Brian Damage
Many younger fans of WWE know Nick Aldis only as the General Manager of Smackdown. An authority figure who simply books matches on the fly during a regular broadcast. In truth, Nick Aldis has accomplished so much more in pro wrestling. Today on the blog, we take a deeper look into the wrestling career of Nick Aldis.
Nick Aldis was born and raised in Docking, Norfolk, England. As a youth, Aldis excelled in sports like swimming and tennis. He was also a big fan of professional wrestling and at the tender age of 16 years old, began training to become a wrestler. According to Aldis, many other trainers and wrestlers felt that he was too skinny to succeed in pro wrestling. Aldis had a “swimmer’s physique,” which was very lean. He knew that he had to bulk up to ever be taken seriously in the business, so he began by consuming large amounts of protein and bodybuilding. For about three years, Aldis only wrestled part time as he got his body just right.
At 19 years old, Aldis focused completely on a full time schedule as a wrestler. After about a year wrestling across England in several independent groups, Aldis made the decision to try and get noticed by WWE scouts. In 2007, at the age of 20, Aldis flew out to Eldon, Missouri to train at Harley Race’s school. At the same time, Harley was bringing in scouts from Pro Wrestling NOAH in Japan and WWE. Unfortunately for Aldis, he wasn’t signed and he returned to England to compete.
In 2008, Aldis decided to try and audition for a role on the UK’s reboot of Gladiators television competition show made famous in the States as American Gladiators. He ended up being cast on the show as ‘Oblivion.’ He starred along with another future wrestler in Barri Griffiths the future ‘Mason Ryan’ in WWE. The reasoning for Aldis to pursue the role on the Gladiators TV show was to gain national exposure to help his wrestling career. He said that getting the gig was one of the best decisions he ever made, as he learned so much about television production and how to present himself on camera.
After a year of playing Oblivion on Gladiators, Aldis made a second trek to the United States. This time, Aldis fame in the United Kingdom got him noticed by TNA management who signed him. He debuted as Brutus Magnus and dressed like a Roman gladiator. Years, later Aldis said that while he was happy to be wrestling in the United States, he absolutely hated the costume and name he was given. Despite the gimmick, Aldis worked hard to be taken seriously within TNA’s ranks.
His ring name was eventually shortened to just ‘Magnus.’ He formed a faction with fellow Brits…Doug Williams and Rob Terry known as ‘The British Invasion.’ He and Williams won the TNA world tag team titles. They also captured New Japan’s IWGP tag titles. Magnus slowly worked his way up as a singles competitor and wrestled as both a heel and a babyface joining such factions as ‘World Elite,’ ‘Main Event Mafia’ and ‘Team Dixie’ aka Dixie Land. Magnus traveled to India where he wrestled for TNA’s international partner Ring Ka King and won their version of the world title. He won both the TNA and GHC (NOAH) tag team titles with partner Samoa Joe.
His biggest push in TNA came in 2013, when he entered a tournament for the vacant TNA world title. Magnus defeated Samoa Joe, Kurt Angle and Jeff Hardy to make history and become the TNA World champion. The first Brit to win a recognized major world singles title in over 108 years. Aldis was quoted after the historic win by saying… “No matter what happens, that will always be the case – that I will always be the first guy to win a recognised World championship from the UK.
“So that’s a very cool thing and something that I never thought would happen – because honestly there’s so many great wrestlers to come out of the UK that deserved to be a World champion before me, that I never thought would be a possibility.
“It’s not something I ever took seriously because I just assumed that someone else would get there first, honestly.”
Magnus went on to solidify that world title run by defeating the man who vacated the title in the first place in a returning AJ Styles. Magnus beat AJ to be the undisputed TNA world heavyweight champion.
After a solid seven year run in TNA, Aldis left the company to join his friend Jeff Jarrett’s upstart Global Force Wrestling promotion. He went on to be crowned the inaugural Global Heavyweight champion. When the company failed to make a TV deal, Aldis headed for the independents wrestling all over the country. It was then that musician turned wrestling promoter Billy Corgan came calling.
Corgan loved Aldis’ work in TNA and the indies and wanted to make him the crown jewel of his newly purchased National Wrestling Alliance (NWA). Corgan envisioned Aldis being a traveling worlds champion very much like Harley Race and Ric Flair were for the NWA during their heyday. Nick Aldis became known as ‘The National Treasure’ and would defend the NWA worlds title nationally and globally. ‘The Aldis Crusade’ as it was known, was Corgan’s attempt to restore the credibility of the NWA title by having Nick Aldis travel to 3 continents defending the belt.
Aldis lost the title to Cody Rhodes at the largest independent show in history (All In). The show sold a record 11,263 tickets. The most for a non WWE/WCW in the United States. Aldis would eventually regain the title from Rhodes and hold the belt for another 1,043 days. Sadly, Aldis and Corgan had a very bitter and personal fall out with each other due to creative differences that led to Aldis parting ways from the NWA.
Aldis took a semi hiatus from wrestling spending more time at home with his child while his wife fellow wrestler Mickie James wrestled more of a full time schedule. Aldis did wrestle, but it was more of a part time thing. In 2023, WWE came calling and offered Aldis a job as a trainer/producer/on screen authority figure. Aldis put his active wrestling career on pause to take the opportunity to work for the company he always had his eyes set on as a youngster in the business.
David Fullam
He was so good as the NWA Champion.