The Eliminators

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The Eliminators was the tag team of Perry Saturn & John Kronus in ECW.

[edit] History

While working as the manager of a nightclub in Boston, Perry Satullo met bouncer George Caiazo, who expressed an interest in becoming a wrestler. Satullo sent Caiazo to Killer Kowalski's school to train, and then offered to form a tag team with him. At this point, Satullo adopted the surname Saturn and Caiazo based his surname on the Greek equivalent of the God Saturn, Cronus. As Saturn and Cronus were their cultures' respective gods of the harvest, Satullo proposed that they be known as "The Harvesters of Sorrow". Promoter Jerry Lawler advised Satullo that the significance of the name would not be evident to many fans, so they became known as "The Eliminators".

The Eliminators wrestled their first match together at a USWA house show in 1993. They were hired at a starting salary of $40 a week (they later negotiated a 100% pay rise), and shared an apartment with four other wrestlers. The Eliminators won the USWA World Tag Team Championships on May 2, 1994 from Satullo's mentor, Eddie Gilbert, and Brian Christopher. They held the titles until June 13 when they were defeated by PG-13. Satullo later travelled to Japan with Caiazo to wrestle for the WAR.

The compactly-built and heavily-tattooed Satullo and the high-flying Caiazo caught the attention of Paul Heyman's ECW when they were brought in to job to Rick and Scott Steiner, and the Eliminators were hired by ECW in 1995. Heyman quickly abandoned plans to give them a sadism and masochism gimmick and instead booked them as an unstoppable force in the ECW tag division, giving them a manager, Jason Knight, to compensate for their weak interview skills. The Eliminators captured the ECW Tag Team titles three times between 1996 and 1997, and feuded with teams such as The Gangstas and The Pitbulls. After The Pitbulls' manager Francine cut Satullo's hair, he shaved his head in a homage to Mickey Knox, the character depicted by Woody Harrelson in Natural Born Killers (in reality, Satullo was beginning to go bald). The Eliminators were widely recognized at the time as being the best tag team in the world.

Satullo was a trainer in the ECW House of Hardcore, a professional wrestling school at which Taz and Mikey Whipwreck also taught. While Satullo was respected for his focus on fundamentals and technical wrestling, he was criticised for manhandling trainee Pablo Marquez after Marquez made a mistake.

On May 31, 1997 in Trenton, New Jersey Satullo tore his ACL when he landed on a crutch while executing a kick on Big Dick Dudley. After an intense reconstructive surgery, Satullo was given a recovery time of up to a year. He began rehabilitating after two months and returned to action in August. However, Satullo had become impatient with what he regarded as Caiazo's lack of motivation and dedication, and refused to reform the Eliminators. Paul Heyman offered to release him from his contract if he could find alternate employment, and Satullo entered into negotiations with World Championship Wrestling, which he signed with.