Making waves in the 2000s as The Predator in Zero One, Sylvester Terkay was a large, burly wrestler with a Bruiser Brody look, an MMA background, and a strong collegiate background.
A North Carolina State University alum, he lost to a young Kurt Angle in the 1992 NCAA Division I wrestling tournament but won the tournament in 1993. Fun fact: Mark Kerr, Randy Couture, and Kevin Randleman were also in the 1992 finals in different weight classes.
Terkay had wrestling in his DNA and made the transition to pro wrestling in 1999 after dabbling a bit in acting. With such a background, you’d think WWE could’ve done something with him between 2006 and 2007. Let’s try to salvage the Terkay character.
WWE Career
In 2006, after making his home with Ultimate Pro Wrestling in California—at the time a WWE developmental camp that trained Samoa Joe and John Cena—as well as Zero One in Japan, Sylvester Terkay made his WWE debut.
He was paired with a young Elijah Burke who also had a ridiculous strong background, a great look but also had oodles of athleticism and charisma to spare.
Terkay ran an MMA fighter gimmick which wasn’t the most creative but was something that would be easy to work since Burke was portrayed as his corner guy. The two debuted on WWE SmackDown in July 2006, with his first television bout seeing him defeating Matt Hardy.
Prior to that, he lost to Hardy on a dark match but from his TV debut until his ECW debut, he went undefeated on TV and at house shows. Someone saw something in Terkay in these four months—probably his size at 6’7 and over 300lbs. Once the duo hit the ECW brand, they continued their gimmick.
Following a loss in his ECW debut, he went on a winning streak on television and on the house show circuit before being cut from the promotion in July 2007. After that, he returned to Japan wrestling for Antonio Inoki’s wrestling/MMA promotion IGF and later ZERO1.
Salvaging Sylvester Terkay
I don’t see Terkay as being that salvageable in WWE. This was a period of WWE where an MMA gimmick could’ve worked but he wasn’t the guy for it. He had all the tools to be two separate gimmicks.
The better of the two would’ve been The Predator gimmick. Imagine just a big, dangerous, unpredictable destruction machine. I wouldn’t have paired him with Elijah Burke for this since Burke should’ve been doing his own thing in-ring.
Someone like Armando Estrada would’ve worked—especially if he was another monster alongside Umaga. Hell, you could have him in a group with Burke, Umaga, and Estrada and have Burke as the guy who could talk for himself.
Sylvester Terkay had the background and even the size to come off as an Ivan Drago-like MMA guy. He didn’t need to cut and dye his hair but just being a towering, mostly silent menace who fights for himself and no one else.
The thing is that he didn’t resemble MMA fighters of that time: tattooed, buzzcuts and mohawks, and so on. He looked like a big, 80s-early 90s wrestler. I’d say my first gimmick pick would see him at least remain while Umaga and Estrada were around.
Eventually, that stable of fighters would’ve been broken up and it would be up in the air where he went. Other large guys of a similar size and/or build who came in during the 2000s—Morgan and Snitsky specifically—didn’t last long in WWE. Gallows lasted a while in WWE’s system before being released.
Was Terkay salvageable in WWE? Far from it. Actually, I’m not even sure he was salvageable in the U.S. His WWE run didn’t hurt him but it didn’t appear that TNA had any interest in him at the time. It’s a shame because with the right booking he probably could’ve been quite the threat to Samoa Joe.
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