WWE Hall of Famer and AEW commentator Jim Ross recently spoke on his podcast, “Grilling JR,” about a variety of professional wrestling topics including the NWA Bunkhouse Stampede event, which happened at a time when Jim Crockett was facing financial pressure at the time. Here are the highlights:
Jim Crockett facing financial pressure:
“I think so [that it was obvious]. I think every was, I mean, everybody knew the consequences. Everybody knew the lay of the lamb those balloon payments were the kiss of death because it just gives you another chance to fail. If you’re late the talents overreact are going to get paranoid and uneasy and there’s a lot of paranoia and uneasiness in our locker room at that point in time.”
Pushback around moving to Texas:
“Not well. Because, you’re on uncharted territory or it’s a new deal. You know change is an interesting thing. Change is not always negative, but it is perceived as such more often than not. So, you know, I was one of those guys that moved to Dallas. I went down there and against my better judgment I bought a house in Plano. A nice little pool a three bedroom house by myself coming off another divorce my records are great. We all kind of buckle up and for me it worked out just fine because I had to relocate anyway. I mean, I was out of a place to live under normal circumstances. I could afford buying me another house or rent. But, I thought it was probably time to leave Oklahoma. Jimmy’s idea was, you know, it just he felt like in a nutshell Conrad that living in Dallas gave his brand more credibility for whatever reason than living in Charlotte.”
Business being better when focusing on your own:
“Absolutely, yeah, no doubt. You focus on the task at hand and what we needed to do, as I said earlier about that momentum issue, is that we needed to get some guys, our angles, programs, marriages whatever you want to call them hot and interesting and unpredictable so to speak. I’m a big believer that you know we just didn’t have all those pieces in place, but you got to take care of home base you got to take care of the in-ring product so people go over there and say ‘Well, did you watch the Bunkhouse Stampede? No? Oh man it was a hell of a show. Really? Yeah.” So the next time you have a pay-per-view you’ve got some little chatter that people have liked it and I’m not going to miss this one. So, it was important to have a bell to bell success throughout the night. I’m not sure we succeeded in all those areas, but in any event it was an interesting weekend in Long Island to say the least.
You can listen to the complete podcast below:
(h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription)
