- 06/15/2012 (1:50:11 pm)
- Bob Mulrenin
On the 5 Year Anniversary of heer Passing…
Today is the five year anniversary of the passing of Sensational Sherri. Sherri is one of the few performers that I go out of my way to intently watch her stuff. She knew how to enhance the people that she managed, get heat, and to never gain sympathy when the babyface finally catches her. Unfortunately I never got to be around Sherri too often, since we were always in different places.
The first time I ever talked to her was by the weirdest coincidence. I was at an airport in 1991 when I was trying to change a flight. The person at the airport was a wrestling fan, so we started chatting about stuff. Next thing you know, Sherri called the air lines to change her flight. The airport worker told Sherri over the phone that he was right now changing my flight; he then gave me the phone to talk to her. I told her how I loved her work with Randy Savage & Ted Dibiase. I even joked around about how I loved her maid outfit that she had when she managed Dibiase. Sherri told me if I wanted the costume, she would gladly send it to me. Sherri was too generous, especially considering we only talked for a few minutes.
Before I was fired from WCW in 1994, they had plans in bringing Sherri to work against me. It was one of the biggest missed opportunities of my entire career. Sherri was smart enough of a worker to probably carry me in the ring & smart enough of a worker for me to not receive any sympathy, since both of us would have been heels at the time.
Ironically enough, I would end up taking Sherri’s spot in managing Shane Douglas for one night when Paul Heyman booked a WWN TV taping in NYC for Jim Crockett in 1994. I thought
In 1999, for some stupid reason I wanted to reinvent myself by trying to work actual wrestling matches. I was booked against Sherri in
I remember in 2005, I had a heated discussion with Bobby Heenan at a Q & A. Heenan dismissed the role of the valet. His complaint was a valet can’t take bumps from the babyface without the crowd turning on them. I pointed out Sherri took bumps from the babyface & received NO sympathy. She even took beatings from The Ultimate Warrior every night & retained her heat. That’s how smart Sherri was as a manager. She was similar to Bobby Heenan in the sense that they “managed like a wrestler” & “wrestled like a manager”. They knew the psychology enough to take bumps to enhance their wrestler’s matches & they knew enough shortcuts for their own matches.
Sherri is one of the few valets that I go out of my way to watch. When AWA reruns started airing on ESPN Classics in 2008, I started watching it specifically in order to see her work with Buddy Rose & Doug Somers. I even saw a match with Randy Savage with Sherri against Genichrio Tenryu in
In 2010, I worked a show in
The last time I saw Sherri was in June, 2006. I ran in to Sherri & her new husband at an indy show in
Once again, I marked out that Sherri treated me more then a peer on the few times that I met her. I’m forever grateful that she carried myself to my only decent match & was always nice to me. I’m still happy that I had taken a picture with Sherri & her husband on that day, since it was almost a year later that she passed away. I still have the picture & I always look at it fondly, since I always considered myself a fan of Sherri, but she always made me feel like I was much more when I saw her in person.
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Missy Hyatt
1.st Lady Of Wrestling