April 5, 2014 saw a day many people did not think would ever happen when the Ultimate Warrior was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame. April 6 Wrestlemania XXX took place and we heard the Ultimate Warrior’s music played at a Wrestlemania show, the first time since 1996 when he squashed Triple H at the twelfth ‘Mania. Then on April 7 he appeared on Raw for the first time since July 1996. Yes, it was a truly memorable weekend if you were an Ultimate Warrior fan.
For most people the biggest shock of the weekend was not the Warrior’s return to the WWE, but the loss of the Undertaker’s streak to Brock Lesnar. That all changed late last night though. First announced by Triple H on Twitter and then shortly after by WWE.com it was reported that the Ultimate Warrior had passed away. Fans on the Twitter feed were tweeting to say that this had to be a hoax or Triple H’s Twitter must have been hacked, they were, as was I, and frankly I still am, in shock that the man formerly known as Jim Hellwig had passed away.
The exact details behind his death are not known at present, in fact the only thing that seems to be getting reported is that he collapsed when walking to his car wit his wife and kids after leaving their Arizona hotel. This was reported by TMZ though, so, how true it is, I would not care to say. Whatever the course of death though, it does not really matter. We still lost a genuine superstar. Not superstar in the generic terms used by wrestling companies these days, but a one-hundred percent bonafide superstar. Whether people enjoyed his in-ring work or not. Whether they liked his views on life or not. Whether they cared for him as a person or not. No-one could take away what he accomplished in his career. The sheer heights of stardom he reached.
It’s very easy to forget that it was only 5 years prior to his epic battle with Hulk Hogan at Wrestlemania VI that he was being broken into the business and running around as a member of Powerteam USA. Before he very quickly broke away from them with his close friend Sting to the very short lived Freedom Fighters where he was “Jim Justice” and his partner was “Flash Borden,” better known as Sting. They quickly changed their name and became the Bladerunners though with Sting now known as just “Flash” and Warrior changed his name to “Rock.”
Bladerunners Vs. Steve Williams & Ted DiBease in UWF:
After just over a year together they parted ways and Warrior headed down to WCCW where he transformed into the Dingo Warrior. He found more success in the Texas based area and won both tag gold and their Texas Heavyweight Championship.
Dingo Warrior Vs. Chris Adams in WCCW:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Ekag9oNBDQ
By the summer of 1987 the WWF had heard all the reports and seen any footage that they needed to see to know they had to sign up the young Dingo. When he first arrived there in June he kept his name and competed as such for about two months without much fanfare, just taking down jobbers mostly.
Dingo Warrior Vs. Barry Horowitz in WWF:
Then in September everything changed for Warrior. He was given the new name of the Ultimate Warrior. After all he had to stand out, he couldn’t just be any old Warrior, he had to be the most dominant and dangerous Warrior there be, and the Ultimate Warrior just sounded right. Fitting the bill perfectly to get across everything that the character was about. Everything he did was to the maximum level. The energy he filled arenas with really was the ultimate experience. Everything from the music to his ranting promos.
The Ultimate Warrior WWF Debut:
And thus is begun. The legend of the Ultimate Warrior. As with most talent when they first entered the WWF during the 1980’s, Warrior didn’t do too much for the first year or so of his career there. He had some minor feuds, the one that probably stands out the most was against Hercules Hernandez, a very underrated guy, and Warrior’s time was spent mainly working his way up the ranks, getting the fans behind him. All leading up to the big moment at Summerslam 1988 when he would win gold.
Vs. the Honky Tonk Man Summerslam 1988:
There’s no doubt in my mind that Warrior had one of the most entertaining reigns with the Intercontinental Championship of the mid-to-late 1980’s. Mainly this was because of his feud with Ravishing Rick Rude. It’s arguable that no-one brought out the best in Warrior like Rude did. The two had tremendous matches that went all through-out 1989. He also had a feud with Andre the Giant in the latter months of the year. It may not be the prettiest thing to go back and watch, but at the time, nothing could have worked better to cement Warrior as a top guy.
Vs. Andre the Giant:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xkiGavjk7M
1990 was the big year with the match I mentioned earlier on. In the Toronto Skydome where the Ultimate Warrior defeated Hulk Hogan for the WWF World Heavyweight Championship and the torch was passed. It was a landmark match for Warrior as it also made him the first man to ever hold the World and Intercontinental Championships at the same time, although he was forced to vacate the Intercontinental Title shortly after.
Once he had the title, Warrior was almost immediately put back into a feud with Rick Rude and the two continued to put on great matches together, it just never seemed to get old. He had some other opponents here and there and sided with the Legion of Doom in their war against Demolition, but his next major feud would not be until the beginning of 1991 when he was paired off against Sgt. Slaughter. This would be an encounter that left Warrior without the strap and as Slaughter beat him at the 1991 Royal Rumble.
& Hulk Hogan Vs. The Undertaker, Sgt. Slaughter, & General Adnan:
Of course Hulk Hogan would be the man to beat Slaughter at Wrestlemania VII for the title, that didn’t matter though. In many ways it was the Warrior who stole the show at that event, well, the Warrior and Randy Savage as the two squared off in a retirement contest. Savage would be the loser adding yet another accolade to the already overflowing list of the man with the painted face.
Vs. Randy Savage – Wrestlemania VII:
His next foes would be the Undertaker and Jake Roberts in a feud that contained the unusual body bag match and in the end, never really finished in a satisfying manner, even if it did include Warrior being the first person to score a pin fall victory over the Dead Man in America. In fact, this was the beginning of the end for the Warrior in terms of being a main stay professional wrestler.
Vs. The Undertaker – Body Bag Match:
Toward the end of his run with ‘Taker and Roberts Ultimate Warrior and the WWF had contractual disagreements and it would eventually result in him leaving WWF programming and sitting his contract out at home with Vince refusing to release him from the company.
A brief return would be made in the summer of 1992, which included an extremely bizarre angle with Papa Shango and the infamous vomiting of Warrior from some form of Witch Doctor spell cast upon him by Shango. He did also receive a shot at the reinstated Randy Savage’s World Heavyweight Championship at Summerslam 1992, but that was about it for the Warrior in the WWF.
The Curse:
With more contract disputes from Warrior and the whole steroid fiasco going on in the WWF he was finally released from his contract. For the next three or so years, Warrior would make sporadic appearances for certain independent promotions, but, nothing of a large scale. In 1996 he made a very short comeback to the WWF for the aforementioned Wrestlemania XII match and he also competed at the June King of the Ring pay-per-view where he defeated Jerry Lawler.
Again the two parties had a falling out over no-shows, contractual obligations, and the what by this point had to feel like the usual. This time though, the Warrior really was gone for good. He would not be seen in the WWF, well, it would have a couple of name changes in the 17 or so years he was absent.
There would be one more left behind the face paint though. The Warrior appeared for WCW in 1998, unfortunately though, his run their tanked. It is remembered very poorly by fans and very rarely is a good point brought up from his time in the Atlanta based company. When he left them he hung up the boots to concentrate on motivational speaking and promoting his own legacy through his blog and various other mediums.
He did have one last match in 2008 against Orlando Jordan for the Nu-Wrestling Evolution promotion though:
Even with a vicious court battle against the WWE, the release of the rather unflattering Self-Destruction of the Ultimate Warrior DVD released in 2006 by the WWE, his lackluster return to the WWF, his poor run in WCW, and the length of time he spent away from wrestling, his legacy still survived. There may very well be haters out there, but every celebrity has their haters, the majority of people recognize that while he was limited in terms of what he could do in the ring, there was something about him that just dragged your attention to the screen. He had that factor, that factor that people like to call “it.”
No-one can doubt that his legacy was still very much in tact when you see and hear the reactions he got at the WWE events over the course of the weekend. The response was extraordinary. I think most people noticed that he looked a bit rough on Raw, but I would assume like me most people chalked it up to the fact he was getting up in years. After such a positive comeback for him into a role as an ambassador for the WWE and seemingly all the wrongs righted and hatchets buried, nothing could have been more shocking than to see Warrior had passed.
At least in this case though he got the opportunity to be recognized for his accomplished and make peace before he passed. What was already being classed as a great speech at the Hall of Fame now seems even more outstanding and his speech on Raw seems to have taken on a whole new meaning as if he was saying good bye. Whether this is true or not I don’t know, but, I’m thankful that we as fans got to see it and he as a person got that moment of pure respect.
– By Jimmy Wheeler