[1991-08-24-WWF-Superstars] Interview: Jake Roberts / Interview: Sid Justice / Interview: Bobby Heenan

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Great interview from Jake, who explains his heel turn with a parable. Excited to re-live this run.

 

Next, Sid is out for an interview and promises to call it down the middle.

 

Finally, Heenan is trolling Hogan with Flair's belt, which I love.

[PeteF3]

Jake tells a fable of a rabbit and a snake, that's basically a re-casting of the Scorpion and the Frog. I like that Jake didn't really need an explanation for turning--even as a babyface, he came off as evil and untrustworthy.

 

Sid doesn't even have entrance music yet, which seems odd by the standards of the normally airtight WWF quality control. Okerlund accuses Sid of being a "true blue Hulkamaniac." They're still trying to ambiguate where Sid stands but I can't imagine even the densest WWF fan envisioning Sid as anything besides a babyface at this point.

 

Heenan knocks on the Real World Title belt as simulation of what Hulk Hogan's knees are doing. They're still talking about how Ric Flair "may" be coming and openly acknowledging his contract situation, which I guess they legally have to do to protect themselves. It bears repeating how mindblowing it was at the time that the simple phrase, "another organization," was being uttered on WWF programming.

[Kevin Ridge]

Jake’s heel promo is fantastic. I feel like it is probably too much for the WWF audience though.

 

We don’t see Sid wrestling but he is always wearing his in ring gear. Sid promises justice will be served at Summerslam.

 

This is surreal with Bobby talking about Flair still being under contract to another organization.

[soup23]

Story time from Jake. He gives a good parable between a rabbit and snake and how dangerous a snake can be. I can get behind calling the Warrior a rabbit.

 

Sid gets a pretty legitimate pop coming out to talk to Gene. They really portray that the match really relies on Sid's bias. Okerlund calls him a true blue Hulkamaniac but Sid culls that thought and says again justice will be served.

 

Bobby has a hold of the belt and calls out Hogan with it.

[garretta]

Jake: He blames Warrior, and by extension the fans, for ever trusting him in the first place, which fits. Like I said earlier, though, this whole thing is dead in the water before it starts, forcing Vince to go to Plan B, which is Savage. Fortunately, we don't need three weeks of vignettes to see that feud start.

 

Sid: As Pete said, anyone who doesn't know he's a face through and through simply hasn't been paying attention. I think Mean Gene was referencing the Jake/Warrior stuff when he talked about the things that Sid couldn't control outside the ring, but I can't be sure. At any rate, the pledge to call the match down the middle comes off half-hearted at best; Vince really could have done a better job making Sid a tweener if he truly wanted to go that way, which of course he didn't.

 

I wonder if there was any thought to firing Warrior before the match and simply inserting Sid in his place. It would have made for a hell of an in-ring debut, that's for sure.

 

Heenan: Bobby doesn't say much, but he looks and sounds better than he has in a while when he says it. Once again, you get the idea that Flair is his ace in the hole, the trump card Hogan can't even begin to counter. He wasn't this confident about Bundy, Studd, Orndorff, or even Andre. I like the idea that they're teasing Flair's non-appearance as much as his potential coming, but realistically, if he's not coming where did they get the belt from? No response from Hogan yet, but why would he take time out from his SummerSlam training to talk about a man who doesn't work for the WWF and may not come at all?

 

It may have ended up a pile of hash, but the start to this angle is absolutely first-rate.

[dawho5]

I feel like I've run out of good things to say about Jake as a promo. I've been down on Sid since before he left WCW, so I tend to wander off mentally. Bobby's promo was his best work in a while. You can tell he's excited to work with Flair.