One MIND-BLOWING Secret For Every WWE SummerSlam
27. 1999 | The Original Undercard
SummerSlam 1999 underwent a quite public change in direction - Triple H’s Shane Douglas tribute act not quite being main event-ready is hardly a mind-blowing secret - but the undercard was not finalised internally until the week of the show, either.
One floated tweak was very typical of the era, in that, per the August 23 edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, one bout was set to get an extra participant.
The Hardcore title match between the Big Boss Man and Al Snow was set to include Road Dogg. This Triple Threat match didn’t end up happening, and thank God for that; Pepper was a far better dog than Brian James at this point, because Road Dogg was only truly over in 1998. The singles match was a bit long, but it was of tremendous value. Mostly.
Pepper, Al Snow’s beloved companion, became a key point of the SummerSlam match and, subsequently, one of the best worst storylines of all-time. The material was rubbish, or at least should have been rubbish, but Ray Traylor was absolutely brilliant at portraying a brusque, vile-voiced psychopath who thought doing the worst things imaginable was hilarious. The cackle on the man was evil. Infamously, Boss Man killed Pepper and fed Snow the remains, but it could have been worse: he could have been Billy Gunn, who was murdered in even more gruesome fashion by the Rock around this time.
Road Dogg did find a way to undermine the match without being a contestant in it. His “roving reporter” live commentator role was excruciating on the rare occasions you could make out what he was actually saying.
Additionally, the eventual Tag Team Turmoil match at SummerSlam ‘99 was originally conceived as a battle royal before the WWF actually got creative.