Hitman My Real Life in the Cartoon World (87 page)

I saw a long, empty road ahead. The business was more dead to me than it had ever been before, but I still cared enough about my career that I wanted to have one last great match. I knew the Kemper Arena was the best place to do it, and that Chris Benoit was the only guy to do it with: a tribute match for Owen right there in front of the fans who watched him die.

I knew the end of my career wasn’t so far away anymore. I could still put out, but I could feel the pain every night and I couldn’t truthfully make the claim that I was the best in the business anymore.

Wrestlers seemed so much more reckless now, and the business had sunk even deeper into violence and sleaze. Often, there was no attempt at realism, which couldn’t have been more clear than on September 14 when Vince himself defeated Hunter to become WWF World Champion. Wrestling belts were just props now.

I actually had to talk WCW into letting me work with Chris Benoit in honor of Owen. Like anything else that made sense, it took them a while even to get behind it, and it was Chris who got them to do it. Chris had never forgotten that Stu, and Bruce, had got him into the business. Wrestling, old style, was all about trust and respect, the business of very tough men who could set aside those prized reputations when they needed to do so in order to make each other and the business. Benoit, despite being a young man, was old school. I wanted the Benoit match to honor my dad, the workers of his generation, the boys in the dressing room, those old-time fans—and, most of all, Owen.

October 4, 1999. Kemper Arena. I could feel Owen’s spirit there with me, and that he was really looking forward to watching this match. I didn’t want to disappoint him, but I’d been off for so long that my conditioning and timing weren’t the best. I said a prayer, asking for Owen to help me out. I’d also invited Harley to be the special guest announcer, and he’d driven for three hours with a bad back to be there.

The fans were respectful and quiet when Chris and I started. The fact was, they weren’t used to babyface contests anymore and it was a hard sell. Too bad, I told them in my head, you’re getting an old-time match whether you like it or not!

Twenty minutes later, we had the crowd riveted to every move as we neared the finish. Mickey Jay, the ref, gave us the cue and after a hard-fought battle, Chris went for his crippler finish. I blocked it, tripping him backward to the mat. I sprawled over Chris and somehow came up with the sharpshooter, and the Kemper Arena crowd rose as one and cheered for both of us as Chris tapped out. I could feel Owen’s presence. I looked up, fighting off tears, and gave Owen one last wave. Then I hugged Chris, who broke down crying. “Chris, he’s up there right now watching us.” I somehow knew that this would be my last beautiful moment in the ring, ever. Back home in the kitchen at Hart house, my mom and Stu, too frail to attend, watched with tears in their eyes.

The WWF’s legal eagles countersued Martha for U.S.$75,000, plus costs, which could easily add up to millions if she lost. They asserted that Owen’s contract stated any litigation against the WWF

under its terms would be brought in its home state, Connecticut, where punitive damages weren’t awarded. Martha’s legal team argued that the contract was terminated when Owen died, that it did not cover negligence by the defendant outside the ring and that since Owen died in Missouri and the suit was filed in Missouri, it should be heard in Missouri. On October 23, Yokozuna died of a massive heart attack in a sleazy London hotel. He was thirty-four years old and at the time of his death he topped seven hundred pounds. On that same day, Vince McMahon offered shares of the WWF to the public and became a billionaire. Within days, Linda McMahon told CNBC that the McMahons would love to settle with Martha in a way that would take care of her and the children for the rest of their lives. But no such settlement had been offered, and one of her lawyers, Ed Pipella, fired back, in the Calgary Herald, that the WWF’s threatened countersuit could more than wipe her out financially, no matter what Linda’s fine sentiments were. At WCW, we were hanging on for dear life trying to put over Vince Russo’s weird story-lines. Russo thought his storylines had a lot to do with the WWF’s rise in the ratings war, but he didn’t get, and never would, that the best wrestling needed at least to pretend to be real. He had grand plans for me—as a heel. I told him the sympathy factor for me was too strong to pull off a heel turn, not to mention that I’d been turned so many times already. He still wanted to do this big angle on Nitro where I turned heel on Goldberg the day after Starrcade ’99 in Toronto. I hated it all, but I was so angry at McMahon that I hoped Russo could bring the company back to life with his radical soapopera booking. At the Halloween Havoc pay-per-view on October 24, he had me pretend to injure my ankle and give up to Lex in a single-leg Boston crab as part of the buildup. After the match, Liz gave me a big hug and told me she was sorry things had got so dark for me. “Things will get better,” she said, and she sweetly added that I had always been her favorite wrestler to watch. Her words meant a lot to me.

The following night, I pulled up to the back of the building in Phoenix for Nitro, popped my trunk and got out to get my bag. One worried little boy, wearing Hitman shades pushed up on his forehead, stood blinking at me. “How’s your ankle, Hitman?” he said. I hardly pretended this stuff was real anymore, but as I lifted my bag I hissed, “It’s pretty sore.” After signing his shades, I limped painfully off: I had too much respect for both of us not to. I didn’t see enough real fans anymore.

That night, Russo put together a storyline that had me face Goldberg with my “bad” ankle. I wasn’t too keen on getting hurt by Goldberg for real; he’d already hurt three or four guys, including nearly breaking Haku’s neck. I liked Goldberg, but I was going to use this opportunity in Phoenix to feel him out in the ring.

When I jumped on Goldberg’s back, I felt like a cowboy riding a Brahma bull at the Stampede. Bill’s neck was so thick it was hard for me to grip him in a sleeper. He reached up and yanked me down, taking out a referee. When I rolled out to the floor, Nash, Razor and Sid came charging out and after a tough stand Goldberg was laid out. I crawled back into the ring just before going off the air and covered Bill for the one . . . two . . . three. This would give me my second big win over him.

As usual, there were messages from fans on my hotel phone that night, a lot of sincere good wishes and the usual number of women offering themselves up to me. Clearing my inbox, I hit the gentle voice of a woman who called herself “The Nasty Girl,” telling me once again that she was going to make all my sexual dreams come true. She’d been leaving me messages after every Nitro for months. She called me again later that night and got me on the phone. I tried to be nice, but I finally had to be blunt with her and hung up. Some fans I’d limp for, others I had no time for at all.

On November 2, I jetted off to England to attend the U.K. premiere of Wrestling with Shadows.

Meanwhile, a compelling documentary that Paul put together on Owen, which included interview footage of Owen that had not been used in Shadows, was shown on TV in Canada and the United States. While in England, I finally had a chance to catch up with Dynamite on the phone and told him I’d be more than happy to pay for any back surgery that might help him get out of his wheelchair, but he said there was nothing that could be done. He told me he’d written a book, and laughed about how he was going to include a story about Stu scooping up cat shit with a spatula while making eggs for him. Stu was such a wounded soul right now though that I worried that Dynamite telling a ridiculous story like that would be hard on his already broken heart. (Later, I read Dynamite’s book, and the story was there, along with all kinds of other nasty and depressing stuff. I have not talked to him since.) November 19, 1999. I stood talking with Ric Flair, who I was going to work with that night. As he knew, I loved to hear stories of wrestling history, and he was telling about what happened when he finally got his chance to work with the real “Nature Boy,” Buddy Rogers. Rogers had walked away from the business after a falling out with the Crocketts, and was only coming back for this one match where he was about to put Flair over. Before they started, Rogers grabbed Flair by the wrists, looked him square in the eye and said, “Just remember, kid, there’s only one Nature Boy!” I glanced at Flair, wondering how long it had been since anyone had called him a kid. There was only one Nature Boy and it wasn’t Ric Flair. I respected Ric for hanging on, but I vowed that no-body would see me wrestle old. Julie, my kids and my nephew Marek, Tom’s son with Michelle, all flew in for the big night in Toronto, on November 21, where I was slated to win the WCW World title.

I won my match with Sting after all kinds of hokey interference, then took on Chris Benoit in the final. Chris and I worked a good solid match, with me finally fighting off his crippler and slapping on the sharpshooter. Chris tapped out, I rolled off and Mickey Jay handed me the World title. Twenty thousand Toronto fans stood in one long, rousing cheer, wanting to believe that this moment really did mean something. I held open the ropes as Julie, my kids, Marek and Wayne Gretzky’s kids all climbed into the ring to celebrate my sixth World title win. (Wayne and his children had been invited to the show, and though Wayne couldn’t make it, his kids had spent the day hanging around with mine, and I invited them to join in.) When I came back to the dressing room, Curt Hennig was there to greet me with a handshake. “You’re the iron man, Hitman! I don’t know how you keep doin’ it!”

The next day Julie and the kids went home and I headed off to Detroit for Nitro. On the moving sidewalk at the airport, I noticed a heavy-set black woman glaring at me and studied her stare long enough to remember it.

At Cobo Hall, I kept my babyface storyline going even though Nash and Razor always arrived on the scene to interfere in my matches. The wrestling was silly, but I went along with it because that’s all I could do. Over the next few weeks I somehow even won the WCW Tag belts with Goldberg as my partner. After Nitro, I listened to a phone message from that Nasty Girl. She said she’d seen me at Detroit airport and she was furious because apparently I’d stood her up again: The next time she saw me I’d be a dead man! I’d received a lot of weird threatening messages in my time, but I put together the look I’d got at the airport with that scary message and a chill went down my back.

I kept working as many house shows as I could because I wanted to whittle down the number of days I was required to work in order to have more time off in the summer. I worked some house shows with Goldberg down south in Alabama and Florida. Goldberg was no fun. Every night he mowed me down with his full-contact spear tackle, only to have Razor, Nash and Sid run in for the DQ to save the belt for me.

Starrcade ’99 came on December 19, 1999, at the MCI Center in Washington, D.C. I sat on my bench strapping on my knee brace, wrapping my battered wrists and knees. My ribs were sore from Goldberg spearing me; they’d been tender for at least ten years, ever since Dino Bravo knocked me into that steel fence back in 1989. I stretched and paced as I waited for my match with Goldberg.

“Whatever you do out there, Bill, don’t hurt me,” I said. I really wanted this to be a great match.

The storyline called for the referee to get hurt and be replaced three times, with Roddy coming out at the end. After wiping out the first ref, Goldberg and I brawled out on the floor, but once the replacement ref showed up Goldberg tossed me back in the ring, like a suitcase. He reminded me of the gorilla on that old Samsonite luggage commercial. Then he had me backed into a corner and drilled me with an elbow smash that I can only compare to someone swinging a pillowcase full of bricks. It was a stiff blow that left me dazed. Goldberg knew it too and whispered in my ear, “Sorry, brother.”

He grabbed me in a front face lock and wrenched me backwards, wiping out the second referee. I was still groggy as I pulled myself up, and I barely moved out of the way in time as Goldberg charged me in the corner, nearly hitting his head on the post. The impact shook the whole ring, and he was lucky he didn’t really hurt himself. I slid out to the floor and pulled his legs toward the post to do my figure four around the post. I threw one foot up on the apron and felt Goldberg grab it like I’d told him to, but when I fell backwards he let go! My head thumped hard on the padded floor and all my weight buckled on top of me like an accordion. The crowd was chanting “Goldberg!” as I pulled myself up. I had to carry on. This was my heat.

To give myself time to recuperate, I rolled Goldberg in and began fiercely working his leg—neither the crowd nor Goldberg had any idea that I was hurt. He snatched me by the throat and gave me a couple of punches as the third referee tried to break us up. I snapped a boot into his knee, fired him into the ropes and as he reversed me, I heard him call, “Watch the kick!” I had no idea what kind of a kick he meant and there wasn’t much room coming off the ropes. Goldberg was standing in the middle of the ring, standing sideways to me, and his right foot flew just under my right hand, which I’d thrown up in an attempt to shield my face.

WHAAAAM!

I felt like someone chopped me with a hockey stick, an agonizing blow that sent me crashing to the mat where I lay holding my neck just behind my right ear at the base of my skull.

I was thinking, I’ve got to get up for the finish . . . but I can’t remember what it is!

I got up anyway, just in time for Goldberg to spear-tackle me like someone running me over with a car. The ref was still down and Goldberg played to the crowd. Right on cue, out came Roddy, doing his best John Wayne imitation, making his way down the aisle in a referee shirt. I have a foggy recollection of clipping Goldberg from behind and quickly twisting him into the sharpshooter. The crowd was confused when Roddy didn’t even wait for Goldberg to give up to signal for the bell.

When Roddy took the belt and headed back down the aisle, I was as confused as the booing fans. I jumped out after Roddy. I felt nauseous, and my head was throbbing and my vision blurred, but I managed to race up and grab him before he cleared the curtain, where he handed me the belt. On autopilot, I followed the script, but I was totally out of it as I stumbled through the curtain.