Bushwhackers Look Back On Their Oft-Forgotten ECW Run

The Bushwhackers in ECW?  It happened.

NWA, WWF — sure. But many forget that the fun-loving, and once violent duo made a trip to the land of extreme. The two popped up there in 1998 to take on Tommy Dreamer and the Sandman, before putting over Chris Chetti and Jerry Lynn just a couple of days later. 

In speaking with Fightful, The Bushwhackers looked back at their spot.

Luke:

That was the Dudleys From Down Under. The Dudleys and Paul brought us in ‘cause he wanted us to do a run with Sandman and Tommy Dreamer. He brought us in to the Dudleys to get over and then work with Sandman. Anyhow, we came in for the first weekend and he says, ‘You know, I’m gonna give you a starting date. You start for us in a month, two months, a month and a half.’ I said to him, ‘We’re booked for two months, but we can give not for the next three weeks, we’re tied up. ‘Cause we don’t want to fuck the promoters. Because we were relying on these other promoters to help us for the last two or three years, you know what I mean? Since WWF and they were good to us.’ So, we gave the other promoters and bookers over a month. We gave them notice.

Anyhow, we did those three shows for them and then, all of a sudden, he rang us the next week on a Friday night, and he says, ‘I’ll send you the plane tickets, I need you tomorrow night.’ We were already on the road working for these independent promoters. I had to say, ‘We don’t want to screw,’ I told him. Who was it called us? Maybe it was Tommy Dreamer then, too, who was doing helping him with the travel arrangements. I told them that, ‘We’re not going to let these guys down.’ Well, Paul Heyman said then, he said, ‘If you don’t come now, we don’t need you.’”

Butch:

“The thing about us, Sean, if we were booked somewhere—even for the independent promotion—if we were booked somewhere, as long as that plane was going and as long as they were landing, we always made the show. We kept our word and we were known for that. All through the years, that Luke and I were together, we kept our word and we always, what we said we did and we turned up.”

Luke:

“Even if we’re injured. Even back in the NWA days. We never took time off. We just knew we could work. The other guy would be on the apron. Butch had a situation, right? We had a double shot in NWA We held the belts at the time with North American Mid-Atlantic and he was on the apron, he couldn’t get in the ring. But, I’d been in a situation where I couldn’t do it. But, we always arrived and gave the people a show.”

You can see our full interview with the Bushwackers at the top of the page.