Kyle Durden

Born in Torrington, Connecticut, Kyle Durden began his career at the Ring of Honor (ROH) Wrestling Academy in Bristol, PA in 2006. Under the training of Bryan Danielson as well as Shane Hagadorn he made his professional debut on 9-14-07 at ROH's Motor City Madness in a losing effort to Shane Hagadorn. Over the next several months he attempted to gain momentum against fellow ROH Academy graduates Alex Payne, Ernie Osiris, Rhett Titus. On 3-15-08 he also was part of the filming of the film "the Wrestler" as they filmed in Dover, NJ. The most success he received in ROH as an active wrestle was a series of wins in Tag-Team matches with Pelle Primeau as his partner. Also at this time in 2008 Kyle began making appearances for the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) in the north-east initially as part of NWA Liberty States. Developing the character of "Internet Millionaire" Kyle Durden, based loosely off of Girls Gone Wild founder Joe Francis, Kyle joined the stable of the Playaz Club (Dave Greco, Erik Andretti, Justin Corino, Danny Demanto) manager and sometimes 5th member leading them to the NWA Liberty States Tag Team championships. One of the more notable feuds the stable had was against former WCW & WWF World Champion Psycho Sid, of which Kyle's open challenge to Sid resulted in a vicious power-bomb at an outdoors event in Newark, NJ on June 14, 2008. Kyle would make one of his last appearances as a wrestler for the ROH promotion on July 26, 2008 at the New Horizons event in the Honor Rumble match by attempting to eliminate Bobby Dempsey with the distraction of a cheeseburger. Months later with the departure of Gabe Sapolsky as booker for the ROH promotion and Adam Pearce taking over the role, Kyle transitioned from wrestler to backstage interviewer for the company. For the remainder of 2008 and the first months of 2009 he continued to wrestle throughout the north-east for various independent promotions while continuing to manage the Playaz Club in NWA as well as strengthening his broadcasting work. February 28, 2009 ROH had its first national TV taping for their new program on Mark Cuban's HDnet giving Kyle Durden national attention as one of the voices of the program. In this position he was recurring used as a comedic straight man for Austin Aries "A Double" persona as well as memorable interactions with Steve Corino & Kevin Steen. The program would be canceled in the first part of 2011 by HDnet. This along with ROH being sold to Sinclair broadcasting, as well as Kyle relocating to the Orlando area, would mean his leaving the company.