“It took almost 14 years to get there, a very long journey for me”

On After The Bell the new North American Champion Keith Lee recalls doing extra work in 2009 for WWE and getting beat up by Triple H and Shane McMahon:

“I got invited to do some extra work. I did get thrown into a barricade by Mr. Triple H, and poked in the eye by Shane McMahon and punched in the face by Vince. That was my introduction to the bosses,” he said. “At some point, someone gained interest and I ended up in my first tryout in 2008 and I was turned down. In 2011, I did another piece of extra work and got asked to comeback for another tryout and was also turned down. In 2013, when the Performance Center opened up, I was part of that first class and was turned down a third time. I wasn’t sure I was going to continue wrestling. Then I had a conversation with William Regal and Dusty Rhodes and brief words with Jim Ross. Without those first two, I probably would not have continued wrestling. I pursued a different dream, which was making it on my own on the Indies, and building a name out of sheer willpower. Eventually, I did enough good deeds and turned enough heads and shocked enough people, and they came looking for me. It was completely different at that time. It took almost 14 years to get there, a very long journey for me.”