Bruce Prichard: Vince Russo Was “Kiss Of Death” For Test’s WWE Career

In 1998 there was a new face bursting onto the scene in WWE. He was tall, athletic, and had a great look. His name was Andrew Martin but fans knew him as simply Test.

Test had a nice run in WWE with many highlights and dated Stacy Keibler and Kelly Kelly IRL so he couldn’t complain much. But eventually he left WWE without making too big of an impact in 2007 after returning from a little hiatus in 2005.

Test went to TNA to have one match in 2007. Here’s a note of trivia: Test’s only match in TNA was a Doomsday Chamber of Blood match at Hard Justice where he teamed with Abyss and Sting to defeat Christian, Tyson Tomko, and AJ Styles. Yup, that happened.

It looked like Martin had a budding acting career starting but before he could do anything else, Test sadly and expectantly passed away in 2009 four days before his 34th birthday.

“I was shocked by [Test’s tragic passing]” Bruce Prichard said on Something To Wrestle With. “I don’t remember him having any problems while I was there. So it did shock me and I hate it any time that someone leaves us before their time especially at a young age like that — it’s just a tragedy and Andrew was a great guy, yeah it sucks.”

Bruce Prichard said Vince Russo had big plans for Test including a run as a member of D-Generation X. But Triple H hated the idea and so did Shawn Michaels. Bruce went on to discuss how Vince McMahon was high on Test, but he just wasn’t ready yet. But ultimately it might have been that endorsement from Vince Russo which meant Test’s ultimate downfall.

“Yes, Vince was high on Test the first time we saw him and he came into our first developmental with Edge and Christian and Val Venis and all of those guys. The kiss of death with Test was [Vince] Russo, who believe it or not didn’t always look at in-ring talent, looked at guys would have ideas and looked at it like ‘this is acting I can just put anybody into that spot and they’ll work cause I’m such a great writer bro, whatever I write they’ll do it right — they’ll be a star.'”

“It took a couple of years [for Vince to give up on him] because the first few years were ‘you know, Vince — he’s still learning.’ It wasn’t fair to [Test]. We put him in a loose situation because he wasn’t ready and we put him into a top spot. We put him in a position where there were so many eyeballs on him and everybody was looking for him to fail. So he couldn’t win and then he was against the 8-ball coming in.”

“I do think that if [Test] would have had more seasoning or time before he made his debut then it might have been a little bit different but I think his confidence was shot and he thought because he came in at that top spot that he was already there and already over and he wasn’t.”

If you use any portion of the quotes in this article please credit Something To Wrestle With Bruce Prichard with a H/T to Still Real To Us for the transcription.