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CJ Valor makes a statement on WWE EVOLVE attacking starboy charlie ‧₊˚✩彡 from behind😳 Oh wait that’s me 😜 @EliteJaay Main Man Max Abrams @theJarielRivera 🤝 #wwe #wweevolve WWEID
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![The Miz on getting kicked out of the wwe locker room “I knew the person that told me that, "Hey, you're kicked out of the locker room." He said, "You're not coming in until I say so." Was that The Undertaker? “No, that person went away. So then when that person went away, I was like, oh boy, how am I gonna get back in the locker room? So I had to wait another three months. I asked Taker. I was like, ‘Man, I’ve been out of the locker room for a long time.’ He goes, ‘Oh, you have?’ Yeah, I’ve been out like six months. ‘What’d you do?’ I ate a piece of chicken in the locker room, and it got all over. I still believe it did not, but other people will tell you differently, and they can have their opinions. That is fine. I was under a microscope of, let’s get this guy. A lot of times in a locker room, someone could say he ate a piece of chicken over my thing. And, [someone else says] ‘Oh, man, what are you doing? Why are you doing this?’ And then another guy walks in. ‘Oh, you ate chicken over his his bag?’ Another guy walks in. ‘He did what?!’ Then another guy is outside the locker room. And then he heard he ate chicken and he got it all over the place. Then by the time the telephone game was played, I was throwing chicken all over the locker room, I was smearing it on stuff, that’s what it felt like. So yeah, I went to Taker and I said, I ate chicken over a bag. Yeah, it’s real.” (Chris Van Vliet)](https://image.24vids.com/tw-2011091192830968094/ext_tw_video_thumb/2011091028967927809/pu/img/FqFgwUMFJR6pTQJc.jpg)
![A UFO chased these four men through the wilderness—in the middle of the night. “It was alive.” “It was some sort of plasma.” “I saw this neon blue cone of light coming toward us … ” Then, everything went dark. That’s the last thing they remembered. Charlie Foltz, Chuck Rak, and twin brothers Jack and Jim Weiner were camping in the Allagash Wilderness in 1976. They went canoeing on a lake in the middle of the night, with only the light of their campfire to guide them back. That’s when a plasma-like UFO found them. Charlie and Jim just sat down with Jesse Michels to share this wild story: Foltz: “We all turned and looked toward the back of the canoe, and I see this aspirin tablet-sized white circle.” “It makes a left turn, and then it starts coming straight toward us.” “As it gets closer, the tops of the trees are illuminated.” “When it was about less than 100 yards away from us … I thought, I wonder what the hell it’ll do if I flash an SOS at it.” “And then this thing stopped.” “No sound whatsoever.” “All of a sudden this big cone of light, like a neon blue light … starts from the bottom of this sphere coming out across the lake, toward the canoe.” “All I could hear behind me were Jack and Jim screaming, ‘paddle, Charlie, paddle!’” Weiner: “And it had this weird kind of life to it.” “The surface of this thing was like roiling.” Michels: “Like it was some sort of plasma—” Weiner: “Yeah.” Foltz: “This thing had a halo around it.” “And the sphere itself was in constant motion.” Weiner: “The other guy with us, he was just like catatonic with the paddle across his legs and just stared out.” Foltz: “It seemed like only a few moments from the time we started paddling to the time that Jack and Jim and I were … standing in front of the canoe on the sand of the beach.” “And this sphere had followed us all the way across the lake.” Weiner: “The last thing I remembered before we were suddenly at the shore was looking back to see where this thing was.” “It was right behind us, and I was like, ‘oh, Christ, we are not gonna make it back.’” “That’s the last thing I remembered until we [were back] on the shore of the campsite.” Michels: “So there’s a little blackout period, missing time in your memory.” Weiner: “Yeah.” Foltz: “I had a very vivid memory of my eyes focused on that campfire.” “Because that was the only indicator of where our campsite was.” “When we got to shore, the three of us were standing in the sand, I reached down … and picked up the flashlight again, and I gave it another SOS.” “This time, all it did was it just went away from us to the opposite side of the lake.” “It ascended up and away at a 45-degree angle.” Weiner: “I remember it hovering right over the water, and this cone of light was coming straight down under it on the water.” “And it was close.” “I remember thinking … I could hit this with a rock.” Michels: “Could you make out how big it was and the shape?” Foltz: “It was spherical.” Weiner: “Like 80 feet in diameter.” Jesse Michels American Alchemy](https://image.24vids.com/tw-2054213797150138541/amplify_video_thumb/2054213156700827648/img/v_yOU0fMgA93BRJw.jpg)
![CLAIM: Kamala HQ says Donald Trump called Neo-Nazis “very fine people.” REALITY: This claim has been debunked by left-wing Snopes and rated “false.” See Trump’s full quote below: “You had some very bad people in that group [the Neo-Nazi group], but you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides.” In his statement Donald Trump goes on to disavow and condemn the Neo-Nazi group and any other group inciting violence in Charlottesville. For full context, consider reading those quotes and Trump’s remarks in the full transcript below: Reporter: "Let me ask you, Mr. President, why did you wait so long to blast neo-Nazis?" Trump: "I didn’t wait long. I didn’t wait long." Reporter: "Forty-eight hours." Trump: "I wanted to make sure, unlike most politicians, that what I said was correct -- not make a quick statement. The statement I made on Saturday, the first statement, was a fine statement. But you don’t make statements that direct unless you know the facts. It takes a little while to get the facts. You still don’t know the facts. And it’s a very, very important process to me, and it’s a very important statement. "So I don’t want to go quickly and just make a statement for the sake of making a political statement. I want to know the facts. If you go back to -- Reporter: "So you had to (inaudible) white supremacists?" Trump: "I brought it. I brought it. I brought it." Reporter: "Was it terrorism, in your opinion, what happened?" Trump: "As I said on -- remember, Saturday -- we condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry, and violence. It has no place in America. And then it went on from there. Now, here’s the thing --" *inaudible* Trump: "Excuse me. Excuse me. Take it nice and easy. Here’s the thing: When I make a statement, I like to be correct. I want the facts. This event just happened. In fact, a lot of the event didn’t even happen yet, as we were speaking. This event just happened. "Before I make a statement, I need the facts. So I don’t want to rush into a statement. So making the statement when I made it was excellent. In fact, the young woman, who I hear was a fantastic young woman, and it was on NBC -- her mother wrote me and said through, I guess, Twitter, social media, the nicest things. And I very much appreciated that. I hear she was a fine -- really, actually, an incredible young woman. But her mother, on Twitter, thanked me for what I said. "And honestly, if the press were not fake, and if it was honest, the press would have said what I said was very nice. But unlike you, and unlike -- excuse me, unlike you and unlike the media, before I make a statement, I like to know the facts." Reporter: "The CEO of Walmart said you missed a critical opportunity to help bring the country together. Did you?" Trump: "Not at all. I think the country -- look, you take a look. I’ve created over a million jobs since I’m President. The country is booming. The stock market is setting records. We have the highest employment numbers we’ve ever had in the history of our country. We’re doing record business. We have the highest levels of enthusiasm. So the head of Walmart, who I know -- who’s a very nice guy -- was making a political statement. I mean -- I’d do it the same way. And you know why? Because I want to make sure, when I make a statement, that the statement is correct. And there was no way -- there was no way of making a correct statement that early. I had to see the facts, unlike a lot of reporters. Unlike a lot of reporters -- Reporter: "Nazis were there." Reporter: "David Duke was there." Trump: "I didn’t know David Duke was there. I wanted to see the facts. And the facts, as they started coming out, were very well stated. In fact, everybody said, ‘His statement was beautiful. If he would have made it sooner, that would have been good.’ I couldn’t have made it sooner because I didn’t know all of the facts. Frankly, people still don’t know all of the facts. "It was very important -- excuse me, excuse me -- it was very important to me to get the facts out and correctly. Because if I would have made a fast statement -- and the first statement was made without knowing much, other than what we were seeing. The second statement was made after, with knowledge, with great knowledge. There are still things -- excuse me -- there are still things that people don’t know. I want to make a statement with knowledge. I wanted to know the facts." Reporter: "Two questions. Was this terrorism? And can you tell us how you’re feeling about your chief strategist, Stephen Bannon?" Trump: "Well, I think the driver of the car is a disgrace to himself, his family, and this country. And that is -- you can call it terrorism. You can call it murder. You can call it whatever you want. I would just call it as the fastest one to come up with a good verdict. That’s what I’d call it. Because there is a question: Is it murder? Is it terrorism? And then you get into legal semantics. The driver of the car is a murderer. And what he did was a horrible, horrible, inexcusable thing. Reporter: "Can you tell us broadly what your -- do you still have confidence in Steve?" Trump: "Well, we’ll see. Look, look -- I like Mr. Bannon. He’s a friend of mine. But Mr. Bannon came on very late. You know that. I went through 17 senators, governors, and I won all the primaries. Mr. Bannon came on very much later than that. And I like him, he’s a good man. He is not a racist, I can tell you that. He’s a good person. He actually gets very unfair press in that regard. But we’ll see what happens with Mr. Bannon. But he’s a good person, and I think the press treats him, frankly, very unfairly." Reporter: "Sen. (John) McCain said that the alt-right is behind these attacks, and he linked that same group to those who perpetrated the attack in Charlottesville." Trump: "Well, I don’t know. I can’t tell you. I’m sure Senator McCain must know what he’s talking about. But when you say the alt-right, define alt-right to me. You define it. Go ahead." Reporter: "Well, I’m saying, as Senator --" Trump: "No, define it for me. Come on, let’s go. Define it for me." Reporter: "Senator McCain defined them as the same group --" Trump: "Okay, what about the alt-left that came charging at -- excuse me, what about the alt-left that came charging at the, as you say, the alt-right? Do they have any semblance of guilt? "Let me ask you this: What about the fact that they came charging with clubs in their hands, swinging clubs? Do they have any problem? I think they do. As far as I’m concerned, that was a horrible, horrible day. Wait a minute. I’m not finished. I’m not finished, fake news. That was a horrible day -- " I will tell you something. I watched those very closely -- much more closely than you people watched it. And you have -- you had a group on one side that was bad, and you had a group on the other side that was also very violent. And nobody wants to say that, but I’ll say it right now. You had a group -- you had a group on the other side that came charging in, without a permit, and they were very, very violent." Reporter: "Do you think that what you call the alt-left is the same as neo-Nazis?" Trump: "Those people -- all of those people – excuse me, I’ve condemned neo-Nazis. I’ve condemned many different groups. But not all of those people were neo-Nazis, believe me. Not all of those people were white supremacists by any stretch. Those people were also there because they wanted to protest the taking down of a statue of Robert E. Lee." Reporter: "Should that statue be taken down?" Trump: "Excuse me. If you take a look at some of the groups, and you see -- and you’d know it if you were honest reporters, which in many cases you’re not -- but many of those people were there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee. "So this week it’s Robert E. Lee. I noticed that Stonewall Jackson is coming down. I wonder, is it George Washington next week? And is it Thomas Jefferson the week after? You know, you really do have to ask yourself, where does it stop? "But they were there to protest -- excuse me, if you take a look, the night before they were there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee. Infrastructure question. Go ahead." Reporter: "Should the statues of Robert E. Lee stay up?" Trump: "I would say that’s up to a local town, community, or the federal government, depending on where it is located." Reporter: "How concerned are you about race relations in America? And do you think things have gotten worse or better since you took office?" Trump: "I think they’ve gotten better or the same. Look, they’ve been frayed for a long time. And you can ask President Obama about that, because he’d make speeches about it. But I believe that the fact that I brought in -- it will be soon -- millions of jobs -- you see where companies are moving back into our country -- I think that’s going to have a tremendous, positive impact on race relations. "We have companies coming back into our country. We have two car companies that just announced. We have Foxconn in Wisconsin just announced. We have many companies, I say, pouring back into the country. I think that’s going to have a huge, positive impact on race relations. You know why? It’s jobs. What people want now, they want jobs. They want great jobs with good pay, and when they have that, you watch how race relations will be. "And I’ll tell you, we’re spending a lot of money on the inner cities. We’re fixing the inner cities. We’re doing far more than anybody has done with respect to the inner cities. It’s a priority for me, and it’s very important." Reporter: "Mr. President, are you putting what you’re calling the alt-left and white supremacists on the same moral plane?" Trump: "I’m not putting anybody on a moral plane. What I’m saying is this: You had a group on one side and you had a group on the other, and they came at each other with clubs -- and it was vicious and it was horrible. And it was a horrible thing to watch. "But there is another side. There was a group on this side. You can call them the left -- you just called them the left -- that came violently attacking the other group. So you can say what you want, but that’s the way it is. Reporter: (Inaudible) "… both sides, sir. You said there was hatred, there was violence on both sides. Are the --" Trump: "Yes, I think there’s blame on both sides. If you look at both sides -- I think there’s blame on both sides. And I have no doubt about it, and you don’t have any doubt about it either. And if you reported it accurately, you would say." Reporter: "The neo-Nazis started this. They showed up in Charlottesville to protest --" Trump: "Excuse me, excuse me. They didn’t put themselves -- and you had some very bad people in that group, but you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides. You had people in that group. Excuse me, excuse me. I saw the same pictures as you did. You had people in that group that were there to protest the taking down of, to them, a very, very important statue and the renaming of a park from Robert E. Lee to another name." Reporter: "George Washington and Robert E. Lee are not the same." Trump: "George Washington was a slave owner. Was George Washington a slave owner? So will George Washington now lose his status? Are we going to take down -- excuse me, are we going to take down statues to George Washington? How about Thomas Jefferson? What do you think of Thomas Jefferson? You like him?" Reporter: "I do love Thomas Jefferson." Trump: "Okay, good. Are we going to take down the statue? Because he was a major slave owner. Now, are we going to take down his statue? "So you know what, it’s fine. You’re changing history. You’re changing culture. And you had people -- and I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists -- because they should be condemned totally. But you had many people in that group other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists. Okay? And the press has treated them absolutely unfairly. "Now, in the other group also, you had some fine people. But you also had troublemakers, and you see them come with the black outfits and with the helmets, and with the baseball bats. You had a lot of bad people in the other group." Reporter: "Sir, I just didn’t understand what you were saying. You were saying the press has treated white nationalists unfairly? I just don’t understand what you were saying." Trump: "No, no. There were people in that rally -- and I looked the night before -- if you look, there were people protesting very quietly the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee. I’m sure in that group there were some bad ones. The following day it looked like they had some rough, bad people -- neo-Nazis, white nationalists, whatever you want to call them. "But you had a lot of people in that group that were there to innocently protest, and very legally protest -- because, I don’t know if you know, they had a permit. The other group didn’t have a permit. So I only tell you this: There are two sides to a story. I thought what took place was a horrible moment for our country -- a horrible moment. But there are two sides to the country. "Does anybody have a final -- Reporter: "What makes you think you can get an infrastructure bill? You didn’t get health care -- Trump: "Well, you know, I’ll tell you. We came very close with health care. Unfortunately, John McCain decided to vote against it at the last minute. You’ll have to ask John McCain why he did that. But we came very close to health care. We will end up getting health care. But we’ll get the infrastructure. And actually, infrastructure is something that I think we’ll have bipartisan support on. I actually think Democrats will go along with the infrastructure." Reporter: "Mr. President, have you spoken to the family of the victim of the car attack?" Trump: "No, I’ll be reaching out. I’ll be reaching out." Reporter: "When will you be reaching out?" Trump: "I thought that the statement put out -- the mother’s statement I thought was a beautiful statement. I will tell you, it was something that I really appreciated. I thought it was terrific. And, really, under the kind of stress that she’s under and the heartache that she’s under, I thought putting out that statement, to me, was really something. I won’t forget it. "Thank you, all, very much. Thank you. Thank you." -- END OF TRANSCRIPT --](https://image.24vids.com/tw-1823032682730946863/ext_tw_video_thumb/1823032443038994432/pu/img/9AYuKrCdHdMAI4Hx.jpg)
![Ch. 14 of NITRO: The Inside Story of Hulk Hogan's heel turn - #OTD 30 Years Ago (7/7/96)! AS DAY BECAME NIGHT at the Sullivan home, Bollea deliberated his participation in the pay-per-view. “Everybody was telling him that it was the wrong thing to do,” Kevin Sullivan says. “He was getting booed out of the arena, but they were all saying, ‘this is gonna kill him’.” With no end to the discussion in sight, the wily booker casually suggested that Bollea and Young make use of his two guest rooms until the morning. “I isolated [them],” Sullivan admits. “I was just afraid that at the last minute, he was going to use his creative control [clause] and pull out.” If Sullivan could deliver Bollea to the arena by showtime, the finish of the match called for Hogan to star in the most dramatic of surprise endings. In a sequence devised by Kevin Nash, an unannounced Hulkster would shockingly interfere in the match, but only after the heels gained an unfair advantage through cheating. It would be a brilliant misdirection, Nash thought, as fans would instinctively believe Hogan’s appearance to be in support of the babyface team. “I knew there were gonna be 55 different ideas,” Nash says, thinking back to the eve of the event, “[so] I actually put a lot of thought into it. I called Scott [Hall] two or three days before that, and said ‘what do you think about this?’ “We had to make it a 2-on-2 match with Lex Luger getting injured [during the match] and going out. We would cheat to get Macho [Man] in trouble and all of a sudden Hulk comes down, which of course would mean ‘ok, here comes Hulk to make the save’. [Hall] said, ‘I love it’.” There was, however, the looming possibility that Bollea could reject his turn at the eleventh hour. Thinking ahead, Eric Bischoff developed a contingency plan in which Sting would play the role, ultimately revealing himself - despite not having prior experience with the WWF - as the ‘third man’ instead. “I remember Eric came in to the locker room,” recalls Marcus 'Buff' Bagwell, “and said [to Sting], ‘I wanna talk to you about something’. I could hear them going over the idea, and then when they got done, Sting told me what they were talking about. He said that [Eric said], ‘there are only two guys that could turn heel where it would really matter’. That would be Hogan and Sting.” “He was offering Sting the job first, [as I recall], and Sting didn’t wanna do it. He didn’t really say it wouldn’t work, but he just said, ‘it doesn’t intrigue me. I don’t wanna do it’.” According to Andre Freitas, a special effects artist who worked in costume design and character development for WCW, the proposed Sting swerve was to involve the use of a doppelganger - or ‘phony’ Sting - presumably in an effort to fool fans that the real character had switched sides. “That was their original plan,” says Freitas. “Eric showed me a picture of Jeff Farmer (a lower-card wrestler) and said ‘can you make him Sting?’ I told him that they have similar bodies...then we looked at Sting’s hair and Jeff’s hair...and talked about all that stuff. I did a head cast for [Farmer] and some prosthetic and test make-ups. But when they secured Hogan, we didn’t do [the angle].” ----------- Amazingly, even as Bash at the Beach began, Bischoff continued to consider Plan B. “I remember walking by this perforated wall in the Ocean Center,” divulges Nash, “and Eric said to me, ‘Hulk is with Sullivan, and he’s not sure he’s gonna do it yet’. It was up in the air.” Meanwhile, viewers of the pay-per-view - and, for that matter, WCW’s own production staff - speculated as to the identity of the third man. “They were trying to ‘work’ everyone,” asserts Jason Douglas, a WCW producer backstage at his first pay-per-view event. “‘Rocket’ (staff member Rick Sancher) came up to me - they were kinda testing me because I was new on the road - and said ‘hey, I think it’s gonna be [WWF wrestler] Bret Hart’. I guess it was to see if I would leak something, and so I was just like ‘oh, cool, Bret Hart’.” In reality, aside from Bischoff, Bollea, Young, Hall, Nash and Sullivan, the turn would be concealed from everyone - even the announcers, according to orders from Bischoff - as to ensure their most realistic reactions. With less than an hour before the main event began, production staffer Woody Kearce discovered a revealing clue in the parking lot. A Hulk Hogan motorcycle had appeared mysteriously in one of the spaces, sparking another round of backstage conjecture. Finally, with what Sullivan recalls as “thirty minutes” and Bischoff remembers as “forty-five to sixty minutes” left on the air, Bollea belatedly arrived at the Ocean Center. The mood suddenly changed. Upon realizing that his star had been convinced, Bischoff began to relax. “Once he got to the building, I recall a sense of calm,” he reveals. “All of the anxiety, all of the tension, all of the worry, all of the effort to make sure things stayed quiet...all of that just kind of dissipated. It was like fog lifting when the sun comes out - it all just went away. I was thinking, ‘it is what it is, there’s nothing more I can do...so let’s just roll with it’.” To cement the turn, Bollea knew, he would have to deliver a monumental post-match promo to explain his actions. While typically, he enjoyed using Bischoff as a sounding board to rehearse interviews, the need for complete privacy - on this occasion - was unquestionably paramount. And so, away from prying eyes - and ears - the two met up in the most unglamorous of clandestine locations - a utility closet. In the midst of the run-through, Bischoff stopped to emphasize an important point: When you grab that microphone, I want you to say...‘this is the beginning of the new...world...order’. The phrase - ‘new world order’ - lingered auspiciously in the air. Bischoff surprised himself with the utterance, realizing slowly that the term encapsulated everything that the invasion storyline could represent. In 1990, then-president George H.W. Bush famously utilized the same expression in a speech to Congress, although its origin could actually be traced back to the 28th President, Woodrow Wilson. But if Bischoff was unsure as to the source of his spontaneous inspiration, perhaps the answer could be found closer to home - on the preceding Nitro, just six days earlier, announcer Larry Zybysko serendipitously made the following proclamation: “This Sunday, I promise you, there will be a new world order of wrestling…” Fans at the Ocean Center waited anxiously to see if Zybysko’s prophecy would materialize; for after all the hoopla, it was suddenly time for the main event. Before the opening bell, the audience was already on its feet for ring announcer@Michael_Buffer’s pre-match introductions. As Hall and Nash sauntered to the ring for The Hostile Takeover match, Buffer set the scene with theatrical aplomb: “Ladies and gentleman, at this time, let me introduce the men whose plan and goal is to takeover the WCW with force and hostility. We were told there would be three of these interlopers, and I must apologize as I have been informed - as you can see - there are only two. Ladies and gentleman, introducing...the Outsiiiiiders!” In a moment that played off perfectly on television, Sting’s entrance music began - and quickly ended - as ‘Mean Gene’ Okerlund traipsed cautiously into the ring. After exchanging quizzical looks with Buffer and referee Randy Anderson, Okerlund confronted the Outsiders to get some answers, an inspired plot device designed to build the tension even further. “Gentleman,” began Okerlund, “if I could have your attention...I don’t have police protection with me at this time, but I wanna confront you in front of this full house here at the Ocean Center, and millions of others watching across the country and around the world. I don’t see three men here tonight. Where is your partner?” Responding in a manner consistent with their WWF characters, Hall and Nash assured Okerlund that the third man was present - and ready. “Let me tell you something,” announced a confident Nash, “we got enough to handle it right now, right here.” Once more, Sting’s entrance music blared from the arena speakers, this time preceding the man himself, accompanied by Luger and Savage. “Here we go!” screamed color commentator Bobby Heenan as the wrestlers passed an unusually large contingent of security personnel on the entrance way. “The war is on!” Less than two minutes into the bout, Luger collapsed to the outside, a move in accordance with Nash’s plan to even the sides before the climactic reveal. “Now it’s two against two!” yelled Heenan. After a brief delay, the concerned crowd looked on as Luger left the arena on a stretcher, leaving Sting and Savage alone to fight valiantly for WCW. As the match progressed, the contemptible Outsiders used every trick to stall their opponent’s momentum, until a revitalized Savage began a furious rally at the fifteen-and-a-half minute mark. The invaders were suddenly down, but not out - as with the referee distracted, Nash landed a low-blow to bring the Macho Man to his knees. All four men lay on the canvas, exhausted, as referee Anderson started a ten count. As Anderson yelled ‘ONE’, several rows of spectators rose to their feet. Within seconds, the reaction diffused from section to section, the noise level increasing with each passing beat. On the live broadcast, viewers at home caught glimpse of a familiar figure making his way down the ramp. “Hulkamania!” screamed Dusty Rhodes on commentary while Hogan walked methodically towards the ring. Noticeably, the Hulkster seemed oddly disaffected - even out-of-character - but after exchanging the briefest of glances with the crowd, he continued stride with the din reaching fever pitch. “Whose side is he on?” bellowed Heenan, a question that seemed inexplicable given the history of Hogan’s on-screen persona. “Whose side is he on?” repeated Heenan, who as longtime fans could recall, had opposed Hogan for years as a manager in the WWF. For that reason, the comment flew over the heads of most (but not all) viewers; meanwhile, the live crowd was cheering as if their team had won the World Series. Nash and Hall retreated to the floor as Hogan tore off his shirt, an apparent signal that the archetypal good guy was here to save the day again. “Who’s bad now boys?” taunted play-by-play man Tony Schiavone on commentary, confident that WCW’s honor was no longer in jeopardy. Savage lay prone on the mat as Hogan surveyed the scene. Above the cheapest of cheap seats, peeking through a curtain with palpable anticipation, was Eric Bischoff. “I knew that something big was about to happen,” he recalls. “It was either gonna be a big failure, or a big success.” Seemingly out of nowhere, with his unsuspecting devotees enveloped in celebration, Hulk backed up to the corner. With the coldness of a serial killer, the once-honorable hero shockingly shoved referee Anderson, and executed his patented finishing move - the leg drop - to the helpless Macho Man below. The audience became completely, utterly unglued. “I was standing back with the announcers,” remembers Michelle Baines, newly hired as a production assistant. “One of the producers turned to me and said, ‘you need to go to the back’. “‘I said, ‘what do you mean?’ “She said, ‘it’s gonna get ugly real quick’.” “She was right - the crowd turned ugly quick.” In retrospect, it was clear that even as Hogan’s body approached the canvas - contact with Savage just milliseconds away - the gravity of the assault started to hit home. “What has he done?” questioned a crestfallen Rhodes, “is he the third man? What the hell is going on here?” Heenan was even more direct - “Hulk Hogan has betrayed WCW! He is the third man in this picture!” A breathless Schiavone could barely muster more than three words: Oh My God, he repeated. Oh My God, he continued, as Hogan high-fived a grinning Hall and Nash. The courageous Sting, stumbling to his feet to stop the injustice, was quickly dispatched, and in the coup de grace, Hogan tossed Anderson to the floor. Sardonically, he covered Savage for the pin, the contest now clearly a farce. “I hope you love it,” a disappointed Rhodes wailed on commentary. “You just sold your soul to the devil.” The third man was a mystery no more, and Hall, Nash, and Hogan raised their hands in victory to a genuinely astonished audience. The immediate outrage, which first gave way to shock, was now inspiring unmitigated rage. Simultaneously, the evil trio continued to taunt, pose, and antagonize while the announcers lamented WCW’s future. As Sting and Savage hobbled back to the locker room, a visibly distraught Okerlund returned to conduct an explanatory interview, based around the one Hogan and Bischoff had mapped out earlier. “Mean Gene,” commanded Hogan, “the first thing you need to do is to tell these people to shut up if you wanna hear what I gotta say.” For the next four minutes, Hogan rationalized his turn with remarkable clarity. “The first thing you gotta realize, brother, is this right here is the future of wrestling. You can call this the new...world...order of wrestling. These two men right here came from a great big organization up north, and everybody was wondering who the third man was. Well, who knows more about that organization than me, brother? I made that organization a monster. I made people rich up there. I made the people that ran that organization rich up there. And when it all came to pass, the name Hulk Hogan, the man Hulk Hogan, got bigger than the whole organization!” Bischoff watched from his secretive seat in amazement - he had not seen, nor had anyone, this intensity of emotion on display at a wrestling show before. It was almost as if the assembled masses had lost themselves in the performance, perhaps even forgetting, if only for a moment, that they were witnesses to a pre-determined event. Hogan’s actions had ostensibly interrupted their critical faculties; in other words, they had suspended their disbelief by reacting to the incident as if it were real. Moreover, the shock was manifesting in the most volatile ways imaginable, as in an incident edited out of future showings of the pay-per-view, a rather large man, likely intoxicated, ran into the ring before being knocked down by Hall and Nash. Concurrently, a stream of debris rained down from the stands, with one object hitting Okerlund, and the rest filling the ring in a stunningly unique visual. Hogan continued as the trash piled up around him, even referencing Ted Turner in his diatribe: “Billionaire Ted promised me movies brother. Billionaire Ted promised me millions of dollars. And Billionaire Ted promised me world caliber matches. And as far as Billionaire Ted, Eric Bischoff, and the entire WCW goes, I’m bored brother! That’s why I want these two guys here, these so-called Outsiders. These are the men I want as my friends. They are the new blood of professional wrestling, and not only are we going to take over the whole wrestling business...with Hulk Hogan, the new blood and the monsters with me, we will destroy everything in our path, Mean Gene.” “Look at all the crap in this ring,” responded Okerlund. “This is what’s in the future for you if you want to hang around the likes of this man Hall, and this man Nash.” Hogan raised his finger as if to stop the interviewer midstream, the perfect line instantly coming to mind. “As far as I’m concerned, all this crap in the ring represents these fans out here,” he boomed defiantly. “For two years, I held my head high,” ranted Hogan, alluding to his rather uninspired WCW tenure. “I did everything for the charities. I did everything for the kids. And the reception I got when I came out here, you fans can stick it brother! Because if it wasn’t for Hulk Hogan, you people wouldn’t be here. If it wasn’t for Hulk Hogan, Eric Bischoff would still be selling meat from a truck in Minneapolis. And if it wasn’t for Hulk Hogan, all of these ‘Johnny come latelys’ that you see out here wrestling wouldn’t be here. I was selling the world out, brother, while they were bumming gas to put in their car to get to high school!” In closing, Hogan foreshadowed the future state of affairs in WCW with a prophetic preview of coming storylines: “With Hulk Hogan and the new world organization of wrestling, brother...me and the new blood by my side...whatcha gonna do when the new world organization runs wild on you? Whatcha gonna do? What are you gonna do??” Despite mistakenly bungling the ‘new world order’ phrase at the conclusion of his speech, Hogan still provided the perfect punctuation to a sensational heel turn. His promo, inarguably the most dynamic of his career, came across as strikingly authentic (“it felt real, because it was real’,” offered a proud Eric Bischoff upon reflection years later). On commentary, Schiavone - who most inspiredly suggested that Hogan had planned to double-cross WCW all along, since his debut in 1994 no less - added to the realism with some mournful final comments: “We have seen the end of Hulkamania,” he grieved. “Hulk Hogan, you can go to hell! We’re outta here. Straight to hell.” ---- To the layman, there appeared an obvious explanation for the feverous crowd response that accompanied Hogan’s turn. Clearly, the element of surprise - one of the key elements of Nitro’s success - had been exploited to a masterful degree (“nobody on earth thought that the third man was going to be Hulk Hogan,” highlights Nash). To Kevin Sullivan, however, there were several layers of story at play. “People thought that it was an invasion from the WWF,” he begins, implying that the success of the angle could be correlated to its realism. “They really bought into it, and when Hogan turned heel...they were sure of it. “So while Hogan gets the credit for the reaction, it was [Nash and Hall] who set the whole thing up. Those guys built the foundation of heat, and when Hogan came down, it just blew up.” “We were red hot coming off WWF television,” agrees Nash, “and then you had the biggest turn in the world on top of that. The biggest babyface of all-time finally turned heel!” To the ever-meticulous Sullivan, always a keen observer of the nuances present in a wrestling angle, an often overlooked element was also noteworthy. “He did it to Randy [Savage],” the booker emphasizes, speaking of Hogan’s betrayal. “People knew there was real-life heat there. That helped out too, but everyone played an intricate part. “Lightning...you can’t catch it in a bottle but one time.” The above is an excerpt from the book, NITRO: The Incredible Rise and Inevitable Collapse of Ted Turner's WCW. Amazon USA: Amazon UK: Amazon Canada: Amazon Australia: 17+ Hour Audiobook Available at Audible and Apple Books Audible USA: Audible UK: Audible Canada: Audible Australia: Apple Books: Ultimate NITRO Bundle: Deep Cuts - Wrestling Stories in 60 Seconds! David Penzer AdFreeShows.com 83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff On This Day in WWE Allan Conrad the Mortgage Guy IandrewDiceClay WCW Archive Because WCW WCW4Life ᴀʀᴅᴀ Öᴄᴀʟ 90s WWE Secrets of WCW Nitro #WCW #nWo #HulkHogan #BashattheBeach #HeelTurn #Wrestling #WrestlingBooks #OTD #WWE #WorldChampionshipWrestling #Nitro](https://image.24vids.com/tw-2074461260037472650/amplify_video_thumb/2074458245859618816/img/LGSM61_LAq--YROA.jpg)
