 | Thisbiography of a living personneeds additionalcitations forverification. Please help by addingreliable sources.Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced orpoorly sourcedmust be removed immediately from the article and its talk page, especially if potentiallylibelous. Find sources: "Tatanka" wrestler – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(January 2012) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
.jpg) Tatanka in 2017 | |
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Born | Chris Chavis (1961-06-08)June 8, 1961 (age 64)[2] |
Spouses | |
| Children | 4 |
| Professional wrestling career | |
| Ring name(s) | The Legend[1] Tatanka[2] War Eagle[2] |
| Billed height | 6 ft 2 in (188 cm)[3] |
| Billed weight | 285 lb (129 kg)[3] |
| Billed from | Pembroke, North Carolina[1] |
| Trained by | Larry Sharpe[1] |
| Debut | 1990 |
| Retired | 2022 |
Chris Chavis[1][4][5] (born June 8, 1961) is an American retiredprofessional wrestler. He is signed toWWE, under a legends contract. He is part of theLumbee Tribe of North Carolina.[6] He is best known for his tenures in theWorld Wrestling Federation/World Wrestling Entertainment under thering nameTatanka from 1991 to 1996 and from 2005 to 2007. His ring name is aLakota word, which means "bison".
Chavis started competing inpowerlifting. He competed in his firstbodybuilding contest, Mr. Virginia Beach, placing second. He won many competitions during his time in bodybuilding, but decided against competing on the national level and possibly turning pro. From 1985 to 1990 he worked forBally's Health and Tennis Corporation, becoming a divisional manager.
Chavis went to the open try outs during the1987 NFL player strike for theMiami Dolphins and made the cut, but he turned it down due to the lucrative money he was already making selling memberships at Bally's.[7] In 1989, Chavis left Bally's to pursue an accounting career.
In 1989, Chavis met"Nature Boy" Buddy Rogers inFlorida at a video store while looking for wrestling tapes. Rogers had Chavis callLarry Sharpe, who ranMonster Factory inSouth Jersey. He had his first match, as "Tatanka", againstJoe Thunder inPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania, on January 13, 1990.
Rogers introduced Chavis toGeorge Scott, thebooker for theWorld Wrestling Federation (WWF) during the 1980s. Scott was starting his own promotion called theNorth American Wrestling Association. Chavis wrestled under the name "War Eagle" Chris Chavis and was voted third runner up forPWI Rookie of the Year inPro Wrestling Illustrated for 1990. Also in 1990, he became the South Atlantic Pro Wrestling Heavyweight Champion by beatingVince Torelli. Not long after, he was signed to a WWF contract.
Chavis received his first try-out match with the WWF on January 8, 1991, as War Eagle againstDale Wolfe at aWWF Wrestling Challenge taping inChattanooga, Tennessee. He received a second try-out on February 18, 1991, against theBrooklyn Brawler at aWWF Superstars taping inOrlando, Florida. Wrestling as the War Eagle, Chavis was victorious. He followed it up with another win against Dale Wolfe the next day at aWrestling Challenge taping.[8] On October 21 he received what was likely another tryout match at aSuperstars taping, this time defeating Skinner. In November Chavis began wrestling on house shows under his given name.[9] Soon after, he took on thering name "Tatanka". After wrestling in try-out matches athouse shows, Tatanka made his television debut as afan favorite on the February 1, 1992, episode ofWWF Superstars, defeatingPat Tanaka in his debut match.[9] As Tatanka, Chavis performed a war dance to theLumbee tribal war cry that preceded his entrance to the ring, and had a red stripe dyed in the middle of his hair in a mohawk style.
Tatanka waspushed as undefeated on WWF television; he did not suffer any defeat bypinfall orsubmission, but he lost several matches at house shows, the first being a countout loss toRick Martel on June 4, 1992, inFort Wayne, Indiana.[9][10] Tatanka's earliestrivalry on television was against Martel; it culminated in Tatanka's pay-per-view debut atWrestleMania VIII with Tatanka winning the match.[9] On May 18, 1992, Tatanka reached the peak of his success by winning the 40-manBashed in the USAbattle royal.[9] He renewed his "feud" with Martel, who had stolen sacred eagle feathers from him to add to his wardrobe, going on to defeat Martel again atSurvivor Series to reclaim the feathers.[9]
AtWrestleMania IX, Tatanka received his first televised title shot in the WWF, againstShawn Michaels for theWWF Intercontinental Championship. Tatanka won the match by disqualification. Since a title could not change hands on a disqualification, Michaels retained the title.[9] On the October 30, 1993, edition ofSuperstars, Tatanka suffered his first televised defeat in the WWF, losing toLudvig Borga (Borga had hit Tatanka in the back with a steel chair whileMr. Fuji distracted the referee).[9] After the match, he was attacked byWWF ChampionYokozuna and was subsequently out of action for three months.
Tatanka returned to the WWF in the beginning of 1994.[9] He was scheduled to face Borga in a rematch at theRoyal Rumble, but Borga injured his ankle just days before the event. Borga was replaced byBam Bam Bigelow, who Tatanka defeated. Bigelow, however, would go on to eliminate Tatanka from the 30-manRoyal Rumble match. On the March 7 episode ofRaw, Tatanka was honored by retired professional wrestlersChief Jay Strongbow and ChiefWahoo McDaniel and byLumbee tribesman Ray Littleturtle. Littleturtle presented him with a full-length Lumbee tribe chief headdress.[9] Throughout mid-1994, Tatanka engaged in a storyline feud withIrwin R. Schyster, who insisted he pay a gift tax on the item. Strongbow briefly served as Tatanka's mentor and manager during the duration of the feud.[9]
.jpg)
During the summer of 1994, Tatanka accusedLex Luger of selling out toTed DiBiase, which resulted in a match between the two. Afterward, DiBiase entered the ring with a red, white and blue bag full of money. Luger kicked the bag out of DiBiase's hands resulting in Tatanka attacking him andturning him into avillain atSummerSlam, joining DiBiase'sMillion Dollar Corporation.[9] He spent the remainder of the year feuding with Luger which topped off in a cage match onRaw that saw Luger come out the victor.[9] According to Tatanka, that the original plan was to haveBarry Windham return to the WWF and form the "NewMoney Inc." with (his brother in-law) Irwin R. Schyster and managed by DiBiase and have a long feud with Luger (Windham's long time rival fromNWA andWCW) and Tatanka, however Windham suffered a knee injury fromRic Flair atSlamboree and the WWF couldn't reach a deal with him and Luger suggested that his next feud be with Tatanka instead and WWF agreed.
In spring 1995, Tatanka had another feud with Bam Bam Bigelow, who just turned face.[9] As a result, he teamed withSycho Sid at theKing of the Ring pay-per-view to lose to Bigelow andDiesel.[9]
Tatanka was suspended on August 30, reportedly as a preemptive measure for being named in a lawsuit to be filed by a woman stemming from an incident in Anaheim, California, following a WWF event in late 1994. According to sources, the woman was said to have been drugged, sodomized and her head shaved on only one side. Kevin Nash reiterated this story in an interview with Kayfabe Commentaries. The woman was having drinks with him and Undertaker the night prior. When the wrestlers were leaving the hotel the following morning, Nash noticed that she was seated in between two police officers. The hallway was smeared in blood. She had half her head shaven as she was crying, reporting the incident to the officers. In the interview, however, Nash presumed the person who did this wasJimmy Del Ray because of similar stories of Del Ray. During representation by Tatanka's attorney the facts showed that Tatanka was not involved in the incident at all and Del Ray was fired from the company; Tatanka's suspension was lifted and he returned with full-pay to the active WWF roster. As Nash noted in his interview, he knew that Tatanka was not involved at all, but he had been around Del Ray that night, which caused Tatanka to also be named and unfairly suspended.[11]
Following this hiatus at the end of August 1995, Tatanka returned to the WWF to compete in theRoyal Rumble event, where he was eliminated by Diesel.[9]
On March 18, 1996, Tatanka wrestled his final televised match in the WWF, losing to the WWF championBret Hart in a non-title match where he (despite his heel role) got a face pop for accidentally hittingThe 1-2-3 Kid when Kid grabbed Bret, and Tatanka was supposed to hit Bret but Bret ducked out of the way and Tatanka ended up hitting Kid by accident instead.[9] Tatanka left the WWF in the spring of 1996, citing family and spiritual issues. He continued to appear for independent promotions, which allowed him to continue to wrestle while maintaining a lighter schedule.
After WWF, Tatanka worked in the independents. He lost to his former tag partner Bam Bam Bigelow on September 28, 1996 at EWA/USWF show in New York City. In 1997, Chavis wrestled for the independent New York-based promotion Ultimate Championship Wrestling (UCW), where he wrestledBruce Hart of theHart wrestling family,King Kong Bundy,Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart andMarty Jannetty. He went from playing the role of a face to a heel when he turned on Falcon Coperis andTommy Cairo to align himself with the likes of the UWF faction of the organization which included Neidhart, Hart, and eventually Jannetty. Chavis captured the UCW Heavyweight Championship title and handed then-champion Falcon Coperis his first championship defeat. Chavis remained champion until the organization folded its professional wrestling division in 1998.
He won theStampede Wrestling North American Heavyweight Championship on April 8, 1998, defeatingSid Vicious in a fictitious tournament final. During the reign, he would feud with Jim Neidhart and his cousinJason Neidhart in 1999. That year he vacated the title as he left Stampede. He would work for Florida'sFuture Of Wrestling from 1998 to 2000.
In 2000, he won the i-Generation Wrestling Australasian Championship defeating theOne Man Gang in Australia. A few days later he dropped the title back to the One Man Gang. In 2001, he worked in England and in 2002 worked in Canada and Ireland. In 2003, he made an appearance forCombat Zone Wrestling. Tatanka then took a hiatus from wrestling and was not seen in the public eye for over two years.
On August 1, 2005, Chavis returned toRaw as a face once again which was intended to be a special one-time appearance to faceEugene in the "Eugene Invitational", a three-minute match withKurt Angle's Olympic gold medal on the line. Tatanka lost the match when Angle attacked Eugene with 27 seconds remaining, causing a disqualification.
Chavis returned to a full-time schedule for WWE at the tail end of 2005, debuting at a December 27house show,teaming withShelton Benjamin in a win overCarlito andJonathan Coachman. He returned to television in theRoyal Rumble match at theJanuary 2006 event, where he was eliminated byJoey Mercury andJohnny Nitro. The next month he began appearing onVelocity before being moved full-time to theSmackDown!brand.
As aface, Chavis teamed withMatt Hardy to defeatMNM, the then-Tag Team Champions, in a non-title match atNo Way Out. They were granted a title shot on the next edition ofSmackDown!, but lost. On the April 28SmackDown! avignette played announcing that "a new warrior would soon be forged in Tatanka". Over the next three weeks footage aired of Tatanka being (legitimately) adopted into the Oglala Sioux Tribe (Lakota). When he returned to wrestling Tatanka defeatedSimon Dean with his new finisher, "Wakinyan" (from the Lakota word for "Thunder").
On the September 1, 2006, episode ofSmackDown!, he lost toThe Miz in Miz's debut match, and would later lose a rematch to Miz as well. Tatanka engaged in a mini-feud withSylvain Grenier, trading victories with him, before he was moved into anangle where he entered into a losing streak due to what he perceived to bebad decision-making byreferees during his matches, especiallyCharles Robinson. This escalated until the October 27SmackDown! when Tatanka, alongside partnerBobby Lashley, lost a match toWilliam Regal and Dave Taylor when Regal pinned Tatanka by illegally using the ropes (during the pin Dave Taylor got his hands in the last second). After the match Tatanka argued the decision again, then he turnedheel by attacking the referee and then Lashley when he tried to calm him down. The next week he appeared onSmackDown! with a new style of warpaint, covering the top of his face in black and the bottom in white, and cut apromo on Lashley saying he owed neither him nor the crowd an explanation for his actions. He compared his recent losing streak to the years of persecution that his people had suffered over the years and said that he "called upon his forefathers to unleash a new warrior in [him]" and also said if Lashley went to war with [me] or war with a whole nation of warriors. He asked for and was released from his WWE contract on January 19, 2007,[12] but not before ending his losing streak by defeatingJimmy Wang Yang, his first victory in months. WWE.com noted this event with these parting words: "Tatanka is an accomplished veteran of the squared circle. The Native American made a splash upon his entrance to the WWE in the early 90s, remaining undefeated for two years."[12] Tatanka stated on his official website that he requested to be released and mentioned he was not done with WWE as he would like to return someday.
In 2008 Tatanka toured Ireland and France with the American Wrestling Rampage tour. He also wrestled forAll Star Promotions in the United Kingdom. He competed in All Star and American Wrestling between August 29 to October 31, 2008, in the Tower Circus area ofBlackpool Tower.
Tatanka made an appearance in Danish Pro Wrestling (DPW) and lost to Chaos after he was hit by a DDT. He was given a standing ovation after the match.
Tatanka appeared inTotal Nonstop Action Wrestling on the December 17, 2009, episode of Impact where he defeatedJay Lethal in a Black Machismo Invitational Match with an End of the Trail.
Tatanka also made headlines in Scotland while appearing for Scottish Wrestling Entertainment, renewing his partnership with the Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase inDundee. Tatanka was due to return to Scotland to wrestle for the SWE at the Dewars Centre inPerth on August 25, 2012.
On August 8, 2012,Chikara announced that Tatanka would be making his debut for the promotion in the following month's2012 King of Trios tournament, where he will team with the1-2-3 Kid andAldo Montoya as "Team WWF".[13] In their first round match on September 14, Team WWF was defeated by The Extreme Trio (Jerry Lynn,Tommy Dreamer andToo Cold Scorpio).[14][15] The following day, Tatanka defeated Sugar Dunkerton in a singles match.[14][16]
Tatanka made another appearance in Danish Pro Wrestling (DPW) and defeated Chaos after hitting Wykea after a long and enduring match. He was given a standing ovation once again.
He also wrestled in Germany in June 2013 for ACW (Athletik Club Wrestling) and GHW (German Hurricane Wrestling).
On May 2, 2014, Tatanka won the DPW Tag Team Championship along with Rick "The Prick" Dominick. They lost the titles on October 18, 2014, to Ravn and Demolition Davies.
Tatanka made an appearance on theOld School Raw on November 15, 2010, backstage along withRon Simmons,Dusty Rhodes,IRS, andThe "Million Dollar Man" Ted DiBiase.
On November 3, 2015, WWE announced that they signed Tatanka to a Legends contract.[17] On April 3, 2016, atWrestleMania 32, Tatanka competed in the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal as a face and was among the last to be eliminated.
On January 4, 2021, Tatanka, in full ring gear made an appearance for a special episode of Raw called "Raw Legends Night".[18] On May 24, 2025 he was shown in the crowd duringSaturday Night's Main Event XXXIX.[19]
| This section of abiography of a living personneeds additionalcitations forverification. Please help by addingreliable sources.Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced orpoorly sourcedmust be removed immediately from the article and its talk page, especially if potentiallylibelous. Find sources: "Tatanka" wrestler – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(February 2020) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Chavis and his wife, Michelle, have four children.[20]
Tatanka is a playable character inWWF Royal Rumble andWWF Rage in the Cage. He is in theWWE 2K17 video game asDLC. He also appears inWWE 2K18 andWWE 2K19 as a playable character.
Chavis himself, however, is from the Lumbee tribe.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
,Cagematch,Wrestlingdata,Internet Wrestling Database