Welcome back to the Deep Dives. Today, we've
got a stack of files here that I think are going
to make you look at one of the most famous last
names in wrestling a little bit differently.
And before you jump to conclusions, we're not
talking about the guy hitting RKOs on your TV
every week. Although you can't really tell this
story without him showing up eventually. But
yeah, he's not the main subject. Exactly. Today,
we're focused on the man who, you know, who really
paved the way. We are opening the file on cowboy
Bob Orton Jr. And looking at this research, the
first thing that just jumps out is how easy it
is to pigeonhole the guy. You ask a casual fan,
they say, well, that's Randy's dad. Or maybe
he's the guy with the cast. Yeah. Which, I mean,
it's true. But it's such a disservice to what
he actually did. When you really dig into the
sources, the biography, the old match logs from
Florida, the backstage reports from the 80s,
you realize Bob Orton Jr. is not just a sidekick.
He might be the greatest supporting actor this
business has ever seen. That's the aha moment
for me in these notes. He's the bridge. He's
this like missing link between the smoky old
NWA arenas and the big bright rock and roll spectacle
of the WWF boom. And somehow he fit into both
worlds perfectly. He did. And our mission today
is to figure out how he did it. How does a man
known for wearing a plaster cast on his arm become
one of the most important villains in two different
eras? And maybe does his career prove that being
the number two guy is actually the smartest way
to play the game? OK, so let's start at the beginning
because he wasn't born with the cowboy hat in
the cast. Sources say Robert Keith Orton Jr.
from Kansas City. And talk about pressure. His
dad. was bob orton senior the big o right the
wrestling dna is there from day one but it wasn't
a handout the records show him starting in 1972
in championship wrestling from florida you have
to understand florida in the 70s it was a shark
tank eddie graham was booking you had these technical
masters all over the card you couldn't fake it
there orton actually started as a referee Which
is such a classic way to break in. You learn
the pacing, you're in the ring, you hear the
veterans calling spots, but you're not taking
the bunks just yet. Exactly. But he moved up
fast. He was teaming with guys like Bob Root,
Mr. Wrestling 2. And what I found really interesting
is he wasn't a cowboy yet. He was just this young,
really solid, technical heavyweight. And here's
a deep cut for you. Bob Orton Jr. is one of the
very first guys credited with using the superplex
as a finisher. I stepped on that note, too. It's
so hard for modern fans to wrap their heads around
that because now a superplex is just. It's a
transition move. You see it five times a night.
It's like a headlock now, yeah. But back in,
say, 1978, it was a nuclear bomb. You have to
understand the psychology. The top rope was like
forbidden territory. So for a big guy like Orton
to drag someone up there and just throw them
backwards, it looked like he was trying to legitimately
end your career. It's what made him legit. That's
the word that keeps popping up in these NWA reports
in the early 80s. He wasn't a cartoon character.
He was a tough, tough guy. And he got real heat.
There's this one angle where he and Dick Slater
broke Ric Flair's neck in storyline, of course,
with a pile driver. That's the level he was on.
A main event villain in the territories. So you
have this credible, dangerous wrestler. But then
he does a short run in the WWF, leaves, and comes
back in 84. And this is where everything changes.
He links up with Rowdy Roddy Piper. An ace is
born. This is the shift from wrestler to full
-blown character. We have to talk about the cast.
It is probably the most famous piece of medical
equipment in wrestling history. What's so great
about the research here is that it all starts
with a real injury. It's the best kind of wrestling
story where the line gets blurry, the sources
all confirm it. He broke his left forearm for
real in a match against Jimmy Snuka. It was at
the war to settle the score in 85. A real injury.
But the genius is what he did after it healed.
Because anyone else would just take the cast
off and go back to wrestling. Right. But on television,
Orton keeps wearing it. He has a doctor's note
saying the bone isn't setting right, that it's
still weak. It basically gave him a legal excuse
to carry a weapon to the ring every night. It's
such a simple, brilliant mind game. I'm hurt.
Don't hit my arm. It makes you hesitate for a
split second. And then whack, he clubs you with
it when the ref's back is turned. And he admitted
it. I found this old transcript from WWE Confidential
where he just flat out says it. He's like, the
injury was real, but I, well, I said it didn't
heal so I could keep using it. It's the ultimate
heel move, turning a weakness into a weapon.
And that cast takes us straight to the most important
night in WWF history, March 31st, 1985. WrestleMania
I. The night everything changed. And Bob Orton
Jr. is right there. Main event. He's not the
star, but he's in the corner of Piper and Paul
Orndorff against Hulk Hogan and Mr. T. And just
think about the pressure of that night. Vince
McMahon had bet everything on this show. If that
main event doesn't work, the company probably
goes under. And Orton is the key to the whole
finish. The screw up. The planned screw up. Yes.
The idea was for Orton to interfere. He gets
on the top rope. tries to hit Hogan from behind
with the cast. And Hogan moves. Hogan moves,
and Orton just blasts his own partner, Paul Orndorff,
by mistake, knocks him out cold. Hogan gets the
pin. So you could argue Bob Orton's cast is the
reason Hulkamania truly exploded. If he connects
with Hogan, maybe history is totally different.
It's just classic bad guy storytelling. They're
so evil, they can't even stop themselves from
messing up. But he stuck with Piper after that.
And that bodyguard era... That might be his best
character work. It was perfect chemistry. Piper
was the manic energy, the mouth. Orton was the
silent muscle, the ace. He gave Piper this instant
credibility because you knew if you finally got
past the guy in the kilt, you still had to deal
with this technical killer with a club for an
arm. And they got into everything. I love this
little detour in the notes about boxing. Bob
Orton, do you remember this? Oh, vividly. This
was for WrestleMania, too. They were building
a match for Mr. T, who obviously wasn't a wrestler.
You know, he's a tough guy, but he's not going
to do a grappling match. So they had to rebrand
Orton. And the cast finally came on. For a little
while, he became Boxing Bob. He even had a worked
boxing match on TV against some guy named Jose
Luis Rivera just to establish that he could throw
punches. It just shows you how versatile he was.
He could be a technician, a brawler, a boxer,
whatever they needed. But in wrestling, nothing
good lasts forever. Piper goes off to Hollywood,
comes back as a good guy, and Orton. Hmm. Well,
Orton joins adorable Adrienne Adonis. That was
quite a different look. The pink cowboy hat,
the makeup, a total 180 from Piper. And, of course,
he betrays Piper, leads to a really hot feud.
But let's jump ahead a little because the late
80s get weird for him. I mean, truly strange.
The research mentions a stop in Japan I had no
idea about. Ah, yes. You're talking about 1988
in New Japan. I am. So Orton leaves the WWF,
goes to New Japan Pro Wrestling, and he's teaming
with Tyler Main. But they're not Orton and Main.
The notes here say they were the Gaspar brothers.
Billy and Gully Gaspar. Okay, explain this. What
is a Gaspar? I'm picturing Bob Orton, the cowboy,
as a pirate. That's exactly it. They were hockey
-masked pirates. Bob Orton was Billy Gaspar.
It's a really deep cut, but it's just a reminder
that for these guys, work is work. If the promoter
in Tokyo says, I need a monster foreign team
in hockey masks, you put on the mask and you
collect the check. Wow. From the main event of
WrestleMania to a pirate in Tokyo. He gets back
to the States, though, and lands in WCW in 89.
And he's back to being a cowboy, thankfully.
He's managed by Gary Hart. And this run is actually
pretty underrated. He has this great feud with
his old partner, Dick Murdoch, and it leads to
a bull rope match at Russell War 89. I read the
description of the finish. It sounds incredibly
violent. It was old school. They're tied together
by this rope with a cowbell in the middle. Orton
loses the match, but afterwards, he uses the
cowbell to literally hang Murdoch over the top
rope. choked him out with it. It was that gritty,
believable violence from his NWA days. It just
shows he could always tap back into that dark
place. He wasn't just a sidekick. And speaking
of wild, we kind of have to mention the Fresno
incident. I knew you were going to bring that
up. It's the stuff of wrestling legend. How could
I not? The police report from Fresno in 86 reads
like a movie scene. It's just unbelievable. It
definitely shows you what life on the road was
like back then. The police were called to a hotel
and the report says they found Orton and Piper
causing disturbance. It ends with Orton naked
and drunk on the hotel roof. And he was shot
three times with police tasers. Three times.
And was apparently still on the roof yelling
at them. Yeah. I mean, that's just a different
kind of tough, I guess. Yeah. But it really puts
that whole era in context, doesn't it? It does.
We look back at the 80s now and it's all nostalgia,
but it was a brutal lifestyle. Driving hundreds
of miles, wrestling almost every night. Things
went off the rails. It just reinforces that these
guys were... They were outlaws. To put it mildly.
But what's so amazing is the longevity. The guy
just never stopped working. Even after the big
companies, the notes show him on the independent
circuit constantly from 1990 all the way through
the 2000s. He was taking bumps into his 60s.
Which brings us to the next big chapter, the
legacy. Because by the early 2000s, the story
wasn't just about Bob anymore. It was about Randy
Orton. Yeah. The legend killer. And Bob was instrumental
in getting Randy established. He gets inducted
into the Hall of Fame in 2005, which for most
guys, that's it. You give your speech, you go
home. Not Bob. He got right back in the mix.
He was a huge part of Randy's feud with The Undertaker
that year. And he wasn't just standing there.
Oh, no, he was active. It was brilliant. He'd
be begging for mercy to cause a distraction.
He interfered at WrestleMania 21. And of course,
he used the cast again. And the druid disguise.
I totally forgot about that. On SmackDown, he
comes out dressed as one of Undertaker's druids
holding the urn just to set up a sneak attack.
It was fantastic television. It really helped
pass that villain heat from the father to the
son. But this is where we have to talk about
the controversy from that feud. Right. The tone
in the notes definitely shifts here. This is
about the hepatitis C situation. It is. And we
need to be really careful and precise with the
facts here because this is a very serious medical
issue. Okay, so lay out the timeline from the
sources. So according to the reports, Orton was
diagnosed with hepatitis C when he was a teenager.
But he apparently had no symptoms. And over the
decades, he said he basically forgot about it.
He just didn't believe he was still a carrier
after all that time. But then 30 years later,
in 2005, he gets retested during the feud. Correct.
And the test confirms he does still carry the
disease. This is a huge deal because of the match
they were building to, Hell in a Cell. Which
means blood is almost guaranteed. Exactly. At
the pay -per -view inside the cell, Orton bleated,
cut his own forehead to bleed for dramatic effect.
It was common then. And in doing so, his blood
got on The Undertaker during the match. And the
big question is, did The Undertaker know? No.
The sources are clear on this. The undertaker
did not know. And when he found out later, he
was furious. What about the company? Did management
know? That's the other part of it. The reports
state that the head of talent relations at the
time, John Laurinaitis, did know about Orton's
condition. But he still allowed the blading to
happen. He did. Wow. That's that's just a massive
breach of trust in a business where your health
is literally in your opponent's hands. Yeah,
that's a huge problem. It really is. It shows
you how different the health and safety protocols
were even as recently as 2005. That would never
happen today. But it's a documented part of the
story and it caused a lot of backstage tension.
No doubt. But it seems like in wrestling, time
heals most wounds because even after all that.
Bob just kept showing up. He's like the wrestling
Terminator. He was at Money in the Bank in 2017.
I remember that. He's just sitting in the front
row looking like somebody's grandpa. But he was
part of the angle. The Singh brothers, who were
with Jinder Mahal, assaulted him at ringside
to distract Randy, which cost Randy the championship.
Even in his late 60s, Bob Orton Jr. is still
taking bumps to get the main event over. It's
just unbelievable consistency. And he's still
getting his flowers. He was inducted into the
St. Louis Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2024. He's
getting an award from the Cauliflower Alley Club.
The respect from inside the business is clearly
there. And it's well -deserved. I mean, you look
at his career, the NWA, the AWA, the WWF, Golden
Era, WCW, New Japan, then showing up in the modern
WWE with his son. He's literally touched every
major corner of the business. So when you step
back and look at the whole file, what does Bob
Wharton Jr. represent? To me, he seems like the
ultimate utility player. You need a cowboy. Got
it. Bodyguard. Got it. Pirate. Weirdly, yes.
Manager. Done. I think that's it. He represents
adaptability. In a business that is just so full
of ego, where everyone wants to be the top guy,
Bob Horton Jr. built a Hall of Fame career by
making other people look better. He was the ultimate
professional. Think about it. He made Piper more
dangerous. He made Hogan a bigger hero at WrestleMania.
He even made The Undertaker look more sympathetic.
He was the guy who would take the fall or swing
and miss with the cast so that the star could
have their moment. He understood that a hero
is only as good as his villain. Yeah. Or his
villain's henchman. Exactly. And that kind of
leads me to a final thought for people to chew
on. We always focus on the top guy. The Hogans,
the Austins, the Randy Ortons. We count their
titles. Right. Who's on the poster? But Bob Wharton
Jr. had a career that lasted five decades. He
was almost never out of work. He's a Hall of
Famer. So the question is this. In an industry
built on being the man, does Bob Wharton Jr.'s
career prove that being the ultimate number two,
the perfect supporting character, is actually
a smarter, more sustainable path than destroying
your body trying to be the main event? That's
a really interesting way to frame it. Maybe Ace
really did play the best hand after all. That's
all the time we have. Thanks for listening, and
we'll see you on the next deep dive.