Matthew Anoa’i, best known as Rosey, or in Japan Ro-Z, passed away on 4/17 at the age of 47.
Anoa’i was known to be suffering from congestive heart failure although no cause of death had been reported. Family friends said his health wasn’t good, but his passing was sudden and a great shock.
He was diagnosed with congestive heart failure and atrial fibrillation in January 2014. He had talked about undergoing kidney dialysis last year. His weight had yo-yo’d over the years but was said to be around 450 pounds of late.
Anoa’i was the older brother of Roman Reigns (real name Leati Joe Anoa’i) and the son of Leati “Sika” Anoa’i, 72, part of a brother combination with Afa that were one of the top tag teams in pro wrestling in the 70s and 80s. The brothers were big wrestling fans of Peter Maivia, when they were in San Francisco in the late 1960s, including being involved in some famous near riots at the Cow Palace as fans. Because of their size, they were trained to become wrestlers and went on the road at that point, and held tag team titles all over the world, including being WWE tag team champions and Hall of Fame legends.
“The Anoa’i family is mourning the loss of Sika’s son, Matt aka Rosey, due to an untimely death.
We want to let his fans know that he loved them and the wrestling world so much. In his passing, he left three beautiful young children and a heartbroken family. Please respect the privacy of his children and family as they mourn the loss of this kind, loving, gentle man, who was a father, son, brother and a superhero to us all.
Our family appreciates your prayers and continued support during this very difficult time.”
In recent years, he was running a Florida-based wrestling promotion, Epic Championship Wrestling, with his father and while living in Cincinnati before moving back to Florida, had run a restaurant called Island Boi BBQ.
Even though there was a 16-year age difference between Matt and his brother, they were very close and when he was in wrestling was always talking about how well his brother was doing in football and their hopes that he would play in the NFL.
Matt Anoa’i was born on April 7, 1970. He was a high school teammate of Emmitt Smith at Escambia High School in Pensacola, where the family ended up settling after his father left San Francisco. He played college football at Mississippi Delta Junior College and went to the University of Hawaii but a leg injury ended his football career. He graduated with a degree in Graphic Design.
In 1990, he won a $100 first prize at the World Catfish Festival is Mississippi by eating two pounds and 12 ounces of catfish in ten minutes.
He worked at various night clubs in New Orleans before his cousin, Eddie (who later became a major star as Umaga), and he started training at the Wild Samoan wrestling school run by Afa. They worked some of Afa’s shows together, and he began his career in 1995 working for the WWC in Puerto Rico as Prince Kuhio, to honor the King Curtis Iaukea, who worked as Prince Kuhio in some territories in the early 60s.
Matt & Samu, Afa’s son, went as a tag team to ECW in 1996. Matt was given the name Mack Daddy Kane and Big Matty Smalls while in ECW as the tag team the Samoan Gangsta Party. He wrestled for the next few years in Puerto Rico and in Japan for FMW (using the name Matty Samu).
“I knew Matt very well,” said John Raad, who was part of this publication for years but at the time was working for Fed-Ex. “He lived in a rented house on my Fed-Ex route back in the 90s. He was the kindest, sweetest and most at-peace giant I’ve ever known. Breaks my heart.”
He and cousin Eddie held the FMW tag team titles in 2001 and then signed a developmental contract with WWE that year. They were assigned to Cincinnati and Les Thatcher’s Heartland Wrestling Association, where they were pushed as headlining tag team The Island Boyz, Kimo (Matt) & Ekmo (Eddie, whose nickname was Eki).
They were brought to the main roster in 2002 as Three Minute Warning, as Matt was now Rosey and Eddie was now Jamal. The name Rosey was because of his size, as he was hovering around 400 pounds and was named after Rosey Grier, a star pro football player in the 50s and 60s who was one of the first star 300-pound players in the league.
Their original role was as big hit men for Eric Bischoff, who was a heel General Manager, who would look at his watch and they’d come out to destroy people with splashes.
The most memorable Three Minute Warning attacks was when they’d splash older wrestlers like Fabulous Moolah and Mae Young, or a non-wrestler like Lilian Garcia, and perhaps the most remembered was in an attempt to break out of a ratings slump WWE brought in two women who were part of the UPW promotion in Southern California and had them make out and promoted it heavily as Hot Lesbian Action, with the segment ending when Three Minute Warning splashed them both.
“I vividly remember picking Eki and Matty up from JFK on a Sunday as WWE was doing Monday Night Raw at Madison Square Garden,” noted Court Bauer, a longtime family friend of the Anoa’i family. “Over the weekend, Jimmy Snuka had agreed to let them put him through a table as part of building heat for Eric Bischoff. This was a big moment as they, like all of the island family, looked upon Jimmy as a legend. Jimmy was kind of their version of Bruno.
“Anyway, they stayed that Sunday night at my house in Westchester. They were like two kids, just in awe that they were going to do such a big angle and get to do it with Jimmy at Madison Square Garden. It was there things wrapped into one, plus it was a sign that the office continued to have immense faith in them.”
Bauer remembered that both wanted to buy new suits to go to the show in, but Mens’ Warehouse had nothing for their size.
“They were simply euphoric over the whole night,” he said. “I remember Adam Geller (who later worked in production for UFC and a number of other sports and was a huge wrestling fan), another dear friend, was at the venue as he was doing production for WWE remotes.”
After Eddie was released, Rosey turned into a comedy babyface figure as the tag team partner of The Hurricane, Shane Helms. He was dubbed Roosevelt, the Super Hero In Training, with the comedy initials as shyt. Hurricane would teach him to help old women across the street and kind of play a good-hearted but bumbling giant attempting to be a superhero. They were mostly used as comedy, but did get a run as world tag team champions, beating La Resistance on May 1, 2015. For a time, they were joined by Stacy Keibler as Super Stacy. They lost the titles on September 5, 2005, to Trevor Murdoch & Lance Cade.
Helms then turned heel on Rosey. Eddie was rehired in 2006 and they teased a return of Three Minute Warning as a team, but the decision was made to give Jamal the big push as Umaga, and Matt Anoa’i was released on March 21, 2006.
“He was a really, really great guy,” said Helms. “He was genuine, and he was a loyal friend. I’ve been heartbroken ever since I heard the news. He meant a lot to me, more than my introverted nature could properly express. I’m going to miss my friend.”
“Rosey was a gentle, kind man, who was always great to be around and who leaves three young children without their dad,” wrote Jim Ross, who first signed him in WWE. “RIP big fella. My condolences to the entire Anoa’i family for their loss.”
After Eddie was signed to return, the two did one dark match with the Three Minute Warning name, and he was to get a renewed push with the team back together. But Eddie had improved greatly during his time away, working for All Japan, where he’d advanced into being a main event heel.
As soon as the match was over, Vince McMahon said, “We’re signing him, but not for Three Minute Warning. We have ourselves a main event heel in the makings.”
Eddie, repackaged as Umaga, may have been the most physically talented worker in the entire Anoa’i/Fatu clan. He ended up as a major star, and played a big part in getting inadvertently Jeff Hardy from being a popular high mid-card babyface to the most popular wrestler at the time in the company. But issues with drugs prematurely ended his career as a top heel, and WWE let him go after he failed a drug test and refused to go to rehab.
Matt never had another shot, although Bauer said he pushed for him in a role of a Samoan San Francisco gang banger, but the idea was never accepted.
He moved to All Japan Pro Wrestling, as Ro-Z, to get around the WWE’s ownership of the name Rosey, working there in 2006 and 2007. In the World’s Strongest Tag League at the end of 2006, Ro-Z & Suwama lost in the finals to Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima. He also appeared as part of an All Japan vs. New Japan match at the January 4, 2007, Tokyo Dome show, teaming with Giant Bernard & Taru & Suwama to beat Riki Choshu & Manabu Nakanishi & Takashi Iizuka & Naofumi Yamamoto (Yoshytatsu).
In 2007, he was part of a reality television show called “Fat March,” on ABC. The show was 12 overweight people walk about 570 miles across nine states to attempt to get fit and lose weight. The story used on the show is that he was doing the show because weight issues made it no longer safe for him to compete as a pro wrestler and he needed to lose weight to return. But his knees couldn’t hold up to the walking and he quit the show after the fifth episode.
There was a push to bring him back after being on a national television, because he had dropped a lot of weight before quitting the show. However, Vince McMahon decided against it.
Matt actually wrestled fairly often on the independent scene until 2012, and did matches as late as last year even though his medical condition was well known.
“He struggled with his weight, yo-yoing a lot in later years after doing Fat March,” said Bauer. “He ended up gaining it all back and then some. He leaves behind three beautiful children and a lot of friends and family who loved him. You won’t find anyone that will speak badly of Matty. He was the definition of chill, just an easy-going island boy.”
Matt was hoping to attend WaleMania before WrestleMania, but canceled, saying he was too weak to come.
“His health was clearly fading,” said Bauer. “He had a lot of struggles with his heart in2014 and hadn’t lost weight over the past three years. In spite of his deteriorating health, he always had such a great upbeat, positive outlook. He was like a big kid with the enthusiasm for life that he showed.”
The Anoa’i family has had more than their share of tragedies. Matt’s partner, Eddie/Umaga passed away on December 4, 2009 at the age of 36, from a heart attack attributed to a drug overdose. Another cousin, Rodney, who wrestled as Yokozuna, a WWF main event performer in his youth, also passed away young, at the age of 34, also having battled against health problems due to weight issues. Gary Albright, who married into the family, passed away from a heart attack at 36 during a match in Hazelton, PA.
And folks saying that they wish it was Roman dying instead of Matthew. I hope Roman gets pushed to the moon and beyond just so these folks can stab themselves in the eyes when he's on tv. It's really gotten pathetic.
< all my faces reading that. Folks foul as fukk.
This is the part of being a fan I absolutely despise, I hope none of the sick fukks saying that have children.
@ you quoting one of them