"I’m sorry" - Top WWE personnel apologizes to The Undertaker for "awful" matches against ex-star
WWE Executive Producer Bruce Prichard has apologized to The Undertaker for putting him in "really bad" matches with former star Heidenreich.
Heidenreich's WWE career began in 2003 and lasted just three years, and one of his first high-profile feuds came against The Phenom. He first faced the legend at Survivor Series in 2004 and they went on to have a few more matches on SmackDown, before a final, casket match at Royal Rumble in 2005.
While speaking on his Something to Wrestle with podcast, Bruce Prichard said the singles matches between The Undertaker and Heidenreich at live events were very poor.
"I’m sorry man. I gotta take exception [to The Undertaker and Heidenreich house show matches being referred to as “really bad”]. That’s an example of being completely wrong. Those matches stunk to high heaven. They weren’t ‘really bad’, they were awful. They were worse than awful. They were — I mean, if you saw that, it would take you weeks to get that stink out of your clothes. I would publicly like to say to The Undertaker, I’m sorry," said Prichard. (H/T Post Wrestling)
Later that year, Heidenreich joined hands with Road Warrior Animal to form a new version of Legion of Doom, but that was short-lived. The duo, though, did win the WWE Tag Team titles when they defeated MNM at The Great American Bash in 2005.
Heidenreich and The Undertaker's disastrous match at a WWE live event
Undertaker & Heidenreich have a had violent 4 month feud and now meet in a Casket Match. Tazz--as always--sells the seriousness #wwe05 https://t.co/OHjoXTZkHP
Heidenreich revealed a few years ago how the ring rope broke at a live event in Italy, and how he and The Undertaker handled it.
"The match is gone, in your mind, of what you're going to do. I was frozen. He said, 'Kick my ass, beat the hell out of me, it's easy now.' That was Defcon 50-whatever, to start the match nervous and have the rope break. We modified everything and had the match," said Heidenreich.
The Phenom defeated Heidenreich in their final clash at Royal Rumble after landing a Tombstone Piledriver on him.