83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff - 83 Weeks #254: Buff Bagwell

Episode Date: January 23, 2023

This week we FINALLY get to talk about Buff Bagwell. But instead of just talking about him, We talked TO HIM. So listen at the beginning to hear all about Buff's career from Eric Bischoff and then stay to the end to hear from the man himself: Marcus "Buff" Bagwell Special thanks to this week's sponsors! Manscaped Beard Hedger-Get 20% Off and Free Shipping with the code 83WEEKS at Manscaped.com. Athletic Greens- Athletic Greens is going to give you a FREE 1x-year supply of immune-support Vitamin D AND 5 FREE travel packs with your first purchase. All you have to do is visit athleticgreens.com/83WEEKS. Mindbloom- Go to Mindbloom.com/83WEEKS, promo code 83WEEKS for $100 off your first six-session program today Factor-Head to FACTOR75.com/83WEEKS60 and use code 83WEEKS60 to get 60% off your first box. WoooooWings- Wooooo! Wings, a virtual restaurant concept from The Man himself, the Nature Boy Ric Flair. Enjoy the legendary flavors and world-championship wings by ordering with your Uber Eats or Postmates app. Wooo Wings is now open in Nashville, San Antonio, Jacksonville, Florida as well as Huntsville and Tuscaloosa in Alabama, with many more locations coming soon. Try the only chicken wings worthy of carrying the name of the 16x World Heavyweight Champion. FOLLOW ALL OF OUR SOCIAL MEDIA at https://83weekslinks.com/ Stop throwing your money on rent! Get into a house with NO MONEY DOWN and roughly the same monthly payment at SaveWithConrad.com Get early, ad-free access to more than a dozen of your favorite wrestling podcasts, starting at just $9 over on AdFreeShows.com. That's less than 15 cents an episode each month! You can also listen to them directly through Apple Podcasts or your other regular podcast apps! AdFreeShows.com also has thousands of hours worth of bonus content including popular series like Title Chase, Eric Fires Back, Conversations with Conrad, Mike Chioda's Mailbag and many more! Plus, live, interactive virtual chats with your favorite podcasts hosts and wrestling legends. All that and much more! Sign up today at AdFreeShows.com! Get all of your 83 Weeks merchandise at https://boxofgimmicks.com/collections/83-weeks Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, hey, it's Conrad Thompson, and you're listening to 83 weeks with Eric Fischoff. Eric, what's going on, man? How are you? I am doing great. A great weekend. Grilled a little bit last night. Mrs. B and I had a wonderful afternoon. All this good.

Hey, I don't know if you saw some. the pictures of my grandson, Way J, hanging out with alligators and stingrays at the aquarium was pretty awesome. If you haven't seen it, you should go to my Twitter and take a look. It's fun. At E. Bischoff, a shout out to Way J. And shout out to you guys for showing up for what is going to be a very good episode, a very different episode. Of course, for the last couple of weeks, we've been talking about all things WWE and Vince McMahon and a potential sale talk and all that. We're getting back to our regularly scheduled program with a twist later today we will have a guest that's right the one and only marcus buff bagwell will be

here on the program as we celebrate his entire career in wcw today but first let's just start at the beginning our plan was to talk about buff oh about three weeks ago because buff uh had a birthday earlier this month he's only 53 years old born january 10th 1970 and marietta georgia we're going to talk about all that, but goodness gracious, man, that jumps off the page to me because this is a guy who was last on, quote, unquote, national television 22 years ago. So at 30, 31 years old, his television career, I mean, that's when most guys are finally, quote unquote, starting to make it. He had already had a whole career on TV by that point. He started incredibly young and enjoyed incredible success at a very young age, right?

He did, and I'm going to be anxious to hear from Buff at the end of this episode because I've been tracking him, you know, social media, and, you know, I see Buff occasionally out on the road at conventions and so forth. My impression, long-distance impression, right, from what I see and what I hear, suggests to me that he's got a handle on this. And if anybody can pull it off, you know, he started very young. Yeah, he did. He had an amazing career at a very early age.

And he was pretty much done at a very early age. And unfortunately for Marcus, he put him, you know, he put him, he aged himself quite a bit during that off period, right, with some of the challenges he's had. But if he can address those challenges and overcome those challenges, chronologically at least, you know here's a guy at 53 years old that has two careers worth of experience in the ring let's see what happens i'm excited for him we can't wait to hear from him i'm excited to hear from him too i think we're all pulling for you know the next great success story in wrestling and i'm pulling for that to be buff and i just want to take a time out you know and i know we're getting

off track right up front because we're talking about buff but boy do we got to give our flowers to diamond dallas page today the impact he's had not just on wrestling, but on the world is really immeasurable. And I know that there's the cynical wrestling fan who has their opinion of this or that. But the reality is DDPY has helped a lot of people change their lifestyle and take better control of their health. But now he's actually reached out, man, more than a decade ago, I think, at this point, to Jake the Snake and Scott Hall.

And most recently with Buff Bagwell. And you just can't argue with that support. because here's the reality. I don't think Dallas has some special degree in recovery or whatever. I don't think he's licensed in that regard or anything like that. But never underestimate the power of someone believing in you and someone pulling for you and someone supporting you and being there. That's what DDP has done most of all is allow these guys perhaps and girls

who are trying to change their life, whether it's their diet or their physical prowess or what have you, or their addiction. just to know that hey man somebody still cares and we're still pulling for you and we're here and we believe in you Dallas has done that for a lot of folks and I don't think it gets talked about nearly enough you know one of the interesting things about and I've known Dallas since way back in 1987 AWA days and really got to know Dallas in WCW when we were neighbors obviously Dallas if it wasn't for Dallas I may have never gotten hired at UCW, and we've told that story in a past.

I won't go into it now. But DDP helped me at a point in time when I wasn't sure he'd do anything but bury me. He helped me achieve something that changed my life. And then fast forward, you know, go into 95 and 96 and 97, Chris Canyon, Sugar Shane Helms, you know, so many of those guys that ended up being. parts of WCW, that was Dallas's little, that was his team. That was the people that were trying to break into the business that needed guidance, needed support. And Diamond Dallas Page, almost obnoxiously so, from my perspective, worked endlessly to not only try to help

those guys individually, but to nurture their careers and get them an opportunity into to WCW. There's a lot of great talent that emerged in WCW, some of whom are working in WWE today, Jamie Noble, that would have never gotten an opportunity in WCW, therefore probably wouldn't have gotten an opportunity in WWE for those that progress that far. But it's because Diamond loves helping people. And all, the only difference between Diamond Dallas Page Now and Diamond Dallas Page then is he's now helping people in a different way helping people is always been at the core of ddp's motivation and instincts it's a part of who he is and it's just manifesting in a much broader way that's helping more people it's really amazing to watch

him well we're going to keep watching him and certainly keep up with buff let's let's tell buff story today you know he was a golden gloves boxing champion um and uh he did that as as a young man and then he gets in some acting and this isn't something i even noticed at the time but about 10 years ago someone pointed out he was in hall cogan's movie i can't believe this is real but the uh the helicopter scene there's marcus bagwell as a young man i don't think that's him steve and in your shot here but that's certainly the same where it happens uh but yeah he was in hulk hogan's movie way back in 1989 but somehow he settles on a wrestling career and according to buff i think he credits missy hyatt who i believe uh lived in his neighborhood at the time

of getting him into the wrestling business did you hear of the missy hyatt buff bagwell connection you know i just read that uh recently like within a last month or two so i wasn't aware of it you know when it happened keep in mind i wasn't in management when that happened you know buff came in through through dusty um so i no i wasn't aware of it but interesting tidbit yeah nice little trivia note there um he gets trained by Steve Lawler, works with Joe Pedicino, who was trying to pop some stuff off there in Atlanta. Before moving to the Global Wrestling Federation there, he's going to be mentored by Eddie Gilbert, Missy's then husband, and Scott Levy, who we all know today is Raven.

And maybe he's one of the more ideal candidates to get into wrestling at the time. He's a handsome, good-looking dude with a bodybuilder shape. And when you take a look at the way wrestling was back then, it's kind of curious to me. that he didn't get a more serious look from the WWF back then. Doesn't it feel like he protects all of Vince's boxes to you? I mean, obviously Buff looked great, you know, when he broke into WCW, but I don't know how tall Buff is, but I'm guessing he's six foot or under.

And I think at that time, now we're going back to what, early 90s? That's right. At that time, I think he was too short for that right. I, you know, in Vince's opinion. All that's changed now, right? We see guys that are, you know, 5, 10, 175 pounds that are, you know, at the top of the game. But back then, not so much. Well, humble beginnings.

Before he was buff, he was known as the handsome stranger, which was essentially him wrestling in a Zoro mask and some white tights. But then you arrive in WCW just a few months before Bagwell comes into the company. And I think the story is that Dusty has. had Magnum T.A. call buff to bring him in. What was Magnum's role in the company way back when you first started? You know, when I first started, as I've said previously, Dusty made a real effort to include me, not in discussions, not talking about creative or anything, but he would always invite me in his office to hang out and we talk about hunting or we talk about whatever we

talked about, right? We just had, our personalities were similar. Our interests were similar, I should say, in many respects. But Dussie always kind of kept me close. I don't know if it was a situation where, as the saying goes, keep your friends close, but keep your enemies closer. And perhaps Dussie just wasn't quite sure about me. Or he just had the graciousness, I guess, to kind of mentor me, and I believe that to be true. You know, somebody more cynical would look at it the other way. I believe that Dusty really wanted to help me and develop me as a wrestling personality. But Dusty also, you know, there were a couple guys that were also very close to Dusty that would be in that room when we were just chatting about whatever or telling old wrestling stories, which was my favorite part of hanging around with Dusty.

because Dusty could tell a freaking story not only in the ring, but just sitting around and it was fascinating to me. Again, growing up as a fan of Dusty, now I'm sitting there listening to Dusty Rhodes in his office telling me stories I'd never heard of before. But Magnum was always in that room. My Graham was in that room. Yeah, that was his team.

like when Dusty would actually, you know, sit down and collaborate, which wasn't that much. Dusty's approach was generally, all right, let's sit around our own, we'll throw some ideas around, and then he'd go into his office and he never usually shut his door until he was working on creative, which everybody knew, don't mess with, don't interrupt Dusty, don't ask to come in and talk about something when his door's closed. But Magnum, I think, was one of those people that was always close to Dusty and always had his ear. I think you first met Buff, if my timeline

is right here, in 1991, what was your first impression of Marcus? First impression, super high energy. You know, he had no fear. I mean, when I say no fear, I mean, he came into that locker room

and it was like he'd been there for 10 years. He wasn't intimidated. Now, if he was, he didn't show it, but he was so comfortable and sum it up in one word self-confident actually that's two words but you know what I mean he's just really confident in himself it wasn't like he came in as the new guy and you know humble and

and he was humble he was respectful but man he just acted like he knew everybody in that locker room for 10 years well confidence is key I mean that's for sure and you can see that he had it right away his his first match with the company is a dark match at a worldwide tape in Gainesville, Georgia, where he's going to lose to the veteran Mike Graham. He has another dark match at center stage, and very quickly, Bagwell makes it to the major stage. His television debut is with Missy Hyatt at the Clash of the Champions in Savannah.

He's portrayed as the newest rookie being trained by Mike Graham and Dustin Rhodes. At this point, what did you think the ceiling was? It's always hard to tell. Sometimes you take a look at a talent and you say, man, that guy's got it. He's going to be a top guy. he's going to make it, whatever. And other times, you think, well, he might could make a living. Clearly, Buff, at least to me, as a fan at the time, Marcus jumped off the page as saying,

hey, this guy's going to be a big deal in wrestling. Did you see that right away, too? I did, but not for the, you know, obvious reasons or the reasons people would think, you know, did I see him performing in the ring and make some kind of qualified judgment that this guy is going to make it? No, I didn't do that. That's just not me. because I didn't look at the world and the business from the eyes of a wrestler.

I looked at it through a different lens because I wasn't a wrestler. But what I did know that a lot of people didn't know, because I did hang out with Dusty and Magdham and others in that room telling stories. I knew how excited Dusty was about Buff. And by default, I pretty much believed, and again, you look at, you know, I looked at Buff and physically, you just look at him as a character on television. Let's see, does a camera like him? Check that box.

Is he got just inherent charisma? Was he lucky enough to be born with that it thing that people talk about? Check that box. Looks like he, you know, from my perspective as a non-wrestler and someone that didn't really analyze wrestling from a technical perspective. It looked to me like he could go in a ring, check that box. Oh, and yeah, Dusty loves him. none of those other boxes matter he's going right well i'll tell you what we'll check all your boxes and i'm pretty sure without even asking this is buff approved we're talking about the beard

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I've never even heard of that. One guard for 20 links. I'm going to grow a beard just so I can use it. You like that Tony Chivani's had single stroke efficiency down for 40 years. That's particularly easy for Tony, but we won't go into the specifics. Yes, we won't. We'll save that for another time. So listen, just a handful of matches in, and Bagwell's been a big spot already.

Starcade 91. He's going to open the show in a lethal lottery match teaming with Jim Garvin to defeat to defeat Michael Hayes and Tracy Smothers, that earns him a shot in the battle bowl. Listen, I understand that maybe we didn't love the battle bowl concept, but to be this early in your wrestling career and on a Starcade pay-per-view and getting the win, this is a big deal. You know, and you think back, I don't, I can't remember how old Buff was when he broke into WCW, but relatively early in his career, right?

Yeah. only 20 years old, maybe, whatever he was, 1920. To achieve that much success when you are that young, dare I say immature, I can speak from personal experience that I believe men typically mature at a rate about six or seven years behind women. When I think back of myself when I was 19 or 20, I was really 15. or 16 at best, you know what I mean? And to get, to have that much success so early in his career and on top of that,

it's such a young age, that's kind of overwhelming and would be interesting for anybody to handle because typically you've been in the business for five, seven, eight, ten years and kind of have a much better perspective. So when you walk through the door and bam, four months later here you are getting the push of a lifetime and you're still only 19 or 20 years old it's a lot of pressure for a young man it is and i'm glad you said it like that because i do think a lot of people sort of gloss over this but let's just remind everybody that when buff starts in wcw he's too young to rent a car there are some hotel rooms that wouldn't

rent him a room like you've got to be a certain age to do these sort of things he's still not there and as you know wrestling can be for lack of a better word a very political space so there's a lot of guys who are just going to be threatened by his mere presence here's this young good looking handsome jacked up baby face here to take my spot brother so he's got to deal with all of that and oh by the way he's probably got a six figure income as a 20 year old and he's probably not had that sort of disposable cash before and he's a national television star so not only is he a good looking dude who's on TV and got a pocket full of cash, but he's surrounded at his workplace by sharks and the world is not made for him to be there. He's not old enough to rent a car and things like this. And now he's got all the pressure of celebrity and things coming too fast, too soon.

And yet he rides it out. I mean, that would be that sort of pressure, Eric, to your point, we've seen how many athletes get that level of access and success and fame and fizzle immediately, it becomes almost fight or flight in those type situations, does it not? It becomes self-destructive.

Yes. Because I think at an early age, whether it's in the NFL or anywhere else, you know, we hear it more often or most recently, I guess, in the NFL. But man, you have to be mentally and emotionally mature enough to really process that much success that quickly. because it can mess you up. I'm trying to get not to swear on the show. So far, I've been doing pretty good.

It can really mess you up and affect your judgment going forward. It becomes overwhelming. You know, how many times have we read and heard, to your point, Conrad, how many times have we read and heard about a young NFL prospect, you know, ended up going out and doing things that either ended his or her career or sabotaged it? so people you know it's when you're not when you've never experienced it when you can't really understand or relate to it because your life is is a more normal life than perhaps that of a professional athlete or professional entertainer you don't really think about things like

we're discussing you don't really think about you know how would I have reacted when I was 19 years old to a ton of money becoming a television star having all of the success says, wild guys behind you are looking for ways to pull the rug out from underneath you. That's a head trip. It really is. And he made it, man. He even makes it to the main event here of StarK-91. He's going to eliminate Thomas Rich, and he makes it to the final six.

He's eliminated by a fellow who would go on to become stone cold. That's right. Steve Austin eliminates him. It comes down to Austin, Vader, Sting, Ricky Steamboat, Scott Steiner, and Rick Rude. pretty good company here for a young Mr. Bagwell and in early 92 he starts a program with stunning Steve Austin who was then the world television champion that feud is going to lead him to team up with guys like Sting and the Steiner brothers and Tom Zink and Brian Pilman and Ricky Steamboat as they take on various incarnations of the dangerous alliance this is a big opportunity

he's surrounded immediately by all of these top guys you know if we had to compare him to someone today it almost feels like a guy like austin theory might be a moderate counterpart for a buff bagwell when you think about how young and how quickly he was thrown into a pretty prime time spot wow what a great analogy because i mean i didn't even know who austin theory was until i'm watching monday night raw or whatever it was and here he is sitting in vince and now vince McMahon he doesn't he doesn't do that that often and it didn't do that that often, where he'd involve himself in the launch of somebody's career. He'd tag in after you were already successful, which very rarely saw Vince McMahon actually

attempt to catapult a new star by being involved creatively, at least at that level. But think about that, man. And I hadn't thought about it until you said it. But here's this young guy comes in, great look, all the potential in world. Oh, my gosh, Vince McMahon sees something in him, kind of like Dusty, son in Marcus and launches them like from out of nowhere launches them right into you know top of the card status top of the story status at least got to imagine and then again politically you know people say whatever they want politics still exist in every roster

in any significant wrestling company that's out there yes it does so i would imagine austin theory probably felt a little of what Bagwell should have felt, but didn't. I don't think Bagwell cared, honestly. But yeah, very good parallel. And here's what else is interesting. They're both Georgia boys. Austin's from McDonough, Georgia. It's like 50 miles from Marietta.

So the parallel of water. Yeah. Super Brawl 2 is February 29th, which is a fun date to have a show. Bagwell's going to pick up a win over Terry Taylor, who was then going under the gimmick. a tailor-made man. He's going to keep wrestling individual matches throughout 1992, but he spends a great deal of time teaming with Tom Zink,

competing for the U.S., NWA, and WCW. World Tag Team titles. They're going to battle the Freebirds, Dr. Death, and Terry Gordy, even has a few during this time with Greg Valentine in both singles and tag competition, even teaming with Shane Douglas to defeat Valentine and Dick Slater, which is Valentine's last match in WCW in October of that year. And there starts to be rumors during this time that, and this is, you know, what happens when you have, well, insider newsletters, that maybe he's getting calf implants. And of course, we know that he has got a bodybuilder physique, and I think there was even an MTV skit years ago about that. Did you hear about Buff and calf implants?

Oh, yeah, that was all over the place. Yep, I heard about it. And Buff took a fair amount of ribbing. I mean, that's an understatement. But it, you know, he, he went with it, you know. He had a very self-deprecating approach to dealing with the caffeine plants. Right. He joke about it himself, you know, and it's, it was, yeah, it was the talk of the locker room for sure.

Well, listen, to each his own. We also know that from January 93 to November of 96, he's going to have major tag team runs with a few different partners. The first is a short-lived team with Brad Armstrong in the early part of 93. They appeared together a handful of times

on Worldwide and Power Hour and some house shows, but their only major matches were against the future Hollywood blondes, Pilman and Austin, and a house show victory of a pretty interesting combination. Tony Atlas and Vinnie Vegas. I want to see those. promos. Don't you want to see some Kevin Nash, Tony Atlas promos? That would have been

hilarious. I'm sorry, but the last Tony Atlas visual that I have in my head was from Christmas and he posted it himself, which is really weird. But I can't get that image out of my head. And seeing Kevin Nash and Tony Atlas together, I'm going to have to, I'm going to have to Google the internet and get a look at that. Bagwell then's going to team briefly with Eric Watts. He's going to lose to Pilman in Austin at Superbrall 3. And then he joins up with his first major tag team partner on the March 1st episode of WCW main event.

He's tagging with two cold Scorpio. Now let's take a time out here, Eric. By this point in 93, I just want to understand, do you have any hand in creative when it comes to pairing guys together? Or do you recall how the whole two cold Scorpio, buff Bagwell combination, would have come to be it would have been a dusty call i mean to answer your first question i had zero input i or knowledge of what was going on creatively that just wasn't my lane and i didn't try to force myself into it um so no i i don't know how it came about i would have made it was dusty's call

but it could have easily been you know a magnum t or my gram or or anybody else that dusty you know listen to consistently well what's fun is you know these guys start to become a pretty good duo like i was a big fan of these guys as a kid you had this new exciting high flyer and two cold scorpio and it felt like for multiple years in a row it felt as if buff bagwell was the rookie of the year and on the april sixth episode worldwide from the municipal auditorium in columbus georgia we see bagwell and scorpio go to a 17 minute time limit draw against the Hollywood blondes and a computer contenders challenge for the Unified NWA slash WCW tag team championships.

This is years before taboo Tuesday or internet chat rooms or whatever, but it was a little silly and maybe you had to be there. But Bagwell and Scorpio keep working together with the Hollywood blondes for the tag titles, and they're usually working them on the house shows, losing by pinfall. But they finally pick up a big win over the tag. champs on an episode of Power Hour on May 19th, but it is by DQ. After their program with the blinds seemingly wraps up, we see them work a lot of TV shows and house show loops against guys like the nasty boys and Harlem Heat and Shanghai Pierce

and Tex Lanzinger, who are going to go on to be the Godwins, of course. It finally happens, though, now that Teddy Long is going to be added to the mix as their manager, they're going to win the tag straps from the nasty boys on October 4th on WCW Saturday night. 14 minutes and 44 seconds is a really long, nasty boy match, but they finally get their first taste, a tag team gold, man. What did you think of that pairing, Bagwell and Scorpio?

I loved it. You know, you go back and watch Scorpio, too cold Scorpio at that period of time. You know, he was an innovator. You know, he was doing things in the ring. And Scorpio wasn't a, you know, he wasn't a cruiserweight. You know, he might not have been six foot five or six or seven, but he was a, he was a solid 240.

at least, and could fly like a 160 pounder. And at that time, that was kind of a new thing. And with Buff's looks and his abilities, it was a pretty dynamic team. Before we go any further, though, I'm going to do a shameless plug for ad-free shows.com and the great family that we have there. James Sorensen, who's been a part of the ad-free shows family for as long as I actually remember who drove up from Nebraska to come and visit me and have a burger in Cody Wyoming and I see James everywhere. James is in Tokyo with Sunny Ono for Sting's last

match with Muda. And he's wow. James has been there now for I think over a week and he's traveling around with Sonny and Sonny's wife Julie. They sent me a selfie of them on the train think they were going to Yokohama and i just think it's so cool that because of you conrad and your vision for every shows and what your team and it's a big team have done you are you guys we are i guess changing lives and that's just freaking awesome super cool man excited to see oh wow jimmy's up early it's 314 in the morning there as he's watching by the way when you sign up over at ad-freeshows.com. You not only get these shows early in ad-free,

but you get to be a part of our live studio audience. It doesn't get any earlier than being here while we're recording it. Unfortunately, Bagwell and Scorpio lose the tag straps in just three weeks back to the Nasty's, a Halloween havoc in 1993 here, and they continue their feud against the nasties

on the house shows in WCW Saturday night, and then in early 94, that's sort of it for this team of Scorpio and Buff Bagwell, because by early April, Scorpio's out of the company and Bagwell finds himself wrestling the international world wrestling heavyweight champion Rick Rood and TV matches on Worldwide and Power Hour. I liked them as a tag team, but you see a lot of great tag teams break up over the years.

But when you leave the tag team scene and now you're working for the big gold belt with Rick Rude, it worked out okay, huh? Yeah, I did. And I think breaking them up had a little bit to do. with Tukal Scorpio leaving the company, but it had a lot more to do with me because at that time I did have more influence over creative. I didn't exercise it as much as I did in 95

with the launch Nitro, 96 and 7. But at this point, because I was also responsible for the financials of the company, so I'm looking at that roster a little differently in 1994 than perhaps somebody that was only thinking about creative. Now, I say that because just doing the math, it's not that hard, to try to have a robust, meaningful tag team division means you're carrying a lot of talent that you're not really being able to use cost effectively. Let me break that down simple.

You're going to have a decent tag team division. You're going to have at least six or eight tag teams. So that's 12 or 16 talents, but you're only using, you're using four of those talents on any given show in one segment, as opposed to two talents in one segment. So just the math, the overhead of having a meaningful tag team division is kind of expensive. In a 94, all of my focus was on saving money. The old story I tell about making everybody in the WCW office go back to their desk and count how many pencils that were in their desk wasn't because I gave a damn about pencils, but I wanted people to start thinking about resources and how best to manage them. And creatively, having a tag team division at that time in 1994 was not a good use of resources. So, and now add that to, in general, you get a tag team division.

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That's athletic greens.com forward slash 83 weeks. Let's keep it going here and talk about what's next for Buff. Now that he's working these singles matches with Rick Rude for the Big Belt, it's worth mentioning that he's been in the company around three years. He's had a handful of tag team partners. He's had success as a tag team wrestler with two cold Scorpio. And it seems like he's been wrestling sort of lower to mid-card guys. And then bam, he's immediately with Rick Rude.

Would that have been something Rude would have maybe had input for and asked about himself? Possibly. But I think it was more likely suggested to Rick Rood. And Rick, Rick would have had to feel pretty good about that or he wouldn't have done it. You know, Rick, Rick Rood was not shy about letting, he wasn't the type of guy that would show up and just do whatever he was told and not ask any questions. That wasn't Rick. So I think the fact that Rick probably saw the same thing in Marcus Bagwell that Dusty did, for example. He saw potential in him.

He knew he could have great matches with him. He knew he had momentum, he meaning Marcus, had momentum behind him. That probably had a lot to do with why Rick would not only probably, and I can't speak for Rick, but not only felt comfortable, it was pretty excited. Well, we were excited to see what was next. Unfortunately, it's not going to continue this singles run. We're going to try another tag team partner.

This time, we're going to be a part of a team called Stars and Stripes with the the new star in town, the Patriot Dale Wilkes joins WCW. And he had success with the Patriot gimmick and global before hit for a line in WCW and well, WWF years later. But Stars and Stripes quickly move into the tag title picture. They're going to feud with the then champions pretty wonderful,

Paul Roma and Paul Orndorff. And the two teams feud for the summer into the early fall, Stars and Stripes finally win the tag titles on main event. on September 25th, but much like the tag run he had with Scorpio, it's not for long. They're going to drop the belts back at Halloween Havoc, 94. Boy, it's like a, it's a pattern with Bagwell, man. If you need them to drop the straps, just do it at Halloween Havoc. What did you think of this presentation?

Stars and Stripes. Maybe it's a little cheesy by 2023 standards, but at the time, this felt like what you did in wrestling, man. You got a Patriot, and he's got a, the American symbolism with him and the young handsome baby face. This is his white meat baby faces we can get. Is it not? It is. But now, you know, you think about it. And I certainly didn't think about it at the time. But now, you know, 30 some odd years later, 29 years later, whatever it is, you know, you look at it, Marcus had already kind of been established as that

white meat, pretty boy baby face. And this is where psychology comes. in. Oftentimes, especially guys in the ring talk about psychology. And psychology means different things in different contexts. But when I look at the psychology of a wrestling audience, because I think, and again, a lot of this is stuff that I've learned well after the fact. I didn't know it then. I wish I would have. But the audience has its own psychology. Right. And you have to understand that to be a great performer in the ring. And the greatest ones certainly, did, whether it be Rick Flair or Hulk Hogan or The Rock or anybody else, they could anticipate how an audience is going to react.

That's the art. Otherwise, you're just going out there doing perfunctory moves and whatever. It's an exhibition at that point. But in order to create emotion and therefore a story, you have to anticipate how an audience is going to react. And I think a guy like Marcus Bagwell, being pushed as a baby face, it's kind of a mistake because Scott Hall said it best, man. Guys want to be you and women want to hang you.

And I think the male audience, the male demo in WCW didn't necessarily want to be like Mark Bagwell. He was too pretty and he knew it. Right. You always knew that Rick, excuse me, that Mark Bagelwell had a Buff, they had a pretty high opinion of Buff. And that rubs that male demo the wrong way, consciously or subconsciously. He was just too pretty to be a baby face.

And putting Buff in that Patriot gimmick, people were still seeing the pretty boy. So he brought some of that resistance with the male demo with him and what would otherwise bet a pure baby face team. Now, what I liked about the team of Del Wilkes and Marks, and again, I knew Del Wilkes all the way back in the AWA because Dell worked for Vern for quite a while when I first got there. Del was a big guy. You know, I don't know what it's, he had to be 6364. he was a solid and jacked up 260, 270. So he brought the muscle, Bagwell brought the sizz.

In other words, Del brought the meat. Bagwell brought the sizzle. And that combination, I think, was a great combination. But I think Bagwell also brought a little bit of subliminal heat with him in that regard, which is probably why I didn't take off quite as much as it could have or should have. They have one more tag title run. They win at Clash of the Champions 29, but drop it on Saturday night on December 8th. And by early 95, the Patriot is gone from WCW.

And much like with Scorpio, he finds himself back in singles competition. Throughout 95, he has, he Bing Buff pronouns, pal, I had a series of different tag team partners, including Hacksaw Jim Duggan and Johnny Be Bad and Alex Wright. But he finally teams up with. Scotty Riggs to form the American males on the August 21st episode of WCW. Saturday

night. They're going to pick up a win over Lieutenant James Earl Wright and Sergeant Buddy Lee Parker. What can you tell us about Scotty Riggs coming in and what do you think of the American Males presentation? I love their entrance music. It was pretty good.

You go back and listen to that. That was a Jimmy Hart classic. You want to sing a song? American males. I mean, this is, you know, but I liked about that pairing. Well, I mean, first answer what I thought about Scotty Rex. You know, I never really got to know Scotty. Scottie was very quiet backstage.

He was very unassuming, very quiet. You know, my interactions with him were very professional, but extremely limited. We didn't engage in a much of a bunch of extracurricular discussion or activity when it came to what we were doing at TV. It was very cut and dry. But he was very quiet. talented great great performance in the ring great look to him perfect pairing i think with with marcus in some respects i think riggs felt very comfortable in that what i would call a semi heel role

um just by virtue of the fact that they were acknowledging themselves as kind of like the hierarchy of a a male tag team during that period of time because they had to look you know this again semi heel right but it fit it was it was a good fit i think they both felt very comfortable in it and they had that great jimmy heart entrance music i mean it is a good song yeah it's become a sort of a cult classic and you got to think their inspiration is maybe those early 90s boy bands i don't know coloring me bad or right said fred or whatever yeah i mean look at three count that was another jimmy heart creative thing and three count i thought was really entertaining jimmy worked that you know created that's because i literally handed

Jimmy the responsibility to book the WCW Saturday Night Show once Nitro took off and really started rolling. But you look at some of Jimmy Hart's influence, you know, three count. And a lot of those guys went on to become very successful. That was a Jimmy Hart thing. But again, it was that boy band vibe, right? Because that's, you know, Jimmy's, you know, he's been in the music business almost all of his adult life. And kind of had his finger on what was hot at that time. It wouldn't be hot now.

But at that time it was. well what's going to be hot here in 95 is the debut of nitro and on september 18th 1995 the third episode of nitro the american males win the tag titles beating harlem heat they're going to drop it back on october 11th on saturday night but still at this point bagwell has had the tag straps with three different partners two cold scorpio the patriot and now scotty rigs both rigs in bagwell will compete in the world war three match to crown a new vacant heavyweight champion of course that will ultimately be won by randy savage and then they're going to chase the Harlem heat for the tag straps in the

1996 without any success and for most of 96 they're losing lowered a mid card matches the big time names like the steiners and lex luger and sting and randerson and rick flair he does get a couple of pay-per-view singles matches during that time he had a match against ddp great american bash in june of 96 and he was a part of World War III in November, which was won by the giant. But as the NWO starts to build, it feels as if there's an opportunity. We start to see some trouble brewing between the American males that comes to ahead in November of 96.

On November 18th, on that episode of Nitro, they lose to the amazing French Canadians. And this is when we start to see maybe some problems. This is also the same episode where Eric Bischoff has an altercation with Roddy Piper. And it's revealed that you, in fact, are a member of the NWO. And the next week, you give an ultimatum to the WCW locker room, saying they have 30 days to join the NWO or suffer the consequences. And Bagwell comes down the ramp to join, but Riggs follows trying to talk him out of it.

Bagwell turns heel on him, and now he is the newest member of the NWO. And you and I have talked about this before. I mean, certainly if you take a look at the tag team success Bagwell had, he's a proven tag team great wrestler here and i don't know why that's never discussed but how many guys had tag title runs with three different partners i don't know the answer but it can't be a lot um buff bagwell is among those guys but really this american males thing it's not taken off the n w o was here it feels by that standard that new standard maybe a little hokey maybe a little dated and we know that buff is going to go on to become

a huge name as this Buff Daddy character but in hindsight do you think Buff would have been better served if the roles were reverse Scotty Riggs joins the NWO Buff Bagwell represents the face of WCW and becomes

a baby face. No question about it I think putting Riggs into the NWO and because of the backstory with Bagwell in his relationship with Lex Lugar and Sting and the Steiner brothers who at that point in time were definitively WCW guys,

right, much like Rick Flair, would have been smarter, really would have been. Putting Bagwell in the NWO checked a couple boxes, but absolutely you're right. And there could have been some great story there between Riggs and the NWO and Buffalo as a WCW flag waving, you know, cheerleader for the WCW brand. It would have been a bunch of better choice. No question about it. When you think about the different members of the NWO, if you sort of go in order,

Scott Hall, former WWF guy, Kevin Nash, former WWF guy, Hulk Hogan, former WWF guy, Ted DiBiase, who we knew was the million-dollar man, former WWF guy. And the first deviation is the giant. then we would see NWO Sting and Six and Vincent and Miss Elizabeth and there's lots of other names that had that WWF background. Big Show is really the first one or the Giants really the first one that didn't. Of course, Bagwell doesn't either. When I've seen people be critical of this storyline and you would always argue, no, it wasn't about them coming from the WWF, it was that they had been here before.

But for fans like myself who thought, okay, these are just former WWF guys. In hindsight, would you have added the giant, should he too have stayed on the WCW side of things? Yeah, the giant was a bad choice. That was a bad choice because the NWO didn't need the muscle because they didn't rely on it. They relied on cheating, lying, stealing, and cheating, Eddie Guerrero. Yes. That was their MO. And they had Kevin Nash.

If they needed muscle, if they were in a storyline where you needed that. power player, Nash was your guy. Giant was awkward, not because of his size, just because of his inexperience. He was awkward at best. He still hadn't really found his character yet. Yes, it was misplaced. And he also would have been a much bigger obstacle for WCW and for the NWO, so that struggle could have been played out differently. Yeah, you could probably make a list of the mistakes that were made that I made in terms of the NWO roster. And I'm not even going to go into talking about why again for the 100th time. But it was a mistake, pure and simple, regardless of the motivation, the intent,

or whatever the situation was, it was bad casting. NWO worked and became the phenomenon. Actually, it still is. But initially, because of the casting. what it represented with Hall Cougain, Scott Hall, and Kevin Nash. And then to continue to cast that entity with people that didn't bring that same vibe, that was a mistake. Now, I will say if someone were to ask me, but then why did you do it?

The mistake I made was thinking that NWO needed that, I don't want to say comedic, but Buff was that guy, and this is who he was, you know, whether he would want to hear this or not. But, you know, backstage, he was that guy that, you know, you kind of like being around him, but every once in a while you want to smack him because it was smart-ass sense of humor, right? And it was, and I thought, man, if we had that comedic level within the NWO group that you could rely upon once in a while, it would be a good idea it was it was a good idea just wasn't the best idea did you ever watch american pie remember those movies no well there was a character in there named stiffler i think you should go check him out i think the buff character uh has a lot in common with the stiffler character

just the guy who could maybe get under your skin just a little bit yeah um let's talk about you know the positioning of why I sort of theorized on an older show that perhaps buff should have represented sort of the face of WCW had been on that sting side of things as opposed to the NWO because we all understand buff is going to become a phenomenal heel and if if we had to guess we would think he's probably a better heel than a baby face I would imagine would you would agree with that absolutely for the reasons I just mentioned a few I mean just he walks to the ring and he's subconsciously he's a heel the minute he comes

through the curtain, whether he wants to be or not, to a certain segment of the audience. So with that said, you know, obviously that makes the fit for the NWO seem to make sense. But I do think if he was, you know, one of the sort of torch bears for WCW and then later he turned, it could have been an even bigger deal. But what we saw happen was a real transition from Marcus Alexander Bagwell, the white meat baby face that we had first met way back in 1991. and now he's going to become buff and it was almost like a transformation speaking of transformation there's no quick fix for anxiety and depression it's not finding a new therapist or starting

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promo code 83 weeks so listen let's talk about how buff is going to be uh the new thing here as marcus transforms his character um he changes his appearance as well He's going to change from the American male haircut and this clean cut look, maybe something a little more edgy. He's got the goatee and the short hair and the bull rope tattoo on his left bicep. And it's about this time in early 97. He starts calling himself Buff Bagwell. Of course, he's really turning up the arrogance and the conceit and the cockiness.

Who's sort of going over this character with him? Is this something you're working with him on? Is this Kevin Sullivan, someone else? You know, I'd Kevin Sullivan, I would say the majority of it. I may have had a note here and there. But Kevin, you know, I was thinking about this the other day because we cover so much about that period of time

when Nitro, when Nitro was, you know, kicking on all cylinders. And I find myself often saying, I, I, I. And sometimes the questions are presented to me, is what were you thinking what was what was your idea what was your input there was no i for the most part once we started taking off after the nw o really started getting momentum it really was a we and of that we Kevin sullivan really had substantial impact on everything below the main event below the NWO storyline the A story as it was back then um and And Kevin still had a lot of influence.

I was just more involved in the A story than I was in the C stories than the D stories. But Kevin Sullivan, a lot of the great things and some of the bad ones, Dungeon of Doom, like all of us, have had great ideas. And some that weren't so great, including me. Kevin Sullivan had much more involvement in that creative process. And sometimes I acknowledge in the course of doing the show. So I want to correct that here. Kevin Sullivan had a lot to do with Buff's character developments and evolution into the NWO. Well, let's talk about something else that's going to be an opportunity for Buff that we've never talked about on this program.

And I can't believe we've never discussed it. But Buff did a movie. The Day of the Warrior, Meltzer would say that it made Hulk Hogan's movies look like masterpiece theater. Bagwell played a character known as the Supreme. warrior or they have him in a loin cloth and face paint and Meltzer would say it builds to a 32nd final fight scene against a penthouse playmate who he head butts in the breasts and gets knocked out by and penned. I have to admit, I was such a wrestling fan here in this era that I sought this movie out and I thought, man, if Bagwell's in and I got to see it. And I

realize I'll never get this time back. Listen, it doesn't always work out. Did you ever remember sitting down and watching the day of the warrior? And if not, can we do that as a bonus on Ann Free Show? No, we have to. Now, let me tell you just a little story about that. I think that opportunity came to Buff through a third party, an agent or somebody that he knew. Buff told me about it and wanted to get my support.

court. So I actually went out to L.A. and met with the director and his wife, who I think was the writer. I'm dying to remember their names. I'm sure it's going to be in the credits. Hopefully somebody that's listening live over at ad-freeshows.com can do a little research and find it for me because if you say his name, I remember it. But I actually went to their house to sit down with them and learn about, number one,

I want to know how much time it was going to take off a Bagwell schedule because that was Planned Pryderis. Is that it? And that's it, Andy Sedaris. Yeah. And I was concerned about how much time this was going to take. And I wanted to talk to the director, who I think was also the producer, and try to get a feel for that before I signed off on it. And, you know, the Sedaris has lived in a beautiful home, beautiful home.

I think it was in the Hollywood Hills. So they had obviously been very successful, at least for a period of time in the movie industry. And I went in there and talked to the Sedarisis. I didn't get into the creative too much. I was just looking again, who's producing the movie? What's the budget for the movie? When's the movie coming out? How much time is it going to take off Bagwell's schedule?

What am I going to have to work around? That's the reason that I wanted to have a real conversation before I could sign off. So I was kind of impressed with the meeting and the people involved in meeting, Andy Sedaris and his wife. Obviously, like I said, they lived in a little. kind of a tony neighborhood not isn't shivani but isn't you know you know what i mean uh and then i saw the movie yeah we got to do a watch along that's a fun one anytime you watch somebody get knocked out by a set of jugs bam got to watch it and listen here's the thing sadaris did

another one too uh the return to savage beach and once again he pulls bagwell in that one comes out a couple of years later. So, yeah, this Sedaris relationship worked out for Bagwell, got a few paydays and got some new experiences and got some cool stories. I can't believe this is real, but Woo Wings, your very own virtual restaurant concept is now open and fans can enjoy the legendary flavors and world championship wings by ordering with their Uber Eats or Postmates app. Woo Wings is now open in Nashville, San Antonio, Jacksonville, as well as Huntsville and Tuscalo

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the Buff Bagwell Scott Norton pairing? The contrast. You know, I love contrast. You know, when I go out to eat, you know, if I'm going to have something that's a heavy, maybe, what's the word that they use all the time? There's a certain word for it, rich flavored, you know, food, heavy food. I need something light and the opposite of that, right, to enjoy it. So I love contrasts and everything. And I think with a tag team, when you have the right contrast, it just makes it more fun to watch. I could not think of anybody more opposite of Buff Bagwell than Scott Norton.

Scott Norton was just, you know, he was a bricklayer, you know, not in real life. But, I mean, he was that everyday blue collar guy that just had. happened to be one of the most powerful people on the on the planet but he had this deep voice you know and he was bigger i mean he was he was bigger around than he was tall and he was a lot taller than me you know it's and he was such a straightforward almost non-character that putting him in the ring with buff who was an over-the-top almost uh he was so very much he was so very vain and over the top that that contrast I thought was just entertaining and I liked it I liked it I wish it could have gone further a lot of that had to do with timing and they didn't get the push as a tag team

that some of the people in the A stories or even the B stories got you know that that tag team combination was meant to be middle of the middle of the show maybe after the crossover segment at nine o'clock following the cruiser waits but before the A story or main event it was never designed to be a big moneymaker. It was designed to help get us to the next part of the show in an entertaining fashion. And I love that contrast. That tag team even gets to test their medal for New Japan Pro Wrestling in February

here as part of the NWO Japan. But through most of the year, I would say, you can't believe this is real. But Wu Wings, your very own virtual restaurant concept is now open and fans can enjoy the legendary flavors and world championship wings are ordering with their Uber Eats or Postmates app. Wu Wings is now open in Nashville, St. Antonio, Jacksonville, as well as Huntsville and Tuscaloosa, right here in Alabama. Many more locations coming soon. As a virtual restaurant, Wu Wings is looking to partner with existing restaurants in major metro areas. Tell your favorite sports bar or local restaurant you want Wu Wings in your town and to visit

Rickflarewings.com for more information on how to become a partner. But if you're in Nashville, San Antonio, Jacksonville, Huntsville, or Tuscaloosa, hop on your Uber Eats or Postmates app and look for Woo Wings and try the only chicken wings worthy, hearing the name of the 16-time World Heavyweight champion, Wu Wings. Be sure to check out Rickflairwings.com to become a partner. From July forward on into 1998, vicious and delicious are going to be working with the Steiner's brothers. This is as WCW as it gets, man, Bagwell and the Steiner's. Most of the time, of course, Bagwell is teaming with Norton through all of these. Occasionally he's going to team with Conan. And there's even a nitro where he's teaming with Kevin Nash. And along the way,

Buff takes a break from his feud with the Steiner's to team with Nash, Conan, and six to defeat the four horsemen at the war games match, fall brawl. We haven't talked about another WCW stalwart. ask your opinion, what was the relationship like with Sting and Bagwell and Flair and Bagwell, sort of the two staples of WCW? Stig and Bagwell were very close personally outside of WCW. You know, Sting, Bagwell, Lux Lugar at the time, they were kind of like the three musketeers once they left the arena or the office, so to speak. So the relationship was very good. it was a very they were they were supporting each other and propping each other up in every way and

and having fun together you know it was obvious when you saw staying and buff and lugar together that was a great combination of of talent there that worked in the ring and outside of the ring let's also mention that buff is about to get his biggest win of his career he pins lex Lugar at Starcade 1997. He's mostly been a tag team character. We're now at the biggest show of the year, the biggest show in WCW history, Starcade 97, and Buff gets a win over Lex Lugar. Now, Meltzer is critical of it. They get plenty of time. Maybe you could argue two months time, 16 minutes and 36 seconds. Meltzer would say this feud is elevating Bagwell's career as he continually takes credit for beating Lugar on flukes, but it also shows Bagwell's limitations as a worker

as he can't even come close to carrying Lugar to a decent match, way too long and boring. So let's just take a time out right there. You mentioned before how close Lex was with Buff. It totally makes sense to me that Lex would have happily been looking forward to the opportunity to put over his friend Buff. This is a big moment for him, but Meltzer is pretty critical of his in-ring work.

Did you ever think Buff's in-ring work was less than, or is this just Meltzer being Meltzer? look james beltzer and everybody knows how i feel about him and what he really is but he's entitled to his opinion you know we all have certain tastes that are very subjective what what i find to be really a good match is going to be different perhaps than what you think conrad is a great match we all have you know it's just like food and some people love it's burgers some people hate it whatever um i i i didn't look at matches the same way dave did and does so i didn't agree with him I always looked at how did the crowd react? How much runway do we have with great story as a result of a match? Where can it go? Did it serve a purpose? And then I look at the aesthetic part of it, right?

So Dave was far more critical of it than I was. But like I said, that's his opinion. I don't begrudge anybody, including Dave Meltzer, for having an opinion. It's when your opinion crosses over and trying to convince people that it's a fact. It's just an opinion. He's welcome to it. After the Steiner's breakup at Super Brawl in February of 98, Buff is going to wrestle Rick at a few house shows and then continues the feud and tag matches. Buff is going to team with Scott in a losing effort against Rick Steiner and Lex Lugar at Spring Stampede 98.

Then he reunites with Scott Norton to defeat Rick and Lugar. on an April 22nd episode of Thunder after Scott hits Rick with a chair, but that's not the big story. Right before Scott interferes, Rick comes off the second rope with a bulldog on Buff, but Buff's head gets loose and rather than being driven into the mat,

smashes into Rick's back as Rick hits the mat, and Buff has several vertebrae damaged here, and develops spinal shock. It's a scary moment that shut down the life, program. I remember watching this. I remember exactly where I was. I thought we were seeing something very serious. It was clear this was not part of the show. You were there. What was going through your mind as you see this happening on live TV. Go back and watch what happened tomorrow Hamlin a few weeks ago. Yeah. That was essentially the vibe in WCW backstage at that point.

uh we didn't know it looked horrible in hamlin's case it was horrible he actually died on the field and he was brought back i guess um but with with buff we weren't in fear of his life but we were afraid he was paralyzed from the neck down because that was he was in that in that particular moment that you're describing he was we didn't know if he ever if he'd ever be able to walk again or even wheel himself around in a wheelchair again. It was very scary, very. It was, um, I don't know, man. I remember all of my friends talking about it the next day at high school.

Like, you know, we, we, we never seen anything like this in wrestling before or I hadn't. The observer had this. I hadn't either. It was a first for me. After being transferred to a hospital in Atlanta the next day, he underwent lengthy neck and spinal surgery on April 27th, the fuse the C3 and C4 vertebrae together, and also the C5 and C6 vertebrae together. He had some serious complications later that evening coming out of surgery with his esophagus, which led to his blood pressure dropping drastically, and him being in danger of going into a life-threatening coma. At press time the next day, Bagwell was listed in stable condition. the doctor prognosis was that given his age, 28, and his level of physical conditioning,

the odds are that he'll make a nearly full recovery and would be able to return to the ring, although the timetable is expected to be six months before he can return to training and one year before he can actually return to the ring. Bagwell was also told that the injury was three centimeters away from being a duplicate of the injury suffered by Christopher Reeve, which would have rendered him paralyzed for life, and that his strong musculature helped save him. However, the muscles probably worked against him in the surgery because the surgeons would have had to cut through far more muscle

than the average person in order to address those neck problems. That, in hindsight, is what I think everybody was thinking. We didn't touch on it just yet, but the Christopher Reeve incident, and maybe you don't remember that name, but this is a guy who played Superman in the movies and through a horse accident had become paralyzed. The idea that we had our former Superman now in a wheelchair was unfathomable to think about.

And that was at the top of, I think everyone's mind when they saw what was happening to Bagwell here. Boy, I hope this isn't another Christopher Reeve situation. Yeah, I don't even, I can only speak for myself. I don't know what other people were thinking. For me, I never even got. that far. I was so focused on what I saw in front of me and what I thought was a permanent situation that I didn't compare it to anything else or hope it wasn't something else. I only

saw what I saw. And, you know, I went to see Bagwell the next day or maybe two days afterwards in the hospital and Bagwell's, you know, spirits were up then and kind of sense that he was out of the woods in terms of permanent injury and paralysis, but it was still scary, you know, there was still the unknown. He had a long ways to go before he was out of the woods. The other thing we got to address is how tough it must have been to carry on the broadcast. You know, on the one hand, you're doing all you can from a professional medical standpoint to take care of buff. On the other hand, you don't necessarily want to, to exploit it.

But you had a show that was formatted that did not involve, all right, we're going to just stop everything and we can't do anything in the ring for a while. So you're having to really sort of freestyle. And Melzer would say at this point, Tony Chivani basically took over the broadcast and it was a very unique situation as you had paid wrestling shields put in a strange position of a legitimate potential tragedy going on right before their eyes, while at the same time being in the position of arguably not one. wanting to waste valuable television time without hyping the major storyline in the company

involving Hulk Hogan. What made the situation doubly unique is two of the three announcers in the booth at the time, Chivani and Hennon, have both undergone serious neck surgeries in recent years. So that's an unwinnable, really tough spot for someone like Tony Chivani here. Because this is not part of the program. And we've got to sort of walk the line of real life and wrestling fiction. That's a tough job for Tony here, is it not? Tough for Tony, even tougher for Bobby.

Yeah. Bobby was very, he was hypersensitive. And, you know, he had a right to be, right? He'd gone through it. He knew it. But he was also pretty fragile. And oftentimes I'd put him outside of the ring. and there was, you know, a lot of extracurricular activity.

And we've seen, you know, scenes that we've discussed before in 83 weeks where Bobby reacted in a very real way to even the potential of something happening that would further injure an already injured neck with Bobby Heenan. And Tony is a, Tony's a great human being. Tony Shavani is a great human being. Tony has a heart. Tony has a high degree of empathy. and to have to sit and the show must go on,

I'm sure it was hard for Tony, but I think it was even harder for Bobby because it was just so much more person. You know, Bobby, Tony's had his own issues. You know, you hang around Tony to the say, if you're over to his side of Tony, you say, hey, Tony, he doesn't turn his head. He turns his body.

And there's a reason for that. So Tony also was firsthand knowledge, right? Tough situation, no doubt about it, especially when there's a lot of things you don't know. Meltzer was really complimentary and said that he didn't think that Chivani and Heenan could have done a better job, but we're trying to just do what we can. Any sort of freestyles that maybe you were concerned about sharing

too much of the real life potential danger or injury. Was there some sort of an edict or discussion made by you or passed on to anyone about what? to share or not to share during that process? No, it's just that we didn't know. You know, Dave is very inclined to share and discuss and print his fact what he doesn't know. That's the nature of what Dave has made a career of. I wasn't so inclined to come out and disclose a lot of information that I didn't have.

Right. I know. No, I think it would have been inappropriate. to be honest and you also have to consider what is the talent want right i couldn't have a conversation with about marcus said hey marcus do you mind if we just tell the world what just happened to you and what the prognosis may or may not be even though you don't know i know you're on a stretch or take you out to the ambulance but how about we stop and have a little chat so we can figure out how best to present us to the audience i couldn't do that and without having a little bit of

input from the talent, I would not be inclined to share information, even if I was comfortable with it or knew it without first talking to the talent. Because now you're talking about their lives and the rest of their lives. This is not a storyline. It's not just a wrestling thing. This is potentially someone who may never be able to brush his own teeth again. Do we want to share that with the audience? No, I wouldn't. Dave would, but I wouldn't. We don't see Buff back on TV until the July 6th episode of Nitro. Yes, it's that Georgia Dome Nitro where Goldberg is going to be Holkogen.

But Buff has a big part of this. He's pushed to the entryway in a wheelchair by his mother Judy for an interview with Mean Gene Okerlin, who's actually going to refer to Bagwell as Mark. And Mean Gene is going to reiterate the severity of the spinal fracture of the C-7 and C-4 and point out that Bagwell almost died in intensive care multiple times and this allows Bagwell to cut a big time baby face promo in front of his home crowd thanking them for their support praising his mother this is something we've had a lot of fun with over the years talking about Judy

Bagwell's involvement in wrestling but seeing her here pushing Bagwell to the ring or to the entrance ramp this was a cool moment for WCW TV was it not it was a real moment yes and that's sometimes that's when wrestling is at its best is when it finds that perfect harmony between character and story and reality and this was an extreme version of that obviously and one that clearly wasn't planned but I think being able to embrace it and bring it forward in an honest real way was the right thing to do let's also mention that the next week buff is once again pushed to the ring in a wheelchair, this time it's by his doctor for another interview with

me, Gene, and the NWO is split in the two groups at this point. It's black and white versus red and black. And Gene's going to ask Buff, where does he align? Is he with the black and white or the red and black? Instead of answering directly, he calls out Rick Steiner, trying to confront him over the neck injury. And that brings Hollywood Hogan out, who comes out mocking Bagwell's injury, pushing his wheelchair over. The crowd starts chanting. Hogan sucks, Hogan sucks, Meltzer is pretty critical of this. He says, it was right at this moment when I realized WCW is going to lose Mondays consistently. If there was any message last week, it should have shown that the face of WCW was no longer Hogan and it was Goldberg.

Instead, we get a paper review show ruined by Hogan and a TV show designed as nothing but a personal vehicle once again for Hogan. Like when Bagwell can return, he's going to feud with Hulk Hogan. they could have allowed Raven or Jericho or even Hart or anyone else to heal heat of doing the angle with Bagwell that Bagwell could do a hot program with when he returns but instead it's another of these WCW injury angles that never pays off so let's take a time out right there because I know you're not necessarily exchanging Christmas cards with Dave Meltzer but I do think this is a fair criticism that Bagwell has all the sympathy in the world now and it does feel as if this could set up a major pay-per-view angle, but instead it's Hulk Hogan, and there's not going to be a payoff in that regard. And you could make the argument on the other side that, hey, if Hulk Hogan is doing something in your segment, when is that a bad thing? He's the biggest star in the company and arguably in the history of wrestling. What say you, if you had this to do over again, would you have set bagwell down the course of a hot few that you could pay off with a pay-off with a pay-per-view and not

gone with the Hogan bit? again you know subjective it's tomato tomato in a way for the reason you pointed out I wasn't inclined to make a story off off the injury I don't know why I didn't feel good about it but I just didn't feel good about it but it might have made more sense look I'm not going to beat up on the useful idiot just for the sake of beating up on him But I do dig how everybody's hashtagging Dave Meltzer, useful idiot in social media. I'm getting a personal, just a bizarre amount of personal joint for that. But look, his opinion is his opinion.

And Dave Meltzer, while he's never booked a wrestling television show in his life, therefore doesn't understand sometimes the complexities of it, has an opinion. It might have been a better choice. We'll never know. I just wasn't inclined to do it. I doubt that Bagwell, if we get around to asking him later on in the show, I want to remind people that that interview is coming up.

Yes. I don't know that Bagwell would have felt that bad about it. He's getting a pretty good rub. Well, the next week, me and Gene's going to bring out Rick Steiner to talk about what happened the prior week. Once again, Buff is wheeled out. Buff is going to forgive Rick, and Rick helps Buff stand up from the wheelchair. chair. And right then, Scott Steiner attacks Rick with a chair. Bagwell stops Scott from hitting

Rick again. Then he grabs the chair to start attacking Rick. Buff rips off the shirt and reveals an NWO shirt underneath. He's still with the black and white. Let's fast forward to Nitro in October. Scott Steiner and Buff Bagwell come to the ring. Rick Steiner comes out and said Buff's mom, Judy Bagwell, doesn't like that Buff is making a joke about his neck injury. And Judy walks out and Judy cuts an awesome promo on Buff. Meltzer would say great intensity and facial expressions. Buff returned fire by saying without him, she and his dad wouldn't eat.

He said he supports the whole family. Judy says she hasn't slapped Buff since he was seven years old and slaps him here. And he then gets in Scott's face and Scott grabs her arm and tells her, you ain't my mother, so get out of my face. and Rick jumped Scott, Judy's Dragon Buff away by the year. It's kind of a fun segment. Maybe it's a little too long, but Judy is doing a good job here as a television character.

Who knew? Too good a job. She became a star. That's, but, you know, it's easy to do a great job when you're not a professional. You've never been on camera before, but a lot of Judy's reaction. was probably real. She didn't have to, you know, imagine what it would be like to be confronted with some of the things that Mark was saying

because she grew up with him. She probably hadn't slapped him since he was seven, but probably did at some point. And Buff certainly had it coming. So it was a natural. It's one of the beautiful things about using real life moments in the storyline is because you don't have to be a great actor to do it. It starts to come off the rails a little bit of Halloween havoc, 1998.

Scott Steiner does an interview. He brings out the giant, challenges Rick to a tag team match, saying the NWO does what it wants and that the giant and him are going to defend the tag titles against Rick and Bagwell. J.J. Dillon comes out and okays this, which is odd. And the idea is if Scott and Giant lose, Rick is going to get his singles match with Scott on this very card. So Rick Steiner and Bagwell then go on to beat Scott Steiner and the Giant. to win the tag titles here. So that makes yet another tag team partner that he's won the tag straps with.

And this two-match series has a great storyline, but little in the way of wrestling, according to Meltzer. Giant is back to smoking cigarettes on his way to the ring. It's worth mentioning again. The giant smoked cigarettes on his way to the ring. Bagwell's doing all the crotch chopping that you usually see on the other channel. When he tags in to the surprise of nobody,

he gives Rick Steiner a low blow and walks out. Giant comes down with a missile drop kick. That happened. And Rick moves, so he hits Scott. Rick pins the giant after the bulldog off the top, which gets a huge pop. And then, of course, it's Steiner Brother versus Steiner Brother. Bagwell's in the middle of all of this,

but I got to say, maybe this was less than. It does feel like he had so much sympathy coming back off. the injury we could have built to something bigger but listen in this time the the top of the cards in wcw are so crowded goldberg's the made man you got randy savage you got holcogen you got sting you got lex luger on and on and on in hindsight do you think we could have done something a little different with this neck injury angle i know you were hesitant at the time but with the benefit of hindsight now is this the highest and best use nope nope nope not going to sugarcoat it not going to try to justify it

nope with hindsight not you can figure anything out figure a way to make something better in hindsight but absolutely that would have been a better storyline that just there's nothing I can say but you're absolutely right uh bagwell is um going to be out here

in a uh a bill Clinton mask and eventually when he unmasks, we reveal, oh, it's Bob Bagwell. Rick is going to come back. The guy who injured him and drop him across the top rope throat first, Meltzer would say nobody cared. They blew the million dollar angle long ago. Rick puts the bulldog on the top of Scott. Nick Patrick runs in from the back, counts the pen.

And after the match, Bagwell, who was wearing the Clinton mask before? He was running around yelling, where's Monica? creative here feels like it's a little off the rails, but this predates Russo is Kevin Sullivan dabbling in mind bloom at the time, or how do we get here? No, look, if it was an NWO story, I would have been involved in it.

I can't tell you who's the one person behind all of this schmaz. but I would have been involved Sullivan would have been involved Bagwell would have been involved there would have been a lot of input from the talent to people on a creative team

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Mentally and physically. Factors a way to go. Check it out. Factor75.com forward slash 83 week 60. Don't forget that promo code, 83 week 60. Let's talk about what's next for, Judy Bagwell. Rick's going to come out to defend the tag titles,

and Meltzer would say, I guess old poor Kenny Chaos has been replaced as Rick's partner by Judy Bagwell. Buff tries to punch his mom. That's neat. Slaps him. Scott and Buff then run away, and Rick is going to challenge him to another title match on the

pay-per-view. They accept and then they leave. So let's just remind everybody. Buff's mom, Judy, here, is a 55-year-old lady. She's coming to the ring in street clothes and wearing earrings and she's been able to cut big promos and the fans are with her and it's getting a good response but in hindsight it feels like this should never work but somehow it kind of did it's the comedic you know element

that buff was able to bring to his character so one of the reasons why i thought that contrast with everybody else in n w would be added value it wasn't as it turned turns out, it would have been better to do some things creatively and differently, creatively, but, you know, that comedic ability and the comfort, you know, a lot of guys are uncomfortable making fun of themselves or putting themselves in it, you know, the kind of position that Bagua had to put himself in creatively as a performer, backing down from your mom and being afraid of your mom and all that, letting your mom slap your run on national television. A lot of guys, if you try to pitch that to them and go, oh, brother, come on.

Nah, not doing that. Buff, embraced it and had fun with it. And in the process of having fun with it, the audience had fun with it. And that's why it worked. And it was because of the comfort level that Bagua had with it. Hey, guys, Tony, Shavani. I need to call the time out real quick. Wanted to tell your listeners what I've been telling me what happened when listeners

for a while now about all the cool things happening over on ad-free shows.com. On a brand new edition of Insiders, Gary Juster sits down with Conrad to discuss his decades spent behind the scenes in AWA, NWA, WCW, and R.O.H. I don't think it was a battle with Eric so much on TV versus house shows. It was a matter of if they're not making money, we've got to figure out, you know, something else. You know, we just can't let it bleed like that. We go one-on-one with WWE Hall of Famer Teddy Long as he joins Mike Keota for his special edition of Monday Mail Day. And so I'm tired, man. I'm really tired, but I don't want to let Mike drive, but I already

know, you know, I already know how he tried. So anyway, I just couldn't take it no further. So I said, Mike, you know, agree, you know, take us in. So I got in, let Mike start driving. I guess, man, I went right to sleep about tired. So I guess maybe 10 minutes into that ride, all of a sudden I wake up, we're like in a tailspin. Royal Rumble season is here, and we watch back the most memorable. rumble of all time featuring the most iconic robe of all time alongside the nature boy herself um i mean there was only one olivia walker she was classic and um but i just out of nowhere i just decided to um to pick that color in black you know it's deal i i've never had a great

physique and you know that black makes you look leaner so black on black black boots so i went to i went to black a lot after about 40 days of 41 Very simple, honest answer. That's just a small taste of what we've got waiting for you with four levels to choose from. See for yourself. My ad-free shows is the best value in wrestling today. Sign up now at ad-freeshows.com.

Well, unfortunately, the match with Judy never happens. She gets appendicitis. Maybe it was a sign from above. But boy, what fun she was on TV. When Buff finally returns to a wrestling, wrestling ring. It's March 1st, 1999. It's an episode of Nitro. There's no real build, and he's going to team with Scott Steiner in a losing effort against Goldberg and Rick Steiner. After all this time, as we said before, maybe we could have done a little bit better of a job of the payoff after this

injury angle. But through March and April and May, it looks like Buff is finally going to start getting this big singles push. It picks up wins over really big names. Guys like Fit Finley, Vampiro, Ernest Smiller, Bam Bam Bigelow, Kerr Henning, Bobby Eaton, even Randy Savage, and a DQ win over television champ, Rick Steiner. And then he starts a feud with Rick Flair, who's acting as the WCW president, and Roddy Piper, who's working as the vice president. We even see in June of 99, Buff have two matches with Flair and Piper on the same Nitro. The first is a handicap match against both,

and the second is a tag match where he teams up with Dean Malenko in a losing effort. it leads to a boxing match between buff and piper at bash at the beach this all happens in july with mills lane as the special referee of course mills lane at the time is arguably the most famous boxing referee and piper doing boxing stuff feels like a piper idea but doing it with buff bagwell man that's some pretty cool rarefied air for a young buff bagwell is it not especially a young buff bagwell who was a gold-to-goose boxing champion And let's not forget that. So, yeah, it was probably a storyline come true for Buff.

Judy's involved as well. She's going to bite Piper's ear because why not? It's a year after the whole Mike Tyson thing. She's going to pour the spitwater bucket over Piper's hair. She's even going to restrain Rick Flair when he tries to intervene. Just some wild stuff here. Buff is working big programs here in the old Mr. T spot. with Roddy Piper and right after that he's put back in a feud with Rick Steiner and gets

fresh feuds with David Flair and Berlin who we used to know as Alex Wright and it's about this time in September of 99 where you're essentially relieved of your duties you come back to the company in April of 2000 the whole new blood angle emerges um had you seen any change in Marcus Bagwell from 1991 or maybe even when you leave in 99 to when you come back in 2000. Obviously, he's growing up, he's maturing, et cetera, et cetera. But what are you saying in the evolution of Buff Bagwell? I hate to say this, but I think under the circumstances and what I'm guessing we're going to hear from Bagwell coming up here before the end of this podcast, I could see the effect of the extracurricular activities that Buff was involved in.

he was still the same cocky self-assured character but there was a there was also a darkness about him I can't describe it he wasn't negative necessarily or cynical but he just had a different vibe I didn't understand it at the time or it's not that I didn't understand it it said I didn't perhaps acknowledge it at the time I was just aware of it. He wasn't as much fun to be around.

That's the best way to say it. I used to, even if I wasn't hanging out with him, just observing him, you know, interacting with other people. He was kind of, he was entertaining.

Marcus was entertaining backstage. He liked to keep people laughing, you know, like to laugh himself. That was not the guy I saw when I came back in 2000. And by the way, we're talking about 2000 here. It reminds me before we end up wrapping up here

and getting to, Marcus' interview because he's standing by. I do want to do another shameless plug because I am a hoa. Strictly Business this past week got an interview with Brian Bedal. Now, a lot of you that listen to 83 weeks on a regular basis, you know who Brian Bedal was. Brian Badal was the guy along with Steve Greenberg's partner I teamed up with to acquire WCW from Turner Broadcasting. John Alba and I on Strictly Business had a pretty,

interesting conversation with Brian Bedell. Brian Bedell is a guy that started Sports Classic or Classic Sports Network, started his own cable TV channel, which he then sold to ESPN, created College Sports TV, which he then sold to CBS, launched a company called Bedrock Media Ventures who invest in startup media and tech companies. Ryan knows a lot, Harvard grad, you know, and dug in deep with Turner Broadcasting and WCW in that acquisition process and we talk a lot about what's going on in right now with wwee so if you want that kind of expert opinion um ryan badal certainly raised our game by joining

us and it's a very interesting you can catch it on youtube or catch it on your podcast yeah it's here on your feed if you're listening on the rs but i recommend you go check it out on youtube uh that is the best place to enjoy the podcast these days now that we're We've got the video component. Listen, in 2000, Buffs in the U.S. title picture chasing Lance Storm without success. He does win the tag titles once more, this time with his old pal Shane Douglas. Maybe people after this episode will start talking about Buff Bagwell is one of the greatest tag team wrestlers of all time. As a reminder, team package is not a manscaped reference.

It's the team of Rick Flair and Lex Lugar, or I'm sorry, Buff Bagwell and Lex Lugar. but like all the buff's tag title runs it uh it ends in a month um but this time it's because of life outside of the ring there's an ugly incident that makes the paper in may of 2000 i guess marcus um had some battery charges filed against him or striking someone who who worked to put together the show um i don't know any details about this i think ultimately it was settled outside of court. But whenever you hear that, hey, one of our talent got into a physical altercation with a stage hand or something like that, that's, uh, that's got to be something Turner doesn't want on their desk, right? Yeah, that's an issue. That's a serious issue. And,

you know, we, we, we all have heard the term unsafe working environment thrown around. It's, it's kind of a legal standard, I guess, but it gets thrown around a lot. And, you know, not, not necessarily incorrectly, not criticizing that, but that is an example of an unsafe working environment. There's a lot of exposure there, you know, legally. So, yeah, that's a no, no, but I think a lot of that has to do going back to what I said just a few moments ago about, you know, the things that got a hold of Mark and that he had challenges with because those things affect your judgment. They turn you in, they can. You know, you do, you abuse drugs and alcohol long enough, it will change your brain. It will rewire your personality into a

permanent state unless you do something drastic to change it. And I think that was probably a manifestation of, you know, some of the challenges and things that Mark was doing at the time. Because that's not Mark. That wasn't the Mark that I knew. Right. I mean, he, if he had a problem with you, he'd just, you know, cut promos on you and you'd end up laughing with him at yourself. you know for bark to get physical saw it also with ernest miller backstage and sturgis those were examples of a mark bagwell that was like alien to me well let's um let's remind everybody that buff gets stripped of the tag titles here by wcw as a result of this he's suspended for 30 days and by the time he comes back that's around the time that you and hulk are piecing out and

and leaving but in august something happens when you're not there that we got to at least mention the infamous judy bagwell on a poll match one of the wildest stipulations we've ever heard of you weren't a part of it but i'm sure you saw it you heard about it what did you think i couldn't watch it and just in a part of that was me just you know i wanted so much to not even look back at my wrestling career just focus on going forward and then add to it that it was just such a stupid idea on the surface that I couldn't watch it. I just couldn't. Well, we know that he's going to have quite the 2000.

He's going to do a bunch of other silly stuff. There's a pregnancy angle with David Flair and Ms. Hancock, the first blood match at Halloween Havoc, because Flair needs a sample of Bagwell's blood for a DNA test. My goodness. At Sarkade, we'll see Buff become a part of another team. this time it's totally buff with Lex Lugar. They feud with Chronic and Kevin Nash

and the tag champs Palumbo and O'Hare through early 2001. And then at WCW greed on March 18th, Buff and Lugar are going to lose to Palumbo and O'Hare in 52 seconds. And that winds up being Buff's last WCW match as the company is going to be out of business eight days later.

There's lots of rumor and innuendo around that match and around the last show the last nitro that maybe Buff was being difficult. I know you weren't necessarily there, but I think you had Johnny Ace trying to sort of run things for you with the hope and the assumption that you were going to get your hands on the thing. Were you hearing that Buff was maybe tough to deal with here at the end of WCW? Yeah, not a lot, though.

It wasn't like a huge problem, but in the course of conversation, for example, would stay in touch with Johnny Laurenaitis, who I did bring in from All Japan, I believe, is where he was. Johnny was very much involved with creative in All Japan, and I wanted somebody. I actually brought Johnny in not so much to be talent relations in as much as I really was hoping that Johnny could bring

a much richer approach to finishes than WCW had ever had. That was always like my big challenge at that point. It was like, how do I get better for? finishes. It was our Achilles seal, was our finishes. And then because of the transition, I bring Johnny in, all of a sudden I get sent home, a couple days later, a couple months later, they'd bring me back. Johnny's still there. Now he's in more of a talent relations role. And yes, we would talk about, you know, some of the talent because I was trying to figure out what we were going to do going forward. And I occasionally would hear references from

johnny about marcus but not not in a way that made me go oh my god now what am i going to do with him just kind of like notes well i think we all know the story for buff after this he weren't there so we can't really talk about it in great detail but he does pop up briefly with the w w w wf i think he loses a house show match then has that raw match with the wcw champ booker t and tacoma and then shortly thereafter he's no longer there he would wind up uh joining raven in a lot lawsuit against the WWE in 2016, saying he was never paid royalties, consistent with the WWE network content. He had some legal troubles over the last 10 years or so, and we know last year he started

working with Diamond Dallas Page, and it feels as if we're about to see the next chapter for Buff Bagwell and what's next for Mr. Bagwell. But before we do, I want to remind everybody that in my real life, I love helping people save money. And there's no better place to do that right now than savewithconrad.com. If it's one of your New Year's resolutions to get out of debt and get a cheaper monthly payment, have more money, do more travel, spend more time with the family. Man, if you can get rid of some of that financial stress, life would be a little easier here in

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He writes five stars, very professional. Jason gave us five stars and says, Amy was very pleasant to work with and made the process really easy. Chastity gave us five stars and said easy to work with, very helpful in guiding us through the process, would definitely recommend. Here's another five star from Jeffrey in North Carolina. Everyone was very helpful, especially Diane.

It was great experience for even with someone with less than perfect credit. 100% recommend. That's worth mentioning. You don't need perfect credit to do this. And you might think, well, I had a bankruptcy a couple of years ago. Did you know you can still qualify for a government loan, just two or three years outside of bankruptcy. Listen, the reality is we don't say no.

We say not yet, but here's how. We're going to get you a game plan to figure out where you want to be and work with you every step of the way to make sure you hit those. Whether that's retiring on time, helping your kids pay for college without burdening them with student loans, getting a lower monthly payment, whatever it is, we can help at save withconrad.com. Hey, before we get Mr. Bagwell in here, Eric,

I also want to remind everybody that as folks are listening to this, tomorrow night over on ad-free shows.com. I can't believe this is real. We're celebrating the 35th anniversary of the very first Royal Rumble. If you thought these promotional wars started with the Monday Night Wars, you see, once upon a time, Vince McMahon thought wrestling on pay-per-view belongs to me. So someone like Jim Crockett had the audacity to try to put a paper review forth, the bunkhouse stampede.

What does Vince do? let's go head to head on free TV and we'll come up with a gimmick match that nobody's ever seen before and we'll put it on TV for free to sabotage their pay-per-view we'll call it the Rumble Royal and we're going to watch it

tomorrow on ad-freeshows.com with the guy who won the thing oh, Hacksaw Jim Duggan is coming to ad-freeshows.com you get to watch the show, interact, ask hacksaw questions about the very first Royal Rumble 35 years ago. If you haven't already, you also want to check out the sit down we had with

Nick Patrick as we talk about all things, Starcade 1997, and maybe the most critically acclaimed thing we've done on ad-free shows, maybe ever? The book with David Crockett in Dusty Road's booking genius in J.J. Dillon's handwriting, the actual personal memoirs, memoirs, the book, the booking sheets, shows the gates the dates the towns the houses the matches it's all from jim crockett junior's personal collection and we go over it page by page every single month through the year with david crockett you don't want to miss it i don't know what i expected today man but today's show has been fun and somehow it's just going to get better from here how did we do it today er i don't know but like

he said i'm so looking forward to speaking with marcus i'm so excited for him and i think the best part of the show is coming up in a minute we have not done this before. It's very rare that we have a guest here on the program, but we felt like given all the recent news and developments, rather than just talk about Marcus Bagwell, why don't we invite him on the program? So we're going to take one more break, and then when we come back, you're going to hear from Marcus, Alexander Bagwell. And now something totally different. We promised it. We're going to deliver. I can't believe it. We've got a guest on 83 weeks, Eric, and who better than one and only mr buff bagwell mr bagwell how are you sir hey man i'm doing great how you guys doing

man we're excited to be on with you today we're celebrating your whole career today on 83 weeks and i thought man what a better way to sort of put a bow on this episode than to speak to the man himself talked about how you got into wcw and your incredible wcw run but man the world's been talking about what buff is doing these days and i thought hey let's just get it straight from the horse's mouth how are you man i'm doing fantastic you know i I just graduated Tangu, which is my aftercare in Atlanta here. I completed 30 days at Blackberry Covery in the North Georgia area and completed that after 30 days. And I moved into something I never done before, which is something called aftercare.

And it's something that I always thought, and I've learned with addiction, that 30 days just isn't enough. You always try and think, well, I've been 30, so I'm good. now and I did it three or four other times like that and it's just not when you take on the aftercare part and continue your sobriety with with numerous days with the 90 meetings and 90 days all the stuff that people hear but stuff that people don't do and I actually did it I did the 90 and 90 I'm a hundred I'm not a day counter uh my sobriety date is August 27th but that's actually 148 days today. So they got a new app now that you can check that out.

So, but it's 148 days today, sober. And I've never been 148 days sober in my life. I mean, I really don't think so. When you talk about complete sobriety, 148 days is a huge. So I'm very excited. I am doing things I didn't think I could do. Like I can sleep at night without being medicated. From years on the road, I didn't think I could do.

that, but I can. And it's great. And the daytime with my life, going to the gym and stuff, it was a pill, it was a pill for everything. It was a pill to go to the gym. It was a pill to relax. It was a pill to go to sleep. There was a pill to wake up. And then alcohol with it is it just gets to be a crazy world. And I was already living in one called professional wrestling. And so it added right to that. But I got a corral on it. I got grips of it. And I got grips of it. And, you know, I'm sober. I feel great. I've been told I look great.

So that's all fantastic. So thumbs up over here. I just feel fantastic. Man, that's great to hear. You know, you and Eric go back a long way. And you're becoming one of the great success stories in wrestling, of course, with, you know, really the whole world pulling for you. And I think a lot of people, whenever they hear that someone is trying to better themselves,

they take a wait and see your approach. And you've proved all the doubters wrong. this time. What do you think was different this time for you, Mr. Bagwell, as opposed to the other attempts in the past? I really do think that because when you say the words, like, you know, I got it. I mean, I've been clean for 30 days. I've got this. And you just don't. You don't ever have this. You don't ever got it. And it was hard for me to, you know, wrap my head around that because I do have it. I do got it when it comes to something. I, I understand how to work out.

I know how to get lean and watch your carbs, but this was different. It was a different animal with addiction. And you just, this time I literally had to be a follower. And follower in my world was bad, but this time it was a good thing. Being a follower is 90 meetings and 90 days. It is finding an aftercare place that is good,

that you can stay sober, having a fantastic support team on the outside, having good friends and family. All the things you hear just are so important. And that's what makes a difference this time is, you know, that. But the main thing that makes a difference is, is I was ready this time. You know, Mark Bagwell was tired of being tired.

And I just said by this time and was like, man, it's just you're 52 years old, Mark. What are you doing? So along with, you know, Dallas and my support team like Steve and my niece, Jonna, you know, minus that, it had to be something I was ready to do. And I was and I tackled it, man. And, you know, I want to say I'm so proud of myself, but that's the last thing you really should do at this stage I'm at.

So it's not about being so proud. It's about being happy and glad and excited. And I think all those things is why I'm different this time. you know mark you said you said something there that throughout you're probably the largest part of your life because you've always been physical you know from the time you're in high school and then you segue it into professional wrestling you may have dabbled in bodybuilding for all i know you look like you did whether you did or not right but that mentality and that discipline and in that drive you have to convince yourself that you're capable of doing things whether you are or not in order to progress competitively. You never walk into a competitive situation with that, well, most people don't that are good at it, with the attitude is of, well, I'm not sure if I can do this or not. You mentally, consciously and subconsciously, you're constantly telling yourself,

I can do this, I can do this, I can beat that guy, I can beat that time, I can do, you know. And after years of conditioning yourself that you can basically do anything you put your mind to when it comes to competition and physical challenges and things that gets a hold of you and you think you're capable of doing a lot more than you really are so that when you said

learning that you don't got it that had to be a seminal kind of like big pivot point right it was huge and you knelt it on the head and it's because of saying at 19 years old hey I can do

what those guys are doing on TV I know I can't You can. No, man, you're crazy. You're too small. You're too little. No, no, no. I know I can. And you do that. And so that worked for me. That was my go-to. You tell yourself you can do it. Like Dallas says, it's the story you tell yourself. I told myself I could be a pro wrestler. And I was. Well, fast forward, and you tell yourself that you can get clean and kick this addiction. And all of a sudden, the same path you took doesn't work. So you find yourself, like I said, not being a leader, being a follower and having to listen, which is very rare for me and very hard for me to do when it's something I think I'm good at. And so I listened and had to really learn a whole new way. And it was the same old ABC thing, which is not the way you do it, being a professional wrestler, being a pro athlete, being a professional bodybuilder. It's not the way you do it.

You've got to find you your niche. With addiction, man, you've got to follow people that have been successful. And I found myself having to be a follower. And the way I was raised in, the family I was raised in, a follower was a loser. And I'm not a loser. So I thought following was a bad thing. But I learned quick, and I give the thanks to Blackberry recovery, because they are the ones that gave me the tools to realize that I did need these things. And don't say you've got this.

say that you're you're good i've got this the marg bible that would say hey i've got this i'm good i'm clean i did my 30 days and now i'm it's time to move on i'm ready to go that's ass backwards with addiction so i really found out that the ways by following did work this time so i set my goals and i did them you know what's cool marcus you know you and i've really been thinking a lot about not necessarily you in particular but you as a part of a more macro kind of perspective that I've been able to enjoy lately is, and I've seen so many people, I mean, you hit it on the head opening up,

and, you know, you're a professional wrestler, you're flying around on jets, motorcycles, hundreds of thousands of dollars, girls, fun, all the things that go along with being a star on television, right? And then when you walk away from it, whether you do it voluntarily or involuntarily, whatever, that's such a part of, so many people's existence, meaning that they become the character they play on television,

or they've gotten so dependent on that feedback and validation because you're on television and people react to you and they recognize you that when you take that part of someone's life away from them, very few people that reach a real high level in professional wrestling as you did can just leave that behind without some kind of separation anxiety because it's wrestling was not only what you did not saying you specifically but what one did it becomes who they are and when that's taken away from them so is a lot of their identity and validation and confidence and that's when people kind of I've seen it I've experienced it myself to to a degree you know and I just kept telling myself man wrestling was not who I was it's what I did and I think in our world you know our

our peer group of people that we all know and love or have loved that have succumbed I think a lot of that has to do with just not being able to walk away from the business and into that next chapter of life and what's cool about talking to you today is while you were getting that adoration and validation and and all the things that came with being a star at WCW at that time. Your new chapter is probably going to give you a lot more real. I don't want to say validation, but you're going to be able to inspire people. People are going to listen to you and go, yeah, that's, God, that's me. I thought I got it.

And I didn't get it. Yeah. And it's working for him. And I think that's really a gift. That's a blessing that you have. And it's something I think is going to carry you forward. And you can do whatever you want to do with that, man. Well, I think you're exactly right.

And a minute ago, you said validation. It really is validation. But let's call it reward. The reward is what's going to be coming for me. And it's going to be a much bigger reward because it's real lives at stake here. It's not a fake TV show pro wrestling, even though we make that as real as we possibly can. It's not real lives. It's not lives where roofs overheads and, you know, families to feed and ruining families with addiction. It's, it's a whole new thing that I'm

extremely excited about of the levels I can reach with it. And what you're talking about also is the void, you know, what do you put in this hole that that WCW and Buff Bagel was in? I mean, what do you put in that hole? What's going to fit in there? And the only thing I could find it would fit and worked was beer, alcohol, and drugs. And you fill that with something, and that seems like what it was. And now it seems like I filled it with family, God, love, sobriety. And I've never replaced that void with those things before.

But that's what it takes to get to where I'm at, even at the early stage. as I'm at of now, it's just, it's really is just, just getting started, man. I mean, even when I graduated at Black Bear, the 30 days, it came to my brain when I was giving my speech leaving there. I said, I said, look, I said, this, this is not where it starts, guys. I said, it starts when we leave that gate. When you leave the gate at Black Bear, that's when recovery starts. Because it's easy behind those gates.

When people are telling you what to do and telling you where to go. all of a sudden you leave that gate and it's up to where you want to go and what your brain wants to do. So that's where support team, family, and aftercare takes place of getting you to the next step, which is where I'm at now and love where I'm at. So awesome. So what's next, man? Listen, everybody's wanting to know what's the next chapter of Buff going to look like. Well, is the buff character still going to exist?

Are we Marcus now? Do we have some plans in the entertainment world? Are we just going to continue this path of recovery? Or what's the next chapter for you, dude? Well, I really believe that there's no, you know, there's no getting rid of Buff Bagwell. Buff Bagwell is who I am. That's, you know, I see we had so much fun as a character Buff Bagwell.

So I'll always be considered Marcus Buff Bagwell. Just because it just, people know me that way. People also know me as Marcus, but there's no way I'd ever get rid of, you know, the word buff or buff bagwell. And as far as the future, man, the future to me is just like I said, goals at 19 years old to be a professional wrestler. It's far of a reach as that was. And people thinking that was crazy, you know, I did it. And the same goal now is not unreachable to me. And it's not too far to put out there.

And it's to make it back into the ring. I'm just 53 years old. And in this business, that's considered very young. And I knew years ago getting into this business, I did know that through everything that was coming at me, there was one that was majorly in my corner, and that is my age. I mean, I was at WCW at 20 years old. I was rookie of the year at 22. So, I mean, that is a, my television career was over.

when I was 30. So, you know, I was very young. So I knew that being young was one day going to be a good thing for this business. And here it is. And that's why it's a good thing. So, you know, I'm open to any doors that are coming at us. But at the same time, you know, I would love to do something with recovery and sobriety. But at the same time, I'd love to pro wrestle again and be in the rain. I would give anything to do that. So I really really just, I'm just doing, and recovery, what you do is, is you do what's in front of you. What is in front of you right now? And what's in front of me right now was coming and talking on a podcast with Eric Bischoff and Conrad Thompson, and that's what I'm doing. So you just don't want to get overwhelmed with it and you just want to make sure that you're comfortable and just know that I'm open to anything that's coming at me, but it all equals sobriety recovery and also pro wrestling so if you do pursue an in ring career at this point

and by the way i think a lot of us myself included would be pulling for that i mean you take a look at what guys like sting or jeff jared or chris jericho are doing and not throwing anybody under the bus but all of those guys are older than you are and and in this role operating at a high level and doing very well what do you think would be different in your approach to wrestling with this mentality that you have now compared to when you were on top in WCW back in the day and maybe you were youthfully ignorant. You weren't as evolved. You hadn't really become the man you are now.

Would your approach be different from a mental standpoint, do you think? And how so? Great question. And first let me tell you that I've had something happen just this week that was huge to me. And it was, um, uh, it was a doctor and his name was Dr. Pandya. And I was able to talk with him this week. And it was just the first time that a light has really gone off for me with since my sobriety and recovery walk as started with trying to get some more on my knee finally. And this knee has been two and a half years in the making of trying to get it better.

And the whole way working toward getting it done is just nothing in Mark Bagwell's life has ever taken two years. And again, having to follow for a change and listen for a change. this has. But the two years is now seems like it's all having for a reason and it's time to get down to fixing my knee now now that I'm fixed. And by both of them being fixed and getting a chance to get back in the ring again, my approach, man, would be exactly the same because Marcus Bagel's approach, Marcus Bagel didn't know what a beer was. Marcus Bagel, to drink a beer, that just meant I was taking up room in my stomach for protein. So drinking a beer was just taboo.

Any kind of pills or medication like that was, it was just taboo. That's something that I learned and found out in the world of pro wrestling or through injuries. When I broke my neck in 98 was kind of when I first got my first prescription. And that may be what it all kind of really started about, you know, prescriptions and keeping your prescriptions up. and then running out and just that's when the addiction part stops and nobody says that when you break your neck they don't go hey you take this too many times you get addicted they say you know

you broke your neck man you need to take this medicine take as needed take yeah take as needed is really a line that's on there and it should be done that way but when you take it for hey i'm bored today let's have some fun that's when it gets to be a problem but you don't know it's a problem It's just something you start and then it turns into a problem. But, you know, this time it would just be the exact same attack, except I would, I know what walls and barriers to stay away from this time as far as knowing what it could lead down. When before you're young, you don't know, and drinking beers and popping some pills

could be very, very simple and not worried about. But it really did affect my life dramatically. You know, so what I want to do is, you know, I want to, teach, inspire other wrestlers to stay away from what I did, to not do the mistakes that I made, to make sure they know truly what they're doing. And like with my diet, know everything that goes in their mouth. If I cared about my prescription pills and what it was doing to my body, like I cared about my protein and my carbohydrates, this would have never happened. But it does, and it did. But this time is going to be much different because

I'm aware of it and I would be more logical and use my head more of, you know, knowing who to hang out with, what to do. And just knowing that the attack of this, though, would be no difference. It would be Mark Bagwell going after something. And when I go after something, I get it. Hey, Mark, we've got, we're doing this. We have a live audience that are at free shows, family members get on. And we've got some questions for you and we're going to hit them throughout.

But I want to make sure. we get a couple in. Eddie Prather over to have free shows, you know, wanted to know. Do you, have you leaned on Lex? Have you been in contact with Lex through this process? Because I, you may or may not know this. You know, my relationship with Lex was way different, you know, up until a couple years ago than it is today.

And I find him to be a very inspiring individual. Have you worked with him at all through this process? Well, you know, Lex, even back in the day, was a huge part of everything I did. I mean, me and Lex were elbow to elbow for five years. I mean, it was me, Lex, everywhere we went, training, tanning, protein shake to protein shake. I mean, every set in the gym, you know, just I learned so much from Lex in life and in wrestling. I mean, Lex was just an icon that liked Mar Bagwell and Mar Bagwell loved him and respected him.

of the fullest and he just we just clicked man we just really clicked and then you fast forward you know 20 years 25 years and then now lex is a huge part of my life again he is he was there the day i came home from from rehab the day right before i went to after care um he was here for that he's here for my birthday on january 10th he texts me every single day an inspiring biblical psalm and it's just it's just unbelievable i mean he is there all the time and i even thought he had it set up like where he was having it text to me by some kind of clock but it's him doing it man i mean he's he is hands on and has the most utmost respect from me that you could possibly imagine and he just has got me so many things in life of the knowledge and the business and now

all I'm not even tapped into what Lexa we can do for me now. He just has started with what I'm all going to go to him with now on this walk of sobriety, recovery, and my, my Christian walk. Marcus, one more, and I'm going to hand it back over to Conrad because I know I'm bogey in this thing, but I'm so fascinated by the process you're going through and kind of living it vicariously through you and cheering you on. But going back to what Conrad asked earlier, you know, in terms of your approach to wrestling, You know, this is just me observing, right, from the sidelines.

I think it would be hard for you to come back as a heel, really hard. Number one, because you've been around so long. You know, one of the things that happens when guys have been around and been, you know, in the public eye and wrestling for 15, 20, 25, 30 years, is just by virtue of the fact that you're out there, you end up inheriting a certain level of respect. That's hard for a huge. I used to say this about Rick Flair. because Rick always liked me to heal.

But he was Rick Flair. And I used to tell him, Rick, you could walk to the ring on live television with a herd of puppies walking you to the ring. You could put kerosene on them and light him on fire. And people would still cheer you because he's been around so long. Would you come back as a baby face? Would you prefer to come back as a heel? And my real question is acknowledging the knee issue, the broken neck issue, you know, a couple things along the way. how would you modify your in-ring presentation compared to what it was 15, 20 years ago?

That would have to be something I'd have to cross, you know, once I got in the ring a little bit and started, you know, filling out what really I could do with my knee. What really is my knee going to be capable of, you know, of taking? And, you know, I just think that that's a little too, you know, soon to call as far as you know with the knee apart as far as being up standing to me but you know my brain and my creativity is where I'm going to go with everything that you just said because with my brain and my creativity and my charisma the hill baby face thing I think will take care of itself on paper you know you got to realize that you know there's no doubt being a baby face is definitely

the way to go. But again, when I broke my neck and came at the WCW, a baby face was a way to go, but we shoved it down their throats with being a hill. And it worked. And it worked. So, you know, I do think a baby face is the way to go as far as the crowd. As far as my ability in the ring to be able to look at what I can do and be able to control the match and the timing and all of that being a hill would be a much better way to go at it. But right now it's just about what can I do, period. It's going to be getting in the ring and seeing what this knee can actually do before I cross that bridge.

And I wish I was there to be able to say, I'm going to be a baby or I'm going to be a hill and I'm not. So it's really to be more of like what the knee can take. But just with the amount of charisma and creativity that I'm going to bring to the table, I just know that I can do it again. And there's a, there's a doubt in my mind, I'm going to do it again. It's just a matter of what level and how much my need will go on how great I've become again at this at this fort because I give you a quick word of advice sure it won't matter as long as you're having fun because if you're having fun doing what you're doing the audience is going to have fun watching you have fun doing what you're doing and there's where the success comes from so just fun first brother the rest takes care of itself and you're absolutely right and that's exactly what Buff Bagwell did he I went out and I just had fun and cut up with the people in the crowd and

and look back at it and that's that's what I did and that's what it takes because people do see what you're going through if you're going through you're not happy or you're not comfortable or whatever it is they feed off you and it was very obvious with watching the Buck Bagel character he was having fun and that's what this is all about your exactly right if you're not having fun then why do we do it You know, so you got to have fun first, and the rest will follow. You mentioned you want to get comfortable in the ring again. Have you put any thought into what school or what trainer you might lean on to get yourself ready again? You know, I thought a little bit about that, but it would just be more like some friends,

like even, you know, just Dallas and Jake just coming and hanging out with me, really. Because when you reach the pinnacle of like a buff bagel or a WCW or, you know, reaching those levels like we did reach and wrestling macho man's and Rick Rudes and Lex Lugers and Stings and just to the area that I was in in the business, you know, do you really have somebody come in and train you? Not really. I think it's more a support team with that as well. Having a support team behind me like Dallas and Jake just to talk to me about it because these are things that they do. go through and did go through with their age and figured out can they still go and you know what you know can

they still do it or not and and that's a question we all ask ourselves and nobody wants to say hey I can't do this no more there's no way I'm not able to do that and you know with my knee that that that may be the answer in the end but right now you can't tell yourself that like if somebody had told me in the early ages of bodybuilding that I could never look like on a Schwarzenegger, I would have told them they were crazy. I said, yes, I can't. I'm going to look like Arnold. Now, I was just young enough that that was what my drive was. And if somebody would have told me that and convinced me of it, I'd probably have been down or depressed about it. But I didn't know that. I knew that I thought I could look like Arnold. And I got as close as my genetics and my body would

let me get to Arnold. But those are the kind of things that people, you just got to find it on your own. And on my own, I'm going to find out what I can do in that ring or not. And I'm excited to find out. I'm real pumped about it. But like Johnny Swinger would be a guy to reach out to come, take some bumps with me and wrestle. But there's also guys in the PC here like Dylan and Nathan that are in the indie circuit that I trust a lot. They can help me, you know, get in the ring and just take some bumps from me and give me some bumps to figure out what's going on. So I'm just really excited about doing all that over again, you know, because it's just, I'm actually.

my inside just get almost i just i get tickled inside when i think about pro wrestling again i just it just makes me ignite when uh whenever i know that steve you and ddp you're hanging around i assume there is going to be some stuff filmed and we're going to see some sort of project come together in the future maybe i'm just making that up but as we go through this hypothetical what would be the let's say this does become a movie your story your story inspires a bunch of folks and it becomes a movie what would your in your mind's eye that final scene is it you in the royal rumble is it you going in the wwee hall of fame is it you what is that do you have in your mind's eye what a perfect storybook ending to this movie that we're

sort of living right now would be actually no because the word ending is nowhere in my vocabulary. The word ending is really not even in there. It's starting. My journey in recovery and sobriety is starting and my wrestling career

is continuing. So ending, absolutely not. Goals I set would be, you know, getting back in the ring. And once back in the ring a royal rumble. And of course, who don't want to be in the WWE?

Hall of Fame. I know I do, but I don't look at that as the ending. That may be the ending, and I would, I'd like to talk about that because it's fun to talk about making it to the WWE Hall of Fame, but right now it's about making it to a WrestleMania for the first time in my whole life, making it to a Royal Rumble for the first time in my entire life. And, I mean, you know, it's, it's kind of sad, really, but when you think about me and Booker T and Tacoma, Washington, 25 years ago, it's so depressing because I'm the only wrestler, at least I'm throwing it out there. Somebody please prove me wrong about this, but I'm the only wrestler that I can find that was main event on a major network one week

and fired in seven days. I just, that's never happened. I was, I got close as an executive. I lasted a little longer. I squeezed four months out of that thing, but, you know. As we call in the business, that's heat. So, but yeah, so I was main event. When we hear, keep in mind, I knew it was over in Tacoma. Me and Booker are backstage going, why are we wrestling this week?

We're covering our mouths up. We're like, why are we wrestling this week? It's called the invasion. The next week is Atlanta. so we knew something wasn't good but you can't say nothing because we're just trying to make it through and not get heat so we're main event on TV one week and we're fired the next take anything you've heard

my mother called uh the match was bad any of those things don't equal firing a buff bagwell man it just don't so you know it just it just hate I hate this like that you know but at the same time I'm, you know, I just think it's, you know, it's just kind of crazy to think of it like that. But I just, I'm just excited about everything that's coming up, you know. I'm just pumped. Well, listen, man, I appreciate all the time today.

I don't really know what I expected today, but this has exceeded all of my expectations. Just so happy you were able to take a few minutes and catch up with us here today. Tell everybody how they can keep you. keep up with what's next for buff bagwell are you using social media or is there a place we can check in and see what's up absolutely uh marcus buff bagwell at gmail dot com is the best way to you know that's that's that's that's how you that's my email address and then marcus buff bagwell.com is where you go to my website and that gets you to all my social media uh you know facebook instagram uh twitter all that stuff all my handles are on there so go to marcus buff bagwell.

and that'll lead you to anywhere you want to go. And they'll also tell you kind of what's going on in my world. And also with me right now, it's just, I'm just getting back on the road again and just starting to do a lot of signings and stuff. I did Resslecade. I saw Eric at Resslecade, which was great. And just getting back out there again. But I do, I do want to, and I'm very excited about doing, like, motivational talks to

to recovery groups and about my walk. because it really is it's it was a crazy crazy walk man and and we've all got a crazy story that goes with it and I just want to tell it to where it's not crazy no more it's a logical story that happened but of a crazy background so but it's a great ending um to tell that you know about the recovery the start of my sobriety and the start of this recovery walk because it's a new me and I'm excited about the new me again. Well said, man, can't thank you enough for the time. Everybody check it out, Marcuspuffbagwill.com.

Get all the latest and greatest on what's going on with Mr. Bagwell. And man, we're pulling for you. We can't wait to see what's next. Thank you so much for the time today. I appreciate you guys so much, man. It's great to seeing you, Eric. Good to see you, Marcus. And I just want to say, you're inspiring to me.

I'm so happy for you. I can't tell you. I really appreciate that means a lot to me man and looking at you in the screen it just brings back so many great memories man of just what we did and how much fun we had while doing it and you were just I want you to know personally that you were a huge part of my life and I know somewhere in your body you've got to know that because when Mark Bagwell talks to anybody they I looked them in the eye and they can feel that Mark Bagwell likes them or not. And I know you've seen eyes that look at you like I love you because I do love Eric Bischoff. And Eric Bischoff was always in my corner, no matter what, from Harle's to any situation, you always had my back. And I just remember all that stuff, always. And I just want you know, every time I hear your name or think about you, I think about the wonderful things that you are part of my life. Thank you, brother.

I appreciate that so much. Absolutely. Absolutely. Thanks for checking out. 83 weeks, everybody. We'll see you next week right here.