Road Dogg Goes In Depth On Origins Of The New Age Outlaws

During the latest episode of the Oh... You Didn't Know podcast, Road Dogg spoke about when he and Billy Gunn first initially formed the New Age Outlaws.

“You know, when I first got there (WWE) the first time and went with Jeff (Jarrett), they (Smoking Gunns) had been there. So they were kind of figured in and they were on the road. I was the new guy, so I didn’t really have a relationship with them,” he began.

“I pretty much stuck to Jeff Jarrett and X-Pac, and Hunter and Shawn (Michaels) a little bit and Kevin (Nash) and Scott (Hall). We kind of hung there because I’ve worked with them a lot. So yeah, me and Billy weren’t really friends at that time. When I came back and we started, of course then our relationship grew.”

“Billy and I didn’t always see eye to eye, and sometimes we were even tag champions when that occurred. We started to get to know each other and talk to each other more. I still wouldn’t say we hung out with each other. Two totally different human beings.”

“The first night we roomed together he woke up and I was peeing in the air conditioner. I had partied a little too much and that was the story of my life to tell you the truth for a long time. That was our first night in a hotel room together, and it was the last night in a hotel room together for a really long time. We butted heads a lot. He has it where he works out. It’s his whole life. It’s a lifestyle for him to go to the gym.”

On the original storyline with Honky Tonk Man:

“I think this was totally just an underneath storyline to get us on TV and to utilize Honky, who I think was leaving. I think he had a year deal or something. I’m not sure of that. But it was just like, ‘Okay, let’s get what we can’, and I don’t think they had anything else to do with us after that.”

“So during that run, I worked with Billy a ton on house shows. Me and Billy would work together and against each other. It didn’t matter who was the heel or who was the babyface. I know halfway through all those matches, we were literally going to (Vince) Russo and anybody who would listen to us at the time, Bruce Prichard, and say, ‘Hey, we think we could be good as a tag team.’ So we were pitching ourselves as a tag team.”

On if he thinks Billy Gunn was happy to be paired with him:

“We at this point had been tag champs and running the roads in the tag division and was kind of figured in. While it was a singles opportunity for him (when he got pushed as a singles managed by Honky Tonk Man), I think creatively he had to look at as a step backwards (being put back in a tag team, this time with Road Dogg), just because of where he’d been, so I don’t know if he was happy at the time.”

On the origin of the New Age Outlaws name:

“I was the New Age Outlaw Jesse James Armstrong. That was my name in Memphis in USWA in late ’95 when we (him and Jeff Jarrett) quit (WWE). I went there and started working. I had new clothes made that said New Age Outlaw.”

“I wrestled as the New Age Outlaw, and so when we went there I just said ‘Hey, I would love to use New Age Outlaws’, and so it stuck. I don’t know where I ripped it off from. I’m sure I didn’t come up with it by myself.”

On his relationship with Billy Gunn now:

“We’ve literally grown from then to now in our relationship, and I mean, we’ve been through everything, ups and downs and all arounds and we got sober together. I spent this whole weekend with him and our relationship couldn’t be better. I have probably three really good friends in the industry, and he’s one of them. That relationship is just ironclad now. It’s awesome.”