Background and career
Allen Ray Sarven (born July 18, 1963) is an American professional wrestler, better known by his ring name Al Snow. He is best known for his tenures in Extreme Championship Wrestling and the World Wrestling Federation/World Wrestling Entertainment. Snow has also held various backstage positions for professional wrestling promotions. Snow worked as a road agent for Total Nonstop Action Wrestling from 2010 to 2017 and has promoted Ohio Valley Wrestling since 2018. His work as promoter of OVW was chronicled in the Netflix docuseries Wrestlers.
Sarven attended a professional wrestling try-out camp held by Ole Anderson and Gene Anderson. There he met Jim Lancaster, promoter of Ohio's Midwest Championship Wrestling, who agreed to train him. Lancaster later described Sarven as "a leader in the ring" who "had drive and natural ability". He made his debut on May 22, 1982. Sarven defeated Lancaster on May 5, 1985, for the Midwest Championship Wrestling title. He wrestled against Harley Race, Bruiser Brody, Kerry Von Erich, Ken Patera, Curt Hennig and Jimmy Garvin. Sarven wrestled in various independent promotions throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, capturing both tag team and singles titles, but failed to make any big breaks. In 1993 he competed in the WWF as a jobber losing to Marty Jannetty and The Undertaker under the name Steve Moore. He gained a reputation as "the best-kept secret in wrestling". Sarven helped train future Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Hall of Fame member and NWA World Heavyweight Champion Dan Severn. During this time he would sometimes wrestle as Shinobi, a ninja-style masked gimmick. He wrestled in the November 19, 1994, tournament for the vacant NWA World Heavyweight Championship, but he lost to Chris Candido, the eventual winner of the tournament. Also fought in a couple of matches for World Championship Wrestling in 1993 and 1995. From 1995 to 1997, Snow operated a professional wrestling school called "Body Slammers" in Lima, Ohio, employing D'Lo Brown as an assistant trainer. It has since branched out with one of his trainers running "Bodyslammers" in Ottawa, Canada.
After a tour of Japan, Sarven wrestled a match in Michigan against Sabu, an Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) regular, who suggested he try ECW. After making his debut against The Tazmaniac and losing via pinfall on December 10, 1994. Sarven faced Chris Benoit as Al Snow, in a 15-minute match that was hailed as one of the best of the year.
Sarven was also being courted by Jim Cornette for his Smoky Mountain Wrestling federation. ECW booker Paul Heyman agreed to let him work for both companies. Sarven soon found that he was not being utilized by ECW and went to Smoky Mountain full-time. In Smoky Mountain Wrestling, Snow teamed with Unabomb (Glenn Jacobs, later to be known as Kane) as the Dynamic Duo and defeated the Rock 'n' Roll Express for the SMW Tag Team Championship. Both wrestlers caught the attention of the World Wrestling Federation and were signed by the end of 1995.
Sarven began working for the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) when he signed a contract in August 1995. During his tenure in the company, Sarven wrestled under numerous gimmicks, such as Avatar, which saw him come to the ring unmasked, putting on a wrestling mask to wrestle, then removing it afterwards. The gimmick was based on Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and Mortal Kombat whose popularity the company wanted to capitalize on at that time. During his particularly short run under this gimmick, Sarven's WWF debut as Avatar took place on the October 23, 1995, episode of Monday Night RAW, defeating Bryan Walsh. About a month after his debut, he was scheduled to be the third man for The Underdogs at Survivor Series but for reasons unknown, was replaced by Bob Holly. After this, he started teaming with Aldo Montoya. His two final matches as Avatar were against Sycho Sid and 1-2-3 Kid. He was also to partake in the 1996 Royal Rumble match but once again, for unknown reasons, never appeared. His final match in February was against Isaac Yankem. On February 20, 1996, Sarven wrestled as "Shinobi", a "ninja assassin" hired by Jim Cornette to dispose of Shawn Michaels, who defeated Shinobi in quick fashion. Avatar returned for one last appearance against John Bradshaw Layfield at a house show on March 17, 1996, at Madison Square Garden in a losing effort.
Sarven received his first mainstream exposure with the WWF as Leif Cassidy, the tag team partner of Marty Jannetty in February 1996. The duo were promoted as The New Rockers, a throwback to the original Rockers team of Jannetty and Shawn Michaels. Jannetty left the WWF in December 1996, and Sarven was reduced to jobbing for mid-carders in January 1997. In the late 1990s, WWF and ECW began to cross-promote their organizations to counteract the success of World Championship Wrestling (WCW); Sarven was one of the wrestlers sent to Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW). He left in July of that year and went to ECW. His last appearance in WWF in September 1997 was a loss to Tiger Ali Singh at WWF One Night Only.
