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Jim Ross On Why Junkyard Dog Left Mid-South Wrestling, Says It Wasn’t Due to Racial Slur

September 20, 2023 | Posted by Jeremy Thomas
Mid-South Wrestling 5-21-1983 Junkyard Dog Image Credit: WWE/Peacock

Jim Ross is disputing Dark Side of the Ring’s explanation for why the Junkyard Dog left Mid-South Wrestling. The season four episode on JYD suggested that the late WWE Hall of Famer left the promotion due to overhearing a racial slur from Bill Watts, and JR shot down that notion on a recent episode of Grilling JR. You can see some highlights below, per Wrestling Inc:

On JYD’s reason for exiting Mid-South: “Dog left for more money,” Ross said. “He saw the opportunity to increase his income — I don’t want to say tenfold — but it was up there. Right out of the gate, when you can become the first African American action figure, things like that can accumulate to income. And Dog had worked hard and, you know, he was kind of sparring with the devil on his drug use.”

On Dark Side of the Ring getting the reason wrong: “So he made some bad decisions. He left without notice, and it wasn’t because of a racial epitaph said or some bulls**t like that. He simply had the opportunity to go be the No. 2 or 3 babyface in the biggest company in the business, and that was going to mean he was going to make a whole hell of a lot more money. And he had six-figure royalty checks for his action figures, things like that.”