Former WWE/TNA star Chris Harris made an appearance on My Wrestling Podcast. The following was sent to us:
Why he didn’t sign for WWF when they bought out WCW:
“That was such a confusing time for everybody. When they bought the company obviously a lot of the top guys had their contracts secured and so they they were able to sit it out for a while and a lot of the top mid card guys are the ones thatthey hired. So there were so much shuffling going on and there I was, of course I was still one of the low guys on the totem pole. So I don’t think I was even on their radar to be honest with you. I know a lot of the guys that were there, they were trying to build at the time. They did take and send some to developmental and I’m talking about guys like Jindrak and OHaire. So a lot of the guys that they were looking to build were just pretty much sent to developmental and they just took the pick of the litter but I was even lower than that. I don’t even think I was on the radar. So none of that was offered to me. It was a low point for me because it was one of those things, you look for the big two WWE and WCW, I’d signed my contract in October. I was there the whole year per appearance, but I signed my contract in October of 2000 and within six months one of those big two gone under so it was back to the Indies for me.”
Thoughts on Moose as Impact World Champion:
What they’ve done with Moose, I was a big supporter of him coming up. I was like, that’s the guy they need to go with, and we see that’s what they did at Bound for Glory when he took that. I’m a big Josh Alexander fan so it was great to see him climb to the top, but that’s the direction we went and you know, then Moose cashed in and got the title. Both of those guys were top top guys, but I really think they can go somewhere with Moose. I mean, he’s the one that can carry them. That’s the thing when you’re picked as the top guy and you’re the world champion there’s a lot that goes with that and a lot of people don’t realise that. Moose can carry the company when he puts the strap on his shoulder, he’s the one carrying the company and when you look at him you’re like okay, that’s the guy. That’s believable, man. I mean, that’s legit. So I’m really excited where they can go from here.”
Working with Sting and playing the role of Fake Sting:
Sting was on board man. Back in 2000 in WCW they obviously had taken a look at me because I was getting a lot of matches and I just had the that look, I guess the same kind of build and the hair obviously made a big difference. He was doing something with Vampiro at the time and so there were a lot of shots that we were doing. I did some coffin shots where I came out of the coffin as Sting and beat the hell out of Vampiro with a bat. There were even some of those where I was in the rafters and got some shots up there. Then the big one was Halloween Havoc 2000 when I came from out from under the ring with Sting and got to battle him one on one with that. So I think Sting was on board with it. Some of the past Stings – it kind of turned out to be a little bit of a joke. But mine, I feel like was more serious which is they gave me more of a run with it.
Sting was the one that painted my face. So it was kind of cool when he was doing it. He even looked at me he’s like, man, this is weird! This is like looking at a mirror! I think he was referring back to his to his Crow days so that was really cool. I got close with Sting and when they wrote him in for TNA it was great to work with the guy. It’s hard to find somebody to say something bad about him. It was very exciting to have him on board. I think he helped put TNA on the map. We did a little something in 06 where we relived some of his past Sting characters. I was part of that and then even 2010 or 11 I did a little something. If you’re ever looking for for a Crow Sting, you know, Chris Harris is your guy!”
Thoughts on how WWE used Sting:
I think the general consensus is that it took years and years for them to finally get him and I think he would probably agree that they just they didn’t use him like he should have but you know, are we really surprised about that? I mean, they get the biggest star from WCW and don’t do much with him at all. When he gets his his WrestleMania moment with Triple H I think it was exciting, you know, we got DX, we got the nWo. That was all exciting but in the end they kind of put down the the legend. I think they could have done much more especially when he had more in the tank. I think Stings even gone on record that he would he would love to work something with The Undertaker. I think we all would’ve loved that. I’m not sure why that didn’t happen, but it didn’t.
Now we get a little bit of Sting and I think that he’s in a position where he can do that. You know, he’s taken Darby under his wing and I think the whole locker room is probably going to learn from him. But yeah, if you were ever wondering if they were gonna hide him in the tag team match with Darby and Darby is going to do all the work well that’s not what we saw last night (AEW Dynamite). Darby was taken out so Sting did all the work and he hung in there man and he performed and you know, we got we got what we got”
Learning from and working for Jeff Jarrett:
“I learned a tremendous amount from Jeff and you have to remember, when this thing all started he was wearing a lot of hats. I mean he was doing everything and there was a small group of guys that he could really depend on to get things done but a lot was weighed heavily on him. So in those early days he was the head guy. We started with Ken Shamrock and then did some transitions. But once Jeff was the top guy, that’s the thing you have to go with somebody that that you trust. That can carry the ball and Jeff has done it before and who better? People were like oh, Jeff wanted a promotion so he could put the belt on himself. Well you got to look deeper than that. When you’re going with a direction, Jeff Jarrett is a name. Jeff can be the PR guy you know, it’s his company, and he’s running it and when you talk about the top guy it’s a safe bet. Jeff can handle it. There’s just a lot of factors that go into that. So I think Jeff was the right guy for that.
I had a chance to work with him and that was great. Had a little singles run, I think it was 04 and got to work with him and a lot of top guys that time. AJ was one of them, Raven, R Truth. It was just great to be able to work with a lot of those guys at that time and I learned a lot working with Jarrett. Just to listen to Jeff talk business was incredible. He had learned from his father. He had learned what to do and what not to do from WCW. So he brought a lot to the table. And I think that was why TNA was so successful”
How Americas Most Wanted were formed:
“(James) Storm and I had known each other from that territory down there, we were good friends, mostly wrestled against each other and had great matches together. We even as opponents had great chemistry. I think in the early days of TNA, there was just so much going on. They obviously needed some star power. So I think they were heavily focused on some of the big names, the stars, but they also wanted some homegrown talent. Storm and I was part of that, they knew they wanted to do something with us. Obviously AJ was in that category as well. I think they wanted to do something they just didn’t know what direction to go. So it’s it was one of those where a lot of people fell in this line where it’s like okay – put these guys together, let’s see what happens. So it was it was honestly something that was just kind of thrown together. Storm and I of course in our minds, we’re thinking well we want to be singles, guys, that’s what we’ve done our whole careers. But that’s not how it works in wrestling, you take what they give you and they put us in a team and we said let’s roll with it. We looked at each other and we were like, we’re going to be the best damn tag team out there. If that’s what they’re giving us we’re gonna roll with it.”
