NWA, 1987
Pro wrestling has never been short on wacky characters. As over the top as most of the wrestlers are, wrestling managers have to be even more outlandish. After all, they can’t rely on inside the ring work to get over. A manager has to dress outrageous and talk slick if they want to get the fans attention and ultimately get their protege over. However, a strange thing happened in the late 80’s. Sure, the Bobby Heenans and Jimmy Harts of the world still reigned supreme, but new types of managers/sidekicks started to pop up. 1987 alone would see birds, snakes and dogs all hanging out at ringside, providing support to their wrestlers.
Leave it to the NWA’s New Breed to take non-human managers to another level.
You WrestleCrappers remember Chris Champion and Sean Royal, the New Breed, right? The wrestling “time-travelers” who visited Jim Crockett Promotions in 1987, coming all the way “back in time” from the world that they lived in… the year 2002. A world where Dusty Rhodes was the President and the Rock ‘N’ Roll Express were “midget slaves,” by the way.
I feel high just typing all this info that I transcribed directly from Champion, I should note.
Arriving in the NWA, the New Breed first found themselves in a feud with “Boogie Woogie Man,” Jimmy Valiant and Lazer-Tron, whom Chris Champion thought was an actual robot. Showing no respect to his foe, Champion would repeatedly call Lazer-Tron the worst insult you could call a so-called robot – “Go-Bot.”
Pfft, I think even Leader-1 and Cy-Kill could kick Lazer-Tron’s ass.
To help get the edge over the tag-teams they were feuding with, the New Breed used their “flux capacitor” to beam themselves a manager from 2002. The big reveal was set for, no, not the “mothership” Saturday broadcast, but the one hour Sunday show at 7:05est. Remember that show, the one that most people forgot about by the time the weekend was winding down?
Jim Cornette was on-hand to witness the shenanigans. He must’ve done something to really piss off the Crockett’s that weekend to wind up with this gig. Cornette seemed happy enough to see the guys until it was time to introduce their new manager…DRUMROLL…
XTC-1!!!
And a vintage Cornette face!!!
Poor Jim, he looks as thrilled as a wrestler who just ate a feces-tainted Blizzard from Dairy Queen. But Jim wasn’t there just to attempt to ruin his wrestling career via guilt-by-association, he was there to interview XTC-1. Yes, the New Breed’s Radio Shack-looking sidekick was about to cut a promo! And here you thought he’d be as useless as this hunk of junk…
With a flick of a switch or something, Champion turned on XTC-1, and the wrestling world prepared to never be the same again.
I haven’t been as frightened at the sight of human hands getting ready to potentially unleash the end of humanity since Frank Cotton opened the Hellraiser puzzle box.
And off we were. Jim Cornette assumed the microphone position to get the kind of one-on-one scoop the wrestling world wouldn’t see again until Jim Ross interviewed Mankind on Raw in 1997. XTC-1 was set to reveal his plans to rule the wrestling world.
Wait a minute…XTC-1 is a girl robot?!?
A couple things to note here. I mean, beyond that futuristic, mumbo jumbo promo we just heard.
One, why does Cornette have the mic so low? Is XTC-1 talking out of her crotch and if so, shouldn’t her name be R2-Queef2?
Two, for a robot that’s supposed to be from the future, that sure sounds like Baby Doll talking and sounding as sedated as someone who had just taken half a bottle of Quaaludes or something. W
ell, it was either Baby Doll or one of the girls from 1-900-FUN-MATE…
Poor Chris Champion. This look on his face mid-promo tells it all. He looks ready to set his time machine for the year 1993 to begin his Yoshi Kwan era immediately.
Believe it or not, that was not XTC-1’s only appearance. The New Breed would drag her out for a few more appearances on the syndicated NWA weekend television shows. Unfortunately, all of this was just a few weeks before Chris Champion broke his arm in a car accident, shelving not only the New Breed’s upcoming feud with the Rock n’ Roll Express, but also XTC-1’s wrestling career.
A shame.
I’ll always wonder how Ricky and Robert would’ve countered XTC-1. Perhaps with a crappy robot of their own? Perhaps…
H.E.R.B.I.E.?
Oh, H.E.R.B.I.E., you’d totally job to XTC-1.
How about the robot from Rocky IV?
Definitely would have the size advantage to counter XTC-1, but I think there’s only one 80’s robot that could match XTC-1 promo-for-promo…
Don’t let Teddy Ruxpin’s cute fur fool you, there’s a twisted machine under all that!!
Yo Man Mountain Rock, what do you think about all this robot stuff?
Heh, I’ve always wanted to do that…
I am just glad all these droids didn’t decide to join forces and take us over Robotron: 2084 style.
I do remember Champion having wire and circuit boards glued onto his cast. Always liked the dedication to the gimmick.
Watch out, Gobbledy Gooker. You may have a new rival for Wrestlecrap mascot.
Why haven’t I heard of this before?! HOLY CRAP is this Wrestlecrap.
I hadn’t heard of it either. Hail to the Blade!
This explains why Tekno Team 2000 didn’t get over. They didn’t have a robot manager to lead them out there or help them perform a triple leap frog.
I’m not sure even Optimus Prime himself could have gotten Erik Watts over…
Watts was extremely over most of his career and a good wrestler. The only reason he was not more successful was the bookers and management keep screw him over because his father was a jackass
Good wrestlers don’t botch dropkicks.
Good wrestlers don’t sell botched dropkicks either but I don’t think Dr.Death had anything else better to do :S
Chris at Trolla Corp. totally needs to sue these bastards for gimmick and copyright infringement!
Blade says XTC-1 is a Hearoid robot by Tomy:
http://www.theoldrobots.com/heroid.html
You can see other Tomy robots here:
http://www.theoldrobots.com/tomybot.html
Excellent job, Blade! A great write-up and a great obscure find- those are the best kind of inductions!
Man Mountian Rock in a Baxton induction? best thing ever
Who’s this Baxton guy?
For as hardcore NWA as I was back then I sure as heck do not remember this at all. Perhaps it’s a plot by our robot overlords to make us forget about their humble beginnings. It does make me want to get a 2XL from E-bay one of my favorite childhood toys.
I knew I wasn’t the only one who was thinking 2-XL when I saw that thing.
Re: stripped Teddy Ruxpin…so that’s where George Lucas got the idea for Star Wars Episode III Darth Vader…
They must’ve come from that OTHER 2002. Like the one The Jetsons supposedly came from according to that episode of Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law.
Oh my god, Cornette’s face here is utter gold. You can see him thinking “you know, that idea to move to the mountains and do wrestling shows there is sounding better and better….”
After XTC-1 was released, Ric Flair secretly hired her to live up to her name and cut him some pills…
The real obvious choice to counter XTC-1 is the robot from Short Circuit.
Waitaminute…. Dusty Rhodes was President of the United States in 2002? Y’know, that explains [i]so[/i] much….
Wait a second…
Half moron/half party boy persona…
Famous for odd turns of phrase and verbal flubs….
Master of deceptive booking strategies…
Shit…9/11 was a Dusty Finish.
Whenever a blinkered wrestlesnob calls WWE childish and tries to claim they’re more mature because they watched Jim Crockett, WCW, AWA etc. – as well as all the great angles WWE has produced over the years, there are countless angles just as retarded as this that put these punks in their place. Same to be fair goes to those who criticise Impact (myself included), plenty of cool angles as well as all the crap.
Actually I’d like to live in the timeline where Dusty Rhodes is president.
I thought this would be about ECW’s New Breed. Boy was this a pleasant…
I don’t wanna say “surprise,” because that has positive connotations. Well, it was…
something!
My theory is that a Terminator was sent back in time to cause the accident that wounded Champion, thereby altering the historical events that would have led to Dusty Rhodes’ election as president.
Even back in the 80’s, Jim Cornette had his “F### this company” face.
Also, dismembered Teddy Ruxpin looks like he’s ready for the next Five Night At Freddy’s game.
I don’t know man I’m pretty sure ROB could destroy XTC-1 in a heartbeat (or whatever the closest thing is for a robot) as long as he had a smash ball stocked.
Blade Braxton can write … ?
Heh, just kidding, I know Blade can write. I miss Jobber of the Week.
Thinking you are not the only one. 😉
-I want to hear President Rhodes cut a “Hard Times” promo on Al Qaeda.
-Although that would lead to Osama Bin Laden returning as either the Black Scorpion or The Midnight Rider.
So many government sanctioned “Dusty Finishes”
They could have done better….after all, they had a hook-up with the Decepticons (yes, this was also a real Chris Champion promo…look up “New Breed” and “Transformers” if you don’t believe me). Soundwave would be a better manager by far!!!
New Breed Superior…Valiant & Lazertron Inferior…
How have I never heard of this before? This might be THE most WrestleCrap worthy thing I’ve ever seen.
And WWE would go on to sign XTC-1 to a one year contract to star alongside Andre the Giant in the classic Saturday morning Honeycombs commercial
Blade gets bonus points for the R.O.B reference! Love it!
Honestly wouldn’t surprise if WWE tried to redo this exact gimmick today. They had a stupid laptop as a GM for some asinine reason so why not a robot manager?
didnt Chris Champion go on to become Cowabunga in the USWA?
champion was Cowabunga the ninja turtle in the USWA. I thought that character pre dated the new breed team, but I could be wrong. I also remember a run at some point in Memphis/USWA as Chris Champion, and of course he was Yoshi Quan in several places as well.
Good God! Chris Champion couldn’t catch a break. WrestleCrap should do a list of guys who kept getting stuck with bad gimmicks.
I have a DVD set containing four TV episodes of the old NWA Florida territory. One of them features a pre-New Breed Sean Royal. Gordon Solie was hyping him like he was destined to be the biggest star in wrestling history.
Jim’s face definitely screams “What the Hell am I doing here?”
Still a better promo than Nikki Bella.
To think, WCW would do better with cybernetics when they signed Robocop.
I wonder if this was the sort of thing Johnny 6 would watch when he wasn’t busy cleaning up WrestleCrap HQ or having to sit through TNA?
Gotta love that spot on 2002 sound quality of the robot though. Very futuristic indeed!
$9.95 per call? I’ve been a horny idiot many a time, by even I wouldn’t pay that much for a phone call.
You missed a chance to refer to Bender the Offender in there…
No way, man. Robert and Ricky would have totally used T-Bob from M.A.S.K. as their robot manager. Ricky would ride him down to ringside while a confused crowd sorta kinda marked out for them.
You my good man, are awesome.
Oh the humanity! How come this has never been brought up before? This makes the Shockmaster look GOOD by comparison, for crying out loud.
I think Baby Doll ‘literally’ phoned in her promo…BEEP!
It is definitely amazing how robots and metal can be used for things like this. It is incredible to me that this metal can even bend in such a way to make it look almost human. I think that it would be really interesting to learn how to make something like this one day. It is definitely something that would take a lot of work.