Ex-TNA Star Recalls Taking Crazy Hurricanrana Off A Steel Cage

Elix Skipper and Chris Harris were part of one of the earliest historic TNA moments – a tightrope Frankensteiner from atop a steel cage!

TNA’s 2004 Turning Point saw a hellacious Six Sides of Steel match between America’s Most Wanted‘s James Storm and Chris Harris, and Triple X’s Christopher Daniels and Elix Skipper. During the bout, ‘The Wildcat’ was removed from the top of the cage with a mammoth tightrope Frankensteiner.

Speaking with Chris Van Vliet on his Insight podcast, Chris Harris addressed the famed spot, explaining how he initially refused to take the spot from Skipper:

“It is [insane] and it’s crazy that people still talk about it to this day. That was our second cage match, a lot of people don’t remember the first one. Our first cage match had got a lot of attention but when we were talking about the second one, we wanted to top the first one, which is incredible if we could do that. Elix had this idea and I thought that it was completely absurd.

What a lot of people don’t remember is that part of Elix’s arsenal was that he would walk the top rope and do a hurricanrana off of that, on the ropes. It wasn’t a complete out-of-the-blue idea, he had done it in his matches previously. When he brought that idea up, I was like, ‘That takes it to a whole different level, that is dangerous’. A lot of people don’t know this, but I told him no for most of the [day], it wasn’t talked about until that day. Most of the day I was telling him no, there is no way. I don’t know if I want to take something like that and it is dangerous for him.

It couldn’t have been more than a few hours before the event, he came and he tried it one more time. I looked at him and I said, ‘Can you really do this?’ What convinced me was his confidence, he said to me, ‘Yes. I can do this.’ When I saw that he had no wavering, I said, ‘Okay, let’s do it.’ You have to take your chances, man.”

Today in #IMPACTHistory: Elix Skipper defied gravity with his jaw dropping ICONIC cage walk. (Turning Point, 2004) pic.twitter.com/ac7CMjY6xQ

— IMPACT (@IMPACTWRESTLING) December 5, 2020

As Chris Harris continued, the seven-time NWA World Tag Team Champion commented on the practice that goes into such a spot:

“A lot of people still think there is a lot of practice and going over everything, that is a one and done thing, you don’t practice that. I don’t know if they had a cage up that day. I don’t think we walked through anything. But we were all professionals and confident in our abilities. So yeah, I said, ‘Let’s do it’, and it just was a switch.

I can remember, if you look back at that, he is stumbling at first to get his footing. I am over on the other side with Christopher Daniels and already he is taking a while. I am looking at Chris and I’m like, ‘What is plan B?’, because he is not going to make it. By the time I looked back, he was on me, so you saw once he got his footing he was gone, man.

Next thing you know his legs are around my head and here we go. He gets props for that and I am glad he does, but a lot of people forget who took that bump. But it couldn’t have been any better, I am very fortunate, it’s a long way down.”

The match saw America’s Most Wanted victorious over Triple X, utilising Daniels and Skipper’s own finisher, the Powerplex; thus, Triple X was forced to disband. They’d ultimately reform – joined by Senshi, a.k.a Low Ki – two years later at the Victory Road pay-per-view.

Although Chris Harris was deemed retired following 2018, he recently made an in-ring return for IMPACT Wrestling, teaming with Storm, Heath, and The Good Brothers in a victory over Honor No More at the Against All Odds special at the start of July.