The Natural Born Thrillaz

In the dying days of World Championship Wrestling, they were being touted as the next big superstars of professional wrestling, graduates (for the most part), of the WCW Power Plant training facility in Atlanta. The Natural Born Thrillaz were a group of young, hungry, up-and-coming stars who had the world at their feet. Unfortunately, this world came crashing down around them as WCW's high-spending in years gone by finally caught up with them. As they were being pushed to the moon and back, Vince McMahon snapped up his rival in exchange for the proverbial bag of peanuts.

But it didn't look that bad for this group of athletes. As well as buying the WCW brand name and it's vast video back catalogue, McMahon acquired the contracts of more than twenty wrestlers as well. However, even though they were relatively successful in WCW, this didn't mean that this success would transplant itself to the WWF, especially given the fact that the WWF creative team seemed intent on slaughtering anything to do with their former rivals.

So now, three years on, just what has happened to this group?

Until he arrived in WCW, Shawn Stasiak was famous for three things in the wrestling business - being the son of former WWF World Champion Stan "The Man" Stasiak, being Kurt Angle's first pay-per-view opponent, and being fired by the WWF for covertly recording conversations he had with other wrestlers.

When he arrived in WCW, he quickly earned a televised victory over Curt Hennig. After this, Stasiak labelled himself "The Perfect One", and shortly afterwards, he was teamed with a graduate of the Power Plant, the man mountain that is Chuck Palumbo. Given the nickname "The Event", Palumbo and Stasiak became known as "The Perfect Event", and soon became tag-team champions. However, although Palumbo showed he had the makings of a good wrestler, he was hardly capturing the imagination of the crowd.

Around the same time, another rookie tag-team came onto the scene. Mark Jindrak and Sean O'Haire had the looks and the talent. Although they were green around the gills at first, they showed some good moves, and reminded quite a few fans of the Hardy Boys, although they were a bit bigger than their WWF counterparts. However, although Jindrak and O'Haire received some good support from the fans to begin with, the WCW writers decided it was in their best interest to turn them heel.

Then came Mike Sanders. A man of cruiserweight proportions, Sanders wasn't cut out of the high-flying mould, but he did have two things going for him, two things that the wrestlers I've just mentioned didn't have - charisma, and the ability to work a crowd. It wasn't long before Sanders won the cruiserweight title, and in addition, he was also made WCW Commissioner, feuding with Earnest "The Cat" Miller. But then again, this was at a time when it seemed like everyone in the company had had a short stint as commissioner. But still, Sanders excelled in the role.

And so the Natural Born Thrillaz were born, and while they were pushed by the writers, announcers such as Tony Schivane and Mike Tenay told us how these men were the future of sports entertainment, the next generation of wrestling superstars.

But they still needed something extra, and they soon got it in wily old veteran Kevin Nash. As the NBT took their first steps on television, Nash could be seen in an advisory role, telling the young guns just what they should do and how they should go about it. As Nash's time in the ring decreased steadily, his time as unofficial father figure to this team grew and grew. But as with most things in wrestling, this relationship didn't last long as the pupils soon turned on the teacher. Nash was being outnumbered, so he turned to his old friend Diamond Dallas Page for help. The "cut-price Outsiders", as Mark Madden called them, soon won the tag-team titles from Jindrak & O'Haire. Nash & Page didn't hold the belts for long though, as the NBT regrouped, putting together the two power men of the team, Palumbo & O'Haire together. The two youngsters soon brought the gold back into the NBT camp.

While this was going on, Sanders continued to feud with Miller. As even more changes behind the scenes meant that many storylines were dropped without being truly explained, Sanders lost the commissionership to Miller.

As with many factions, the Natural Born Thrillaz soon went their separate ways. Palumbo & O'Haire would go on to feud with Jindrak & Stasiak, before Stasiak went on to form a short and unexplained relationship with Stacey Keibler.

But then, it happened. WCW went under, and many of the NBT jumped ship to the WWF.

Palumbo & O'Haire had the distinction of being the last "true" WCW Tag-Team Champions, as they held the belts as the company officially closed it's doors. However, this didn't seem to mean much to anyone in Titan Towers. Palumbo & O'Haire were two of the first WCW wrestlers to appear on WWF television during the Invasion angle, but on their first appearance, they were literally slaughtered by every WWF mid-carder as they came through the crowd and jumped into the ring. They didn't stand a chance.

As the WCW/ECW Alliance was born, Palumbo & O'Haire were scheduled to face the WWF Tag-Team Champions, the APA of Farooq and Bradshaw. Although the ensuing pay-per-view match at Invasion was good, commentators Jim Ross and Michael Cole seemed to spend the majority of the match telling us all how young and inexperienced Palumbo & O'Haire were, and how they didn't really deserve to be in the ring with the likes of the APA. It was as if Ross and Cole were doing all they could to kill off their WWF careers before they even began.

But the commentators had a helping hand from within the ring just a short time later, as the Brothers of Destruction, Kane & The Undertaker, made Palumbo & O'Haire look even worse than Ross and Cole ever could. The two WWF veterans literally gave them nothing as they took the WCW titles from them. Now without a championship, Palumbo & O'Haire faded into the Alliance background as the titles they once wore with pride were now being traded around like candy between more established tag-teams. In fact, Palumbo faded so far into the background that he was "fired" by the Alliance.

Meanwhile, Stasiak and Jindrak also had their part to play in the Alliance's war with the WWF, although hardly anyone remembers just what Jindrak did during this time. He was nothing more than a bit part player, often appearing on the weekend shows, never making it to the big stage on a Monday or Thursday night. It wasn't long before Jindrak was being sent down to Ohio for tuning up. At least Stasiak was making it to the big shows, even though he was being portrayed as a bumbling fool. Stasiak seemed intent on pleasing Alliance leader Steve Austin more than anything else, but all he succeeded in doing was making himself look like an idiot, and in the ring, nobody cared what he did.

At least these four were part of the angle. As far as Sanders was concerned, the WWF knew he had the skills in the ring and on the microphone to get over with the crowd, but rather than let him do his piece, he ended up down in Ohio as well.

Just as the Invasion was coming to an end, Palumbo announced that he had formed a new team with "Mr. Ass" himself, Billy Gunn. You could hear the apathy coming from the fans at the WWF's New York restaurant when they made this announcement. Despite all of their attempts in the past, Billy Gunn was still treated like someone with the plague by the fans. However, in the past, the WWF had had some success when two no-hopers had been paired together, and if this team was going to work, they needed some drastic changes to their personalities. Although in the case of Palumbo, he needed a personality.

And in came Rico, fresh from a stint in Ohio, the mutton-chopped one came in as Billy & Chuck's style guru. It wasn't long before the three of them were camping it up, big time. Yep, previously heterosexual studs, Billy Gunn & Chuck Palumbo, were now living it up in a style Adrian Street and the Travesty Man would have been proud of. This just went to show that a great deal of wrestling fans had very short memories, because during the memorable Billy v Bart Gunn feud, didn't Billy's real-life wife actually appear in the ring after an accident or something?

But that didn't matter. With their bleached-blonde hair and new theme tune, and with Rico strutting around the ring in his leopard-skin print suit, Billy & Chuck were getting noticed, and getting a great deal of heat from the fans. They soon became tag-team champions, but at the time, this didn't actually mean that much. It wasn't long before the brand extension made the team the exclusive property of Smackdown. All the division of talent did was decimate the tag-team division, which meant that even though they were that tag-team kings of Thursday night television, they didn't really have any decent competition. Indeed, their first contenders were put-together team of Rikishi and their own stylist Rico.

Despite the fact that the brief feud with Rico almost lead to the splitting up of the team, the relationship between Billy & Chuck remained strong, so strong in fact that what happened next earned them a great deal of mainstream publicity. You know what I'm talking about. Billy & Chuck were getting married.

The press the WWE received for this was enormous. When they announced that a gay wedding would be taking place on Smackdown, it made news all over the world. However, when the big day came, it proved to be something of a letdown. Yet Billy & Chuck almost went through with it, before they announced that the whole event was nothing more than a publicity stunt. It was then that the bigger plan was revealed, as then newly appointed Raw General Manager Eric Bischoff revealed that he was the minister conducting the service. As he ripped off his latex mask, Rico revealed his true colours as Three Minute Warning, Rosey & Jamal, stormed to the ring and kicked the crap out of everyone they could get their hands on, even Smackdown General Manager Stephanie McMahon. This set up an inter-promotional pay-per-view match, but by this time, hardly anyone gave a rat's ass about Billy & Chuck anymore. The WWE gained a
great deal of negative publicity for not actually going through with the gay marriage angle.

This was the writing on the wall as far as the Billy & Chuck team were concerned. They never really recovered from the situation. After the then tag-team champions, Lance Storm & Christian, defected to Raw, the WWE announced a short time later that Smackdown would be getting their own tag-team championship. Billy & Chuck were entered into the tournament, but surprisingly, went out in the early rounds. When they finally had the chance to get some competition, the chance was taken away from them.

As Billy Gunn went down with another shoulder injury, Palumbo again faded into the background a little, before being put with another stable. A short time earlier, James Maritato, the artist formerly known as Little Guido and now known as Nunzio, formed a new version of the Full Blooded Italians faction, along with Palumbo & Johnny "The Bull" Stamboli. The faction has enjoyed moderate success over the past few months, their most notable act being their short feud with the Undertaker. But despite their members having put on some good matches in the past few months, the creative team doesn't seem to know how to handle them at the moment. A run with the tag-team belts would have helped Palumbo & Stamboli, because they certainly show more charisma, and are certainly more over with the fans than the current champions, the Basham Brothers.

As far as Sean O'Haire goes, one is left scratching his head. After the Invasion angle finished, O'Haire relocated to Ohio before he was brought back to the Smackdown brand last year. A series of viginettes introduced us to O'Haire's latest character, a sort of devil's advocate who preeched a certain set of rules to those who would listen. When he began to appear in backstage segments, he began to coerse unsuspecting victims, getting them to do things that they wouldn't normally do, his most memorable act was getting Brian "Spanky" Kendrick to "streak" in front of a live crowd. This angle and character promised much, but for some unexplained reason, O'Haire was placed with the returning Roddy Piper. As the Rowdy One came back with his Piper's Pit interview segment, O'Haire became nothing more than Piper's lackey, standing around in the background as Piper showed that he certainly wasn't the man he was ten or fifteen years ago. When Piper left, O'Haire's airtime decreased even more, which made people wonder why the WWE had spent all of that time promoting him when they hadn't done a thing with him since.

But at least this Sean faired a lot better than the other Shawn. On the Raw brand, Stasiak was still treated to a tremendous amount of apathy from the fans. Now claiming to be a resident of "Planet Stasiak", he showed that while he still had some glimmering of talent, nobody gave a damn, and it wasn't long before he was shown the door once again. This time, tape recordings had nothing to do with his dismissal.

As for O'Haire's first tag-team partner, Mark Jindrak is now plying his trade on the Raw brand, teaming with Garrison Cade, having spent a great deal of time in Ohio. However, although the team shows promise, it needs a gimmick, something to make the fans really take notice of them, something more than just attacking Evolution in the locker room. There was a rumour a few weeks ago that Jindrak & Cade would reveal that they were in fact gay. It made one think back to the heady days of Billy & Chuck. It also made you wonder if the writers would ever learn from their past mistakes. Jindrak & Cade need something more than just cheap shock tactics to get over with the fans. If they don't find something soon they'll be confined to weekend television for years to come.

The man who could have gone far, at least to Intercontinental title level, was never given a chance. Despite the fact that Vince McMahon himself was known to have been an admirer of his skills in WCW, Mike Sanders never got close to a slot in the WWE. There were rumours that he would be given a job as an announcer, but reports came out that for some reason Paul Heyman had taken a disliking to Sanders, and had persuaded McMahon not to give Sanders his chance. This is a great shame. If he hadn't been given the chance to shine as a wrestler of an announcer, he have gotten a shot as an old-fashioned manager, the likes of which we haven't seen since the heyday of Jimmy Hart & Bobby Heenan. As a trained wrestler he would have been able to take some degree of physical punishment. But then
again, he was never given his chance.

These men were touted as the future of wrestling by a company that was, at one time, regarded as the best wrestling promotion in the world. The simple fact is that when WCW died, the chances they would have had probably died with it. What would have happened if WCW hadn't closed down, if they had been able to get a decent, strong creative team who would have been more than willing to give these "Natural Born Thrillaz" a chance? One of them could have been WCW World, or at least United States Champion by now. The WWE creative team may have looked at them in a different way had they achieved a great deal of success in Atlanta.