UNIVERSITY OF DUTCH
05/08/20
JAKE HAGER

Jake Hager talking about being neighbors with Danny Hodge: “Growing up, I lived 2 blocks away from the school. Danny lived 1 block away from the school, so he was my neighbor. One of his grandsons graduated with me from High School. His name was Patrick Hodge, who is a good friend of mine to this day. Growing up, younger, I knew of the legend, but I didn’t know Danny Hodge was living a block away from me. This was when I was 7 or 8. I knew of the name but didn’t understand how close he was to me.

Hager explaining how he got into AEW: “Chris Jericho really gave me the call, gave me the ok with everybody there and got me the job with AEW. He was training at Dave Bautista’s gym; the same one I train at in Tampa. My head coach was training him at the time and we would bump into each other all the time. He saw the progression between the fights (Hager’s Bellator fights) and must have liked it and liked what he was seeing. He said this is my guy, I want him.”

The full episode is available at this link.