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Former WWE head writer Vince Russo recently spoke about the late great Terry Funk and recalled his days working with the legendary performer in WWE and WCW in the late 90s.
Funk passed away at the age of 79 last week after braving through several health challenges over the past few years. As expected, his passing led to an outpouring of grief from the wrestling community, with fans and wrestlers from various companies coming forward to share their tributes for him.
Even WWE paid homage to Funk on the latest episode of SmackDown, with Cody Rhodes specifically dedicating his promo to him. Moreover, Street Profits and Brawling Brutes competed in a Terry Funk Hardcore match at the show.
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On Sportskeeda's The Wrestling Outlaws, Vince Russo mentioned how Funk continued to wrestle until very late in his life. Russo added that the late great star never shied away from putting his body at risk for the sake of entertainment.
"Yeah, the first thing that came to my mind, first of all, bro, he was almost 80, and the punishment this man put on his body. The fact that he almost made it to 80 was like..yeah. When I think about Terry Funk, the first thing I think about is this was a man's man. Like, this was a legit tough guy. Old-school, no-nonsense," said Vince Russo.
Furthermore, Russo recalled working with Terry Funk in WWE and WCW in the 90s and said he was one of the easiest people to work with creatively.
"When I was working with Terry in WWE in 1997-98, bro, the dude was doing moonsaults at 53. Never batting an eye, never an issue creatively. Then I worked with him again in WCW. Just a pleasure to work with, somebody who absolutely loved the business," said Russo. [1:53 - 3:03]
Check out the full video below:
Dutch Mantell spoke about the Terry Funk Hardcore match from WWE SmackDown
On the latest episode of Sportskeeda's Smack Talk, Dutch Mantell discussed the Terry Funky tribute match between The Street Profits and Brawling Brutes.
The former WWE manager was left underwhelmed with the tag team bout, saying it didn't feature enough hardcore spots that Terry Funk had been associated with all his career.
"As I was watching it, I said I'm daring somebody to do a hardcore move, other than the table. If they're not under the ring at the start of it, then give it away. And look how much easier it would have made the match. The hardcore is that you don't have to have a great wrestling match. Just bust some ladders or bust some chairs or whatever. Just do something," said Mantell.
Montez Ford and Angelo Dawkins eventually came out on top on SmackDown after taking down Brawling Brutes with some timely assistance from Bobby Lashley.
If you take any quotes from the first half of this article, please embed the YouTube video and credit Sportskeeda Wrestling.
