AEW star reveals grisly lengths he took to return from injury
10/23/2024 10:02 PM
When Adam Cole made his triumphant return at WrestleDream, it felt like a long time coming for the AEW star.
After headlining Webley Stadium at the first running of AEW All In, Cole’s career took an ugly turn when he destroyed his ankle jumping off the ramp at Grand Slam 2023, leading to multiple surgeries and no clear timeline for his in-ring return. Sure, Cole still debuted as The Devil at Worlds End on Long Island, and sure, he returned to the ring once more to facilitate a seeming face turn for MJF at Double or Nothing, but none of that required wrestling physically.
Well, as it turns out, fans don’t know the half of what Cole had to go through to return to the ring, as, in an interview with SI, “Bay Bay” let it be known that he literally had to have a bone transplant in order to fully heal from his decimated ankle.
“The first piece of news that I heard was, your ankle is way worse than we anticipated. You have to get another surgery in seven days,” Cole told SI. “So, not only did I have to get double the amount of screws in my ankle, but also, I had to get someone else’s bone put into my ankle because the bone piece within my ankle just completely disintegrated.”
Goodness, that is grisly.
Buddy Matthews just challenged Adam Cole to a match next week before calling him FRAGILE.
The Fright Night Dynamite lineup is getting stacked! pic.twitter.com/LnZouxts4d
— Drainmaker (@DrainBamager) October 24, 2024
Adam Cole reveals why he took such a harsh path back to AEW
So why did Cole opt for that path? Well, he touched on that, too, noting that the bone will help him to recover quicker and have a better outcome overall. Even though his ankle doesn’t yet feel 100 percent normal, in the end, he still feels like he can perform like vintage Adam Cole, which, in the end, is all that really matters.
“Incredibly thankful to [the donor] and the family. It’s certainly a better option. I definitely notice a difference in my left ankle as opposed to my right one, but I think that comes with the territory. I still feel like I can be Adam Cole and do the things that I wanna do. And I’m certainly not even close to wanting to be done with wrestling,” Cole said.
“If you could say there’s any positive to the situation that I’ve been in, as far as injuries go, it has constantly reminded me of how much I love and want to be a part of pro wrestling. I am so unbelievably amped, so unbelievably stoked, excited to get back into the ring and have matches and be on AEW TV every single week. I’m 35 years old, but I have so much more of my career left to go.”
Should Cole reference his “Dead Man’s Bone” in promos moving forward? Or will other wrestlers bring it up to make fun of his fragility or the lengths he would go to in order to wrestle once more when even his body doesn’t want him to? Frankly, for the sake of the donor, it would probably be best to avoid that entirely out of respect for the family. Then again, in wrestling, everything is on the table since Dusty Rhodes was throwing around Bionic Elbows, so if someone doesn’t bring it up, it could potentially be even weirder than leaning into the gimmick.
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