Credit: Ken McAndrew and PWInsider
Mick Foley was among the talents brought in for yesterday’s Top Rope Championship Wrestling event promoted by Marvin Ward (formerly AWE, which produced the Night of Legends PPV with Kevin Nash vs. Ricky Morton on top). He took part in a Stand Up show, which featured a Q&A:
The Q&A was originally scheduled to start at 4pm. Earlier on the day of the event, the promoter emailed saying it was delayed until 5:15pm because of Foley’s traveling (more on that during the Q&A). The doors opened at 4:30pm as planned, but the Q&A didn’t start until nearly 6pm due to Foley’s travel issues. They kept fans up to date and eventually noted folks could go do their other VIP signings while they waited. I went out and Jake Roberts and the Rock ‘n Roll Express were out there, along with some of the indy guys like Jamie Olivencia (who said he was going to tone down the number of times he said his own name, which he did). They also moved the wrestling bell time to 8:30pm and held the VIP signees beyond 8pm so folks in the Q&A could get their autographs.
Finally the Foley Q&A started. First he was asked if there was anything he’s ever said “no” to that a promoter has suggested. He noted that he’d do things to himself voluntarily, but would be more cautious letting others do something to him. He did say there were some things he’s said “no” to. Also, he said that there were too many poor choices being made on smaller shows. (Later on, some guys next to me at the matches noted a guy who tried to do a moonsault to the outside and hit the guardrail, and another who did a top rope move and hit his head on the post, busting himself open, so Foley might have a point!)
Foley was asked the origin of the stump-puller (wedgie) piledriver. He said he had to do things differently than others because of his physical limitations, and that he adapted this version of the piledriver because of it. He told a funny story of doing it to guys, like Shane Douglas in ECW, where their trunks would stay lodged up their rears because they didn’t realize it had happened. He also told a story about the John Cena/CM Punk match from a few weeks ago at Raw, and how irate Vince was at the piledriver used in the match, saying Vince had to be physically restrained from going out after it happened.
Foley was asked if he wanted to have one last match, and if so where and with who. He was also asked if he’d go out to dinner with the questioner’s family. His answers were “no” and “no.” On the match, he said he’s done, but if he were to wrestle again, he would’ve fought CM Punk during their promos last year. On dinner, Foley noted that the reason he was late was that he’d flown from Long Island to Flagstaff, then back to Virginia, and had to fly back out west to accept an award for Paul Bearer. So he was a little tired! (On Facebook some fans were complaining about Foley not seeming like he wanted to be there during the VIP signing…he was personable to me, but I was near the end of the Q&A/VIP line, and when I got my autograph there was a -long- line for Foley still.)
Foley was asked by a 12-year-old fan if it hurt when Undertaker threw him off the Cell in 1998. Foley noted that question makes him feel like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, because he’s always asked that. He talked about some of the other reactions he’s gotten (like “the table broke your fall” to which Foley said “of course, it’s a magic table!”) and also how Terry Funk bought him time and that his first reaction when moving after that was “how’d those shoes get in the ring?” He told the story about wanting to poke his tongue through the hole in his lip and how it looked like he was smiling, inducing JR’s call. Foley did say he’d let the question go because the kid was young, but if he asked it again when he was 14, they’d have to rumble.
Foley was asked about the best and worst ribs he’s seen (with worst being “bad idea”). He noted that in the early days, there were a lot of guys who’d pull a rib on a new wrestler by whipping out a gun and pretending to kill another guy, but those wouldn’t happen today. For the best, he picked a rib on Jonathan Coachman, where they had him arrested for racketeering and got him released a couple of hours later. But Coach was apparently afraid of being taken out with handcuffs on, with the reaction that might get back to his family, so Vince put a pair of his underwear over the cuffs for Coach. For worst, Foley talked about some ribs on Downtown Bruno. One was how Bruno was given a list of jokes about black people and started reading them, when Brickhouse Brown came up behind him and held a gun to Bruno’s head for the offensive jokes, but cracking up. The other was how Bruno was hired by Ric Flair in a bar for WCW, then Flair smelled beer on Bruno’s breath and said they don’t tolerate drinkers and fired Bruno almost as fast as he was hired. Foley said he later came out for a match and saw Bruno sitting on the hard camera side by himself in tears. He said ribs like that, which affect a person’s livelihood, aren’t cool.
Foley was asked about a major pre-WCW/ECW/WWE moment that mattered to his career. First he went off on a story about how Mideon became Naked Mideon. Foley noted that some guys loved walking around naked after their showers, including Kurt Angle. So Mideon decided he’d stay naked just a bit longer than Angle to become the king of the naked people. When Mideon did the gimmick on TV, Foley was shocked, but found it funny. There was one skit he wanted to do when he was WWE commissioner where Naked Mideon would be his assistant, and Foley would be at a pay phone asked for a quarter to make a call. Foley would reach back and wonder at the roll of quarters being carried in Mideon’s pouch, but of course it wash’t a roll of quarters. He said some things wouldn’t get past the censors, even in the Attitude Era.
As to the question itself, Foley recounted a story of wrestling Sam Houston in 1987 in Ohio. He said Houston threw an elbow that missed by two feet, but Foley sold it anyway, and how that kind of reputation can follow a wrestler around for a long time. He also used Dolph Ziggler having to escape the Spirit Squad gimmick as a similar type of story, and how it finally paid off for him with his World title win. Foley did say the worst bump he saw was a guy that was supposed to take a kick to the back of the head to bump out of a battle royal, and got hit with a thrown bag of popcorn and took the bump off that. His other big moment was coming out of the package to attack Sting when he made his WCW debut.
Foley was asked about his stint doing commentary and would he stayed at it. He said that he’d intended to do commentary for a long time and could’ve seen doing it for the next ten years, but he can’t stand being cursed at. When Vince did it the first time, Foley called Vince and told him he wasn’t comfortable with that, to which Vince replied that was on him and that it wasn’t intentional. When it happened again around a trip to Disneyland, which Foley didn’t want spoiled by anything bad, Foley stepped down. He did note that it wasn’t Vince angry at him personally, but it was hard to separate that.
A dental assistant asked how Foley gutted through the Cell match, especially with his tooth in his nose like it was. She also noted she was a little girl when that match happened which Foley said, between that and the 12-year-old who wasn’t born when the match happened, made him feel old. Foley said that continuing is like when wrestlers travel together and the rental car breaks down…they take the plates off the car, leave it by the side of the road, and get to the next show however they can. So too did he feel he had to continue the match, but in today’s world that match would’ve been stopped. He finally noted that, on the age front, the Bella Twins’ mother is younger than Foley himself is.
Foley was asked about how he’s maintained a successful marriage with the wrestling lifestyle. He made a joke about it being down to quality time apart. But he said that while being away from home was tough, he loved it because he’s seen people traveling on the train trudging back and forth from work and how that wouldn’t appeal to him.
Foley was asked to compare his experiences in WWE, WCW, TNA, and ECW. He said it’s hard because WWE is so big and professional. But he told the story about doing promos in the basement with a person ironing right nearby. He noted that in WWE and ECW, there was one boss, but in WCW it was a bunch of finger pointing. He said there was a lot less politics/schmoozing,
Finally, Foley was asked why he loves Santa so much, He showed off a Santa shirt that he designed, based on an old poster, and had his shirt guy make for him. He also talked about how he dyed his beard for the Santa appearance on Raw and how he was hit by Alberto Del Rio’s BMW the next week on Raw. But he was proud to have done $800 of damage to Del Rio’s ride.
After the Q&A I wandered the vendor’s area, which had a lot of non-wrestling local products as well as some wrestling vendors. In the cafeteria, they had the signings with Jake Roberts, the Rock n Roll Express, Kevin Nash, X-Pac, and Miss Tessmacher, as well as several of the local and visiting talents.
