Hello again Scott, I thought I'd share this moment when JR turned heel
back in '96. I actually thought heel Jim Ross was interesting and it's
too bad they ruined it with the fake Razor and Diesel nonsense. For
those that have never seen it:
http://youtu.be/3jLy1NtcCfA
too bad they ruined it with the fake Razor and Diesel nonsense. For
those that have never seen it:
http://youtu.be/3jLy1NtcCfA
Boy, the interwebs were losing their SHIT on the Monday before this happened, let me tell ya. Heel JR was interesting, but also way too far before his time to be a proper outlet for the writers bitching about Vince's dumb ideas.
Also, Fake Diesel? Whatever happened to THAT guy?
One of the first true "Holy Shit" moments for me as a fan, even though I had been into wrestling for several years up to that point.
ReplyDeleteI watched Bret Hart Appreciation night yesterday on You-Tube. I was hoping Bret to turn to Lawler and say "so how's Isaac doing?"
ReplyDeleteMy favorite JR moment of all time. Real emotion is the best emotion in wrestling.
ReplyDeleteNever liked it.
ReplyDeleteNot saying JR couldnt be a heel, but Im not interested in 96... 2006, or 2016 in hearing a heel PBP commentator.
But Vince was really the PBP commentator in 1996. JR was basically WWF's version of Mike Tenay at that point.
ReplyDeleteyou right. i always forget that between wm9 and SS97 he wasnt used to his full potential.
ReplyDeletejust a waste.
The heel JR stuff was such a great continuation of everything that had been happening in WWF since, like, 1995. When Diesel lost the title to Bret at SurSer 1995 and kind of called out Vince, followed by the slow burn of the McMahon-Hart situation (McMahon digs in to Bret, JR defends him), and then Stone Cold starts to evolve as a character after King of the Ring. JR just losing his shit on McMahon and bringing in the fake Diesel and Razor all made sense within the continuity of the company that year, at least from my memory.
ReplyDeleteThere was no way they could sustain heel JR, though. I just don't think he has it in him to be a long-term bad guy, especially when he's in the booth. But he played his part perfectly for the time.
Yup. Granted, I just don't like the idea of a heel JR anyway. One of the great PBP men in wrestling history should never have been relegated to being the 3rd/informative guy.
ReplyDeleteI was LIVID. I didn't have internet at the time, so I thought this was on the real. I was so excited. Then before they came out, we saw a flash of Bogner, and I thought Razor looked different. But I didn't want to come to terms with this might be a hoax. Then goddammit. Man, I was so mad. I literally wanted to punch JR right in the fucking face.
ReplyDeleteI really liked that ceremony. Kudos to WWE for doing it.
ReplyDeleteProbably wisely short-lived, but my friends and I loved the bit where JR built his own announce table in front of the real announce table.
ReplyDeleteThat was in '99 when he was coming back from his second bout with Bell's palsy. And in the middle it said, "JR is RAW" or something to that effect. It's when they paired Dr. Death with JR until they released Steve Williams and JR wound up retaking his traditional PBP duties during the WrestleMania 15 main event.
ReplyDeleteThat was one of the first moments where I was a kid and listening to JR and hearing people boo him and not getting why.
ReplyDeleteIf he's getting cheered for his heel promo, doesn't that mean that he sucks as a heel?
ReplyDeleteThey clipped the heck out of it here. The full speech was very long and rambling.
ReplyDeleteI was there that night and the live portion of Raw was great. I don't think anyone saw JR's heel turn coming that night, which made it a pretty hot angle to close the show on. Back then, though, that meant there was still another hour of matches to go.
ReplyDeleteThis is one of those things that truly dates us. If you are under, say, 30 years old, I'm not sure you can really understand how true Scott's description is. The interwebs, as they existed at that point in time, were really losing their SHIT over this.
ReplyDeleteDid Hall & Nash really hate WCW enough to jump back? Was it even possible?
Obviously not, but man, every wrestling "news" site back in the day reported it as a possibility. And since most people's internet was AOL - don't forget to download Sunny's photos on AOL's WWF site! - it spread like wildfire.
No offense intended to younger viewers, but man, the internet was different and wrestling stories and rumors were different. The amount of "experts" and "insiders" online was staggering. And 95 percent were full of shit, but they had a clever screen name and that was good enough.
The angle really never had a chance of working with impostors, as great as heel JR was. But it certainly didn't help all of us WWF loyalists that Savio F'N Vega was the guy who decided to fight for our honor. Ugh.
This was Vince in full panic mode. WCW was really gaining momentum at this point and Vince had never really been challenged. Was Russo the booker at this time? Because the whole thing fits his "Do what it takes to pop ratings" style.
ReplyDelete