Drew Gulak Looks At The Intercontinental Title As A Launchpad

In an interview with Newsweek, Drew Gulak spoke about his Intercontinental title match with AJ Styles on tonight’s episode of Friday Night Smackdown. He also mentioned the history of the title and how he feels about it personally. Here are highlights:

On how he views the title: “I think the Intercontinental Championship represents hard work over everything. People sometimes say it’s a midcard championship, but it’s been defended on all parts of the wrestling card throughout its history. I just look at it as much more than a launchpad. It’s kind of like a foundation, that’s how I see it. It’s not just a springboard that will propel me into the heavyweight title scene. This is a very prestigious championship that many talented wrestlers regardless of weight class, background, their experience level have competed for. You know what the Intercontinental Championship is if you’re a WWE fan. It hits you just for its legacy alone. This is an extremely prestigious championship and I’m honored to be able to battle for it on SmackDown.”

On the changes his character has gone through: “I know I have a lot of different weapons at my disposal. If I need to pivot I can pivot. At the same time whatever I’ve done previously has carried over in some way to the next thing. I’ll give you a perfect example. For a while I was campaigning for a better 205 Live against high-flyers and it took me to completely shed that skin and say “screw everyone else I only care about myself” to win the Cruiserweight Championship. That took me to SmackDown and SmackDown is a whole different world. My first appearance on SmackDown I had to confront Braun Strowman so in that situation I went back to my wheelhouse so that he and Tyson Fury can have their fight and he can win. Of course he didn’t listen to me and he lost, but at the same time my opportunities were getting smaller and smaller because of the situation I was in until I confronted Daniel Bryan and said I saw some holes in his game. He decided to take me up on that advice and we took it to Elimination Chamber. I beat the crap out of him, even though he won, but that prompted him to ask for my advice. And we’ve become a pair ever since then. But that’s allowed me to take a step back on the presentation side and focus on my personality and focusing on myself and working with someone else collaboratively to make myself better. There’s a perfect example of even though I have different weapons in my wheelhouse I’m able to use them to get to where I need to go next.”

On working with Daniel Bryan: “He’s awesome. He’s a really great person. Super passionate about wrestling. If there’s anyone who is as passionate as me about wrestling it’s him. We can talk about it non-stop and our passion never wavers. Someone like AJ Styles I feel like his passion is kind of wavering, which is the dichotomy of the two people. It’s been great working with Bryan.”