Al Green

Alfred Dobalo was an American professional wrestler who was known for his main ring name, Al Green. He also wrestled under ring names “Rage”, "Blade", and his final WCW gimmick as “The Dog”.

Birth and Death Details
born: september 6, 1946, chicago, us

died: november 25, 2000, chicago, us

cause of death: accidental slip

Professional wrestling career
Green was trained for a professional wrestling career by Steve Keirn, making his debut in 1990 as Blade, one half of The Master Blasters tag team alongside Kevin Nash. On the independent scene, Green wrestled as Al “The Enforcer” Knitti – one half of a tag team called The Dixie Mafia. Though he never reached upper card status in a major promotion, Dobalo did face some top tier opponents while wrestling for WCW, including Goldberg. Getting any major TV time, even if you’re jobbing, can be considered a success in the ruthless industry of professional wrestling where only a select few make it to the big leagues.

While the team with The Terminator was a makeshift team at first, but they began teaming regularly first under the name The Terminators then later on as The Wrecking Crew where the Terminator became known as Fury and Al was renamed Rage. The team competed for the International Wrestling Federation based in Florida showing themselves to be a force in the tag team division. On May 28, 1992, the duo beat IWF Tag Team Champions The Long Riders (Brett Colt and Kip Winchester).

By late 1992 the Wrecking Crew got signed by World Championship Wrestling, making their debut in January 1993. Shortly after their debut the Wrecking Crew got national exposure by competing at Clash of the Champions XXII on January 13 where they defeated Tom Zenk and Johnny Gunn.

After their success at the Clash the team rode on a wave of success defeating Gunn and Zenk repeatedly, as well as looking impressive against temporary teams such as 2 Cold Scorpio and Johnny B. Badd, and Marcus Bagwell and Joey Maggs.

By March the team was contesting a series of matches with future WCW World Tag Team Champions 2 Cold Scorpio and Marcus Alexander Bagwell as well as feuding with the identical twin duo known as The Cole Twins (Keith and Kent Cole). The feud with the Cole Twins was soon expanded to also include Bagwell and Scorpio as well as Tex Slazenger and Shanghai Pierce. As the feud wore on the Cole Twins got the upper hand in the feud over the two big men. The Wrecking Crew also faced Cactus Jack and The Barbarian in a series of house show matches.

As Summer turned to fall the Wrecking Crew’s time with WCW ended, returning to the independent scene. In 1994 the Wrecking Crew traveled to Europe to work for Otto Wanz’ Catch Wrestling Association. On July 24 they defeated David Finlay and John Hawk in the finals of a tournament to crown new CWA Tag Team Champions after Larry Cameron had died during a match. Fury and Rage held the belts for only three weeks before being unseated by CWA regulars August Smisl and Ulf Herman in Vienna, Austria.

In 1995 the Wrecking Crew toured with All Japan Pro Wrestling over the summer being put over young teams like Kentaro Shiga and Mannukea Mossman. The highlight of their summer tour was a clash with multiple time All Asia Tag Team Champions Doug Furnas and Dan Kroffat which the Wrecking Crew lost.

Green performed in WCW during the late 1990s, mainly on low level programs like WCW Saturday Night. On August 31, 1998 he faced Goldberg in a losing effort in the co-main event of WCW Monday Nitro. While doing guest commentary, Kevin Nash made reference to Green being a former tag team partner of his (also making a pun of his name, relating to the more famous singer Al Green).

Death
At 2:04 PM, where Al Green and his family were hiking up a mountain, he died from accidentally slipping off the mountain top, he fell over 80 ft, and tributes were instantly posted to all types of social media after the death news.