(PART 1 OF 3)

(For part 2, click HERE. For part 3, Click HERE.) 

Modern-day gladiators.  Warriors of the squared circle.  Kings among men, the best wrestlers to grace the ring include some of the finest athletes and entertainers the world has ever seen.  But face it, folks; They ain’t brain surgeons.

Great matches, memorable angles, and successful title reigns are all important components in building a wrestler’s legacy.  But a fool and his career are soon parted.  This is a list that “honors” the people behind the spandex for doing things that damaged their futures, hurt their reps, placed themselves in physical jeopardy, got in hot water with the law, or all of the above.

Yes, each and every one of these incidents is a true story.  To wit, storyline stupidity won’t cut it here (Lita getting knocked up by Kane doesn’t count because it didn’t really happen).  Also, this is not a “dumbest gimmicks” countdown.  It’s easy to vivisect Vince for ideas like Bastion Booger and Xanta Klaus, but I can’t really string up a promoter for trying something new or different.  Ever since a mannequin head got Al Snow over after a decade-and-a-half stuck in indy purgatory, I don’t think it’s fair to dump on a booker who throws his own dump against the wall.  You just never know what’s gonna stick.

What DOES stick, however, is a good Real-Life Dumb Wrestler Moment.  And here are the stickiest.

50. DYNAMITE HORSES AROUND

Steroid addiction is nothing to laugh at.  But when Tom “Dynamite Kid” Billington couldn’t find his regular steroids, and thus, thought it would be a good idea to use a HORSE STEROID instead, well, that IS something to laugh at.  Loudly.  This and many other tales of Dynamite drug-fueled debauchery can be found in the pages of his book, “Pure Dynamite,” easily one of the finest wrestling books ever written.

49. HOLLY SHIT!

Rene Dupree took a rental car that was under Bob Holly’s name.  Somehow, young Rene got ol’ Hardcore slapped with a warrant for his arrest.  Holly had to fly back to wherever from out of town to straighten the mess out.  When Holly confronted Dupree about this, Dupree basically shrugged his shoulders and said “mistakes happen.”  Understandably upset by this, Holly proceeded to legit beat the holy hell out of the “French Phenom” at a house show.  When he figured out what was happening, Dupree put his tail between his legs and ran back to the locker room like a true nancypants.  The feeling amongst everyone was that Dupree had it coming.  The moral of the story is that you just don’t mess with Spark Plugg’s ride.

48. MISSING THE MARK

If you make a mistake your first day on the job, that’s understandable.  If you make said mistake when your new boss is sitting right next to you, that’s bad.  If you’re Mark Henry at SummerSlam 96, you screwed the pooch so badly that you have to go to the “suppository” aisle of the nearest Petsmart.  In the middle of the Monday Night War, Vince signed the powerlifting Olympic hopeful to what was then the biggest guaranteed money contract in WWF history (10 years at $250,000 per).  Henry’s first role was to come in as a personal friend of Jake Roberts during the “Snake’s” feud with Jerry Lawler.  To wit, Henry joined Vince and company at the broadcast table for their PPV match, ostensibly to lend moral support to Jake.  (Dude, if GOD couldn’t pull that off, Mark Henry had NO chance, but I digress.)

Lawler did his stand-up routine before the match, bombarding Jake with one hilarious insult after another.  As Lawler mocked Jake’s legit personal demons, Vince and Jim Ross were aghast.  Hell, I hope they don’t read this site.  Color commentator Curt Hennig laughed, but that was fine, because he was a heel.  Here’s the real punchline, though: While Lawler was humiliating his pal, Mark Henry was laughing his freakin’ ass off.  Vince was clearly not pleased by this turn of events, as Mark’s laughter was followed by a few tense moments of dead air.  A sheepish Mark broke back in with, “You know what, that’s not funny, though.”  Obviously, Vince went off-headset to take young Mark aside and give him a crash course in not blowing your debut angle on a live PPV.

But the real victim here wasn’t Henry, Jake, or even the clichéd “fans.”  A rumor I just now started has it that Vince came down on Lawler like a ton of bricks, forbidding “The King” from ever saying anything funny on WWF TV ever again.

47. K-DAWGHOUSE

It was a big TV taping in Las Vegas two days after Wrestlemania VII.  The newly-single Bret Hart used the sharpshooter for the first time.  The Undertaker stuffed The Ultimate Warrior in a casket.  Matches were taped for Superstars, Prime Time, and Coliseum Video.  The damn thing went about five hours.  I was there.  But today’s story involves Konnan, who had a tryout in the second dark match of the night.  Backstage, hijinx ensued when the subject of Japanese icon Jushin Liger came up.  For some reason, Vince pretended he never heard of the guy.  In front of all the boys, Konnan piped up and said, “Sure you have!  You took a picture with him for a Japanese magazine!”  That’s right, the future K-Dawg humiliated his prospective employer in front of his employees.  His current writing team apparently can’t remember what they did last week, but Vince himself has a long memory, and Konnan was not invited back.

46. KUWAIT UN-LIBERATES VADER

In 1997, the WWF toured Kuwait.  Their headline match was Vader challenging Undertaker for the World Title.  To promote said tour and said match, said guys appeared together on a Kuwait talk show.  Vader, God love him, protected the biz by showing up in his bully heel character and menaced the host, grabbing him by the shirt and threatening to “kick (his) ass.”  Apparently, the A-word and such antics are taboo for Kuwait television, so the Mastodon found himself temporarily detained in a Kuwait jail over the whole mess.  One slap on the wrists (and a purported payoff later), Vader was shipped back to the U.S. a little bit older and hopefully a little bit wiser for the experience.

45.  FOLEY ME ONCE, SHAME ON YOU

Mick Foley’s streak of credible books ended at one.  His second opus, “Foley Is Good” (released 2001), was packed with anecdotes that were questionable at best, out-and-out lies at worst.  Foley’s biggest offense was when he made up a bogus name for the guy who was supposed to ghost-write his first book.  When“Wrestling Observer” editor Dave Meltzer confronted Foley about this, the Hardcore Legend didn’t give a rat’s rear because Meltzer and Alex Marvez were the only ones who noticed at first.  It was a bump from which Foley’s credibility never fully healed.

44. LOUIE, LOUIE…HE HADDA GO NOW

To be invited to wrestle in Japan is a great honor, and a sign of a young wrestler’s stock rising.  The pay is good and the learning experience is invaluable, but the working conditions can be a bit rough.  Such was the case for the late Louie Spicolli in the 90s.  A bunch of American wrestlers were being bussed from place to place, and Louie was blindsided by the call of nature.  With no options for the next few hours, Sabu (who was on the trip) encouraged Louie to just piss in an empty bottle and throw it out the window.  Louie did, and got busted.  Shockingly, throwing a urine-filled projectile out of a moving vehicle is frowned upon in the Land Of The Rising Sun.  From the pee bottle to the shitcan, Louie was immediately fired.  To his credit, Sabu felt so bad about the role he played in Louie pissing away his job, ‘Bu went to bat for Louie and got him booked in ECW, where wrestlers chucking piss bottles were the least of their problems.

43. BRET’S MAGIC CARPET RIDE

You can’t blame wrestlers for taking any acting jobs thrown their way.  The guys are great entertainers, and deserve to be appreciated by the mainstream.  (Well, most of ‘em, anyway.)  But when Canadian legend Bret Hart took on the role of Aladdin in a stage play, well, a picture is worth several thousand words:

There will be much more on this story when Bret gets investigated in my next “Behind The Pyro,” due to hit right here in the ‘Shmazz later this year.  In the meantime, well hell, just LOOK at him!

42. HOW HOT ROD “KILT” HIS CAREER

Roddy Piper is one of wrestling’s greatest promo men ever, but as an activist, he blows harder than his prized set of bagpipes.  When “Hot Rod” was interviewed for an edition of HBO’s Real Sports in 2003, he talked candidly about wrestling’s nonstop cycle of drug abuse.  Piper concluded his burial by saying that he can’t watch the current product and hates “that guy” on TV (meaning, his own character).  This was the same episode where Vince had his own episode, “Vinceing up” and slapping at the notes of one reporter.  Once this aired, Piper was subjected to another “Mr. McMahon” trademark.  Namely, “YERRRR FIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRED!!”

41. DR. JEKYLL AND MR. MCMAHON

Vince McMahon oughtta just ban himself from HBO altogether.  In early 2001, Vince appeared on Bob Costas’ “On The Record” to discuss the WWF and his new-but-soon-to-be-old XFL endeavor.  Vince, who was never exactly a role model for grace under fire to begin with, snapped into his “Mr. McMahon” character, and proceeded to have numerous confrontational outbursts directed at Costas.  For those of us who have been following Vince for years, this was just another day at the office.  But for everyone else, the carnival barker who masterminded the lowest-rated programming in the history of prime time network television just plum lost his ever-lovin’ mind.

40. H(YPOCRITE)-B-K

Those who live in glass houses shouldn’t complain about SummerSlam 99.  That may not be how the cliché goes, but for Shawn Michaels, it should have.  SummerSlam 99 had a highly-publicized main event as then-Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura was special referee for the triple-threat main event that saw Steve Austin defend the WWF World Title against both Mankind and HHH.  Mankind pinned Austin to win the belt for a third time.  This lit a fire under HBK, who openly criticized Austin for not jobbing to HHH.  Naturally, the floodgates opened on the fact that when it comes to “doing the right thing” in title matches,

Michaels himself has the single worst track record in WWWFE history.  For full details on Shawn’s greatest misses, click here.    Shawn’s tantrum landed him in the company doghouse for obvious reasons.  Friendly advice to Shawn: Stick to what you know (losing your smile and living off your rep), and leave the PPV reviews to the professionals.

39. TATTLETAZZ

Tazz left ECW in 2000, coming off a run as their most dominant World champion ever.  The push went to his head quicker than a hardway Tazplex.  Just a few months removed from ECW, Tazz called his former employer to complain about something he saw on an ECW television show.  What was the offense that so scalded Tazz’s dogs?  Well, Johnny Swinger folded his arms during his ring intro, which Tazz felt was a ripoff of Tazz’s own arm-folding pose.  The call cemented Tazz’s reputation as wrestling’s toughest whinybutt.  How can such a big ego fit in that little body?

38. THE HALL WAS HE THINKING?

During the mid-90s WWF, the notorious Clique (Scott Hall & Kevin Nash & Shawn Michaels & HHH & Sean Waltman) ruined careers, wrecked angles, and held down more guys than the “Discipline Room” at the Bunny Ranch in Nevada.  After several publicized problems and more-than-several “last chances,” Scott Hall found himself unemployed in 2000.  The night an ECW house show was on tap in Florida, Hall hitched a ride with his pal Justin Credible to get himself backstage.

But upon arriving at the building, Hall was immediately confronted by Shane Douglas, Chris Candido, and Bam Bam Bigelow.  Then the “Triple Threat” faction, all three blamed the Clique for sabotaging them during their time in the WWF.  Hall was promptly kicked out of the building.  Threat manager Francine helpfully suggested that if Hall wants to see the show, he should “buy a ticket like the rest of the marks.”  Sadly, he couldn’t afford one.  As Hall left the arena, he sarcastically asked, “Does this mean we’re not friends anymore?”  You really do meet the same people on the way down as you do on the way up.

37. GARZA CORKSCREWED GARZA

Master of the breathtaking corkscrew plancha, Hector Garza was in the process of being elevated into TNA’s main event title picture when the “Mexican Sensation” got popped at the Tex-Mex border with a bag full of steroids.  Garza was thrown in the pokey, and thus, the next two weeks of TNA television had to be remixed and rewritten to compensate for his absence.  (Garza was scheduled to face Scott “Cholester” Hall at TNA’s Final Resolution PPV on 1/16/05.)

But the truly stupid thing about this incident was that Hector tried to argue before the court that he had a prescription for his steroids.  He did, sure enough, but the “prescription” he produced listed his wrestling name instead of his real name (Hector Solano Segura).  The sympathy from his peers was underwhelming.  “He should have hid his shit better,” remarked more than a couple of Garza’s contemporaries.

Let’s recap: Garza lost a PPV payday, lost his TNA spot, and lost his U.S. career altogether when he was ultimately deported over the matter.  So it was an easy call to have Garza IMPORTED to this list for his act of borderline stupidity.

36. EUROTRASHED

Our Scott Hall trifecta reaches a drunken crescendo!  Yeah, I know the Garza thing wasn’t his fault.  I don’t care.  Scott Hall’s name was mentioned.  There’s a pattern.  There’s always a pattern when it comes to Scott Hall.

I dunno, sometimes I think picking on Hall is TOO easy.  It’s like beating up the retarded kid.  Where’s the challenge?  Hall was the first three-time Intercontinental champion, as well as the first wrestler to simultaneously hold both the U.S Title and TV Title in WCW.  Still though, Hall’s lengthy title history is nothing compared to his rap sheet.  The granny-groping, limo-defiling man affectionately known as “Last Call” may just be the most arrested wrestler ever.

But Hall topped himself in 2002 during a WWF European tour.  Y’ see, “AlcoHall” got so plastered that one night, he actually FELL ASLEEP WHILE STANDING AT RINGSIDE.  Given Hall’s track record, it wasn’t a shock when he was fired, but it was still pretty damn dumb.

35. RAPMASTER MEETS SLAPMASTER

For every one match most OVW guys have had, Haku has had five terrible matches against Davey Boy Smith.  But who’s gonna tell him?  The point is that there are some guys in wrestling you just don’t mess with.  Apparently, this was one of life’s many lessons lost on the perennially hopeless Paul Neu.  Neu’s biggest career push was when WCW repacked him as “Rapmaster” P.N. News back in 1991.  Later that year, WCW scored a full-blown coup when they signed one of wrestling’s greatest heel workers ever, “Ravishing” Rick Rude.  Outside the ring, Rude was a gentleman and a scholar, but he still didn’t take any crap from anybody.  One night in the WCW locker room, Neu disrespected Triple-R, picking a fight with him.  Well, I guess “fight” isn’t the best word to describe what

happened.  Rude, a legit former arm-wrestling champion, simply knocked Neu

unconscious with an open-hand slap.  Rude’s rep remained rock-solid.  Neu, on the other hand, gained a rep of a different sort for this monumental act of stupidity.

34. RETCH OF HONOR

It’s not unusual for an indy wrestler to go balls-out to try and steal the show to get himself noticed.  But it IS unusual for a wrestler to completely expose the business after having just competed in a highspot-laden “scramble” match for the NAMBLA convention known as Ring Of Honor.  Teddy Hart’s post-match antics in 2003 saw him first do a number of backflips in the ring, followed by the grand finale of violently upchucking onto the mat.  The good news is, it worked.  Teddy was the talk of the wrestling world following this debacle.  The bad news is, the other ROH guys were so pissed at him, they threw his bags out of the building and threatened to do unpleasant things to his ass. Even Jake Roberts and Scott Hall knew that you had to first HAVE a career before you could wreck it.

33. EXIT, PANTS

ECW’s resident “hardcore icon,” The Sandman, had one of those gimmicks that any other wrestler would kill for.  He smoked cigarettes, drank beer, and caned the hell out of people.  Sadly, he took “living your gimmick” to a new low one night in Pensacola, Florida.  Sandman got so wasted, he ended a night in the ring by dropping trou and introducing Li’l Sandy to a world not ready for him.  He was off in Never Never Land, all right.

32. STEINER DRIVER

In its dying days, WCW was burning through money as if it were Waco religious zealots.  One of their extravagant purchases was a Hummer.  Not the Nitro Girl version, but rather a Humvee all-terrain vehicle.  Those things ain’t cheap.  The new car smell was still floating around when Scott Steiner wanted to see how fast he could make it go, wrecking the damn thing in the process.  WCW wrote it off  as a business expense.  The rest of us wrote it off as a classic stupid Steiner moment.

31. DR. ROBERTS’ NO-CARB DIET

Did you know that snakes require food in order to live?  Apparently, wrestling legend/town drunk Jake Roberts didn’t.  The man who made several careers as “Jake The Snake” didn’t feed his pet snake when they both lived in England several months ago.  The reptile died and Jake was charged with animal cruelty, so he left the country.  At least when Earthquake killed Jake’s snake back in 1991, Quake had the good manners to recycle its scaly carcass into tasty Quakeburgers for us all to enjoy.  I dunno, maybe Jake just wanted to have one story out there in which he wasn’t the only “wasted snake” around.

The numbers are getting smaller in direct proportion to the IQs involved.  Next Friday, we keep the short yellow bus rolling as we head into the top 30 real-life dumbest wrestler moments EVER!