Kevin Fertig, better known to longtime WWE fans as Kevin Thorn and infamously as Mordecai, spent the better part of 15 years of his adult life hating and resenting WWE.
And then they saved his life.
During an appearance on The Velvet Ropes with SoCal Val, the former WWE Superstar explained how WWE saved his life, how the Mordecai character was specifically built to feud with The Undertaker at WrestleMania, the nerve-wracking meeting with Vince McMahon where he initially pitched the Mordecai character, spending thousands of dollars of his own money to “live the gimmick” at the time, the story behind him quitting WWE in Baltimore and the dream match that he never got to have while he was with the company.
Featured below are some of the highlights from the interview where he touches on these topics with his thoughts. Also embedded below is a complete video archive of the discussion.
On how the Mordecai character was built to feud with The Undertaker at WrestleMania: “He was a big, big part of the Mordecai character. When all that first got pitched and everything else like that, it was really to wrestle him, eventually, in WrestleMania.”
On the nerve-wracking meeting where he pitched the Mordecai character directly to Vince McMahon: “I go and sit down in front of Vince, and he’s got his readers on, and he’s just staring a hole through me. And I was like, all right, I’m not looking away from this guy. I’m gonna try to stare back as hard as I can. I know that he’s already reached my soul somehow, and he’s ripped it out. And he’s like, okay, what do you see yourself here? And I’m like, well, me and Tomko are doing this, and I think we could do this. And he goes, no. He goes, I don’t want tag teams. I want singles wrestlers.”
On spending thousands of his own money on white suits to live the Mordecai gimmick 24/7: “I went above and beyond of wearing white to the point where anything that I could find was white. I had white tracksuits to go to the gym. I spent thousands on white anything, white suit, that I could possibly wear. It was a cleaning nightmare too, because I am not the cleanest person to eat and walk around. I wanted to portray the gimmick and live the gimmick. I was always a huge fan of The Undertaker growing up. Pretty much every time you saw him out in public, he was pretty much all in black, had his band. He looked like The Undertaker, and it just looked cool. So to me, I wanted to have that image out there too.”
On Hade Vansen’s promos originally being his work with Dusty Rhodes: “Hade Vansen comes on TV, starts doing the promos I’d already done. And I remember texting every writer I knew, like, what the f*** that was my promo? I know it was my promo because I have it written right here. And it was him talking doing the dark walk or whatever he’s doing. So I drove up there and I show up. They’re like, what are you doing here? I’m like, I’m still trying to figure out why my promo that I did with Dusty, that was sent to The Undertaker because we talked about it, is now being said by another person on TV.”
On WWE’s rehab program saving his life: “I spent probably 15 years pissed off, hated WWE, depressed and all this stuff. I made a phone call to them, and I went in the rehab program, and they saved my life. So everything with that is, as much as I hate them, as much resentment as I had for them, they saved my life, and I wouldn’t be here today. A lot of it was me, and I’ve come to figure that out, and I’m a lot better off from that. They sent me, got me cleaned up and got me back better than I ever have been.”
On quitting WWE in Baltimore: “I pretty much went in and quit in Baltimore. Not a lot of people know that. I went into Johnny’s office and said I’d had enough. I worked my ass off to get back within the amount of time, I did all this stuff, and then now here we are again. And out of frustration, I went in and asked for my release.”
On who impresses him most in today’s wrestling: “Logan Paul’s probably the one that’s impressing me the most right now, because he goes out there and looks like a seasoned vet every time he’s out there.”
On the dream match he never got: “Eddie Guerrero. Eddie would have been the one, and I was supposed to wrestle him as Mordecai. It just never happened. I think Eddie would have been fun. Eddie would have been a lot of fun.”
