I have been a personal fan of ‘The Main Event’ Chuck Palumbo ever since I first saw him emerge in World Championship wrestling as a simple jobber making other Wrestlers look good. He was then however re-packaged and sent back to the WCW Powerplant where he trained long and hard to get where he would get to. After finishing his training, Chuck was put back on the main roster in the year 2000 as a member of ‘The Natural Born Thrillers’, a faction of young, up and coming and newly professional talents which included the likes of Shawn Staziak, Mark Jindrak, Sean O’Haire, Reno and last but certainly not least, Chuck Palumbo himself.
The Natural Born Thrillers were labeled as an evolution’ and new school’ based Faction, all up and comers, fresh new graduates from the legendary WCW training grounds famous for training the likes of former WCW World Heavyweight Champion Bill Goldberg, the man who produced an undefeated streak of 173 wins and 0 losses.
All members of the Natural Born Thrillers had what it took to become the next big thing in professional wrestling, and without a doubt, they were the future of our sport. Sean O’Haire was the high flying psycho, Jindrak was the all rounder, Staziak was pure muscle and power, Reno was a hardcore brawler with a very unique look, and Chuck simply had it all. The looks, the talent and the charisma. As we all know, a Superstar Look is what is needed to get far in this business, you need literally ‘The Total Package’ to succeed, and this is exactly what Chuck had, as was recognized by WCW management who promptly put him in a feud with THE Total Package, Lex Luger in a valiant effort to main event Chuck Palumbo, even going as far as giving him the nickname ‘The Main Event.’ Chuck was certainly riding high, but the time was not right to put the world heavyweight championship on Chuck Palumbo, and he sank back down to the midcard status in WCW along with the rest of the thrillers, but still putting on main event quality matches with each and every performance that he came on the winning end of.
Chuck Palumbo went on to work with the World Wrestling Federation upon the purchase of WCW, but he never got far in the entire Alliance angle. He was instead sent once again to development to hone his skills and re-emerged as the tag team partner of Billy Gunn as a ‘gay’ tag-team called Billy and Chuck. They even went as far as to have a public ‘wedding’ on television. The controversial angle provoked WWE to remove the angle altogether, and Billy & Chuck were no more. He would later emerge as a member of the Full Blooded Italians, but again, this would not last long and Chuck would leave World Wrestling Entertainment shortly after.
Since then, Chuck Palumbo made his return to WWE in the summer of 2007, once again sporting his long hair much like he did in WCW, this time riding a motorcycle and becoming a biker on television. Chuck still has what it takes, he just needs a break, and if the WWE are smart, they will attempt to push him as best as they can to see how it will take off. He is literally a total package in professional wrestling, and closing in on his prime years, he could very well have a main event role lined up!
