Note: This interview was originally conducted exclusively for The Smarks website
In less than a year, Steve Corino went from ECW Midcarder to ECW Champion, to NWA Champion, to being on the verge of retirement. His relatively short career has not been uneventful though, and, along with Smarks.com writer Adam Lord; I recently had the pleasure of being able to talk to the ‘King Of Old School’ about his ECW past, his NWA present and his Japanese future.
This interview was conducted at the conclusion of the WrestleXpress event in Dagenham, Essex on October 20th 2001 where Corino successfully defended his NWA World Title against former ECW adversary The Sandman.
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ALLEN: OK, first off, tell me how you got started in wrestling
CORINO: Uh, 1994, I attended a wrestling school in Reading Pennsylvania that was headed up by two guys named the Mess Brothers, they were just local Indy guys, and I got lucky because Tom Brandi and King Kaluha… Tom Brandi who was Sal Sincere in the World Wrestling Federation back in the late 90s, he came in to train his cousin, and I was about the same size as his cousin at the time, so Tom had said “Hey, you wanna bump around with Bas (sp?), I’ll teach you some stuff” And, you know, his cousin ended up going to Chiropractors school and I ended up learning off Tom all the time.
LORD: And just on the subject of people like Tom Brandi… are there any Indy guys that you know who should’ve made it but didn’t?
CORINO: Um, definitely King Kaluha, he was like a mainstay in the North East independents. Uh… Tom definitely should’ve made it to a bigger level. Christopher Daniels… I mean, here’s a guy who’d been under contract to WCW twice and just, they don’t give him what he deserves. Uh… Reckless Youth, he was really good. Uh… I’m trying to think here…
LORD: What about Mike Modest?
CORINO: D’you know what… I’ve never seen one match he’s been in, I’ve never met the guy…
LORD: Did you see the NITRO match?
CORINO: No, never saw it. So, no, I never comment on guys like that. But, you know, Chris Daniels is really good friends with Mike Modest and he said that now that Mike Modest wrestles for Pro Wrestling NOAH, he says that that’s the best thing for him, because that’s his style and he’s happy now. So, some guys don’t want to go to the WWF… or when WCW was around… they have other things in mind, like, y’know, I’m still happy with the Japanese style… I love that style… that’s why I’d stay there. And a guy like Mike Modest, he may just love that Pro Wrestling NOAH style so much that he’ll just make a career out of it.
ALLEN: OK, now you’ve talked about the guys you admire that didn’t make it, but who were the guys you admired when you first broke into the business? Who were the guys you wanted to be like?
CORINO: Oh… well definitely when I broke into the business, I always wanted to be like an Eddie Gilbert type… Michael Hayes… like a loudmouth… because I was always smaller, so I figured y’know, I’m going to have to use my mouth to get people to react to me. I was always a big Barry Windham fan, Dusty Rhodes, Tully Blanchard… When I was in wrestling school and trying to develop a style, I tried to take little things out of each and every one of them.
ALLEN: Was there any specific show, or angle, that really got you hooked on wrestling, where you immediately thought ‘that’s what I want to do with my life’?
CORINO: When I first started watching wrestling, it was like the sixth time I watched it. Tommy Rich was on TV, he was screaming about how Buzz Sawyer… y’know… whether he stole the National Heavyweight title from him, or did something like that… attacked him… but I was hooked! It was the Tommy Rich-Buzz Sawyer feud from Georgia Championship Wrestling…
LORD: When you think of blood feud you think of that…
CORINO: Those guys looked like they were killing each other every night.
ALLEN: Alright, you talked about the wresting school in 94, but you sort of came to people’s attention when you were in the WWF training system for a while in 98. You were in the Funkin’ Dojo with Dory Funk Jr.
CORINO: Yes
ALLEN: What was Dory Funk like as a teacher?
CORINO: Oh, unbelievable… I mean, here’s a guy that’s got almost 40 years of experience, and he just knows so much about the wrestling business. Y’know, he’s forgotten more than I’ll ever know… that’s the whole thing.
ALLEN: And he’s still active in Japan today… he wrestled for New Japan recently…
CORINO: Yeah, he’s just wrestled in New Japan and he’s still got the school going down in Florida. I mean, being with Dory Funk Jr for those nine days in the Dojo, it was like being retrained.
ALLEN: It was just nine days?
CORINO: It was just nine days they brought us up for.
LORD: Did they teach you shooting techniques?
CORINO: Yeah, definitely. There was a lot of shooting, there was a lot of the psychology of wrestling… just interaction with the fans, interaction with the promoters, interaction with the TV… it was, y’know, for 12 hours a day for nine days you were just eat, sleep and drinking wrestling
ALLEN: Who else was in your class at the time? Rhyno, wasn’t it?
CORINO: No… Rhyno was, I think, two classes before me. I had Kurt Angle, Test, Shawn Stasiak, Tiger Ali Singh, Dr Death Steve Williams…
ALLEN: Yeah, like he needs more training!
CORINO: Yeah…! Who else was in there…? Christopher Daniels, Crowbar, myself, Barry Houston… there was some great talent there…
LORD: Who were the people in the group that you made best friends with?
CORINO: Well, I was already really good friends with Crowbar… we had come up together in the eastern independents. But at the Dojo, I really struck up a good friendship with Christopher Daniels, and to this day he’s one of my best friends.
ALLEN: Well, you weren’t actually picked up from the group to go on to the WWF. Who made the decision?
CORINO: I’m sure Jim Ross made the decision. We were actually the first class that had three guys who weren’t under contract and no one won a contract. So, y’know, it was funny… me, Crowbar and Chris Daniels had this thing where we were the US Three… we were the Un Signed Three. And Chris Daniels was definitely the star of the Dojo… I mean, he, without a doubt just did everything right… and they didn’t offer him a deal. With me, it was back to the drawing board… OK, now I know what to do… now I need to work on this… work on that… so I never took it to heart. You can never expect to be signed somewhere, you have to work for it, work for it, work for it… You should never go in there expecting to win a contract
ALLEN: Well, looking back now at your skill level at that time, do you think it was fair that you didn’t get a WWF contract? Do you think it helped in the long run?
CORINO: Oh yeah… God… I mean, even going to ECW was the best thing for me, because I had learned so much more. I mean, you just keep learning as you go along. And, y’know, I have that problem where I’m too tall to be a light heavyweight, but too small to be a heavyweight, and the WWF banks on big guys. I mean, you get your diamond in the rough every once in a while, but… so, I had that going against me, and so that’s why ECW was the perfect choice for me.
LORD: That leads on to a question I was about to ask… Was it ever explicitly pointed out to you during the Dojo that your size would count against you?
CORINO: No, not at all… because it was beat into me, Chris Daniels and Crowbar’s heads that they were going to do the light heavyweight division and they were going to spend a lot of time on it, and we were three guys they were really going to put some stock into. So, we had that going… hey, maybe he’ll just get to be the light heavyweights there… but you could see right then that they weren’t probably concentrating on it. They were just starting to win the war with the Monday night ratings… like, what could we do? So, yeah, I was going to say that never once has the WWF ever said that you’re too small to work here, you’re too tall to work here…
LORD: Do you know, or do you have any idea why the WWF keeps flirting with the light heavyweight division, and never goes all the way with it?
CORINO: My personal opinion is that they probably don’t have the right guy booking it… I have a vision of having a total TV show with the Junior Heavyweights. In my opinion, that’s what Jakked or Metal should be… or, I know they just discontinued WWF Superstars, but, you know what, maybe they should think about saying “OK, we had the WWF Latino program, maybe we should have like a WWF Juniors, and just concentrate on the Junior/Light Heavyweight Division.”
LORD: Yeah, and they’ve got Dean Malenko to fit the Jushin Liger role…
CORINO: Y’know, Dean Malenko would probably be the best guy to coordinate everything for them.
ALLEN: It’s really a bit of a problem at the minute, as they’ve got X-Pac booking the light heavyweight division, from what I understand…
CORINO: Right
ALLEN: And here’s a guy that always said he was above Light Heavyweight wrestling and he didn’t want to be part of it
CORINO: Well, for years, light heavyweight wrestling has been looked on as something that you do for a while, and then you go up in class, even if you’re not heavy enough, and whereas in Japan, being a Junior Heavyweight is still prestigious, being here, being a Light Heavyweight, the consensus was that it never drew money. So, X-Pac has drawn money as DX, and looked upon as a heavyweight, so I can see where he was thinking that
LORD: Even in Japan though, you have to admit that heavyweight is still seen as the big thing, isn’t it? Like Fujinami, Takada…
CORINO: Yeeeeaah… Fujinami, I mean, he’s a real Junior, y’know… but he was so popular, and it was his dream to be a heavyweight champion… but it’s still prestigious to be a Junior Heavyweight over there, and now, the way that New Japan and Zero One have gone, with more of the shoot style, man, you really gotta be ready to go when you go there as a heavyweight.
ALLEN: Alright, following the WWF Dojo, you went to the independents for a while, but it wasn’t long before you got picked up by ECW. How did you get picked up there? Was there someone in particular who recommended you to Paul?
CORINO: Nova and Tommy Dreamer. They were looking for a couple of Indy guys to just come in and… y’know, they had just lost Bam Bam Bigelow, they had just lost Sandman, Mikey… and they were just looking for some talent… and they were looking at Paul Heyman’s big thing that he could ‘create’ talent, and they brought me and Reckless Youth in for tryouts. I won a job, and he didn’t… I still don’t know why he didn’t… and that’s how it went. I had always been… y’know, on the independents I had always preached the Old School, and anti-hardcore, so going in, Paul knew “Hey, here was something different”
ALLEN: So whom did you have your tryout match against?
CORINO: Nova, at the ECW Arena.
ALLEN: And Paul offered you a contract immediately then?
CORINO: Yes, right after.
ALLEN: What was Paul like at the start? Sometimes people say he’s unapproachable, and that he’s very difficult to get hold of.
CORINO: Oh definitely… even when you know him he’s difficult to get a hold of. He coined the phrase “I’ll call you back in five minutes.” I mean, I’m not a big fan of Paul Heyman personally, but professionally Paul Heyman knows what he is doing… and unfortunately for him, he was doing the job of, like, 15 people. Y’know, he was booking the town, booking the talent, booking the TV, working with the talent, doing this, doing that, and trying to envision ideas. I mean, it was too much… How he hasn’t had a heart attack amazes me…
LORD: Do you think in the long run it was a mistake for him to try and do everything?
CORINO: Oh yeah, definitely… but he had a vision, so he went with it, and you gotta admire someone who has a vision. He wanted to create something, and he did, but he also burned himself out and probably in the long run hurt ECW.
LORD: Was that vision something you agreed with?
CORINO: There was a lot of things… ECW, when it started in 93 to what it was when it ended in January, it was a totally different thing. We created so many… we created to the point where it really wasn’t extreme any more… it was more of a wrestling company that had longer matches, and the occasional extreme match. But yeah, it was something else when you had Jerry Lynn, Justin Credible, Tajiri and Super Crazy, myself, Kid Kash and Simon Diamond… these guys… we were wrestlers, and that was the thing. And then you had the occasional hardcore thing from Sandman and New Jack and The Baldies… and it was just icing on the cake…
ALLEN: Something for everybody…?
CORINO: Yeah… it was almost perfect.
ALLEN: Ok, you mentioned that you preached the Old School thing… was it you that put forward the ‘King Of Old School’ gimmick to Paul, or…
CORINO: Yeah, I brought it to Paul. The first day I started I said “Hey, I don’t want to throw any ideas in, but I do this thing with the Old School…” And he loved it, and he wanted to go with it, and that’s what he did.
ALLEN: You were used primarily in the early days as a manager for Rhyno and Tajiri, who have both made it on to the WWF. How do you think you helped their careers? Or do you think that you helped their careers?
CORINO: Yeah… I don’t think I helped them too much
ALLEN: Well, to get over, maybe…?
CORINO: A little bit… cause I was over as a heel. I had just done a program with Tazz, where we were just about to lead into our big match when he had put in his notice… and then Raven had come back, which ruined my program with Tommy Dreamer… so I was in this manager role while Rhyno was learning how to talk and get more comfortable in front of the camera, and Tajiri, being Japanese and not speaking much English at all… I could talk for them. But as you saw, ECW, near the end, Rhyno was one of the big talkers
ALLEN: Yeah… We’ve seen Tajiri in the comedy skits in the WWF where he’s speaking Japanese. How much English does he actually speak?
CORINO: Barely anything. I saw him on Thursday and (adopts Japanese accent, with broken English) “Hewo Mista Cowino… How y’doing?” So barely any…
LORD: How about Kaientai?
CORINO: I worked with them a couple of times… no English. But at that level, you shouldn’t have to worry about who speaks what language, you should know how to go. I just wrestled Hashimoto a couple of weeks ago, actually last week, and he doesn’t speak much English at all. You just go. It’s actually like playing human chess.
ALLEN: Moving back to ECW, you added Jack Victory to the entourage. How did that come about? Why Jack Victory?
CORINO: Jack Victory actually came the same night Rhyno did. Jack had gotten over a knee injury, and they didn’t know what to do with him. They decided to put us together for one night… and then the next week on TV he was going to get killed by Tazz, but we had such good chemistry that first night that Paul was like “You know what, I’m never breaking you guys up” and that’s how we stuck.
LORD: Towards the end, I couldn’t help noticing from watching the TV that there were elements of Edge & Christian’s act in it. Was that forced upon you?
CORINO: No. Me and Jack are best friends… me, Jack, Lou E Dangerously, CW Anderson would always travel together with Tommy Dreamer in a car and we would just do the goofiest things… and when I won the belt, Paul was like “Alright, I’m gonna turn you right back” I’m like “OK”, and he’s like “I want you and Jack to be like you are in real life”, so I’m like “Oh, alright, that’s cool… we’ll go with it”
ALLEN: One of the major ways you got heat at the start was that you worked an angle with Fred Durst. How did that come about, and what did you think of Fred Durst personally?
CORINO: This is a funny story. They came to be in Peoria, Illinois… the promoter, or I guess it was one of his managers on the road said “Hey, d’you wanna go on stage with Fred Durst?” I was like “Who’s Fred Durst?” They’re like “Oh, he’s this guy, in this big rock band” and I went “Yeah…” They go “Do something for a couple of minutes, and then Axl, Balls and New Jack will hit you with a chair and you go away.” So I said “Alright.” I went right to the building, that’s how we met, that’s what we did, and that was it. Nothing.
ALLEN: OK. Your team was picked up by the Network pretty quickly, and you started to see more in-ring time. Was that something you were looking forward to, or did you get used to just being a manager
CORINO: No, y’know, I always liked being in the ring. But Paul didn’t want to put me back in the ring until he had the right opponent for me… and that was when Dusty Rhodes came in, and he was like “Alright, this is your feud…”
ALLEN: Was it Paul that decided to bring Dusty in? It seemed like a strange move at the time
CORINO: Dusty showed up just to say ‘Hi’ to some people in Atlanta, and that’s where they came up with it. I think Tommy Dreamer came up with it.
LORD: What’s your opinion of Dusty Rhodes? I’m one of the people who sees him as very unique, and funny in his own way…
CORINO: Dusty to me… there’s not many people who have more charisma… he wasn’t in great shape, he wasn’t a great wrestler, but he had charisma, he could sell, he could get people to believe in him, and as a human being…
LORD: Yeah, it’s just that there are a lot of people that just dismiss him as a joke…
ALLEN: He popped a huge rating for WCW…
CORINO: Exactly… at 52 years old, he popped a huge rating for WCW. And the whole thing that people that see him as a joke… it’s like, wait a second, they still came out and saw him. And they still cheered for him. He would come out at the Philadelphia Civic Center, which is a heel town, to wrestle Tully Blanchard, and he’d be booed all the way to the ring. Two minutes into the match, everyone was cheering for Dusty… and it was just that he had that way about him. He was just a great guy, and I learned so much from him and I couldn’t give back anything…
ALLEN: Were you star struck when the self-proclaimed ‘King Of Old School’ met a real Old School king?
CORINO: Oh God… I mean, oh my goodness…
ALLEN: How did he treat you as a performer?
CORINO: He treated me wonderful. Wonderful. And my whole thing was… Tommy Dreamer came to me, and I always used to call Tommy Dreamer ‘The Dream’ and he goes to me “Hey, working with ‘The Dream’ tonight!” And I was “Cool… What, are we wrestling?” And he was “No, man… you’re working with the ‘real’ Dream!” And I was like “Whaaat?!” So Jack Victory was like “Ok, calm down…”
LORD: How was it actually working with him?
CORINO: Dusty? He still threw the elbow, still wiggles… that was all I needed. (Laughs) All you needed…
ALLEN: What was the biggest thing Dusty ever taught you?
CORINO: How to work a crowd. Less is more. How to make them react the way you wanted them to react. It’s just amazing. Just feuding with him, and just watching how the crowd. Just unbelievable. Unbelievable.
ALLEN: The whole deal with the Dusty Rhodes angle was obviously to get you over as an in-ring performer, but at the PPV meeting you guys had, he went over on you. Were you happy with that? Do you think you should’ve gone over?
CORINO: Not at all, not at ALL… I don’t think I should’ve went over him when I DID…
ALLEN: That was at Cyberslam, right?
CORINO: I didn’t agree with that then. Dusty was a LEGEND, and just for him coming in and giving me that rub of being in the ring with the ‘American Dream’ Dusty Rhodes was enough. I didn’t have to beat him, but it was his idea. So I went with that. I even tried to talk him out of it.
ALLEN: I want to talk now about people who review your matches. I ask because they weren’t particularly kind to your matches with Dusty just because of Dusty’s age, his body size, the excessive use of the elbow… how much stock do you put in reviews from the internet?
CORINO: None. None. Because as the old saying goes ‘Internet does not put any money in your pocket.’ These reviewers, it’s just one person’s opinion.
ALLEN: Do you read them though?
CORINO: No.
ALLEN: …not at all?
CORINO: No.
ALLEN: Did anyone in ECW really live or die by them?
CORINO: I’m sure they did…
ALLEN: …or were really affected by them?
CORINO: If there was, I don’t know of anyone who was… but the whole thing is, it’s just one person reviewing. I may think, watching a baseball game that the second baseman sucks… that’s my opinion, you know? There might be a million people that love him… so everyone’s entitled to their opinion. If someone didn’t like the Dusty Rhodes angle… hey, turn the channel.
ALLEN: Fair enough.
CORINO: Yeah… If they were appalled by New Jack… don’t come, y’know? Who cares? You have the freedom to not come to the show, you have the freedom to turn the channel, you have the freedom to turn off the radio.
LORD: How is New Jack backstage?
CORINO: I never really talked to him…
LORD: ‘Cause he’s got a reputation
CORINO: Yeah, I never really talked to him. He hung out with a totally different crowd than I did.
ALLEN: Let’s move on to your next PPV match, against Tajiri, where you started what would kind of become two Corino gimmicks for a while. Number one, you had your ass handed to you, and number two, you wore the proverbial ‘crimson mask’
CORINO: Correct.
ALLEN: What was the booking plan behind you, for want of a better word, getting your ass kicked?
CORINO: To show that I could keep getting back up. The same thing I did for Hashimoto too, last week. I can keep taking it, I can keep getting beat down, and keep getting back up
LORD: On that note, who have your toughest matches been against?
CORINO: Definitely Hashimoto. Hashimoto KILLED me. He just beat me mercilessly. Tajiri was tough. But the whole thing is that I can give it as much as I can take it. But the crowd will react. I mean, just watch Heat Wave 2000 with Jerry Lynn. It was just… it was a BATTLE for 15 minutes. It was funny that what you didn’t get to see was because I was heel, heel, heel, heel, heel… he gave me a Piledriver, and it was 1-2-3 and they went to a commercial… and while it went to a commercial I got a standing ovation. And Paul was like “That’s IT… Turning him!!” That was his goal. Once the Dusty feud was over, I became serious about wrestling. And I wanted to be the top of the Network, and it worked out beautifully.
LORD: Talking about Jerry Lynn, how do you feel about what’s happened to him at the moment? What happened to him is sort of like what happened at the height of WCW, that they have people just to have them, rather than doing anything with them.
CORINO: I think Jerry Lynn should be on top. He should be real close to the top. I think the world of Jerry Lynn. I think the world of his abilities. I hope they find something for him.
ALLEN: Moving back to Tajiri quickly. How stiff does he actually work? It looks ultra-stiff, but is it?
CORINO: Well, it ain’t ballet.
ALLEN: …to quote JR…
CORINO: I brought that line up, and he stole it off me…
ALLEN: When did you coin that phrase?
CORINO: Probably about 20 years after he did… Nah, it’s just y’know, I work a little tight. Too many people are desensitised. There’s no mystique left in wrestling. People sit there and they go “Ahhh, that was fake… that was fake, that was fake… do a million things and you still get back up.”
LORD: Yeah, if you watch the Steve Williams shoot interview from RF Video he says basically the same thing. In the old UWF, the way you worked WAS stiff. They were all ex football players and that was the way you did it.
CORINO: Yeah, you walked out with a puffy eye, and they were like “Wow, man…!”
ALLEN: You had the controversial ending with Hashimoto last week, and in an interview with you I think I read that you were very proud of actually making people believe again, for a while, and bring the mystique back again.
CORINO: Yep
ALLEN: Is that something that you really miss about the business?
CORINO: Oh, absolutely. Because I remember as a kid, man, that was just fun of wrestling. Not knowing. What’s the fun of magic? Not knowing. Trying to figure it out. Trying to figure out who’s doing what. That’s the key. I don’t like hearing what Cal Ripkin Jr makes a year, you know? I don’t wanna know. He’s been told, I think, that it’s $17 million and he had a crappy year. I don’t wanna know that, because I want to see Cal Ripkin as like, the pure baseball player. And that’s how I want to see wrestling. And, y’know, I made people believe. I made people believe last week that what we did… and to a point it was real… I made them go home and say “Oh my goodness, I saw something..”
LORD: A minute ago we were talking about Jim Ross, and he’s another guy in the industry who definitely has a reputation. So what’s your view on him?
CORINO: Uh, I really haven’t dealt much with Jim Ross over the years. He’s been very professional with me. I don’t have a bad word to say about him. I don’t know him well enough to really have an opinion about him.
ALLEN: So, after Heat Wave 2000 against Jerry Lynn, you got your standing ovation, and Paul decides to turn you babyface. Did he tell you what he had in mind for you as a face?
CORINO: No. I had walked back, and was getting stitched up and he was like “Man, you could be a great babyface” and I said “Yeah, right…” and they had changed me like two weeks later. It was just something, Paul had in idea in his mind and he took care of it. And it was cool, I had so much fun doing it.
ALLEN: You had a very good match against CW Anderson at Anarchy Rulz 2000 to determine the #1 contender for the ECW title, and the general feeling was that neither one of you had really done enough to be in that position…
CORINO: No, I agree…
ALLEN: Did you feel under particular pressure in that match to prove yourself to the ECW faithful?
CORINO: No, I felt under pressure because CW is probably my best friend. So, I felt pressure of having to have a good match with him. I didn’t know I was going to win the World Belt, but I knew I would be pushed into that position…
ALLEN: You would get the run against Lynn…
CORINO: Yeah, I had no idea I was going to win it. But who was better at the time? CW was getting built up… He had beaten Jerry Lynn, he had beaten Dreamer, he had beaten these guys, and who else was there? I mean, Van Dam was gone, Rhyno had the TV Belt, Tajiri was doing stuff with Mikey… and who else was there? There was us.
LORD: On a related point, when ECW was getting built up and kept getting knocked down by the bigger companies… Did you get frustrated by that, or did you just see it as the nature of the business?
CORINO: No, no… I didn’t get frustrated at all, and I don’t know why Paul did, because he could create so much talent, so it was like when something happened… when Lance Storm left, I got my push… when Tazz left, Justin Credible was right there… when this guy left, somebody else was built up, and that was the mystique of it. Let them go, y’know… it’ll always be known that they were made in ECW because that was the key. Maybe that’s why Paulie gave out the guaranteed contracts and he tried to pay what the WWF were paying, and that probably ultimately ruined the company. But I thought it was great, you did your time in ECW, and then you went off but you always had an ECW legacy with you.
ALLEN: You won the title then, at the Double Jeopardy match at November To Remember. You pinned Sandman and Justin Credible, but you didn’t actually pin the champion Jerry Lynn. Do you think that hurt your credibility again, or…
CORINO: No, because, I guess the plan was that me and Jerry were gonna feud for a while, and the whole thing was that I wouldn’t be able to pin him. That was his key. But somehow I got rushed into another feud with the Sandman. But I don’t know whether it was a behind the scenes thing with Jerry and Paul… I don’t know… but yeah, me and Jerry were all pumped up to do some great stuff.
ALLEN: Looking back at the ECW title reign… was it too much too soon?
CORINO: For me? Yeah. In a perfect word, I should’ve had six more months of being built up so people would’ve gotten into it. They got into it, got into it, got into it… so it was funny, one of the times that I had read on the internet, people were like “Gotta give Corino the belt at November To Remember, gotta give Corino the belt at November To Remember…” and I wrote down the people who put that on the ECW message board. The next day when I got home, the same people who said “Give him the belt” 24 hours before were like “I can’t believe they gave him the belt. It’s much too soon”
ALLEN: (Laughs)
CORINO: So that goes back to your question about reviewers. How can you take stock in them, cause they’re always changing their mind.
LORD: And they’ve got no one to be accountable to
CORINO: Yeah, exactly.
ALLEN: Your last appearance for ECW was at Guilty As Charged 2001, wasn’t it?
CORINO: Uh huh…
ALLEN: And that’s where you lost the belt.
CORINO: Yes
ALLEN: Was there a feeling at that PPV that that was the last one?
CORINO: For me, yeah, I thought it was over. There were no other shows scheduled. You didn’t want to believe it, but you knew it.
ALLEN: But in saying that, the show ended with you and Justin Credible teaming up as potentially the second version of the Impact Players…
CORINO: Yeah, for about 35 seconds there was…
ALLEN: So obviously Paul reckoned there was going to be…
CORINO: We came up with that. Paul wanted to, I guess, but I just don’t know why he didn’t. Me and Justin came up with the idea to create the New Impact Players.
ALLEN: What would you have done with Justin, d’you know? Who would you have feuded with?
CORINO: Probably… We wanted to go after Roadkill and Danny Doring
ALLEN: After ECW ended, you were reported to have been backstage at a Nitro, saying hello to Dusty Rhodes…
CORINO: Uh huh… I was the only one that knew Dusty was gonna be there…
ALLEN: Yeah? The story at the time was that you were obviously looking for a job. Did you speak to Bischoff about getting a job?
CORINO: Uh huh, yeah, of course
ALLEN: And what did he say to you? Sorry?
CORINO: No, not at all. “Show me your release”
ALLEN: And you didn’t have the release?
CORINO: No I had it.
ALLEN: So you made the decision not to go to WCW?
CORINO: No, we had a plan, and unfortunately the company was sold. At the PPV with Dusty & Dustin against Jarrett & Flair was my opportunity. We’d known probably the Tuesday before that something was going down, so there’s no use in introducing somebody. For me, it would look like I jumped on two companies that went down.
ALLEN: Ok. You said you talked to Bischoff. Did you ever have talks, either formal or informal with the WWF at the same time?
CORINO: No.
ALLEN: Any reason why?
CORINO: Because Dusty was advising me on what to do, and I was listening to Dusty.
ALLEN: And have you had any talks, formal or otherwise, since that?
CORINO: Uh huh, yeah.
ALLEN: Who did you talk to? Or do you not like to talk about those things?
CORINO: Yeah, I’ve had talks with some guys in there, but they never really amounted to anything. You gotta remember that they have so many guys under contract, what are they gonna do? And where am I gonna go? But I’ll tell you what, if they offered me a colour commentary spot or something (snaps finger) I’m right there. About a wrestling spot, I’m not really interested because it once again goes back to that thing that I feel that I’m too tall for a light heavyweight, too… y’know, where would I be?
LORD: If they offered you a contract and said that you had to go down to Heartland for six months and we’ll see you then, would you be like…
CORINO: Oh, no, nooo… Heartland? To learn off Les Thatcher? Oh my goodness… I would go there NOW, not under contract, because Les Thatcher knows… or if they said “Go to Ohio Valley” Man, I couldn’t get there fast enough.
LORD: What’s your opinion of Tough Enough, given the fact that there are so many guys waiting around who are already trained?
CORINO: Oh, I thought it was a great concept, especially if they’re gonna go down to the developmental deal… Y’know, I haven’t watched Raw in so long, but I just heard that the kid beat Tazz…
ALLEN: Yeah, on Smackdown this week…
CORINO: To me, that is totally INSANE! But, who am I, y’know? But I think he should be down there with Cornette or Les Thatcher, learning, learning, learning, and then, y’know… but I guess they just got such good ratings off it, that they wanted to go with it, so… I feel bad for Tazz
ALLEN: Don Callis, aka Cyrus, reported that you and Heyman had gotten into an argument about money.
CORINO: Uh huh…
ALLEN: And that he had felt betrayed that he had taken a chance on you, made you ECW Champion, and that you would bring the money situation up to him. Was that something that happened? Is it a fair report?
CORINO: Me and Paul had a fair few arguments. I’m sure Cyrus had the same argument with him. Hey, I’ll always be grateful for Paul for putting me in that position. On the other hand, he had an obligation, y’know? I’d have done anything for the guy, I believed in his company. He had an obligation to tell me the truth, and tell me what was going on in his company.
ALLEN: He didn’t tell you the truth?
CORINO: No, he just sugarcoated it, and y’know what? Sugar coating does not pay the mortgage. You know, TELL me I can’t pay you this weekend, I’ll understand, I’ll go get another job. I’ll wait out the storm. Don’t tell me to sit at home and do nothing.
ALLEN: Do you think your soured relationship with Paul has ruined your chances with the WWF, since he’s got quite an influential place up there, apparently?
CORINO: No, not at all.
ALLEN: No?
CORINO: No, because him and Jim Ross don’t get along that well either. If the WWF feels they can use you to draw money, you’re in. Here’s my point. Mike Awesome’s there and Paul’s there
ALLEN: Yeah, but he hasn’t had a push, has he?
CORINO: Doesn’t matter. He’s still cashing the big cheques every week.
LORD: Do you think Paul will ever get over that? Do you think he’ll ever bury the hatchet?
CORINO: I don’t know, I heard he’s been cordial to Mike, y’know? Because I guess Paul believes he’s gotta work with this guy. I’m sure, push comes to shove, if me and Paul had to work together, we’d find a way to get along.
ALLEN: Let’s talk about the NWA then. You went on to the NWA, and got the NWA title. How much did you feel that it was somewhat befitting for the King Of Old School to hold the Old School World Title.
CORINO: Oh, more of a personal thing. The NWA title was the first title I saw on TV, so I was just so happy with it. I was honoured to hold the same belt that Dusty and Brisco, Funk and Flair, and people like that held
ALLEN: In saying that though, there’ve been problems with the NWA title over the last few years, y’know? WCW took away recognition for the belt, in ECW Shane Douglas threw the title down, Naoya Ogawa took the title away to Japan and barely defended it, same with Dan Severn… what have you done to bring prestige back to the title?
CORINO: I defend it four days a week. I’ve defended it in Japan, Canada, Puerto Rico, everywhere in the States… First time in England in 14 years the world title has been defended.
LORD: If I can quickly ask you about British wrestling… Do you enjoy it over here?
CORINO: This is the first time I’ve been over here. So I enjoyed it.
LORD: What do you think the British companies should do? You think we should stay small, or just all join together?
CORINO: No… Small, build… If you could all get together, but like the old saying goes… too may chiefs, not enough Indians… you know what I mean? Everybody wants to be the boss of something.
ALLEN: Can we just finish off by talking about your retirement?
CORINO: Yep
ALLEN: Why? Simple question.
CORINO: Because I’ve done everything I want to in North America.
ALLEN: What about stuff with Zero One?
CORINO: Oh, I still have a deal with Japan, twelve weeks a year.
ALLEN: So, even though you announced your retirement, you’ll still…
CORINO: Oh yeah, I think I’ve made it pretty clear that it’s North America I won’t be working in. I’ve done everything in North America I’ve wanted to do, so…
ALLEN: It was reported that you made the decision without telling the NWA Board…
CORINO: I did tell them
ALLEN: You did tell them?
CORINO: Yeah
ALLEN: So there were no political problems…
CORINO: Oh, of course there were political problems, there are always political problems. In an organization that has 20 different promoters in it, there’s always going to be political problems. So, y’know, hey, I deal with it. There’s so much crap you gotta deal with, but, on the other hand, so much fun too.
ALLEN: What’s going to be your last match in North America, then? Will it be the rematch against Hashimoto?
CORINO: No, that won’t be the last one. I haven’t decided yet. And when I do it, it’s going to be so quiet you’ll just be like “Oh, Corino’s not here anymore!” I don’t want to go out in a blaze of glory.
LORD: What do you feel about Zero One? Do you feel that’s a long-standing company on it’s own, or will it eventually be reabsorbed back into New Japan?
CORINO: No. No, I think that… Well, maybe… maybe to a point. If they get the right formula… they’re seeing shoot style so strong over there right now. Y’know, they mix a little pro wrestling, they mix a little shoot, they mix a little high flying… hey, see what works. Throw it against the wall, and whatever shoots they’re gonna go with.
LORD: So who are the guys in Zero One that you really rate?
CORINO: Ohtani, Ishikawa, Hashimoto of course…
LORD: What about Hoshikawa?
CORINO: Oh, awesome… he’s probably one of my favourite guys. I pushed at the NWA convention last week to get him against Chris Daniels, but yeah… I was overridden…
ALLEN: Final question. Who’s the one guy you’ve never wrestled that you always wanted to wrestle?
CORINO: Bret Hart.
ALLEN: Reason?
CORINO: He’s just awesome. Just being in the ring, I could’ve just LEARNED… Him or Flair.
ALLEN: Ok, Steve Corino, thank you very much.
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Following the WrestleXpress event, Steve was going to Southampton, England on October 25th to defend the NWA Title against former WWF superstar Earthquake. His highly anticipated rematch against Shinya Hashimoto will take place next month.
I’d like to take this time to thank Steve Corino for being so enthusiastic and friendly in taking part in this interview, and to wish him all the best of luck in the future. Thanks, Steve.