Owen Hart: Encyclopedia II - Owen Hart - Wrestling Career

Owen Hart - Wrestling Career

Owen entered wrestling by working for his father's Stampede Wrestling. Wrestling however was not Owen's first choice for a career; as Martha Hart, his widow, would explain in her book Broken Harts, Owen tried numerous times to find a profitable living outside of wrestling. Those attempts were unsuccessful, and Owen began his WWF stay as The Blue Blazer in 1988. The Blue Blazer was at that time a generic masked wrestler gimmick who was a high flying technician, but made its return in 1999 to be portrayed as a stereotypical over-the-top superhero; some argue this was done to punish him for refusing to take part in lurid storylines of the WWF Attitude Era. Following the breakup of The Hart Foundation, Owen formed a team with Jim Neidhart known as the New Foundation. Owen would later team alongside Koko B. Ware in the early 1990s as High Energy. Eventually he was pushed as a singles competitor and feuded with his brother Bret. They competed at WrestleMania X and later in a Cage Match at SummerSlam 1994. They are both considered two of the greatest matches of the 1990s. Owen combined high flying and technical mat skill for a very sound style; he was also quite adept at playing a sneaky, smarmy heel, as evidenced by his King of Harts gimmick (he took the nickname after winning the 1994 King of the Ring).

Hart's WWF career included Intercontinental, Tag Team and European gold; he teamed with the late 600-pound Yokozuna and his late brother-in-law Davey Boy Smith, the British Bulldog, at various points in his career. He was also infamous at this time for the errant piledriver at SummerSlam 1997 which severely injured Stone Cold Steve Austin and ultimately led to Austin's retirement in 2003. When his brother Bret lost his WWF Title in controversial fashion at the 1997 Survivor Series in Montreal, Smith and Jim Neidhart, another Hart brother-in-law, responded by joining Bret in WCW. Owen tried this as well, but elected to stay put in the WWF when faced with breach of contract issues. This was the start of his Blackhart gimmick which had a great deal of potential; however Shawn Michaels, the WWF Champion in the wake of Montreal, suffered a career-ending (at the time) back injury and additionally managed to convince WWF owner Vince McMahon not to put that potentially hot feud together. As such Owen floundered for a bit, turning heel again and joining the Nation of Domination, a black militant themed stable. Obviously, this was not a good fit for Owen.

In early 1999, Owen began teaming with Jeff Jarrett and again captured tag team gold; however he was also in a storyline involving the Blue Blazer character; this, again, was rumored as punishment for Owen not wanting to do a storyline which suggested a sexual affair with Debra, the valet for the team. Of course, Owen was a happily married family man and wanted no part of this. It was the Blue Blazer gimmick which led to his untimely and unfortunate death at the Over the Edge PPV in May 1999.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Wrestling Career", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki