Brian Damage
At one moment the WWF has a rocket strapped to the backs of a young, talented tag team. The next, it is all gone, with absolutely nothing to show for it. This is the very true and unfortunate tale of the WWF tag team known as ‘The Young Stallions.’
In 1987, the WWF had a bevy of good, to great tag teams in that division. From Demolition, the Hart Foundation, the Killer Bees, Can Am Connection, the Rougeau Brothers and the Islanders. A new team was quietly being put together on the house show circuit. That being the combination of Paul Roma and Jim Powers. The two were working as enhancement talent for the promotion for a number of years. Roma was trained by Mr. Fuji and Powers had some of his training by Big John Studd. Both men certainly were paying their dues in the WWF making others look better.
The unnamed team of Paul Roma and Jim Powers began as they always were, as “jobbers” to the stars. The duo caught the eye of Pat Patterson, who served as the right hand man to the boss Vince McMahon. Patterson loved their entire look and wanted to do more with the tag team. According to Roma, a lot more. Roma contends that both he and Powers were both sexually propositioned by Patterson individually. Roma said that he flat out refused, but accused Powers of allowing Patterson to have his way with him. Jim Powers said that he was sexually harassed by Patterson, but refused to do anything with him.
Regardless of who you believe, Pat Patterson took the young, handsome duo under his wing. Roma said that their push really began once the Can Am Connection unceremoniously split up. It was an opportunity for Patterson to help elevate Roma and Powers from enhancement wrestlers to bonafide WWF superstars. It was Patterson who came up with the name for the team…the Young Stallions. Roma said that Vince McMahon met with the newly christened tag team and laid out all the big plans he envisioned for them. It included merchandise, video packages, entrance music and a run with the world tag team titles. As great as it all sounded, Jim Powers admitted he was a bit skeptical. It all seemed too good to be true to him.
Despite Powers’ reservations, the Young Stallions push began as promised. They got new T shirts, their own entrance music produced by Jimmy Hart and a winning streak. The Young Stallions were thrust into a feud with the reigning tag team champions the Hart Foundation and scored a non title victory of Bret Hart and Jim Neidhart. A storyline was created where the Young Stallions stole the song ‘Crank it Up’ which was intended to be the new theme song for the Hart Foundation to add fuel to the burgeoning feud. In addition to that, the Young Stallions won the inaugural Survivor Series tag team elimination match along with the Killer Bees.
According to Paul Roma, to add to the Young Stallions big push, the team would have none other than Mr. T as their manager. That part of the deal fell through, when Roma said Mr. T began no showing appearances with the team. Despite that, the Young Stallions looked well on their way to becoming the top tag team in all the WWF. As the old quote goes…“All that glitters is not gold.” Simply put, the Young Stallions were not as together as they appeared to be.
Jim Powers stated that the two were from very different backgrounds and had different beliefs. Powers said that Paul Roma was all business 24/7 and all he cared about was his appearance and what he could get out of everything. Powers on the other hand, was just happy to be involved in the wrestling business…which he loved. Powers claimed that the two were to meet up at Roma’s home to discuss business, but Roma kept him waiting and that soured Powers on Roma. Paul Roma claimed that wasn’t true at all and quite the opposite. Powers was very flaky and constantly showed up late to the arenas which angered the road agents and made Roma guilty by association. Both admitted they argued constantly about how to conduct business.
Roma also accused Powers of partying way too much and that got in the way of their big push. Other teams started refusing to work with the Stallions because Powers was allegedly hungover or flat out drunk most of the time. Roma said that Barry Horowitz actually flat out refused to work a tag team match citing that he could smell booze on Powers breath and wasn’t about to put his life in his hands. Roma said he had to beg Horowitz to wrestle the match and promised that he would do all of the work. Horowitz eventually agreed and all Powers did was stand in the corner the entire match.
That was the straw that supposedly broke Roma’s back and went directly to Pat Patterson to tell him that he was quitting the team. Patterson allegedly promised to fix things with Powers and to try and continue to work together, but Roma said that he had enough and walked away. Powers claimed that he too went to Patterson and complained repeatedly about Roma and his ballooning ego and finally had enough himself. Powers felt that Patterson took Roma’s side and put the blame on the failure of the Young Stallions on Jim Powers shoulders.
As quickly as their push came, it was dropped just as quickly. There were no break up angles filmed and the two wrestlers simply went their own ways in 1989. Not only did the Young Stallions split, but they were both dropped back down the card as enhancement talent. Roma was able to salvage his WWF career, by aligning with Hercules to form the very underrated team of ‘Power and Glory.’ Meanwhile, Powers at times teamed with another demoted star in Jim Brunzell and were used as glorified jobbers to the stars. Ultimately, the potential was there for both Jim Powers and Paul Roma to succeed and thrive as the Young Stallions, but a plethora of personal issues between the two ended all of that.
