John Morrison (wrestler)
John Randall Hennigan[1] (born October 3, 1979)[2] is an American professional wrestler, actor, and filmmaker. He is currently signed to WWE, where he performs on the Raw brand under the ring name John Morrison.[10]
Hennigan was the winner of Tough Enough III, a televised competition that would award the winner a WWE contract, and was assigned to their then developmental territory, Ohio Valley Wrestling (OVW), to continue his wrestling training. Hennigan was called up to the SmackDown! roster in April 2005 under the ring name Johnny Nitro, and in his debut match (as a part of MNM) won the WWE Tag Team Championship. After leaving WWE in November 2011, Hennigan began wrestling overseas on the independent circuit under several ring names, before finding success in lucha libre wrestling promotions Lucha Underground and Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide as Johnny Mundo, as well as Impact Wrestling under the name Johnny Impact.
Hennigan is a four-time world champion, winning the ECW World, AAA Mega, Impact World, and Lucha Underground Championship once each. In WWE, he has also held the Intercontinental Championship three times and is a six-time tag team champion (one World Tag Team Championship, four WWE Tag Team Championships, and one SmackDown Tag Team Championship). In lucha libre, Hennigan was a central fixture throughout all four seasons of Lucha Underground, and was AAA’s first-ever triple champion, holding the AAA Mega, Latin American, and World Cruiserweight Championships simultaneously. He has headlined multiple pay-per-view events for WWE and Impact, including the latter company’s flagship event, Bound for Glory, in 2017 and 2018.
Outside of wrestling, Hennigan has also worked in the film and television industry. In film, he has mainly worked as an actor, producer and stuntman. He is also known for being a contestant on the 37th season of the competitive reality show Survivor.
After graduating college with a degree in film and geology and deciding that he did not want to pursue either path,[16] Hennigan began his professional wrestling career training at the Supreme Pro Wrestling school in Sacramento, California.[7] After failing his audition for Tough Enough 2,[17] a competition in which the winner earned a World Wrestling Federation (WWF) contract, he was accepted as a cast member for Tough Enough III in 2002, eventually becoming the co-winner with Matt Cappotelli.[18] For winning, Hennigan was awarded a developmental contract and assigned to their developmental territory, Ohio Valley Wrestling (OVW), to continue his training.[19] Hennigan competed in Acolytes Protection Agency’s invitational Bar Room Brawl match at Vengeance in July 2003.[2] Hennigan and Cappotelli made an appearance on an episode of Heat in January 2004, losing to Garrison Cade and Mark Jindrak.[2]
On the March 1, 2004 episode of Raw, Hennigan debuted on the main roster as a heel, under the ring name “Johnny Blaze”. His gimmick was that he was the apprentice and assistant of the Raw General Manager, Eric Bischoff.[20] The next week his name was changed to “Johnny Spade”,[21] and three weeks after that it was changed to “Johnny Nitro”.[22] The Nitro name, which finally stuck, was a reference to WCW Monday Nitro, the flagship show of World Championship Wrestling (WCW) for which Bischoff had previously worked. To drive the point home, he began using the Nitro theme as his ring entrance music.[23] Nitro acted as Bischoff’s apprentice and assistant until June, when he was sent back to OVW. To explain his departure, Nitro lost a match on the June 7 episode of Raw against Eugene, which carried the stipulation that upon his loss, he also lost his job.[24]
