The Hardcore Truth

by Bob Holly

  That was really the end of Scott Hall in wrestling. He’s a first class bully — I’ve seen it first hand. He’ll walk into a restaurant when he’s drunk, he’ll find a guy who has his family with him, and then he’ll belittle the dad in front of his kids. It’s awful. Scott is a great guy when he’s not drinking, but if you add alcohol, he’s a sorry motherfucker. They brought Nash back when his leg healed and tried to get him over. It didn’t work and he disappeared again. They tried this all again just recently. It didn’t work again. You’d think they’d learn, but I guess if you kiss Triple H’s ass, you get an opportunity quicker than if you can actually wrestle.

  PART 10: COMPETITION

  I think wrestling today would be better if Eric Bischoff had managed to buy out WCW and keep it going. Competition is good for the industry and was definitely better for the wrestlers. For a few years, we were in a position to get paid better. I still don’t feel we were ever paid entirely fairly. Both companies were making so much money that they could have afforded to pay the boys a lot more.

  TNA isn’t competition for Vince. They take guys who didn’t make it with Vince and make them their top guys. Nobody is going to get behind that. All the while, they’ve got their own guys who are damn good, like A.J. Styles and Daniels, and they never get behind them properly. I don’t think Hogan is helping them — he should have got out of wrestling a long time ago but I guess he’s been on a stage all his life so he’s finding it hard to step off.

  It’s going to take something huge for WWE to take off again. I honestly don’t see it happening. Without competition, there’s nothing to push them. They’re making so much money off merchandise that TV ends up as nothing but a platform to help sell it. Maybe if the ratings drop to a level where Vince has to start paying for his air time again, that might kick their asses into action, but for now, they’ll keep on throwing two guys out there without a storyline, just for the sake of having matches and filling TV time. The commentators will talk about the main event guys and pay no attention to the match in the ring, and you go round and round and only end up with about eight stars.

  CHAPTER 25

  TOUGH TIMES

  To accommodate all of the guys they had on the roster after the invasion, WWE split the company in two and put the guys either on Raw or Smackdown. I ended up on Smackdown, working under Paul Heyman. I loved working with Paul — that guy is such a damn genius with such a great mind for the business. He was the man behind the original ECW back in the ’90s, and that was one of the best wrestling shows ever. I had a lot of interaction with Paul. We came up with a load of ideas for me, but they all got blocked by the higher-ups. For what reason, I don’t know. I guess I was good enough to get other people over and that was all. Any good idea for me that Paul took to the writers got squashed.

  At least I got a finisher at this point. I hadn’t had a real finish up until then. I used something off the top rope back when I was Sparky Plugg: either a cross body, a splash, or a kneedrop. After I’d become “Hardcore,” I usually won matches by using foreign objects. I did use a pump-handle slam sometimes, but Vince Russo came to me around the time they were starting to push the hell out of Test and asked if I would mind giving the move to him. “Do I have a choice?” I asked. He replied, “Not really.” So why fucking ask me?! I tried the Falcon Arrow for a while but didn’t really like it. It didn’t help that Russo wanted to call it “the Hollycaust.” That got stopped quickly when the office decided the name would offend a lot of people. After I watched a whole bunch of documentaries on the subject, I understood. It’s something people don’t want to be reminded of. To try and shock people, Russo probably would have pushed for me to use it to beat Bill Goldberg, Billy Kidman, and all the other Jewish wrestlers . . .

  I came up with my finish when I was watching a match on TV. They did an up-and-over in the corner and the guy charging in caught the legs of the guy trying to jump over him. They struggled and ended up going into a sunset flip, but I thought to myself, “What if I held onto the legs and then whipped the guy over my head?” So next time we got to TV, I asked one of the extras I knew if he’d mind taking the move. We got to the ring and tried it. It was a simple flat back bump, but he was hanging down my back so far that whipping him over meant he went further and it would hurt more. I told him to push up off my hips so he didn’t have so far to go and we tried that. It was a much easier bump, so we went with that and, the next time I got to go over on somebody, I used that. One of the announcers came to me after the match and asked what they should call it. So I went back to them and said, “Why don’t we call it the Alabama Slam?” Vince seemed to prefer the “Alabama Slammer,” but the commentators usually just went with my suggestion.

  I thought it was a very convincing finish and people like Spike Dudley and Paul London made it look devastating when they would emphasize the bump; I always appreciated guys like that who did their best to get my move over. Those guys get it — if you’re going to lose, lose to something that looks like it about knocks you out. If I’m going to lose a match, I’d rather get beat clean with a guy’s finish instead of having him roll me up and sneak a win. A number of times over my career, an agent would come to me and say, “We’re going to do a fuck finish and make it look like you got screwed.” And every time, I’d tell them that unless they needed a cheap win for storyline reasons, I’d prefer to lose to the other guy’s finish and make my opponent look strong. I appreciated them trying to protect me, but I never liked cheap finishes as a fan or a wrestler.

  As far as I’m aware, I never hurt anyone with the Alabama Slam. I nearly hurt Rico with it one time, because he didn’t push off my hips like I told him to. I had to whip him hard to get him over, and it must have stung to say the least when he landed. He was fine after though. When I asked him why he didn’t post off my hips, he said, “I just forgot,” so I replied, “Well, don’t or you’re gonna get hurt!” For all the rumors that went around out there that I liked hurting people, the fact is it would have been real easy for me to break somebody’s neck with that move. I could have held on to their ankles and pushed up when they were coming down. They would have over-rotated and landed on their neck. These guys were putting their lives in my hands, so I was damn sure going to make sure they were safe. Nobody had a problem taking it because they knew I’d look after them.

  I never found any of the boys were sloppy with their finish. Some moves were stiffer than others but I always liked those. They looked more convincing. The stiffest of all was Bradshaw’s clothesline. A man could literally be knocked out by that because he swung that arm from left-field. I always looked forward to our matches because of the physicality. He knew I liked to work stiff, so he brought it, and I knew I never had to worry about hurting that big bastard. If I could have worked with guys like that every night, I would have been happy. But when he came at me with that clothesline, I knew he was coming to try and take my head off!

  Even though I had a finisher at last, I wasn’t in a program on TV and was just putting people over, so they found a use for me as one of the trainers on the second season of the WWE reality show Tough Enough. Hunter apparently didn’t like the show because he felt the business shouldn’t be exposed any more than it already was. Hunter doesn’t like anything that doesn’t benefit Hunter. Reality TV was starting to go everywhere and our business had already been exposed as a work, so what else was there to expose? The whole concept was to find some new talent, put them under the same roof, and take them through an intense training process that would turn them into WWF superstars. They all were different personalities and it was a really interesting show.

  My old friend Al Snow was the head coach on the series and I thought we worked well together. I work rough and he works light. We have two totally different styles but I think he’s great. He did good cop, I did bad cop. Tough Enough 2 was the highest rated show on MTV until the Osbournes came along, so we must have been doing something right. Doing that se
ries was a wonderful experience. All of the trainers were good; we knew what we were doing. We had Chavo Guerrero and Ivory as trainers too. Ivory wasn’t the greatest wrestler but she could work decently enough. She would get in the ring and roll around with the girls, showing them first hand what to do. I feel like she got a bit of a raw deal with WWE and they dicked her around, pushing people who couldn’t work at her expense. She was always positive and upbeat — I don’t think I’ve ever been around somebody who had so much energy.

  The biggest problem with the show was that MTV wanted to control it. Each week, when we sat down to determine who was going to be eliminated, the MTV producers would try to intervene and tell us to keep certain people because they were “good for the show.” We had to keep telling them that it was a competition to find the best fit for the wrestling business, not the best fit for the next week of their show. Of course we wanted good ratings but we weren’t about to keep somebody who was useless just because they brought some drama to the show.

  Out of everyone from season two, Matt Morgan went on to do the most in wrestling. During filming he tweaked his shoulder and had to quit, feeling he couldn’t carry on. He got signed to a contract anyway and was later put on TV. He didn’t get over. In his mind, he thought he was the best big man, above Kane, above ’Taker, above the Big Show. I didn’t think he was any good, and if he had been, WWE would have kept him. They love big men. He looked good but he couldn’t work and he couldn’t get over. That’s the bottom line. The fact that he quit Tough Enough because he got hurt just went to show he didn’t have enough heart for the business. Jackie Gayda blew out her knee during filming but she sucked it up and got on with it. She finished the show, she was one of the two winners, and she got signed to a contract. I liked her; she was a good sport.

  The other winner of Tough Enough 2 was Linda Miles. During the show, she was a great personality and a really nice person but once they put her on TV and started giving her a push, you couldn’t find a door big enough for her head to get through. She thought she was the whole show. We’d be on a tour overseas, three or four days in, and she would complain to anybody who would listen that she was worn out. She was so dramatic about it all. She had double standards in the ring too — she wouldn’t hold back on anybody but complained loudly if anybody was the slightest bit rough with her. Her downfall came at an airport one day, waiting for our bags to come around the carousel. We hadn’t been on the road long on this particular tour, but she already looked like she was about to pass out. When her bags came around, she told one of the newer guys to get them for her. He was told, mind you; she didn’t ask. The guy asked her why he should get them and she snapped, “I’m too tired to get them, so you get my bags for me now.” All the boys turned around and looked at her as if to say, “Who the fuck do you think you are?” The guy rightly refused and she got seriously pissed. Word got back to the office about all of this. Combined with her continual whining and diva-like behavior, they decided to get rid of her. She thought she was a huge star who deserved more than what she was getting. Nobody is bigger than the company, least of all Linda fucking Miles!

  When Tough Enough got picked up for a third season, I asked to be a coach again but they told me they had plans for a storyline involving me, so I wouldn’t be able to do it. They didn’t tell me anything else about this storyline so I suspected they were lying to me. Meanwhile, they kept using me to help the new guys along. I was fine with that because I enjoyed it. I can lead somebody and I can help them learn. Being a coach on Tough Enough had showed me I was very good in that role.

  In mid 2002, Randy Orton started with WWE and they asked me to work with him in his TV debut. They knew he was a hothead so they wanted me to test him. J.R. came to me and said, “We want you to beat the shit out of this kid, let’s see what he’s made of.” They wanted to see if he was tough enough. I really worked him over to see if he was going to get mad. I was super rough with him. He never complained. Look at him now; he’s one of the best in the business. Even back when he started, all the potential was there. He was green but he listened and he did what he was told. His attitude and his temper did get him into trouble elsewhere though. He got pushed fast and started making money for the company, so he got away with a lot. He failed several drug tests but wasn’t really reprimanded. I think he got suspended a couple of times but nowhere near as many as he should have been. He probably should have been fired for his behavior at times.

  We were in Spain at one point when he was World Champion and we were heading to Germany. Our flight had been delayed due to a hole in the fuel tank, so we were waiting at the hotel. Randy had been whining the whole trip about wanting to go home and wanting time off because his wife was pregnant. If you’re the World Champion, you don’t get time off — that’s the price you pay for being World Champion! Considering the amount of money you make in that role, you’d better damn well stay because you’ve got to earn it. He lost his temper so badly that he destroyed a five-star hotel room, causing over $15,000 worth of damage. We were all in the banquet room, waiting for another plane while Randy was off wrecking everything he could get his hands on. Triple H left his credit card with the desk and told them to charge the cost of the repairs to him. Admittedly, I thought that was pretty damn noble. Do you think Randy got fired for his actions? Of course not. If that had been somebody at my level, management wouldn’t have thought twice about it. They would have said, “Send him home, he’s done.” Hell, if I’d caused 15 cents worth of damage, they probably would have got rid of me.

  Randy was still in a bad mood when he came downstairs. There was some kind of road rally, like a cross country race with exotic race cars, going on. There were 20 of these expensive cars all lined up and we were about ten feet away as we got on the bus. Randy got ready to kick in one of the doors — he reared up, but Dean Malenko grabbed him and told him to knock it off. Randy was way out of control at that point.

  A lot of people on the internet have spread stories about Randy, many of which are true, but the bottom line about Randy is that he’s a good guy who can also be an ass — and that’s something you can say about almost anyone. He’s had a baby since then, and that straightened him up, which it damn well should have. That baby made a big difference in the way he chose to make decisions, and he stopped the stupid behavior. Having a baby will change anybody — it opens your eyes. You’ve got somebody who depends on you now and you have to say, “Okay, I’ve got a responsibility and I’ve got to take care of it.”

  CHAPTER 26

  PUSHING THROUGH THE PAIN BARRIER

  Another new guy who came along in 2002 was Brock Lesnar. He was a huge monster who was also a great amateur wrestler, so management strapped a rocket to his ass and gave him the WWE Championship soon after his debut. He was still pretty green, so they put him with veterans to learn. They asked me to work with him on an episode of Smackdown in September of that year. It was just going to be your typical match; I go out there, make him look good, and then get beat. I came up with the idea that he would go to powerbomb me, I would sit out and land on my feet, and we’d go into the finish from there. He was cool with that — Brock was very easy to work with, willing to listen and follow instruction.

  When the time came for us to go home, we set up for the powerbomb but when he lifted me up, our timing was off. I jumped at a different time than he lifted, so I didn’t manage the rotation I needed in order to get up on his shoulders. I tried to correct it but we were both really sweaty — he tried to hold on to me but he couldn’t, and I ended up coming down on my neck. If you watch the footage, it looks like he drove me into the mat. As soon as I landed, I knew something was wrong. Everything in my neck just crunched. My whole body went numb — it was horrifying. Brock knew something wasn’t right, so he gave me a moment to come back around as the ref asked if I was all right. I said I wasn’t sure. I figured I’d be fine as soon as I was able to move a bit, so I said we should carry on and finish. It
was a taped show, so we did the powerbomb spot again, in case they wanted to edit out the first attempt that went wrong. We did it fine this time — I got the rotation, landed on my feet, and dropkicked him. It looked good. We went from there and ended the match with him beating me with his finish. When we got to the back, Brock was upset, saying, “Man, I’m sorry, I feel like shit.” He was trying to blame himself. I told him it was all me because I hadn’t managed to sit up on the powerbomb. He didn’t drop me on purpose, I knew that.

  I went into the locker room and lay down on the trainers’ table. Johnny Laurinaitis came in and asked if I was all right before he went in search of Brock. The trainer brought me some ice and was looking at my neck when Brock walked in. He apologized again; I could tell he felt horrible. I told him that it was an accident. Wrestling ain’t ballet! Brock said that Johnny had just chewed his ass out, telling him that he’d only been there for six months and he couldn’t be hurting guys like that. I told him I’d speak to Johnny and make sure he knew Brock wasn’t to blame for the accident.