Rocky Johnson become new WWE Trainer

[Guest FeArHaVoC]

Johnson, WWE’s newest trainer, attends Armageddon

 

FT. LAUDERDALE, Fla. – Dec. 15, 2002 – Although he won’t officially start until mid-January, the newest addition to World Wrestling Entertainment’s talent development staff, Rocky Johnson, attended Armageddon tonight.

 

Johnson, who said he recently signed a “lengthy contract” with WWE, lives in nearby Davie, and stopped by to visit old friends and watch the show.

 

Johnson will be spending two weeks a month at Ohio Valley Wrestling, WWE’s training center in Louisville, Ky. The other two weeks, he will travel to WWE events and work with the younger Superstars before the show. Johnson said his first day at OVW will be Jan. 14.

 

“There’s a lot of good young talent down there that just needs to be seasoned,” Johnson said. “They’ve just got to learn the dos and don’ts – why they’re doing this and why they’re doing that. To make it short, they all know wrestling, but they need psychology. This business is like reading a book.”

 

“I’m just happy to be working with WWE. I’ve been in this business all my life. I never left it. I’m really looking forward to starting the next year off with it.”

 

Johnson is no stranger to the ring, or to training. He wrestled all around the world, in virtually every territory that was active in the 1970s. He also spent considerable time in WWE into the 1980s, winning the WWE Tag Team Championship with Tony Atlas. They were the first African-American duo to win those titles.

 

More recently, Johnson has been running the WWE SmackDown! Wrestling Academy in Davie.

 

Johnson’s star pupil, of course, is his own son, Dwayne, better known as The Rock.“From when he was 10 or 11 years old, I messed around with him, took him to the gym with me,” Johnson said of his only son. “I made him do gymnastics and karate for coordination and balance. I would show him holds.”

 

Johnson added with a laugh, “I showed him the sleeper hold, and he went to school and he got in a fight with some kid, and he put the sleeper on him. But I never showed him how to wake somebody up, so they had to call me. So I stopped showing him dangerous holds.”

 

Years later, The Rock decided to retire from football and pursue wrestling. His training sessions with his father became more serious and intense.

 

“I knew (wrestling) was his next step,” Johnson said. “I knew before him. I told him, ‘You’ll play football, but you’ll get it out of your system.’ He’s third generation. He called me and said, ‘You know Dad, you’re right. I’m tired of football.’ I said, ‘If you’re going to do (wrestling), then do it 160 percent.’ You see the rest.”

 

Jim Ross, the voice of RAW as well as the company’s head of talent relations, compared WWE’s hiring of Johnson to a football team bringing in a great strength coach or defensive coordinator. He said he’d like to see the Superstars “slow down and execute a more plausible, realistic wrestling-based story, instead of being so tied to doing acrobatics for the sake of doing acrobatics.” He said Johnson was one person who could teach them how.

 

“He’s proven in the past to be a very good teacher, and he was a great in-ring tactician in his active wrestler days,” Ross said. “We’ve seen some of the kids he’s trained, and he’s done a great job. He still has a great passion for the product. So we thought he would be a great fit for our developmental area, and we’re looking forward after the first of the year for him to join our staff in Louisville.”

 

Johnson said he thoroughly enjoyed Armageddon.

 

“I thought it was fantastic,” he said. “You’ve got some great athletes out there. I thought they worked hard. Some of the younger guys need a little bit more seasoning, but the only thing that can handle that is time. I don’t mind guys who are green (inexperienced) making mistakes, as long as they show you 110 percent. And they all showed that tonight.”

 

Johnson said he plans to help the younger guys so that they make fewer mistakes.

 

“I don’t want to be in this business if I can’t add something,” he said. “Hopefully I can open the doors for a lot of these young guys. I can’t drink the water for them, I can only take them to the water. It’s a challenge, and I love a challenge.”

 

Credit: WWE.com

[Guest webmasterofwrestlegame]

Just as long as he doesn't teach everybody how to do a Sharpshooter like his son...

[Guest FeArHaVoC]

Jim Ross, the voice of RAW as well as the company’s head of talent relations, said he’d like to see the Superstars “slow down and execute a more plausible, realistic wrestling-based story, instead of being so tied to doing acrobatics for the sake of doing acrobatics.” He said Johnson was one person who could teach them how.

 

Johnson said he thoroughly enjoyed Armageddon.

 

“I thought it was fantastic,” he said. “You’ve got some great athletes out there. I thought they worked hard. Some of the younger guys need a little bit more seasoning, but the only thing that can handle that is time. I don’t mind guys who are green (inexperienced) making mistakes, as long as they show you 110 percent.

That explains why JR hates RVD and the Cruiserweights.

 

and, who besides Trish and Christian were "Young" on the PPV?

[Guest CanadianChris]

Jim Ross, the voice of RAW as well as the company’s head of talent relations, said he’d like to see the Superstars “slow down and execute a more plausible, realistic wrestling-based story, instead of being so tied to doing acrobatics for the sake of doing acrobatics.” He said Johnson was one person who could teach them how.

 

Johnson said he thoroughly enjoyed Armageddon.

 

“I thought it was fantastic,” he said. “You’ve got some great athletes out there. I thought they worked hard. Some of the younger guys need a little bit more seasoning, but the only thing that can handle that is time. I don’t mind guys who are green (inexperienced) making mistakes, as long as they show you 110 percent.

That explains why JR hates RVD and the Cruiserweights.

 

and, who besides Trish and Christian were "Young" on the PPV?

Well, if Christian is young, so is Edge, since they're the same age.

 

Albert and Big Slow are still relatively young. That'd be funny if he was talking about them.

 

Was there anyone there who hasn't been wrestling with a major company less than 3 or 4 years?

[Guest oldschoolwrestling]

Is this an attempt to keep Rock happy and want to focus on wrestling more, or is this guy really a good trainer? I've never heard of the Smackdown academy in Davie, has anyone else?

[Guest Insane Bump Machine]

Was there anyone there who hasn't been wrestling with a major company less than 3 or 4 years?

I think you worded that question wrong. Makes no sense to me...

[Guest Si82]

Jim Ross, the voice of RAW as well as the company’s head of talent relations, compared WWE’s hiring of Johnson to a football team bringing in a great strength coach or defensive coordinator. He said he’d like to see the Superstars “slow down and execute a more plausible, realistic wrestling-based story, instead of being so tied to doing acrobatics for the sake of doing acrobatics.” He said Johnson was one person who could teach them how.

Just like those good old hosses eh J.R?

[Guest CanadianChris]

Was there anyone there who hasn't been wrestling with a major company less than 3 or 4 years?

I think you worded that question wrong. Makes no sense to me...

You're right, I did.

 

Was there anyone at the PPV who hasn't been with a major company MORE than 3 or 4 years?

[Guest treble charged]

Jim Ross, the voice of RAW as well as the company’s head of talent relations, said he’d like to see the Superstars “slow down and execute a more plausible, realistic wrestling-based story, instead of being so tied to doing acrobatics for the sake of doing acrobatics.” He said Johnson was one person who could teach them how.

 

Johnson said he thoroughly enjoyed Armageddon.

 

“I thought it was fantastic,” he said. “You’ve got some great athletes out there. I thought they worked hard. Some of the younger guys need a little bit more seasoning, but the only thing that can handle that is time. I don’t mind guys who are green (inexperienced) making mistakes, as long as they show you 110 percent.

That explains why JR hates RVD and the Cruiserweights.

 

and, who besides Trish and Christian were "Young" on the PPV?

We already know that Rocky likes the younguns. And I'm sure by 'seasoning' he means 'a night of playing strip-poker with me'.

[EL DANDY~! 0]

I'm all for it if these hosses can put some fuckin psychology in a match instead of being like punch punch, choke, kick, finisher. And about those acrobatic cruiserweights? You ever actually SEE Jaime Knoble before he came to the WWE? You see the psychology he ever used? Oh yeah...you were told to work the WWE style WITH THE CRUISERWEIGHTS. Man...JR knows jack shit about anybody who wasn't a fuckin pulling guard in a Big 12 school...

[Guest Insane Bump Machine]

Was there anyone at the PPV who hasn't been with a major company MORE than 3 or 4 years?

Kurt Angle?

[Guest buffybeast]

Sounds like WWE charity to me.

[Guest razazteca]

its kind of like telling the Dwayne Johnson to come on home.

[Guest Loss4Words]

For crying out loud, if you're going to hire retired wrestlers to lay out matches, bring in Barry Windham and Ricky Morton. Let Morton lay out the cruiserweight and tag team matches and let Windham work with the heavyweights on the roster. Then we'd be getting somewhere.

 

For the record, Johnson was over in his prime, but he was nothing special as a worker.

[Guest deadbeater]

Rocky Johnson has ways to bring a lot of good heat to matches. His match with Don Muraco for the IC title had the most heat I've seen on TV pre-Hulk Hogan era. Perhaps he is there to teach the big ones and some others how to do that.

[Guest AndrewTS]

Ah yes...the same Rocky Johnson arrested on child molestation charges. There are plenty of guys in WWE he can swap stories with.

[Guest oldschoolwrestling]

Ah yes...the same Rocky Johnson arrested on child molestation charges. There are plenty of guys in WWE he can swap stories with.

What's the story here?

[Guest buffybeast]

Wasn't he accused of fondling a 17-year-old girl at a youth center in Tampa?

[Guest deadbeater]

Weren't the charges dropped? Accusation is not conviction.

[Guest netslob]

Accusation is not conviction.

 

it is in THIS country!! go back to Mother Russia, pinko!!

[Guest Slingshot Suplex]

On a side note.Rocky Johnson is supposed to be in Steele,Missouri on Saturday the 21st at Dugout Card Shop at 2pm for an autograph signing and....

 

Contract signing of February 1, 2003 "Showdown At Selmer" Main Event: CCW Mid-Southern Title Match: "Girl Candy" Christian Jacobs vs Rocky "Soulman"" Johnson will also take place at the card shop.

[Guest buffybeast]

Weren't the charges dropped? Accusation is not conviction.

I do think the charges were dropped......after Rocky probably paid the minor a nice piece of cash.