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WWE REPORTS BRIAN 'CRUSH' ADAMS PASSES AWAY; CAREER RETROSPECTIVE ON FORMER WCW AND WWF TAG CHAMPION

World Wrestling Entertainment's website posted this afternoon that former WWF and WCW star Brian "Crush" Adams, 43 years old, has passed away and was discovered today in his home. We don't have any further information beyond WWE's announcement.

Adams, a Hawaiian native, originally broke in the Pacific Northwest territory run by Don Owens using the ring name American Ninja.  I've heard he was at least partially trained by New Japan but I'm not 100% on that.  Adams was brought into WWF to be a third member of the Demolition team (already WWF Tag Team champions at the time) under the name of Crush.  At the time, Bill Eadie was going to be phased into a manager type role but as it turned out left the company.  The trio did do some six man tags against the Legion of Doom and Ultimate Warrior.  He and Smash later dropped the belts to the Hart Foundation and Adams departed the company, returning to the Pacific Northwest for about a year.

Adams was brought back as a babyface by WWF in 1992.  Debuting with blonde hair during a cartoonish era of WWF superhero type characters, he used a double hand head vice squeeze as his finisher, which the company got over by running silly vignettes of him as a kid "crushing things" with his hands.  I remember him working bouts on early Monday Night Raws against Shawn Michaels (then Intercontinental champion) and Repo Man, among others.  He was a decent mid-card babyface but never really connected in an over the top way with the audience.  He was never considered an amazing worker but a strong performer like Michaels could get a good match out of him.

Adams' most memorable feud during that time period was against the evil version of Doink the Clown (Matt Borne), which started when Doink would pop up in the crowd during Adams' matches mocking him.  This led to an angle where Adams confronted him to warn him to stop, but Doink (doing evil pranks) attacked Adams with a fake arm he had in a sling, beating him down.  This led to a not-so-memorable Wrestlemania IX match with a memorable finish, which saw the interference of a second, identical Doink (Steve Keirn) coming from under the ring.

After several months off for a scripted injury suffered at the hands of then-WWF champion Yokozuna, WWF turned Adams heel.  They did an angle where Adams, on the telephone to discuss his return, realized Randy Savage was on the line with Vince McMahon and hung up.  This led to Adams accusing Savage of abandoning him while he was out hurt, turning heel and signing with Mr. Fuji as a manager, aligning himself with Yokozuna.  The irony was that Savage was the one who rescued him from Yokozuna during the original angle. 

Adams and Savage had a pretty heated feud for that era of the company, which tried not to be too violent as they were in the pre-Vince McMahon trial era where they were keeping the company as clean as possible in presentation.  Still, there was at least one episode where Crush "attacked a fan" at ringside, who turned out to be future ECW World champion Steve Corino and another where Crush and Savage brawled all over the backstage area in different segments, leading to them fighting in the street outside the building by the end of the show.  The two had a Falls Count Anywhere match at Wrestlemania X which, to date, was Savage's final appearance at a Wrestlemania event.  Adams and Savage remained close friends for many years and Adams worked with Savage when he released a hip hop CD, acting as Savage's bodyguard for the promotional tour.

In March 1995, Adams was arrested on steroid charges as well as possession of illegal weapons in his native Hawaii.  WWF turned the arrest into an angle, bringing him back as part of the Nation of Domination, playing up Crush as something of a convict.  When he left the Nation, he formed his own faction with The Harris Brothers and Brian Lee, known collectively as the motorcycle riding Disciples of Apocalypse.

Adams left WWF in late 1997 for World Championship Wrestling, becoming a member of the NWO under his real name. Upon his WWF departure, he never used the Crush ring name again. He worked an undercard role as part of the NWO heel faction but was never a pushed star or headliner for WCW during that era.  He was later slated to play the role of the Kiss Demon character, but only made one appearance (debuting following a live Kiss performance) before Dale Torborg took over the role, which Torborg still uses to this day during occasional appearances.  Adams and Bryan Clark formed a team during the Vince Russo era of WCW under the name Kronik, becoming WCW Tag Team champions during a pretty forgettable era of that company's dying days.

Adams and Clark weren't initially picked up by WWE following its purchase of WCW, but were brought in and given Stevie Richards as a mouthpiece.  The team feuded with Undertaker and Kane, but didn't get over and were generally considered to have had poor matches during the short tenure.  Clark ended up released while Adams was sent to WWE developmental.  He worked the remainder of his WWE tenure helping out with then-developmental territory Heartland Wrestling in Ohio before being released.

Adams and Clark reprised the Kronik team in both All Japan Pro Wrestling and for Andrew McManus' World Wrestling All-Stars promotions.  They won the AJPW Unified Tag Team titles, but abandoned them when Adams announced he was leaving wrestling to pursue a professional boxing career.  Adams never debuted as he was injured while training for his debut fight, which would have seen Randy Savage accompany him to the ring.