The Nasty Boys were a notable tag-team in the 1980s and 1990s. Consisting of Brian Knobbs and Jerry Sags, the Nasty Boys captured a number of tag-team titles across different promotions. They worked very well as heels, were decently charismatic and proficient in the tag-team genre, which is the reason why they lasted so long in the business. In addition to all those fine qualities, Knobbs and Sags were also notorious troublemakers.
Reportedly, the two were very good at getting under the skin of their co-workers and often got into backstage fights. Once upon a time, Knobbs and Sags were involved in an incident with Ken Shamrock, an accomplished mixed martial artist and then future UFC champion. The Nasty Boys knocked Shamrock out in the hotel and were planning on throwing him off the balcony until other wrestlers intervened. In another incident, Brian Knobbs got into a bar fight with Ric Flair himself.
Brian Knobbs And Jerry Saggs Were Notorious Troublemakers
This was when Ric Flair made his WWE debut, all the way back in the early 1990s. Flair made the jump after an extensive stint in NWA. By that point, he was a huge star, not quite on the level of Hulk Hogan, but Vince McMahon certainly saw him as one of the top guys in the company, despite not being a home-grown talent. In his book To Be the Man Ric Flair noted that WWE was a very different place than what he was used to.
In the promotions he previously worked, Flair had a substantial amount of control over his matches. After all, he was known for wrestling longer matches, but in WWE it was mostly up to Vince McMahon and his booker, Pat Patterson. The shorter matches frustrated Ric Flair and in this passage, the Nature Boy also took a shot at Hulk Hogan, stating that it was understandable the company kept the matches short for Hogan as nobody wanted to see Hogan wrestling a long match, terming the idea as something rotten. This was frustrating for Ric Flair, so to cool off a bit, he often went to bars straight after the shows.
Ric Flair Got Into A Fight With A Drunken Brian Knobbs
After a show in Manhattan, Flair went straight to the bar, and this time he was joined by the Nasty Boys and Vince McMahon himself. Flair also brought along a good friend, whom he identified as Robby, a top executive in a high-profile toy manufacturing company. Within no time, the group ended up drunk and the Nasty Boys started messing with Robby.
Flair himself admitted in his book that while Knobbs and Sags were two of the most “fun-loving” people on the planet, they were also good at getting under other’s skin, and once they did, they did not let up. Robby, drunk out of his mind, started cutting a wrestling promo in the bar and in response the Nasty Boys stomped on his sunglasses and ripped open his suit. This prompted Ric Flair to step in, telling Brian Knobbs to leave his friend alone. Knobbs retorted by hurling the F bomb at Flair, so the Nature Boy slapped him across the face.
After that, a fight broke out between the two. Flair said that while Knobbs fought back, he had it all under control as Knobbs was a “jellyfish”. With this going on, Sags, who had been hanging out with Vince McMahon, noticed that his partner was in a fight, and he dove at Flair from ten feet away. In contrast to Knobbs, Flair admitted that Sags was actually a pretty tough guy, as he caught the Nature Boy on the eye with a good shot. This resulted in Flair leaving the fight with Knobbs and brawling it out with Sags.
Ric Flair And Brian Knobbs Remain Friends To This Day
Flair did not expand upon the amount of destruction they wrought on the club, but it was bad enough that he was kicked out and the damage was put on his credit card. Flair expressed confusion at the idea that he was thrown out, while Knobbs was allowed to remain inside. Looking back on the whole incident, Flair did throw the first punch, so maybe that’s why.
Outside of this, Flair and the Nasty Boys were close friends. This story comes straight from Flair’s book, but the other guy involved, Brian Knobbs, confirmed that all of this went down in Manhattan. He also revealed that Flair was charged $5,000 for all the damage,a pretty decent amount back in those days. Despite this incident, Knobbs said that he, Flair, and Sags were back to having fun the next day, and no grudges were held.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
