gold star for USAHOF

Jeff Jarrett named to the WWE HOF

Jeff Jarrett named to the WWE HOF
19 Feb
2018
Not in Hall of Fame
Hell froze over again in the WWE Hall of Fame again as it was announced that Jeff Jarrett will become the next member of their institution.

Jarrett was last seen on WWE television in 1999 when he dropped the Intercontinental Championship to Chyna and allegedly held up the company for a large payout (his contract has lapsed the day earlier). When Vince McMahon purchased WCW on that RAW he openly said that Jarrett was “G-O-N-E, Gone” and he was not expected to ever be welcomed back.

But as they say, anything can happen in the WWE!

The son of former wrestler, Jerry Jarrett, Jeff Jarrett started his career in Continental and moved to the USWA when his father formed the Memphis based promotion when the company merged with the recently acquired World Class. Jarrett would emerge as the number two face behind Jerry “The King “ Lawler and he would win multiple championships there.

The USWA would begin a working agreement with the WWF, and Jarrett would debut in late 1993 as “Double J” Jeff Jarrett, an aspiring country musician who was using the organization to propel his music career. He would languish in the mid-card throughout 1994 but would win the Intercontinental Title from Razor Ramon at the 1995 Royal Rumble and with the exception of a brief vacation of the belt due to a controversial ending in a defence to Bob Holly and a two day stint where Ramon had won the back the belt, Jarrett held the title going into the summer of that year.

At the In Your House II Pay Per View, Jarrett would pull double duty, first lip-synching his “hit”, “With My Baby Tonight” and would later lose his title (due to botched interference by the Roadie) to Shawn Michaels. Jarrett and the Roadie would leave abruptly after the show due to a pay dispute, but Jarrett would return briefly later in the year, only again to leave without notice.

Jarrett would this time go to WCW and after a period of “free agency” would join the Four Horsemen and defeat Dean Malenko for the United States Title, though would lose it to Steve McMichael. After his one year contract expired he returned to the WWF.

Jarrett was poised to be a near main event player upon his return. He delivered a worked-shoot promo on both the WWF and WCW and positioned himself as a wrestler who refused to compete against anyone other than elite competition. This led to a one off match with the Undertaker at the D-Generation X Pay Per View (he won by disqualification) and would then briefly align himself with Jim Cornette and the NWA, only for that to fall off while he would return to the Double J gimmick and a new manager (Tennessee Lee). That didn’t last either, and he would be given a new look via a hair vs hair match (losing to X-Pac) and a new attitude where he was more of a perpetually angry wrestler.

Jarrett would be paired with Owen Hart and Debra McMichael and he would win the WWF World Tag Team Title. Following Owen’s death, he would become the Intercontinental Champion, a belt he would trade back and forth with Edge and D-lo Brown, but for the most part in 1999, Jarrett would hold the championship until he lost it to Chyna at the No Mercy show. He would follow Vince Russo to WCW, who took over as the head writer there.

Jarrett would be pushed to the top at WCW but the company was in severe disarray during the time he was there. He would however win the World Heavyweight Championship there four times.

With the demise of WCW and McMahon’s lack of interest in him, he would work in various independents but most notably he would form TNA Wrestling in 2002 and would run weekly Pay Per Views until 2004 where they ran monthly ones. They would also begin a weekly program on Spike TV and while Jarrett was often criticized for booking himself at the top, there was much praise given to him for the creation of a solid second national promotion offering work to many professional wrestlers across the country.

After a decade, Jarrett would be forced out of the company he created and would again create another promotion, Global Force Wrestling though despite partnerships with New Japan and TNA itself, it was not overly successful. GFW would merge with TNA (now named Impact Wrestling) in early 2017 and the revamped promotion took the GFW banner with Jarrett as a key executive, though Impact Wrestling would cease its relationship with Jarrett and the GFW name.

Despite the fact that Jarrett had been speculated for the WWE Hall of Fame, this still has to be considered a surprise given the past history between Jarrett and McMahon. On our Notinhalloffame.com WWE list had him at #45 as of our last ranking.

We here at Notinhalloffame.com would like to congratulate Jeff Jarrett for earning this honor.
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