Jim Ross

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Jim Ross
Statistics
Ring name(s) Jim Ross
Good Ol' J.R.
J.R.
Billed height 5'10
Billed weight 205lbs (93 kg)
Born January 3, 1954
Westville, Oklahoma
Billed from Oklahoma
Debut 1972

James William (Jim) Ross, also known as J.R., or Good Ol' J.R. (born January 3, 1954), is a professional wrestling executive and a play-by-play announcer working for World Wrestling Entertainment on WWE Raw. To many peers, Ross is considered to be one of the best wrestling announcers in history and has been called the voice of World Wrestling Entertainment.

He suffers from Bell's palsy, which sometimes results in temporary paralysis of Ross' facial muscles. In late 1998, following the death of his mother, Ross took a break from RAW, and the effects of Ross' grief reportedly worsened his Bell's palsy, thus Michael Cole filled in for Ross. Despite his condition, Ross has established himself as one of the all-time greatest wrestling commentators, often compared to Gordon Solie.

Ross has his own brand of barbeque sauce and a selection of cookbooks.

Contents

[edit] Career

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Shortly after Bill Watts bought out the Mid-South territory, Ross went to work there becoming their lead play-by-play man in 1986. The first World's Title match he called was between Ric Flair and Ted DiBiase. When Jim Crockett bought the Mid-South (since renamed the Universal Wrestling Federation) and merged it with his Jim Crockett Promotions group, Ross joined the new company and eventually supplanted Gordon Solie and Tony Schiavone as lead play-by-play man for the National Wrestling Alliance. Ross continued to hone his skills and build his legacy as NWA became World Championship Wrestling (WCW).

While in WCW Ross worked his way up to the job of Executive Vice President of Broadcasting for WCW, yet along the way had a contentious relationship with Eric Bischoff. According to Ross, Bischoff, who reported to him, had done a really good job of "selling himself" to executives of WCW's owner Turner Broadcasting. According to Bischoff, Ross mistreated him and once Eric was promoted to executive producer in 1993, he "justly" fired Ross from the company. Either way, Ross had an air-tight three year contract with Turner Broadcasting, yet took an immediate buy-out for fear that he wouldn't get work elsewhere following a long hiatus.

[edit] World Wrestling Entertainment

After leaving WCW Ross was hired by the World Wrestling Federation (WWF), making his debut at WrestleMania IX and taking over for Gorilla Monsoon on WWF Wrestling Challenge the next weekend. Ross worked alongside Bobby Heenan on that show until Heenan was (kayfabe) thrown out of the WWF by Monsoon following the 1993 Survivor Series. Ross was originally the main voice of the WWF's Pay-Per-View events when he was first brought in, calling both WrestleMania IX and the King of the Ring with Heenan and Randy Savage in 1993, however, Vince McMahon took his place at SummerSlam 1993.

Ross was then made host of Radio WWF, which lasted a little under a year. In this role Ross was joined by co-hosts such as Johnny Polo and talked to various WWF superstars and fans. Ross and Monsoon called SummerSlam and Survivor Series at the end of 1993 and the Royal Rumble in the beginning of 1994 for Radio WWF. Ross would be fired from his duties on February 11, 1994 and became an announcer for Smokey Mountain Wrestling and the NFLs Atlanta Falcons.

When Vince McMahon was indicted in 1994, he was unable to provide commentary on Monday Night RAW. With no one to adequately fill his shoes, the WWF rehired Ross to fill in for McMahon alonside Randy Savage during the summer of 1994. When McMahon was acquitted, Ross was let go by the WWF again. However, the Federation quickly rehired him in early 1995, in time for WrestleMania XI. Relocated to the syndicated WWF programming for the majority of the next two years, Ross would join the primary announce team in the summer of 1996.

However, in September 1996, Ross turned heel for the first time in his career. Following Diesel and Razor Ramon leaving the WWF for World Championship Wrestling and their debuting there as The Outsiders Ross began to proclaim, on television, that he was still in touch with "Diesel" and "Razor" and claiming that he would be bringing them back to the WWF soon. Eventually, on the September 26 episode of Monday Night RAW, Ross delivered a now infamous worked-shoot promo during which he ran down WWF Chairman Vince McMahon (in turn, outing him as chairman and not just a commentator) and debuted his "new" Diesel and Razor, claiming that while working in the WWF "front office" he'd been the man responsible for so many people leaving the company as part of his "revenge" against the WWF for how they treated him in the past.

After this angle, Ross went on to host various WWF programs such as Superstars, Action Zone, Monday Night RAW, Shotgun Saturday Night and SmackDown!. Ross again became the main voice of the WWF beginning at the 1997 Survivor Series.

In 1998 after taking a break from Raw, due to the death of his mother and his conditon of Bells Palsy, Jim Ross returned to Raw in a storyline stating that Vince fired him because of his condition but he would not go down quietly and enlisted the services of "Dr. Death" Steve Williams as his personal "enforcer". The storyline went as far as to have Jim Ross have his own announce table in front of the official announce table labeled "JR Is War". The storyline was soon dropped and Jim Ross took his seat back as "official" commentator of Raw starting with the main event of WrestleMania XV.

In what was virtually an on-air dismissal, he was again fired from his play-by-play job on RAW by Vince and Linda McMahon on the October 10, 2005 edition of RAW and replaced by Jonathan Coachman and later Joey Styles. Very soon after his legit firing, doctors discovered an issue in JR's colon. JR has said that his firing was a "blessing in disguise" as if he had not been relieved, he would have continued on without getting the medical treatment he needed. His colon surgery was infamously spoofed by McMahon in a skit that many considered in poor taste, where McMahon pulled random objects from Ross's colon before pulling out Ross's own head ("There's your problem JR: you had your head up your ass!"), and eventually made out with the nurse.

TV shows leading up to the November 1, 2005 pay-per-view Taboo Tuesday indicated that Steve Austn would face Jonathan Coachman with Ross being "re-hired" if Austin won the match. However, Austin backed out when WWE decided he would job to Coachman, and that J.R. would not be getting his job back. Coachman (along with new allies, Goldust and Vader) faced Batista at the PPV instead with Batista winning and nothing being said about Ross.

Vince McMahon was not happy with his current announce team and slowly came to the decision to bring Ross back. While Joey Styles called the weekly Raw, Ross was brought back for Saturday Night's Main Event then the RAW matches at WrestleMania 22 in Chicago, before taking back his play-by-play job on RAW on May 8.

On the August 28 episode of RAW, Ross was met with some heat from some superstars and fans because of two references he used on the night. He described a referee as being "slower than Government Aid to New Orleans" and Umaga as "A Katrina size disaster".

Jim Ross' contract with WWE expired in October 2006. At that point, both sides hadn't signed a new contract and instead worked week to week under the terms of the expired contract. In November 2006, Jim Ross stated on his official blog that he had signed a new one year contract with WWE.

On the September 26 edition of ECW, Ross made a special appearance in his home state of Oklahoma, where he was interrupted by Matt Striker who teased Ross about Oklahoma before then getting a Singapore cane beating from both The Sandman and J.R.

[edit] Oklahoma

Oklahoma was an on-air wrestling character portrayed by former WWF head writer Ed Ferrara when Ferrara was working for rival company WCW, the purpose of which was to mock Ross, down to imitating his Bell's Palsy. The Oklahoma character was eventually retired, but not before winning the WCW Cruiserweight Championship. Ferrara and Russo later apologized to Ross for the impersonation, some years after Ross' friend Jim Cornette had spat in the face of Ferrara in a show of contempt. Ross has at times been verbal about this situation, speaking about in the "Monday Night Wars" DVD, where he said his kids cried after hearing and seeing the impersonation.

[edit] JR's Family Bar-B-Q

In 2006 Jim Ross opened his own online sauce store due to the success of his cook books. On the website at http://www.jrsbarbq.com you can buy his sauces as JR's Family Barb-B-Q gear. JR also has a blog page where he takes time out of his busy days to interact with his fans.

[edit] Matches

Ross has participated in seven wrestling matches during his time in WWE, and has a current win/loss/draw record of 4-2-1:

[edit] Other storyline confrontations

Ross has suffered multiple (kayfabe) injuries and indignities, mainly during in-ring interviews, including:

[edit] Job titles

  • WWE Executive Vice President of Business Strategies
  • Former WCW Executive Vice President of Broadcasting
  • Former WWE Executive Vice President Of Talent Relations
  • WWE Pay-Per-View Play-By-Play Announcer
  • WWE RAW Play-By-Play Announcer
  • Former WWE SmackDown! Play-By-Play Announcer
  • Former WWF LiveWire Show Host
  • Former WCW Saturday Night Play-By-Play Announcer
  • Former UWF/Mid-South Play-By-Play Announcer
  • Former XFL Play-by-Play Announcer

[edit] Trivia

  • January 24, 2005 was officially named "Jim Ross Day" in Oklahoma by Governor Brad Henry
  • Ross makes an appearance in the film about the life of Andy Kaufman, Man on the Moon.
  • Ross, despite not being a wrestler, has not been defeated by Triple H in the two matches they have had together.
  • Always wears a black cowboy hat.
  • The first JR WWF action figure was made with a defect; on JR's jacket it was supposed to say, "War Zone" but instead it said, "War Tony."
  • JR was the last voice heard on the very last WCW Monday Nitro.
  • As of August 1, 2006 Ross became a writer for the website OU Insider and the accompanying publication Sooners Illustrated. Both are local beat publications about the Oklahoma Sooners.
  • JR's entrance theme is "Boomer Sooner", the fight song of the University of Oklahoma.
  • Ross is credited for being the man to sign The Rock, Steve Austin, Mick Foley, Batista, Lita, Trish Stratus, The Dudley Boyz, Kurt Angle, The Hardy Boyz, Edge, Christian, John Cena, Brock Lesnar, Chris Jericho, Big Show, Goldberg and other successful wrestlers to WWE. He was relieved from his talent duties in 2004.
  • Ross is a member of Phi Lambda Chi Fraternity from his college days at Northeastern State University.

[edit] Awards

Wrestling Observer Newsletter

  • He is a member of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame (inducted in 1999)
  • 1988 Best Television Announcer
  • 1989 Best Television Announcer
  • 1990 Best Television Announcer
  • 1991 Best Television Announcer
  • 1992 Best Television Announcer
  • 1993 Best Television Announcer
  • 1998 Best Television Announcer
  • 1999 Best Television Announcer
  • 2000 Best Television Announcer
  • 2001 Best Television Announcer

[edit] External links

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