This is a script for a video on my YouTube channel. The list of sources is below and the video can be found here: https://youtu.be/z4MPKA29OZQ
At In Your House 5 on December 17th 1995, one of the stranger WWE debuts in history occurred. As you can imagine, that covers a lot of ground. We start at ringside where Savio Vega and Santa Clause are throwing out presents to children in the crowd. Already in the ring though is the Million Dollar Man Ted Dibiase, who goes on a rant about Christmas, and how anybody can be bought. When DiBiase specifically mentions Savio, he jumps into the ring bringing Santa with him. Ted gets Savio to tell us all that he believes in Santa, which turns out to be St. Nick’s que to attack Savio, ending with Santa and DiBiase putting the boots to him. The point of this was apparently to prove that everybody has a price for the Million Dollar Man.
If you were to go to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter from that week expecting a trashing of this segment as I was, you might be in for a surprise, a Christmas miracle even. In the Observer, Dave Meltzer actually praised the segment largely because quote “You could see this coming a mile away but for some reason I always enjoy Santa Claus angles.” Further proof that this mans opinions cannot be trusted.
On Raw the next night, Ted Dibiase would be interviewed by Brother Love. He would explain that the man who attacked Savio Vega wasn’t actually Santa, but Xanta Klaus. DiBiase claims that Xanta was from the South pole, and that instead of giving presents, he quote “takes everything he can get his hands on”, and that he is officially part of the Million Dollar Corporation, one of the less popular groups in WWE history even by mid-90’s standards. On the very same night, WWE would tape three more episodes of Raw including the January 15th ‘96 airing show, which would feature another new member to DiBiase’s group, Steve Austin making his WWE debut as the Ringmaster. The fact that DiBiase announced Xanta’s membership implies that there were more plans for him, which is an ambitious thought just one week before Christmas. Ted even tells us that Xanta “would claim victory after victory” over the other superstars, but that would mean he would have to have more than one match.
On the December 23rd edition of Superstars, which was taped on December 19th, days after the pay per view appearance. Xanta came through the curtain with a unique look you could say. Gone was the red and white, in favour of black and red jocks to further announce his heeldom. His Heeldom? His heelness? I dunno… On the back of his new costume was the name ‘Xanta Klaus’, spelled with an X, for some reason. If you know why please let me know in the comments because I couldn’t find anything. At these tapings Xanta would compete and be victorious in a one and a half minute long match with Scott Taylor, who was enhancement talent at the time, but would go on to become known as Scotty 2 Hotty. Xanta would win the almost entirely one sided match with a very high angle suplex, followed by a Camel Clutch for the submission victory. This would be Xanta’s only televised match, and he would not appear again on screen, not in this persona at least. He also wouldn’t appear on any of the Christmas to New Year house shows WWE held, with Savio Vega wrestling Triple H on those, not even a Million Dollar Corporation member.
On the episode of Ted DiBiase’s excellently titled Everybody’s got a Pod podcast that was released on December 22nd 2023, Ted and his co-host Marcus D’Angelo cover In Your House 5. When speaking about Xanta turning on Savio, Ted doesn’t offer much insight beyond saying “it wasn’t the greatest thing that the Million Dollar Man was involved with”, which is a bold claim given that he once hired an evil twin referee to end Hulk Hogan’s four year WWE title reign at The Main Event. Ted elaborates saying “I was just rolling my eyes. Not with the guys, but with the guy who was going to be producing that segment. I said whose Idea was this anyway and they would say well, Vince. And I said okay, you’re not gonna argue with the boss.”
But who was the man behind the white wig and beard as WWE’s bad Santa? He was played by a wrestler who had previously wrestled for WWE using his real name, John Rechner. Rechner had appeared a few years earlier on episodes of Superstars, in enhancement matches against the likes of Marty Jannetty, Papa Shango and the Nasty Boys. More recently than that he had been working in Jim Cornette’s promotion, Smokey Mountain Wrestling, there using the name Boo Bradley. Around the mid-90’s many talents came through SMW and made it onto WWE television. Most famously Kane who wrestled for Cornette as Unabomb, but other future WWE stars also such as Al Snow, Bob Holly, D’Lo Brown and the Headbangers among others. So many wrestlers came through SMW and appeared in WWE that according to the Observer wrestlers had to be told that Cornette was not involved in booking for WWE. He would be later, more notably in the attitude era where he would clash with Vince Russo, but not yet while SMW was still going. Before I move on from Smokey Mountain Wrestling, I have to show you this rather weird storyline, and take another chance to show you how much Jim Cornette loves his old school serious wrasslin. Boo was a simple character to put it delicately, and he was being bribed for his services by Sunny to help Chris Candido. At some point Candido apparently killed the cat in the ring the way Earthquake killed Damian Cactus Jack and Damian would hold a funeral for the cat on television, apparently burying it in a field somewhere. Aye, Jim Cornette’s booking there.
Speaking in an interview in 2002, Rechner noted that he got the gig through working for Jim Cornette in Smokey Mountain Wrestling. He spent a year there and described it as the “biggest turning point of his career”, because it “developed him into a complete worker.” According to Rechner, he was working at a gas station when he got a call from Bruce Prichard who had a gimmick in mind for him and wanted a meeting. He said Bruce told him “We’re gonna sign you for two years, we’re gonna give you this Christmas-like gimmick. It might last anywhere from three days (which it did) to three months. Maybe we’ll blow you off at Wrestlemania, then we’ll keep you under contract and keep you under a gimmick.” On the Xanta gimmick he says “They give me three dates, I see the outfit.” “Then three days before Christmas I get a phone call from JJ Dillon, ah well the character’s not working blah blah blah.” JJ goes on to tell John that they will keep him under contract, and he can work indies, but only if he uses the Xanta gimmick, which basically puts him out of work since nobody was going to want to book a Christmas character through the rest of the year. Because there was no guarantee of any work, Rechner requested and was granted his release with no ill feelings on either side.
So what happened after his very brief WWE stint? Where else might you have seen Xanta Klaus for the rest of the year? Throughout 1996 John Rechner would wrestle using one of his earliest gimmicks, Abbudah Singh. It was in fact, a very different time. According to Rechner speaking in 2002, “Larry Sharpe didn’t know what to do with me, but I learned how to breathe fire in college.” Sharpe then came up with the rest of the gimmick from there. Larry Sharpe was Rechners trainer at The Monster Factory, the same school that graduated wrestlers like The Big Show and Bam Bam Bigelow. John also describes the outfit he wore as “like Sabu’s outfit before Sabu.” Rechner would get a break in his career by the end of ‘96, ironically in December, where he would adopt a new name and persona. John Rechner would join ECW and become known as the hardcore chair swinging freak, Balls Mahoney.
Balls would debut in ECW on December 7th 1996 at Holiday Hell, where he would be victorious against Devon Storm, the wrestler later known in WCW as Crowbar. He would first appear on ECW television on the Christmas Eve episode, taking part in a seventeen man battle royal the would be won by Sabu. From here Balls Mahoney would become a mainstay in ECW until the bitter end, wrestling on 89 of ECW’s 94 shows in 1997. In ECW Balls would become a three time tag team champion, once with Masato Tanaka, twice with Little Spike Dudley, but never with his regular tag team partner, Axl Rotten. His theme song, a cover of Big Balls by AC/DC would always get the crowd hyped up as they sang along loudly.
The next time John Rechner would appear on WWE television would be on the June 6th 2005 episode of Raw. As Balls Mahoney, he would disrupt the show along with a crew of ECW originals in the build up to the ECW One Night Stand pay per view. On the night Balls wouldn’t have a match, but he and Axl Rotten would with many others run in during the main event of the show, attacking the Blue World Order. Balls and Axel would receive tryout matches with WWE at Raw tapings in July 2005, wrestling two dark matches but ultimately not being hired.
Balls would be brought back to WWE in 2006 for the build up to not just One Night Stand 2006, but the launch of ECW on Scifi. He would have his first televised WWE match since appearing as Xanta Klaus on the one off special show WWE vs ECW Head to Head, in a battle royal consisting of members of the Raw, Smackdown and ECW rosters. This match would be won by Raw’s Big Show, who would turn on his brand, relieving that he had joined ECW, a massive red flag for any fans of the ECW originals. Balls would have a near two year run with WWE, being released in April 2008, by way of the words every WWE wrestler dreaded seeing on the home page of WWE.com.
Had Balls not joined ECW in the following year, who knows if Xanta Klaus could have made an annual appearance, much like the Boogeyman still does at Halloween. Xanta Klaus went on to a very memorable rest of his career. Wrestling not just for WWE, but also for TNA, and all over the indie scene after ECW folded. While Xanta might have been short lived and forgettable, Balls Mahoney was certainly not.
Sources:
Wrestling Observer December 26th 1995 - In Your House 5 review: https://members.f4wonline.com/wrestling-observer-newsletter/dec-26-1995-observer-newsletter-madusa-throws-belt-trash-dan-severn/
PW Torch December 23rd 1995 - In Your House 5 review: https://members.pwtorch.com/torchbackissues95/torch366/Torch366.shtml
DiBiase Pod Episode 33: https://open.spotify.com/episode/661tbD7a4emr3o4grsZ6C3
Superstars December 23rd 1995 - Xanta vs Scott Taylor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVwQd3k4Oos (1:41:42)
ECW Holiday Hell 1996: https://archive.org/details/ecw-dec-17th-1996
ECW December 24th 1996 - TV debut: https://www.cagematch.net/?id=1&nr=47377
WWE release: https://www.wwe.com/inside/news/ballsmahoneyreleased Balls shoot interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8m5TkS6az4
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