It’s not every day when you hear or see Tommaso Ciampa do or say something that a good-hearted human being would ever actually do. After all, he is a pretty hated heel and having a great time living up his old-school gimmick in and out of the ring.
Long story short, if you see Tommaso tweet something then you can usually expect that he will be ripping into someone or expressing his displeasure with something most people love.
But Mauro Ranallo recently spoke to Cage Side Seats and revealed something Ciampa said to him that really takes some of the illusion out of his usual hateful persona.
However, before Ranallo revealed the out of character compliment from Ciampa he painted a great picture to illustrate how the current pro wrestling climate has such a unique force with Tommaso Ciampa as the Sicilian Psychopath.
“It was just a combination of something that is why we watch everything — why we watch all sports. The storytelling, that visceral, palpable energy in that crowd and how firmly behind the ultimate babyface Johnny Gargano [they were]. And Tommaso Ciampa, right now — other than Samoa Joe — there’s no better heel in the business because he completely embraces his role and it’s 24/7.”
“But the story they told in the ring and the ebb and the flow. The fact that it was a year in the making, which nowadays with our gnat-like attention span, you just can’t do it. Well, we proved at NXT that you can. That’s why it’s so special to me, because it reminded me of what got me so invested in this business in the first place. And they were off the charts, what they did.”
In the end, Tommaso told Mauro after TakeOver that Ranallo is doing for him what Jim Ross did for “Stone Cold” Steve Austin during the Attitude Era. You probably can’t get a much better compliment than that, especially from Tommaso Ciampa.
“Tommaso Ciampa, as one of the best heels,” Ranallo said, “it meant a lot to me for him to tell me what JR did for Stone Cold in the ’90s, he feels I’m doing for him now. It doesn’t get any better than that as an announcer.”
Tommaso Ciampa and Johnny Gargano are putting on some of the best matches of their careers at this point in NXT. But fans might need to treasure these encounters while they can because you never know how the WWE main roster will treat guys of Gargano and Ciampa’s size.
But at this time Tommaso Ciampa is obviously enjoying every moment he can as he realizes just how special his time is in NXT. Thanks to Mauro Ranallo, he has a brilliant wordsmith to provide the soundtrack for some of his best career-defining matches.
