In light of the release of the Jim Ross autobiography, Slobberknocker, Bleacher Report published a feature article on the legendary commentator. Included in the piece were excerpts from Ross and others on his contributions to the Attitude Era.
Jim Ross regarding working with Jerry Lawler:
“We were able to develop chemistry almost immediately. I was a preparation freak, and he was just the opposite. He was just such a natural talent with amazing instincts. But our philosophy was the same. When I tossed him something, he knew what pitch was coming. He knew where we were going and was ready to swing. And we had a great product to call and were given the opportunity by management to do our thing. They trusted our instincts.”
Terry Taylor on JR as VP of Talent Relations:
“He assembled the roster. Now he had to answer to Vince, and Vince is very smart and knows what he wants. But it was J.R. who had to make the deals happen and had to know how to motivate somebody, incentivize somebody. In that era, you had WCW offering guaranteed contracts that paid the same whether you worked or not, whether you were successful or not. J.R had to compete with that, and all he had was the power of opportunity.”
Adds Matt Hardy:
“He took such great care of us. One thing that was amazing about J.R. is that he always gave it to you straight. That doesn’t always happen in wrestling. He never gave you an answer he thought you wanted to hear. He said what he actually thought.
“We had a great string of matches on the WWE Live events for about a month straight. And J.R actually started bonusing us. Because we were having great matches. We were just breaking in and on the lower end of the pay scale. Those bonuses were a big deal. He was looking out for us, because we were J.R. guys.”
Mick Foley on JR’s call of his famous Hell in a Cell match vs. the Undertaker and the fact that Ross didn’t know the bump off the top of the cage was coming:
“He liked to see the match evolve. If I had said, ‘Hey Jim, don’t be too surprised if my body comes flying off this massive cell structure,’ he probably would have come up with something cool to say. But it wouldn’t have been immortalized.
“If wrestling wasn’t stigmatized to some degree, the sporting world would acknowledge that that call is every bit as good as ‘The Giants win the pennant’ and probably better. ‘Do you believe in miracles’ is a good call, but I’ll still pick ‘As God as my witness, he’s broken in half.’
The article features much more, including an overview of Ross’s entire career, JR’s calling the final match at last years WrestleMania, and several perspectives on his relationship with his late wife, Jan. You can read it in it’s entirety at BleacherReport.com.
That Hell in a Cell match is to a generation what Hogan slamming Andre was to another. But Hell gets a bit of an edge because of Good ol’ JR’s call.