JBL Blogs On Backstage Chaos At SmackDown Last Night

Mankind was hiding under the ring and had no idea what happened, I was one of the guys who ran out to try and save the ending and put a band aid on something that had never (to my knowledge happened). Minutes later, I was told to wrestle Jake Roberts ‘until the PPV was back on the air’. I was out there with Jake and Tim White. The PPV was back on shortly and we showed the matches that didn’t happen on Raw the next day.

This was an ‘In Your House’ PPV I believe. One thing I love about social media, is someone will find it and let me know. It was somewhere in the Carolinas and Collin Raye was there that day singing the national anthem.

Last night was almost a repeat. I was doing commentary so I missed the exact facts of what happened, but here’s what I know. I had finished Main Event (Miz was returning from Middle East so I was filling in) and coming back to change my suit and tie to go back out for Smackdown.

I see total chaos. Apparently Dave Kapoor (who is Great Khali’s working ‘brother’) was filming a backstage segment and a light either burst or got too close to a sprinkler and set off the fire sprinklers in the dressing room I had my stuff in.

The force of the water was unreal. Guys were trying to save our stuff in the dark (we all had computers, clothes etc) and also trying to figure out a way to get the water off. The alarm had sounded it looked like the filming of the sinking of the Titanic.

I’m in the room trying to get my extra suit and computer as my stuff was right under the sprinkler, guys were helping me with flashlights in the darkness.

The alarm was saying to evacuate the building.

Triple H had left ‘Gorilla’ and was directing guys to put towels down to keep the flooding in one area, it was a ton of water. Our whole crew was back there trying to figure out how to keep the water in one room. It was unreal seeing guys trying to stop something minor before it became something major. If all the sprinklers had come on, tons of stuff would have been ruined-fortunately it was only one dressing room

They all finally succeeded. Some guys stuff was ruined, poor Dave Kapoor was just soaked with horrible smelling water.

We tape up to four shows on Tuesdays, not to mention the backstage stuff-an incredible amount. The WWE did what we always do and adjusted to outside forces and taped the shows.

Ah, the joys of taping TV. Just another fun chapter now and some really good TV taped around it.