Nikita Koloff Talks About Vince McMahon & Why He Never Worked For WWE

"The Russian Nightmare" Nikita Koloff joined Busted Open with Dave Lagreca and Doug Mortman. You can hear Busted Open from 2-4 ET on Sirius 94, XM 208, and Sportszone 860 on the internet. Here is a highlight from the interview, where Koloff was asked about Vince McMahon:

"Well, truth be known... and it's always interesting in the world of wrestling what is said," said Koloff. "I've had one conversation – brief conversation – two encounters with Vince McMahon. One encounter was actually in Las Vegas in a gym. He happened to be in the same gym. We had a brief dialogue there, and then the second one was at Road Warrior Hawk's funeral where we had a brief conversation. I never discussed, or Vince never approached me, or the office never approached me to come to New York. Barry Darsow, who had been our third-wheel once I turned on Don Kernodle, tried to convince me, talk me into going to New York and become part of Demolition with him. And I said to Barry, I said 'Barry, man, I've worked too hard on this camp for Nikita Koloff, developing this, to just go up there and just blend in with the crowd.'

"But more important than even that, I know looking back, I probably could've made ten times the amount of money. I know I could've approached when Crockett started with the guaranteed contracts. It would've been very easy to leverage New York and say Look, 'I'm going to talk to them.' Two things I realized: one, yeah, I would've been in the main event with Hulk Hogan, there's no question in my mind. But then secondly, what would my career have been after that? Probably not what it became. But most important to me, loyalty is a major component of who I am. I'm a very loyal individual. Still loyal fan of the Minnesota Vikings, the Minnesota Twins where I grew up, years removed from living in Minnesota. I'm a very loyal person. And so more than the money, the true story is I had a real sense of loyalty to Crockett Promotions, Jim Crockett in particular, for giving me my break. Because I didn't make the big millions and millions of bucks, but I made more money that I ever would've back home or maybe even in pro-football. And so that was the number one reason. And I'm sure most of the folks know, Steve-Sting-Steve Borden and myself are about the only two that have actually never worked for WWE and Vince McMahon."