R.I.P. Crush

Another wrestler dies before his time, and one can only imagine what the implications for the business are going to be....

For my money, Crush was one of the best agile men in the early 90's, along with Vader and Bam Bam Bigelow (how sad is it that two of them have passed on?). But unlike those other two, Crush was much faster and carried himself well in the ring.

I'd heard about "Brian Adams" beforehand in the Apter mags, but it was only when he debuted as the newest member of Demolition that I saw what all the hype was about. That said, he was clearly misused in that team, and WWF set out to right that wrong by giving him a decent singles push.

I'm assuming it was legal troubles that curbed that run because the next time we saw him, he had gone from happy-go-lucky Kona Crush to evil Japanese sympathizer Crush to edgy ex-con Crush with tattoos on his head. Personally, I enjoyed that last gimmick the most and wished they would have run with that for a while, instead of rushing him into the Nation of Domination.

While his nWo and Kronik runs didn't do a lot for me, there are a still a lot of good memories. Particularly I'll remember his angle with Evil Doink, his Intercontinental title match with Shawn Michaels (in which I was SURE he was going to win; instead it ended up being the introduction of Diesel), and the bout with Randy Savage at WrestleMania XX, back when falls count anywhere matches weren't a part of WWF lore.

Rest In Peace, Brian. Shakka brah!