“And I had just taken out two of this Irish family’s members.” I’m in a semicircle with roughly twenty Irishmen taking off their jackets.
Celebrity American wrestler Trevor Murdoch has shared the aftermath of a brawl he got into with twenty “Irishmen” on a wild night in Belfast.
Together with other wrestling heavyweights Lance Cade, Randy Orton, and Arn Anderson, the former NWA (National Wrestling Alliance) Worlds Heavyweight Champion was in Ireland for a European tour.
The Viper, also known as Randy Orton, was the WWE Champion in 2007 when he ran afoul of some obstinate Irish fans.
In a WrestlingNewsCo interview with Steve Fall, Murdoch described how the two got into a fight with an Irish wedding party that was lodging at the same hotel.
Murdoch intervened after one of the wedding party members was ejected by security for attempting to engage in physical combat with Orton. The party member had sneaked back in to assault The Viper.
“And this guy, coming out of nowhere, was charging Randy like he was going to tackle him,” Trevor said.
“Randy saw Trevor emerge from the side about five seconds earlier and yelled, ‘Trevor!'”
Right now, I’m wasted. I am completely submerged in the booze. And as I turn around and see this man, I simply hook him right away.
“This other gentleman approached me, removing his jacket, and I gave him a straight punch to the face.”
Only then did he understand the men were members of a sizable Irish wedding party that had congregated in the lobby.
“And I had already taken out two of this Irish family’s members. About twenty Irishmen are pulling off their jackets and getting ready to beat the s**t out of me when I find myself in a half circle.
“Lance, my tag team partner, transforms into an NFL linebacker and begins jogging as this is going on. He stoops to knock a hole straight through this half-moon of guys, lowering his head and shoulder as he approaches from behind.
These people are after us as we hurry towards the lift when he reaches through the hole and grabs me. The lift doors close at the last second, much as in a movie.
Upon returning to their room, they saw the lights of the police and ambulances approaching the hotel from the other side of the street.
And we thought, “Surely, that’s not what we want.” And after fifteen minutes, we receive a call informing us that we are being arrested and that we should come downstairs.
He said, “I suppose the Irish police follow the protocol of apprehending all parties involved in a fight before investigating what transpired next.”
“After we were detained, they had to bring a paddy waggon for each of us since Lance and I were too huge to fit in it side by side.
“They picked up Lance, myself, and the security man at the hotel, took us to the police station, and then they walked the security guard back to the cell.
“After leading Lance and I into a different room, the police began apologising to us for having to bring us in.
Since they were all fans, they began bringing us coffee and posing for pictures with us.
We told them to take as many shots as they needed, but we had to get on a plane since we were going home. We scrambled back to the hotel, and while the lads board the bus, we hurried to our rooms, packing as much as we could into our suitcases to barely make the flight.
Since they had been detained abroad, they began to worry on the plane about how promoter Vince McMahon would respond when they returned.
“We went to Vince and told him everything that had happened. After a ten-second interval, he took off his spectacles and turned to face us.
“He told me what you guys did and why you did it, and he told me it’s good for the fans to get their asses kicked every once in a while, so don’t worry about it, guys,” the man said.
However, I was fired after about a year and a half, and two months later, I received a call from WWE legal and they’re saying I had to go to Ireland to take care of this situation.
“I’m like, ‘what situation’, as I had totally forgot about it.”
They explained that it was in relation to the fight, but he insisted he was not going back to Ireland.
“I said I’m really not worried about it, and they said, ‘well, that’s fine but it’ll mess up your passport’.
“I was going back and forth to Japan at the time and that would have killed all of that so now I’m freaking out.
“It truly would have affected my career. And it really hurt my feelings, to be absolutely honest with yo, because when I was with WWE I did everything they asked me for, every single thing.
“But they were willing to just leave me hanging to dry out there.
He eventually travelled back to Ireland where he spent “maybe 15 minutes at the police station”.
“They had CCTV and it had a 15 second delay so all they see is me standing there and the next shot the guy is down. They literally had no evidence. They had no footage of me making contact with anybody so they let it go.
“I got a free plane ride to Belfast, Ireland for about 15 minutes of conversation and then Lance and I went and drank the rest of the evening and had a good time.
“And it was all over with, that was it.”
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