Maxx Payne

Darryl Peterson (born October 3, 1961) is an American musician, actor and retired professional wrestler.

He is best known for his time in World Championship Wrestling as Maxx Payne, and in the World Wrestling Federation as Man Mountain Rock.

Peterson became involved in wrestling in grade school when he transferred from football to amateur wrestling as result of a personality clash with the football coach.

His amateur career was halted by a motorcycle accident in his junior year of high school.

After playing a high school wrestler in the film Take Down with Lorenzo Lamas, Peterson married and had a child.

He began working in the construction industry, but decided after two years to return to amateur wrestling.

Peterson earned wrestling scholarships to junior college and then to Iowa State University, competing in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA).

In 1985 he was an All-American, placed fifth in the NCAA competition and also won the Gorriarian award for having the most falls in the least amount of time at the tournament.

Every match he won that year at the NCAA's, he won by fall.

It was his best and only NCAA finish.

Then he relocated to Los Angeles to pursue an acting career.

While working as a security guard, he was introduced to professional wrestler Red Bastien by his boss, and decided to train with him.

Peterson worked for the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) in March 1986, and put together the steel cage used in the main event of WrestleMania 2.

With his training complete, he debuted in June 1987 and soon after traveled to Japan to work for New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), where he trained in the New Japan Dojo alongside fellow gaijin Chris Benoit for five months.

In 1988, Peterson developed the character Max Pain (short for "Maximum Pain"), a sinister, grungy, Jimi Hendrix-loving heavy metal guitarist.

His original idea was Lucifer Payne, but he felt that this was too foreboding.

He used the name Max Payne, hailing from Hell's Kitchen, New York nationally in the United States as well as in Europe and Japan.

Following a short stint with the Universal Wrestling Federation (UWF), Pain debuted in the Tennessee-based Continental Wrestling Association (CWA).

He quickly began pursuing the CWA Heavyweight Championship, and on February 8, 1988 in Memphis he defeated Jerry Lawler to win the championship.

He then went after Lawler's AWA World Heavyweight Championship, but was unable to win the title.

He forfeited the CWA Championship to Brickhouse Brown on May 23, but won the title once more on June 27.

His second reign ended on July 10 when he was defeated by Phil Hickerson.

Pain left the CWA after a year before returning to Utah, where he opened his own promotion, featuring wrestlers such as Louie Spicolli.

He also made an appearance under his real name as a jobber on a February 1989 episode of WWF Prime Time Wrestling, losing to Bret Hart.

After his employees began to leave the territory, Peterson applied for a job with WordPerfect.

Soon after, he received a phone call from Benoit, who invited him to join an upcoming tour of Germany.

Peterson received his plane ticket to Germany half an hour before he received a job offer from WordPerfect, so decided to join the tour.

He spent six months in the German Catch Wrestling Association as Heavy Metal Buffalo and won the vacant CWA Intercontinental Heavyweight Championship on October 25, 1992, defeating Giant Haystacks.

He then successfully defended the title against The Warlord at Euro Catch Festival on December 19.

He vacated the title the following year when he returned to the United States.

World Championship Wrestling (WCW) booker Bill Watts was impressed by Peterson's amateur credentials, and hired him in 1993, with Peterson relocating to Marietta, Georgia.

Peterson made his televised debut in WCW as the villain Maxx Payne on the January 30, 1993 episode of Worldwide by defeating local competitor Scott Allen.

Peterson's first pay-per-view match was at SuperBrawl III, where he played Taps on his guitar before challenging Dustin Rhodes for the WCW United States Heavyweight Championship, substituting for the injured Ron Simmons.

After Rhodes locked him in an abdominal stretch from which he was unable to escape, Payne pushed the referee over rather than submit and was subsequently disqualified.

At the June 17 Clash of the Champions XXIII, Payne shot Johnny B. Badd in the face with a confetti gun, (kayfabe) scarring him so badly that he had to wear a mask and forcing him to forfeit their scheduled match.

This led to a match at Beach Blast on July 18, which Payne lost.

They faced one another again at the August 18 Clash of the Champions XXIV in a mask versus guitar match, with Payne putting his guitar on the line in order to unmask and therefore humiliate the mutilated Badd.

Badd won once more and took Payne's guitar.

Payne took part in WCW's Jesse "The Body" Ventura Strong-Arm Tournament in late 1993, but was eliminated in the first round by Sid Vicious.

On November 20, Payne entered the Battlebowl, a tournament which saw randomly assigned tag team partners work together in order to progress to a battle royal.