November 6, 2025 • 49 mins
Today on Brewsers, we talk to Steve with Warrior Wrestling. We talk about how Warrior Wrestling got started, Resurrection happening December 5th at Half Acre Brewing, and so much more. Follow us on instagram and twitter at Brewserspod. Like, share, review, enjoy and cheers. #brewsers #brewserspod #Enjoylife #DrinkLocal #Cheers
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Welcome to Bruisers, a podcast about beer, coffee, booze and bruisers.
I'm your host, Troy John and today we talked to
Steve with Warrior Wrestling. We talked about how Warrior Wrestling
got started, Resurrection happening at December fifth at half Acre Brewing,
and so much more. This is such a fun and
dream conversation for me. I have been a fan of
Warrior Wrestling for such a long time. I've mentioned that
multiple times on this show. Obviously, they took a hiatus,
(00:42):
and we will get into that, but I'm just so
happy they are back, and I was so happy to
talk to Steve about Warrior Wrestling. So, without further ado,
here is Steve with Warrior Wrestling. I would like to
(01:03):
welcome show Steve with Warrior Wrestling. How are you doing today, sir?
Speaker 2 (01:06):
I'm doing great, my friend.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Thanks for having me, Thanks for coming on. I've been
a fan y'all's promotion for a long time, so this
is a This is a pleasure for me.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
It's a pleasure for me to I love hopping on
and talking wrestling with people who love wrestling, so I
always jump at the chance, and I appreciate you inviting me.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Good. I'm glad you guys are coming back, which is awesome.
We'll get in it in a minute, but let's go
all the way back in time real fast. What is
your earliest memory of pro wrestling?
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Oh, my gosh, as a kid, so.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
I was born in eighty five, okay, so probably is
like a four or five year old, maybe five or
six year old. I have vivid memories of wrestling in
the late eighties, nineteen ninety ninety one. So I had
all the action figures, I had the toy ring, I
had the whole Cogan wrestling buddy. I think this first
specific like instance in wrestling I can remember is when
(01:54):
Earthquake broke Hulk Hogan by landing Hull Hogan. Like as
a kid, that is like a defining moment of like,
oh no, I talked to the other kids in the
neighborhood about it.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
I think we wrote letters.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
You're supposed to send in letters to whole and so
I remember that very specifically as being like a defining
childhood memory of watching wrestling.
Speaker 1 (02:14):
Looking back, how long was he really out for because
I'm sure he was he was filming a movie, I imagine, but.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Probably like six weeks or two months or something like that.
But as a kid, you're like, will he ever return?
Every day felt like an eternity.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Yeah and yeah, And now it's like, uh no, he'll
be back in two weeks. It's a big deal. Yep.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
Now now I watch an injury angle on TV or
it's like, oh, they nearly decapitated that guy. He'll be
gone about three weeks. They'll be back for the pay
per view. But now, as a five year old, my
world was shook.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Well, I remember like, uh, the Ultimate Warrior getting locked
in the casket from the Undertaker, and I was like,
what is happening? Like how obviously he clawed and you
know they got him out. But you know also that
came on at like eleven o'clock at night on a Saturday.
And then I, as a child, have to go to
sleep after this, like that's insane.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Yeah, right, I'm gonna be up for days. I just
pulled up the date.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
It was May of ninety when earthquake squashed Hogan, and
then Hogan returned in July, so about two months and
then led up to Summer Slam in August of ninety.
But yeah, I vividly, vividly remember that.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
That's awesome. Well, let's go fast forward obviously, what was
the Well, how did you actually get into the wrestling business?
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Oh man? So i So.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
I fell out of wrestling for a while in the nineties,
didn't really care about it. Came back in the Attitude
area with some friends and was a fan from like
ninety eight to you when we started doing these shows
in twenty eighteen as the first one, so gosh, twenty
years there where I was just obsessive, right.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
I went to tons of indie shows.
Speaker 3 (03:45):
I went to ECW before it folded, WWF WCW, tons
of local Chicago indies, saw a very young cmpunk wrestling
in high school gyms and rec centers, which is created.
I actually have a cmpunk T shirt that I bought
in like two thousand and one.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
I still have my T shirt drawer.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
So I just absorbed as much as I possibly could,
studied as much as I could. When I was in college,
I was an American Studies major. I actually wrote my
senior thesis about pro wrestling in US history, like intertwining
with trends in US history and stuff.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Did you know about Lincoln being a wrestler back then?
Speaker 2 (04:19):
I had heard the stories for sure.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Yeah, I flirted with WWE briefly after college. I had
applied to be a creative writer. I went through the
interview process, didn't ultimately wasn't offered a job. I went
through several layers of the process and then they're like,
we're changing it up. We only want people with with
formal TV background, and you know, that was kind of
the end of that. And then when I lived in
(04:41):
LA for a couple of years, I was doing a
volunteer teaching program. I trained to be a wrestler in
southern California. While I was out there, I went to
PWG like crazy in two thousand and two days nine,
twenty ten, so I was just absorbing wrestling as much
as I could. And then back in Chicago in the
twenty teens, I was going to a bunch of indie stuff,
constantly poking around to see like could I help out,
(05:02):
Is there any way to get involved? And I just
kind of got polite nose everywhere, to the point where
after a while I was kind of like, maybe I'll
do my own thing. And I started to brew this
idea with some friends and kick it around, and ultimately
it just picked up steam, and I was a high
school principal at the time, and I pitched it to
like the advancement people in the high school. I was like,
(05:22):
would we ever have any interest in doing a wrestling
shows like a fundraiser?
Speaker 2 (05:26):
And they're like, why not?
Speaker 3 (05:27):
And so the first show got greenlit and it was
a fundraiser for scholarships for the school where I was principal,
and it went well, and the first chunk of shows
were all at the school, and then we spun it
off as a separate company and it grew from there.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Yeah, because so I think that's what I kept hearing,
like your business model was that you obviously you worked
at the school, and so are you already had access
to the venue anyway, it was just from then and
like the money went back into the school or something. Yeah,
then I was.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
So the first two years really were it was a
not for profit like wing of the fundraiser at school,
or it wasn't a standalone company.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Not until a couple of years later did we spin
it off as a company.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
And then it actually became a private for profit company
where we went out and did other shows, but we
still did fundraiser shows after that.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
As well, well, yeah, I mean you guys were always
very good about being giving back to the community and
always doing things like that.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
So yeah, just in our nature.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
Yeah, I mean as it should be. I mean you're
a teacher, so you're a giver.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
So I don't know if we're on video or just audio,
but your dog just walked in and now I do
tell me about your dog.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
He does that. That's Miilo. He is a miniature Schnauzer.
He is. He gets loud. If anybody comes to the door,
who will you will hear him? For sure?
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Good for him.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Yeah, he's done many a run ins the on this show.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
He's always lingering at ringside.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
He's a threat exactly. You never know. He's got foreign objects. Well,
so growing up in Chicago, Chicago's always been known as
like the wrestling town obviously outside of New York. And
what was it like because, like you said, there was
so many indies going on up there and it was
just always a hotbed for that. It would be love
(07:08):
coming through there. And then like you said, Sam Punk came,
you know, grew up there. And then when Ringham Honor
was happening. What was it like growing up in Chicago?
You know, with the massiveness that you know, you guys
as fans are.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
It was awesome, right, it was. So I am a
huge fan.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
My favorite sports are college football and hockey, and i'd
liken a really great wrestling crowd to like a college
football student.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
Section, Oh for sure.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
Yeah, like that's when wrestling is kicking on all cylinders.
That's what it sounds like, it feels like, and it
felt like going to wrestling shows in Chicago.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
It was.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
It was part of the fandom. It's like, we're a
Blackhawks kid, right, And you mentioned Ring of Honor. So
Frontier Fieldhouse is actually where they had Ring of Honor
for fifteen years. My little sister played basketball there like
every Saturday morning. So I would go and like see
my sister's basketball game, and then come back next week
and see roh and see the Brisco's bloody some buddy
up And it was It's crazy.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
But yeah, we never missed a show. We were.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
Me and my buddies always went to those Ring of
Honor shows and it just became kind of like a
rate of passage. Even though there were guys that we
would meet at the shows that we only knew from wrestling,
and you'd see them at the next show. The next
time Ring of Honor came through. Same thing with the
WWE shows. There's people you'd see at the All State Arena.
It was just like again, like getting tickets to a
Cubs game or a Blackhawks game or something. It was
(08:24):
what you did, were wrestling fans the shows in town.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
We're going to the show, right, Yeah, I mean it
makes sense that we did that here in DFW. If
there was wrestling coming through, we would always see it.
Like like you said, we were lucky enough to get
ECW right before it closed. Like for me, my one
of my highlights as a fan is I got to
see Yeah, WWE, WCW and ECW all in the same year,
and I was like, I did it. I nailed it.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
Got the traffac du Yep Boom, Triple Crown.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Yeah. Well, when you started actually running your own promotion,
how much what indies did you kind of take from?
Because I know at the time I went up there,
I've only been to Chicago three times and it's all
three had been for wrestling and have never been longer
than like two or three days. So I remember grabbing
a flyer for Billy Corgan's I think it was Revolution
(09:12):
Wrestling up that was happening at there. I was like, oh,
I didn't know we had a promotion, but how much
of like considering all those other indies that were happening
around the same place, what did you kind of take
from some of them then you were like, we want
to do this different or what was your kind of
mindset going into Actually you know what, this is my
kind of love letter to wrestling.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Yeah, so awesome question.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
I think a lot of that came in those couple
formative years that I had in Los Angeles when I
went to PWG all the time, and then I also
went I taught in East LA, which is a predominantly
Hispanic community, and a lot of the kids I taught
in their parents were very into lucha, and there were
like lucha events all over East LA in that area,
usually on Sunday afternoons and Sunday evenings, so regularly, like
(09:51):
my students and their parents would be like, you want
to come with those saluchas on Sunday. And so I
watched PWG and Lucha Libre like crazy for two years,
and I think when I got Chicago, those had really
seeped in as influences, right the PWG very high level,
maximalist athletic, like the best guys in the world going
at it like crazy. And then the colors, the fun,
(10:13):
the flying, the energy of lucha. Those two things were
big influences for us. At the same time, we were
also watching locally like aaw here in Chicago, a lot
of big super matches at the time in fifteen sixteen seventeen.
Freelance wrestling has this incredible vibe to it in Logan
Square and there's just like a really hip neighborhood here
in the city, and so I kind of wanted to
(10:34):
be pay homage to the stuff that I learned in LA,
be different from the other great groups who were running
here in Chicago, and we kind of carved out our
niche with these high level, big name matches, lucha on
every show and just a really fun atmosphere. That was
our goal was a list star's action and atmosphere.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Love that yeah, because you guys brought in big names
and I was always like, how the fuck are these
guys coming up? It was this indie promotion that's running out
of a high school. What are we doing, dude?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
So much of it was just getting lucky and falling
ass backwards the first time around. So our very first
show was headlined by Alberto del Rio versus Jack Swagger.
It was a rematch of what had been a WWF
title match a couple of years earlier in New York
City in New Jersey, and it just so happened that
both of them and del Rio hadn'tet had all his
(11:24):
legal problems and issues that would come in the next
year or two after that, and Swagger hadn't done too much,
and so it had all kind of fallen into place.
We got the right contact or the right people, and
it was one of those deals where del Reel's brother
was also working Luca in Mexico and wanted to break
into the US, and it was like, hey, if you
book my brother on the show, I'll give you an
incredible rate.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Done, We're booking your brother.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
And so the moment he fell into place, that was
like the key domino right that, like, oh, people saw
del Riol was on the show. Then people came out
of the woodwork and we show went so well, thank
god that like we were legitimate it and we recorded
it and then afterwards put it up on YouTube. This
is before everybody was streaming, and so we were able
(12:07):
to get a lot of distribution and a lot of
people saw it. And then our second show was the
one where we had Ray Mysterio and that just put us,
you know, through the roof. And that show was streamed
on high spots, which at the time high Spots had
toyed with streaming a couple of years earlier. It didn't
really work, they dropped it. We were the first show
streamed back on high spots, so that show.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Got a ton of eyeballs. That was all in weekend.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
We were actually Ray mysterios last independent date before he
went back to WWE. He was announced back at WWE
the day after our show, so he did all in
us announced he was going back to WWE.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
So those kind of combinations.
Speaker 3 (12:44):
So del Reel falling into place, that first show going well,
Ray Mysterio falling into place for show two, and then
from there everybody took our phone calls, so to speak.
So getting Lucky off the bat and the show's going
well opened up a thousand doors for us.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
It is so insane. You never know who you're going
to get, or you know, just people you know you
don't ask you don't get a response. So just asking
the right people or just some people that you think
might be the right people, and then, like you said,
all these different things might just fall into place after that.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Yeah, so so real quick, asking the right people.
Speaker 3 (13:19):
Ray Masterius was announced for all in this back in
twenty eighteen, and we were kicking around running that weekend anyway,
and I emailed Dave Meltzer and I was like, Hey, Dave,
who books Ray? And Dave put me in contact with Conan.
I called Conan, talked to Conan. We got Ray booked
right like literally, I just cold call email to Dave.
Dave connected me to Conan. Conan helped us book Ray.
(13:39):
Boom done.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
See, I was in Chicago that weekend. I had no
idea y'all this show was even going on, I think,
But maybe that was.
Speaker 3 (13:45):
Just a million things, right, Like we re promoted as
best as we could and we did great for that show,
but there was just a million things. And we were
the other side of town, so all of it was
like the northwest side of Chicago. We're the south east
side of Chicago. But yeah, I mean it was just
that that was it. Like that weekend put us on
the map.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
Yeah, that weekend was so amazing. Yeah, All In is
definitely one of those shows that I was like, yep,
I was there, and I can't believe that I actually
first off grabbed to take it and I was actually
able to make it happen to go.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Yeah, I honestly, And I don't know how many Manias
you've been to. I've been to a handful of mania
I've been to a lot of aw things. I would
probably put All In as my favorite wrestling weekend.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Of all time.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
Yeah, because it was just this sense of like, oh
my god, this is happening right. There's been such a
malaise for so many years because WWE's product had not
been good and all North America had was met WWE
at that time and met Impact, and New Japan was
rising and we were watching all that and this just
it all the confluence of all those different influences, like
(14:50):
like you're looking around it all In like, of course,
like the elite and the wrestlers and promoters did it,
but like as fans, you felt like we did it.
We planted our flag and said we want something different
and we're going to support it.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:03):
I mean around the hotel that weekend at the venue.
That was just an incredible time to be a wrestling fan.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
It really was like independent WrestleMania, and yeah, I've been
to sixteen WrestleManias now lucky enough. I think next year
seventeen and the streak will be over because we're not
going to Saudi Arabia. So yeah, I'm not anyway, I
can't afford that. No, but no, but all In yeah,
like you said that All In Weekend was so good,
that hotel was phenomenal, that they did star cast at
(15:30):
the first one ever and it was just like this, yeah,
like you said, as wrestling fans, we did this because
they sold out and what was it under thirty minutes?
Speaker 2 (15:38):
I think thirty minutes.
Speaker 1 (15:39):
Yeah, I remember that was at my parents and I
was like on my phone the whole time. They're like,
what are you doing. I'm like trying to grab these
tickets because you know, I don't think they're gonna They're
probably gonna sell out, and then sure enough, less than
thirty minutes.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
Yeah, it was just it was an incredible feeling.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
It was just and it felt so different right because
it was different cadence than WWE, different style than WWE.
The show itself at all different wrestling styles on it.
It just it felt special, like you felt like something
was changing, like something cool was happening, and you were
there when it happened.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Yeah, I'm speaking of which that was the second time
I've been in Chicago. The third time I was in Chicago,
I was traveling with the Pale Pro Wrestling guys and
we were working your show. And literally the night before
we were in a hotel lobby in Vegas watching cmpunk
come back to pro Wrestling in Chicago. And then the
(16:32):
next night after the show, we're all hanging out outside
and I'm talking to people that were there. I was like,
what was that pop like, because there's like I imagine, it
was just off the off the chart.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
It was unbelievably, I was there, were there in the
United Center. It was it was just deafening, absolutely deafening.
That's another one of those nights like I can't believe
it's happening, Like yes, And it's so interesting because I
don't know what else we have left as fans to
feel that way, right, So like for diehard WWE fans,
(17:03):
it will be seen as last match and sure, but
I don't know what moments are still out there, and
I think that might be a symptom of those moments
were bottled up for so long, and there were so
many of them that, you know, kudos to AEW for
presenting many of them, many of the things we'd waited for,
right like the other one that springs to mind, And
I was not there. I did not go to New
(17:24):
York because I was getting married the next week, so
I was a little bit busy. But the very first
Grand Slam, when that bell rings and it's Kenny O.
That to me is the greatest moment in AW history.
Was when the bell rings for Kenny Omega and Danielson
and twenty thousand people in that stadium in New York
and Arthur Ash Stadium just go nuts and you're like,
oh my god, we're about to see Kenny Omega versus
(17:46):
Brian Dae Right like. That was just like, because this
promotion exists and has succeeded, we get to see this
thing that was never on the WWE tastemaker's radar. But
for the rest of us, who will be looking elsewhere
for years, this is like a north star and there
it was, so it'd be interesting to see what are
(18:07):
there moments in the next five years of wrestling fandom
in any promotion, sure that can rival some of the
moments we just talked about. I don't know, I think
most of them have.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Happened, right, Yeah, I know, like AJ Style's retiring next year,
Like he just had his you know what we imagine
as his last Japanese match, and you saw that online.
I imagine. I don't know what his last match will be,
whether it'll be at Mania or it will be somewhere else.
But you know, he's not gonna get the big send
off the tour that John Cena is. But you know,
John Cena won all his championships in we So it's fine,
(18:39):
but I do wonder because it is the moments are there.
It's just also, how are we building up to it
and telling the story or how are like, we have
an Omega Danielson, How are we having this person from
this company that we never like? Essentially a forbidden door situation,
But who's going to open their door first? And what
(19:03):
combination are we going to look at?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Yeah, well that's the thing, right The only scenario really
is a jump from one company to another, right right?
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Right?
Speaker 3 (19:11):
Roman Reigns lets his contract run out and we get
Roman Reigns versus John Moxley, Roman Reigns versus Kenny Omega
or something like that, or Kenny Omega goes to WWE.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
But even there, I feel like.
Speaker 3 (19:25):
The shine is a little bit off of that at
this point, because the elite has had the chance duit
a couple of times, it hasn't and so I don't know, Yeah, like,
I don't know what another moment like that could be
besides a couple of retirements.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
I think maybe now that you mentioned the Bucks, the
Bucks in the New Day, that would be because they
did tease that quite a bit online for a long time.
Unfortunately Big E wouldn't be a part of it, but sure,
yeah it would still be great. Well, at that point
we also get the Bucks versus the Ussos.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
Tops is happening.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
With them, I don't think enters any other I mean
the Hardy's, but we've already seen that with Ring of Honor.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Honestly, you know what, this is never gonna happen because
of who's involved and because of where all the lines
have been drawn.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
But the Bucks versus see a punk in somebody, that.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
Would be truly like moments where you're like, oh my gosh,
we're never going to see it. That is the kind
of thing that I think it would excite me as
a fan to see what are they going to do
if they ever wanted to do it, what would they
do with it?
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Yeah, I mean Seth Rawlins and Omega would be great too.
I mean, but you know, or even will Ospray versus
a seth Rawlins.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
Yeah, that would be cool if Osprey went that way.
I think some of the matches would be cool. Yeah,
I'm trying to think there's somebody more like I like Seth. Yeah, Yeah,
I think yeah, I think it'd be fun with Osprey
and Seth, Omega and Roman reigns. Yeah, but there's very
little again, and all we're talking about here is what
if a big star jump from one of the big
(20:50):
two to each other. There's not much else out there right, Like,
nobody in New Japan has any cachet or gravity with
them right now.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
New Japan is just rebuilding.
Speaker 3 (20:59):
Misstic was already mostly wrestled the main guys from aw
There's just not a lot of those moments left right.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
I thought that with Sina doing his retirement tour and
Tanahashi doing his retirement tour. Why wouldn't you especially, I mean,
they don't have maybe the best relationship with the New
Japan and WW, but why wouldn't you try to put
those guys together at least one time, you know, maybe
even he might have his last WWE match and then
(21:29):
had you know, at New Japan.
Speaker 3 (21:30):
I don't know I've actually thought that. So John Cena
has been so adamantly. I'm not a wrestler, I'm a
WW superstar. I'm not interested in wrestling.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
I'm interested in WWE.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
And part of me is just like, what would it
take January one to walk out on Dynamite Because in
my mind, like that would be so so not just
as an AEW fan, but it's a fan of wrestling
in the landscape of wrestling, that would be unbelievable. But
I'm sure ww' is gonnay him five million year to
(22:00):
be a legend and do nothing right, So.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
Like sure he'll be an ambassador still and do the
make a wish things and yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
For sure, for sure.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Well, speaking of Wressell Kingdom and obviously will Ospray, he
was your champion at the time, he was doing a
belt collecting situation and came out at Wrestle Kingdom with
your belt. What was that like? Because I knew that
he was when he won, I was like, that's awesome.
They'd be cool if he brought it over. And then
he did and I was like, oh, this is even better.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
So he so that was unbeknowns he said it in
the ring after he won it. So so that match
was Will Ospray versus tre Miguel, who was our champion
versus Blake.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
Christian is a triple threat.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
And honestly like the and this is super Polian curtain
back and not that anybody who's listening to your podcast
doesn't have a recording, right, So the finish of that
match was going to be Trey over Blake, like that's
that was the end of the match. Tre's gonna keep
the belt. And we had worked with Will once before
in December of nineteen.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
This was December of twenty one, and.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
We were talking with Will and Will was kind of
like kind of interested in doing more dates in the
States and like working with us and liked us. And
we're looking at we're literally backstage looking at calendars and
he goes, I mean, if you wanted me up, I
could come back this, this, this, and this and these shows,
and we're like, we've got a show here, here and
here and here.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
We're like, all right, cool, Will's up, Will's get on
the belt.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
And when we decided that literally mid show, right, So
that match went in the ring at nine thirty. That
was decided at eight forty five or nine o'clock, and
that's just what was decided. The only thing they switched
was the very end of the match. So they go
out there, they have the match, Will wins the match.
Will grabs a mike unbeknownst to us and says Warrior Wrestling,
I'm bringing this belt down the ramp at the Tokyo
Dome and our whole crew is like, what, Like, we
(23:35):
didn't discuss that part, and like so it was just
a kid in a candy shot moment and then he did.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Right, We have this great picture.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
There's a poster of an Eric's basement of Will standing
on the stage at Wrestle Kingdom with our belt tied
to his belt hanging down in front of him as
he walks down to face Okada in the main event
of Wrestle Kingdom. Like, damn not bad for a little India.
That started into high school three years before that.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
You know, yeah, I remember seeing that too. I was
a fan obviously of you guys, and then what Will
was doing, I was like, this is awesome. I'm so
happy for these for the little independent company that did.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
Yeah, absolutely surreal. But I think, you know, that was
just an example of we got very lucky and by
hopefully treating people well and running a professional shop and
letting good word get out there, other folks were willing
to work with us, and then that just kind of
built and built and built into a guy who, I
would argue at that time and still is.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
One of, if not the best professional wrestlers on the
planet Earth.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Was our champ walking our belt down the ramp in
the Tokyom in front of thirty eight thousand people.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah, insane.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
No, your show was very well run. I didn't see
any hit us. I think I think somebody who got
injured the show, but I think it was just it
was in the Luca match. It was just a quick
it wasn't have anything big. I think he just hit
his head and maybe had a concussion or something. But yeah, yeah,
dunder Rose had won the time. I don't with that one,
(25:00):
and I know, Jay White was there as well, and
I was like, how the hell am I in the
backstage with like all these amazing people, And I'm just
I'm just a little ring an ounce you.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Guy, dude.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
And we learned so much from everybody on those shows
just watching them work conversations with him. Abouse that flows
Jay White was That show was amazing. So we turned
Sam Madonna's had been a heel for us for three
years and he was facing Jay White that night and
we had talked about turning Sam babyface and Jay, I
don't know if you remember it.
Speaker 2 (25:26):
So they wrestled the match.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
They kind of turned Sam babyface in the match, and
then Jay went to do a postmatch promo.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
And he picked up the mic just kind of dropped
it and walked off, and.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
Then people booed Jay White on the way out, and
then Sam Madonnas crawled up and the people cheered him.
And then we got to the back and we were
talking with the guys after the match, and Jay had
not seen what happened after he left, He goes, did
they cheer him real big?
Speaker 1 (25:45):
After?
Speaker 3 (25:45):
We all right, great, great, thanks glad, We could take
care of business for you, right, Like Jay just asked
us at the start of the night, what do you
guys need, what are you looking for?
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Here's what we're hoping to do. He goes, got it.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
I'll get it done, and he went out and got
it done, and like and just the sweetest guy, meeting
all the kids and the fan fat Some of these
performers are just incredible people, incredible professionals, and working with
them is just really really cool.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
That is one of the coolest parts, is like when
you do finally like you're a fan of these wrestlers
and then you get to actually work a show with
them and you do see that. Yeah, they are the
nicest people ever, and especially if you go out afterwards,
they're even nicer.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
So yeah, that's always been one of my favorite things
as well.
Speaker 3 (26:23):
Yeah, I often tell the story of Wardlow was on
Warrior three, four and five for US, I think, and
then it was on six one of them, but his
very first show for US, I think it was Warrior three.
Wardlow first of all, showed up like five hours early,
helped set a bunch of stuff up, showed up in
a suit. He was such a pro, helped set a
(26:43):
bunch of stuff up, and then after the event was over,
helped break everything down and sat and had a beer
with our crew and talked wrestling for like two and
a half hours into until one point thirty two o'clock
in the morning, and just just a total normal, nice guy.
And so when he got signed to AEW, we were
thrilled because couldn't be a nicer guy in the world.
Speaker 1 (27:03):
Yeah, it's always good to root for people that are
actually good people.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Yeah, Well, so you guys went on a hiatus for
a little bit. What was the what was the reasoning
behind the hiatus?
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Yeah, for sure, So combination of a couple of things.
Part of the creative, part of it, financial part of it,
just life. So the model that we were running was
these super shows that we've been talking about, which are
super expensive to put together.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Yeah, yeah, and so it's.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
High risk, high reward, hopefully high return, and so much
of the talent that we had built on in twenty eighteen, nineteen,
twenty twenty one two three was had been soaked up, right,
like the talent war had happened between WW and AW
where they signed everybody up from the indies who was
a major draw, and so we no longer had access
(27:48):
to in twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, we could go down
a list of twenty five different acts we.
Speaker 2 (27:53):
Could book that would draw huge.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
And that list had dwindled to four or five by
twenty twenty three, and so we were trying to book
more and more and more people even though the big
draws weren't there, and so we were doing shows that
weren't as big, weren't as extensive, and so we had
a discussion about, Okay, financially, the return's not there anymore, right, Like,
we started losing money on shows show over show, and
(28:15):
it was like, Okay, we can't keep doing it as
big as we were doing it and charging what we
were charging and trying to sell as many tickets as
we were selling, and doing the size of venues that
we're doing.
Speaker 2 (28:24):
So do we go much smaller?
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Do we become a local promotion and do just all
local talents, small venues. And then we talked about that
we can go small for a while and then get
big again. And then we're like, but does that does
that not fit with the brand?
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Right?
Speaker 3 (28:38):
Like, if the brand is this once in a lifetime
mega indie show, super show, and we changed the brand
of it, does that fit, and we thought, now, not really,
and so then we said, all right, let's put Warrior
Wrestling on the shelf for a little bit because we
don't know what to do with it that could be
financially successful creatively successful.
Speaker 2 (28:57):
At the same time, also, all of us had gotten married,
had kids.
Speaker 3 (28:59):
We all had and toddlers and whatever, So we weren't
going to do a schedule like we did in twenty
twenty two, where we did seven shows in six months
or whatever. It was all across the Midwest, and so
we said, we still want to do wrestling shows.
Speaker 2 (29:11):
But we don't know that it fits to be a
Warrior wrestling show.
Speaker 3 (29:14):
And so we ended up in conversations with all these
potential sponsors, and Revolution Brewing here in Chicago was the
one we were talking through, Like, let's do a show here.
Let's white label it, like, let's not call it a
Warrior Wrestling show. Let'll just call it the name of
the event. Let's just run it for fun and see
how it goes something different for us. So we get
to be creative, have a wrestling show, but we're not
putting the Warrior Wrestling name on it. So we did
(29:35):
that at Revolution worked great then we did want it
at this place called Climb Zone here in Chicago, though
we did want it Lakefront Brewery in Milwaukee. Then we
did a Ryan Guys and we came back to Lake
Front in Milwaukee. And so we were just doing these
brewery shows that we didn't have the pressure of being
Warrior wrestling, if that makes it might sound a little douchey,
but like we had a standard that we expected a
warrior wrestling show to live up to, from a star, power,
(29:57):
from action, from et cetera.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
And these were small, smaller scale shows.
Speaker 3 (30:01):
But what we found over the two years of doing
them is we could throw a party truly right, like
in a way that we're like, the party is worthy
of the name.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
So could we do a hybrid of both.
Speaker 3 (30:17):
Could we have one or two giant name talents and
this atmosphere that we've built in these breweries so that
the atmosphere and we're planning for this big show in December,
all this cool stuff we've studied, all these fans first
elements from Disney and the Savannah bananas and all these
other things like how do we make the experience unforgettable?
Speaker 2 (30:35):
And we finally in noodling around on this for months.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
We're like, I think we've got a concept that the
Warrior Wrestling name can attach to, that can live up
to that and no one will be like I went
to the show, but it wasn't as good as Warrior shows, Like, no,
we think you're gonna come to this show and think
it's better than any Warriors show you've It's not the
number of TV talents because their availability just isn't there,
(31:00):
but it's the right TV talents and the right atmosphere.
So that's kind of why we went away, and that's
kind of how we found our way back that our
new brand is a couple of a listers, awesome action
and atmosphere that no one will be able to beat.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
I love that you are studying the fan aspect of it,
and I love also that you brought up the Savannah bananas.
They what Banana Ball has been doing. If people aren't
paying attention, they fucking should be, because they're literally selling
out college football stadiums which hold one hundred thousand people,
like legitimately, and so the fact that they're doing this
(31:38):
and it's also selling out all these NFL stadiums in
the MLB stadiums, I know they'll be coming here in
Arlington Global I Field next year. They've added two teams
in the past year. They're all like, the last team
they are adding is one of the old Negro League teams,
and they're doing absolutely fantastic things about helping telling that story.
So what they're bringing the fun back into baseball, and
(32:00):
I love that that's what you you know, are making
sure that the fans experience is better than you know,
just any regular independent show.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
Yep, me and Eric, So Eric's my right hand man
and all of this.
Speaker 3 (32:09):
You've probably met Eric when you guys were here the
last few years back. He I went with him and
his family to the bananas at Socks Park here in Chicago,
and everything from when you walk in the parking lot
to the way you're greeted, the way they check tickets,
the way they do merch, the way they do whatever,
even all the like the emails and the information you
get ahead of time, just first class, fun, funny, engaging.
(32:31):
And I had been watching them from afar for a
couple of years because the concept just totally amused me.
And then after we went to the game, I was like,
all right, I'm learning everything I possibly can I bought
the founder's books, I read them, I annotated them, I
read other books he recommended.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
I listened to his podcast.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
I just absorbed as much as I could to say,
how do we take this and apply it to wrestling?
How do we make it the best way you've ever
waited in line at a wrestling show, the best way
you've ever checked in your tickets at a wrestling show,
the best thing you ever saw in the bathroom at
all of these moments are moments where you can do
nothing and have it be normal, or you can invest
(33:08):
some thought, not necessarily even money, but just some thought
into what you do and make each of those moments
special for your fans that are there. And that's what
we're pouring into this new version of order wrestling.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Yeah, if you don't follow the founder of Banana ball
On at least LinkedIn. He puts something every day. It
is super motivational and it doesn't all have to be
about entertainment or business or whatever. It's just different things
that it'll hit you in different ways and you'll go
back and you know you'll realize different things as well.
But no, I love the fact that you really guys
are doing that is next level, because I don't think
a lot I think do think that these companies obviously
(33:42):
still wws aw exact same way. You're coming to this
place to check out wrestling. Everything that you want to
do is right there in that square circle. And no,
it's not. It's literally everything that leads up to it,
that's happening during it. Afterwards, it's like you talked about,
it's the entire experience itself.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
So we were talking earlier in our conversation about going
to Raw, going to w b's kids, et cetera. One
of the things I conversations I had with my team
was what are things that you loved doing as a
wrestling fan growing up? And we're like, you know what,
I used to love doing this as the nineties is
before phones and I'll twitter and all that.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
I used to love making signs when we went to
Monday Night Raw. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:18):
Yeah, Like my friend we would joke all week about
what sign are we going to make? We'd go to
Walgreens or wherever and get poster board, and we'd meet
in somebody's house the night before and make all of
our signs for Monday Night Raw, and then we bring
them to the show. And hold them up, and you
know you'd watch the tape back on the VHS to
be like, you can see my sign way in the back.
And so we're like, how do we recreate that? And
so one of the things we're toying with is a
(34:39):
sign competition. And now you don't want to signs all
over any wrestling because you don't want people not see.
So I can you do like a specific moment in
the night where we do a best sign competition and
people can win stuff for having cool signs for the wrestlers, Like,
how do we go back and recreate As you just said,
it's not just the bell to bell, it's all of
the lead up experience to going to a wrestling show.
(35:01):
So that's what we're constantly brainstorming about between now and
December is how can we make every one of those
moments awesome for you as a fan?
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Yes? Exactly, Well, so I mean talk to us about
you guys are coming back December fifth, Resurrection at half
Acre Brewing. What can people look forward to?
Speaker 3 (35:19):
Yeah, So Willow Nightingale from AEW is going to be
headlining the show. Willow is one of our most requested
bookings ever and all the shows people like can You
Get Willow? Can You Get Willow? So we're really excited
about that. We're going to have all different types of wrestling.
Our social media guys are rolling stuff out every day.
We're going to have some hard hitting grudge matches. We're
gonna have some tag matches. We're gonna have some incredible characters,
(35:41):
some incredible party matches. It's just it's going to be
a really fun time and all the things that we've
talked about in the last few minutes about all of
those fans first elements are going to be present. We
used to do a VIP fan fest before our shows
where you could buy a ticket and come and meet
the wrestlers, et cetera. Now we're doing a pregame party.
Everybody welcome. Every ticket doesn't matter. Everyone gets in the
(36:02):
pregame party two hours before the show. We're gonna have
bean bags, We're gonna have trivia. Jackbox Games is sponsoring
a section of the I.
Speaker 1 (36:09):
Saw that I love Jackbox. I have so many jacks
Box T shirts from the TKO game.
Speaker 3 (36:14):
It's yes, right, So then they're gonna have a comedian
there running like a live Jackbox Game session. Cards against
Humanity is one of our sponsors. They gave us a
bunch of tabletop games. We're gonna have a bunch of
different things going on. There's gonna be a DJ there's
gonna be beer sales. So not only when you buy
a ticket do you get a wrestling show, you get
a two hour pre party.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
All these games are free. You don't pay for anything.
Everything is in with your ticket.
Speaker 3 (36:36):
With your ticket, your ticket to the wrestling show, and
your ticket to the pre party, you get a two
hour hangout with all this cool stuff, and then you
get a two and a half three hour wrestling show
on top of it.
Speaker 2 (36:45):
We want to make it the best bang for your buck.
Speaker 1 (36:48):
That's huge. I love that, And like you talked about,
it's the entire thing. It's not just you know, like
you said, bell to belt, it's the whole party. And
who doesn't want a pre party beforehand, you know, especially
hey wrestlers are hanging out. You got jack Spot game.
If you guys haven't played, jacks box is so much fun.
And again again, if you've never heard of Card Against Humanity,
(37:08):
I'm not sure you know how to play games or
you ever play games, because that gain is awesome and
so the fact that you guys are doing all this
other stuff is just huge. And you know, this resurrection
is without a doubt of what people can look forward to.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3 (37:23):
And I think we've found from all the different things
we've experimented with, what are the best elements from everything? Right? So, like,
I think you guys helped this out with a couple
of Stadium series shows, maybe in twenty or twenty one
in the summer.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
I don't know if you were those, but I know
some of the Pelee team was.
Speaker 3 (37:38):
And during the pandemic, we are trying to figure out
how do we make the sound better on a football yeah? Right,
And so someone in our team was like, hey, what
about like a soccer game, everyone is cow bells. So
we gave people cow bells for the stadium series. We
like the cowbells so much now we give out cow
bells for our indoor shows too, and it just makes
a rowdy, raucous atmosphere. We talked about roh Earl, right,
(38:00):
we grew up going to roh. We would always me
and Eric and the guys. We'd go to party City.
We'd buy a bunch of streamers before our ah and
then we'd go to ROH. So now we give streamers
to everybody in the front row, and we have people
through streamers during entrances. How do we take little bits
from everywhere we've learned, for everything we've seen, and put
it together into a bigger, kind of a melting pot
(38:21):
of all the cool pieces of wrestling, And that's what
we're doing.
Speaker 1 (38:24):
I miss streamers in wrestling. I really wish. Yeah, Yeah,
they were so awesome, awesome. So obviously you're starting back
with the first show. What I mean, what do you
think twenty twenty six will look like for Warrior Wrestling.
Speaker 3 (38:39):
I think we're going to keep the Warrior, the brand name,
the banner, and I know for a fact we're returning
to Cincinnati. I know for a fact we're returning to Milwaukee,
and there's a chance at a whole lot.
Speaker 2 (38:51):
More shows in Chicago as well.
Speaker 3 (38:53):
We're also in talks with Detroit as well about debuting
early in the new year. So I see Warrior Wrestling
going back around the Midwest under that Warrior Wrestling banner,
mostly a breweries in places like that where we can
have this incredible atmosphere and bring the party.
Speaker 1 (39:10):
I do think more wrestling needs to happen to breweries
because most of them have the room for it. And
everybody loves a good time anyway, and if you're not
having fun at a wrestling show, the beer is definitely
gonna help you.
Speaker 3 (39:22):
So yes, yeah, well that just you know, we have
performed in We've done forty something shows in our seven years,
and we have done high school gym, high school football field, amphitheater,
civic centers, convention centers, all these various places.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
Right, the brewery is the loudest and best body for sure.
Speaker 3 (39:41):
Right, it's the drinking right, you get people two or
three beers deep before the bell even rings.
Speaker 2 (39:46):
Awesome.
Speaker 3 (39:46):
Yeah, and then you put them in a compact area
where they're cheering and the sound echoes and reverberates.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
It's just the right vibe for wrestling.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Yes, yeah, I really think there needs to be more
beer brawls all over the place.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yep, agreed.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
Now, if people have never seen any of the Warriors shows,
what three matches should they go out of their way
to go see?
Speaker 2 (40:07):
Oh my gosh, there's a match. In December of nineteen,
Warrior Wrestling seven.
Speaker 3 (40:14):
It was the Rascals, Trey Miguel Desmond Xavier and Zach
Wentz versus Will, Osprey, the Amazing Red and Rocky Romero.
Whoa just it was a sellout at the curtain. Literally
the rest of the locker room came and sat on
the stage just to watch. Brian Cage was in his
underwear eating Deep Dish pizza, sitting on the stage in
(40:34):
full view of the fans, just watching the match, after
just having just wrestled the title match. Unbelievable athleticism, unbelievable
character work. And at that moment, Will had not done
outside of PWG. He hadn't really done any US or
North American indies, and so it was a big get
to get Will. And Will always wanted to work with
Red and wanted to work against the Rascals, and so
that match was just magic, absolute magic and in all ways,
(40:58):
And it's on YouTube Wrestling seven Osprey, Amazing Red and
Rocky Romaro versus the Rascals. So that's one I would
put up there. The original War of Attrition match from
Warrior Wrestling two. That's how we crowned our first champion.
War of Attrition is four on four, losing team is eliminated.
The four left face off in a tag match. Losing
tag is eliminated. The two guys left face off in
a singles match, and that's how we crowned our first
(41:20):
champion that was Brian Cage. In that match was Ray Masterial, Austin, Aris, Phoenix,
and Penta Jeff Cobb.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
I'm missing somebody.
Speaker 3 (41:29):
Apologies to whoever I'm missing, but it was just a huge
I mean eight stars and they all held delts from
various promotions at the time. Aris was the TNA champ
and like it was just a special match.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
That was the one of all in weekend.
Speaker 3 (41:43):
So incredible action, incredible story, and incredible result there. So
I put that as number two, and the third match
I would select would probably be Robert Ego, Anthony and
Frank the Clown versus Joey Janella from our first stadium
series in the fall of twenty twenty. They had a
brawl all over the Marian Catholic Football Field that culminated
(42:06):
in Joey doing a swanton bomb off the goalpost through
a table on the Frank and Ego and it was
just there's this great Ian from three count Photo got
this incredible black and white photo of Janella flying through
the air off the goalpost, and that was just like
the epitome of using the football field during that pandemic era.
(42:27):
So I would say those are the three and they're
all on YouTube. If you're listening, go find them.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
You'll love them.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Who everybody in that match was, Yeah, Brian Cage, Austin, AI's,
Jeff Cobb, Penta, Ray Phoenix, Raim Stereo, Rich Swan and
Sammy Gavar.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
Like that's Juan and Navarro. That's right.
Speaker 1 (42:43):
Yeah, you've got two bases and then the men that
are just gonna fly all over the place.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
Yeah, it was. It was insanity, pure insanity.
Speaker 1 (42:50):
I love that so much. Well, I have a segment
on a show. I call it the five Count. There's
just five random questions.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
Let's do it.
Speaker 1 (42:57):
What were the last three things you googled? Oh my gosh,
besides earthquake and whole.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
H Well, I I look get my phone. The number
one was when did earthquake crushule cogin. Yeah, let's see.
Speaker 3 (43:10):
I was looking up the Blackhawks schedule yesterday because I
want to say where they were playing. And then, uh,
I've been looking at various custom stickers things for giveaways
we might be doing at the Warrior wrestling show.
Speaker 2 (43:21):
So probably those are probably my three most recent googles.
Speaker 1 (43:23):
Okay, also something people can look forward to. Uh, if
you owned a liquor company, brewery, winery, coffee shop, or dispensary,
which one would you own and what would the name be?
Speaker 3 (43:33):
Ooh, I would do a brewery. Okay, I went, well, man,
I gotta think about this. So we named the first
show at Revolution Brewing Trouble Is Brewing, which I really liked.
Speaker 2 (43:46):
I thought that was fun.
Speaker 3 (43:47):
So maybe Trouble Is Brewing and it could be a
wrestling themed brewery and we just do our shows there.
Speaker 2 (43:51):
Done.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Yeah. Uh, Now this isn't one of the five questions,
but I normally ask people in the other world about this,
what would your wrestling name be? Since you are a
promoter and you've been around it enough and you've been
a fan your entire life.
Speaker 3 (44:02):
Interesting, I honestly have never thought about it, even when
I was three years ago. I would do, say, so,
my name is Steve Tortorello. I would do Steve something
with a tea, Steve the Warrener.
Speaker 2 (44:12):
And know that's kind of lame. I don't know. I'd
have to think about it.
Speaker 3 (44:14):
I'd have to think whether I wanted to be a
goofy gimmick or because it's so amazing, as you know,
I'm sure right, Like the Young Bucks were just written
down because the guy couldn't remember their name and they.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
Were young kids. He wrote the Young Bucks Samoa Joe.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
The guy the promoter couldn't remember his name and just
wrote Samoa Joe as a placeholder. So whatever, Goofy, your
silly name you start with, you could be stuck with
for thirty years. Yeah, I'd have to think long and
hard about it.
Speaker 2 (44:37):
I don't know. I'll come I'll come back to that
at the end.
Speaker 1 (44:39):
Yeah, please do. Yeah, when when this is released, I
will let you guys know what he what he came
up with. Number three What was your first concert?
Speaker 2 (44:48):
I think it was probably weird al n for sixth grade.
Speaker 3 (44:52):
I love Weird al and my parents took me and
a bunch of my friends to see him in Hammond, Indiana.
Speaker 1 (44:57):
Okay, I bet he put on a great show.
Speaker 2 (45:00):
Incredible show.
Speaker 1 (45:00):
Yeah. Number four, Who are what inspires you?
Speaker 3 (45:03):
Oh my gosh, anybody who is striving to this is
gonna sound kind of lame.
Speaker 2 (45:10):
Anybody's striving to make great art?
Speaker 3 (45:11):
Right like that could be wrestlers, it could be physical
artists like sculptors, painters, it could be musicians, anybody who
is constantly.
Speaker 2 (45:20):
Working to refine their craft.
Speaker 3 (45:22):
Like I'm a huge literature nerd, I'm a huge film nerd,
Like I love seeing films from filmmakers I really like
and respect and seeing how they navigate different things. So
anybody who is just pouring themselves into something, trying to
make something special and unique, I walk away from watching
or reading or seeing that more inspired to do my
own thing.
Speaker 1 (45:42):
Yes, yeah, it's like, oh they're doing that. I could
now that that's been done, Let's do something in that world. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
And then number five, what would you tell your seventeen
year old self?
Speaker 2 (45:52):
Oh, man, U.
Speaker 3 (45:56):
Ask a thousand questions and don't be deterred by no,
because that's that's something I was Probably the seventeen year
old version of me was a little bit more demure,
a little bit more like, oh okay, well I kind
of tried this, Like no, like, go there are people
who are way less qualified than you succeeding in these
(46:17):
various things, So go out there and just take what
you want.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
No, you were one hundred percent right, like you if
there's an old Steve Harvey. He's in between shows doing
the family feud, and it's that whole jump speech, like
you have to jump you it's gonna be scary. You
don't know what's gonna happen. You don't know if you're
gonna land properly or not. But you've got to make
that jump otherwise you're never gonna get it.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Yeah, yeah, I would tell myself jump.
Speaker 1 (46:45):
There you go. Not just the Van Haleen song and.
Speaker 2 (46:49):
The Van Haalen song. I might sing it to myself.
Speaker 1 (46:52):
You should little keep targoing on. That'd be great.
Speaker 3 (46:56):
Now.
Speaker 1 (46:56):
If people want to find out more about Warrior obviously
get tickets to the show on December fifth. How can
they do all the things?
Speaker 3 (47:02):
All of our socials and the actual handles are different
from platform to platform, But just search for Warrior Wrestling
on Twitter, Blue Sky, Instagram, Facebook, you name it. All
the links are up there on the socials. Google Warrior Wrestling.
I promise you'll find us. Warrior Wrestling, Chicago, Warrior Wrestling, Resurrection,
Happy Brewery.
Speaker 2 (47:21):
Yep. Just look for us.
Speaker 3 (47:22):
You'll find us and shoot us a message if you
have questions. But we'd love to see everybody out to
anybody who's in the Chicago area or visiting. December fifth
is the show at half Acre and we're playing a
good one for.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
You, but I can't wait to see what happens with
the new show and this is going to be fantastic
for anybody who's actually in the Chicago area. Make sure
you get up there because December fifth, you are not
going to want to miss this, and I can't wait
to see what twenty twenty six holds for you guys
as well.
Speaker 2 (47:45):
Thank you, my friend.
Speaker 1 (47:57):
Thank you so much again to Steve with Warrior Wrestling
for coming on again. They are back. Resurrection is happening
December fifth at half Acre Brewing. You're not gonna want
to miss this. This is Warrior Wrestling two point zero.
It's going to be even better and even better than
it was before, So you are not gonna want to
miss it. Definitely make sure to if you're going tag
them on social media. Tag us on social media. It
(48:19):
is bruisers Pod. That is b R E W S
c R S p O D on the Instagram, the threads,
and the Twitter. If you want to send us an email,
it is Brusierspod at gmail dot com. If you want
to follow me directly, it is Rody John. That is
r O d I E j o N. Roady John
is the name on the Twitter and an untapped in
case you want to find out when I'm drinking, maybe
we're gonna have beer together. If you will follow me
on the threads or the Instagram, it is official Roady John.
(48:40):
So until next time, make sure to enjoy life, drink local.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
Cheers
Welcome to Bruisers, a podcast about beer, coffee, booze and bruisers.
I'm your host, Troy John and today we talked to
Steve with Warrior Wrestling. We talked about how Warrior Wrestling
got started, Resurrection happening at December fifth at half Acre Brewing,
and so much more. This is such a fun and
dream conversation for me. I have been a fan of
Warrior Wrestling for such a long time. I've mentioned that
multiple times on this show. Obviously, they took a hiatus,
(00:42):
and we will get into that, but I'm just so
happy they are back, and I was so happy to
talk to Steve about Warrior Wrestling. So, without further ado,
here is Steve with Warrior Wrestling. I would like to
(01:03):
welcome show Steve with Warrior Wrestling. How are you doing today, sir?
Speaker 2 (01:06):
I'm doing great, my friend.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Thanks for having me, Thanks for coming on. I've been
a fan y'all's promotion for a long time, so this
is a This is a pleasure for me.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
It's a pleasure for me to I love hopping on
and talking wrestling with people who love wrestling, so I
always jump at the chance, and I appreciate you inviting me.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Good. I'm glad you guys are coming back, which is awesome.
We'll get in it in a minute, but let's go
all the way back in time real fast. What is
your earliest memory of pro wrestling?
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Oh, my gosh, as a kid, so.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
I was born in eighty five, okay, so probably is
like a four or five year old, maybe five or
six year old. I have vivid memories of wrestling in
the late eighties, nineteen ninety ninety one. So I had
all the action figures, I had the toy ring, I
had the whole Cogan wrestling buddy. I think this first
specific like instance in wrestling I can remember is when
(01:54):
Earthquake broke Hulk Hogan by landing Hull Hogan. Like as
a kid, that is like a defining moment of like,
oh no, I talked to the other kids in the
neighborhood about it.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
I think we wrote letters.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
You're supposed to send in letters to whole and so
I remember that very specifically as being like a defining
childhood memory of watching wrestling.
Speaker 1 (02:14):
Looking back, how long was he really out for because
I'm sure he was he was filming a movie, I imagine, but.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Probably like six weeks or two months or something like that.
But as a kid, you're like, will he ever return?
Every day felt like an eternity.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Yeah and yeah, And now it's like, uh no, he'll
be back in two weeks. It's a big deal. Yep.
Speaker 3 (02:35):
Now now I watch an injury angle on TV or
it's like, oh, they nearly decapitated that guy. He'll be
gone about three weeks. They'll be back for the pay
per view. But now, as a five year old, my
world was shook.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Well, I remember like, uh, the Ultimate Warrior getting locked
in the casket from the Undertaker, and I was like,
what is happening? Like how obviously he clawed and you
know they got him out. But you know also that
came on at like eleven o'clock at night on a Saturday.
And then I, as a child, have to go to
sleep after this, like that's insane.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Yeah, right, I'm gonna be up for days. I just
pulled up the date.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
It was May of ninety when earthquake squashed Hogan, and
then Hogan returned in July, so about two months and
then led up to Summer Slam in August of ninety.
But yeah, I vividly, vividly remember that.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
That's awesome. Well, let's go fast forward obviously, what was
the Well, how did you actually get into the wrestling business?
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Oh man? So i So.
Speaker 3 (03:30):
I fell out of wrestling for a while in the nineties,
didn't really care about it. Came back in the Attitude
area with some friends and was a fan from like
ninety eight to you when we started doing these shows
in twenty eighteen as the first one, so gosh, twenty
years there where I was just obsessive, right.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
I went to tons of indie shows.
Speaker 3 (03:45):
I went to ECW before it folded, WWF WCW, tons
of local Chicago indies, saw a very young cmpunk wrestling
in high school gyms and rec centers, which is created.
I actually have a cmpunk T shirt that I bought
in like two thousand and one.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
I still have my T shirt drawer.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
So I just absorbed as much as I possibly could,
studied as much as I could. When I was in college,
I was an American Studies major. I actually wrote my
senior thesis about pro wrestling in US history, like intertwining
with trends in US history and stuff.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Did you know about Lincoln being a wrestler back then?
Speaker 2 (04:19):
I had heard the stories for sure.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Yeah, I flirted with WWE briefly after college. I had
applied to be a creative writer. I went through the
interview process, didn't ultimately wasn't offered a job. I went
through several layers of the process and then they're like,
we're changing it up. We only want people with with
formal TV background, and you know, that was kind of
the end of that. And then when I lived in
(04:41):
LA for a couple of years, I was doing a
volunteer teaching program. I trained to be a wrestler in
southern California. While I was out there, I went to
PWG like crazy in two thousand and two days nine,
twenty ten, so I was just absorbing wrestling as much
as I could. And then back in Chicago in the
twenty teens, I was going to a bunch of indie stuff,
constantly poking around to see like could I help out,
(05:02):
Is there any way to get involved? And I just
kind of got polite nose everywhere, to the point where
after a while I was kind of like, maybe I'll
do my own thing. And I started to brew this
idea with some friends and kick it around, and ultimately
it just picked up steam, and I was a high
school principal at the time, and I pitched it to
like the advancement people in the high school. I was like,
(05:22):
would we ever have any interest in doing a wrestling
shows like a fundraiser?
Speaker 2 (05:26):
And they're like, why not?
Speaker 3 (05:27):
And so the first show got greenlit and it was
a fundraiser for scholarships for the school where I was principal,
and it went well, and the first chunk of shows
were all at the school, and then we spun it
off as a separate company and it grew from there.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Yeah, because so I think that's what I kept hearing,
like your business model was that you obviously you worked
at the school, and so are you already had access
to the venue anyway, it was just from then and
like the money went back into the school or something. Yeah,
then I was.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
So the first two years really were it was a
not for profit like wing of the fundraiser at school,
or it wasn't a standalone company.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Not until a couple of years later did we spin
it off as a company.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
And then it actually became a private for profit company
where we went out and did other shows, but we
still did fundraiser shows after that.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
As well, well, yeah, I mean you guys were always
very good about being giving back to the community and
always doing things like that.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
So yeah, just in our nature.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
Yeah, I mean as it should be. I mean you're
a teacher, so you're a giver.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
So I don't know if we're on video or just audio,
but your dog just walked in and now I do
tell me about your dog.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
He does that. That's Miilo. He is a miniature Schnauzer.
He is. He gets loud. If anybody comes to the door,
who will you will hear him? For sure?
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Good for him.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Yeah, he's done many a run ins the on this show.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
He's always lingering at ringside.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
He's a threat exactly. You never know. He's got foreign objects. Well,
so growing up in Chicago, Chicago's always been known as
like the wrestling town obviously outside of New York. And
what was it like because, like you said, there was
so many indies going on up there and it was
just always a hotbed for that. It would be love
(07:08):
coming through there. And then like you said, Sam Punk came,
you know, grew up there. And then when Ringham Honor
was happening. What was it like growing up in Chicago?
You know, with the massiveness that you know, you guys
as fans are.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
It was awesome, right, it was. So I am a
huge fan.
Speaker 3 (07:26):
My favorite sports are college football and hockey, and i'd
liken a really great wrestling crowd to like a college
football student.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
Section, Oh for sure.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
Yeah, like that's when wrestling is kicking on all cylinders.
That's what it sounds like, it feels like, and it
felt like going to wrestling shows in Chicago.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
It was.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
It was part of the fandom. It's like, we're a
Blackhawks kid, right, And you mentioned Ring of Honor. So
Frontier Fieldhouse is actually where they had Ring of Honor
for fifteen years. My little sister played basketball there like
every Saturday morning. So I would go and like see
my sister's basketball game, and then come back next week
and see roh and see the Brisco's bloody some buddy
up And it was It's crazy.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
But yeah, we never missed a show. We were.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
Me and my buddies always went to those Ring of
Honor shows and it just became kind of like a
rate of passage. Even though there were guys that we
would meet at the shows that we only knew from wrestling,
and you'd see them at the next show. The next
time Ring of Honor came through. Same thing with the
WWE shows. There's people you'd see at the All State Arena.
It was just like again, like getting tickets to a
Cubs game or a Blackhawks game or something. It was
(08:24):
what you did, were wrestling fans the shows in town.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
We're going to the show, right, Yeah, I mean it
makes sense that we did that here in DFW. If
there was wrestling coming through, we would always see it.
Like like you said, we were lucky enough to get
ECW right before it closed. Like for me, my one
of my highlights as a fan is I got to
see Yeah, WWE, WCW and ECW all in the same year,
and I was like, I did it. I nailed it.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
Got the traffac du Yep Boom, Triple Crown.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Yeah. Well, when you started actually running your own promotion,
how much what indies did you kind of take from?
Because I know at the time I went up there,
I've only been to Chicago three times and it's all
three had been for wrestling and have never been longer
than like two or three days. So I remember grabbing
a flyer for Billy Corgan's I think it was Revolution
(09:12):
Wrestling up that was happening at there. I was like, oh,
I didn't know we had a promotion, but how much
of like considering all those other indies that were happening
around the same place, what did you kind of take
from some of them then you were like, we want
to do this different or what was your kind of
mindset going into Actually you know what, this is my
kind of love letter to wrestling.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Yeah, so awesome question.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
I think a lot of that came in those couple
formative years that I had in Los Angeles when I
went to PWG all the time, and then I also
went I taught in East LA, which is a predominantly
Hispanic community, and a lot of the kids I taught
in their parents were very into lucha, and there were
like lucha events all over East LA in that area,
usually on Sunday afternoons and Sunday evenings, so regularly, like
(09:51):
my students and their parents would be like, you want
to come with those saluchas on Sunday. And so I
watched PWG and Lucha Libre like crazy for two years,
and I think when I got Chicago, those had really
seeped in as influences, right the PWG very high level,
maximalist athletic, like the best guys in the world going
at it like crazy. And then the colors, the fun,
(10:13):
the flying, the energy of lucha. Those two things were
big influences for us. At the same time, we were
also watching locally like aaw here in Chicago, a lot
of big super matches at the time in fifteen sixteen seventeen.
Freelance wrestling has this incredible vibe to it in Logan
Square and there's just like a really hip neighborhood here
in the city, and so I kind of wanted to
(10:34):
be pay homage to the stuff that I learned in LA,
be different from the other great groups who were running
here in Chicago, and we kind of carved out our
niche with these high level, big name matches, lucha on
every show and just a really fun atmosphere. That was
our goal was a list star's action and atmosphere.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Love that yeah, because you guys brought in big names
and I was always like, how the fuck are these
guys coming up? It was this indie promotion that's running out
of a high school. What are we doing, dude?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
So much of it was just getting lucky and falling
ass backwards the first time around. So our very first
show was headlined by Alberto del Rio versus Jack Swagger.
It was a rematch of what had been a WWF
title match a couple of years earlier in New York
City in New Jersey, and it just so happened that
both of them and del Rio hadn'tet had all his
(11:24):
legal problems and issues that would come in the next
year or two after that, and Swagger hadn't done too much,
and so it had all kind of fallen into place.
We got the right contact or the right people, and
it was one of those deals where del Reel's brother
was also working Luca in Mexico and wanted to break
into the US, and it was like, hey, if you
book my brother on the show, I'll give you an
incredible rate.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Done, We're booking your brother.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
And so the moment he fell into place, that was
like the key domino right that, like, oh, people saw
del Riol was on the show. Then people came out
of the woodwork and we show went so well, thank
god that like we were legitimate it and we recorded
it and then afterwards put it up on YouTube. This
is before everybody was streaming, and so we were able
(12:07):
to get a lot of distribution and a lot of
people saw it. And then our second show was the
one where we had Ray Mysterio and that just put us,
you know, through the roof. And that show was streamed
on high spots, which at the time high Spots had
toyed with streaming a couple of years earlier. It didn't
really work, they dropped it. We were the first show
streamed back on high spots, so that show.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Got a ton of eyeballs. That was all in weekend.
Speaker 3 (12:29):
We were actually Ray mysterios last independent date before he
went back to WWE. He was announced back at WWE
the day after our show, so he did all in
us announced he was going back to WWE.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
So those kind of combinations.
Speaker 3 (12:44):
So del Reel falling into place, that first show going well,
Ray Mysterio falling into place for show two, and then
from there everybody took our phone calls, so to speak.
So getting Lucky off the bat and the show's going
well opened up a thousand doors for us.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
It is so insane. You never know who you're going
to get, or you know, just people you know you
don't ask you don't get a response. So just asking
the right people or just some people that you think
might be the right people, and then, like you said,
all these different things might just fall into place after that.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Yeah, so so real quick, asking the right people.
Speaker 3 (13:19):
Ray Masterius was announced for all in this back in
twenty eighteen, and we were kicking around running that weekend anyway,
and I emailed Dave Meltzer and I was like, Hey, Dave,
who books Ray? And Dave put me in contact with Conan.
I called Conan, talked to Conan. We got Ray booked
right like literally, I just cold call email to Dave.
Dave connected me to Conan. Conan helped us book Ray.
(13:39):
Boom done.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
See, I was in Chicago that weekend. I had no
idea y'all this show was even going on, I think,
But maybe that was.
Speaker 3 (13:45):
Just a million things, right, Like we re promoted as
best as we could and we did great for that show,
but there was just a million things. And we were
the other side of town, so all of it was
like the northwest side of Chicago. We're the south east
side of Chicago. But yeah, I mean it was just
that that was it. Like that weekend put us on
the map.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
Yeah, that weekend was so amazing. Yeah, All In is
definitely one of those shows that I was like, yep,
I was there, and I can't believe that I actually
first off grabbed to take it and I was actually
able to make it happen to go.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Yeah, I honestly, And I don't know how many Manias
you've been to. I've been to a handful of mania
I've been to a lot of aw things. I would
probably put All In as my favorite wrestling weekend.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Of all time.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
Yeah, because it was just this sense of like, oh
my god, this is happening right. There's been such a
malaise for so many years because WWE's product had not
been good and all North America had was met WWE
at that time and met Impact, and New Japan was
rising and we were watching all that and this just
it all the confluence of all those different influences, like
(14:50):
like you're looking around it all In like, of course,
like the elite and the wrestlers and promoters did it,
but like as fans, you felt like we did it.
We planted our flag and said we want something different
and we're going to support it.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:03):
I mean around the hotel that weekend at the venue.
That was just an incredible time to be a wrestling fan.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
It really was like independent WrestleMania, and yeah, I've been
to sixteen WrestleManias now lucky enough. I think next year
seventeen and the streak will be over because we're not
going to Saudi Arabia. So yeah, I'm not anyway, I
can't afford that. No, but no, but all In yeah,
like you said that All In Weekend was so good,
that hotel was phenomenal, that they did star cast at
(15:30):
the first one ever and it was just like this, yeah,
like you said, as wrestling fans, we did this because
they sold out and what was it under thirty minutes?
Speaker 2 (15:38):
I think thirty minutes.
Speaker 1 (15:39):
Yeah, I remember that was at my parents and I
was like on my phone the whole time. They're like,
what are you doing. I'm like trying to grab these
tickets because you know, I don't think they're gonna They're
probably gonna sell out, and then sure enough, less than
thirty minutes.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
Yeah, it was just it was an incredible feeling.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
It was just and it felt so different right because
it was different cadence than WWE, different style than WWE.
The show itself at all different wrestling styles on it.
It just it felt special, like you felt like something
was changing, like something cool was happening, and you were
there when it happened.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Yeah, I'm speaking of which that was the second time
I've been in Chicago. The third time I was in Chicago,
I was traveling with the Pale Pro Wrestling guys and
we were working your show. And literally the night before
we were in a hotel lobby in Vegas watching cmpunk
come back to pro Wrestling in Chicago. And then the
(16:32):
next night after the show, we're all hanging out outside
and I'm talking to people that were there. I was like,
what was that pop like, because there's like I imagine, it
was just off the off the chart.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
It was unbelievably, I was there, were there in the
United Center. It was it was just deafening, absolutely deafening.
That's another one of those nights like I can't believe
it's happening, Like yes, And it's so interesting because I
don't know what else we have left as fans to
feel that way, right, So like for diehard WWE fans,
(17:03):
it will be seen as last match and sure, but
I don't know what moments are still out there, and
I think that might be a symptom of those moments
were bottled up for so long, and there were so
many of them that, you know, kudos to AEW for
presenting many of them, many of the things we'd waited for,
right like the other one that springs to mind, And
I was not there. I did not go to New
(17:24):
York because I was getting married the next week, so
I was a little bit busy. But the very first
Grand Slam, when that bell rings and it's Kenny O.
That to me is the greatest moment in AW history.
Was when the bell rings for Kenny Omega and Danielson
and twenty thousand people in that stadium in New York
and Arthur Ash Stadium just go nuts and you're like,
oh my god, we're about to see Kenny Omega versus
(17:46):
Brian Dae Right like. That was just like, because this
promotion exists and has succeeded, we get to see this
thing that was never on the WWE tastemaker's radar. But
for the rest of us, who will be looking elsewhere
for years, this is like a north star and there
it was, so it'd be interesting to see what are
(18:07):
there moments in the next five years of wrestling fandom
in any promotion, sure that can rival some of the
moments we just talked about. I don't know, I think
most of them have.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Happened, right, Yeah, I know, like AJ Style's retiring next year,
Like he just had his you know what we imagine
as his last Japanese match, and you saw that online.
I imagine. I don't know what his last match will be,
whether it'll be at Mania or it will be somewhere else.
But you know, he's not gonna get the big send
off the tour that John Cena is. But you know,
John Cena won all his championships in we So it's fine,
(18:39):
but I do wonder because it is the moments are there.
It's just also, how are we building up to it
and telling the story or how are like, we have
an Omega Danielson, How are we having this person from
this company that we never like? Essentially a forbidden door situation,
But who's going to open their door first? And what
(19:03):
combination are we going to look at?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Yeah, well that's the thing, right The only scenario really
is a jump from one company to another, right right?
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Right?
Speaker 3 (19:11):
Roman Reigns lets his contract run out and we get
Roman Reigns versus John Moxley, Roman Reigns versus Kenny Omega
or something like that, or Kenny Omega goes to WWE.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
But even there, I feel like.
Speaker 3 (19:25):
The shine is a little bit off of that at
this point, because the elite has had the chance duit
a couple of times, it hasn't and so I don't know, Yeah, like,
I don't know what another moment like that could be
besides a couple of retirements.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
I think maybe now that you mentioned the Bucks, the
Bucks in the New Day, that would be because they
did tease that quite a bit online for a long time.
Unfortunately Big E wouldn't be a part of it, but sure,
yeah it would still be great. Well, at that point
we also get the Bucks versus the Ussos.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
Tops is happening.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
With them, I don't think enters any other I mean
the Hardy's, but we've already seen that with Ring of Honor.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Honestly, you know what, this is never gonna happen because
of who's involved and because of where all the lines
have been drawn.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
But the Bucks versus see a punk in somebody, that.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
Would be truly like moments where you're like, oh my gosh,
we're never going to see it. That is the kind
of thing that I think it would excite me as
a fan to see what are they going to do
if they ever wanted to do it, what would they
do with it?
Speaker 1 (20:21):
Yeah, I mean Seth Rawlins and Omega would be great too.
I mean, but you know, or even will Ospray versus
a seth Rawlins.
Speaker 3 (20:28):
Yeah, that would be cool if Osprey went that way.
I think some of the matches would be cool. Yeah,
I'm trying to think there's somebody more like I like Seth. Yeah, Yeah,
I think yeah, I think it'd be fun with Osprey
and Seth, Omega and Roman reigns. Yeah, but there's very
little again, and all we're talking about here is what
if a big star jump from one of the big
(20:50):
two to each other. There's not much else out there right, Like,
nobody in New Japan has any cachet or gravity with
them right now.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
New Japan is just rebuilding.
Speaker 3 (20:59):
Misstic was already mostly wrestled the main guys from aw
There's just not a lot of those moments left right.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
I thought that with Sina doing his retirement tour and
Tanahashi doing his retirement tour. Why wouldn't you especially, I mean,
they don't have maybe the best relationship with the New
Japan and WW, but why wouldn't you try to put
those guys together at least one time, you know, maybe
even he might have his last WWE match and then
(21:29):
had you know, at New Japan.
Speaker 3 (21:30):
I don't know I've actually thought that. So John Cena
has been so adamantly. I'm not a wrestler, I'm a
WW superstar. I'm not interested in wrestling.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
I'm interested in WWE.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
And part of me is just like, what would it
take January one to walk out on Dynamite Because in
my mind, like that would be so so not just
as an AEW fan, but it's a fan of wrestling
in the landscape of wrestling, that would be unbelievable. But
I'm sure ww' is gonnay him five million year to
(22:00):
be a legend and do nothing right, So.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
Like sure he'll be an ambassador still and do the
make a wish things and yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
For sure, for sure.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Well, speaking of Wressell Kingdom and obviously will Ospray, he
was your champion at the time, he was doing a
belt collecting situation and came out at Wrestle Kingdom with
your belt. What was that like? Because I knew that
he was when he won, I was like, that's awesome.
They'd be cool if he brought it over. And then
he did and I was like, oh, this is even better.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
So he so that was unbeknowns he said it in
the ring after he won it. So so that match
was Will Ospray versus tre Miguel, who was our champion
versus Blake.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
Christian is a triple threat.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
And honestly like the and this is super Polian curtain
back and not that anybody who's listening to your podcast
doesn't have a recording, right, So the finish of that
match was going to be Trey over Blake, like that's
that was the end of the match. Tre's gonna keep
the belt. And we had worked with Will once before
in December of nineteen.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
This was December of twenty one, and.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
We were talking with Will and Will was kind of
like kind of interested in doing more dates in the
States and like working with us and liked us. And
we're looking at we're literally backstage looking at calendars and
he goes, I mean, if you wanted me up, I
could come back this, this, this, and this and these shows,
and we're like, we've got a show here, here and
here and here.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
We're like, all right, cool, Will's up, Will's get on
the belt.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
And when we decided that literally mid show, right, So
that match went in the ring at nine thirty. That
was decided at eight forty five or nine o'clock, and
that's just what was decided. The only thing they switched
was the very end of the match. So they go
out there, they have the match, Will wins the match.
Will grabs a mike unbeknownst to us and says Warrior Wrestling,
I'm bringing this belt down the ramp at the Tokyo
Dome and our whole crew is like, what, Like, we
(23:35):
didn't discuss that part, and like so it was just
a kid in a candy shot moment and then he did.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Right, We have this great picture.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
There's a poster of an Eric's basement of Will standing
on the stage at Wrestle Kingdom with our belt tied
to his belt hanging down in front of him as
he walks down to face Okada in the main event
of Wrestle Kingdom. Like, damn not bad for a little India.
That started into high school three years before that.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
You know, yeah, I remember seeing that too. I was
a fan obviously of you guys, and then what Will
was doing, I was like, this is awesome. I'm so
happy for these for the little independent company that did.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
Yeah, absolutely surreal. But I think, you know, that was
just an example of we got very lucky and by
hopefully treating people well and running a professional shop and
letting good word get out there, other folks were willing
to work with us, and then that just kind of
built and built and built into a guy who, I
would argue at that time and still is.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
One of, if not the best professional wrestlers on the
planet Earth.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Was our champ walking our belt down the ramp in
the Tokyom in front of thirty eight thousand people.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah, insane.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
No, your show was very well run. I didn't see
any hit us. I think I think somebody who got
injured the show, but I think it was just it
was in the Luca match. It was just a quick
it wasn't have anything big. I think he just hit
his head and maybe had a concussion or something. But yeah, yeah,
dunder Rose had won the time. I don't with that one,
(25:00):
and I know, Jay White was there as well, and
I was like, how the hell am I in the
backstage with like all these amazing people, And I'm just
I'm just a little ring an ounce you.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Guy, dude.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
And we learned so much from everybody on those shows
just watching them work conversations with him. Abouse that flows
Jay White was That show was amazing. So we turned
Sam Madonna's had been a heel for us for three
years and he was facing Jay White that night and
we had talked about turning Sam babyface and Jay, I
don't know if you remember it.
Speaker 2 (25:26):
So they wrestled the match.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
They kind of turned Sam babyface in the match, and
then Jay went to do a postmatch promo.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
And he picked up the mic just kind of dropped
it and walked off, and.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
Then people booed Jay White on the way out, and
then Sam Madonnas crawled up and the people cheered him.
And then we got to the back and we were
talking with the guys after the match, and Jay had
not seen what happened after he left, He goes, did
they cheer him real big?
Speaker 1 (25:45):
After?
Speaker 3 (25:45):
We all right, great, great, thanks glad, We could take
care of business for you, right, Like Jay just asked
us at the start of the night, what do you
guys need, what are you looking for?
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Here's what we're hoping to do. He goes, got it.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
I'll get it done, and he went out and got
it done, and like and just the sweetest guy, meeting
all the kids and the fan fat Some of these
performers are just incredible people, incredible professionals, and working with
them is just really really cool.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
That is one of the coolest parts, is like when
you do finally like you're a fan of these wrestlers
and then you get to actually work a show with
them and you do see that. Yeah, they are the
nicest people ever, and especially if you go out afterwards,
they're even nicer.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
So yeah, that's always been one of my favorite things
as well.
Speaker 3 (26:23):
Yeah, I often tell the story of Wardlow was on
Warrior three, four and five for US, I think, and
then it was on six one of them, but his
very first show for US, I think it was Warrior three.
Wardlow first of all, showed up like five hours early,
helped set a bunch of stuff up, showed up in
a suit. He was such a pro, helped set a
(26:43):
bunch of stuff up, and then after the event was over,
helped break everything down and sat and had a beer
with our crew and talked wrestling for like two and
a half hours into until one point thirty two o'clock
in the morning, and just just a total normal, nice guy.
And so when he got signed to AEW, we were
thrilled because couldn't be a nicer guy in the world.
Speaker 1 (27:03):
Yeah, it's always good to root for people that are
actually good people.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Yeah, Well, so you guys went on a hiatus for
a little bit. What was the what was the reasoning
behind the hiatus?
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Yeah, for sure, So combination of a couple of things.
Part of the creative, part of it, financial part of it,
just life. So the model that we were running was
these super shows that we've been talking about, which are
super expensive to put together.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Yeah, yeah, and so it's.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
High risk, high reward, hopefully high return, and so much
of the talent that we had built on in twenty eighteen, nineteen,
twenty twenty one two three was had been soaked up, right,
like the talent war had happened between WW and AW
where they signed everybody up from the indies who was
a major draw, and so we no longer had access
(27:48):
to in twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, we could go down
a list of twenty five different acts we.
Speaker 2 (27:53):
Could book that would draw huge.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
And that list had dwindled to four or five by
twenty twenty three, and so we were trying to book
more and more and more people even though the big
draws weren't there, and so we were doing shows that
weren't as big, weren't as extensive, and so we had
a discussion about, Okay, financially, the return's not there anymore, right, Like,
we started losing money on shows show over show, and
(28:15):
it was like, Okay, we can't keep doing it as
big as we were doing it and charging what we
were charging and trying to sell as many tickets as
we were selling, and doing the size of venues that
we're doing.
Speaker 2 (28:24):
So do we go much smaller?
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Do we become a local promotion and do just all
local talents, small venues. And then we talked about that
we can go small for a while and then get
big again. And then we're like, but does that does
that not fit with the brand?
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Right?
Speaker 3 (28:38):
Like, if the brand is this once in a lifetime
mega indie show, super show, and we changed the brand
of it, does that fit, and we thought, now, not really,
and so then we said, all right, let's put Warrior
Wrestling on the shelf for a little bit because we
don't know what to do with it that could be
financially successful creatively successful.
Speaker 2 (28:57):
At the same time, also, all of us had gotten married,
had kids.
Speaker 3 (28:59):
We all had and toddlers and whatever, So we weren't
going to do a schedule like we did in twenty
twenty two, where we did seven shows in six months
or whatever. It was all across the Midwest, and so
we said, we still want to do wrestling shows.
Speaker 2 (29:11):
But we don't know that it fits to be a
Warrior wrestling show.
Speaker 3 (29:14):
And so we ended up in conversations with all these
potential sponsors, and Revolution Brewing here in Chicago was the
one we were talking through, Like, let's do a show here.
Let's white label it, like, let's not call it a
Warrior Wrestling show. Let'll just call it the name of
the event. Let's just run it for fun and see
how it goes something different for us. So we get
to be creative, have a wrestling show, but we're not
putting the Warrior Wrestling name on it. So we did
(29:35):
that at Revolution worked great then we did want it
at this place called Climb Zone here in Chicago, though
we did want it Lakefront Brewery in Milwaukee. Then we
did a Ryan Guys and we came back to Lake
Front in Milwaukee. And so we were just doing these
brewery shows that we didn't have the pressure of being
Warrior wrestling, if that makes it might sound a little douchey,
but like we had a standard that we expected a
warrior wrestling show to live up to, from a star, power,
(29:57):
from action, from et cetera.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
And these were small, smaller scale shows.
Speaker 3 (30:01):
But what we found over the two years of doing
them is we could throw a party truly right, like
in a way that we're like, the party is worthy
of the name.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
So could we do a hybrid of both.
Speaker 3 (30:17):
Could we have one or two giant name talents and
this atmosphere that we've built in these breweries so that
the atmosphere and we're planning for this big show in December,
all this cool stuff we've studied, all these fans first
elements from Disney and the Savannah bananas and all these
other things like how do we make the experience unforgettable?
Speaker 2 (30:35):
And we finally in noodling around on this for months.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
We're like, I think we've got a concept that the
Warrior Wrestling name can attach to, that can live up
to that and no one will be like I went
to the show, but it wasn't as good as Warrior shows, Like, no,
we think you're gonna come to this show and think
it's better than any Warriors show you've It's not the
number of TV talents because their availability just isn't there,
(31:00):
but it's the right TV talents and the right atmosphere.
So that's kind of why we went away, and that's
kind of how we found our way back that our
new brand is a couple of a listers, awesome action
and atmosphere that no one will be able to beat.
Speaker 1 (31:15):
I love that you are studying the fan aspect of it,
and I love also that you brought up the Savannah bananas.
They what Banana Ball has been doing. If people aren't
paying attention, they fucking should be, because they're literally selling
out college football stadiums which hold one hundred thousand people,
like legitimately, and so the fact that they're doing this
(31:38):
and it's also selling out all these NFL stadiums in
the MLB stadiums, I know they'll be coming here in
Arlington Global I Field next year. They've added two teams
in the past year. They're all like, the last team
they are adding is one of the old Negro League teams,
and they're doing absolutely fantastic things about helping telling that story.
So what they're bringing the fun back into baseball, and
(32:00):
I love that that's what you you know, are making
sure that the fans experience is better than you know,
just any regular independent show.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
Yep, me and Eric, So Eric's my right hand man
and all of this.
Speaker 3 (32:09):
You've probably met Eric when you guys were here the
last few years back. He I went with him and
his family to the bananas at Socks Park here in Chicago,
and everything from when you walk in the parking lot
to the way you're greeted, the way they check tickets,
the way they do merch, the way they do whatever,
even all the like the emails and the information you
get ahead of time, just first class, fun, funny, engaging.
(32:31):
And I had been watching them from afar for a
couple of years because the concept just totally amused me.
And then after we went to the game, I was like,
all right, I'm learning everything I possibly can I bought
the founder's books, I read them, I annotated them, I
read other books he recommended.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
I listened to his podcast.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
I just absorbed as much as I could to say,
how do we take this and apply it to wrestling?
How do we make it the best way you've ever
waited in line at a wrestling show, the best way
you've ever checked in your tickets at a wrestling show,
the best thing you ever saw in the bathroom at
all of these moments are moments where you can do
nothing and have it be normal, or you can invest
(33:08):
some thought, not necessarily even money, but just some thought
into what you do and make each of those moments
special for your fans that are there. And that's what
we're pouring into this new version of order wrestling.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Yeah, if you don't follow the founder of Banana ball
On at least LinkedIn. He puts something every day. It
is super motivational and it doesn't all have to be
about entertainment or business or whatever. It's just different things
that it'll hit you in different ways and you'll go
back and you know you'll realize different things as well.
But no, I love the fact that you really guys
are doing that is next level, because I don't think
a lot I think do think that these companies obviously
(33:42):
still wws aw exact same way. You're coming to this
place to check out wrestling. Everything that you want to
do is right there in that square circle. And no,
it's not. It's literally everything that leads up to it,
that's happening during it. Afterwards, it's like you talked about,
it's the entire experience itself.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
So we were talking earlier in our conversation about going
to Raw, going to w b's kids, et cetera. One
of the things I conversations I had with my team
was what are things that you loved doing as a
wrestling fan growing up? And we're like, you know what,
I used to love doing this as the nineties is
before phones and I'll twitter and all that.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
I used to love making signs when we went to
Monday Night Raw. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:18):
Yeah, Like my friend we would joke all week about
what sign are we going to make? We'd go to
Walgreens or wherever and get poster board, and we'd meet
in somebody's house the night before and make all of
our signs for Monday Night Raw, and then we bring
them to the show. And hold them up, and you
know you'd watch the tape back on the VHS to
be like, you can see my sign way in the back.
And so we're like, how do we recreate that? And
so one of the things we're toying with is a
(34:39):
sign competition. And now you don't want to signs all
over any wrestling because you don't want people not see.
So I can you do like a specific moment in
the night where we do a best sign competition and
people can win stuff for having cool signs for the wrestlers, Like,
how do we go back and recreate As you just said,
it's not just the bell to bell, it's all of
the lead up experience to going to a wrestling show.
(35:01):
So that's what we're constantly brainstorming about between now and
December is how can we make every one of those
moments awesome for you as a fan?
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Yes? Exactly, Well, so I mean talk to us about
you guys are coming back December fifth, Resurrection at half
Acre Brewing. What can people look forward to?
Speaker 3 (35:19):
Yeah, So Willow Nightingale from AEW is going to be
headlining the show. Willow is one of our most requested
bookings ever and all the shows people like can You
Get Willow? Can You Get Willow? So we're really excited
about that. We're going to have all different types of wrestling.
Our social media guys are rolling stuff out every day.
We're going to have some hard hitting grudge matches. We're
gonna have some tag matches. We're gonna have some incredible characters,
(35:41):
some incredible party matches. It's just it's going to be
a really fun time and all the things that we've
talked about in the last few minutes about all of
those fans first elements are going to be present. We
used to do a VIP fan fest before our shows
where you could buy a ticket and come and meet
the wrestlers, et cetera. Now we're doing a pregame party.
Everybody welcome. Every ticket doesn't matter. Everyone gets in the
(36:02):
pregame party two hours before the show. We're gonna have
bean bags, We're gonna have trivia. Jackbox Games is sponsoring
a section of the I.
Speaker 1 (36:09):
Saw that I love Jackbox. I have so many jacks
Box T shirts from the TKO game.
Speaker 3 (36:14):
It's yes, right, So then they're gonna have a comedian
there running like a live Jackbox Game session. Cards against
Humanity is one of our sponsors. They gave us a
bunch of tabletop games. We're gonna have a bunch of
different things going on. There's gonna be a DJ there's
gonna be beer sales. So not only when you buy
a ticket do you get a wrestling show, you get
a two hour pre party.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
All these games are free. You don't pay for anything.
Everything is in with your ticket.
Speaker 3 (36:36):
With your ticket, your ticket to the wrestling show, and
your ticket to the pre party, you get a two
hour hangout with all this cool stuff, and then you
get a two and a half three hour wrestling show
on top of it.
Speaker 2 (36:45):
We want to make it the best bang for your buck.
Speaker 1 (36:48):
That's huge. I love that, And like you talked about,
it's the entire thing. It's not just you know, like
you said, bell to belt, it's the whole party. And
who doesn't want a pre party beforehand, you know, especially
hey wrestlers are hanging out. You got jack Spot game.
If you guys haven't played, jacks box is so much fun.
And again again, if you've never heard of Card Against Humanity,
(37:08):
I'm not sure you know how to play games or
you ever play games, because that gain is awesome and
so the fact that you guys are doing all this
other stuff is just huge. And you know, this resurrection
is without a doubt of what people can look forward to.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3 (37:23):
And I think we've found from all the different things
we've experimented with, what are the best elements from everything? Right? So, like,
I think you guys helped this out with a couple
of Stadium series shows, maybe in twenty or twenty one
in the summer.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
I don't know if you were those, but I know
some of the Pelee team was.
Speaker 3 (37:38):
And during the pandemic, we are trying to figure out
how do we make the sound better on a football yeah? Right,
And so someone in our team was like, hey, what
about like a soccer game, everyone is cow bells. So
we gave people cow bells for the stadium series. We
like the cowbells so much now we give out cow
bells for our indoor shows too, and it just makes
a rowdy, raucous atmosphere. We talked about roh Earl, right,
(38:00):
we grew up going to roh. We would always me
and Eric and the guys. We'd go to party City.
We'd buy a bunch of streamers before our ah and
then we'd go to ROH. So now we give streamers
to everybody in the front row, and we have people
through streamers during entrances. How do we take little bits
from everywhere we've learned, for everything we've seen, and put
it together into a bigger, kind of a melting pot
(38:21):
of all the cool pieces of wrestling, And that's what
we're doing.
Speaker 1 (38:24):
I miss streamers in wrestling. I really wish. Yeah, Yeah,
they were so awesome, awesome. So obviously you're starting back
with the first show. What I mean, what do you
think twenty twenty six will look like for Warrior Wrestling.
Speaker 3 (38:39):
I think we're going to keep the Warrior, the brand name,
the banner, and I know for a fact we're returning
to Cincinnati. I know for a fact we're returning to Milwaukee,
and there's a chance at a whole lot.
Speaker 2 (38:51):
More shows in Chicago as well.
Speaker 3 (38:53):
We're also in talks with Detroit as well about debuting
early in the new year. So I see Warrior Wrestling
going back around the Midwest under that Warrior Wrestling banner,
mostly a breweries in places like that where we can
have this incredible atmosphere and bring the party.
Speaker 1 (39:10):
I do think more wrestling needs to happen to breweries
because most of them have the room for it. And
everybody loves a good time anyway, and if you're not
having fun at a wrestling show, the beer is definitely
gonna help you.
Speaker 3 (39:22):
So yes, yeah, well that just you know, we have
performed in We've done forty something shows in our seven years,
and we have done high school gym, high school football field, amphitheater,
civic centers, convention centers, all these various places.
Speaker 2 (39:37):
Right, the brewery is the loudest and best body for sure.
Speaker 3 (39:41):
Right, it's the drinking right, you get people two or
three beers deep before the bell even rings.
Speaker 2 (39:46):
Awesome.
Speaker 3 (39:46):
Yeah, and then you put them in a compact area
where they're cheering and the sound echoes and reverberates.
Speaker 2 (39:52):
It's just the right vibe for wrestling.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Yes, yeah, I really think there needs to be more
beer brawls all over the place.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Yep, agreed.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
Now, if people have never seen any of the Warriors shows,
what three matches should they go out of their way
to go see?
Speaker 2 (40:07):
Oh my gosh, there's a match. In December of nineteen,
Warrior Wrestling seven.
Speaker 3 (40:14):
It was the Rascals, Trey Miguel Desmond Xavier and Zach
Wentz versus Will, Osprey, the Amazing Red and Rocky Romero.
Whoa just it was a sellout at the curtain. Literally
the rest of the locker room came and sat on
the stage just to watch. Brian Cage was in his
underwear eating Deep Dish pizza, sitting on the stage in
(40:34):
full view of the fans, just watching the match, after
just having just wrestled the title match. Unbelievable athleticism, unbelievable
character work. And at that moment, Will had not done
outside of PWG. He hadn't really done any US or
North American indies, and so it was a big get
to get Will. And Will always wanted to work with
Red and wanted to work against the Rascals, and so
that match was just magic, absolute magic and in all ways,
(40:58):
And it's on YouTube Wrestling seven Osprey, Amazing Red and
Rocky Romaro versus the Rascals. So that's one I would
put up there. The original War of Attrition match from
Warrior Wrestling two. That's how we crowned our first champion.
War of Attrition is four on four, losing team is eliminated.
The four left face off in a tag match. Losing
tag is eliminated. The two guys left face off in
a singles match, and that's how we crowned our first
(41:20):
champion that was Brian Cage. In that match was Ray Masterial, Austin, Aris, Phoenix,
and Penta Jeff Cobb.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
I'm missing somebody.
Speaker 3 (41:29):
Apologies to whoever I'm missing, but it was just a huge
I mean eight stars and they all held delts from
various promotions at the time. Aris was the TNA champ
and like it was just a special match.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
That was the one of all in weekend.
Speaker 3 (41:43):
So incredible action, incredible story, and incredible result there. So
I put that as number two, and the third match
I would select would probably be Robert Ego, Anthony and
Frank the Clown versus Joey Janella from our first stadium
series in the fall of twenty twenty. They had a
brawl all over the Marian Catholic Football Field that culminated
(42:06):
in Joey doing a swanton bomb off the goalpost through
a table on the Frank and Ego and it was
just there's this great Ian from three count Photo got
this incredible black and white photo of Janella flying through
the air off the goalpost, and that was just like
the epitome of using the football field during that pandemic era.
(42:27):
So I would say those are the three and they're
all on YouTube. If you're listening, go find them.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
You'll love them.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Who everybody in that match was, Yeah, Brian Cage, Austin, AI's,
Jeff Cobb, Penta, Ray Phoenix, Raim Stereo, Rich Swan and
Sammy Gavar.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
Like that's Juan and Navarro. That's right.
Speaker 1 (42:43):
Yeah, you've got two bases and then the men that
are just gonna fly all over the place.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
Yeah, it was. It was insanity, pure insanity.
Speaker 1 (42:50):
I love that so much. Well, I have a segment
on a show. I call it the five Count. There's
just five random questions.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
Let's do it.
Speaker 1 (42:57):
What were the last three things you googled? Oh my gosh,
besides earthquake and whole.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
H Well, I I look get my phone. The number
one was when did earthquake crushule cogin. Yeah, let's see.
Speaker 3 (43:10):
I was looking up the Blackhawks schedule yesterday because I
want to say where they were playing. And then, uh,
I've been looking at various custom stickers things for giveaways
we might be doing at the Warrior wrestling show.
Speaker 2 (43:21):
So probably those are probably my three most recent googles.
Speaker 1 (43:23):
Okay, also something people can look forward to. Uh, if
you owned a liquor company, brewery, winery, coffee shop, or dispensary,
which one would you own and what would the name be?
Speaker 3 (43:33):
Ooh, I would do a brewery. Okay, I went, well, man,
I gotta think about this. So we named the first
show at Revolution Brewing Trouble Is Brewing, which I really liked.
Speaker 2 (43:46):
I thought that was fun.
Speaker 3 (43:47):
So maybe Trouble Is Brewing and it could be a
wrestling themed brewery and we just do our shows there.
Speaker 2 (43:51):
Done.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Yeah. Uh, Now this isn't one of the five questions,
but I normally ask people in the other world about this,
what would your wrestling name be? Since you are a
promoter and you've been around it enough and you've been
a fan your entire life.
Speaker 3 (44:02):
Interesting, I honestly have never thought about it, even when
I was three years ago. I would do, say, so,
my name is Steve Tortorello. I would do Steve something
with a tea, Steve the Warrener.
Speaker 2 (44:12):
And know that's kind of lame. I don't know. I'd
have to think about it.
Speaker 3 (44:14):
I'd have to think whether I wanted to be a
goofy gimmick or because it's so amazing, as you know,
I'm sure right, Like the Young Bucks were just written
down because the guy couldn't remember their name and they.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
Were young kids. He wrote the Young Bucks Samoa Joe.
Speaker 3 (44:26):
The guy the promoter couldn't remember his name and just
wrote Samoa Joe as a placeholder. So whatever, Goofy, your
silly name you start with, you could be stuck with
for thirty years. Yeah, I'd have to think long and
hard about it.
Speaker 2 (44:37):
I don't know. I'll come I'll come back to that
at the end.
Speaker 1 (44:39):
Yeah, please do. Yeah, when when this is released, I
will let you guys know what he what he came
up with. Number three What was your first concert?
Speaker 2 (44:48):
I think it was probably weird al n for sixth grade.
Speaker 3 (44:52):
I love Weird al and my parents took me and
a bunch of my friends to see him in Hammond, Indiana.
Speaker 1 (44:57):
Okay, I bet he put on a great show.
Speaker 2 (45:00):
Incredible show.
Speaker 1 (45:00):
Yeah. Number four, Who are what inspires you?
Speaker 3 (45:03):
Oh my gosh, anybody who is striving to this is
gonna sound kind of lame.
Speaker 2 (45:10):
Anybody's striving to make great art?
Speaker 3 (45:11):
Right like that could be wrestlers, it could be physical
artists like sculptors, painters, it could be musicians, anybody who
is constantly.
Speaker 2 (45:20):
Working to refine their craft.
Speaker 3 (45:22):
Like I'm a huge literature nerd, I'm a huge film nerd,
Like I love seeing films from filmmakers I really like
and respect and seeing how they navigate different things. So
anybody who is just pouring themselves into something, trying to
make something special and unique, I walk away from watching
or reading or seeing that more inspired to do my
own thing.
Speaker 1 (45:42):
Yes, yeah, it's like, oh they're doing that. I could
now that that's been done, Let's do something in that world. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
And then number five, what would you tell your seventeen
year old self?
Speaker 2 (45:52):
Oh, man, U.
Speaker 3 (45:56):
Ask a thousand questions and don't be deterred by no,
because that's that's something I was Probably the seventeen year
old version of me was a little bit more demure,
a little bit more like, oh okay, well I kind
of tried this, Like no, like, go there are people
who are way less qualified than you succeeding in these
(46:17):
various things, So go out there and just take what
you want.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
No, you were one hundred percent right, like you if
there's an old Steve Harvey. He's in between shows doing
the family feud, and it's that whole jump speech, like
you have to jump you it's gonna be scary. You
don't know what's gonna happen. You don't know if you're
gonna land properly or not. But you've got to make
that jump otherwise you're never gonna get it.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Yeah, yeah, I would tell myself jump.
Speaker 1 (46:45):
There you go. Not just the Van Haleen song and.
Speaker 2 (46:49):
The Van Haalen song. I might sing it to myself.
Speaker 1 (46:52):
You should little keep targoing on. That'd be great.
Speaker 3 (46:56):
Now.
Speaker 1 (46:56):
If people want to find out more about Warrior obviously
get tickets to the show on December fifth. How can
they do all the things?
Speaker 3 (47:02):
All of our socials and the actual handles are different
from platform to platform, But just search for Warrior Wrestling
on Twitter, Blue Sky, Instagram, Facebook, you name it. All
the links are up there on the socials. Google Warrior Wrestling.
I promise you'll find us. Warrior Wrestling, Chicago, Warrior Wrestling, Resurrection,
Happy Brewery.
Speaker 2 (47:21):
Yep. Just look for us.
Speaker 3 (47:22):
You'll find us and shoot us a message if you
have questions. But we'd love to see everybody out to
anybody who's in the Chicago area or visiting. December fifth
is the show at half Acre and we're playing a
good one for.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
You, but I can't wait to see what happens with
the new show and this is going to be fantastic
for anybody who's actually in the Chicago area. Make sure
you get up there because December fifth, you are not
going to want to miss this, and I can't wait
to see what twenty twenty six holds for you guys
as well.
Speaker 2 (47:45):
Thank you, my friend.
Speaker 1 (47:57):
Thank you so much again to Steve with Warrior Wrestling
for coming on again. They are back. Resurrection is happening
December fifth at half Acre Brewing. You're not gonna want
to miss this. This is Warrior Wrestling two point zero.
It's going to be even better and even better than
it was before, So you are not gonna want to
miss it. Definitely make sure to if you're going tag
them on social media. Tag us on social media. It
(48:19):
is bruisers Pod. That is b R E W S
c R S p O D on the Instagram, the threads,
and the Twitter. If you want to send us an email,
it is Brusierspod at gmail dot com. If you want
to follow me directly, it is Rody John. That is
r O d I E j o N. Roady John
is the name on the Twitter and an untapped in
case you want to find out when I'm drinking, maybe
we're gonna have beer together. If you will follow me
on the threads or the Instagram, it is official Roady John.
(48:40):
So until next time, make sure to enjoy life, drink local.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
Cheers
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