Jim Ross has revealed a long-forgotten pitch he made to hold a professional wrestling event at Alcatraz, describing a concept that generated internal interest before getting buried under government red tape.
Speaking on Grilling JR, during a conversation about AEW’s upcoming Fairway to Hell event at a golf venue, Ross revealed the Alcatraz concept he had developed while in WWE.
“The idea that I came up with that never happened was I pitched matches from Alcatraz. And there was a lot of interest in it internally from us and the parks and recreation people or some government agency that manages that property. It just got politics involved, and it got bogged down and we couldn’t get it out of the mud. A bureaucracy. And it finally, like a lot of concepts in politics, it ran its course, people lost interest, and there the idea went. I thought that would have been a decent idea because you’d have the rustic outdoor thing at Alcatraz. In my crazy mind, you could do a two-match, pay-per-view, out to match elements, and the main event would be held. Of course, you want to save that space for the main event, and that might be the only thing you have from Alcatraz. You have the matches at other venues to supplement the card, but the attraction would be Alcatraz.”
He was later asked when this would’ve been and he noted it would’ve been for The Undertaker, although he didn’t say against who. He also addressed conversations with All Japan Pro Wrestling during his WWE tenure about a possible joint event featuring exploding death match elements, noting that Mick Foley was a likely candidate for that kind of match.
“I would have done that, but that doesn’t mean it’s right or wrong. My cup of tea. I never could figure what we could gain out of it. How’s it going to get anybody over? And Mick would lobby for that booking. He might want to do it with Sabu because he’s the guy that’s been in the most of those crazy matches. There’s just no distinct margin for error in those exploding matches. You’re not dealing with professional pyro guys. You’re dealing with wrestlers who have a lighter. I like to watch them sometimes, but to watch a whole pay-per-view built around that, that doesn’t work for me. That’s too gimmicky for me,” Ross said.
If you use any portion of the quotes from this article, please credit Grilling JR with a h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription.
