411’s Dark Side of the Ring Report: “Blood, Fire, and The Original Sheik”

-Well, this one has taken on a somber tone after the shocking passing of Sabu over the weekend. He will obviously be a big part of this episode. I thought about finding a show to review as I have done when other wrestlers have passed, and I still might, but for now here is a link to my review of Barely Legal 97. Funny enough the first time I ever saw Sabu on my TV was his very short run in WCW in 1995. I knew of Sabu and his craziness before that thanks to photos and stories in PWI and other magazines like that. My first time seeing ECW didn’t happen until mid 1996 when I stumbled upon it on TV at around midnight on a Saturday. I always wanted to see what insane stuff Sabu was doing. One of the first DVDs I owned when I got a DVD player was an ECW release that featured the infamous barbed wire match with Terry Funk. In fitting with the weird theme, the first time I was able to see Sabu wrestle live was at a WWE ECW show at Rostraver Ice Garden. I went with my cousin, and we had front row seats and I had more fun at that show than many of the bigger shows I attended. Sabu defeated CW Anderson! When I think of ECW it is always Raven for me as it was his character and feud with Tommy Dreamer that hooked me on the promotion, but I always needed to see what Sabu was doing as he was terrifyingly believable, and you couldn’t turn your head away. Rest In Peace sir and thank you for years of entertaining and influencing a generation.

-As a reminder, Chris Jericho is our narrator!

-Teaser: Jim Cornette, RVD, Sabu, and Dory Funk are some of the talking heads as they note Sheik helped pioneer hardcore wrestling. RVD: “I have no doubt he would have liked to die in the ring.” Sounds like Ric Flair!

-Show opening!

-Jim Cornette first and says he has been a life long and that started with The Original Sheik. He brings up Sheik’s aura and how everyone could sense something when he made an entrance. He talks about Sheik coming out of a limo while a match was happening in Detroit and then fans ignored the match as all they wanted to see was The Sheik.

-Sabu, the nephew of Sheik, says his uncle made people believe even if they knew wrestling was bullshit.

-RVD was trained by The Sheik and says he set the foundation for Hardcore Wrestling. He talks about his influence and we see Iron Sheik, Kane throwing fire, Jake carrying a snake, Sullivan using a sharp object to stab someone.

-Back to Cornette who says modern fans are use to violence like tables breaking and people getting his by cars, but that didn’t happen in the 40s and 50s. Ed Farhat used his ethnic background to create The Sheik character. Arabs were seen as scary and unique and Sheik built on that in the 1950s. He was a rich, but insane Sheik from the Middle East. His wife Joyce was his slave that he would bring to the ring and he would abuse her before praying in the corner. He would only do the prayers when the crowd was quiet.

-We see footage of Sheik stabbing people to draw blood and using chairs. Dory Funk Jr says he used to wrestle Sheik and it was rarely a wrestling match. Speaking of blood, here’s Abdullah The Butcher. They both knew the fans were scared of them, so they did a lot of shit.

-Cornette brings up the deal with Sheik throwing fire and it was explained that it was a magic ability he had. Cornette explains the gimmick as Abdullah shows off a scar he has from being burned and says if he didn’t turn his head he would be blind. Back to Cornette who mentions Bull Curry, who was doing similar hardcore wrestling back in the 40s even before The Sheik, but it was Sheik who took it mainstream and made it profitable.

-Sabu says his grandparents were born in Lebanon and we hear from Sheik’s grandson, Ed, as well. They came to America and settled in Detroit. Sheik liked on his application to join the Army earlier than legally allowed. He started boxing and wrestling in The Army. He met Burt Ruby, promoter and trainer, and they developed the idea of The Sheik persona.

-Cornette defines kayfabe as you were to always be the personality you were on TV and at the matches. The Sheik took that to the extreme and he was committed to never exposing the business. He never answered to his name and even made the heels and faces sit in separate rooms when they would come over to have dinner at his house. He wouldn’t speak to people in public and made sure to use Arabic if anyone was in hearing range. Cornette thinks Sheik realized he hit on a gimmick that was once in a lifetime and realized he could be the top heel in wrestling and make a ton of money.

-The issue with that is the fans aren’t the smartest and would try to attack Sheik after the shows. Sabu says one fan broke in the dressing room and Sheik had his blade on him and cut the kid to the bone and his insides almost came out. The explanation they gave to the papers was he fell through a plate glass window when being caught by the police. He also had a gun pulled on him and there were fans that wanted him dead.

-Commercials!

-Cornette goes back to the fun story in Amarillo where the gun jammed. The police checked and the bullet fired the second time the trigger was pulled.

-The real money was made in owning things, so Sheik bought Detroit’s Big Time Wrestling, but he made sure nobody knew. He made his father-in-law, Francis Fleser, the figure head in name. His wife ran the office and Kelli (granddaughter) says her grandmother was the boss.

-They ran Cobo Hall in Detroit, which fit 12,000 and they filled it to capacity on a regular basis. It became the hottest building for wrestling in the country and they were out drawing The Pistons. Sabu says it was the WWE of the time as Cornette goes over how if there was no athletic commission there, and you could take whatever money you want as owner. In 73 Sheik reported earnings of $400,000 which is $2 million today, but that was what he reported.

-Sabu talks about the mansion that was built. It had a sauna and 35 rooms. Sheik loved cars, suits, and jewelry. He notes his uncle had over 1000 suits and wore them everyday no matter the weather. Funk says Sheik had one weakness and it was gambling. He would burn through money in Vegas, but had to to keep up with the gimmick.

-They bring up how the Main Event guy should rarely lose, but Sheik took it to the extreme as he felt any loss would take his heat away. He would sell and bleed for wrestlers, but he would never lose which made it shocking when he would. We get to 1967 where Detroit had riots for 4 days over police raided a bar that was in an African American era. Sheik saw that and realized losing to his top face, Bobo Brazil, would be the best thing. This was at a time where the blacks and whites were still being separated in the South. Sheik once tore down the chicken wire that split the fans in the South and told the black fans to come down and join the crowd.

-He wanted to help calm down the riots and knew losing to Brazil would help. It actually helped settle down the tension in the crowd, but Cornette notes Sheik beat Brazil two weeks later to get his Title back.

-The fan started to get tired of Sheik always winning so they stopped coming and it didn’t help that the auto industry was starting to tank as was the economy in the 70s. Sheik didn’t have the money coming in that was going out and could not keep up the lifestyle.

-Commercials!

-We are up to the mid 70s and Big Time is struggling financially and guys are leaving due to the not getting what they were promised. Bruno came to Detroit and told people he would not come back as Sheik promised him 2 grand, but only paid him 800 so he was no showing the return match. Big Time stopped running Cobo in 1980 as they couldn’t afford it and that was pretty much the end for Big Time Wrestling.

-Japan came calling and that’s what saved Sheik financially. He went to work with Baba and Japan had only seen pictures in magazine. He instantly got over with his hardcore act, but that got old and Sheik couldn’t keep up in the ring. Baba stopped booking him after a few years and he couldn’t get booked anywhere else in the US, so the money started to dry up. Sheik had spent all his money and Sabu can’t go into it all the way as it is embarrassing. Sheik had to sell the mansion, but it was still him and his wife against the world.

-Sheik was well past his prime, but was taking any booking just to put food on his plate. He would work with Bobo in high school gyms in front of a thousand fans. He was born in the 20s and yes was still working in the 80s just to make whatever money he could.

-Commercials!

-Sheik shifted to training the next generation and that included his nephew. Sabu says his uncle always took care of his mom and would beat up his dad, who was abusive to his mom. He told his uncle he was going to be a wrestler but only did amateur wrestling. Sabu tells a story of being at a shooting when he was 19 and he tried to stop the guy and ended up getting shot in the mouth. He knew then he wanted to start training as a pro-wrestler. Sheik took him to a cabin and told him he would be there for a year. He had to do chores each day and set up and tear down the ring. He would wash cars, clean the cabin when it wasn’t dirty. Sabu did whatever was asked and never questioned it.

-Sabu adopted a lot of The Sheik’s character, but was more acrobatic and a daredevil. Cornette: “I don’t think Sheik ever climbed to the top rope in 50 years.” Sabu says he never copied him and his uncle paved the way, but never gave it to him as he had to earn it. Sabu recruits RVD to be trained as they met in 1989, when Rob was 19. He tells a story of Sheik pushing and pulling him in training and scaring him by biting at his nose. They would wrestle, go swimming, and then Joyce would make dinner. Sheik wasn’t in the best health, so Sabu and RVD trained alone a lot or at best Sheik would sit in a chair and watch.

-Sheik gets hip surgery and heads back to Japan to work for FMW and do a match with a ring that was on fire. It was a barbed wire ring that had sections that were set on fire and it got out of hand as the fire went places they didn’t want. This was covered in the FMW episode and it’s pretty terrifying. It got so hot and sucked all the oxygen out of the ring. They were stuck in the ring where they couldn’t breath or see. Sheik didn’t know Onita could speak English, but he yelled to Sheik that “this was bad.”

-Commercials!

-What happened was it was outdoors and the wind shifted which sent flames the wrong direction and things staretd melting. Sabu and his opponent were able to get out of the ring, but Sheik and Onita were stuck. They tried to work the match, like normal but realized they needed to find a way out and were able to get to the floor. They continued to brawl and Sabu told his Uncle he needed to throw water on him as he was smoking, but Sheik didn’t want his hand wet as he still had to throw fire. Sure, that’s what a fire that looks like hell needs is more fire. Skin was sloughing off, but he was still doing Sheik things. The passengers on the plane back to America were disgusted as they could smell burnt flash. Sheik was wrapped up like a mummy with third degree burns, but never let anyone know he was in pain. His wife took care of his extensive burns.

-Hey, we get to WCW in 1995 and Halloween Havoc where Sabu makes his lone WCW PPV appearance. It was in Detroit so Sheik was out there with him and when Sabu hit a spinboard moonsault on Mr. JL, Sheik got knocked down as well and it broke his leg. Even with one leg he made sure to throw fire at JL. Here’s my review of that show.

-They got a wheelchair for Sheik once they got through the curtain, but he never complained. He did realize he needed to stop and that was a relieve for everyone. He was still The Sheik in public out of habit, but was more about his family. He even came to grandparents day when his granddaughter was 8 and that’s when she realized he was famous as other grandparents were staring at him.

-Commercials!

-Next week: Daffney! Oh man!

-By the early 2000s Sheik was having organ failure and cancer. The last two years were spent in the hospital and his grandkids made sure to see him every other day as their grandma didn’t want him alone. He passed surrounded by love! You can tell how much these kids loved their grandfather. Sabu says he was on a plane traveling to Japan and didn’t know. He just knew his uncle was sick but got a call from Goldberg who passed along his condolences and that is how Sabu found out. He gets emotional talking about staying to wrestle as that is what Sheik would want him to do and he missed the funeral, but to him funerals are just a way for those living to show they cared and Sabu knew who cared. Even the priest at the funeral called him The Sheik.

-Sheik was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame years later with RVD and Sabu doing the honors. RVD says Sabu was to be the sole person to induct him, but he doesn’t speak well, so he asked RVD to join him. That makes sense now! The family says it was was nice moment to see that appreciation being given to him from a new generation.

-The talking heads wrap up by discussing Sheik’s legacy and influence that is still being felt today.

-I was kind of expecting some kind of insert before or after the episode to pay respect to Sabu, but perhaps too late to edit anything in at this point. This was a solid episode, but nothing I would say was “Dark Side” as Sheik was a loved man, who found a crazy gimmick and lived it. His biggest vice was apparently gambling and living outside his means at times, but that’s not minor compared to some of the other things we have seen from this series. It was cool hearing from the family and Cornette always brings the goods with the history. This being one of the final things we will ever see from Sabu is the heart breaking thing about this episode and it probably meant a lot to him to have this episode out there for people to learn about his uncle. Again, RIP Sabu and thank you for reading!