Prior to his 2009 release from WWE, professional wrestling fans could’ve witnessed a pretty interesting feud between Brian Cage and Hurricane Helms.
The current IMPACT Wrestling star is a former product of WWE’s old Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW) developmental system. Cage told The Miami Herald recently that late WWE Hall Of Famer Dusty Rhodes once praised him for his ability as a worker. They came up with an idea to have him play a Super-her0/villain type of character and call him up to the main roster.
Cage came up with the name “Dark Claw” and was told creative was pondering the idea of having him either feud or team with Shane Helms on the main roster, as Helms had brought his Hurricane character back during that time in 2008. Cage was doing promos and everything, but was shortly let go by WWE:
“I am out there having awesome matches with Justin Gabriel, Tyson Kidd, Trent Barrreta, and Dusty Rhodes pulls me to the office and goes, ‘Let me tell you something baby. You are a phenomenal worker. You got to have something else.
“You can’t be that. Hey Matt, what’s that guy called the Honey Badger? The Wolverine yeah. But you can’t be the Wolverine because that’s a trademark, so give me something else. I went back, and I was looking through my trading cards and comics, and I said, ‘I’ll be like the Dark Claw which is Batman and Wolverine.’
“I made my attire off that, and they were going to bring me up, and then Hurricane came up and Dusty said, ‘OK, we are thinking of feuding or teaming you with Hurricane.’ So I started doing a bunch of heel promos but I got released.”
You can check out Cage’s full interview with The Miami Herald by clicking this link here.