Exclusive interview with Steve Corino, Speaks retirement, days in ECW, and more

Exclusive interview with Steve Corino, Speaks retirement, days in ECW, and more
Submitted by Luis Perez on Saturday, August 25, 2007 at 12:11 PM EST

Lords Of Pain Exclusive Interview With “The King Of Old School” Steve Corino

Hello everyone, I’m RIPbossman, and this is a special interview with someone who I feel is one of the most talented performers in the business, former ECW World Heavyweight Champion and former TNA star “The King Of Old School” Steve Corino. This year Steve will be retiring from professional wrestling, and an outstanding career that has spanned over a decade will be coming to an end. On behalf of Lords Of Pain, I would like to thank Steve for taking time to go through with this interview, and on behalf of wrestling fans everywhere, I would like to thank him for his years of dedication and entertainment.

My pleasure. I get paid for this interview right? If not expect one word answers!!!

*******

You’ve announced that 2007 will be your last year in the wrestling business. But before discussing the end of your career, I would like to ask you about your beginnings as a wrestler. In 1995, you wrestled your first match in Reading, Pennsylvania, in a dance club called The Silo. Would you like to share any comments on how you felt before and after this?

I am just shocked that you know what the Silo is! I actually started in 1994 but I always consider my real debut in 1995 at the old Silo Nightclub in Reading for Pennsylvania Championship Wrestling.

To say I was nervous would be an understatement. I remember thinking that I was going to throw up when my music came on. I have the match on VHS but I don’t dare watch it because I know I was awful. I was a skinny kid, about 170 pounds soaking wet, in a baseball jersey and shorts thinking I was the anorexic Public Enemy or something but thankfully Mark Mest got me through it. And also lucky for me all of my friends and family were overly nice and told me “good match”!

During the early part of your career, you wrestled for the Organization Of Modern Extreme Grappling Arts, or OMEGA. This was an organization that was started by Matt and Jeff Hardy, and was folded in 1998 when they both went to WWE. Do you feel this was an organization where you significantly developed yourself as a wrestler?

I wouldn’t say I developed in OMEGA as a wrestler but I definitely developed as a heel there. With all of the high flying guys like Matt, Jeff, Shane Helms, and Shannon Moore there both Matt and Thomas Simpson (OMEGA promoter) wanted me and Joey Matthews to be the biggest heels that we could be. I learned how to slow down more and play with the crowd.

OMEGA was a lot of fun and to think that if you saw a show there in 1997 and then turned on TV in 1999 weather it be WWF, WCW, or ECW you would see The Hardy Boys, Shane Helms, Shannon Moore, CW Anderson, Venom (Joey Abs), Mike Maverick (Jack Dupp), Otto Schwanz (Bo Dupp), Joey Matthews, Christian York, and myself would be there.

Do you feel that you have tried to emulate any wrestlers from the past? Were there any wrestlers that you tried to watch and learn from in particular?

I don’t know if I tried to copy any of them per say but my style has definitely been inspired from watching guys like Tully Blanchard, Barry Windham, Eddie Gilbert, Dusty Rhodes, Nick Bockwinkel, Michael Hayes, Tommy Rich, and more. I try to take something from everyone and tweek it into mine.

Then when I arrived in Japan in 2001 I really got into the old school All Japan Pro Wrestling tapes and fell in love with the style of Jumbo Tsuruta and even to this day use his jumping knee attack in most of my Japanese matches.

In 1998, you started wrestling with ECW. Many former wrestlers from that organization have said that if someone could succeed in ECW, that was a true testament to their work ethic and toughness, both on a physical and mental level. You saw a lot of success there, being a regular main eventer and a former World Heavyweight Champion. How especially rewarding was this for you?

ECW was one of the most fun times I have had in pro-wrestling. It is the only place I ever worked where it wasn’t just the wrestling but it was everyone that came together to make the show. The wrestlers, staff, and fans combined to make every show an event. The fans were tough but they also kept us on our A-game every show. They didn’t want to hear you complain if you had an injury or something that would keep you less then 100%. They showed up and were loud in every city and they wanted you to give them as much as they were giving you. It was amazing. I would remember getting to a building tired and sore and thinking how the heck I was going to survive wrestling New Jack or Dreamer but as soon as the ECW theme song came on and the crowd popped it was like you took a gallon of Red Bull. The pain was gone and you couldn’t wait to get out there. It was truly an amazing time.

But being rewarded with the ECW World title was the ultimate honor that Paul could have given me and to this day I remember finding out about it at 3:30 that afternoon and thinking that The Sandman was ribbing me because I thought the plan the whole time was to put the belt back on Justin Credible.

Fans of ECW have been considered some of the most vocal and demanding fans in the history of professional wrestling. Was performing under this type of atmosphere something that provided an overwhelming amount of pressure for you personally? If so, when did the pressure start to go away, if it went away at all?

Like I said in the last question, the fans wanted 100% out of you every show because they were giving you 100% of their energy.

It was demanding and full of pressure but a good pressure. And luckily the fans would not let you skate through any matches so you were always making sure that if you gave 100% you had to find a little more. It was a lot of fun.

A large part of your gimmick has been to be against hardcore wrestling. Once at Living Dangerously ’99, you teased a chair shot against Balls Mahoney, only to unfold the chair and sit on it while you applied a head lock, to the dismay and anger of the crowd. If you had to do it all over again with a different type of gimmick, what would it have been?

Not at all. I started the anti-hardcore gimmick in 1997 while wrestling in the New Jersey based AWC for AJ Sparxx. At the time ECW was getting bigger and starting to get some steam on PPV and a lot of the indy wrestlers were trying to be as hardcore as them to get noticed. I figured to be noticed I had to be totally different and it worked.

Throughout your career, you have been known to blade on a number of occasions, often to the point of clearly losing large amounts of blood. You’re face being covered with the crimson mask has been an exclamation point on several of your matches. Were there ever any times where you felt you could have been at risk for dieing due to massive blood loss, and if so did an experience like this ever prompt you to contemplate leaving the business?

I think one of the major misconceptions of me is that I enjoyed bleeding and it is the farthest from the truth. I hated to do it and I still do but I also believe that blood is a necessary evil in pro-wrestling. Was it over done while I was in ECW? Heck yeah, but Paul was my boss and I listened to what he told me to do.

People have always told me how good I am at bleeding and what they don’t realize is that I am horrible at it. If I was good my forehead would look more like Tommy Dreamer’s (minus his horribly reseeding hairline and fat ass!) and less like Carlos Colon (OK, not that bad!). The wrestling school I went to never taught me how to do it, and I really don’t know if there is a school that would teach it, and my trainers Tom Brandi and King Kaluha never did it so its not like they would teach me how to do it.

I would think that the worst one was at Heat Wave 2000 against Jerry Lynn. That was pretty much the only time I was scared because I lost so much blood. It was crazy.

At ECW’s Heatwave 2000, you and Jerry Lynn stole the show with an exciting match that was highlighted by your aforementioned crimson mask. At that same event, wrestlers from Xtreme Pro Wrestling were sitting in the front row, trying to make a stand for themselves at an ECW event, and a short brawl with ECW wrestlers and the XPW wrestlers took place during the main event of the evening. Later that night, it is said that members of XPW’s ring crew got into a street fight with members of the ECW locker room. What was the overall feeling and attitude of the ECW locker room throughout that night, and are there any details of this event that you would like people to know more about? (I respect if you decline to name names on who exactly was involved in this whole incident.)

This is a funny story. I think both me and Balls Mahoney were the only ones not involved in the fight only because I was in one of the offices getting 26 stitches and Balls was there to support me.

After I get out of the office I looked around the locker room and everyone looked like they were just running a mile. I saw Jack Victory who had his trademark “82” shirt off and he had one of his straps down on his singlet like he was Jerry Lawler and I said “Jacko, what the hell happened to you? You look like you just beat up someone.” And he laughed and told me what happened.

I truly believe that the ECW vs. XPW fight was good for both companies because it showed that there were some passionate guys. The ECW guys were defending “ECW” and the XPW guys were looking to make a name for themselves. I think if Paul and Rob Black could have worked something out it would have been exciting because here you have a real fight that people know about and now they are going to get in the ring with each other. The boys would have been wondering who would have taken the first cheap shot and vice versa.

At Living Dangerously 2000, you wrestled The American Dream Dusty Rhodes in a Bull Rope Match. You have been quoted as saying this was your favorite match from your tenure in ECW. What was it like for you to wrestle Dusty, someone who is considered a wrestling legend by many wrestlers and fans alike?

To just meet someone like Dusty Rhodes was an honor but to actually be in a program with him was a dream (no pun intended) come true. Not to take anything away from Tommy Dreamer or Taz, who I was feuding with, they weren’t “old school” and here I was talking how I was the King of old school wrestling. Dusty made the gimmick legitimate in the fans’ eyes and made me.

The bullrope match was something that I suggested to Paul after the first angle involving me and Dream. I never thought he would go for it but in January he called me at like two o’clock in the morning, a Paul Heyman Special I like to call it, and told me he wanted to do it for the March PPV. From that moment I studied tapes of Dusty vs. Tully Blanchard and Dusty vs. Kevin Sullivan to make sure that we would have something that people would remember.

I thought the match was better then I could have imagined and the one thing I remember the most is after the match Paul came up to me, gave me a hug, and told me that it was better then anything that Dusty and Tully ever did. I don’t know if he was just pumping me up or didn’t realize that Tully was one of my ultimate heroes but I remember just sitting down in the locker room and enjoying the moment and realizing how blessed I was.

You’ve wrestled many matches in Japan over the years. It is said that fans of Japan provide a more quiet and respectful atmosphere for wrestling. This is clear to anyone who has watched matches from Japan. While wrestling for a Japanese audience, do you feel you have to change your style of performing at all to please these fans as opposed to wrestling in front of fans in America?

I think it is important to change your style depending on where you are at not just Japan. Some things that work in Philadelphia are not going to work in North Carolina and things that work in North Carolina are not going to work in Chicago. You have to know your audience and go from there. It isn’t just cities that are different, its companies too. You can’t do the same thing in the AWA that you do in ROH and the things you do in ROH can’t be done in the AWA. The fans are different and their believability is different.

That being said in Japan you have to go with what will work. I would say that 60% of the time I will do some sort of comedy in the country towns because they don’t understand the strong style as much as the hardcore fans of Tokyo. Many fans don’t know this but I owe a ton of my success and longevity in Japan to a guy named Masa Horie. He is the ultimate fan but also studies pro-wrestling as an art. He would tell me what fans were saying about me and I used that to get over and stay over for the last six years. If I didn’t have Masa I might have only been invited over for one or two tours as opposed to the 66 I have done and made a living off of it.

You’ve also wrestled matches in other countries as well. Is there anything you want to tell us from your experiences with pleasing these crowds?

Some countries that don’t get a lot of live wrestling are easier to please then say Philadelphia fans who have seen everything. And I am not burying Philadelphia fans because before I got into wrestling I was one of them. I used to go to the old Philadelphia Civic Center every month to watch the NWA.

But in Europe fans are just itching to get that energy out that you just can’t do while watching TV and its great for the wrestlers. The UK, Germany, Finland, Australia, and more have a lot of fun and they want to show the world that they are just as good of pro-wrestling fans as the fans in the US and Japan.

You were a former employee for TNA in their early days. Do you feel TNA is a good place. What are your general feelings about your experience there?

I hated it to be totally honest. But you have to remember that it was in the beginning stages while they were doing the weekly thing in Nashville. I truly believe that Vince Russo never had a plan for me and Sandman besides trying to live off the ECW name. Instead of realizing that I totally changed my style in Japan he wanted me and Sandman to be a team. That and not finding out until the night before if you were booked was frustrating. Being a single father at the time it is near impossible to wait by the phone all day for someone to call you and say yea or nay and then try to either ask your ex-wife to watch your son or find a babysitter. It was just too unorganized for me and frustrating.

But that was 2003 and its 2007 now and things are different. I wouldn’t mind going back there but I wouldn’t want to be Steve Corino, former ECW wrestler. I would want to do something totally different. I don’t watch the show much because it is written too much like a WWE show and I think that is why their ratings haven’t gone up. They have such a talented roster but the booking team keeps trying to compete with McMahon and the WWE instead of being the alternative. If I was in charge of the booking I would sell PRO-WRESTLING to the fans that watch not sports entertainment. If they want sports entertainment they will watch the WWE. Right now I think the UFC is doing so well is because it is different. There is a mystic about it. For all we know it could be a work like the old UWF in Japan but no one is saying it so there is a believability line. TNA has the six sided ring and some of the best pro-wrestlers in the world, why compete with the WWE when you can change the whole pro-wrestling industry?

Right now, I would have to be remiss in not asking someone in the wrestling business what their thoughts and feelings on the Benoit tragedy are. How has this impacted you on a personal level?

You said it right, it’s a tragedy. I go into it in depth on my most recent live journal entry at SteveCorino.com and my blog at My Space. There are so many things that come to mind with this subject but I think it was hard to put it down in words.

I just hope that most fans remember Chris Benoit for the amazing pro-wrestler that he was and not how it ended.

Is this entire incident something you feel is going to have a serious impact on wrestling for years to come, almost how the ’94 strike hurt baseball and the recent hockey strike hurt their sport?

I think it is a little early to see how it is going to effect pro-wrestling as a whole. Hopefully it will clean up the sport and the WWE will push guys that don’t look like there are on steroids. I can’t tell you how is on and who isn’t because even if you were on it’s not discussed. Plus what fans don’t realize is that even with steroids these guys have to train super hard and have a diet that is top notch. I really hope that guys that are on get off just for their health. I hate seeing how many wrestlers have died in the last 10 years and we need to change it. Most of these guys leave behind a family and that is a real shame.

You have expressed your views on wrestlers starting a union, saying that it is something that really should be done. Do you feel this is something that is a reasonable possibility to happen?

It should be done but I can’t see it ever happening. There really needs to be a top level pro-wrestler and someone from the SAG/AFTRA unions to help it along and tell the wrestlers how beneficial a union would be. Wrestlers need insurance and retirement benefits and only we can do that.

Who are your closest friends in the wrestling business?

CW Anderson, Ricky Landell, Mike Kehner, Amazing Kong, Colt Cabana, Masato Tanaka, Shinjiro Otani, Sterling James Keenan, Mr. Wrestling 2, Takao Omori, Chris Hamrick, and Ricky Reyes to name a few. I am sure I forgetting some though!

Being in the wrestling business since you started training in 1994, you must have some very interesting stories to tell. Would you like to share one or two with us?

Ahhhhh, there are so many that you have to wait for the book to come out for the full stories! But I can tell you it includes Jack Victory peeing himself, CW almost killing a girl in Japan, me and CM Punk going to a Trannie Bar in England, to “losing” the ECW title five minutes after I won it, and more.

You have announced that you are going to retire this year from wrestling. What has pushed you to make this decision?

It’s something that I have been seriously thinking about for two years now. The travel, injuries, and dealing with shady promoters get on my nerves to the point where I don’t love the sport the way I used to. Plus I have gotten involved with working with kids and special needs kids at our YMCA in Pennsylvania. Unlike other YMCA’s we have 22,000 members and I am in charge of the youth fitness program. We have our own kids gym where kids 9-14 learn how to work out, their muscles, and nutrition. It’s funny because over the last five or six months I have gotten into the best shape of my life while getting ready to leave pro-wrestling! But working with kids is so much fun and something I love.

And the other thing is being home more with my wife and son. My son is just about to turn 11 and is involved with some great things in school, the community, and sports.

I love spending weekends with my wife but I will tell you that she has pushed for me to stay in pro-wrestling but on a part time level. It is something I am considering but not as Steve Corino. If I did work part time it would be something totally different and only for companies that I want to work for. Will I do it? I don’t know and I can’t say for sure but I leave the door open but as I said after December 22, 2007 I will never wrestle as Steve Corino ever again. I had a great 13 year career and I want to end it the way I want.

Looking back on your career, what do you consider to be your single biggest accomplishment?

EVERYTHING! When I first started in wrestling school my goal was to have one match and after that it was little things. Then it was to work with some of my heroes and in other countries. I have had a dream of a career and something that I am so proud of. I got to wrestle and become friends with a lot of heroes and I got to be in front of some of the most passionate pro-wrestling fans worldwide. I wish I could tell you one big accomplishment but my whole career went so much further then I ever thought it would and I am so grateful for everything.

In that same vein, what is the single most disappointing aspect to your career? Was there a feud with a wrestler you never got to have, were you injured just before any big matches you were looking forward to?

I think the only thing that I am disappointed at and it is only at a minimal level is that I never got the credit I think I deserved from the internet fans. Especially the ROH fans in my last run there. I consider them the “smartest” of the wrestling fans but they missed the whole point of my last time there. They didn’t realize that I was only in there to wrestle Homicide and that I didn’t “care” about the other matches. Instead of using that as heat to lead up to the final Homicide-Corino match, the would say that I was lazy. Lazy is not a word that I would use for anyone that wrestles. I have seen guys take it easy on house shows and stuff like that but I don’t think anyone has ever said “lets go out there and have a shitter tonight”. Then when it was time for the final match with me and Homicide the crowd was different. From the first match you could tell they weren’t into it as much as they usually are. But I got the blame for the match not being what they expected. But what did they expect? I took about 30 slaps to my ear to the point I had to have it drained the next day so it wouldn’t harden up to have cauliflower ear. Me and Homicide spent almost four years beating the shit out of each other and it took a lot out of us. I lost my hearing in my left ear, he hurt his shoulder, we both got hurt in the barbed wire match, etc. I let him shave my head after the final match as a conclusion and to show respect not only to him, but to Gabe for allowing Homicide and myself put on a feud of that caliber, and mostly to the fans that I was giving up and “putting” the feud behind me and giving my nod for Homicide to go on and win the ROH World title. As much as Gabe liked it and saw what we were trying to do, it went over the fans’ heads. I would have thought that anyone that would have got it, it would have been the ROH fans. I guess sometimes you can be too smart and the simplest of things get by you.

Any regrets?
(Note: I realize this is very similar to the previous question, so feel free not to answer it if you want.)

I would say only, and once again at a minimal level, not getting a chance for the US television audience to see how good me and CW Anderson are as a tag team. We have spent over five years as the best gaijin team in ZERO1-MAX and have had great matches with teams like Otani and Tanaka, Team 3D, and more. It would have been great to show TV watching fans how good we were.

Have you set a date for your final match, and if so when and where will it take place, and against who?

It is set for December 22 in Tokyo. Right now, and I hope it doesn’t change, is me, CW Anderson, and Ricky Landell (The Extreme Horsemen) vs. Shinjiro Otani, Masato Tanaka, and Takao Omori.

For these last few questions, I thought I would take a direction away from wrestling and let the readers get to know you better as a person.

That might not be good! They might realize that I am not such a bad guy!!! haha

You got married back in 2006, when you were less than a few weeks away from turning 33. How do you feel now to no longer be a bachelor?

I love being married to my wife. She is amazing and completes me. I was a single father for almost seven years before Saana and I got married and its great to be able to come home to her and Colby. Family is the most important thing in my life and I am so lucky to have a wonderful wife and awesome son.

You have a son, Colby, who turns 11 this year. Being a proud father, I’m sure that your son has been a huge part of your life. Is there anything you would like to say about your son?

Colby is my best friend. I am sure that every father would say the same thing about their son’s but my son has kept me centered since the day he was born. I have never seen a more sensitive and caring person in my life and he is only just about to turn 11.

I can’t wait to see him grow into a adult, father, and family man. He is amazing.

You are a very big fan of baseball, and a very big fan of the Philadelphia Phillies. The Phillies have not made it to the post season since ’93, when they lost in the World Series. What do you think is the likelihood that the Phillies will finally break their 12 season drought (counting out the strike year)?

Rub it in why don’t you! You must be a dirty Mets fan like that scum bag Landell or worse, a Braves fan! Hahah.

I love baseball more then any other sport and my favorite time of year is right now when you have everyone shooting for the post season. The Phillies have stuck in there all year considering that they have had four of their five starters on the disabled list and 22 playes in all with stints on the DL. I think if this team was healthy we would be on top of the NL East but right now we are struggling with trying to get into the Wild Card. I will be happy with another 85-87 win season though.

It’s been said that you are a fan of the show Lost. Any thoughts on the upcoming season?

I am a huge fan! Big TV nerd when it comes to Lost. I know a lot of fans are upset at the direction the show is going but I love it. There is something that makes me turn in every week. I think Season 4 will be as fun and frustrating as the first three seasons.

What upcoming events will you be wrestling at?

I finally updated my site at www.SteveCorino.com so you can visit there and see all of my upcoming dates. I hope to see fans come out to places like West Virginia, Milwaukee, Toronto, and more!

Are there any additional comments you would like to make at this time?

Yes, do I get a bonus for longer answers? What? What do you mean I don’t get paid for this? Oh man!!! Hahaha.

No, in all seriousness I want to thank everyone who reads this for the last 13 years. It has been amazing to perform in front of you and it doesn’t matter if you loved me or hated me. I respect all of you and thank you for allowing me to entertain (or try to if you hated me!) and also allowing me to make pro-wrestling a career for me.

Thank you for your time Steve, and good luck to you and your family.

Thank you! It was a fun interview.

***********

Steve Corino’s websites can be visited at:

www.stevecorino.com (Official Web Site)

www.MySpace.com/SteveCorino

www.corino/livejournal.com

If you wish to send an email to Steve, his email address is:

SteveCorino@Comcast.net

*NEW GALLERY* Must See! Lots of Rare and Hot Photos of Randy Orton's New Wife Samantha!

Quick Links -
[Back to LOP] [News Archives] [Results] [Columns] [Forums]