Ask 411 Wrestling 10.10.12: IYH, WCW, 2nd Gen, More!

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Backtalking

Russo, Schiavone and Arquette: I distinctly recall that RF shoot interview with Russo wherein Tony said Arquette should win the title as a joke, he was joking, which then gave Russo the idea, and he called everyone back and then no-one stood up and said “No, this is a very very stupid idea”. So while technically Tony had the idea, it was really all Russo.

Your Turn, Smart Guy…

Who am I? I debuted in the 80’s, and my first major gimmick name was a second attempt, since the first idea I had was too dark. I once beat Jerry Lawler for a title, I once scarred a man, and I also wrestled Steve Austin and Ric Flair in the same match. I was part of the long list of guys who didn’t get along with Eric Bischoff backstage, and Bob Backlund on camera. A man who was once part of a superb match teaming with a future world champion and against two guys who don’t normally have superb matches, I am who?

Rob had it.

Who am I
Scarred a man (Johnny B. Badd)
Wrestled Ric Flair and Steve Austin in the same match (teamed with 2 Cold Scorpio at Battlebowl 1993)
Teamed with a future World Champion (Mick Foley) against two guys who don’t normally have superb matchess (The Nasty Boys)
You are Maxx Payne (AKA Man Mountain Rock)

Who am I? I’m an alumni of CHIKARA, ROH and CZW. I’ve served in the military. I’ve wrestled under a mask at one point, although not for long. I have two daughters, and 4 men who I’ve won tag title gold with. I’ve won a couple of tournaments in my time, although none of them were for title belts. I’ve beaten Chris Hero under European Rules, and in my last match for a major indy company, I lost to the answer to this question from 2 weeks ago. Who am I?

Questions, Questions, Who’s Got The Questions?

We begin with Ron ‘All In’ Gamble once more. Hey, without him I wouldn’t be doing this, so he gets permanent cutsies.

As they say in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” I’m not dead yet. To prove it, here’s some questions!

Let’s say Grizzly Smith wants to have a family reunion (I know he’s dead, but work with me), and he wants to invite all his children, their spouses, ex-spouses, etc. Who all gets an invitation?

Well, all his family does.

Ron’s next question is…

Oh, I see.

Well then, that would be…

Jake Roberts, his son, would bring his wife Judy and two ex wives, Karen and Cheryl. Karen would bring three kids (Brandy, Dustin and Derek) and Cheryl would bring her two children (or at least they’d have 5 between them. Some sources disagree over the split.)

Sam Houston, his other son, would bring his ex, Baby Doll and their two daughters, Mikala and Mikka (… Really?).

Rockin’ Robin, as Grizzly’s sole daughter, would only bring some guy called Harvey to whom she was briefly married to in 1990.

That would be the immediate generation down and their immediate relatives. Unless I’ve missed someone, which I’m sure the readers will be all too happy to sign up and tell me so below.

While I’m at it, I’ve heard a rumor (and I’ve confirmed it; it is definitely a rumor) that Ricky Morton gets a Father’s Day card from Kid Cash. Is that true?

No, although I can see where the confusion comes from. When Kash was starting out, Ricky Morton met him and took a shine to the kid, and while Kash continued his training he and Morton formed a team with Kash wrestling as David Tyler Morton Jericho which… Yeah.

Anyway, although the two teamed, and then feuded when they broke up, the two aren’t actually related. DTMJ did last a short while, popping up in ECW and WWF, but after he broke both ankles trying to hurricanrana Scotty 2 Hotty, he took time off and returned as Kid Kash.

Kash may see Morton as a father figure, or maybe there’s some hilarious in-joke that he and Morton share involved a Father’s Day Card (like me and Shazza McKenzie joke about how she only got into the business because of me. Well… I say that and she just laughs at me, but close enough), but they are not actually father and son.

So there you go.

Merwyn has a block of questions which he shouldn’t apologize for.

Hey Massive, hope you don’t mind another block of questions:

1. When Earthquake produced a folded snakeskin and a huge plate of Quakeburgers it was heavily implied that they were the actual product of a squished Damien. To the best of my remembrance there had never been anything mentioned about Jake having his pet’s remains stolen from him. My kayfabe guess is that Jake might’ve disposed of the bag in the dumpster. Living on the road he wouldn’t have a place to bury him, professional cremation is expensive, Jake’s belief may have been that the body’s only a shell. Or perhaps Jake never spoke of the theft, maybe he smoked crack and lost track of his possessions, or maybe Gene Okerlund and WWF News considered the development too disturbing to report to young Hulkamaniacs. Do you have any ideas to contribute on this?

Well, if you re-watch the segment, he doesn’t actually say that the contents of Quakeburgers are actually Damien. Rather, they are merely burgers where Snake is the meat of the dish. So, you don’t need to have a justification for how Earthquake got his hands on the remains of Damien, he just got some snake, as well as some snake skin, and made the suit and the burgers all to just piss Roberts off, to get under his skin, so that Roberts would be upset, which Earthquake wanted, he wanted to hurt Roberts mentally. And also, hey, if Roberts snaps, he’ll get suspended.

But Roberts did sort of address the remains issue. By Paul Bearer talking about it and Roberts just blowing him off.

2. Not even 6 months after Damien’s demise Jake and Earthquake were partners at Survivor Series ’91. There was no bad blood or distrust between the two in their promos and lead-up, plus Earthquake had no fear whatsoever standing next to Jake and his venomous cobra. How can this relationship development be explained, and when did Earthquake get therapy for his phobia? (I might’ve thought his squashing the bag would’ve been a case of him conquering his fear, except there’s at least two instances of him running away from Lucifer after that.)

Yeah, this is the sort of thing that Russo hated and avoided, for the record. How Roberts last match as a face was this…

And then he turns on Warrior…

And then suddenly Roberts and Earthquake are, while not tag partners (Jake didn’t wrestle at Survivor Series 91, the Disasters teamed with IRS) they were friendly. Because all heels are buddies, as are all faces.

Never was a fan of that thinking.

But anyway, the explanation, if required, is that when Roberts turned on Warrior he became, ironically, more trustworthy to the Diasters. They had reason to believe now that Roberts wouldn’t set Lucifer on them, now that he was after Savage and wasn’t trying to win the fans approval. So they had no reason to hate the snake beyond the basic ‘snakes are scary’ issue, which I’m sure was solved by Jimmy Hart taking them out to a reptile park for the day.

Man, why didn’t WWF ever do that, have a Roberts enemy go to a Snake park to get over the fear? They can then walk into the ring, proud that they aren’t scared of Damien or whatever, then kick wham DDT and then Roberts wins. “Never mistake overcoming fear with destroying weakness. For when you focus on one snake, you may not notice another one behind you…”

That would have been so cool…

3. I’ve asked this question before, but either a) it got lost in the ether, b) was dismissed as being a joke, c) was answered for someone else years ago and I missed it, or d) it’s still on the waiting list and I’m impatient. For the three storylines I know of where the heel kills the face’s beloved pet (Earthquake squashing Damien, Candido squashing Boots, and Bossman making Pepper steak fajitas) there was never a satisfactory conclusion for the face. (In fact, Bossman got the last laugh when he pissed on the dog’s grave.) However, in a very morbid coincidence, all three heels ended up passing away at a young age. Since I’ve heard that some wrestlers are superstitious, do you think Chris Jericho thanks his lucky stars every day that Lucy survived her pre-Wrestlemania 18 accident?

No, because while most wrestlers are indeed superstitious, they are also damn good at finding loopholes. And in this case, Jericho has a big one. Earthquake meant to squash Damien. Candido meant to end one of Boots’ lives. And it’s kinda hard to imagine how Bossman could accidentally turn Pepper into Mexican food. But if Jericho had indeed killed Lucy, since it was an accident, it wouldn’t have mattered, he didn’t fit the pattern.

(Although if he’d killed Lucy and then retained the Undisputed title at Wrestlemania, then he might well have begun to panic.

4. How is it, in kayfabe, that Jake’s DDTs and Earthquake’s Quake Splashes originally sent wrestlers to the hospital but later on merely secured a win without injuring their opponent too severely?

Thanks!

Because when Jake and Earthquake were doing that, they were facing scrubs, they were fighting guys who weren’t upper class WWF superstars, and thus they were weaker gentlemen. That’s why they kept losing, their talents and ability to withstand pain was lesser than those higher class of superstar they would face later on. And of course, by then, enough people have taken the move such that, as part of the brotherhood, word has gotten around, people have compared notes, and now people have ideas, that if you breath out when Quake hits, or if you try and get your hands down, you can lessen the impact.

So basically a higher class of athlete, with more time to prepare and train, leads to a move becoming less impactful. I mean, hell, today a DDT is barely a 2 count unless it’s added to somehow, people know how to absorb the punishment. Unless Jake Roberts gives it, because nothing quite prepares you for the original…

Mike F has a few questions, starting with more logic. Hey, that’s what I’m good at.

Evening Mr Sforcina, thought I would rattle off a couple of questions that have been rolling around in my head before you inevitably announce your decision to set off on your future endeavours.

Hmm. I dunno, the thought has occurred to me, my first Ask 411 Wrestling was Christmas Eve, 2008. Boxing Day, 2012… It’s somewhat fitting…

1/ I have been watching a lot of 90s Michinoku Pro recently and there is one move I can’t get the “wrestling logic” off. Wrestler A falls to the outside of the ring for whatever reason, Wrestler B jumps to the top turnbuckle or rope but instead of delivering the expected top rope splash, moonsault or whatever they back-flip into the ring, pose and then generally make the “I’m smarter than you” point to the head sign. What’s the logic here? How is not delivering a high impact, potentially decisive move to your opponent a good thing.

Freaking your opponent out, making him second guess himself, not stupidly going for a high risk move this early, playing it cool while showing that you’re better than your opponent and can beat him any time you want… Take your pick really. Depends on the guy. I think the ‘I could jump off and crush you, but I don’t need to because I’m just that good’ reason is the basic, generic one. I am just gonna get a pop from the crowd rather than attack you because I’m just that good. But it could mean anything you want it to.

2 / What is the off-screen and on screen history of the Kliq? How did the originally 3 key members of come to be friends backstage, how did the other members get involved and how was this mirrored by the on screen referral to Shawn’s fans as being the Kliq?

OK, go from the end to the front: The Kliq as the name for HBK’s fans, that came about because Russo suggested it as a ‘clever’ inside reference that HBK didn’t like and that never really got over.

As for the history of the group… There’s a lot of misinformation, and different ideas and stories. But basically, it goes something like this. Starting backstage, Michaels, Razor and The Kid were all in WWF at the same time. Michaels was rising up the card, Razor and Kid were solid midcard acts. All 3 would enjoy the night life, all had egos, but they all found each other good company, and so they formed a friendship, and were buddies. And then Michaels, looking for a way to further his career, turned on WCW and saw Vinnie Vegas. He reached out to Nash, and Nash then got out of his WCW contract, claiming he was quitting the business, then debuted a week later as Diesel.

Nash and Michaels quickly became friends, and the 4 of them formed a tight group. They never called themselves anything, they were just buddies. But as the group rose in power, with their on screen stock rising and with it more say backstage, others began to refer to them as a group, with Lex Luger, apparently, naming them the Clique.

Eventually Triple H would join the company and… OK, this is where one could be accused of bias, but the thing is, the 4 other guys were all party animals who hung out with each other because they were all cool guys, and then they’d also make sure they were looked after in the ring. Hunter was not a party animal, he didn’t do drugs or the like. So, you’re left with the idea that Hunter only hung out with them, at first, for the power thing, for the social climbing. But then he became very close later on, both in the group and then becoming Shawn’s best buddy.

Of course, you can just as easily say that if you’re entering a new social setting, you would look for a group to latch onto so as to fit in quicker. So maybe it wasn’t power climbing.

*cough*

But anyway, the five hung out and were buddies and all looked after each other and then Nash and Hall went to leave for WCW and… The Curtain Call.

And then the group basically stayed together behind the scenes, and the onscreen stuff begins to intertwine and become mixed. And the group had hangers on and offsiders, like Credible and Spicolli and the like. Guys would be mentored by members of the group and thus get peripheral membership, or would travel with members, or would screw members…

On air… The group never really was ever aligned, 5 strong. They’d always be feuding or something. But then after Curtain Call the thing keeps getting brought up, from the subtle (the Wolfpac symbol and the crotch chops) to the direct (The Band). They’d never really be united as a team. Unless you’re asking for a total history of the 5 men’s interaction on screen.

Are you? Let me know, and if so, I’ll do it next week.

3 / Tatanka’s initial WWF run was famous for his undefeated streak that came to nothing and then his less than stellar heel turn against Luger. Why did nothing come of this initial push? From memory he did work a short program against Shawn for the IC title but it came to nothing. Why did his heel turn run out of steam and he ultimate vanish into indie obscurity for a number of years until his comeback?

As always, thanks for your insight and wisdom

The heel turn failed because he didn’t differentiate himself post heel turn. He should have become Chris Chavis, turned his back on his heritage, or become something other than just Tatanka, but EVIL~! it might have done better. He sorta half did it, but not really, not full bore, which he should have.

As for the first run, it did what it was supposed to, which was to establish him as a solid mid card face. Not every push is designed to make a main event star. Sure, if it happens that’s awesome, but Tatanka was meant to be solid upper-mid. He did work a program with Shawn, although his highest point was actually post loss, when he worked a surprisingly strong drawing run against Yokozuna at house shows for the title.

So yeah, his push did get him over. Maybe not as over as he could have, but it did its job.