The British Bulldog’s break-up and the feud following tore the pair’s family apart in the subsequent years.
Dynamite Kid and Davey Boy Smith left the WWE in 1988, following Dynamite Kid’s incident with the Rougeau’s, plus aggrievances over plane tickets. They opted to move back to Canada to work with Stampede Wrestling. During this time, they regularly travelled to Japan, taking up work with All-Japan Pro Wrestling.
They split up the British Bulldogs in Canada, with Dynamite Kid wrestling Davey Boy Smith in matches all over the country. However, they remained a team in Japan until Davey Boy Smith turned his back on his cousin to return to the WWE in 1990.
Due to Dynamite Kid’s injuries, the team was reliant of Davey Boy Smith doing the bulk of the work for the Bulldogs. While the matches weren’t close to the level fans were used to from their peak in the WWE, they were still a great team that the fans, especially in Japan, loved to watch.
Davey Boy Smith Returned To The WWE Without Dynamite Kid
Two years after leaving, Davey Boy Smith returned to the WWE for the biggest run of his career.
Taking on the name “The British Bulldog”, Smith embarked on a main event singles run for the first time in his career. He was regularly in the top matches against opponents like Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels.
Davey Boy even beat Bret Hart for the Intercontinental Championship at Wembley Stadium at Summerslam 1992, in what Vince McMahon called the “best match in wrestling history”. In doing so in 1990, he left his cousin behind in Japan. Davey Boy Smith asked Dynamite Kid if he wanted to join him, but the Wigan-born wrestler refused to ever work for Vince McMahon again.
Knowing that, due to Dynamite Kid’s injuries, their tag team had a limited shelf life, he made the decision to go back to the WWE alone. This was viewed as a betrayal by Dynamite. He saw it as his cousin abandoning him, especially after all the injuries he had suffered for their days in the ring together.
Both men had their reasons to feel the way they did, although the British Bulldog’s behaviour following was very spiteful indeed.
He Claimed Dynamite Kid Died In A Car Crash
One of the most bizarre real-life team breakups happened to the British Bulldogs in Japan.
The pair were set to compete in AJPW’s annual World’s Strongest Tag Determination League. While Dynamite Kid’s injuries limited him in the ring, the pair were still putting on good matches and were wildly popular. However, the duo were abruptly withdrawn from the tournament, with very little notice. This perplexed Dynamite Kid, who had heard nothing from his partner.
As it turns out, Davey Boy Smith had abandoned his cousin and jumped back to the WWE. They previously discussed the idea of going back, but the Dynamite Kid refused to ever work for Vince McMahon again.
He never told Dynamite Kid this. He only found out from the agent who sorted out his travel from Canada to Japan for the All-Japan tours. The agent told the Englishman that he had almost been cancelled from the tour, as they’d heard he’d been in a car crash.
According to the Dynamite Kid in his book Pure Dynamite, it was Davey Boy Smith who rang All-Japan’s office in Tokyo to tell him about the “car crash”.
Other tellings of the story claim that Davey Boy told AJPW that Dynamite Kid had perished in the crash. He reasoned that the only people who could have known he was going to Japan were Davey Boy Smith or his wife, so it must’ve been his tag team partner.
Why did he lie?
He seems it was simply out of spite, and maybe fear of the Dynamite Kid’s reaction when he was told about the return to WWE.
He was a violent man and could be very unpredictable, which is why Davey Boy Smith neglected to tell him face to face.
The pair never spoke or saw each other again. Davey Boy Smith returned to the US, returning to wrestling in Britain just four years later.
Davey Boy Smith Stopped Dynamite Kid Using The Name “British Bulldog”
In 1994, both of the British Bulldogs were back wrestling in the United Kingdom. However, they were in opposition to each other, not on a team like at their peak in the WWE.
Davey Boy Smith was working for Joint Promotions, while Dynamite Kid was the All Star Wrestling star. Smith was the replacement for the recently-retired Big Daddy and Kendo Nagasaki, as the British wrestling scene was struggling greatly.
He had been fired by WCW in 1993, and after leaving the WWE the year before that, Davey Boy was between jobs. Outside of wrestling in Japan, his options were limited.
While he was with the WWE, Davey Boy Smith had trademarked the name “British Bulldog” for himself and began being billed as that name. According to the book “Dynamite and Davey”, he had attempted to trademark it along with his cousin. However, Dynamite Kid didn’t want to pay the money for it, so Bulldog took the moniker for himself.
After both men wrestled together in Britain, Brian Dixon (All-Star Wrestling’s booker) and Orig Williams (BWF’s promoter) started billing Dynamite Kid as “The British Bulldog”.
This garnered the attention of Davey Boy Smith, who sent his family and lawyers to All-Star shows, with a cease-and-desist and threatened him with legal action due to copyright infringement.
Dynamite Kid rightly pointed out that he was the original British Bulldog, and threatened to countersue his cousin for rights to the name. It never made it as far as court, but the Dynamite Kid did attempt to confront Davey Boy Smith at a show when both were in England.
Dynamite Kid Tried To Fight British Bulldog At Howe Bridge In 1994
At a show in Howe Bridge, the Dynamite Kid tried to confront Davey Boy Smith over the use of the name “British Bulldog”. However, once he made it to the arena, his former partner was nowhere to be found.
Dynamite Kid wrote that he was confronted by Davey Boy Smith’s father and promoter Max Crabtree, but the British Bulldog hid in his dressing room and refused to see his cousin.
“So all this was fresh in my mind when I turned up at the wrestling hall in Howe Bridge. Davey was wrestling a match, and the first thing I saw when I walked in was a table full of his pictures. So I tipped the thing up, and the pictures flew everywhere.” Dynamite Kid wrote in Pure Dynamite.
“Max Crabtree came over, trying to calm things down, but in the middle of all this, somebody opened the doors to lee the fans in. Max was shouting “Close those doors!”. “Then I saw Davey’s dad. My uncle Sid I said ‘All right, where is the fat bastard?’. He said ‘he’s not here yet.'”
“I said, ‘If you’re here, he’s here. Where is he?’. While this was all going on, somebody called the police and eventually about eight of them came. They arrested me, handcuffed me, and led me out of the building.”
“I found out later that Davey Boy Smith had locked himself in a private dressing room.”
This was just one of the controversial moments from the Dynamite Kid’s career, more of which you can learn about by clicking this link.
