Andrew Lutzke
Presented by Sean Oliver and Kayfabe Commentaries.
The concept behind this shoot is for fans to write questions for Jim Cornette at various message board threads set up by Kayfabe Commentaries – then they take the best questions and fire them off at Corny in a no holds barred fashion.
Cornette is asked about his early days and he talks about being a photographer in 1977ish and watching the guys work the same match in several towns. They could get away with it since fans didn’t travel generally.
Jim attended a “super card” in the Memphis area headlined by Harley Race versus Rocky Johnson for the NWA World title and Lawler going after the regional gold.
An early visit to the Cincinnati Gardens to see the Sheik against Abdullah the Butcher disappointed Cornette as Sheik had killed the territory and only 300 fans attended – the aura was nothing compared to what Cornette had seen on TV.
Cornette’s mega antenna on his house as a kid picked up wrasslin’ from not only southern promotions but extended all the way to Indianapolis’ WWA promotion with Dick the Bruiser.
Jim collected WWWF programs and fan newsletters but when he finally saw the promotion in cable’s infancy, he was totally under whelmed.
The * rating system that so many wrestling geeks use to rate matches was a creation of Cornette’s.
As a photographer, Cornette was never allowed in the wrestler’s locker room in Memphis. Lawler was open enough to at least tell Cornette about planned spots so he could get good pictures.
Cornette’s biggest early paycheck was $75 for a title match that he managed Dutch Mantel for.
JYD was a shit worker but so over that he was fun to work with.
Hercules Hernandez was Cornette’s bodyguard in Mid-South and he saved Cornette from fan attacks several times. Hercules and Dr. Death Steve Williams fought a slew of fans in the middle of the ring once – Cornette used Doc’s football helmet for a weapon.
Hercules was attacked by a fan on the way to doing a run-in, the fan was arrested – but the cops let Herc “teach him a lesson” first and one slap from Hercules sent the man flying and he lay unconscious for over 20 minutes before some paramedics hauled him off.
Dennis Condrey and Cornette were attacked by 13 people outside an arena – the Rock and Roll Express drove a car into the crowd and saved them.
Midnight Express and Cornette told Fritz Von Erich on night one that they had already signed with Jim Crockett – then the deal was delayed and that perhaps killed Fritz interest in pushing Eaton and Condrey to the top.
Fritz told Jim his guys were too small to work with the Von Erichs – Cornette says Eaton and Condrey were no smaller than Gino Hernandez and Chris Adams who were headlining WCCW. WCCW pay days were maybe 250-300 dollars a night. Main eventers were paid almost double and the Express couldn’t get those, so they quit.
A Texas Stadium show that drew a million dollar gate netted the Express an $1100 payday and that was the last straw.
WCCW was not built to sustain the popularity that it enjoyed in 1983 and ’84. Fritz never really tried to change his business layout either.
Lex Luger was never a wrestling fan – he got heat in the locker room because he got a big contract very early in his life and since he was smart he would question why others would work for small pay days.
Dennis Condrey was a better heel than Stan Lane – Lane was a flashier worker. Both guys worked well in their era – Condrey and Eaton needed to get heat to sell tickets in the territories and Lane and Eaton went on PPVs and were expected to be exciting,
Crockett’s business started to spike back up in the Summer of 1988 with Luger versus Flair and the Midnight Express against Arn and Tully – Jim Crockett’s family tried to get him to stop the sale to Ted Turner but it was too far along in the process.
Tully bashed Dusty’s booking during a “private” meeting with TBS executives and Dusty had him banned from Crockett’s private plane as a result.
Cornette sent Jim Herd a bouquet of dead flowers and congratulated Herd on killing WCW in 1991.
Starrcade ’86 and ’87 each earned Cornette a $10,000 pay day.
In the summer of ’88 Greensboro was doing sell outs – by February 1989 the gate was killed off. Cornette blames Turner’s execs.
The Thrillseekers – Jericho and Storm took a higher pay day per night in exchange for Cornette keeping their money from selling gimmicks. Storm brought his wife to the matches and Jericho wouldn’t fuck the local women so they failed to get over like Cornette felt they were.
Jericho broke his arm practicing moves – he worked that night anyway.
Vince McMahon believed that Chris Candido looked like workout guru Tony Little and thus “Body Donna Skip” was born.
The WWF lost 6 million dollars in 1995 – so Cornette’s SMW going out of business wasn’t a huge surprise. Cornette blames a lack of new stars, which seems to fall right back on booker Jim Cornette.
Cornette tried to get Vince to use SMW as a developmental territory but Vince wasn’t thinking about long term stars at that point.
Brad Armstrong was Corny’s first choice to be the “star” of SMW – WCW had him under contract though. Terry Taylor, Brian Lee and Tracy Smothers were all tried instead – Cornette says Taylor was connected to WCW yet and Corny didn’t trust that Eric Bischoff wouldn’t use Taylor to mess with SMW.
Bob Armstrong had his sternum accidentally cracked by Cornette – they worked it into a storyline and drew a $20,000 house, which was among the largest in SMW history.
WWE bought SMW’s video tapes for over $100,000.
Cornette goes off on modern wrestling and I let loose a huge belly laugh.
Heyman was trying to convince Cornette to quit WCW so Paul E. could be the top heel manager. He’d then call up Cornette in SMW and make sure Corny wasn’t coming back.
The Gangsta’s cost Cornette money since much of the south didn’t want to pay to see the uppity negros.
Heyman was a habitual liar and screwed a lot of guys around.
Jim explains why he hates ECW: Barbed wire, fire and other such things are impossible to follow and the audience has to come to expect a choreographed stunt show with increasing violence.
Public Enemy getting over in ECW and then failing in WCW and WWF is an example of how Heyman was actually a good booker (who lacked constraint).
When the Rock and Roll Express came to WWF for a special appearance in 1993, Vince didn’t even know which one was Ricky and which was Robert – he never watched the NWA, WCW, ECW or anything else.
Tuesday Night Titans helped turn the business into the current crap pile it is.
The WWF atmosphere drove Jerry Jarrett to drink nightly during his run helping them in 1994.
Yokozuna ate a bucket of KFC chicken as a snack during TV tapings.
As a rib Mr. Fuji paid to have a wrestler’s engine taken out of his car.
Cornette is asked about Joey Styles and he goes off on Republicans for several minutes.
“I paid about 1.5 million in income taxes over the last 25 years, so if I get sick, the government should send a nurse to BLOW ME”.
Russo messed with Cornette by giving him Bob Holly and Bart Gunn as a tag team with his beloved “Midnight Express” name attached to it.
The Montreal Screwjob boondoggle is gone over in length. Cornette has no dog in the fight between millionaires.
Vince Russo is blamed for the death of Owen Hart for having him do the Blazer gimmick and the stunt.
Jerry Brisco wanted to attack the Kliq after the MSG “Curtain Call” that exposed the business.
The UFC is doing pro wrestling better than the modern WWE.
Jim thinks Shane McMahon saw HHH and Stephanie taking control and that he wouldn’t be next in line of the dynasty and moved on in his life.
Cornette’s biggest WWF payday was $15,000 for Wrestlemania 10.
Batista was roided to the gills, often injured, passable in the ring and often complained about being cold or ill. WWE was about to fire him when Batista started working out with HHH and suddenly he was a head liner.
Nick “Eugene” Dinsmore had great matches in OVW but was constantly overlooked by WWE for less talented muscle heads.
Vince McMahon was never a guy Cornette had problems with personally – but all the minions and idiots he hired caused Jim issues.
Cornette is determined to outlive Russo so that he can piss on his grave.
“I never heard of the Insane Clown Posse since I listen to music…”
Jim feels that Hogan’s TNA run is sad since Hulk made so much money in his career and now he has to meander around a dead promotion and go through the motions.
Mark Madden surprisingly makes Cornette’s top 5 most useless people ever employed in the business.
TNA shouldn’t charge admission – they should charge for people who want to get out.
Cornette wanted to quit TNA as soon as Russo came in but Jeff Jarrett wouldn’t let him.
Independent group Combat Zone Wrestling gets Cornette to go off on hardcore wrestling again. “It takes no talent to hit each other in the head with blunt objects.”
Jim says he won’t take independent bookings anymore because people might think he needs the money since the movie “The Wrestler” made all old wrestlers look pathetic.
Ring of Honor allows Jim to wear many hats and he isn’t taking a big salary as he’s more interested in making ROH a success.
With grooming, Tyler Black should be one of wrestling’s big names within 5 years.
Final Thoughts: Three hours and forty minutes of Jim Cornette firing off stories, getting mad, spewing venom and making us laugh – what more could you ask for? By this point many of Corny’s stories are retreads of his many shoots in the past and much of the Youshoot fun was had when fans questions were designed to poke the hornet’s nest of Jim’s emotional epicenter (See Russo, Vince and Dunn, Kevin). Even with some repeated ramblings, Corny’s always good fun. Recommended.
