Ever since WWE became a national promotion in the 1980s, wrestling promotions have risen to present themselves as alternatives to Vince McMahon’s pro wrestling empire, if not direct competition. Much talk has been made of current contender All Elite Wrestling and Extreme Championship Wrestling decades prior, but at the same time as ECW there was another WWE alternative: the Jim Cornette co-founded, Tennessee-based Smoky Mountain Wrestling.
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While it wasn’t ever the runaway cult phenomenon that ECW ended up being, Smoky Mountain Wrestling lasted from 1991 to 1995 and enjoyed some impressive success during a transitional time for pro wrestling. WWE currently owns the tape library and has it available on streaming, so let’s talk about what fans should know about a somewhat forgotten company.
10 A Result Of Frustration
In 1990, legendary pro wrestling manager and future internet curmudgeon Jim Cornette was managing The Midnight Express (Bobby Eaton and Stan Lane) in WCW, but was deeply frustrated with where the company was headed under notoriously clueless boss Jim Herd.
Cornette would fantasy book a territory in his head to maintain his sanity, but felt inspired to make it a reality once he noticed that WCW’s shows in Knoxville, Tennessee always had a fun, receptive crowd. Cornette then decided that starting up a promotion in that area would be a success.
9 Co-Founded With Sandy Scott
Smoky Mountain Wrestling’s co-founder alongside Cornette was Sandy Scott. A Canadian wrestler, Scott was part of a tag team known as The Flying Scotts, and was a former AWA World Tag Team Champion as well as a tag team champ in various NWA territories.
Scott retired in the 1970s and worked backstage for Jim Crockett Promotions (later WCW) as well as an on-screen host. He was working with Cornette as the wheels began turning to create SMW, so he departed WCW to help start it up.
8 Old School Style
As mentioned earlier, SMW offered a different kind of pro wrestling alternative from the more in-your-face, hardcore stylings of ECW. Cornette’s old school sensibilities meant that SMW took a traditional Southern Wrestling approach, with straightforward storylines and clear delineation between the heroes and the villains.
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Smoky Mountain’s classic approach came right down to the presentation, with old school JCP announcer Bob Caudle on commentary proclaiming in the very first episode that SMW is “professional wrestling as it used to be.” In other words, the target audience were old school wrestling fans who didn’t like WWE’s cartoonish “sports entertainment” style.
7 Backed By Rick Rubin
Financial backing for his new pro wrestling venture came from a surprising source: Rick Rubin. Co-founder of Def Jam Recordings, Rubin produced huge albums over the course of his career like Beastie Boys’ License to Ill, LL Cool J’s Radio, Johnny Cash’s American series, and Jay-Z’s 99 Problems.
Rubin was also a fan of the same kind of Southern wrestling that Cornette was into, and Cornette knew Rubin through a friend, so he was the perfect candidate for SMW’s money man. Reportedly, Rubin was never too involved in the process, and only visited occasionally to watch the show along with the crowd.
6 Bob Armstrong Was The Commissioner
Any decent, wrestling show that makes sense needs an on-screen boss to move storylines along and sanction matches, and Smoky Mountain Wrestling had it in “Bullet” Bob Armstrong. By the early 1990s, the veteran Armstrong was in his early fifties, but could still compete, so it was inevitable that he would step into the ring.
Not only did Armstrong team with his sons during the course of SMW, but also clashed with Jim Cornette’s heel manager character on several occasions.
5 The Thrillseekers
Smoky Mountain Wrestling featured established talent like Tracy Smothers and The Rock ‘n’ Roll Express, but also introduced fans to several future stars, in particular Chris Jericho and Lance Storm. The Canadian duo befriended one another while training in Calgary, and in the ensuing years before showing up in SMW either teamed up or clashed across the indies, Japan, and Mexico.
Jim Cornette saw potential in the two young high-flyers as heartthrob babyface characters and paired them as a tag team called The Thrillseekers.
4 Other Future Stars
There were, of course, other SMW talents who either found greater success or greater notoriety in the years that followed. In addition to Bob Holly and Balls Mahoney (wrestling as Boo Bradley), Smokey Mountain Wrestling also introduced Kane, who back then was tagging with Al Snow as a wrestler named “Unabomb.”
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While Brian Lee is best remembered as Chainz or the impostor Undertaker in WWE, in SMW he was top champion “Primetime” Brian Lee. And SMW proved to be the major platform for Chris Candido and his real-life girlfriend Tammy Sytch (a.k.a. Sunny), as Candido captured a number of belts during his time in the promotion.
3 The Gangstas
Controversial, dangerous, and massively entertaining, New Jack entered many fans’ radars in ECW, but was actually discovered by Jim Cornette and introduced in SMW. Inspired by hot button topics of the day like the OJ Simpson trial and the Rodney King beating, New Jack was grouped with Mustafa Saed and a fresh-to-business D’Lo Brown as The Gangstas in 1994.
New Jack proved an amazing talker, and his racially charged promos drew nuclear heat from the traditional Southern wrasslin’ crowds — heat that sometimes bordered on actual racist hatred.
2 Working With WWE
WWE has rarely acknowledged other promotions in its history, but courted Smoky Mountain Wrestling about doing some crossover work a couple of years into the promotion’s run. SMW’s Heavenly Bodies (Tom Prichard and Jimmy Del Rey) were brought in to challenge the Steiner Brothers for the tag belts at SummerSlam ‘93, so Cornette made sure WWE acknowledged where they came from on television in order to get more eyes on SMW.
As part of the relationship SMW Tag Team Titles were defended on WWE shows, and talent like the Steiners and Undertaker showed up on SMW television.
1 Had The NWA World Title
After that infamous moment Shane Douglas threw down the NWA World Championship to kick off Eastern Championship Wrestling’s transformation into Extreme Championship Wrestling in 1994, the title showed up in Smoky Mountain Wrestling, as Chris Candido won a tournament for the newly vacant belt.
Candido defended the belt in SMW until he dropped it to Dan “The Beast” Severn. However, Severn then toured with the belt rather than keep it at SMW, though he did defend it there once or twice.
