Buff Bagwell Explains His Plan to Retire Next Year, Talks His WWE Run and More

– Buff Bagwell did a new interview with Wrestling Inc discussing his intention to retire next year, WCW’s rise and fall, his WWE run and more. Highlights are below:

On his plans to retire next year: “Yeah. I think so. It’s not necessarily – I think it’s a combination of my injuries, I’m not able to train like I used to. Let’s be honest, if your name is ‘Buff’ Bagwell you better look like ‘Buff’ Bagwell. If you are going to claim that schtick, you better live it for a lot of years, and I did, for a lot of years, but man, it gets tough. When you get older you get older and I’m 47 now, just really trying to make it happening, and I’m losing it so it bothers me that I don’t look like ‘Buff’ Bagwell, and I’m trying to show these fans a 20 year old memory, and I’m looking good enough to pull it off but it’s getting close. It really is, it’s getting close.

“Everybody says that I look great for a 47 year old, but for ‘Buff’ Bagwell standards and what I gave the people, I was such in shape at that time it’s such a difference. I think it matters a little bit, but I’ve received nothing but positive responses from everybody for my age, and how I look and been taking care of myself obviously. I dodged a bunch of crazy bullets, but hip and shoulder wise I don’t think I can pull it off another year without embarrassing myself, without having to hold a rope to clothesline a guy and it bothers me, it’s just not good.”

On the roller coaster of his career: “The thing about it is, I was in the front seat riding it. It was one of the most unbelievable visual things you will see in your life. We went from Center Stage, with Chip Bernam, who was Head of Marketing. He grabbed me, the young, pretty boy and said for me to come with him. He used to give tickets away for free shows. There was Macho Man [Randy Savage], Nasty Boys, Sting, Lex Luger. We had a bunch of really good crowds, but nobody knew what WCW was, so when they finally got the Disney deal and people started noticing us. After Disney, then the nWo, there we went and there was no stopping it.”

On the WCW’s sudden rise and fall: “Think about it, how does that happen, right? So, you think; you build your house, buy your car, you go to a good job, but nobody saw one small thing that was huge and it was basically Ted Turner merged with AOL Time Warner, and when they did, Ted always had the most stock with TBS, he had 11%. It may not sound like a lot to me and you, but when you’re holding that kind of money, and that type of stock, dealing with millions and millions of dollars, but for whatever reason, when the deal got done, AOL’s numbers had bumped him to where he was second, he was not the one with say. Those who were ahead of him said that they didn’t want wrestling. We were like, ‘what? Are you joking?’ We were beating the NBA Championship. The NBA Championship was doing a 1 [rating] and we were doing a 3, and we got fired. They just didn’t want us, they did not want wrestling in the tag, so they were done.”

On whether he was in the arena for the final Nitro: “I actually was believe it or not, on the final Nitro, but I never watched it. 100% I was on it, I did an interview with Luger. It’s not good on the very last night you’re not on the crowd. I’m trying to leave and go home and realize that my career is over. Half my way driving home my Dad calls and asked if I was going to be on TV, I said no. He said, well, they [WWE] just mentioned 5 names and you were one of the 5. I said, what? He said, believe it or not, I’m not just saying this as your Dad, because I went back and listened to it as well, but it’s probably the 2nd, maybe the 3rd biggest pop of the names mentioned; then to be fired 2 weeks later, how do you explain that? I still don’t know what happened. No matter what thought you come up with, drugs, whatever you want to come up with, hey Mark, quit it, or we’re going to fire you. No warnings, still don’t know what happened. They said that we were going to chill out for about 3 months and then bring you back afterwards, but of course that wasn’t true. I shook their hands and thanked them and then went on my way.”

On going to WWE: “I did the same thing [as DDP, getting a buyout from his contract]… He got the idea from me because we share the same attorney. What we did was, we could have sat at home and made an extra $60,000 to $80,000, but the reason why you saw Booker T, Buff Bagwell and DDP, it wasn’t by choice, but because our contracts were up. We had to make a decision, so we had to jump ship. I called Brad Small, my attorney and said, ‘hey dude, I have an idea.’ I said, ‘let’s [save] Vince [McMahon] the money. Let’s show that we are on board.’ I saved Vince $60,000 where I could have just stayed at home, but keep in mind, he hasn’t hired me yet either. I wanted to show that I was on the team, save him $60,000, sign a new contract, which, you know, even with contracts it’s a big difference from my WCW contract, it was huge. The first ones through the walls was really tough for us.

“Booker T survived. I got flack from saying he was one of the best black wrestlers, but he really is one of the best black wrestlers. He’s just got that height, body, he’s got the talk. Junkyard Dog was a gimmick, and I was a big fan of Junkyard Dog, especially from back in the day especially. [Booker] can move like a cat. He’s one of the best of all-time. He survived, but as you’ve noticed, everyone else had gone out in flames. I think Dallas got beat by a drop kick by Bob Holly. I was like, my gosh man.”

On his lawsuit against WWE over the network: “I would love to go on about it but I got in trouble for saying something about it last week. It was only minor, so I have to say no comment for the moment.”

On if his match with Booker T would have gone differently had someone else booked it: “Every time I get asked this question, because like you said, I’ve been asked it about a million times. My answer is always this: Why do the invasion of two billion dollar companies in Tacoma, Washington when in seven days you are going to be in the Georgia Dome and you put Buff Bagwell and Booker T in it in Takoma, Washington and we got booed out of the building. I’m telling you, my heart and my soul tells me they knew in Tacoma that WCW wasn’t going to be around, and this happened to fall on, which happened to be a bad match. Whatever it was, let me know what I was doing wrong so I can fix it, but they never told me what I did wrong, so that is what stings me.”

On his high and low points on TV in his career: “The highest high was definitely the nWo, that is when everything picked up, which is when it all picked up. That was definitely the highest of the highs. The lowest of the lows was something you can’t help, and something you live by, which is timing. It was when Vince bought the company and my contract completely fell into a situation that nobody wants to walk in the door of competition and shake their hands, that is what we had to do. I was young enough. I was only 30 so I was thinking that I was going to see my buddies. I’m smiling and seeing Steve Austin, saying hi to everyone. Suddenly everyone’s arms are crossed, nobody is smiling, and I’m thinking, ‘oh boy, this is big time.’ Being first, I learned pretty quick that being first was not where you wanted to be. I learned that Booker T leaving too soon gave him heat. He missed Austin with the table. DDP did something wrong to somebody, and then somehow I got fired. I thought, wait a minute, I had a mediocre match in front of a crowd that I never even wrestled before in 11 years, and next week we’re going to the Georgia Dome, let’s like act like it’s not going to happen, but it is. Why can’t you wait 7 days in Georgia in front of 80,000 screaming fans with Booker T and Buff Bagwell signs? It really made no sense.

“That is why… me and Booker were talking about it, like, what do you say? He and I were just trying to keep our jobs. Our contracts just happened to fall in bad spots, which put us in these negotiations, figuring out contract strategies again, so it was a lot, to get fired. I just kept thinking why they went through all that trouble with my contract only to fire me after two weeks? I really believe with all my heart that he was going to do it anyway, because how do you get rid of me so quickly after Booker and I have had around 1,000+ matches over the years, it was just ridiculous. We’ll never really know the answer.”