[Brazelton] The Ultimate Warrior

ThatNickGuy

ThatNickGuy

http://www.wwe.com/inside/ultimate-warrior-passes-away-26223975

@Frank posted about this in the wrestling thread, but I thought it deserved its own thread. After all, The Ultimate Warrior was a huge household name back in the day and is still synonymous with wrestling in a lot of ways.

It's a little surreal that he's gone just after returning to WWE this week, with his Hall of Fame induction and his brief appearance and speech on RAW just last night. It's also a very haunting, given the contents of his speech.

 
ThatNickGuy

ThatNickGuy

A small part of his speech is this:

"Every man's heart one day beats its final beat. His lungs breathe its final breath. And if what that man did in his life makes the blood pulse through the bodies of others; If it makes them believe deeper in something larger than life; than his essence, his spirit, will be immortalized."

Christ, that's haunting with the timing.
 
Frank

Frank

TMZ reported that Warrior collapsed outside of a hotel in Arizona at 5:50 p.m tonight Pacific time while walking to a car with his wife. He was rushed to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
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According to TMZ, heart attack. Not suicide, just....fateful timing.
 
Covar

Covar

I was never an Ultimate Warrior fan. I didn't start watching wrestling until he was out of the WWE, and mostly knew him as the rambling crazy nutter who used to shake the ropes. Having watched Raw just last night, which must have just been right before he passed, I can't help but feel mournful. It's a very surreal feeling knowing that you just saw him one day, and the very next he's gone.
 
Jay

Jay

Covar said:
I was never an Ultimate Warrior fan. I didn't start watching wrestling until he was out of the WWE, and mostly knew him as the rambling crazy nutter who used to shake the ropes. Having watched Raw just last night, which must have just been right before he passed, I can't help but feel mournful. It's a very surreal feeling knowing that you just saw him one day, and the very next he's gone.
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Sad to see him die but he was quite the douche when he was in the WWE.

Spoilered for length :

From Bret Hart's book.

"I got to see exactly what kind of champion Warrior was during a show in Omaha.

Propped up on a stretcher a few feet outside the locker room was a Make-A-Wish kid who looked to be down to his last few hours. There was not a hair left on his head, and not even his Warrior face paint could mask his sad eyes. Sickly pale and barely breathing through a ventilator tube, the boy wore a purple Warrior T-shirt and green and orange tassels tied around his biceps to honor his hero. His mother and father and an older brother and sister were with him, patiently waiting for the promised encounter with The Ultimate Warrior.

I bent over to say hello, as did all the other wrestlers on the way into the dressing room. It was odd, but there was Warrior actually sitting with us: He usually kept to himself in his private dressing room. By the time the third match started, a WWF public relations rep poked his head in and politely asked Warrior if he was ready to meet the dying boy. Warrior grunted 'In a fuckin' minute. I'm busy.'

I thought to myself, Busy doing what, talking to a bunch of guys you can't stand anyway?

As the night wore on the family waited just outside the dressing room door, the boy hanging on to his dying wish to meet his hero. As I was returning to the dressing room after my match, I was relieved to see that they weren't there anymore; I assumed that the kid's dying wish had come true. Warrior's entrance music played while Jim and I quickly showered in hopes of beating the crowd out of the building. We'd have to hurry since Warrior never went over ten minutes. We dressed, grabbed our bags and took off. As we rounded a corner down a backstage ramp, we came upon the boy and his weary family, who had been moved there so as not to get in the way of Warrior's entrance.

I thought, That lousy piece of shit. He'd made them wait all night, unable to summon the compassion to see this real little warrior. Hogan, Randy and countless others, including Andre, never hesitated to take the time to meet a sick, dying kid. My disgust for Warrior magnified a thousand times.

To me he was a coward, a weakling and a phony hero"

This ain't the only story I heard about him.
 
ThatNickGuy

ThatNickGuy

Oh, there are plenty of stories out there. The biggest was the infamous "queers don't make the world turn" stuff about ten years ago when he was doing university speeches and such.

But you know what? From his Hall of Fame speech and his short speech on RAW, he seemed like a very humble, older man who was grateful for what he had - most especially his family. You could tell just from his HoF speech that he loved his family and they loved him right back. You could see it in all their faces. He also fully admitted in that speech that he was young, stupid, and ungrateful for the opportunities he had. I should also note that there have been many stories, especially this past weekend, where Warrior went above and beyond showing the fans respect and made each of them feel happy to see him. That doesn't sound like the same man as the above story.

I want to believe that he changed in his old age and becoming a father, like many can and have. Whether he did or not or died a homophobe, I don't know. I doubt we'll ever know. But I do think he had changed a great deal and at the very least, was able to get some happy closure in his career.
 
Jay

Jay

Amen.

No one is an angel all their lives.... some seek redemption at some point... it's sad he died, especially at this point and time.... but he was a MAJOR douche for decades... to the point he didn't have a wrestling career anymore not because of injury... but simply no one wanted to work with him.[DOUBLEPOST=1397157165,1397157002][/DOUBLEPOST]
In 2008, Warrior weighed in on the death of Heath Ledger (whom he repeatedly called "Leather Hedger"), and declared that no one should mourn for a drug user who starred in a gay propaganda film.
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Jesus christ...
 
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