Savage had everything, the look, the promos and was more of a high flyer than anyone Id ever seen up to that point, plus his speed, his punches, everything about him was there. At the time, few wrestlers had the bodybuilding physique, and with the exception of a guy like Ricky Steamboat and Jimmy Snuka, most of the ones who did, like Graham, Austin Idol, or a young Hulk Hogan or Jesse Ventura, had a physique, or maybe a mouth, but you didnt expect them to be able to be a top worker. I couldnt understand why this guy wasnt headlining Madison Square Garden or working one of the top territories at the time.
But even more were things they said on television. They would do interviews where they would rip on other territories, usually the Fullers in Knoxville, but mainly Jerry Jarretts wrestlers in Memphis. Roop, who was a very good articulate promo guy, like a Nick Bockwinkel, would talk about how in other territories, the promoters would ask you to lose matches, but of course, that doesnt happen here. Rip Rogers would show a high school yearbook photo of Jerry Lawler, and note that Lawler never played any sports and wasnt a real athlete. Others would talk about how the Fullers real last name was Welch, and how they owned the territory they headlined in. Tojo Yamamoto, a Memphis legend, was outed as being Harold Watanabe and not even being Japanese. And they made fun of guys selling for the 5-foot-2, aging Yamamotos chops, laughing at how silly it was.
But Savage, as the world champion, was the king. He would constantly challenge Lawler and Bill Dundee to matches. They took out ads in the paper for their card, and would advertise things like Randy Savage offers $100,000 if Dundee, Jerry Jarrett and Yamamoto can beat him, three-on-one, or other amounts to Lawler.
A lot of the Memphis wrestlers wanted to respond on television, but Jarrett forbid it. He would constantly tell them, ignore them, because eventually they are going to go away. He said spending any time talking about them would take away from the angles they are doing and trying to draw money with. Jarrett impressed on Jimmy Hart that advice, and Jimmy Hart years later gave the same advice to Hogan when Savage was doing his grandstand challenges for a real fight for charity on Tampa area radio. So the ICW guys kept it up, looking for a response, and not getting it.
Things threatened to become physical. Jimmy Hart notes about a night hell never remember. Lawler had just broken his leg playing touch football, and was out of action, but in those days, word traveled slowly. A few days later, the Jarrett crew went to Lexington for their regular show. As they pulled up, Savage, in front of fans, saw Hart and started talking about how tonight, hes taking out Lawler, and apparently he really meant it. Hart told him that Lawler broke his leg and wasnt going to be there.
Savage paused, collected his thoughts, and told Hart, Okay, tonight, Im taking out Dundee.
Not just Savage, but the entire ICW roster bought tickets and came into the building, apparently waiting to cause a scene in the main event that involved Dundee. However, in the semifinal, a fan attacked Hart and a riot started, not involving the ICW crew, and the police had to come to quell things down. The show continued, but with officers everywhere, the ICW guys never made a move.
Even though Savage wasnt a big guy, he was intense, people thought he was crazy, and had a rep for being a tough guy. So did Orton Jr., and Garvin, while Roop wrestled in the Olympics. They were plenty intimidating. Lance Russell noted that when the crew traveled north to Lexington or sometimes Louisville, every car would have a gun because things had gotten so heated.
Dundee (Bill Crookshanks), was Jarretts long-time No. 2 babyface behind Lawler. Savage was routinely making fun of him on television because he was about 5-foot-4 and would grandstand challenge him and make fun of the Jarrett guys for failing to show up with so much money at stake. It was the same gimmick Savage did in his 50s with Hogan. At one point, there was a confrontation, and Savage went after Dundee. Dundee ran back to his car and pulled out a gun. Savage then wrestled the gun away from Dundee and pistol-whipped him, breaking his jaw and putting him out of action. When Dundee finally returned, he did an interview and sort of acknowledged the rumors of what happened, just saying there was a story going around about him getting in a fight and breaking his jaw, but what really happened was he was thrown off a horse and broke his jaw.
The perennial world title feud in ICW was Macho Man against Leaping Lanny. While Poffo may downplay his ability, he was quite the wrestler himself when he was young. He may have been the first wrestler to do a moonsault, years before Keiji Muto made it famous and it had a name. Their matches were much better than those that were on top in Madison Square Garden, except they were wrestling in front of 100 or so people and flying all over the place. After a few years of feuding, they did an angle where Lanny was beaten senseless, and another babyface was there, and heard him utter the shocking words. Randy Savage was really Randy Poffo, his older brother. You have to understand that no wrestling magazines touched the ICW, which made the whole idea of this Randy Savage being maybe the best guy in the business so perplexing. At least then I knew who Randy Savage was. Savage freaked out on television over his identity being exposed, tried to claim they were really half brothers and Lannys mother was a whore, and did a Cain and Abel type feud.
Even though they didnt draw, Angelo Poffo was the expert on saving money. They would cram ten wrestlers in a van to drive to the cities, and if they had to stay overnight, they would rent one hotel room with most of the guys sleeping on the floor.
Besides running down the established promotions on television and in newspaper ads, the Poffo family filed a $2.4 million lawsuit against nine promotions and 13 promoters, Jim Barnett, Eddie Graham, Nick Gulas, George Gulas, Tom Renesto, Jerry Jarrett, Jerry Lawler, Wilbur Snyder, Dick The Bruiser Afflis, Ed The Sheik Farhat, Verne Gagne, Edward Buddy Fuller Welch and Bob Geigel. The lawsuit claimed the promoters had established an illegal monopoly on the business and had blacklisted the family from appearing with any major promotions. The lawsuit was thrown out of court when Roop and Garvin, who had been hired back by establishment promoters, Roop by Bill Watts and Garvin by Ole Anderson, recanted their original depositions where they claimed they had been told by Barnett when working in Georgia to hurt the Poffo family and the case fell apart. In all, nine of the ten key witnesses that worked for ICW left the promotion, killing the case.
In 1983, Watts, who worked with the National Wrestling Alliance but was not a member, and was going to book who he wanted and didnt care about establishment blacklists, hired Lanny Poffo and was about to hire Randy Savage. An angle was started where Mr. Wrestling II was mentoring Magnum T.A. Magnum and Poffo did some teaming. Wrestling II, who was about to do a heel turn that played off great on television because the storyline was excellent, but actually didnt work because fans wouldnt boo him, told Magnum that hes been around he knows the Poffo family, and theyre bad news. He would show tapes of Randy Savage, as a heel, and note Lanny was his brother. Magnum would say that Lanny, who worked as a face, had never done anything to him and he didnt judge him based on his brother. The idea was to build to Magnum vs. Savage as a feud but it never happened. Savage never ended up coming in. However, in their conversations, Watts told him he was wasting his career, as he was already 30, and there was money to be made working against Lawler. Savage wrote a letter to Lawler apologizing for everything he had said and was looking to work together to do business. Years later, when Savage was on top, he called Watts, by this point out of the business, to thank him for the advice, noting that if he had stayed independent and not gone to Memphis, he wouldnt have been seen by Scott on a tape, and never gotten the opportunity. Realistically, at some point, the opportunity would have come. Its also possible it may have come at a different time where he may not have gotten the same opportunity.
Jimmy Hart remembered Lawler calling him up and telling him about the letter and asking him for advice. Hart told him it would be great.
Lawler said to me, `What if it turns into a real fight. said Hart. I told him, `Dont worry, Ive got your back.
His attempt at humor notwithstanding, they actually tested the match out in Lexington, putting it on cold with no angle and no television, and it drew more than 8,000 fans at Rupp Arena, ending without a decision in a long match described as tremendous. It was, up to that point in time, the largest crowd and gate ever for wrestling in that city.
With the trust issue seemingly put to bed, Savage and Angelo Poffo showed up on Memphis television, acting like they were barging in on a live television show. Savage demanded Lawler. Eddie Marlin, who played the role of promoter, tried to reason with Savage about leaving during the live show. Eventually Lawler said he was tired with all the talk for all those years and wanted the match.
The match took place on December 5, 1983, at the Mid South Coliseum, with Lawler retaining his Southern title and winning via DQ, before 8,012 fans, about double what they had been doing. It wasnt a sellout, but it was the fourth largest crowd of the year for the promotion that ran every Monday night, trailing two appearances by Andy Kaufman in handicap matches against Lawler, and a Lawler challenge of Nick Bockwinkel for the AWA title. Week two, a cage match with Lawler once again winning via DQ, was down to 4,500 fans, just above normal. Week three, on a traditional bad week given it was right before Christmas, they were down to 2,480, with Lawler & Austin Idol beating Savage & Jos LeDuc via DQ. From that point, Savage was moved down the cards.
Eventually he turned face in a feud with Rick Rude in September, 1984. The second week after the turn, Lawler & Savage teamed up for the first time losing to Rude & King Kong Bundy. Savage, often teaming with his brother, was not as successful as a face, and by March, 1985, was turned heel against Lawler again.
Randy was a babyface when I came in and had been switched so many times they didnt believe I could get him back as a heel, said Jeff Walton. Randy had to know and like you. He was a loner. He never traveled with the boys, always going up and down the road with Elizabeth, his wife at the time.
I remember one night at the Nashville Fairgrounds we were working a hot match with Lawler, said Walton. I jumped into the ring to save Randy after a lot of interference on my part. That was all it took and a riot broke out. As I was stomping Lawler, I saw a big, burly biker coming into the ring with a chain wrapped around his fist. He was coming straight at me. It was like in slow motion. All of a sudden, Randy tackles this big guy and saves my neck, and my other body parts. He always had my back. He was a tremendous athlete dedicated to the wrestling business sand I was shocked and saddened at his all too soon passing. He was just the best.
Savages 1985 feud with Lawler was actually hotter than the first one, probably because they gave him credibility and had him beat Lawler for the Southern title on March 18, 1985. On April 15, Savage even retained the title pinning Bockwinkel in what was likely their only meeting. That win meant a lot for his credibility, as Lawler vs. Savage the next Monday drew 9,000 fans, the biggest crowd thus far of the year. May 6 was a unique match with Lawler & Bruiser Brody going to a double count out with Savage & David Shults.
In a trivia note, Savage and Brody were actually supposed to do a big program in the ICW in 1983. After working on the same shows in St. Louis for Matysik, Brody agreed to come to the ICW and was going to beat Savage for the title on October 30, 1983, in Cape Girardeau. Brody was such a name at the time in the sense he had credibility and it likely would have been a shot in the arm for the promotion. But politics entered the fray.
Before the match, Matysik, in attempting to get the Wrestling with the Chase time slot on KPLR-TV, came face-to-face with his adversary for the slot, Vince McMahon, who was about to start his national expansion. Matysik was an independent promoter, although had a good name in St. Louis. McMahon was running a major promotion with big name stars, and selling out Madison Square Garden. The station essentially asked the two to work together, which led to Matysik as the St. Louis promoter for WWF shows and WWF getting the time slot. Matysik kept it quiet, only telling Brody that he was folding his promotion to go with WWF. Brody then called Bob Geigel, who was running the established NWA promotion in the city, and acted like he was going to bail on Matysik and destroy him, to get a strong guaranteed deal with Geigel, who saw dollar signs because Brody, the big star with the opposition, against Ric Flair or Harley Race meant big business. But in doing so, one of his dates was on October 30, and Brody did not even call Savage to let him know he wasnt coming on the night the title was supposed to change hands.
Savage gave notice after getting the phone call from Jimmy Hart and immediately agreeing to go to WWF. This built to a loser leaves town match on June 3, 1985, which drew 9,000 fans, with Lawler pinning Savage in 30:09 of a great match. In those days, most wrestlers when getting the WWF offer bailed without giving notice, which is how Vince wanted it since they were at war and in those days, it wasnt like Vince would have wanted a guy he was building to face Hogan to have done a high profile job for Lawler, even if it was just in Memphis and a few other cities. But Savage felt grateful enough that after all he did, that Jarrett and Lawler gave him his chance, and did the right thing for them on the way out, losing in every city.
I learned a major lesson from him, said Jericho. Id first come to WCW in 1996, when the NWO arrived. Hall & Nash were very much prima donnas, basically assholes in a lot of ways. As an impressionable guy, but also coming from Calgary, and spending so much time in Japan, I was taught respect. There guys were the opposite. Savage was a lot nicer because he came in like I did.
One night the music didnt work. It was Sting & Savage vs. Hall & Nash. So Hall & Nash refused to go to the ring. They are complaining, saying, `This is bush league, Vince always had music. They were supposed to go out first and wouldnt go out. Savage was backstage and said, `Enough of this bullshit, lets go out. Sting didnt want to go out either. Savage just went out with no music. He did a promo about the music not being there. Then Sting had to go out since he was Savages partner, and finally Hall & Nash went out. Savage did the professional thing. Savage in my opinion at that time was a bigger star than all three of those guys. To see that, it was a pretty professional thing. They all should have done it. He may never have even remembered it, but Id never forget it.
Savage had debuted in late 1994 with the storyline of whether he was going to shake Hogans hand or slap his face. He saved Hogan from an attack, shook his hand, and started out as a face.
Savage worked most notably with Flair in 1995. WCW had been doing terrible house show business, even with Hogan, in 1994 and 1995. The turnaround in WCW business can be traced to early 1996, and the Flair vs. Savage feud, with Elizabeth thrown in. Elizabeth returned as Savages valet, only to turn on him and go with Flair, turning on more heat with a storyline of how Flair, now with Elizabeth, was spending all the money Savage gave her in the divorce settlement.
They feuded until the NWO angle, which came in a match with Savage & Sting & Luger as the top faces against Hall & Nash and their mystery partner, who ended up being Hogan. Savage feuded with the NWO, and later joined them. He had a long feud with Diamond Dallas Page which Page credits, and rightly so, for making him a legit main eventer.
I couldnt believe when I met him that was really his voice, said Konnan. I could have sworn it was a gimmick. He was very paranoid, always worried what people might be saying or thinking about him. If he thought you were making fun of him, which most of the time we were, shit was on.
Remember when he had that dry hair, before he met Gorgeous George and she sort of hipped him up, and he had the hair plugs with the hair slick back and looked pretty pimp and he was wearing all black?
Well, before that, his hair looked terrible and Hall and Nash would tell him to cut off his hair, and he wouldnt. So they said they would if he would. He would ask me if they were fucking with him. But Hall told me he would, just to see Macho shave that freeze dried straw hair off. This went on for quite a while and he was always paranoid. I would always tell him, call them out and if they cut their hair first, they obviously arent fucking with you. But I really think he was more worried about what he would look like bald. He was very paranoid about his looks and about how people perceived him. This went on for months and it was great.
In those days, the top guys didnt put anyone over who wasnt a star, so it was a huge deal to Page when Savage agreed to put him over clean with the diamond cutter on PPV, making him a player. Later Savage was back as a babyface after being turned on by Hogan and Bret Hart. In June, 1998, he underwent two major knee operations, putting him out for the rest of the year.
He returned with the slick back hair and Gorgeous George as his valet in 1999. Eventually he added Miss Madness Mona (Nora Greenwald, who became better known years later in WWF as Molly Holly) and Madusa to Team Madness. Savage stayed with the company through May, 2000, before his contract expired, and due to WCW being so deep in the red, it wasnt renewed.
Savage had four WCW title runs between 1995 and 1999. And although pro wrestling was far more popular in 1998 and 1999 than at any time previously, when Savage passed away, almost nobody spoke of his WCW tenure except in passing. Almost everything written was either sports people bringing up his baseball career, or the WWF run, mostly the period with Elizabeth.
I dont really get that star struck in the business, but when the Wolfpac was me, Nash, Luger, Sting and Mach, I was very star struck and honored to have been able to chill and talk and work with one of the greatest performers this industry has ever seen, said Konnan.
Macho Man and Elizabeth is part of our cultural fabric, said Jericho. People remember that more than most movies from those years. Everybody knew Miss Elizabeth and what happened. It really struck a chord. It was the first modern age of modern day wrestling. That first time it really caught fire. The stories were so good. And its part of your childhood, and that becomes beloved, like watching Batman & Robin. I thought it was the best show ever. Now, I realize its God awful terrible.
After wrestling, Savage promoted a rap album, which was a joke, built around a song called, Be A Man, where he challenged Hogan to a real fight. After Savage got small, he disappeared, and didnt seem to want to be in contact with anyone. He went gray, cut his hair and totally changed his look.
About the only person he stayed in contact was with Brian Crush Adams. Bret Hart, who was very close friends with Adams, asked Adams if he could get Savages phone number. Adams said that Savage told him not to give his number to anyone, so Hart told him to give Savage his number and to ask him to call. Savage never called.
In 2007, at the funeral for Adams, Hart and Jericho were talking.
He came up, nobody knew who he was, this guy with white hair and a big beard, said Jericho. It was Randy. Eventually I recognized the voice. Bret didnt recognize him. I asked, `Randy, is that you? He looked so different. Like a Santa Claus.
He told me, Bret, its me, said Hart. After the funeral, Hart again tried to get in contact with him and never heard back.
Hogan, on twitter, after his death, said that Savage hated him for the last decade but they recently had made amends. Most people were skeptical, since it was Hogan, and knowing Savage was avoiding friends, let alone the person he hated more than anyone.
Still, last year, Mattel proposed a list of talent they wanted for a Legends action figure line, which included Savage. WWE did not block them from pursuing a deal with Savage. They came to an agreement and the first new action figure of him in years, wearing the outfit he wore at WrestleMania VII for the match with Warrior, came out in January. Another figure was schedule to hit retail now.
The Mattel people went to Florida to get Savage to cut an interview for the San Diego Comic Con for the announcement. The room broke out in applause when Savage appeared on screen with his action figurethe first Savage product under the WWE banner since 1994. Those involved said that while he hadnt been around wrestling, he seemed to enjoy cutting the promo.
After WCW folded, Savage never appeared on WWE television, nor was he even interviewed for a DVD the company put out on him after years of McMahon refusing to okay one, the company did not block either THQ, which produced its video games, or Mattel, which produced its action figures, from using the Savage character over the past year. Those close to the company said they believed McMahon was going to relent and allow Savage in the Hall of Fame, which would mean a return to company television at least for one appearance, for the first time since 1994, perhaps as early as next year. But others said that was wishful thinking and McMahon was still in the absolutely no way Savage is on TV mind set to the end.
Savage also appeared as an actor in a number of television shows, often playing himself, as well as playing the role of wrestler Bonesaw McGraw in the 2002 Spider-Man movie.
Savage had told his family he wanted a private funeral with only family invited. He asked to be cremated, with his ashes spread next to his favorite tree, the same as he did with his dogs ashes when his dog died a few years ago.
