June 23, 2025 • 60 mins
#rickreynolds #wolfied #prowrestling #gmbmpw
Welcome to Episode 4 of the Best Of jamesrockstreet Productions! Home to the Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling and Live and In Color with Wolfie D podcasts, Sheik's Shorts and more! So, sit back and enjoy as we bring you some of the very best stories, you'll never hear anywhere else! @GMBMPW @livewolfied @jamesrockstreet Everywhere!
Today we bring you the first half of episode 38 of Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling with the man who trained Wolfie D to wrestle, Rick Reynolds! We talk his start in the business, his early days, Gypsy Joe, Wolfie D, Big Scorpion, Dante and Mephisto and so much more! Enjoy!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
This is Rick Reynolds, and you're listening to Give Me Back
My Pro Wrestling. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to
Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling. You know now you know.
(00:43):
Baby, this is hot Rod Bigs, Jared, Jimmy St.
We're going to take them to the limit One more time, baby, right
here. Oh, give me back my pro
wrestling. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome
one more time to the Give Me Back my Pro Wrestling podcast,
and today, as always, my brotherfrom the same father and mother.
And then? No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
(01:11):
Sorry, Jared, The plastic chic St.
And you've already introduced yourself there by Yeah, calling
yourself somebody else. So what's up?
How are you doing? I'm good brother, how about
yourself? I'm great, but I'm sure you're a
little better than great. But tell everybody where you
just got back from. I just got back from Hawaii, or
(01:31):
as the natives called it, Hawaiiso.
Hawaii. It's more of AV sound, so it's a
found that out on the trip so. Yeah, brother, welcome to
Hawaii. Yeah, it's a we saw a lot of the
islands and it's it's, it's a beautiful place.
It's the time difference is kindof a killer though, man.
(01:52):
It's six hours, the East Coast time.
It's yeah, it's. So I find myself trying to
adjust to that but slow process.No joke, because Michelle and I
got to go there on our honeymoonand we were waking up at 4:00 AM
and going to bed at 8, and it was just weird, you know?
(02:13):
Yeah, But beautiful, beautiful place, beautiful state, you
know? Oh yeah, absolutely.
Just go. I highly recommend it to
anybody. Absolutely.
If you can deal with the plane trip, you can.
You can go. But yeah, well, it's good to
have you back. Of course, no one noticed.
None of our listeners noticed because it's just been the
normal 2 since since our last show.
(02:35):
But you know, this week we've got a really cool one.
And this one, this guy is kind of like everybody that I talked
to when it comes to the wrestlers, they were like you
got to get this guy on, you got to get this guy on.
So he's kind of one of those guys that's like your favorite
wrestlers wrestler, you know, and it's pretty cool when you
(02:56):
know that somebody is so well respected and so they everybody
wants to hear their story. So obviously that makes us want
to have them on the show. Now the good news is I got to
know Rick a little bit in Nashville and you know Rick,
Rick's a straight up dude. That's all I can say.
He's just a straight up just real good guy and you know,
(03:17):
we're just happy to have him on the show today.
He is Rick Reynolds AKA Damien, AKA Forsaken, AKA Medic,
whatever you want to call him. But the man has done a lot and
done a lot of stuff and, and honestly, just from the little
bit that I know about him, I'm just excited to they get to know
him even more today on our on our show, man.
Yeah, man, he's a, you know, thethings you mentioned, the shows,
(03:41):
he has a lot of respect from other wrestlers and man, that
means a lot. Like you look at somebody like,
you know, we've talked a lot of people have a lot of respect for
people like Bobby Eaton and something like that.
And and what somebody somebody is well revered like that.
You know, they're they're a solid dude.
And that's, that's going to be agood interview that you know,
I'm, I'm looking forward to getting more information out of
(04:03):
out of Rick and, and finding outall about his career.
Yeah, well, there's some interesting tidbits that we've
been queued in to ask by our sources that we will never name.
Thanks sources. Snitches get stitches.
Yeah, snitches get stitches. Wait, Or would that make us the
snitches about the stitch? I don't know.
Anyway, you know, I have my resources.
(04:26):
Sometimes if the Internet doesn't tell you everything, you
got to go a little bit higher upthe knowledge tree, you know
what I'm saying? So good news is I know a lot of
guys that know a lot of cool stuff.
So anyway, like I said, the sources will never be named, but
we thank you Sources. You know who you are anyway.
Well, I tell you what, why don'twe just go ahead and get the
(04:49):
show started with Mr. Rick Reynolds?
What do you say about that? That sounds great man.
All right, we'll be right back with Rick Reynolds AKA Forsaken
on the Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling podcast after these
messages. Promotional consideration paid
for by the following This is Kroll and you're listening to
(05:10):
Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling with Jimmy St. and Jared the
Plastic Chic. Be sure to like, subscribe, and
view all of our USWO and Saw wrestling content at Nashville
Wrestling Network exclusively. On.
YouTube what you doing Jimmy Straight?
(05:36):
How you doing man? Let me let me get up here and
get off the road here in a minute.
OK. I started rolling all up trying
to save. I forgot about four hours while
I get home. Shoe.
Left out at 9:00 this morning went and I own a a expediting
little comfort little yeah. And and once a year for about
(05:59):
two months, we deliver yearbookseverywhere.
And for for Jostens and I did the very first one and this is
the very last one I had to take.I had to take two stops at one
in Dover, TN and then drive one down to Houston.
So I'm coming back from that. That's pretty cool man.
(06:21):
How did you get into that? Tommy Hicks.
Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, I was.
AI was a police officer. Yeah, yeah, I thought I
remembered that. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, for, well, I did that total of 21 years and matter of
fact, I wrestled and I and I waswhile I worked in narcotics.
(06:45):
And so I worked, I worked under a hood.
And then I was to leave out and go work and Jamie Dundee one
time with Fairgrounds and Whoopiand Jamie and they're talking to
him. And I said, James, shut up.
(07:08):
Oh. My God, I know.
Shut up. That's you.
I'm just blown away that you area narcotics officer and you
actually were around Jamie Dundee.
Well, I I was just a police officer when I started
(07:29):
wrestling. OK.
And I went with Gypsy. I went to talk to Gypsy and
literally here I'm a cop and, and Joey Rossi took me into his
house and there was pot smoke sothick you could cut it with a
knife. It was a thick.
(07:50):
Oh no. That's a that is a fine line to
cross right there. It's like I'm really, it's
wrestling. I'm telling you, it's a it.
Well, you know, nobody ever really done it around me.
You know, just about everybody knew who I was and respected
that. And you know, I, I didn't, I
(08:11):
didn't go in on their stuff. They didn't come in on mine.
So. Sure, but I mean, the remnants
are hard to hide on marijuana. Let's just be honest, you know
so. Absolutely it is.
And but you know, one of the things I've found is that I
think 98% of the people I know Smith is right.
(08:33):
I don't know too many people. I don't, but there's just about
everybody I know. Yeah, yeah, OK, cool.
So we're glad you're here. So let me go ahead and kick us
in here because I feel like we'll get into other
conversations and we'll just record that.
All right, We are back with morefrom Give Me Back My Pro
(08:53):
Wrestling and today, y'all. I'm very excited, Jared, and
I've been talking about him in the earlier part of the show
here, but this man right now is a giant in the business.
He's one of the guys that honestly was a locker room
leader. He was one of the guys that you
can go to and ask him how to do a match.
And he was a big man, but he understood wrestling.
(09:15):
He understood all the intricacies of doing storylines.
And he also just understood thatold thing called psychology.
But the cool thing I like about him is, is he's not only a pro
wrestler, he's a former police officer, he's a minister, and
he's on the show today. And this, ladies and gentlemen,
is Mr. Rick Reynolds, AKA Forsaken, AKA.
(09:38):
What are you you want to call? Just don't call him.
Anything bad won't end up well for you.
But Rick, welcome to the show, brother.
Thank you so much for coming on.You're so nice, Jimmy.
Thank you so much. Well, you're welcome, brother.
And hey, man, I've been wanting to have you on one of my
podcasts. And since the other one dropped
the ball, I'm gonna take the ball.
(10:00):
Yeah. My pleasure.
All right, so we always start off with the main question, the
number one question. And that one always goes to the
plastic sheet himself. Jared St. my own brother.
Flesh and blood. Jared.
Take it away all. Right, Rick.
So this is a question I like to ask.
I didn't come up with it, but wewe will act like I did.
But this this kind of lets people know your influences in
(10:22):
wrestling and your and your favorite people in wrestling.
If you had like four or five, like a Mount Rushmore of
wrestlers of all time, your favorite, what would that be?
You know, I, I listen to your podcast also, so I knew this was
coming. Thank you.
They the the very first one on my list would be the Mongolian
(10:44):
Stomper. And the reason it would be the
Mongolian Stomper was when I wasa kid, I used to have dreams.
I, I grew up in East Tennessee and I had dreams about wrestling
the Mongolian Stomper. And I got to see him several
times live. Never met the man, always wanted
to, always wanted to work once Igot in the business, but never
(11:07):
had the opportunity. But my very first one would be
the Mongolian Stomper. My my second one would be Ronnie
Garvin and I went and watched him and Boris Milenko.
They had a few Knox and I watched them and I absolutely
(11:31):
loved. I drove different towns just to
watch that feud of Ronnie Garvinand I got to meet Ronnie Garvin
at the Gulf Coast Wrestlers reunion down in Mobile, AL, and
he and I got to talk about the feud and.
And so I have ultimate respect for Ronnie Garvin.
(11:52):
I think my third would be NikitaKoloff.
OK, Nikita and IA few years ago,got to spend a lot of time
together and I actually got to take the Russian sickle a few
times and, and we traveled a lotand we, we talked Jesus and you
(12:16):
know, he's a minister now also and hear his stories and just to
talk with him and spend time with him.
It, it helped me grow as a man and, and my walk with God.
He, he was really strong and influential in that.
And I, I was thinking about my last one and I started going
(12:39):
through, you know, that there's several people that, that I was
going to put in there. You know, I was thinking about
Shane Morton and I love Shane Morton and we've been, you know,
friends for 30 years, you know, and I go through and of all the
great guys, I've had something to, you know, to do with their
life or them with me and I wanted to put them in and I I
(13:01):
thought about it hard and long. There's a lot of great
wrestlers. I've I've wrestled.
I I think it's just good as anybody out there.
Scott Spade up in Chicago, roughcrossing, you know, those guys.
Eric Freedom out of Michigan, Heand I have had great matches
together And I I've decided to put in the fourth spot with
(13:25):
somebody that allowed me to lovewrestling again because at one
point in my life, and we'll get into it, is that I, I was going
to step away. And his name is Jimmy Blaze, and
he's the owner of Pal Entertainment out of Chicago.
OK, very cool. Yeah, I noticed him on your
(13:46):
list. Quite a bit of of work, guys,
you've worked. So, you know, I did a little
research myself and that's a cool name.
I like that. We'll check him out for sure.
Listeners, go check out Jimmy Blaze.
That's awesome. Yeah, that's a great list.
Yeah, very original too, you know, because there's two
Canadians, a Minnesota Russian and an indie guy.
(14:07):
You got to love that. Yeah.
When, when Nikita and I, we werein Tampa and we were sitting at
this restaurant talking and I asked him.
I said. I said, why did you change your
name? He said for the gimmick, yeah.
You know, he, he changed his whole personality, everything
for the gimmick. You know, that's commitment to
(14:28):
wrestling right there. But.
Yeah, and you know, you know, hegets a lot of Flack from some of
the guys who make fun of him forusing the accent.
But do you remember when I was doing the Omar Al Kazan gimmick?
Do you remember that, Rick? Yeah, because I think I'd
already ended that. And as much as Shane wanted me
to do it down in Colombia, when you and I and everybody worked
(14:48):
together, I was actually happy to kind of be away from it
because it allowed me to be myself.
But Long story short, I would dothe, I was doing this kind of
Middle Eastern oil tycoon character and I found myself
doing the accent too. I almost feel like it was a way
for him to maintain, you know, to not let up on it, you know,
(15:09):
and, and, and that's the way I've always seen why he probably
stuck with the accent sometimes when maybe it wasn't necessary,
you know, but. He could live the character.
Yeah, well, he's a great guy. He really is.
I got to work with him. Well, he was on a show and he
did a little, you know, devotional during the the middle
of the show there. And he gave his testimony and
(15:30):
Nikita was really cool. He he actually was very cool.
Took a picture with us and and, you know, just kind of great
stuff like that. But just talk to him a little
bit. And he prayed for us before the
show. It was, it was really cool man.
Very nice man, very nice man. Yeah.
Well, anyway, we're here to talkRick Reynolds today, so we'll
talk Nikita when he comes. So Rick, tell me a little bit
(15:53):
about you growing up here, brother.
Where were you born and where'd you go to high school?
I was born in a little small town up in East Tennessee called
Sunbright. I had a graduating class of
about 40 people. It's up in Morgan County, and it
was like I said, it was just a little small town.
(16:14):
I left there. I went to to college at Rome
State. I went there to play basketball
and I, I had a terrible attitudeand, and everything.
And as a matter of fact, I stillcan do the same things I did
when I played there. Sit, sit down and watch back and
forth the ball go up and down because that's all I did.
(16:36):
And so I didn't last long there.I quit because, yeah, just like
I said, I had a bad attitude. And it was, I thought it was a
coach, but it was all me. And so left there and then went
and moved to Nashville and I started working the prison down
in Nashville. OK.
That was my very first, you know, full time job was the
(16:58):
prison. Now you're saying basketball.
So obviously in high school did you play basketball?
Did you also play football? What?
What were did you play in in those?
I played foot. I played football until freshman
year. And this was, I got cut from my
basketball team. And it made me, I was furious
(17:20):
that I got cut. And as a matter of fact, I've
got a picture and where they took a picture of me and I had
an old suit on uniform on and I looked like I was beat to death.
I was. And I was determined that I was
because I was one of the tallestplayers.
You know, I'm, I'm 65 now. And so, you know, I was
(17:43):
determined I was going to, to get better.
And one summer I had my dad put me a, a goal up and we made a
backboard and he put it up on a telephone pole.
And I played basketball 8 hours a day.
I mean, I played and played and played.
And the next year I, I made the team, made the, the junior
(18:05):
varsity. And as a junior I was starting
and, you know, I had a pretty good career there at some right.
But it's a small school, you know.
So it's that I went on to Rome State and I didn't do well at
all there. And so I left and went into the
workforce. Yeah, yeah, I understand that
one for sure. So OK, now we know you not only
(18:29):
as all these other things, but as a as an awesome wrestler and
we're going to get into all that.
But the start of it really is when did you start liking
wrestling? Oh, as a kid, I, it was, I was
probably 7 or 8 years old and I would watch out of the Knoxville
(18:51):
channel, watch Robert Fuller and, and all that.
And I watched Nick Gulis wrestling and it is absolutely
loved it. My, my grandparents would watch
Nick Gulis and I, I used to watch, you know, Tojo Yamamoto
and, and, and, and all the one Lynn Rossi.
(19:14):
And so, and Lynn was actually him and Joy was instrumental
about me getting into wrestling.That's a.
Little bit about that, Yeah, a little bit.
You're starting wrestling. Yeah.
So I was a police officer in in Williamson County and Lynn Rossi
had a health food store in Brentwood.
The one Tommy Hagee told us about.
(19:37):
Probably matter of fact, they had they had a the picture of
Tommy and Joey, a big oil painting with A tag teamed up on
the wall. And and so I know who Tommy was,
but I never met Tommy at this time.
And I used to go in there and, and things were different back
then, you know, not anybody could get into wrestling.
(19:59):
And I, I would go every day and I would go talk to to Lynn.
And I and we became friends and I tried to get him tell me
something about wrestling. I tried to get him to train me.
I tried to and, and just, he just wouldn't do it.
I mean, he wouldn't, he wouldn'tsmart me up.
He wouldn't. He wouldn't put me a with
(20:21):
somebody. He never did.
We talk about everything. But when he got to that, he cut
me off. And Joey Rossi, his son, one day
I was talking with him and this is after months, months of me
talking to him. And he told me he says, he says,
Rick, he said, do you really want to get into wrestling?
(20:43):
I said, I want to do that more than I've ever want to do
anything else. And he said, well, if you're if
you're serious, you'd be here atthe shop at 6:00.
At 5:45, I was sitting in the inthe parking lot.
Joey came out and unlocked the door and looked at me.
Came out like he said, Are you sure?
He said, I won't tell you beforeyou get in it.
(21:05):
He said you're going to see all kinds of people and see all
kinds of things and you're goingto have to separate your life
from wrestling and your private life.
That's I'm willing to do that. And that's when he took me over
to Gypsy Joe's house over in offof Nolensville Pike and I met
Joe for the first time. Yeah.
(21:26):
Now that is, that's awesome. So let me ask you real quick
here now, you know, Gypsy Joe had a reputation obviously about
him of one of the toughest, you know, guys ever in the business
whatsoever. How did that translate until
you're meeting him and continuing on with him?
(21:47):
You know, Joe, he'd like to Smith and so you know, I I
walked in and it was just, you know, I was like, oh, no.
And so he looked at me and he talked to me for a minute and he
told me he says, he says Thursday you be here and is off
of West End. And I was there and we got in
(22:12):
and talked and and he got me in the ring and he's just OK.
I train you and I can tell you the Gypsy Joe where I trained is
not like the Gypsy Joe's some other guys down the road.
Joe worked us and I can't tell you a hold that I didn't have to
(22:33):
do to his perfection. One day I I had they put me in a
in a arm bar in the back and I had to grab the back of the head
and flip over the guy and land on my feet.
And I did that one whole day until I landed on my feet like I
was supposed to. I would follow on my head,
follow everything. And he he cussed me and get up,
(22:55):
do it again and I did it again and I never gave up and he
wouldn't let me give up, but he he taught me every hole that you
could ever see. I did that hole during training.
Yeah. Now who were you training with
in the ring? Because just to not to knock on
Gypsy, I think the world of Gypsy.
And again, I respect his abilities and everything like
(23:15):
that, but you're probably, what,a good foot taller than him.
Oh. Yeah, at least.
Yeah, that didn't matter. Yeah, exactly.
But who were you working in the ring with with him?
See, Cooberries Williams just finished up.
When I started, there was a guy and I, I was coming in at the
time and I can't remember the name of the promotion that was
(23:35):
down in Nashville, but Doctor Squash was running at GWF or, or
something like that. And Max Payne was down there and
a guy named Barry Cody and Gentleman Jim Corbin.
And but anyway, that was the group that was running Nashville
and Gypsy was there with them. And so there was a guy, like I
(24:01):
said, Breeze just finished. I come in and I had a friend of
mine wanted to train. He was my same size.
And so Joe was training him and me both.
And we were going in as the medics with him going against.
Oh, I can't think his name is, is Bubba Perry.
And St. was his last name, his partner, They were the interns,
(24:27):
so they was turning them babyface going to bring us in as
the Hill team. And they're a veteran team, so
we was green as grass so they could carry us through a
program. So that was the plan.
And so there was a guy from Manchester, a little small guy,
muscled up. He was training there with me.
(24:48):
He started about the same time. And a guy named Luscious Leslie
Love and he was in mid train, hewas, he was working matches but
he was still training and I was happy always to see him there
because Gypsy normally cussed him out instead of me.
So. That's awesome.
(25:09):
I'll tell you, let me tell you one story about Joe, then we'll
move. Please.
I was I was training and I I couldn't throw a drop kick for
and Gypsy started cussing me andhe told me, he says you kicked
me right here, right here in thehead.
You kicked me. He kicked me and he cussed me.
So I jumped up and I kicked the dog out of Joe.
I hit him so hard his ear was bleeding.
(25:30):
Knocked him up against the rope and he rolled out, his ear was
bleeding and he was cussing me. And he started reaching up
underneath the and he brought out a a big 2 by 4 and he got in
there and I said, oh, my buddy, I said.
I said yeah. I said if he just tried to hit
me with that 2 by 4. I said I said I'm fighting him
and he got that two before he looked at me and raised that 2
(25:51):
before. He says oh you still and so big
now you kick this two before. I had to spend the rest of time
doing drop kicks on that 2 before.
That's oh, man. Oh, Joe.
Yeah. God bless you.
So do you consider that like your first match or what's your
(26:11):
first match? My first match was in
Hartsville, TN and I I don't remember the guy running but Joe
called and and me and my partnerSam, we went to Hartsville and
that was our very first match against a guy named Tommy Vito
and Tommy had been around for a while and another guy named Joey
(26:35):
Jarrett was my very our very first match in Hartsville, TN.
Yeah, that's awesome. And now a word from our sponsor.
(26:57):
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome toGive Me Back My Pro Wrestling,
the podcast that's based on the old school but can still help
you find the good stuff from today.
Jimmy St. and the Plastic Chic Jared are the undisputed tag
team champions of the wrestling podcast world.
From thought provoking topics tosuperstar interviews to action
(27:19):
figure expertise, this team doesit all.
And all they ask is Give Me BackMy Pro Wrestling every other
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OK, so we're kind of dancing around a little bit here about
(27:40):
the you know the topic, but whendo you remember basically
getting your first encounter with my Co host and partner in
podcasting live and in color with good old fashioned PG13
Wolfie D? When do you remember seeing him
first? Pete, his stepdad.
(28:03):
I work for Pete. Once I left the, the prison
system, I work for Pete as, as security over the hospital in
Williamson County. And, and I actually moved into
the apartment complex down in Nashville where Pete was living
and became good friends and Camille.
(28:23):
And so we spent a lot of time together and then warned, you
know, he was just a child, you know, I guess he was 7 or 8
years old, maybe 9. And he, he was still.
And we, I, I used to sit there with him actually, and he'd show
me wrestling moves. You know, he has his wrestling
(28:46):
and he have all these, you know,he's always been creative and he
would take it, do these wrestling moves and show me all
these wrestling moves. Yeah.
That's but. That that was the first time I I
met. So OK, so now was this in in the
famous world famous LA part of Nashville?
Yeah. Now tell Jared what LA stands
(29:08):
for Lower. Antioch.
Yeah, now if you've ever heard apromo from a very famous,
actually Jared, who's my favorite pro wrestler of all
time, Rick Flair, Maybe the other Rick.
Oh, Ricky Morton, yeah. No, I'm saying, well, Rick
Reynolds, too. I love Rick, too, but Ricky
Morton's probably my favorite wrestler of all time.
(29:30):
And I always heard Ricky Morton say it in random promos that he
was from lower Antioch, too. So, you know, that's pretty
funny. Yeah.
So. So the when it gets down to it,
though, Wolfie talks about round131415 years old is when he was
sneaking his way into the ring. Do you remember first working
with him? Yes, yeah, yeah, I do.
(29:52):
Actually, Camille, his mom came to me and I've been working
probably 7-8, nine months thereabout and and she came to
me and Warren has always loved wrestling and and she asked me
if I would train them and Pete talked to me about doing it.
(30:14):
And so I agreed to to get him inthe ring and, and start working
with him. But you know, he he was a
natural, I'll tell you. And it because he's always, you
know, he's always watch wrestling.
So you know, if you, if you toldhim to do something, he already
knew the basic moves. And that's more than what most
people can do now. You know, you tell somebody do a
(30:36):
top wrist, like they don't even know how you know, Warren was he
wasn't natural. He already knew how to do all
this stuff. Yeah, yeah.
And he was an athlete and it wasprobably simple for him to come
into now, but Gypsy Joe maybe had a little issue with it.
Is that right, Gypsy? Gypsy, Gypsy cuss me, I know.
(30:58):
I know of three good cousins he gave me for before that because
one of them was because where wetrained at was over in West
Nashville over and it was a little garage that had a ring in
it and, and it had about 3 layers of carpet on it and, and
(31:19):
the boards was rotten and it smelled like cat pee and, and it
was but that's where we trained.And so for the very first time I
went in there and and I didn't, I didn't ask Gypsy to go up
there. And I guess the guy that that
owned the the garage called and Gypsy came up there and he
(31:42):
cussed me. Lord, I thought he was going to
fight me that day. Oh, man.
OK, well, so tell me a little bit about some of the promotions
you were working for, you know, because I ultimately want to get
to talking about, you know, one of my favorite tag teams, one of
the best tag teams of all time, in my opinion, Dante and the
(32:02):
great Mephisto. I want to get to that where you
start working with them, but kind of lead us up to that
process if you don't mind. I, I started out as the medic
and like I said, you know, we originally was going to go in to
Doctor Squash's thing and then that folded.
And so we didn't, we didn't do much with them.
(32:25):
And then I just started working little outlaw shows here and
there, you know, trying to get my name out.
And we went and met Dutch Vanteland we went to Memphis and we
worked the blackbirds down on Memphis TV.
And And so The funny thing, that's the first time we ever,
(32:47):
you know, I ever did TV and was both nervous very first time I
met Jamie Dundee. And Jamie, Jamie was like 15
years old and and he was no different than he was now, you
know, And yeah, I love Jamie, bythe way, some of the.
(33:07):
So the very first thing you toldmy brother, he said, advise you
I take that gum out of your mouth before you get out there.
He said, somebody smacking out. There's this little guy.
And, you know, and so we went out there and and Sam wasn't as
well versed in wrestling as I was and.
And I'm still far from being good.
(33:29):
But they got in there. They supposed to take the finish
on me. I felt my take it.
And we was working a brick houseand the Iceman King Parson and
King Parson gave Sam a DDT and Sam fell on his on, on King
Parson's shoulder. And they like to beat the dog
(33:50):
out of Sam. They threw me out of the ring
and beat the dog out of Sam and brick house come off top rope.
He didn't catch himself at all. I mean, he landed flat on sale
and and pinned him and Sam quit right after that.
And that was his, his last. But I continued going and then I
(34:13):
worked down in Tullahoma, Winchester.
Then I got into Columbia and I started working as a medic down
in Columbia for a lot, you know,and I, you got to keep in mind I
was still working, you know, a few nights a week.
And plus, I was I went into I'vebeen a police officer and I was
still working full time there and I have to wear a mask to go
(34:36):
work these other places now go back to work, you know, and be a
police officer. I have to been wrestling.
And so I did the the medic gimmick and then when Cool
Breeze Williams was the Greg Mephisto and with Tommy and I've
I've been working with Pete because I was pretty good sized
(34:56):
guy and Pete, I could stand behind him.
You couldn't see me, bro. And there was there was too many
other guys that side. So me and Pete were married for
about four years together and then Cooberies quit wrestling
and they asked me to be the nextpart of the Devil's Disciples.
(35:18):
And so when he left, I went in as Damian, so with Damian and
Dante and we ran I guess 12 years or so.
Tommy and I did and we ran, did N.W.A, we work Music City or I
did all all the stuff around andthen it was a it was a good
(35:41):
round with Tommy. Yeah, because, you know, people
don't understand this too. Is that honestly, you know,
because there was Memphis in theMemphis territory, which had,
you know, the the Louisville, Nashville, Evansville, you know,
all the other shows. But then you also in Jonesboro,
those kinds of things. But then you also had this
offshoot of kind of like the Middle Tennessee outlaw scene
(36:06):
where honestly, that was like its own territory where a lot of
the US SWA guys would come in and work on their, you know, one
night off or two nights off. They would sometimes have a, you
know, a night off and they wouldcome in and work and, you know,
basically you guys were working 5-6 nights a week.
But then so you're working very similar to what the USWA guys
(36:27):
are working. Instead, though, you're, you're
kind of doing all the other kindof ancillary towns that
sometimes they would come visit.So you would run into a lot of
people, I'm sure, during that time.
Terry Rice ran Power Probe and at one time Terry Rice had it
going on and Pete was looking for him.
(36:49):
And that was the very first timeI met New Jack.
He he was with Junkyard Dog. They came to they came over to
Terry Rice's show was running Woodbury and we was packing that
place out. Yeah.
And we, I mean, literally pack that out.
I think that was the most heat Iever got as a single wrestler
(37:12):
was there and I was Santa Claus and Pete was the big Pete was
the big baby face. And I come in with throwing
candy and everything to everybody.
And I reached out. So I got something special for
you. And I reached over and had this
big, I had a brick in the in thething.
He reached down to get his present.
I cracked him over the head and he juiced and and then I reached
(37:34):
over and pulled the manic hood down over and man I like to got
beat to death before I got back and dressed up.
Yeah. So real quick, before we get off
of Pete, I know, I know. We're going to bring him up a
little bit later in the show too.
But when it comes to Pete, I've heard that when he put a chop on
you that he could actually touchyour shoulders with his
fingertips. Is that?
Oh yeah, yeah, he was huge. Pete was huge.
(37:57):
But you know who had the hardestchop besides Joe was Cool Breeze
Williams. Cool Breeze chopped me one time
and popped my backbone. Holy.
Cow he we were down in common. We're in Columbia and and breezy
would always talk to you in the ring.
Hey there buddy, how you doing that?
(38:18):
He and he went and he said, here's a little chop and he like
to killed me and and I can take a chop and but he hits the boom
and my back pops. I said, I said, oh breeze.
I said, oh breeze. I said just leave me alone for a
minute. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
(38:47):
So I like to, I always like to ask this.
I asked, I asked the previous Devil's Disciples interview we
had. I asked them this question.
How was it working under a mask?Under the hood.
You know what, I worked under the hood for so long.
It wasn't, it wasn't no issue for me because from the time I
started until I started the Forsaken character, I was always
(39:11):
under a hood. And it's so, you know, once you
get used to it, it, it's not bad.
If I had to go back now, it would be be a different story.
Yeah, yeah, cuz you know, Arville would say stuff like the
peripheral vision sometimes is off.
You have to get used to that andstuff like that, but.
Choke your wind is the. Yeah, choke your wind.
(39:32):
Yeah. So give us a little bit quick
rundown of the gimmicks up untilthis point.
So you were, you're the intern. You did.
The medic didn't. You did the medic and then I
went into Damian. I only had two at that time.
Yeah, OK. Two at that time and then also
you are protecting and serving now.
What was the police force you were working for at this point?
(39:55):
I worked at the WINS County Sheriff's Department and then I
worked at Brentwood and then from there when I started doing
the the. Any character is when I got in
and I was working narcotics also.
Yeah, yeah. OK, gotcha, man.
That's that's got to be a crazy job there.
I know this isn't giving me backmy Police Department, but
(40:19):
working pro wrestling or the narcotics which was the tougher
1? Probably the pro wrestling, you
know, and it actually saved my life one time.
Oh well, I took off to go wrestle and then I was going to
come back and my partner that was with me, they were going to
(40:40):
Clarksville and a drunk driver hit him and killed the drunk
driver and hurt my partner. But I would have been in the car
with him if I hadn't went to to go run.
Holy cow, holy cow. So we've, we've elicited some
responses from some of your peers and some of my old
buddies. And so we've we've had some
questions kind of come up and it's more about stuff that they
(41:03):
want to hear you talk, talk about.
So what one of the things. And again, if the timing is off,
that's OK because we just bounceall over the place anyway, even
though we're trying to tell a, you know, a little bit of a
story along a line here, you know, chronologically speaking.
But Shane gave me a a funny story that saying the Harding
Mall when the ring broke with Dante and the Mortons.
(41:23):
What was this much later or was this around this time or?
No, this, this is when me and Tommy was working together and
Terry Rice ran a show at at the Harding Mall.
And then we had good show and the very first match, Pete
Cannon dropped a a leg and the whole ring hit the floor.
(41:45):
Boom, very first match. And so they they tacked it up a
little bit, tried to and they ran another match and and it
broke and Terry come to us and said, guys, you got to save us.
So we, we just did a big brawl. And at that time I, I was, I was
pretty heavy in martial arts forseveral years and, and it was
(42:10):
hard for me to, to throw workingkicks, I bet because I, I, but
anyway. And so Shane, Dante had Shane
and had him hooked. And he said he said hey, Ricky,
kick him. I said OK.
And the guy one of the marks over said something about it
being fake. I said fake.
(42:31):
And one of the things about me is that you hear a lot of
stories, people can say whateverthey want to do about wrestling,
they've been fake. But I never wanted them to think
I was fake. I always wanted them to know
they couldn't beat me up no matter what.
They thought I was the guy that they couldn't beat up, you know?
So I went and I kicked Shane andI kicked him, right?
(42:54):
I almost knocked Tommy out. I kicked him so hard, kicked
Shane in the mouth and his head went back and they hit Tommy.
And so I turned around and did my thing, come back, grabbed
Shane and he bleeding out of hismouth, busted his lip, cut it.
I said, what's wrong with you? He said.
You didn't you? I said, oh man, I'm so sorry.
(43:15):
Yeah, I laid him open. Sure.
Wow. So you're talking about martial
arts there a little bit. Tell us, tell us a little
something about going with Wolfie to a karate tournament.
I know he went with me to a couple of them.
I, I did pretty well normally. I was, I was in it for a lot of
(43:37):
years. I went up to I did Ition room,
which is an Okinawan style and we used to do MMA before MMA was
cool. You know, we did grappling,
ground techniques, joint manipulation, you know, all the
good stuff, knees, elbows. And so he went with me one time.
(43:58):
I at one time in the middle, they had different rankings and
I was fifth in the Southeast ranking and, and Woofie went
with me and I don't think anybody ever got anything on me.
And that's so cool, you know, just look, I need to be.
Yeah, that's awesome. That's awesome.
(44:21):
Are you a pro wrestling fan? We'll stop by Captain's Corner,
where you can get autographed photos, cards, magazines, and
figures from all of your favorite wrestling superstars of
the past, present, and future. You'll also be able to
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Make sure to stop by Captain's Corner on Facebook and give us a
(44:42):
holler. Remember, cheers to the working
man. OK, well, another one of my
favorite people, and I just had him on the podcast with Wolfie D
is Ben Jordan. And course, we, you know, we
love the wild boys, Ben Jordan, Steve Neely, great tag team.
You know, honestly, at the end of the episode we were trying to
(45:03):
get them to say the Mount Rushmore of Tennessee tag teams
and they kind of went Memphis with it.
And I respect that. That's what they like growing
up. But what I was wanting to hear
was like, the Devils, the wild boys, you know, the Mortons and
the Scott brothers, you know, that's kind of what I was
expecting to hear. And and I kind of wanted to hear
that. But so obviously, Ben now is a
(45:24):
good friend of mine. And, yeah, he brought up a
question that I have to ask you.And he, he really wanted it to
kind of elicit a response from you as well, where it's these
trips to Evansville with Ashley Hudson and Ben Jordan.
And then there was apparently a snowstorm and a cigar and a
locker, the electric keys in thecar.
So go ahead. I'm gonna let you talk.
(45:48):
So we we were leaving out to go to Evansville to work.
And you know, I think, I think it was either Ben or Ashley, one
of the two that called the guy said, listen, it's supposed to
get bad up there. And he said, Oh no, we're having
wrestling, come on. Said yeah, OK, here we go.
So we're going up and we hit thepenny route going up and by I
(46:13):
think it was Madisonville or stuff like that.
The mate was driving and you know, he's from Australia, so
they don't have a lot of snow upthere or down there, I should
say. And all at once he hit and we
went around and around, went through the medium and ended up
in the medium facing the the other way.
(46:34):
That's the ticket actually. And he he went and kicked it and
finally we got us out and we went around to the side and, and
finally got out of that and drove to Evansville.
And when we got there, guess what?
No wrestling. They cancelled it.
Of course. Yeah, I don't remember him
locking the keys in the car. Oh yeah, that surprised me, but
(46:58):
I don't remember. Was there something about a
celebratory cigar after? You know, Ashley and I on the,
the way back from a successful night of wrestling, we normally
had a good cigar. And I, I, I've, I used to, I
haven't done it probably 20 years.
(47:19):
I I would get Cuban cigars and we'd always smoke high dollar
Cuban cigars. Ain't nothing since class.
Yeah, yeah. That's class.
We'd we'd we'd have a glass of port and and Sherwood and a
cigar on the way back. Man, man, well, we're going to
(47:41):
bring up Ashley in a little bit.I don't want to talk too much
about him, but we've got a little thing at the end.
We play the name game and I wantyou a little talk more about
him. But so I just, you know, a
couple other things that I've heard about that I've got to ask
you about. And again, if my timing is off
on some of these, but I would love to hear about the year long
feud with Shane Morton. Shane and I, we, we worked.
(48:03):
I've been, I've worked Shane 300times, you know, through tag
teams and all that. But he and I, we worked down in
Columbia just constant. And I think that one of the, the
funniest stories with me and Shane, I, I was doing a thing
with a snake and I was scared todeath of a snake.
And Charming Charles was my manager back then.
(48:25):
And Charles, Charles always played with snakes and I had to
go over to his house and he had to educate me on snakes and the
and the snake I had because I was so scared to.
And so but we did the finish where I reached into the bag and
pulled out a snake and and then put it over Shanes head, the bag
with a snake in it. And Shane poked himself with a
(48:48):
razor blade like he'd been bit and took a took a Alka seltzer.
And I pulled that off and Shane sitting there shaking and the
fans hollering, he's been bit, he's been bit.
And Shane sitting there and theycalled the ambulance and Shane
goes to the hospital. Sure did.
And they thought it was a snake bite.
And but Shane and I had some great angles and, you know, and
(49:13):
we, we've done a little bit of everything, you know?
Yeah, we, we did 1 angle over inand Lebanon and Laverne and
those guys over there, Lord havemercy.
We were on like third match and they'd already everybody's
already bled and went through chairs and went they done.
(49:34):
And me and Shane said they're looking at each other.
Shane says what are we going to do?
I said let's not do anything. He said.
I said let's not do anything. I said we won't touch you and
we'll play cat and mouse. And we've done that for a couple
times. We did it in, in Columbia.
We did it there where the, the whole time limit, we would never
touch each other. I, I jump out, come out, you,
(49:56):
you, you scared. And he'd get out.
I'd get in the ring and all thatstuff.
And I had people slobber trying to get a hold of me to try to
get me into the ring. And then about the time they
start to count, Shane would grabme a rear back to hit me and the
the bell would ring and I would slide out.
And and every time we've done that, the crowd, they had to
hold them back to keep from the getting to me.
(50:18):
Yeah, your chicken comes here. I'm so much bigger than Shane,
you know, and I'm playing, you know, and man, they're just
slobber. We we did it one time over in
Columbia and a guy passed out. He looked at me and he said, I
hate you. And he passed out.
He passed out. He passed that.
He was, somebody was shaking. He just read his I said.
(50:39):
Come on, let's go back to the dressing room.
There's nothing else you can do that's the best.
OK, So I've heard as well that you are a kind of guy that when
you get shot into things, thingshappen, such as you getting shot
into the dressing room and something happened.
(50:59):
Can you tell us a little bit about that?
Yeah, I love you Con, probably more.
He loves me, but you don't ever fire somebody before they go out
for the match, he told me. And I'm a different guy now and
I wouldn't do something like that.
But we, me and Shane was workingdown Telahoma and Yukon told me
(51:23):
he wasn't going to bring me back.
And so I, I've always been a businessman, you know, I love
wrestling, but I, I also got paid anywhere and I spent some
nights at home because of that, but I always got paid no matter
where I was at. And so he, he, he didn't want to
(51:44):
pay me what I wanted. So he, I was, he was going to
end me up. And so he put me and Shane out
there and I absolutely tore thatwhole place apart.
I, I tore the railings off the, the, the side and I had to grab
Shane and they had a, a, a, the dressing rooms and had fire the,
(52:05):
the particle board on it and I threw Shane in it and it hit
boom. And I grabbed, I told Shane, I
said reverse it and Shane threw me.
And I get that thing as hard as I could put a big hole in it.
And that you can hear the boys in there.
He's coming through all the nursing.
They're holding the wall up. Like the Kool-aid Man.
(52:26):
Yeah, I mean, I get that thing. Everything I could and was.
There something about it. Yeah, go ahead.
Was there something about a car?Maybe that was your own?
Yeah. We started fighting outside and
and you God was coming out. Oh stop, stop.
And we and I had my my van sets out there and I told Shane, I
(52:48):
said told me in that van and he threw me in it.
And you call was like, oh, stop the cars, not the cars, but it
was my card. So, yeah, OK, so you know, we
kind of got some stuff there about Shane and, and obviously
your story can't be told withoutShane.
Obviously, I consider Shane one of my mentors.
But if you had to pick your favorite angle that you worked
(53:12):
with Shane, if you had to pick, and I know that's, you know,
probably impossible and maybe you're going to have to pick one
that you can remember real quick.
But tell me, what would you say your favorite angle working with
either the Mortons or or Shane specifically?
What would you just? It was definitely in the Mortons
when we were doing tag teams with Tommy and you know, Tommy
(53:36):
Hagee always. I love Tommy and Tommy told me a
lot about Russ and and when we were doing an angle with him and
Boogie or him and Steve, we always had great matches.
But I remember 1 I, I was up in the Chicago area and, and
(53:58):
Michigan and all up to there forabout 7 years.
I went up there just about everyweekend.
And so those guys came down, waswatching, watching Southern
style wrestling and we hit Shanewith a bottle and he bled and,
you know, and it was a they couldn't believe the reaction
(54:20):
that we had with the with the crowd.
But it that I think that whole whole deal with with Boogie and
with Shane and me and Tommy, that's probably my favorite
angle and it lasted for years. Yeah, yeah.
It's something about that, I tell you.
You know, it's so funny how in Nashville, you know, sometimes
(54:41):
they got a little, maybe a little burnt out.
Some people say that, you know, TNA killed Nashville as far as
wrestling goes, Bert for sure said that.
But you know, when it comes downto it, nobody ever got the memo
down in Columbia that wrestling was as much a real thing down
there as it ever was any. I think Columbia is such a great
(55:03):
wrestling town. You know what?
Because we gave them this. Now I'm going to jump way back
to Lynn Rossi. I used to go once I got trained,
Lynn talked to me about wrestling and he told me he says
there's two kinds of BSBSBS and believable BS.
And he says if you will put on believable BS, people will come
(55:27):
see it. He says if you don't.
And now so we're going to got sofar away from anything
believable. Like I said earlier, you know,
whatever anybody says, they would believe that I was real.
And you know, so you know, we did that so much and they
believed because like Shane and Boogie, you know, there's an art
(55:49):
to sell it. You know, you want to get over
the babyface sell. You want to buy, you want to
pack a house. You have heat, heat and personal
You will draw. You know it.
It will draw today. You draw yesterday, you'll draw
tomorrow. But you have to have believable
BS you know in order for it to to to work.
(56:12):
Yeah. And, you know, like Ricky
Morton, you know, we're talking about Morton's here.
Might as well bring up cousin Ricky here.
But Ricky is one of those guys. And that's what makes him one of
the greatest baby faces of all time was that believability and
how he would just reach to the crowd and say, you know, under
his breath, almost help. He would just mouth help me.
And yeah. Yeah, something magical about
(56:34):
that, you know. Hey, Ricky was great.
We, we went up, he and I, we flew out of Nashville one time,
went up to, I think it was Wisconsin.
I don't, you know, all these towns start running together.
But that was, that was the funniest trip I've ever been on
in my life with somebody. And he and I, we laughed and,
(56:55):
and had the best time and we worked the match up there and
had a great time. And Ricky Morton is excellent in
my he's great guy and probably one of the best sellers ever.
Ever. No question.
Hey everybody, Jean Jackson hereinviting you to check out the
Retro Wrestling review where each week I'm joined by some
(57:17):
great Co host to help me review classic episodes of USWA
Championship Wrestling. And right now we are doing week
by week reviews of 1993. But we don't just do reviews,
sometimes we get a chance to interview some of the people who
were there and lived it. Plus do watch alongs.
It's a lot of fun. So check out new episodes that
drop every Wednesday at wrestlecopia.com.
(57:40):
And to find links to everything being associated to the podcast,
you can go to uswapodcast.com. Hi, this is Mike Needham, host
of the Reckless Abandoned podcast.
With Mike Needham. We invite you to jump on your
favorite podcast platform and search for the Reckless
Abandoned Podcast and give us a listen.
(58:01):
I'm sometimes joined by a part time podcaster, part time Co
host and full time wife Kitney Nicole.
We talk wrestling, we talk pop culture, we talk local events,
local happenings in West Tennessee, and a ton of other
stuff. But be sure to check out the
Reckless Abandoned Podcast, findus on Facebook.
Also look up the micro group Podcasting Family on Facebook
(58:25):
and see some of our other podcasts we have out there.
Until next time, make good choices and always remember, no
Dollar, no dice. Hey y'all, Jimmy here.
(58:47):
And that was episode 4 of the Best of James Rock St.
Productions with the first half of episode 38 of Rick Reynolds
on Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling.
Rick is a great friend and a mentor to me just like he was to
Wolfie D when he was training Wolfie to wrestle back in the
day. Whether he was a medic or a
devil, or as he is known now as AC Rick, I always appreciate our
(59:08):
conversations. You guys can hear the full
episode over on at G MB MPW or Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling.
Wherever you listen to podcasts or simply click the link in the
notes below. We hope you have enjoyed this
look back in the archives of James Rock St.
Productions. Check us out next week to see
what else we have in store. Until then, follow at G MB MPW
(59:30):
and at James Rock St. everywhere.
Peace with a tear in my eye. This is the greatest moment in
my life. We'll see you later.
(01:00:10):
This has been a James Rock St. production.
This is Rick Reynolds, and you're listening to Give Me Back
My Pro Wrestling. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to
Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling. You know now you know.
(00:43):
Baby, this is hot Rod Bigs, Jared, Jimmy St.
We're going to take them to the limit One more time, baby, right
here. Oh, give me back my pro
wrestling. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome
one more time to the Give Me Back my Pro Wrestling podcast,
and today, as always, my brotherfrom the same father and mother.
And then? No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
(01:11):
Sorry, Jared, The plastic chic St.
And you've already introduced yourself there by Yeah, calling
yourself somebody else. So what's up?
How are you doing? I'm good brother, how about
yourself? I'm great, but I'm sure you're a
little better than great. But tell everybody where you
just got back from. I just got back from Hawaii, or
(01:31):
as the natives called it, Hawaiiso.
Hawaii. It's more of AV sound, so it's a
found that out on the trip so. Yeah, brother, welcome to
Hawaii. Yeah, it's a we saw a lot of the
islands and it's it's, it's a beautiful place.
It's the time difference is kindof a killer though, man.
(01:52):
It's six hours, the East Coast time.
It's yeah, it's. So I find myself trying to
adjust to that but slow process.No joke, because Michelle and I
got to go there on our honeymoonand we were waking up at 4:00 AM
and going to bed at 8, and it was just weird, you know?
(02:13):
Yeah, But beautiful, beautiful place, beautiful state, you
know? Oh yeah, absolutely.
Just go. I highly recommend it to
anybody. Absolutely.
If you can deal with the plane trip, you can.
You can go. But yeah, well, it's good to
have you back. Of course, no one noticed.
None of our listeners noticed because it's just been the
normal 2 since since our last show.
(02:35):
But you know, this week we've got a really cool one.
And this one, this guy is kind of like everybody that I talked
to when it comes to the wrestlers, they were like you
got to get this guy on, you got to get this guy on.
So he's kind of one of those guys that's like your favorite
wrestlers wrestler, you know, and it's pretty cool when you
(02:56):
know that somebody is so well respected and so they everybody
wants to hear their story. So obviously that makes us want
to have them on the show. Now the good news is I got to
know Rick a little bit in Nashville and you know Rick,
Rick's a straight up dude. That's all I can say.
He's just a straight up just real good guy and you know,
(03:17):
we're just happy to have him on the show today.
He is Rick Reynolds AKA Damien, AKA Forsaken, AKA Medic,
whatever you want to call him. But the man has done a lot and
done a lot of stuff and, and honestly, just from the little
bit that I know about him, I'm just excited to they get to know
him even more today on our on our show, man.
Yeah, man, he's a, you know, thethings you mentioned, the shows,
(03:41):
he has a lot of respect from other wrestlers and man, that
means a lot. Like you look at somebody like,
you know, we've talked a lot of people have a lot of respect for
people like Bobby Eaton and something like that.
And and what somebody somebody is well revered like that.
You know, they're they're a solid dude.
And that's, that's going to be agood interview that you know,
I'm, I'm looking forward to getting more information out of
(04:03):
out of Rick and, and finding outall about his career.
Yeah, well, there's some interesting tidbits that we've
been queued in to ask by our sources that we will never name.
Thanks sources. Snitches get stitches.
Yeah, snitches get stitches. Wait, Or would that make us the
snitches about the stitch? I don't know.
Anyway, you know, I have my resources.
(04:26):
Sometimes if the Internet doesn't tell you everything, you
got to go a little bit higher upthe knowledge tree, you know
what I'm saying? So good news is I know a lot of
guys that know a lot of cool stuff.
So anyway, like I said, the sources will never be named, but
we thank you Sources. You know who you are anyway.
Well, I tell you what, why don'twe just go ahead and get the
(04:49):
show started with Mr. Rick Reynolds?
What do you say about that? That sounds great man.
All right, we'll be right back with Rick Reynolds AKA Forsaken
on the Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling podcast after these
messages. Promotional consideration paid
for by the following This is Kroll and you're listening to
(05:10):
Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling with Jimmy St. and Jared the
Plastic Chic. Be sure to like, subscribe, and
view all of our USWO and Saw wrestling content at Nashville
Wrestling Network exclusively. On.
YouTube what you doing Jimmy Straight?
(05:36):
How you doing man? Let me let me get up here and
get off the road here in a minute.
OK. I started rolling all up trying
to save. I forgot about four hours while
I get home. Shoe.
Left out at 9:00 this morning went and I own a a expediting
little comfort little yeah. And and once a year for about
(05:59):
two months, we deliver yearbookseverywhere.
And for for Jostens and I did the very first one and this is
the very last one I had to take.I had to take two stops at one
in Dover, TN and then drive one down to Houston.
So I'm coming back from that. That's pretty cool man.
(06:21):
How did you get into that? Tommy Hicks.
Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, I was.
AI was a police officer. Yeah, yeah, I thought I
remembered that. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, for, well, I did that total of 21 years and matter of
fact, I wrestled and I and I waswhile I worked in narcotics.
(06:45):
And so I worked, I worked under a hood.
And then I was to leave out and go work and Jamie Dundee one
time with Fairgrounds and Whoopiand Jamie and they're talking to
him. And I said, James, shut up.
(07:08):
Oh. My God, I know.
Shut up. That's you.
I'm just blown away that you area narcotics officer and you
actually were around Jamie Dundee.
Well, I I was just a police officer when I started
(07:29):
wrestling. OK.
And I went with Gypsy. I went to talk to Gypsy and
literally here I'm a cop and, and Joey Rossi took me into his
house and there was pot smoke sothick you could cut it with a
knife. It was a thick.
(07:50):
Oh no. That's a that is a fine line to
cross right there. It's like I'm really, it's
wrestling. I'm telling you, it's a it.
Well, you know, nobody ever really done it around me.
You know, just about everybody knew who I was and respected
that. And you know, I, I didn't, I
(08:11):
didn't go in on their stuff. They didn't come in on mine.
So. Sure, but I mean, the remnants
are hard to hide on marijuana. Let's just be honest, you know
so. Absolutely it is.
And but you know, one of the things I've found is that I
think 98% of the people I know Smith is right.
(08:33):
I don't know too many people. I don't, but there's just about
everybody I know. Yeah, yeah, OK, cool.
So we're glad you're here. So let me go ahead and kick us
in here because I feel like we'll get into other
conversations and we'll just record that.
All right, We are back with morefrom Give Me Back My Pro
(08:53):
Wrestling and today, y'all. I'm very excited, Jared, and
I've been talking about him in the earlier part of the show
here, but this man right now is a giant in the business.
He's one of the guys that honestly was a locker room
leader. He was one of the guys that you
can go to and ask him how to do a match.
And he was a big man, but he understood wrestling.
(09:15):
He understood all the intricacies of doing storylines.
And he also just understood thatold thing called psychology.
But the cool thing I like about him is, is he's not only a pro
wrestler, he's a former police officer, he's a minister, and
he's on the show today. And this, ladies and gentlemen,
is Mr. Rick Reynolds, AKA Forsaken, AKA.
(09:38):
What are you you want to call? Just don't call him.
Anything bad won't end up well for you.
But Rick, welcome to the show, brother.
Thank you so much for coming on.You're so nice, Jimmy.
Thank you so much. Well, you're welcome, brother.
And hey, man, I've been wanting to have you on one of my
podcasts. And since the other one dropped
the ball, I'm gonna take the ball.
(10:00):
Yeah. My pleasure.
All right, so we always start off with the main question, the
number one question. And that one always goes to the
plastic sheet himself. Jared St. my own brother.
Flesh and blood. Jared.
Take it away all. Right, Rick.
So this is a question I like to ask.
I didn't come up with it, but wewe will act like I did.
But this this kind of lets people know your influences in
(10:22):
wrestling and your and your favorite people in wrestling.
If you had like four or five, like a Mount Rushmore of
wrestlers of all time, your favorite, what would that be?
You know, I, I listen to your podcast also, so I knew this was
coming. Thank you.
They the the very first one on my list would be the Mongolian
(10:44):
Stomper. And the reason it would be the
Mongolian Stomper was when I wasa kid, I used to have dreams.
I, I grew up in East Tennessee and I had dreams about wrestling
the Mongolian Stomper. And I got to see him several
times live. Never met the man, always wanted
to, always wanted to work once Igot in the business, but never
(11:07):
had the opportunity. But my very first one would be
the Mongolian Stomper. My my second one would be Ronnie
Garvin and I went and watched him and Boris Milenko.
They had a few Knox and I watched them and I absolutely
(11:31):
loved. I drove different towns just to
watch that feud of Ronnie Garvinand I got to meet Ronnie Garvin
at the Gulf Coast Wrestlers reunion down in Mobile, AL, and
he and I got to talk about the feud and.
And so I have ultimate respect for Ronnie Garvin.
(11:52):
I think my third would be NikitaKoloff.
OK, Nikita and IA few years ago,got to spend a lot of time
together and I actually got to take the Russian sickle a few
times and, and we traveled a lotand we, we talked Jesus and you
(12:16):
know, he's a minister now also and hear his stories and just to
talk with him and spend time with him.
It, it helped me grow as a man and, and my walk with God.
He, he was really strong and influential in that.
And I, I was thinking about my last one and I started going
(12:39):
through, you know, that there's several people that, that I was
going to put in there. You know, I was thinking about
Shane Morton and I love Shane Morton and we've been, you know,
friends for 30 years, you know, and I go through and of all the
great guys, I've had something to, you know, to do with their
life or them with me and I wanted to put them in and I I
(13:01):
thought about it hard and long. There's a lot of great
wrestlers. I've I've wrestled.
I I think it's just good as anybody out there.
Scott Spade up in Chicago, roughcrossing, you know, those guys.
Eric Freedom out of Michigan, Heand I have had great matches
together And I I've decided to put in the fourth spot with
(13:25):
somebody that allowed me to lovewrestling again because at one
point in my life, and we'll get into it, is that I, I was going
to step away. And his name is Jimmy Blaze, and
he's the owner of Pal Entertainment out of Chicago.
OK, very cool. Yeah, I noticed him on your
(13:46):
list. Quite a bit of of work, guys,
you've worked. So, you know, I did a little
research myself and that's a cool name.
I like that. We'll check him out for sure.
Listeners, go check out Jimmy Blaze.
That's awesome. Yeah, that's a great list.
Yeah, very original too, you know, because there's two
Canadians, a Minnesota Russian and an indie guy.
(14:07):
You got to love that. Yeah.
When, when Nikita and I, we werein Tampa and we were sitting at
this restaurant talking and I asked him.
I said. I said, why did you change your
name? He said for the gimmick, yeah.
You know, he, he changed his whole personality, everything
for the gimmick. You know, that's commitment to
(14:28):
wrestling right there. But.
Yeah, and you know, you know, hegets a lot of Flack from some of
the guys who make fun of him forusing the accent.
But do you remember when I was doing the Omar Al Kazan gimmick?
Do you remember that, Rick? Yeah, because I think I'd
already ended that. And as much as Shane wanted me
to do it down in Colombia, when you and I and everybody worked
(14:48):
together, I was actually happy to kind of be away from it
because it allowed me to be myself.
But Long story short, I would dothe, I was doing this kind of
Middle Eastern oil tycoon character and I found myself
doing the accent too. I almost feel like it was a way
for him to maintain, you know, to not let up on it, you know,
(15:09):
and, and, and that's the way I've always seen why he probably
stuck with the accent sometimes when maybe it wasn't necessary,
you know, but. He could live the character.
Yeah, well, he's a great guy. He really is.
I got to work with him. Well, he was on a show and he
did a little, you know, devotional during the the middle
of the show there. And he gave his testimony and
(15:30):
Nikita was really cool. He he actually was very cool.
Took a picture with us and and, you know, just kind of great
stuff like that. But just talk to him a little
bit. And he prayed for us before the
show. It was, it was really cool man.
Very nice man, very nice man. Yeah.
Well, anyway, we're here to talkRick Reynolds today, so we'll
talk Nikita when he comes. So Rick, tell me a little bit
(15:53):
about you growing up here, brother.
Where were you born and where'd you go to high school?
I was born in a little small town up in East Tennessee called
Sunbright. I had a graduating class of
about 40 people. It's up in Morgan County, and it
was like I said, it was just a little small town.
(16:14):
I left there. I went to to college at Rome
State. I went there to play basketball
and I, I had a terrible attitudeand, and everything.
And as a matter of fact, I stillcan do the same things I did
when I played there. Sit, sit down and watch back and
forth the ball go up and down because that's all I did.
(16:36):
And so I didn't last long there.I quit because, yeah, just like
I said, I had a bad attitude. And it was, I thought it was a
coach, but it was all me. And so left there and then went
and moved to Nashville and I started working the prison down
in Nashville. OK.
That was my very first, you know, full time job was the
(16:58):
prison. Now you're saying basketball.
So obviously in high school did you play basketball?
Did you also play football? What?
What were did you play in in those?
I played foot. I played football until freshman
year. And this was, I got cut from my
basketball team. And it made me, I was furious
(17:20):
that I got cut. And as a matter of fact, I've
got a picture and where they took a picture of me and I had
an old suit on uniform on and I looked like I was beat to death.
I was. And I was determined that I was
because I was one of the tallestplayers.
You know, I'm, I'm 65 now. And so, you know, I was
(17:43):
determined I was going to, to get better.
And one summer I had my dad put me a, a goal up and we made a
backboard and he put it up on a telephone pole.
And I played basketball 8 hours a day.
I mean, I played and played and played.
And the next year I, I made the team, made the, the junior
(18:05):
varsity. And as a junior I was starting
and, you know, I had a pretty good career there at some right.
But it's a small school, you know.
So it's that I went on to Rome State and I didn't do well at
all there. And so I left and went into the
workforce. Yeah, yeah, I understand that
one for sure. So OK, now we know you not only
(18:29):
as all these other things, but as a as an awesome wrestler and
we're going to get into all that.
But the start of it really is when did you start liking
wrestling? Oh, as a kid, I, it was, I was
probably 7 or 8 years old and I would watch out of the Knoxville
(18:51):
channel, watch Robert Fuller and, and all that.
And I watched Nick Gulis wrestling and it is absolutely
loved it. My, my grandparents would watch
Nick Gulis and I, I used to watch, you know, Tojo Yamamoto
and, and, and, and all the one Lynn Rossi.
(19:14):
And so, and Lynn was actually him and Joy was instrumental
about me getting into wrestling.That's a.
Little bit about that, Yeah, a little bit.
You're starting wrestling. Yeah.
So I was a police officer in in Williamson County and Lynn Rossi
had a health food store in Brentwood.
The one Tommy Hagee told us about.
(19:37):
Probably matter of fact, they had they had a the picture of
Tommy and Joey, a big oil painting with A tag teamed up on
the wall. And and so I know who Tommy was,
but I never met Tommy at this time.
And I used to go in there and, and things were different back
then, you know, not anybody could get into wrestling.
(19:59):
And I, I would go every day and I would go talk to to Lynn.
And I and we became friends and I tried to get him tell me
something about wrestling. I tried to get him to train me.
I tried to and, and just, he just wouldn't do it.
I mean, he wouldn't, he wouldn'tsmart me up.
He wouldn't. He wouldn't put me a with
(20:21):
somebody. He never did.
We talk about everything. But when he got to that, he cut
me off. And Joey Rossi, his son, one day
I was talking with him and this is after months, months of me
talking to him. And he told me he says, he says,
Rick, he said, do you really want to get into wrestling?
(20:43):
I said, I want to do that more than I've ever want to do
anything else. And he said, well, if you're if
you're serious, you'd be here atthe shop at 6:00.
At 5:45, I was sitting in the inthe parking lot.
Joey came out and unlocked the door and looked at me.
Came out like he said, Are you sure?
He said, I won't tell you beforeyou get in it.
(21:05):
He said you're going to see all kinds of people and see all
kinds of things and you're goingto have to separate your life
from wrestling and your private life.
That's I'm willing to do that. And that's when he took me over
to Gypsy Joe's house over in offof Nolensville Pike and I met
Joe for the first time. Yeah.
(21:26):
Now that is, that's awesome. So let me ask you real quick
here now, you know, Gypsy Joe had a reputation obviously about
him of one of the toughest, you know, guys ever in the business
whatsoever. How did that translate until
you're meeting him and continuing on with him?
(21:47):
You know, Joe, he'd like to Smith and so you know, I I
walked in and it was just, you know, I was like, oh, no.
And so he looked at me and he talked to me for a minute and he
told me he says, he says Thursday you be here and is off
of West End. And I was there and we got in
(22:12):
and talked and and he got me in the ring and he's just OK.
I train you and I can tell you the Gypsy Joe where I trained is
not like the Gypsy Joe's some other guys down the road.
Joe worked us and I can't tell you a hold that I didn't have to
(22:33):
do to his perfection. One day I I had they put me in a
in a arm bar in the back and I had to grab the back of the head
and flip over the guy and land on my feet.
And I did that one whole day until I landed on my feet like I
was supposed to. I would follow on my head,
follow everything. And he he cussed me and get up,
(22:55):
do it again and I did it again and I never gave up and he
wouldn't let me give up, but he he taught me every hole that you
could ever see. I did that hole during training.
Yeah. Now who were you training with
in the ring? Because just to not to knock on
Gypsy, I think the world of Gypsy.
And again, I respect his abilities and everything like
(23:15):
that, but you're probably, what,a good foot taller than him.
Oh. Yeah, at least.
Yeah, that didn't matter. Yeah, exactly.
But who were you working in the ring with with him?
See, Cooberries Williams just finished up.
When I started, there was a guy and I, I was coming in at the
time and I can't remember the name of the promotion that was
(23:35):
down in Nashville, but Doctor Squash was running at GWF or, or
something like that. And Max Payne was down there and
a guy named Barry Cody and Gentleman Jim Corbin.
And but anyway, that was the group that was running Nashville
and Gypsy was there with them. And so there was a guy, like I
(24:01):
said, Breeze just finished. I come in and I had a friend of
mine wanted to train. He was my same size.
And so Joe was training him and me both.
And we were going in as the medics with him going against.
Oh, I can't think his name is, is Bubba Perry.
And St. was his last name, his partner, They were the interns,
(24:27):
so they was turning them babyface going to bring us in as
the Hill team. And they're a veteran team, so
we was green as grass so they could carry us through a
program. So that was the plan.
And so there was a guy from Manchester, a little small guy,
muscled up. He was training there with me.
(24:48):
He started about the same time. And a guy named Luscious Leslie
Love and he was in mid train, hewas, he was working matches but
he was still training and I was happy always to see him there
because Gypsy normally cussed him out instead of me.
So. That's awesome.
(25:09):
I'll tell you, let me tell you one story about Joe, then we'll
move. Please.
I was I was training and I I couldn't throw a drop kick for
and Gypsy started cussing me andhe told me, he says you kicked
me right here, right here in thehead.
You kicked me. He kicked me and he cussed me.
So I jumped up and I kicked the dog out of Joe.
I hit him so hard his ear was bleeding.
(25:30):
Knocked him up against the rope and he rolled out, his ear was
bleeding and he was cussing me. And he started reaching up
underneath the and he brought out a a big 2 by 4 and he got in
there and I said, oh, my buddy, I said.
I said yeah. I said if he just tried to hit
me with that 2 by 4. I said I said I'm fighting him
and he got that two before he looked at me and raised that 2
(25:51):
before. He says oh you still and so big
now you kick this two before. I had to spend the rest of time
doing drop kicks on that 2 before.
That's oh, man. Oh, Joe.
Yeah. God bless you.
So do you consider that like your first match or what's your
(26:11):
first match? My first match was in
Hartsville, TN and I I don't remember the guy running but Joe
called and and me and my partnerSam, we went to Hartsville and
that was our very first match against a guy named Tommy Vito
and Tommy had been around for a while and another guy named Joey
(26:35):
Jarrett was my very our very first match in Hartsville, TN.
Yeah, that's awesome. And now a word from our sponsor.
(26:57):
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome toGive Me Back My Pro Wrestling,
the podcast that's based on the old school but can still help
you find the good stuff from today.
Jimmy St. and the Plastic Chic Jared are the undisputed tag
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From thought provoking topics tosuperstar interviews to action
(27:19):
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OK, so we're kind of dancing around a little bit here about
(27:40):
the you know the topic, but whendo you remember basically
getting your first encounter with my Co host and partner in
podcasting live and in color with good old fashioned PG13
Wolfie D? When do you remember seeing him
first? Pete, his stepdad.
(28:03):
I work for Pete. Once I left the, the prison
system, I work for Pete as, as security over the hospital in
Williamson County. And, and I actually moved into
the apartment complex down in Nashville where Pete was living
and became good friends and Camille.
(28:23):
And so we spent a lot of time together and then warned, you
know, he was just a child, you know, I guess he was 7 or 8
years old, maybe 9. And he, he was still.
And we, I, I used to sit there with him actually, and he'd show
me wrestling moves. You know, he has his wrestling
(28:46):
and he have all these, you know,he's always been creative and he
would take it, do these wrestling moves and show me all
these wrestling moves. Yeah.
That's but. That that was the first time I I
met. So OK, so now was this in in the
famous world famous LA part of Nashville?
Yeah. Now tell Jared what LA stands
(29:08):
for Lower. Antioch.
Yeah, now if you've ever heard apromo from a very famous,
actually Jared, who's my favorite pro wrestler of all
time, Rick Flair, Maybe the other Rick.
Oh, Ricky Morton, yeah. No, I'm saying, well, Rick
Reynolds, too. I love Rick, too, but Ricky
Morton's probably my favorite wrestler of all time.
(29:30):
And I always heard Ricky Morton say it in random promos that he
was from lower Antioch, too. So, you know, that's pretty
funny. Yeah.
So. So the when it gets down to it,
though, Wolfie talks about round131415 years old is when he was
sneaking his way into the ring. Do you remember first working
with him? Yes, yeah, yeah, I do.
(29:52):
Actually, Camille, his mom came to me and I've been working
probably 7-8, nine months thereabout and and she came to
me and Warren has always loved wrestling and and she asked me
if I would train them and Pete talked to me about doing it.
(30:14):
And so I agreed to to get him inthe ring and, and start working
with him. But you know, he he was a
natural, I'll tell you. And it because he's always, you
know, he's always watch wrestling.
So you know, if you, if you toldhim to do something, he already
knew the basic moves. And that's more than what most
people can do now. You know, you tell somebody do a
(30:36):
top wrist, like they don't even know how you know, Warren was he
wasn't natural. He already knew how to do all
this stuff. Yeah, yeah.
And he was an athlete and it wasprobably simple for him to come
into now, but Gypsy Joe maybe had a little issue with it.
Is that right, Gypsy? Gypsy, Gypsy cuss me, I know.
(30:58):
I know of three good cousins he gave me for before that because
one of them was because where wetrained at was over in West
Nashville over and it was a little garage that had a ring in
it and, and it had about 3 layers of carpet on it and, and
(31:19):
the boards was rotten and it smelled like cat pee and, and it
was but that's where we trained.And so for the very first time I
went in there and and I didn't, I didn't ask Gypsy to go up
there. And I guess the guy that that
owned the the garage called and Gypsy came up there and he
(31:42):
cussed me. Lord, I thought he was going to
fight me that day. Oh, man.
OK, well, so tell me a little bit about some of the promotions
you were working for, you know, because I ultimately want to get
to talking about, you know, one of my favorite tag teams, one of
the best tag teams of all time, in my opinion, Dante and the
(32:02):
great Mephisto. I want to get to that where you
start working with them, but kind of lead us up to that
process if you don't mind. I, I started out as the medic
and like I said, you know, we originally was going to go in to
Doctor Squash's thing and then that folded.
And so we didn't, we didn't do much with them.
(32:25):
And then I just started working little outlaw shows here and
there, you know, trying to get my name out.
And we went and met Dutch Vanteland we went to Memphis and we
worked the blackbirds down on Memphis TV.
And And so The funny thing, that's the first time we ever,
(32:47):
you know, I ever did TV and was both nervous very first time I
met Jamie Dundee. And Jamie, Jamie was like 15
years old and and he was no different than he was now, you
know, And yeah, I love Jamie, bythe way, some of the.
(33:07):
So the very first thing you toldmy brother, he said, advise you
I take that gum out of your mouth before you get out there.
He said, somebody smacking out. There's this little guy.
And, you know, and so we went out there and and Sam wasn't as
well versed in wrestling as I was and.
And I'm still far from being good.
(33:29):
But they got in there. They supposed to take the finish
on me. I felt my take it.
And we was working a brick houseand the Iceman King Parson and
King Parson gave Sam a DDT and Sam fell on his on, on King
Parson's shoulder. And they like to beat the dog
(33:50):
out of Sam. They threw me out of the ring
and beat the dog out of Sam and brick house come off top rope.
He didn't catch himself at all. I mean, he landed flat on sale
and and pinned him and Sam quit right after that.
And that was his, his last. But I continued going and then I
(34:13):
worked down in Tullahoma, Winchester.
Then I got into Columbia and I started working as a medic down
in Columbia for a lot, you know,and I, you got to keep in mind I
was still working, you know, a few nights a week.
And plus, I was I went into I'vebeen a police officer and I was
still working full time there and I have to wear a mask to go
(34:36):
work these other places now go back to work, you know, and be a
police officer. I have to been wrestling.
And so I did the the medic gimmick and then when Cool
Breeze Williams was the Greg Mephisto and with Tommy and I've
I've been working with Pete because I was pretty good sized
(34:56):
guy and Pete, I could stand behind him.
You couldn't see me, bro. And there was there was too many
other guys that side. So me and Pete were married for
about four years together and then Cooberies quit wrestling
and they asked me to be the nextpart of the Devil's Disciples.
(35:18):
And so when he left, I went in as Damian, so with Damian and
Dante and we ran I guess 12 years or so.
Tommy and I did and we ran, did N.W.A, we work Music City or I
did all all the stuff around andthen it was a it was a good
(35:41):
round with Tommy. Yeah, because, you know, people
don't understand this too. Is that honestly, you know,
because there was Memphis in theMemphis territory, which had,
you know, the the Louisville, Nashville, Evansville, you know,
all the other shows. But then you also in Jonesboro,
those kinds of things. But then you also had this
offshoot of kind of like the Middle Tennessee outlaw scene
(36:06):
where honestly, that was like its own territory where a lot of
the US SWA guys would come in and work on their, you know, one
night off or two nights off. They would sometimes have a, you
know, a night off and they wouldcome in and work and, you know,
basically you guys were working 5-6 nights a week.
But then so you're working very similar to what the USWA guys
(36:27):
are working. Instead, though, you're, you're
kind of doing all the other kindof ancillary towns that
sometimes they would come visit.So you would run into a lot of
people, I'm sure, during that time.
Terry Rice ran Power Probe and at one time Terry Rice had it
going on and Pete was looking for him.
(36:49):
And that was the very first timeI met New Jack.
He he was with Junkyard Dog. They came to they came over to
Terry Rice's show was running Woodbury and we was packing that
place out. Yeah.
And we, I mean, literally pack that out.
I think that was the most heat Iever got as a single wrestler
(37:12):
was there and I was Santa Claus and Pete was the big Pete was
the big baby face. And I come in with throwing
candy and everything to everybody.
And I reached out. So I got something special for
you. And I reached over and had this
big, I had a brick in the in thething.
He reached down to get his present.
I cracked him over the head and he juiced and and then I reached
(37:34):
over and pulled the manic hood down over and man I like to got
beat to death before I got back and dressed up.
Yeah. So real quick, before we get off
of Pete, I know, I know. We're going to bring him up a
little bit later in the show too.
But when it comes to Pete, I've heard that when he put a chop on
you that he could actually touchyour shoulders with his
fingertips. Is that?
Oh yeah, yeah, he was huge. Pete was huge.
(37:57):
But you know who had the hardestchop besides Joe was Cool Breeze
Williams. Cool Breeze chopped me one time
and popped my backbone. Holy.
Cow he we were down in common. We're in Columbia and and breezy
would always talk to you in the ring.
Hey there buddy, how you doing that?
(38:18):
He and he went and he said, here's a little chop and he like
to killed me and and I can take a chop and but he hits the boom
and my back pops. I said, I said, oh breeze.
I said, oh breeze. I said just leave me alone for a
minute. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
(38:47):
So I like to, I always like to ask this.
I asked, I asked the previous Devil's Disciples interview we
had. I asked them this question.
How was it working under a mask?Under the hood.
You know what, I worked under the hood for so long.
It wasn't, it wasn't no issue for me because from the time I
started until I started the Forsaken character, I was always
(39:11):
under a hood. And it's so, you know, once you
get used to it, it, it's not bad.
If I had to go back now, it would be be a different story.
Yeah, yeah, cuz you know, Arville would say stuff like the
peripheral vision sometimes is off.
You have to get used to that andstuff like that, but.
Choke your wind is the. Yeah, choke your wind.
(39:32):
Yeah. So give us a little bit quick
rundown of the gimmicks up untilthis point.
So you were, you're the intern. You did.
The medic didn't. You did the medic and then I
went into Damian. I only had two at that time.
Yeah, OK. Two at that time and then also
you are protecting and serving now.
What was the police force you were working for at this point?
(39:55):
I worked at the WINS County Sheriff's Department and then I
worked at Brentwood and then from there when I started doing
the the. Any character is when I got in
and I was working narcotics also.
Yeah, yeah. OK, gotcha, man.
That's that's got to be a crazy job there.
I know this isn't giving me backmy Police Department, but
(40:19):
working pro wrestling or the narcotics which was the tougher
1? Probably the pro wrestling, you
know, and it actually saved my life one time.
Oh well, I took off to go wrestle and then I was going to
come back and my partner that was with me, they were going to
(40:40):
Clarksville and a drunk driver hit him and killed the drunk
driver and hurt my partner. But I would have been in the car
with him if I hadn't went to to go run.
Holy cow, holy cow. So we've, we've elicited some
responses from some of your peers and some of my old
buddies. And so we've we've had some
questions kind of come up and it's more about stuff that they
(41:03):
want to hear you talk, talk about.
So what one of the things. And again, if the timing is off,
that's OK because we just bounceall over the place anyway, even
though we're trying to tell a, you know, a little bit of a
story along a line here, you know, chronologically speaking.
But Shane gave me a a funny story that saying the Harding
Mall when the ring broke with Dante and the Mortons.
(41:23):
What was this much later or was this around this time or?
No, this, this is when me and Tommy was working together and
Terry Rice ran a show at at the Harding Mall.
And then we had good show and the very first match, Pete
Cannon dropped a a leg and the whole ring hit the floor.
(41:45):
Boom, very first match. And so they they tacked it up a
little bit, tried to and they ran another match and and it
broke and Terry come to us and said, guys, you got to save us.
So we, we just did a big brawl. And at that time I, I was, I was
pretty heavy in martial arts forseveral years and, and it was
(42:10):
hard for me to, to throw workingkicks, I bet because I, I, but
anyway. And so Shane, Dante had Shane
and had him hooked. And he said he said hey, Ricky,
kick him. I said OK.
And the guy one of the marks over said something about it
being fake. I said fake.
(42:31):
And one of the things about me is that you hear a lot of
stories, people can say whateverthey want to do about wrestling,
they've been fake. But I never wanted them to think
I was fake. I always wanted them to know
they couldn't beat me up no matter what.
They thought I was the guy that they couldn't beat up, you know?
So I went and I kicked Shane andI kicked him, right?
(42:54):
I almost knocked Tommy out. I kicked him so hard, kicked
Shane in the mouth and his head went back and they hit Tommy.
And so I turned around and did my thing, come back, grabbed
Shane and he bleeding out of hismouth, busted his lip, cut it.
I said, what's wrong with you? He said.
You didn't you? I said, oh man, I'm so sorry.
(43:15):
Yeah, I laid him open. Sure.
Wow. So you're talking about martial
arts there a little bit. Tell us, tell us a little
something about going with Wolfie to a karate tournament.
I know he went with me to a couple of them.
I, I did pretty well normally. I was, I was in it for a lot of
(43:37):
years. I went up to I did Ition room,
which is an Okinawan style and we used to do MMA before MMA was
cool. You know, we did grappling,
ground techniques, joint manipulation, you know, all the
good stuff, knees, elbows. And so he went with me one time.
(43:58):
I at one time in the middle, they had different rankings and
I was fifth in the Southeast ranking and, and Woofie went
with me and I don't think anybody ever got anything on me.
And that's so cool, you know, just look, I need to be.
Yeah, that's awesome. That's awesome.
(44:21):
Are you a pro wrestling fan? We'll stop by Captain's Corner,
where you can get autographed photos, cards, magazines, and
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the past, present, and future. You'll also be able to
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Make sure to stop by Captain's Corner on Facebook and give us a
(44:42):
holler. Remember, cheers to the working
man. OK, well, another one of my
favorite people, and I just had him on the podcast with Wolfie D
is Ben Jordan. And course, we, you know, we
love the wild boys, Ben Jordan, Steve Neely, great tag team.
You know, honestly, at the end of the episode we were trying to
(45:03):
get them to say the Mount Rushmore of Tennessee tag teams
and they kind of went Memphis with it.
And I respect that. That's what they like growing
up. But what I was wanting to hear
was like, the Devils, the wild boys, you know, the Mortons and
the Scott brothers, you know, that's kind of what I was
expecting to hear. And and I kind of wanted to hear
that. But so obviously, Ben now is a
(45:24):
good friend of mine. And, yeah, he brought up a
question that I have to ask you.And he, he really wanted it to
kind of elicit a response from you as well, where it's these
trips to Evansville with Ashley Hudson and Ben Jordan.
And then there was apparently a snowstorm and a cigar and a
locker, the electric keys in thecar.
So go ahead. I'm gonna let you talk.
(45:48):
So we we were leaving out to go to Evansville to work.
And you know, I think, I think it was either Ben or Ashley, one
of the two that called the guy said, listen, it's supposed to
get bad up there. And he said, Oh no, we're having
wrestling, come on. Said yeah, OK, here we go.
So we're going up and we hit thepenny route going up and by I
(46:13):
think it was Madisonville or stuff like that.
The mate was driving and you know, he's from Australia, so
they don't have a lot of snow upthere or down there, I should
say. And all at once he hit and we
went around and around, went through the medium and ended up
in the medium facing the the other way.
(46:34):
That's the ticket actually. And he he went and kicked it and
finally we got us out and we went around to the side and, and
finally got out of that and drove to Evansville.
And when we got there, guess what?
No wrestling. They cancelled it.
Of course. Yeah, I don't remember him
locking the keys in the car. Oh yeah, that surprised me, but
(46:58):
I don't remember. Was there something about a
celebratory cigar after? You know, Ashley and I on the,
the way back from a successful night of wrestling, we normally
had a good cigar. And I, I, I've, I used to, I
haven't done it probably 20 years.
(47:19):
I I would get Cuban cigars and we'd always smoke high dollar
Cuban cigars. Ain't nothing since class.
Yeah, yeah. That's class.
We'd we'd we'd have a glass of port and and Sherwood and a
cigar on the way back. Man, man, well, we're going to
(47:41):
bring up Ashley in a little bit.I don't want to talk too much
about him, but we've got a little thing at the end.
We play the name game and I wantyou a little talk more about
him. But so I just, you know, a
couple other things that I've heard about that I've got to ask
you about. And again, if my timing is off
on some of these, but I would love to hear about the year long
feud with Shane Morton. Shane and I, we, we worked.
(48:03):
I've been, I've worked Shane 300times, you know, through tag
teams and all that. But he and I, we worked down in
Columbia just constant. And I think that one of the, the
funniest stories with me and Shane, I, I was doing a thing
with a snake and I was scared todeath of a snake.
And Charming Charles was my manager back then.
(48:25):
And Charles, Charles always played with snakes and I had to
go over to his house and he had to educate me on snakes and the
and the snake I had because I was so scared to.
And so but we did the finish where I reached into the bag and
pulled out a snake and and then put it over Shanes head, the bag
with a snake in it. And Shane poked himself with a
(48:48):
razor blade like he'd been bit and took a took a Alka seltzer.
And I pulled that off and Shane sitting there shaking and the
fans hollering, he's been bit, he's been bit.
And Shane sitting there and theycalled the ambulance and Shane
goes to the hospital. Sure did.
And they thought it was a snake bite.
And but Shane and I had some great angles and, you know, and
(49:13):
we, we've done a little bit of everything, you know?
Yeah, we, we did 1 angle over inand Lebanon and Laverne and
those guys over there, Lord havemercy.
We were on like third match and they'd already everybody's
already bled and went through chairs and went they done.
(49:34):
And me and Shane said they're looking at each other.
Shane says what are we going to do?
I said let's not do anything. He said.
I said let's not do anything. I said we won't touch you and
we'll play cat and mouse. And we've done that for a couple
times. We did it in, in Columbia.
We did it there where the, the whole time limit, we would never
touch each other. I, I jump out, come out, you,
(49:56):
you, you scared. And he'd get out.
I'd get in the ring and all thatstuff.
And I had people slobber trying to get a hold of me to try to
get me into the ring. And then about the time they
start to count, Shane would grabme a rear back to hit me and the
the bell would ring and I would slide out.
And and every time we've done that, the crowd, they had to
hold them back to keep from the getting to me.
(50:18):
Yeah, your chicken comes here. I'm so much bigger than Shane,
you know, and I'm playing, you know, and man, they're just
slobber. We we did it one time over in
Columbia and a guy passed out. He looked at me and he said, I
hate you. And he passed out.
He passed out. He passed that.
He was, somebody was shaking. He just read his I said.
(50:39):
Come on, let's go back to the dressing room.
There's nothing else you can do that's the best.
OK, So I've heard as well that you are a kind of guy that when
you get shot into things, thingshappen, such as you getting shot
into the dressing room and something happened.
(50:59):
Can you tell us a little bit about that?
Yeah, I love you Con, probably more.
He loves me, but you don't ever fire somebody before they go out
for the match, he told me. And I'm a different guy now and
I wouldn't do something like that.
But we, me and Shane was workingdown Telahoma and Yukon told me
(51:23):
he wasn't going to bring me back.
And so I, I've always been a businessman, you know, I love
wrestling, but I, I also got paid anywhere and I spent some
nights at home because of that, but I always got paid no matter
where I was at. And so he, he, he didn't want to
(51:44):
pay me what I wanted. So he, I was, he was going to
end me up. And so he put me and Shane out
there and I absolutely tore thatwhole place apart.
I, I tore the railings off the, the, the side and I had to grab
Shane and they had a, a, a, the dressing rooms and had fire the,
(52:05):
the particle board on it and I threw Shane in it and it hit
boom. And I grabbed, I told Shane, I
said reverse it and Shane threw me.
And I get that thing as hard as I could put a big hole in it.
And that you can hear the boys in there.
He's coming through all the nursing.
They're holding the wall up. Like the Kool-aid Man.
(52:26):
Yeah, I mean, I get that thing. Everything I could and was.
There something about it. Yeah, go ahead.
Was there something about a car?Maybe that was your own?
Yeah. We started fighting outside and
and you God was coming out. Oh stop, stop.
And we and I had my my van sets out there and I told Shane, I
(52:48):
said told me in that van and he threw me in it.
And you call was like, oh, stop the cars, not the cars, but it
was my card. So, yeah, OK, so you know, we
kind of got some stuff there about Shane and, and obviously
your story can't be told withoutShane.
Obviously, I consider Shane one of my mentors.
But if you had to pick your favorite angle that you worked
(53:12):
with Shane, if you had to pick, and I know that's, you know,
probably impossible and maybe you're going to have to pick one
that you can remember real quick.
But tell me, what would you say your favorite angle working with
either the Mortons or or Shane specifically?
What would you just? It was definitely in the Mortons
when we were doing tag teams with Tommy and you know, Tommy
(53:36):
Hagee always. I love Tommy and Tommy told me a
lot about Russ and and when we were doing an angle with him and
Boogie or him and Steve, we always had great matches.
But I remember 1 I, I was up in the Chicago area and, and
(53:58):
Michigan and all up to there forabout 7 years.
I went up there just about everyweekend.
And so those guys came down, waswatching, watching Southern
style wrestling and we hit Shanewith a bottle and he bled and,
you know, and it was a they couldn't believe the reaction
(54:20):
that we had with the with the crowd.
But it that I think that whole whole deal with with Boogie and
with Shane and me and Tommy, that's probably my favorite
angle and it lasted for years. Yeah, yeah.
It's something about that, I tell you.
You know, it's so funny how in Nashville, you know, sometimes
(54:41):
they got a little, maybe a little burnt out.
Some people say that, you know, TNA killed Nashville as far as
wrestling goes, Bert for sure said that.
But you know, when it comes downto it, nobody ever got the memo
down in Columbia that wrestling was as much a real thing down
there as it ever was any. I think Columbia is such a great
(55:03):
wrestling town. You know what?
Because we gave them this. Now I'm going to jump way back
to Lynn Rossi. I used to go once I got trained,
Lynn talked to me about wrestling and he told me he says
there's two kinds of BSBSBS and believable BS.
And he says if you will put on believable BS, people will come
(55:27):
see it. He says if you don't.
And now so we're going to got sofar away from anything
believable. Like I said earlier, you know,
whatever anybody says, they would believe that I was real.
And you know, so you know, we did that so much and they
believed because like Shane and Boogie, you know, there's an art
(55:49):
to sell it. You know, you want to get over
the babyface sell. You want to buy, you want to
pack a house. You have heat, heat and personal
You will draw. You know it.
It will draw today. You draw yesterday, you'll draw
tomorrow. But you have to have believable
BS you know in order for it to to to work.
(56:12):
Yeah. And, you know, like Ricky
Morton, you know, we're talking about Morton's here.
Might as well bring up cousin Ricky here.
But Ricky is one of those guys. And that's what makes him one of
the greatest baby faces of all time was that believability and
how he would just reach to the crowd and say, you know, under
his breath, almost help. He would just mouth help me.
And yeah. Yeah, something magical about
(56:34):
that, you know. Hey, Ricky was great.
We, we went up, he and I, we flew out of Nashville one time,
went up to, I think it was Wisconsin.
I don't, you know, all these towns start running together.
But that was, that was the funniest trip I've ever been on
in my life with somebody. And he and I, we laughed and,
(56:55):
and had the best time and we worked the match up there and
had a great time. And Ricky Morton is excellent in
my he's great guy and probably one of the best sellers ever.
Ever. No question.
Hey everybody, Jean Jackson hereinviting you to check out the
Retro Wrestling review where each week I'm joined by some
(57:17):
great Co host to help me review classic episodes of USWA
Championship Wrestling. And right now we are doing week
by week reviews of 1993. But we don't just do reviews,
sometimes we get a chance to interview some of the people who
were there and lived it. Plus do watch alongs.
It's a lot of fun. So check out new episodes that
drop every Wednesday at wrestlecopia.com.
(57:40):
And to find links to everything being associated to the podcast,
you can go to uswapodcast.com. Hi, this is Mike Needham, host
of the Reckless Abandoned podcast.
With Mike Needham. We invite you to jump on your
favorite podcast platform and search for the Reckless
Abandoned Podcast and give us a listen.
(58:01):
I'm sometimes joined by a part time podcaster, part time Co
host and full time wife Kitney Nicole.
We talk wrestling, we talk pop culture, we talk local events,
local happenings in West Tennessee, and a ton of other
stuff. But be sure to check out the
Reckless Abandoned Podcast, findus on Facebook.
Also look up the micro group Podcasting Family on Facebook
(58:25):
and see some of our other podcasts we have out there.
Until next time, make good choices and always remember, no
Dollar, no dice. Hey y'all, Jimmy here.
(58:47):
And that was episode 4 of the Best of James Rock St.
Productions with the first half of episode 38 of Rick Reynolds
on Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling.
Rick is a great friend and a mentor to me just like he was to
Wolfie D when he was training Wolfie to wrestle back in the
day. Whether he was a medic or a
devil, or as he is known now as AC Rick, I always appreciate our
(59:08):
conversations. You guys can hear the full
episode over on at G MB MPW or Give Me Back My Pro Wrestling.
Wherever you listen to podcasts or simply click the link in the
notes below. We hope you have enjoyed this
look back in the archives of James Rock St.
Productions. Check us out next week to see
what else we have in store. Until then, follow at G MB MPW
(59:30):
and at James Rock St. everywhere.
Peace with a tear in my eye. This is the greatest moment in
my life. We'll see you later.
(01:00:10):
This has been a James Rock St. production.
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