Countdown To Lockdown (5 page)

At one point in the promo, I pointed to Sabu, a true ring warrior if ever there was one, and told him he’d never gotten his full due; that he should have been one of the biggest stars in the business.

Later on backstage, he hugged me and thanked me, and I noticed he was doing his best to fight back tears, and failing. Finally, a tear fell down his battered, scarred face.

“Sorry,” he said, wiping the tear away quickly. “I had to do my best not to break down out there in front of the fans.”

Wow, tense moment, begging for some levity from the Hardcore Legend. “I wish you would have, brother,” I said, slapping Sabu playfully on the collection of keloids that is his deltoid. “It would have proved that someone was listening to my promo.”

I didn’t take the failure too personally, even laughing to myself at Steve Cold’s earlier words. I had given the wrong promo in the wrong place, at the wrong time. Hey, poop* happens, right?

Besides, I’d get ’em next time, right? Well, not exactly. By my count, this would be the second-to-last, honest-to-goodness, microphone-in-hand, making-a-real-point promo I would give as a member of WWE. Not until sixteen months later, in my last appearance for the company, would Vince McMahon allow me any real promo time.

Looking back on it, I’m pretty sure my D.C. promo was the final
nail in my WWE main event coffin. Not sure that metaphor even works. Let me see: I’m lying in a coffin, trying to get out in order to do a main event, but nails keep being pounded into the coffin, making it harder to get out to do a main event, then
bam
, there’s one more nail, making sure I never get out again. Okay. It works well enough, even if I did get to do one more main event only three months later, but I never really did get that microphone back until that final day.

But I do believe it’s safe to say that the powers that be behind the scenes who were not big fans of mine finally won out that night over the powers that be who still felt I had something major to offer.

I had read off and on for months that I had heat with people behind the scenes, and that my depictions of the WWE creative process hadn’t won me any new friends within the company. The
Wrestling Observer
hinted that Triple H was not among my biggest fans, which struck many as odd since I’d been fairly influential in his career in 2000, when he was making the transition from popular performer to legitimate main-event bad guy.

To which I say to Triple H … brother, … that’s okay. Honestly. First of all, I was paid for those matches with Triple H. Paid really well, too. It wasn’t like I helped him move into a new apartment, or lent him money when he was down.

Second, whether I was helpful to his career or not, Triple H is a part of the McMahon family — he owes it to Vince and Linda, and Shane and Stephanie as well as the shareholders and fans to offer his best opinion, based on what’s best for the company, not based on who may have been beneficial to his career.

So let’s forget about the idea of anyone owing me anything. If, however, someone wants to start a discussion about how wrong WWE’s judgment was, or how they chose to ignore all the big reactions I received in favor of a couple of those cricket chirpers … well, I’m willing to listen.

A day after
WrestleMania
, Vince pulled me aside. He had two issues to discuss. One, I was no longer exempt from the WWE dress
code. After years of coming and going pretty much as I pleased — flannels, sweats, sneakers — I would be expected to wear a sports coat, slacks, and shoes. I heard the part about the sports coat, but not really the words
slacks
and
shoes
, choosing to pretend they’d never left his mouth at all.

Two, I needed to be “repackaged.” Fans “no longer connected with me.” There would be no angle, no match with Morrison, no follow-up on the book. I did a pretaped promo for the Make-A-Wish Foundation that took me nearly twenty takes — probably because my confidence was shot — then drove to the airport and caught a flight home, leaving behind a long legacy of making a difference with the company.

I received a phone call from my editor at Pocket Books a couple days later. What happened to my big push on TV? she asked. Where was the big angle?

I told her I’d been sent home for repackaging and recited Vince’s line about not connecting with the fans anymore.

“What?” my editor yelled in disbelief. “You don’t connect with the fans? You’re number six on the
New York Times
list!”

March 17, 2009

Orlando, Florida

8:55 a.m.

I’ve got a bowling ball in my stomach, I’ve got a desert in my mouth. Figures that my courage would choose to sell out now.
That’s what’s going through my head as I make my way down to ringside for the match I need to do that will get me where I want to go — Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, for my April 19
Lockdown
match against Sting. Those
words are from “Crucify,” a song by Tori Amos, who is now making her third appearance in a Mick Foley memoir. Why? Because almost literally, I feel like I have a desert in my mouth. Like an entire desert. Sure, my courage feels like it’s been selling out every time I’ve stepped through the curtain for a big match over the last nine years. My legs always feel like Jell-O; quivering, soft, no real strength upon which to move with the slightest authority. Just walking upright feels like quite an accomplishment come match time. I’m always worried about my wind, too, figuring I haven’t done the proper cardio for matches of any magnitude. Usually I’m right, too. My wind goes, and my legs go, and I’m left to rely on a few big moves, a little creative forethought, and a little compassion and understanding on the part of my opponent to carry me through. It worked like a charm at
WrestleMania 2006
with Edge. It worked pretty well at
One Night Stand
in June of ’06, too. But that was before that “desert in my mouth” problem started acting up.

*Look, before we move forward, there is something you need to know about my writing style. When I write about wrestling matches that have occurred in the past I nonetheless often refer to them in the present tense, as if they are taking place in my mind. Which, come to think of it, they usually are. Other times I will shift back into a past tense, sometimes without warning. I will leave it up to you as the reader to navigate this particular nuance.

The match is just minutes old, four or five, when Kurt picks me up for an Angle Slam on the concrete. I can almost hear you guys saying,
On the concrete, Mick? Are you crazy?
No, I’m not crazy, but Kurt needs a big move, something drastic and obviously painful to dramatically turn the tide, put me in a world of hurt, and create immediate sympathy. I’m simply not in good enough shape to fight out from underneath, stage comebacks, and hit any kind of impressive offensive moves. I need something quick, efficient, and convincing. Angle Slam on the concrete.

I’m only halfway up and I already feel redeemed. What a difference twenty-four hours can make. Hello, old “light” Mick. So long, you
S.O.S. My back lands with a sickening thud on the concrete — the cold, hard concrete, if you want me to go into details about it. Growing up a wrestling fan, I know concrete just wouldn’t be concrete without the adjectives
cold
and
hard
in front of it. I hear the collective groan of the crowd in the Impact Zone, and I know I’ve got a chance to tell this story. If only I could swallow.

What is it about this pace that makes it such a task? It can’t just be nerves. Often, since joining TNA back in September, I’ve needed only to cut a promo in the ring — and I’ve found myself barely able to talk. At our live
Impact from Las Vegas
, I was almost in a state of panic, looking at our smoking-hot floor director, Stevie (who is a woman, by the way, a woman “with flaming locks of auburn hair, with ivory skin and eyes of emerald green” — a little Dolly Parton “Jolene” lyric for you), to give me the five-minute cue, and feeling, absolutely feeling, that I had less than a minute of moisture in my body before my mouth just sealed shut, like the slamming of some forbidden tomb.

At least then I was just talking. Now I have to face the prospect of being beaten up by the world’s most intense, driven athlete while worrying about my legs, my wind, and my damn saliva. I have a vivid thought, a question that I ask myself as Kurt rolls me into the ring.
If I had a choice between a million dollars and a bottle of water, what would I choose?
It’s a million-dollar question, literally. Kurt is putting the boots to me for several seconds when I answer my own question.
I would take the million.
But I had to think about it. Really, really think about it.

There’s only one way to make this work. I need to look as helpless as possible — defenseless, incapable of any hope of offense. But I can’t just lie there. I’ve got to be animated in my helplessness. Show my despair to the camera, let the fans in the building and at home feel my pain. Kurt just needs to stay aggressive, ruthless. Not really a problem for Kurt.

I look over at Sting, Kurt’s partner for the match. “That’s enough, Kurt,” he says. “He’s had enough.” Bingo. There it is. My incentive. My
rationale for whatever action I might take. It all goes back to what “Freebird” Michael Hayes told me so long ago: “A heel has to believe he’s right.” Not that I think my potential actions will turn me heel. I don’t really want to be a bad guy. I just want to paint my character with a few shades of gray. For I think it’s within these shades of gray that the battle for TV ratings and Pay-Per-View buys will be fought, hopefully won. The ratings have been up for TNA. But these ratings have not been translating to Pay-Per-View buys. I don’t know if a match with Sting can be part of the solution. But I think it can. Maybe I’m naïve or slightly delusional. I think there’s always been a fine line between self-confidence and self-delusion in our business. Any guy bold enough to think he can make a difference is probably just barely on the right side of that formula. I’ve seen top guys toward the end of their run fall on the wrong side of that line, and it’s not pretty.

I may have little to no confidence in my in-ring abilities, but when it comes to getting people involved in my matches, getting caught up in my stories, I’m like the Little Engine Who Could. I think I can, I think I can. So, if I can just make it to
Lockdown
to face down Sting in about a month, I can hope for those few big moves, that creative fore-thought, and that understanding and compassion from my opponent to at least give me a chance to pull off some kind of April surprise.

Besides, I have a little over a month to improve my situation. Increase my wind, strengthen my legs, find a solution for that desert in my mouth. Maybe it’s a medical condition. Dry mouth. Or, as I’ve long suspected, it may be the special-effects fog — the smoke that accompanies our entrances — that causes the problem.

I’ve been searching for answers on the Internet, looking up “dry mouth” and “leg fatigue,” as if some magic formula exists for all these things that ail me. I know my name and
Internet
usually go together like Al Snow and
Hall of Famer
, but I’ll try anything at this point.

Just about a minute left. Another merciless minute at the hands of Kurt Angle before I can finally harvest the fruits of my labors. Kurt goes for a pinfall but pulls me up at the count of two. How heartless,
how diabolical. Sting once again pleads for clemency, but Kurt’s compassion well has been dry for quite a while. I know I’m kind of mixing in facts and stories, characters and human beings here, but that’s indicative of my mind-set. It certainly feels real to me.

Jeff Jarrett has seen enough. Like a real-life Popeye, the TNA founder has stands all he can stands, and he can’t stands no more. (I wonder how many children over the decades have flunked an English test or two due to the influence of the grammatically incorrect sailor?) Jeff fires up his own comeback while I lay prone in the ring. “Bam, bam, bam,” or “ga-bing, ga-bing, ga-bing” — depending on which wrestler’s vernacular you go with. Down goes the ref. It’s an overused but valuable cliché, and it gives Kurt a chance to scamper out to ringside for a metal folding chair. Something else happens, but I’d be lying if I said I had a clue what it is. I’m too tired to really follow everything. My head is starting to clear, enough to realize that a million dollars could be an awful lot to pay for a bottle of water. Still, I’d probably give Stevie about a thousand dollars for just a swig — that would be a pretty good deal.