Scott D’Amore Reveals How ‘Rhino†Appeared In TNA While Under WWE Contract

Former TNA president Scott Dâ€Amore recently opened up about Rhinoâ€s shocking “appearance†at a 2019 show.

In 2019, Rhino seemed to appear at TNAâ€s Slammiversary show, dressed in a hoodie and mask, to deliver a Gore to Michael Elgin. The moment was surprising to fans all over the world, but there was a catch to it. At the time, Rhino was still under contract with WWE and thus not able to be at the show at all. In his latest edition of Dâ€Amore Drop on Yahoo! Uncrowned, Dâ€Amore revealed the secrets of how the moment came to be.

“I have never talked about this publicly, but when we were booking Slammiversary XVII in Dallas in 2019, Don Callis, my co-EVP with TNA at the time, looked at me and said: ‘We need Rhino to do a run-in. We need to set up what weâ€ll be doing for the rest of the summer.†Now, Rhino was under contract with WWE,†Dâ€Amore wrote. “He was waiting out his contract. There was no non-compete period, and it was our intention to bring him in as soon as we were legally able. We already had big plans for Rhino, but those plans could not start at Slammiversary.â€

Dâ€Amore reveals how they pulled off Rhinoâ€s “appearanceâ€

Dâ€Amore went on to note that, while they knew Rhino couldnâ€t do the show, they figured someone could pretend to be Rhino in the moment. After years of speculation, Dâ€Amore revealed that it was none other than he who was the man in the mask.

So I said, ‘Don, you know Terry cannot do the show.†And Don looked at me with that Callis smirk and said, ‘Yeah, but Rhino can,’†wrote Dâ€Amore. “‘We just need someone who looks like him, moves like him, and can hit a Gore like him. Someone under a hoodie who can fool the fans for 20 seconds.†‘That is crazy,†I told him. ‘There is nobody who resembles Terry. The size of his legs alone — nobody else has legs like that.†And Don said, ‘Scott … you have legs like that.’â€

Dâ€Amore went on to note that he eventually agreed and then began practicing. He said he spent time watching Rhinoâ€s moves and made sure to memorize how he would hit his Gore. In the end, the moment fooled folks, so much so that before he revealed it was him, people at WWE thought Rhino had breached his contract.

“I even heard WWE had internal discussions about it. ‘How could Terry be so unprofessional? Did he really think we would not know it was him? It was clearly him. Nobody else has legs like that.’â€

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