Mike Santana Explains How His 'Cruz Montana' WWE Name Is A Tribute To His Father

The former Mike Santana has confirmed how his new WWE name of Cruz Montana is a tribute to his father, revealing the new moniker is taken from two characters in the movie Blood In Blood Out, which Santana watched with his father when he was a child.

Cruz Montana stated on Busted Open After Dark:

"First and foremost, the name, I put it together to honour my father, who passed away. I've been very open about how much my father meant to me in my life and how close I've held him throughout this journey. My name, Mike Santana, was in honour of my grandmother, who is the woman who saved my life and introduced me to wrestling. When this opportunity came about, I was like, 'My name has to mean something.' That was it, it was to honour my father.

"My dad and I, a lot of our relationship revolved around watching movies together. Movies and music is what we bonded on. One of the movies he showed me when I was 10 or 11 – a movie I shouldn’t have been watching at that time – he told me, 'I want to show you this movie because there are a lot of life lessons in this movie that I want you to learn from.' That movie was Blood In Blood Out.

"Cruz Candelaria was a character in the movie who was an artist who fell into the grips of addiction. He lost his family and everything. Throughout the movie, he rebuilds himself and starts to flourish as an artist and regains his family. That was one correlation I had to my story. Montana was another character who was the head gang leader in the jail, but he was trying to change the perception of Latinos and preached empowerment. Instead of us selling drugs and killing each other, let’s grow, get out of the jail system, go back to school, and spread positivity. That was another correlation with me trying to show Latino people where I’m from that your dreams can be a reality. That was one of the main components.

"Also, Cruz, means cross. One of my boys used to say, 'For what you’ve done and struggled with, it’s like you’re carrying the cross.' Montana means mountain, and one thing my daughter tells me is, 'Papi, you move mountains for what you want.'"

Cruz Montana made his full-time WWE debut on the July 21 episode of NXT, with the 35-year-old not being mentioned by name by the NXT commentary team as he was instead referred to as simply a former TNA World Champion. It was then confirmed ahead of this week's NXT that Mike Santana had been renamed Cruz Montana, with Santana stating the name was inspired by his late father, who passed away in 2020.

H/T Fightful