What is Hardcore!?!? Hardcore is a form of Wrestling involving Foreign Objects like Chairs,Tables Dumbsters,Fire Etc. In my opinion .Hard-core is a term meaning No Rules but there is other matches like Extreme Rules Matches,Death Matches,Hell in a Cell just to name a few matches under Hardcore. The man who I consider one of the Kings under this category of Wrestling is Terry Funk! He is an inspiration to younger talent including Tazz,Raven, Mick Foley,Sandman just to name a few.
Terry Funk didn't become a Hardcore Wrestler till 1994 in his Career. In 1994, after a special appearance against Tully Blanchard at Slamboree 1994, Funk promised to help the fledgling Eastern Championship Wrestling (later renamed Extreme Championship Wrestling or ECW) by lending his talent and notoriety to the promotion, which had just split from the NWA. Funk maintained a regular schedule of wrestling for ECW in its early days while also competing in Japan. He had many feuds and wrestled programs with wrestlers such as Cactus Jack, "The Franchise" Shane Douglas, The Sandman, Sabu, and Terry's own protege, Tommy Dreamer.
On August 20, 1995, IWA Japan held a King of the Death Match tournament in Kawasaki, Japan. In this tournament, Funk endured three extreme-style matches involving ladders, thumbtacks, and barbed wire. In the final match of the tournament, he lost to Mick Foley (as Cactus Jack), in an exploding ring, C4 explosive, barbed wire match.
Funk further elevated ECW by headlining their first pay-per-view, Barely Legal on April 13, 1997, winning the ECW Championship from Raven. Earlier in the night, he defeated The Sandman and Stevie Richards in a Triple Threat match, thus earning him the match with Raven. He was later defeated for the title by Sabu in a barbed wire match at Born to Be Wired, in which the ropes of the ring were taken down and replaced with barbed wire. Both men had to be cut out of the wires at the end of the match. Sabu had his biceps visibly torn open by the barbed wire - as a result, the wound was taped up and the match continued. In September of that same year, a show was held in Funk's hometown of Amarillo. It was called "WrestleFest - 50 Years of Funk" and was both his own show and a celebration of the careers of Terry, his father, and his brother. Terry lost to then WWF Champion Bret Hart in the main event. However, before the match, ECW owner Paul Heyman presented Terry with a belt, paid for through a collection taken up by wrestlers on the ECW roster, that declared him the Lifetime ECW World Heavyweight Champion. Funk's retirement lasted just three months before he started taking independent bookings again. Soon after, he was signed by the WWF and debuted as Chainsaw Charlie. Funk had a match with Foley on Raw, and the New Age Outlaws came and threw both in a dumpster, and pushed them off of the stage. This led to a match between The Outlaws and Funk/Foley at WrestleMania XIV, for the WWF Tag Team Championship in a Dumpster match when Funk/Foley beat the New Age Outlaws. The title was held up and put on the line in a Steel Cage match the next night on Raw due to a technicality: the wrong dumpsters had been used in the match. The Outlaws regained the title. He then had a Falls Count Anywhere match with Foley on Raw in 1998, where Foley defeated him.
Terry Funk was Inducted Into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2009. Fun Fact: Terry Funk isn't from Texas originally he was born in Indiana.
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