The Snake and The Dragon, Ricky Steamboat and Jake Roberts. In the mid-to-late 1980s, the WWF ran a program between two men who couldn’t be more different than they were here.
If light and darkness faced each other in their purest form, they would likely have been captured in this battle. When Jake Roberts came to the World Wrestling Federation, his first major feud was as a heel.
Ricky Steamboat and Jake Roberts –
The Epic Rivalry That Elevated A Snake and A Dragon
In May 1986, Roberts was set to face Ricky Steamboat, and on the sixth edition of Saturday Night’s Main Event, that is when it happened. Steamboat had come to the ring prepared to enter it as he saluted the fans and stood outside the ring on the ring apron.
It was at that very moment when the Snake struck. Roberts would attack Steamboat as he was on the ring apron just outside the ropes.
As Steamboat fell to the floor, Roberts removed the mat that surrounded the ringside area and proceeded to hit his signature DDT on Steamboat on the exposed floor.
He did this with Steamboat’s (then-wife, Bonnie) sitting in the audience. Roberts then proceeded to drape his snake Damien over the unconscious Steamboat.
This heinous act set for the wheels in motion a feud that drew heat for Roberts and greater admiration for Steamboat.
While Roberts had warned the bookers of the risk of what could happen if Steamboat received the DDT on the unprotected concrete, it still went ahead as planned.
“I was never brought with a plan. The first thing I heard about it was when we went to Saturday Night Main Event. They laid it out to us and I said wait, wait, wait, wait, I can’t DDT him on the floor.
I said it’ll f******* kill him and they’re like ‘Well, that’s what we really want.’ So they left for us for me and Steamboat to talk to talk and I just kept telling Ricky it can’t be done.
I’m telling you it cannot be done. If I do that to you it’s going to f*** you up really bad. He’s like ‘No, no, no. I’ll put my hands down in time. I’ll block it.’ No, Ricky you won’t.
You just don’t have time to do it. He was real adamant about wanting to do it. He owed a favor to George Scott the booker at the time under Vince.
As the weeks and months passed, both would emerge with a story of revenge. In what would be Roberts’ first feud as part of the WWF/E, we would see a different side of Steamboat.
To combat Roberts’ snake, Damian, Steamboat introduced a Komodo dragon. It became about fighting fire with fire. The two continued their feud in a series of matches on live events, with the results typically the same.
For the majority of their battles, the results were double disqualifications between the two. When Jake was victorious, it was typically by count-out. There would have to come a time when the two would need to end their rivalry with one another.
These count-out finishes would also need to stop, as would disqualification finishes as well between the two. So on August 28th, 1986, the two would face each other in an aptly titled ‘Snake Pit Match’ with the stipulation being that there would be no disqualification.
In a match with over seventy thousand fans inside the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, the two would meet as part of The Big Event. As Alan Parsons Project rang on the overhead speaker, Steamboat would arrive to a hero’s welcome.
Roberts wouldn’t allow Steamboat to even enter the ring attacking him before the bell rang. In what likely at the time felt like a longer match than it was, Steamboat was busted open, and just when Roberts would hit his pattened DDT, Steamboat would stop him.
Steamboat would then counter a pinning attempt by Roberts getting the three count and the win.
The success of the response to this Snake Pit Match would lead to another one. This time, however, it would air on television as part of the seventh edition of Saturday Night’s Main Event on September 13th, 1986, in the Richfield Coliseum in Richfield, Ohio, United States.
While the match had gained national attention being on the first Saturday Night’s Main Event since the previous edition, it would be the blowoff between the two that would see Steamboat gain retribution for the attack he received four months earlier.
The final time these two would face one another was as opponents in a six-man tag team match in WCW six years later.
Much could be said about their feud, which lasted only a few months and attracted the attention of young fans because the antagonist and protagonist couldn’t have been more different.
As their time in the WWF continued, they would even team up with one another on occasion in multi-man matches. But what were ultimately matches that didn’t show any signs of previous animosity.
In fact, Roberts recalls a conversation he had with Steamboat after the initial DDT onto the concrete floor. In hindsight, they could laugh at it, as Roberts had insisted that the risk of injury was far too great. Steamboat would laughingly agree, as the result was obvious.
The feud was as important for Steamboat as it was for Roberts. Roberts himself knew the impact of this feud and what it had for him as part of the World Wrestling Federation. It would raise his value in the company moving forward.
“Jake’s a killer that what they thought, you know. Jake’s a killer and he catapulted from being on the first couple of matches to the main event overnight.
I can never thank Ricky enough because he basically helped me build my house.”
The chemistry between the two was obvious. If anything, it was the limits that the feud with Roberts had on Steamboat that would result in changes. He would transition from wearing typically white to typically wearing black or other darker colors.
This feud brought out Steamboat’s darker side. His approach showed that Steamboat couldn’t be naive and take his eyes off the heel, especially someone as cunning and heartless as Jake ‘The Snake’ Roberts.
There were intangible qualities about his skillset that made him virtually unlike anyone else. A quality that Roberts feels has stood the test of time.
“To see Steamboat in those days, the way he could move, man. He was like — he’s like he’s on glass, skating on glass. He was so f**king smooth.
And whenever he fired up and that’s the mark of a great babyface number one, knowing how to sell, which nobody sells better than Ricky Steamboat.
To this day, nobody’s matched his mark on the art of selling. Number two, how much fire do they have when it’s time for that to come back?
My God, he’d blow the top off of the building whenever he started that comeback. Not anybody that had it all, no.”
– Jake Roberts on what he felt made Ricky Steamboat such a special talent during his time in the ring.
In a feud that took place more than thirty years ago, took two extraordinary talents and elevated their storytelling to that of art.
