Drew McIntyre says it was not until 2024 that he felt WWE fans truly knew who he was, even after being WWE Champion more than once.

McIntyre was asked on The Joe Vulpis Podcast whether there was a match or moment when he understood how to control a crowd.

“It took a very long time before I felt like people truly, like, knew me, knew Drew McIntyre, cared about me. I don’t want to use the word, like, over, but over enough where I walk out, people go, ‘I know Drew, I know what he’s about.’ And truly, there was times where I felt it, but truly, truly, from like ’24 onwards, so the past couple of years, I felt like, okay, I know what to do,” McIntyre said.

“And I felt at times before that, like I’ve been WWE Champion multiple times. I’ve been the guy and whatever for a period of time before that, but that’s where I felt like, okay, I can go out and I know what to manipulate them,” he said. “If I’ve got the microphone, if I’ve got match time, I know I’ll get exactly what I want from the people.”

Earlier in the interview, McIntyre tied the change to playing a version of himself rather than a character, which he said came together “around like 2022, ’23, especially ’24, when I was with Punk.”

“There’s years that I just played a character instead of being the character,” he said. “The more real it is to me, the more it comes across, the more I can feel it, the more I can project whatever I want to project.”

He said The Undertaker gave him the same advice early in his career, when Vince McMahon put Undertaker in charge of him during his “Chosen One” run.

“My favorite one was, ‘Stop playing the wrestler and be the wrestler.’ And I was like, okay, thank you, sir. And I’d walk away and be like, I’m in wrestling gear, I’m in a wrestling ring, I’m doing wrestling moves. Of course I’m being a wrestler,” McIntyre said. “And it wasn’t for years later, I was like, oh God, what he was saying was… He’s basically saying, ‘Freaking relax and be present.'”

McIntyre’s 2024 feud with CM Punk ran for most of the year. McIntyre won at SummerSlam, Punk won a strap match at Bash in Berlin, and Punk won the Hell in a Cell rubber match at Bad Blood in October. Punk has said it is the rivalry he expects to be remembered for.