Brian Damage
The story of the beginnings of ‘The Mean Street Posse’ began long before their WWF careers started. You see, the truth is, the members were real life friends of Shane McMahon. Rodney Lienhardt and Shane became friends in junior high school and eventually met Peter Gasparino in high school to fill out the trio. They remained good friends even after graduating college.
The idea to use both Gasparino and Lienhardt came when the duo were spotted working out at the gym at Titan Towers aka WWF headquarters. Writers Vince Russo and Ed Ferrara wanted to build heat for Shane McMahon going into his Wrestlemania XV match with X-Pac for the European title. Russo and Ferrara had an idea to use Shane’s friends in a segment showing them to be rich, spoiled kids from Shane’s home in Greenwich, Connecticut. After Shane was approached with the idea (which he loved) McMahon approached his friends Gasparino and Lienhardt about doing the angle. Being friends and also wrestling fans themselves….the two agreed to do it.
Shane would cut promos talking about how tough he and his friends were living off the mean streets of Greenwich. Of course, it was a complete heel move, because Greenwich was a notoriously rich, snobby area in Connecticut. This led to the duo of Pete ‘Gas’ Gasparino and Rodney being introduced along with other real life friends of Shane’s which included college buddies ‘Mean’ Willie Green, Billy ‘P’ Piro and ‘Sir’ Chris Szcechowicz as they debuted on Monday Night Raw in March of 1999.
The segment was only intended to be a brief “one off” appearance, but the Greenwich Posse as they were being referred to as…got a great reaction from WWF fans. So much so, Vince McMahon wanted to continue to use the posse going forward. Shane approached his friends about potentially doing more stuff, including getting physical in the ring. This, despite none of his friends having any formal wrestling training. Pete Gas, Rodney and Willie Green were immediately interested in doing more, with Billy P and Sir Chris not interested at all. Eventually, Green was dropped from the group as he was supposedly too much of a partier.
Pete Gas and Rodney remained and to ensure that the Posse looked halfway serviceable in the ring…were assigned a real wrestler to portray another friend. According to Pete Gas, the wrestler originally chosen to be a member of the Posse was highly touted developmental wrestler Steve Bradley. Unfortunately for Bradley, he came down with a case of mono and could not be used. The next choice was another developmental wrestler named Jason Arhndt. Arhndt was a friend of the Hardy Boyz and came from their independent promotion OMEGA. He was given the ring name of ‘Joey Abs’ which was actually the nickname of another real life Shane friend named Joseph Abbazia.
The Greenwich Posse was complete, except for their group name, which was later changed to the Mean Street Posse to go along with Shane’s promos talking about surviving on the mean streets of Greenwich, Connecticut. Pete Gas said that despite having no training and not “paying their dues”, the locker room was very friendly to them…at least to their faces. But Gasparino said there was a lot of animosity that they were receiving a great deal of TV time. Especially from Test and Bradshaw who initially hated them.
Pete Gas said that both wrestlers took liberties on the very green trio every chance they had. Bradshaw went as far as to stiff Pete with an unprotected chair shot to his head. Pete Gas was legitimately injured from it, but instead of complaining to his buddy Shane, went over to Bradshaw and shook his hand thanking him. He said that helped change the perception the Posse had with the rest of the boys in the locker room.
The Mean Street Posse remained with the company for well over a year, before being sent down to developmental to learn and gain ring experience. They remained in developmental for a year before all were released from their contracts after Shane McMahon decided to take time off from the company. The Posse ultimately split up and retired from the wrestling business. Pete Gas became an executive for an office supply company, Rodney Lienhardt started his own landscaping company and Joey Abs became a mechanic. Sadly, the other Posse member ‘Mean’ Willie Green passed away in 2022 at the age of 52. No other details concerning his death were made available.
Some loved the Mean Street Posse and others despised the group. One thing was for sure, they generated a response and that is all that really matters. They may not have been the most gifted in the ring, but they were respectful of the business outside of it.
