Jim Ross was among those shaken by Darren Drozdov being paralyzed, and couldn’t get any sleep the night the tragic accident happened.
Drozdov, aka Droz, was paralyzed during an October 1999 match on an episode of WWE SmackDown. D’Lo Brown could not get a proper grip on Droz, who was wearing a loose-fitting shirt.
This led to a powerbomb being botched and Droz breaking two vertebrae in his neck. Though initially paralyzed from the neck down, he’d later regain use of his arms.
On a recent edition of his “Grilling JR” podcast, Ross recalled learning of the injury as he was not at the SmackDown in question. He said,
“I didn’t sleep that night at all. Droz was one of our favorite guys, likable, always had a great personality, and you hate to see anybody get hurt, especially somebody that is so well-liked and respected as Darren Drozdov.
“Vince was the one that made the final call as far as taking care of the compensation to compensate Droz’s injury. It was very horrible. I was with Stone Cold when he got hurt, taking a feature at a deer hunting lodge, so I wasn’t even there on that day. One of the rare TV’s that I missed and it was just hard to believe. We got the call, and we just keep hoping it’s not as bad as it seems, and unfortunately, it was worse than we thought.”
In the hospital, Droz told a tearful D’Lo that he shouldn’t blame himself for the accident. Droz passed away in 2023 at the age of 53 of natural causes.
