Speaker 1: It's the Lapsed Fan Wrestling podcast with Jack and carn
S e O and JP Sorrow.
Speaker 2: He's a lapsed fan and all my years and wrestling.
Speaker 3: I never seen anything.
Speaker 2: And it's the laps fan name by the one in
the ring.
Speaker 4: Forget about Slado. He the real king of swing.
Speaker 5: When the bell.
Speaker 2: Goes in and the kick like me throwing in the corner.
Speaker 4: But it's lash like stick.
Speaker 2: Even Jerry King can sake off the crowd nodded in.
Speaker 6: His head like it.
Speaker 2: Steve low Brown, would you get low down?
Speaker 4: Go even high up? Flipp you on your head?
Speaker 7: But you know cool driver, you speak more now and
dragon spits fire give you more shock than when head
treats higher drop a more truth than the con of
sniper unless you would a coconut.
Speaker 8: Roddy Piper, Jack a JP.
Speaker 7: He like j y d drop the cupcakes and gold
the brain Bob means the best podcast Frost start the
close cloud if you all's plassic and pos So.
Speaker 3: We've already kind of talked about it in our look
back at the remarkable career of sid. He kind of
disappeared in nineteen ninety seven.
Speaker 4: From the WWF. Yes, yeah, it's very weird.
Speaker 3: And we last we're with our hero here on our
tribute TLF style to Sid, who, of course we lost
this year. We had listened to the audio of him
dropping the WWF Championship to Undertaker at WrestleMania thirteen, which
of course was his second title run, and then after
that we hit you with the deep dive of his
winning the championship over Brettbart on the February seventeenth, nineteen
ninety seven Raw, and it just seemed like, all right,
Sid has now arrived. He's won the championship twice. He's
now a firmly ensconced main event player. He's going to
be around for a while, especially as WWFRE constitutes its
image and tries to go more attitudinal and features him
and things like the Raw is War opening package and
all of that. And then he's gone. And you were
really keen to point it out. I wasn't sure as
if we went you would forget this or not recall it.
But you remember the last time we saw Sid on
WWF television.
Speaker 4: I do it, you know, because I, uh, just because
what happened for me was I It's not because I
remember it from being when I was watching back then.
It's rewatching the raws more recently within the last like
I don't know, probably eight eight, seven, eight years, whatever
it is, because I saw the show. You know, I'm
watching every war and then you know, he just vanishes
kind of after you know, I think he fast pay
per view was King of the Ring and then he's
just kind of gone. And then a few weeks later,
all of a sudden, he comes out as maybe Steve
Austin's one of Steve Austin's potential partners for Canadian Stampede,
and it was one of the most jarring things I'd
ever seen.
Speaker 3: Tell me why, Tell me why?
Speaker 4: Because you know, as a fan, I just kind of
accepted the fact that he was just gone, you know,
that he was gone whatever. And he disappeared after King
of the Ring and that was it, and so and
even then he was I don't think I remember him
being featured too much on TV, and so to see
him come out and not really do anything, it's just
an appearance, like his music hits and he comes out
and poses, but that's it, and then he's gone, and
that's kind of it. Like it's just a weird to me.
It's it's like it's like Vader being in in the
WW like way into ninety eight more than he should have,
right than I'm comfortable, right more than you know, because
you're like, are you serious? Like Vader was there and
it's like, wait, Sid was still there, Like what the fuck?
Speaker 3: Right here, I am thinking that this was a big
enough impact player that if he did anything on WDWF
television I would remember, not there would be eight months
after my last memory of the guy where he was
actually still on television, right, And I definitely Sid fits
that category. But you know that justified tribute show in
Lapstom because you remember these things, of these these fleeting appearances.
There are so many other wrestlers I'm sure that made
appearances months after their last one and then disappeared into
the night that we never think about again. But for Sid,
it just seemed significant that he was missing. Was it
was a noticeable absence, and like you said, he sort
of popped his head back up one more time, very
and much the same way he did in nineteen ninety
six for the International Incident replacing Ultimate Warrior. Right here
is that are preparing a multi person a tag team
main event for in your house in July. The next year,
his name is in the sauce again for Team USA,
and I invite you to consider it because we've done
Canadian Stampede. It's of course one of the best WWF
pay per views of all time and so reflective of
what was going to happen, absolutely and what the reflective
of what was about to happen with Stone Cold taking
off is the unquestionable top man in the business and
the guy that would reverse the WWF's fortunes. But I
invite you to consider. I invite you to consider Psycho
sid being on Team USA at Canadian Stampede.
Speaker 9: I don't know how I feel about that, right.
Speaker 4: It kind of doesn't feel right like he feels because
he's not someone I mean, not that Austin is either.
But Austin's feud wasn't really about Canada versus the USA.
He was just he was just picking on the hearts.
But like l od theyre USA, you know, Chicago, you
know the whole fucking thing, Shamrock.
Speaker 3: And gold Dust.
Speaker 4: Who was it was?
Speaker 3: Who Ken Shamrock and gold Dust?
Speaker 4: Ken Shamrock. Yeah, I guess I can kind of see
that gold Dust. I can't really see although he's Hollywood,
So I don't know, but he's definitely a stretch, But
I think more of a stretch would be said, because
he's a fucking loner, you know, that's his thing.
Speaker 3: Yep, yep, And whatever you try to place him in
a group or a stable or in a bodyguard position,
eventually he'll find a way to break out of that
and it'll be someone's bright idea to give him a
singles run toward the war title. And that's just name
the organization he's ever been put into a tag team
or a group scenario with. But I don't know. It's
just it's such a significant landmark show in that team,
as bizarre and motley crue as it was supporting Steve
Austin at Canadian Stampede is so kind of burned in
the memory and in the history that it's wild to
think about SID being in there and how that might
disrupt the dynamic, because the one thing you can say
about Team USA at Canadian Stampede is Steve Austin was
by far and away the brightest shining star in the.
Speaker 4: Bid Fay side, no question.
Speaker 3: But if SID was there, I wonder if that dilutes
the intensity in the real sort of concentration of energy
into what Steve Austin was doing.
Speaker 4: I don't know, I maybe, but I do feel like Stone.
I feel like Austin at that point was such a
fucking a spark plug that he would not have allowed
Sid to overshadow him. Yeah, you know, like I think
he would have. Fucking I think he would have. He
would have found holes in Sid and fucking exploited them.
Speaker 3: And if there's one thing we've learned about Sid by
this point in his wrestling career is he's not going
to stick around very long if he doesn't get the
impression that he's not authoring, sort of like the gait,
He's not somebody that can lay claim to drawing the house.
Even if WWF is struggling, so to speak, not so much.
I mean, the ticket sales aren't great, but they're nowhere
near where they were ninety five and into ninety six,
come nineteen ninety seven. But still the television ratings, as
we've documented so many times, including that raw where he
won the title, just so impossibly far away from Nitro
that it just seems like it's a feutal effort. They
might as well just stop trying on Monday nights, and
for Sid, you know, when he looks around and he's
being put in a scenario where he doesn't feel like
he's a single guy that can draw the house and
take credit for the house and call himself a draw,
that means something to him. That's kind of sure to
hear him talk about his career that ended up being
why he was in the business. Of course, it's it's
mostly about money, but for him, like if he's not
able to lay claim to filling a house, then he's
not going to be able to maximize the amount of
money he can make. He's he said, before, you know,
I've been I've been in this business in such a
way where I'm making a lot of money but not
drawing a lot of people, and it just doesn't satisfy me.
Speaker 10: Mmm.
Speaker 3: It just doesn't give me what I come to really
want out of pro wrestlers, which is really interesting considering
the movie he's about to make, which of course completely
subverts that notion. But it's what I think what he
basically means is when he's been in WWF, he's he's
slotted as somebody that can that can be somebody who
is associated with the main event such that you can say,
you know, Sid made evented this show, so this business
has something to do with him. In WCW. In the
second run too, to a large degree, it was always
so muddled, like.
Speaker 4: Was it Sid? Yep?
Speaker 3: Sure Sid was in the main event, but the guy
he wrestled had a million other people he was feuding with,
and this match thread through, you know, Sting versus the Horsemen,
whatever the case may be. When you go back to
that Halloween havoc that he that he headlined for the
first time. So it's it's not a surprise. I don't
think that if what they have creatively for Sid is
that he's going to join a Team USA with somebody
else the helm that he's gonna it's gonna get a
bad taste in his mouth about it. Now, what's great
about a tribute show is we picked subjects where, like
you said, there's this nagging curiosity like what the hell
happened to said in nineteen ninety seven he went from
mainaventing WrestleMania to m hmm, completely disappearing. And you know,
unless you do kind of a close examination of what
he said about his career and what was said contemporaneously,
you don't really understand where he went and why he
only popped his head up a couple more times in
nineteen ninety seven. Right, but I think in our next
chapter here in the Sid Tribute, it's time to do that, boss.
Speaker 4: Oh please.
Speaker 3: It's really wild how he does so little on WWF
television for Russelemnia thirteen too the summer, but how much
actually happens behind the scenes with him.
Speaker 11: I love it, just you.
Speaker 3: Know so many further variations on the theme of oh,
Sid's getting another opportunistic injury, A cinek might say, you.
Speaker 4: Know, you know here, this is what I picture too, Okay,
of course I picture him. You know, he's back. You
know he comes to TV every week whether or not.
No he doesn't. He certainly doesn't. He's not to go
to TV, but he does it on his own. He
feels like, you know, he he he chooses to go.
Speaker 3: I will be at the TV that you don't tell
me to be at.
Speaker 4: Right, right, Sid, Look, Powet, we don't need you to
be at TV. I'll be there on time, but I
believe it. With bells on, yep. And I just picture him,
you know, I picture him just kind of like coming
in there with with his his roller bag, and he's
wearing jeans like a tucked in a short sleeve you know,
plaid shirt all right, and he's wearing a baseball hat yep.
And he's kind of like walks in like he owns
the fucking place, doesn't talk to anybody, just fucking walks in.
But people are like, what the fuck is I supposed
to be here? Right?
Speaker 3: He's not supposed to be here, right, and sid walks
in with the look of somebody that's oblivious to that,
but deep down he's excited to have a fight about it.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, exactly.
Speaker 3: It is someone who acts like he wants to avoid arguments,
but he can't survive without getting into a little verbal
tussle with people on the regular. That's his whole strategy, honestly.
You know when when when he feels like his position
on the card isn't going to be one that it's
going to let him take credit for houses and maximize income,
particularly in the WWF you know pay system, where your
position on the card really does impact your your take
home before everyone had the guaranteed deals downsideals, he's looking
at this landscape and he's like, no, Nope. You know,
if I'm not, if I'm taking a step down from
the main event, something's going to go wrong. I'm going
to force an argument. I'm going to force myself to
take exception with something I'm pitched creatively, and I'm gonna
be gone. It goes back to the Crusher quitting every
summer so we can take the take the summer off,
having an argument with verne Gana and over the years you're, Okay,
he's just gonna do this because he wants an excuse
to not have to work the summer. I get it,
and would see it. It was it was injuries and he
always you know. The best thing is like he says,
ask hardcore Hally about the nineteen ninety five neck injury,
and then you read Rli's book and he's like, yeah,
is lying. It's like I asked, I asked him Sid,
and the answer isn't exactly.
Speaker 4: What you're anticipating. How do you know he's not lying?
Speaker 3: Sid thought he had alibis.
Speaker 4: I do have alibis. I have many buys people by
shows for me right because I'm Sid.
Speaker 3: I have many buys. By the way, have we gotten
the the returns in from WrestleMania yet, Yes, the least
bought WrestleMania of all time. I would introduce you to
the WrestleMania you headlined that couldn't even beat w c
W one censored WrestleMania.
Speaker 12: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Sid was a big draw man. He knew how to draw.
That's one thing you can say about him. No, that's
one thing you can say about him. You can say
a lot of things about the guy, and that's why
you're paying tribute to him, But that's one thing you
cannot say about him, that he was a draw.
Speaker 4: That's so incredible.
Speaker 3: Ye, And we'll get more into that as we go here.
But again, there are so many things happening, because if
you recall after WRESTLMINGI thirteen for the April show in
your house show.
Speaker 4: And that was what one was that that was holding
and hell's me Revenge of the Taker.
Speaker 3: Revenge of the Taker. And do you remember, of course
that's a Brett Steve Austin rematch. Yes, we talked about
that in the nineteen ninety seven journey available in the archives.
Speaker 4: But yes, do you recall that.
Speaker 3: At first it was to be Brett versus Sid at
Revenge of the Taker. No, ladies, and gentlemen, I didn't
know that. Consider a world where Brett comes off the
win over Steve Austin and the famous post match angle
at wrestlming He thirteen, Sid comes off the loss to Undertaker,
and Sid and Brett interfewed. Not Austin and Brett.
Speaker 4: Well, I mean, you know, in a weird way, it
would make a little bit of sense. Although you know,
here's the thing. This is the thing about that while
while I don't I can see that as being, yes,
a thing, But what I would what I would think
would happen, is that Brett would face Sid and Austin
would cause Brett to lose in some fashion.
Speaker 3: Oh, certainly Austin wouldn't exit the picture. But the idea
of going right back to the match and what that
meant for the trajectory of Brett and Austin in nineteen
ninety seven would have been totally different.
Speaker 4: If I mean, maybe, you know, I don't really think
of that match as being a thing that really did
much to their feud. Yeah, that you know the I mean, listen,
I agree like the fact that they had a rubber match,
although it wasn't really rubber match because Austin lost both
but I think.
Speaker 3: I'm getting is the reason you don't think of that
as a big landmark part of the feud is because
it wasn't in the plants.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, that's true.
Speaker 3: It was cobbled together because Sid fell off the card.
They had even promoted it a couple of times on
television that Brett and Sid was going to be a
match on this show. But I just think when we
when we construct the Steve Austin Breheart story from Survivors
series ninety six all the way through ninety seven, Yeah,
this is a this is a part that if you
switched out this match, you'd wonder, like second third order effects,
how that might differently affect the way these two developed.
Because the fact of the matter is after Revenge of
the Taker they had clashed again, Brett and Austin had
gotten their hands on each other again after the blood
bath at WrestleMania, and if that had been delayed two
three four months, you wonder how differently it would have
felt when Austin just kept pouring it on as opposed
to getting back into the ring.
Speaker 4: With the man.
Speaker 3: But that's another example and a motif that's developing as
we go through Sid's career of a guy who is
sort of like in the background, and his little maneuvers
are having a big impact not on his ability to
draw money, but on the programs that do end up
drawing money, and the wrestlers who do draw money end
up in the positions they ended up in because of
Sid's many decisions and pivots. So it's a rather rich
year of nineteen ninety seven, though just sitting home watching
wrestling television every week, you would not know it as
it regards Sid and the moves he's about to make.
As the Attitude Era is about to begin, and we're
dawning on another holiday season around here, Boss, Am I
wrong about?
Speaker 4: The halls are decked, the the atmospheres where it should be.
You know, it's a it's a it's a downer of
a beginning of the season. So it's, uh, you know,
we we need something, We need something to kind of
pick up our pick up our spirits. So we decorated
way early this year, uh, for Christmas, and it's it's
feeling wonderful the way it should be.
Speaker 3: And we're coming off the conclusion of the Mighty tlf
X games. Yes, we are as lapsed Vince as most
of the smart money would have predicted on the front end,
but you know, subjected to a fair, open and empirical vote.
Speaker 4: I do wonder. I do wonder this. I do wonder
if Hogan, if Hogan had been on the other the
other side, Yep, I think that would have been a
very very that would have been a closer, because I'm
pretty sure if if you did have Hogan and Vince
on opposite sides, it would have been kind of easy
money that that's going to be the main event.
Speaker 3: I think it's going to be the main event. But
let's not forget the people had their chance to vote
on Vince versus Hogan and it wasn't even close.
Speaker 4: No, I know, but I think when it comes to
but it's not the finals though, yeah, you know, like
if it was the finals.
Speaker 3: I think Vince crushes him by the same margin if
no kidding.
Speaker 4: Interesting, I don't know, I'm not sure. I think the
finals mean a different thing. I mean, I think, you know,
I don't know. I think it would have been I
think it would have been a different ballgame.
Speaker 3: Very interesting, And you know, weigh in with your thoughts.
The lapsed fan at gmail dot com. Let's just say,
Santa's mail sack is swelling quite a bit as we
head into the holiday season, so if.
Speaker 4: He does have he has two mail sacks.
Speaker 3: Actually, Santa's gonna have to sit down and get through
a lot of letters from young boys and girls, I
think before he takes off on Christmas Eve. So oh,
let us know all about your thoughts on the King
of the Caste. It started with thirty two participants and
we want to send our great appreciation to Russ and
so many members of the Solar System who will make
this such a fun way to celebrate ten years of lapstom.
It of course came down to lapsed Vince and lapse Nash.
And on the day where we elected our next president,
Vince McMahon is elected King of the cast Now you
tell me that there's not something larger going on there.
Just from a timing standpoint, we certainly did not plan this,
and all of a sudden, right before us lay an allegory,
if you will.
Speaker 4: It was yeah, yeah, it actually you know it when
it kind of came, when it kind of came to be,
I felt kind of like, um, wait a minute here,
like this feels actually maybe a little wrong.
Speaker 3: Is Vince about to take the victory podium at a
time when someone else is about to take the victory podium.
That's going to replace the US attorney that's running the
DOJ investigation into Vince McMahon, and we'll probably kill it
where it stands.
Speaker 4: I believe that I have. I believe that I've elected
myself president, and that's how I roll. It's gonna be
the United States of Vince McMahon, the US.
Speaker 12: V M.
Speaker 3: Linda for Commerce Secretary.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, definitely something of that nature.
Speaker 3: Because you guys know about commerce, after all.
Speaker 4: Well we we you know, we are commercial enterprise, so
we know commerce. We know you know, we believe in uh,
consumers better and and consumer motivation as well as any
number of of you know, different you know, dynamic metrics
of them, of corporate and business and monetary nature.
Speaker 3: This American work period, period period. I don't think much
more needs to be said. Lapsed. Vince crowned King of
the cast on election day twenty twenty four, and again
great thanks to everyone who helped make it possible, everyone
who voted and participated, and I think it all ended
up where we thought it would. It's one of those
things where you tell yourself that the reality might not
be what it appears to be, and then of course
it was. Of course it was all along. Did you
think Jesse had a chance, did you think anyone did
you expect lapse on Ash to be there?
Speaker 4: I listen, it went down to It went down pretty
much how I envisioned it would when I kind of
played it out in my in my brain when the
brackets were first released, I said, it's I thought there
were possibilities that you know that that Hogan or Vince,
you know that that to me, what could have been
a toss up? Same thing with Jesse Nash. But I
figured it was either going to be Did you call
Jesse early? I did call Jesse early on, but I
did think to myself, like, it's going to be one
of those two either way. I don't know who will
come out on top if it's Nash and Jesse, but
I knew it would be one of those two guys.
At the end, I did think about it might have
been Jesse, but there's always you know, Nash is always
kind of lurking in the back.
Speaker 3: Amazing, amazing stuff. It was great that someone that was
inserted late in the process after the first draft of
the Brackening was done and lapsed. Heel and Heart made
it all the way to the final four with the
solar systems Yep, yep, speaking up for what needs to
be spoken for. And another character that you thought, you know,
because they are your favorites, they're somebody else's favorites. You
realize that that's not how the country runs. Yeah, that's right,
people like Vince always end up winning. That's really not
more complicated than that.
Speaker 4: Because here's the thing. I'm untouchable, and why are you untouchable?
Because I am a master of things. Okay, I'm a
creator of things. I help the economic machine.
Speaker 3: Any chance, Vince, after all these all these blemishes on
your name, all these actions against your person and your
reputation fall by the wayside, what at a time, and
things get settled and wallpapered over and dropped cold, any
chance you walk back out there onto that stage and
let everybody know what you think of them once and
for all. Does TKO need to prepare? Does Mark Shapiro
and others not Mark Shapiro triple h I'm talking about now,
I'm talking about the h the TKO boardroom.
Speaker 4: You know, Look, I am a white billionaire.
Speaker 3: Okay, Mark Schapiro said he just had lunch with you,
that it wasn't anything more than that. I thought it
was strange that after what happened, I let me tell
you this, all right, the ballot box that he came
out and said that. But yeah, I just want to
about what you thought about it.
Speaker 4: You've got TKO, all right, you got t KO sooner
than later that company is going to be called VKM. Yeah,
that because that's who runs the ship.
Speaker 3: Have we only just begat? Who have we only just begun?
Speaker 4: Makes the decisions?
Speaker 3: What's going to happen to triple H?
Speaker 4: Triple H? I mean, you know, there are there are
times when you see your children who are progressing in
a way that you're like, yes, you know this is
a pot you know this is good, this is good.
And then you know, sometimes they start to make wrong decisions.
Then that means they have to die.
Speaker 3: So you're saying, you're Jared Kushner isn't going to be
part of your your administration.
Speaker 4: I will say, And when Daddy is back at the
head of the table, huh, the real head of the table,
there's going to be a rearranging of the chairs.
Speaker 3: And Stephanie and Ivanka and Jared and Paul are going
to find themselves having an awful lot in common something I'm.
Speaker 4: Going to find myself's new children, new children who understand
that my decision is always the best one. My decision
is the way things need to be. My decision is
for America.
Speaker 3: So I hope your disposition as is as sunny as
ours is. As we salute the folks that help make
the TLFX Games not only so fun but poetic. At
the end of the day, is all things lapsed always
somehow end up being And we want to expressly think
Garage Beer, who have been tremendous partners and sponsoring everything
we've done along the course of the TLFX Games tournament
and proudly ascribing their name to the tournament to determine
the greatest character in the history of well, if you
ask some folks, the greatest wrestling pod there's ever been,
what you know about it? What you know about that
engagement which now about them them X Games, What you
know is Vince triumphs as always and Garage Beer appeals
over there saw to it that the effort was worth it,
and so we salute them and we will certainly recommend
that you pop the top and some of their premium beverages,
beer that tastes like beer, as they say over there, Yes,
the next time you join us for a live call
or such on Patreon. We also want to thank when
we're in this category, a rather resilient sponsor who just
you know, continues to continues to let's say, supplement the
cast boss. Yes, a friend a Titan Nutrition. As we
head into the holidays, and if you've got workout nuts
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New Year's resolution, right.
Speaker 4: Are you going to work out? And genetic jackhammers too?
Speaker 11: Right?
Speaker 3: Do you want to stay on brand? You want to
fuck the name Titans in it? Titan Nutrition proud sponsors
of TLF, Proud to partner with them to spread their gospel.
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As we start thinking about what to put under the tree,
I think we're already worried, boss about where to put
the stuff we've already gotten.
Speaker 4: Oh my goodness, I don't even know where to begin.
Speaker 3: We are joining you here on this lapse tribute show
to sid this regular main feed show, if you will,
for the first time since gathering around the aforementioned sorrow hearth, Yes,
for the twenty twenty four TLF Christmas Show taping. We
know what you have done. We've taken stock, we know
what it has done to us. We've taken inventory, we've
seen it all, we've recorded it all. Of course, it's
going to be a doozy of course, yes, you know
what podcast as you locked down with the appropriate holiday
spirit this year, and we can't wait too unload it
on the Solar System and much the fashion that we
did last year. But suffice to say, we sat there
as if someone had shot us in the head in
our comfy sofa chairs, with all of the generosity of
the Solar System and the creativity of the Solar system
and the tenderness and thoughtfulness of the of the Solar
system resting at our very feet next to the fire
and Boss. I don't know if people deserve what we're
about to unload on them.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's something, you know. The people who gave gifts,
they know what they gave and they know, you know.
But when you put it all together, when you put
everything together, when you put the setting, when you put
in the uh, you know, the unscripted nature of things. Yes,
you know that is our show. There is a it's
it's a really it's a crazy motherfucking thing. It is
a crazy motherfucking thing. And you guys are going to
be I imagine you're going to be pleased, surprised, and maybe,
I don't know, maybe mortified too.
Speaker 3: We did what had to be done. You in the
Solar system who sent gifts, did what had to be done,
and it's a smashing, smashing success. That's all I can say.
That's all I can promise here as we celebrate ten
years of Lapsed with our upcoming our third unwrapping Yes
coming in December to the main feeds.
Speaker 1: The Lapsed Fan Wrestling podcast the wrestling podcast that knows
the boys need their candy. It's the Lampsed Fan. He's
a lapsed fan wrestling podcast with Jack and and JP Soro.
Speaker 3: Having just done that, having just gathered together as we
love to do around this time of year, it being
fresh in our minds, it's just impossible not to to
give some voice too. How that all left us feeling.
And let me tell you, folks, and you'll hear it
during the show. We've got to figure out a plan here.
We've got to figure out a plan because I don't
know if you think we live in four hundred thousand
square foot mansions or what, but I know there aren't
enough storage lockers in the county to account for the
excess that's rained down upon us. Not a clue what
to do with most of it. So appreciative that people
took the time, but my goodness, I don't know. It
might be we might have to start talking about regifting
around here.
Speaker 4: Boss, I will sell it. I think that might be,
uh might be something that needs to be done. It's
it's such a I mean, I wish I wish people
could have seen the atomic bomb that went off in
my my you know, family room.
Speaker 3: Well, they'll they'll get a taste on our socials because
we were we were active with the photography or in
the course of this thing. But it's there's no substitute
for standing in that room and just seeing the paper
and the refuse and the and seeing the pain, seeing
the pain. You know, you said to yourself, all right,
there's this many boxes that have come to the post office.
This is great, there's this many gifts. No, you open
the box, there's sixteen things in there.
Speaker 4: I know. That's that's that's the thing. You know, you
kind of forget. It's not just one thing in a box.
It's a lot of things in a box.
Speaker 3: It's postmodernism in a box. You're damn fucking right now.
It's gonna be a TLFX. Miss you already know what
it is, and you know where to be, and you
know to pour a tall glass of eggnog.
Speaker 4: Before you do it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh yes, coming your way tlf twenty twenty four
Christmas Show and also coming your way, the conclusion of
the epic TLFX defining Carnies are Forever Journey under the sinning.
Speaker 4: Yes, got two more left, two more left? All right?
We have we have of course, invaded the Daniel Craig
era of the Bond, the most recent era of Bond.
I mean, I want you to know something, you know
we're going. I can't. I'm not sure. I don't know
if we've ever gone this close to Like I'm trying
to think of a movie that we saw we would
have done cinemat that was very very close, only within
a couple of years of lease from when we did it.
You know, I think this might be the closest.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is getting very close. I mean because Terrifier too, Yeah,
Terrified too, was it?
Speaker 4: For sure? Terrify two? For sure. That's a good point.
I didn't even think about that. That's just because reason
I'm trying to take that on my mind, because that
was last year. Yeah, right, so but uh yeah, like
it's kind of I guess maybe what's so interesting to
me is the fact that you know, we've gone from
way in the past, We've gone from the sixties all
the way to now and uh yeah, we've got two
more left and uh you know we close out this
uh this wild and unpredictable. And I mean, if if
if you like, if you like movies, if you're a
James Bond fan and you're not signed up for cinemat
I'm telling you what what happened was. First of all,
there are so many wrestlers that have been redisc covered
I'll say that rediscovered within this journey. And also, it's
not just the story of Bond, it's the story of individuals. Yes,
it's the story. I mean, there are so many players
in and there have been so many threads that have
been told over the course of this series that even
I wasn't expecting. I had no idea, like the certain areas,
I had no idea we were going to be telling
basically talk about the downfall of MGM Studios. I had
no idea that we're going to be doing that, right.
I had no idea that, you know, there would be
this guy Kevin mclory who would end up being a
thorn in everybody's side, and you know, and watching the
rise and fall, and I never I'll tell you what
I never. I never thought that I would find Roger
Moore to the most fascinating individual of all time.
Speaker 3: It's it's so full of revelations. As someone who's not
a cinophile, sitting in the spectator seat, sitting in the
passenger seat as boss Man drives the flip side of
what your custom to here in the main show. I
am just so amazed at how interested I find myself
in the minutia of these films and franchises. And it's
not just the wrestler, as I suspected when we started
under the Cinemat all those years ago, that draws me in,
but it's equal parts. Just the way the dramas of
Hollywood echo the dramas of wrestling exactly back a certain
amount of time, there's no difference. You know, you talk
about Cauliflower Alley Club and you talk about the heritage
of wrestlers kind of sharing the same fraternity towards the
turn of the century with actors.
Speaker 4: Yep, it becomes.
Speaker 3: Really fascinating to think about how closely intertwined they were.
It's it's it's two p's of the same pod, yeah,
for sure. And that pot is under the Cinemat, good
damn right, And it's available for the Executive Producer tier
and above. Over at patreon dot com slash the Lapsed Fan,
where you prove you're either just along for the ride
or you're helping to author what we've been doing for
ten years. Take the pride of ownership. That's where we're headed, folks.
If you don't own something, no one takes you seriously.
So have some ownership stakes in this cast by putting
fuel into the engine instead of just standing on the
side of the road with your arms folded expecting everything
to operate perfectly without you having to lift a finger.
Speaker 4: Not up, not up.
Speaker 3: And it's not like we don't give you something in return.
We give you the smash hit under the cinemat. So
many critically acclaimed things coming in on this Bond series
and all just kicked it into a new gear this year. Frankly,
I mean, scary movie season was phenomenal. Christmas movie season
is coming up. There really isn't a better time of years.
Speaker 4: It's we get some some great stuff for Christmas movie season.
Well maybe not great stuff, but it's gonna be fun.
Speaker 3: Great, great in the way that we've accustomed you to
think of great.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, that's for sure.
Speaker 3: And and there aren't tallmount we shy away from climbing either,
but the small mountains can be equal parts. Is fun
just as your accustomed to on the main feed. You
know how it goes the shows that you care least
about are some of the most revered TLF episodes.
Speaker 4: I mean every every every show has a story that's right,
no matter how big, no matter how small.
Speaker 3: We don't give a fuck. We don't give a fuck.
Bring any set of facts to us and we'll put
it through the process and you'll be glad we did.
And that is doubly the case. Over at patreon dot com,
Slash the Lapsed Fan were not only do you get
under the cinemat but if you have the courage and
the resources to join that tip top mote tier, the
premiere select Group, our ride or dies, as I like
to say, the folks that are like, not only is
what you guys do good and worthy of money, but
you know I want to be I want to be
in the infantry with you guys. You know I want
to I want to be next to you holding a
rifle as you do what it takes to survive in this.
Speaker 4: Podcast, want to be on the front line, in the
front lines.
Speaker 3: When you think about it, you think about how much
of a cliche it became in recent years. Everybody is
a podcast. Everybody is a podcast. It doesn't mean anything
to have a podcast. Well, over here, it does.
Speaker 4: Yes, it does.
Speaker 3: Over here, it does.
Speaker 4: Want to tell you what this is the difference though, Okay, yeah,
you know what, Everyone can have a fucking podcast. You're
absolutely right, every're gonna have a fucking podcast. But I'll
tell you what. It doesn't matter that you have a podcast.
It matters what you do with the podcast and go
all right, And there are a lot of fucking ham
and eggers out there who just have one. And you
know they Number one, two, things will happen, Okay, either
they're either they're gonna they're gonna stop because they they
they nothing happens fast enough, which is always bullshit to
begin with. All right, nothing ever happens fast. Okay. Number two,
they you know, they become guest reliant and they can't
find guests, and then you're gonna fail, all right, and
you're gonna quit because you don't put the work in
the actual work, and the actual work is hard shit. Yes,
it's time consuming. Yes, it's stressful.
Speaker 3: Because you did a podcast because you think it would
be cool to have a podcast, not because you must
have a podcast. We must have a podcast. Yes, we've
been told this for too many years, even before we
started the show, and it might not have been a
podcast per se that they were calling for, but folks knew,
Folks who observed the dynamic knew that there was a
community for this stuff. And the proof points just keep
flowing in year after year, incremental by incremental. The returns
are in, and the returns are looking decidedly positive. And
so patreon dot com slash the lapsed fan is where
to go to prove that you're worth the shit in
a world where unless you're coming out of pocket, you
you barely exist.
Speaker 4: Yep.
Speaker 3: And we don't write the rules, but we certainly play
by them. And the mote tier, as mentioned, not only
do you get that extra panache from your co chair
is not only are your nearest and dearest to our
heart when we're thinking about special events and things that
we want to make exclusive to you folks out there
in the Solar system, exclusive access to your co chairman.
Like our phone calls between each other when a wrestler
passes away, that's mode only. Also mode only, it's getting
on the living room carpet with Mama sorrow ah yes,
and watching the matches of your and just hearing a voice.
It's really like it's as if you had an Alexa
in your house that's downloaded. Yep, what every mom and
dad has ever said, every kind of subtly disapproving mom
and dad has said to their sons and daughters that
are wrestling fans, and just watch it, watch it sing
like a symphony and going directions you never could have anticipated.
Speaker 4: It's it's a reminder as to in a way, you know,
it's a reminder of really the shame and pain it
is being a wrestling fan. Okay, that's what it is.
It reminds you that that that uh, you know, what
you're watching is uh, you know, it's it's harmful to yourself.
Speaker 3: And it's certainly not something that even if you watch
it your whole life, that your parents are ever going
to really understand. And by you know, insert parents, everybody,
polite society, yes, anyone you'll ever run into for the
rest of your life, you know, has no one.
Speaker 4: Let me let me tell you this, no one's going
to think more of you for being a wrestling fan.
Speaker 3: Not everybody will think less of you. But you're exactly right,
no one will think more of you.
Speaker 4: I I challenge anybody to just you know, you meet
somebody new for the first time and tell them you're
a wrestling fan and watch how far they distance themselves.
Speaker 3: Oh really, there, it is so like you're talking about
like w w oh okay, okay, okay, okay, that's why
we're here. Where the corner you retreat to when it's
like God, yeah, in trouble, I'm trying to I'm out
there in the real world and they're looking at me. Well, look,
there is something wrong with you. But this is how
you deal with it. TLF is how you deal with it.
And we'll send you back out of that corner and
fighting shape with vasoline on your cuts and your mouthpiece
firmly affixed and hopefully the blood flowing as it should
in those cramped up legs. So Wrestle Mamia is a
great way to get in touch with the kind of
thing we're talking about. As the Boss Man watches all
manner of matches from the archives with Mama Sorrow in
the room, commenting things that are on the minds of
people who haven't been wrestling, brain addled with the course
of their lives. And we say this because we're part
of it, We're inextricably part of it. We say it
not to cast judgment we say it to just have
our eyes wide open about the company we keep as
these long time obsessive wrestling fans, so then we know.
Speaker 4: You're out there too.
Speaker 3: The Christmas Show proves it, Patreon proves it. It's a
wonderful thing. So join us for Wrestle Mamia and the
Moteer if you find yourself so inclined and find yourself
in receipt of the resources to do so as we
close out twenty twenty four in the year and with
the holidays upon us. Of course, if you've got a
lapsed fan in your life, there really is no excuse
as far as schwag availability.
Speaker 4: Oh fuck yeah.
Speaker 3: I walked down in your basement when we were recording
the Christmas Show, or after we recorded the Christmas Show,
and I laid eyes on it for the first time.
Speaker 4: What did you see?
Speaker 3: I laid eyes on the TLF Letterman jacket. Yes, you did,
and the fashion of the black and red raw is
war jacket that Vince and Jr. Started wearing wearing right
around the time we're arriving at in our sid tribute,
by the way, and I.
Speaker 4: Looked at that thing, good point.
Speaker 3: I observed the craftmanship. I observed how the letters were
raised off of the fabric. I observed the the leather
texture of the red sleeves, and I just I was
just flabbergasted by the quality.
Speaker 4: It's a beauty. It's a real beauty. You know, we
geta I gotta find a place to take it out
for for a test drive. But yeah, it is a beauty. Yeah.
Speaker 3: If there's some if you're looking for something premium for
the TLF fan in your life, and if they're you know,
if they have kind of like the aesthetic that fits
with that, look, man, this is the ticket. This is
what Dicky has come up with over at Chopped Teas.
Our Chopped Tea store is just off the chain. But
Letterman jacket, isn't just it that that's available on kind
of a limited run basis for premium price. I would
suggest to you at some point it won't be a
purchase option because these aren't these these aren't cheap to
put together. This is high quality craftsmanship that Dicky is
facilitating here. But there's a lot of other stuff, non
T shirt stuff like hoodies and caps and jackets, and
then you.
Speaker 4: Know, and he's also been able to take some of
the items that yes, that haven't been able to to
cross the line over at over at pro wrestling teas.
So you know, some of the stuff that you know,
like the the the new warlorder shirt that I made
ten years ago, the design that I made ten years
ago that just you know, because of because of you know,
any kind of copyright issues, no one knowing you know,
they were progressing t's wasn't able to do. But it's
available now over it chopped, so you know, stop ticking around.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's no excuse. And progressing t's is very much
worth mentioning because that's of course our full gallery of
every T shirt in particular that we've ever come up with,
and progressingts dot com Slash the Lapse fan is a
place to go for you know, let's face it, the
key piece of wardrobe for any self respecting wrestling fans
the black T shirt.
Speaker 4: Oh fuck yeah. I mean listen, we cater to the
black T shirt.
Speaker 3: That's how you know, Like, if you're driving around trying
to find a wrestling venue, that's how you know you're
on the right block because you see two blocks worth
of people wearing double x or single XL black T
shirts lined up.
Speaker 4: I mean, come on, triple XL quadruple XL as well,
and with what around their shoulder, usually a championship belt
because they on something somewhere is there the champ right,
it's not because they it's not because they They're they're
carrying a phony belt that means absolutely nothing on their shoulder.
Speaker 3: And then with that visual, I I you know, I
developed some internal comfort that I found my destination. But
at the same time, as I locked my car door,
I look down at my shoes and I do a
quick exhale, and I shake my head and I walk
towards my people once again.
Speaker 4: Yep.
Speaker 3: And we look forward to seeing everybody when we're out
and about in the wrestling world. But there's no better
way to fly the flag and please send us on
social and stuff. We love when people go to wrestling
shows wearing stuff from Pro Wrestling t's. It's always such
a treat to see people fly the flag. I'll never
forget the homie Scott Suddy in the front row of
an aw show. Oh I love it, grabbing his laps
fan logo T and just like what I need, forcing
it into the foreground. Oh God, what pride that's sent
through through our veins. So Pro Wresting ts dot Com.
And I want to give a special shout out to Andrew.
Andrew is somebody who recently took us up on our
Sids Vanna's line. In tribute to Sid and his proclivity
and his mission really to send as many cases of
Vienna sausages to his church in Memphis as he possibly could,
we've developed a line of Sid's softball Vienna T shirts. Yes,
he was passionate about the Viennas and so are we.
And I want to thank Andrew for putting down real
American currency to purchase the cenn Sid's Vienna's T shirt
Overpro Wrestling dot Com. Salute to you, sir, and I
hope you wear it with pride and wear it with
joy this holiday season. Well that's that's important business. But
it's yes, it is, it's business. Nonetheless, let's get into
a little bit of fun, shall we. Let's get back
into where Sid stands in nineteen ninety seven. So he's
dropped the championship to the Undertaker at WrestleMania, right yep.
And you wonder, you know, because for Sid, it's always
like they gave me the belt because they believed in
me and I was going to go on a run.
And of course it's never that. It's always said, you'll
be a good placeholder until we get to the people
we really want to build around, which will never be
you at large part because you have certain limitations as
a performer, and we never know when you're going to
just completely up and disappear on us or you know,
oversleep the Royal Rumble ninety seven press conference where we're
trying to fill the fucking Alamodome.
Speaker 4: I'm trying to get my stuff done.
Speaker 3: And so were we, and that's why I have.
Speaker 4: You don't understand I have responsibilities. Yeah, I do understand.
Speaker 3: That's why I'm kind of.
Speaker 13: I have responsibilities outside of yours. I need to accomplish things.
I have accomplishments that rely on my attention.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so they're not quite accomplishments before you accomplish them.
But I do understand what you're trying to say.
Speaker 4: That's what they think you do.
Speaker 3: That's why the sentimentation is so good, because he would
plub the syntax that way, you would have to be like, well,
I kind of get what he's saying. But do you
think sid went into WrestleMania expecting to lose the championship.
Speaker 4: I'm sure he did. I'm sure he went in there
thinking that there's no way he's losing the championship.
Speaker 3: Here he is in one of his many shoot interviews,
this one with our video, talking about his mentality going
into Chicago that night and the end of the title
reign that began on the show we last covered for
you on the sid tribute was you know, I was.
Speaker 12: Told again, once I get to go back, as long
as I was doing good business, that we were going
to keep it on. I got to WrestleMania, it was
dropped to me, I was gonna drop it, So I said, okay,
finally me.
Speaker 14: Yeah, you know, and.
Speaker 3: That's the only God knows what the story is behind
that pregnant pause.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I mean that was definitely like what what, how
am I going to share this story?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Maybe because you found out that you you know, what
do he say? Like, they're gonna keep me champion as
long as him drawing money.
Speaker 12: I was told again, once I get the belt back,
as long as I was doing good business, it was
dropped to me, I was going to drop it.
Speaker 4: Well, I don't understand you're telling me I'm dropping the.
Speaker 3: Belt tonight, yes, said it's kind of an obviousness.
Speaker 4: Said yeah, well, I mean, you know, it's just the
way we got to do things. I don't understand. You're
telling me right now that I have to drop the belt.
You said that I did not have to drop the belt. Well,
what I said was you didn't have to drop the belt.
We wouldn't take the belt off you unless it was
you know, as long as you were doing good business.
That's exactly what I'm saying. So why are you taking
the belt off me?
Speaker 3: If we told you ahead of time that we're to
take the belt off of you, you wouldn't have showed up.
That's why.
Speaker 4: I mean. There's that, and I mean said, I mean
to be frank about it, and you're not doing good business.
Business is down with you on top.
Speaker 3: I mean, this is on track, on track for the
lowest bought WrestleMania of all time.
Speaker 4: Just sorry, What the hell are you saying? Are you
saying that I'm a draw? Are you saying that I
didn't pack the house with those fans out there?
Speaker 3: That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 8: Shut up.
Speaker 4: I want you to look me in the eye. I
want you to look me in the face. Mcmn.
Speaker 15: I want you to look in the eyes of Sid
and I want you to tell me that I am
doing bad business.
Speaker 4: Said, you're doing bad business.
Speaker 8: You understand what it means to be the master at
the road of the world.
Speaker 3: That really good And sham Michael's shamacho.
Speaker 8: He goes away with his damn leg is damn me
and his smiles gone around the back.
Speaker 4: Of his head.
Speaker 2: You don't have to worry about Sid smile.
Speaker 4: You haven't worry about Sid smile.
Speaker 8: My smile stays right. Words should be on my mouth now,
not getting from.
Speaker 4: Here here, not in the back of my head like
sham Michael's.
Speaker 8: My smile and on the back of my head like
sham michaels.
Speaker 2: Let's fucking go.
Speaker 4: I don't know why you're telling me. Fix it, man,
You tell me right now. You're telling me right now
that I don't have what it takes a draw.
Speaker 3: Someone get him a piece of paper and some crayons,
please and improved.
Speaker 4: If you want to prove that you can draw, I'll
tell you what they You know, there is a there's
a daycare center in the building, and they've got crayons
and markers and construction paper, and you can show me
if you can draw. But if you're going to do that,
which I definitely think you should, the one thing is
they don't allow championship belts in the daycare the beauty family.
Speaker 3: You know, you go to the house and they got
drawings on the fridge and no, that's so cute. You
realize most of them are done by Sid.
Speaker 4: I Frank to that.
Speaker 3: No, Dad, you think Frank would get off his ass
for a second to color a picture of you?
Speaker 4: Out of your mind?
Speaker 3: I got a garage full of Vienna's because of that
fucking guy. I feel like we ended up with a
garage full of Viennas by the time the fuck could run, rapping.
Speaker 4: Was over too. Oh, I know seriously, so like I'm.
Speaker 3: Looking down and at inventory that that failed to be
distributed as originally arranged.
Speaker 4: Uh uh said.
Speaker 3: We're going to keep the belt on you. No, we're not, said,
why would we do such a thing? That's the story
with him. It's like I never got the run. We've
heard it, you know, I never got the chance to
prove that if you keep the belt on me for
a period of time, I can be among those top
drawing champions that you had. And yeah, yeah, they sure
didn't go with you, because every two months it's like,
oh this wasn't what I thought it's gonna be. Uh
my bicep hurts, Like come on, man, what do you expect?
But yeah, that pregnant pause was so much. You know,
there's so much more shit he pulled at Mania so
much more.
Speaker 4: Maybe went into Undertaker's locker room and try to convince
him to like say, no, you're not gonna take the belt.
Speaker 3: Well, you probably came up with some kakammy thing where
like you don't do this, I'm not going out there
or something.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 3: That's just what I heard in that clip. I thought
that was fascinating.
Speaker 4: Mark. I want you, Mark, I want you going there.
You tell them you're not taking the belt. You you
look me right in the eye. Run now. I want
you go out there. I want to tell Vinswick man,
I'm not taking Sid's belt.
Speaker 3: What hits you in the head like a shot?
Speaker 4: Or I'm gonna kick you in your kneecap?
Speaker 3: Wow, whoa, that's a threat. Jeez, how's he ever gonna
come back from that? It is funny to threaten somebody
with a very kind of rudimentary blow like a single
blow like that, not to the face, just to some
other appendace kneecap. Well, hey, if you kick Mark Kellaway
in the knees, you could uh incapacitate him.
Speaker 4: Before could he couldn't he could implode, could.
Speaker 3: Just vaporize where he stands. But yeah, it really tasty
to think about what was on Sid's mind because you
watch the shoot interviews that he did over the course
of his life, and they're so meandering, and it seems
like he's holding nothing back. It seems like he's got
a he's got like a SOB story for everything that's
ever happened in his career. Not a SOB story, but
kind of like, you know, it's always like, oh it
was great, but you know one thing I always bothered me,
or one thing that really sucked about that whole thing,
or one thing that really couldn't get over. There's always
that at the end every time, which I love about
the guy. I mean, that's that's that's our oxygen here,
you know, as wrestlers who can't help but let some
grievance out every time they open their mouth. But for Sid,
it's just like man if if if in this instance,
he wasn't comfortable saying what was on his mind in
that exact moment. I can't imagine when you consider the
things he does say, the things he does insist on
mentioning it's a it's it's.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's something. If there's something that he's holding back from,
it's gonna be pretty pretty fucking juicy.
Speaker 3: So coming off Wrestling Maney thirteen, he hits Peoria the
March twenty fifth taping where he beats Jerry Fox and
then uh, he goes to Kuwait with the ww OF
tour in April of ninety seven. You know, they would
often go to the Middle East, not often, but when
they did go.
Speaker 4: Isn't it that it's that tour, isn't it? Isn't it
that tour?
Speaker 3: Isn't what that tour where Vader gets stuck? He nailed it. Yeah,
this is the tour where Vader does a morning talk
show with Undertaker in Kuwait and.
Speaker 4: Is Taker just sits there like a fucking idiot.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, we went through this on the nineties
seven journey. I think yeah, and uh, you know, the
rest of the host starts implying it's fake and says
asks if it's fake, Invader gets up and snatches him
by the shirt and idiot. It's a big international incident
and they don't want to let him go return to
the United States and he's going to be charged and
it's bloody hilarious and Taker has to pretend to still
be in character the whole time, even though.
Speaker 4: But he's not even like you know, keep in mind,
this is Undertaker also dressing as right biker Taker, you know,
big dead Undertaker. Like he's just he's he he's just
he's sitting there. I mean, he looks not like the Undertaker.
You know, he looks like two thousand Undertaker. It's very odd.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, it's odd, I agree, And it's a it's a
time of great identity crisis for the Undertaker because they've
put the strap on him. Now he's the man like,
he's the guy that's going to go around and represented
Waifs Champion. He's not this side show that doesn't really
get a lot of media exposure because he's a gimmick
like no, and now he's got to be the WIF Champion.
He's going to be doing interviews. He's got to figure
out how to talk and still be the Undertaker and
still keep up this k Fabes kept up so long
with the gimmick and was so well respected for keeping up.
So I think that's kind of interesting crossroads and that
whole thing. But yeah, this is the tour and Sid
didn't want to go on the tour. Of course he didn't.
As we'll get to he thought it was a wonderful
opportunity as a matter of fact, to let a lot
of nagging injuries heal. And he found a way to
take it very personally that WWF instead of taking what
he thought was a golden opportunity to take him off
the road and suffer no ill consequence because there's not
a lot of US cities that they're going to hit
during the Kuwait tour to rehab some injuries and let
him come back when they get back from Kuwait. He's
doesn't want to make the shot. He doesn't want to go,
and that they him go anyway.
Speaker 4: And on.
Speaker 3: April ninth of nineteen ninety seven in Kuwait City, he
loses to Freddie Joe Floyd in Kuwait. Oh really, in
the first round of the Kuwaiti Cup. Oh my god,
So this is not the one that I'm mad wins?
Remember that, didn't they do that the year before he
won the Kuwaiti Cup.
Speaker 4: Yeah, something like that, and.
Speaker 3: They showed it on TV and played it up this one,
they hardly been mentioned on television. But but yeah, he
loses to Freddy Joe Floyd. Hkak Tracy smothers his old
pal from from Memphis. So I'm sure that wasn't a
huge negotiation of all the jabbronis to have Sid lose to.
But you know, when Sid's losing to someone like that,
or losing in a very quick way, you know, he's
coming off of having been told he's been a bad boy,
you know, and this is your punishment lost to Freddy
Joe Floyd. He's the equivalent of you know, rubbing the
dog's face in the mess, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, fan wrestling podcast, the wrestling podcast that knows the
boys need their candy. It's the lapsed fan. He's an
lapsed fan wrestling podcast with Jack and Carneo m JP Sorrow.
Speaker 3: So it's not going well in that result, I think
tells you the story and then all of a sudden,
what's also in jeopardy? His April match with Brett House
with Brett Heart at the In Your House pay per
view Brett House. Yes, all of a sudden, it's a problem.
April twentieth, nineteen ninety seven, Dayton Daily News headline, Steve Austin,
not Psycho Sid to be in your House. Wow, it's
by Alex Marvez. The circumstances entering Tonight's in Your House
pay per view show may be more interesting than the
card itself. The World Wrestling Federation was forced to change
Bretdheart's opponent to Steve Austin after Psycho Said missed a
Monday night raw show two weeks ago.
Speaker 4: Oh my god.
Speaker 3: Sid told WWF officials he had injured his back, but
some believe that was an excuse to avoid losing to Heart.
Considering Sid's shaky track record, that WWF decided it couldn't
risk billing him on in Your Head House. Austin versus
Hard is the promotion's hottest feud, but the WWF was
hoping to save this match until later. Don't don't expect
a conclusive finish, because neither Austin or Hart can afford
to lose. And I'm sitting here and I don't remember
the finish. I think that's probably oh.
Speaker 4: DQ, Yeah, Austin puts Brett Hart in the Sharpshooter and
the the Heart Foundation comes out and disqualifies.
Speaker 3: Brett like right a Monday night raw finish on pay
per views, right right, which tells you all you need
to know about how how not by design? Rematching these
two a month after Mania?
Speaker 4: I mean, it's a shame. It's a good it's a
decent match too. It's like, oh, yeah, they're not gonna
do anything you can't have. I mean, you really, you
can't have a clean finish on you know, that's that's
your money feud. That that should have been your WrestleMania
fourteen main event.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, we've talked about that, Austin Hart Mania fourteen.
If the screw job doesn't happen, that's the move easily,
not Austin Sean. But yeah no, yeah, So what's this
all about? Sid? I mean, what back injury? All of
a sudden after your well, you know you told him, right,
you told him they shouldn't have sent you to Kuwait.
Speaker 4: I said, don't, don't, don't take me to Kuwait. So
you take me to Kuwait, I get injured? What happened?
Speaker 3: I've done so many jobs to suggest that I don't
want to do a job I've done more.
Speaker 4: Well, let's let's just let's just let him say.
Speaker 12: Oh boy, Uh, the first injury was a back injury.
And that wasn't a fucking injury. First of all, it
was a bullshit, fucking deal, Bruce Piccher, not fucking fat
ass Jim Ross. My back was fucked up because I
was taking those suit plexes off that fucking top roade
for Brett every night, you know, and okay, god, and
it just seemed like every night my back was landing
right on that piece of iron or something, and I
was just totally worked well all right after els Mania,
I told Vince, I said, I don't want to go
to that damn Overseas them sorry radio bullsh because I
know there weren't going to beat people there. And I said,
it's be a perfect time for me to get my
back piled up. And I had, uh one day surgeries.
I had a series of three of my needed to
do and it was taking an epidural, which is you know,
a big long need onto your back for cortizone injections,
which would obliviate the pain for at least a year.
So when they came back from Overseas, they said well,
have you got releasing the doctor yet and.
Speaker 14: I said no, I haven't.
Speaker 12: You know.
Speaker 14: He said, well, man, we need to make Monday, not Row.
It's coming Monday.
Speaker 12: I said, well, I can make it, you know, and
I'll just go to the doctor when I get back.
They said, no, we need to go right now to
the doctor and have a look at you.
Speaker 14: Now. This is before they started the court zone treatments.
Speaker 12: I said, guys, if I could just have a couple,
I mean, don't worry about my back.
Speaker 14: I'm telling you right now, if.
Speaker 12: I go to the doctor, they were probably don't want
to do surgery. And I was, you know, I knew
that that was how fun e stept it was. Then
I said, what my doctor came get me in today.
I was leaving to go to the family union for Saturday,
and I was going to be back Sunday to go
fly Monday from Monday out Row. So as soon as
I have the phone, they coming back, like thirty minutes later.
They actually called my own doctor and Scudy said we
really needed him in there. Could you please get him in?
So I said, okay, I'll call you back about thirty minutes.
Five minutes for my doctor's office weren't in sure enough.
He said, man, you're like six weeks eight weeks off
or something. So that I called him back and see
what I fucking told you, And see that's what started
my bullshit. There was them two fat fox getting in
my way to see events, knowing it or not knowing it.
If he does do it, then that makes him a
dumb fuck too to take a talent like me and
just fuck me off like that, because I was willing
to come back to work without a fucking doctor's release,
because we all had to do that, and we're all
going to have back problems, you have to walk around them.
I mean, it was nice to get those Corrizon shop
if that's just a doctor's way of making a quick
fucking cup of way, you know what I mean. It
gives you temporary relief, they say for one year, but
after that's going to come back anyway. And the thing is,
we all know when you've been in the business, loans
we have, you got an injury, it's gonna go away
sooner or later, you know what I mean. So if
you're gonna cry out every injury you have and not
be at work every night because you got an injury.
But some people are then you never fucking work. But
that's where that that injury came in. It wasn't really
an injury. It was just I needed a little time off,
and then when I came back, we had the wreck
and that's when I had the real surgery when I
didn't invertebrate in my neck. I mean, I don't know
what reason in the world, but they wanted me to
have a doctor's release from my back before I came back.
I guess for whatever reason they wanted to fuck with
me or something. But I said, then I'll come back
and then I'll go to the doctor and I'll just say.
Speaker 14: I'm okay and we'll go on heals. Okay, well that's
what we'll do.
Speaker 12: And like I said, when we talked to your doctor
said he'll squeeze.
Speaker 14: You in and I said, okay, I didn't want to
go to the doctor because I know exactly what it said.
Speaker 3: Nice is at least it's not complicated dealing with the guy.
Huh No, not at all. What the you guys told me.
If I go here, then but if I did this,
but if I didn't go there, he's not even open today.
I'm going to reunion. Fine, I'll go tomorrow, but he
can't even fit me in. Well, I go my reunion
just like the what I didn't what? Why why are
you telling me about your reunion?
Speaker 11: What do you have to do?
Speaker 16: Care?
Speaker 4: Stop it? Stop it?
Speaker 3: I mean what a what a okay? First of all,
tremendous that he calls Jim Ross and Bruce Richard fat Fox.
Oh yes, tremendous, absolutely, because I bet what's happening. And
you can hear a little bit of annoyance in Bruce's
voice when he did a pod about Sid like in JR.
While he says diplomatic things about Sid, particularly after his passing,
and otherwise he doesn't have a lot to say, like
Sid is not someone who comes up in the books
he's written and said, is not somebody he wants to
talk much about, it seems like to me, which is
weird because he was, you know, head of Talent Relations
and there during Sid's biggest mischief years.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Can I just say too, By the way, I
just so I have I'm looking through now because he
said I don't know how often did he say it
was facing Brett Hart. I don't know.
Speaker 3: He just said he's taking suplexes all the time. I
don't know if it was every night.
Speaker 4: I mean, so far the I've only seen three matches
I've been going through since February of ninety seven. I'm
on the history of w website and there are maybe
three let's see here, I got I.
Speaker 3: Think he would take them in the triple threats with Sean.
Speaker 4: Well, they haven't had They had one in January. Yeah,
and then he had three four four steel cage matches
between March seventh and March ninth with Brett Hart. Besides that,
he was teaming with Brett Hart. Yes, he and he
and and Brett. We'll go against Sewn, Michaels and Steve Austin.
Speaker 3: But it's every night, boss, I'm taking super plexes every night.
Speaker 4: Super plex? Are you taking superlexes from your partner?
Speaker 3: So when you see him take a superplex against Brett
in that cage match after what but shoves down Vincent all.
Speaker 4: That, I mean, I'm sorry, I don't. I just don't
think that that sid is taking a fucking superplex.
Speaker 3: Well it wasn't an injury. I love this, that bullshit thing.
It wasn't even injury. Well, was it? Why is there
a deal then if you're not hurt, like I mean,
I get it his whole thing, And did you decode
what he was saying, like what is the case he
was trying to make kind of He's saying that like
I just needed to heal from a from a minor problem.
I don't even call it an injury. And I thought,
you know, since someone's gonna be in kuwait, I should
just sit here and fucking rehab. And instead they're like,
we need you to go to raw uh And you're like, okay,
but I don't have clearance, and they're like, you need
to get clearance. This is at a point in time
when WWF for some reason got very particular about having
a doctor's okay before someone came back to the ring.
They're probably afraid of getting sued or something like that,
i'd imagine. And so Sin is like Sid, Sid's the
master of this game. Since the master of the doctor's
closed or who knows what he tells the doc when
he gets in there. You know, guys, I'm telling you
he's gonna tell me that I can't work. Just go
in and said, because you know they're thinking they're doing
like a third party check and verification on this guy.
They think they're doing their diligence. Yeah, I mean, what
are the odds, I said, just goes into the doctor
and says, Doc, I can't even move.
Speaker 4: I just caid, doc, Doc, I want to ask you
a question. Yes, just look me the eye. I want
you to look me in the eye. I want you
to answer the question, am I able to.
Speaker 11: Go to work?
Speaker 4: Well?
Speaker 9: Before you answer that, answer the answer the damn question, Well,
should what kind of work do you do?
Speaker 2: I'm a long jumper, That's what I might have put it.
Speaker 4: Well, you see, you're like a long jumper, like like that,
kind of like an Olympic athlete.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's exactly what I am.
Speaker 4: Well, I don't think you should do that. No, no, no, no,
I can't go to work. Doctor said, So, Doc, did
you say I could go back to work? I said no,
I said, no, we cannot go back to work if
he's that kind of an athlete. Absolutely not.
Speaker 11: How long do I need to rest?
Speaker 4: Doc? Well, I mean, honestly, are you training for the Olympics? Yes,
I am.
Speaker 11: How long do I need to rest?
Speaker 4: Well, I'd say you need at least, you know, some
maybe about two months of rehab. Doc.
Speaker 11: How long do I need to rest.
Speaker 4: I'd say at least four months.
Speaker 3: Awesome at that KFA doctor that's three minutes from his house. Yeah, okay, real,
a real fresh set of eyes, a real objective observer.
I mean, I'm not doubting the guy was hurt, but
he says it right there in the clip. You know,
if you took off every time you could argue that
you're hurting, you would never work, especially back then. So
it's it's just it's phenomenal. And he's basically to my
here my ear, accusing Prichard and Ross of you know, saying,
fuck this guy, like we're gonna catch him in a lie,
you know, and you don't catch Sid in a lie.
You don't do it because he's just never gonna He's
never gonna grant your premise.
Speaker 4: Right exactly, Listen, Sid's always gonna get out of it,
or he's gonna find a way out of it, exactly.
Speaker 3: Just when you think you've like laid a fact pattern
bear that calls into question his h his all the
things that he said with so much conviction, something else
comes up and he's just like, God, this is just
gonna go on forever, isn't it unless we just give
him when he wants, so let's just do that. But
this is this is it, this is where they completely
lose patience with him. They've got the strap off him.
He played the role he needed to play during all
that messiness with Sean giving up the belt, and now
there's pretty much we're headed towards zero tolerance policies it
regards the Sidster and uh and these whole meandering games
don't don't really hold water anymore. So that's what's going
on around the April nineteen ninety seven In Your House show.
Sid also says in the same interview that he had
never heard of him being booked to wrestle Brett on
the pay per view, despite it being on the docket
and advertised once or choice on television. Meltzer reported that
Sid's been working with a hernie in a disk in his
back that was caused, you know, by straining and the
other things talked about, and he says the reason was
handled so clumsily. This is the Sid Brett match on
the April seventh, nineteen ninety seven, an episode of Monday
Night Raw is they literally didn't know about it as
the show was going on that Sid was not going
to be able to do the match.
Speaker 4: Oh my god.
Speaker 3: I didn't know if he'd actually be there on RAW
or not. So this must be April seventh. Must be
the Raw that he's talking about that they called him
and said they'd need him for that. He knew shows,
and then all the doctor stuff happens, Meltzer reported. Apparently
Sid left a message at the office over the weekend.
Nobody was there, and Raw was taped on a Sunday night,
so nobody knew.
Speaker 4: I think this is where this started. Is that the
voicemail for nor We talked, Yeah, we did this amazing.
This is where we did the we started the whole thing.
Speaker 3: It was this missed Raw, unbelievable. And he calls on
the weekend knowing no one's going to be there, you
know that whole trick. Yeah yeah, yeah, like telling Holt
to facts the thing on a Sunday that he's going
to exercise creative control against a head of bash at
the beach two thousand, just just to.
Speaker 4: Cover your rent.
Speaker 3: You're ass legally upon Eric Bischoff's suggestion that he'd later
claimed to know nothing about that, and he didn't think
to call the building Meltzer reported to let anyone know
he was hurt. Ends up talking to Evince later in
the week, and Meltzer was reporting that no word on
how long he'll be gone. But there's also a lot
of skepticism at the time to the legitimacy of the
maladies he.
Speaker 4: Was an injury or some sort. I mean, you didn't call.
I called, and even if I didn't, I don't need
to tell you if I called her not right? Well,
I say, uh, you do kind of. I mean, what
is there anything we can do to to help you?
I mean, we listen, we don't want to.
Speaker 3: I mean, let's be honest, pal. Yeah, I mean, you know,
Brett put you over three times in a row. You know,
now it's time for us to get Brett back on track.
And it's you know, you gotta, you gotta When when
can you come back? Because you know Brett needs that.
You know, Brett needs his win back. Remember the flip
side of the coin when he was taking power bombs
every night?
Speaker 4: Said hello are you there?
Speaker 2: Said ship?
Speaker 11: Oh?
Speaker 4: Ship? He was listening. He was boyling, is what he
was doing. I don't answer you face McMahon.
Speaker 2: Oh that's in a shot.
Speaker 1: Oh, don't.
Speaker 2: That's Brett. I to the sid and I want you
to look me in the eye.
Speaker 4: We're on the phone. Shut up, sadly exactly.
Speaker 8: I don't have to come to work because I had
the master.
Speaker 2: And the ruler of my world.
Speaker 4: To say that again, yes, that these are all facts.
I understand that. However, you do you do have some
contractual dates. I do not have contractual anything. Uh told
have contract mm hmm is that true? Does he not have? No? No,
we we we have, we have we have a contract.
I got right here, Pa, you signed it. I'm looking
at it right now. I want you is real good?
Pick man? See it's not the world champion.
Speaker 3: No, yes, woh see, it's real simple.
Speaker 4: See it's real simple. You go around there, you start
promoting that undertaker, that piece of shit. You go around
and you're backing up Steve Austin, Sean Michaels, Brett Hart.
But I want to ask you one thing. How come
I'm being overlooked and stick man? Is it because I'm
not a big movie star?
Speaker 3: He goes out of the old promo. He's only got
like four or five scripts in his head. Really, let
me guess it's real. Let me let me. Guess what
I said. The game we play is simple?
Speaker 4: Is this some? Is the game we play simple? I'm
gonna tell you what's simple? And I ask you again,
Is it because I'm not a big movie star like
Hulk Coagan, the Immortal One himself said, I don't really
care about Hulk Hogan. I know he's over in WCW.
Is it because I'm the newcomer? Said? You've been in
the company, I mean, on an office since nineteen ninety two.
You're not a newcomer anymore. I want you to answer
this one question, vis Nick Man, I want you to
ask me if I know shit.
Speaker 1: Do?
Speaker 4: This is an interesting position, all right, I'm do do do?
Do you know shit? I don't know shit.
Speaker 17: I don't know you.
Speaker 4: I don't know where I am. And that means I
don't have to obey and I don't have to sit
around and do things that you want or that I
think that I need to do. I'll tell you what
I need to do. I have got three hundred pounds
of things Vienna sausages in my garage right now. Uh okay,
Vietna three pounds. Okay, that's a lot of canned meat.
Did you say Vietnamese sausages. You're saying Vietnamese. So that's
not what I said. I got Vienna's, I got Vina,
I got vienna is coming out of my ass.
Speaker 3: He says it like it's He says it like I
got I got whooping cough, you know, like I got Vienna's. Look, look,
I got Vienna's. Like that's one thing you can't say
about me is that I don't have Viennas.
Speaker 4: If you need me, send me pictures of viennas I
got them, if I need to prove to you that
I have all that I have all these Viennas in
my in my garage because my fucking son doesn't didn't
deliver them on time.
Speaker 11: Vienna's.
Speaker 3: You talk about what else might they be packaged with?
In terms of an overall holistic meal?
Speaker 4: What do you I mean Vienna's. It's a that's a
hearty meal, is it not. It's like top of.
Speaker 11: A serial killer. You're just hoping he doesn't shoot.
Speaker 4: I'll tell you in my experience, Vienna sauage, very hearty meal.
I see h. What do you what do you exactly?
Do you do you? Are you calling the police? Exactly?
Are you so? What exactly I don't know how long
I can do this. I don't not want Patterson. You
better call the goddamn cops. I don't know what I'm
fucking doing here. So what what? What? What would do?
What would you kind of eat in addition to the
Vienna sausage? Would you have another, uh maybe a side
dish or something. So you get a nice cheddar cracker
and you put the viennas on side on top, you know,
in between, you make yourself a sandwich about to drink,
about to drink? Said, wow, you have a beverage to
kind of wash down me a Vienna sandwich? I just
get bow water. It's all these a ball of water,
I'll say you would if you really want to make
it a successful meal, a meal that will draw fans
every single time, Well, this is what we need, we need.
I guess we should start doing na Vienna sandwiches to
fans and arenas. I guess they draw people. You can
get all right, if you really want to make it
a full meal, you get yourself a moonpie, I say,
moonpie with Vienna sandwiches and a bah wah wah. Do
you get that one bah wah wah ball water? So Bruce,
he called you a fat bitch.
Speaker 18: Any comments at this point, it's a lot of skepticism
because again Sid had everybody's number, He had Vince's home
phone number. Vince isn't that hard to get in touch with.
So everybody's got the booking sheets. You can let everybody know.
So that's the that's the part where the bullshit flags
go up and you just think, Okay, Sid doesn't want
to play anymore, and that that was the feeling.
Speaker 10: It just was damn it well. But also there was
a feeling of relief.
Speaker 18: That well, we got WrestleMania out of it, we got
the we got everything on taker, and.
Speaker 10: We're moving forward. So that was the feeling.
Speaker 18: Man, if a guy, thing that we wanted to do
was make sure the guys were taken care of. Also,
we had to take care of the company. So if
you come in, it was a changing in times in general,
where you say you're hurt, Okay, we need you to
get checked out by a doctor, find out what's wrong
with you, find out what it is that you need
to do to correct the problem. Once you do that,
we also need a doctor to release you and say, yes,
this person is in good physical condition. To be able
to go out and compete and be a part of
the show.
Speaker 10: That's what we did.
Speaker 18: So if that is getting in his way, then yeah,
we got in his way. But we're taking care of
the company. We're taking care of business because just the
business was changing. Couldn't just take someone's word and say, yep, okay,
I'm clear to go now after you've told me, and
after you've got a doctor say no, you're not good.
So it was I think it was the first time
that he was really being challenged on some of these things.
Speaker 10: And if that's the case, then that's case.
Speaker 3: You were saying, boss.
Speaker 4: Well, so he says like, oh, we got you know,
we at least we got it on you know, we
had WrestleMania. We got WrestleMania from him, and we got
the belt onto It's like, wh why didn't you give
the bell to take her fucking in February at the
final four? Then yeah, that was your big problem.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's it's it's an interesting call. I mean,
I think probably started to be a good match for
WrestleMania they were going to do. I think one of
the things we figured out doing this whole thing is
that they were going to do Sid Undertaker title or
no title at WrestleMania, right, right, So if you're going
to do that, if it's going to be a championship
match all of a sudden, might as well have Taker
win it at Mania instead of Final Four. I guess
that was always supposed to be the show to figure
out what to do without Sean there and bridge the gap.
But yeah, so this is you know, to hear Bruce
tell it, this is people challenging Sid. You know, these
these up the these injuries that seemed to come up
right at the same time that they're proposing he do
something that they probably think he doesn't want to do.
Enough of those strange coincidences, and they, like we said,
they thought they were going to, you know, catch him
in the act, catch him in a lie by engaging
the doctor. And I'm not sure that didn't just make
everything a lot worse. And Pritchard on his show goes
on to say that they were still hopeful come that
in your house, that Sid would show up and Ross
before that, and he says he thinks Vince felt that
if we put him there and gave him the opportunity,
he's going to see it. And he's going to come back,
but of course that wouldn't be the case come early June.
There's a barding that said was supposed to return on
the May thirtieth show in San Jose, but claimed he
had the flu. It wouldn't be back until June twenty eighth.
Speaker 4: He had to flew the coop.
Speaker 3: He flew the coop exactly. But he does come back
June's second, nineteen ninety seven in Huntington, West Virginia, and
not only does he come back, we get that result
that tells us he's been a naughty boy. He loses
to the Undertaker in five minutes.
Speaker 11: Wow.
Speaker 3: There was a rematch on Raw between Undertaker and Sid
in June of nineteen ninety seven, and Undertaker does an interview,
you know, kind of laying out what he's become since
beating Sid and makes a comment about ruling the world,
and that brings out Sid, who challenges him to a
match later in the show. Then Taker beats him quickly.
And Meltzer was reporting at the time that when Sid
showed up, they told him he's doing a job for
Undertaker and he didn't want to do it, and he
and was given.
Speaker 4: When the belt back parent. Did we say that's the thing?
Did we say that that was going to happen? Wait,
you thought we were going to put the belt back
on you? When you put the belt back on you,
That's why I came back, I said, just someone told me,
because you told me this man that you're giving me
the belt back.
Speaker 3: Was the name of the person that told you this?
Speaker 4: Was it Sid? By any chance? Did did Sid tell
you this that? Or tell you? What?
Speaker 16: Was it?
Speaker 19: Bo?
Speaker 4: Was it? Oh? Shit? Was it bo? Justice?
Speaker 3: Does Bow know Pal? Does Bow know the finish is
Bow and the No?
Speaker 4: Shit, that's a good question. Or does Bow blow? I'm well,
you're talking pale right now, you're talking crazy. But I
want to tell you exactly who it was, yes that
told me I was going to get the title back?
All right, I'm all here, and believe me. I'm all ears,
and I want to get my firing hand ready because
someone's gotten fucking fired. It was stens nick Man. Wow,
Uh who I'm fired? Do you know? I gotta go? Bye?
Speaker 3: And it was given some threats, according to Meltzer, s
to his future employment and finally agreed to lose to Undertaker.
As a result of that, A pictcher just talked about
remembering that and Sid saying something's defective. Well, you're bringing
me back and I'm gonna go out and do a
job tonight. What good will I be after that? And
Pritchard's thought is, exactly what good have you been for
not showing up for all this last bird of die?
So at least let us get a win on television
for the top guy and see what happens from there.
But Richard said he just didn't understand why he was
being brought back to do a job. And our feeling
was you're being brought back so that we can get
something back on television because we're really not sure what
the future is.
Speaker 4: Why you have me lose, well, because that's you know,
you When you lose something, that's the way it goes.
Speaker 14: I don't lose.
Speaker 4: People don't believe that I lose because I'm a shooter.
Speaker 3: Excuse me, don't you remember a shooter? Don't you remember
that magazine feature you did on me?
Speaker 4: Impty, I hunt uh hunt game.
Speaker 12: This.
Speaker 3: I saw your meeting there with Big Sid. What's on
his mind?
Speaker 4: Oh? I'm telling you he's hunting you, hunting me?
Speaker 11: Huh, that's he said.
Speaker 4: He's hunting game. He's hunting hunter.
Speaker 3: The hunter is becoming the hunted bell.
Speaker 4: The hunter hunter. You're being hunted by a hunter hunter.
Speaker 3: Let me ask you a question, Pelle. If I asked
you to stand naked in the middle of Times Square
and deface yourself.
Speaker 4: Would you do that? Would you do that?
Speaker 11: Would do that?
Speaker 4: If I told you to do it? Would you do that?
Would you do that? Would you be a good son
and do that for me? Go out to Times Square naked?
All right, touch yourself and like wave it around.
Speaker 3: How do you prove you prove loyalty to events? You
masturbate to completion in Times Square?
Speaker 4: I would like you to do to pleasure yourself in
Times Square. I want you to lay on lay on
the ground, all right, lay on the ground in Times
Square naked, and I want you to pleasure yourself to completion.
Speaker 3: Paul, this is Jack and JP. They host the Lapsed
Fan podcast. Actually, oh, you're the guys that, uh, you
guys would talk about, you know, wrestlers jerking off all
over themselves. And so if you guys talk a lot
about Dix, I always think that's kind of weird. You
can't picture his face right now? Yeah, totally to laugh
at us, Well, weren't you telling people to suck it
for years? Didn't you kind of go half naked during
the beginnings of d X, you know all the time.
Speaker 4: I mean, oh, I was a kid.
Speaker 3: These guys thought it was a shoot. You believe these guys,
Oh my god, Well like his chrow magnan forehead and
his bald head.
Speaker 4: Oh god, his bracelets. You guys need a little you know,
you guys need a little uh, you know, a little
dose of reality. Guys working you know, God's been working
your gimmick too much.
Speaker 3: I don't know if you know the the LAPS fan podcast.
Oh yeah, yeah, you guys are the who who oh
whoa whoa guys, right, so uh ah giving us every
indication at the time, Bruce says of Sid that Sid
didn't know what his future was in the company, And
in fact, if you look through the tea leaves at
the time, there was some overtures clearly being made from
Sid towards WCW. And I do wonder if, yeah, when
he got that pregnant pause there, I do wonder if
he kind of a called WCW in frustration when he
realized they were taking the strap off of him.
Speaker 4: What's the problem, Why why not tell that? Though that
seems like a weird thing not to tell.
Speaker 3: You talked about sid not telling it. Yeah, yeah, well
probably there's legal sensitivities about opening up those conversations before
the contract is expired. That's always been like a two.
Speaker 4: Even this far out.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, like that's always been a two faced thing
about wrestling. Were like it was like a big deal
when Jericho in his book talked about like coming to
Vince's living room table a dining room table when he
was still under w'sw contract. Because that's tampering. You're not
supposed to you're not supposed to be going after somebody
that gives the other company legal recourse. But of course
everybody does it. You just don't admit you're doing it.
But you usually send out feelers through back channels and things,
and you know word gets back to them. You want
word to get back to them because you want them
to sweeten the pot. You want them to suddenly take
your demands more seriously because they're afraid you're going to jump,
and you need them to know that to get that leverage.
But at the same time, you can't be too explicit
about it. This is me hypothesizing what may have been
going through Sid's firing neurons when he paused there in
that interview. But yeah, this is the time too when
people like Shan's going to WCW. Remember that did the
whole backstage fight with Brett and he's going to go
right to Nitro and all that shit. This was that
time where it's like, what's the next shoot to drop
on the big migration to WCW. And it would shock
me if SID didn't find a way to get his
name in that sauce. So I think that's what Bruce
Richard is intimating. There and there and there was There
was like a one off clipping I found looking at
news coverage of Sid, mainstream news coverage of SID in
nineteen ninety seven, where it's trip up said he's heading
to WCW. It was completely unsourced. The cares like one
of these, like you know, local wrestling newspaper columnists. They
don't have any sourcing or anything like that, but for
some reason bold enough to declare it's going to happen.
Speaker 11: Of course it didn't.
Speaker 4: Wow, But uh, you know.
Speaker 3: That usually bubbles up to the surface because there's some
fire to the smoke.
Speaker 1: It's the Lasall Wrestling podcast, the wrestling podcast that knows
the boys need their candy. It's the Lapsed Fan. He's
the Lapsed Fan Wrestling podcast with Jack and Carnacio and
JP Sorrow.
Speaker 3: But it continues for Sid. He hits Lowell on June six,
ninety seven, teaming with Shawn Michaels and Steve Austin. There's
a three man team for you. Yeah, I tell you
that's crazy if you think O. When Bulldog and Jim
Knightheart they moved to Portland and Maine for the same match.
And then King of the Ring like you mentioned, takes
place June eight, ninety seven in Providence and on that show,
Jim Knighthart Owen Hart and British Bulldog from the Heart
Foundation they defeat. Do you recall who.
Speaker 4: Sidneylod Well done on.
Speaker 3: The show said on the losing end, once again, you
can tell this isn't going anywhere in particular. Then there's
the June ninth, nineteen ninety seven row. This is the
infamous one in Hartford where Brett rips out some of
Shawn Michael's hair backstage. On that show, Undertaker, Sid and
Ken Shamrock defeat Jim Knighthart, owen Hart and the British Bulldog.
So kind of pushing in the direction there of SID
of being aligned against Team Canada against the Heart Foundation. Yeah,
ros Ward June ninth, ninety seven, Harvard Civic Center. The
next the same night, he defeats owen Hart. That's probably
taping for the next week. They go to Montreal June
thirteenth of nineteen ninety seven, where the Bulldog defeats SID
in the European title match, and then they go to
Toronto on June fourteenth, where owen Hart defeats SID for
the Intercontinental title. So if he's taken back to back
losses here in Canada, you can tell this is us
definitely out of the SID business and they're definitely trying
to get as many wins over him as they can.
Speaker 4: And these were the these are house shows or these
are on TV the house shows?
Speaker 3: Okay, Yeah, the TV one was the six Man and
him beating owen gotcha. So they're not even having to
lose on But there must have been something that fell
apart around that June ninth raw taping in Hartford, where
you know the next two shots they have he's losing
to Bulldog and Owen in Canada. There's got to be
that had to be some last straw argument or something
like fuck this, We're not doing this anymore kind of thing.
This appeared in the June sixteenth, nineteen ninety seven Canadian
Press out of Hawkesbury, Ontario. It's about to get a
lot more complicated because even if they were throwing in
the towel on sid as, those match results indicate their
hand would also kind of be forced. Hawkesbury, Ontario, four
World Wrestling Federation superstars were turned home Monday, banged up
with cuts and bruises after the car they were in
flipped at oh Boy and route to About in suburb
and Ottawa. On Sunday, they were in a Lincoln Continental
that hit a soft shoulder of Highway forty near Point Fortune, Quebec,
about two kilometers from the Ontario border, said Quebec Provincial
Police spokesman Pierre Robischowed. They were heading from rap from
Montreal to the Choral Center in Cannata, Ontario, for the
WWF Canadian Challenge on Sunday night. WWF spokeswoman Joe Anne Rougeau,
that's gotta be j Jacques. Joe's a daughter or something.
Joe Ann Rujeau said, Psycho Sid really named Sid, Udy,
flash Funk, Charles Skaggs, and Flash Funk is always around
when Sid when happens, but it's going down.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 3: Philipon and Doug Furnace or Dwight Furnace were in the
car when it tumbled three or four times. Wow, the
passenger side was totally crushed, she said from Montreal. The
car is totaled. I bet you can't even tell the color.
She said. It appeared Furnace suffered the most serious injury,
a broken shoulder blade, while the Fawn suffered a concussion
and cuts to his scalp. And this would be the
end of Furnace and the Fawn and WWF boss right here. No,
it's a result of these injuries. They pretty much know
the push, the push. They come back, but no one
kiss a fuck.
Speaker 11: It's over.
Speaker 4: It's over.
Speaker 3: They're in srivs at seven, right, it's over.
Speaker 4: Ah, that's sad.
Speaker 3: Skaggs was unheard except for bruises, while Udy, the six
foot ten, three hundred and twenty pound former WWF champion,
was experiencing numbness in his arms.
Speaker 11: And legs. M.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, let's talk about after the crash. Enough of
a before the crash. They're all having a hard time moving,
Rajau said, adding everyone with the exception of Lafawn was
headed home to the United States. Lafun is from Quebec
but resides in Calgary. Roubischoud said the driver lost control
while trying to adjust the sun roof. Beauty was behind
the wheel.
Speaker 4: Police, you get your rashed down steering i'sta sun roof.
Speaker 3: Sid was bunched up his knees to the steering wheel,
steering with his thumb and index finger in both hands.
Speaker 4: Absolutely.
Speaker 3: Claire Diamond, a spokeswoman at Hawkesbury General Hospital, where the
four were taken, said that they were all treated and released.
On Sunday night, the show with the core set up
before five thousand fans, was delayed for about thirty minutes
while organizers scrambled to change the car. So a faithful
ride in Canada leads to yet another injury, hiatus and
hiccup for one Sid Uti. Let's let's take it to
sit in a shooting interview talking about what happened in
this incident.
Speaker 12: Right after that, we were well for Montreal Canada. That's
when I flipped the car. And that's when the complete
best serving body is completely up. And at first I
was when I'd gotten home. I was put in the
hospital for almost twenty four hours, but I was on
machines that they thought I had a stroke? Did they
take that rays of everything but my neck? And then
the next day I went to a neurology is that's
the very first thing the actually and they saw the
broken vertebrat was pinched up against my spinal cord and
that's what it was causing the numbness in my left
I wouldn't suffer any strength in it. I just could
feel anything, I mean everything body when I mean really, Wow.
Speaker 3: That's weird, total numbness boss.
Speaker 4: Starting in the brain.
Speaker 3: A bad set of circumstances here for sid, no question,
And of course there's always that twist of they forgot
to do an MRI of the brain, but they did
a scan of everything else on the first doctor's visit. Wow,
And then the next day there's got to be something there.
There's got to be some reason. He pointed that out.
But whatever it is, and he clearly was banged up
from this accident, I don't think anybody quibbles with that.
But the degree of injury I think is sort of
a case dependent on his perception of what they might
do with him bringing him back into the fold, of course.
And uh, obviously it was legit injury as others suffered
injuries and had a difficult and long rehab process ahead
of them. But that that's why Sid disappeared before that
San Antonio raw that you remember him coming out at.
Interesting is this car accident because he was on RAM
before and then he wasn't. But it's pretty wild that
before the car accident happened, he was taking those losses
like that on that Canadian swing. Yeah, you know, because
that's always that always foretells.
Speaker 4: A lot of losses. Yeah, that's usually. Yeah, he's on
his way out.
Speaker 3: I always foretell something for Big Sid, who is behind
the wheel in this car accident, But it is. It
is July fourteenth, nineteen ninety seven. Row comes to San Antonio,
texashean Michael's hometown. He's there with Bells on as well,
having come back from losing his smile and winning the
tag titles with Steve Austin on Raw YEP Wrestling. Steve
Austin at the king of the ring, one on one
kind of forming like you know, even though they wrestled
each other, they were still sort of aligned. They were
still on the same side of the baby face heel
ledger if you will, And here comes Sid. Sid comes back,
and Sid comes back curiously, not in the usual gear,
not showing off his physique, but he's in a black
turtleneck with a jacket and black pants. Yes, and there's
a lot to that, but first let's hear it. This
is what you remember, boss. This is the segment on
that July fourteenth, nineteen ninety seven episode of Raw in
San Antonio where we see Sid for the first time
since the car accident, but for the last time in
the w w F at a high level. Can Sherman
joining sewn on the Steve on the stage, the Patriot
del Wilkes so much excitement. Ah yeah, seriously, do you
remember they had the Heart Foundation in the ring, and
then one by one, with Steve Austin's music playing the
whole time, they bring him out. They bring out Ken Shamrock,
they bring out the Patriot, who was brand new to
the WWF at that time. Yeah, that's wild, pretty sure,
this is his first appearance before the people in WWF
standing shouldered shoulder with Steve Austin and on the Titan
tron by the way, they have Old Glory the American
flag waving, and then they bring out Sid and you
heard the people go especially nuts for the reappearance of
Sid standing tall behind Steve Austin and before the American flag.
And then Shawn Michaels comes out. You know, he's not
ready for battle. He's dressed in like his fucking khaki
shorts or whatever he would be wearing in the summertime
back then. But it's wild, like, how much more interesting
would Canadian Stampede be if it was Steve Austin, Sean Michaels,
Sid the Patriot, and Ken Shamrock instead of what we
can right.
Speaker 4: Crazy?
Speaker 3: This segment indicates that's what they had in mind, the
storyline being Owen and Bulldog as tag champs. We're going
to defend against some combination of all those guys and
it would be decided and revealed later on in the show.
The typical ratings ploy who indeed would get those those shots,
and it ended up being Steve Austin, and none of
the people on the stage do you remember how this
episode of Row concludes who joins forces with Stone Cold
Dude Love, Dude Love. It's the debut YEP of Mick
Foley as Dude Love YEP on the July fourteenth, nineteen
ninety seven Raw, and throughout the course of the evening,
we hear backstage from everyone who joined Steve Austin on
the stage, from the Patriot to Ken Shamrock to Shawn Michaels,
all kind of describing while why they're in the hunt
and while they were aligning themselves with Steve Austin here
in pursuit of the tag team championships in Warfare with
the Hard Foundation. But we don't hear from Sid, but
he went home. We see you say that, we see Sid,
but he's the only one we don't hear from a
curious choice, but to hear Jim Cornette tell it, who,
of course was serving in the executive capacity at the
time and certainly was was no fan of Sid's prior
behavior and business dealings, had the unfortunate and unenviable task
of trying to corral Sid for not only in appearance
on this episode of Raw, but also for a post
segment promo. Much like the others did, and there's a
very clear reason why said didn't make it, and we're
going to get to that right now. This is from
Jim Cornett's podcast, and we also get a little glimpse
of what, well, let's say, the negotiation was ahead of
this episode of Rossid's final appearance on WWF television here
and how there were some terms that had to be
reached before Sid would get on the plane.
Speaker 6: Of course, it was the goddamn San Antonio, the Joe
and Harry Freeman Colisseum. Because I remember I was so
hot that I was ill and almost threw up by
the time I got back the hotel room.
Speaker 14: It was like one hundred and ten in San Antonio
that day, and.
Speaker 4: Vince had insisted he come.
Speaker 6: He'd been off because he was injured, and Vince had
me calling, and I called and got his wife because
he was out. He was playing softball or he took
the softball team to Oceola or somewhere in Arkansas. And
I said, Vince wants him, you know, at raw Monday night.
He doesn't have to wrestle. He know he's hurt, but
he's got to make an interview appearance and do part
of this deal.
Speaker 8: Right.
Speaker 6: Oh, he's not gonna like that. He hasn't had time
to train lately. He doesn't feel well. I said, he's
not wrestling.
Speaker 4: How bad could he look in a fucking month.
Speaker 6: I'm thinking to myself, we haven't said him in a
fucking month. How what could he have deteriorated too? And
she said, you know, Sids often said that he he
thought he might be happier if he went back to
selling farm chemicals. I don't know whether she's trying to
just pour her heart out to me or negotiate with
me on his behalf, like you better give me more money.
He might go back to selling farm chemicals. And I said,
I said, nevertheless, Vince wants in there. He's sending a
plane ticket Monday, San Antonio. He's going to do this
interview thing.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 6: So he shows up and I Katie remember the particulars.
But the four top baby face whoever they were at
this point in time, was michaels Is whoever the fuck?
They all come out on the stage and confront the
group of heels in the in the ring, and Sid
is one of them, and he he didn't take his
shirt off, He's dressed his streak gloves. He didn't take
his shirt off because he felt like he hadn't tanned
like Jesus Christ. And then they were supposed to come
back at the top of the hour seg seven and
that was when Raw was a two hour show and
do some kind of run in and whatever and pay
the thing off. And we started looking around for where
Sid that's right, and asked Bruno, you know RV Whippelman Downtown.
Bruno because they went back to the Memphis days and.
Speaker 4: That was his manager of said justice, yes, and we
said where Sid. Oh. He came up to me.
Speaker 6: He said he felt like he was having a heart attack.
I said, who, where'd you take you for? I took
him back to the hotel? What the holiday inn?
Speaker 10: For a heart attack?
Speaker 6: He said, just waiting to go back to the hotel
is so hot?
Speaker 4: The jeez, so he made he didn't make that segment.
He doesn't. You don't see him for the rest of
the show. Nope, he had a heart attack. That's just
I mean, come on, I mean, look at that. That's
that's that's that's what happens.
Speaker 3: Why are we making light of all the challenges the
man's facing.
Speaker 4: I know, I know, look I had a heart attack.
What you sound all right? I may have had a
heart attack. Oh that's not what you said the first time.
Tell you you said you had a heart attack. I
had a condition, a condition. I may have had something
happen to me. I cannot talk about it. Well, you've
been talking about it the last two minutes.
Speaker 3: I may have had something happen to me that I
cannot talk about. Now, Cornette opens up a very important vein,
I think, for us. In our Sid tribute, Sabrina answered
the phone Sid's wife, Oh, yes, and I do invite
you to consider Sid, pantomiming over her shoulder Patterson Vince
style while she's talking to Cornette about this raw appearance,
pretending he's not home. But she was really good at
doing if I may make a supposition there and and basically,
you know, sometimes Sid just feels like you just go
back to selling form chemicals.
Speaker 4: You believe.
Speaker 3: She says that, Oh it's so, it's so rich, you know,
she's just so predemptibly.
Speaker 4: I think he's you know, he's he's been talking about
he just wants to say molans, you know, that's what
he wants to do.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 4: I think he's kind of over the whole wrestling. He's
wants to mo Loans.
Speaker 3: I think it's his home, his his his, his business
that he set up. The catchphrase is kicking grass, and
he's gonna be out there turning over a new leaf
in life. You know, sometimes I just think Sid just
wish you'd go back to selling farm chemicals, so stupid.
Oh my god, she thinks like and she thinks like
she's going to get them to agree to pay him
more to show up, right, No, And he's in the
back like making gestures like, okay, tell him a care cop.
Speaker 11: Tell him I wish, I wish I'll go back to
selling form chemicals. Tell him that.
Speaker 4: Tell him so Brina, he was go top tail the
could they sell farm things?
Speaker 3: And it's just not Yeah, it's just not easy to
get Sid to show up, and it's not easy to
get Sid to do anything at this point, and so
you can start to see that the challenge is when
he disappears and Bruno, who's of course the first guy
he went to when he had to skip town in
ninety two, remember that whole fiasco, yep, as they high
tailed it from a to to Logan airport because the
STENSI the warrior didn't want to do business and he
had enough. While simultaneously there was the whole issue of
a failed drug test around WrestleMania eight. That was also
an issue, and it's more severe cracking down on steroid
use in the company. And yeah, Bruno is just the
guy he turns to to say, you're coming with me,
you're booking the flight or whatever the hell you're doing,
you're facilitating my flight in the middle of the night.
Here my fleeing of the territory, and you're coming with me,
whether you'd like it or not. Brune of course did
not go and stayed there and managed other people. And
then by the time Sid came back, I guess they
rekindled the friendship. Never really heard that there was a
falling out between those two, interestingly enough, but it's telling
that with Sid missing as he's due to make an
appearance on the flagship television show, that Bruno is the
only person in the building who knows about this heart
attack or this field or suspected heart attack. And over
in WCW is oh, no, that had already happened. I
was going to make a smartness comment.
Speaker 4: No, no, no, no, it was going to be.
Speaker 3: Ninety seven, Starkad Nash and Giant, Right, yes so yeah
so over in and Atlanta, Kevin Nash takes careful notes
about what to say when he's penciled into job to
the Giant at Star Kid. So there go Sid, not
only once again, but kind of for the last time.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it really is. I mean he comes back with
like little one off things after w W gets sold,
but that's.
Speaker 3: It really only once. Yeah, and Doc Hendricks promote SummerSlam
to the New York audience. According to this piece of
reporting on the syndicated shows that reach New York, and
they're listing a series of matches for Summer Slam ninety seven,
including Vader versus Sid, Wow, Brett hartbers Undertaker, which Shawn
Michael's a special ref one, the Owen Hart versus Steve
Boston neck break match. All that I was supposed to
feature Sid versus Vader.
Speaker 4: How about that? That that's fascinating. No one have been interesting.
Speaker 3: There's also something I want to put here, but I
want to have couch it, and I do it in
the spirit of hoping somebody can primary source this one
for us. There's long been a thing about how Sid
had a squirrel, a pet squirrel, and that he would
take it with him on the road, and that one
day the other wrestlers dared him to keep the squirrel
down his pants for a minute, bet him he couldn't
do it, and that he accepted, And after about thirty
seconds he got bit in the dick and he fell
on the floor in agony, crushing the squirrel in the process,
and had to.
Speaker 4: Get Raby's shop. Oh my god.
Speaker 3: So you can see if that actually happened, how no
one would ever forget it.
Speaker 12: Now.
Speaker 3: SID has been asked about this point blank in interviews
and just has no clue what people are talking about
in a way that I don't think strange credulity like
the usual. I have no idea SID answer. Yeah, So
there really wasn't a lot more to go on than
this persistent rumor. And I'm trying to figure out and
people have emailed us about it, knowing that we're doing
a SID tribute, wanting us to talk about and I
just can't find out where this comes from from. That
there used to be this long form thread called like
the sleeze or something. It was like a huge document
full of all these like one line or things that
people whisper about the other wrestlers, okay, and the sick
things they've done or or might do or will do.
And this may have been from that anonymously sourced famous
forum post with all these things, this may have been
something someone said about Sid as far as I could tell.
But if anybody knows kind of who the first person
was to suggest or tell the story that Sid had this,
squirrel love to run that down but could not do so.
But I have the feeling that it comes from this
rough time period in the WWF as far as when
it happened. So I'm putting it here. And the call
is out of the Solar system, you know, the email
address the Lapsed fantasyemail dot com. If you can assist
us as you are, I feel confident that the Solar
system doesn't find that it doesn't exist.
Speaker 4: Agreed.
Speaker 3: So see if you can find anybody saying, oh, yeah,
this is a eyewitnessed SID do this with my own
two eyes, that would be extremely helpful. It's hard to
know because just about anyone who was in the company
at that time and has done shoot interviews could theoretically
have seen this and said this. So we can't just
as well, look at everybody's interview that's ever been done.
That was there, but would be great to have a
shortcut for people that might remember hearing it from somebody's
lips for the first time. So we're moving along here
in Sid's career by herker, by Krook, whether he likes
it or not. And as nineteen ninety seven becomes nineteen
ninety eight, this is actually right around the time he
sat down for the first RF video shoot interview, which
we have excerpted from generously. It was one of the
rare times where they did a shooting interview before a
guy had firmly faded from the spotlight and was still
kind of an active aid free agent in the marketplace,
still looking to return to WWF if he could, And
he sat with him and talked about all this shit,
which was an interesting choice. Think about Sid shooting on
WWF in March of nineteen ninety eight. That's wild, that's
a risk, but he's doing it. And so they asked
him what his status is with with the WWEF contract
and he says, legally, I do have a release, and
then legally I don't have a release, and that's a
Sid answers you're going to get, he said. What we're
trying to do is just get the final details of
the merchandising worked out. How many months or how many
years they're going to owe me for what's usually a
general timeframe is two years of what they pay you
after you leave. So that's what we're trying to get
them to say. So basically, it appears that as of
March of nineteen ninety eight, you know, es wrestle Mania
fourteen's getting ready to go, Sid is negotiating how much
pay he's going to get for merchandising in exchange for
leaving the company. Sid also said in this interview that
they won't return my lawyer's calls and he's been calling,
and you know, only just the thing was I told
them I'm in no hurry because of my neck. But
now I'm in a little bit of a hurry. But
as far as legally, I can go work anywhere I want.
So basically he's it sounds like he's saying that, yeah,
my contract is expired or my contract you know, is
null and void at this point, but I'm looking to
get more money out of them on a merchandising deal point.
And so if they're going to give me that money,
I'm gonna have to negotiate giving them something in return.
So in that respect, if they give there, I'm still
kind of in contractual limbo and not able to go
wherever I want. So only Sid can have a can
be in a contractual position at any given point in
time where his contract is and is not pending and valid.
But of course, now where did Sid go in nineteen
ninety eight? We certainly don't know, do we.
Speaker 4: Oh? I don't think so, do we?
Speaker 3: It' certainly as the attitude ever explode, Sid's not on
nitro and he's not on raw.
Speaker 4: Where is the man?
Speaker 3: Well, he goes back home. Of course, Sid goes back
to Memphis and what's left of that old territory that
launched the lord humongous character, that old territory where he
got into the ring with Jerry Lawler in the Mid
South Coliseum before he knew what a turn buckle was,
before he knew what anything was in the wrestling business,
but had the size to get that early endorsement and
you know, share the ring with Nick Backwinkle the first
time he ever had a match. For instance, he goes
back to Memphis and at the time, it had been
transitioned into a promotion called Memphis Power Pro Wrestling or
MPPW under Randy Hales, who would go on to be
heavily associated with promoting at wrestling in that great city
for for years after Jerry Lawler and Jerry Jarrett kind
of set down the reins for that territory. So Memphis
Power Pro still run and they're still doing WMC Channel
five Studio wrestling. I don't think they're running the Mid
South Coliseum anymore, but they are doing a live event
business as well. This is kind of boss the successor
to the us w A. Okay, Yeah, which we know
kind of bubbled up after the Memphis territory as we
knew it fractured as Lawler went to w w F
and it just became kind of like this feeder system thing.
Speaker 4: Was that also part of wasn't that wasn't it was
a w A.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that was wasn't a world class part of that too,
part of the us w A sort of, Yeah, it
kind of becomes the us w A. This is after
Jerry Jarrett buys out Fritz's interest in Dallas. They were
called c w c w A and then yeah, basically
the combined organizationrunning out of the Sportatorium was was called
USWA for a time, and then Global moved in to
the sport He drove Price reigned and Rod Price reigned.
That's correct, due to inflation, no doubt. And so Memphis
Pro is not only you know, running under new auspices,
it's also kind of at the catbird seat for a
developmental territory deal. And this would be the promotion that
Kurt Angle, for instance, would get a lot of his
reps in before coming over to the main ww roster
in November of nineteen ninety nine, and they would run
a lot of their prospects through the Memphis Power Pro organization.
I don't think that he's exactly taken hold yet when
Sid went over there, but we remember, you know, Sid
went to Memphis after the second WCW run before they
brought him back in ninety five to be Psycho Sid
to the WWF. Oh yeah, so I'm sure he's seeing
this not only as a bit of ho homecoming, but
also a way to stay on their radar and prove
that despite all the bullshit, he's actually employable. And this
is how he looks on television and This is how
he's carrying himself and he's not too hurt, not too hobbled,
et cetera, and still trying. This is just a wild
and weird time for Sid starting in February ninety eight
where he starts showing up on shows and Mississippi, teaming
with Jerry Lawler against the likes of Reggie b Fine
and Johnny Rotten. Johnny Rotten was Sid's buddy that he'd
take everywhere and get bookings.
Speaker 4: So love not everyone's got like their little buddy that
they help.
Speaker 3: It's really interesting. It's so yeah, it's like part of
the playbook to to survive in the business. So they're
working in these Mississippi shows. Tracy Smothers is around the
territory at the time as well, Bill Dundee and some others.
There's the third annual Eddie Gilbert Memorial Brawl that takes
place for twenty eighth, nineteen ninety eight at the Radison
Hotel in Philadelphia. As you know, we start to see,
you know, the Philly area indies start to pick up
again with ec W being hot. Sid goes over there
and beats King Kong Bundy at the Radison in Philly,
that's something to consider Sid versus King Kung Bundy in
nineteen ninety eight.
Speaker 4: Boss, I guess it is something to consider it. No,
I feel about that conclusions draw.
Speaker 3: But then he goes back to Memphis Power Pro and
March teaming with Lawler again, wrestling Johnny Rotten and wrestling
King Kong Bundy on a New England Wrestling show in Thomaston,
Connecticut on March twenty eighth, nineteen ninety eight. So when
we're getting ready to go to the Fleet Center for
wrestling at fourteen the week before Sid's wrestling Bundy in Connecticut.
Speaker 4: Of course makes sense.
Speaker 3: I just can't. I can't incorporate Sid being on this
track to my mindset at that time in ninety eight.
I know, I never even thought about SidD. You did
you wonder where he went?
Speaker 12: No?
Speaker 4: Nope.
Speaker 3: As Austin descended and everything and it's all that happened,
I never thought about Sid in ninety eight.
Speaker 4: I was kind of you know, I was so into
Austin at that point that I didn't really care.
Speaker 3: It's amazing, considering how big of a deal he was
and how resident of a star he was supposed to be,
that we didn't think about where he was. That's that
says something. He works in Middletown, New Jersey, on April
fourth of nineteen ninety eight, defeating Tom Brandy, the former
Salvator sincere, he works a Legends Pro Wrestling show in Sheffield, Alabama,
on April eighteenth, nineteen ninety eight, against Mike Samples. He's
back in New Jersey wrestling maybel on April twenty Yeah,
Mountain Holly, New Jersey. That's a show you want to see.
Then he goes to Wall Township, New Jersey and wrestles
Mabel again. And then he goes to Garfield, New Jersey
and loses to someone named Rick Ratchett. Don't even ask
me to start there. I have no idea who Rick
Ratchett is. He does a Jersey All Pro Wrestling show
in Bayone, New Jersey, on September twenty fifth, nineteen ninety eight,
defeating a wrestler by the name of Patch and come
fall time, as the leaves change, he's headed back to
Memphis and he's working. Yes, sir, I take that back
the Mid South Coliseum wrestling likes of Bo Alexander and
Bulldog Rains and Rex King and Tom Pritchard he face,
he faced a bow. The boy he faced to bow,
not bowjus justice as far as we know. But in fact,
Bo Alexander April pardon me, October third, nineteen ninety eight,
he's in a battle royal in Memphis. And as far
as I can tell, the final shot of this Memphis
sojourn for Sid in nineteen ninety eight was on October
third of nineteen ninety eight, as Hawk from the Road
Warriors teams with Bart Gunn to beat Jerry Lawler and
Sid Vicious in a tag team explosion, a main event
anywhere in the country.
Speaker 4: Boss, that is true, it was anywhere in the country.
Speaker 3: There's precious little on tape that I could find easily
of Sid during this run. It sounds like he's mostly
working arena shows. I'm sure he's at the TV tapings,
but he's not having matches necessarily that are reflected in
his you know, record, So it's hard to pin down
what shows he was at and just didn't wrestle on.
But as far as I can tell, and I'd love
to hear from somebody that you know, was local to
Memphis at the time or somehow was tape trading for
that area and remembers this whole angle. But Sid finds
himself the lead spokesperson for a stable of wrestlers in
Memphis Power Pro called the POB. Now do not ask
me what POB stands for, but whatever it stands for,
they've got the you know, twenty five people that are
at the WMCTV studios for the television show Chanting Pob POB.
Whenever these guys are out there and they look to
me boss, like in Aces and eights, Oh god, Sid
is basically the head of a biker gang stable, and
it's hard to deal with. It's hard that Sid just
isn't enough that he's got to have a new gimmick
in nineteen ninety eight. It's kind of humiliating if you
ask me. But Sid, you know, he was one that
could kind of get carried away, letting his creative juices flow.
He was somebody that if you really handed him the reins,
just you could have him on board, let him do
what he wanted. He would come up with some really
goofy shit that really deluded what it was that people
wanted to see from Sid all these years and being
the spokesperson and the lead heel for this POB stable
we get and this is saying something for Sid some
of the more incomprehensible promo work of this man's life.
Here's just a little sample from one edition of Memphis
Power pro Television. At the time Sid about to take
the microphone as the head of this stable.
Speaker 10: All right, asked Jane, we need to get some help
for Darry King.
Speaker 19: And here last Russell said, viciousious.
Speaker 8: You are I'm gonna say, you say so, now is it?
Speaker 16: You?
Speaker 8: People have a lot of heart that whatever he's watch yesterday,
don't discuss me.
Speaker 4: But what I'm gonna do today, what I'm going to
do to day. Some people were gonna say you.
Speaker 2: Went over the line, said you went over the line.
Speaker 8: That some people will say, no, say didn't go far enough.
Because what I'm talking about what step we got that
we'll be.
Speaker 16: Going down line?
Speaker 8: What what we're gonna have to do is here the
last week someone so he supposed he's not opposed the
Rady Hills ideas, gave this young man a call and
brought him down here and did probably what they don't
even realize in their own minds.
Speaker 4: They made the biggest mistake of the art. They dete
traded the pride. They dec trated the crime, they.
Speaker 8: Burnt the charge and everything we stepped for. And I
want everyone one more time to realize. I don't want
you to judge before what I'm going to do today,
because what I want to do today is something I
don't even like doing myself. But sometimes when people step
that line, they go too far.
Speaker 4: Two things. You have to teach them a lessons.
Speaker 8: And sometimes you have to make example the people. Then
make a quick example. There's a young lady out here
we call angel.
Speaker 16: They see the faith.
Speaker 8: You'll Palladians shit that couple of days you had a
call she gonna stick in her mouth, But she's here today.
Speaker 4: What are they talking about exactly?
Speaker 8: I want to cart the shot of the pop girls.
I want to carry me to get a guy with.
Speaker 2: The pop goals.
Speaker 3: A pob girl got in a car accident in his
front row.
Speaker 4: Happy over what happened last week? Here Dave Brown, Yeah,
get him back on the rail.
Speaker 8: For a long time, I have gone over the line sometimes,
but for the most part, I've.
Speaker 4: Been a considerate man.
Speaker 8: I've been honest. But when I see my friends, my families,
what happened the last week? If you want to took
my hotel. My hotel right now that day?
Speaker 4: What just get him? You think you're like an animal soday?
Speaker 8: Today, I ain't going to be the judge and jury
of the four men that were part of it is
supposed to be.
Speaker 4: In the Goblet match.
Speaker 8: And when we get through judgings, we also going to
chance him.
Speaker 4: Here at their guns getting the Academy award, is it?
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, you s'b vicious, still.
Speaker 5: Knowing I will play.
Speaker 1: It's the laps Fall Wrestling podcast, the wrestling podcast that
knows the boys need their candy. It's the Lapsed Fan.
He's the Lapsed Fan Wrestling podcast with Jack and Carnassio
and JP Sorrow.
Speaker 4: Oh my god, I don't even know what to say.
Speaker 3: That said left to his own devices, Okay, just screaming
and trying to pack sixteen different disparate things into one statement. Yeah,
I mean it was just missing a Vienna Sausages thing.
Speaker 4: I mean, honestly, he should have. I'm surprised he didn't,
you know, say, hey, going to Saint Mary's.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean it's right in the same city exactly,
very approximate, very convenient. But yeah, I don't know. He's
he's he's vowing revenge on somebody who had beaten down
one of the Pob brothers the week before.
Speaker 11: I don't know who.
Speaker 3: There's a woman in the front row who supports the
stable who got in a car accident and had some
stitches in his mouth, and he does the the gregarious
thing of calling her out and letting us all know
that she's here in support. She's just screaming, and it's
just like, I don't know, he doesn't seem employable to me.
Hit this point, it just seems like, oh God, we're
gonna sign up for this, Like.
Speaker 4: He just seems it's just it's like it's the same
old shit, but it's just getting.
Speaker 3: Worse, getting worse. It's getting worse. And uh, you know,
you realize how much of a finishing touch they had
to put on at WWF to make it look like
he was a good promo, you know, because he's not.
Speaker 5: He's not.
Speaker 3: And hear someone say he is, I'm just flabbergasted. I mean,
whatever he is, it's by complete happenstance, like he just
happens to be in a position where his off the
cuff rantings and ravings are right a right fit for
the moment, which they only are one times out of ten.
And this isn't This is what you get when you
just put him in charge of cutting a you know,
a traditional buy the books studio wrestling promo, you know,
talking about what's happened, vowing revenge for what happened or whatever,
and pointing to the next to the next thing it's
gonna happen. And he is just all over the place,
and you can hear Dave Brown just but just trying
to prompt him to talk about how it happened last
week again, and they run out of time and he's
still talking over the music. And look, I mean, you
can't be a great wrestling promo if you don't know
how to do that studio promo correctly agreed, and I
know it, just you cannot qualify as good or great
even And there he is, after all these years in
the business, at the highest levels, with the biggest production
budgets and the most direction and guidance. That's what he
does when taking off the leash. So take from that
perhaps what you will. But it's back home to Memphis
for this homebody, and he meets a fellow homebody like
Jerry Lawler, doesn't he down there, boss, Yes, I'd imagine so,
softball buddy and Yeah, Luller, in a shoot interview of
his own, talks about Sid and kind of why he
may have been welcomed back to the area time and
again with open arms.
Speaker 20: Sid was a lot like me in the fact that Sid,
I don't like to travel. Sid likes to be at home,
and Sid likes to play softball just like I do.
Speaker 21: And I can honestly tell you that if given the
choice of wrestling on the main event in Madisle Square
Garden or playing a softball game, wrestling in front of
eighteen thousand people, playing a softball game in front of nothing,
but with twenty of your ends, if you had the
choice between the two, probably Sid and I would both choose.
Speaker 20: The softball game. And and a lot of people, you know,
think you're crazier or.
Speaker 21: Get a bad impression of you from that, But I
think it's just you know, a difference in priorities, and
a lot of people, a lot of people give Sid
the the you know, the label of being difficult to
work with simply because of things like that, not maybe
not showing up for something so.
Speaker 20: Because he thought something else was more important or or
that sort of thing. But you know, Sid was at
least not for me, never difficult to work within the ring.
I thought we you know, had a lot of good matches.
Speaker 4: So there it is.
Speaker 3: How do they have all in Memphis?
Speaker 4: I mean it's a weird matchup to me.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's kind of weird now that you say that.
They never really clashed on the WWF stage. M do
you think, like in ninety six or something quick, Jerry Lawler,
they've made sense for a guy like Sid, you know,
beat the shit out of him power bombing a couple
of times.
Speaker 4: I mean, I do like the Jerry Lawler admits he'd
rather be home than anything else.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that's you know, that's got to be what's
going through their mind when he can't make the Kuwaiti
tour after wrestling A thirteen. He doesn't want to travel
and all this other stuff is because he doesn't want
to travel basically, right, And he thinks he can use
an injury to get out of traveling. Well, you're going
to go, and he went and hated it, and I'm
sure he couldn't bring his fucking gimmicks with him, so
he was extra cranky and in the rest is history,
but interesting perspective there from a Jerry Lawler who feels,
for some reason post that Tug of Memphis, he just
has to go home in Memphis. Sometimes I just can't
imagine what waits for him go home. I can't imagine
what forbidden fruit he's waiting to pluck, I know, to
free from its roots, oh boy and branches. But yeah,
they're going back to play some softball.
Speaker 11: And that's that.
Speaker 3: So Sid is at least back where he, in his
own mind belongs here in nineteen ninety eight, way out
of the national spotlight. And again an afterthought, I think,
I think, you know, it's hard to say that he
was a huge superstar when no one cares where he is.
Throughout the entirety of nineteen ninety eight, all the wrestling
business reaches unforeseen heights. As soon as he leaves.
Speaker 11: The WWF starts catching.
Speaker 3: Fire as soon as he leaves, of course, of course,
I mean as soon as he's definitely gone, they absolutely
take off. It's remarkable to see. If you made a chart,
a barograph or something, you'd be stunned at the correlation,
the inverse correlation between business picking up and Sid disappearing
or Sid showing up in business plateauing and struggling, but
he fell off the face of the earth as mentioned
until all of a sudden, Boss nineteen ninety eight becomes
nineteen ninety nine and this happens. I want to ask
you to load up this video, but please don't hit
play until I'm ready on my side, because we're about
to enter a new, truncated but interesting chapter for Sid. Okay,
have we ever seen Sid in the land of his
an extreme?
Speaker 4: No, we've never seen him with his extremities.
Speaker 3: Tests and tell the people what you see, Bonny sometime here.
Speaker 4: I mean, I'm well, I'm what I'm seeing is some
goofball who I don't even know who is that with.
There's a guy with you know, kind of a shaved
head with scraggly hair over his face and a goatee
and a black onesie. That's what I see.
Speaker 3: Are you calling Judge Jeff Jones's robe a onesie? No,
he's not a robe.
Speaker 4: Oh, this is John Cronis. Sorry, that's pretty funny. He's
wearing a onesie.
Speaker 3: This is John Cronis, formerly the Eliminators with Perry Saturn.
You recall, oh, don't du whatever you say, there we go.
Let's hit play in three two one, play.
Speaker 22: Sweet and Living on Pennsylvania.
Speaker 19: You took me and lay me slat.
Speaker 5: In the center.
Speaker 4: That's Judge Jeff Joseph and.
Speaker 2: With your four fifty.
Speaker 3: This is ECW Guilty is Charged, the first ECW pay
per view of nineteen ninety.
Speaker 8: Yo, Cronus, I am the judge and I am the jury,
and for that crime, I'm as Sault Cronus. I find
you guilty as jorm.
Speaker 4: From liliar Cronus. It was a salt and pepper.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I could say, okay, now.
Speaker 22: That I've sentenced you, you will face my executioner. And
you could say he's a little bit psycho and he's
gonna deal him by plain justice.
Speaker 4: And a vicious matter for us psycho and vicious manner justice.
Crazy psycho said vicious Jessice, what's wrong with him?
Speaker 16: Right?
Speaker 4: Question? Every time the man, Oh, go all right for
the pot?
Speaker 2: Wow said he's here? Did he see de yah looking?
Speaker 4: He he's just fucking screaming.
Speaker 12: M hm h.
Speaker 2: Na wear wrestling be jeans.
Speaker 23: Brothers throws a right hand naked too, whoa, Oh my god.
Speaker 4: We just talked to him by the throat over the
top of the.
Speaker 3: Floor of thro her table.
Speaker 23: He's a former d w dbe you chippy and he's
a monster.
Speaker 2: They ripped through Wu s W the psycho.
Speaker 3: Oh great chair shots, Oh god, like I would not
want a Jesus.
Speaker 2: She is trying to destroy Jock Troce. No, Jeff Jones
couldn't call himself anything he wants.
Speaker 4: They want it.
Speaker 3: They want the power bom bomb.
Speaker 2: The fans want to see a power bob.
Speaker 4: It's a good one. Good night, I go away.
Speaker 2: Somebody better get a squeeze.
Speaker 3: Squeeze kucker.
Speaker 23: I've got a sickly feeling that Jeff Jones, judge or not.
Speaker 2: Can't control sick.
Speaker 4: Well, it's fair.
Speaker 2: The monster, the maniac SID is in E c W.
Speaker 3: Well, there you have it.
Speaker 4: That's wild.
Speaker 3: Sid is in the land of the extreme. You've never
seen that, No, I've never seen that before. Thoughts on
SID and a gene vest in jeans, and.
Speaker 4: You know, it kind of works. Actually, it's it's funny,
you know, with the the genes and stuff. He actually
kind of looks bigger. Yeah, you know, he looks more
uh more, I don't know, threatening, and.
Speaker 3: It kind of looks like he's here for like extra curriculars.
He's not here at a world title, you know, he's
not in gear.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I suppose that is true as well.
Speaker 3: I was in like a hired gun and power bombs
the shit out a job like he's like an assassin
of sorts, right, which is great positioning for him, because
you can't just as well get into the fucking snake
pit with this guy actually have them feed with one
of your wrestlers. Although to hear Sid talk about it,
entreaties were made and he came in with the expectation
that ec Dot and Trees, yeah and Trace with a
pig big money offer. You know, we talked about not
too long ago the kind of money that Mike Ausain
was able to sign for before winning the CW Championship
and getting a hand of that, our hands on that
contract ahead of talking about him in WCW, and it
was it was pretty wild, the kind of you know,
six figure deals that Paul Hayman was willing to ink
at this time without a whole hell of a lot
to show for it from a revenue standpoint, although you know,
in nineteen ninety eight, ninety nine, early ninety nine at
least there was reason for optimism that as they settled
in on pay per view and really hit their stride
and cleared in more systems, that significant revenue was going
to start coming in from these shows and that it
would lead to more ticket sales and merchandise, and they
were getting licensing and things like that. So but come on,
there are reasons to think that problem start affording these contracts.
But the contract at the level that SID is expecting
is just asking for trouble. And so it's probably just
as well that he just positioned as this killer that
came in and took people out and not somebody that
was actually a pushed singles wrestler. Though we did have
a handful of formal matches, it wasn't all just run
in some and power bombs like that. But that was
night one for SID there at Guilty is charged. And
you know, it makes some sense because Paul Hayman was
known to SID back from the Continental days of course
Territory where he first linked up with Bruno Lauer Downtown,
Bruno's manager as Lord Humongus. Paul Hayman was also there
at the time, cutting his teeth as a manager, and
of course followed Eddie Gilbert who was the booker in
Continental to WCW where he became poly dangerously and following
shortly behind was in fact Sid, who, as we've talked
about earlier in our Sid tribute, really had the door
open to him to World Championship Wrestling by virtue of
Eddie Gilbert coming and working on the booking commute such
as it was. So it makes some sense that, you know,
Hayman would have Sid's ear in a way that maybe
other indie promoters at the time in nineteen ninety eight
and nineteen ninety nine wouldn't It also accounts for why
he was able to bring in Dusty Rhodes a year later,
as we talked about recently where we looked at his
feud and match with Steve Carino, and so Sid is
an ECW, and I just remember it being such a
mind fuck because I don't know, you kind of put
ECW in a certain category of you know, they're gonna
make do with this ragtag group of guys that for
the most part got over under their roof, right, and
so you told yourself are doing it kind of at
a cut rate to try to ride this revolution as
far as it's going to go, and these aren't This
isn't necessarily the most transactional locker room. With WWF and
WCW breathing down their next trying to sign guys, it
seemed like as they hit their own stride on pay
per view that now MAYBECW could afford to keep some
guys around, but not necessarily afford somebody like Sid, and
that was one of the prevailing things. I remember when
Sid came into ECW, it was just like, whoa like,
did they have a lot more money than I realized?
Speaker 12: What is this?
Speaker 3: I mean, I know the particulars at all at the
time of how much Sid was making, but didn't take
a lot to deduce that he was one of the
better paid wrestlers in the business at the time. So
to see him come out in ECW as.
Speaker 4: Really it's kind of insane, like it, I mean, it's
it is a trip. And it's also you know, he's
just too much, you know when you when you look
at ECW, it's it's not you know, he's so much
part of the of like the machine, yes, you know,
and he's not. Really these are for people the ECW.
To me, it has always been people who who aren't
part of the machines who are trying to get themselves over.
Speaker 3: Exactly, and that's right. This is guys who, for whatever
reason wouldn't necessarily get an opportunity in the big two companies,
and for that reason, ECW is the place that they're
really going to go all out because that's their only
chance to really shine at a higher level. And for
a lot of guys, that was the case here with Sid.
You're absolutely right. It was one of those proof points
that happened all the time in ECW where these fans
were so vehemently anti WWF, anti WCW, anti the Big two.
But the second any of those guys graced the ECW
a reno with their presence, these these fans just fell
in love with anybody that had been on television in
the week. I'm not anybody, but anybody that had been
a superstar. It instantly wasn't like, what the fuck is
he doing here? It instantly became, oh my god, he's
you know, he's deemed us worthy.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: What was was the prevailing feeling and the way they
popped for Sid and the way the way they want
to Sid see Sid do all of his routine stuff,
and they want to see the chokes limb. They want
to see the power bomb. It just shocked me, honestly.
I didn't think they would reject the guy. Yeah, but
to rejoice that much that Sid was there. It surprised
me in a similar way when Rick Rude came in
It Barely Legal, and Jake Roberts showed up, and Jerry
Lawler showed up and Dusty Rhodes showed up. We talked
about how surprising it was that Dusty was so wholeheartedly
embraced in the land of extreme. You know, they tried
to play the whole on the original hardcore whatever the fuck.
But you know, the fact of the matter is he
was running WCW at the time when ECW was at
its most anti establishment.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 3: He was a guy that kind of embodied the anti
break your neck for the business and ring work rate
approach that so many guys in ECW were respected by
the fans for, and Sid too. Sid's not a guy
that's going to go out there and kill himself for
great match, No, no, absolutely not. He worked harder than
I think his reputation proceeded, but still not a good
fit for the style de jure and ECW. But the
people just didn't fucking care. They kind of did the
similar thing with nine one one, where he choke slammed
everyone from you know, out of their fucking boots for
weeks and weeks and months and months and months.
Speaker 4: People love that.
Speaker 3: That guy couldn't do anything. You didn't know anything about wrestling.
He just choke slammed people.
Speaker 4: So I don't know anything about him, indeed, rest in peace.
Speaker 3: But they had, you know, they had that kind of
archetype in ECW somebody that could fit in as just
this crazy monster that would just come in and crush
people for spectacle. And I'm sure it was going somewhere,
but where Sid thought it was going, a fucking two
hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year contract was not
ever probably going to be the case. But in terms
of the pre existing relationship between U, Sid and Paully
interesting insight into it. Sid once did an interview with
the In Your Head podcast series where he talked a
little bit about Polly, and he talks about him here
in answering a question about Dave Marquez, who was a
long time independent wrestling promoter on the West Coast who
was booking people at the time of this interview and
who you know Sid had an opinion about because he'd
been in dialogue with him about potentially making an appearance.
And the only reason that's relevant is because Sid decides
to contrast in one very particular way Dave Marquez with
the Paul Hayman he knew from ECW.
Speaker 5: Uh you mentioned Dave Marquez And I don't know if
this ever got to you or not, but somebody who
knows Dave Marcus told me that he came up with
an idea for you where you'd be like you were
frozen or something and then you get you like thought
out for your return. No, it was very big, are.
Speaker 12: No?
Speaker 17: No, I will think first, I don't think, you know,
those guys are really nice guys, and I think the
group of guys that tried really really hard, but the
Nume have a a lot of uh sense of the business.
I think you Dave of Spanish American version of Paul Lee. Yeah,
I swear, but he's a little cleaner, a little more
educated than Paulo. But enough said, I said, But you
know that's that's sort of the deal. There's like, man,
you don't know this guy's taking your shirt when you leave,
when you leave your room, you know, it looks for
your wallet. Then this guy talks too smooth. Man, I
feel like I've been gone to president and rape. That's
a conversation with you guy, Paul you know, just you know,
it's just was nasty little dude, never showered and stuff,
you know, so charm and that he really started not
taking showers there at the end, and that's where he
gives you that dirty version of him, you know. So
I think that's why it gives Daymark Quz to say
the upper swing on him. Say, you know what, talking face,
we call those things hygiene hygiene. Yeah, the hygiene level
daymarkies is like a day ahead of Paul.
Speaker 5: Does he compliment the man anyway?
Speaker 17: No, of course I did.
Speaker 4: What the fuck he's saying?
Speaker 3: Dave Marquez is like Polly, except he's cleaner than Paully.
And Paulie stopped taking showers towards the end. Okay, smelled okay,
And he says that, uh sure, he smells like fucking roses,
a hygiene thing. He couldn't think of the word for hygiene.
So yeah, definitely an interesting dynamic between Sid and Paulie.
As he looks back on it. Yeah, but here's how
it happened, here's how it came together to get him
to come into E.
Speaker 12: C W.
Speaker 3: And Uh, as you can imagine, and as I can
assure you, it's all very sid So.
Speaker 24: I got a call from Paul and he was, you know, said,
hey like to bring in sort of a you know,
unadvertised in the beginning.
Speaker 12: Uh.
Speaker 24: I know, for what I think I know of the business,
I think he was really doing a great job a
way he was using me. It was pretty much like said,
usually unannounced, unadvertised. I'd show up, you know, power bottle
a bunch of guys, especially at their TV tapings, and
then then they then they were doing some advertising for
some of.
Speaker 14: The house shows. But this was was the problem.
Speaker 24: We had a deal worked out where say, you know,
one hundred dollars a week, I can't remember what it was,
and if I worked over two days or whatever like
that was become extra money. Sure, well, I told him
I was willing to work as many days as possible,
and then he would call me and say, hey, what
about this weekend. Well, this weekend, Morty booked me and
he'd already advertised me for some of those towns. But
I can't remember now, but outside of New York of it,
and then people started wrapped giving me a wrap of
doing the Nose Show, which I oh my god, I
did know I was advertised because I know when I
was advertised, I would have made the show because we
were also trying to work to do. If he could
have paid me, to say, up to two hundred and
fifty thousand dollars a year, then I was going to.
Speaker 14: Be a permanent figure.
Speaker 24: Okay, you know, so that you know he was trying
to talk me into that, which I was trying to
talk us about it, you know, because I was always
I was looking to go to one of two big
companies at the time.
Speaker 3: That's crazy that they were really trying to make a
play for Sid like that. Yeah, I don't really believe it,
But what do you know, boss, I mean, what what
a circumstance where Sid finds himself in a place that
someone's advertising him for a show that he knows he
can't make, and the promoter knows he can't make, and
he gets this reputation as a no.
Speaker 4: Show Sid get out of here.
Speaker 3: I mean, come on, It's just amazing how a guy
who did no show things also was such a victim
of circumstance in that when he didn't show up, promoters
just took advantage of that.
Speaker 4: And just we're able to come on.
Speaker 3: Hey fave the people into thinking, based on his past reputation,
that yeah, this is something he would do. But according
to Sid Paul was advertising him for shows he was
never even on. And again all they did was ask
him how the CID how the ECW thing came together,
And pretty soon he's meandering into this whole excuse series
about oh, of course for everything, and he's going to
it's going to find its way into the conversation even
if he's not asked directly, because that's his his pre
eminent memory about every little chapter of his career is
you know, a moment where he did, arguably at least
to me, uh, pulled a power play and uh and
it had hurt him in the eyes of the fans
or something or the consumer. And he's going to make
up for that here in the interview and explain that
he was he wasn't told about the shows he was
advertised on. And as Bruce Richard said, you got Vince's number,
and I'm sure he had Paully's number as well, but
here we go, here goes the the fun and games
in the land of extreme when you're inessed with Sid.
He did go on to say that ECW was the
second most fun he had had in the business. Now
this is a shoot interviews he's doing shortly after the run,
where it probably made a little more sense to stay
in the good graces of Polly than any else. But
talked about guys being really nice to him in the
ECW locker room, calling out Saboo and Rob Van Dam
in particular and RVD what's pretty complimentary reflecting on Sid
after his passing on his podcast and such. So he's
doing an indie show and then he does a Queen's
ECW taping and or at least he shows up, I
should say, at a Queen's ECW taping because he's owed money.
He's owed money and he's not happy that.
Speaker 4: Paul you know, come on exactly then nothing. You know,
if he's owed money, he's going to cause a stink.
Speaker 3: And that Paulie is telling people he's going to be
at a show that he isn't going to be at,
which you know, is just something that always ends up
happening to the guy, and he gets his reputation as
a no show. So he shows up with a Tommy
Rodgers who's a longtime veteran of the business and also
was with ECW at the time and apparently had made
an alliance with SID because he also had concerns about
money and ECW was so many others would go on
to have and you know, Sid, I just want to
be clear, boss, when he shows up unannounced or uninvited
to this Queen's ECW after this bit of curflow, he
is definitely not crying to strong arm Paul Hayman.
Speaker 24: Okay, well, I showed up and Paul is freaking you know,
because I was with Tommy Rodgers's the time. Rogers was
owed some money as well. Of course Tommy forced him
to give him cash. I said, Paul, you send me
another check. You know, I know, you know you're You've
been good to me. I'm not here to worry about
my money. I'm just here dropping and saying what's going on?
Why haven't you called me? You know, things like why
are you I'm getting the wrap of not doing those
shows and you haven't told me that I was booked
on any of these shows. And he was so paranoid.
He wouldn't let me, you know, anybody see me through
the curtain and stuff like that. I think it sort
of got blown out of portion and I came there
to strong arm some people, which I didn't. You know,
I came with Tommy Rogers, who's you know, a little
bitty guy said, and uh, never even took any money,
you know, he sent me my money and the check
was good.
Speaker 3: Definitely not a strong arm thing. No, no, no, it's
going to make the record clear there.
Speaker 4: The weak arm thing.
Speaker 3: Actually, it's pretty funny to think about Paul French trying
to make sure that the fans don't see him so
they expect Sid to come out later and be disappointed.
Speaker 4: It's like, I don't know, if you're concerned that the
fans might be disappointed, maybe he's not the right guy
for the job.
Speaker 11: Yeah, I know, I know.
Speaker 3: If you find yourself having to actively hide someone who
is one of the bigger stars in the industry from
your fan base, maybe there's a problem here. Maybe yeah,
maybe something isn't correctly calibrated in the first place. But yeah,
you're not going to tell people Sid's going to be somewhere,
not tell him about the show and then foist the
heat on him, which is what he said happened. But
he got his check in the mail. He got his
check in the mail. He didn't demand cash on site,
so this was hardly a strong arm thing. He just
showed up without being invited. I don't know what the
big deal is, So we fast forward. He never does
that Living Dangerously nineteen ninety nine, which is ECW second
pay per view of the year.
Speaker 4: It seems like that's what Sid is doing all the time.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, absolutely, And the Dudleys are in the ring, and
it's going to really be an interesting flashpoint I think
for SID and the culture clash of the CW locker room.
Of course, whenever you involve Bubba Dudley and anything, it's
going to be a fucking, you know, fiasco. And and
here I'm trying to decode some of what Sid saying
in an R video shoot interview about THECW run. He's
trying to make reference to something involving a table. Apparently
some moment that was going to be climactic where somebody
puts him through a table finally, and this apparently was
a big fucking negotiation or something. It wasn't just a
spot called one Night, and Sid wants you to know,
despite what you may have heard, he volunteers this. Of course,
no one asked him about it, that he was totally
willing to do the table thing if they didn't try
to sneak it in. The problem was, the problem was
mult listening.
Speaker 24: Problem was those guys all were uh, Bubba Dudley and
super nice guy, a little bit of a prima donna.
But I don't know if it was you know, maybe
he was jealous of me coming in. I don't know,
maybe that's just his personality. I've got personality. People take
the wrong way too, because I'm quiet to myself a lot,
you know, and try to get to know people. But
they are a lot of fun to work with Saboo.
That made it a lot of fun too. And uh,
you know, this is what is bad about the business.
I didn't realize that till at the end, that they
were setting me up for a table deal for a Saboo.
Speaker 14: All they had to do is asking me.
Speaker 20: I don't mind.
Speaker 24: And if anybody really looks back and sees the things
I've done, I have honestly volunteered to do more jobs
than most people have done like beause, especially if I
was a main event and they came with a d
Q or a double count out, I said, no, I'm
putting the guy over, you know, especially as a hill.
You know, I said, this is not this is not
the way to end the show. So that's the thing
is that they would have just presented that to me,
and I tried to I still have now what.
Speaker 4: The fuck he's talking about. I don't know.
Speaker 3: We talking about the Dudley's and he's talking about a
spot where Sabba was supposed to put him through a table,
and somehow they expected to try to do that to
him without telling him and asking him, which I don't
understand at all.
Speaker 4: But maybe I don't know how that works. Maybe more
late is.
Speaker 3: About to be shed on how ECW communication used to work,
and maybe maybe Sid picks up on some of the
subtle ways that they would try to get over on
people on television to the benefit of their own homegrown guys.
Speaker 11: I don't know.
Speaker 3: I'm just trying to develop the thesis here based on
these disparate parts and the weird places that Sid's mind
goes when he's asked about working with the Dudleys, which,
of course took places mentioned in a similar segment to
what we just saw with John Cronos on the Living
Dangerously pay per view, where the Dudleys is they were
wont to do at the time, kind of take over
the middle of the ring. Bubba grabs the mic and
just starts like a profanity laced tirade against anybody and everybody,
challenging people, calling out fans, calling him homosexuals and things
like that. So here's what it sounded like when Sid
clashed with the Dudley's at ECW Living Day Interesting nineteen.
Speaker 2: Boy, let's not start something.
Speaker 10: We can't finish.
Speaker 11: No one.
Speaker 1: Is there?
Speaker 2: No man with the nuts?
Speaker 4: Is there?
Speaker 2: No man Toumber? Now?
Speaker 11: Is there?
Speaker 17: No man?
Speaker 5: Man?
Speaker 12: Now?
Speaker 2: Tom getting the ring more?
Speaker 4: Godley boys?
Speaker 10: All right, you made your point.
Speaker 23: You embarrass yourselves by spiking Bob Artis with a godly
death drop.
Speaker 4: Why are you in breads?
Speaker 2: Just quit while you're ahead. Get the hell out of it.
Oh no, and no jog because bad man, you leave
me back.
Speaker 8: Change change James Harry, come here.
Speaker 2: It is Wow, there's no bad.
Speaker 12: Enough.
Speaker 2: I'morayan TiVo Dudley.
Speaker 8: Be careful with your whisper because she is here and
the Dudley boys.
Speaker 3: Look ready, there's no man bad enough.
Speaker 2: You shout, whoa, I wouldn't.
Speaker 14: Look at what.
Speaker 22: You're such a psycho and you're so dicious's razy ro said,
no man, no man, start shut up, and the Dudley
wife is.
Speaker 3: Going to work on said, and then you start beating
said down a bit.
Speaker 4: Oh Jesus.
Speaker 23: And now the four o'clock time World Tag Team Champions.
Speaker 12: And working over.
Speaker 2: The six foot tag Wait, wats palmon? So apian country boy?
Speaker 4: You're sure not pretty mouth?
Speaker 18: WHOA?
Speaker 2: Well, I didn't need to hear that. It's up the rod.
Speaker 3: Whoa there's that ecw ring sound? Yeah, seriously, Sid takes
over Jesus. He stretches Devon and then Spike Dudley, who
was there, jumps off the ropes. He's supposed to actually
jump off Sid's shoulders and clothesline Devon off a stretcher
that's positioned on a ramp, and it just falls apart.
Falls apart, of course he does, and then Sid just
goes out and picks up the stretcher and drops it
across Devon's back. Spike hits an acid drop on Bubba
in the ring for the one two three, So basically
goes down as Spike Dudley and Sid as a team
defeating the Dudley's here Living Dangerously ninety nine and then
Sid Well he power bomb Spike Dudley for no reason, no,
why not in the ring, and then he power bombs
him off the fucking ramp through a table on the
concrete at a high rate of speed, extra hard, for
no reason. And that's Sid styles goes Now, honestly, what
was the point of that? And I think says it
all there, and they chance Sid rapidly. Listen at these
these proud ECW fans buss they can't stop chanting Sid.
Speaker 4: He's such a he is such an a weird phenomenon,
but he always gets this kind of reaction when he
first shows up.
Speaker 3: When he first shows up, exactly when people lay eyes
on him, they just want to see him do his thing,
and he's doing it here for sure. And they chance
Sid rapidly as he just walks to the back and
parts the curtain with them panding up like they used
to do with that ECW sign right above the entrance curtain.
Speaker 4: And that's it.
Speaker 3: Sid has done what he came to do. Now, Yeah,
can you imagine just for a second. We heard Bubba
Dudley's words there. I don't know what you thought about
his promo, Eh, bob Ry Dudley. Can you imagine getting
sid to agree to having the Dudley say to him
when they're beating him down, that's a pretty mouth you got.
Speaker 4: Well, I feel like that's not something he actually agreed to.
Speaker 3: We heard that little twist there in the sit commentary
from the shoot interview calling making sure to take the
time to call Bubba Dudley a prima donna?
Speaker 4: What's that about? What could that be?
Speaker 3: Had to be tied to this segment, had to be
tied to this interaction that he had with the Dudley's
on a big stage here on pay per view. I've
never seen the Dudley's comment on it, though, so it's
kind of it's kind of hard to say, you know
what what was and wasn't understood ahead of time. Of course,
a lot of that stuff is just up to our supposition.
Wait a minute, what's this, KP.
Speaker 4: What's going on?
Speaker 5: Man?
Speaker 25: It's twenty four time world tag team champion Dvon Dudley
here and now hear you got a couple of questions
that you want me to answer.
Speaker 4: Now, usually they.
Speaker 25: Don't give me requests. Where people want me to answer questions,
it's usually wanting to say starting like happy birthday, things
like that, brother you this so yes, Living Dangerously e
c W nineteen ninety nine was a very very good
pay per few for the Dudly boys. We wrestled Sid
that day, and you know he was a big, big man,
loved working with. Said crazy as hell, but a really
really down to earth good guy. One of the questions
you asked was when Bubba said you got a pretty mouth?
Was it hard to get Sid to agree with that? Well,
first and foremost, Bubba never asked, He just said it,
and that was it. Oh, that was the way we
did things back then. I said as permission too many times.
But we knew what level of respect to have for
a person getting in the ring, such as a guy
like Sid who had been in WWE, w c W
and other organizations way before he got to ECW, so
we knew what ground to flirt with and what grounds
not to flirt with. He was great to work with,
very intent, somebody that basically made you push it when
you didn't want to push it.
Speaker 4: You asked the question, Eric, Sid said.
Speaker 25: Vince said, Vince, I'm sorry Sid said that Bubba was
at Prima Donna. Well, if he said it, he never
said it to us. It wasn't something like, you know,
he said it to be disrespectful anything. He could have
been in character. We didn't know Sid like that for
him to make that kind of comment, And we really
didn't deal with Sid back then.
Speaker 4: At the pay per view.
Speaker 25: It was basically Paul Haman coming to us, telling us
what he wanted, and then told Sid. And then it
was conveyed that we understood what Sid would and Sid
understood what we wanted.
Speaker 4: So we went that way and we had a great
time in ECW. So again, there was a.
Speaker 25: Level of respect back then that we had for one
another that we were able to do things like that
without crossing the line. So I hope that answered your questions.
And thank you so much for this, and you know,
I wish you nothing but the best, and take care
of yourself and hope see you soon. And I hope
you enjoyed this cameo. Take care of my friend.
Speaker 1: Get the lap fan Wrestling Podcast, the wrestling podcast that
knows the boys need their candy. It's the Lapsed Fan
he's an lapsed fan wrestling podcast with Jack and can.
Speaker 4: Thank you Devon.
Speaker 3: He he feeled the question gamely. Indeed, I think indeed,
I'm not sure what that Prima Donna comment was all about,
which is fair game and I guess sure, sure, But
there's the confirmation that Sid did not see that line coming.
And it sounds like you sniffed that one out right away.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I would imagine. I don't think sidce he's a
lot coming in fairness. Right, that's a great point.
Speaker 3: Actually, they could have easily run it by him and
he would have no clue.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I mean he could have. I feel like
they they could have given him an exact line reading
and he would have been totally taken aback.
Speaker 11: Yeah.
Speaker 3: A lot more in that category to come as we
continue with our tribute to Sid. But yeah, so that
line and you can kind of see Sid blow a
bubble and bubb his face after he you know, call
some the the the F word slur there and just
kind of like, Okay, we're doing this, like I'm in
the ring now, and you're gonna grab the moment and
say a bunch of things that make you look like
you're not afraid of me and and running all that
and knowing you're about to beat me down, you're gonna
go extra aggressive about of course, it gets his gets
back on track to say the very least power bombs
Devon and beats the shit out of a bubba. But
I don't know that that that pretty little mouth line
was just not something I think Sid expected to hear.
Speaker 11: What he's on his knees taking the beat down.
Speaker 4: I agree, I agree, And there's it's a very it's
an interesting one.
Speaker 3: There's the confirmation from Devon himself, and interesting to hear
him say, like, you know, it's not like we would
sit down with the people that we would interact with
and run things by each other. It went through Paul,
which I can totally see Paul leveraging to the hilt.
You know, he said this, he said this. I'll bring
this word back to him, always wanting to be the
intermediary in case there was anything that had to be
I don't know, conveniently lost. And yeah, between the parties,
we didn't know Sid like that. He says, we had
respect not to cross the line. I don't know, man,
what as cross the line sound like? I guess they
could have went out.
Speaker 4: There at DNA. Was that TNA.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he never went over there, so I guess he
truly didn't cross the line Sid that is, But I
don't know. That just struck me as a flashpoint in
his ECW history and might inform why he was sure
to make that comment when asked about Yeah, yeah, so
hardcore having comes around May sixteenth, ninety nine mid Hudson
Civic Center and Poughkeepsie and on the show Just Incredible
actually worked Sid Vicious. They went to a no contest
in two minutes. ACRN RVD Credible was rather rather worried
that he wouldn't be able to get much of a
match out of Sid, and RVD was there he our
RVD had this match in mind with Sid that never happened,
never consummated that he thought really would have been awesome,
where you know, he'd be able to work all around
Sid's strengths and really pull some rabbits out of the
hat and make Sid look better than he ever had.
And I don't know, I actually hear hearing already talk
about that. I was kind of intrigued like an rv
D versus Sid match, I don't think it would suck.
Speaker 4: I really don't. No, I think they could be pretty good.
I think I think that would actually be I mean,
I'd be certainly interested to watch it. I wouldn't be
turned off by it. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Just seeing the way he would the way he would
take off for some of Sid's power offense would be
would be really interesting to me.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And I could see how RVD would find ways to
fly into him and really without him having to do
an awful lot, you know. In according to Just Incredible
for what it's worth, he saw Sid as a fill
in for Shane Douglas, who had departed the company. He
says in his book, we feuded with Dreamer and Douglas
working a big match together Living Dangerously on March twenty one.
Soon after that, I lost a match Douglas at Cyber Slam.
But come mid nineteen ninety nine, the feud with Dreamer
and Douglas ended when Douglas left the company. Following Douglas's departure,
Sid Udy Everyone's favorite fill in, took over for Douglas
for a time. So that's the extent of what he
says about Sid. But it's interesting to hear him frame
to someone that was really brought in because they were
losing Shane Douglas. ECW then moved to Detroit on May
twenty second of nineteen ninety nine at the Michigan State Fairgrounds,
where yes, you heard this right, Rod Price goes to
a note contest with Sid. Wow in ECW, that's the
main event anywhere in the country, that's the main event
everyone needs. So here's Sid on his sojourn to ECW
what it meant to him in retrospect, because that's the
extent of it. We just read off everything that pretty
much happened. Seemed like there was an awful lot more
on the table that didn't actually ever take place. Wow,
I'm sure after that a surprise meeting in Queen's there
wasn't much left to the relationship between Sid and ECW,
but he made a couple of impactful pay per view
appearances that there were a lot of eyeballs on that
we just played for you. Yeah, and so it's remembered
rather vividly by an ECW fan base that was kind
of blown away when a guy of his statue stature
would park those those curtains here, sit down to shoot interview.
Looking back on ECW and that short run and what
it portended for the next move in his wrestling career.
Speaker 17: Well, the thing was is this, you know, I'm looking
for a platform ore is to you know, preach off
of and that was a perfect platform to let the
world see me in a small scale. Uh, somewhat a
lot larger, but somewhat the same as d nw A.
That's and then too it just you know, I knew
Pauli for a long time. Actually I did my first
gimmick Lordian Mongers started with Pauli just for a huge
shots of Memphis before I went down to Continental with Bruno.
But uh, and then there's a hell a place to
go to. I still believe that, I, you know, was
there that that place that really had a chance to
do something. But once I got there a little bit
and saw how things were going there that I realized
it did never make it big because they were too intent,
too too badly wanted to have the company always larger
than the boys. You know, they really have fans channing
c W then say you know whoever you know, so
you know it's like and then it's just, you know,
I don't know. These guys were all nice to me.
I don't have word argument. Guy out of the place, right.
So but when you're pushing your top guys, it's taz
and he can't make in the WWS because he's too short.
That tells you that you know your hair cutting yourself.
You know, if he had a lot of office business,
wouldn't be doing.
Speaker 5: Interested in how this contract if e c w like
you know, if it would have been a little bit bigger,
would it would have been in a place like you
would have liked that, like.
Speaker 4: A longer run.
Speaker 17: Well, let's say he was. It came really close to
that happened, you know, Paul was really and he got
it pretty close for the money, you know, to give
me the money I needed, but not enough though, and
so but no, I was no, I'm glad I didn't
stay there because he never guy's company, you know, any bigger.
So I would province anyway, which I don't I want
to do anyway. But it was just that particular time
you're out there lobbying yourself, and man Eric came across
with you know, dyl the lifetime, and I would have
turned that down for nothing.
Speaker 3: Eric came across boss with the deal wow of a lifetime,
and it was to hear Sid say it in no
small part because he found himself back on television. We
know u Bischoff never shied away from recruiting his next
big act from ECW. It seemed to be a key
part of his playbook and Sid crossing his plane of consciousness.
But you know, there's there wasn't the greatest ending to
Sid in Atlanta the last time he was there.
Speaker 4: That's true.
Speaker 3: A lot of issues, a lot of problems, a lot
of considerations. But you know what if Sid is not
getting the contract he's he's liking from Paul Hayman and
he's not liking what he's seeing the waycw's framed up,
I'm sure he went after Taz in that interview for
one specific reason, because Taz was making more than he was.
Tat A signed Taz to a big I think to
fifty I'm not exactly sure, but they signed him to
a big money deal to try to keep him, and
of course by the end of ninety nine he's making
the jump. So I'm sure in Sid's mind that's that's
the dollar for you, right, he would want to stay,
and the fact that they gave it to somebody else
that couldn't make it in WWF is something he kept
very close attention to, kept a very close score on.
That's that's how sid rolled and so calling him out there.
But now he's back on the national stage to some degree,
and people are seeing what he has to bring to
the table. And Boss, I don't know. I mean, if
we know Eric Bischoff, i'd say it's time to to
gas up the jet engine plane. Don't when you say so, oh.
Speaker 4: I think you know, listen, if he if he wants somebody,
it's time to exactly get on the lear jet and
travel and you know, fly over and and and really
make a deal with somebody. Because he's cool. Eric's cool.
Speaker 16: But when I flew to he said for the very
first time to bring him in. When I was I
wasn't charge.
Speaker 4: At the time, I had my.
Speaker 16: Own plane, so I fooled myself to Yeah, oh god,
the little town he lived in, Mississippi.
Speaker 4: And I didn't know what to expect.
Speaker 16: I'd heard all the stories, all the dirt sheet bullshit
from guys like Dave Meltzer. Went into the meeting with
I was, I was cautious, I was reserved. I didn't
know what to expect. Man, humble home, humble guy, small
town that's what he loved in his family, obviously, and
I kind of admire someone, especially at a young age,
especially when people are dangling buckets and buckets and buckets
and money in front of you. When you're a small
town guy from Mississippi, who's you know, happy driver a
twenty year old car. As long as it works, that
was it. He wasn't. He didn't live above his means.
Money was I guess important to him. But it's clear
to me now, especially in retrospect, as you just pointed out,
his life, his family, his community was far more important
than perhaps another opportunity to wrestle in a WrestleMania main
event or WCW main event. He had his priorities straight.
They're pretty uncommon in this business, and I understand that.
You know, it's hard for people to wrap their head
around the idea that someone like sid would jeopardize hundreds
of thousands of dollars because being with his family and
being in this community and be a part of it
was actually more important to him.
Speaker 14: I admire that.
Speaker 3: Well, that sounds like he's found a way to get
over the stabbing.
Speaker 4: Okay, yeah, I guess so, I guess it's fine to
I may mean was arn was retired by this point, right, he.
Speaker 3: Was retired from the ring, but he was definitely working
at WCW every day.
Speaker 4: But you know they were retired from the ring though,
so he's fine.
Speaker 3: Easy to keep them apart.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, turns out to be something that addressed and something
that certainly wouldn't provide an in an insurmountable barrier. And
that's that would imagine remarkable when you think about what
actually happened in that hotel in England. But here we are,
and this is the wrestling business, and it's intense, the
battle between w w F and ww and even ECW
making a bid for someone like a Sid. It's time
for the w CW largess. It's time for Sid Boss,
as he tells Sean Mooney here to after all of
these kind of false starts in his mind, finally, yes,
finally cash in.
Speaker 26: So Eric Bischoff lies a private plane. I pick him
up at the West Memphis Airport. We go to Cracker
Burrow and we sit there and make it deal with
Cracker Barrow. All right, you know, he says, he goes,
We're going to start you out at one point six, right,
that's exactly what I was making province for four years, right, Okay,
so I'm figuring he already knew that. I'm sitting there,
I'm looking at him. Okay, you know this evidently, right,
But I didn't say anything. Then he goes, but he said,
I mean one point six year first year said I, Oh,
my fucking god, you know, because I'm trying not to
show that how happy I am. So I said, well,
let me think about it, you know. So I take
you back to the airport, drop you mom. He actually
flew himself in. He's a power as well. So did
they call me the next day? We talked about on
the phone.
Speaker 3: I say yeah, I say, yeah, sounds like a big
money contract there, boss, Yeah, I does. But of course
we'll never know what actually was in the contract.
Speaker 4: I don't believe that.
Speaker 3: Next time, on the TLF Tribute to Sid, we embark
upon his final run in the National Spotlight, the one
that would see the end of his career in some
of his prime earning years. And yes, friends, we dig
in to Sid's complete WCW contract. We'll see you next time.
Speaker 11: The City Presiding Announcement as.
Speaker 1: A t J DeSantis production. Its content is intended for
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