The Sandman On Controversy Over Alleged Comments Against Women's Wrestling

ECW legend The Sandman was recently interviewed on Busted Open this week and talked about the controversy when he allegedly told Jordynne Grace, Tessa Blanchard, Rosemary, and Taya Valkyrie that “women main eventing is wrong” at the WrestleCade Supershow. Sandman claims that Grace’s version of his comments misrepresented what he said, below are highlights of the interview, transcribed courtesy of 411Mania.

On what he actually said at the WrestleCade Supershow:

“The bottomline is, all I said was I don’t think that most fans are ready for girls to be in main events, that’s it. There are so many girls that totally deserve to be main eventers in all different kinds of organizations, from WWE to AEW, they’re so good right now it’s absolutely incredible, but no, I absolutely do not think like that and that’s just the way it is.

On if he talked to Jordynne Grace backstage at the show: 

“I don’t know where that girl got her information but I know that I never talked to that girl.”

“I was not talking to four women, ever. I don’t even know who that girl is. Never talked to that girl.”

On who he did speak to backstage about women wrestling in main events: 

“I was talking to Johnny Morr [Johnny Morrison], dude I am so bad with people’s names, his girl [Taya Valkyrie], wasn’t she in the match? I was just walking by her and working the room, I just got there, said hi to everybody, just asked her hey what’s going on, I said what number are you tonight because I like watching her matches and help her out anyway I can, and I was talking to her, not talking to four people at all.”

“Jordynne Grace was not there in my conversation, there the whole time, my conversation was with the girl I cannot remember, I can’t remember anybody’s name, but that girl was not in that conversation.”

On if he is aware that women main evented WrestleMania 35:

“Yes, absolutely, and I thought there was a problem with it. Dude, I don’t watch professional wrestling, I just know that something, there was something going on with that match for some reason, I don’t know if the match was good or if the match was bad, I didn’t say it, I just know that people talked about it a lot.”

“Dude, if you’re over, you’re over, and that’s it. Girl, guy, whatever. If you’re over, you deserve to be there.”

On why he thinks Jordynne Grace would say what she said on social media if it wasn’t true:

 “I never said those words. The girl was not in the conversation with me. She might have popped in the very last second when I was walking away, but I never talked to that girl ever.”

On if he’d work a match with a woman:

 “In a second. Are you kidding? I mean I’m horrible. Dude, you know what’s crazy, once AEW, I figured there was a new war starting, so I actually did watch it for a couple of weeks when they were doing the tag tournament, and then I would watch a little bit of NXT, dude, everybody can work their butts off now, girl or guy, it’s like crazy. The stuff you seem in them tag matches in the AEW, like oh my God, the spots these dude are doing, they can all out work me, I just figured out how to get over without having to work.”

Jordynne Grace on The Sandman’s comments:

“He did not just say it to Taya, and that is not the only thing he said. I didn’t go in to the whole conversation on social media because it was like a 10 minute back and forth thing that went on. It was me, Taya, and Tessa all standing around talking. The Sandman comes up to Taya, asks her what match she’s in, she says the last match, he says the main event? She said, ‘Yeah, the main event.’ He said, ‘Excuse me?’ And we all just kind of stared at him because I didn’t know if he was joking or not. He said, ‘You know that’s wrong, right?’ Looked at every one of us. Then he started talking about the WrestleMania women’s match and how bad it was, and then Tessa, she’s a little more outspoken, I was in shock, she tried to start talking, he cut her off, stuck out his hand, and said ‘Oh, I’m the Sandman by the way.’ She said, ‘Oh, I’m Tessa Blanchard.’ He said, ‘Oh, I respect your family so much.’ Continued to completely shit on women’s wrestling. Him and her start going back at it, back and forth, Rosemary walks up, we tell her what Sandman just said, we’re all standing there, listening to him argue about women’s wrestling with Tessa, he throws up his hands, walks away, two minutes later comes back, and says, ‘Oh, excuse me ladies, I just went around to the locker room and I polled a bunch of people with over 200 years of wrestling experience, and they all agree with me, women main eventing is wrong.’ So that’s exactly what happened. Tessa and him went back at it a little bit more. She told him how disrespectful he was. He clearly didn’t care, and he came on here and he was completely lying through his teeth to save face now.”