Now, this might come as a shock to some of you, but “The Loose Cannon” Brian Pillman — the man who pulled a gun on Steve Austin during an episode of Raw and once wanted to chain himself naked to a goalpost during the Super Bowl –may have actually lived up to his nickname during his brief time on this Earth. He had a reputation for being unpredictable, and his most infamous and iconic moments (like “I respect you, bookerman” worked everyone, including his coworkers). It turns out, that was pretty much par for the course with Pillman.
On episode 366 of the Steve Austin Show, Pillman’s former co-Hollywood Blond shared some memories of “Flyin’ Brian” and revealed that he was in character all the time. Always. Forever. And he was a wrestler and a mind that was tragically far ahead of his time.
“Brian didn’t smarten anybody up to what he was doing. He worked everybody and if anybody ever talked to Brian, and he dropped some 411 on what he was doing, I’d like to hear it. But, man, as far as I know, Brian kayfabed everybody on that ‘Loose Cannon’ s–t. Guys didn’t know if he was crazy, shooting, working, what, because there was no separation.
“Brian called me all the time, but Brian never called me and said, ‘hey kid, here’s what I got going next’, and he was totally in character 100% of the time. He worked himself out of a contract that was signed. They terminated a contract because he wanted everything to be a shoot and that was the biggest work of all time, to terminate a contract to play into his storyline when he knew he was going to jump, so Brian didn’t smarten anybody up to anything.
“That guy was way ahead of his time. It really took a lot of guts to do what he was pulling off and it was just absolutely incredible. I really wish Brian would have lived to see, first of all, how the business would unfold, but also, to see how his career could have unfolded, maybe had he gotten that foot or that ankle healthy. But he was a dynamic person, a dynamic personality, hellacious professional wrestler. He was born for the business.”
Pillman helped to influence a whole generation of wrestlers (like Dean Ambrose, for example). But imagine what could have been if he had been able to hang around as a producer and agent today, helping guide the careers of those wrestlers. At least there’s always the WWE Network, so we can go back and watch his entire career and know that he was keeping everyone else guessing every time he did anything.
