The Knicks’ historic championship run started with a Cameo from WWE wrestler Danhausen.
While recording his Cameo for a fan just before game 6 of the Knicks/Hawks NBA playoffs series, the Very Nice, Very Evil brawler made the fate-changing decision to uncurse the New York City team. From that point on, the Knicks went on a 13-game winning streak that got cut short in the third game of the Finals against the San Antonio Spurs in Madison Square Garden. It was the game Donald Trump attended.
With a little help from the Wu-Tang clan during the halftime show in game 4, the Knicks bounced back and finished the job in game 5.
Danhausen was present for all of it, and it resulted in the creation of special NY/Danhausen merchandise, interviews with ESPN, and playoff game appearances. Hell, even sports journalism giant Stephen A. Smith got the Danhausen treatment a few days before the uncursing. He was cursed on the show First Take.
The lesson here? There’s nothing more powerful than a wrestling gimmick that makes it to the highest echelons of the mainstream. Danhausen is the very embodiment of this. His case shows that knowing when not to let an opportunity pass up is half the battle. By going all in on the uncursing on the cusp of a pivotal game, he essentially inserted himself into the narrative of the Knicks’ first championship since 1973.
When asked whether he though the uncursing was real in the Tonight Show with Jimny Fallon, Knicks point guard and Finals MVP Jalen Brunson stated that he was “a little skeptical, but I mean, you have to believe it now.” It’s just not common to see this kind of synergy between wrestling and sports on a stage of this magnitude. In terms of cultural exposure, this is 80s Hulk Hogan big.
What’s impressive in this case is that the whole narrative unfolded with Danhausen in character, not as an official representative from another sport. It’s not The Rock engaging with another sport as Dwayne Johnson. Danhausen brought the wrestling world into the NBA and used it to his benefit.
It came at the heels of a failed uncursing attempt, too. In trying take over Grimace’s roll as a good luck charm for the NY Mets, Danhausen uncursed the baseball team on April 2026 after a string of losses. The counterspell didn’t seem to take as the Mets snapped a 12-game losing streak but then kept losing.
Smartly, though, the wrestler claimed the uncursing only worked 50% because the Mets never fulfilled his personalized merchandise demands or follow through with payment of the “human money” amount he asked for. He called an audible and it worked.
I wouldn’t be surprised if we see more wrestlers try their gimmicks at “changing” the course of other sporting events. In fact, the United States soccer team could do with an uncursing (though there’s not enough wrestling magic in the world to fix this one). What’s certain is that Danhausen will be present during the Knicks’ next season, when they’ll go for a repeat. Thankfully, they won’t need to have a curse lifted this time around. After New York won, Danhausen declared the team forever uncursed.
