Rob Van Dam

Not many people in the history of the WWF have made such an impact in such a short space of time as Rob Van Dam. Last night saw RVD make his WWF PPV main event debut, even if he did eventually lay down for Steve Austin. Still, it's quite an achievement for a guy who many wrote off before his WWF debut. In light of this, I thought this was the perfect opportunity to take a look back at the career of RVD.

Real Name: Rob Szatkowski

Legitimate height: 5'11"

Legitimate weight: 216lbs

Age: 31

Rob Van Dam was a casual fan of wrestling during his youth, inspired by martial arts films; RVD trained in various disciplines of martial arts such as Karate, Aikido and kickboxing during his teenage years. After turning 16, Rob started to enter local tough man contests in the Detroit area and usually faired well; it was at this point that someone recommended that he should pursue a wrestling career. Fresh out of high school in 1989, RVD managed to contact local legend The Sheik who agreed to train Rob and his buddy. In the course of his training at The Sheik's house, RVD was helped through some of the sessions by The Sheik's nephew Terry Brunk, otherwise known as Sabu. Little did Rob know that he would be associated with Sabu on and off for the next 10 years. RVD began his career in 1990 by working local Indy shows in Michigan and Ohio, often wrestling Sabu and fellow trainees from The Sheik's school.

RVD's first break occurred in 1991 when he and Sabu managed to bag a spot on the grueling USWA circuit based in Memphis, Tennessee. Quickly tiring of the nightly $35 payoffs, Rob moved on to Florida to work for the fledgling IWF promotion. It was in the IWF that Rob would start performing under the name of Rob Van Dam, an obvious moniker considering his likeness to Jean Claude Van Damme. Impressing WCW officials with his unique high-flying offense, RVD was contacted by WCW in late 1992 and was offered a short-term contract; RVD was heading for Atlanta.

Under the name of Robbie V, Rob floundered as a lower mid-card jobber for six months. With pinfall losses on WCW TV becoming more and more common, RVD decided to leave WCW in 1993 and return to the independent circuit. Fresh off national TV exposure, RVD was a hot prospect on the circuit and even bagged part time work with All Japan Pro Wrestling in Japan where he polished his skills by working with such luminaries as Kenta Kobashi, Dan Kroffat and Doug Furnas.

RVD's wrestling career was put on hold for a time in 1995 when he managed to bag a role in a low budget martial arts film entitled "Superfights". A second movie role in "Bloodmoon" then followed as RVD concentrated more on his acting career than his pro wrestling career. However, movie work soon dried up in the weak martial arts market and RVD returned to the pro wrestling scene by accepting dates with ECW. Making his debut with the promotion on January 5, RVD rolled over Axl Rotten and immediately got over with the often cruel and vicious ECW Arena crowd. Spurned on by the positive response, ECW owner Paul Heyman immediately pushed RVD into a feud with the promotion's top star, Sabu. The two clashed throughout the summer of 1996 with the highlight being the famous Stretcher match between the two on August 3 at the ECW Arena. Although he lost, RVD had now established himself as a solid upper card presence in ECW and even went on to form a team with Sabu as the year came to a close.

The team of Sabu and RVD began a heated feud with The Eliminators at November to Remember 1996 and continued to collide with The Eliminators for the next three months. Unfortunately, the matches were often sloppy spot festivals and RVD was generally the man to lie down when his team was defeated due to management's protection of Sabu. Sensing the promotion had run out of ideas for him, RVD decided to weigh up his options. This led to RVD turning up backstage at a Nitro show in Savannah, Georgia in the spring of 1997 looking for a possible position with the company. Word quickly spread throughout the sheets and the Internet that RVD was bound for WCW when in fact the promotion had little interest in him. RVD would soon use this to his advantage and create the character that would make him a star in ECW.

Following Sabu's heel turn at ECW's first PPV, Barely Legal, RVD joined him in the ring and declared that he was seeking employment "elsewhere". By christening himself with the name of "Mr. Monday Night" and playing up on the ECW fans hatred of the WWF and WCW, RVD quickly turned himself into the promotion's top heel. RVD continued to up the ante in the following weeks by bragging about his lucrative offers from the WWF and WCW, however that was overshadowed by his bombshell announcement that he would be wrestling on one of the Monday night wrestling shows come May 12. RVD shocked the entire industry that night by appearing on Raw and defeating a very young Jeff Hardy. Due to the working relationship between WWF-ECW at the time, RVD went on to make several appearances on WWF TV during the next few weeks with mixed success. However, that all came to a end on June 23, 1997 when RVD refused to lose via count out to Jesse James (Road Dogg) at a Shotgun taping (ironically it was James' that advised him to do it). Understandably upset, the WWF severed all links with RVD and made it perfectly clear that they wanted nothing to do with him. Van Dam wouldn't appear in a WWF ring again for almost 4 years.

It wasn't all bad for RVD, as he was now the hottest heel in the company after being branded a "sellout" by the ultra loyal ECW fans. RVD spent the rest of the year battling ECW loyalist Tommy Dreamer and flaunting his WWF connections whenever he could. Moving into 1998, the "Mr. Monday Night" gimmick had wore off somewhat and RVD was suddenly hearing the cheers of the fans mainly due to his high spot orientated offense. RVD kept up his momentum by rolling over Bam Bam Bigelow to raise the ECW TV Title which he would go on to keep for a incredible 23 months. RVD spent most of 1998 as a tweener of sorts as he successfully defended his TV title throughout the year in addition to raising the ECW World Tag Team Titles in conjunction with Sabu. It was in the latter months of 1998 that RVD first clashed with Jerry Lynn on house shows and at the ECW Arena, and the two would go on to stage a series of legendary matches the following year. The first high profile RVD vs. Lynn match occurred at Living Dangerously '99 with RVD coming out on top in a great match. The two clashed at Hardcore Heaven '99 once again with RVD once again coming out on top in an absolute classic. RVD quickly evolved into the most popular wrestler in the company's history on the back of these two matches. The two formed and on-off partnership over the summer months and continued to wrestle each other in the usual first class matches as the year came to a close.

Then, disaster struck on 29th January 2000 in Orlando, Florida when RVD broke his leg and ankle during a house show match against Rhino. RVD hit the sidelines for close to 4 months and was forced to hand over the ECW TV Title. RVD made his in-ring comeback against resident foe Jerry Lynn at Hardcore Heaven 2000, but RVD would not come out on top this time with Lynn securing his first ever win over RVD following interference from Scotty Anton. RVD settled the score with Anton at the Heatwave PPV but everything was not all rosy in Team Extreme.

Mounting debts and uncertain TV future led to ECW boss Paul Heyman suffering a major financial crisis in the fall of 2000. As the company's top earner at the time, RVD saw his pay take a dramatic fall as weekly payments were missed and PPV bonuses all but disappeared, add this to the fact that he was being asked do more jobs than ever before and RVD wasn't a happy camper. In order to relieve some of the pressure, RVD returned to "acting" as he accepted a role in martial arts film "Black Mask 2", which was being filmed in Thailand. Prior to his departure, RVD informed Paul Heyman that all issues over missing payments must be cleared up by the time he returned from Thailand or he would activate a clause in his contract that allowed him to seek employment elsewhere. ECW was in a mess at this point and the subsequent money was not available. Come early December, RVD had left ECW.

At first it didn't seem anybody was too interested in RVD, the WWF were apparently still bitter about the Road Dogg incident while WCW was in no position to offer anybody a contract due to it's own financial troubles. RVD accepted a one off payment to wrestle on the ECW Guilty as Charged PPV in January 2001 but the writing was obviously on the wall for ECW as the company folded a few weeks later. Things started to look promising in late January as Fusient Media moved in to purchase WCW and RVD quickly agreed a verbal deal with the group and was scheduled to make his return to WCW in May. RVD kept busy by returning to All Japan in February of 2001 for the first time since he quit the promotion in early 1997 after refusing to be pushed as a Junior Heavyweight. However, disaster struck when Fusient's attempted purchase of WCW collapsed as the WWF moved in and purchased the company. At odds with WWF management, things couldn't have looked worse for RVD, but that was all about to change.

In late April, WWF management seemingly had a change of heart and decided to pursue RVD. Following a meeting with Jim Ross, RVD signed a deal to start work with WWFE and was all set to play a major role in the revamped WCW. As the WWF wheeled out the Invasion angle prematurely in order to offset slipping ratings, that plan was scrapped. It seemed that the WWF still didn't have total faith in RVD, and following his debut, RVD was quickly reduced to working a dark match against Johnny The Bull at the July 10 taping of Smackdown. Hopes were raised amongst RVD's army of supporters when he was booked on the Invasion PPV against Jeff Hardy and RVD did not disappoint as he tore the house down on his way to winning and fortunately for him, this wasn't an isolated occurrence.

RVD rolled over Matt Hardy in another good match the following night on Raw, as the crowd roared him on yet again. Immediately seizing on his momentum, RVD started racing up the card in the following weeks and was soon clashing with the likes of Kurt Angle and Kane in high profile TV matches. RVD was quickly becoming the fastest rising star in the business. Things shifted into an even higher gear following Summerslam when RVD started sharing air time with Steve Austin, which eventually resulted in RVD securing a shocking clean win over Austin at the September 4 edition of Smackdown. At the time of writing, RVD had beaten Chris Jericho on numerous occasions on TV and PPV and had just participated in his first WWF PPV main event alongside Steve Austin and Kurt Angle. Not bad for a guy who was working dark matches less than four months ago.

So where does RVD go from here? Does he split with the Alliance and feud with Steve Austin? Does he follow up on the Stephanie McMahon confrontations and feud with the returning Triple H over the affections of Steph? Who knows? However, one thing is for sure, RVD is heading straight to the top. Young, talented, massively over and most important of all good friends with one of the bookers, it seems nothing can stop RVD and his quest to become the WWF's whole F'N show.

Greatest Matches

vs Chris Beniot (Summerslam 2002)

Greatest Feuds

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