This past Sunday, the wrestling world was stunned over the death of Sabu.
Though the former ECW World Heavyweight Champion was 60 years old, Sabu was fresh off his death match against Joey Janela a month prior. While the man that wrestled that night was a bit slow, many dismissed it as father time getting the best of the professional wrestler.
But now there seems to be some question on whether it was a mistake or not to have Sabu wrestle at the age of 60. It isn’t just the fact that he’s 60, but Sabu has been thru so many hardcore and death matches in his career that it’s surprising that he’s managed to last so long in the business.
Joey Janela discussed his match against Sabu to Phil Schneider of Yahoo's The Uncrowned and revealed that it almost didn’t happen as Sabu wasn’t particularly in the best condition heading into the bout.
“I was fairly confident that he was fine. I was kept in contact with him and he has a team of people around him, guys this time. They were all saying he was ready to go, that he was going to the gym, that he was on a training program. I believed them until the day of the show. Then two hours before, I get a call: ‘Sabu can't walk.’
"What do you mean Sabu can't walk? They said, ‘Yeah, Sabu, something with his knee — they're locked up. He can't walk. And his feet are bleeding. He's not coming. Sabu's not coming.’ I said, ‘Sabu's f***ed.’ So we talked to [indie wrestler] Matt Tremont, and Tremont is about to be the replacement for the match. And I feel like this is going to be the most embarrassing moment of my wrestling career.
here's 2,000 people here. This is one of the biggest Spring Breaks ever. The biggest crowd ‘Mania weekend, indie-wise. And I'm going to have to go out there and announce that Sabu, once again, no-showed. And no-showed his own retirement match.”
The GCW promoter chimed in about the situation and noted what it took to finally bring Sabu to his retirement match.
“We are an hour into the show and I said, ‘Just get Sabu here,’" Janela continued. "So they gave him something called kratom. You can buy it at a smoke shop or something; it’s like a legal opiate or something. They said, ‘He's hopping on the bed, he's hopping off the bed, and we're going to get him to the show.’ So he shows up two hours into the show. Sabu was on a different f***ing planet. Everyone in the backstage was like, ‘What the f***? Is this match going to happen?’ And my God, did it happen.”
It was all smooth sailing for Sabu and Janela once they got into the ring, but there was one point where Sabu seemed to be done.
“He was definitely out cold. He was done," Janela said. "They were telling me there was no way. The refs were communicating to me that there's no way he's continuing this match. Like holy s***, that is the one time you want the barbed wire to stop you. He just blew right through it. And then [old ECW rival] The Sandman came out and that was all Sabu needed, then the resurrection happened. Jesus resurrected two days later, the anniversary … couldn't f***ing believe it, dude. He was ready to go again. I guess that concussion knocked him back into 1996 or something, I don't know.”
Now some fans didn’t necessarily react favorably to Janela’s interview. The former AEW star has been answering questions left and right through social media. Sabu’s cause of death has yet to be determined, but this interview didn’t necessarily put Joey Janela in a good light as it goes back to the issues with safety in professional wrestling. I won’t go into a deep dive about the topic since I wasn’t there nor do we know what Sabu’s cause of death is, but it’s understandable why some fans weren’t happy with Janela once this interview dropped.