Interview with Roddy Piper

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Sitting in a weight room in Manchester, N.H., recently, Piper, accompanied by his trusted business associate, Lewis Rach, talked about how he could possibly return to WWE after the comments he’s made recently, and more. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: What’s your relationship like with Vince McMahon? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: Actually, pretty good right now. We’ve known each other for a long time. We’ve been through a lot of valleys and a lot of mountaintops. And it’s a pretty sincere, straight-up relationship. If I want something, I say it; if he wants something, he says it. So the relationship is not one built on talent/promoter, it’s built on a young guy, Vince McMahon Jr. (actually Vincent K. McMahon), trying to take over a company while another young guy in his peak, Roddy Piper, met all at the same time. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: What about your relationship with Hulk Hogan? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: Hogan comes somewhat under the McMahon equation, with the exception that Hogan was an enemy of mine, and I of him in the beginning because he was getting cotton-balled by the promoter -- which happened to be Vince McMahon – and I wasn’t, though I was drawing just as much money. So I was ticked off at that for a while. But at the same time, Hulk Hogan was a great opponent, and after time goes by and you wrestle a guy enough times on a mat of intensity as it was in 1984 on, or 1985 on I guess, you get a respect for each other. What started as a relationship of jealousy and animosity, and the fact that Piper wouldn’t do business, has all dissolved into, “Man, we’re still alive and we’re here. Let’s hug each other.” </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: Who is responsible for the success of WWE – for catapulting it into the national and international spotlight the way it is today? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: First of all, Cyndi Lauper and her manager Dave Wolff, who was the liaison between McMahon and MTV. At the same time, he was managing me, which made me much more trustable in their camp, as I was asked to kick Cyndi in the head. When a manager is asking if I’ll kick the female entertainer of the year in the head at Madison Square Garden, and if I will take care of her, that’s a rather serious responsibility, especially when there’s six cops, Dick Clark and Hogan and Mr. T. So who’s responsible for it? I know where you’re coming from. The bad guy draws the money. That’s what you’re looking for, I think.</div> <bR> <div> But at the same time, for the bad guy to do that, he has to have a tremendous opponent, and Hulk Hogan is that. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: Do you think you get enough credit for helping catapult WWE into the national and international spotlight? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: Now I do. Yeah. But not then. They didn’t want me to get credit because I was more of a lone wolf. In my career, I was trained to rely only on myself and not draw alliances, unlike Hogan and McMahon. There’s nothing wrong with either one of them; it’s just two different ways of handling yourself in the business of professional wrestling. But when people look back on it now, there’s no doubt in their minds that they came to see Roddy Piper get his ass kicked. If anybody doesn’t see that, then God bless you. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: How did you end up coming back to WWE this most recent time? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: On the “Best Damn Sports Show,” I heard that McMahon and Hogan were going to go at it, and I was just filling time. I said, “They’ve been living next door to each other all their lives. If you really want to fight, put me in the middle and I’ll get them to kill each other.” Next thing I know, I got a call. That’s how it started. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: How long are you here for? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: As long as I want to be. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: How much can you wrestle? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: As much as I want to. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: How much are health problems a factor? I know you’ve got a replaced hip, for example. </div> <bR> <div> Piper: Well, the hip was in 1994, so I’ve had I don’t know how many wrestling matches since then. Can I fight 20 years from now? I don’t think so. But if you’re just asking about the present day – contemporarily, right now – I can do pretty much what I want to. If you’re asking me for my boundaries, not the boundaries of the company, then I think I can pretty much do what I want to do. At the same time, I want to be in the ring with an opponent who knows what he’s doing, so there can be some quality coming out of it. Otherwise, it’s no fun doing it just to do it. It’s fun doing it to be the best at it. That’s fun. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: But if you want to work Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday – wrestling all those days – could you? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: You know, I haven’t tried it for a long time, other than this last little run. I don’t know. I couldn’t really give you an honest answer on that one because I got run over by a car a little more than a year ago, busted my right ankle, four ribs, my liver, my spleen and my back in two places.</div> <bR> <div> Since then, I haven’t got in (the ring that often). So to be sincere with you, I’ve got to give it a shot. I don’t know if I could do it Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, like you’re saying, but I’d sure give it a try. (Laughs) I’d be there. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: Did something specific happen to your hip, or was it wear and tear over the years? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: It was just wear and tear over the years. I’ve had more than 7,000 pro fights. Actually, I knew about 10 years before it happened that I was going to have to have a hip put in. I just went with it. And so it just wore, wore, wore until one time I was running at the Venice Gold’s Gym on an incline on the treadmill, and it just blew it right out. The very last straw that broke the camel’s back was when I wrestled Bret Hart at WrestleMania VIII. Bret was coming off the ropes, and I stuck my right foot up straight, and I caught all his weight, but it jammed and that was the one that actually finished it off. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: I think you were just talking about this, but what happened on Jan. 31, 2002 – a date I found in your book? There was a car accident? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: Yeah. I was in Los Angeles and there was this guy. I was a passenger. And I don’t know what was wrong with him. All of a sudden he took the car and on purpose slammed it into the wall of Highland Avenue in downtown L.A., where Highland and 101 meet. We went along the wall and then careened out, shot off a lamppost and then two Suburbans hit my side, broke my right ankle, four ribs – one rib went into my liver four inches – my spleen and my back in two place. This kid here, Lewis Rach, actually saved my life. I walked home from the accident – caught a cab – and I told him, “Leave me alone. I’m just going to have a bath and go to bed.” And I guess I went down in the bathtub, and when Lewis called the paramedics, my blood pressure was 60/30, and they thought I was gone. I’m still here, for some reason. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: How are you feeling today, physically? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: Physically, I know I’ve been through war. I feel very much like I’ve been through the battle. Mentally, a lot more appreciative for everything, I think. If anything, it might’ve taken away a little of the meanness that I had in me, which is good for everybody. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: I could be wrong, but it seemed like toward the end of your book, you strongly implied that you’d never return to WWE, and you’ve made some other anti-WWE comments since then. Am I wrong about that? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: No, not at all. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: So that being the case, how did you wind up back here? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: What I said was that Vince McMahon is sick – equating it to the sickness that I talk about in the book – and that he is all-consumed. They were doing necrophilia and Grandma’s (breasts) were being shown and two guys were getting married. You want me to go on? You got my idea? If you’re going to do that bulls***, I ain’t interested. But that’s all gone all of a sudden. OK. Then I don’t have a problem with it. But folks don’t want to forget – this sport belongs to the fans and to the wrestlers, and that’s it. Everybody else just leeches money off them. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: It’s funny because you also talked in the book about never taking a Stink Face, and how you’d never want to see your son wrestle a Samoan wearing a thong. And your first feud coming in is with Rikishi. Is that a coincidence? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: No, I think they’re testing me. They asked (if I’d take the Stink Face). I said, “No, it ain’t happening.” They asked if I’d kiss McMahon’s ass. (I said), “No, it ain’t happening.” </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: You’re willing to wrestle Rikishi, but there’s certain things you’ll still not do. </div> <bR> <div> Piper: Do I have any problem getting in the ring and wrestling Rikishi? Not at all. Not at all. I don’t know about you, but I don’t usually let naked men sit on my face with their ass. How about yourself? Is that fun for you? I won’t even do it for money. But to (wrestle) with you? That’s great. Nothing against Rikishi at all. It’s just what he’s chosen as a piece of business. But you have to have a morality level to get out of the sickness, and I just don’t see what the purpose is there. I don’t find it entertaining, only humiliating to the family members of that particular person. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: But you do think they’re testing you by having you in a feud with Rikishi right away? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: I have no proof. But the first thing I was asked was about the Vince McMahon Kiss My Ass Club. “Nope.” And then (they asked me about) the Stink Face. “Nope.” But he can hit me in the head with a coconut. That’s not a problem. But I don’t see how we’re going to draw any money (by me taking the Stink Face). If somebody could explain it to me, and make it equal millions of dollars, or maybe put all my kids through school and take care of them for the rest of their lives (then I’d do it).</div> <bR> <div> But if I’m doing it to give entertainment to something called WWE that has no reflection on me financially, nor will give a f*** about me when I go out the door, no, I ain’t doing it for them. And if you are, then you’re just as sick as they are. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: Do you plan to be at WrestleMania XX at Madison Square Garden? Would you like to be there? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: I was there on the 10-year. One and 10. I guess I’d be fun to be there for XX, you know, just to have the honor of saying, “I, X, XX.” Yeah, I think there’s a good possibility, because of the earlier question you asked about the relationship with McMahon. McMahon knows me as a man, and knows what money I can draw and can’t draw, and knows my morality structure. He’s very clairvoyant when it comes to where he sees things going. So I can see this stretching into WrestleMania XX, and that would probably be the end of Roddy Piper. </div> <bR> <div> WWE.com: Can you tell me about the Frats T-shirt? How did it come about? </div> <bR> <div> Piper: (The people listed on the T-shirt) are all guys who have died, whether it was suicide, murder or whatever. As things are proceeding here, we have the highest suicide rate of any sport. I wear them on my back to remind everybody. I just wonder when everybody’s going to catch on, and help these young kids that we’ve got coming up before they die. </div> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>