[1998-04-06-WWF-Raw] Cactus Jack promo

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Cactus begins his heel turn with a great promo. He sits in a chair in the middle of the ring. He points out that Terry Funk flew home and it must be really bad because Cactus Jack and Terry Funk do not miss wrestling matches. He says some kind words about Terry Funk and the fans are being so disrespectful which probably made it easy for Cactus to muster the anger needed to do this promo. I loved this but I really hated the heckling idiots since he was 100% right.

[soup23]

This was an amazing promo where Cactus comes off as justified in everything he says and yet positions himself to have a major role in the ongoings upcoming. I had forgotten about this and was wondering if the Dude Love transformation came out of left field. I am relieved to say this was the perfect setup. Where WCW is dropping the ball on the little things, WWF is picking it up in spades. Notice the lingering long shot up the entrance ramp of Jack leaving. One of my favorite things from the yearbook so far.

[Childs]

Foley was maybe the best ever at this kind of promo. He played with his real biography brilliantly. The fans still weren't treating him as a big star however.

[Migs]

Foley was the best at turning on the fans he was in part responsible for creating. It was one of his key skills.

[Superstar Sleeze]

Great promo by Cactus, but really not much in the way of crowd heat. He was still walking that line as face and heel. He was justified, but as JR pointed he sounded bitter even a bit whiny. So the fans were a bit confused. So we should boo or cheer. I never knew how they got from Cactus to Dude Love. This was a damn good setup.

[PeteF3]

Really good promo that harkens back to his best ECW work, though the fans don't have much patience for it because he's not regurgitating catchphrases. One other neat bit of detail was how they made sure to explain and show, in the recap video, the fans chanting for Austin after hearing that he was out of jail, giving some context to Cactus' comments that we didn't get on the show last week. JR plays this 100% straight, which is the right move--Cactus legitimately appears to be gone for good.

[TravJ1979]

Good promo, but in hindsight Foley is kind of a whiner in a kayfabe way as well as a shoot way. if you don't like his stuff you are bad people because you should react to him killing himself for you in his matches.

[TonyPulis'Cap]

This is a fantastic promo from Cactus, with a lot of truth to what he is saying, and you can feel some empathy with him. However, as others have pointed out, there is something whiny about it, which unfortunately is a characteristic that I think some associate with Foley both on and off screen. Knowing what is to come with the transformation into Dude Love as the corporate puppet, this is a really good bridge, and even today, Foley is the master of making sure angles have logical steps and the characters have logical motivations for their actions.

 

One thing that is touched on by others though, is the fact that the crowd seems pretty disinterested and restless during the segment. Now while that actually works in a way with Foley’s whole point, it’s worryingly a trend that gets more prevalent as we really get into the heart of the Attitude Era, that fans have increasingly short attention spans and are starting to zone out for anything that’s not catchphrases or swearing.