Mick Foley has named the greatest match of his legendary career.
Speaking on the INSIGHT with Chris Van Vliet podcast, WWE Hall of Famer Mick Foley shared that the No Holds Barred, Falls Count Anywhere Match against Randy Orton at Backlash 2004 was his favorite match of his career.
Mick Foley said that Randy Orton knocked it out of the park that night and that when Orton came to his room, he planned out in detail about what he was going to do in a match, only for the second time in his career.
“My favorite match was Backlash against Randy Orton. Crazy thing is, if he has a new favorite, I don’t want to know about it. He’s technically, probably had better matches. But the idea of being in that spot, people ask me, you will just say you made somebody. No one person makes anybody. It takes a lot of people, a lot of factors, and even if the bases were loaded for Randy, it’s still up to him to knock it out of the park.
“And he did, and one of the wisest decisions I ever made, much wiser than working at the Huntsville auto show the day before my street fight with Triple H, much wiser than catching a red eye and getting into New York City at 6 am for the Royal Rumble. I did a lot of stupid things that way, as far as travel, I actually canceled a talk at a community college so that I could come in the night before, as opposed to the day of the show. I like people to be able to read between the lines, rather than just spill the [beans].
Foley says he planned out a match for only the second time in his career
“But in this case, I think it’s beneficial to know Randy came up to my room, and for only the second time my entire career, I had an A through Z plan, and I’ll never forget, he was just taking it all in. I’m getting the tingles here, because you’re talking about a moment that changed his career, and I don’t know if we could have had that type of match if I’d gone through that speaking engagement.
“And the other key factor is that Michael Hayes heard some of the things we want to do. He goes, ‘You’re going to need more time.’ So instead of rushing through, we had time to let things breathe. And it just felt really good.”
Mick Foley also claimed that fans looked at Randy Orton like a completely different person after the match, but said that he wasn’t a fan of WWE turning Orton face a few weeks after the match.
“Even though I had many trials and tribulations getting back home. My luggage was delayed for four hours. I did throw up in the parking lot of Tim Hortons in Edmonton, because my brain had jogged a little bit, but I made it back in time for Raw the next night, and it was like the fans looked at him like he was a completely different guy. And it really made me feel good. Now, they turned him babyface in two weeks, which I thought was a big mistake, but it was hard not to like somebody who’d been through that type of ordeal.”
Mick Foley Also Revealed The Other Matches He Planned A-Z
Speaking further, Mick Foley revealed that the Hardcore Match against Triple H in May 1999 was the other match he had planned from A to Z. However, he remembered he also did the same in a match against Wing Kanemura at a Japanese event in May 1996.
“The street fight with Triple H. So when two of my five favorites are on that list, maybe I should have done more that way. The only other one that was A to Z was when I got to Japan. I only worked two FMW shows. A lot of people think I worked FMW. I actually worked IWA and I did two anniversary shows for FMW.
“So. It was Wing Kanemura, and he was a good worker, and he did a lot of crazy things, and he had like five notebook pages written out in English. And I’m a guy who likes to have a lot of say, because, it’s not a matter of pride, it’s, I think I have something to offer. And then when I looked at this thing, I just, I like it. If you watch that match with Wing Kanemura, I had zero input in the creativity, but then it’s up to you as a performer, to pull everything off.”
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