Road Warrior Animal

This article is about the professional wrestler, for otheruses see Road warrior

Joseph (Joe) Laurinaitis (born January 26, 1960) better known by his ring name of The Road Warrior or Road Warrior Animal, is an American professional wrestler.

WWE agent and former professional wrestler John Laurinaitis (Johnny Ace) and former wrestler of the tag team The Wrecking Crew Marcus Laurinaitis (Terminator / Fury) are his brothers..

Joseph's son, James Laurinaitis, plays linebacker for The Ohio State University's football team.[1] In fact Sports Illustrated made a joke about borrowing his father's shoulder pads.

For many years he teamed with Road Warrior Hawk. Together they were a muscular tag team called The Road Warriors. The Road Warriors burst onto the wrestling scene in 1983 wearing mohawks, dog collars, spiked shoulder pads, and face paint. Their interview style was vicious, yet charismatic and a bit humorous.

The Road Warriors wrestled across the globe, capturing the All-Japan International Tag Team titles, as well as every American version of the World Tag Team Championship (WWF, NWA and AWA).

Though the Road Warriors never officially broke up, Animal started making an increasing number of solo appearances in the late 1990s and early 2000s as Hawk struggled with drug and alcohol addiction. He became a high-profile player in the dying days of World Championship Wrestling, where his brother John had a powerful behind-the-scenes role.

Droz made his WWF debut on Monday Night RAW as an associate of the tag team. Dubbed "Puke", he was the unofficial third member of the group. He was involved in a storyline involving L.O.D. member Hawk's alcoholism. In this storyline, Hawk was seen by his partner Animal as unfit to wrestle and Droz was tapped to take Hawk's place in the tag team. The storyline ended with accusations that Droz had been the "enabler" of Hawk's problems and had dosed the L.O.D. member to take his place in the team. During this segment, Hawk infamously was shown to have fallen off the Titan Tron. It was edgy and controversial segments like this that pushed the envelope of good taste that were a hallmark of the WWF's "Attitude" era.

Animal became a born-again Christian in 2003 and appeared at a number of Christian wrestling events run by Ted DiBiase and Nikita Koloff.

Road Warrior Animal and a fully-recovered Hawk made a surprise appearance on RAW on May 12 2003 when they took on Kane & Rob Van Dam for the World Tag Team Championship. Although Hawk and Animal came up short in their attempt to become three-time champions, it was clear that Hawk had defeated the demons that had once kept him from competing, and the Road Warriors were complete once again. However, Road Warrior Hawk died on October 19 2003.

Animal made a return to WWE on an episode of SmackDown! in 2005, where he was challenged by the then WWE Tag Team Champions, MNM to a title match at The Great American Bash. Finding a new tag team partner in Heidenreich, Animal went on to defeat MNM for the titles, dedicating the win to Hawk by saying, "Hawk, this one's for you, brother!" The two would team up for a few months in a new chapter of the Legion of Doom, with Heidenreich adopting the L.O.D.'s shoulder pads, face paint and mohawk haircut. However, this came to an end with Heidenreich's release from WWE on January 17 2006.

On the March 3 2006 episode of SmackDown!, Animal teamed up with Matt Hardy to face MNM. After he and Hardy lost the match, Animal turned heel for the second time in his career by attacking and injuring Hardy's knee. Animal's reason for this turn was that he had realized that Hardy and Heidenreich were screw-ups and that Road Warrior Hawk was the only tag team legend for him. After the heel turn, Animal would drop many aspects of the well-known Road Warrior gimmick, losing the face paint, and shoulder pads. Animal's look at this time was similar to his old Road Warrior gimmick in the early 1980s he had prior to teaming up with Hawk.

On the May 6 2006 edition of Velocity, Animal defeated Paul Burchill. This was his final WWE appearance. On June 26, 2006, Animal was released from his contract.

• Finishing and signature moves

• Powerslam
• Animal Strike (Right hand punch while wearing brass knuckles)
• Powerbomb
• Shoulder block

• Managers

• Paul Ellering
• Sunny
• Christy Hemme
• Jon Heidenreich

• Quotes

• "That's right, What a Rush!"
• "It's the L.O.D., baby!"
• "There's gonna be a vintage Road Warrior beat down!"
• "I am the Road Warrior!"
• "im the big bad animal man!"

• World Wrestling Entertainment

• 2-Time WWE World Tag Team Champion (with Road Warrior Hawk)
• 1-Time WWE Tag Team Champion (with Heidenreich)

• National Wrestling Alliance

• 1-Time NWA World Tag Team Champion (with Hawk)
• 4-Time NWA National Tag Team Champion (with Hawk)
• 3-Time NWA World Six-Man Tag Team Champion (with Hawk & Dusty Rhodes twice and Hawk & Genichiro Tenryu once)
• Won the 1986 NWA Jim Crockett Sr. Memorial Cup Tag Team Tournament with Hawk. They also won the 1989 NWA Iron Team Tournament at StarrCade '89.

• American Wrestling Association

• 1-Time AWA World Tag Team Champion (with Hawk)

• All Japan Pro Wrestling

• 1-Time AJPW International Tag Team Champion (with Hawk)

• Other Titles

• 2-Time Superstars of Wrestling Tag Team Champion (with Hawk)
• 1-Time IPW Tag Team Champion (with Hawk)
• 1-Time PCW World Tag Team Champion (with Hawk)
• 2-Time i-Generation Tag Team Champion (with Hawk)

• Pro Wrestling Illustrated

• PWI ranked him # 64 of the 500 best singles wrestlers of the "PWI Years" in 2003. He also was ranked # 1 of the best tag teams of the "PWI Years" with Road Warrior Hawk.
• He also won four PWI Tag Team of the Year Awards with Hawk. They won in 1983, 1984, 1985 and 1988. They also were involved in the 1987 PWI Feud of the Year. The feud was with the Super Powers vs. the Four Horsemen.

• Official Site
• Interview with Animal by Genickbruch.com