****************************************************************
2K Sports, which has the WWE video game license, brokered a deal with Ultimate Warrior,
54, to be a character in its WWE 2K14 video game that will be released later this year.
The official announcement was made on 7/15 and a press event was held in New York that
day, with Warrior, which is his legal name, appearing for the first time for something related
to a WWE promotion in 17 years. News actually broke the day before on the Observer site,
and there was a communications issue in the sense it was actually an ad in WWE Magazine
that had a large photo of The Rock with an inset photo of Warrior, for the August issue, that
leaked out several days before the announcement was to be made. In addition, officials at
Gamestop were aware of the promotion and some life size figures of Warrior to promote the
game appeared at some stores before the news was set to be officially released at 8 a.m.
Eastern time on 7/15.
Warrior had taped a segment on 7/10 in Los Angeles, done by 2K Sports, that was shown at
the press event and online. In the segment, he did an Ultimate Warrior promo in a comedy
segment in an office. He wore his face paint similar to his wrestling career. He performed
pretty well, exactly like his old Warrior character. There were those involved who raved
about his performance in the video. But with very close grey hair, he looked his age, and
Ultimate Warrior as a character has to have the long hair and body. He has always maintained
the bodybuilder mentality and considering his age, is physically in great shape. He wore a
jacket, but it wasn’t buttoned leaving his chest and stomach exposed and he looked as good
as could be expected for someone his age. He was limping, as the result of a recent injury. I’d
have suggested using a wig for the segment, but he is not the easiest person to do business
dealings with, so that may not have been an option.
The deal was months in the making. His deal was with Take 2, not WWE, but Vince
McMahon has approval rights of every character in the game and has turned people down in
the past. Over the years, Warrior had filed suit against McMahon at least four times, with
mixed results.
It’s notable that WWE did run a web site story on his being in the game, but he was never
mentioned on Raw. WWE did not promote it on social media to anywhere near the level I
would have expected, but their support was still significant considering it involves Warrior,
who they have no direct relationship with. They did send an e-mail blast to their entire
subscriber list.
The deal is similar to the one in 2011 with Brock Lesnar, that had to be approved of by both
Dana White and McMahon, and the 2012 deal with Mike Tyson. Warrior will be an exclusive
character for those who pre-order the game on Xbox 360 or PS 3. The importance of being a
pre-order character is that pre-orders are a major factor in the game business. Retailers use
the pre-order numbers as a sign of what the popularity will be, which would then determine
things like orders, how much they will promote it and display space.
Given he was at an event in Manhattan, and Raw was in Brooklyn that night, one would think
people would have jumped to conclusions that he could be there. There were some rumors
around about it, even though we had reported it was highly unlikely he’d be there, and that
his name was not expected to be even mentioned on the show. But unless they were
confiscated, there were no signs in the crowd that I could see related to Warrior, nor were
there any chants for him at the show.
Although it is not a deal with WWE, this was the most high profile thing he’s done in the
U.S. since his last pro wrestling run in 1998 with WCW. His last WWF appearances were in
1996, shortly after he had been brought back that year since business was so down and it was
hoped he’d give it a jolt. He didn’t, and was then fired after missing a few house shows. His
father, who he was estranged from, had passed away. But Vince McMahon at the time
claimed that Warrior insisted on Vince buying tons of copies of his Ultimate Warrior comic
book he had produced to sell at the matches, Vince refused and Warrior threatened not to
come to matches. When he didn’t come, he was suspended and essentially never used again.
Warrior later did an interview with Opie & Anthony to promote the game. He said he
considered his wrestling career “virtually over,” and doesn’t think about returning to WWE,
although when asked about doing a match with McMahon, he seemed intrigued by the idea.
“I don’t sit around fantasizing about it too much. My days in the ring, chances are, are really
good, that they’re over. They’re done. That’s it.”
He said that after years of legal battles with the company, they are not fighting now. Reports
were that at this stage of his life, he has no animosity toward McMahon. Regarding a Hall of
Fame appearance, one would expect WWE to try and work out a deal with him at some point,
and that closing the deal, like any deal with him, will be difficult.
McMahon signed off on the deal, but when it came to promoting it, it has seemed a very
strange situation. This was an incredibly sensitive subject internally, with the deal largely
kept quiet, I guess in the event it may fall apart.
Over the years, Warrior and Vince McMahon have been involved in a number of different
legal problems and lawsuits. Warrior, then named Jim Hellwig (he legally changed his name
to Warrior, partially so he would be able to use the name in his legal battles over the image
with WWF), debuted in late 1985, working for Jerry Jarrett. Warrior, a former bodybuilder
who had won the Mr. Georgia title and placed in the top ten in the Mr. America contest, he
was recruited by Rick Bassman to perform as Power Team USA, and trained by Red Bastien
and Billy Anderson. After only a short period of training, he and Steve Borden, another
former bodybuilder, who was to become Sting, left as a tag team.
They worked a few weeks for Jarrett as a team, first as The Freedom Fighters, with Hellwig
known as Justice and Borden as Flash. They only spent a few weeks with those names before
Jarrett turned them heel as The Blade Runners.
After being let go by Jarrett, Bill Watts signed them on as projects. Hellwig was known as
Rock, believe it or not, while Borden was Sting. Sting got along better with Watts. Warrior
quit and wound up in Dallas as The Dingo Warrior, where he got over on his own. He
became close friends with Kerry Von Erich, and was pushed as a top guy for the first time in
his career. In 1987, he was to debut with New Japan Pro Wrestling under the name Big Van
Vader (I actually had the original sketches for the Big Van Vader character, who was a
bodybuilder with hair like Hellwig), but when he instead signed with WWF, Leon White got
the Vader gimmick.
He started in WWF as Dingo Warrior, but the name was changed to Ultimate Warrior, a
name that had been the nickname of Badnews Allen in Stampede Wrestling.
He was used at arenas but kept off television for a long time. Because of his physique in an
era where fans reacted to big bodybuilders, he got over even without television. Once he was
put on television, he had a quick rise to stardom, particularly being put over Andre the Giant
in match after match, with his career peaking at WrestleMania VI at Toronto’s Sky Dome
(now Rogers Centre), on April 1, 1990, where he, as IC champion, pinned Hulk Hogan to
capture the WWF title.
The match is still among the most famous pro wrestling matches in history, billed as “The
Ultimate Challenge.” Hogan was leaving to do a movie so the result was pretty well known.
In almost every city, when the match was being promoted between the company’s two top
babyfaces, the crowd was behind the younger challenger. But in Toronto, while Warrior
wasn’t booed, Hogan was cheered considerably more.
Hogan put Warrior over clean, something he was not happy about doing and didn’t think was
the right thing, and then through facial expressions, was able to steal the spotlight from him
in a brilliant bit of gamesmanship. When it was over, the story went from the idea the
company had, that Warrior had beaten the legendary Hogan and was the new top star, to just
how gracious Hogan was in losing. While Warrior remained a big star, his run as champion
was not a success, and within a few months, the plans of him being the young champion and
Hogan being the larger-than-life superhero star at the same time (the Bruno Sammartino role
when Bob Backlund was champion) was changed and plans were made quickly to get the title
back to Hogan.
The event drew 64,287 fans (announced at 67,678), with 61,864 paid and a gate of
$3,490,857 U.S. The latter number was, at the time, the all-time record for a pro wrestling
event. It should be noted that more than 40,000 of those tickets had been sold before Hogan
vs. Warrior was announced and really even teased that it was going to happen, and it was
WrestleMania coming to Toronto for the first time that drew the crowd. The gate record
worldwide lasted until the 1995 Keiji Muto vs. Nobuhiko Takada match at the Tokyo Dome,
and from a North American standpoint, it wasn’t topped until WrestleMania X-7, 11 years
later, for The Rock vs. Steve Austin match at the Reliant Astrodome in Houston.
Originally he was to become the franchise player, the new long-term superstar, but crowds
fell greatly when he was champion and the decision was made to get the title back on Hogan.
Rather than go directly, Sgt. Slaughter was brought in as a heel, who beat Warrior at the
Royal Rumble, and then lost to Hogan at WrestleMania in 1991.
McMahon fired him in 1991 after their first contract dispute, essentially Warrior demanding
to be paid equal to Hogan. McMahon agreed to the terms, apparently because he was
promoting a Hogan & Warrior tag team match against Slaughter & Col. Mustafa (Iron Sheik)
& General Adnan (Adnan Al-Kaissie) as the SummerSlam main event for that year. He then
announced Warrior as suspended immediately after the match.
McMahon brought him back in 1992 after Hulk Hogan was forced into a sabbatical by
McMahon. But Warrior didn’t last long and was fired a few months later. Warrior and Davey
Boy Smith were fired together, allegedly because McMahon found evidence they were using
GH to circumvent the company’s drug testing, at a time when steroid and GH use was a
major hot button issue for the company. The fact McMahon would fire two of his top stars
showed how seriously he was taking the issue at the time. Warrior claimed in legal papers
stemming from a later lawsuit that the story wasn’t true and that McMahon knew it wasn’t
true.
That’s what actually led to Bret Hart becoming WWF champion for the first time. The
company felt they needed a new superstar babyface having lost two of their top faces in one
fell swoop, and the only way to do so was to make that person champion right away. Because
of the steroid microscope they were under, the decision was that the new top star should be
more normal looking, but a great performer, rather than incredibly huge and muscular like the
headline babyfaces had been. Hart got the pick because he was getting substantially more fan
mail than anyone except Hulk Hogan, and far more than his push.
Warrior wasn’t brought back until 1996, returning at that year’s WrestleMania in Anaheim to
squash young wrestler Hunter Hearst Helmsley in 90 seconds. There is of course, a ton of
irony in that, in the sense the current HHH, the No. 2 person in the company today, wanted to
put together a match with him, and he was not listening and was insistent on winning it as a
squash. While a lot of time has passed, and HHH has in the past called Warrior the most
unprofessional person he had ever dealt with stemming from that match, that may explain
some of the sensitive nature of this deal.
He came to WCW in 1998, largely to first give the win back to Hulk Hogan, who Warrior
had beaten eight years earlier at WrestleMania. Hogan did win the rematch and Warrior only
worked one more Nitro date, booed heavily even though a babyface. But even though they
stopped using him, he was paid based on a lucrative long-term deal.
WWF did try to bring him back in 1998, in an attempt to cut off the WCW deal. He has only
wrestled once since 1998, a June 25, 2008, match with Orlando Jordan in Barcelona, Spain.
He was also offered a spot in the WWE Hall of Fame in 2010, but turned it down.
Warrior has no current deal with WWE, although it wouldn’t shock me if that changes. He’s
made it clear he’s amenable to a deal.
The game will be released on 10/29 in the U.S. and 11/1 in Europe.
|
