Chris Masters Says He Reminded Vince McMahon Of WWE Hall Of Famer
John Poz's Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling podcast welcomed former WWE Superstar and current NWA wrestler, Chris Adonis A.K.A. Chris Masters, to the show on this week's episode.
The current NWA National Champion discussed his beginnings in pro-wrestling. Masters noted that when he was coming into WWE, he had been told that he reminded Vince McMahon of a WWE Hall of Famer. It ultimately inspired "The Masterpiece" to watch more tapes to aid with his own development.
"Well, I had already known through interactions with various people that I was kinda looked at like a 'body guy,' and that I had reminded Vince [McMahon] of Paul Orndorff," Masters said. "So, I kinda started looking into watching Paul Orndorff and watching "Ravishing" Rick Rude and different stuff like that."
Once Chris Masters had signed with WWE, he became known for using his finisher the "Masterlock" forcing his opponents to submit. However, there was a reason behind why it became such a devastating finishing move.
"We were just trying to figure out a finisher and we were just playing around with a lot of different things," Masters explained. "We ended up falling on the Full Nelson. I used the Full Nelson as a bouncer when I broke into WWE which was kind of the funny part. It's a great restraint hold. When I was bouncing on Sunset Boulevard in LA, they just didn't want us to beat anybody up, obviously. They wanted us to restrain them and get them out. So my default was the Full Nelson.
"With the WWE, it was more about also the kind of the timeframe we were in, where I tell people at that point, WWE was trying to recondition the fans. They'd done a lot of extreme stuff, like jumping off of twenty-foot ladders and stuff. So what they were trying to do was kind of recondition the fans to start believing in some simple stuff again that was actually credible."
If you use any quotes from this article, please credit John Poz's Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling with an h/t to Wrestling Inc for the transcription.