Jacob Fatu recently said the surreal feeling of standing across from Roman Reigns during a Raw segment briefly had him questioning what was happening to his own body.
Speaking on “What’s Your Story?” with Stephanie McMahon, Fatu described sharing the ring with Reigns and Seth Rollins as an entirely different level of experience than anything he’d encountered before.
He explained that he genuinely couldn’t feel his body in the moment and briefly wondered if he was having a panic attack, admitting the sensation scared him because he was worried he might actually fall. Looking back, he described it as the good kind of overwhelming, crediting Reigns’ presence for creating that reaction.
I felt that with Roman. It’s a whole nother vibe. When I was in that segment with Roman and Seth, I couldn’t even feel my body. I was like, dude, am I having a panic attack? What’s going on? I walked in the back and, you know, a feeling like that. What Roman said, that’s the magic right there. It was a good feeling.”
“I was also scared of the feeling because I couldn’t feel my body. I was like, man, I don’t want to fall out.
Fatu was also candid about how unprepared he was for the technical side of television when he arrived. Coming almost entirely from the independent scene, most notably a two-plus-year MLW World Heavyweight Championship reign, he admitted he had no real experience working in front of cameras that actually mattered, down to not understanding basic things like which camera to play to.
I didn’t know how to work a camera. I didn’t know about the red dot. I didn’t know nothing.
