CINCINNATI -- A guy from one of Cincinnati's rougher neighborhoods climbed his way to the top of pro wrestling Sunday night, taking the World Heavyweight Championship.
Dean Ambrose, born Jonathan Good, won the WWE Money In The Bank ladder match and pinned WWE Champion Seth Rollins to win the belt.
DEAN AMBROSE is the NEWWWW @WWE World Heavyweight Champion! #MITB pic.twitter.com/d8SAV8Yptd
— WWE (@WWE) June 20, 2016
"It's not me, it's not just me. It's all the people who supported me along the way," Ambrose said about his championship. "This is theirs. This belongs to them."
Ambrose, who's also wrestled professionally under the name Jon Moxley, told SLAM! Wrestling he had to be independent growing up in an "outlaw neighborhood" on Cincinnati's East Side.
"For instance, there were times that I would have to cave in and do something like sell somebody's drugs, just so I wouldn't get beaten half to death," he said. "But then there were other times where dudes would catch me walking by and try to push me around, and I had to draw a line, even if I was gonna get pulverized. I ended up earning respect that way -- not that I cared, I just wanted out."
Ambrose, now 30, said wrestling was his way out of that life. In his teenage years, he said he started training under Cincinnati wrestling legend Les Thatcher, then worked his way up through Cincinnati's Heartland Wrestling Association, Insanity Pro Wrestling, Combat Zone Wrestling, Dragon Gate USA, eventually signing a deal with the WWE in 2011.
He qualified for the Money in the Bank ladder match by defeating Dolph Ziggler on WWE Raw last month.
Ambrose now lives in Las Vegas.
