Darren Young reveals awkward interaction with WWE Hall Of Famer before he came out (Exclusive)
It's an often overlooked fact that Fred Rosser is one of the true innovators of professional wrestling. While under the moniker of Darren Young, Rosser became the first-ever openly gay active WWE Superstar.
Before he came out, though, one WWE Hall of Famer said something very awkward indeed about him "looking gay" - which Mr No Days Off told us all about on Episode 4 of Dropkick DiSKussions!
When I came out, I was very fearful. Fearful of the unknown, fearful of losing my job, but when guys like Randy Orton, Mark Henry, Big Show, Titus O'Neil, Sheamus - when those guys embrace you... CM Punk also, of all people, when they embrace you with open arms, it makes it that much easier for me to walk into a locker room, it makes it much easier for me to go out there and wow the crowd and perform.
It wasn't always so easy, though...
It was Mark Henry, years ago, before I came out, he kind of outed me a little bit. I just came up onto the main roster from NXT1, the original NXT, and, at the time, I had this gold sequence around my hair, and my hair was spiky. I felt like I was looking fly, flash and fabulous, but Mark Henry in the locker room said, "Why do you got your hair like that, boy? It makes you look gay." I was just like, blown away. I said, "Mark, I'm just trying to look different, I'm trying to stand out."
Rosser went on to say that Henry's reaction was very different once he'd publicly came out, though.
Fast forward to when I came out publicly, like I said, he was one of the first guys to embrace me and then he was like, "Boy, how come you didn't tell me? How come you didn't tell me?" I said, "Mark, man, I was fearful of the unknown, man."
You can check out the entire interview here.