Sa, Welcome to the Extreme ECW Live cast. And we are back with another bonus episode and we are paying tribute to Sabu. Sabu has just passed away, so we're doing a very special tribute to him now. This is coming a couple weeks after his passing, but we fell here with the extreme CW Live cast that we had to pay tribute to him. I think you guys enjoy this. We're gonna cover the career life, do some watch alongs of Sabu, pay tribute to one of the mainstays of ecw. Like, when people think of ecw, they think Sabu. So we had to do this. You know, despite what I might say or JV might say on the podcast at times about Sabu, we don't really mean that. That's part of the podcast. Like, this guy was an innovator. This guy was very important. And of course we're gonna have Rick Beebe here with us. So, Rick, welcome to the show. This is a very special episode and we've been talking about this for like a week and a half. You know, it's been at this time, I think 11 or 12 days. Well, we wanted to do this. We wanted to do it right away, but, you know, schedule and shit, you know, prevents us from doing when we want to. But and also like the audio recording and all that nonsense too, as well. So please. Rick, how you doing?

I'm, I'm doing pretty good, Pru. How are you?

Good, Good. Yeah. Rick and I have been working on this episode kind of throughout the day. Like, yeah, we try to figure out what platform we were going to use, because hardcore heaven 97, even though we thought at the time of recording, it was like, oh, that was. That was great. That was. Oh, we found something new to do. You know, we can record these episodes on this now. And when we released it, it didn't come off that well. So now, now we're trying this other platform which we had used in the past from many of our podcasts. So hopefully this will work out again. But now it's like. And they want. They want the money. So. So, yeah, so that's part of it. And whatever. If, if I have to pay a little bit, then screw it. I want you guys to get these episodes because you guys are paying for our episodes and I want you to pay for Mike. Pru's voice cracking out, JV screaming into the mic. And Rick BB sounded oh, so sweet as always.

Of course, the dulcet tones.

All right, so before we get into this very special episode, please give us a follow on X at Extreme Cast. Follow me Mike Pro@NPRUA3. Of course, follow JV. He's not here for this bonus episode. Seems like the bonus episodes are, you know, me and Rick basically. But of course JV can always be involved the bonus episodes. But oftentimes JV's schedule is pretty packed and that's why he's not involved or

he just forgets to show up for an episode. So we doing a bonus episode anyways.

Well, that did happen one time, right?

That happened once, yeah.

But of course father could be at Leo Y85. And again, this is going to be a tribute to Sabu and we're going to do a couple watch along matches so that should be fun. And we're just going to kind of run down the career and we expect this to be short but you know, you guys know, we run our mouse. We might talk too much, but we'll see. I'm gonna. And I wanted Rick on this, of course because you know, Rick is very well knowledgeable about the career of Sabu and hardcore wrestling, Japanese wrestling and like everything involved in what Sabu's life would be. So he's gonna take, you know, the helm basically here. I'll, I'll kind of guide through stuff and share my opinions and whatnot. But Rick's gonna break it down for the most part there, so. So let's get right into it. Rick, you ready for this? You ready for the tribute to Sabu?

Yeah, I am, I am ready.

Yeah. So excited.

Well, it's, it's, it's a sad.

I know it's sombering, right? It's like.

Yeah, and it's, it will. So we'll start with. You were the one who told me, who broke the news to me that, that he had passed away. And I was like, oh, shoot, like. And it's, it's. I'm not saying it's funny because it's not, it's not funny, but it's ironic or I don't even know how to put it. Other people since, since I started doing the show with, with you guys, you know, other wrestlers have obviously passed away. Terry Funk passed away. I can't even remember. But there's been people that have passed away that have either been in ECW or just are people we grew up watching. And, and while not saying like it didn't bother me, this one hit me harder. I think it's because we've kind of seen Sabu for the past, what, four years almost. Yeah, yeah, right, exactly. Covering the show and it's now, like, we're still seeing him and he's gone now. And it's just weird to. To think about, you know, like, somebody like Terry Funk who was quite a bit older. It. I'm not saying, like, it's not weird that he's gone, but it's like, well, he was, you know, in his 80s and he wasn't looking great, but Sabu was like, he just wrestled a month ago, you know, it wasn't. I mean, did. I don't know. Have you seen the final match that he did with Joey? Janela?

I didn't watch it yet. I. I have heard about it, read

about it, and to me, it's like, he just looks like he's older and he's had a career where he's beaten up his body. But he. I wouldn't. If you had shown me that match and been like, hey, he's not going to be alive a month after this match. I would, like, no way. Like, you crazy? Because he didn't. Didn't look. He didn't look like he was at the end of his life. So it's. It really kind of shocked me. So that's, I guess, like, like you say, it's. It's kind of sombering to be doing this, and I, I feel honored that we get to do this, honestly, you know.

Yeah.

I never met Staboo and. Or anything, but I just. I feel like it's. It's something we should do.

No, definitely. And, you know, one of the things that you were leading into is, like, how we've covered ECW and how people have passed away, even people like Terry Funk, and he gave a good explanation. You know, Terry Funk was in his 80s, but the fact that we decided, oh, we gotta pay tribute to Sabu, like, this is the first. First time ever that we're doing something like this.

Right.

Like, we should have done one for Terry Funk, probably, but, like. But this one just kind of. It's weird, you know, It's. Yeah, and I think it has to do with, like, him coming to age during our childhood. Like. Like, he broke through. He was something from our childhood that we're like, oh, I remember when he first came about now. And we'll get into talking that in just a bit, but I think that's a big part of it. Sabu has an impression on many people's lives that are wrestling fans because he just stood out.

Oh, absolutely. And. And we'll discuss, you know, his influence on other people as well. But, yeah, it's just. It was just Kind of a, A weird, weird and almost like, you know, you kind of realize your own mortality too. Because we watched him growing up, you know, Right.

He, he just passed away at 61 years old. Some said 60, 61. I guess information came out that his age wasn't accurate.

I was gonna say in doing my, my research, which, I mean, I didn't go super in depth because I didn't. There wasn't a lot out there that's like his early life. And I actually, in my notes, I said I couldn't really find anything about his early life. It's basically he was born, but even then the information I got that he was born was 19, December of 64. So that would mean he just turned 60, what, five months ago.

Right. I think it was a year off.

Right, exactly. But then everybody's saying, oh no, he was going to be 62 this year. Okay. So that means that he turned 61 five months ago. And it's just not, I don't say confusing, but it's like you say the birth date is off by a year in some cases.

So now, funny story with me, and now birth certificates obviously would give you the accurate date, like.

Right.

But who knows if he had access to his birth certificate or what, whatever. Right. When I was born, I'm born January 5th, 1983. Okay. So oftentimes, you know, when babies are born, they, they fill out a card and they put that card that says, oh, this is, you know, Michael Stephen Prue was born. And they put the date and all that and they put it in the little bin where the baby is, where I was. Right. So, and it says like, oh, it was Dr. So and so so forth. They had to do multiple ones for me because what do you think happens after January 1st for many people when they're writing a date,

they're putting the wrong year.

Yeah, they put the. Y', all, they put the wrong year. So I had a card that said I was born in 1982 instead of 1983. So I had access that I had that I was like, you always said I was born 1983. This says I was born 1982. Am I a year older than I think I am?

Right.

So, you know, think that was 1982. 83. How about Sabu 20 years earlier? Like, I'm sure they were making those fuck ups back then too. So he, he probably thought he was a year older or something. Or year younger. Yeah, because they screwed it. I don't know. But just something to bring up like the fact that you know, records could be just off because of a mistake.

Yeah, I. I granted this. Was he. This. I used to work with this guy, and he actually. He shares the same birth date, like, day, you know, date as my son. And so it was kind of. Plus I had worked with this guy for, oh, yeah, 12 years at that point, something like that. And he was an older gentleman, but, you know, sharp as attack. And he turned 90 and somebody, you know, was talking. His name was Bob. And somebody was talking to him was like, bob, you know, you know that it's great to be 90. And he goes, to be honest with you, he goes, I don't know if I'm turning 90 this year or if I turn 90 last year or if it'd be next year, because there's. He goes. There was, you know, in 19, you know, 1926 or whatever it was. He goes, people weren't always good about record keeping. So he's like, they kind of guessed that this is my birthday.

Yeah.

Not that I'm saying that happened with Cebu, but I mean, it. It's very possible. Yeah. You know. Oh, yeah.

And especially my point was, like, the fact that the doctor wrote the wrong on my thing.

Right. But that's what I'm saying. And I Knew A guy, 83, he wasn't even sure what his year or, to be fair, what date it was too. He always said it was October 13th, but he's like, I could have been born the 11th. And they just took, you know, they just wrote it two days later and put the wrong date or whatever. So.

Right.

Yeah. So. But, yeah, that's why.

That's why I always get to tell my students, yeah, you can't trust all the records in history. No, there's some discrepancy. So with that said, let's continue on beyond that. You said you didn't find a whole lot of background in Taboo, but what can you tell us about Sabu's youth growing up as Terry Brunk? Which is ironic. It seems ironic. Right. Because of Terry Funk. We got Terry Frunk.

Yeah, he was. He was born Terence Michael Brunk is what I found. And according to. Again, not sure that the records are completely right, but he was born in Staten island, according to what I found. But obviously he's raised in Michigan because that's where his uncle was from. I believe, again, I could be wrong, but I believe his mother was the sister of the sheik Ed Farhat. And so that's how they were related. Like I said, I couldn't really find anything Else other than, you know, growing up, he obviously idolized his uncle and wanted to get into the wrestling business. And then he debuted after training in 1985 was a good year.

And that's your year, right?

That's my year. Yeah, that's my year. That's why I said it's a good year. But, yeah, so he would have been like 21. And apparently when he first started out, he was a lot more of like a technical wrestler. He wasn't really doing as much of the, the high flying or obviously the hardcore stuff.

That makes sense, right?

Yeah, you figure, you figure you want to get the, the fundamentals in and, you know, not just start flipping and diving all over the place because that only, that only lasts for so long and that can only work with so many people.

Right. But his uncle was kind of crazy.

Yeah.

That time period, though. Right. So he picked up on that.

Yeah, that's the, the thing is if, if you have ever seen the chic and not just talking to you, but he is basically a lot of punch, kick, brawling, eye gouging, choking, stabbing people with a pencil fight, you know, brawling into the, into the stands kind of matches. That's not to say that the Sheik, that's all he could do. But, but when he was, you know, in his heyday in the 60s and 70s, facing off against like Bobo Brazil or Mark Lewin, a lot of his matches were him throwing fire, stabbing a guy with a pencil. You know, just a brawl. It wasn't even a, a wrestling match per se, but he could do that. But that's what he was very famous for. And so Sabu kind of took after that.

Yeah.

And emulated his uncle because, I mean, as a lot of people do, you know, if you have a father, you, you want to be like your dad. Most of the time he wanted to be like his uncle.

I like how you, you brought up Mark Lewin too, because he doesn't get mentioned a lot. No, he was wild as hell.

I was gonna say. Mark Lewin does not come out swinging

chairs at the fans when he came out to the ring.

Yeah. Maniac Mark Lewin. And, and a lot of people don't. Not again. Tangent. Here we go. Oh, the, the thing about Mark Lewin is he was like a big star in the 60s and the 70s, and then he had a resurgence in Florida in the 80s with Kevin Sullivan.

Oh, he had a character.

Yeah. Purple Hayes.

Purple Haze, I believe.

Yeah, I think he was Purple Haze, where like, he shaved half of his head and he acted all crazy and spoke in tongues and, you know, looked up to the sky like he was talking to somebody, that kind of thing. And I mean, I don't want to say it like revitalized his career, but I mean, it gave him an extra, you know, couple of years that he would have just been like, oh, that's the guy that used to fight the Chic. But instead, no, this guy's. This guy's nuts. You know, he worships the devil. That kind of thing with Kevin Sullivan.

So.

But yeah, that. So Cebu was first technical wrestler. A lot of his earlier stuff he was in like the Detroit, Michigan area in the Independence. And he was billed as Sabu the Elephant Boy at one point early in his career. As well as Terry Sr. The Sr. Standing for Sheik's Revenge before they just started calling him Sabu. And I found out where the name Sabu came from is there's an Indian. I think he was Indian actor. And apparently the chic really liked this guy's work. He was. There was a live action Jungle Book that this guy was in and a bunch of other movies and apparently the Sheik really liked him.

So he was like the 30s and 40s, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, like probably what the Chic would have been watching when he was growing up. Like when he was a little boy. Kind of like some guys like Dusty Rhodes would have. He, he loved John Wayne because that's what he, you know, growing up, you watch John Wayne movies, she grew up watching Sabu movies. So he, he named, he named his, his nephew Terry Sabu as kind of a tribute to, to this, this actor.

Well, did the sheik name him that or did. Yes, Terry Brunk do that as a tribute to his uncle? Like, oh, I'm gonna take on this name because you like this actor. And I know that

well, as far as I read, as far as I read, the Sheik kind of said, hey, you know, you should use this name kind of a thing. Kind of gave him the name. But I'm sure Sabo kept it as a tribute to his uncle as well.

Yeah, that makes sense. Everyone probably was like, I don't know who the that is.

Right, exactly. This guy, this, this guy was probably. I, I don't think. Yeah, he's probably never seen the movie and movies and that kind of thing.

You're right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So basically the. From 85 to like 89, he's just kind of traveling the various indies in the 80. The. In the, you know, Midwest, you know, Michigan. He goes down to Memphis, Ohio he actually goes to Hawaii at some point. Point probably for. I don't know, was Polynesian pro in existence in like the mid to late 80s, or were they kind of done by then?

I thought they were done by then.

That's right. Yeah. But he basically just kind of travels the Indies, you know, journeyman, working on his craft. He ends up in uswa. In what?

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, you're right. Yeah, uswa. Go on.

Yeah, yeah, he ends up in uswa. They called him Samu, not to be confused with the head shrinker Samu, or Samoan SWAT team Samu, but same spelling. And he actually feuds with Jeff Jarrett and Colonel Parker Robert Fuller. That was his big. He won his first feud in USWA, but he also wrestled RVD there. And there's a. There's a match on YouTube. I actually debated us doing a watch along for it. It's Samu versus RVD. I forget. I. I think RVD goes under his

real name, Rob Zakowski then in 1991.

Yep.

Oh, did you watch it?

I did. It's. It's. It was like a Memphis studio tell. It's. It's a Memphis studio television match.

It's not like four minutes long.

Yeah, exactly. It's. It was like. We watch it if we. If we were gonna watch like four matches. Yeah. Throw that in. Because it doesn't take up. But it's not very long. It's on YouTube though, so if anybody does want to it out and. Yeah. So then also in 1991, he goes to Japan. That's where he. He starts with the. The legend of Stab Sabu. In Japan, he starts Wrestling in BMW Frontier Frontier Martial arts wrestling. And that's where he starts getting all those scars that he's famous for because he wrestles in a lot of barbed wire matches.

Man, that. What a great aesthetic. That for his character over time.

Yep.

Is just. I've been through. Look at me.

Yeah. Allegedly, he. He did over two dozen barbed wire matches, which, I mean, I believe it. Not necessarily in 1990.

That sounds like. But.

Right. I could see him being in 24 or more over the course of his career, but maybe not in just a. That point, you know? Right. Not. Not after he's been wrestling for six years. I. I don't. I don't think so. But then. Have you ever seen the. The infamous Fire death match that it was Sabu and the Chic versus Tarzan Goto and at Sushi Onita?

I have not.

You have not. Okay. Again, I almost was like, well, we should Watch that. And then I realized the match is about a minute and a half long. And then it just. It's. It's. It's all on a. Like a hand cam. It's not a. It's not like an ECW fan cam, but it's like low quality footage. Well, no, no, no, it's. It. But it's like low quality footage. And it's. It's like a minute and a half of the match, and then the rest of it is just pandemonium. And you don't know what the hell is going on because the whole arena is pitch black. Basically what happened was they decided they were gonna have a fire deathmatch. And what they did was they took the ropes and they put barbed wire up, and then they wrapped the barbed wire in these towels that were soaked in kerosene. And once the four of them were in the ring, they lit them on fire, which is a cool visual for about 10 seconds, until basically the entire ring just becomes a giant fireball. And I've seen an interview with Sabu talking about that. And he goes, we all started. We all started the match. And like 30 seconds in, we all were like, we need to get the fuck out of here. There it is, like an oven in here. And we can't breathe because there's just so much heat that it's like sucking all the oxygen out of the ring. So he goes, I slid out. And, you know, at Sushi, Onita slid out and Tarzan Goto slid out. But when the sheik went to slide out, he got stuck and it gave him, like, third degree burns over his entire back. But he. He goes, my uncle was a tough bastard. He goes, he, he kept fighting. He's like beating up the. The, you know, young boys that are doing, like, seconding, you know, the wrestlers, if anybody's ever watched Japanese wrestling, they always have, like, the trainees.

Trainees on the outside.

Yeah. And he goes, he's like beating these guys up, you know, stabbing at him with a pencil or whatever. And he says, I grabbed a bucket of water and threw it on his back to try to help him. He goes around, starts bitching me out because now he's all wet and he can't throw fire. The ring's on fire. And he's. This man wants to still throw a fireball. And on top of that, he also says when he threw the water on him, it just. All the skin on his back just slid off because it is just, you know, he had 33, so it just like his back just Melted. So it was. It's a. Interesting visual to see this match, but like I said, it's a minute and a half, and then it's just pandemonium because the whole place is pitch black at that point while they're trying to put the fire out before it burns the whole arena down. But that was. That was one of the. The big things that he's famous for in. In Japan, and he actually teams with Horace Boulder in fmw. Horace Hogan. People might know him.

Hogan's nephew, right?

Hogan's Hulk Hogan's nephew. Yeah. It's like his. Yeah, his. Hogan's sister. That's her kid. And so that was that. I mean, that's like the big thing. Fmw. It's all garb. It's garbage wrestling. I mean, it's.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, that's barbed wire and fire and.

Right.

Death matches, quote, unquote.

That'll become a theme as we go through.

Yeah.

So what I want to go back to, though, is our first experiences, like. Oh, yeah, like. And we. We've talked about this on earlier Extreme ECW Live cast episodes. I know I have. When they first came, when he first appeared. And I'm pretty sure you have brought it up, too, over time.

Oh, sure.

Let's just recap that now. My first experiences, and it's probably like many people, many listeners, is I came from the magazines. It came from pwi Pro Wrestling Illustrated. And I would say it had to be. It was kind of light. I would say it's 94, 95 now. He had already been around 93. 94, 94 is when he had a lot of ECW. So that's where it started to show up in PWI, if I remember correctly. And that's where I started to see this guy Saboo. And like, I think in 94, the PWI started to have color inserts in the magazine. And a lot of time I would have Saboo, and you'd see his. His pants, you know, his big MC Hammer pants.

Yep.

And like, they're purple or whatever. And he'll be crashing through a table. And he just looked badass. And it's like, oh, my God, who the hell is that guy? At that point, it's like, who is that guy? That guy's cool. I want to see him. I like looking at these magazines just to see him, you know? And it's so funny, like, to try to compare, like, how things are today with back then in 1994-95, you know, where our children today are. Watching YouTube videos and tick tock videos of people doing stuff that's like, oh, I want to do that. And we're looking at photo stills in a magazine. Yeah. It's like, that's so cool.

Yeah. Or you're just, you're just reading like a match recap.

Yeah.

And they're talking about, you know. Oh yeah. And then after the match, Sabu did a moonsault or backflip through a table and you go whole like what?

You have to use your imagination.

Right? Yeah, yeah. I mean, and that's actually something that I, I had noted that basically he was what. What we would call, or what we did call in like the late 90s, an indie darling in that he was the worst kept secret of the indies. And you know, people were tape trading and like you said PWI or the wrestler or whatever would have stories and pictures of him in his pants or you know, doing them, you know, flying through the air, like out of the ring, into the crowd or whatever. And you, you'd be like, wow. Like, because I growing up. 1990, say 1993. 1993, I watched WWF and I watched WCW. I didn't have access to ESPN to see what was going on with Global. And where we grew up, you know, was not Memphis. There was no Memphis. There was no Portland or the, the indies were like in a few and far between in a, you know, VFW lodge. It was, There was no, there's no real indies. Right. We didn't have. Right. We didn't have indies. Like so some, like I say Memphis or. Well, Portland was gone by 93.

But for us we had.

Yeah.

Where I am, we had Pal Wrestling.

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Yankee Pro.

But they didn't have t. They didn't have a team.

They were on the magazines or anything.

Right, exactly.

Nobody knew the fuck they were. Right.

And so we, you know, looking at these magazines, I think I've told the story before about summer of 92 at Kmart. I picked up a copy of the Wrestler and that's when I learned about ecw. That's when I learned that there was wrestling that wasn't on my tv. And, and that was an eye opening experience. Granted I didn't see Sabu until like you say 94, 95, when I, when I actually got to see ECW on TV. But you see him in the magazines, you hear about all this stuff and it's just, it's crazy because 1993 people weren't doing what, what he was doing, you know, at least in WWF and wcw. Which is what I was watching.

Right. Yeah, that was a major breakthrough. Like I said, just seeing it in pictures, like, wow, somebody's doing that. I want to see that.

Right.

The fact that you saw it. You saw that article in 93. But when's the first time that you actually saw footage though? Probably I didn't see footage until 95.

Yeah, probably say 95 was probably. Probably about the same time. I mean, I've seen the footage.

It was like a year. Like I knew of Sabu for like a year before I actually saw him. Yeah, probably so excited. Wow, there he is.

Probably the same with me.

And I was so excited just to see him in wcw. Even though that was kind of lame. But it was like, wow, he's on tv. Like, real tv, right?

Yeah.

And I have to like ask my grandparents to get me a ECW tape from our video, which they did, surprisingly. Like, the fact that they would. Okay, yeah, we'll order this random video from this. But that's how it was back then. It's like, that's how was bought. Like you didn't know who you buying from and.

Yeah, you bought it from magazine.

Yeah, it's from magazine. Yeah, just send out the order and put a check in there. Tape comes in.

Yeah, check her money order and then wait two months.

Yeah.

Actually speaking in 1993, I do have a note in my notes that Sabu actually had three dark matches in WWF in 1990.

Oh, okay. Yeah, bring those up. Those. Yeah, the Scott Taylor one.

Yeah, he wrestles. He wrestles Scott Taylor twice. Once, October 18th, before raw. And that footage is on. I think it's on YouTube. I've. I saw it since, you know, since passing. I think it's available. Yeah, it's definitely available on. I'm pretty sure it's on YouTube. I'm actually. Might even be the WWE Vault. And he also wrestles Scott Taylor two days later on October 20th before a Superstars taping. And in the day between October 19th before Wrestling Challenge, he wrestles Owen Hart and loses. I'd love to see that match.

Yes. That wasn't recorded.

If it was recorded. The footage is. Hasn't been released ever. I'm starting to get choked up thinking about how awesome that would be.

Rich and Land, we need Richard Land to find it.

Yeah, I mean, it was before wrestling challenge, so obviously I can guarantee you it was recorded as like a tryout to say, hey, can, you know, do we want to sign this guy? Or whatever. But yeah, it's in the vault somewhere. I'm sure. But yeah, that would, that would be cool because you figure it's October of 93, so it's right before, you know, a couple what, three months, four months before Owen Hart turns heel.

He turns heel at Royal Rumble 94. Yeah, he kicks Providence. Kicks his leg out of his leg.

Yeah, he kicks his leg out of his leg. Yeah. But yeah, he did that. They never obviously signed him and he was, he was doing ECW around that time, you know, or it debuted sometime in October. Blood. Blood Fest. Blood Fest. Blood Feast.

We always debated that, right?

Yeah, right, exactly. Against, against tasmaniac.

Yeah, it's funny you didn't even cover that with us, but you know the joke. Yeah, yeah.

In addition he was also just. I skipped, we skipped over this. But he was also wrestling. He wrestled in TWA in the early 90s as well, but again. Yeah, Tri State wrestling.

Oh. Oh yeah, yep. Okay. Yeah, that was nothing notable though, right?

Yeah, I, I've seen him in about a royal where it's like him, the Sandman, a bunch of Philly indie guys. But yeah, nothing notable. He's just.

So he was involved though. Yeah, but again that would be the connection of.

Yeah.

Why he comes back.

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. But it's again I, I was like oh well if we can watch match. But I wasn't about to be like let's watch, let's watch a 20 minute battle royal that he might only be in for five minutes and quality is not good. Eventually we are going to watch TWA stuff. But that'll be yes we will later. But yeah, not, not. Yeah. And again it would be like we'd have to search through the like a two hour show to find the, the battle royal, you know, so. But yeah, so any, any other thoughts on the early 90s Sabu from you, what we were talking about?

No, I mean I think he covered up all very well. Yeah, I think at this point we should jump into ecw. Like so that's, that's the big thing.

That was my next thing.

Yeah, great coverage early on in the 90s and no, and Sabo's already at that point in the early 90s. He's established himself as somebody different. Yep. Like he did start off like you said, as you know, traditional wrestler but he was already starting to apply, you know, sheet characteristics and was getting hardcore when people weren't doing this at all. So this took people for a loop. Not just fans but wrestlers in general. Like oh, I got to work with this guy. How the am I going to work with this guy? Wants to do this. Like, so. That's very interesting. I would love to hear more about how early wrestlers adapt his style when they weren't necessarily, oh, well, what is this?

Like, right.

How can I do this? You just changed a game on me right now, and I got to adapt, and I think that's good. Leading to Sabu and ecw. So, Rick, take it from there. How sad. We start off in 1993 with this Hannibal Lecter.

Yeah.

Gimmick that he comes out with. Paulie. Paul Heyman, too. So that's another thing.

Yeah. He comes in. Paulie is managing him, and he has 911 as his handler, who's basically the guy that's wheeling him out and unchaining him from the gurney and then corralling him back onto the gurney with the mask. He hated that because first off, it wasn't very comfortable to ride on that chained to. Basically, what's a two wheeler that you would use to move boxes? Also, he said the mask was a little hard to breathe because, you know, it's. It's not covering your entire mouth, but it's still. It's a piece of, you know, to mask covering your face.

All right, hold on. I just want to pause and interrupt for a second.

Go ahead.

It's funny, and it's ironic that he would be saying that. Oh, you know, it sucks being wheeled out on this. On this. On this two wheeler here and have this mask covering my face, but I'm gonna dive off and go through tables and go through barbed wire. But like, yeah, this.

That's.

That's the part that sucked, is that I was on Bali.

Yeah, well, not. Not only that, but he also said, like, you know, he's supposed to be a wild man, like, uncontrollable, and they have to chain him to get him places and that kind of thing. So he's like, I had to fight. Like, pretend I was fighting to get out of the chains and struggle. He goes, and I'd wear myself out before I even got in the fucking ring. So that was another thing that he hated, because then he's like, now I'm all blown up, and I. I can't do my match, you know, the way I want to do it, because I'm. I'm out of breath already.

Yeah, that's a good point that it brings up. Now, people could argue, though, you could be a better actor.

Yeah, true.

You don't have to exert yourself. You can just make little face movements and eye movements, and that shows that you're struggling right yeah, no, you, you

know, you are correct.

You know, be flipping out, right? Shaking yourself.

Yeah, but. But we all know Sabu don't half ass it. He doesn't have ass.

Yeah, he doesn't have ass. Yeah. No, see, here I am on a tribute and I'm still giving them.

Yeah. You got to do it one last time.

There'll be more.

Oh, there will be. I know. So, yeah. And that's also. Like we said, this is. I mean, he had been doing it on the Indies, but this is really when the. The mythos of the table breaking started because it was more widespread to, you know, of an audience. You know, seeing it in PWI or hearing about it in PWI is one thing, but actually seeing the footage of him doing it. And not only that, but, you know, as it went on, ECW started to get. Wasn't really syndicated per se, but, you know, started to get TV deals in more than just Philadelphia. So other parts of the country are now seeing it. Not just hearing it or, you know, hearing about it or seeing pictures, but seeing him put up a table and backflip off the top rope, crack his knees on it and break the table in half. That's fucking crazy to. To see. You know, nowadays it's not, I'm saying, common, but it's like, oh, cool. But back in 1993, 1994, that was like. You didn't see that ever. You didn't see people get put through tables, period. Much less some guy diving through a table after a match by himself.

Yeah, that was like a curtain call that he did.

Right.

All right, I did this. I'm just gonna smash through the table

on my own, Right?

Yeah. That's nuts. It's crazy. And that was the whole point, is this is how crazy I am.

Right, Right. And they also leaned into it where there was. I. I think they only did it one a couple times, but, you know, they'd be backstage and Paulie would be talking and Sabo would all of a sudden, like, go to dart over because he sees a table and 911 would have to grab him real quick.

Yep. I like.

Yeah, because he's crazy and he's got like a table fetish, you know, but. And then he. So he beats Tasmaniac at Bloodfest Feast. And the second match he has is a match against Shane Douglas, and he beats Shane Douglas in the second match to win the ECW title, which is

just the Eastern Championship title.

Correct, Correct. But in his second match, he's now the champion of. Of ecw. And then A month later, within the month later, he, him and Hawk Hot Road Warrior Hawk face Terry Funk and a mystery partner that turns out to be King Kong Bundy.

Lame. And it wasn't even on tv.

Right. Popcorn Fart and that we didn't get to cover it. Yeah. November to remember 93. That was the one that Richard Land, I believe you asked him and he was like, yeah, I don't have footage of it. I don't think they ever put it. Put it out as a VHS or whatever.

Yep.

But yeah, he beats. He pins Terry Funk and so he wins the TV title too. So now he's a double champion after a month in the promotion. Granted, he loses the ECW belt a month later. But you know, the fact that he comes into the promotion and within a month he's. He's already won two titles. That shows the. Yeah, that shows that they clearly had plans, you know, for, for him to be around.

Well, who had championships before Johnny Hot Body. Come on.

Well, yeah, Terry Funk, Shane Douglas.

Yeah, yeah. But this has other than. Yeah, yeah, but still Sabu coming in. That's a big deal.

Yeah, No, I know what you mean. Yeah, yeah. And then obviously we get into the night, the line was crossed. February of 94, the. The infamous three way dance.

Yeah, I love that three way dance. I love it more so for a Funk and Douglas. But you know.

Right.

Played a great role in that. Yeah, it kind of sucked outside some sometimes.

Yeah, well that was. That's normal.

That's normal. I know.

Yeah. What's. What I think is, is we probably pointed it out. Well, you guys pointed out because I wasn't really doing them on that one back then. But is that it's a three way dance. And yes, like today you do a three way dance or whatever, two guys fight, one guy rests on the floor, that kind of thing. You don't usually get too many interactions between all three people that often within the match. With this one it was a thing where they start. I'm trying to remember, did they start out with two of them and then like Funk comes in last and then like Cebu gets injured and goes off for like half an hour. So like Shane Douglas is the only one that's actually in the ring for an hour match.

Yeah.

The other two are like I say, I think Terry Funk shows up later and then Sabu like goes crashing through a table and they take him away and he's missing for like 20 minutes and then he comes back for the finish.

That could have been just like Shane Douglas is willing to work for an hour and give.

Right.

Give these guys a break because Sabu's gonna damage his body. Terry Funk is older.

Yeah.

I'll like Shane Douglas probably, like, I'll wrestle the whole match. I'll give these guys breaks because that seems like the guy Douglas would be anyway.

Right? Yeah. And I'm not. I'm not on the match at all by saying that. I'm kind of agreeing with you in that it. The match was very much more Funkin and Douglas. Sabu was there and he was. He played a part of it, but he wasn't like the, the main storyline, I think, was more aimed towards Douglas and Funk. That's the thing.

But still he's a big. Right. But yeah, that just shows like he's main event level and they kept them that way for a while.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Even though he didn't have the ECW title at that point, he still was in the picture and.

Yeah. You know, contributing is a draw.

Yeah. Oh, absolutely.

He's in the magazines. I. I love Shane Douglas. I always did. But Sabu is gonna make me pick up the magazine more than seeing Shane

Douglas on the COVID Oh, absolutely. Yeah. He's gonna sell magazines and he's gonna. He's gonna. He. Because he's different. Like Shane Douglas. Great wrestler, great talker, but looks wise. He's a guy.

Right. Sabu is different.

He looks different. He's covered in scars. He's wearing the Hammer pants, you know,

and he's wearing the turban too.

Right.

That's a different culture. It's like, who's that? What is that?

He's. He looks crazy. Like, he has this crazy look in his eye. So it's all. It's all part of the package deal with, with Sabu. And like you say, he's a draw. So then we keep going through 94. He loses the TV title. He teams with Bobby Eaton at When Worlds Collide against Arne Anderson and Terry Funk.

Yeah, that was a nice little spot there for. Yeah, that was a WCW exchange deal, right?

Yep.

And then Bill fell through.

Yeah, that was. That was one of those things that they were gonna do more with with them, as far as I remember. And then, I don't know, something happened between. Let's see, 94 probably would have been Bishop, Bischoff and Heyman. Yeah. And yeah, there was. Heyman probably wanted something and Bischoff's told Heyman that none of the guys that, that, you know, that they exchanged could lose or whatever. You know.

Right.

Something stupid.

Some.

Yeah. So then he ends up teaming with Taz and we get the. The infamous Sabu. Gets dropped on his head at November to remember.

Oh, yeah, well, that's a classic spot.

That's a big deal. Yep, yep. And, uh, you know, injures his neck, injures his back, comes back two weeks later.

That's crazy. How soon he came back.

Doesn't say. Doesn't. Doesn't stay out for very long. Could have been a career ending injury, but no. Yeah, two weeks. Okay. You know, man's got to get paid. And then he ends up like you Skip.

You skip.

What? I said Benoit. Yeah.

On purpose.

Well, I think everybody know. Everybody knows who dropped Sabu on his head, but yes, it. He. Sabu and. And Taz were feuding with Ben Juan.

That's fine. Yeah, that's fine. That's fine.

Well, I mean, and then after that, they win the tag titles at Double Jeopardy, him and Taz Tasmaniac. And then they lose them to Benoit Malenko at Return of the Funker, like what, a month later. Turn of the funker was 2-95-95. Was.

What's the February? Oh, yeah, yeah. Late February.

Yeah. So it might have been. That might have been one of those things where they did like an early February, like the first weekend of February and then the last weekend.

That sounds right. Yeah.

Yep. Yeah. Because that's when, I mean, obviously Terry Funk comes back. But that's the.

Those double tables that same month though, too, so I don't.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Return of the Funk is the Cactus Jack. Cactus Jack wrestles D.C. drake and then Sandman.

That's right. That was one of your first things that you brought up. I broke down D.C. drake.

D.C. drake has been my obsession for 30.

That's who you saw first in the magazines, right?

Yes, yes, yes. I. If I ever got to meet him, I would be like a seven year old boy again. I'd probably be like pissing myself and like in awe of this man. Even though I can. I have a strong feeling he looks nothing like he did when in 1992, I bet.

Cool.

Yeah, he actually, I believe at some point he was in this area too, because he's a. He does. That's drug addiction counseling. Oh, no, no, no.

Oh, that's all right. Yeah.

After he retired. Yeah, he became like a drug addict. Yeah, drug. Like a drug rehab counselor and that kind of thing, which is really cool. Like, I, you know, I have a lot of respect for that.

No, that's great.

Yeah. So anyways, then we get to Three Way Dance, which was supposed to be Benoit Malenko versus Public Enemy versus Sabu and Taz Maniac for the tag titles and Sabu no shows. Why? Because he had a New Japan booking at this the same day and chose New Japan over ecw.

Now, as an ECW fan, we do the podcast. What? Like, we're like, oh, what the. But I mean, that's an opportunity for him. That's something different.

Exactly.

Like he's thinking ecw, like this is just Philadelphia. Like, let me go international, let me do something. Like, he probably thought of that as a great opportunity. So the fault him for that is. I don't agree with that. I don't think anybody should ever give him a fault on that at all.

I don't, I don't fault him for it. And that's pretty much his. When somebody asked him about it or in a shoot interview, that's what he said. He, he says, as much as I love dcw, it was a part, it was a part time thing. He goes, I was still doing the Indies and Japan was going to pay me more money for basically for less work, you know, doing a tour. Because no matter. Well, I don't say now, but back like then, like the 70s, the 80s, the 90s, the American wrestlers, you know, foreigners made bank going to Japan, you know. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And that's why the guys love to go is because sometimes the trips were a little crazy where you'd be, you know, riding on a bus, go to the, you know, do, do the show, jump back on the bus and drive another, you know, 12 hours kind of

a thing like long, random town, you

know, right in the middle of nowhere. But they were getting paid very well and they were getting treated very well otherwise. And it was just a thing where if, you know, if I can do this now, they invite me back, they're going to give me more money the next time because people are going to want to see me kind of a thing. So I don't, I don't fault Sabu for basically trying to, you know, make a living out of it. And that's the thing. I mean, he was already a quote unquote legend in Japan because of all the FMW stuff and just the fact that this is a sheik's nephew, you know, that then the chic carries clout in Japan.

Yeah. And you could say at this point, Cebu has some clout too. So. Oh yeah, take, take advantage of the options that you have. No, especially, you know, like something had to be going on if, if Paul Heyman was willing to just, like, publicly just fire Cebu on the spot. That means their relationship wasn't that good.

Oh, right. Yeah.

So he took this opportunity because, like, something was wrong already. Then Paul Heyman was like, oh, no, you're fired. Tap was like yourself. You'll take me back when you need me.

And he did.

And that's what happens, right?

Yep. So he makes 64 appearances for New Japan in 1995. I wrote. Noted that he deals with. He teams with Masachono against the stable of. And I'm gonna probably butcher this Heisei Ishigan.

Was it simple? Do you know?

I have no idea. I. I don't. I didn't see that. I. I didn't see what it translates to or anything.

New World Order.

Yeah, it's. It's honestly comprised of a bunch of guys that I have never heard of, except for I know of three of the names and one of them. I don't. One of them. I can't honestly say I've ever even seen him wrestle. Kengo Kimura, but it's Shiro Koshanaka, Kuniaki Kobayashi, Masashi Aogi, Akitoshi Saito, and then the Great Kabuki. And eventually Jumbo. Not Jumbo Saruta. Was it Jumbos? No, the Genichiro Tenrou that he eventually joins. But like. Like 99 or something like way later than. Than 1995. So it's the thing, like, I'm not a. I'm not like, an expert on Japanese wrestling, but it seems like there's a lot of times, like, they just. They'll have stables, and it's almost like they have stables just because they have enough guys to do stables. It's not necessarily like a New World Order type of invasion or anything like that. It's just.

I only reference that because, you know. Yeah, I only referenced New World Order because prior to the New World Order, there was a storyline in New Japan that there was this New World Order.

Yeah. New New Japan versus uwfi.

And that's what they. You know, people say Eric Bischoff stole that idea. And I get. I would imagine it was in 95. If he started that in 96, possibly.

There's. There's been a few different, like, quote unquote, invasion angles in Japan that I. I can think of. Like I said, New Japan versus UWFI. There was also New Japan versus UWF in like, 90 and 90 G's. 85, 86. But that's it. We're getting too far off.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, essentially, Sabu is feuding with this stable. Yeah, he. He defeats Koji Kanemoto for the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship, loses it a month later. Then he wrestles Grand Hamada, who we saw are barely legal, and he ends up beating Grand Hamada for the UWA World Junior Light Heavyweight Championship. But he loses it to El Samurai a week later. However, this is in the span of 1995. He's won two, you know, heavyweight champ junior Heavyweight championships. So he's clearly. He has a spot in Japan, you know. And his final New Japan appearance is in December. It's December 11, where he tags with Hiro Saito to face Dean Malenko and Chris Benoit. Although Chris Benoit was wild peg at that point. Yeah. And so also in 1995, while he is not in ECW, he shows up in WCW as.

Yes, that's where. Yeah, that's what I was talking about earlier. That's when I first really saw him, like, oh, there he is. Like I had at that point. And I've talked about this on the Extreme ECW Live cast numerous times. Like when I first started watching ECW and getting tapes and seeing broadcast on satellite wasn't this early. It wasn't 95, so it wasn't until maybe late 95 actually. Yeah, it was like August of 95 is when I actually was able to see it. But this early stuff of Sabu I had never seen. And then there is September of 95, when I'm actually getting into it, because now I can see it and. Oh, he's on, he's on Nitro.

The second episode of Nitro when he did.

It's crazy.

Against Alex Wright. Das Wunderkin.

Yes. Who was ahead of his time, by the way.

Yes, Alex. Very underrated. Yes.

Yeah, Underrated. Yeah, for. Yeah, for somebody in his, his position. He obviously doesn't speak the language or fluently, but that guy could wrestle, man. Like, he would be a top star today if he was new.

Like he was like 19 and he was that good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If, if, if he could have come along 10 years later, like 2005, put him in Ring of Honor, he could have had amazing matches with like Bryan Danielson or Loki or. Yeah, you know, just Austin Aries, any. All, all the guys that were in like Ring of honor in the mid 2000s.

It's a shame, like he didn't get moved over. Like WWF never picked him up. Like at the same time they picked up Holder, Hearst Helmsley, John Paul Levesque. Like Alex Wright would have fit right in because Alex Wright's as tall as Jean Paul Levesque, Hunter, Hart, Helmsley.

Oh, yeah. He's.

He.

He. It's very misleading how tall he is. Like, he doesn't look on TV. He didn't. He didn't come across as being like, 65 or whatever he is.

It was huge.

Yeah.

And he could have got even bigger or whatever and been a monster.

Oh, absolutely, absolutely. Yeah.

Who knows?

Yeah. Who knows? But, yeah. So anyways, Sabu beats him on his debut of Monday Nitro, only to have the decision reversed because he decides that after the bell, he's gonna put Alex right through a table.

Yeah, well, I love that they did that because it's like, oh, this guy. Like, everyone knows this guy's supposed to be crazy. So let's have him go through crazy, right? And then he loses the match because of it.

Huh? Huh? And he starts a mini feud as well with a masked wrestler named Mr. J.L. who we stupid. We. We will see in a yearish.

We'll see.

Yeah. Mr. Jerry Lynn.

Mr. Mr. Jerry Lynn.

Yeah, he doesn't. He's not Mr. Mr. Jerry Lynn or anything, but Mr. J.L. yeah, he's Mr. J.L. he has one match with him on Nitro. It. Oh, it's. It.

It's the jl. It pissed me off how lame it was even as a kid. I was like, that name sucks. He's a Mass wrestler. He's awesome. Yeah, he's Mr. JL.

What it's like, is that my teacher the laziest. You know, like, the least amount of effort put into naming him. Oh, yeah. Okay. What's your. What's your name, kid? Jerry Lynn. JL all right, you're gonna be Mr. Jail. Put the mask.

They should have just called him J.L. not Mr. J.L.

right, exactly. Like. And the other thing is, Jerry Lynn had been wrestling since, like, 1987 at that point, like, he. He had been a jobber in the awa. So it's not like he was some random dude. He didn't have a name as much as, like, Sabu or whatever, but it's like, you could have had him come in as Jerry Lynn. People would kind of know him. He was in global, like, Right.

They wanted to spice him up. Like I said, just call him J.L. and put a mask on him. That's cool. J.L.

yeah, exactly. Exactly. So they have a match on Nitro, and then they have a match at Halloween Havoc. And this match is famous for. I say famous. Infamous for two reasons. One, during the first, like, minute and a half, Sabu does an Acai moonsault to the outside and breaks the Sheik's leg, but doesn't even realize it. And then at the end of the match, Sabu beats JL and then the she cobbles into the ring and throws a fireball in Jail's face for no reason.

What?

Yeah. Have you ever seen this match?

Oh, yeah, I've seen the Halloween.

Yeah. Yeah. So, yep, for those of you who haven't, the. The Chic escorts Sabu down to the ring, and he's got this big, like, Middle Eastern saber. Just looks cool. And Sabu and Jerry Lynn decided they were going to start the match off fairly quick and, you know, hot and just kind of get the crowd going. They didn't tell the Sheik what they were going to do, so they're doing their thing, and they end up outside by the Sheik. And Cebu goes up and does an Acai moonsault, except the Sheik didn't know that he was going to do this. So Jerry Lynn goes to catch Sabu and stumbles backwards, and they both land on the Sheik, and it basically breaks the Sheik's hip. The Sheik had an artificial hip, and it just pops it out now. No, neither of them knew this at the time that they had hurt the Sheik, because the Sheik just gets up and stands at ringside like he's supposed to do, and then they finish the match. I forget how the match ends, but that's irrelevant. And the Sheik rolls into the ring while Sabu's, you know, quote unquote, celebrating, and just hobbles over to Jerry Lynn and throws a fireball at him for no reason. Jerry Lynn's just, like, in the corner laying there, selling that he just lost. And all this in Jerry Lynn's words, he goes, I was laying there, and all of a sudden there was a flash of light in my face, and I felt a bunch of heat, and I went, what the just happened?

That's his gimmick, though. He's got to throw a fireball, right?

But he couldn't have done it during the match.

Now he's like, I gotta get my shit in, man. Right.

Well, the other thing is he was told, do not throw fire, because that's gonna get as kicked off of, like, turn the Turner. People don't want to. Don't want this. You know, like, they don't this. They don't want fire being thrown. And the Chic went, okay, and then said, I'm just gonna do it myself because I'm the Chic, you know?

Yeah. Oh, he had to. He had to. Oh, no, because this was not mistaken. This was in Detroit, right?

Yes. Yeah, that was Cobalt. So that's exactly where. That's. That's why they had the chic with them to begin.

Right. So he's like, I gotta get my spot in here. I'm here. People want to see me. It's Detroit, Right. And it's the same night as the Monster Truck, right?

Yes. Yep.

Yeah.

But, yeah, so then they. They. I guess when Sabu found out, he felt so bad, and he goes. He goes, but my uncle, he never bitched about. About the fact that I broke his hip. He's never. Never mentioned it. Never brought it up. Didn't give me hell for it anyway. Yeah, he no sold it for the rest of his life. He no sold it.

You didn't hurt me.

You Right, exactly. And then the next night on Nitro, he faces Disco Inferno, and that's his last match in wcw. So he's basically. It's basically in WCW for like a month and a half. Yeah.

That's a shame, though. Like, that's the story, though, of Sabu, as we'll continue on, is that he just gets bounced out of places. He just goes different places.

Yep.

But, hey, explorer, I love it. I love that he just made his mark everywhere that he could, goes wherever.

And he's a draw all over the place because he has a. An aura about him, you know?

Exactly.

So that brings us to November to remember 95, when Sabu makes his return to ECW, which he basically just starts feuding with Scorpio over the TV title. Feuds with Cactus Jack faces off against Stevie Richards, and then it eventually leads into the feud with RVD, when RVD shows up in early 96 over the.

On 420.

Yeah.

Of all dates.

Yeah, I know. It leads to the stretcher match. They had a Doctor's Inn. They have a match at Unlucky Lottery, which I don't think we even ever covered.

No, we never covered Unlucky Lottery. What the was that

was after Dr. Is in. So it's sometime in. Sometime in late 96. I think it was one of those. Like, it was. It was an ECW arena show, but it was. It was just a show. Like, it wasn't. They had a name for it, but it was actually.

It wasn't even ECW Arena. It was Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania.

Oh, okay. It's one of those ones.

It was the night prior to when worlds collide in 96.

Oh, okay. Yeah. So they have a grudge match and eventually, eventually they. They make up. So not make up, but they, you know, get each other's respect. And that's when the. The Can Am Express Furnace and Lafon face them both at When Worlds Collide and then at High Incident. Also, obviously, you got Taz. Yeah, I know you got Taz calling Sabu out, um, partially because Cebu, when Paul Heyman fired him, the whole crowd was, you know, you Saboo, you're a piece of. And then he comes back and the crowd's like, oh, my God, we love you so much. And Taz is like, I busted my ass. I broke my neck. And, you know, he. He comes back and they just love him when I've been here the whole time. Fair gripe at that point.

Yeah.

And so that's when he starts calling him out. And, you know, basically, they're. They don't, you know, they don't touch. They don't come into contact with each other, but. Like the Cold War. Yeah, exactly. There's, you know, Sabu doesn't answer them. Sabu doesn't answer him. And finally Sabu answers. I meant November to remember 96, wasn't it? Yeah, it's November to remember 96.

Yeah. And the lights will go out.

Lights go out. Sabu appears, they circle each other, they step in to lock up, and the lights go out again. The lights come back up and they're gone crazy. That was a great, great moment. Yeah, imagine that.

Like the fact that that's memorable. Like the people that watched it at the time and just the people that seen it on video, whatnot. Like that. That's still memorable. But Matt, like, imagine that being on actual tv, like live tv.

Yeah.

Where people, like, where people could see it, like a mass audience. Like, that's great television right there. And great television was being produced on such a low level.

Yeah. I mean, say what you will about Paul Heyman, the man can book a TV show and book a feud when he puts his mind to it. So, yeah, yeah, keeps keep going with Sabu and rvd, or he's still teaming and, you know, building up to no barely legal Sabo vs Taz, which was a pretty good match. Part of the double main event was on the poster.

So, Rick, you're down playing now. Like.

I know, I know.

Come on.

That was.

Hey, you don't have to rush through everything, do you?

No, it was a great. It was a great match. It's very. It's a historical match. I mean, for. For all intents and Purposes, I would argue that it may have even been a better feud than Tommy and Raven,

only it's not debatable. I like Taz. H. No, man. Yeah, now I'm in the debate.

Yeah.

Because.

Because. Not because Tommy and Raven was bad, but because Tommy and Raven went from 95 until 97, and it was pretty much Raven kicking Tommy's ass or dodging Tommy for two years. Sabu and Taz. It was Taz calling out Sabu for about a year, and then they just built up towards the one match it was not. You didn't get tired of it. Whereas with Tommy and Raven, it. I don't want to say you got tired of it, but it was like, oh, okay, Tom. It got to a point where you're going, okay, Tommy's not going to win. Tommy's not going to win. Okay. Oh, oh. Now it's Raven and Stevie versus Tommy and Sandman. Well, Tommy's not going to win. You know, Tommy's either gonna get pinned or he. He's gonna pin Stevie, but he's not gonna pin Raven.

Right. That deck was always stacked against Tommy Dreamer.

Yeah.

And Raven just had his cronies and all. All the going on. Whereas with Taz and Sabu, you don't even have that because Sabu's not around for most of the time.

Right.

Taz is just like, you, man. I'm gonna. I'm calling you out. You better come back. I'm calling you out. All that.

And Taz goes through different people by, you know, calling out Sabu. Hey, come stop me.

You know, he's building up his character now. There's a similar storyline, a similar angle that's going on right around the same time as this, and that's in wwf. And it's Stone Cold. Stone Cold's doing the same thing to breath the Hitman heart.

Call him out.

Brehot's been out since WrestleMania 13 in early 96.

WrestleMania 12.

No. Yeah, 12. Did I say 13?

You did say 13.

All right.

Yeah.

So he's been out since WrestleMania 12 when he lost the title, and that whole second half of that year. Stone Cold is on the rise and he's calling up a person that's not around. Just like Taz calling out Sabu, who is not around to defend himself, but, like pumping himself up, being like, oh, I'm the best around now you're not around anymore. I'm the best. And Taz goes on that run where he's just destroying people. So very similar.

Yeah, I never thought about it. That way. But you are. You are, right? Yeah. Stone Cold calling out Brett for the whole summer until the same year.

Right.

The 96. Yeah.

96 into 97.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it goes. Yeah. Basically. So Brett leaves 96. That was the end of March. Beginning of April was WrestleMania. So say April. April to November. Yeah, that's. I mean, Taz had been calling out Sabu, but yeah, it's lines up pretty well. And November is the. The month that it comes to a head. Granted, Brett and Austin had a match. Sabu and Taz didn't.

But they didn't.

Not at that time. But yeah, you're right.

That.

That was like they have that November

match at Survivor Series, but then that just sets up more leading to WrestleMania, which is just a few weeks before illegal.

Yeah. Yep. Yeah. So it's very. There's a lot of parallels

and I, I think a lot of people would say Taz is like the Stone Cold of ECW at that time too.

Oh, definitely. He's. He's. He talks.

Talks harsh.

Yeah. The anti hero. You know where.

Right.

He's not badass. Right. He's not a good guy, but he's really not a bad guy either. He's just.

Oh, he's just a guy that wants to prove himself.

Right. He's a badass, like you said. Yeah.

Not to make this about Taz, but. Or Stone Cold, for that matter. Yeah, I thought the connection was there.

Oh. And I mean, it's. It's fair because Taz did post. He posted a video of, you know, saying Rip Sabu and then also, glad to say, on Aw, he also had something nice. And I, I think it was actually kind of. It was kind of cool that he did that. And he started, you know, he broke down on TV and AEW because it goes to show that, like, look, they were rivals, but he has a lot of respect for him and, you know, that it. It hurt him that, you know, Sabu was gone. Kind of the thing, you know, like, it's. It's.

I believe this has said that, like Taz is only tasked because Sabu put him over.

Exactly. That's.

He gave him that feud.

Yeah, he said. He said that. I forget if it was on Aw or if it was the just like the little tick tock selfie type video. But yeah, he basically said, I got brought into ECW to do one thing. That one night at Red Blood Fest, Blood Feast, I'm putting over Sabu. That's it. He goes, I was. I was supposed to be there for one night just to put him over and that's it. And Sabu made me look so good that they kept me there for four years or whatever, you know?

Right.

Like, that's it. So like you said, there would be no Taz without Sabu. And the fact that he can admit that is. Is great because it's true. You know, there would be no Taz without Sabo.

Yeah. There would be not a lot of other people without Sabo.

Right.

A lot of the people that were just kids like us watching wrestling and reading in the magazines that became wrestlers because. Him too. Yes.

Yes. So after Barely Legal, we go and Taz and Sabu have a rematch at Russell Palooza, and Sabu actually wins it. And that leads into Born to Be Wired, which we kind of covered recently.

Well, kind of recently. Yeah.

I say. I say kind of covered because we. We didn't see the whole match. We saw like that clips and then the ending of it. Yeah. Where Cebu beats Terry Funk for the. The title in a. Yeah. He tapes. Tapes his arm up because he tears his bicep to the bone, like.

Oh, nasty.

And that. That will. I mean, as I'm sure you're aware, but that will not be the first time that we'll see Sabu injure himself badly in a match and super glue or tape his. His wounds shut so he can finish the match.

This guy.

Yeah. Hey, that's. He's hardcore.

Or crazy definition of who he is.

Yeah.

He's hardcore.

Yeah. And then what. What was it like nine days later after Born To Be Wired?

Yeah.

That was the Hardcore Heaven.

Well, we just covered Hardcore Heaven.

Yeah.

Up episode. Hopefully the one we're recording right now is better quality. We don't know until it gets released.

Yeah. Because Hardcore Heaven, it sounded great when we were recording it.

Yeah. Then it became a hardcore heaven. R. Yeah.

Yep. So one thing I. We did kind of Glo. Not gloss over this, but I did find something interesting. So after Cebu comes back in 95 and he's wrestling, you know, in ECW in 96, apparently he was offered a spot in WWF. He was the original choice to be the sultan.

Oh, really? I didn't know that.

That's what. That's what I. I read it was. Sabu had said that he was offered that he would be The Sultan. Summer 96.

Cool.

And he was gonna take it. And Paul even said, yeah, take it. So, you know. But he turned.

Ended up wearing the same gear, basically. He wore the big. Yeah. Pants and.

Yeah. Yeah.

He had the little mask too. He did, like, early Savu and the turban, kind of like the head.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But he turned it down because they wouldn't. They wouldn't have his uncle be his manager. They were going to put him with the iron cheek, so.

Oh, that's who they put Fatu with.

Right, exactly. Which, I mean, I'm not. I'm not picking on wwf. But you got to think of it this way. Sultan doesn't talk, Sheik doesn't talk.

Yeah.

Putting it with the iron cheek. The she. Iron cheek talks. We all know he talks. So how do you. How can you get this guy over without a mouthpiece? That's. That's probably what they were thinking, you know?

Right. Yeah. Now, it's funny you say that, because I don't know if I'll be leading to this. Yeah. But one of the greatest mouthpieces that he could have had is Bill Alfonso.

Oh, yes, yes. And that's that. Yeah. Because Fonda turns on as Barely Legal to become his manager and.

Right. So that changes, like, Sabu's character, too, as well. Like, all right, this guy is quiet all the time now. You got, like, this juxtaposition, I guess, is how you phrase it. Right.

He goes from no sound to no. Fonzie not shutting up and blowing his whistle.

Blowing his whistle doesn't shut the up. He's always yelling, yeah, baby. Yeah, daddy. Like, all this nonsense is just, like. It just feeds into the chaos of Sabu, like, diving off of everything. Right. Going through tables. Yeah.

Plus Fonzie's, like, setting up tables for him. He's giving him a chair so he can, you know, throw it at the guy or put it down to bounce off, to do his air Sabu or whatever. So it. He's. He's helping with the character, too.

Yeah. Fonzie was amazing. He gets. I think he's. I. I don't. I. I don't think he's underrated, but I feel like maybe some people might think he's underrated. Like, he helps Sabu out big time.

Yeah. The. The thing with Fonzie is he, for a while, like, in wwf, when he was in Florida and everything, when he was a referee, he was just there, you know, he did his job exactly how he's supposed to do it was just out of the way. Then he comes into ECW as the troubleshooting referee who's enforcing the rules in ecw, and everybody hates him. Hates him to the point of they want to kill him. And then he becomes Taz's manager. And now it's like, he's the most annoying little. And nobody will with him because they have to contend with Taz. And then he goes on to be Saboo's manager, and he's just an annoying guy again. He's annoying because of the whistle. And he's. Yeah, Daddy, I'm. You know, doesn't shut up and everybody hates him again. But looking back on it, he was doing his job. He was doing a damn good job. That's the point. He was trying to make people hate him. And it became such a. A thing that everybody started loving him because, hey, it's Fonzie, you know, so. Yeah, yeah. It's just.

I have that. Yeah, yeah. I have that in my heart for him. He's Fonzie, man. This guy's the man.

Yeah, it's like, I want people know

who I want to get a picture with him. Well, people know, like, my criticism of referees, whoever listened to the Bottom Line wrestling cast or many extreme ECW Live cast episodes, I on referees often. And now he became more of a character than a referee. But as a referee, I never would complain about Bill Alfonso. Like, nope, there's plenty of referees that make it about them. At least when he made it about him, he became an actual character. We can move beyond that. Beyond being a reference. Like, his storyline as a ref, making it about him led to something. And how many refs can say that? Like Earl Hebner. No, it never led to anything really at all. Other than the first time you showed up in WWF and we're the fucking stupid twin.

Yes.

That was it.

Yep.

And then you just became a blow hard for yourself.

Right. You had to get his in.

Right. But yeah, Bill Fonzo, man, he's awesome. I think he was like ref of the year at some point in the 80s, too.

Yeah. When he was in Florida.

Yeah.

Yep. Yeah, he was the. He was the ref for the Bruiser Brody. Lex Luger, Cage Match. That Bruiser Brody completely started no selling. And Luger ends up running away because he thought Bruiser Brody was gonna kill him.

Yep.

Yeah, you're right. Fonzie was ref of the year at some point. Like, PWI Ref of the Year or something. So back to ECW with after Hardcore Heaven.

Yeah, we don't have to go into too much more because now we're at the point where we are in the Extreme ECW Live cast. So.

Yeah, well, that's what I was gonna say is we saw that. That him and RVD were beating up the ice Insane Clown Posse, as they should. And Sandman came in and saved and so they beat up the Sandman. And that's, that's going to lead places. But like I said, yeah, it's going

to lead to a Sandman feud for a while. Sabo is going to team up with RVD and yep, they're gonna have some

great matches in 1998.

Yeah, we don't want to break all that down now because, you know, we're gonna, we're gonna do it, we're gonna talk about it, we're gonna watch it. So there is all that to come. And that kind of culminates into the end of his ECW career, though.

Yes. So one.

So we're almost through covering that. Yep. And yeah, just that like right there is like, man, we've watched a whole lot that, man, as the time goes by, it's like you don't realize what you've covered and what you've watched. Like, wow. We've experienced a lot of his career.

Oh, absolutely.

Now. And I've said it, I said it earlier. Yes. I goof on the botches and JV goofs on the botches. We. A lot of times we're just doing that on purpose.

Yeah.

Because that is what he does. He botches. And we're going to call it out. And yeah, sometimes it might seem like we don't like him, but we appreciate him. We know his impact on the history of wrestling, on the history of what wrestling became to this day. Like he was an innovator. So, yeah, we understand that. It's. I just want to put that out there. It's like, yeah, people probably thinking, like, why is Mike pro, even on this episode paying tribute to Sabu when he shits on him all the time? I should on all the time. Because it's part of a episode where it's supposed to be funny. That's it. Goof on the guy because he botches.

Right.

But I understand. I know wrestling. I've watched wrestling for a long time. His botches ultimately became part of his character is how I surmise it. It's this guy's risking his life. If you're risking your life all the time, you're gonna fuck up. Right. Just think day to day life, if you, if you live a crazy lifestyle, you think you're gonna do things perfectly every time. Nope, you're gonna fuck up a lot. That's what Sabu did. He was a crazy wrestler, so he fucks up a lot. And in kfab, you can almost say that's not a botch. He's just going nuts.

If, If. If you ask rvd, some of the botches were actually intentional simply because maybe Sabu knew that people were coming to see if he was gonna something up, so he'd it up on. On purpose. Oh, yeah. He's off the rope or whatever, because why not? You know?

That's great. Well, see, yeah, I didn't even know that. I didn't hear that, but thought, yeah, like, this guy, he's a pro. He. He was around the world. He knows what he's doing. And yes, you're gonna up. If you're trying to do what he does. You're gonna slip, gonna fall. And that just becomes part of the lore, becomes part of the story, is that, oh, you. You up. And it gave the crowd. And at that time, that was a new thing, right, Rick? That you fucked up. You fucked up, right?

Yeah. I mean, people.

People created that almost, right?

Yeah, people would botch stuff, but the crowd wouldn't either know or they wouldn't. They wouldn't be chanting you fucked up, you know, that kind of stuff. He. He was the innovator of up. Not really, but, you know,

he made up cool, right?

He. Exactly. He. He made botching a. Botching a spot. Cool. That's a. That's a great way to put it through.

No, and that's the thing, like, when you mess up. No, like, I think of, like, how I do at work. Like, if I mess up, like, I just try to move on, pretend like it was fine, and that's what everyone should do. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that was. All right.

I meant to do that.

Yeah, I meant to do that. That was fine. And Sabu, he killed it, man. He's. Yeah. All right, so, Rick, I want to get you back on track, though, because I took you on a detour.

Yeah, no, it's. That was a worthwhile detour.

And it's funny because, like, we talked about this. Oh, we got to keep this, like, this first part, like, 40 minutes. So we can. We can never do that. No. No. All right, Rick, so go ahead.

All right, so the last Sabu match he has, I won't tell the date, but it's against one Scott Demore, who is, last time I checked, was like, the president of TNA or something like that. High up in that kind of thing. Yeah, that guy, the. If I don't know. Did you. Did you watch TNA much, Pru?

I watched. Not early tna, but I watched, like, the Impact DNA and like. Okay, 16.

Yeah, I. I'm not saying you definitely have Seen Scott Demore, but. Scott Demore.

I know Scott Demoris.

You do? Okay. All right. Because I was gonna say he, he was involved in quite a bit of like the behind the scenes stuff, but he also was on, on screen. But yeah, he Cebu beats Scott Demore and that's his last match in ECW. Obviously it's before 2001, but. Yeah. And so then he goes on to just doing independence kind of floating around. Ends up in iwa Mid South Border City Wrestling up in Canada. Stampede apparently. I didn't know Stampede was still in it running in 2000. It must have been.

That was a revival.

Yeah. I was gonna say one of the brothers.

I think it was Bruce that brought it back.

Of course it was Bruce but. And then he ends up in XPW and he actually wins their title. The world title. Whatever. I don't know if it's a world title, but probably shouldn't be a world title. Their. Their heavyweight title. How's that sound? Yeah, and I mean I'm, I, I think my views on XPW are fairly. Have been. Have been fairly covered at this point. But xpw, if you took out all of the, the pornography aspect of it, it's ECW light.

Yeah. You know, I mean trying to go for.

Right. And I think it would have been somewhat successful except for the fact that the whole marketing of it was it's porn and wrestling, you know.

Yeah, that's. Yeah.

Anyways, yeah, we'll, we'll talk more because XPW will show up later on in ecw. There'll be a, an incident. We'll bring it up then. Anyways, so he also, he also ends up winning the, the heavyweight title for 3pw. I forget what 3 the 3pw stands for, but they're, they're in like Pennsylvania or something. They were just an indie type of thing. And he beats Gary 3 PW. It's like.

Gary G. Yeah.

It's like, I swear it's like power.

The.

Was Gary Wolf Wrestling or something? Yeah. And this was in like 2002, 2001. So it's like years after the Pit Bulls, you know. And he just kind of bounces around. He. He's on the very last show of the FMW ever does again. He's teaming with Tetsuhiru Karate Kuroda again. I don't know. Yeah. Against. He's. And he's facing the Sandman and a guy named Fuyuki. Fuyuki had been around for 10 plus years at that point. Not a bad wrestler, just kind of one of those Guys that he's in Japan, he's known, but he's not. He's not, you know, Tatsumi Fujinami or Tenryu or Muda or anything.

Not at this point.

Yeah, no, no.

And then he actually, he's not dealing with any. Anybody special.

No, no, no, no. And actually I think Fuyuki ends up passing. Passing away. He has cancer like at some point in the. Shortly after this or whatever. But yeah, he's on the last FMW event. It's February 4th, and then like a week and a half later they go out of business. So he also ends up on the World Wrestling All Stars tour in Australia. He wrestles Devin Storm, Crowbar and a few.

I love Devin Stone. Yeah, he's. He's a local guy. To me he is.

Yeah.

Because he was always in the New England shows.

Yeah, he was in. He was in ECW for a cup of coffee too. Dressed like a. Like a rocker. Yeah, yeah.

And that's what he wore early on in New England as well.

Yeah. What?

Well, at this point was he still. We. He wasn't wearing that gimmick anymore?

No, no, no. He was more Crowbar with the. The straggly hair.

Still being called Devon Storm.

Yeah, he went back to being Devil Storm probably. Probably because was, well, Crowbar. WCW was in wcw and even though this was after WCW closed, that was probably part of the assets that WWF bought. You know, the name. Either that or he was like, well, I don't really want to be associated with Crowbar.

So it's funny I say name recognition for Devin Storm. Like that's name recognition, right?

I know, yeah.

Which for me it is more so than Crowbar. Yeah, well, I think like some grimy greasy dude like as Devon Storm he was. You look like a Russell man.

Yeah, he did.

Yeah, he was pretty damn good.

Yeah, he was just like a standard indie wrestling guy. But he still looked like a wrestler. He didn't look like he worked at Gamestop.

Oh, he could.

Yeah. Oh, he could have. Yeah, he probably did. Or to quote Hard Body Works, he works at Jiffy Lube on the, on the weekends, you know. And also Sabu wrestled a three way hardcore match against Perry, Saturn and Simon Diamond.

Simon diamond you've brought up before and I never got to the point of watching Simon Diamond.

Simon diamond is. He's. He's a passable wrestler. I'm not going to on him because he's not. He's not bad.

He's forgetting what I did look up though is that he's the head of like talent relations for NWA right now.

Yes, he is. What is. He was in WWE for a cup of coffee. Was. What was his name? Simon Dean.

Oh, is it. Is he Simon Dean? All right, that would make sense then because I remember that it was like a.

Like his gimmick was like he was like a personal trainer or something.

Oh, it's a different guy, I think.

No, Simon D. I'm sorry. Simon Dean was Nova. So now.

Okay, hang on.

Now I gotta look up Simon Lance Diamond.

Simon Diamond.

Maybe I'm thinking. Maybe I'm thinking that he was. I think I'm thinking of something different. I'm thinking. Okay, I'm thinking. I'm thinking of Simon Dean. Nova

too.

Yeah, I don't think he was in wwe. He's been in TNA and stuff.

But even still, this guy is the head of talent for.

Yeah, he is the director of talent relations for the nwa.

Which shout out to Sparks and Half Point. Yeah, because they're covering that. This guy's running the. Running the talent.

Yeah, he was, he was a guy that was in like the indie darling kind of era where he had like reckless youth and. Yeah, those kind of guys back in like the, you know, mid to late 90s.

Right.

But yeah, so he wrestled. So Sabu wrestles Saturn and Simon diamond in a three way hardcore match in wwa, but he also ends up in TNA in July of 2002.

I wish I could see more of this.

Yeah.

Stuff.

I know. I, I didn't. I. I'll fully admit I didn't watch tna, like, ever. I never was. Was a TNA guy. I had seen bits and pieces of things throughout their history, but I never was invested in it.

Yeah. The thing. Yeah. With me is I, I kept like cashed out of Wrestling in 2001.

Basically 2003 for me when Stone Cold

turned heel, like, not because he turned hill, but because of just. I graduated high school that year. Yeah, that's over. All right.

Yeah, that's.

That's about.

Yeah.

And 2003, then I, I kind of just like passively watched it and I was like, all right, that's going on. Oh, there's this guy, John Cena who's like Mark Wahlberg. That's cool. And like, I didn't really pay attention much until. I know. Until I finished college. And I was like, all right, I wanna watch wrestling again with my friends.

Yeah.

And then we started watching. I know. And there was this tna. I was like, I'm not watching this. What the hell is this? Like, I put it on A couple times like, ah, this, this ring sucks. I'm not, I'm not watching it just because of my age. Not that I had anything really against it. It was just I hadn't been watching wrestling. Now am I gonna watch this wrestling that looks like not wrestling? And all these young people that I don't even know who the hell they are.

Yeah, the six sided ring and all that.

Right. And I don't care about if Ken Shamrock's in there. No, no, Shamrock should have been one of the titles before in wwf and they didn't let him do that.

Yeah.

And then Jeff Jarrett's in this too, so that sucks too.

Right? And he's, he's the world champion. What? All right, so, so I, I didn't do a whole lot of research into it. I just kind of skimmed TNA because it didn't seem like there was. Like he was there, he was doing stuff, but it wasn't anything big.

Yeah, I looked into it too and I thought, like, it seemed like a pretty decent run for a short time.

Yeah.

To be in there. Like he had feuds with Raven, right?

Yeah, that's. I was gonna say is I, I. The biggest thing I saw Raven had

like CM Punk in his group called the Gathering.

Yeah. Was 2004 when he teams with Raven and then he feuds with them and they, they, you know, finally get, they're doing the whole like Sabu's, I'm not gonna fight you. I promised my uncle I wouldn't fight you. Which doesn't really make sense, but whatever. Yeah. And eventually Raven breaks him down.

What I was saying, what the. Does that mean not gonna fight Raven?

Yeah, I don't know. It's the same thing of like, you know, the Undertaker and Kane, you know, I'm not gonna fight my brother. Like, okay, that at least kind of made sense, but yes. So then eventually Raven breaks him down and he's faces Raven, but then he hurts his back. And so the feud kind of gets put on the back burner and goes away while he has a back injury. He apparently caught a virus. And they had a benefit show. The awwl, don't know, indie promotion, I'm guessing, holds a benefit show to help him pay for his medical bills. Yeah.

Great.

Yeah. And so then he f. He, you know, comes back from being sidelined. He faces Terry Funk and Shane Douglas at Hardcore Homecoming, which was I think like two or three days before One Night Stand in 2005. So basically they like Redid the three way dance and then he faces Rhino at WWE. One Night's ECW One Night Stand from the Hammers. Hammerstein Ballroom. Yep. Yeah, well, I couldn't remember if it was a Hammerstein or if it was a Manhattan Center.

Yeah. Hammerson.

Yeah. And that obviously, kinda eventually, not right away leads to him being in WWWE for the ECW Revival, I guess is the best way to put it.

Yeah. Oh, funny. Even before that though, like with his run at cna, he gets through, he gets released from that.

Yeah.

So. Yep, he just keeps getting released.

Huh. Like, like you said, he shows up and then he's gone. He comes back to TNA to face off with Jarrett and against Jarrett and Rhino teaming up with Raven and then he has a feud with Abyss that leads to like a barbed wire massacre match that everybody says is pretty brutal. I haven't seen it, so I can't

say for sure, but yeah, I haven't either.

Yeah. And then he apparently faces Samoa Joe at lockdown 06. Again, haven't seen it. From what I, from what I've heard though, the Lockdown pay per views, it's like every match is a steel cage match. Which.

Yeah. Which is horrible. Tv.

That's dumb to me.

Hell wants to see cage match.

And I'm. And I, I may also be a little biased because I believe it was at Lockdown a year earlier that Chris Candido broke his leg and ended up passing away. So that's kind of a shitty thing too, you know, sustain. You continued it on Lockdown. Yeah. But yeah, so he ends up signing a contract with WWE for a year in 2006. And that's when he has the match against Rey Mysterio at one night stand 2006, the same.

That was a good run though.

Yeah. Yeah.

Like it sounds shitty. Like, oh, it's ECW WWE version. But they gave him a lot of big time matches.

Oh, they did.

As Rick's gonna run through right now.

Yep, yep. So he faces Rey Mysterio at One Night Stand and I believe that was for the. Was it for a title.

It's the World Heavyweight Champion,

the big gold belt.

Yeah.

And that ends in a no contest when they both go through a table. Surprise, surprise. And then he is on the ECW TV show, what they call ECW on Sci Fi, and he wins a battle royal and that earns him a shot at John Cena for the WWE title at Vengeance, which he doesn't win, but it's in an extreme lumberjack match, so you know, he should have won it.

That's a, that's a great spot to be in, though, too.

Oh, it is. I'm not. I'm not on it.

Yeah. 2006 to be.

Oh, my God. Yeah. Because that was one night stand, actually. No. Yeah. Cena would have been the champion at that point, but Cena had faced off against RVD on at One Night stando six, and that was the. If Cena wins, we. Riot sign and him throwing the shirt into the crowd and them throwing it back at him.

Right, right.

So, yeah, that was a big. Big. That was. You know, him. Sabu Versina was a big. That was a big spot, like you said.

Yeah, it was a lumberjack match. Yeah, right. Yeah.

Yeah, an extreme lumberjack match, I believe.

Yeah. Because all the extreme are out there.

Yeah. Extreme. I love that.

That's a funny time to go back and watch, though. 2006. Hey, as long as this podcast goes on, we are gonna watch ecw.

Oh, sure. That was during my dark period, so I. I have very little knowledge of what was going on outside of, like, the. The big stuff, you know, like all the feuds. I don't necessarily know. So I'll be. If. When we get to that. I'm definitely excited to. To see it, you know, because it.

It.

From what I've heard, like you said, it's.

There's some stuff.

Right. It's not all shitty. It. There's some good stuff. All right.

And Paul Heyman is involved in some of it.

Yeah. At least in the beginning.

Yeah.

So anyways, then we. We have the unfortunate incident where RVD and Cebu, after a house show in. I think it was in West Virginia or something, they get pulled over for speeding, and they. The cops discover that they have 18 grams of weed and five Vicodin, along with a bunch of other unidentified pills in there on their person, so they get arrested. Now, RVD at the time was not only the WWE Champion, but was also the ECW Champion. And so that. That kind of put a damper on things because it was all over tmz. I remember that. I wasn't watching wrestling at that point, but I remember seeing that. I'm like, oh, God, what the. The. No. Neither of them ends up going to jail or anything, but basically, RVD kind of gets bumped down the card and Sabu keeps going, but they ends up getting pulled out of the. The spot, I believe. Just kind of like a punishment, you know, he ends up facing off against the Big Show. But, I mean, it's the Big Show. Like, nothing against Big show, but.

Oh, that's the Big Show.

Yeah. Yeah, it's The Big Show.

Yeah. Who gives a about Sabu Feeds in the Big Show.

Exactly. Exactly.

Yeah. That's where some of this comes to it. Show.

Yeah. Yep. Or like the. The December to December pay per view. The one and only WWE cw.

The worst one ever.

Yeah. Where he is supposed to be in the Extreme Elimination Chamber and he gets assaulted backstage and is replaced by one Hardcore Holly. You know, the ECW Original Hardcore Holly.

Yeah. Smokey Bond.

Granted Test and Bobby Lashley I believe were also in that match. But anyways, so that's just Show.

Yeah. I think next thing coming up though is this is a good spot for Sabu is he was in a Royal Rumble.

He was.

That's pretty cool that he actually got to be in that.

Yeah. And he brings a table down to the ring and then proceeds to get choke slammed through it to get eliminated. But that's a memorable spot. And just the fact of he was in a Royal Rumble is pretty, pretty impressive. You know, I've never been in a Royal Rumble. Scott hall was never in a Royal Rumble.

Yes, you're right.

Yeah. Which when you. When you say that to somebody who's wrestling fan, they go, no, he was in. No, no, he wasn't. No, no, no, he wasn't in the Royal Rumble in 94 or 95 or 93 or 93 or 96.

93 fought Braha in the main event.

Right. But it's always one of those things. No, he had to have been in the Royal rumble. Nope.

Nope.

93 like you said. 93. Wrestling Bret Hart. 94. He's wrestling somebody.

Forget Double J or something. No, double J is 95.

95 IRS. Maybe in 94.

IRS in 94, I think.

Yes. And then 96. I don't think he's even on the show in 96. Yeah, I don't. But yeah, he was never in a Royal Rumble. And that always like mystified. Not mystifies, but like people like. No, no. He would have had to have been like. No.

Right.

Yeah. He never was in a Royal Rumble. Despite the fact that he was in the company for four royal rumbles in

a row at 96. Was Gold Lust. Yeah, I see. Title because he was the IC champ.

Right.

Like every time or you know, in the first one against Brett, he was going for the title.

Exactly. Yeah. That's.

And that was all I see matches after that.

Yep. And then he leaves the Rumble. He's never. He's never back. I don't think he was in WWF again during like when the Royal Rumble was, you Know, because he comes back during the NWO, was it 2002 invasion? But I don't think he sticks around long enough to make it to January of 20 2003.

No, he wasn't. No.

Yeah. So, yeah, he. Sabu was in the Royal Rumble, which is pretty awesome. And his last match was roughly a year after his con signs contracts. May 1 is his last match. He gets released a couple weeks later, May of 2007. And then he goes back to the Indies for a while. He shows up in Juggalo Championship Wrestling.

What'd you call it?

Juggalo Champion Wrestling.

All right. There you go.

Yeah, well, that's the name of it.

Oh, is it?

Yeah, for a while, that's what it was.

Champion.

Yep. Yep.

As I. I was just thinking that's what it should be called.

Yeah.

All right.

I am. I. I am not a Juggalo. But when I was in high school, I bought. They had JCW volumes 1, 2 and 3 on VHS and DVD. I owned all three of them because it was like, hey, I like wrestling. I want to see this. This sounds funny. And in some cases, it was entertaining.

Yeah. Well, first off, I just want to say I don't have anything against jugglers.

Oh, I don't either.

Icp.

Yeah.

I was just, like, laughing at what you were saying.

Yeah, but. No, well, it's like. It's like you were saying, like, yeah, we. We on Sabu up. But it's. It's. It's part of the gimmick, you know, it's part of the show. It's like, I'm. I don't have a problem with Juggalos. I know people that are juggalos. I just. It's.

It's.

It's. It's me being funny, you know, trying to be funny. But yeah, they, they. It was literally called Juggalo Champion Wrestling, and then they eventually switched it to championship, but.

All right, so that's why I didn't know because I wasn't aware at that time. I seen after the facts it was championship.

Yeah. Yeah. And I don't think Sabu was on E. Any of those DVDs. Yeah.

You have DVDs of Champion?

I. I did. I don't know what happened to them at some point, but the tangent. But they are, like, filmed at, like, a nightclub or a bar or something like that, and they have.

Where the. Do you think they'd be?

Yeah, well, no, but that's what I'm saying. None of them were, like, at the gathering of the Juggalos. Or any, anything like that. Like they're always like these smoky halls, you know. And I can remember there was one match, King Kong Bundy beaten up, some real like skinny dude. And they, and they said, they said that King Kong Bundy looked like, looked like a dick in a broken black condom.

Well, yes, that's true.

When you're like 16, that's the funniest thing you'd ever could, you know, imagine.

Oh, King Kong Bundy.

Yeah, that poor guy. Yeah.

We talked about a show earlier where they didn't even release it for ECW and. Yeah, yeah, here he is on a Juggalos condom show.

Yeah, that's, that's, that's our new gimmick on King Kong Bundy. Now RIP King Kong Bundy too. I'm sure he was a very nice man.

I heard it was cool.

Yeah. Five count.

Yes.

So, yeah. So Sabu makes an appearance. It makes appearances in JCW and in AAA with that day of the six sided ring. And then he ends up back in TNA for Hardcore justice, which was the ECW tribute show that they did. We're skipping a little bit because he just kind of floats around the Indies.

Yes. I love. Yeah, I, I watched that show. That was a good show.

Yeah. In 2010. It's part of the EV 2.0. And then he ends up getting released in November of, of that year. And then again he's just bouncing around the Indies doing. Doing spots, that kind of thing. He ends up coming back to Impact eventually in like 2019 to, to team up with RVD and they face off against the Lucha Bros. Ray, Phoenix and Penta.

Well, that's timely right now because these bros are top stars right now in wwe.

Yes. Yeah, yeah, they're doing, they're doing really well. And during this time, Sebu tours the Europe. He's in the uk. He goes to Newfoundland and Canada. He wrestles Nick Gage in Game Changer Wrestling.

Who. Yeah.

Which is everybody knows Nick Gage, so to speak. I shouldn't say everybody, but Nick Gage is one of those guys that is very polarizing. Either you love him or you hate him.

Yeah. So as you get into that, I would like you to bring up like how like Sabu's influence, modern hardcore wrestling and whatnot. And that has to do with Nick Gage and gcw.

Yep. And in certain. And before that, you know, CZW and IWA Mid South. Yeah.

Right. Any others. But like his style of wrestling, a lot of people like to equate it to. I, I feel like people do like say oh, that's like ECW ripoff. It's like. No, it's kind of like a Sabu style ripoff. Like all these wrestlers want to be like Sabu because they're not being like ECW because ECW didn't do just that.

Right.

It's like this is a promotion that is tailor made to just be like Sabu style. And I think that's what some of these promotions were. And that's just my thought. And I think people like Nick Gage, Darby Allen, so forth, which is nothing wrong with that. They, they learn from Sabu. They became wrestlers because of Sabu. They didn't become Russells because of ECW wrestling. They became restless because of somebody like Sabu.

Right, right, that's. I, I completely agree with, with what you're saying. The thing about Nick, some like Nick Gage and I, I'm not an expert. I can't say that I've followed Nick Gage's career or anything like that.

And who would want to?

Right, Exactly. I'm.

You got the idea of what he goes for.

Right. And this is as somebody who, when I was in high school, they. There was, I don't know, is FYE a national thing? Do people know fye? I know they're around. They were around here, but.

Yeah. For your entertainment?

For your entertainment?

Yeah, yeah, it used to be.

Yeah, they used to be in every mall.

Yeah.

And so anyways, when I was in high school, FYE had a fairly sizable wrestling section. And not only was there, you know, WWF and WCW necw, but yeah, then you had ROH and all that. And that's actually where I got the JCW stuff was fye. But they also had the, the stuff from. Where was I going with this?

All the tapes that you're getting from the gate, like.

Yeah, my mind just went blank. Oh, okay. So they also had fmw. That's, that's where I was going with this, where the Garbage Wrestling, you know, they had that. Oh yeah, that's. I. Dude, I had FYE at FYE.

I had probably cost you like $40 for a.

No, no, because what they would. Okay, so what they were doing, right, was it was a company called Tokyo Pop. And Tokyo Pop would put out these fmw. Like for instance, they had FMW Total Carnage. And it was basically just a few matches. We'll say six matches from one show. The thing is, is I'm. I'm watching this in like 2000. The show that they're, that they have on the matches from was like 1995. So they took like old FMW footage and they dubbed over it with these two guys speaking English. But they were like trying to be funny. Not like icp where they're just on people on the commentary, but like they're trying to be real and make like serious. But it's. I don't. It's hard to describe. So it was like old footage, like five, six years old. That's when you. I saw like Mike awesome vs Hayabusa, Terry Funk and Terry Funk and Mr. Pogo against Masato Tanaka and Atsushi Onita in an exploding landmine, barbed wire death match, that kind of stuff. So as somebody who is. Who watched a decent amount of garbage wrestling, Nick Gage goes above and beyond garbage wrestling with pizza cutters and weed whackers, fluorescent light tubes and all that dumb. It's not entertaining to me. But here's the thing is for those, you know, for somebody who likes that kind of thing, that's the kind of stuff they like. Yeah, I mean, and obviously I do a show with you MJV about ecw and when people think ecw, they think barbed wire and they think thumbtacks and they think blood and violence and it was that. But it was other stuff too. I definitely think Nick Gage and some of the other people from czw, Game Changer, that kind of thing, were influenced by Sabu. And then they just kind of took it further, you know.

Yeah, that's fair. Yeah, yeah.

And just like, you know, Mick Foley was inspired to be a wrestler partly because he saw Jimmy Snuka come off the steel cage in Madison Square Garden. I can see people being like, I saw Sabu do xyz and that made me want to be a pro wrestler. I wanted to be a pro wrestler when I was, I don't know, 14, something like that, because of, I don't even know who. Shawn Michaels, we'll say, you know, it. Lots of wrestling fans have a guy that, oh, I want to be a wrestler because of that. And nowadays there's a lot of guys that are in the wrestling business because of somebody, and Sabu is definitely one of the, one of those people that influenced a lot, a lot of people, both from the high flying aspect and the, you know, reckless abandon, like Darby Allen, you know, let me, let me do this move called the coffin drop, where I basically just throw myself backwards off the top rope, you know, so it. Sabu is very influential whether, you know, whether people are directly imitating his moves or they're just kind of doing something that's an in the same vein, that's a case by case basis. But. But yeah, Cebu's influential. Absolutely.

No, I, I agree. Absolutely. Yeah. And that, that's, that was my sentiment is that, yeah, so many people have made their careers off of him, and we still see it with other wrestlers today, is that that is how wrestling should work, is that people learn from what came before them. And it's going to be gonna be wrestlers that come about that maybe we don't like that guy right now, but he's going to influence a whole new generation of wrestlers that keeps this going. Like, and this is something that we like. You know, Rick, you and I, jv, You know, we do this because we love wrestling. We're not just gonna give up caring about wrestling and like, loving and watching wrestling because it's not the same as it was. We're gonna follow along and sometimes it's gonna be stuff that. Yeah, maybe that's not for us, maybe that's not exactly what we like, but at least it's still happening. Like, the fact that this, this platform of entertainment still exists, it's amazing, right? And somebody like Savu was somebody that could just come in and just like, yeah, we're gonna change this a little bit or I'm gonna be part of this. And it's not like he intentionally decided to do that. He just did what was natural at the time and it led to something new. Now people could argue, is that good? Is it bad? Hey, guess what? It's still here. Wrestling's still here. And it's popular more than ever, probably. Oh, yeah, there's more thousands and millions of fans that go watch wrestling than ever before. I mean, you can, you can say all these places how they had. It was packed. It was packed. It was. Nothing's more packed than these shows today.

Yeah.

And a lot of it has to do with the style of wrestling that came about because of the movement in the 90s with people like Sabu innovating. So now, with that said,

just gonna

wrap things up here. Final Reflections. What's the legacy of Sabu for you? I, I kind of give mine. Like his legacy is what I was just describing. But what do you say? Just, I don't mean to put you on the spot.

Yeah, no, no, that's, that's, that's totally fair because like you said, you, you just kind of gave what your. You think his legacy is. And I mean, I can agree with a lot of the same things that you said.

Put it into a few words. What's the legacy

Innovative. He was very. And I say experimental, but I don't mean it like it just willing to. Willing to try new things. That's more what I. I think I mean when I say experimental, you know, you didn't have guys that would put a chair down, you know, two feet from the. The ropes, bounce off the other ropes, and then use that as a stepping stone to fly over the top rope. You didn't have that in 1994. Sabu did it. Now other guys do it or they do something similar to it. So yeah, I would say, you know, innovative, willing to try new things. And. And fearless, I guess is almost like probably a good way to sum him up.

Yeah, I love that. Innovative, willing to try new things and fearless. That. That sums up how most people should be like in general, like, you gotta try new things. You gotta be fearless. You're just gonna throw it out there. Try, try new things. Don't do the same old that everyone else does because that's old. Nobody wants that anymore. And how do things change if you don't try to progress? That's what he did. So, man, you nailed it perfectly with that. Like, I wish, you know, it's easy for. I like to equate things like that. I watch for entertainment to apply to my life, in my work. It's like, yeah, sometimes you just need to be innovative, take risk. And we've said this with Cebu previously, we didn't say here, but I think I said this. Part of my wrap up with him is you gotta be willing to up Taboo fucked up all the time. It was because he was trying. Right? He was trying to be something different. Right. Because if, if he was afraid to try new things, then yeah, we want to get the botches, but then we wouldn't get the good that he did either. Right.

Right. Yeah, you wouldn't, you wouldn't have certain moves or moments if he was like, no, I'm not gonna try that. I don't wanna, I don't want to try, you know, diving off of a ladder or whatever, you know, I'm just picking something out of midair.

All right. As much as I said as I bust balls on the show gripe about, oh, he botched, he botched, he botched. The botches is what made him good. Because the botches led to all the cool that we got to see when nobody else was even trying. So we can't bust this guy's balls because he's he up at doing nobody else did. Yeah, like various people tried it, gave up others eventually Once they learn how to do it safe, they did it. But he was the innovator, Man. Taboo. Rip, Rip. All right, so Rick, I thought I, I figured this would happen. We would just get too involved with talking about the career of Sabu, the legacy of Sabu, a tribute to Sabu that we would not get to our watch alongs that we planned on. We had two big watch along matches that you had found and I wanted to watch and I was like, all right, we should be able to do it. Yeah, we can, we can talk about all this other stuff in like 30 to 40 minutes and then, then we'll do the watch alongs and it'll be a nice hour and 30 minute episode. Nope, nope, no, that's not us. We just talk. And Rick, you know, Rick's, he's got all the knowledge. So. Yeah, we're not gonna. So what we'll do here is we're just going to present to you the episodes that we were gonna watch. They are available. We did kind of mention them before, but. Right.

Maybe he can throw them in the, in the show notes. Yeah, whatever.

So I'll put them in the show notes. But Rick, what are they?

So we were going to watch Sabu versus the Lightning Kid, you know, 1, 2, 3, kid, Xbox, Sean Waltman, whatever you want to call them from NWA Grand Slam, which was April of 1993, so it was about a month back before Lightning Kid ends up upsetting Razor Ramone on Monday Night raw, becoming the 1, 2, 3 kid. And that match was a tape trader, like a gem, so to speak. Like, that was a match that a lot of people were trading tapes for in the early 90s because of, as we mentioned, all the, the magazine coverage and everything. It just became kind of legendary. One of the, the legendary matches. And why I picked this one is because It's April of 1993. WrestleMania 9 was in April of 1993. You're not going to see any of the stuff that you see at WrestleMania 9. And what you see in this match in. I don't even remember if it's. I don't sound like a high school gym, but I mean it's, it's like a rec center, I believe, in Minneapolis. The other one is Saboover's Cactus Jack in a what's billed as a desert death match for the National Wrestling Conference in Las Vegas. And that's from October of 1994. Picked this because, as I said to Pru when, when we were talking about it, you can't go wrong with Sabu and Cactus Jack in a brawl. I mean, It's. It's like 26 minutes, and it's just pandemonium. Like, they're just all over the building brawling into the. There's a casino that they're at. They're brawling into the casino where the slot machines are. You don't see it in this tape, unfortunately, in the match video, but at one point, they brawl over to a blackjack table and climb on top of it and Cactus Jack pile drives Sabu on the blackjack table. And yeah, it was for like a quote unquote, small little indie company in Vegas. And actually the guy who founded it, his name is TC Martin. He's now the voice of the WNBA team in Vegas. I think they're the Aces. And he has his own podcast, the TC Martin Show. I haven't checked it out, but he's still doing sports. Sports. I mean, he's been doing sports for 30 years, so. Interesting little match, and I figured it was just kind of cool to see a Cactus Verse Sabu match that wasn't in ecw.

Yeah. So, yeah, I hope you guys check that out. And hey, if we happen to be able to just squeeze these in and maybe we'll do just like a straight up. Just watch along, like, bang right into those. We'll see if we have the time. Yeah, yeah. If not, please check those out.

Yeah, definitely not promising anything, but yeah, and check out, check out.

I kind of want to do that, Recto, because I want to watch those matches with you still.

Yeah, maybe. Maybe we can find a time. We can maybe rope JV into it too, just so he can get a,

you know, part of the Sabu.

Yeah, exactly. But, yeah, anybody out there that's listening, you know, thank you for listening to us. And definitely check out. There's plenty of Sabo stuff out there that's not ecw. WCW stuff. Definitely check him out because he's is pretty. Pretty innovative guy for. For the time. And as we just said multiple times, he was an influence on a lot of people. And it's sad that he's gone, but, you know, it's nice to be able to look back and. And see, you know, what kind of an impact he had on wrestling.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Thanks you guys for bearing with us and hope you enjoyed this. And we'll be back next time with another episode of the Extreme ECW Live Cast. Maybe another bonus episode with a couple matches of Sabo. See you next time. So long.