Matt Cardona (@themattcardona) is a WWE pro wrestler competing on SmackDown. He sits down with Chris Van Vliet in Orlando, FL to discuss returning to WWE after almost 6 years away, his 2025 return as Zack Ryder in the John Cena tournament, possibly teaming up with his wife Chelsea Green, only needing the WWE Championship to be a Grand Slam Champion, how much his figure collection is worth, and more!
I know that it was your goal throughout the Indies to like find a way to get back to WWE.
“Yes and no. So when I get fired, my knee-jerk reaction isn’t, what do I got to do to get back there? I couldn’t live my life that way. But we’re very big on what we’re grateful for, goal setting. One of the goals was always to be the WWE Champion. You can’t be the WWE Champion unless you’re WWE, right? So I had to get back there. But it wasn’t like from day one I’m gonna prove them wrong, I’m gonna get back there. No, and I say this all the time too. I didn’t want to prove people wrong. I didn’t care about that. I wanted to prove myself and my fans right, and I feel like I did.”
Did you feel like you were always confident there was gonna be a path that led you back to a WWE contract?
“At one point I thought there’s no way I’m getting back because I was doing everything. Indie Wrestler of the Year, cover of PWI, I was with Seth DeLander at the time because Chelsea had gone back, and I texted Steph. I said you need to get away from me because I’m holding you down. There’s no way I’m ever going back, because if not now, when?”
So how did this first call come for the John Cena tournament when Zack Ryder returns to WWE?
“So from September to when I redebut in January, it’s like a mindf*ck for me. It was such a whirlwind of things. I’m definitely gonna mix up the timeline a bit. But it starts in September, I believe. I’m doing TNA, but I’m not signed to TNA. I’m asked if I want to participate in the NXT invasion, go invade NXT. I’m like, well, if they think I really work for TNA. I went there and I got paid, right? But I didn’t have a contract. I’m like, I’ll sneak my way in here. So I did the invasion, which led to a match with Josh Briggs. I said, all right, that’s cool. I texted Triple H, ‘Thank you for the opportunity.’ He texted back. It was all good. Shortly thereafter, maybe within that week, Chelsea was in Saudi Arabia doing media for the Royal Rumble, and she was there with Nick Khan and said something to the effect of, ‘Did you see my husband on NXT?’ He said something like, ‘I’ve never met him. Give him my number.’ So she did. I called him or texted him immediately. ‘Hey, it’s Matt Cardona, blah blah blah…’ I think it’s that day or the next day he calls me, and he’s very straight to the point, which I love and respect. He said, ‘What do you want?’ I want to come back. It was as simple as that. He’s like, ‘Okay, well, we need to set up a call with you and Triple H.’ I’m like, ‘This is great. Here we go.’ That week we have a FaceTime with Triple H, or Zoom call, whatever, and it was a good call, but it wasn’t a good call. You know what I’m saying? I’m like, there’s nothing here. There was no offer to come back. It was just a very friendly, civil, respectful call. I’m like, all right, well, I guess back to being the indie god, whatever.”
Were you thinking should I have asked for a job on this call?
“I definitely said I was interested in coming back, but there was no, ‘Yeah, we want to have you back.’ There was no here’s your offer. There was none of that, right? A couple of weeks go by, and he texted me, ‘Hey, do you have time to talk today?’ I’m like, yep, and that’s when he pitched me the Cena tournament thing. I said I’m in, and I’m assuming that I’m going to do this representing TNA as Matt Cardona. So SmackDown films Fridays. You fly out Thursdays. Tuesday of that week I get a text from John Cone from WWE Talent Relations, and he’s like, ‘Hey, we got some T-shirts for you to approve.’ And I’m like, ‘Oh, it’s cool, but how do you guys have my Matt Cardona logos?’ It’s like, ‘Oh no, you’re Zack Ryder.’ I’m thinking, oh f*ck. Not that I don’t want to be Zack Ryder. I don’t have any gear, because what am I gonna wear? Everything else I sold off, so everything that I had was either one-off, like WrestleMania title win gear or stuff that was all falling apart because it’s years old. I’m like, oh no, luckily always ready. Got gear made in 24 hours, and then did the Cena tournament as Zack Ryder.”
Why were you Zack Ryder in that tournament?
“I have no idea, and I didn’t care. I brought both outfits. I said, You just tell me which one to put on.”
At this point, did you know this was just a one off? Even though you had had conversations with Triple H and Nick Khan.
“It was an absolute one-off. I was hidden in a room all day, so I didn’t talk to anybody before the match besides the producer and LA Knight, obviously. And I said, ‘You just tell me which gear to put on, because I got them both.’ Always ready. And then they said, Zack Ryder. I said, ‘Let’s go, let’s do it.’ Sold some shirts. The Woo Woo Woo, all that, and it was a great experience. I thought, if this is it, this is perfect closure.”
But for years, you had been saying Zack Ryder’s dead. So for you to then come back five years later as Zack Ryder, what does that say?
“I’m not saying that, but this is an opportunity, right? I’ve been busting my ass on the indies for years. I’ve been reaching out every once in a while when I was doing something cool for an opportunity. They’re going to give me one, and I’m like, eh, no thanks. I don’t want to be Zack Ryder. That’s not how you do good business.”
So then, when you do end up getting signed, how do you make it to your Matt Cardona?
“Okay, so then I think it’s a one-off. I get the Triple H point, which is great. I sold some 8 x 10s with that. Thank you, Triple H. He’s like, we’ll keep in touch, and they did. About a few weeks later, I was at Wrestlecade, so I guess after Thanksgiving, I’m eating dinner with the boys after signing all day and a match, and I got a call like, ‘We wanna sign you.’ I’m thinking, okay. I’m just assuming it’s as Zack Ryder so I get all this new Zack Ryder gear made blah blah blah blah. Then a week or so before my debut I hear through the grapevine you’re gonna be Matt Cardona. Now I’m like oh sh*t I need new Matt Cardona gear. But I am very proud that they thought there was more value in Matt Cardona than Zack Ryder. Because who else has left [and come back with their non-WWE name? Okay, Razor Ramon leaves, and he comes back as Scott Hall. He went to WCW. I did this all in the Indies. No one’s ever done that before. Gone to the Indies and come back as their indie persona.”
John Cena had some very nice things to say about you on social media after you were in the John Cena tournament:
“You know what? I don’t know for sure, but I would assume he has something to do with me getting in that tournament. I’m just assuming. He is somebody I always ask for advice. Even back in the day, he was a big help in the Z True Long Island story days. But even before that, he was always the guy. He’s the champ, and he’s at the monitor watching every match at a house show, and giving advice, giving feedback. To this day, I believe if I called him or anyone else on the roster that he doesn’t even have a personal relationship with, he’d be there for them.”
So you return to WWE full time around Christmas time?
“It was a crazy gift. It was a crazy couple of months because Chelsea and I were moving into a new house. It was the whole contract negotiations, and not like I want more money. Nothing like that. It was more like because I have all these outside things that I’m involved with, and WWE is so cool about me keeping my podcast, my toy line. But there was a couple of things legally that we had to work through. It wasn’t just like okay, here’s the contract, sign it.”
So you’re able to still do all that stuff now?
“Yeah, I’m able to do the podcast, the toy company, certain things. You can’t win all the battles. I had to ditch WhatNot.”
How does this run in WWE feel different from the first one?
“Because I feel like I’m my own man now. I’m not portraying some gimmick. And Zack Ryder, when I was 26 doing the woo, that was me, right? But I’ve grown up as a man, as a wrestler, as a performer. I owe everything. The whole Matt Cardona run couldn’t have happened without Zack Ryder. The reason I was successful in the indies is because of everything I learned as Zack Ryder in WWE, like how to make merchandise, how to market yourself, how to do interviews like this, how to use social media. All that came from WWE. When I came to the Indies, I was just going to use it all.”
You’re on those graphics that people put out often of like they’re one championship away from being the Grand Slam champion. Do you feel like it’s within your grasp?
“I feel like I’m the closest I’ve ever been, especially now being back in WWE. I certainly felt on the Indies that I was closer to being the WWE champion as Matt Cardona on the Indies than I ever was as Zack Ryder previously. This is what I said to Triple H. I said before I got re-signed, ‘I can’t hit a home run if I’m not in the game.’ I honestly believe that. You look at my win-loss record, okay, I lose a lot, but when I win, I win big. it just takes one win, and I’ve been counted out so many times throughout my career by the office, by the fans, by myself, and I just always come back. I always find a way to come back. I’m like a cockroach; you cannot kill me.”
What do you think makes Chelsea so good at what she does?
“Because she’s authentic and she doesn’t try to BS anybody, and the fans can see that. And also, she has a connection with the audience. Some people have it naturally. Some people have to figure out a way to get it, but she has it. Once you have a connection with the audience, you’re set.”
Do you think that it could work if you and Chelsea Green were paired together in WWE?
“I mean, I would love that. Some of my greatest times in my career were when we were on the Indies together. It was just the best, like traveling together, and it just made the matches so much easier. Especially as me being a heel, I have this valet, and also she could wrestle, so we could do mixed tag team matches, and then she can get involved physically. It was the perfect formula.”
You were on the indies the same time as Danhausen, who is crushing it!
“Doesn’t surprise me one bit. I will say this: the only Danhausen matches I’ve ever seen is when I wrestle Danhausen at GCW, and when I team with Danhausen against Los Garza. But that’s just me not saying wrestling is not important, but it’s everything else. And he has a connection with the audience; the people love him. I knew he’d be a star in WWE, I could have never have predicted how big of a star he has become. He’s mainstream. He is with the Knicks. It’s unbelievable.”
How did you feel when Kevin Owens and Cody Rhodes were talking about you on Cody’s podcast?
“Oh boy. Honestly, I was pissed! Because they made it seem that all I would say is I want to be back in WWE. Blah blah. I’d only talk about it when I’d be doing things like this, and you ask me a question. So it bothered me, but I’m over it now.”
But it felt like it was being said in like good fun.
“Yes, it wasn’t malicious. I just did not appreciate that I didn’t get a chance to come on and tell my version until I got re-signed. At the time, there’s nothing I could have put out on social media, because I would have lost in the court of public opinion. I think I spliced it up and made it seem like they were putting me over. But I wasn’t going to go after them, because I would have lost that fight.”
In 2005 you had a squash match with Matt Morgan:
“Yes, this is before I’m signed. Extra talent. Me and Bryan Myers. It’s at Madison Square Garden. I’ve never been extra talent before. I’ve never been backstage at a WWE show before, so we go in. We’re shaking everyone’s hand, right? We know we gotta respect everybody, shake everyone’s hand, the cameraman, the garbage man, people who don’t even work for WWE. We’re shaking their hand. And if you’re backstage at WWE, there’s all these signs of where to go. There was a sign that said Male Talent. I guess this is where we go. That’s not where we go. So we go in. I remember Hardcore Holly being there. They’re giving us like the death stare. This isn’t good. John Morrison, Johnny Nitro, he had just debuted. He pulled us aside. He’s like, there’s a locker room for guys like you over there. The extra talent locker. So we went to the extra talent locker room. Here’s another funny story. There are a couple funny stories from that day, so we’re in the extra talent locker room and it was across from the seamstress. So we’re just in there, me and Bryan, and Trish Stratus comes in. She’s like, ‘Hey, do you guys mind if I try this on?’ We’re like, yeah, go ahead, Trish. She was like, ‘Well, can you leave?’ So that was that, and then also, my dad was a New York cop at the time. Flashes badge to get backstage. I’m like, you can’t be here, Dad. He ended up getting a ticket, and they let him watch the show. It was fine. But yeah, I wrestled Matt Morgan, squash match. I was so nervous, and I think he might have been more nervous than I was because it was his debut as his stuttering gimmick. We were both equally nervous. I remember. I’ll never forget. He starts to mess up, just shoving me down. We were practicing it backstage and I was just taking balls on the concrete floor.”
The five-year anniversary of your death match with Nick Gage just passed. How do you feel five years removed from it?
“So on my YouTube channel, I put a little documentary out about the five years and what that match means to me. That match changed my career, changed my life. If it wasn’t for that match, I truly believe I would not be back in WWE. It changed everything.”
Did you know when you won that Intercontinental Championship at WrestleMania that it was only going to be for one night?
“I did.”
You knew you were going to lose it the next night?
“I knew, and it didn’t bother me because to this day people are like , ‘Oh, you should have held it long.’ I’m like, why? If I held it for a month and lost to Cesaro at Backlash, who cares? It wouldn’t have been memorable, right? But I lose it the next night, and it’s the perfect way. Zack Ryder would win the title and lose it the next night. That’s the story of Zack Ryder. That’s the story of Matt Cardona. You work so hard, you get it, it somehow gets taken away, damn! Then you somehow get it back, or you get better than ever.”
What would you say is the total value of your wrestling toy collection? $500,000?
“Oh more, 100%. Over a million.”
Over 3 million?
“I would say in that ballpark. But here’s the thing, right? Things are only worth what someone is willing to pay. There are a lot of things that I have that are like top, top shelf, top dollar things. And there’s some things that I couldn’t even give away.”
Chelsea Green was a guest on my live show last year, and she told the story of you leaving a tanning imprint in the bed.
“I don’t see what the big deal is. It comes out in the wash. It does look like a murder scene! I’ve been doing this for almost 15 years, you know. Whether it be at my house or on the road. I don’t think it’s a big deal.”
Where do you go from here?
“That is a great question. I feel very blessed that I’m in the win-win situation, where I feel like I’m the top of my game. I’m 40 years old, 41 now, but I feel better now and look better now. I wrestle better now at 41 than I did when I was 21. You look at the landscape with WWE, the two current champions are my age or older, right? But then again, there’s all these young up-and-comers, so I gotta be on my toes to keep up with them, and hopefully this all works out and we do an interview in a couple years, and I could talk about my WWE title win, right? But if it doesn’t, I found my place outside WWE, and I could always go back there, which is great, a good backup plan. But I don’t want a backup plan. This is the plan to be the WWE Champion.”
What is Matt Cardona grateful for?
“Chelsea, my family and my pets.”
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