Poor Terry Taylor. First he gets made up like a chicken, then he has to clean up after Eric Bischoff and Vince Russo.
I don’t know which is worse.
But in the mid 80’s, Taylor was really making a name for himself in the old NWA. Combining scientific skills with good looks, Taylor was a lock to be a superstar. A series of matches with Nikita Koloff added to his already impressive resume, and main events were seemingly on the horizon.
Then he went to the WWF, and Vince McMahon hatched one of his worst gimmicks ever: The Red Rooster.
The idea was to get over the fact that Bobby Heenan could manage anyone – ANYONE – to WWF gold. Heenan claimed he could take any young kid, and make him a champion, and to prove it, he plucked Taylor from the NWA. Heenan claimed he was just a “Little Red Rooster”, and that his name didn’t even matter.
Heenan constantly abused Taylor during matches, yelling at him, “Finish him off if you don’t mind!” and talking about he was “not that smart, not that fast, and not that strong.” This led to sympathy for Rooster, who broke away from Heenan to form his own image. Heenan told him that he wasn’t The Red Rooster anymore, that he was Terry Taylor.
And Taylor DISAGREED, saying he WAS The Red Rooster. He sprayed red paint in his hair and started strutting around LIKE A CHICKEN. It was beyond awful.
Taylor’s career was forever scarred, and he never achieved the level of success many thought he had coming. He is now in WCW as a creative consultant, which is admittedly, for the birds.