By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
Insight With Chris Van Vliet with guest Shannon Moore
Host: Chris Van Vliet
Podcast available via Podcasts.Apple.com
Fans hated the 3 Count gimmick, at least at that time in WCW, but they couldn’t deny how good you guys were in the ring. “Yeah, and I think that was the attraction, and I think Jimmy [Hart’s] idea, or Jimmy thought that we were going to be a legit boy band because at that time you had the Backstreet Boys, you had NSYNC, you had all these guys. They were selling out arenas, and so Jimmy’s idea was like, hey, you guys are gonna release these legit songs, and we’re gonna hit some of these, like the Mall of America, and you guys are gonna perform, you’re actually gonna do these performances, and the Nitro Girls are gonna teach you how to dance, and like we’re gonna do some stuff with them.
“In my head, I’m going, well, first of all, I want to be a rock star. I wanted to look like this. I wanted to be tattooed, but I’ll do whatever, man. If Jimmy believes in us, I believe in it. And Arn, he had a different view of what 3 Count was. Arn, he understood, I think, the heel side of it, and Arn took it, and a lot of credit to Arn for actually getting us the heat that we would get from it. Because there was a while where 3 Count would go to the ring, and those green circles that we had, they were legit shields. Because we would get you M&M’s, change, sodas, just thrown at us. They’d get lobbed at us because Arn would overdo it. He’d send us out to open the show, and then he’d send us out like right before intermission, and then he would send us out again right before the main event, or somewhere in that at that point on the card.
“By the time we went out that last time, man, like the people were just throwing everything at us, and it was like, ‘Thank you, thank you. We knew you would come around.’ They tried to act like they were cheering for us, and then finally, they would send Sid Vicious down, no music, nothing, and Sid would just slowly walk to the ring. So you go from this chaos of just M&M’s, sodas, change, just getting lobbed at us, to you would hear a slow eruption of cheers, just following Sid as people started to notice him, and then we’d really like get into it. ‘Man, we knew you guys would finally love us. We knew that you would finally come around and be 3 Count fans.’ Sid would just stand behind us, and we’d sit there, and we’d milk it for a minute, and then turn around and then he would just destroy us and just kind of send us out of the ring, and the people would go nuts, but Arn just understood, I guess, the amount of heat that that group could get or these young guys that people ultimately really didn’t want to see, especially singing and dancing in the ring.”
I think you took the best F5 of all time! “Talk about a monster and a good dude, man. Brock Lesnar, by far, whenever it comes to probably the strongest or the baddest man that I’ve ever been in the ring with. I remember whenever he debuted in UFC and just feeling the strength of Brock Lesnar and the things that we had done together at that point. I couldn’t imagine being in an octagon with him, knowing that this machine, you’re about to just go at it. I got excited whenever he entered UFC just because of those moments and those times.”
He spins you around so many times! “But those are the moments, man. I truly believe that moment will live forever in the wrestling industry or in WWE. That’s something that’ll be used for decades to come. And I think going back to those moments, those things, and even the belly-to-belly that he gave me where I hit the ramp…”
He throws you over the top rope. “Yeah, he gives me that belly-to-belly, and that’s something that’ll live forever, and probably the worst bump that I’ve ever taken. I could hardly walk after that. Whenever I got to the back, once it settled in, and the backstory to that too, it saved my job. Taking that bump ended up saving my job that night. I remember right before the show, Terry Taylor came to me, and talk about another human that I think is such a great person that has done a lot for my career. Because one thing that Terry has done for me is he’s been honest with me, and this is one of those moments where he was super honest with me. He came to me. I was sitting down watching the monitor, and Terry comes to me, and he’s like, ‘Shannon, you got to do something tonight that makes the boss want to keep you here.’ I was like, ‘What?’ And he’s like, ‘Yeah, you need to do something that makes Vince [McMahon] want to keep you here tonight.'”
And if you don’t, you’re probably gonna get fired? “Yeah, I think Terry at that point had probably been in a meeting, or got an email of talents that they were probably gonna let go that night, and I was like okay, like thanks for being honest, and I remember the pressure was on, man. I was just roaming around back, going, okay, what can I do? I got an opportunity tonight. Terry’s already said that I’m probably gonna get fired if I don’t do something that stands out, and that’s how the belly-to-belly bump come about. I went to Brock, and we’re getting ready for the match, just going over the match. I’m like, ‘Hey man, I got this idea. I want you to belly-to-belly me from the center of the ring to the floor. Try to be dead center because I want this to be a highlight.’ He’s like, ‘Well, I don’t want to do that.’ He didn’t want to do it at first. He’s like, ‘You’re gonna get hurt.’ I’m like, ‘Trust me, I’ll be fine.’ I didn’t know if I was gonna get hurt. I didn’t know what was gonna happen.”
Not something you could practice either? “We couldn’t practice it. We couldn’t go over it. I was just like, I’m gonna take the chance. That’s how it turned out was pretty close to the center. But he gave me that belly-to-belly, and I remember when my feet hit the ramp, the back of my heels hit the ramp, and it bruised them. I remember after the match having a hard time standing up because my Achilles was so bruised. Then the next day, like just trying to get around, it was brutal.”
When you went to the back after that belly-to-belly, what was the reaction? “So going to the back, it was a relief, and it was surreal. So I remember going through the curtain, and the first person I saw was Vince on the headset standing up, giving me a standing ovation. It was surreal because it was like, okay, I think I did it. Maybe I’m safe? Sure enough, afterwards, Terry came back to me that night, and he goes, ‘I think you did it. I think you’re safe.’ But I mean, it just shows, too. One of the things when I do seminars and stuff today is trying to get people to understand there’s a bigger picture to these shows. It’s not all about you, and it doesn’t have to be all about you, but you can make it about you if, from a psychological standpoint, you truly understand your spot on the card and what the business of your spot is, and I think that’s something that I really tapped into doing this work with the bigger guys back in the day.”
The work you did in WWE with Matt Hardy, where you were Mattitude follower and MFer, I feel like that really changed the trajectory of your career because it got you more noticed in a storyline like that. “The MFer thing, that was another point probably in my career where my career could have went one way or the other. It could have ended up with me doing nothing. But at that time, Michael Hayes, he was a big part of putting me with Matt, and Matt played a part in it too, just doing the whole MFer character, the Mattitude follower character, and then that just kind of evolved. We did a lot of really good skits. I felt like that ultimately led to being able to be part of the Rumble that we did, where Matt and Jeff were in the Rumble. Jeff was gonna Swanton Matt. I don’t know if you remember that or not. Then I slide in and lay on Matt, telling Jeff, no, don’t do it; we’re all friends, don’t do it. Then Jeff ends up Swanton Bombing both of us. But going back to those moments, I’m pretty excited about the one moment that we did too. Thinking back, it was so exciting to do something where I kept Matt from being thrown over by holding him up with my feet. I don’t know if the rumble save, I don’t think at that point that had been seen yet. I don’t think it had been done much at that point.”
