A number of WWE Superstars are given partial credit for kicking off the Attitude Era. Stone Cold and his King of the Ring promo. Mankind getting thrown off Hell in a Cell by The Undertaker. One man who doesn't get enough credit for the shifting of the wrestling tides during the mid-1990s is Brian Pillman. The man who had all three of wrestling's biggest promotions vying for his attention at a time when it was becoming hotter than ever before.
Pillman's master plan began when he realized there was no place at the top of the card for him in WCW. As highlighted by Pro Wrestling Stories, Eric Bischoff told him he was too small to be a believable heel, and his voice was too raspy for him to be a believable babyface. Pillman needed to have surgeries on his throat throughout his life to remove polyps, resulting in his voice sounding the way it did.
The Loose Cannon
He and Bischoff then came up with The Loose Cannon gimmick. A Pillman character designed to fool both the fans and the wrestler's peers that he was actually losing his mind. It began with a match against Eddie Guerrero. After running away from Latino Heat, Pillman would re-emerge, head to the announce table, and grab Bobby Heenan. Heenan had neck issues which meant no one was allowed to touch him, leading to The Brain asking Pillman “what the fuck” he was doing live on air. Not great for Heenan and Pillman's relationship, but the perfect way to convince everyone the wrestler was legitimately losing it.
That led to a feud with Kevin Sullivan who was WCW's head booker at the time and clued in on the situation before he was pulled into the angle. Pillman hinted Sullivan's wife was having an affair with Chris Benoit, and would frequently refer to him as “booker man” live on TV. The Loose Cannon would eventually convince Bischoff to fake fire him in front of other wrestlers, and a week later he showed up on ECW TV, technically still under WCW's employ.
Bischoff had a secret agreement with ECW's Paul Heyman at the time, allowing Pillman to work for both companies. When wrestlers and fans started to figure out what was going on, Pillman convinced Bischoff they needed to take things to the next level. Actually fire him, complete with termination papers, again with witnesses, so that the gimmick would become believable again. In reality, Pillman wanted to take those papers to WWE so he could prove to Vince McMahon and Jim Ross he was really a free agent.
Igniting A Bidding War
That's exactly what happened, and thus began a bidding war between WWE and WCW for Pillman's services. According to Dave Meltzer, a good friend of Pillman who was kept in the dark throughout most of this, Bischoff low-balled Pillman at first before realizing what was going on. WCW's leader then upped the offer to $400,000 per year, not wanting to lose a project he had pumped so much time into. Then disaster struck. Pillman fell asleep at the wheel, crashing his car and severely injuring his ankle in the middle of all these negotiations.
Doctors told Pillman that the surgery needed to fix his ankle would actually make it feel better than it was before the accident, fixing a problem he had just been dealing with for years prior. Deterred by the injuries and unsure whether he could still trust Pillman, Bischoff backed out of the bidding war allowing a hurt Loose Cannon to get his wish and go to WWE for big money.
Pillman's stay in WWE was sadly short-lived. Less than 18 months after he signed, the wrestler died of heart failure, a condition exacerbated by the painkillers he had been taking to get back from his injury sooner. Pillman passed on the same day as Badd Blood 1997, an event on which he would supposedly have become Intercontinental Champion. An awful end to an incredible talent taken way too soon, and the impact he made in WWE in such a short space of time combined with the genius behind how he got there demonstrates how important a player he could have been throughout the rest of the Attitude Era and beyond had he been around longer.
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