Posted on by bdamage1
Brian Damage
“Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.” – Michael Corleone ‘The Godfather Part 2’
Pro wrestling has been filled with wrestlers, managers, valets and promoters who were friends outside of the ring. It has also seen its fair share of enemies throughout the business. One relationship in particular, captured both the love and hate within a time frame. The relationship I speak of is between former head of World Championship Wrestling Eric Bischoff and the late ‘Ravishing’ Rick Rude.
Eric and Rick’s relationship was a complicated one. On one hand, they were close friends and on the other they were heated adversaries….especially on the part of Rick Rude. Bischoff and Rude became friends before Eric got involved in professional wrestling. They both had several mutual friends and the two, for the most part, got along great. It certainly helped that both had strong ties to the state of Minnesota where Rude grew up and Bischoff started living there as a senior in high school.
When Eric Bischoff got his feet wet with pro wrestling…first with the Minnesota based AWA promotion…and later with WCW…the two’s friendship blossomed even further. The two became traveling buddies for WCW events. While pro wrestling helped strengthen their friendship, it was also the cause of their meltdowns. In the early to mid 1990’s Rude had become somewhat erratic inside and outside of the ring. Ric Flair claimed that Rude would be inebriated while wrestling and became a liability.
Rude’s actions outside the squared circle were just as erratic. Allegedly, Rude had demanded to become the face of WCW, the top guy in the company. It was something that the bookers like Flair, Kevin Sullivan and Eric Bischoff simply couldn’t risk considering Rude’s behavior. The Ravishing One also had physical possession of a WCW championship belt. Bischoff needed to retrieve it, but knew that Rude’s behavior was at the time unstable. Bischoff requested that Barry Windham escort him to the dressing room as backup while he asked for the belt back.
After an exchange of some heated words and stares, Rude took Bischoff to the parking lot. Rude opened up the trunk of his car and inside was the title belt and a hand gun. According to Bischoff. it was Rude’s way to send a message to Eric that he was not to be messed with at all. Bischoff said it was an extremely awkward situation, especially since they were friends…but Bischoff insists that nothing else transpired from that incident.
In 1997, after Rude had retired from wrestling, he was working for the WWF. When the now infamous ‘Montreal Screwjob’ took place, it was Rude who immediately called his buddy Bischoff to alert him that everything that transpired was legitimate. Rick Rude would then jump ship to WCW without warning, as he was on a pay per appearance contract with the company.
Rick Rude was back in WCW and reunited with friends like Bischoff, Curt Hennig and Bret Hart. With the Monday Night Wars still ongoing and pro wrestling hotter than perhaps it has ever been…Rude wanted to end his retirement and return to the ring. The problem was, Rude had an insurance policy with Lloyd’s of London. When he seriously injured his back in a match against Sting in Japan in 1994, Rude cashed in his policy for roughly $350,000 -$450,000.
When Rude cashed in the policy, he was told that he had to permanently retire from pro wrestling in order to get and keep that money. For Rude to be able to return to in ring action, he was responsible for paying that entire amount of money back to Lloyd’s of London. Rude approached his boss and friend Eric Bischoff and asked him to pay the money back, so he could actively wrestle again. Eric Bischoff turned him down and refused to pay back the money on Rude’s behalf.
Bischoff claims that it simply wasn’t feasible to pay that money back and on top of that….pay an additional amount to sign Rude to a contract. Bischoff claimed that WCW management would never approve of such a thing. Rude, on the other hand, saw guys like Hulk Hogan, Scott Hall and Kevin Nash get big time guaranteed contracts. He also saw non wrestlers like Dennis Rodman get huge pay offs…yet it couldn’t be done for him.
That decision by Bischoff created a great rift between him and Rude. One that would never get repaired again. Rick Rude would pass away in 1999 and was never able to return to a wrestling ring and compete. Bischoff says when he went to pay his respects to his former friend at Rude’s wake, within minutes upon arriving….Rude’s sister asked him to leave. Embarrassed and saddened, Bischoff left the funeral home without making a scene.
From that day on, Eric vowed to never attend another funeral for a former wrestler again. His reasoning was to not be the center of attention or create a hostile situation. It’s unfortunate that Eric and Rick’s friendship deteriorated as it did over money and business. Who was in the right and who was in the wrong? At the end of the day, all that matters was a friendship torn apart.
