Three year anniverary of Eddie Guerrero's death

Photo courtesy of wwe.com

Sunday, November 13, 2005 is a day that I will never forget. My twenty-first birthday had been four days earlier and I had just returned to the CSU Monterey Bay campus the day before from a basketball road trip at UCLA, where we had been crushed 101-40.

On the morning in question, I slept in until about 10 or 11 a.m. and put the television on NFL football as I always do during NFL season. I proceeded to turn my computer on and once loaded, made my usual rounds on the internet, checking my email and stuff like that.

While surfing the net, I saw a thread on a message board that said “Eddie Guerrero dead at the age of 38.” Naturally, I didn’t even open the thread as I thought it was some prankster or noob playing a cruel joke and just looking for attention. After shaking my head in disgust, I went over to wwe.com and nothing could have prepared me for what I saw on their front page.

In big, bold white letters next a picture of him, was the headline “Eddie Guerrero Found Dead This Morning.” I felt my heart sink. I just couldn’t believe it. I still didn’t believe it until I went to Yahoo.com and on their front page, under headlines, it said “Pro Wrestler Guerrero Found Dead,” and the reality hit. . . Eddie Guerrero was gone.

I screamed out “NO” and began crying uncontrollably for at least twenty minutes, if not more. I was thinking to myself, “With all the stuff he’s been through and how hard he fought to get his life back, how can he be dead?” I hadn’t cried this hard in a long time and what was strange was that I had never met the man but here I was, weeping over his passing. I think that speaks volumes of how many people Guerrero touched during his wrestling career.

About an hour later, WWE.com posted a video of a press conference of WWE owner Vince McMahon and Eddie’s nephew, Chavo Guerrero (who wrestled for WWE as well) saying that Eddie had been found dead on the floor in a Minneapolis hotel room that morning. Chavo said that he had talked to Eddie the night before and everything was great as Eddie had just celebrated his fourth year of being clean and sober.

Chavo went on to say that when Eddie didn’t answer his wake-up call or come down for breakfast, he knew something was wrong. He tried calling Eddie on his cell but there was no answer and none of the other wrestlers had seen Eddie either. Finally, Chavo got a maid to open Eddie’s room door and there was Eddie, on the floor with his toothbrush in his mouth. He had dropped dead while brushing his teeth.

McMahon went on to announce that he was changing the format of the Raw and Smackdown shows that were to be taped that night into Tribute Shows for Eddie and anyone who wanted to wrestle tribute matches for him could do so.

The next night on Raw, there was not a dry eye inside the Target Center. The audience was in tears, the wrestlers and divas were in tears and I too was in tears for I cried the whole two hours as the wrestlers and divas gave farewell speeches to Eddie, recalled fond memories of him and aired several music video tributes (which you can view below) and career highlights.

"Here Without You" by 3 Doors Down


"Hurt" by Johnny Cash

An autopsy would reveal that Eddie had died as the result of acute heart failure, caused by an undiagnosed arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease and enlargement of the heart as a result of prior anabolic steroid abuse. In addition, Eddie’s blood vessels had shriveled up to the point of being extremely thing and Eddie simply dropped into a deep sleep.

For those of you wondering who Eddie Guerrero was, allow me to give you a quick education. Eddie Guerrero was born into the wrestling industry as he was the son of legendary Mexican wrestler Gory Guerrero. Eddie’s in-ring character was that of a crafty, resourceful wrestler who would do anything to win his match and lived by the motto “I Lie, I Cheat, I Steal.” Even though he was a heel for a majority of his career, the crowd could not help but love Guerrero and made him one of the most popular wrestlers in professional wrestling history.

Throughout his decorated career that included wrestling in Japan, Mexico, Europe and the United States for ECW (Extreme Championship Wrestling), WCW (World Championship Wrestling) and WWE, Eddie’s personal demons were too powerful to overcome and he encountered various substance abuse problems, including addictions to alcohol and pain killers, which he started turning to in order to fill a void inside of him as he felt he had accomplished everything in his wrestling career he could.

In his autobiography, Cheating Death, Stealing Life: The Eddie Guerrero Story, Eddie recalled a time where he almost killed himself in a car crash on New Years Eve 1998 when he took five capfuls of Renutrient, a legal form of GHB that promotes fat reduction and muscle building by stimulating growth hormone release, and was thrown a hundred feet from his car after falling asleep at the wheel and taking a curve at 130 miles-per-hour. After that near-death experience, Eddie would overdose twice more in a one month span on various drugs and didn’t think anything was wrong.

After leaving WCW for WWE in January 2000, Eddie would hit rock-bottom in November 2001 when he was released from WWE following an arrest for a DUI, which caused his wife, Vickie, to file for divorce. At the time, the head of WWE’s Talent Roster, Jim Ross, told Eddie to his face, “Can you blame her? You’re a Goddamn Drug Addict!”

The losing of his family and his job finally opened Eddie’s eyes and as a result, began picking the pieces of his life up one day at a time. Eddie entered rehab and after proving himself to management, was rehired by the WWE in April 2002. Upon his return, Eddie began having five-star matches every night, stealing the show in most cases, and it was clear that this was a different Eddie Guerrero. This was the Eddie Guerrero who made a name for himself in Japan, Mexico, ECW and WCW. This was the Eddie Guerrero the fans knew about and for that, they welcomed him back with open arms.

On February 15, 2004, Eddie reached the top of the WWE when he became the second Mexican born wrestler to become WWE Champion (the first being Pedro Morales) as he defeated the 6’4”, 290-pound Brock Lesnar at the No Way Out pay-per-view at the Cow Palace in San Francisco. Eddie, who stood 5’11” and weighed 225 pounds, was the lightest WWE Champion in history and the celebration and ovation he received that night brought tears to everyone’s eyes and not a person was sitting down.

To bring this to a close, please enjoy this music video of Eddie's career set to "Higher" by Creed on his "Cheating Death, Stealing Life" DVD.