THINGS I LOVE: WRESTLERS AS WRESTLING FANS

Everyone remembers the more talked about instances where wrestlers reveal their love for wrestling when they were young - Mick Foley sneaking in to Madison Square Garden to watch Jimmy Snuka leap off the steel cage, Edge as a sixteen-year-old attending WrestleMania VI in the eleventh row with his future kayfabe brother Christian, and so on.

But there's some you might not know. Like Shawn Daivari being interviewed by Mike Tenay on Nitro when he was fourteen:

Or Jeremy Borash as a teenage smark:

Or CM Punk getting his picture taken with Stone Cold Steve Austin (and incidentally, Davey Boy Smith - sweet glasses, Bulldog!):

There's gotta be tons more I'm missing. WWE Magazine just had a feature on Zack Ryder who mentioned he's visible at SummerSlam 2002 decked out in classic Heartbreak Kid gear (hat, wristbands, glasses, holy crap), but I can't find him anywhere. But there's a picture of Zack Ryder and Curt Hawkins dressed as Bret Hart and Mr. Perfect somewhere on the internet that gets the same sentiment across... but I can't find that either so that helps in NO WAY. DAMNIT.

Anyway, the point of this is that I like seeing wrestlers who had a love for wrestling when they were young, and they got to grow up and live their dream as a professional naked fake fighter (my dream job too), whether it's seeing Daniel Bryan and Derrick Bateman reference Steve Blackman on NXT, or Kevin Steen marking out for Diesel on Twitter, or a young Undertaker honing his gimmick as a child.

Got any other examples?

UPDATE: Thought I'd add to this with two new discoveries.

How about this awesome picture of a young Chris Jericho with Ricky Steamboat?

Credit - We Watch Wrestling (Tumblr)

Or, if you squint and look closely, you can see Colt Cabana in the crowd at WrestleMania 13 when Ahmed Johnson and Savio Vega are brawling in the crowd [3:06] (credit: Brian).

That Colt Cabana find is a timely one, as he just posted on Twitter a signed Hart Foundation poster he's about to hang up on his wall. Not if I can steal it first though.

Keep those examples coming!