This was supposed to be my Throw Back Thursday, but lets call it a Flashback Friday!
The Extreme Horsemen.
Who were/are the Extreme Horsemen is a question I get a lot. And I don’t know if CW Anderson and I have actually told the story of how we came up with the name.
CW and I have known each for almost 22 years now. And besides one night in Detroit when he wanted to fight me (Jack’s fault!), he not only has been my best friend in wrestling, but the best tag team partner. There is NO ONE more under rated, even in 2017, than The General.
Simon Diamond and I met in 1995 while I was still a rookie. He was the lead heel for Jim Kettner’s ECWA and fate (aka Devon Storm got injured….or signed with WCW. It was over 22 years ago.) brought us together as tag team partners. I learned so much from Simon. He was way more seasoned than me and took the time to teach me how to work the microphone and be a heel.
Simon and CW had so much in common. Both were standout baseball players and drafted by Major League teams. They were also both leaders in the ring and let me sponge off them. We always talked about being a group. We just didn’t know where. Simon and I were basically NWA-Coraluzzo guys and CW was Southern based.
By the middle of 1999, we were all in ECW. And although we were in ECW, we were all over the place when it came to our spots on the card. Simon was getting his feet wet, CW was teaming with Bill Wiles, and I was just starting to make a little name for myself with Jack Victory by my side.
A year later and ECW is different. The old guard was gone. The Dudley’s and Taz had left ECW for the WWF. Shane Douglas, Bam Bam Bigelow, and others left for WCW. Paul Heyman did what he did best: Promoted within and exposed strengths that his talent didn’t know they had.
In June of 2000, and most people don’t know this, Paul had talked to me about putting the three of us together as a group and having Jack Victory as our mentor. I was excited, but in pro-wrestling, plans change and change quickly.
By early August, CW and Simon were together…but with Johnny Swinger. And me, well, Jack and I became babyfaces. The “new Freebirds” would not be for now.
By March of 2001, both ECW and WCW are gone. Dusty Rhodes had started his Turnbuckle Championship Wrestling and wanted CW Anderson and I to be his lead heels. I was in wrestling heaven. TCW was a throwback to the old school and we were running towns like Carrolton, GA, Dothan, AL, and town in-between. Dream immediately put me in a program with his TCW champion, Barry Windham. The same Barry Windham that was a hero to me growing up. The same Barry Windham that I would be compared to with my look in 1999-2000.
After our first match together (which is available on RFVideo.com and a match I am very proud of.), Dream tells me that he would love to turn Barry and have him, me, and CW together as a faction. The name he thought of?
The Elite.
Funny.
I didn’t like it because it didn’t fit what we were. CW and I were fresh off Extreme Championship Wrestling and Barry Windham was one of the Four Horsemen.
Wait. A. Second.
We are from the “Extreme” and Barry is a “Horsemen”.
The Extreme Horsemen name is born. Dream hated it at first.
The next week, he said “Okay, you guys are the Extreme Horsemen. Glad I thought of it.” and gave me that wink that only Dream could give you.
Turnbuckle didn’t last as long as we all hoped, but man did we have some wars with Dustin Rhodes, Glacier, and Dusty. It was so much fun and so many fond memories.
By 2002, CW and I were regulars for the original Pro-Wrestling ZERO-ONE and used the Extreme Horsemen name regularly. But later that year, during the start of Major League Wrestling, promoter Court Bauer came to me and CW and said he wanted to use us and the Extreme Horsemen name, but he had a suggestion.
He asked if we ever thought of having Simon Diamond join us. He wanted to make CW and Simon a focused tag team and me a singles. We couldn’t have been happier. It was all coming together. In late 2002, Simon Diamond becomes the fourth official member of the Extreme Horsemen.
As MLW progresses, we found ourselves in an old school feud with Terry Funk, Dusty Rhodes, Steve Williams, Sabu, Sandman, and others. Court had the idea of doing a War Games style match in Fort Lauderdale. We all knew who we had to call: BARRY WINDHAM.
Now, it is going to sound bad because I always make notes before I write and I feel like I am burying him and I’m not, but the addition of Justin Credible was not CW and mine. It was MLW’s. It wasn’t that we were so against it, but we wanted Jack Victory to be the fifth member. Court talked us into making “PJ Walker” a member for War Games and it turned out well. PJ was a former ECW World champion and all of us liked him. He was an amazing performer and will never get the respect he should have as a talent.
After MLW closed its doors, CW and I continued in Japan. Simon became a talent in TNA and eventually a producer for them. Barry went back to the WWE as a producer also.
In 2005, CW and I decide to make young Ricky Landell a member of the Extreme Horsemen. Ricky was like a younger us and we had a hand in training him. He was like a younger brother to us.
For almost 10 years, we didn’t add anyone. In 2015, as I was rehabbing my neck (and eventually leaving for the WWE), CW suggested we think about the next generation of Extreme Horsemen. We added both John Skyler and Preston Quinn as full members.
Then, this year, we introduced Damian Wayne into the fold.
As we approach 2018, the Extreme Horsemen is more an ideology of our love for pro-wrestling, as opposed to a faction that wrestles. Guys that would die for our business and love what we do.
But if you put it that way, all of us could be Extreme Horsemen. That is not a bad thing.
16December
2017
2017
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