February 10, 2026 • 11 mins
Go beyond the main event and dive into the heart of wrestling with Ben Higgins and guest Swerve Strickland, AEW superstar and the company’s first African-American world champion. Recorded live from the 2026 Super Bowl’s Radio Row, Swerve reveals what drives him in and out of the ring, his journey of legacy, faith, and fatherhood, and why passion is about loving the grind—even when it gives nothing back. Hear Swerve on inspiring a new generation, fighting for his daughters, and the evolution of his music and career. Don’t miss exclusive stories about his entrance track, mentor moments, and his advice to anyone chasing greatness.
TIMESTAMPS
00:00 Super Bowl Radio Row Intro
00:31 Welcoming Swerve Strickland
01:12 Evolution in Professional Wrestling
02:13 Making AEW History
02:57 Competing for the Title
04:25 Family and Fatherhood Motivation
05:46 Inspiring the Next Generation
06:39 If You Can Hear Me—Core Message
07:22 Staying Consistent Through Struggle
08:12 Defining Passion and Resilience
09:14 Where to Watch AEW
09:35 Entrance Song and Music Legacy
10:27 Honoring the Late Producer
10:39 Final Thoughts and Farewell
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to if you can hear me, a space where
culture meets the soul. I'm Ben Higgins. You may know
me and many of my guests from culture and Headlines,
but this podcast is about going beyond the surface into
something deeper. Today, we're on location at the twenty twenty
six Super Bowl, connecting with some friends for a brief
conversation about identity, faith and purpose. Let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
We're here at Radio Row in San Francisco for the
super Bowl. It's the big game and I have the
honor to talk to Swerves Strickland. You are a superstar.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Oh thank you, appreciate you came up here today.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
They're kind of prepping me for these interviews. What you
do is something incredible to me.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
You know, obviously we're here to talk about your faith
and kind of like what guides you in life, but
I want to start with talking about what you do
for a career. Yes, I mean we're here at the
super Bowl. We have athletes all around it, and I
think watching you all jump off of things and fall
down and all that stuff is maybe equally as impressive.
(01:09):
How do you prep like for your big events?
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (01:13):
Yeah, so a big professional wrestler Superstar from All Elite
Wrestling turns March turns. It turns about seven years old
now being on TBS and TNT. What motivates me and like, honestly,
what pushes me is I'm always trying to think of
how to do better and how to push things to
the next level. And that's kind of like why I
(01:34):
work so well with AW like because we're doing the
same thing such a young company. We're always pushing to
try to improve and do better than what we did
prior or the last accomplishment, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
So we never rest on any of those things.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
So I'm always pushing just like try to like take
something that I've done that was very successful and evolve
it to the next thing. So a lot of people
try to take things to try to change it, change it,
and I don't think you changed the formula, but you
just find certain new ingredients for the recipe to evolve
it to the next stage. And I feel like that's
what I've always been working on and trying to do well.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
It's it's working for you because you're competing for a
title right.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Now, right, Yeah, I was.
Speaker 4 (02:13):
I was the first African American World Champion in the
company's history. I think I went down as like one
of the like the ninth Black World Champion in wrestling
as far as on national stage, like as far as
like with all the wrestling WWWCW, all the history of
like the biggest promotions on national television, the eighth or
ninth World Black World Champion in history. So I would say, like,
(02:41):
like man, I would say doing that.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
I mean, but as you compete for this title, obviously
this like evolution that you're talking about has helped you
get to this point right where you're you're at the
top of the game.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
Right, Yeah, what's helping me, Like, honestly going for the
championship is like in twenty twenty six now, because like
since I had it, the last time I won the
championship was in twenty twenty four, the roster has grown,
and you compete with newer, younger guys coming in since
that time, So that's a two year window.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
So it's honestly, like you're not only just.
Speaker 4 (03:14):
Competing for the championship, you're competing against other great talents
that are also just as hungry, if not more hungry
than you are. So it's like almost like a good
competition going on amongst each other where we support each other,
but at the same time we're competing, and it's the
hunger to try to be better and try to push
to go stronger and stronger, faster, harder than the next person.
(03:38):
So going for the World Championship this year in twenty
twenty six is going to be It's going to be
probably the most difficult challenge in the company's history because
now the landscape and the main events scene is so
stacked right now. So but I push my body to
like get up to like a two hundred and thirty
nine pounds, now I cut back down to two thirty three.
So like that, right, there was the challenge in itself
(04:00):
to try to evolve myself and push it to try
to be more World Championship ready than before.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
Now this show is obviously about individual stories of faith
and how faith inner seeds.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
In their life.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
I mean, what is it that drives you to do this?
I mean, to be great at something, you have to
have I think a motivation behind it other than just
to hold up the belt, right, there has to be
something behind it. What is that for you?
Speaker 4 (04:26):
For the longest time, Like earlier on in my career
just to like get out the gate like with the strongest,
like the most like inspiration I could was my children.
It was my daughters, you know, And it was like
at first it was just about fight for survival because
if I don't perform well, they don't eat.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
I don't make the funds, I don't bring home, you
know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
So then that when I got past that stage and
it was like financially I was good, it was like,
what's the next motivation? It was still the girls, but
it was also to like leave a legacy behind for them,
going to be proud of their father for what they've done.
What I had to do to get to the stage
I'm at to provide for them and to like now
it's just like live up to the name now, you know.
I just wanted to pave a pathway and a landscape
(05:09):
for them to like be like walk with honor with
that name, you know what I mean, not like no
controversies and not know like all your father did these
things and you hear about these negative stuff, you know,
you want to hear. You want to hear that your
parents did something good and they inspired others to do
good and like change the landscape for the better, you know.
(05:30):
So that's kind of like the inspiration that keeps me
going but pushing forward, like to inspire. Now it's like
once again, I'm inspiring now other young black kids to
grow up and watch professional wrestling. You know, they see
somebody like me, that that looks like them. That's a
big deal to a lot of households and that I'm
starting to understand and see that. And They're coming up
(05:51):
to me more and more as I'm out in the
public and stuff and being told that like, yeah, we
grew up watching you. So it's like that generational jump
is already here, which seventeen years later, it's like, wow,
it's already here now. And you look back at the
seventeen years it's like, man, like you're just grinding. You
couldn't focus on those things. But now that you're here,
it's like, Wow, look at all these things that you've
(06:12):
possibly inspired all these other young.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
Kids, boys, girls, black.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
White, any type of ethnicity to want to do what
you do just because like you like put in the
work for it.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
So there's no greater honor than that. I think I'm
having people say, hey, I've watched you. I admire you.
I'm a girl dad, myself a very young girl. There
is also no motivation better motivation than having the kids
at home. This show is called If You Can Hear Me?
The motivation behind it is to connect stars like yourself
(06:44):
and everyday people with a common human story. If you
right now were kind of you know, I don't know
your faith story, but if you were either crying out
to God or crying out to the public to say
can you hear me? Like can you hear what I'm
trying to say? What would that be for you right now?
Speaker 4 (07:00):
Honestly, I feel like whether whatever you believe in, whatever,
like your drive is, whatever your inspiration is, whatever you're working,
whatever you're working with field you're working, and whether it's entertainment, sports,
you know, the work field, all of it, I feel
like everybody can relate to and resonate with. The fact
of consistency is the key to all of it. Whether
(07:22):
things are going good are bad, you stay consistent, you
keep moving Like it's I was told back by a
trainer a long time ago that like we we know
what happens if we stop, the movie's over and everything ends.
But if you keep going, all the different possibilities can
open up if you keep going, you know, And I
think that's the beauty of this. So don't don't stop,
(07:44):
stay consistent on the good days, on the bad days,
adapt and overcome.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
From a military background.
Speaker 4 (07:53):
Yeah, like, because the large percentage of people will quit
and give up because it things got hard, the smallest
percentages keep going through and those are the guys that
win because.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
I mean, this story has not been easy for you.
It's not your line of just success and like accomplishments.
It's been difficult at times where I would.
Speaker 4 (08:13):
Say I knew what I never knew understood what the
word passion meant, and I figured it out through my
journey and pro wrestling. It was like, passion means like,
you keep loving something even when it doesn't love you back,
it's not treating you well. You still keep pushing, you
still keep going because that's what a passion is. It's
easy to love something that's giving you everything.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
I'm writing that down. Yeah, yeah, that's good.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
And I learned that through the struggle.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
I was like, I was struggling, I've had no money,
I'm still like fighting and going through all this stuff.
But it was like, you know, but I still love
doing what I do, and I'm going to keep doing
it because I love it, even though it was always
treating me back the way I as hard as I
loved it and gave it, gave to the game. But
that's what a true passion is. It's easy to love
something that gives you everything you want, but do you
still love it when it's not giving you anything?
Speaker 2 (08:59):
And you you've you stayed consistent. Now for all the
people out there listening to this and watching it and saying,
I got to follow along with this story in twenty
twenty six a big year for so sure, where can
they watch AW if they don't know right now?
Speaker 4 (09:14):
So we're on San Francisco time, so Pacific time five pm,
eight five pm on AAW, TNT TBS on Wednesday nights
on TNT. On Saturdays five pm Pacific time, Eastern time,
eight o'clock on this is the show Collision. We have
two shows, Dynamite on Wednesdays, Collision on Saturdays on TNT.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
And you have a new entrance song if I'm correct here,
you created it correct alongside of a buddy.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (09:44):
So a friend of mine rest in Peace of Prophet
was the producer. He produced my first song which was
Big Pressure did millions of streams, did very well. And
so coming back with that evolution we were talking about
on myself, we wanted to go bigger with a new song,
bigger song and add another feature on to make it big,
you know. So Prophet and myself we reached out. We
(10:06):
got Ray Kwan from Wu Tang and he added a
good verse on there and hook and so now we
called Hit Different, hits us out there, Swerve, Strickland, Ray
Kwan and Manteesy. Hit Different is out there now on
all streaming platforms, produced by the like ever ever so
talented legendary profit the producer. He won two Grammy's working
(10:26):
with Kanye West on the Donda album. So he just
passed away beginning of January. So now we play that
song in his honor.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Yeah, yeah, and it's gonna it's gonna push you through
to a title too in twenty twenty six. I believe, yes, Hey,
I think it's incredible. The stuff you shared. Passion is
something you love when it's not loving you back and
Swerve wish you the best in twenty twenty six. Thanks
for joining us here.
Speaker 3 (10:50):
Absolutely so many people will be.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
Tuning in watching your journey as you compete for the belt.
But you are inspiring many and we appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
Thank you very much much. Thank you for having me
appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Man Hey friends, thanks for listening or watching. Would you
take a second, follow, subscribe, and drop a comment. It
really helps
Welcome to if you can hear me, a space where
culture meets the soul. I'm Ben Higgins. You may know
me and many of my guests from culture and Headlines,
but this podcast is about going beyond the surface into
something deeper. Today, we're on location at the twenty twenty
six Super Bowl, connecting with some friends for a brief
conversation about identity, faith and purpose. Let's get into it.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
We're here at Radio Row in San Francisco for the
super Bowl. It's the big game and I have the
honor to talk to Swerves Strickland. You are a superstar.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Oh thank you, appreciate you came up here today.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
They're kind of prepping me for these interviews. What you
do is something incredible to me.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
You know, obviously we're here to talk about your faith
and kind of like what guides you in life, but
I want to start with talking about what you do
for a career. Yes, I mean we're here at the
super Bowl. We have athletes all around it, and I
think watching you all jump off of things and fall
down and all that stuff is maybe equally as impressive.
(01:09):
How do you prep like for your big events?
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (01:13):
Yeah, so a big professional wrestler Superstar from All Elite
Wrestling turns March turns. It turns about seven years old
now being on TBS and TNT. What motivates me and like, honestly,
what pushes me is I'm always trying to think of
how to do better and how to push things to
the next level. And that's kind of like why I
(01:34):
work so well with AW like because we're doing the
same thing such a young company. We're always pushing to
try to improve and do better than what we did
prior or the last accomplishment, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
So we never rest on any of those things.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
So I'm always pushing just like try to like take
something that I've done that was very successful and evolve
it to the next thing. So a lot of people
try to take things to try to change it, change it,
and I don't think you changed the formula, but you
just find certain new ingredients for the recipe to evolve
it to the next stage. And I feel like that's
what I've always been working on and trying to do well.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
It's it's working for you because you're competing for a
title right.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Now, right, Yeah, I was.
Speaker 4 (02:13):
I was the first African American World Champion in the
company's history. I think I went down as like one
of the like the ninth Black World Champion in wrestling
as far as on national stage, like as far as
like with all the wrestling WWWCW, all the history of
like the biggest promotions on national television, the eighth or
ninth World Black World Champion in history. So I would say, like,
(02:41):
like man, I would say doing that.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
I mean, but as you compete for this title, obviously
this like evolution that you're talking about has helped you
get to this point right where you're you're at the
top of the game.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
Right, Yeah, what's helping me, Like, honestly going for the
championship is like in twenty twenty six now, because like
since I had it, the last time I won the
championship was in twenty twenty four, the roster has grown,
and you compete with newer, younger guys coming in since
that time, So that's a two year window.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
So it's honestly, like you're not only just.
Speaker 4 (03:14):
Competing for the championship, you're competing against other great talents
that are also just as hungry, if not more hungry
than you are. So it's like almost like a good
competition going on amongst each other where we support each other,
but at the same time we're competing, and it's the
hunger to try to be better and try to push
to go stronger and stronger, faster, harder than the next person.
(03:38):
So going for the World Championship this year in twenty
twenty six is going to be It's going to be
probably the most difficult challenge in the company's history because
now the landscape and the main events scene is so
stacked right now. So but I push my body to
like get up to like a two hundred and thirty
nine pounds, now I cut back down to two thirty three.
So like that, right, there was the challenge in itself
(04:00):
to try to evolve myself and push it to try
to be more World Championship ready than before.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
Now this show is obviously about individual stories of faith
and how faith inner seeds.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
In their life.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
I mean, what is it that drives you to do this?
I mean, to be great at something, you have to
have I think a motivation behind it other than just
to hold up the belt, right, there has to be
something behind it. What is that for you?
Speaker 4 (04:26):
For the longest time, Like earlier on in my career
just to like get out the gate like with the strongest,
like the most like inspiration I could was my children.
It was my daughters, you know, And it was like
at first it was just about fight for survival because
if I don't perform well, they don't eat.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
I don't make the funds, I don't bring home, you
know what I mean.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
So then that when I got past that stage and
it was like financially I was good, it was like,
what's the next motivation? It was still the girls, but
it was also to like leave a legacy behind for them,
going to be proud of their father for what they've done.
What I had to do to get to the stage
I'm at to provide for them and to like now
it's just like live up to the name now, you know.
I just wanted to pave a pathway and a landscape
(05:09):
for them to like be like walk with honor with
that name, you know what I mean, not like no
controversies and not know like all your father did these
things and you hear about these negative stuff, you know,
you want to hear. You want to hear that your
parents did something good and they inspired others to do
good and like change the landscape for the better, you know.
(05:30):
So that's kind of like the inspiration that keeps me
going but pushing forward, like to inspire. Now it's like
once again, I'm inspiring now other young black kids to
grow up and watch professional wrestling. You know, they see
somebody like me, that that looks like them. That's a
big deal to a lot of households and that I'm
starting to understand and see that. And They're coming up
(05:51):
to me more and more as I'm out in the
public and stuff and being told that like, yeah, we
grew up watching you. So it's like that generational jump
is already here, which seventeen years later, it's like, wow,
it's already here now. And you look back at the
seventeen years it's like, man, like you're just grinding. You
couldn't focus on those things. But now that you're here,
it's like, Wow, look at all these things that you've
(06:12):
possibly inspired all these other young.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
Kids, boys, girls, black.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
White, any type of ethnicity to want to do what
you do just because like you like put in the
work for it.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
So there's no greater honor than that. I think I'm
having people say, hey, I've watched you. I admire you.
I'm a girl dad, myself a very young girl. There
is also no motivation better motivation than having the kids
at home. This show is called If You Can Hear Me?
The motivation behind it is to connect stars like yourself
(06:44):
and everyday people with a common human story. If you
right now were kind of you know, I don't know
your faith story, but if you were either crying out
to God or crying out to the public to say
can you hear me? Like can you hear what I'm
trying to say? What would that be for you right now?
Speaker 4 (07:00):
Honestly, I feel like whether whatever you believe in, whatever,
like your drive is, whatever your inspiration is, whatever you're working,
whatever you're working with field you're working, and whether it's entertainment, sports,
you know, the work field, all of it, I feel
like everybody can relate to and resonate with. The fact
of consistency is the key to all of it. Whether
(07:22):
things are going good are bad, you stay consistent, you
keep moving Like it's I was told back by a
trainer a long time ago that like we we know
what happens if we stop, the movie's over and everything ends.
But if you keep going, all the different possibilities can
open up if you keep going, you know, And I
think that's the beauty of this. So don't don't stop,
(07:44):
stay consistent on the good days, on the bad days,
adapt and overcome.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
From a military background.
Speaker 4 (07:53):
Yeah, like, because the large percentage of people will quit
and give up because it things got hard, the smallest
percentages keep going through and those are the guys that
win because.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
I mean, this story has not been easy for you.
It's not your line of just success and like accomplishments.
It's been difficult at times where I would.
Speaker 4 (08:13):
Say I knew what I never knew understood what the
word passion meant, and I figured it out through my
journey and pro wrestling. It was like, passion means like,
you keep loving something even when it doesn't love you back,
it's not treating you well. You still keep pushing, you
still keep going because that's what a passion is. It's
easy to love something that's giving you everything.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
I'm writing that down. Yeah, yeah, that's good.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
And I learned that through the struggle.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
I was like, I was struggling, I've had no money,
I'm still like fighting and going through all this stuff.
But it was like, you know, but I still love
doing what I do, and I'm going to keep doing
it because I love it, even though it was always
treating me back the way I as hard as I
loved it and gave it, gave to the game. But
that's what a true passion is. It's easy to love
something that gives you everything you want, but do you
still love it when it's not giving you anything?
Speaker 2 (08:59):
And you you've you stayed consistent. Now for all the
people out there listening to this and watching it and saying,
I got to follow along with this story in twenty
twenty six a big year for so sure, where can
they watch AW if they don't know right now?
Speaker 4 (09:14):
So we're on San Francisco time, so Pacific time five pm,
eight five pm on AAW, TNT TBS on Wednesday nights
on TNT. On Saturdays five pm Pacific time, Eastern time,
eight o'clock on this is the show Collision. We have
two shows, Dynamite on Wednesdays, Collision on Saturdays on TNT.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
And you have a new entrance song if I'm correct here,
you created it correct alongside of a buddy.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (09:44):
So a friend of mine rest in Peace of Prophet
was the producer. He produced my first song which was
Big Pressure did millions of streams, did very well. And
so coming back with that evolution we were talking about
on myself, we wanted to go bigger with a new song,
bigger song and add another feature on to make it big,
you know. So Prophet and myself we reached out. We
(10:06):
got Ray Kwan from Wu Tang and he added a
good verse on there and hook and so now we
called Hit Different, hits us out there, Swerve, Strickland, Ray
Kwan and Manteesy. Hit Different is out there now on
all streaming platforms, produced by the like ever ever so
talented legendary profit the producer. He won two Grammy's working
(10:26):
with Kanye West on the Donda album. So he just
passed away beginning of January. So now we play that
song in his honor.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Yeah, yeah, and it's gonna it's gonna push you through
to a title too in twenty twenty six. I believe, yes, Hey,
I think it's incredible. The stuff you shared. Passion is
something you love when it's not loving you back and
Swerve wish you the best in twenty twenty six. Thanks
for joining us here.
Speaker 3 (10:50):
Absolutely so many people will be.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
Tuning in watching your journey as you compete for the belt.
But you are inspiring many and we appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
Thank you very much much. Thank you for having me
appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Man Hey friends, thanks for listening or watching. Would you
take a second, follow, subscribe, and drop a comment. It
really helps
Popular Podcasts
Hey Jonas!
Hey Jonas! The official Jonas Brothers podcast. Hosted by Kevin, Joe, and Nick Jonas. It’s the Jonas Brothers you know... musicians, actors, and well, yes, brothers. Now, they’re sharing another side of themselves in the playful, intimate, and irreverent way only they can. Spend time with the Jonas Brothers here and stay a little bit longer for deep conversations like never before.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com