Josh Alexander Reveals He Also Suffered A Knee Injury During World Title Reign

Last year, Josh Alexander was forced to give up his Impact World title, ending his record-setting reign at 335 days. This was due to a triceps tear that he had repaired, allowing him to return later that year. In an interview with Sunday Night’s Main Event (via Fightful), Alexander revealed that he also suffered a knee tear during that title reign, which he got fixed after his triceps. Alexander eventually returned at Slammiversary. He was out for a total of four months.

He said: “Something that was instilled in me for whatever reason, I just wanted to get out of the ring. I had this true passion for this that if my knee got banged up while I was training, I might be stupid for doing this, but I didn’t want to show that my knee was banged up because I didn’t want them to tell me that I couldn’t train. So I’d be hiding all this stuff that was happening, whether it was a bruise or a swell or a sprain, or all this other stuff. I just never want to get out of the ring. So that’s kind of the mentality I always had. So then when I trained with [Johnny] Devine, it was like, ‘You don’t know what hurt is.’ I’ve been wrestling with a torn ACL for a year, and I just wear this brace, and as I progressed through my career, I’ve wrestled with a torn knee for two and a half years. My whole title run, my knee was torn, and I didn’t get it fixed until my tricep went, and then I just called the surgeon, and [he] was like, yeah, I’ll fit you in next week, it’ll be healed in six weeks. I had knee surgery in secret, just to clean up my knee finally, to get me back to 100%. But wrestling, there’s no off-season, there’s no time to get stuff fixed, especially if you’re on a run, so you’ve just got to keep going. I came home from triceps surgery, and it was like ten days later, my surgeon fit me in to do my knee. But knee surgery is amazing now. I had the same surgery done when I was 17, and I was out for months. This one, I was on the stairs at the gym like a week later. He was like, ‘The more you can move, the better.’ I was like, that’s great for me.“