My NWA Title Reign

My NWA World’s Championship Reign

I started watching professional wrestling in 1981. I’ve talked about it before how, as an eight year old child, I saw Tommy “Wildfire” Rich doing a promo with Gordon Solie during a Georgia Championship Wrestling broadcast on old Superstation 17, which is now WTBS.

But the first championship title I ever was in awe of was the NWA World’s Championship. I believe I must have seen the National Heavyweight Title on TV, but it was the “10 Pounds Of Gold” that took my breath away. To me, it was ultimate prize in wrestling. It was treated with respect and valued by every wrestler I saw on TV. It meant something.

And I as I knew on that day when I first saw Tommy Rich that I wanted to be a Professional Wrestler, I knew as soon as I saw the NWA World’s Championship, that I wanted to be NWA Champion one day.

It was a dream. A dream that faded when the NWA title was replaced with the WCW Championship in 1991. A dream that was re-born when the NWA title was revived in Japan in 1992. A dream that was crushed when WCW left the NWA again in 1993. And then, a dream that was attainable when the NWA, although much smaller, became a working promotion throughout the United States and even Japan.

But, did you know I was supposed to win the NWA World’s Heavyweight Championship in 2000?

Yes. And if you are thinking “He must have his year wrong because he was in ECW in 2000.” Good thinking, but let me explain the story.

In 2000, the NWA World’s Championship was vacated because Nayoya Ogawa gave it up for whatever reason. He was Ogawa. You never know. There was a tournament that was scheduled to crown a new champion. I may be wrong, but I believe the original plan was to put the title on Colorado Kid Mike Rapada. Howard Brody loved him and wanted to push him as champion. And to be honest, Rapada could have been a great World’s Champion with the right TV exposure and the right Booker. I think he gets a bad rap. Howard recently told me that Dan Severn was supposed to win the tournament, but it something we can debate more one day.

Around this time, I have finished up the Dusty Rhodes’ program that propelled me into the top tier of heels in ECW. I am having blood baths with Tajiri and Jerry Lynn that people remember to this day. The beatings were so brutal that I would actually get a big babyface reaction on my way out of the ring. But where do I go from there? Turn babyface of course. This is for another story, but I was never supposed to beat Justin Credible. When I turned babyface in ECW in August of 2000, Paul Heyman made it clear to me that 1) this was a temporary turn and 2) I would get so close, but never beat Justin Credible. He would be the guy that would always have my number. But we will get to that in another story.

I had always had a good relationship with then-NWA President Howard Brody. Even to this day, Howard and I can argue about our philosophies on professional wrestling, but at the end of the day we are friends. Our disagreements, fights, and arguments were never personal. Just business. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The NWA Title Tournament. Paul and I were talking one day about where I was going. The idea for my next program got messed up due to business and he was going to keep me on the babyface side for a while. I was the King Of Old School, but since Dusty left, what was keeping me “old school”? It was then that I pitched to Paul about talking to Howard about winning the NWA World’s Championship in the tournament, doing one ECW vs. NWA Title vs. Title match against Justin Credible (Spoiler: It would have been a non-finish that lead to my return to the heel side), and then lose the title on a non-televised NWA show against whoever the NWA wanted me to, which most likely would have been Rapada. Which in turn, would have helped Rapada’s reign since he pinned a main event guy on TV. It was a win-win.

I spoke to Howard about it and he liked it. And agreed. The stage was set. I was going to win the NWA World’s Championship and be able to take it to ECW. What could go wrong??? Of course something went wrong. I was on vacation in Los Angeles one night when Gabe Sapolsky called me and said “You have to call Paul now. He is pi$$ed about the NWA thing.” My heart sunk. Then raced. I called Paul, who wasn’t as angry as Gabe made it seem (not that he wasn’t hot when he told Gabe to have me call him.) He basically said that plans changed, he didn’t tell what the plan was, and there was no way he could let me win the NWA Title. I was crushed. Both Paul and I called Howard. Howard was disappointed, but understood. Another member of the NWA board at the time still holds it against me. I promised Howard that I would make it up to him one day and would wear that 10 Pounds of Gold.

Mike Rapada won the tournament and was crowned the new NWA World’s Champion. I felt bad. It should have been me that put him over and gave him the run he deserved. But business is business.

By the way, the plan ended up with me becoming the ECW World Heavyweight Champion in November of 2000.

Fast forward to January of 2001. ECW was ending and I was back to hustling on the Indies, living off my TV name. Howard and I always stayed in contact and I joked with him one night “I’m ready to take my title.” But he wasn’t joking. He said “Let’s do it. And let’s do it in Tampa, where Dusty did it.”

He took the idea of me becoming champion again to the Board and trust me, it was not unanimous. In fact, the vote was very close. There was not a lot of trust. There was also a worry of what I would cost. And, believe it or not, there was worry of me getting beat in non-NWA companies. I was never one who cared about wins and losses. I just wanted the fans to be entertained. If I was a heel, I wanted to not just get heat, but get the most heat. If I was a babyface, I wanted to sell like Dream and Ricky Morton and make that comeback. I didn’t care who won at the end. So it baffled me why it would matter why it mattered if I got beat on a show where there was no NWA representation. In fact, if the promoters were smart, and if that promotion where I did get beat was close, they’d book the rematch in their area for the title. I get my win back. The other guy gets a payday and all is well in the world. But, what do I know?

April 24, 2001 was the date picked. Tampa was going to be the city. But wait, there’s more.

Howard tells me that the NWA wants to put the NWA North American Championship on me on April 13 in Texas. The idea was that it would qualify me as the number one contender for the World’s Title Match on April 24. I actually liked the idea a lot. I was told that I would win the North American title and then vacate it when I win the NWA title on the 24^th. Easy enough.

But wait…..there’s more.

On April 21, I am scheduled to defend the NWA North American Championship in my birthplace of Winnipeg, Manitoba. It had been 15 years since I had been home. It was a homecoming for me. I got to have dinner with family members that I hadn’t seen in years. It was awesome. When I got to the venue, I met Robby Royce, who I’d be working with. Seemed like a nice dude right away. Then I met the promoter. One of the top ten worst people I have ever met in the business. Total a-hole, but enough about him…well not yet…but this is a fun story. He comes up to me and says “I’d like you to lose in the middle of the ring.”

Huh?

I was taken back how this little man with a big ego, who doesn’t know me, would try and strong arm me like I cared about the finish. But I did want to make sure this was okay with Howard and the NWA because as far as I knew, I was vacating the title in three days after winning the World’s title. I wasn’t mad at all about losing the North American title. I was hot that the promoter would treat me, or anyone for that matter, like crap. But, once Robby and I sat down to come up with some ideas, I was relaxed and excited. And I couldn’t have been more thrilled with the match. I’ve had a lot of fun matches that I consider great, but the one with Robby Royce was one that was so good. Crowd was amazing through the whole thing. And Robby was great.

I felt awesome after the match. Especially since Howard told me that part of the idea of losing to Robby was that I would defend the World’s title on my return to Winnipeg in September. Total old school booking. I knew that the rematch would be a big draw.

Back to that in a few moments.

Now, its Tuesday. Time for the show. I had worked with Rapada the month before to get a good set up for the title match this time. He was smooth and easy to work with. He wasn’t afraid to say no either to ideas. I always respect when someone has ideas of their own. I wasn’t nervous at all….until Fonzie came up to me and asked if he could referee the match. Even now, I get goosebumps that a guy that I grew up watching referee huge main events was going to come out of his “referee retirement” and be a part of this.

The match was fine. I don’t remember most of it. It wasn’t Dusty vs. Harley, but it wasn’t a stinker too. And the house wasn’t full, but those there knew that the NWA World’s Championship meant a lot to both Mike and I. With the count of three, I fulfilled my dream of being the NWA World’s Heavyweight Champion.

I wanted to be the best NWA World’s Champion I could be. I wanted to travel to all of the “territories”. I wanted to lose non-title matches and come back for title matches. I wanted to draw money. I wanted to take the title to non-NWA promotions (where I made about 40% more per booking) and bring a buzz to the title again. It would never be the title of the 1960’s, 70’s, and 80’s, but it could be a new beginning. I didn’t want to be in the WWF, I wanted to be the NWA WORLD’S HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION!

But it wasn’t meant to be. If the 26 NWA members of the 70’s couldn’t get along, then they looked like glue compared to the NWA of 2001. There was more time complaining about where I was booked rather than getting me dates in their towns. There were complaints that the NWA fee was too much. There were complaints that my travel cost too much. Just excuse after excuse. Now, like I said in the paragraph before, when I was defending the World’s Heavyweight Championship, I was actually taking a 40% hit in what I normally charged for a show. There were bounced checks, canceled dates, empty promises, and even a promoter on the West Coast/Canada that one got me a one-way ticket for a weekend and lied about the return flight. One promoter wouldn’t let me defend the title in “his state” because Dusty Rhodes’ TCW was too close to his. DUSTY RHODES. Like instead of working with Dream, you know the 3-time champion and LEGEND, he just complained. Oh, and he never booked me. I wasn’t even allowed to defend the title in my own PWF company in Pennsylvania because there couldn’t be two promoters in the same state promoting the NWA. Some of the promoters would tell me how they wanted their guy to be the next champion. They just didn’t get it. It was a shame. They took what I loved and made it miserable.

Now that paragraph sounds like it was misery, but there were good things. Tons of them. When I did defend the NWA World’s Title, I loved it. It was the NWA Title that got me my first of 86 tours of Japan starting with Shinya Hashimoto’s Pro-Wrestling ZERO-ONE.

I could go off for hours on what Hashimoto and Yoshiyuki Nakamura meant to me. Not only were we co-workers, we became friends. Although Hashimoto-san passed away in 2005 (which one day I will give my theory), I’m still friends with Mr. Nakamura to this day. I couldn’t have done that without being the NWA World’s Champion.

It was my first tour of Japan where Hashimoto told me his dream was to become the NWA World’s Champion. It was where we bonded. He grew up idolizing Antonio Inoki and three-time NWA Champion Giant Baba. He wanted to be the next champion. It was definitely why ZERO-ONE got into bed with the NWA. But he had a problem with winning the title from me: I was too small. At the time, I was about 195 pounds. I was actually smaller than the NWA World’s Junior Heavyweight Champion at the time. Hashimoto told me that I needed to put on 30 pounds if I wanted the Japanese fans to respect me as the NWA Champion.

Nakamura and Hashimoto’s idea to get me over was to put me in the first ZERO-ONE Fire Festival Tournament. I would have ended up in 2^ndplace in my block with two loses. The idea would be that I would gain some popularity by defending the NWA World’s Title on future tours against the two people I lost to. It’s good business. It’s business they still do to this day. When I see the IWGP Champion lose to someone in the G1 Climax Tournament, I get excited with the notion that most likely this will become a title match later. The NWA didn’t see it that way. They didn’t understand how Japanese booking worked and to them, it made me look weak. They pulled me off the tour. A tour that cost me $5000. That was the last time I allowed the NWA to book me to Japan. A lot of people would think I’d be mad at Howard Brody for costing me $5000, but if it wasn’t for Howard booking me there the first time, I would have never gotten 85 more tours. The $5000 I lost, I made back and then some over the next 15 years.

I grew frustrated more and more that I was putting myself out there, but less NWA promoters were booking me as champion. And then the straw that broke the camel’s back came in my return to Winnipeg.

Now remember how I told you a few paragraphs ago about the cool set up with me and Robby Royce? He took the NWA North American title from me in my homecoming. I return as the NWA World’s Champion. Can lightning strike twice? The perfect build right?

Nope. The promoter and Robby had a falling out and Robby was replaced by a kid that to this day I blame for wanting me to quit wrestling, but I’m sure it’s not really his fault. The circumstances surrounding that day soured me to no end. I was angry that this promoter allowed Robby to leave, ruining this whole story. I was more angry that this promoter called my cousin and asked if I could stay at his house. You know, the cousin I hadn’t seen in 15 years before April! No hotel. The promoter complained about the fee for me and wanted to pay me in Canadian money even though all International promoters knew it had to be US cash.

Needless to say, the house was less than half it was in April. I know this because the promoter blamed me right away. And the match? Awful. The kid I was working with and I didn’t connect. On anything. He was expecting a brawl because I was in ECW. I was expecting an NWA World’s title match. The crowd hated it. There was a point in when I locked in a Chinlock and said to myself “I quit”. I was done.

I called Howard Brody when I got back home and told him I wanted to quit wrestling. He understood my frustration and said that he was working on a deal where Hashimoto would beat me at the NWA Annual Event in October.

Then 9/11 happened. The world changed.

With the world unsure and afraid, there was a sense that Hashimoto would not be able to come to the United States. We didn’t even know if there would be a show. Pro-Wrestling was the least important thing to people. They were mourning and trying to figure out what tomorrow would bring. And who could blame them?

At the end of September, Hashimoto made a decision to come over to the US. But at the time, the NWA could not use the Armory. Luckily, the IPW allowed the NWA to use their venue in St. Petersburg. The problem with the venue is that it was compact. Like people on top of people. And HOT. As CW Anderson would say “Pi$$ in a microwave” hot. But also awesome at the same time. I had heard how the fans at would go to IPW were rabid and loved their wrestling. I was excited…until about a week before. That’s when I was told that people on the Board wanted me to lose the Championship to Hashimoto in Japan because it would look better. They wanted a Disqualification ending. I was hot. I wanted out and I wanted to be done with professional wrestling.

The NWA Anniversary show was stacked. But I also knew that if we ended the show with Hashimoto defeating me by Disqualification that it would be a stinker. I had a finish in mind that I thought could cause a buzz if the NWA really wanted to do the title switch in Japan. I pitched it to Samoa Joe, who always was a ZERO-ONE guy, and he said to pitch it right to Nakamura and Hashimoto. So I went over the NWA’s head and sent them my idea. I don’t recommend that to anyone….unless you know it’s going to work. Hashimoto loved the idea and wanted to meet about it.

The thing that shocked me was that Hashimoto wanted to win the NWA title in the United States, not Japan. Once he explained it to me, I got it. He wanted to be the returning hero. Baba, Fujinami, Chono, and Mutoh all won the title in Japan. Even Jumbo and Masa Saito won the AWA World Title in Japan. He wanted to be the guy that won the title in the USA.

The idea was simple: Create a buzz that something that shouldn’t have happened, happened. Hashimoto was still coming off the “shoot” (that will be in my Hashimoto story one day) with Ogawa from two years before. What if a “shoot” happened? But how do we get people to believe? Easy. Contact people that would carry the results and send them the results early with the agreement they don’t post them before the end of the show. That way you could put Corino defeated Hashimoto by Disqualification. There were only five people, including Christopher Daniels, that would be in the know. Also, Howard wanted to make sure the promoters knew. I didn’t agree with him because I knew one of them would stooge that what we were doing wasn’t on the up and up.

Hashimoto’s big worry was coming off as a heel with the Japanese press. He was a hero and huge star. I got that. So I told him that in the first five minutes, I will make sure that the press knows I’m the heel.

The match was simple. We made it look like we weren’t on the same page. I wanted to create an atmosphere of “Why isn’t this match clicking?” with the fans. Bring them down. Create a bit of confusion…and then that first KICK. The crowd went “Okay, that was stiff.” And then the kicks got more stiff. And dangerous. But the one that made everyone believe was one that looked like a cheap shot that not only busted me open over the eye and sounded disgusting, but made referee Fred Rubenstein (also an NWA member) worry for my well-being. For real. Fred had known me since I got in the business seven years before and was always good to me. As the violent kicks continued, Fred went from referee that was in on the work to concerned father. When he finally called for the bell, it came of more of like a guy that cared for the guy getting the crap beaten out of him rather than the guy that knew when the match was supposed to end. Because it was real.

Chaos ensued. People hit the ring like they did during the Hashimoto-Ogawa aftermath. There was screaming and fingers pointing. Some brawling. It was nuts. I can’t tell you how hard it was for me to continue the angle because I was pretty much out on my feet. The idea was for Hashimoto to get right into the car and get to the hotel. What I remember the most is that the late Jimmy Del Rey going after Hashimoto because he thought that Hashimoto shot on me. That is loyalty. And one day I will tell the story of meeting Jimmy Del Rey. Miss that guy. He was always good to me.

I left the venue “angry” and headed over to Hashimoto’s hotel. He was thrilled. We drank beer and he joked with me that I was crazy for taking those kicks. And then he offered me a job. He wanted me to be in the ZERO-ONE office to help with finishes and angles. He wanted ZERO-ONE to be different than traditional wrestling and said that the Japanese wrestling world was changing fast. I found my love for wrestling again that night over too many beer, a concussion, and people that would become my good friends. I miss him every day.

For about 36 hours, fans thought that the whole NWA title match was a shoot. Until a member of the NWA Board said it wasn’t. I know who it was but what’s the use of being negative. The buzz deflated like air out of a balloon.

The title was officially declared held up. I don’t know who decided that. The idea was there would be a “conferences” for the next two weeks to determine what was going to happen with the title. Was Hashimoto the champion due to a TKO? Was it a no-contest and I was still the champion?

The reason for this was I had my first UK tour the next week and had a defense against former NWA Champion Gary Steele scheduled. The tour was set up by a new company called WrestleExpress. That went belly up and a promoter named Scott Conway took over my bookings. But once I got over to the UK, I emailed the NWA UK the day before the show and asked for directions to the show. I got back “Oh, I didn’t know you were still coming. No one from the NWA told us anything.” WHAT? My first thought was if you didn’t hear anything from the NWA, why wouldn’t you email them? And then the promoter tells me that he can’t pay the whole fee. Ugh. It got worse. Once I got there, he told me that my match with Gary Steele would be a Ladder Match..for no reason. And then asked if I wouldn’t mind losing. Now I think the promoter has since passed and don’t want to talk ill of him, but the whole situation soured me again. I came up with a finish to where I knocked Steele down, grabbed the title, but the title slipped out of my hands and landed on Gary. To the fans, it looked like Gary Steele had regained the NWA World’s Championship. To me, it created a finish that we didn’t need to address more than “Corino technically won the match because he grabbed the title first.”. Then Gary would have gone back to that town the next time and would have had sympathy because he had been screwed. But the NWA Board freaked out. They didn’t see that the program was me and Hashimoto, not Gary. Gary would have had an issue with the eventual new champion Shinya Hashimoto. They could have had a title match in Japan. Easy booking.

Instead, a round robin series of matches was scheduled to have an undisputed champion. Hashimoto went 2-0, I went 1-1, and Gary Steele went 0-2 totally killing off any chance of him getting a rematch. But, I wasn’t booking.

December 13, 2001 my championship reign ended for good. Shinya Hashimoto was now the NWA World’s Champion and all was good in the NWA title picture.

Looking back, with all the ups and downs I had as NWA World’s Heavyweight Champion I only see a great ride. Frustrating at times, but I fulfilled a dream. The only regret was that I didn’t get a second run a few years later. I would have taken more of a step back and enjoyed the title reign.