At Exploder, we like to do things a little different. Instead of looking at the top this or that, we’re honest and look at the bottom, the worst of the worst. Because while many have a great memory of Bobby Heenan and pretty much everyone who he hasn’t tried to kill has a great story about Jim Cornette, there are a litany of just awful managers along the way.
With that in mind, here is our list of the Bottom 10 Worst Wrestling Managers.
10. Johnny Polo
There’s nothing wrong with Johnny Polo per se. The pre-Raven spoiled rich kid gimmick did the already experienced Scott Levy well. The biggest problem I have with the gimmick is that it was never truly defined. He started as a rich kid carrying his trademark polo mallet, but over time, the look ranged from “casual frat guy” to “track suit wearing guy”. All casual, but beyond the name, no real consistency.
Not only that, his stable was pretty varied. Adam Bomb and The Quebecers. A “survivor” of the Three Mile Island disaster (which was when a nuclear plant had a partial meltdown…back in the 70s) and two pseudo-Mounties. They won the tag team titles, but that’s about it. Polo wasn’t a terrible manager, but he wasn’t good either, which is why he’s number 10.
9. Bob Backlund & The Iron Sheik
I’ve never understood the idea of giving a wrestler two managers. No matter the talent, it’s easy to argue that one manager is enough. The Road Warriors had Paul Ellering, Giant Gonzales had Harvey Wippleman, hell, the entire Heenan Family had Bobby Heenan at the helm alone. But sometimes, people (and by people, I usually mean the WWF) saw it fit to give a wrestler two managers for…some reason.
Thus we have the strange duo of Bob Backlund and The Iron Sheik, the weirdest pairing since Frank Sinatra toured with Slayer. Together, the two former world champions would manage their protege, the superstar of the new millennium… The Sultan. The gimmick was dead on arrival and was one of the last gasps of the campy mid-90s characters we know and loathe, but it wasn’t helped by the pairing of the All-American lunatic and the Iranian…lunatic.
There’s not much more to say besides this happened very briefly. Thank god. Sheiky-Baby would go on to manage future hall of famer Tiger Ali Singh while Backlund would, many years later, manage Darren Young for reasons that can only be understood by taking copious amounts of hallucinogens.
8. Hillbilly Jim
I’m not here to badmouth Hillbilly Jim as a character. For what he was, he did it well. He was a large, bearded hillbilly character that got over more than he ever had any right to. Then again, it was the 80s, so there was a lot of that (looking at you, Paul Roma).
But in the 90s, while the WWF was making all types of 80s stars into managers (unlike WCW, who just let them keep wrestling), Hillbilly Jim drew the straw to manage the Godwinns, the Arkansas pig farmers who look exactly how you think they do. Hillbilly Jim wasn’t necessarily bad in this role, it’s just that he didn’t add to anything. He was a hillbilly managing two other hillbillies. Umm… OK?
And it didn’t help that he was huge. Hillbilly Jim is 6’7″, a few inches taller than both Henry and Phineas Godwinn, making it one of the few times the manager was actually larger than his charges. Now, maybe this is just the old school in me, but the guy talking for the wrestlers shouldn’t be more intimidating than the guys he’s talking about. Think if Roman Reigns was managed by Andre the Giant. Exactly.
This pairing wouldn’t last long before the Godwinn boys would turn on the large hillbilly and replace him (briefly) with Uncle Cletus. Because of course they did.
7. Julius Smokes
This is one I just don’t understand. Julius Smokes or “The Devil’s Son in Law”, whatever the hell that means, was a mainstay in ROH during their early years, managing The Havana Pitbulls (Ricky Reyes & Rocky Romero), Low Ki, and Homicide.
While some may say he’s a good hype man ala Flava Flav, to me he was just a guy with a grill who barked during promos and made noises with his mouth I’m 80% sure weren’t human. Other than that, he danced around ringside and…kept making these noises. That’s pretty much it. Homicide, Low Ki, etc. didn’t really need him and I’m amazed he lasted as long as he did.
Not only that, but in 2005, they brought him back to manage the Vulture Squad of Jack Evans, Ruckus, and Jigsaw, a group I’ll definitely talk about in a later article.
6. José Lothario
In addition to being the trainer of hall of famer Shawn Michaels, José Lothario actually had quite a wrestling career of his own, wrestling for many years in the NWA. But by 1996, the elderly Lothario was well past his prime, in even worse shape than he was when he trained the future Heartbreak Kid. He was brought in as part of Michaels’ “Boyhood Dream” storyline, which saw Michaels go back to his roots (his gym, his original trainer, etc) to gain sympathy for his upcoming WrestleMania title match an eventual win.
Following his first world title win, Shawn Michaels would seemingly drag around his elderly trainer as his mentor. It was a nice white-meat babyface touch in what was otherwise a so-so title reign, but after the first couple weeks, the bloom came off the rose, so to speak.
Lothario did train Michaels, but beyond that…he just stood there. Don’t get me wrong, he was an old man, I’m not expecting him to take bumps every week, but what made him attractive is exactly what limited him. He would stay with his protege until Michaels regained the WWF title at Royal Rumble 1997, but would eventually return home.
5. Sapphire
When the WWF picked up former NWA Champion Dusty Rhodes, many were excited to see The American Dream on the industry’s biggest stage. The WWF immediately responded by putting him in polka dots. Not only that, they gave him a manager, a middle aged African American woman they called Sapphire. Because of course they did.
The woman behind the gimmick, Juanita Wright, had a brief career as a wrestler before being hired by the WWF and put with Rhodes. First, there’s the idea of babyface having a manager. The role of a manager is to get heat on someone, which is unnecessary for s babyface. Add to that, managers are mouthpieces for talents that usually aren’t that great on the mic.
Sapphire couldn’t really talk and she was managing Dusty F#$%ing Rhodes. And let’s notforget the optics of an admittedly heavy set, polka dotted Dusty Rhodes dancing in the ring with a heavy set middle aged African American woman with zero charisma. Yeah, it didn’t work.
Even when Sweet Sapphire, inexplicably, turned on The American Dream and took the payoff from the Million Dollar Man, it didn’t make anything better.
4. Yamaguchi-San
Yamaguchi-San managed 4 people (Kaientai) during his entire WWF run. And he tried to chop off Val Venis’ penis with a samurai sword. Both of these statements are true. Outside of that, Wally Yamaguchi didn’t do anything. He wore a suit, did promos in broken English that made Juventud Gurerra sound like a poet laureate. There’s not much else to say here, he just wasn’t that good.
3. Frenchy Martin
You know how Yamaguchi-San only managed 4 people during his entire WWF run? Frenchy Martin managed 2, Dino Bravo and The Canadian Earthquake. (And Jos LeDuc’s cup of coffee, but I digress.)
Martin was certainly (French) Canadian, but outside of carrying a “USA is not ok” sign to the ring, he didn’t really do anything else.
2. Kim Chee
Remember when I said the WWF had a tendency to occasionally give a wrestler two managers for some reason? Well, here’s another example, the one and only Kim Chee.
In addition to being yet another persona of jobber patron saint Steve Lombardi in his quest to lose all the matches, Kim Chee was also the silent handler of Kamala during his early 90s run. That’s right, I said silent. As in he didn’t speak. A manager who didn’t speak with a wrestler whose language solely consisted of howling and slapping his belly. Brilliant.
Of course, since neither of them talked, Kamala and his mime handler were put with Harvey Wippleman. The former Downtown Bruno mostly represented lower level talent like Big Bully Busick, but overall, he was harmless. A good annoying manager for lower card guys. So why did they need Kim Chee managing him too?
1. Mr. Fuji
While Mr. Fuji is a truly legendary wrestling figure, from his days teaming Professor Toru Tanaka to his reputation as a legendary ribber, we have to talk about his managing style. Mr. Fuji was a prolific manager in the WWF, stretching from his time with The Powers of Pain and later Demolition to his work as a co-manager of WWF Champion Yokozuna.
The problem with Mr. Fuji as a manager was that he couldn’t really do anything. Besides participating in a 3 on 2 tag team title match at WrestleMania, Mr. Fuji was well past his time in the ring. Sure, he’d occasionally take a simple bump when needed, but he didn’t even do that much. Then again, much like José Lothario, it’s not something you should expect from someone that age.
But, and I’ll say this as respectfully as possible, Mr Fuji was shit on the mic. Wow, I guess that wasn’t very respectful at all. But it’s still true. Despite his career and notoriety, both backstage and as a manager, Fuji just wasn’t a good promo.
So much that, even while managing WWF Champion Yokozuna, he was joined by Yoko’s “American Representative” Jim Cornette. That’s right, Yokozuna had two managers because his first one (Fuji) could barely talk. Now this is one thing when it’s in the Kamala-Steve Lombardi gimmick #7 range, but this was the WWF Champion. That’s why, in my opinion, Mr. Fuji is the Worst Wrestling Manager.
So do you think I have a point? Think I’m full of it? Wanting to fight me to defend the honor of Frenchy Martin? Either way, let me know what you think and be sure to follow Exploder on Facebook and Twitter and be sure to listen to weekly new episodes on iTunes, Stitcher, Podbean, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast fix.
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