The story of how Lex Luger and Elizabeth’s paths ended up intersecting many years into their pro wrestling careers is a remarkable one. The tragic ending to Miss Elizabeth’s life is one nobody would have predicted when the WWF audience was first introduced to her and Randy Savage in the summer of 1985. While this is the first time they were seen on a national basis, they were a couple in ICW, the promotion that Randy’s dad, Angelo Poffo ran from 1978-1984. ICW was an outlaw promotion that ran in opposition to the Memphis territory. ICW would often challenge the stars from Memphis to fight them knowing they were not going to work together. There were other instances of wrestlers from ICW showing up backstage at Memphis TV or at the Mid South Coliseum to challenge Jerry Lawler. Eventually, ICW went out of business, and some of the stars, including Randy Savage, would legitimately work for the Memphis territory.
When Savage debuted in WWE, every heel manager in the company wanted to manage him. After a month of TVs, Savage, with all of the managers in the ring, announced Elizabeth was going to be his manager. Elizabeth made her way to the ring. While the audience didn’t know who she was, they were stunned by her beauty. Elizabeth was portrayed as the valet for Savage, although in real life, they were married in 1984. While Savage was a heel, Elizabeth didn’t perform the dastardy interference the other managers did in each match. Elizabeth led Savage to the Intercontinental Championship. With Savage becoming more and more popular, he eventually turned babyface and won the WWF Championship at WrestleMania IV.
Behind the scenes, Savage was very controlling of Elizabeth and multiple wrestlers have said this in various interviews and documentaries. Years and years of this behavior by the Macho Man took its toll on their marriage. By the time SummerSlam ‘91 arrived, built around the “wedding” between Savage and Elizabeth, their real life marriage was crumbling. Behind the scenes, Elizabeth had befriended Hulk Hogan and his then wife, Linda, while Savage and Elizabeth were together. Savage and Elizabeth got divorced in 1992. For years, Savage blamed Hogan for him and Linda encouraging Elizabeth to go through with the divorce.
Elizabeth soon left the wrestling business and worked in retail sales. Randy Savage went to WCW in 1994. With WCW starting to become as popular with WWF during the Monday Night Wars, Elizabeth sent feelers to WCW to see if she would be able to come in. Eric Bischoff, who was signing a lot of the WWF talent, agreed, with Savage giving his blessing. Elizabeth made her return to wrestling managing Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage at Clash of Champions XXII against Ric Flair and The Giant. Three weeks later, Elizabeth stunned the wrestling world by turning on Randy Savage at SuperBrawl VI causing him to lose to Ric Flair. In late 1996, she joined the NWO.
Lex Luger played for the Miami Hurricanes football team in 1978 along with NFL Hall of Famer Jim Kelly. Upon graduation, Luger Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League where they lost to the Edmonton Eskimos in the 67th Grey Cup, which is the Canadian Football Championship game. He then signed with the Green Bay Packers in 1982, but was on the injured reserve list. He was released before the start of the 1983 season. In 1984, he made his way into the United States Football League (USFL) and played for the Tampa Bay Bandits, Memphis Showboats, and Jacksonville Bulls.
When Lex Luger’s football career ended, he pursued professional wrestling. In 1985 he started his career in Florida Championship Wrestling. He very quickly rose to the top of the rankings by becoming the Southern Heavyweight Champion. He headlined throughout Florida challenging the NWA Champion Ric Flair. After only one year, he signed with Jim Crockett Promotions on TBS for a half million dollars a year and became a member of the Four Horseman. He quickly became one of the top stars and won the United States Championship from Nikita Koloff. He would go on to win the NWA World Tag Team Championship as well as the WCW World Heavyweight Championship.
Lex Luger knew after Clash of Champions 27 in 1991 that he probably would not be renewing his contract with WCW. In 1992, he signed with Vince McMahon’s WBF, the World Bodybuilding Federation, as he contractually wasn’t allowed to sign with the WWF as a wrestler until the next year.
Lex Luger entered the WWF in 1993. Many thought him to be the one to finally replace Hulk Hogan as the top star because he had the look and the physique the WWF wanted and Luger officially made his WWF debut at The Royal Rumble. Bobby Heenan came out to announce him as “The Narcissist” as Luger posed in front of a mirror. Vince McMahon decided to change direction with Luger and make him the All-American babyface. With the WWF Champion Yokozuna issuing the bodyslam challenge which nobody was able to accomplish, Lex Luger made an appearance on the USS Intrepid to accept the challenge. Luger slammed Yokozuna, and in that moment, Luger became a babyface. The WWF had Luger go on a Lex Express tour which was him in a red, white, and blue bus stopping at various cities and meeting the fans. Behind the scenes, Luger was miserable doing this and it didn’t come across as genuine when he was doing it. This would lead him to SummerSlam to face Yokozuna for the title which everybody expected Luger to win, however, he won by countout which means he did not win the title. Luger’s WWE career fizzled out after not winning the title, and WWF went in a different direction and eventually put the title on Bret Hart.
With WCW starting a brand new show, Nitro, on TBS in 1995, Eric Bischoff found out Lex Luger was working without a renewed contract from WWF. Bischoff signed Luger and he showed up unannounced and unexpectedly on the very first Nitro show for WCW.
In 1997, Elizabeth married an attorney by the name of Cary Lubetsky. In 1999, Elizabeth began managing Lex Luger within the WCW storyline. Within a short period of time, they began to have an extramarital affair as Luger was married with two children. Elizabeth divorced her husband in 1997 while Luger remained married while keeping the affair a secret from his wife. It was rumored that many in the WCW locker room knew of the affair. Both Luger and Elizabeth began having substance abuse issues during this time period.
In 2001, WWF finally won the Monday Night Wars when they bought WCW. Luger sat out the remainder of his guaranteed contract from WCW. Luger’s wife found out about his affair with Elizabeth when she found a Valentine’s Day gift on the table for her. Luger’s wife gave him another chance, but Luger continued the affair behind her back. Luger went so far as to have a second home built as a getaway for him and Elizabeth so they would have a place to continue their affair. Luger’s wife found out about this and wanted a divorce.
With Luger not wrestling and having more time on his hands, both he and Elizabeth’s substance abuse issues increased. On April 19, 2003, Luger was involved in a domestic dispute with Elizabeth in which Luger allegedly struck her. The police found Elizabeth with two bruised eyes, a cut on her lip, and a bump on her head. Luger was arrested for domestic violence, a charge he denied. He said he restrained her during the argument but never hit her. Elizabeth said she had gotten tangled up in the leashes of their two dogs and fell down in the driveway a few days earlier. Two days later, Luger was arrested for driving under the influence after rear-ending another car. Luger was driving with a suspended license for not appearing in court on a previous offense while driving with no proof of insurance.
On May 1, 2003, Elizabeth died of “acute toxicity” due to a combination of painkillers and vodka. She was 42. Luger described the incident, “I’ll never forget the early morning hours when Liz passed away. We were just watching movies together, sipping on some vodka and popping pills. Literally before the 9-1-1 call I realized that she had stopped breathing. Five minutes before that, she was standing at the microwave and I was heating up some food and she literally got up and stood right next to me and wanted to help. I told her to sit down and that I had it. She sat down and I went back to fixing what was mine. I look back now at the fragility, the recklessness and the carelessness. We didn’t know that we were playing Russian Roulette. One minute she was there and the next minute I was wondering why she wasn’t eating and trying to wake her up. I realized she wasn’t breathing, panicking and calling 9-1-1. The tragedy of that. To witness that first hand. I’ll never forget.”
Luger wasn’t suspected of homicide, but a search of the townhouse turned up around 100 bottles of steroids, growth hormones and painkillers. He was arrested on 13 felony counts of purchasing and possessing a controlled substance and one misdemeanor charge of distributing a dangerous drug. He was released the following day on $27,500 bail. Luger pleaded guilty to the charges and was fined $1,000, sentenced to five years probation, and ordered to undergo periodic drug tests.
Luger continued to have drug and alcohol issues after Elizabeth’s death. Luger finally went to court in February 2005 to plead guilty on the steroid charges and was sentenced to five years probation, a $2,000 fine, and community service.
In December 2005, Luger and fellow wrestlers Scott Steiner and Buff Bagwell were removed from a flight to Winnipeg, Manitoba after committing acts of disturbance on board the plane. Steiner and Bagwell were free to resume their trip, but Luger was charged with violating his probation by failing to obtain permission to leave the country. He was tried in Georgia and sentenced to four months in Cobb County Jail.
At one point, Luger said there was a stretch of time where he didn’t care if he lived or died, but then his life was saved when he talked to one of the pastors he knew while he was in jail, Pastor Steve. Luger went back to his hotel room one night and he couldn’t sleep. He called up Pastor Steve. The pastor came to his hotel room and shared the plan of salvation with him. Luger got down on his knees and prayed and he began to cry. It was at that point he asked Jesus for forgiveness and he came into his heart. Luger said he felt an instant peace.
In October of 2007, Luger completed a workout and boarded a plane in Atlanta for San Francisco. During the flight he was talking with the person next to him and felt a nerve pinch in his neck. He was unable to turn his head and remained facing the person next to him for the next three hours. Luger went to his hotel and went to bed. When he awoke, he was in pain. It turned out that the workout had inflamed the muscles in his neck and shoulders. At the time, Luger was also dealing with arthritis and bone spurs. The combination cut off the flow of blood to his central cord. He had suffered a Spinal Infarction which left him paralyzed from the neck down. The initial prognosis was that he was going to be a quadriplegic. When he heard this, he asked for God’s strength.”
Luger ended up losing 70 pounds of muscle mass. In 2008, he was able to stand for short periods of time. In 2016, The National Wrestling Hall of Fame acknowledged his turnaround with its 2016 Frank Gotch Award for bringing positive recognition to professional wrestling through work outside the ring. Today, he spends his free time speaking to at-risk people about the dangers of drugs. Lex Luger was known as a very arrogant wrestler during his time in the ring. Today, anybody who comes in contact with him is quick to point out that he is a changed man and a pleasure to be around.
