Jim Ross spoke about the state of the WWE in the run-up to the 1998 Royal Rumble on his most recent podcast.
On the latest episode of Grilling JR, Ross talked about the development of Chainsaw Charlie and Legion of Doom doing business.
You can check out some highlights from the podcast below:
How Chainsaw Charlie came to be: “Well, I think I’m not going to be surprised and I can’t tell you otherwise that it was Terry’s idea to be Chainsaw Charlie. I think Chainsaw Charlie was the creation of Terry Funk’s creativity. Who the hell else would have come up with Chainsaw Charlie? What did he do wear a nylon stalking over his face? That’s Terry. When you get a talent like Terry Funk, first of all for me as a lifelong fan and as somebody who had refereed Terry Funk’s matches in the 70s because Cowboy brought him in as a bounty hunter in a big program in the Mid-South, and I refereed some of those matches. He was unbelievable. Unbelievable in those days. As good as I ever saw. Heavy heel and wasn’t afraid of heat. Great promos that were real. They weren’t outlandishly over the top to where you roll your eyes. He was just tremendous, but I think he came up with Chainsaw Charlie. For a guy like me that’s been a fan all his life and been around Terry for multiple decades, it was an honor to have the job that I could call him and say ‘We want to hire you. I got work for you if you’re interested.’ Of course he was interested and he loved Mick.”
If the Legion of Doom were difficult to work with: “No, and here’s why. They were older. When you were remembering back to the stubborn LOD, they were young and they were holding most of the cards. During this period of time, they were older, they had their share of injuries. They weren’t the same guys. So you’re trying to give them a reason to get that new coat of paint and fix those dents in the bumper or whatever. So I had no problem with it. They needed something to freshen them up or we needed to get rid of them. That probably wasn’t a thing to do. It wasn’t the thing to do. They still have marquee value on your cards. We’re still in a live event business. For LOD to be in Des Moines or Wichita or wherever it may be, [they were] still an attraction and it still meant something. But, they needed that proverbial fresh coat of paint and that angle seemed to provide that.”
If he thought the angles in WWE in 1998 were too much: “You make a turd a television character in The Nugget [DX’s nickname for Owen Hart], I think that’s a good illustration of ‘what are we doing?’ The thing about it was the same thing I said earlier. Doing something in the show that’s edgy and controversial is one thing. But doing three or four more other controversial things, all it does is water down what you’ve put on tape. In other words, too much. Too much. Let it soak. Let the audience process it, let the announcers talk about it. Let it become something significant and we didn’t. We rushed everything.”
