Piper Versus Snuka: I Thought That Looked Real
 
From In the Pit with Roddy Piper, by Roddy Piper:

"I remember one time when we were in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and Chief Jay Strongbow was in to tape a segment with me. I always looked forward to working with the Chief. He was a very smart man who was always full of great ideas when it came to our business ... on this particular day he asked me if I had ever picked up a coconut and knew how heavy they were. When I told him no, he went on to tell me that he thought it would make a great prop on (Piper's Pit). As soon as he said this, another wrestler, Jimmy "SuperFly" Snuka, came to mind.

I always used to get on Jimmy's case about being Polynesian ... while that sounds rather heavy and personal, I knew what I could get away with when it came to Snuka. That was the "craft" of the interview. When I mentioned this to Chief Jay, without question, he told me that I should hit the Polynesian guy on the head with the coconut. I forgot about it until about an hour later, when the Chief had someone go to the supermarket and buy some bananas and coconuts. The Chief was really hell-bent on seeing me doing some noggin knocking on Snuka that day. So, with fruit in hand, Strongbow came to find me so we could talk about what should happen on the segment.

"As we were talking I picked up one of the coconuts and realized just how heavy it really was. I thought to myself, 'Wow, this could really hurt,' but then I also realized how great the interview could be if I whopped him on the head with this hard piece of tropical fruit.

"About half an hour later Jimmy came out onto 'Piper's Pit.' Whenever he was on he didn't have to say anything, he just had to look at you with his eerie stare to make good TV. SuperFly was one of those very scary individuals who didn't have to utter a word to be intimidating. I remember starting the interview, but I wasn't doing such a great job because all I was doing was thinking about how heavy and hard this fucking coconut really was and that I had to hit him with all my might so that it would break on his head.

"Well, here came the moment of truth, and I hit Jimmy Snuka as hard as I could, and that coconut burst like a bomb! The instant it hit I heard Jimmy give a moan that came from the depths of his soul, and he started falling back and tried to take the set with him. I'm not positive, but I am pretty sure he was unconscious upon impact. When he was on the ground, I started whipping him with the belt that went around my kilt. When he came to he crawled on his hands and knees and then he finally got up. The Polynesian grappler immediately went bananas and came after me, but I slipped into the locker room, shut the door, and locked it. On TV all you saw Jimmy doing was hitting this big industrial door, then they took him away and escorted him to the other dressing room. I was told that Jimmy just stared at the floor for about ten minutes and didn't move. They say to this day that Jimmy Snuka feels the repercussions of that coconut hit."