The Curse, The Knicks, and The Very Nice Very Evil Man Behind It All

And that is where it all began.

April 2026. Danhausen walks onto the set of ESPN's First Take, stands across from Stephen A. Smith, and with complete sincerity and a jar of teeth, curses the New York Knicks. The Knicks were coming off a Game 1 win against the Atlanta Hawks, 113-102. Good times were rolling.

Then the curse hit.

The Knicks proceeded to lose the next two games. 107-106. 109-108. Coincidence? Probably. Most likely not.

Enter a desperate Knicks fan with access to Cameo and a willingness to spend real human monies. They paid Danhausen to lift the curse off the Knicks and redirect it toward their enemies. Danhausen, being a reasonable businessman, obliged.

The curse was real, the uncursing was realer, and Danhausen took full credit as he should.

Then the Eastern Conference Finals arrived. Cleveland Cavaliers. Danhausen showed back up at ESPN, jar of teeth in hand, and officially cursed Cleveland on national television. Game 1, the Cavs blew a 22-point lead in the final eight minutes. The Knicks went on a 44-11 run and won in overtime. Cavs fans were so desperate they started hiring Etsy witches to reverse the hex. Danhausen has since stated he will only keep the curse lifted if James Dolan gives him front row courtside seats situated exactly between Timothee Chalamet and Kylie Jenner.

Perfectly reasonable demands.

Now. You may know me for my Knicks content or my book reviews. But one of my other great passions is professional wrestling. And Danhausen is exactly one of the reasons I love it. So let me ask the obvious question.

Who the hell is Danhausen?

Very Nice. Very Evil. Very him.

Danhausen is not the person you picture when you think of a professional wrestler. On Earth he is about 5'10" and 175 lbs. But his permanent address is 1313 Mockingbird Lane. Look that up if you are unfamiliar. When he is in character, when he is fully himself, he is 6'7" and 300 lbs. He carries that energy into every wrestling appearance, every media appearance, every interaction. The presence is undeniable.

Here is the thing though. He did not start that way.

He started in 2013. Working as a nursing assistant in Detroit, taking wrestling bookings on the side, learning the ropes. Early on he tried to be what he thought a wrestler was supposed to be. Generic face paint. Tough guy. Badass. Evil in the conventional sense. It was a cover for who he actually was. And eventually he stopped hiding it.

When he fully leaned into being Very Nice, Very Evil, he basically strapped a rocket to himself. It was not the fastest rocket ship. But it got him to the moon.

The character stood out immediately because there was nobody like him anywhere in professional wrestling. A horror comedy persona somewhere between a 1950s monster movie host and a late night talk show presenter. He described himself once as Conan O'Brien possessed by a demon. That is the most accurate description that exists. He carries a jar of teeth. The teeth of his enemies. He wears a cape. He has a vocabulary that is entirely his own. His fans are fanhausens. Money is human monies. Anyone who swears near him is a swear wolf. He needs a blimp. He has always needed that blimp. He deserves that blimp.

Everything he said and did became instantly quotable, instantly shareable, instantly part of wrestling internet culture. And he had no machine behind him. None. Just himself.

He understood early that an independent wrestling show reaches a few hundred people. The internet reaches millions. So he invested in his YouTube channel, producing genuinely high quality comedy vlogs and sketches with other wrestlers. He built his social media presence before anyone expected independent wrestlers to do that. He treated content creation as seriously as the wrestling itself. He built his own merchandise empire with a creative partner, and the shirts were actually good. They were very Danhausen. People wanted to wear them. They still do.

The moment that really pushed him over the edge into mainstream consciousness was a podcast appearance. His fanbase made enough noise online that Conan O'Brien eventually figured out who this guy was. Danhausen appeared on Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend in early 2021 and walked out with an entire new audience that had never watched a wrestling match in their life. They loved him anyway. Because of course they did.

Ring of Honor recognized him before the big companies did, giving him his first national platform and the Best New Star award in 2020. But by the time the big companies came calling, Danhausen had already built something real entirely on his own terms.

Finally, one of the big boys called. AEW.

January 2022. AEW ran a big Beach Break special and during an Orange Cassidy match, Danhausen appeared from under the ring. The crowd lost their minds. He went right to work, immediately cursing Adam Cole. He linked up with Orange Cassidy and the Best Friends stable which made perfect sense because they all operated in the same lane. Comedy with heart.

Then came the pairing that really got people talking. HOOKhausen.

HOOK is a second generation wrestler, son of the legendary Taz, all business, stone cold quiet, undefeated at the time. Danhausen is animated, over the top, trying to curse everybody in sight. Night and day. It was working fantastically.

And then he was gone.

I think I saw him on AEW television maybe five or six times total. He eventually suffered what on Earth you would call a torn pectoral muscle, which kept him off television. But even after he healed, nothing. Still under contract. Still invisible on TV. He kept his own momentum going by working independent shows, because at least AEW allowed that. But it did not make sense. AEW felt like it should have been the place for him. It just was not.

When it was time to leave, he left. And WWE was waiting.

February 2026. WWE had been building anticipation for weeks around a mysterious coffin being shipped back and forth between shows. The rumor mill was running hot about a major star arriving. The night came. Elimination Chamber in Chicago. A smart crowd. The coffin opened. A laugh echoed through the arena. A woman in Danhausen face paint appeared. And then Danhausen himself stepped out.

There was some confusion. Some disappointment from people expecting someone else. But here is what I think actually happened. The boos were not for Danhausen. The boos were because he came out, did his thing, and then the lights went out and he disappeared. They wanted more. They always want more with Danhausen. One of the women in face paint was his wife, who helps choreograph the whole presentation. The little puffs of pyro that did not quite work properly? That is just what happens sometimes when Danhausen's magic is involved. It tracks completely. For the people who knew who he was, it worked. For the people who did not, they were about to find out.

The dirt sheets immediately declared it a flop. They ran with the discourse. They questioned the whole thing. And then Monday Night RAW happened two days later.

Danhausen did what Danhausen does. He was himself. He showed up with a list of demands. He needed a blimp. A Hall of Fame induction this year. A personal assistant. A personal camera boy. A photo of Triple H pointing at him. His face on all the trucks. Completely reasonable. Then he ran into Dominik Mysterio, who is a jerk, and cursed him. Later that same night Dominik lost his match. And just like that, WWE was off to the races with Danhausen.

He became one of the best selling merchandise people in the company almost immediately. The audience was already there waiting for him. He did not need to be built. He came pre-built. Curses were landing. Backstage interactions were happening constantly. The fallout from the curses was immediate every single time.

His current situation involves the Miz. Danhausen wanted the Miz as his mentor. The Miz refused. So Danhausen cursed him. Everything has been downhill for the Miz since. It came to a head at Backlash where Danhausen needed a tag team partner to face the Miz and Kit Wilson. His solution was to clone himself. Apparently the calculations were off. What popped out of the new coffin was Minihausen. Not quite what was expected. But it worked out. Danhausen and Minihausen pulled off the win.

If any of this is interesting to you, look up the Danhausen WWE segments on YouTube. His interactions with Dominik, the Miz, Kit Wilson, and others. And while you are at it, look up his ESPN appearances because that is where this whole story for Knicks fans started.

Speaking of which. There is one more layer to all of this that is almost too perfect.

The Miz is from Cleveland, Ohio. Home of the Cleveland Cavaliers. Danhausen originally wanted the Miz as his mentor. The Miz refused. Danhausen cursed him. The Knicks just swept the Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference Finals and are heading to the NBA Finals on an 11-game winning streak — the greatest sustained run in NBA history, regular season or playoffs included. The Miz does not believe in curses. The math does not care.

Danhausen is just doing his thing. Thriving in every way possible.

Look, Danhausen is one of the reasons I love professional wrestling. Not specifically just him, but everything he represents. The idea that something like this can work. That a 5'10", 175 lb guy from Detroit who used to work as a nursing assistant can become one of the most over people on the biggest wrestling stage in the world by simply refusing to be anything other than himself. He crossed over into mass media. He is one of the top merchandise sellers in WWE. He has a deal with Adventure Media, so do not be surprised if you see Danhausen on a movie screen near you soon.

No matter what you look like. No matter what size you are. If you have the determination and the creativity and the willingness to just be fully, completely, unapologetically yourself, you can make it work. Danhausen proved that.

Very Nice. Very Evil. And absolutely thriving.

Now go look up some Danhausen stuff. YouTube. Right now. His WWE segments, his ESPN appearances, his indie stuff. All of it. Do it.

Or risk being cursed.

You have been warned.

★ Update — May 23, 2026 (Because of course this happened.)

While you were reading this, Danhausen went ahead and made it official.

WWE x New York Knicks. An actual merch collection. Two shirts — "Uncursed Your Knicks" and "You Are Uncursed" — available now at WWE Shop. He even put it in the tweet: order it, or... you are cursed.

The man is not just a wrestling character anymore. He is a legitimate crossover brand.

Very Nice. Very Evil. Very business savvy.