Speaker 1: It's a good I'll tell you.
Speaker 2: Go to the Night, the Fantasy, Safan Louis Field, History,
Speaker 2: the Gold tell you.
Speaker 1: John, I'm doing great, crazy day. But uh, I'm glad
Speaker 1: I got a chance to sit down because we have
Speaker 1: a lot to talk about today, Steve fall Uh And
Speaker 1: actually it should be like a two parter and we'll
Speaker 1: explain as we get into this.
Speaker 2: Yes, it should be because today we're talking about Survivor
Speaker 2: series nineteen ninety one, and this Survivor series really connects
Speaker 2: to another event this Tuesday in Texas, which might be
Speaker 2: voted the worst name ever for an event, But we
Speaker 2: will get to that possibly in another episode down the line.
Speaker 3: But today's Adversaries ninety one.
Speaker 2: Before we get into anything, what was it like having
Speaker 2: these events either on Thanksgiving or this one on Thanksgiving Eve?
Speaker 2: What was it like for you because everyone's away for
Speaker 2: their family, so what Thanksgiving things are actually happening backstage
Speaker 2: to feel like you're celebrating, Yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: I mean, you got used to it. This is that's
Speaker 1: what we did, and it's like anything else. And it's
Speaker 1: been pretty much the story of my career is that
Speaker 1: when you work in entertainment, television or news, whatever it is.
Speaker 1: You're working on holidays and weekends and that's that's just
Speaker 1: the life. And you have crazy hours. You're either waking
Speaker 1: up too earlier, you're staying up too late, but that
Speaker 1: is part of the business. And you know, of course
Speaker 1: we'd gotten used to doing this event on Thanksgiving Day
Speaker 1: and this this was different because it was Thanksgiving Eve,
Speaker 1: which meant we'd all be home for at least the
Speaker 1: ones that lived in Stanford, because you know, a lot
Speaker 1: of times these guys really didn't even have the chance
Speaker 1: to get home. And of course, as you mentioned, this
Speaker 1: Tuesday in Texas was an event that was going to
Speaker 1: be taking place not many days later, so uh, you know,
Speaker 1: it was just it was just part of our life, uh.
Speaker 1: And uh it was nice in that sense that I
Speaker 1: remember we did get to because we would take you know,
Speaker 1: the jet and be back sometimes sometime in the middle
Speaker 1: of the morning, but you'd be uh, you know, back
Speaker 1: home the next day. So it was in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways, it was just another one of these pay
Speaker 1: per view events. And it's funny as I look back
Speaker 1: to those thinking today, you know, is that they they
Speaker 1: added this other event, you know, within a week and
Speaker 1: everybody's like, what the hell, Oh my god, how are
Speaker 1: we going to do this? And uh, you know, today
Speaker 1: it's just common practice. It's just kind of the way
Speaker 1: things are that they have them basically. Uh you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes more, but one or two a month. So but
Speaker 1: back then, you know, we had the Big four basically,
Speaker 1: and it was the way the whole season went, if
Speaker 1: you want to call it, and so uh to be
Speaker 1: but to be able to turn it around and do
Speaker 1: this other one, uh, it was a it was a
Speaker 1: big ask back then for everybody involved.
Speaker 2: Are you being fed though, you be is there a turkey,
Speaker 2: is there stuffing? Is there mashed potatoes backstage? Or is
Speaker 2: that not happening?
Speaker 1: No, that was always the case. Especially they'd have a
Speaker 1: big spread, a big turkey spread for those days and
Speaker 1: you know, it wasn't the greatest food in the world,
Speaker 1: but you did appreciate the fact that they didn't know
Speaker 1: it was a holiday and you did have turkey and
Speaker 1: all the trimmings. So uh yeah, that night there was
Speaker 1: pretty It was the same thing because, as I said,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe a lot of these guys maybe weren't
Speaker 1: going to have the opportunity to get home to spend
Speaker 1: some time with their loved ones.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I always thought that was strange when you look
Speaker 2: at wrestling, and even as a fan at the time,
Speaker 2: you're thinking, how do you convince your parents on Thanksgiving Day?
Speaker 2: This one of the Thanksgiving Eve, Thanksgiving Day every year
Speaker 2: for the past couple. Hey, mom and Dad, I know,
Speaker 2: Grandma and Grandpa are coming over and they drove all
Speaker 2: the way from Florida to see here.
Speaker 3: But can we watch Survivor series? Is that all you think?
Speaker 2: It's the hard sell for regular people having Thanksgiving versus
Speaker 2: just a single person who's gonna watch wrestling.
Speaker 1: Well, I think you know exactly the way we tried
Speaker 1: to sell it. It was no different than you know,
Speaker 1: watching football on holidays, and this was another event I
Speaker 1: must see. So I think that a lot of people
Speaker 1: that was part of the holiday for them. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: have this, you know what? Great? How what could it
Speaker 1: be better? What could be better? Then you get to
Speaker 1: have Thanksgiving, which is a happens to be one of
Speaker 1: my favorite holidays because you don't have to bring gifts necessarily.
Speaker 1: If you're going to somebody's house, you could bring a
Speaker 1: bottle of wine or something like they say, don't come
Speaker 1: with your arm swinging but for the most part where
Speaker 1: you're not worrying. You didn't have to watch shopping and
Speaker 1: get special gifts for everybody you show up. Just stuff
Speaker 1: your ass full of food all day, loosen the belt,
Speaker 1: and sit back in the couch and watch, you know, football,
Speaker 1: or watch of course the Survivor series. What else would
Speaker 1: you want to do. And it's it was a perfect holiday,
Speaker 1: So that wasn't a tough sell for people who are
Speaker 1: who were wrestling fans at the time.
Speaker 2: It's just so funny because for years it was on Sundays,
Speaker 2: and then now it's on Saturdays, and then first so
Speaker 2: long it was just like it's a Monday, it's Thanksgiving,
Speaker 2: it's on Thanksgiving Eve. There was no rhyme or reason
Speaker 2: on when these things landed. It was just a weird
Speaker 2: situation for cyber series anyone. It's funny because doing research
Speaker 2: for this event, Okay, first I want to do because
Speaker 2: I want to, oh, be a great idea to connect
Speaker 2: this to this Tuesday in Texas. I have a double
Speaker 2: bonus episode. But this Survivor series, any review you find
Speaker 2: all negative. There is not a good thing to be
Speaker 2: said about the Survivor series. The commentary is so all right.
Speaker 2: I watched it, and I'll tell you what. I watched
Speaker 2: it half cocked. You know, I'm doing the things I'm
Speaker 2: looking at it, maybe folding some lawn and do playing.
Speaker 3: With my kids, but I'm watching it.
Speaker 2: What it's consistently great about it is the commentary of
Speaker 2: Bob Heat and Grilla mo on Soon. Any garbage could
Speaker 2: be on television, but listening to them talk, I was
Speaker 2: I was like, wow, you know, I could see why
Speaker 2: someone could think this is bad, but also commentary is
Speaker 2: just so good.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, they're just so good together. I was watching
Speaker 1: some of it, and you know, the comments and other
Speaker 1: stuff with Gorilla and Bobby, and I remember one where,
Speaker 1: you know, Bobby's commenting how you know he keeps going
Speaker 1: in and out of the ring, and Gorilla says, so,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna throw you in and out of
Speaker 1: this arena if you don't shut up. You know, like
Speaker 1: the kind of the stuff that he could say to him.
Speaker 1: And that's why that dynamic works so well. I've mentioned
Speaker 1: that before, because Bobby he would let Bobby go, go, go, go,
Speaker 1: mouthing off, mouth and off, and then it was like
Speaker 1: the big SmackDown and then Bobby would have to retreat
Speaker 1: and kind of get okay, get back into the good
Speaker 1: graces of Gorilla and they could continue on. And that
Speaker 1: was one of the one of the wonderful parts of
Speaker 1: their of their dynamic that made it work so well.
Speaker 3: So you agree though that you think this is a
Speaker 3: terrible pay per review.
Speaker 2: Now I'm interested to see your perspective on this because
Speaker 2: you worked there.
Speaker 3: Why do you feel like it is well?
Speaker 1: And I think that you have to couple this with
Speaker 1: this Tuesday and Texas, which we'll be doing another episode on,
Speaker 1: which is a whole other hit to dive into. But overall,
Speaker 1: and you know, I made my living shilling events. That
Speaker 1: was pretty much what my main job was there. And
Speaker 1: as I've explained before, you know, Superstars and Wrestling Challenge
Speaker 1: were actually just one big commercial that was it was
Speaker 1: all those were promotional tools to get people to go
Speaker 1: to the house shows, and of course, as we started
Speaker 1: with the pay per views, it was all about getting
Speaker 1: people to buy the pay per views. And this event
Speaker 1: Survivor series for a number of reasons, which I will
Speaker 1: talk about, was one big supercharge. Wrestling Challenge is really
Speaker 1: what it came down to. And it's funny I've heard
Speaker 1: people make comments of you know, that Undertaker Hulk match
Speaker 1: show was you know, the third match in and that's
Speaker 1: you know, because Hulk Hogan wanted to be home with
Speaker 1: a family, Like, come on, that was not it at all.
Speaker 1: It was brilliant in a sense. Okay, we get this
Speaker 1: match over early, we create all this controversy, and then
Speaker 1: for the rest of the pay per view we get
Speaker 1: to sell what's going to happen next. So I mean,
Speaker 1: that's what it was all about. This was a gigantic
Speaker 1: promotional event, and I think a lot of people saw
Speaker 1: through that. And we had some other moments which are
Speaker 1: worth discussing. But when you come down to it, and
Speaker 1: I was never a huge fan of these events. When
Speaker 1: you had four or five, whatever whatever number of teens
Speaker 1: you would go in there because after a while, there's
Speaker 1: only so much you can do with them, and depending
Speaker 1: on their level of skill, whether orut those match were
Speaker 1: matches were entertaining, and sometimes you would it would be,
Speaker 1: you know, two of the guys were good, but the
Speaker 1: rest of it was just you know, slop, and so
Speaker 1: I was never a huge fan of it. And then
Speaker 1: of course they threw in this match with the Hulk
Speaker 1: and the Undertaker with all the idea of what was
Speaker 1: going to happen next, and to try and do this event.
Speaker 1: Can we turn around an event within days and capitalize
Speaker 1: after over what happened previously these days before, which which
Speaker 1: was you know, a predecessor to to what they do
Speaker 1: even today, where you can have an event like this
Speaker 1: and then build something up and just a few days later,
Speaker 1: we're going to get some kind of end to it,
Speaker 1: some kind of thing between these two guys where you
Speaker 1: get it settled. So it was, you know, they were
Speaker 1: trying things out. They wanted to see can.
Speaker 3: We do this?
Speaker 1: The event didn't do great anyway, if you look at
Speaker 1: the buy raiate it was down from the year before.
Speaker 1: And then this Tuesday in Texas, which took place just
Speaker 1: a few days later, five days later, you know, or
Speaker 1: I guess six d it was what Wednesday to a Tuesday.
Speaker 1: I don't know the exact dates how it played out
Speaker 1: day wise, but to turn something around that quickly, you know,
Speaker 1: I didn't make some money off, but I think the
Speaker 1: buy rate for the second event was about half of
Speaker 1: what they did. I think it was three hundred thousand
Speaker 1: something like that. And then this day this said, the
Speaker 1: event This Tuesday in Texas did about half of that, So.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there you go, you were paying half. It was
Speaker 2: twelve ninety five for this Tuesday in Texas. It was
Speaker 2: twenty seven dollars and ninety five cents for Survivor series.
Speaker 2: But yes, that is the number one feeling I felt
Speaker 2: too when watching it for the first time ever.
Speaker 3: Watching it and you're thinking.
Speaker 2: Oh, that's gonna be great, and you think, well, hoping
Speaker 2: versus Taker is is now okay whatever, or it ends.
Speaker 2: But this event, when it even starts, When this event starts,
Speaker 2: the first thing you see is Jack Tunny promoting.
Speaker 3: This Tuesday in Texas. That's the first thing you see.
Speaker 2: He's talking about the most famous, one of the most
Speaker 2: disturbing moments ever, the Cobra of biting Macho Man's arm
Speaker 2: on television.
Speaker 3: It's one of the greatest things.
Speaker 2: I know, we'll do like a full episode about just
Speaker 2: that moment at some point. But the outrage that comes
Speaker 2: forth from this from fans and being just this is crazy.
Speaker 2: What were your thoughts on this? Did you get so
Speaker 2: much pushback from this event? That's why you had to,
Speaker 2: you know, ban reptiles from ringside?
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, of course, which which they were hoping, which
Speaker 1: they were hoping to God that it would happen, and
Speaker 1: it did. They knew that men people are going to
Speaker 1: go out of their minds, and they knew that right
Speaker 1: away just by the reaction to people at Ringside and
Speaker 1: that arena, when you know Randy was was locked up
Speaker 1: with the cobra. I I first of the couple of things,
Speaker 1: I want to give credit to President Jack Tunney because
Speaker 1: I think it really if you think he was the
Speaker 1: perfect person to play that role he and he pulled
Speaker 1: it off really well and with that authority and you know,
Speaker 1: the belief and the everything that went with it. But
Speaker 1: I just find it so amusing that, you know, all
Speaker 1: animals are all animals are banned from Ringside and one
Speaker 1: of the reasons with the cobra is because well, yeah
Speaker 1: it was a cobra and it and it bit Randy Savage,
Speaker 1: but it was the fact that well it was supposed
Speaker 1: to be the venomized and and that's like one of
Speaker 1: the things he mentions in the in the banning is
Speaker 1: that it didn't turn out that way because Randy Savage
Speaker 1: ended up in the hospital. That's why we're really outraged
Speaker 1: here so.
Speaker 2: That's venomized too, venomized king bit one of your employees
Speaker 2: that you're in charge of.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I'm telling you that it's just the absurdity
Speaker 1: of it all. And the you know, were the banning animals.
Speaker 1: It's good thing that you know that undertake it didn't
Speaker 1: have a buzzard that needed to be ringside because we
Speaker 1: would see that later. But uh, you know, it just
Speaker 1: just went with how just insane all of it was.
Speaker 1: And if you didn't catch on right away, because wrestling
Speaker 1: fans have always been smart in a lot in many
Speaker 1: part heart of this, and I think that early on
Speaker 1: they realized we're we're getting a little bait and switch
Speaker 1: happening here, guys.
Speaker 3: I think, though, how do you.
Speaker 2: The king Cobra thing is one of those moments where
Speaker 2: you always hear, like, who you don't want to act
Speaker 2: with animals and children? This king Cobra cannot be controlled
Speaker 2: to get off, macho man. It's one of the most
Speaker 2: disturbing images you've ever seen. The Camemean Gang close ups
Speaker 2: of the snake. And I even sent you a link.
Speaker 2: I watched the pre show, the showdown that you hosted
Speaker 2: in a bow tie nice tucks looks great, looks great,
Speaker 2: and they show.
Speaker 1: This that's the one Bruce Fritchard ruined, by the way,
Speaker 1: but that's another story.
Speaker 3: Oh okay, we'll talk about that later off camera.
Speaker 2: Vince though, screaming, got a bridge of famized, got a
Speaker 2: bridge here, and then they then you come back and
Speaker 2: you're like, yep, it was venomized. It had venom inside.
Speaker 3: Somehow.
Speaker 1: It's evil. Yeah. Yeah, how he survived we will never know.
Speaker 1: But you know, Jake talks about though that that because
Speaker 1: of all of the Rigamoreau, the stress that Randy put
Speaker 1: him through about you know, a brother, I want you
Speaker 1: to put that and I want to see it bite you,
Speaker 1: you know, and the whole to make sure it was good.
Speaker 1: So Jake talks about before he went out there, you
Speaker 1: know with that, with that cobre, he gave it a
Speaker 1: couple of good you know, that thing was ready to
Speaker 1: bite anything, and that's why it locked on. It wasn't
Speaker 1: going anywhere. Somebody had to pay dude.
Speaker 3: It's still where I think it's top.
Speaker 2: That is the top moment, like mankind being like tossed
Speaker 2: over a hell in the cell, the through it and
Speaker 2: thumbtacks is just on the level because he controlled. He
Speaker 2: decided to do those things. He decided to go up there.
Speaker 2: This snake is like, I'm gonna eat your and everyone.
Speaker 2: He's gonna love it. Yeah, well we'll do We'll do
Speaker 2: a full episode later on about why match him in
Speaker 2: and Jake had to happen, because obviously Warrior. We did
Speaker 2: a whole episode about it about war being fired by
Speaker 2: fitsg Man after SummerSlam ninety one, which changes everything about
Speaker 2: this event. But the first thing we see again some
Speaker 2: ever series ninety one is Jack Tunny promoting this Tuesday
Speaker 2: in Texas saying that I know everyone wants Machaban to
Speaker 2: be reinstated, but he won't be. But he will be
Speaker 2: this Tuesday in Texas, and Jake the Stick is out
Speaker 2: of his Survivor series. Match imagine you bought this for Jake. Yeah,
Speaker 2: they but they do promos, They do promos. They still
Speaker 2: come out and cut Hey, by the way, this Tuesday
Speaker 2: in Texas.
Speaker 3: Hey, this Tuesday in Texas.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, and you know that said justice was out
Speaker 1: too now, but at least people had an idea of
Speaker 1: that before they got out the wallet. But I also
Speaker 1: wonder about, you know, the whole thing that you know,
Speaker 1: Sid had the damaged elbow. I think that was the
Speaker 1: injury that they said was inflicted upon him. But you know,
Speaker 1: I have to wonder about that. You never really knew
Speaker 1: what was the work and what wasn't because Sid also
Speaker 1: loved softball, and it has come out, I mean really
Speaker 1: that when it came down to it, that Sid really
Speaker 1: didn't care that much about the business so much, but
Speaker 1: he knew it. It was it was a great income.
Speaker 1: But you know, you got to imagine an event like this,
Speaker 1: it's on Thanksgiving, He's not really He's just going to
Speaker 1: be a team guy whatever. Oh man. But I know
Speaker 1: nothing about that. I have no idea if any of
Speaker 1: that may have have been true. I just knew that
Speaker 1: that he liked softball a lot, and there were a
Speaker 1: few occasions that he had talked about where you know,
Speaker 1: that was something he wanted to do more that week.
Speaker 1: If you listen to the podcast I did with him
Speaker 1: on Prime Time with Sean Mooney, he mentions his his
Speaker 1: fondness for softball. But that's uh, we digress. We get
Speaker 1: off the track here because then you have Jake Roberts,
Speaker 1: and everybody thinks who's gonna fill Sid's position, Who's going
Speaker 1: to be that team member. Actually, who who else could
Speaker 1: it be? Steve would see that man man. Yes, the
Speaker 1: heat that those two have, but what do they do?
Speaker 1: Randy Savage Jake Roberts has gone to so it's is
Speaker 1: gonna be less team members. Okay, I guess I already paid,
Speaker 1: so I'm gonna watch and see what happens. But what
Speaker 1: the hell?
Speaker 2: That's what makes this some ever series so hated because
Speaker 2: you have people being pulled from it because you're right again,
Speaker 2: I watched that showdown with you hosting it, and I've
Speaker 2: watched Random Superstars and Trustan Challenges get Ready for this,
Speaker 2: and they acknowledge on television multiple times who is going
Speaker 2: to replace Sid. It becomes like a theme through episodes
Speaker 2: of Who's going to replace him? Even even the w
Speaker 2: WF does a reinstate Macho Men hotline. Well, you could
Speaker 2: pay seventy nine cents to call the WWF to tell
Speaker 2: you that you want Macho Man reinstated. I did the math.
Speaker 2: Seventy nine cents in nineteen ninety one is only a
Speaker 2: dollar eighty five and twenty twenty five as record, this
Speaker 2: not a lot, but still then you pull apply.
Speaker 1: That by thousands though, and it does add up and.
Speaker 3: You pulled him. You had a doll and then you
Speaker 3: pull him.
Speaker 1: The balls of these people because they do what they're
Speaker 1: doing all along. We even had you know, the magazine
Speaker 1: was uh, we were putting all kinds of stuff in there,
Speaker 1: and and going into this, they knew what they were
Speaker 1: going to do. Once Sid was out, there wasn't a
Speaker 1: whole lot of discussion about, you know what, getting Randy
Speaker 1: in there. And I'm sure there was, but I think
Speaker 1: that they found the advantage of Okay, now we get
Speaker 1: we can build this up and then it could help
Speaker 1: us at the next event. So it really was and
Speaker 1: to the WWE's credit at the time, you know, they're
Speaker 1: trying all kinds of different things. I said before that
Speaker 1: you know, Vince had a great team of promotional people
Speaker 1: behind it. It wasn't just they weren't necessarily you know,
Speaker 1: guys that were wrestling people. They didn't come from wrestle.
Speaker 1: They came from promotions and what got people's butts into
Speaker 1: seats and what would get people to buy a pay
Speaker 1: per view and spend almost thirty dollars to get it.
Speaker 1: So they were experimenting to see how people would react
Speaker 1: to this stuff and as I said, was this was
Speaker 1: laying the carpet here as we would see the Golden
Speaker 1: Carpet as it would transpire in the years to come
Speaker 1: of how they would do these events. So it was
Speaker 1: it was an experiment. They were willing to risk, maybe
Speaker 1: some fan hire to get there. But you know, overall,
Speaker 1: I don't think people it wasn't a point where it
Speaker 1: was a disaster and people were going, I will never
Speaker 1: watch the WWE game. There wasn't that. They may have
Speaker 1: been disappointed, and we'll talk about the big main event,
Speaker 1: but overall, you know, I think that it was a
Speaker 1: time where you know, they were there was a lot
Speaker 1: going on, and they were trying to find ways to
Speaker 1: keep that audience and keep people coming.
Speaker 2: I like that because you know, you go back a
Speaker 2: year ago, it's Servery Series nineteen ninety. There's a little
Speaker 2: like blurb that Satday Night's main event is going to
Speaker 2: be Tomorrow night. So they already obviously taped this event
Speaker 2: and it's WARR versus Billion Dollar Man. So during the
Speaker 2: Spivspery is nineteen ninety, it's barely there, but they acknowledge
Speaker 2: it for like a split second on the bottom of
Speaker 2: the screen that war is gonna fight Million Dollar Man.
Speaker 2: And I don't know if someone said, like, oh that worked,
Speaker 2: Like we had an event before the other event that
Speaker 2: we could use to promote this. So maybe you see
Speaker 2: a ratings pop you think we can pull the same
Speaker 2: shit off but with a pay per view instead, you know,
Speaker 2: on NBC, let's charge people pull ninety five. Because I'll
Speaker 2: be honest, it's not that big of d But if
Speaker 2: you're going to clearly start this event off with a
Speaker 2: commercial for this Tuesday in Texas As as like me
Speaker 2: convincing my dad to pay for this or someone, I
Speaker 2: might be a little upset.
Speaker 3: But the event's not terrible, but it's not great.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And and our motto really was you can't promote enough.
Speaker 1: I mean, for God's sake, people had to see my
Speaker 1: mug three times in every single show of promoting something
Speaker 1: or and then that would include a special report with
Speaker 1: Gene and all we were doing was sell it. And
Speaker 1: so it was something that people had very much gotten
Speaker 1: used to. But yeah, to just kick it off, but
Speaker 1: in a way that was creative, I thought, you know,
Speaker 1: have why not start with the with the president the
Speaker 1: authority of the WWE right there at the beginning telling
Speaker 1: you what you know, what's going on, because you all
Speaker 1: want to know. There's all these questions out there, we've
Speaker 1: got to get them answered. So what we're going to
Speaker 1: get the already on right away and just set it
Speaker 1: up at the same time selling it up.
Speaker 2: True, true, I do like the first match though, like
Speaker 2: they'll listen to these people. Got Rick Flair, who just
Speaker 2: came in to the WWE just a few months before that.
Speaker 2: He's got the Mount Tidy Bossi, Million Delaman and the Warlord.
Speaker 2: They're taking on Roddy Piper, who has a storyline with
Speaker 2: Ric Flair, Brett Hart, who's the storyline with the Mount Virgil,
Speaker 2: who's a storyline Million Dela Man British Bulldog storyline with
Speaker 2: the Warlords. Like everything matches up perfectly here. And Rick
Speaker 2: Flair does have we talked about on a Rick Flair episode.
Speaker 2: He has a championship belt that they are trying to
Speaker 2: blow out, but yet it have been informed it's a
Speaker 2: ww tag team title, a little blueish and it's missing
Speaker 2: some things on the side. So in reality, he's holding
Speaker 2: up a tag team title at the Farvesteries in front
Speaker 2: of the audience and they're like, I'm sorry, I'm not
Speaker 2: legion ado with champions.
Speaker 1: I don't think we get it too close to that camera, mister,
Speaker 1: because people like you would recognize what the what the
Speaker 1: heck it really was, but you got the point what
Speaker 1: he was trying to shoving in and hold Cogan's face.
Speaker 1: I'm a real champion and creating that. But as you
Speaker 1: mentioned that, that was a surprisingly good match. I think
Speaker 1: going in I didn't expect it to be much and
Speaker 1: and especially you know the warlord in there who couldn't
Speaker 1: do a tremendous amount because all those muscles got in
Speaker 1: the way. But uh, it really it it was surprisingly Yeah,
Speaker 1: a good a good match. The problem is, I said,
Speaker 1: then you get these other ones and then it just
Speaker 1: keeps going when you've just got these guys and it's
Speaker 1: the storyline of them, are you know, tough, tough to
Speaker 1: get over. But you know, they did have some drama
Speaker 1: that was involved. We'll talking you know, the Rockers and
Speaker 1: uh and then that that that big brawl where they
Speaker 1: just it's actually one of the best matches and then
Speaker 1: they come out and disqualify everybody and uh yeah, it
Speaker 1: like everybody's like wait a minute, it's like the best
Speaker 1: thing we've seen all night and then you just ding
Speaker 1: ding ding ding because he's reason he wins because he's
Speaker 1: out of the ring.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, everyone gets disqualified pretty much except I think
Speaker 2: Bulldog and Warlord get out and then the rest is yeah, yep,
Speaker 2: uh it made Rick for me if storyline. It made
Speaker 2: Rick Flair look like, oh, this guy's important, Like he
Speaker 2: just won this match against all these other people. Okay, cool,
Speaker 2: because that becomes a theme throw the night. It becomes
Speaker 2: like the Rick Flair Show as time goes on in
Speaker 2: this evening. But you know, it made him look great,
Speaker 2: I guess. But there's a there's an image online which
Speaker 2: is so funny because there's a promo before Thisever series
Speaker 2: where Flair is on the funeral parlor with Paul Bear
Speaker 2: and with Hogan and he's yelling a him like, you.
Speaker 3: Know, how along I've waited for this moment. He's like,
Speaker 3: I'm the real world champion.
Speaker 2: That's the first time they ever crossed paths, and that's
Speaker 2: a huge moment for professional wrestling because this event really
Speaker 2: starts off the idea of, oh shit, we're gonna get
Speaker 2: a Rick Flair whole Cogan storyline. It's gonna be on
Speaker 2: pay per view and it's gonna be at Russell and eight,
Speaker 2: which we had a whole episode about as well, where
Speaker 2: not does does.
Speaker 3: Not happen but that it doesn't work. Nope.
Speaker 2: The image though, is uh Rick Flair opening his robe,
Speaker 2: but it's blurred out because the Championship, so it looks
Speaker 2: like he's flashing.
Speaker 1: Which we're only doing for legal reasons. Yeah. And then
Speaker 1: uh and then the big the big cover part with
Speaker 1: you know, Taker and the ern and uh then they're
Speaker 1: all beaten up on the Hulkster, which yeah, so uh
Speaker 1: you know, uh, generating the heat, trying to make that
Speaker 1: happen and build that up, and as we talked about
Speaker 1: in that episode, uh, you know a lot of people
Speaker 1: were surprised that it didn't go from there and really
Speaker 1: build up and and something that people were demanding to see.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was surprised.
Speaker 2: I do like that funeral parlor thing because it's ye
Speaker 2: Taker ripping the ross off of Undertaker. Roddy Piper and
Speaker 2: Machimen are on commentary at the time they leave the booth,
Speaker 2: the grab chairs.
Speaker 3: It's not smash hit Rick Flair. He runs away. They
Speaker 3: start smashing to take her and he's just playing it off.
Speaker 3: Like he's a zombie. He can't feel it like that.
Speaker 2: You're really setting up because on television, Undertaker at this
Speaker 2: point undefeated. But if you watch like house shows, he's
Speaker 2: losing all the time. But if you're watching actually television,
Speaker 2: this guy's undefeated. And it's the gravest challenge because I again,
Speaker 2: I've watched that pre show beforehand that was free on
Speaker 2: the cable Guide television channel if you had it back
Speaker 2: in the day, and it's you and it. All it
Speaker 2: is is promotional tools for Taker in Hogan in really
Speaker 2: hitting home that the theme of this is the gravest challenge,
Speaker 2: and I do like that you talk about promotional and
Speaker 2: the w that to me is great, like this isn't
Speaker 2: just Survivor series.
Speaker 3: This is the gravest challenge for Hult Kogan.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I And I also want to say that I
Speaker 1: loved watching this because now this is a point where
Speaker 1: Undertaker has really embrace that character and and you really
Speaker 1: see him coming into his own You could see that
Speaker 1: confidence that that he had and uh in who he
Speaker 1: was in the ring, and the whole way that he
Speaker 1: was methodical, almost robotic, the when he would do something
Speaker 1: and he was really getting falling into that that character
Speaker 1: that would you know, carry him for the next umpteen
Speaker 1: years here the decades that really, but he before that,
Speaker 1: you know, it was kind of he was just I
Speaker 1: remember him first coming in and then when he was that,
Speaker 1: you know, the Undertaker character, and of course he needed
Speaker 1: Paul Baer to help sell that, but and he was
Speaker 1: still very understated, which was perfect for what he was
Speaker 1: doing and his development. But he was there and and
Speaker 1: you could see it. You could feel that presence of
Speaker 1: that character was going to be really strong, and he
Speaker 1: was he was getting really comfort ble in it. And
Speaker 1: I love when he uh we talk about the match,
Speaker 1: but when he was he's leaving and he does the
Speaker 1: thing with the the whites of his eyes as he
Speaker 1: you know, goes down and he's walking down this thing
Speaker 1: and he's carried. He's staying in it because he knows
Speaker 1: the camera is right there, and I was just like, man,
Speaker 1: he is really he is feeling it, and that that
Speaker 1: was I love watching that back.
Speaker 2: He drags the World Championship two and that was like
Speaker 2: the first time that people weren't wearing it or holding
Speaker 2: it up.
Speaker 3: He's I won this thing. That's great. I'm gonna drag it.
Speaker 1: I don't care.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that was it was good. It was amazing stuff.
Speaker 2: Speaking of Undertaker, this next matchup, I really want to
Speaker 2: ask you if you know anything about this. So the
Speaker 2: match that we see on television is Hackstar Jim Duggan,
Speaker 2: Sardant Slaughter Texas Tornado in al Mattotor, Tito Santana. They
Speaker 2: defeat Colonel Mustafa Berserker Hercules in Skinner. Okay, that's the
Speaker 2: match we get originally, though, in this matchup, there's three
Speaker 2: people missing and they've been replaced by other wrestlers.
Speaker 3: Speaking of Undertaker, this one jumps on at me.
Speaker 2: Ricky the Dragon Steamboat at this point is pretty much
Speaker 2: a dragon person is supposed to be on Jim Duggan's team,
Speaker 2: he gets.
Speaker 3: Replaced and it's Tito Santana.
Speaker 2: But yet, the story that I've read for years is
Speaker 2: he was asked a job to Undertaker on television, not
Speaker 2: at a house show on television, and he was supposed
Speaker 2: to lose again a week later to like really built
Speaker 2: Survivor series.
Speaker 3: What do you know about this?
Speaker 2: Because it seems like maybe he's just like I'm a Dragon,
Speaker 2: I'm not doing much here.
Speaker 3: I can go somewhere else.
Speaker 2: I become a world champion or a tag team champion instantly,
Speaker 2: which he does.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know the specifics of what Ricky was
Speaker 1: thinking at the time. I can't understand why he would
Speaker 1: have been hesitant because you know, they earned a place
Speaker 1: to a certain spot, they have a certain on to
Speaker 1: say of how their character is going to go, and uh,
Speaker 1: doing something like that takes you down a few pegs
Speaker 1: for sure. And UH, if if that's the decision he
Speaker 1: made and then went to management and told those guys, now,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to do it, which uh, you know
Speaker 1: several of them had done well, then you're gonna you're
Speaker 1: gonna pay a little price for that and uh, and
Speaker 1: that's what would have happened. But I I don't remember,
Speaker 1: you know exactly how that situation went down with him,
Speaker 1: But I do know that those guys, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: you've got to keep your place in the pecking order
Speaker 1: so that you can have more opportunities on these cards.
Speaker 1: And when depending on how it goes down, uh, you
Speaker 1: know they're going to have the center of the ring
Speaker 1: and that's that's that's more difficult to swallow. But if
Speaker 1: it's something else where, you know, it's a count out
Speaker 1: or some kind of dq or dirty dealings. But uh,
Speaker 1: I know with Undertaker, they just wanted him to be
Speaker 1: a force, that he was unstoppable. So it wasn't going
Speaker 1: to go down where it was, you know, unless it's
Speaker 1: somebody like Hulkogan, where he's going to have to perform
Speaker 1: some dirty deed to make it to walk away with
Speaker 1: the belt or walk away with a victory.
Speaker 2: It seems like though Ricky Steamboat, when he goes somewhere else,
Speaker 2: it always becomes World Champion, or like another championship goes
Speaker 2: around his waist, the WWE, or he won the Icy
Speaker 2: Championship from Macho Man Rustlina three, and then the story goes,
Speaker 2: he wanted time off because he's having it. He's he
Speaker 2: had a baby with a child. I can't imagine that
Speaker 2: went over well. And then here we are now, hey,
Speaker 2: I don't want to lose the take care. It's like,
Speaker 2: well we have a history, now you don't. You've done
Speaker 2: this between twice now. And I'm not saying it's right
Speaker 2: or wrong to say, hey, I want to protect my character,
Speaker 2: or hey I want to be home with my kids.
Speaker 3: But if you're in this.
Speaker 2: Business, I can't imagine bensing man and be like, oh
Speaker 2: that sounds great, Yeah you should do that, Like, oh,
Speaker 2: you want to the guy I'm trying to build up,
Speaker 2: you want to not lose to.
Speaker 3: I think we're done here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And and that's where you've got the conflict of
Speaker 1: as we've discussed that you need a great deal of
Speaker 1: confidence and feel like you're a headliner or at least
Speaker 1: near the top. And when management comes to you and
Speaker 1: says we're going to need you to do this to
Speaker 1: put some shine on this guy, Uh, you know you're
Speaker 1: gonna the pushback comes because yeah, it's going to come
Speaker 1: to me at a price, and what do I get
Speaker 1: in return? That may have been a situation there, and
Speaker 1: these guys want to want to have, want to live,
Speaker 1: to try and live somewhat normal lives. And these guys
Speaker 1: get to a point where they're making enough money or
Speaker 1: something that they can take a break, but they're all
Speaker 1: you know, Remember, you're you're an independent contract. You're on
Speaker 1: your own and if something else happens in the meantime
Speaker 1: or somebody else steps up and gets over, well you're screwed.
Speaker 1: So you you certainly have to have that that in
Speaker 1: your mind that well, if I'm going to do this,
Speaker 1: I've got to be willing to accept the circumstances that
Speaker 1: come with it that I may not have my spot
Speaker 1: when I come back. There's guys that we're doing really
Speaker 1: well at points and took a break or for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: got in trouble. But but we're h and you could
Speaker 1: go for a month or six weeks and come back
Speaker 1: and they may take you back, take you back, but
Speaker 1: you may never get past the mid card again. So yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a huge gamble. And you hear that time and
Speaker 1: time again from these guys that said, you've got you've
Speaker 1: got to ride that wave no matter what. You cannot
Speaker 1: get off the ride. You have to stay on it
Speaker 1: for as long as it takes you because you don't
Speaker 1: know once you step off if you can get back
Speaker 1: on and get back to the place you were. There's
Speaker 1: no guarantee at all. And we saw that time and
Speaker 1: time again.
Speaker 2: Oh, endless stories of that, endless, endless stories of that.
Speaker 2: So yeah, Ricky stinebo quits, so he's not in the
Speaker 2: Surbarvsaries match anymore. And if I was him, you know
Speaker 2: at this point he's a fire breathing like character and
Speaker 2: he carries around an sometimes, but Reptiles had been banned
Speaker 2: by Jack Tunney, So maybe I that's why he quit,
Speaker 2: because he was so upset with his alligator and not
Speaker 2: being allowed to be a ringside Maybia.
Speaker 3: I don't know. Jim and Amvila Knightheart also removed from
Speaker 3: this match.
Speaker 2: Certain Slaughter replaces him, and on television he's beaten down
Speaker 2: by the Beverly Brothers and Rick Flair.
Speaker 3: I believe was who's beating him up.
Speaker 2: It's like, but why is this one of those moments
Speaker 2: where they're like, we need our Heart to be a star,
Speaker 2: so we remove you from here, or because the Heart
Speaker 2: Foundation kept breaking up and then getting back. They didn't
Speaker 2: break up, they would just not be together randomly then
Speaker 2: back together.
Speaker 3: And it's always like Survivor series would point that out
Speaker 3: to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well I think that. You know, Jim had his
Speaker 1: issues and got in trouble a number of times, and
Speaker 1: when that happened, you know, then Brett was on his own.
Speaker 1: We've heard the Road Warriors talk about that before, and
Speaker 1: where you know, when you were in a tag team
Speaker 1: like that, you're dependent on other people, that partner of
Speaker 1: yours to be there for you. You're you're you're one and
Speaker 1: the same in a sense because the two parts have
Speaker 1: to work together. I think that they always knew Brett
Speaker 1: was very capable of being a solo artist for the
Speaker 1: w WE. Uh, but that that tag team was was
Speaker 1: really over and at a time when tag teams were
Speaker 1: a big part of what we did. So, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I think that that was a situation there. But you
Speaker 1: know a lot of there were there was always you
Speaker 1: can always hear a lot of different stories about what happened,
Speaker 1: why did this happen? And you know, part of it
Speaker 1: was could have been from management doing a discipline or whatever.
Speaker 1: And also it could be the guys just like I,
Speaker 1: you know, they're genuinely hurt, they need time to heal, uh,
Speaker 1: or they're in trouble. So it's uh, you know that
Speaker 1: that went on all the time. That's that, that's the
Speaker 1: way the roster was. I spent my life repairing all
Speaker 1: of those uh those cards in the event center. Uh
Speaker 1: you know where I told you that we had the
Speaker 1: red phone and it rang pretty much every day where
Speaker 1: something would be would have to be changed on these
Speaker 1: cards because of uh, you know, something going on with
Speaker 1: one of the guys that they had to adjust and
Speaker 1: get somebody else in there to fill their spots, and
Speaker 1: then we'd have to you know, fix the event center
Speaker 1: and and get those out and all the shows again.
Speaker 3: Mhmm.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this of oarversaries must have been really fun to do. Uh.
Speaker 2: So Sergeant a Lot replaces him here and he's doing
Speaker 2: his whole I want my country back type deal because
Speaker 2: he realized he was a piece of garbage about three
Speaker 2: months ago at some oversaries, and now he loves America.
Speaker 3: Why would we take them back? I don't know.
Speaker 1: But also Sergeant Slaughter, you got everybody loves yes, I know,
Speaker 1: but everybody loves to come back, right they they he
Speaker 1: saw the errors of his ways, and uh it's the
Speaker 1: old old serge and he loves America and he you know,
Speaker 1: put his life on the line anytime for his country.
Speaker 1: And so yeah, I did. I knew that that anytime
Speaker 1: he wanted to come back, he would be embraced. And
Speaker 1: we should give credit to Sergeant Slaughter. Uh, just as
Speaker 1: a worker, because you know, why do you think he
Speaker 1: lasted so long? Why do you think that he was
Speaker 1: able to work so much? He was one of those
Speaker 1: guys that understood the business very well and was smart
Speaker 1: about it. He wasn't that he you know, let them
Speaker 1: take advantage of him and do stuff. But he knew
Speaker 1: the power he had, what he could do to help guys,
Speaker 1: help give them some shine. And also and sometimes in
Speaker 1: those cases it helped. It helped the storyline for you,
Speaker 1: and and and Serge understood that completely. And whenever they
Speaker 1: needed him to step in, Okay, reporting for duty.
Speaker 3: He turns back in America, he turns back iron.
Speaker 1: So you're still take him back? Then let it go, people,
Speaker 1: all right, let it go, Let it go.
Speaker 3: You've had some amazing stories today so far.
Speaker 2: And I want to hear some amazing stories about Bull
Speaker 2: Big Bully Music, who was only around in the w
Speaker 2: W E for let's see, was it mid was it
Speaker 2: August to November? He doesn't make it the Survivor series.
Speaker 1: Do you have enough said? Enough said? No? I mean no,
Speaker 1: there's there's nothing really, there's nothing really to tell.
Speaker 2: I mean, uh, hit a bowler getting a bowler hat
Speaker 2: on and a big mustache.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was a whole style of fighter.
Speaker 1: Well, but as we've you know, when we get these
Speaker 1: gimmicks that they come up with, uh and uh, some
Speaker 1: of them are wah wah, wah well, huh yeah, listen,
Speaker 1: hay Tans like Edward G. Robinson, Yeah, what do you
Speaker 1: think you're Moses now, you know, mister wise guy. You
Speaker 1: know that.
Speaker 3: Uh it's classic.
Speaker 1: It doesn't work, Yeah, I mean it is. And some
Speaker 1: of you would just really you didn't always know unless
Speaker 1: you're talking gobbledly cooker or something that things aren't going
Speaker 1: to go well. But sometimes you think it might have something.
Speaker 1: There's a brawler or you know, the the tough but
Speaker 1: and people just are like, yeah, okay, I don't care.
Speaker 3: Yeah he remembered.
Speaker 1: Think about it. How many people even remember that guy?
Speaker 1: How many?
Speaker 3: How dare you?
Speaker 1: I don't even remember.
Speaker 2: I want to get all my big bully abusic t
Speaker 2: shirts out in a second.
Speaker 1: Don't make me and I don't want to, Yes, I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't have him speaking specifically the character, of course,
Speaker 1: not the person get me in trouble.
Speaker 3: Hercules that replaced him, and Hercules wasn't doing much more.
Speaker 1: I loves he was.
Speaker 3: He was a guy. He was a good guy.
Speaker 2: But this is one of those this is one of
Speaker 2: those matches of the graphic pop ups every November for
Speaker 2: every series, and people just look at it, go look
Speaker 2: at the faces and look at the characters from this
Speaker 2: time Jim Duggan startin Slaughter Texas, Tornado, El Matador, Colonel Mustafa, Berserker,
Speaker 2: Hercules Skinner.
Speaker 3: Yeah, before we move on.
Speaker 2: Though, this is the first Farves series that doesn't have names,
Speaker 2: you know, the Hulk of Maniacs, the Warriors, the billion
Speaker 2: Dollar Team. Every year before this, every team had the
Speaker 2: Rudes or.
Speaker 1: I love them up with us. Everybody had had a
Speaker 1: team name. Yeah I did.
Speaker 3: Why not this time? You think.
Speaker 1: That's a really good question because I remember thinking, well,
Speaker 1: how do I promote these guys, you know, and I
Speaker 1: have to say all their names, and I couldn't just say,
Speaker 1: you know, before you had the team name whatever it was.
Speaker 1: But yeah, they didn't. And and one thing that I
Speaker 1: did like about it when we did have these because
Speaker 1: it was a showcase where uh, everybody had their fans
Speaker 1: and whether or not they were at the top of
Speaker 1: your list, but you you know, you like these characters.
Speaker 1: Obviously they were. They the ones who stuck around, were
Speaker 1: over somewhat and it was your chance to see them
Speaker 1: and uh to be able to give them, uh you know,
Speaker 1: a shot at doing uh the promos. I like that
Speaker 1: in these group promos. That made it easier for some
Speaker 1: of these guys because they'd have two lines. All you
Speaker 1: had to remember is I go third, you know now,
Speaker 1: and and don't step on Mooney's foot because he's got
Speaker 1: to get the microphone over there. I mean, that's it.
Speaker 1: That's pretty much all you had to do. And uh
Speaker 1: so it was it was a great opportunity to get
Speaker 1: these guys out there and and and give them a
Speaker 1: little shot. Don't think don't think that Pat Patterson and
Speaker 1: all those guys were and Bruce were watching and Vince
Speaker 1: and they might see a little something that they do
Speaker 1: in these that you know, you didn't want them freelancing
Speaker 1: too much because you need to see that because you'd
Speaker 1: have guys try and do these big spots and you're like, dude,
Speaker 1: you can't do that because we had something else planning.
Speaker 1: You just want you just made that one bigger than
Speaker 1: what we were at the spot we had going, you know,
Speaker 1: and then then then you're in trouble. But they would
Speaker 1: might see something that this guy does. They're like, hey,
Speaker 1: you know, and he got a good he got a
Speaker 1: good pop. Did you hear that pop? So, uh it did.
Speaker 1: It was a chance for these guys to get out there,
Speaker 1: and it was it was a showcase for them. So
Speaker 1: there were some positive aspects to it.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, no, I was just I loved like the
Speaker 2: four by four's, you know, you had all these great names.
Speaker 2: It's the first one that doesn't have that, and in
Speaker 2: the years before that, a couple of years it's actually
Speaker 2: Vince mc mann doing the voiceovers, like.
Speaker 3: Those are amazing, and this one is just like the Grievous.
Speaker 2: It sounds like it's starting with Halloween when you actually
Speaker 2: Jack Tunny shows up first and then that's like Halloween.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: Next up is the world title though it's Undertaker and
Speaker 2: Hulk Cogan. Undertaker wins his first title he went, making
Speaker 2: his debut at nineteen nineties for Further Series, winning a
Speaker 2: year later at Forever Series ninety one. This is where
Speaker 2: like the myth of Undertaker really takes off for a
Speaker 2: lot of fans, and he's freaking scary as hell. Yeah, though,
Speaker 2: what was the demeanor heading into this?
Speaker 3: Were there always planning? Did you always know?
Speaker 2: Okay, next week it's Taker winning the championship and then
Speaker 2: we have this Tuesday in Texas and where Hogan's gonna
Speaker 2: win it back.
Speaker 1: Well, as I as I mentioned that, you know, Taker
Speaker 1: had really come into his own already. And think about this,
Speaker 1: he's what twenty five twenty six at this time, very young,
Speaker 1: and he has not been in the WWE that long.
Speaker 1: But man, he leaps and bounds because he It wasn't
Speaker 1: just even the character, it was just that people, you know,
Speaker 1: the way, the way he pulled it off, and people
Speaker 1: just latched onto that. They I mean, the just the
Speaker 1: toll of the bells and then like they boom and
Speaker 1: then then you know, that goes completely dark. And you know,
Speaker 1: so he was he was ready then, and I said,
Speaker 1: you know, he had that confidence, he already had that presence.
Speaker 1: So they knew, they knew he was ready to you know,
Speaker 1: Vince knew I definitely got somebody here and and another.
Speaker 1: And another great thing about Mark is that you could
Speaker 1: work with him. He he he understood the business early on,
Speaker 1: and so uh you know, and he and he proved that,
Speaker 1: and of course he would become the the facto locker
Speaker 1: room leader, as they say, not not too long after
Speaker 1: once the Hulk was kind of out of the way,
Speaker 1: and and would be for for decades. I mean, he
Speaker 1: was the guy and so uh uh he knew it
Speaker 1: and everybody else knew it, and it was just really
Speaker 1: a matter of time. It was like, okay, so how
Speaker 1: do we how do we do this? You know? And
Speaker 1: uh he also he, as you can imagine, got some
Speaker 1: opposition from the Hulkster, uh in a sense, kicking and screaming,
Speaker 1: and of course the controversy surrounding that match and the uh,
Speaker 1: the neck injury. Uh. You know that some people thought, well,
Speaker 1: that's why they turned around and gave it back to him.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't think that was necessarily the case,
Speaker 1: that the plan. Yeah, but but but there was some
Speaker 1: controversy and I I'm sure you've heard Mark tell the
Speaker 1: story about what happened and uh, and it never changed
Speaker 1: his relationship with the Hulkster change forever. I mean, he
Speaker 1: did get to see it not too far after the
Speaker 1: way he tells the stories that you know, of course
Speaker 1: we didn't have instant replay back then. But it took
Speaker 1: a few days and he hit. He says that, you know,
Speaker 1: he had a house event the next night. I mean,
Speaker 1: these guys had to keep working. But before we even
Speaker 1: talk about that element of it, Uh, there was a
Speaker 1: little bit of like Hulk if I want to call
Speaker 1: it this respect or just his his resistance to what
Speaker 1: was happening is that the Undertaker, Uh, Tombstone's before then,
Speaker 1: and and it's a classic, it's a classic Undertaker Tombstone. Well,
Speaker 1: Hulk pops right up, no sell, no cell, just boom
Speaker 1: right up. And I'm thinking, now, come on, uh you know,
Speaker 1: sell it a little. I get I could see maybe
Speaker 1: you're getting right getting up, but give me, give me
Speaker 1: the hulkster. Uh you know, the three arm kind of thing,
Speaker 1: you know, the he he pops right back up and
Speaker 1: like and you know, and then Undertaker turns around, if
Speaker 1: you recall, then he's just and then he's used to
Speaker 1: being able to turn around and methodically go over and
Speaker 1: cover the guy. And Holk's right there. Okay, So then
Speaker 1: you have that and then you mentioned okay, then the
Speaker 1: chair comes in and as Undertaker tells the story that
Speaker 1: you know he was that you know, uh, Hulk was
Speaker 1: somebody who didn't for these pay per view events. If
Speaker 1: let's say it was you know that seven thirty star times,
Speaker 1: Hulk would be there maybe at four h Mark was
Speaker 1: said he got there at the arena like noon, and
Speaker 1: he's and he says he saw that the Hulk Hulkster
Speaker 1: was there. He's like, that's kind of weird. And the
Speaker 1: first thing he does when he sees the Holster hoaxes,
Speaker 1: hey can we talk? Hey, brother, can we talk? You know,
Speaker 1: and he says, you know, uh, you know, I got
Speaker 1: this bad next, so I gotta I want to make sure,
Speaker 1: you know, when you do your thing, you're going to
Speaker 1: take care of me. And Mark's like, oh, you know there, yes, absolutely,
Speaker 1: because I pride myself, you know, in how I take
Speaker 1: care of people. I wrap, I make sure they're they're safe.
Speaker 1: And you know, as you said, you look at all
Speaker 1: those nobody's head ever even gets close. He's just that
Speaker 1: good at it. And when he does that that bit
Speaker 1: with the chair, as Rick sends that in and did
Speaker 1: you do you probably did the same thing I did.
Speaker 1: I had it and I froze it as he goes
Speaker 1: down and what we're talking maybe a good eight inches here,
Speaker 1: you know, he even went way as it's it was
Speaker 1: almost like I don't know how you saw, you know,
Speaker 1: you could sell it was so far up because he
Speaker 1: was especially he wasn't even you know, isn't dropping him
Speaker 1: on the canvas. He was there was a steel chair
Speaker 1: there so you know he's taking extra precaution. And you know,
Speaker 1: then immediately he says that when Hulk is, oh you
Speaker 1: got me, brother, Yeah, you know, and then he's in
Speaker 1: the ring for ten minutes and uh, you know, and
Speaker 1: like he's talking and he's you see him with this,
Speaker 1: can I feel my extremities? It says, and you know,
Speaker 1: Mark's already gone back and he's freaking out. He's freaking
Speaker 1: out like, oh my god, I I broke Hulk Hogan's
Speaker 1: neck the franchise the Golden Goose, I'm dead, my career
Speaker 1: is over. And uh, you know, he's like, Where's where's
Speaker 1: Hulk and he's he said, he's in Vince's office on
Speaker 1: the floor telling him like call my call my wife
Speaker 1: and my kids, and he's behind you know, he's an
Speaker 1: area there that with with Shane and he's and Shane's
Speaker 1: telling him like he wasn't close and uh and then
Speaker 1: as you mentioned, like after this he couldn't see it,
Speaker 1: yea and the boys, but the other boys are telling
Speaker 1: him that we're watching backstage or saying it was not
Speaker 1: He's never not even close. There's no chance that. So
Speaker 1: when he did again eventually get to see it and
Speaker 1: He's like, Okay, now what do I do. I can't go,
Speaker 1: uh you know, take Houlkster to the showers and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, settle it. And he and he approaches him
Speaker 1: and says, you know, I saw the playback. He goes,
Speaker 1: I see your head. Your head didn't even come close.
Speaker 1: And he's like, well, you had brother, you had me
Speaker 1: too high tight. I couldn't, you know, and that's why
Speaker 1: I had no room to rove and I jammed. And
Speaker 1: he said right there, because that's all I ever needed
Speaker 1: to know, and that he totally was you know, he said,
Speaker 1: I showed respect to him the rest of career. Whenever
Speaker 1: he was around. I always made sure I was there.
Speaker 1: But that was it for him, and uh, whatever reason,
Speaker 1: maybe there was that a little bit of a risk resistance.
Speaker 1: I don't think that it was a ploy to get
Speaker 1: the belt back the next week, but it wasn't especially
Speaker 1: for where where Mark was in his career. It was like,
Speaker 1: come on, you know that that wasn't a nice thing
Speaker 1: to do. And that's putting it mildly, you know, in
Speaker 1: a sense that that was just left up.
Speaker 2: Well, we've heard stories before other wrestlers being like, hey,
Speaker 2: like triple Ah Sean Michael's looking at the rock and
Speaker 2: eyebrow thinking, I don't think it's gonna get over. I'm
Speaker 2: taking a wild guess that it's Undertaker rising up and hope.
Speaker 2: It's like like, I'm not Hokogan, But any story that
Speaker 2: really comes out that appears in the seems like they.
Speaker 3: All line around, some lying, some deceiving.
Speaker 2: But as someone who's been on top for so long,
Speaker 2: I can imagine that's what has to be done. Unfortunately,
Speaker 2: to continue being the golden Goose. Well, how do you
Speaker 2: say the golden goose? You have to stomp out the rest.
Speaker 1: You gotta protect yourself, and you know, and I and
Speaker 1: I remember that. I remember backstage too. All the guys
Speaker 1: are saying, man, what the you know? But they're not
Speaker 1: going to say anything to people who really count because
Speaker 1: they don't want to damage their career. But that was
Speaker 1: really the feeling backstage was like what what happened? People? Are?
Speaker 1: You know? People were thinking, Okay, well, maybe it, you know,
Speaker 1: triggered something because Hulk did have a neck injury, and
Speaker 1: maybe just the jarring of it. He didn't have to
Speaker 1: hit his head for it to do the damage. It did.
Speaker 1: But I think overall, because these guys are professionals and
Speaker 1: they had taken you know, that move because it certainly
Speaker 1: wasn't something that was unique to just the Undertaker, but
Speaker 1: you know, and so they know, they know, and that
Speaker 1: was that was the feeling backstage. So but you, like
Speaker 1: you say, you got you got to p checkt yourself.
Speaker 1: Hulk Cogan openly admits when they tried to unionize that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: he went to Vince and told him, I don't want
Speaker 1: to do this because he's I was making all this money.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to sit there and jeopardize my income.
Speaker 1: And that was that kind of bit of you're on
Speaker 1: your own kid. You you do what you've got to
Speaker 1: do to survive. And he would have never did what
Speaker 1: he did it did in the world of professional wrestling
Speaker 1: if he didn't have that mentality. You can't always let
Speaker 1: somebody step in front of you being you can't always
Speaker 1: be polite. You got to look out for number one.
Speaker 1: And he did it and it served him well.
Speaker 2: Right, didn't serve the rest of people around him. But
Speaker 2: obviously for him, that's what he wanted, that's what he got.
Speaker 3: That's what he did.
Speaker 2: And uh, you know, we'll have to wait and see
Speaker 2: how that turns out for him, but uh yeah, it's
Speaker 2: then take You're winning the championship and we got Jack
Speaker 2: Tunney more in this Tuesday in Texas promoting it, saying,
Speaker 2: you know, I can't do anything about it, even though
Speaker 2: I'm the president, I can't do anything about it.
Speaker 3: The referee what he did, it stands. I can't change that.
Speaker 2: But I will book a match of this Tuesday in
Speaker 2: Texas between Undertaker and Hulla Coogan for the championship.
Speaker 1: And then just came up. I just came up with that.
Speaker 1: So this is what we're gonna do to get this.
Speaker 3: That's how we does it. Everything is like Macha man Jake,
Speaker 3: like each other.
Speaker 1: After consulted and consulted with ben people and the parties involved. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there was this is what this McMahon wants us to do.
Speaker 2: There were beakdoor beakers and were we were working hard
Speaker 2: all night for this, but we made it now and
Speaker 2: this is where before it was like, Okay, it's happened
Speaker 2: a couple of times. This is really where this Tuesday
Speaker 2: in Texas, the series turns into that commercial for it
Speaker 2: because they won't stop talking about this event because the
Speaker 2: back cabin is Survivor Series.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is where we can talk about what we
Speaker 1: want you to do on Tuesday. Uh So yeah, that's
Speaker 1: exactly what it all came down to. And as I said,
Speaker 1: this is a two part series, uh that we're doing here, Steve,
Speaker 1: because we're going to talk about the this Tuesday in Texas,
Speaker 1: which was very memorable also for me because a few
Speaker 1: of the events and it's the kind of a teaser,
Speaker 1: but my time backstage with the macho man Randy Savage.
Speaker 1: So we'll talk about that when we get there.
Speaker 3: Yes, I can't wait for that.
Speaker 2: Beverly Brothers, the Nasty Boys versus the Rockers and the Bushwhackers.
Speaker 2: All you need to know about this matches that it
Speaker 2: begins the Rockers storyline of hey, Marty actually kicks Sean
Speaker 2: in the face. He gets eliminated. But on commentary, any
Speaker 2: review you look up about this, it's girla mon Soon
Speaker 2: mistakenly not paying attention at all, and he just rare.
Speaker 3: He's like, what's going on? He's like, why Shawn Michael's
Speaker 3: in his face? Why is he Why is he walking away?
Speaker 3: He got counted out?
Speaker 1: What's happening? Does that happen a lot? What kind of
Speaker 1: a teammate is he dude, he's kicked in the face. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll give that to Gorilla. I'm letting that. That's a
Speaker 1: pass you get set up me. But I love Gorilla,
Speaker 1: so yeah, of.
Speaker 3: Course, And that's all that match really was.
Speaker 2: And then the main event is Legion of Doom and
Speaker 2: the Big Boss Man, which who would have had Macho
Speaker 2: Man take on the Natural Disasters and irs?
Speaker 3: Which could have had Jake the Snake Roberts.
Speaker 2: When we can't get that, the crowd goes home happy
Speaker 2: the Babyfaces win.
Speaker 3: Is that why Hogan and Taker?
Speaker 2: You think is the third match or that's just the
Speaker 2: beginning of how to promote this tusy in text?
Speaker 1: Well, that's as I told you. That's was the purpose
Speaker 1: of it was to allow them to spend the other
Speaker 1: half of this event plugging the next one. And you know,
Speaker 1: take it for what it was, but it did accomplished
Speaker 1: what they'd set out to do. That's what they wanted
Speaker 1: to do, and they were able to, you know, have
Speaker 1: the the backstage interviews, the outrage building it up, and
Speaker 1: it was another way to look at Okay, so how
Speaker 1: can we promote these things? We can do them within events.
Speaker 1: But then you got to walk a fine line where
Speaker 1: people aren't going I'm watching a freaking commercial here, or
Speaker 1: just what I paid my money for so you can
Speaker 1: get you know, just set me up to get more
Speaker 1: from me, and will you deliver next time? I hope so, God,
Speaker 1: But I guess I'll have to come back and pay
Speaker 1: a little more to find out. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, again, everyone seems to be happy. But again, the
Speaker 2: last thing is you're backstage two. You're like, Colgan won't
Speaker 2: talk to me, he won't talk to me. Guys like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: I guess he won't talk to you, but it's going
Speaker 2: to there in your face. Happened a lot to.
Speaker 3: You, actually, a lot of doors slam in your face
Speaker 3: on television.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I didn't take it personally, Yeah I did. And
Speaker 1: it's still hurt.
Speaker 2: It still, it still hurts. It was in the notes
Speaker 2: you wrote, mention this please I want to cry on camera.
Speaker 2: But the last thing we actually see is how Bobby
Speaker 2: Haynen earlier was yelling that the whole commania is dead
Speaker 2: because take your beating for the championship.
Speaker 3: The last thing we see, it's very cryptic, it's very scary.
Speaker 2: It's me Jean, it's it's Taker, and it's Paul Bahert
Speaker 2: pretty much saying.
Speaker 3: Like, there's Tuesday in Texas.
Speaker 2: And they promote that match, and it's very scary because
Speaker 2: you see a casket close on the camera and that's
Speaker 2: the end of the event, which is what a what
Speaker 2: a happy Thanksgiving?
Speaker 1: Yeah, when I learned something else today, you're doing an
Speaker 1: acceptable Paul Bear very nice.
Speaker 3: I love I love him in this.
Speaker 2: If you watch enough wrestling and you watch Paul Bear here,
Speaker 2: he's living around for a few months, so his character
Speaker 2: is solely developing itself. He came in very morbid, very
Speaker 2: like quiet, and now this one he's like, oh, it's
Speaker 2: like shaking the earn at the camera, dude, this is
Speaker 2: this is peek Paul Bear.
Speaker 3: But yeah, that's that sarbas Series ninety one.
Speaker 1: Though he could he pulled that that roll off really well,
Speaker 1: and uh, you know, and he had that you know,
Speaker 1: he had the fleshy hand even when he shook his hand.
Speaker 1: He was you know, he was a perfect mortician. I
Speaker 1: would not put it this way. You wouldn't let your
Speaker 1: teenage daughter near him. I think that that creepy factor
Speaker 1: that he was able to radiate. So yeah, he was perfect,
Speaker 1: perfect for that role.
Speaker 2: That was the last time before we wrap this up
Speaker 2: is though, the ending is your Survivors Series. Last year
Speaker 2: we had the Grand Finale match where every winner of
Speaker 2: every Cyvisseries match would eventually go into a final match,
Speaker 2: the Grand Finale. Good guys, guys, this one didn't have that,
Speaker 2: but in a magazine months prior, it did promote that
Speaker 2: Survivor Series was going to have the Grand Finale. But
Speaker 2: also I used to get Christmas magazines from the ww
Speaker 2: sent to me in March, so I'm not judging, but
Speaker 2: in the timing never matched up on the magazine two
Speaker 2: events ever.
Speaker 1: All right, but let's let's be honest. You WWF magazine
Speaker 1: was not the New York Times, it wasn't where everything was.
Speaker 1: It was also a promotional magazine. It just we had
Speaker 1: people write articles in between merchandise shots. Okay, So if
Speaker 1: that was that was right, If that was considered your
Speaker 1: dirt sheet, that you were in trouble.
Speaker 3: I'm gonna call up. I'm calling up the Macho Man
Speaker 3: line right now and to bednight. The Fantasy stepped in
Speaker 3: the ring field history up to the Gold and Tub
Speaker 3: Wie