About Owen
WELCOME TO OWENS NEW MYSPACE
Born into a family of eight boys and four girls, the foundation was already set for many challenges for Owen Hart even before he graced the professional wrestling ring. The Hart family's legacy in professional wrestling could fill volumes of history books, and the chapters alone on Owen Hart would be worthy of many volumes in itself.Owen entered wrestling by working for his father's Stampede Wrestling. Wrestling however was not Owen's first choice for a career; as Martha Hart, his widow, would explain in her book Broken Harts, Owen tried numerous times to find a profitable living outside of wrestling. Those attempts were unsuccessful, and Owen began his first WWF stay as The Blue Blazer in late 1988. The Blue Blazer was at that time a generic masked wrestler gimmick who was a high flying technician. The most notable match for Owen as the Blazer came at Wrestlemania 5, when he was narrowly defeated by Mr. Perfect. Owen/Blazer quickly left soon afterwards to wrestle worldwide and in 1991, the Blue Blazer lost the mask versus the Mexican wrestler Canek in a mask vs mask duel.
Around this time, Owen wrestled briefly for WCW, and was in the process of contract discussions, but was not willing to move to Atlanta, the company's headquarters. Following the breakup of the WWF's popular The Hart Foundation tag team of his brother Bret and real-life brother-in-law Jim Neidhart, Owen returned to the WWF and formed the 'New Foundation' with Neidhart. Famed more for their bizarre 'baggy pants' attire than anything else, the team disbanded within a few months Owen would later team alongside Koko B. Ware as High Energy.
In late 1993, with rumors circulating that Owen was on the verge of leaving the WWF due to a lack of success, he was eventually pushed as a 'heel' singles competitor and feuded with his brother Bret. They competed in a classic at WrestleMania X and later in a memorable Cage Match at SummerSlam 1994. They are both considered two of the greatest matches of the 1990s. Owen combined high flying and technical mat skill for a very sound style; he was also quite adept at playing a sneaky, smarmy heel, as evidenced by his King of Harts gimmick (he took the nickname after winning the 1994 King of the Ring).
Hart's WWF career included Intercontinental, Tag Team and European gold; he teamed with the 600-pound Yokozuna; brother-in-law Davey Boy Smith, the British Bulldog; and Jeff Jarrett at various points in his career. He was also infamous at this time for an errant piledriver at 'SummerSlam 1997' which severely injured "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, and ultimately indirectly led to Austin's retirement in 2003. When his brother Bret lost his WWF Title in controversial fashion at the 1997 Survivor Series in Montreal, Smith and Jim Neidhart, another Hart brother-in-law, responded by joining Bret in WCW. Owen tried this as well, but elected to stay put in the WWF when faced with breach of contract issues. This caused friction between the brothers for a brief time, though they would reconcile shortly before Owen's tragic death.
Owen returned at the pay-per-view following Survivor Series, running out to attack Shawn Michaels during his world championship match, turning face and adopting the "Black Hart" gimmick in the process. Over the next few months, Owen developed a rivalry with both D-Generation X member at the time (Michaels and Triple H), and won the WWF European Championship from Triple H (who did not officially lose the title in the ring, instead having Goldust sub for him- the decision stood). Hart would later have an ankle injury kayfabe, which caused him to walk around with an air cast. During a match involving Triple H in which Hart joined the commentary at ringside, Triple H regained the title in a controversial fashion, with Hart submitting to Triple H in an impromptu match.
Hart continued his rivalry with DX for a while after that, but Shawn Michaels' departure from the company after Wrestlemania XIV, coupled with DX's face turn shortly thereafter, left Owen floundering in midcard.
Four weeks after Wrestlemania, during a tag team match with Ken Shamrock taking on D-Lo Brown and The Rock, Owen Hart turned on Shamrock, "snapping" his ankle and "biting off his ear" in the process. He joined the Nation of Domination with Brown and Rock, and stayed there through the rest of the year, when the Nation broke up. Hart would go on to wrestle Shamrock twice that summer, with an even record. He and the Rock also contended for the WWF Tag Team Championship, losing to then champions The New Age Outlaws once. They were scheduled to be in a fatal four way main event RAW match with the Outlaws, Kane & Mankind, and Austin and Undertaker (who were the current champs), but a returning Shamrock attacked Rock with the anklelock and took him out of the match. D-Lo replaced him, but the Nation team proved unsuccessful.
In early 1999, Owen began teaming with Jeff Jarrett and again captured the WWF tag team title. This included a storyline involving the revived Blue Blazer character, which would regularly appear alongside goofy denials from Jarrett and Hart that it was actually Hart under the mask.