The Road Warriors: Danger, Death, and the Rush of Wrestling (9 page)

As we made our way down the aisle to the ring, I almost had to rub my eyes. Referee Nick Patrick had been pulled into the crowd right in front of us and was fending off punches from a bunch of guys. It was a classic case of some good ol’ boys getting way too drunk and carried away. This kind of stuff was standard fare in those days, though. It went with the territory. Hawk and I dropped character for a second and charged over as fast as hell. We started knocking every head that got in the way between Nick and us and helped him out.

Bruised and pretty shaken up, Nick went back to the locker room, and we continued down to the ring. I grabbed a microphone and challenged anyone to come on down and try to jump us as they had Nick. The people grew silent. No one came. The most important rule of the unwritten wrestler’s code is to be safe and to protect yourself and each other at all times. If fans crossed the line, which they did from time to time, they’d better pray the cops got to them first.

The match itself went off pretty much without a hitch. Hawk and I took it to Brett and Buzz back and forth as the fans stood to catch our action. Maybe thirty minutes into the match I was watching Hawk and Brett trade punches when I started thinking with amusement,
Buzz thought he was going to make us puke?

Right then, Brett threw Hawk out to the floor. I quickly jumped in and started a standoff with both Sawyers, giving Hawk time to recover. As I looked down to the floor, I caught a glimpse of Hawk crawling underneath the ring and then quickly scrambling back. He had a funny look on his face. Brett was walking around in circles, yelling at the fans and waiting for Hawk to return. All of a sudden, Hawk popped up and climbed back into the ring and we finished the match.

Because Hawk and I weren’t used to going much more than seven to fifteen minutes in our matches, those sixty minutes seemed to pass like sixty years. We still had such a limited collection of moves between us that Hawk and I must’ve press slammed and clotheslined those guys a hundred times. What else could we do? At least Brett and Buzz had enough experience that when the action slowed down they’d place one of us in a submission hold on the mat. Being on the mat like that allowed everybody to catch their breath, while at the same time the crowd would start cheering, looking for some momentum to build up again. Really, the Sawyers carried us that entire match, but it was Buzz’s idea to begin with, so they knew how much work they had on their hands from the start.

When we got to the back, I asked Hawk about his disappearance under the ring.

“I threw up, bro,” he said. “There were buckets of soda and ice there, too, so I rinsed my mouth out before coming back up.”

I couldn’t believe it. That bastard Buzz was right. He
was
going to make the Road Warriors puke. Well, at least one of them. Puking during a match back then wasn’t an uncommon occurrence with Hawk either, which he proved again a couple nights later in Texas.

We were wrestling for Joe Blanchard’s Southwest Championship Wrestling (SCW) in San Antonio against the SCW Tag Team champions, Butch and Luke, the Sheepherders (later known as the Bushwackers in the WWF). The Sheepherders were a couple of crazy New Zealanders who had been in the business for twenty years and were well known for their violent and usually bloody escapades.

Tonight, however, the escapades were courtesy of Hawk. Even after a few months in the business, our endurance wasn’t quite worked up that well and we still hadn’t conquered the nerves of live performing.

About halfway through the fifteen-minute match, Hawk came stumbling over to our corner holding his stomach and breathing hard. He panted for a couple of seconds before announcing, “Animal, I’m gonna blow.” Without any further warning, Hawk leaned over and launched a bucket’s worth of bright green vomit out of the ring and down onto the floor.

Fans in the first two rows didn’t have any time to react and were splattered by the projectile puke. Some of them started dry heaving as they got up to run away. Hawk looked right back at me with a big smile. “I’m good. Let’s go.”

Butch looked at Hawk and said, “Atta boy, mate. Atta boy.”

Right after that, Butch backed me up into a corner and stuck his tongue completely into my ear. Whoa! It freaked me out big-time. You never knew what was going to happen when you wrestled the Sheepherders.

Back in Atlanta, Buzz’s little power trip as booker had reached the end of the line. When Ole came to check things out for himself, he didn’t like what he saw. He wanted Hawk and me to have the belts again immediately, so he set up a match in Canton, Ohio. When Buzz found out, he went ape shit.

As I was finishing up my paint job in the bathroom, referee Nick Patrick came up to us and said Buzz was almost foaming at the mouth. “He looked totally insane,” he said. “Buzz told me that even though Ole told him to drop the belts to you tonight, you guys were going to have to take them back.”

I told Nick, “Give that sawed-off little prick this message: ‘Animal said he’s going to flip a coin to see if he or Hawk knocks you out first.’”

When Nick reported back, he said that Buzz had stared and then muttered, “Yeah, we’ll see what happens,” and walked away.

Ten minutes later, Nick came back with a really disturbed look on his face. “I thought you guys should know Buzz is back there taping blades to every one of his fingers. He’s a mess, so be careful.” Buzz was so out of it that he’d sliced his own hands up pretty good and was bleeding all over the place.

Taping blades was (and still is) a traditional method wrestlers use to prepare for a match when someone is going to bleed from the forehead. They take a single razor and cut the corner off, which yields a short, thin shard of a blade. Then they tape the piece to one finger or wrist with white medical tape. When the time comes during a match to draw color on themselves, they unwrap the tape, grab the blade and while doubled over on the mat or outside floor selling an injury, they slice their head open and,
presto
, they’ve successfully bladed in professional wrestling.

Up until then, we didn’t care about Buzz’s personal problems as long as they didn’t get in our way, and they usually didn’t. But now things were going too far, and Hawk and I were ready to take baseball bats and do some real damage if that’s how he wanted to play.

When Brett Sawyer caught wind of what was going on, he went outside and sat in their car. He wanted no part of it.

Fortunately, Ole found out what happened and went to talk some sense into Buzz. When Ole came back, his shirt was a bloody mess from helping take all the blades off of Buzz’s cut fingers. We were told Buzz had sobered up enough to go out and work with us. It turned out not to be the case.

The bell rang and the match started, but Buzz wasn’t cooperating. He refused to sell any moves, and it really pissed off Hawk. Buzz and Hawk even got into a real wrestling match outside on the floor trying to take each other down, but they eventually broke it up. I can still see Hawk firmly planted outside of the ring near our corner, holding on to the bottom rope with both arms as Buzz kept trying to give him a belly-to-back suplex onto the concrete.

Hawk was looking up at me as if to say, “Is this guy kidding?” The funny thing was that later, back inside the ring during the finish, Hawk nailed Buzz with a successful belly-to-back suplex of his own and got the pin.

Sure, it was a chaotic and uncertain match at times, but at the end of the night we got the win and the belts. I felt bad for Buzz because with us, the Mad Dog’s bark was far worse than his bite. Although he’d freaked out backstage and the whole situation was precarious as hell, he really didn’t give us any problems during the match. He sobered up enough to finish his job and drop the titles.

Unfortunately, Ole was sick of his Buzz Sawyer problem and fired him from GCW shortly afterward. This was how the Legion of Doom started off 1984. It was one hell of a welcome into the world of professional wrestling.

5

DESTROY EVERYTHING THAT MOVES

As we rang in the New Year of 1984, Hawk, Paul, and I toasted each other to our undeniable success. We were even given
Pro Wrestling Illustrated
magazine’s Tag Team of the Year Award for 1983, which was a huge honor because the award winners were chosen by fan ballots and not some group of editors or online journalists. We also went on to win it in 1984, 1985, and 1988, becoming the only team in wrestling history to claim the award more than twice. Paul was even named manager of the year in 1984.

In the span of six months, we had charged into GCW and helped breathe new life into the company. Ole knew how to aim and fire us at the public to keep them trying to catch their breath while wondering who and when we’d strike next. It didn’t matter whether you were a babyface or a heel; no one was safe. In those early days, I don’t think there was a single TV taping of
World Championship Wrestling
or a live event in Georgia where we didn’t interfere with someone’s match or interview. It’s what we became known for.

Arn Anderson once said that when the boys reported to the studio in the morning to see the call sheet, if they were paired up with the Road Warriors, their hearts sank. Some guys would grab their bags and leave on the spot. All we knew was that we were doing what we were told by the guy who paid us and having a ton of fun in the process. We definitely lived our gimmick full-time, but there was never a direct intention to intimidate the other guys in the locker room. We saved that for the fans.

Depending on what mood we were caught in, Hawk and I delivered mixed results for autograph and picture seekers. Usually right after an event, the fans gathered around the back exits of the arena and waited for wrestlers to come out. Most of the time, we took a minute to pose and shake hands; other times, some unsuspecting fan got more than he bargained for.

One night after a show in Wheeling, West Virginia, Hawk and I were dead tired and hungry as hell. We didn’t want anything to do with anybody at that point. Scowling, we kicked the doors open. Even though we had do-rags tied around our heads, people still recognized us. As you can imagine, we stuck out wherever we went, all the time. One fan had the balls to get in Hawk’s way and shove a program in his face for a signature.

Hawk grabbed it, autographed it, and coughed up the most disgusting phlegm wad I’ve ever seen and spat it right onto the cover before throwing it back. “There you go, kid. Enjoy.”

When Ole heard about us doing things like that, we’d always get a phone call at the hotel. “C’mon, guys. Cut that shit out.”

What did we know? We were just two big dummies figuring it out as we went.

With the NWA National belts firmly around our waists, we fended off challenges from every team in the company. The Briscos (Jack and Jerry), the Lightning Express (Brad Armstrong and Tim Horner), and Wahoo McDaniel and Mark Youngblood were just a few of the teams thrown in our direction to no avail. The Road Warriors were the new breed, and this was
our
time.

Eventually Ole started looking around some of the other territories to find some main event, money-drawing talent for us to work with. With some help from Paul, he found exactly what he was looking for in Memphis. Paul used to wrestle in Memphis and knew Jerry “The King” Lawler and Austin Idol were about as big as it got in promoter Jerry Jarrett’s Continental Wrestling Association (CWA). Lawler was the booker for Jarrett and was coming off of a major feud with comedian Andy Kaufman, who had been making appearances wrestling women. Lawler played it as if he was offended by Kaufman’s mockery of the business and set up a match between the two of them, which resulted in Kaufman receiving two big piledrivers and going to the hospital.

The whole thing came to a famous climax on national TV when Lawler and Kaufman confronted each other on
Late Show with David Letterman
. As the two were seated, Lawler shocked the audience when he slapped Kaufman hard across the face for insulting him. The comedian responded by throwing his coffee in Lawler’s face. Of course, the whole thing was a work, but it was a good one and raised huge mainstream attention for Kaufman, Lawler, and the CWA.

Austin Idol, the Universal Heartthrob, was a tanned, muscular, and extremely popular babyface who’d won the AWA International Heavyweight Championship title multiple times. He also challenged Harley Race and Ric Flair for the NWA World Heavyweight title on several occasions. What was interesting about the team of Lawler and Idol was that those guys kayfabe hated each other and had been feuding in grudge matches for years.

Fortunately, Lawler knew it would be a brilliant strategy and even better business opportunity to unite himself with Idol. By putting their differences aside, Lawler and Idol, the babyface heroes of the CWA, could challenge the evil Road Warriors for the NWA National belts in their own backyard in Memphis. It was top marquee billing all the way. To help promote our impending arrival to the CWA, Jimmy Hart approached us with an interesting idea from the “Mouth of the South.”

Jimmy was a high-octane manager and creative force in the CWA who had also been right in the middle of the whole Lawler/ Kaufman feud. Outside of wrestling, though, Jimmy had also been the lead singer of the ’60s band The Gentrys. If you’ve ever heard that classic bubblegum era tune “Keep On Dancin’,” and chances are you have, you heard a twenty-one-year-old Jimmy Hart struttin’ his stuff. Jimmy was also one of the key driving forces behind the fusion of rock ’n’ roll and music videos into professional wrestling. In 1984, MTV was starting to catch on and Jimmy, having had his career in the music industry with The Gentrys, knew it was the next big thing.

About a week out from our big match against Lawler and Idol, we got a phone call from an excited Jimmy. “Hey, baby, this is Jimmy Hart. I’ve got this song you need to come here and let me record. We’re going to put it on the radio and do a video, too.”

Hawk and I thought it’d be fun, so we packed and drove all night to get to Tennessee for our big shoot. When we arrived in Memphis, Jimmy met us and took us to this recording studio downtown. We put our paint jobs on and were wearing cowboy boots, jeans, our leather chaps, custom Road Warriors muscle shirts, and dog collars. Jimmy said he had this rock tune he’d originally written for the former NWA World Heavyweight champion Terry Funk and wanted to give it to us.