5 WCW Wrestlers Roddy Piper Loved (& 5 That He Hated)

One of the major WCW signings of the Monday Night Wars was Rowdy Roddy Piper, one of the iconic heels of 1980s WWE. By the mid-1990s, Piper had become a part-timer and even became WWE’s on-screen authority figure for a hot minute before making his shocking debut for WCW at Halloween Havoc in 1996 and immediately entering a feud with his old nemesis Hollywood Hogan.

WCW had a notoriety for being saturated with superstars and lots of egos, so there was a lot of talent that Roddy Piper had beef with who came through the company, as well as folks that Piper was great friends with.

10 Loved: Bret Hart

Based on everything known about the two wrestlers, it’d be natural to assume that Rowdy Roddy Piper and Bret “The Hitman” Hart probably had some long-standing professional beef. But that couldn’t be farther from the truth -- despite his gimmick being “angry Scottish guy,” Roddy Piper was a Canadian by birth, and the only thing Bret Hart loves as much as pro wrestling and hockey is Canada, so the pair were actually quite close. Closer than you’d think even, as Piper revealed in his 2002 book Piper’s Pit that the pair were second cousins, a fact Hart later confirmed.

9 Hated: Jake Roberts

It’s a little known fact, but Jake “The Snake” Roberts spent a year wrestling for WCW, where he had a notable feud with Sting. As fans know, Roberts regularly incorporates a real live snake in his pro wrestling antics, and it turned out Piper had a legitimate fear of snakes. One time backstage, Roberts tried to sneak up on Piper while holding a snake, and Piper not only anticipated it, but pulled a gun on Roberts.

8 Loved: Chris Jericho

Chris Jericho became a megastar in WWE, but he really began to generate a buzz in the North American wrestling scene thanks to his tremendous midcard heel work in the Cruiserweight division of WCW, where he first met Roddy Piper.

Over the years, the pair not only interacted in the ring thanks to a feud that culminated at WrestleMania XXV, but also held a friendship and mutual respect for one another. The pair maintained this relationship by regularly texting in the years before Piper’s death.

7 Hated: Vince Russo

Of course Roddy Piper had beef with noted Attitude Era writer, former WCW World Champion, and promotion ruiner Vince Russo. What wrestler wouldn’t? You might think the beef had to do with Russo’s role in Owen Hart’s death, which Piper conducted an infamous worked shoot about in TNA, but their feud actually goes back to a perceived slight in 1999 when Russo and his co-writer Ed Ferrara arrived at WCW. According to Vince Russo himself, Piper was offended that Ferrara greeted Piper before Russo did, assuming that Russo deliberately avoided him as some kind of power move.

6 Loved: Diamond Dallas Page

One of few the top guys in WCW who wasn’t someone Vince McMahon made famous, Diamond Dallas Page struck a friendship with "Rowdy" Roddy Piper during their time in World Championship Wrestling. As the top babyfaces during the nWo era, the two would team up regularly. DDP told an amusing story about convincing Piper to follow him into the crowd during his signature post-match exit. Having been legitimately stabbed by a fan in the past, Piper was reluctant but played along, and the intensity of fighting through the crowd prompted Piper to ask Page if he seriously did this every time.

5 Hated: Kevin Nash

Roddy Piper’s infamous beef with Kevin Nash ended up spanning decades. In 1997, Piper and Ric Flair took on Nash and Scott Hall on WCW Monday Nitro, but Piper ended up going off-script, causing the match to go way off the rails. Backstage, Nash heard Piper trashing him, so Nash literally kicked down a door to confront Piper. Both parties differ on their stories about how the ensuing altercation went down, but the feud flared up in 2014 after Piper discussed it on his podcast and Nash took to Twitter to address the situation.

4 Loved: Randy Savage

They only had two televised singles matches ever, but "Macho Man" Randy Savage and "Rowdy" Roddy Piper were co-workers in both 1980s WWF and 1990s WCW, and had a bit of a friendship going. Piper had a great respect for Savage’s abilities and, according to Eric Bischoff, the two were excited to work with one another when Piper came to WCW.

After Savage’s untimely death, Roddy Piper even took it upon himself to dispel the rumors surrounding Savage being persona non-grata with Vince McMahon and WWE.

3 Hated: Steve Austin

Roddy Piper’s beef with the former “Stunning” Steve Austin is rather strange. Basically, Piper had former MadTV cast member (and WCW participant) Will Sasso on his podcast, Piper’s Pit, during which Sasso did impressions of Austin and the pair made fun of Stone Cold. Austin -- whose podcast was on the same network as Piper’s -- reportedly took offense to this. In the fallout, the episode was taken down and Piper not only got dropped from the podcast network but also lost his WWE Legends contract. He very publicly blamed Austin for the whole ordeal.

2 Loved: Ric Flair

Even more than Bret Hart, it’s legitimately shocking that Roddy Piper was great friends with Ric Flair, but they totally were, going back to the early 1980s with matches for the National Wrestling Alliance and Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling. They would further cross paths in WWF and WCW, and ended up remaining friends for years after, appearing on Celebrity Wife Swap together and even winning the WWE World Tag Team titles alongside one another in 2006. Flair even had the honor of inducting Piper into the WWE Hall of Fame!

1 Hated: Hulk Hogan

The opposite of Ric Flair is Hulk Hogan, someone who it’s very easy to believe Roddy Piper would hate in real life. The only dudes that Hogan’s actually friends with were, like, The Nasty Boys and Brutus Beefcake, and even Beefcake is a bit iffy. Piper and Hogan may have had a classic feud back in 1980s WWF, but the two actually had tension between the two for professional reasons, partly because of Hogan’s refusal to lose clean to most wrestlers. That tension would carry on to their rivalry in WCW, where their real life tension was actually incorporated in the feud.

Next: TNA: The 10 Most Absurd Signings Of The Hulk Hogan Era