{"id":137275,"date":"2025-06-30T05:49:06","date_gmt":"2025-06-30T09:49:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=137275"},"modified":"2025-06-30T05:49:06","modified_gmt":"2025-06-30T09:49:06","slug":"kevin-owens-reveals-he-refused-to-work-with-damian-priest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2025\/06\/30\/kevin-owens-reveals-he-refused-to-work-with-damian-priest\/","title":{"rendered":"Kevin Owens Reveals He &#8220;Refused&#8221; To Work With Damian Priest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Pro-wrestling legend Kevin Owens candidly spoke to Cody Rhodes about how he \u201crefused\u201d to work a storyline with Damian Priest. Owens, who has missed almost four months of action due to a neck injury, recently appeared on Rhodes\u2019 \u201cWhat Do You Wanna Talk About?\u201d podcast.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i.ytimg.com\/vi\/u-CFGPwPhwI\/maxresdefault.jpg\" alt=\"Kevin Owens talks injury recovery, indies and lessons from Dusty | What Do You Wanna Talk About?\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The former Universal Champion revealed that three weeks prior to the 2021 Royal Rumble, a friendship between him and Priest was pitched by WWE writers. Owens stated, \u201cThey tried to make me friends with him on television. I refused.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Owens added, \u201cI have nothing against him, but no one would believe that we\u2019re best friends. We could not be more opposite. And why? It\u2019s so random.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Kevin Owens talks injury recovery, indies and lessons from Dusty | What Do You Wanna Talk About?\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/u-CFGPwPhwI?start=923&#038;feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The timeline of Kevin Owens\u2019 claim appears to align with the nonsensical finish of the January 8, 2021, episode of SmackDown. SmackDown General Manager Adam Pearce would involuntarily win a gauntlet match to become the number one contender for the Universal Championship. Owens would replace Pearce the following week.<\/p>\n<p>Priest would wrestle his last match in NXT against Karrion Kross on January 6 at the New Year&#8217;s Evil event. This would explain the finish to the January 8 SmackDown show, as a Priest callup was nixed.<\/p>\n<p>In January 2021, Owens was embroiled in a heated rivalry with Roman Reigns. A Last Man Standing match between the pair would ensue, where the Tribal Chief would survive. The match between the pair is considered their greatest encounter.<\/p>\n<p>The planned friendship was designed to push Priest to a main event position. The Archer of Infamy was intended to replace Owens in his Royal Rumble encounter with Reigns.\u00a0 This further explained why Owens declined.<\/p>\n<p>Owens explained, \u201cHe was gonna take my match. It was going to be him versus Roman Reigns at the Royal Rumble. I was incensed. I said f*** no.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"FULL MATCH: Roman Reigns vs. Kevin Owens \u2014 Last Man Standing Match: Royal Rumble 2021\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/G-GQ8H3hSO4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>It has become clear that KO\u2019s refusal to pair himself with the future El Campeon has not hindered the latter\u2019s success. Priest instead debuted as the 14<sup>th<\/sup> entrant in the 2021 Men\u2019s Royal Rumble match.<\/p>\n<p>He would then form a friendship with Latin Grammy Award-winning artist Bad Bunny rather than Owens. This led to a marquee tag team match with Bunny at WrestleMania 37.<\/p>\n<p>Priest would accumulate accolades such as the United States Championship, a Money in the Bank win, and a World Heavyweight Championship to his impressive resume.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Damian Priest cashes in on Drew McIntyre after CM Punk beatdown: WrestleMania XL Sunday highlights\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ttQhBO9ZI2g?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>One thing that is missing, however, is that elusive singles match against the Tribal Chief. The former Judgement Day leader has only shared the ring with Reigns on two separate occasions. A 15-man inter-brand triple threat tag match at Survivor Series 2019, as well as the 2025 Royal Rumble match.<\/p>\n<p>Whilst there is still time, both men are older and currently babyfaces. Reigns is also a part-time performer and plans to retire by 2028, as revealed in an interview with Vanity Fair.<\/p>\n<p><strong><b>More From LWOS Pro Wrestling<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em><i>Header photo \u2013 WWE \u2013 Stay tuned to the\u00a0<\/i><\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/\" target=\"_self\"><em><u><i>Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a><em><i> for more on Kevin Owens, Cody Rhodes, Damian Priest, and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world, as well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world.<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em><i>You can check out WWE programming on\u00a0<\/i><\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.netflix.com\/title\/81788927\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><u><i>Netflix<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a><em><i>\u00a0(Raw),\u00a0<\/i><\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.usanetwork.com\/wwe-friday-night-smackdown\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><u><i>USA Network<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a><em><i>\u00a0(SmackDown),\u00a0<\/i><\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cwtv.com\/shows\/wwe-nxt\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><u><i>The CW<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a><em><i>\u00a0(NXT),\u00a0<\/i><\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/tubitv.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><u><i>Tubi<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a><em><i>\u00a0(WWE Evolve),\u00a0<\/i><\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aetv.com\/wwe\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><u><i>A&amp;E<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a><em><i>\u00a0(WWE Superstar Sunday \u2013 Rivals, WWE LFG, and Greatest Moments) and\u00a0<\/i><\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.peacocktv.com\/watch\/home\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><u><i>Peacock<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a><em><i>\u00a0(WWE Main Event as well as archives and premium live event streaming). Follow WWE on social media to relive top moments and matches on\u00a0<\/i><\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/wwe\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><u><i>YouTube<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a><em><i>, and catch fast-paced action on X (<\/i><\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/i\/events\/1773457579022155776?lang=en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em><u><i>WWE Speed<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a><em><i>).<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Pro-wrestling legend Kevin Owens candidly spoke to Cody Rhodes about how he \u201crefused\u201d to work a storyline with Damian Priest. Owens, who has missed almost four months of action due to a neck injury, recently appeared on Rhodes\u2019 \u201cWhat Do You Wanna Talk About?\u201d podcast. The former Universal Champion revealed that three weeks prior to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5523,"featured_media":137315,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12,2192,4,3],"tags":[6558,73,77,7214],"class_list":["post-137275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-wrestling","category-wwe","category-wwe-universe","tag-damian-priest","tag-kevin-owens","tag-roman-reigns","tag-wwe-royal-rumble"],"modified_by":"Chinyere Okafor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5523"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137275"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137275\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":137316,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137275\/revisions\/137316"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}