Road Warrior Animal

Joseph Michael Laurinaitis (September 12, 1960 – September 22, 2020), better known by his ring name Road Warrior Animal (or simply Animal), was an American professional wrestler.

Along with Road Warrior Hawk, he was one half of the tag team The Road Warriors/The Legion of Doom.

Laurinaitis was born in Philadelphia on September 12, 1960, to Lithuanian parents.

He grew up in Minnesota, having to work for a living from a very early age.

He attended Irondale High School.

Because of his size and love of power lifting, Laurinaitis was an imposing figure and thus a very effective bouncer.

He worked as a bouncer at Grandma B's in the Twin Cities where he caught the eye of Eddie Sharkey, a well-known wrestling trainer.

Sharkey thought that Laurinaitis and Mike Hegstrand, Richard Rood, and Barry Darsow could make it big in professional wrestling, and trained all four of them.

Laurinaitis made his debut in November 1982, competing as The Road Warrior using a biker gimmick.

After only a few matches as a singles competitor, his career and life would change thanks to an idea by Paul Ellering.

When Paul Ellering was looking to put together a stable of heels in Georgia Championship Wrestling (GCW) called "The Legion of Doom", it was decided to put Laurinaitis together with his good friend Mike Hegstrand and change their names to "Animal" and "Hawk" respectively.

Thus, the Road Warriors were born.

They first started out as biker gimmicks; on The Road Warriors DVD, Animal said he felt like one of the Village People.

To look more intimidating, the two shaved their heads into Mohawks and started wearing studded dog collars, spiked shoulder pads, and face paint.

The look and name were taken from The Road Warrior, helping to paint the two as no-mercy monsters.

Their interview style was vicious, yet charismatic and a bit humorous.

The team was an instant hit, revolutionizing the tag-team scene with their power moves, no mercy attitudes, and innovative face paint that would spawn many future imitators in wrestling.

In Georgia, they won the NWA National Tag Team Championship four times before moving on to bigger promotions, such as the American Wrestling Association in the US and All Japan Pro Wrestling, winning more tag team titles.

Their hard hitting style, no nonsense attitude, and winning ways made the Road Warriors fan favorites.

Even when they were booked as heels, the fans refused to boo them.

They started to split their time between the AWA and the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) until finally leaving the AWA for big money contracts with the NWA and a huge push for the monster duo.

The move paid off instantly as they won the inaugural Jim Crockett Sr. Memorial Cup Tag Team Tournament and feuded with the top stars of the NWA such as The Four Horsemen and The Russian Team (which included the Road Warriors' old training buddy Barry Darsow).

During their initial run in the NWA, they helped popularize the WarGames match, the Scaffold match, and their trademark Chicago Street Fight.

In 1988, the Road Warriors engaged in a violent feud with The Powers of Pain (The Barbarian and The Warlord) the first team that could truly match the Road Warriors in power (and who were one of the most well known Road Warrior clones).

The Powers of Pain even went so far as to injure Animal's eye, (kayfabe) as his eye injury actually occurred days earlier during a match, during a weightlifting competition.

When Animal returned, he initially wore a hockey goalie mask to protect his eye.

The angle abruptly ended when the Powers of Pain left the NWA after finding out they were booked against the Road Warriors in a series of Scaffold Matches and they did not want to get hurt by falling off the scaffold.

Near the end of 1988, the Road Warriors captured the NWA World Tag Team Championship from The Midnight Express whom they mauled in short order to win the titles.

After being the "Uncrowned champions" for a long time the Road Warriors' run with the tag team titles was short-lived.

Teddy Long used a fast count to cheat the Road Warriors out of their titles.

In their last year with the NWA, the Warriors feuded mainly with The Varsity Club, The Samoan Swat Team, and The Skyscrapers before leaving the NWA in the summer of 1990, due to conflicts with Jim Herd.

The Road Warriors immediately signed with the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) in 1990 and were pushed into a feud with the most famous of all "Road Warrior Clones", Demolition, a group which included their old training partner Barry Darsow.

Due to the ailing health of one of Demolition (Ax) he was replaced by Crush, but the magic of the original Demolition was gone and the feud did not live up to the high hopes of the fans.

Just over a year after signing with the WWF, the Legion of Doom won the WWF Tag Team Championship and held it for over five months.

When they lost the titles, they briefly left the WWF, only to return with longtime manager Paul Ellering by their side, as well as a wooden ventriloquist dummy called "Rocco".

Both members of the L.O.D. thought the Rocco gimmick was stupid, and it led to Hegstrand walking out of the WWF immediately following SummerSlam 1992, leaving Laurinaitis on his own for the first time in nine years.

Animal went ahead and finished his contractual obligations with the WWF, as a singles wrestler and occasionally teaming with former rival Crush, formerly of Demolition.

During a handicap match in Japan against the Beverly Brothers in September 1992, Laurinaitis legitimately injured his back from a botched double suplex and had to take a lengthy hiatus.

He headlined multiple pay-per-view events for the WWF and WCW, competing for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship at 2001's Sin.

Animal was inducted with Hawk and their manager Paul Ellering into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2011.