Wall_of_Jericho
Break Me Down.
Just thought I would write a piece about one of my all time favourite wrestlers, Macho Man Randy Savage and his last couple of years in WWE (1992 – 1994). Something which I had never witnessed and still have yet to see again. He went through a steady decline, which saw him, go from WWE Champion, to midcard, to, one off matches, to announcer before finally leaving the company for WCW. Makes you realise was he one of the biggest wasted talents WWE ever had? Could they have gotten more from him?
A former WWE Champion, Intercontinental Champion and King of the Ring. Savage was one of the best and most popular stars in the 1980s. Randy also main evented Wrestlemania V and was involved in one of the greatest Wrestlemania matches of all time when he lost the Intercontinental Championship to The Dragon at Wrestlemania III.
1992 began well for Macho Man Randy Savage as he was deadlocked in a feud with Jake Roberts, which had been going since Jake crashed Randys wedding at Summerslam 1991. Along the way we saw Jake viciously attack Macho Man and go as far as to use his pet Snake on him. As a kid I will never forget the image of Jake Roberts Snake chomping on the arm of the Macho Man. Randy finally saw off Jake Roberts once and for all on an episode of Saturday Nights Main Event in early 1992 and pretty soon after he found himself in a tussle with Ric Flair (the then WWE Champion) over his wife Elizabeth. Savage had become so popular with a lot of fans after his reuniting with Elizabeth and his marriage to her, so the storyline between Ric and Randy really did seem so much more real and personal.
Randy Savage defeated Ric Flair by (suspicious) pinfall at Wrestlemania VIII and became the WWE Champion for the second time in undoubtedly the best match of 1992. This could not have come at a better time for Macho Man, he was the #1 guy in the company at a time when Hulk Hogan was taking a year off to do movies. It was also time when Rowdy Roddy Piper was moving away from the business, The Undertaker was just beginning his babyface run, Bret Hart was still in the midcard as well as the British Bulldog. Macho Man was the top babyface in the company and looked like the man that Vince would place all his chips on as the top guy. That was until an hour later, in the same event (Wrestlemania VIII) when the Ultimate Warrior returned from nowhere to help Hulk Hogan from an attack by Sid Justice and Papa Shango. Warrior almost instantly stole Randys spot and basically made everyone forget the awesome match earlier in the night. It is debatable but if you listen, the noise in the Hoosier Dome for Warriors return eclipses the noise the crowd made when Randy Savage won the Championship.
Randy held the Championship for six months before losing the belt back to Ric Flair in September 1992. Along the way Randy defended the belt against the Ultimate Warrior at Summerslam 1992 infront of a packed Wembley Stadium. It was a special night and I still remember watching it live on TV however Randy and Warrior (despite having a good match) didn’t main event the Pay Per View. Instead Vince played to the home crowd and put Bret Hart vs British Bulldog as the main event. A match which made Bret Hart as he had to carry Bulldog to a five star match. The match is great but if you watch closely there are a lot of botched moves. As Bret Hart says in his DVD, this match is the match, which signalled to Vince that Bret could do it in the main event. A fact that would be true as only a month after Ric Flair regained the belt from Macho Man, Bret Hart won the title from Ric Flair and became the WWE Champion.
The months that followed saw Macho Man make a steady decline from the main event. He finished his feud with Ric Flair at Survivor Series 1992 before eventually fading out of the main event scene to move down to an announcer. Now it’s not unheard of for a wrestler to become an announcer but this usually comes at the end of a career and as Macho Man proved. He still had it even as much as five years later. Macho Man was not injured either, so it wasn’t like he was placed at the announce table to disguise he was injured. Randy became a bit part player in the company only wrestling occasionally within the next eighteen months. Did you know Macho Man only wrestled four times on Raw for the whole calendar year of 1993 and only twice in 1994? Savage also took part in the 1993 and 1994 Royal Rumbles as well as being a substitute for Mr Perfect in Razor Ramon’s team at the 1993 Survivor Series and of course he faced Crush at Wrestlemania X. It’s not much when you consider that not so long before that he was one of the top performers in the business. Why couldn’t they found some high profile midcard feud for him to participate in rather than being a colour commentator? He could have been used to help put a young up and coming heel (Owen Hart, Shawn Michaels etc) over. Summerslam 1994 was the last time I saw Macho on WWE television and all he did that night was come out to the ring as the show started with a microphone and get the crowd a bit rowdy for the show starting. How low he had fallen.
Now people will argue that Vince was trying to bleed out the old timers to make way for a “new generation”, namely Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Razor Ramon, Diesel and Owen Hart etc. Now this is a reasonable explanation, I will be the first to admit that Randy was getting on a bit. However when you consider Savage went to WCW in 1994 and continued to still put on good matches for the next five years and showed he still had some “juice” in the tank. It makes you think was Macho a wasted talent? Could WWE have treated him better and got more out of him?
I also heard whispers a while ago that the reasons behind his de-push was Macho Man apparently tried to get oral pleasure from a very young Stephanie McMahon. Now if these rumours were actually true, don’t you think Vince would have fired him rather than just kill his push? Either way now adays Vince and Randy are not on talking terms for whatever reasons (probably because Savage is nuts) and any dreams people have of him going into the Hall of Fame are going to remain just that, dreams.
A former WWE Champion, Intercontinental Champion and King of the Ring. Savage was one of the best and most popular stars in the 1980s. Randy also main evented Wrestlemania V and was involved in one of the greatest Wrestlemania matches of all time when he lost the Intercontinental Championship to The Dragon at Wrestlemania III.
1992 began well for Macho Man Randy Savage as he was deadlocked in a feud with Jake Roberts, which had been going since Jake crashed Randys wedding at Summerslam 1991. Along the way we saw Jake viciously attack Macho Man and go as far as to use his pet Snake on him. As a kid I will never forget the image of Jake Roberts Snake chomping on the arm of the Macho Man. Randy finally saw off Jake Roberts once and for all on an episode of Saturday Nights Main Event in early 1992 and pretty soon after he found himself in a tussle with Ric Flair (the then WWE Champion) over his wife Elizabeth. Savage had become so popular with a lot of fans after his reuniting with Elizabeth and his marriage to her, so the storyline between Ric and Randy really did seem so much more real and personal.
Randy Savage defeated Ric Flair by (suspicious) pinfall at Wrestlemania VIII and became the WWE Champion for the second time in undoubtedly the best match of 1992. This could not have come at a better time for Macho Man, he was the #1 guy in the company at a time when Hulk Hogan was taking a year off to do movies. It was also time when Rowdy Roddy Piper was moving away from the business, The Undertaker was just beginning his babyface run, Bret Hart was still in the midcard as well as the British Bulldog. Macho Man was the top babyface in the company and looked like the man that Vince would place all his chips on as the top guy. That was until an hour later, in the same event (Wrestlemania VIII) when the Ultimate Warrior returned from nowhere to help Hulk Hogan from an attack by Sid Justice and Papa Shango. Warrior almost instantly stole Randys spot and basically made everyone forget the awesome match earlier in the night. It is debatable but if you listen, the noise in the Hoosier Dome for Warriors return eclipses the noise the crowd made when Randy Savage won the Championship.
Randy held the Championship for six months before losing the belt back to Ric Flair in September 1992. Along the way Randy defended the belt against the Ultimate Warrior at Summerslam 1992 infront of a packed Wembley Stadium. It was a special night and I still remember watching it live on TV however Randy and Warrior (despite having a good match) didn’t main event the Pay Per View. Instead Vince played to the home crowd and put Bret Hart vs British Bulldog as the main event. A match which made Bret Hart as he had to carry Bulldog to a five star match. The match is great but if you watch closely there are a lot of botched moves. As Bret Hart says in his DVD, this match is the match, which signalled to Vince that Bret could do it in the main event. A fact that would be true as only a month after Ric Flair regained the belt from Macho Man, Bret Hart won the title from Ric Flair and became the WWE Champion.
The months that followed saw Macho Man make a steady decline from the main event. He finished his feud with Ric Flair at Survivor Series 1992 before eventually fading out of the main event scene to move down to an announcer. Now it’s not unheard of for a wrestler to become an announcer but this usually comes at the end of a career and as Macho Man proved. He still had it even as much as five years later. Macho Man was not injured either, so it wasn’t like he was placed at the announce table to disguise he was injured. Randy became a bit part player in the company only wrestling occasionally within the next eighteen months. Did you know Macho Man only wrestled four times on Raw for the whole calendar year of 1993 and only twice in 1994? Savage also took part in the 1993 and 1994 Royal Rumbles as well as being a substitute for Mr Perfect in Razor Ramon’s team at the 1993 Survivor Series and of course he faced Crush at Wrestlemania X. It’s not much when you consider that not so long before that he was one of the top performers in the business. Why couldn’t they found some high profile midcard feud for him to participate in rather than being a colour commentator? He could have been used to help put a young up and coming heel (Owen Hart, Shawn Michaels etc) over. Summerslam 1994 was the last time I saw Macho on WWE television and all he did that night was come out to the ring as the show started with a microphone and get the crowd a bit rowdy for the show starting. How low he had fallen.
Now people will argue that Vince was trying to bleed out the old timers to make way for a “new generation”, namely Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Razor Ramon, Diesel and Owen Hart etc. Now this is a reasonable explanation, I will be the first to admit that Randy was getting on a bit. However when you consider Savage went to WCW in 1994 and continued to still put on good matches for the next five years and showed he still had some “juice” in the tank. It makes you think was Macho a wasted talent? Could WWE have treated him better and got more out of him?
I also heard whispers a while ago that the reasons behind his de-push was Macho Man apparently tried to get oral pleasure from a very young Stephanie McMahon. Now if these rumours were actually true, don’t you think Vince would have fired him rather than just kill his push? Either way now adays Vince and Randy are not on talking terms for whatever reasons (probably because Savage is nuts) and any dreams people have of him going into the Hall of Fame are going to remain just that, dreams.
