WWE was barely back on the road coming out of the pandemic when they came to Orlando for the August 9, 2021 episode of WWE Raw.
On that night, Sheamus defended his WWE United States Championship against Ricochet. During a break in the action, as Sheamus was wandering around ringside, he was confronted by MTV Challenge Godfather Mark Long.
"That was the catalyst for this entire run for me," Long recalled on FMC with Jeremy Lambert, Cher Delaware, & SP3. "I met Matthew and Neil from BRCW (Boca Raton Championship Wrestling), they didn't have BRCW at the time, they went to the charity event Give Kids A World in Florida. I met them and they were wrestling fans. Two weeks after, Raw came, and they said, 'We're going to be back in town, we have front row tickets, do you want to come?' 'Absolutely.' I went to that with them. There was a lull in the match, Sheamus is outside walking, and I spontaneously jumped up and started yelling at him. Nothing was going on, so he noticed it, and started yelling back at me. We're yelling and WWE on FOX posted something about it on their Twitter. My Twitter feed blew up. Maybe it was you guys, someone wrote an article. 'Mark Long and Sheamus are on a collision course to wrestle.' That went crazy. It led to, I went there for SmackDown in New York, and did a promo for Sheamus. Two months later, Sheamus was checking into a hotel at the same time as me, we ran into each other and he's like, 'Hey big guy.' We started bullshitting. He came out after the show with us and had drinks. It was great."
Long is now a regular at BRCW and is set to face Matt Cardona at the May 7 event.
Long has also made appearances on NXT television alongside Grayson Waller, and he would like to do an arc in NXT at some point in 2023. Fans can find his full comments regarding a potential NXT run by clicking here.
Watch the full interview with Long in the video above.