Author: New Jack locked himself in a room as over twenty police officers arrived. Of all the things to cause chaos at a wrestling event featuring Christopher Daniels, AJ Styles, Cesaro, and The Dudley Boyz, it was a concession stand mix-up involving New Jack that stole attention from the ring. The incident, steeped in absurdity and volatility, became another darkly comedic chapter in the legacy of one of wrestling’s most unpredictable figures.
New Jack and the Soft Drink Incident: When a Soda Sparked Chaos
Jerome Young, better known to pro wrestling fans as New Jack, carved a reputation as one of the industry’s most notorious enigmas. His time in ECW cemented his legacy as a human wrecking ball of a performer who weaponized staplers, trash cans, and even his own body in high-risk dives that left audiences equal parts horrified and electrified.
Stories of his backstage altercations, including the infamous Mass Transit incident and his near-fatal feud with Vic Grimes, are well-documented. Yet, few episodes encapsulate New Jack’s combustible persona quite like the night a lemon-lime soda spiraled into pandemonium.
The venue was Philadelphia’s Alhambra Arena, a revered site for hardcore wrestling fans, commonly referred to as the ECW Arena (now known as the 2300 Arena).
On September 13, 2006, the venue hosted Pro Wrestling Xplosion’s debut event, Lighting The Fuse. The card boasted future legends: Christopher Daniels clashed with AJ Styles in a technical masterpiece, Claudio Castagnoli (formerly known as Cesaro in WWE) showcased his raw power, and The Dudley Boyz brought their trademark tables.
But as the show unfolded, it wasn’t the in-ring action that dominated the night- it was New Jack’s meltdown over a carbonated beverage.
A Spark Ignites the Fuse
New Jack’s scheduled Triple Threat match against Mana and Ian Rotten never materialized, becoming collateral damage in a storm of his own making. The September 13, 2006, Pro Wrestling Xplosion event at Philadelphia’s hallowed ECW Arena should have been a celebration – a 300-strong crowd gathered for the promotion’s debut show, Lighting The Fuse. Instead, it became a case study in how quickly New Jack could derail proceedings.
The chain reaction began at the concession stand, where precision mattered more than anyone realized. When the female vendor, later revealed to be venue operator Roger Artigiani’s daughter, handed New Jack a 7 Up instead of his requested Sprite, it wasn’t merely a beverage substitution. To Jack, this was a breach of the unspoken contract between performer and promoter. Witnesses described his volcanic reaction: veins bulging as he loomed over the counter, expletives echoing through the arena’s concrete corridors.
As the confrontation escalated, a ring crew worker intervened to defend his colleague. New Jack’s response was characteristically physical – a swift punch to the intervenor’s face that echoed through the backstage area. The commotion drew promoter Ronnie Lang, head of the legendary Atlas Security firm that had policed ECW’s most chaotic events. What began as mediation rapidly devolved into a shoving match between two hardened security veterans, their shouted threats drowning out the in-ring action.
The arrival of 20-30 Philadelphia police officers transformed the backstage area into a scene from a crime drama. As officers swarmed the venue, Castagnoli and Delirious continued their technical masterpiece in the ring – their carefully crafted match now reduced to background noise as fans craned necks toward the real-life drama unfolding behind the curtain.
New Jack’s final act of defiance saw him barricade himself in a storage room, forcing police to extract him like a cornered animal. Even after removal from the building, his rage persisted – a final confrontation with the ring crew worker outside the arena serving as an explosive coda to the chaos.
The fallout was swift and unprecedented. While no charges were filed – the battered worker declined to press claims against the volatile star – New Jack received a lifetime ban from the venue. For a man who’d turned rule-breaking into an art form across every major promotion, this permanent exile marked a rare institutional line in the sand.
Contextualizing the Carnage
To understand this soda-fueled meltdown requires examining New Jack’s personal code, which was a twisted honor system where perceived disrespect demanded extreme retaliation. As detailed in our definitive profile, Jack’s career was a series of violent exclamation points: stabbing an opponent 9 times in a “worked” match gone real, attempting to murder Vic Grimes via 20-foot scaffold drop, and brutalizing 70-year-old Gypsy Joe with a baseball bat.
The 7 Up incident wasn’t about citrus flavors – it was about control. In Jack’s worldview, the wrong beverage symbolized promotional incompetence, a breakdown of the fragile trust between wrestler and organizer. His reaction followed a familiar pattern: disproportionate violence as both performance art and personal justice. For New Jack, that proof came through relentless assertion of dominance.
This incident also exposed wrestling’s dangerous duality. While two of wrestling’s finest executed textbook maneuvers in the ring, the real spectacle unfolded through New Jack’s unscripted violence – a reminder that even in worked entertainment, genuine danger lurked just beyond the curtain.
The promotion itself became an unwitting casualty: Pro Wrestling Xplosion folded shortly after its disastrous debut, its legacy forever tied to a Sprite bottle rather than in-ring artistry.
New Jack: Legacy of a Loose Cannon
New Jack’s death on May 14, 2021, at age 58 from a heart attack closed the final chapter on one of wrestling’s most controversial figures.
Jerome Young left behind a complex legacy that defies simple categorization. To industry veterans, he represented a dangerous liability whose unpredictability made him both valuable and volatile. To hardcore fans, he embodied the authentic edge that mainstream wrestling often sanitized, a performer who, as he once declared on camera, “I’m a very violent person, and I’ll hurt you. It’s no secret.”
The 7 Up incident, while minor compared to his more gruesome exploits, perfectly encapsulated New Jack’s approach to both wrestling and life.
His deteriorating physical condition in later years revealed the toll of his extremspae style: failing vision, memory problems, and heart issues that eventually claimed his life. As he wrote after collapsing in 2016: “With the heart trouble I already had, I could feel myself getting close to the final bell.”
Though he officially retired in 2013 after facing Necro Butcher, New Jack couldn’t stay away, returning to the ring in 2016 with his final match taking place in 2019.
His legacy endures as both a cautionary tale and an antihero; a man who transformed backstage chaos into his signature performance and whose coke-fueled violence made him unforgettable in an industry built on spectacle. In death as in life, New Jack remains what he always was: one of wrestling’s most authentic nightmares.
These stories may also interest you:
- New Jack – The Unimaginable Story of Wrestling’s Most Violent Man
- 10 Wrestlers You May Not Know Appeared in ECW
- Macho Man Randy Savage – The Waffle House Incident
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"Evan Ginzburg’s stories are a love letter to wrestling, filled with heart, humor, and history. A must-read for any true fan." — Keith Elliot Greenberg
Wrestling Rings, Blackboards, and Movie Sets is the latest book from Pro Wrestling Stories Senior Editor Evan Ginzburg. 100 unforgettable stories—from sharing a flight on 9/11 with a WWE Hall of Famer to untold moments in wrestling history. A page-turner for fans of the ring and beyond. Grab your copy today! For signed editions, click here.
"Evan Ginzburg’s stories are a love letter to wrestling, filled with heart, humor, and history. A must-read for any true fan." — Keith Elliot Greenberg
Wrestling Rings, Blackboards, and Movie Sets is the latest book from Pro Wrestling Stories Senior Editor Evan Ginzburg. 100 unforgettable stories—from sharing a flight on 9/11 with a WWE Hall of Famer to untold moments in wrestling history. A page-turner for fans of the ring and beyond. Grab your copy today! For signed editions, click here.
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