Info

Wolfy · Trimis: 12/9/2007 11:30 Titlul subiectului: Info

[edit] Early life and career
Duggan grew up in Glens Falls, New York where he became a star athlete in high school. His father was the Chief of Police for the City of Glens Falls. Duggan was a letterman in football, track, wrestling, and basketball. In wrestling, he won the New York State High School wrestling championship, unlimited weight class division - the first wrestler from Glens Falls to do so.

He was recruited by the football programs of several major universities, including Penn State and Ohio State, but would play at Southern Methodist University (SMU), where he was eventually voted team captain. After college, Duggan was signed by the Atlanta Falcons of the NFL, but was released after being plagued by knee injuries.

Duggan poses with a fan.Jim Duggan broke into the professional wrestling business thanks in large part to wrestler Fritz Von Erich. The two met while Duggan was on a recruiting trip to SMU. Duggan's first professional match was in 1979 against Gino Hernandez. Duggan began his career as a heel. Training at the Sportatorium in Dallas, Texas as well as with Samoan wrestling promoter Peter Maivia (grandfather of The Rock), Duggan gained the attention of Vince McMahon Sr. and the WWF.

After a brief stint with the WWF, Duggan began to work regularly for Georgia Championship Wrestling. During this time, Duggan was known by two in-ring aliases: in the United States as "Big Jim Duggan" and in Hawaii as "The Convict", a masked wrestler. After wrestling for a Birmingham, Alabama-based promotion, Duggan began wrestling in a promotion based in San Antonio, Texas where he adopted the "Hacksaw" nickname.

[edit] Mid-South and Universal
In 1982, Duggan made his debut in Mid-South Wrestling. At one time the Louisiana Heavyweight champion, Duggan was an early heel character. Over the course of the next four years he became a favorite in the Louisiana-based promotion as he switched from being a heel to a face character. Early on, he belonged to a heel stable called the Rat Pack with Ted DiBiase, Matt Bourne, and Mr. Olympia. After newcomer "Hacksaw" Butch Reed appeared, Duggan and Reed had a personal kayfabe feud for a time over who would be the true "Hacksaw". The Rats also feuded with stars Junkyard Dog, "Hacksaw" Butch Reed, and Magnum T.A.. During this time Duggan interfered in a DiBiase/JYD match wearing a gorilla suit, causing JYD to lose a "Loser Leaves Town" match in New Orleans, Louisiana. After DiBiase aligned himself with Skandor Akbar, Duggan refused to go along and turned babyface for the first time in his career. At this time, Duggan began carrying his iconic 2x4.

As a babyface he won the Mid-South Tag Team Championship with Magnum T.A. and later won the Mid-South North American Championship. After the Mid-South North American title was retired when the Mid-South became the Universal Wrestling Federation in 1986, Duggan lost to Terry Gordy in a tournament final to determine the first UWF Heavyweight Champion. Duggan then teamed up with Terry Taylor and won the UWF Tag Team Championship. After losing a Loser Leaves Town match to the One Man Gang, Duggan left the UWF and signed to the WWF.

[edit] World Wrestling Federation
Duggan was signed to the World Wrestling Federation, in January 1987, making his first major appearance with the WWF at WrestleMania III. At the event, he ran to ringside prior to a match between The Killer Bees and The Iron Sheik and Nikolai Volkoff and interrupted Volkoff's pre-match singing of the Russian national anthem. Duggan had previously done this on TV matches leading up to the event.

Although he did not win any major titles in the promotion, for 7 years, he was a consistent fan favorite with his patriotic gimmick. His character was mainly comical, as he rarely was in major contention for titles. During his time in the WWF, he feuded with the likes of Harley Race, Haku (whom he beat to earn the title of "King of Wrestling"), André the Giant, and Randy Savage (who beat Duggan to become the "Macho King".) Duggan also claims to be the only wrestler to "knock out" André the Giant in a WWF wrestling match. Duggan won the first (non-ppv) Royal Rumble matchup in 1988 which only had 20 men.

He also feuded with Nikolai Volkoff in 1987. Three years later, after Volkoff's face turn, Duggan and Volkoff joined forces in tag team matches.

Duggan also served as commentator for the opening match at WrestleMania VII. He teamed up with Virgil, Sgt. Slaughter, and Big Bossman against The Nasty Boys, The Mountie, and Repo Man at WrestleMania VIII. After this he was involved in a feud with the then near 600lbs, Yokozuna. Yokozuna at the time was bad mouthing America, and of course Duggan challenged him to a match. The odds were against Duggan as no one even knocked Yokozuna off his feet at this time. On February 6, 1993, the two men met on an episode of WWF Superstars. Duggan was manhandled by the much bigger Yokozuna and was defeated after a Banzai Drop. After the match Yokozuna gave him about 4 more Banzai Drops off the ropes, sidelining Duggan for about 4 months.

Duggan returned with a new singlet style wrestling attire, and challenged Shawn Michaels for the WWF Intercontinental Championship on Monday Night Raw. Shawn Michaels ran through the crowd, and they had a rematch the following week in a Lumberjack match. He also wrestled in the 1993 King of the Ring tournament, but lost in the first round to Bam Bam Bigelow. Shortly afterward, Hacksaw Jim Duggan left the WWF.

[edit] World Championship Wrestling
Duggan signed with World Championship Wrestling (WCW) in 1994 . In one of his first matches with the company, he won the WCW United States Championship from Steve Austin in less than one minute. For most of his tenure with the company he was seldom used in major angles but often appeared on the company's minor wrestling show WCW Saturday Night (WCWSN). Duggan later claimed Saturday was "his night" as a way explaining why he appeared almost exclusively on WCWSN.

Duggan disappeared during 1998 after he was diagnosed with kidney cancer and eventually beat the disease. Duggan then returned and replaced Buff Bagwell at Fall Brawl 1999, only to lose to Berlyn. Then under the tenure of storyline writers Vince Russo and Ed Ferrara, Duggan became involved in a storyline where he became a janitor for WCW. During this period, he found the WCW World Television Championship which had been thrown away by Scott Hall earlier and claimed it for himself. He would make title defenses exclusively on WCW Saturday Night, and was still champion when the title was retired. During this time, Duggan lost confidence in himself as a wrestler. On an episode of WCW Monday Nitro, Duggan was attacked by a then heel Goldberg. Duggan then challenged Goldberg to a match and nearly defeated him before falling victim to the spear and jackhammer.

Near the end of his career in WCW, he became involved in more major storylines, including one that involved him abandoning the patriotic gimmick for a short time to join Lance Storm and his heel faction Team Canada. This was the first time Duggan worked as a heel since breaking away from the Rat Pack in Mid-South Wrestling.

[edit] World Wrestling Entertainment
Duggan appeared at WWE Homecoming on October 3, 2005 along with several other WWF and WWE alumni. He and the other legends would end up attacking Rob Conway after Conway came to the ring and insulted them. He was also one of the "legends" available for fans to select to team with Eugene in a match at Taboo Tuesday 2005 on November 1, 2005 to face the team of Conway and Tyson Tomko (Jimmy Snuka was chosen instead of Duggan).

Duggan poses to the fans.He returned to WWE again at Royal Rumble 2006, with a message from John Cena to Lita after Edge lost the WWE Championship: "HOOOOO!"

After feuding with Edge and Lita, he became mentor and tutor to Eugene and the two feuded with the Spirit Squad. He has won numerous matches on Heat and has main evented Heat on several occasions. On the November 6 edition of RAW, Duggan and Eugene faced the Spirit Squad in which the losing team would disband and never team up again. After Duggan was caught off guard after the other Spirit Squad members interfered and then pinned for the win, Eugene snapped and attacked "Hacksaw", signaling Eugene's first ever heel turn in WWE.

At New Year's Revolution, Hacksaw teamed with Mega Crazy in a Tag Team Turmoil match to determine the #1 contender to the titles, in a losing effort.

The next night on RAW, Duggan was dragged out by Rated-RKO and was beat to a pulp. Edge and Orton feared Hacksaw would help out Shawn Michaels in a handicap match (referencing, without explanation for viewers, the fact that both Duggan and Michaels were in Mid-South Wrestling together 20 years earlier) and wanted to set an example for anyone else backstage that wished to do the same.

After months of wrestling on Heat, Duggan returned to RAW in July, teaming up with The Sandman and feuding with Carlito and William Regal. This team was short lived as Duggan sooned returned to Heat.

Duggan returned to RAW a few weeks later as a contestant in WWE Dating Game, a parody of The Dating Game. However, Duggan lost when Maria chose Ron Simmons. On September 17, 2007 Duggan suffered a knee injury.

[edit] Mistake on the Illegitimate child storyline
During the the Illegitimate child storyline one of the clues was that Mr. McMahon's son has a fond of gold, which ment he was or is a champion. Duggan was mistaken not to be a former champion and was also the main person to get teased by McMahon. It is unknown why they did that, because the WWE does however recognise Duggan as a former champion in the title history page on WWE.Com. He has won 2 championships in WCW; One WCW Untited States Championship and one WCW Television Championship.

[edit] Personal life
Duggan and his wife Debra have two daughters, Celia and Rebecca.[1]

In 1987, Duggan and the Iron Shiek (Hossein Vasiri) were pulled over by New Jersey police after a WWF event, suspecting Duggan of driving under the influence. After a search of the vehicle and the persons, police discovered that Duggan was under the influence of marijuana and alcohol, while the Sheik was high on cocaine. Small amounts of cocaine were also found in the vehicle. Duggan received a conditional release while the Sheik was placed on probation for a year. The mini-scandal that erupted after two in-ring enemies were found drinking and doing drugs together led to the end of the angle, the Sheik's release, and Duggan's temporary departure from the WWE.[2][3][4][5][6]

[edit] In wrestling
Finishing and signature moves
Patriot Lariat (Three-point stance clothesline)
Patriot Tackle (Three-point stance tackle)
Old Glory Knee Drop (Jumping high angle knee drop to the throat)
Mounted Punches
Delayed scoop slam

[edit] Catchphrases
"HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
"U-S-A!!!"
"Tough guy" (to somebody he does not particularly like)
"A lot of times you're getting ready to wrestle and you're lacing up your boots and you're thinking that this guy I'm going to be wrestling is gonna be awfully tough. That guy's over in the other dressing room and he's young and he's big and he's strong and he wants to make his name beating up ol' Hacksaw, so sometimes I do get a little apprehensive. But then, right before I go through the curtain, I got the American flag over my shoulder, HOOOOOOOOOOO!"

[edit] Championships and accomplishments
International Wrestling Association
IWA Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
International Wrestling Cartel
IWC Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Scottie Gash
Mid-South Wrestling Association | Universal Wrestling Federation
Mid-South Louisiana Championship (1 time)
Mid-South North American Championship (1 time)
Mid-South Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Magnum T.A.
UWF Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Terry Taylor
World Championship Wrestling
WCW United States Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
WCW World Television Championship (1 time)
World Wide Wrestling Alliance
WWWA United States Championship (1 time)
World Wrestling Federation
Royal Rumble (1988)
Pro Wrestling Illustrated
PWI ranked him # 157 of the 500 best singles wrestlers of the "PWI Years" in 2003.
Wrestling Observer Newsletter
Most Improved Wrestler award in 1982
Feud of the Year award in 1985 - vs. Ted DiBiase