The Most Insane Wrestling Lore HIDDEN On The Internet

There was a note in the introduction to this very article that the "scorched earth"-ing of many websites over the years results in so much of what we all once knew being filed as lost media - the stuff that still can't be verified during pub chats, even when everybody races for their phones. 

This is starting to happen with Willie The Worker, but let this be the latest place that keeps his workrate flame burning that little bit longer.

Know about Willie The Worker? If you don't, you're not alone. It was never explicitly revealed exactly who the man was that, for a period of weeks following WrestleMania XIX, elected to email 1Wrestling.com's gaffer Dave Scherer with his various WWE gripes. For a short while, many felt that the whole thing was an elaborate gag. The first message was posted on April 1st 2003, and was so on-the-nose in sync with how so many online felt about WWE at that time that it was almost too good to be true. Internet Wrestling Community (back when there was a monoculture and that term actually meant something) rabble-rouser The Scotsman tried to fool longstanding rival Scherer with a fake letter. Many suspected that it wasn't a wrestler at all, but a downtrodden creative team member trying to get their frustrations out via this uniquely of-the-era method. 

But the messages kept coming. Sticking around for a good time rather than a long one, Willie The Worker offered specific clues or tells within his missives that allowed a bit of basic detective work as to who it might be. Despite shouts towards the likes of Jeff Hardy or Christian, all signs kept pointing towards Rob Van Dam as the man behind the poisoned pen. The mystery man had been with the company a couple of years (Van Dam signed in 2001), he was a wrestler present at WrestleMania but frustrated at not making the card over Nathan Jones and the Miller Lite Catfight Girls (RVD was confined to a pre-show Tag Title match that alienated all involved due to its demotion), big men such as Jones and A-Train getting pushes were a constant target (Van Dam was 'Mr Monday Night, not Mr Some Great Height) and he was - per his own record-keeping - far more over at the merch stand than his contemporaries. Those foam thumbs didn't buy themselves, after all. 

The assumption became the accepted reality, Willie The Worker stopped messaging 1Wrestling.com, and Rob Van Dam, three years later, became WWE Champion for just shy of a month. Nothing was ever confirmed, and with more messageboards and the like getting blitzed by lapsed and lost domains, the story became all the more hidden from view. Thanks to a combination of ancient posts at The-W (via former 411Wrestling big hitter Flea), some SmartMarks chatter and a blog that rescued a couple of his messages, consider this a snapshot of his offering and yet another lifebuoy for the then-shocking remarks to survive online a little bit longer.

On Albert, by then rebadged as A-Train and getting his latest failed push;

I have nothing against Albert.  Matt is a real nice guy and has always been cool with me. But come on already. How many times are they going to try with this guy? They have been trying to push him down the throats of our fans for years now and he's just not connecting with the crowd. But he continues to get chance after chance because he's a huge guy and Vince is a mark for big guys. I dare to say that they probably sold more merchandise of me at WrestleMania on Sunday than Albert has even drawn for the company in all the years he's been there.

He took umbrage with the surprise return of Rena "Sable" Mero, not least because of somebody else going through the revolving door in the opposite direction;

Rena Mero has signed with the WWE. Fart! Are you ribbin me? This "talent" is pushing 40 years old and if I recall correctly, she didn't leave the company last time on the best of terms. Is this the same Rena Mero that bashed the company publicly every chance she got? Is this the same lady that had heat with 90 percent of the locker room the last time she was there? What is Vince thinking? "Hell, we need something to turn these ratings around, let's give Rena a call and see if she wants to come back for another run. Hell, it worked in the Attitude era, let's try again." Is that what Vince was/is thinking?...They just let go of a talent that I've been very high on for many years, that being Raven. If WWE would have given Raven one-tenth of a push they gave Rena last time she was there, he would have been a huge star right now instead of having to worry about picking up indy dates when TNA isn't running. Raven is a world class worker and I shook my head when I heard they let him go. How couldn't they see what a great talent he was?

Nathan Jones got both barrels;

Don't even get me started on Nathan Jones. The guy is a putz. He's the joke of the locker room. Well, maybe the joke is on myself and all the other guys that have busted our asses for the company throughout the years because he had a WrestleMania spot and we didn't. This is what really makes me hot. What dues has this guy ever paid? All he's done since being here has been to hurt guys in dark matches and mess up moves. But yeah, let's give him one of the WrestleMania paydays that are available when it could have gone to at least thirty other more deserving guys that I can think of off the top of my head, myself very much included.

It's ironic - lot of this seems too verbose for somebody as historically chilled as Van Dam appeared to be, but consider this; he found himself at his most animated of his entire WWE run when a) at One Night Stand 2005, he shed his Sports Entertainment skin and b) ranted, furiously, about just how important the show was in contrast to WrestleMania or anything WWE was producing in-house. He didn't have form for this sort of thing when the rants were published, but he by the time he departed the company for the first time four years later.