Today is Monday, which means Raw is coming up tonight. We’re expecting an answer from Brock Lesnar about HHH’s challenge at Summerslam. Teddy Long is also expected to be there as the GM for Raw and Smackdown this week. Long will be the attraction of this week’s “Remember When”

Do you remember when Teddy Long was Thuggin and Buggin?

It was back in late 2002, D’Lo Brown had been tired of being persecuted by the white referees because of his skin color. He acquired the managerial services of former WCW/WWE Manager and Referee, Teddy Long. Long, who then referred to himself as Theodore Long, basically told WWE him and Brown were not going to let the white man bring them down and they were planning to take WWE by storm and we were going to be “Down with the Brown”. This lead to Brown winning some matches but after a few weeks Brown was replaced by a newcomer named Rodney Mack.

Long and Mack were the new duo in WWE and “Back the Mack” was off and running. Mack would go on to do these challenges called “The White Boy Challenge”. In these challenges, Mack would attempt to beat a Caucasian Wrestler in under 5 minutes. Mack’s opponents were usually just local jobbers and Mack would just squash them within the 5 minute duration.

It’s pretty much what Ryback is doing now, except there’s no time limit and no skin color requirement. Long would also get former WWE Diva Jazz in his stable along with Christopher Nowinski, who felt he was being persecuted because of his intelligence. These four would form a group called “Thuggin and Buggin” and would go on to have quite a bit of success including a tag team win over the Dudleys.

After Nowinski suffered his career ending injury, he was replaced with Mark Henry and they would also have some success of their own. Later in 2003, Mack would suffer an injury and was put on the shelf for the rest of the year. During the 2004 Draft, Long was drafted to Smackdown and thus was the end for “Thuggin and Buggin”.

I wonder what Teddy Long has in store for us tonight and tomorrow night. I guess we’re going to have to wait and see.

Here’s T& B taking on The Dudleys at Badd Blood in June 2003

Here’s Mack taking part in the WBC