[1993-04-24-WCW-Saturday Night] Interview: Cactus Jack

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

Cactus comes out all bandaged up from the match last week. For the first time ever, he mentions his wife and son, who begged him not to step in the ring against Vader again. But he says it's out of his hands, he has to get back in the ring with him. He dares Vader to put him out, and if he does, he earns his respect.

[shoe]

Good promo that adds a wrinkle to the Cactus Jack character. It really humanizes him.

[Kevin Ridge]

Yeah, humanize was the first thing I thought about when watching this. It did add more to Cactus as a person.

[PeteF3]

Foley's recount of this angle in his book is one of the high points. In WCW fashion, they went from not wanting to air the match at all, to censoring it and then asking Foley to make himself look like he did afterward for the next episode's taping, resulting in Foley having to drive to Center Stage while punching himself and rubbing his nose and eyebrows with sandpaper. Yes, that sounds like Foley wankery, but I think ultimately he was doing it for the right cause--at least from a wrestling/business standpoint.

 

Jack talks of how his family felt seeing him come out of the hospital, and promises this will be the last time for him in the ring with Vader. Vader may want to destroy him, but Jack's been trying to do the same thing for his whole life and hasn't succeeded. This was all very effective at finally getting sympathy on Cactus--which was a problem for the first few months of his babyface run--while still making him out to be dangerous and creepy.

[WingedEagle]

Cactus with 27 stitches following last week's match with Vader where he had the worst beating of his life.

[soup23]

Great promo to set up what was about to transpire and build up more sympathy for Jack.

[garretta]

For the first time (but not the last) we get a glimpse of Mick Foley the man during a promo. I agree that this was needed, because the Cactus character, much like Mankind later, simply isn't a natural babyface. But if fans can't bring themselves to root for the deranged madman Cactus Jack, maybe they can give it up for family man Mick Foley (although he's not referred to by name here), who's putting himself on the line for a second time against the man who nearly bashed his head in so his family can eat and live comfortably.

 

I liked Cactus holding Vader's mask up like a scalp as he talked. I rust he tore it off of Vader at some point during the first match.

 

I definitely want to see both matches now, because the first one sounds brutal just by the looks of Mick here and the second one should be even worse based on its buildup. if the lead announcer of a given promotion says that he doesn't want to be around to see a match as Tony does here, you know (or at least hope) that it's going to be a war.