Friday Night SmackDown” on Fox looking to get retribution for Lesnar’s previous attack on Mysterio and his son Dominik, who is training to be a wrestler. Mysterio considers sharing the screen and a storyline with his son a “bonus” at this point in his career and something he “never expected” while he was still wrestling.
Velasquez eventually showed up in WWE to defend the Mysterios and prompted a scared and shocked look from Lesnar he rarely displays in WWE. Velasquez said the two men don’t fear each other but he’s “very cautious of what he [Lesnar] can do and what he’s capable of and I think he thinks the same way [about me].”
At a press conference in Las Vegas to announce the match, Lesnar made reference to always having to look in the mirror at the scar Velasquez left under this left eye from their UFC fight. Velasquez, however, doesn’t see it as a personal trophy.
“It just so happened that I threw a clean knee right to his face, you know what I mean,” Velasquez said. “And that could happen to me, too. Very close to that happening to me as well. In the heat of battle when it comes down to it man it’s either kill or be killed.”
Velasquez, who was attacked and received an “F5” by Lesnar backstage on last week’s “SmackDown,” remembers there being plenty of doubters going into his UFC fight with Lesnar. He said that even friend and training partner Daniel Cormier told him at the time that he was “scared” that Velasquez had to face the former NCAA champion wrestler. Velasquez believes he is the underdog in this storyline as well because of what Lesnar has accomplished in WWE.
“That makes me more hungry to go out there and show him that he just can’t go around and picking on people,” he said. “This s–t has to stop.”
Velasquez said he hasn’t given much thought to what his role in WWE will be after his match with Lesnar, but winning the championship would change a lot of things. He’s taking a wait-and-see approach right now to whether he will be a regular on television or a special attraction.
“I think the more I get comfortable with this,” Velasquez said, “the more you’ll see me.”