AEW's Chris Van Vliet discusses his new role, his dream interview and THAT interview with MJF (Exclusive)
To simply call Chris Van Vliet a wrestling fan would be doing the interviewer extraordinaire a severe injustice, but that's just what he is.
The only difference between Van Vliet and every other wrestling fan on the planet is that the 36-year-old from Pickering, Ontario, has over a decade worth of incredible broadcasting experience under his belt and, well, he decided to combine his career and his passion to become arguably the greatest interviewer known to the world of professional wrestling..
Van Vliet has interviewed everyone from Chris Jericho to John Cena and has been dipping his toes into WWE, AEW, and Impact Wrestling to bring world wrestling news in the form of a friendly chat on an incredibly consistent basis, before landing a role just recently on All Elite Wrestling.
But when you're an interviewer, you help tell other people's stories - so who is Chris Van Vliet?
Well, we caught up with the man himself on Episode 3 of Dropkick DiSKussions to turn the microphone on Chris.
We spoke about his love of wrestling, and just how he manages to turn friendly chats into incredible interviews.
I'm Gary Cassidy of Sportskeeda Wrestling and welcome to episode 3 of Dropkick DiSKussions, where today I'm joined today by one of AEW's latest signings, interviewer extraordinaire - Chris Van Vliet.
Hi, Chris, thanks for joining me. How are you doing today?
I'm doing great, Gary. Thank you for having me on!
No, thank you for coming on! Firstly, a huge congratulations to you for becoming one of the latest signings over at All Elite Wrestling. How did that come about?
First of all, thank you so much. I mean, it's crazy for me as a broadcaster by job, a wrestling fan by nature - kind of the marriage of coming together to be the backstage interviewer. The debut show, AEW on TNT. I didn't apply for the job, I think it was just through the series of interviews I had done with Chris Jericho that led to an interview with Tony Khan, which led to another interview with Cody, another with the Bucks - and, yeah, I think it just kind of came together through that and, man, I'm super excited about it.
And your role is as backstage interviewer. Which talent are you looking forward to working with most?
Yeah, I've been really fortunate to work with a lot of the talent or at least interview them, have them on my podcast, or on my YouTube channel. I'm very interested to see how another interview with MJF's going to go. He has famously branded me Chris Van Vleurgh, and not a single day goes by when someone doesn't tweet that to me or direct message me that on Instagram so it will be interesting to see what happens when I have an interview with him.
I have more on that interview coming up later, don't worry, but I promise not to refer to you by that name.
NEXT: Is Chris Van Vliet's AEW contract exclusive?
COMING UP: More on THAT interview with MJF