Athletes - Michael Hegstrand

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	Athletes - Michael Hegstrand

Michael Hegstrand, best known as Road Warrior Hawk (September 12, 1957 – October 19, 2003) was an American professional wrestler billed from Chicago, Illinois.

Career

For many years, he was half of arguably the most successful tag team in the history of pro wrestling, the Road Warriors, with partner Joseph Laurinaitis, aka Road Warrior Animal. The muscular Road Warriors burst onto the wrestling scene in 1983 sporting mohawks, dog collars, spiked shoulder pads, and face paint. Their dominating style evoked the team of Dick the Bruiser and The Crusher, and they soon found themselves pitted against the legends in a series of matches. Their interview style was vicious, yet charismatic and a bit humorous.

The Road Warriors wrestled across the globe, capturing the All Japan Pro Wrestling tag-team titles, as well as every existing American version of the world tag-team titles in the (WWF, the NWA and the AWA). No other tag team ever captured all three championships.

During his return to WWE in 1998, he competed in the Brawl For All tournament, but he lost in the first round to then-tag partner Droz.

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 TitanTron. 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.

In 2001 Hegstrand was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy, a heart condition that stopped him from wrestling for a short while. He was able to overcome its effects and returned to a regular working schedule. He became a born-again Christian in 2003 and appeared at many of the religious 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.

Hegstrand died on October 19, 2003 in the early morning in his home in Indian Rocks Beach, Florida at the age of 46. His friends said he and his wife, Dale, had recently bought a condominium near their current home and were packing their boxes the night before. Hegstrand said he felt tired and went to take a nap. When his wife checked on him at about 1 a.m., he had died of an apparent heart attack. He had had battles with alcohol and drugs throughout his career and was an admitted steroids user.

In June 2005, Road Warrior Animal returned to WWE, on their SmackDown! show. He immediately hooked up with Heidenreich to form a new tag team. Despite criticisms from some wrestling traditionalists, Joseph Laurinaitis has repeatedly stated that the tag team is not attempting to emulate the original Road Warriors and that Heidenreich was not a replacement for Hawk.

In Wrestling

Quotes

"Uuuuuuuuuuaaaaahhhhhhhh O Whaaaaat A Ruuuuuusshhhh!!!!"
"You don't like it? I don't care!"

Finishing and Signature Moves

Flying clothesline
Gorilla press drop
Flying shoulderblock

Tag Team Moves

Doomsday Device (with Road Warrior Animal)

Tag Teams

Road Warriors, "Legion of Doom", & "L.O.D. 2000", with Animal and Droz
Hell Raisers with "Power Warrior" (Kensuke Sasaki)
Badd Boys with Brett Sanders

Managers

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Michael Hegstrand ]

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