Mike Rotunda on How The U.S. Express Landed in WWE

– During a recent appearance on Stories With Brisco & Bradshaw, WWE Hall of Famer Mike Rotunda recalled forming The U.S. Express with former tag team partner Barry Windham and signing with WWE. Below are some highlights (via WrestlingInc.com):

Rotunda on forming The U.S. Express with Barry Windham: “Dusty [Rhodes] called and said, ‘We need a young babyface in Florida.’ So the Crocketts sent me down there and that’s where I teamed up with Barry. Barry was great. I learned a lot from Barry. As young as he was, he was pretty experienced. Dusty would go about five minutes and we’d go about 45 minutes every night in Tampa.”

On how they landed in WWE: “What happened is Dusty left Florida and went up to the Carolinas, but we got up there, we moved everybody up there and we weren’t making any money. So George Scott was the booker for the WWE at the time, so I guess [Blackjack] Mulligan talked to George Scott and we went from making 400 bucks a week to making five grand a week. So you can’t really blame somebody for going there. When Barry and I first went there, we were like this young, raring to go tag team, and knock on wood, it got over. It was exciting and that’s basically how it worked out. We went there and had an opportunity and we took it and ended up being in the first WrestleMania and stuff like that, which was another great learning experience.”

Mike Rotunda and Windham were inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame as The U.S. Express at last night’s Class of 2024 Induction Ceremony. Windham was previously inducted once before as a member of the Four Horsemen.