Posted on by bdamage1
Brian Damage
Back in the 80’s and 90’s, it was very common to see some no name wrestler go up against a proven star of a promotion. Whether that be from the WWF, NWA/WCW, AWA or elsewhere, these nomads of professional wrestling were there to make the stars look great. They were known as enhancement talent, preliminary wrestlers or as many fans have come to know them…”jobbers.” While fans were clamoring to see big time match ups, these “squash matches” served a very important purpose. While perhaps not appreciated at the time, they were just as important as the stars themselves.
In the early 2000’s, Bobby Roode was practically a regular on WWE television. The only difference was, he wasn’t yet “Glorious” during this time. He wrestled under different variations of his name including ‘Rudy Rude’, Bobby Rude and Bobby Rood. He was used primarily as enhancement talent to put over bigger stars at the time including Billy Kidman, A Train and Perry Saturn.
He had close to 20 matches as a jobber on WWE C shows like Velocity. When he wasn’t in the ring getting squashed by WWE superstars, he was also filling roles as an extra in segments on Monday Night Raw where he portrayed a local police officer. Through the years, Roode built up his resume on the independent circuit, getting his big break as a part of the Team Canada faction in TNA. He would win the TNA tag team titles on 6 occasions and the TNA world title twice.
Bobby Roode would leave TNA/Impact wrestling and sign with WWE, where he would win the NXT heavyweight title, the United States Title and co hold the Raw and Smackdown tag titles with Chad Gable and Dolph Ziggler respectively.