The Story Behind 1-2-3 Kid’s Upset Over Razor Ramon on RAW
Once upon a time, back when there was an F in the name and the “Attitude Era” was still five years away, there was a young wrestler bouncing all over the ring like no one had ever seen before. I was like, five or six years old at the time and that wrestler — the 1–2–3 Kid — was the coolest thing in the WWF. Hell, he even looked like a kid.
His legal name was (and is) Sean Waltman; you may know him now as X-Pac. Back then, though, he was the 1–2–3 Kid to everyone but folks inside the business. Remember, this was before shoot interviews and podcasts; the boys did everything possible to protect the kayfabe.
But how he became the 1–2–3 Kid is the story here. It was literally out of nowhere, like an early-90’s version of viral content.
Waltman first learned to wrestle as a teenager from Dean Malenko’s father, Boris Malenko, eventually cutting his teeth in the sport via independent promotions. He bounced — literally — around the country for several years as The Lightning Kid until finally signing with the WWF on a try-out basis in April 1993.
On Steve Austin’s popular podcast, The Steve Austin Show, Waltman revealed his tryout match came on April 5th, 1993 (the day after Wrestlemania IX) against the late Louie Spicolli. The match turned out to be a success and Waltman came aboard as “enhancement talent” — also known as a jobber.
Or so everyone thought.
The Minnesota-native made his WWF television debut against Doink The Clown on the April 26th, 1993 episode of Monday Night Raw. At this point, though, he wasn’t the 1–2–3 Kid, and he wasn’t using his Lightning Kid gimmick, either. Instead, he was introduced as The Kamikaze Kid and would go on to get trampled by Doink in a squash match.
Two weeks later on Monday Night Raw, he returned to the ring against Mr. Hughes. This time, he was billed as The Cannonball Kid and was promptly squashed again.
Now with a ‘jobber’ look to wrestling fans, Vince McMahon pulled one of the greatest surprises in the history of the promotion just a week later.
Roll the tape…
That’s an A-plus video right there…
And according to Waltman, this was a long-play devised between himself and McMahon.
“Nobody knew that I was going to do that angle with Scott [Razor Ramon],” Waltman said. “I never let on about anything.”
At the time, Razor Ramon was the heel in the WWF (and one of the best gimmicks ever created). This made the situation practically perfect! Plus, it was inside the cozy Grand Ballroom of the Manhattan Center which gave the match a real unique, intimate feel.
Wrestling as The Kid this time, Ramon played his obscurity up: he threw his toothpick at Kid, antagonized him, and just acted like the match was a joke. Then in perfect sync, The Kid hit Razor off the top rope and shocked the world with a balls-in-the-face pinfall.
1…2…3
The crowd went nuts and a new babyface was born. And like I said earlier, he actually had a babyface.
From that match on, Waltman would be known at the 1–2–3 Kid. He appeared in his first pay-per-view at Summerslam in 1993 and later on, would hold the WWF Tag-Team Championship belt twice — once with Marty Jannetty; once with Bob Holly.
After leaving the WWF for the WCW, the 1–2–3 Kid became known as X-Pac. And while some of it isn’t related to wrestling, it’s the name he’s most known by.
These days, he hosts a show on AfterBuzzTV and puts a lot of effort into raising awareness about addiction and recovery.
You can find his show here. And you can also buy a VERY cool 1–2–3 Kid shirt here.