Kevin Owens can look very nice in real life, when he does his usual media tours in Quebec, for example. But he remains a professional wrestler, therefore also capable of being very convincing in the role of the villain.
What he had done rather well one evening in 2011 in Quebec. At an NSPW show, the wrestler from Marieville had betrayed Pee Wee, alias Yannick Tremblay, a popular local wrestler. As with any good wrestling betrayal, Owens served him six sledgehammers in a row, in addition to attacking him with a hammer—the tool, not the grip. It was thematic, basically.
“I attacked it, attacked it, and the crowd was really enraged, to the point that I had a chair thrown at me,” Owens recalled proudly. When I went backstage, her mom came and slapped me in the face she was so angry! »
Version corroborated by Yannick Tremblay. “We won the rivalry of the year award in 2011,” recalls the now-host of CHOI FM, among others. “Kevin had come dancing around my carcass in the ring. He took me out on a stretcher. »
“My parents never liked wrestling. When I saw them in the crowd, I thought to myself: they won’t like the end! We went backstage, I got up from the stretcher, but my mother didn’t see me. She just slapped Kevin! »
Tremblay and Owens will be back under one roof on Monday at the Videotron Center when WWE brings a televised event – WWE Raw – to Quebec City for the very first time in its history. Tremblay, also a wrestler and crowd entertainer at the Remparts and Capitales games, will attend as an ambassador for the event. And Owens, of course, as a wrestler.
Long before Mac Templeton, many athletes made their living with their fists in Quebec.
“People always tell me about one place in particular, and that’s the Tower. In the 1940s and 1950s, it was the go-to spot for wrestling,” says Pat Laprade, wrestling historian and WWE Raw Wrestling descriptor at TVA Sports.
The Old Capital will then be the scene of the great rivalry between the Aces of wrestling, who mainly use the Youth Pavilion, and Lutte Grand Prix, which settles in the Colosseum. “Quebec has been very important in the growth of Lutte Grand Prix,” says Laprade.
In the mid-1980s, Lutte Internationale put on one last great show there, with a finale featuring the legendary Ric Flair and the no less legendary Rick Martel. But what was then called the WWF was cornering North American markets.
“In the last 25 years, it’s been local,” continues Laprade. Jacques Rougeau has done shows, several local promotions too. For fifteen years, it is the NSPW, which is voted best promotion in Quebec almost every year and which presents shows at the Canac stadium and at the Diamant. »
Even though he has been in the WWE for nine years, Kevin Owens has experienced the current excitement of local wrestling in Quebec.
“In the past, when I wrestled there often, it was a wrestling city,” said the Quebecer. The EWR was the only federation in Quebec that organized shows every week. Yes, sometimes there were 80, 150 people. Other times there were 500. But there were enough people showing up every week. It is a city of struggle. »
“The show is just good,” adds Yannick Tremblay. The wrestlers are good. Marko Estrada is more and more known, Zak Patterson begins to fight in the professional circuits. Before, people came to a gala and imagined themselves entering the ring in running shoes and shorts. Now guys are investing in their looks, in their athletic abilities. »
WWE had set foot in Quebec in 2014, at the Coliseum, but the show had failed. “Barely a few thousand people,” recalls Laprade. Already, it’s in Canada, so it’s more complicated for them, and the income is in Canadian dollars as well. They are more cautious before returning to a city that attracts average. So for a few years, Quebec was not chosen and Ottawa had priority. »
Last year, the powerful organization came to test the waters with a non-televised show at the Videotron Center, and this time, fans were there.
And they are again this time. Two weeks before the event, some 10,000 tickets had already found takers in a Videotron Center which will be configured to accommodate nearly 11,000 spectators.
“Something happened, I don’t know what, but we needed WWE back in Quebec,” enthuses Yannick Tremblay. We will be seen around the world. It’s a nice postcard for the city, too. I’m counting the sleeps! »
