Randy Orton talks about the loss of ‘chemistry’ with less WWE house show matches
Recently, in an interview before WWE WrestleMania 42, Randy Orton opened up on the importance of WWE house show matches and how they help build “chemistry.”
Speaking with The Schmo, Orton was asked about the successful approach to building chemistry between one and their opponent. Sharing a detailed answer, the 14-time World Champion emphasized the importance of wrestling at house shows.
“I think when we used to do more shows, and there were live events, if I was going to wrestle a guy, you know, pick let’s say me and Drew McIntyre had never wrestled before, we would do a two-week European tour together, and we would wrestle each other every single night. We’d be doing two, three, sometimes four live events stateside, and we’d wrestle each other every single night,” Orton said.
“And by the time that we got into the ring, it was on TV, pay-per-view, Raw, SmackDown, whatever, and had that first televised match, we would already had a chemistry built. So, we would have already had that chemistry kind of uh instead of doing it for the first time live. You don’t want to do anything for the first time live, but now we’ve kind of gotten into a situation where we do a lot of times,” he continued.
He further opened up on the different routine he had when he was younger and compared it with the current WWE locker room schedule.
“I’ve wrestled many guys since our schedule has kind of slowed down, for the first time on live TV, and that’s crazy to think. I think I heard last year, LA Knight wrestled like 77 matches, and that was like the most matches anybody had wrestled. And that’s wild because we were wrestling 180, 200, 220 matches a year for years and years. I had 15 years or so where I was averaging 185 matches a year. So that’s hard on the body. That’s tough. The travel’s gruesome. It’s hard on family life. But your body builds up a resiliency where you’re taking those bumps, that repetition, you’re able to build that chemistry with all that time in the ring off TV in front of a live audience, and you learn what works. And and that’s that’s the chemistry right there.”
At WWE WrestleMania 42 Night One main event, Orton faced and lost to Cody Rhodes for the Undisputed WWE Championship.
Shounak Chakrabarti is an experienced sports journalist with a lifelong passion for athletics and storytelling. He holds a Master’s Degree in International Journalism from the University of Leeds and joined F4WOnline in 2025.
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