Original subtitles

Tammy and Chris's story is everything. It was a love story.

It was a cautionary tale.

It was a success story.

It was a failure story.

High school sweethearts Chris Candido and Tammy Sitch soared to wrestling

stardom, fueled by their talent, ambition, and devotion to one another.

Anybody who met Chris loved Chris. You couldn't help it. From the first time

that I saw Chris in the ring, I knew he had exceptional talent.

He was a natural, and he loved wrestling.

I went from seeing Chris and Tammy backstage to seeing them as two of the

biggest stars.

But as Tammy's star rose higher and brighter than Chris's, the bond between

young lovers was put to the test. Tammy was the first female internet sensation

in professional wrestling.

And when she came onto the scene, she took all of the attention away from him.

until a series of devastating injuries and ill -fated choices sent them

towards disaster.

There was substance abuse.

There was alcohol abuse.

There were rumors of infidelity.

If you are fucking around with the top guy, have enough decorum to shut your

fucking mouth.

They were the two cleanest kids that you could possibly imagine.

What has happened? What's happened to these two?

I once said to myself,

I'd probably die at 36 because I wanted to be just like Marilyn Monroe.

I know my son loved her.

Loved her.

As addicted to opioids as Chris became, his biggest addiction was to Tammy.

Tammy's legacy in wrestling is both a meteoric rise and a meteoric fall.

What happens is bound to happen. You don't live like that and not go away

without. paying the piper

if

you would have came down to 13 year old Chris Candido and said

listen you're going to die at 33 but you're going to be a WWF champion

you're going to have more belts than you can count

You're not going to have kids or get married, but you'll be a wrestling star

who's going to be remembered by the people and by other wrestlers.

Do you accept? He would say yes.

You know, like he took what came.

I'm Johnny Ray, also known as Johnny Candido. I'm Chris Candido's younger

brother.

This is the office.

This is where he concocted all of the...

His wrestling ideas and stuff.

My brother hung this fan. That's why I haven't taken it down.

He's got all the old pictures.

I mean, just stuff everywhere.

In Chris's spare time, he would draw wrestling in here. I wish there was a

on this. This was probably before I was even born.

Cook is what me, my family, everybody in the neighborhood calls him Cook.

When I was a baby, I couldn't say Chris. I called him Cook. It kind of stuck.

So he started the Eastern Kids Wrestling Federation.

He took this platter that was left behind at somebody's wedding, and, yeah,

he just made this out of a weight belt.

It looked like a legit wrestling belt, and he made it when he was 13.

Like, how the fuck do you even make that at 13, right? Like, him and his friend

Scott would say, Chris would say, I'm sleeping at Scott's house.

Scott would tell his mom he's sleeping over here, and the two of them, they

13, they'd get on a bus, go to Brooklyn, and they would wrestle at the Galaxian

Bar.

Then they would take a bus back home the next morning and wash off their gig

marks and come back home like they were just at a regular sleepover.

That's how determined he was.

So he was sort of starting his wrestling career behind your back.

Oh, way behind my back.

I had no clue he was doing that.

I wouldn't have allowed it. It was not my dream or wish for him at all.

Hi, my name is Peggy Ray, and I'm Chris Candido's mom.

He was confident that he was going to be a wrestler. It was what he wanted for

his future. That's what he wanted to do.

He was in a wrestling match at Madison Regional High School, and I went to

the match that night.

I think he was working with Johnny Hotbody, and Johnny Hotbody had him in a

headlock, and he's like, hey, dude, you know, check out the blonde in the front.

I actually saw Tammy while I was sitting in the bleachers, and I said to him,

oh, my God, I saw this girl, and she was all dressed in white, and she looked so

heavenly.

And he told me that, yeah, Mom, I met that girl, too. Actually, we all went

to her house.

The girl in white was Tamara Lynn Sitch, a bright high school student preparing

for college, unaware that her life was about to take a sharp turn.

When Chris and Tammy started dating, they were very into each other, together

all the time.

And he would say, Mom, Tammy's coming, please be nice.

I was always pleasant.

That relationship was his other obsession.

He actually had a prom date.

Tammy was just an acquaintance at that time, but he left the prom with the

and she was sitting there in her convertible.

And he left the date and got in the car with her,

which I didn't think was very nice.

I thought in the very beginning that she was lovely.

After graduating from high school, Chris does everything in his power to

establish himself in the wrestling business.

My brother was constantly on the phone trying to get books, driving to shows.

Even if he's not booked, he's still going to drive there and see if he can

on. And he wanted to go to Smoky Mountain, and he was calling Jim

He started sending me VHS tapes of all of his matches on the independent

circuit. I saw a lot of natural talent in Chris Candido.

I'm Jim Cornette. I was the promoter of Smoky Mountain Wrestling, and I'm the

one who brought Chris Candido and Tammy Fitch to mainstream wrestling.

The drawback for me bringing Chris Candido to Smoky Mountain Wrestling was

I couldn't pay him enough to justify asking this kid to move from New Jersey

East Tennessee for 75 bucks a night, four times a week or whatever.

At the same time...

Tammy had never been involved in wrestling. She was Chris's girlfriend.

would go and do some ringside photography or just support him.

But I was looking at her. I said, there's something about her. She's got

charisma. She's a very pretty girl, but she seems quick and intelligent.

Finally, I got an idea.

What if Tammy was a manager?

What if she could talk? I don't know. Can she? I'm not sure. She's never done

before. But if she can talk, then I could pay them both a little bit. So I

called him and pitched him the idea.

And I said, you're not going to leave school.

So he applied to the University of Tennessee and got accepted.

And I said, well, that's great.

Yeah, you can take that little road trip and go see Mr.

Cornett as long as you go to school.

Yeah, I thought it was going to be temporary.

Of course, he had to wear a baby bonnet.

What?

And he gets that baby bonnet count of two, and no!

Wrestling just makes me so crazy.

They make up these stories. So there was Christopher walking around in a baby

bonnet and a diaper.

The suicide blind, Chris Candido.

I guess it makes sense to some people. It made no sense at all to me.

Chris was such a student of the game, and he understood that it took more than

great moves or a great match to get over. He realized he had to be a

My name is Mick Foley. I am a three -time WWE champion.

I'm known as the Hardcore Legend, and I was a colleague of Chris and Tammy's.

It's just more fun to be a bad guy. Bad guys have more fun.

The cat is in that bag!

Oh, no!

He embraced the heel mannerisms. He liked to be a jerk. He was one of the

best jerks I've seen in our business.

Though Chris relishes playing the bad guy, it's Tammy who is destined to be

ultimate villain.

The way I fell into the business, Jim Cornette asked me to work for him. And I

was in college. I was a pre -med student. I wanted to be a plastic

And I was like, this is his thing. You know, I'm in school to be a doctor. But

was like, all right, it might be fun. I'll make a couple extra bucks. And

how I fell into it.

We were in East Tennessee in the early 90s. And it was a highly Republican

Everybody hated the Clintons.

He's president.

Hillary has tons of heat with all the Republicans.

I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies and had tea, but what I

decided to do was to fulfill my profession.

I saw an opportunity to basically piss off every Republican and every hillbilly

in East Tennessee and surrounding states.

This young lady is Tammy Fitch. Now, the Smoky Mountain Wrestling attorneys have

advised us to let her have her say here on the program.

And I gave her notes. I said, here, this is the story we'd like you to tell on

your first interview.

Put it in your own words. Make it sound natural.

Tammy? My name is Tammy Fitch. Of the New England Fitches, I'm sure you've

of us.

One take.

One take she did.

Mrs. Clinton has proven that a woman can do anything she wants.

Here is this woman who idolizes the person that they all can't stand.

And she was coming to Smoky Mountain Wrestling because she demanded equal

opportunity. At any rate, the reason I'm here today is because I have filed a

sexual discrimination lawsuit against Smoky Mountain Wrestling.

And the people hated that shit.

She leaned into the idea that she could make people hate her. She wasn't scared

of it at all.

I'm ready to become the first lady of Smoky Mountain Wrestling.

Hi, this is Tammy Fitch, and I'm here with Tammy's Tips. You'll be amazed at

I can make Margie into an acceptable human being.

Tune in next week for more of Tammy's Tips.

I'll make something out of you yet.

As soon as she was on screen, she lit it up, you know, like she just popped on

screen. Right, Jim?

Cornette put her in a perfect spot because she was that.

She wasn't playing a part either. That was Tammy.

My name is Dr. Tom Pritchard, and I was Chris Candido's tag team partner in WWE.

Chris was starved in his eyes, and this love for this one woman that he's going

to spend the rest of his life with.

Why wouldn't you want to be with your partner?

From the time they first came to Tennessee, they were inseparable. They

together. They lived together, obviously. They seemed to be the most

loving couple.

You know, Tammy had no idea that wrestling was going to pan out for her.

thought it was something that Chris was going to do.

And then, actually, it made it all the more surprising when she got over

than he did.

They're obviously insecure about the masculinity.

In early 1995,

Tammy's charisma and Kristen's dynamic wrestling style catch the attention of

the WWF. Signing with the company, the pair finally achieve their ultimate

dream. My relationship with Kristen Tammy was obviously as a mentor as well

boss, but I genuinely believed in both of their talents, and I wanted to see

them succeed even past my promotion.

He said, yeah, I'm going to go wrestle for the WWF, which I thought was, well,

okay, so you did make it. That means you're dropping out of school, but I

you did make it.

His ultimate dream was getting to the WWF and being a top talent.

He attained his goal, and a lot of people just never attain their goal, and

did it without any encouragement from me.

Tammy, from the beginning, was ready to conquer the world, and she didn't care

who knew it.

Didn't care what anybody thought about her.

Yes, I do think with the success, her head grew pretty big.

But the transformation that she was undergoing personally inside and

all that was even more remarkable and honestly much more

dangerous.

Hi, I'm Skip.

And I'm Sunny. And we're the Body Donnas. At that time, a lot of people in

were vocations.

They were Mounties. They were IRS agents. They were repo men.

I love my job!

They made them fitness gurus.

The Body Donnas.

Chris was the young, jacked guy that would work out, and she was the...

pretty girl that would exercise along with him. He would have been much more

comfortable being himself, but I think he just thought of it as a rite of

passage. See where it goes, and it went.

I mean, they won the tag titles.

When they added the tag partner and they

made Tom Pritchard, who had, you know, long...

curly hair that he was a big fan of, shave his head. And I'm like, they

have just called me. It's like I had the hair already.

Hi, I'm Lance Storm, a professional wrestler who worked with Chris and Tammy

Smoky Mountain Wrestling as well as Extreme Championship Wrestling.

I could have been Zip, yeah.

Although in hindsight, being 2020, and thank God they didn't. It sucked.

It was horrible.

It was the worst goddamn time of my life. Shit!

Just, it was rotten. It was a rotten gimmick.

And that's what got Chris Candido off on the wrong foot with the fans and the

WWF is they saw this as preliminary foolishness.

And they weren't mad at Tammy anymore because she wasn't this bitchy heel

manager. She was this girl doing jumping jacks and she's pretty, so they started

loving her.

She was amazing on the mic. She was amazing as a manager. She was amazing at

damn thing in the business that you could possibly ask of her.

I am Terry Reynolds, former diva, manager, wrestler.

She was, back in the day, the most downloaded female on AOL.

And if you don't know what AOL is, well...

It was back in the day, like way back when Christ was born, we had AOL books.

Anyway, she was gorgeous.

She just, she had it all.

Viewer discretion is advised.

She went from a 19 -year -old kid to a 24 -year -old sex

bimbo.

I think it timed well with, you know, the explosion of the Internet, and all

a sudden it's, you know, everyone's downloading sexy pictures of attractive

women.

And Tammy was just hitting at the right time as this new sex symbol character on

wrestling television.

And there was a lot of teenager, younger boys that thought that was a pretty

damn good thing.

In the beginning, a lot of people liked Tammy because she could come across as

very charming.

But once you got to know her, you understood that was just a front. And

was all about Tammy.

I had heard Tammy was divisive.

I always liked Tammy. I understood she was ambitious.

Like, that's not a negative.

But it can be if you're a woman in a man's business.

So there was one time on television before they had taken her off the road

the body Donna's manager.

Henry and Phineas Godwin, the pig farmers, they carried a slop bucket

they would dump the slop over the head of their opponents and people would

and they'd just love it.

On a particular night, I remember the Godwins coming in, putting the bucket

in the locker room. I said, Guy, the bucket is going on Tammy tonight. So

anybody do anything in this bucket.

And you can imagine.

There must have been DNA from 20 different

people in there.

Tammy seemed to have heat in the dressing room.

I don't know why.

If cockiness was a penalty, then we wouldn't have much of a business.

Everybody needs to have the performer's ego. Yes, you must have an ego. No

doubt, Tammy didn't lack an ego, but she went off the rails because she didn't

know how to control it.

Tammy skyrockets to fame as one of the first female megastars in the WWF.

But her rise to the top is plagued by a culture of drugs and alcohol.

Soon, she's caught up in the hard partying lifestyle.

Well, at the time that Tammy and Shawn Michaels started their liaison, I didn't

know about it originally.

Most people didn't. Then the rumors started circulating, and then it started

become more of an out in the open thing.

In the mid -90s, Shawn Michaels, the Heartbreak Kid, was the top star in the

WWF. He was the champion. He defeated Bret Hart in 1996 at WrestleMania and

carried the belt through the end of 1997.

I think Michaels did it because he could, and he could get away with it.

Can you feel it? Do you want to feel me? I can feel it. Did Chris find out about

Sean and Tammy?

I don't know if he actually caught them red -handed, but how could you not know

is my point.

Of course he knew.

Everybody knew. I have to believe that he knew it and just could not accept

it. Oh, my goodness!

She was a little girl that just wanted to be loved and, you know, being loved

the top guy.

Felt a whole lot better than being loved by, you know, her boyfriend that was

down here, I assume.

If Shawn Michaels hadn't been Shawn Michaels and he got sideways with Chris

Candido, Chris Candido would have broke him in 15 pieces and shoved him up his

own ass.

But Chris wasn't going to do that because Michaels is a big star.

This is Chris's dream to work for the biggest promotion.

He took it.

And he internalized it, I think.

My brother and Tammy had an altercation in a hotel.

It was too much. I couldn't watch my brother get treated like that. So I

him. I threw him out of the room into the hallway.

He's trying to fight to get back in. I'm not letting him.

I'm like, dude, let's get in the car and let's get the fuck out of here.

He's like, I can't do that, dude.

He's like, dude, I brought her into this business. It's my responsibility to

take care of her. I'm like, that's bullshit, dude. Like, get the fuck out

here. And he's like, I can't do it.

We were together for almost the seven -year mark.

And it was like I had the itch. You know what I mean? I was kind of tired of

being in the same thing.

And so we split up for a little while, and that's when I was seeing Sean.

Nothing was ever talked about. Nothing was ever brought up.

That's why, like, to this day, I always wondered, did he know everything? Did he

not know?

If he knew he just loved me so much, he just ignored it.

You know what I mean? I would love to know, but I'll never know.

Chris Candido's undeniable talent isn't enough to make him a top star in the

eyes of the company.

After falling down the ranks of the WWF, a serious injury makes his prospects

even worse.

He was in Madison Square Garden.

He came back to the dressing room.

It's not going to hurt neck. Well, they found out that it was.

More than hurt, it was broke.

And this kid's going out there busting his ass.

You know, having a broken neck, aching back, everything else in life.

Somebody says, here, try this.

Well, if one's good, six must be even better.

My brother never touched a drink, a drug, anything until he

was in WWF.

And it was out of necessity. It was pain. He was hurt. He broke his neck.

I was surprised when I heard that Chris had fallen into that trap because he'd

always been so clean. Didn't even drink.

It started for pain, obviously, but then it became he could use it to just go to

sleep and forget about it.

And I think he used it for his emotions at times, yes.

While Tammy Sitch revels in the fame and excitement of being on top in the WWF,

Chris Candido finds himself squeezed out and even bullied by the toxic culture

of the locker room. He wasn't well -liked by a few key people in the locker

room. And life can be really tough for somebody who's not well -liked by the

people in the locker room.

Battling injuries and frustration with his mid -card status.

Chris leaves the WWF in search of the main event spotlight and joins the

hardcore and controversial Extreme Championship Wrestling.

Paul Heyman was in charge of ECW.

Chris knew he would be well utilized there, and he was.

The thing that the fans liked about Chris was that he was a throwback to an

-time wrestler.

He was exciting and fast and strong and he could talk and he looked good.

That in -ring portrayal was the best thing that Chris Candido ever did.

It's like, and people think we're, and we were insane, but it's like an ECW

we were working. It's like his finisher was the blonde bombshell, the power bomb

off the top rope.

And depending on which one of us won.

We would give the other one the power pump off the top rope every night.

There it is, the blind doctor!

And he had injuries from these bumps. I remember there was one time in the

middle of the night his back was bothering him so much they caved in and

him to the hospital.

And when they went in and first looked at his back, the doctor looked at him

said, well, I need to see the accident report.

And Chris was like, what do you mean?

He's like, well, you were in a car accident, right? He's like, no.

They're like, well, how did your back end up this messed up? He's like, um, I

wrestled professionally.

The fans for that 90s grunge era loved that kind of shit.

And as a result, all those guys crippled themselves.

Had to face the reality of breaking my neck twice.

And that fed the drug use that most of the people involved on the ECW roster

were already heavily involved with.

Thomas were a drug of choice for a lot of wrestlers, especially in the 90s.

2000s, it's a muscle relaxer, heavy -duty muscle relaxer. They're really

for back pain. The intended use for somas is take one or two with food.

However, if you take six, seven, chew them up, swallow them, and it's

like instant, I was going to say instant drunk, but it's not drunk. It's like a

euphoric state is pretty much what it is.

It seems to me like people can be addicted with one prescription, with 30

By the time that week is up, you can be an addict.

Tammy, she didn't have any of that problem.

It was the jack -offs that she was going out and partying with. They're all

drinking. They're all doing somas. She didn't have any of those issues. She

started doing it socially.

Tammy's meteoric rise in the WWF hits a sudden obstacle with the arrival of

Sable, a new diva who quickly outshines Tammy in the eyes of both the company

and the fans.

Shut up, I'm reading.

In the hopes of revitalizing her career, Tammy joins Chris at ECW as his on

-screen manager.

But her struggles with substance abuse continue, affecting her performance in

the ring.

She would, walking on her high heels, her ankles would be vibrating and

and she'd be stumbling, and the audience noticed it on her entrance.

Joey, take a look at that front row, that ringside area. It's not like

As Chris and Tammy's drug use spirals out of control, it becomes impossible to

ignore, both for audiences and ECW owner Paul Heyman. Let me tell a few jokes.

Let me get on the floor and do the curly shovel. There's no more jokes now.

It's no more fun and games. No more joking around.

To keep their jobs in ECW, Tammy agrees to film a provocative tell -all video as

directed by Paul Heyman. My first drink was at home.

And there were no more pills to make you go to sleep.

It was disheartening.

As their friend, I'm watching it sitting there going, this is not productive.

This is not going to help these kids in any way.

I was hoping I wouldn't wake up this morning.

Tell me about it. Describe that feeling.

It's the worst feeling in the world.

I was mad at Heyman.

For a long time, still, I could work up getting mad at him now for doing that,

but it was all because Paul thought people will watch this, it'll get

Well, they'll watch two dogs fucking on the side of the road too, Paul, but I

wouldn't have put it on my television.

I don't think it did anyone any favors. Now, the right answer would have been

that their time off, they had gone to rehab and got everything worked out, and

we had the triumphant story on the return, but...

That's not what happened.

As their alcoholism and soma addictions grow more severe, Chris and Tammy's

domestic problems escalate to a whole new level of intensity.

I would see something really crazy.

Just crazy insanity.

Like she's pulling knives out of the butcher block.

He's running away.

Then she's locked in the car, and then he picks me up from high school the next

day, and he's like, oh, dude, Tammy's waiting for you to put together your

bedroom set. And he's, like, wondering why I'm not stoked to go put together a

bedroom set.

And we just never talked about it. We just left it under the rug, and that was

it.

Chris would be in the ring wrestling, and Tammy...

would be somewhere else with somebody else in the back.

Well, he's in the ring.

Well, he's in the ring.

You have to want to stop.

You have to want to get better.

And I don't think either one of them knew how to live any other way at that

time. While serving their suspension from ECW, Paul Heyman keeps Chris and

on the payroll by assigning them office jobs, including arranging travel plans.

for other wrestlers on the road.

My brother had the American Express card, and he would book the boys'

hotel rooms and then get reimbursed with cash.

He'd do it, get reimbursed with cash, and then he stopped getting reimbursed

with cash.

What Chris and Tammy don't know is that ECW is struggling with crippling debt.

As the promotion crumbles, the couple is stuck with a massive bill for tens of

thousands of dollars in unreimbursed ECW expenses.

So they ended up in huge, huge debt and ultimately ended up

losing their home.

So that was a horrible time for them. His drug use was probably as bad as it

ever was.

We knew of pharmacies that were corrupted, and we could go there and get

somas every other day, you know.

So we were at this pharmacy, and we were waiting, waiting, waiting.

And all of a sudden he goes, oh, no.

And he has a seizure, and he bites his tongue, and he's coughing up blood.

And I'm holding him, trying to get his eyes to, like, look at me, you know.

So they call the ambulance.

And when you come out of a seizure, you don't know what you're saying.

They're like, sir, sir, what day is it? Sir, what day is it? I'm like, move out

of the way. Ask him something he knows.

I'm like, look, how many times did Ric Flair win the NWA title?

He's like 16.

I'm like, all right, he's alive.

Then we go to the hospital, and he would, you know, be like, where am I?

like, you're in the hospital.

And he'd be like, I'm in the hospital. Get the fuck out of here.

Drip the things out of his arm and we'd go.

After years of uncertainty.

Chris and Tammy receive an invitation to join an independent wrestling promotion

in Puerto Rico with the hope of revitalizing their careers.

However, things quickly take a turn for the worse. We get there.

The buildings are decrepit. A lot of them are outside.

No running water.

You get hit in the head with 9 -volt batteries as you walk in and out of the

locker room.

People go up to the concession stands, buy a cup of soda, drink it, fill it

pee, pour it on your head as you walk in the locker room. Whether you're a heel

or a baby face, it doesn't matter.

I had wealth on my head from 9 -volt batteries night after night.

The access in Puerto Rico to SOMAS was very easy.

You know, it was well known where you could go to get SOMAS just like that.

I heard Chris was struggling.

Ah, man, I heard it was bad.

He would just say, you know, dude, if I go out, I want to leave a good -looking

corpse, you know, blonde, tan, and, you know, I want to, like, live fast, die

young. I'm like, dude, don't fucking say that shit.

He needed to change. I think he even knew, you know, that he needed to

And it's not time to throw in the towel and just, you know, stay there and

fucking die.

One day, you know, we were sitting there having our lunch.

And he's like, man, you know, the guys on the Indies right now fucking, you

know, he's like, they really.

get under my skin. He's like, you know, they don't look like professional

athletes. He's like, you know, when I was 17, 18, I was already big, muscular.

was going to Smoky Mountain. I was making moves. I was doing all this

I'm like, yeah, dude, that's why you were a standout. That's why you made it,

numbnuts. And he's like, he's like, man, I really fucked everything up.

And I was like, dude, no, you didn't. Like, you're 32, 31.

Let's get back on fucking track.

And he's like, yeah, dude, fuck it.

It was at that point that his love for wrestling overcame his addiction

to the psalmist.

Chris gets clean and undergoes intense training to regain his fighting form.

With Tammy by his side, he returns to the mainland to join a new wrestling

promotion called Total Nonstop Action Wrestling.

Back on television, he's determined to work his way to the top of the industry.

What I noticed from Chris Casso is being reinvigorated, getting that drive back,

and you could see it in his eyes. I could see it in his work.

He was as happy as he was when he first got signed to WWF.

Like, he had that same happiness. Like, dude, he was, like, glowing, you know?

The thing he just said, he's like, dude, like, I'm really sorry for all the...

Stuff that you saw at such a young age, you know, I apologize.

He's like, I shouldn't have like, you know, put you in that situation. And I'm

just like, dude, you were a baby too. You know, you were 23, 24.

I had heard at that point he had cleaned up and he certainly seemed like Smokey

Mountain, Chris Candido again.

There was a camera in the ring and he tried to bump to get away from it.

And that got his boot hung up a little bit in the canvas when he was trying to.

bump and his shin broke and right

away he he wanted to stand up but he couldn't he got out of the ring and

they they took him to the hospital and i'm freaking out i'm here you know i i

call his phone and he's just like he's like dude i can't believe i left the

he's like i just couldn't stand up you know i think i'm just like Fucking

embarrassed that I left the ring. Like, I shouldn't have done that.

I talked to him on Monday, and he said, hey, I'm about to go to the doctor.

I'll call you back.

After undergoing extensive ankle surgery, Chris makes a surprise

TNA event just two days later. He then boards a flight home, unaware of the

tragedy that awaits.

Everybody saw the horrendous injury.

that I sustained in lockdown.

On Wednesday, he flew home and he called me Wednesday night.

And he's like, oh, Mom, I just don't feel good. I said, well, Chris, you

probably shouldn't have flown home.

You just need to go to bed.

And that was the last time I talked to him.

All I know is he was fine on the phone talking to me.

You know, the two of us were chatting.

You know, last thing we said to each other was, hey, love you, bro. Love you,

too. It was the next morning that I get a call that Cook's in the hospital.

I go in there, and I see him, like, laid on a hospital bed.

And I get on top of him like I've done a million times, and I'm like, Cook,

Cook, Cook.

You know, I'm like, yo, wake up, wake up.

And, you know, I'm trying to, like, open his eyes and shit.

And then when I...

I was trying to grab, once I grabbed his hand, I realized he passed away,

because the blood stopped flowing, and I was like, holy shit, like,

it was fucking, like, it was the worst experience of my entire life.

I just go walking, and I found a church, and I went and said a couple prayers,

and then, yo.

Sorry, hold on.

The last interaction I had with Chris.

Everything was off.

Everything didn't. It was just fucked.

And I got home, and Tommy Dreamer called me.

I said, Chris is dead.

I said, Chris who?

It couldn't have been Candido. I just talked to him Monday.

He said, Candido.

He started crying.

I said, oh, my God.

And I hung up. He hung up. I started crying.

I don't really break up, you know, but that image has freaking stuck with me.

Doctor comes in, kneels down in front of me and says, sorry, he's gone.

I said, what?

You're sorry he's gone?

I said, what are you talking about? Gone where? Did he have to walk out?

He's like, no, we lost him. I was like, what do you mean? I don't comprehend

this. And then that's when they said they found the blood clot.

They said after the surgery, blood clot formed in his ankle and went to his

lungs, which caused pneumonia, and went to his heart.

And they said this was nothing they could have done.

By the time I got to the hospital, he was already gone.

I let him down.

Why do you say that?

Because if I knew,

maybe I could have helped him. Maybe I could have saved him.

Maybe I should have been there. I shouldn't have let him go through

himself. You know, you think back on things and you say, maybe if I was

things would be different.

I miss him. I miss him all the time.

And I just feel sad that he didn't get the opportunity to

enjoy a lot more life because he had a lot more life to live.

You know, here's the thing about this whole deal.

They said this kid never did anything wrong to anybody.

And he finally, he has all those problems.

And then he finally is getting straightened out.

And just when he gets his last chance,

it was because he was so dedicated to the wrestling business that he

died. He could have sat at home and they would have paid him.

But after he had that surgery, he had to get on a plane and go somewhere, and

you shouldn't fly after surgery. You can get blood clots in the altitude and the

pressure, whatever.

And that's what happened. A goddamn broken ankle killed him.

I need a minute.

I'm sorry.

With Chris, I don't get sentimental about many people.

If Chris Candido was around today, he'd be one of the biggest stars in wrestling

because the style has changed.

And they like smaller, younger, faster guys.

The road that Chris helped pave is now the road most traveled.

And I think because of that, he's left a bigger legacy, even though she was by

far the bigger star at her peak.

Tammy was that bridge to divas.

The road she paved at the time is a road almost no longer traveled.

I once heard her say she has no regrets.

None. Zero. Vilch.

I don't know if you are a living, breathing human being that you can truly

those words and mean them because mistakes are regrets, in my opinion.

When was the last time you spoke to her?

I think she'd just gotten out of jail.

Real quick, what's your last name?

What's your first name?

Okay, what's your middle name?

I mean, the way I look at it, did I fuck up? Sure, I did. Absolutely.

But you know what?

Shit happens.

Life happens, and there's nothing you can do about it. I, unfortunately,

know how to cover it up very well with, you know, seven DUIs and a couple of

jail stints. You could still always hold out hope that she'd straighten up and

get her shit together. People do.

And then we got the news, and at this point, it's never surprising, but still,

it's like, oh, boy, you know, she's done it now.

49 -year -old Tamara Sitch, a former WWE wrestler, crashed into the back of a

car, killing its 75 -year -old driver.

She's drunk.

She has no license with the multiple DUIs. She has no business being anywhere

behind the wheel and is now charged with DUI manslaughter,

up to 20 -something years in prison.

She's denying it and denying it and denying it.

When you can't be honest with yourself, you're not going to be honest with

anybody else. So I just don't think she's coming out.

I hope she doesn't.

I don't want to do any more damage.

It was surprising, the way that everything turned out, to see both of

young people and then especially to see what happened with Tammy.

Tammy changed.

Tammy...

lost track of what was going on, and Tammy lost control of her life.

I wouldn't have seen that coming from the girl I first met.

Chris Candido, the real world heavyweight champion.

Chris, the last 15 years, I don't think if he'd have lived, if he would have

been a significantly different person.

Today, Chris would be one of the biggest stars in the business.

Because the business is more accepting of what Chris offered and what he

brought.

His legacy.

I think if you're happy doing what you're doing, you should just do it.

Just do it. If you have a dream, dream it. Live your dream. Live your life to

the fullest.

He did more in 33 years than I've done in 73.

He's been everywhere. He's seen so many things. He's had so many life

experiences. He was special.

He was my special kid. He was special to a lot of people.

And I'm thankful for that.