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Cryme Tyme
JTG (left) and Shad Gaspard
Tag team
MembersShad Gaspard/The Beast
JTG/Just Too Good/The Neighbourhoodie
Eve Torres (valet)
Name(s)Shad Gaspard and The Neighborhoodie
The Gang Stars
Cryme Tyme
Crime Time
Billed heightsGaspard:
6 ft 7 in (2.01 m)[1]
JTG:
6 ft 1 in (1.85 m)[2]
Combined
billed weight
530 lb (240 kg)[1][2]
Debut2006

Cryme Tyme (also spelled Crime Time) is a professional wrestling tag team consisting of Shad Gaspard and JTG with Eve Torres as their manager. They are currently signed to World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), wrestling on its SmackDown brand. Their gimmick, which Gaspard created,[3] is an over-the-top parody of stereotypical street thugs.[4]

Early lives[edit]

Shad is the son of Benjamin Gaspard, a former street enforcer for street gangs and personal security guard in the early 1970s, who now owns Mcfay Contracting Inc. Shad is the third of six siblings.[5]

At five years old Shad’s father began training him in boxing and at age eight he began training in a mixture of different martial arts, developing into a succesful amateur figher and earning the nickname "Beast" from his mother. By sixteen, Shad began prize fighting for promoter “Hardbody Harrison”,[5] a former World Championship Wrestling wrestler and FX Tough Man Champion, in bar fighting tournaments such as Boxing, Kickboxing, Mixed Martial Arts (MMA), and tough man competitions.[5] Even though Shad was only sixteen years old, he competed against adults who were older than him by five to twenty years.[5] Gaspard holds won-loss records as a No Holds Barred fighter (35-7) and an amateur boxer (57-26).[5]

Gaspard was extensively involved in athletics during his high school years, specializing in wrestling, track, and basketball.[5][6] After high school, he continued to play basketball at Georgia Perimeter College,[5] and after leaving, he became a bodyguard for several rappers and actors, including Puff Daddy, Cuba Gooding, Jr., and Mike Tyson.[5]

Though the Cryme Tyme gimmick was mostly parody, Gaspard has been arrested numerous times, including arrests for assault in New York, New Jersey, Florida, Kentucky, Ohio, Georgia, Illinois, and California; looting and robbery in New York and Georgia; and drug-trafficking in Atlanta.[5]

History[edit]

Ohio Valley Wrestling (2006-2007)[edit]

Gaspard qualified for the finals of the reality television program Tough Enough 2 in 2002, but was disqualified and replaced after failing a physical.[6] He was recruited by WWF talent scout Tom Prichard and trained with Sgt Dwayne Bruce for six months[7] before debuting in Ohio Valley Wrestling (OVW) under the ring name Da Beast.[8] He acted as part of the stable Bolin Services, acting as an enforcer, until he was placed into a tag team with Carlos Colón in February 2004.[6]

JTG, meanwhile had debuted as Just Too Good in OVW and after two matches was repackaged as The Neighbourhoodie and placed into a tag team with Gaspard, under his own name, that later used the name The Gang Stars. In OVW, they held the OVW Southern Tag Team Championship, defeating Roadkill and Kasey James on May 24, 2006 in their first match as a team. After they won the championships, they entered into a feud with CM Punk who teamed up with Kane to defeat them and Simon Dean in a handicap match. Punk and Kane won a title match but by disqualification, so the championships did not change hands. They retained the belts in a gauntlet match but later in the month lost the belts to Punk and Seth Skyfire on July 28. The following day they lost a Number One Contendership to The Untouchables (Dice Domino) and Deuce Shade).[9] The following year the team returned to OVW, this time under the name Cryme Tyme, and regained the OVW Tag Team Championship on July 21 from The James Boys (KC James and Kassidy James). They lost the belts back to them the following day. [10]

World Wrestling Entertainment (2006-2007)[edit]

In late 2006, WWE promoted The Gang Stars to the main Raw brand roster, starting by having them work live events and dark matches. On the September 4 episode of Raw, vignettes began airing to promote the debut of the team, now dubbed Cryme Tyme, showing them "training" for their pending debut on the show.[11] Before the vignettes aired WWE placed a statement on their website, WWE.com, stating:[4]

Cryme Tyme at an autograph signing in 2007

The vignettes, which aired weekly, featured Cryme Tyme robbing people while an (overly and stereotypically uncool sounding) announcer dubbed their actions "training exercises" designed to work on things like "speed", "agility", "drive", "endurance", and "intensity".[12][13] Cryme Tyme wrestled as fan favorites at live events and in dark matches, finally making their television debut, defeating Johnny and Mikey of the Spirit Squad on the October 16 episode of Raw.[14]

After arriving on Raw they were depicted covertly stealing things—such as Jerry Lawler's laptop,[15] and a plasma screen TV[16]—during interviews and while celebrating wins with the announce team.

On November 5, the team made their pay-per-view debut at Cyber Sunday, defeating Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch, The Highlanders (Rory and Robbie McAllister), and Charlie Haas and Viscera in a four team tornado tag team match.[17] Later that same month they were featured in a Raw segment that parodied Michael Richards's "Laugh Factory incident".[18] In the skit, a wrestler (Nick Berk)—acting as a stand in for Richards—recreated the scene of the incident by using racial slurs and insults until Cryme Tyme confronted him on stage. Nervous, he offered an apology, but Gaspard kicked him in the head and JTG made a Seinfeld-esque joke, saying "What's the deal with the Bloods and the Crips? Can't they all just get along?". This event was the beginning of a series of vignettes and skits featuring Cryme Tyme interacting with different, unexpected audiences.[19][20]

Around the same time they began a feud with The World's Greatest Tag Team (Shelton Benjamin and Charlie Haas), during which Benjamin began to express disgust with Cryme Tyme's antics, calling them offensive and harmful to the black community.[21] During the storyline Haas started "acting black", but after the World's Greatest Tag Team handed Cryme Tyme their first loss on the January 29, 2007 episode of Raw,[22] the program was dropped, with Cryme Tyme appearing mainly on Raw's sister show Heat, only appearing on Raw in backstage segments.

On July 21, 2007, Cryme Tyme appeared at an Ohio Valley Wrestling event and wrestled the OVW Southern Tag Team Champion James Boys (K.C. and Kassidy James), taking the title.[23] At the next weeks television tapings the James Boys were again announced as Champions, with no explanation of how they won the title back being offered.[citation needed]

The duo returned to Raw in July and started a gimmick where they would take items and auction them off to the crowd.[24] This led to a feud with the World Tag Team Champions Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch,[25][26] but both JTG and Shad were released from their WWE contracts for undisclosed reasons on September 2, 2007 before the feud was resolved.[27]

Independent circuit (2007–2008)[edit]

After leaving WWE they continued teaming together on the professional wrestling independent circuit, using the alternate spelling "Crime Time". They appeared at Jersey All Pro Wrestling's 10th Anniversary Show, defeating the Dirty Rotten Scoundrelz.[28] They left the promotion undefeated after defeating Style & Finesse (Mike Donovan and Rob Vegas) in January 2008's Reclaiming Hudson.[29]}}

The duo also made severeal solo appearances on the solo circuit. Gaspard lost to Psicosis at a Pro Wrestling Alliance event in September while his partner, appearing under the altered name Jay-TG made several appearances on the Derby City Wrestling television programme.

World Wrestling Entertainment return (2008–present)[edit]

Shad (left) and JTG during a 2008 Raw.

JTG and Shad returned to WWE under the "Cryme Tyme" name on the March 31 edition of Raw in 2008, defeating Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch.[30] Cryme Tyme began working with John Cena on the June 30 edition of Raw when they helped him interfere during John "Bradshaw Layfield's match.[31] The following week, they again appeared together in a segment when they vandalized JBL's limo.[32] After a live event match, Cena confirmed that they had created a faction and announced that it was called CTC or "Cryme Tyme Cenation".[33] Separately, Cryme Tyme started a feud with the World Tag Team Champions Cody Rhodes and Ted DiBiase, stealing their championship belts for a time,[34] then losing a title match to them at Unforgiven.[35] The CTC quietly separated after Cena's injury.

On April 15, 2009, Cryme Tyme were drafted to the SmackDown brand as part of the 2009 Supplemental Draft.[36] Eve Torres later became their manager, accompanying them to the ring and appearing in backstage segments with them. On the July 31 episode of SmackDown, they became the number one contenders to the Unified WWE Tag Team Championship by defeating The Hart Dynasty.

In wrestling[edit]

  • Word Up
    • Cryme Tyme hosts a weekly WWE.com segment called Word Up,[39] during which they define a different word in a parody of The Electric Company. On June 26,2009 they started hosting "Word Up" on WWE Smackdown as a backstage segment with Eve Torres and Slam Master J.

Championships and accomplishments[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b "Shad". SmackDown Bios. WWE. Retrieved 2009-04-15.
  2. ^ a b "JTG Bio". WWE. Retrieved 2009-04-15.
  3. ^ Thornton, Alex (2008-10-17). "Cryme Tyme: Monday Night's Alright for Fighting". Hip Hop DX. Retrieved 2008-10-22.
  4. ^ a b "Cryme Tyme debuts on RAW". WWE. Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Cite error: The named reference MySpace was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ a b c Varsallone, Jim (2009-06-01). "Shad: WWE's Diesel". Archived from the original on 2009-06-19. Retrieved 2009-06-19. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |publusher= ignored (help)
  7. ^ "WWA4". Archived from the original on 2007-10-30. Retrieved 2007-10-11.
  8. ^ "Ohio Valley Wrestling results 2003". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-08-13. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)
  9. ^ "OVW results for 2006". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  10. ^ "OVW results 2007". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2009-08-16.
  11. ^ "RAW results - September 4, 2006". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  12. ^ "Cryme Tyme Training: Speed". WWE. 2006-09-04. Retrieved 2009-02-25.
  13. ^ "Cryme Tyme Training: Endurance". WWE. 2006-09-11. Retrieved 2009-02-25.
  14. ^ "RAW results - October 16, 2006". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  15. ^ Rote, Andrew. "Cryme Tyme steals Four Team Tag Match". WWE. Archived from the original on 2007-01-17. Retrieved 2006-11-05.
  16. ^ "RAW results - October 30, 2006". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  17. ^ PWI Staff (2007). "Wrestling's historical cards". Pro Wrestling Illustrated (2007 Wrestling almanac & book of facts). Kappa Publishing: 122.
  18. ^ "RAW results - November 27, 2006". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  19. ^ "RAW results - December 4, 2006". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  20. ^ "RAW results - December 18, 2006". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  21. ^ "RAW results - December 4, 2006". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-04-06.
  22. ^ PWI Staff. "Arena Reports". Pro Wrestling Illustrated (May 2007). Kappa Publishing: 134.
  23. ^ a b "OVW Southern Tag Team Title". Wrestling-Titles. Retrieved 2007-08-09.
  24. ^ "RAW results - July 30, 2007". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-09-02.
  25. ^ "RAW results - August 13, 2007". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-09-02.
  26. ^ "RAW results - August 30, 2007". Online World of Wrestling. Retrieved 2007-09-02.
  27. ^ "Cryme Tyme released". WWE. 2007-09-02. Archived from the original on 2007-10-22. Retrieved 2008-09-29.
  28. ^ {{cite web|url=http://www.japw.net/new/events/2007.htm#102707%7Ctitle=10th Anniversary Show|date=2007-10-27|accessdate=2008-01-12|publisher=Jersey All Pro Wrestling
  29. ^ "Reclaiming Hudson results". Jersey All Pro Wrestling. Retrieved 2009-08-16.
  30. ^ "RAW results - March 31, 2008". Online World of Wrestling. 2008-03-31. Retrieved 2008-04-01.
  31. ^ Adkins, Greg (2008-06-30). "Opportunity Knocked, Punk Answered". WWE. Retrieved 2008-07-25.
  32. ^ Sitterson, Aubrey (2008-07-07). "Chain Gang Carjack". WWE. Retrieved 2008-07-25.
  33. ^ Pena, Daniel (2008-07-14). "What "CTC" stands for". Rajah. Retrieved 2008-07-16.
  34. ^ Sitterson, Aubrey (2008-08-18). "It takes a thief". WWE. Retrieved 2008-08-26.
  35. ^ Vermillion, James (2008-09-07). "Price(less) is right". WWE. Retrieved 2008-09-09.
  36. ^ "2009 WWE Supplemental Draft results". World Wrestling Entertainment. 2009-04-15. Retrieved 2009-04-15.
  37. ^ "Cryme Tyme WWE Kids profile". WWE. Retrieved 2009-03-15.
  38. ^ Dee, Louie (2008-05-01). "Music from da Hood". WWE. Retrieved 2008-05-28.
  39. ^ "Dot Com Schedule". WWE. Retrieved 2008-07-10.

External links[edit]