Top 5: Stevie Ray Accomplishments

Booker T’s accomplishments are pretty well know, but what about Stevie Ray? Cook brings you some events involving the other half of Harlem Heat!

Every announced induction into WWE’s Hall of Fame brings with it great debate. The funny part about it: I can guarantee that people on both sides of any WWE HOF debate look at the enterprise differently than Vince McMahon does.

Here’s why Vince picked Harlem Heat for a slot in the WWE Hall of Fame Class of 2019:

-To fill the tag team & African-American slots
-Some WCW flavor
-Hometown boys

Yes, I know Harlem Heat isn’t really from Harlem. Don’t tell Vince. He sees this tag team that checks all these boxes of things that should draw some interest. It helps that Booker already has a role with WWE as a Kickoff Show panelist & Stevie from all accounts I’ve seen seems like a decent enough dude.

People online look at things like title reigns. Match quality. Spot on the card. People online defending Harlem Heat’s induction point at their 10 WCW tag team championship reigns. Those against it say that Booker T is already in the HOF and there’s no real need to induct him again, this time with his less than deserving brother.

To me, it’s not all about title reigns & stars. When I think of Hall of Famers I think of memorable moments. Telling me that somebody held 10 tag team championships doesn’t mean much to me, especially in an era of WCW when the people in charge didn’t give a shit about tag teams. What does matter to me are two main things: the memories, and what the wrestler did to stand out.

There’s no denying that Stevie Ray spent his career in the shadow of his younger brother. What did he do that Booker T didn’t do, or what did he do better?

5. GWF North American Heavyweight Champion

Even back in the GWF days when Booker & Stevie were known as the Ebony Experience, it seemed like Booker was the most pushed of the two. That’s why it surprised me when I looked back in the archives and found out that Stevie was the only one of the two to win the GWF North American Championship. Stevie & Booker also had a tag title reign during Stevie’s run as North American champion, which ended when they left for World Championship Wrestling.

Stevie Ray can say he was never defeated for the GWF North American Championship. That’s much better than losing a title five times, right?

4. Competing in two War Games

Harlem Heat’s first major match in WCW was the 1993 edition of War Games. You might remember that one as the first match for the immortal Shockmaster. Stevie returned as part of NWO Hollywood in the 1999 edition, which is widely considered one of the biggest clusterfracks in WCW history. That’s saying something…

Stevie ended up doing the job, but the dude was right next to Hulk Hogan hitting people with a sock. That’s some big time stuff right there.

3. Filled in for Booker T as WCW World Television Champion

Booker had problems with his knees throughout his career. One of his injury hiatuses happened not long after he won the WCW World Television Championship. Fortunately, his brother was there to defend the championship on his behalf!

It’s a shame that more injured champions can’t grant family members power of attorney and the right to defend their championships. It would have saved WWE a ton of grief throughout the 2000s when people were vacating titles every other week.

2. Leader of NWO’s B-Team

Stevie’s NWO experience began when he opted for a black & white t-shirt over a beatdown from Bret Hart & the rest of NWO Hollywood. It wasn’t the greatest way to join that group, but Stevie hung around long enough to get himself a leadership position…

See, after the Black & White got back together with the Black & Red, the top guys in the NWO donned the black & red while the lower-level guys kept the black & white colors & rode around in Fords. Hulk Hogan told each of them that they were the leader of the group, and eventually they settled it with a four-way battle royal. Stevie won, so the others had to follow his example…until he left a couple of months later to get back with Booker. It was a fun little group for comic relief.

1. His stint as an announcer on WCW Thunder

Booker later went on to a commentary career with WWE, but Stevie was the first of the family to get behind the microphone. WCW paired him with Tony Schiavone & Mike Tenay on Thunder telecasts during the second half of 2000, and the results were simply magical. WCW during this time period was tolerable if you simply thought of it as comic relief, and Stevie definitely brought that to the table.

If you want some good laughs, look for some 2000 WCW Thunder on your favorite video sharing site. Hopefully now that he’s a Hall of Famer, WWE will get around to uploading some of this magic on the Network.