| Mike Enos | |
|---|---|
| Birth name | Michael Enos |
| Born | (1963-06-11)June 11, 1963 (age 61) |
| Professional wrestling career | |
| Ring name(s) | Blake Beverly[1][2] The Masked Sky Scraper[3] The Mauler[3] Mike Enos[1][2] Total the Terrible[4] |
| Billed height | 6 ft 4 in (193 cm) |
| Billed weight | 252 lb (114 kg) |
| Billed from | Shaker Heights, Ohio (as Blake Beverley)[1] |
| Trained by | Eddie Sharkey |
| Debut | 1988 |
| Retired | 2000 |
Michael Enos (born June 11, 1963)[citation needed] is an American retiredprofessional wrestler. He is best known for his appearances with theAmerican Wrestling Association (AWA) andWorld Championship Wrestling (WCW) under his birth name and with theWorld Wrestling Federation (WWF) asBlake Beverly. For much of his career, Enosteamed withWayne Bloom asThe Destruction Crew/The Beverly Brothers.[3]
Mike Enos started wrestling in the late 1980s after being trained byEddie Sharkey. His signing with the AWA was due to trainer Eddie Sharkey’s connections in the federation. Early on, Enos worked mainly as a referee but slowly got more and more bookings as a wrestler. He was billed as "The Construction Worker" Mike Enos, that name was soon replaced by “Mean” Mike Enos, as he teamed up with fellow rookieWayne "The Train" Bloom to formThe Destruction Crew. The Destruction Crew was managed by Johnny Valiant.[5] In the fall of 1989 the Destruction Crew challenged thenAWA World Tag Team championsKen Patera andBrad Rheingans to a "car lifting" contest. During the challenge the Destruction Crew attacked Patera and Rhenigans and injured them (Storyline) and forced them to vacate the tag team titles.[6]
A tournament was set up to crown new tag team champions. In the tournament, the Destruction Crew would defeat the team ofSgt. Slaughter andBaron von Raschke in the first round and then beatGreg Gagne andPaul Diamond in the finals to win the titles.[6] That victory combined with their devious tactics earned the duo a jointRookie of the Year award from the readers ofPro Wrestling Illustrated, which is the only time a tag team has won the award.[7] At the last original AWA television taping on August 11, 1990, the Destruction Crew lost the AWA tag-team titles to longtime rivalsThe Trooper andD.J. Peterson.[6]
While still AWA World Tag Team Champions, the Destruction Crew joinedWorld Championship Wrestling during the spring of 1990. In WCW they wrestled under masks as the "Minnesota Wrecking Crew II" and were managed byOle Anderson who was part of the originalMinnesota Wrecking Crew. They attempted without success to win theNWA World Tag Team Championship fromThe Steiner Brothers during a brief feud. Enos also made a one-off appearance atWrestleWar 1990 as the (masked) third member ofThe Skyscrapers, called "The Masked Skyscraper." He was a last-minute replacement forDan Spivey, who had left WCW days earlier.[8]
After the AWA closed, the Destruction Crew went to Japan and competed in a series of matches in theNew Japan Pro-Wrestling including an unsuccessful title match against then IWGP Tag Team ChampionsKeiji Mutoh andMasahiro Chono on August 19, 1990.[9]
In May 1991, Enos and Bloom signed with theWorld Wrestling Federation. The two wrestlers were repackaged as a team of spoiled rich brothers fromShaker Heights, Ohio. They became known as the Beverly Brothers, with Enos given the name Blake Beverly while Bloom was given the name Beau Beverly.[1][2] They were originally managed byCoach, then later on byThe Genius.[5] The team was initially promoted as a force to be reckoned with in the tag team division. After making their WWFpay-per-view debut on a winning team atSurvivor Series '91,[10] they were launched into feuds with theLegion of Doom,The Bushwhackers (who they defeated at the1992 Royal Rumble)[11] andThe Natural Disasters (who they unsuccessfully challenged for theWWF World Tag Team Championship atSummerSlam '92).[12] By the later part of 1992, however, they would be used primarily to putover other tag teams; they were on the losing end of an eight-man elimination tag team match atSurvivor Series '92[13] and were defeated by their old rivals The Steiner Brothers at the1993 Royal Rumble.[14] The team broke up in 1993 when Bloom decided to leave the business. Enos stuck around for a while longer, mostly serving as anenhancement talent on the WWF's weekly syndicated shows.
After his release from the WWF in August 1993, Enos returned toNew Japan Pro Wrestling where he wrestled on his own feuding withKeji Muto. From 1994 to 1995 he teamed withChris Benoit,Lord Steven Regal andScott Norton. On July 13, 1995, Enos and Scott Norton lost toShinya Hashimoto andJunji Hirata for the vacated IWGP Tag Team titles.
Enos returned to Minnesota working forPro Wrestling America and other independent Minnesota shows. He reunited with Wayne Bloom in 1994 as the Destruction Crew.
After leaving the WWF, Enos made several appearances forNew Japan Pro-Wrestling before returning to WCW in 1996. Enos was initially known as The Mauler, but then returned to wrestling under his real name as he had in the AWA. He teamed withDick Slater as "Rough & Ready" and once again worked mainly as enhancement talent for tag teams on the rise. He was managed byCol. Rob Parker but did not have much success. A notable moment in Enos' second WCW run was him wrestling againstSteve Doll on the May 27, 1996, episode ofWCW Monday Nitro whenScott Hall interrupted and made his WCW return, planting the seeds for theNew World Order.
Enos and Wayne Bloom had a brief reunion in 1998 but remained low-card performers. The team finally disbanded after working a few matches together. Enos competed in the WCW double elimination tournament for the vacated WCW tag team titles in February 1999 teaming withBobby Duncum Jr. and became one of the final four teams along withChris Benoit andDean Malenko,Dave Taylor andFit Finlay, andCurt Hennig andBarry Windham, until he andScotty Riggs (replacing Duncum) were eliminated by Benoit and Malenko. Enos retired from wrestling in 2000 after working on WCW weekend shows, smaller independent shows in Florida, and tours in Japan.
In July 2016, Enos was named part of aclass action lawsuit filed against WWE which alleged that wrestlers incurred traumatic brain injuries during their tenure and that the company concealed the risks of injury. The suit was litigated by attorney Konstantine Kyros, who has been involved in a number of other lawsuits against WWE.[15] The lawsuit was dismissed by US District JudgeVanessa Lynne Bryant in September 2018.[16]
Enos owns a painting company called Enos Executive Painting in Tampa, Florida, and resides there with his wife and children. He is also a grandfather.[17]
,Internet Wrestling Database