A 'stud' is how War Raiders described McDonagh.
J.D. McDonagh is back in the swing of competing in the ring after being away since January. He was in a World Tag Team Title match alongside Dominik Mysterio and they challenged then-champions, the War Raiders (Ivar & Erik).
There was a point in the bout when McDonagh performed a springboard moonsault to the outside of the ring and his head whiplashed off the announce desk. It would later be revealed that McDonagh suffered a punctured lung and broken ribs.
Ivar and Erik recounted that moment during their chat with Gorilla Position. Both called McDonagh a stud for continuing the match.
Ivar: "What a stud. So I couldn’t see it when it happened, and I’m not even sure if you saw it."
Erik: "I didn’t."
Ivar: "Maybe heard it. I heard it. We laid out and I kind of went over to him and he wasn’t moving and I’m like, ‘Oh boy.’ I squeezed his foot, nothing. Squeezed his foot again, nothing, and I crawled over to him like, ‘Hey man, are you okay?’ And then he goes, ‘Yeah, yeah. I’m fine, I’m fine, I’m fine.’ So I go, alright. I guess he’s okay. But I didn’t know his ribs were hurt at all until, I don’t know, almost all the way through the match. Because I ended up, like, punched him in the stomach. That’s when he told me to be easy on his ribs. I’m like, ‘Oh, all right.’ All right I guess. But man, he muscled through it."
Erik: "I don’t know any of us had any clue how bad he was injured and how close it came to disaster. Like, how incredibly close…"
Ivar: "None of us could see it."
Erik: "We didn’t see it. We didn’t know…
Ivar: "And then, to WWE’s credit, they made sure to check on him. Everyone thought it was his head. So they checked with him. They checked him for a concussion during commercial break. They made sure he was okay. He kept saying he was okay."
Erik: "And he just said, ‘I got the wind knocked out of me,’ or, ‘I couldn’t breathe. I’m good, I’m good, I’m good…’ Like Ivar said, what a stud. He was just like, ‘Yeah, I can’t breathe’ and goes up and does a shooting star press -- or moonsault."
Ivar: "Which was supposed to be a 450, but he made the modification because his ribs were so hurt. Which I don’t know if the moonsault is gonna really… Man, what a stud. That’s all, man."
The War Raiders' reign as WWE World Tag Team Champions came to an end at WrestleMania 41 when they were defeated by The New Day (Kofi Kingston & Xavier Woods).
If the quotes in this article are used, please credit Gorilla Position with an H/T to Fightful for the transcriptions.
