Happy Holidays to all. We’re feeling festive here around SoBros Network at this time of year, and hopefully, you all are as well. But also, as a sidebar, just know it’s okay if you’re not. Nonetheless, that’s the vibe I’m getting as I look down at my to-do list for 2025. I’m feeling festive, so why don’t we act accordingly?
Any wrestling fan knows there’s certainly no shortage of Christmas-related moments in the WWE‘s history. Themed matches on themed episodes of Monday Night Raw litter the brand’s history. I’m pretty sure Braun Strowman speared a Christmas tree one year, and there’s always some sort of Christmas Street Fight every year. It’s a time-honored tradition in wrestling history…even the local promoters down at the Gladeville Community Center usually get Santa Claus to show up for a show or two in December to take photos with the children and maybe even hand out a gift or two.
But, I wanted to dig a little deeper. There’s so much hokey WWE Christmas content that it felt too easy to write about. I really want to get in there deep into the bowels of wrestling history to find something different to talk about every once in awhile. That’s why I landed on Xanta Klaus. It was a glorious shit show, one that really has no winners except for those of us with sick twisted senses of humor that find failure like this hilarious. While the entire gimmick might’ve lasted no longer than two weeks, the story is so downright entertaining that it’s worth remembering from time to time.
Bruce Prichard said on an episode of Something To Wrestle (linked below) that “Vince does love Santa Claus.” I find that both hilarious and insightful. It does seem that Santa does have a way of popping up around December throughout WWE’s history, but back in 1995, Vince and company pivoted to a twisted vision of Santa Claus. The premise for the Xanta Klaus gimmick was simple. Imagine if Santa had an evil twin from the South Pole who stole presents from children instead of giving them out. That’s Xanta Klaus, and the world met him at In Your House: Season’s Beatings in December of 1995.
“The Million Dollar Man” Ted DiBiase, who was working as a manager at the time with his wrestling days behind him, came out and ran down Santa Claus to the crowd, calling him a fraud…even insinuating that there actually was no such thing as Santa Claus. The audacity! Savio Vega, a fabled mid-carder of the era, wouldn’t stand for it. He came out and reassured all of the children in the audience that Santa Claus was real. Lo and behold, Santa Claus walked down the aisle himself, presumably to back Savio. Instead, he turned on him and delivered a vicious beating as DiBiase laughed. The sour Santa was introduced as Xanta Klaus the following night on Raw, and had a couple of televised matches before riding off into the sunset, never to be heard from again.
While working on one of the segments, DiBiase recalled asking his producer, “whose idea was this anyway?” The guy simply replied, “Vince.” When the guy signing the paychecks tells you to do something, you do it. Vince had it in his mind that a heel Santa would work in 1995. But for as awful as that sounds in its own right, the story gets even weirder when you peel back the curtain.
Diehard wrestling fans would recognize Xanta Klaus as ECW mainstay and hardcore legend Balls Mahoney! Listening to that aforementioned episode of Something To Wrestle, we learn that Vince actually wanted to keep the guy around, but he wasn’t exactly an agreeable guy back then. Rumors vary between Balls Mahoney calling Vince McMahon and cussing him out because he thought he was Vince Russo and that Balls got drunk one night and asked George “The Animal” Steele (a producer with WWE at the time) for money. Steele was not a man you wanted to mess with, and whatever the altercation was, Mahoney lost his job over it. There’s no shortage of drama in the wrestling world, that’s for sure. For this ill-fated idea to work out the way it did in disastrous fashion on the screen and off of it, it almost feels poetic. This is quintessential carny wrestling shenanigans. Go check out Bruce Prichard talking about this whole thing on Something to Wrestle.
Is there a parallel universe where a heel Santa gimmick worked? Absolutely. Hell, they got The Boogeyman over in 2006. It’s simple to me – you take a worker, put him in a suit, and only trot him out at Christmas time. Make it a tradition like Pete Rose at WrestleMania those few years, and maybe you’ve created something that wrestling fans will look back on as they do the Gobbledy Gooker.
Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network, second on Football & Other F Words, analyst for Stacking The Inbox, and a Dogs Playing Poker on velvet connoisseur. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD, #BeBetter, and ‘Minds right, asses tight.’ “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, the NFL Draft, Nashville, Yankee Candle, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley.
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