[1992-08-29-USWA-TV] Interview: Jimmy Hart / Interview: Jerry Lawler & Jeff Jarrett

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

The WWF/USWA working relationship has begun! Jimmy Hart sends in a promo against a WWF green screen, and probably does a longer interview than he ever had the chance to do in the WWF. It's here I realize just how badly he was misused on a national stage, because this is really good. He challenges the nerve of Jeff Jarrett showing up at the Pyramid and challenging Bret Hart to a match recently, and says the lowest guys on the totem pole in the WWF could beat Jarrett or Lawler, much less Bret Hart. He also gets in some great lines about how the WWF has seven trucks with all of their equipment from show to show, while the USWA has one pickup with "maypop" tires (which everyone in the South knows means may pop at any minute). Jimmy Hart could have done great things in the WWF beyond just being the #2 manager who does 30 second insert promos and holds a megaphone. Sad.

 

Then we cut to the studio for a response from Lawler and Jarrett. Lawler is on fire! The sheer volume of great promos from Lawler over the years is staggering. He mentions how he and Jimmy Hart went to high school together and he ended up hiring him to carry his bags years ago because he felt sorry for him performing with the Gentrys for $150 a week. And he can look down on Lawler all he wants, but if not for Lawler, he'd still be a nobody! He says anyone from the WWF can come in anytime and they'll take them on. Eddie Marlin is out quickly to diffuse this, making sure fans don't think this is WWF vs USWA, that it's just Jimmy Hart being a jerk, but Lawler isn't ready to concede the point just yet.

 

I loved this segment.

[Tim Evans]

It's a shame this only lasted 3 weeks with only one in studio appearance by Jimmy. This was awesome and proved how great Jimmy was on the mic if he was given a chance and wasn't turned into a laughing idiot. And this is also probably Lawler's best promo of the year. So intense and hateful.

[shoe]

All I can say this is some tremendous stuff. Memphis really stands the test of time. Lawler is simply amazing here. Hart is so tremendous here. He was so amazing on the DVDVR Memphis 80's set. You just want to throw up with how WWF and WCW just wasted his talents for years. Meltzer mentioned how amazing Hart comes across on the Memphis Heat DVD and wondered how he stands up to young Cornette and Heenan.

[BackToBionic]

Some great promos there. And I loved Jimmy Hart's Arsenio reference.

[Kevin Ridge]

Pretty good interview by Jimmy. Agreed that he should have got more time on the mic in WWF. Lawler is not pleased with Hart's comments and defends USWA.

[WingedEagle]

Awesome, awesome promo by Jimmy about Jeffrey Jarrett challenging Bret Hart. We were absolutely deprived by him not given the opportunity to carry some big feuds on a national level. This makes you want to pop in Memphis set. Says Lawler & Jarrett, just like Memphis, are built on a bluff.

[PeteF3]

I love Jimmy's insistence on referring to Jarrett as "Jeffrey." Hart is clearly loving the chance to cut loose--he takes about 45 seconds just to say, "Eddie Marlin paid somebody off," then regales us with his life story. He goes off on the announcing comparisons--the best announcers in the world are in the WWF, while the USWA has "Dave Brown, the Weather Clown and the guy next to him is so bad, he makes Dave Brown look good!" Hart issues a challenge, because Lawler & Jarrett are just like Memphis, Tennessee--built on a bluff! I think Hart got more great lines into that promo than he did in every single WWF promo combined.

 

Lawler stands up for Carruthersville, Tupelo, and Arkansas in an incredibly emotional response promo. If not for Lawler, Hart and his Gentrys would still be singing at the Levy Lounge on Lamar Avenue for $150 a week. Lawler demands to face anybody in the WWF--goddamn, now I SO want to see Money Inc. come to Memphis to face Lawler & Jarrett.

 

Eddie Marlin comes up and actually stands up for the WWF and Vince McMahon, and wants to downplay the USWA-WWF feud and for Lawler to concentrate on Hart.

 

Fantastic stuff, and a great table-setter for then the WWF-USWA feud really explodes in '93.

[ajtroma]

Some of this stuff Hart was saying really seemed to strike a nerve with the King. I wont get into this whole spiel again (look at the Dr. Lawler post in 1990) but after about 7 years of being referred to as cheap-ass, Kmart wrestling after owning these towns not 7 years prior, this is some intense stuff.

[garretta]

Yay! The real Jimmy Hart is back! Where have you been, Colonel, and who's the fugitive from the nuthouse who's tried to look and talk like you for the past seven years? This is the kind of promo that Jimmy's always been capable of, and it's a shame that Heenan got in front of him on the pecking order, because once that happened any hope of competence on the mic from Jimmy was gone. Apparently, there can only be one top manager in Junior's world at any one time (though his dad did pretty well with three almost-equals for over a decade).

 

Tthe only thing that's WWF about this promo is the green screen Jimmy's standing in front of. Everything else could have been done at the WMC studios, and I kind of wish it had been. The only thing missing here is an actual person or persons behind Jimmy's challenge. Couldn't he have brought Money, Inc. to the MSC and actually had a match with Lawler and Jeff? I think that would have been better than just sending in what turned out to be a random promo. Hell, I'd have settled for Koko coming back in as a heel and challenging the King at Jimmy's behest. Bret-Jeff would have been interesting too, but with Bret having to worry about main eventing SummerSlam I can see why that was dropped as soon as it began.

 

The actual promos were nothing exactly new if you know your Memphis wrestling history, but they were a nice refresher course since the Lawler-Hart feud has laid dormant since before Mania 1. Jeff really didn't need to be there, as it turned out, although I liked the fact that Jimmy has known him long enough and well enough to call him Jeffrey. Marlin came out to prevent a full-blown promotional war, most likely because he didn't want the fans to get ideas of unification matches and the like too soon. As of right now, this is nothing more than the resumption of the age-old Lawler-Hart feud. Thank heaven, it would turn into much more, though not for a little while.

[ajtroma]

The Orient Express were the WWF stars that came in that Monday night. Corey Macklin during the match commentary had no idea of the name Kato and just referred to him as "big guy".

[garretta]

Was Jimmy with them, AJ? Was Fuji?

 

Paul Diamond a big guy in the wrestler sense? Leave it to Corey. If he hadn't sounded so much like a young black version of Lance, Papa would never have hired him.

[ajtroma]

Mr. Fuji was still, I guess, manager of the Orient Express. As you'll see as the working agreement moves along, continuity between heel/face, manager stables or much of anything really didn't really matter to them. Neither manager appeared in Memphis that night.

Paul did double duty that particular night. He wrestled Barry Horowitz there in Memphis as "The Rocketeer", trying out what would later become Max Moon.

[garretta]

I'm not even sure that the OX was teaming regularly by this point, AJ. It might have been a one-off for the Memphis audience. Tanaka had already been back to Memphis as himself to wrestle Embry, as we saw in '91. I think Diamond may have been doing jobs under his own name for Vince, but again I can't be sure. Fuji managed them during their WWF glory days (such as they were), but by now I think he was down to John Nord (The Berzerker) while waiting for Yoko to come in.

[JKWebb]

This is great stuff!  This is the Jimmy we all love.  This is up there with some of my favorite promos of the year thus far.

[dawho5]

Loved Jimmy here and I am sad that there isn't more of this Jimmy Hart in the 90s.  King's promo is amazing as well and he plays the small-town hero card perfectly.