Classic Magnum TA Interview (FULL INTERVIEW)

Episode Transcript
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H Low wrestling fans. We're backwith another edition of the Shoot Interview series

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with five spots. Today we havean n W A midlegic legend, Magnat
a Magnet. Thank you very muchfor joining us. That's my pleasure.
Then we start off. The firstquestion is is how how an individual gets
caught up? That's crazy distance.Well, for me, it's it was
my earliest memories of watching television.I was six seven years old, growing
up living in Chesapeake, Virginia.Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling was the show of

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choice for me, and I grewup watching it with my dad and imitating
the moves I saw him doing ontelevision, and it was it was kind
of just something that kind of instilleda fantasy kind of thing for me as
a kid, you know, pretendinginstead of cops and robbers and cowboys and
Indians. I really enjoyed, youknow, what they did in the wrestling

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ring and appreciated the athleticism you knowthat was going on. There were some
of the guys you already have everto watch them, well, the the
real feud that sticks out in mymind was Johnny Valentine and Lada McDaniels.
Johnny Arllentn had the silver dollar challenge. She carried a big fish bowl around
and had full of silver dollars andsuppose that five hundred one thousand dollars worth

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of silver dollars in it. Andthen he issued a check orange every week
and and Wat McDaniels and he justbrutalized each other, uh in matches that
we we don't get a little tasteof it on television because back in those
days they didn't give it away forfree. You know, they were programming
you to come watch the uh,the main events in the arenas. But

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those two guys would just really layit in while we had those big thick
hands and Johnny Valentine and very slow, methodical, but forceful, tight individual
and they just had some classic confrontationsthat I'll never forget. So this is
kind of a family thing, youand your father, my dad and I

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to a degree. And then asI got a little bit older than my
I found out that my grandparents wereactually the biggest fans and my grand both
my grandfathers actually had taken me downto the arenas. That as I got
a little older and I'd seen somematches, you know, live and in
person, and and you know,it kind of kind of lit flame of

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desire there a little bit, andI got involved in amateur wrestling and high
school. During those years, Ikind of faded away from my interest in
the professional what's going on in thatworld, just basically because I hadn't focused
all my attention on scholastics and thethings I was having to do to keep
my grades up so I could competein wrestle, which was a real challenging

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and rewarding endeavor for me. Sohow did you fall across paths and get
involved in the professional wrestling yourself?Well, I competed in the amateur wrestling
up until my freshman year of college. I was a state champion in high
school at one hundred and sixty sevenpounds. Went to Olda Minia University,

(03:44):
wrestled with that same weight class myfreshman year. Now same height, I
am now sixty two hundred and sixtyseven pounds, and I had dieted all
my life basically to keep myself thelowest possible weight class that I could be
competitive in. And between my freshyear my sophomore year of college, I
started working out a gym with abunch of muscleheads and eating like you're supposed

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to eat, and not worrying about, you know, being the lightst I
could be, but trying to beput as much beef and mass on as
I could, and it ended upgetting about thirty some pounds over that one
summer. And when I came backto go back to wrestling, I waited
like two point fifteen and they wantedme to go back down, and I
said, I'm not going to dothat, but they said, well,

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you're not big enough to be aheavyweight, and didn't really envision me ever
being big enough to be a heavyweight. So I lost my interest in the
scholastic things at that juncture in time, and I had been working on and
off in nightclubs in Virginia Beach doingsecurity work, trying to make some extra
money, and the wrestlers frequent inone of the clubs that I was working

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security in. It was a placecalled the Rogues Gallery in Virginia Beach,
And so the people in my circlestarted talking with me and saying, oh,
you ought to talk with them,and you know you could, you
could do this thing. And aboutthat time they ran an article in the
paper there, a local paper Virginia, and I found out these guys were

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someone were making a one hundred thousanddollars plus a year, and in nineteen
seventy seven, to me, thatsounded like you were a millionaire, because
anybody made one hundred thousand dollars ayear, I mean, that was just
beyond my comprehension. So I waseighteen years old and basically had that was
at that crossroads of which direction doyou go? You know, actually considered
going into the military. It wasinterested in the Navy Seals and whatnot,

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being in the little Creek area wherethey were, you know, based and
everything. And a couple of myfriends and I we were training and working
out every day and running up anddown the beach, and one fella he
did end up going to the Sealteam, and to the best of my
knowledge, is still in there.And I started really pushing some buttons to

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see what I could what it tookto break into this this very mysterious wrestling
business, and nobody wanted to tellme a whole lot about And I made
acquaintance with a couple of people backthen, Ricky Steamboat and Greg Valentine and
a fellow named Buzz Sawyer, andBuzz Sawyer was the key to the whole

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me getting started situation. I wentdown to one of the quote unquote tryouts
that they had back in those days, and Geene Anderson was guy Runam and
they ran us all through the rigamarole, up and down and back and forth
and blew everybody up. And makea long story short, I realized about
two thirds of the way through thething that they really had no intentions of

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anybody that was in this group gettinginto the Rebel professional wrestling if they had
it a bit of more up andup, you know, challenge to see
what you were capable of doing.So I left, and Buzz approached me
and came and got me off theside and said, well, I'd be
willing to train you, you know, but we'd had to do this,

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that and the other, and youreally need to get away from here.
You don't want to break in inyour home area and until you learn the
ropes and get some experience and allthat kind of stuff. And to make
a long story short, a lotof ins and outs about our relationship with
him, but I really don't wantto go into for the sheer fact that

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Buzz is dead and Dawn and youknow, God bless and God rest his
soul. If it weren't for him, I wouldn't have ever got into professional
wrestling most likely. But there weresome less than nice things that took place
financially and everything else in his endeavorto get me in and to kind of
string me along and give me thebusiness and make a long story short,

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I ended up following him all theway to Portland, Orgon and in getting
started working there, and din Owen'sactually was the promoter that booked my first
match, and my first match happenedto be on television on his promotion there
in Portland, Orgon, and Iworked with buzz on TV very first time

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ever out of the shoot, andit was it was not glamorous, It
was not, you know, anovernight thing, but it was something that
I believed deep down inside me thatI had. I had what it took,
you know, to make it,and I had an opportunity to wrestle
every night in different venues a littlesmall towns and I barely made enough money

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to pay my overhead and pay myfuel and my car and the place to
stay and enough money to eat.Basically, I think my first three years
in the business, probably wrestling threehundred and you know, thirty to three
hundred and forty days a year.I made less than twenty thousand dollars a
year those first three years, andyou know, working like that, but
also gaining all this vast amount ofthe experience that ultimately you took me to

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where I got into business. Undertakerof his book had some lesson funder and
things you say about Mossoora. Nowgoing to specifics in it yourself, would
you say that he actually trained you? What would you say? He was
just open the he opened the door. I actually worked out in the ring
twice before I got in the ringthe first time as a professional, So

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two times in the ring, youknow, taking a couple of tackles,
hitting the ropes, doing those things. It was on the job training for
me, and basically I made itin spite of the fact that he was
less than helpful and in my endeavor. Ultimately, I think I think he
saw potential and a talent in me, But also I think he looked at

(09:31):
me as a mark and he tookadvantage of a lot of things with my
family and a lot of financial thingsthat caused a lot of heartache in the
early years, but when I didbecome successful, he and I actually worked
together in New Orleans and the Superdomeabout four years later, when I was
working for Bill Watts, and hehad a mutual respect for me as a

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talent as I did for him asa talent. Could be good because he
was a talent, But as faras a humanity Arrian and a man of
high ethics, that's where it allstopped. Is there any other things from
your days in Portland that you remember, because a lot of people were talking
about your start Willis in Florida.Well, it was a very short term

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thing in Portland for me. Ibasically had gone there following Buzz to get
him to make good on promises thathe had made for me. And he
probably didn't think that I had trackedthree thousand miles across the country to find
him beating as I'd lived in Virginiamy whole life, only child, and
never been more than twenty miles fromhome, basically by myself. But again,
I mean, I was very determinedthat I was gonna make a success

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of what I was doing. Portlandwas a good place for a young person,
young rustler to kind of learn theropes a little bit. There was
guys around that were seasoned and weren'tjust trying to take advantage of a young
guy. The Barbarian was actually breakingin about the time I was, and

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I had some real early matches togetherand uh, Matt Bourne, Uh,
he also was there and we gotto spend time with him. And I
was there about six months. Andthen from there I went to work in
the southwestern part of Texas for JoeBlanchard and that was kind of the next

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stepping stone in my career. Uh. And I spent about six months there
again kind of a journeyman type position. Uh. They didn't just completely squash
me and you know, just tryto use me up. I was,
you know, a young, goodlooking kid that they could throw out there
and get some sympathy and whatnot.And uh and I got got the opportunity

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to being ring with some very talentedpeople, Nick Backwinkle when he was still
wrestling, uh in, a youngTelly Blanchard. Uh. You know folks
that you know, again had donea lot, had been very successful,
and then would talk to you aboutyour trade, would tell you what you
were doing wrong, would tell youwhat you need to do potentially to be

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successful. And so at that timethere was that camaraderie from the old timer
an type guys that wanted to see, you know, new young blood come
in and be successful. And SanAntonio was a big transition for me because
I was still training and I wasworking out hard. Ray Hercules Hernandez came
to San Antonio and we were aboutthe same agent, and he was just

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a nut, you know. Hewas a fun guy, real musclehead type
guy. We worked out together inthe gym, and back in those days,
I had this aspiration of being amonster. I wanted to be like
the Road Warriors. To me,they were the epitome of what a modern
professional wrestler should look like. AndRay and I were training really hard together

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and I got up the biggest I'dever been in my life. I was
up like two seventy one, andI was but I was so bloated and
so just body wasn't comfortable with thisweight I was carrying. Though it was
muscle, I was bloated up andbulked up and pumped up, and it
wasn't it wasn't natural for me tobe that big. And I still had
his mindset. I was going toget to three hundred pounds. And one

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day I was sitting in the dressingroom getting getting ready and Bruise of Brodie
was sitting across from Frank Goodish andhe was he was lacing he even lays
up his bootsy out. I waspulling boots and he was getting ready.
He said, kid, you're lookinggood. And I said, well,
thank you. All felt good.I was all pumped up and tanned up
and you know, feeling pretty goodby myself. He said, but you
know what he said, be awhole lot easier to just learned how to

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work. And I know, andI sat there and for a minute kind
of ticked me off, and thenI got thinking about what he said,
and he said. He looked atme, and he said, because whatever
you look like, when you getto that point that you get your break
and you get that national exposure,if it's something that you can't maintain and
you can't do three hundred and sixtyfive days a year, then you're writing

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your own epitaph in the business.And it stuck. And right then,
at that moment, I decided that, you know, the gym time was
important and I wanted to be fitand I wanted to be strong and I
wanted to be healthy, but thatwasn't the be all and end all of
what I was doing. And ofcourse he went on to beet the tragic

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end not too many years later whenhe was killed. But those words,
you know, struck home and andit turned me in a different direction and
what I was trying to achieve inthe business. And from my standpoint of
being there in Santanio, I met, I met, you know, different

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folks coming in out and working andand all that kind of good stuff.
But Eddie Graham's son, Mike,he comes in as a junior heavyweight,
and Mike and I go out onthe town and just struck it off immediately.
It was like he was shorter thanme. So I hate to say
he's like a big brother, becausehe was a little little brother. But
we just he had the kind ofpersonality that clicked with me. We had

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a really good time and he said, you know, he said, you
need to come down to Florida withme. We could have a You could
have a good time son, fun, you know, learn more about the
business you have. The briskos aredown there and door funk juniors in and
out and you know, be arounda lot of good folks and not you
know, to say the least.Eddie Graham's there, the Graham tutor of
all about psychology in the wrestling business. So Mike got me out of San

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Antinio, brought me in there,kind of brought me under his wing a
little bit. We traveled together everywhere. I flew around with him and his
dad's plane and sat and listened towar stories every night about what they did
in the old days, and justlearned a lot. I was a sponge
for information. I would I didn'tcare about just going out and running off
in a different direction after matchics.I wanted to hang around and learn as

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much as I possibly could about,you know, the legends of the business
and the psychologies that they had putinto place to be, you know,
get where they were in the business. And so I spent a year and
a half in Florida with Mike bringingme in and during that same time period

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American Dream Dusty Roads comes in.And I've never met Dusty, and Dusty's
one of the most unique and wittypeople you've ever met in your life.
And you either love him or youdon't want to be in the same room
with it, and I loved him. He was just an instant bond that
I can't really explain how it allhappened, but I kind of traverse my

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daily activity roles to being around Mikeall the time to all of a sudden,
I'll spend a lot of time withDusty, and Dusty, though not
the great physique of some of thepeople that I admired in the wrestling business,
enlightened me to a whole different sideof the work of professional Russell.
And he showed me what you cando with charisma, what you can do

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with timing and the art of theinterview. And he was a real mentor
to me in a totally different way, in a bond form between he and
I that still lasts to this day. And we spent a year and a
half there in Florida, and Ilearned quite a bit. Dusty put me

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in situations where I had tag teampartners like Scotty McGee and Brad Armstrong,
and he would put me out therewith a season team, the Royal Kangaroos
was the team at that time thatwas in Florida, and he put me
out there in matches where we'd gothirty and forty five minutes every night,
and I got a lot of ringtime, a lot of experienced in painting

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a picture in a match and beingable to learn the difference and registering something
and dying and selling and putting thingsover the way you need to do in
the art of the business. Andyou know, if it wasn't today two
thousand and two, you'd never hadexplained this because we were so into the
k fabe of the business. Butyou know, that's long lost. We're

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dealing. It's not even worth theeffort of talking about. But the art
form that takes place inside that squarecircle and the theater in the round that
we all operated in was something thatyou had to think, eat and sleep
and live twenty four hours a dayto try to perfect your art. And
Dusty gave me that platform by enablingme to have partners who had experience,

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by putting me in matches with peoplethat had a lot of experience and a
lot of patients working with you youngguys, and really roomed me for what
was to come for me in mycareer by giving me a lot of ring
time during that same phase of timebeing down there in Florida, had the
occasion to see Andre the John quitea bit. And we had met originally

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in Portland, Oregon, and I'veseen him in San Antonio when I was
there and came to Florida. Wheneverhe came in, it was usually for
a couple of weeks, and youknow then you wouldn't see him again for
three or four months. But weformed a bond in a friendship. And
one night over breakfast, we weresitting breakfast at about three o'clock in the
morning after we had closed Roboconi's,I think it was in Tampa. We

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were sitting there and he and hetold me, you know that he'd really
seen me come along. He said, but you need a handle. You
need something that people can identify withyou, you know, to make you
you know, you know, notso much a gimmick, but something that
they'll attach besides just this this talentthat you're trying to develop. And the

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Magnum p I series was a bighot thing back then. Tom Selleck was
real hot and I had this short, curlier hair back then and a lot
more of it. And he said, you kind of look like that Magnum
Gallon TV. He said, youshould be magnum Ta, and he gave
me the name. He gave methe Moniker right then as we sat there,
and he said, when you youget a break an opportunity, that

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that's when you should change your nameand start you know, building this persona
So just just you know, excitedme because you know, it was the
first time anybody had even remotely comeup with anything like this for me.
You know, they weren't trying toput me in a tutu or where pink
robe or you know, do somethingridiculous. It was something that you know,

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I said, well, this mighthave some merit. Well, during
those days, Ernie lad was comingin and out of Florida and working with
the Sun and like the vin Ericswould come in from Texas and you know,
different folks always in and out ofFlorida because it was a desirable place
for people to kind of get awayfrom it all too. And Ernie was

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the booker for Watts back in thosedays. And Ernie was looking for the
next white meat baby face as hecalled it, for the Mid South because
they had really put Paul Wordworth kindof on the map back in the day
before he went to the WWF andthey had Hacksaw Jim duggan going well there,

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but he was kind of big,rough, rugged, not quite what
they were looking for in that looktype deal. And they had the junkyard
dogs, so they were looking fora baby face kind of go with him
and that that other look, thatother appeal. And Bill was real big
on building his own starts. SoErnie brought me in, told me he

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had a spot and a big spot, big money, that it could really
be a good thing for me ifI were to come and and Dusty said,
you know, he thought it wouldbe a good thing for me too.
He'd had quite a history with Billand made a lot of money working
throughout the mid South area, andhe thought it was a good opportunity for

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me as well, and I shoulddo it. So, after having been
in Florida for a year and ahalf, packed my car up and tracked
off again to parts unknown and foundmyself getting an apartment in Alexandria, Louisiana,
which was kind of a central centrallocation for the five state area you
basically covered. And uh came inthere and uh, you know, with

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with great expectation but not really knowingwhat I was going to do with this
persona that they were wanting me tobe, because nobody knew what they wanted
Magnum t A to be. Andso but I was very open and and
like I said, optimistic and fullof enthusiasms and ready to go. So
we did. I did some TVsand shreeport and and uh they did.

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They did a lot of things withme, pulled me in a lot of
different directions. They put me inthree piece suits, and they tried to
get me to wear back then thatwas in that punk rock looked kind of
clothing thing that was going on backin the early eighties. And tried to
kind of put me in that littledeal and just bounced me here and there
and back and forth. Didn't knowexactly what to do with me. Team

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me up with Hacksaw Jim Duggan,who was a super guy, got to
be real good friends with and andbut nothing was really clicking exactly, I
like what anybody was expecting of this, And and Ernie was pretty much calling
the shops and I was doing whatErnie wanted me to do. And Ernie
was frustrated. I'd been there sixmonths and he was going, now,

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this isn't working out quite like whatI was expecting, and maybe you should
get back to Florida for a littlewhile and come back here. So I
was. I had called Dusty andI was prepared to go back to Florida
and looking forward to it because wewas going to carry on this Magnum Ta
deal and Dusty united to kick thisthing around. We wanted to do kind
of a lone Wolf type deal,the guy one man on the motorcycle driving

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across America, you know, wrestlingin the little spots and doing the deal.
And we had kind of been kickingaround some ideas about what to do
with this, and I bought thisnew Harley Davidson, and we were we
were going to kind of make itkind of like the then King Bronson Magnum
loaner, you know, lone wolftype guy. And I was booked out,

(24:00):
getting ready to go, and allof a sudden, it's like a
light bulb went off and Bill,all of a sudden, I just noticed
I was there or something from hesaid, well, what are we letting
him go for? You know,he would just all of a sudden said
if this isn't gonna happen, he'snot leading. And I said, well,
okay, well, I didn't comehere just to leave, so that's
fine, and everything just kind ofchanged over night. A fello named superstar

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Bill Dundee was brought in as thebooker. Bill came from a wild,
crazy Tennessee wrestling background, had doneevery crazy thing under the sun to get
somebody over to work wild angles andjust do it all. Tennessee was known
for all that, and Bill wasmy next mentor. Bill and I traveled

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together every day, and they cameup with this idea of tagging me up
with mister Russell number two. Itwas to be my coach, so to
speak, and had a really brilliantangle put together to build us up.
It's this great baby face tag team, but put us in situations time and

(25:06):
time again where whatever bad thing happenedalways happened to me. Always. You
could just set your watch byt.I mean two might get beat up a
little bit, but I got beatup a lot. I got tarred and
feathered on TV in Shreetport, deadof winter, Irish McNeil Boys Club.
No hot water in the joint,nothing, nothing but like mountain war coming

(25:30):
out of the pipes. They dumpeda whole bottle of the glasses over me
and bust a feather pillow and I'mcovered, I look like big bird,
and I'm trying to wash this stuffoff. I turned blue trying to get
this stuff off of me. Andwe just did countless angles with the Midnight
Express back then, where we hadto take the lashes with the belts and

(25:52):
all kinds of stuff. And Billwould tell them, if you don't lay
those things in, if they're not, they don't have welts on their backyard,
all fired stuff like that, becausewe were we wanted people to believe
in what we were doing. Weworked now, we worked hard. You
know, people got colored every night. I mean, it's just it was.
It was that kind of thing.And uh, they worked an angle
finally where two turn Heel screwed thedog out of the out of the North

(26:18):
American Heavyweight Championship and then eventually Ibeat two for the for the North American
title. So that was my firstbig singles title. Got to work main
event programs and a single prog youknow, single type competition deal, and
it was a great education for asolid year of working main events, working

(26:38):
big angles, doing all the interviews, doing everything that went along with it.
That was like my finishing school totake me to the next step in
my career, which was a phonecall from my friend Dusty Rhodes having just
signed with Jim Crockett Commotions to comeup be their booker. And that was

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that was the stepping stone that broughtme full circle all the way back.
I'd left Virginia in nineteen seventy nineand you know, nineteen eighty five,
I'm back. And it was sofunny because all these folks, and you
know, some of my close friendsof course, knew that I was in
the business, but to the world, it was like I just popped up

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out of nowhere because I had nothad national exposure. Mid South wasn't a
nationally exposed organization, and when wegot the opportunity to go on the superstation
with the NWA and World Championship Wrestling, it was like I came out of
the woodwork, when in reality,I'd had three and a half years of
solid matches under my belt, youknow, wrestling anywhere from seven to ten

(27:47):
times a week a lot on alot of occasions, and was pretty well
seasoned although I was only twenty fiveyears old. And I got a big
break and a great opportunity that tothe average person didn't look like it on
the front side. Because I wasworking for Bill making one hundred thousand dollars
a year, coming to work forJimmy Crockett, you couldn't guarantee me more

(28:10):
than seven hundred and fifty dollars aweek, just because you know, they
were on their rear ends. Therewas guys here making three four hundred dollars
a week and they weren't drawing anything. And back then there wasn't guarantees.
You know, if you produced andyou put a person every fourteen inches,
you got paid. If you didn't, you made a twenty five dollars guarantee.
And so Jimmy Crockett got on thephone with me and talked to me

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when I was out there with Bill, and said, you know, he
was going to give me an opportunityand an opportunity for the top spot in
his organization. They had originally broughtBarry Wyndham in to be the top baby
face here and along with Dusty andBarry had gotten frustrated very early in that

(28:56):
endeavor and gone on to New Yorkbecause he couldn't You couldn't hey his bills
couldn't make it, wasn't making anymoney and didn't see it you know that
it was gonna change. So heleft under not the best of circumstances,
went to work for the WWF hadthe door wide open for me and I.
I came on in despite the factthat Bill Watts thought I was a
fool because I was making all thismoney and I was gonna make more money

(29:18):
there with him, and undoubtedly Iwould. But I was a businessman enough
to know that there was ceilings oncertain things, and an opportunity could only
be so great if you were ina little pool. I wrestled on,
you know, main event in NewOrleans and the Superdome where granted they had
a lot of overhead and whatnot beingin that big a building, but I

(29:41):
knew that I was never gonna gobut so high in his organization because Bill's
Bill's sphere of what he was doingwas limited to that mid South area,
I knew it had to be somethingbigger than that to ultimately, you know,
take me where I wanted to go. Can you remember anything about the
uh the wrestling too? I knowthere was two that were there, A

(30:02):
very famous one where you didn't pickup the title and the vision that came
out and win it. Well,yes, a couple of things jumped out
my mind. First of all,very interesting, the uh one of the
one of the matches I had withhim. We wrestled in the Super Dumb
once, if not twice, andI really I can't remember where I won

(30:25):
the title, but they brought Rayheern anders In as as an as another
mister Wrestling, and he appeared inone of the matches that kept me from
winning the title the first go round. And I hadn't seen Ray and since
I was San Antonio days and whenuh, when Ray burst burst into the
ring yet of course I had thewhite wrestling too hood on. He was

(30:45):
about two hundred and eighty five poundsand ripped and just looked absolutely awesome,
and it was like, oh mygosh. And so that was a real
unique situation for an old friend ofmine being interjected into this first time really
big main event part of my lifeand being involved with him in the program

(31:06):
and whatnot. But you know,Johnny was very protective of everything to do
with his mask and just everything,and he was a softy old veteran.
I learned a lot about what youneed to do. And I learned about
how to take care of yourself inthe ring because he would be he knew
how to take care of Johnny andhe always did and he he was he

(31:29):
made sure that he knew how buthe needed to do to get over.
And if you weren't quite up tospeed as much as he was, then
he wasn't necessarily going to pull youup that ladder. But so far,
but I had some folks, uh, Bill Dundee and different folks in my
ear telling me when I'd done somethingstupid and let him get over on me.
As a matter of fact, Iremember, I believe it was Grizzly

(31:52):
Smith sending me back out and likemaking me go make another comeback because I
hadn't done what I need to doto ultimately get over, you know way
I needed to. And uh anduh we had some you know, we
had some classic battles in Houston.Uh. In Houston, we had some
really you know, unique battles andand the same way and uh in New

(32:13):
Orleans and and ultimately it was agreat It was a great turning point in
my career because it really established meas a singles and in in a main
eventor and somebody that could you know, draw, because we we did some
We were doing huge dollars for backthen. We were We were filling up
some pretty good sized arenas all throughoutthat area. And Bill came out of

(32:36):
retirement for a little run that uhthing. He called it the Last Stampede,
and and that was very successful,big package. And but but the
people who had put the work intothe angles and that that drew the money,
the people that had made the theMidnight Express hot was wrestling too,
and myself because we had got themover and letting them just do everything in

(32:57):
the world to us to get heatand never made that come back, never
got back over on them. Andthen two and I ultimately split off into
the speed of our own. Sowe had got them so hot that Bill
came out of retirement, got withthe Junkyard Dog and ran around and beat
him up all over the whole MitSouth, and you know, people popped
in. It was exciting. Buta lot of bloods went and tears went
into making those guys as hot asthey were. And I don't blame them

(33:21):
for stretching out as long as hecould. If I were the company,
I probably did the same thing.But uh yeah, it was a great
That was a great turning, turningthe corner, so to speak, in
my career, taking it to thelevel where I was ready to go somewhere
and have an opportunity to be ina megastar. We're sending your traveling about
its off the Rose of Louisiana Long. Oh yeah, Well, Terry Taylor,

(33:44):
Uh he was Terry Taylor, andRicky and Robert and I we traveled
quite a bit, and as wedid Bill Dundee. Before those guys all
came around, before things kind ofgot light and fluffy and fun, which
they were when they were there.It was myself and Jim Duggant and when
I when I first came there,Jim had been in a bad automobile wreck

(34:05):
in which his fiance was killed andthey would run off the road about drunk
driver and he was in a uhthe car flipped over in a ditch or
something, and uh he walked awayfind that she didn't make it. And
he was a real depression for quitequite a time after that, And we
spent a lot of time together.I really got inside his head, got
to know him as a person.He's a super super guy. And uh,

(34:28):
but he had his demons he hadhe'd had to overcome and fight with
and uh, but we got tobe close friends and travel together pretty exclusively
for about six months. And thenas time went on, when when the
whole Tennessee crew came in and saidTerry Taylor and that whole group of jokesters
and pranksters, uh, you know, I got a little different flavor of

(34:52):
h of the business and whatnot andactually became fun and that it was really
more of work, just work.Before that whole crew came in because they
weren't doing big business, a lotof folks were in bad moods and uh,
you know a lot of hard,hard matches and hard rings and crowds
that weren't very receptive to the thingsyou were trying to do out there.

(35:15):
Remember the missing Link, I rememberhim. He he was. He was
in that that same little time frameand back before I really got started the
program with wrestling too, I hada lot of matches with him, and
those were kind of painful because Deweywas Dewey was a good hand and whatnot,
but it was a very tough gimmickthat he worked. He had his

(35:37):
hair all pulled back like he wassome Mongolian or somebody his face painted,
and he smacked his head into steelchairs and if he actually only bumped into
you, he could knock you outhis pad as a chair and uh so,
yeah, those those were kind of, you know, some unique times,
you know also, but uh uhyeah, traveling buddy was you know,

(36:00):
survived some some accidents and some badroads. And I don't think there
was the interstate interstate systems never didtravel, see seeming the way in the
directions we had to go. Itwas a pretty much two lane highways up
and down and back and forth,and you know, and we averaged probably
two thousand miles a week. Youknow, at that time, it was

(36:21):
before the flying you know thing reallykicked in. What was your question of
the loss? Very talented, verydriven, very self centered, very opinionated
that you know, his way ispretty much the only way. I learned
a lot from him. He camefrom the Eddie Graham school, and he'll

(36:44):
tell you but he feels like hehe didn't and he took it to a
next level. But basically because hewent out and established a bigger territory and
did some things on a grander scalethan Eddie did, because Eddie chose to
stay in Florida with the Florida ChampionshipWrestling, But he was to me someone

(37:06):
who kind of wrote on his ownprophecy of how things ended up. If
you have a tremendous amount of talentsurrounding you that's enabling you to do the
twenty thousand dollars average nightly business thatwe were doing, you have to take
care of those people, you knowon a very special level to maintain the

(37:28):
loyalties and whatnot you need to continueto be successful. And I think I
think Bill's builds people's skills were verymotivating and very good for young talent when
talent got to the level of beingable to realize what they actually brought to

(37:50):
the dance and maybe what their potentialwas. I think sometimes Bill had a
problem in taking that level, thatrelationship to that next professional level that a
owner and talent need to have toto further cultivate, make them feel comfortable,
make them feel that they got agreater opportunity even yet, and his

(38:14):
communication skills on that level, atleast from my standpoint, I think were
part of the reasons that that myselfand Junkyard Dog and and Jim Dugget and
the Rock and Roll Express and theMidnights, and everybody moved on from there
because everybody that that took Jim Crockettto the top was basically there. I

(38:36):
left and then they all wad theywere all they either fall behind me or
they scooted up to New York.Ted Dbiossi one of the greatest ever all
the way around in the business.You know, he went on to be
the million dollar man. And andit didn't have to be a stepping stone
territory. And Bill could have justas easily have done what Jim Crockett did

(38:59):
had he worked his relationship with Dustyand and uh made people feel like they
would have the opportunity to reach agreater level of success if he'd had that
bigger picture I think of what wasgoing on. Uh, he very well
could have been the man to takeit to that level that you know Crockett

(39:22):
was able to do. But butJim, Jim Crockett had a softer,
smooth, and more subtle side ratherthan the big, tough, rugged guy
that wants to talk about popping people'seyeballs out and eating the stuff. You
know, a whole different, whole, different deal. And so it takes
different kinds of people in the businesskind of married together to have that ultimate

(39:44):
uh success formula. And I thinkpossibly had Bill been surrounded by some other
people that would have filled those gapsfor him, you know, he could
have he could have done the samething because he he had, he had
the makings of it all right thereand without ad and I wish him the
best because I again he I wouldhave not have been schooled the way I

(40:06):
was. I wouldn't have have beeneducated the way I was in the business
where not for Bill wats having thatkind of territory that was conducive to teaching
you know, young town and todeveloping stars and not just you know,
completely taking advantage of it. Let'stalk about going into Jim Crockee Central earlier

(40:27):
pression for it, Well, Iwas. I was really excited, first
of all, to be coming backto the mid Atlantic, you know,
uh area, first opportunity that Iknew I was gonna be going home,
to be able to go wrestling inmy hometown in Norfolk Scote, the arena
that I had gone as a youthand watched you know, other professional you

(40:50):
know wrestling events. I was,I was excited. I was a little
nervous, you know, to leave, you know something where you're getting a
paycheck of two thousand dollars or bettera week, that's that's a little of
racking. But I believed in,you know what, what could be done.
And I knew that I had respectfor people like Rick Flair, who
was you know, based out ofCharlotte and and what he had been able

(41:13):
to do with his career. AndI believed in Dusty and believed in his
creative talents. And uh, Ijust I thought there was an opportunity to
be had. I wasn't quite preparedfor how low and how tough it was
going to be when we first gothere. Uh as far as the dollars
and cents, and I'm not surethat I had a week under one thousand

(41:34):
dollars even when I first came in. Jimmy, Jimmy really took care of
me right right from the very beginning, or tried to make every opportunity for
me to make a dollar, putme in good matches. And of course,
back in those days, uh,you know, you made your money
based on whether your main event madea certain percentage of the gate as opposed
to opening match, And I meanthey opened the door, a lot opened

(41:57):
for me to give me a chanceto be a super are. I started
off in a program basically with WahomingDaniels, who was the US heavyweight champion.
US title was the stepping stone tothe world's championship back then, and
it was a very sought after andcoveted position to be in because it carried
him with a lot of weight.While he was somebody who was you know,

(42:22):
I had just the utmost of respectfuljust because of his history, his
professionalism, the way he took careof the sport, the business, He
protected it, he didn't treat itlightly, and being in the ring with
him, you know, just metsomething you know, big to me.
And it wasn't until I don't knowexactly how many months I had been in

(42:45):
in the mid Atlantic before Jimmy cutthe deal with Ted Turner to get us
on the superstation, but that's whenit all popped. It was probably the
summer May or June of nineteen eightyfive that we got on the superstation and
immediately when they started creating the programmingand put us on it, and the

(43:09):
superstations really was a star maker.When we got that platform, our business
just took off right off the bat. They threw me out there. I
won the title from from Wahoom McDanielsin a in a very well sold out

(43:29):
Charlotte Coliseum in a cage match,and I dare say it was probably the
last big single main event match thatwould probably had in his career. And
of course wrestled, you know,many years after that, but as far
as superstar type main event match,that was probably like the last big hurrah
for him. And he gave methe match of a lifetime, I mean,

(43:52):
and he dug in and I meanjust gave it off to me.
And when consequently it meant something,you know, when I took that title
and uh it it established me andthey they immediately put me in the program
with Rick and uh back that wasthe day of the Broadways. And if

(44:13):
memory serves me correct, there wasone month period there where Rick and I
rustled either sixteen or eighteen times toan hour draw in a month, and
it was it was a tremendous,tremendous experience. Uh. Had I not
had everything behind me and uh thatI had done, I wouldn't have been

(44:35):
prepared for it, but I was. And uh. And he was another
one of the great teachers because hecould, you know, I'm sure you've
heard him make an interview. Hecould go have a uh, he could
have a match with a broomstick ifhe if he wanted to. I don't
think he'd go an hour with abroomstick, but uh, but pretty close.
But he was. He was amaster of going out there with people

(44:55):
that were far less his equal andand have good matches. And I dare
say I think we had a coupleof great matches along the way, and
I learned a lot from him.And we wrestled in Three Rivers Stadium in
Pittsburgh outdoors during that Great American Bashthing or something, and it was of

(45:15):
course we always put us on last, knowing we're going to go an hour?
Did anybody want to go after that? And about thirty thirty minutes into
it started raining, well, raininga little bit, and it started raining
hard. The people we were havinga good match, the people got up
to put the chairs over their heads. Thunder lightning starts hailing, starts hailing

(45:37):
so hard it was like ball barons. When you stood up, your feet
were almost sliding out from under you, and Dusty couldn't believe it. We
went fifty eight minutes we were supposedto go through, and Rick tosses me
over the top and gets disqualified atfifty eight minutes because we couldn't stand up,
couldn't go two more minutes. Wewere literally just grasping for anything,

(45:59):
just trying to get through this thing. And uh, yeah, you know
I had had some great experiences likethat, but those are you know,
those are the memories that I've gotof the quest, you know, for
the world title and and something thatthat quite reasonably could have been within my
grasp. Uh you know, probablyyou know, six to eight months down

(46:19):
the road from that particular point intime in my my career, and uh,
it was just it was a great, great learning experience. Where did
the quick quick TV matches come frontfrom? You? Well, we were
looking for something really explosive. Thebelly to belly souplex was something that I
had started, I started establishing inuh in mid South as a finishing maneuver

(46:43):
and because people people weren't using itback in those days as as frequently as
you know, what you obviously seetoday. And they had always told me
that you need to develop whatever yourfinishing maneuver was, it had to be
something you could do to anybody.And I from amateur background and the way
I was built, my leverage andmy strength, I could literally if if

(47:05):
someone wanted to help me, youknow, and go with it. Yeah,
we could. We could do itthe easy way, but if they
didn't, I could do it too. So I had I had a move
that basically had come naturally to meas a movement I could do, and
it was very explosive, and youcould do it as a babyface. You
could be selling, you could bebeat down and explode out of nowhere with
it. It was just a uniquething to have in your arsenal. And

(47:28):
the ideal was for the television,the quick Match, and that whole deal
was was to to create, youknow, this excitement of something that was
so explosive that you know, my, oh my gosh. You know,
we've got to get We've got tosee him in some heads of competition with
a stud a star Nikita call off, a Rick Clair or Tolly Blanchard,

(47:50):
Ole Anderson, you know, somebodythat we're going to go pay to see
him when he comes to arena.Because we want to see him go.
He had to see what they're gonnado when that happens to them. And
it was it was smart. Itwas back then, it was advertising.
It was create this excitement and anduh, you know, make them want
to come, you know, seewhat's gonna happen. When I got some
real competition and uh it was uhuh something that nobody had done or was

(48:15):
doing, you know, back inthat day. And it established me on
a whole different level. You know, as a result. Let's talk about
the uh most famous few requreer thata few of Telly Blanchard, how you
got motive to that? Ud startedafter all and went in leaving up back
there. Well, Tilly Blanchard probablyone of the most ambitious people that I've

(48:43):
ever come across in the rustling business. When I met him when I was
working with his dad, he hadmade it very plain that his his aspiration
was to be the greatest heel inthe business period. And and certainly he
wasn't of the greatest stature. Hewas like the most handsome, you have,
the greatest physique, but his workethic was second to none. And

(49:07):
and he had pushed and pushed andpushed himself to want to be at a
level of excellence that that no oneelse could really follow. And he got
itself pretty close to that mark whenI came into to my own so to
speak, and and he saw,you know what, what potential I was

(49:29):
as a draw. He knew thatI was the one that that he and
I together could be money. Andhe was right. He laid the seeds
and talked with Dusty and came upwith ideas and whatnot. And it was
during that same time. I don'tknow exactly how baby Doll came into play.
I know Nikola's father was in thebusiness and from Texas, and and

(49:52):
I don't know whether that was Dusty'sidea or tell his idea, but Tully
needed something to go along with him. He knew in a handle besides just
being Tully Blanchard. And it wasbefore the full Horseman thing really got rolling
in a big way. And sowhen they brought baby Doll in the picture,
you know with him and called hera perfect ten Nicolas wonderful woman.

(50:15):
But by all you know the standards, not when most people would consider a
perfect ten. But you know,Tully would do the interviews about his perfect
ten and it was just it wasa lot of tongue in cheek things,
a lot of things. But hegot a lot of heat. He always
had a lot of heat with hisinterview anyway. But when he put her
and him together, there was justa little magic combination there. So when
he and I started started working thisdeal and and kind of building this feud,

(50:42):
she was very paramount in what wedid. He used he used her
in the program. She helped he. He was a great ring general.
I mean he got he and Igot so in tune that there had to
be a little or no communication.I mean, we knew what the other
one was gonna do when we're gonnado it. The intensity level was so
high and the pace was so rapidthat if you didn't know what the other

(51:05):
was gonna do, somebody was gonnaget killed. And we beat ourselves to
death all over the arenas, allover the country, trying to have the
most intense matches anybody had ever witnessed. Allah the Valentine Guahoo feuds of my
youth that I watched. Telly andI took that level of violence and intensity
to a new level in the eightiesbecause of the level of physical fitness that

(51:30):
we were in and what our capabilitieswere as as athletes, both of us.
We kept pushing each other to newlevels. So we built this long
running storyline where you know, basically, very shortly after I'd had the US
title and after I'd got off myrun and flare, I got screwed out

(51:52):
of the title and in a bigway, and a baby doll had slipped
him a roll of quarters. Heknocks me out, Charlotte Colise him sold
out, quarters flying everywhere, andI'm laid out, knocked out cold,
and he walks away with the UStitler, and and we well, it
didn't just stop there and just startedbuilding. It built and building, build
and built until we got to theequip match where all cold culminated in Greensburg

(52:16):
nineteen eighty five in the equip match, and we kept everything going and never
let that level of intensity down.It wasn't like he won the title and
brushed me aside and went on tothe next thing he had to deal with
me. It was very in yourface, you know, a thing where
we kept you know, upping thetempo short of killing each other, and

(52:38):
you know, getting to a pointwhere you know, everybody knew something had
to happen, and I believe theequip match was tall his idea, and
I'm not sure he knew exactly howhe was going to get out of it,
but he knew that it was.It was something that would only befitting
the level of competition that we hadbeen to the O. There was nowhere

(53:00):
else we could go. We hadto get inside of the cage. It
had be you know, nobody withno way in, no way out in
a in a winter by you know, just submission or or saying I quit.
And uh, that was before payper view. That was a simul
cast and uh, you know Ithink we did. Uh we had Atlanta

(53:22):
running simultaneously and they were they wereshowing a match live in one place and
then back and forth simulcasting it.And uh, it was something I'll never
forget it was. It was itwas fifteen to twenty minutes, but it
seemed like days or something. Itwas just a brutal, drawn out,
got wrenching, you know, theold John Wayne fighting the bar through the

(53:44):
street out you know, over thein the ground, out the window.
We just you know, literally youknow, be each other to the pulp
and and uh and to his creditto this day, he'll say he never
said I quit, and he didn'tbecause what happened he had an out.
Tommy Young says, you because I'mpoking the stick in his head that looks
like he's going to go completely throughit, and he says all he said

(54:06):
was yes, you know, sohe he answered Tommy's question. He didn't
say the words, but nonetheless itgot us to where we needed to be
and I was us champion again andgetting ready to go to the next level,
which was Nikita. When's the lasttime you watched the act? Bitntch
hmm, it's been years. It'sbeen years. I have an uncut version

(54:30):
of it somewhere. Wayne Daniels,who was with TBS, gave me an
uncut version of it because the versionthey sell on the Starka tape or whatever
is a cut down, you know, high spot version of it. But
I've got the full blown blood andguts deal somewhere. I'll figure with my
kids about eighteen years old. MaybeI'll let him see it. You know.

(54:52):
Let's go right into Nikita. Well, Nikita was was a is a
great, great feeling of accomplishment forme. Nikita to call off no more
dedicated person probably you know, comealong in the in our industry or wherever,

(55:12):
will be what Nikita was as hetook on this demeanor of this Russian
nightmare. Scott Simpson from Minnesota becomesNikita cole Off and has convinced the world,
myself and anybody that was around himthat he truly is the Russian nightmare.
He worked his gimmick, if youwill, to the hilp he k

(55:35):
faved at twenty four to seven,worked out in a gym where he never
spoke English to anybody, and wastruly, in terms of his dedication,
a superstar before his time. Buthe was very, very very green,
and he was very dangerous and strongand explosive and just as likely to accidentally

(55:58):
hurt you while he was trying totake a fall as as you can possibly
imagine. But he was. Buthe was way before there was a Goldberg.
There was Nikita, and he wasthe most intense looking thing you've ever
had staring at you from across aring. If it had, if I
didn't put goosebumps on you and getyour dander up, you were dead because
he was just you know, snorting, firing, ready to go, and

(56:22):
it was a great challenge because Ihad come off the program with with Rick
Flair, the you know, theultimate, uh Tully Blanchard, the hardest
working man in wrestling I've ever playedthe ring with, and now I have
the challenge of I'm the season guy, and I'm the guy that's got to
make sure that this match lives upto expectation. And frankly, it was

(56:45):
it was something I was considering verychallenging because it was an unknown to me.
I'd never been in that situation.But he had Ivan Colof with him,
who's, you know, very seasonedand and uh, you know,
veteran of the of the business andsport and who in a lot of people
who were who had him kind oftutoring him as he was going along.
But he had some very profound thoughtsabout how he should be portraying himself in

(57:09):
the ring, and a lot ofchallenging things, but we had. We
ended up having some great matches andwe had at best. We it culminated,
It culminated in the best of sevenseries for the US title, and
uh, I remember on countless occasionsthe kid and I wrestling twenty thirty and

(57:29):
forty minutes and having some uh,some really classic confrontations that that I feel
like, you know, I wasthe lead man in and I really was
able to help dictate that tempo andmake sure that I could bring the best
not only out of myself, butbut this you know monster that I was

(57:50):
in the ring with, and Tikitawas a was a I mean, a
fast study. But nonetheless it wasto be where I was in my career
and and climbing this ladder and havingmy sights set on one to be the
world's everyweight champion. Uh and knowingthat you know, to be a champion,
it means you have to be ableto take someone like Nikita who's who
may be on a skill level ona scale of one to ten, may

(58:15):
be able to do anything, butit may not know when to do any
of it unless you direct him.And it kind of was to me kind
of like earning my strikes, becauseto go out there with a superstar to
have a great match is a nightoff. To go out there with someone
who's who's a little rough around theedges and tear the house down, then

(58:36):
you're really earning your money and hand we did that on a lot of
occasions and Nikita went on to youknow, be a real credit to the
business and and a consummate u youknow, professional and asset in the business.
But I feel like I was therewith him and his you know,
his tutoring and uh, you know, his growth to you know, to

(58:59):
that his next level as a superstarand uh and I do I feel pretty
good looking back on that because I, I know, had been given the
opportunity to carry the world's strap.I certainly feel like I could have,
you know, carried that that samelevel of responsibility that Rick became so good
at and and going out there andwrestling with the different different stars in different

(59:23):
territories in different places around the countrythat you know, and bring them up
to a level that you know,they hadn't found within themselves it, you
know, without stepping the ring withsomebody that's going to help make them.
And that's what I ultimately wanted tobe, was the best of seventh series
supposed to try out that way fromthe beginning. Ultimately, yes, because

(59:47):
the the plan for me was Iwas being basically, you know, not
to sound egotistical, but I wasbasically being groomed for something besides the United
States headway Taitland and you couldn't haveboth of them simultaneously. And and Nikita
need to be brought to that nextlevel. So my m it wasn't supposed

(01:00:07):
to go ten or eleven matches orwhatever it did. They just got it.
They were so good and they werebeing so successful with them, and
we ended up having some drawings andsome DQ's and some things where there wasn't
a conclusion and they were able toget some more mileage out of it as
wading amount too. But ultimately Nikitawas the one that was to end up

(01:00:27):
with Strap because my next step wasto go back in the Rick. That
was gonna be the a short termand wasn't there. We're gonna real you
for a year and your next stepwas Spirs. Yep. Yeah. How
did you feel when uh years andyears later with uh Ben longbloger Tea they
attribute to you on TV and theydid their best of seven series? Oh
you know, I I will saythat, you know, the people can

(01:00:52):
talk about all It's not like thethe UH old school, but the Ben
was and and and Booker T's andlots of guys Steve Austin's, there's a
lot of guys in the business todaythat have so much respect for those that
came before them, or those thatyou know fought battles and did things to

(01:01:13):
help pave the way for where theyare today. Yeah, it makes you
feel great, makes you feel partof something bigger than just what you did
you know at that time. Tome, this business has always has been
an honor. It's an honor tobe able to do something you love and
you enjoy that people pay you todo, you know, and then they
you know, if you've got itin your blood and you like the roar

(01:01:35):
of the crowd and the lights andthe excitement and all that, you can't
ever replace it. And you know, being able to perform in front of
ten thousand people or twenty thousand peopleand pop them and have them just go
through the roof with excitement and knowthat you're dictating the tempo of the orchestra
of what's going on that night,during that window of time, whether it's

(01:01:57):
five minutes, fifteen minutes, oran hour, is is just the most
satisfying thing in the world. There'sno drug or high or anything that ever
compares to it. The guys thathave experienced it on that level, you
know that find a graceful exit,you know, from their career, you
know, and can look back,you know and find memories of those days.

(01:02:19):
Well, you know, will neverfind anything. I don't believe themselves
that will it will equal that kindof high. And I think that's why
it's so hard for guys to knowwhen to hang it up. I mean,
my hat's off to Rick Flair rightnow, you know, fifty two,
fifty three years old, whatever heis. You know, I don't
know that I'm forty three, andI don't know that, you know,

(01:02:40):
had I not, if I hadn'thad that accident, I don't know that
I'd have found a graceful egit,especially when the money went through the roof
and you know, guys started youknow, making you know, millions of
dollars instead of hundreds of thousands ofdollars. You know, that was that,
along with the the sheer ecstasy ofthe performing end of it wouldn't be

(01:03:00):
a hard thing to walk away from. You know, people still talk about
Bill Watscript and the Atlantic or then w A at that time is you
know, look back to it withthe fondness and memories. What made it
sounmachable. There was a lot ofunder one roof. We were the camaraderie

(01:03:20):
in the a spree decorps kind ofthing of the you know what we all
carried. The banner of the businesswas was different than the big business that
it's become today. You know,back in those days, you'd go out
and watch all the matches because youwant to You want to see what other
people were doing, You want tolearn, you want to see if they

(01:03:42):
were learning. You didn't want togo out there and duplicate something somebody else
had already done. And my goal, as were most of my counterparts,
goal, was to steal the show. You wouldn't have the you want to
have the thing. You want tobe part of the event that people went
on talking about, because there couldbe all kinds of tickles and snackles and
drop kicks as they used to say, you know, they go on that
are part of the big picture andmake for great night of matches. But

(01:04:06):
always wanted to be the one theywent on talking about and whatever it was
that I did or had to door be a part of to do that.
And consequently, I think guys hada different level of respect in general
for each other. And though youknow might share different beliefs or desires or

(01:04:27):
goals for their other things outside theirlife. We pretty much, you know,
slept and ate and drank, youknow, this our business. And
we spent more time you know,with each other than we did families or
or anything else. So consequently youform a brotherhood, uh and a fraternity
that is unlike any other. Andwhen when we got it started, it

(01:04:53):
started in the mid South because thatgroup of you know, the class of
eighty three or eighty four that itcame out of there is what propelled the
explosion that took off. And wewere the the you know, we were
the yin and yang of there wasa w W F there was us.
We wanted to be marketably different thanthem, not that they weren't talented,

(01:05:16):
not that they weren't worthy of beingwhere they were. But in those days,
the philosophy was we were wrestling,we sold wrestling, and we wanted
to have the most competitive wrestling matchesthat anybody had ever seen on the planet.
And Vince was already shooting for amuch bigger picture, looking at the

(01:05:36):
entertainment aspect, looking at a lookingbeyond. He was looking outside the box,
as they say today, and hewas thinking, you know, light
years ahead of where everybody else was. But we were dug in the trenches
and and and and really taking itvery personally. I remember, you know,
we're hearing Rick talking, and youknow, you know, Hogan's up

(01:06:00):
up there. We got a fiveminute entrance, a five minute exit in
a two minute match, you know, And and he's and Rick's out there
every night, whether it's me orwhoever he's working with, and he's going
thirty minutes to an hour, andI'm doing the same until he's doing the
same. And we're we're out thereselling that kind of blood and guts,
hardcore product, and they're they're doingyou know, basically the exact opposite.

(01:06:25):
And uh and so you know,you're either on one team or the other
team. And consequently, you know, my past never crossed that Mason Dixon
line in terms of business relationship,because you know, I was held bent
on the fact that the NBA wasgonna win the war. We were gonna
you know, we were gonna havethe superior product. And uh, you

(01:06:45):
know, my health had allowed meto do so, you know, I
feel like, you know, Idon't know that I would have ever made
that trip up there, just basicallybecause I came from a different school of
thought than than what they were propelling. And I would have been insulted for
somebody to have called what I wasdoing back then entertainment, even though you

(01:07:10):
know that's what it is and there'snothing demeaning about it. But we were
just dead set on, you know, we were killing ourselves in the sake
of entertainment. There wasn't no trickphotography and and uh you know, we
didn't have mats around the ring,and we're suit flexing ourselves on the floor
and you know, just getting beatup and backed up and bashed up,
and uh, you know, somebody'sgot to have you know, road warrior

(01:07:32):
animal running at a mock seven tryingto take a tackle before he runs over
top of you. Before you cansay, oh, that's just entertainment,
or oh they knew what was gonnahappen. Yeah, and you guys gonna
get run over by freight trape,you know, but uh, you know
that's what we did. And anduh, you know, we took a
lot of pride in that Dusty's favoritelittle saying back then, it was pride

(01:07:54):
in your product, uh you know, and when we we had team meetings,
and we treated it kind of likea football team kind of deal.
He used to refer me as aquarterback because you know, he, you
know, was that's where they wantedme to go to. And uh and
everybody, you know, played arole and felt good about being part of
it, and uh and sure therewas all the competitive stuff, but you

(01:08:16):
know, it's just just a wholelot different scheme of things than has turned
into. It's going to ask youabout in a cropt Coup eighty six,
I think you were originally supposed tobe teamed up with someone other than a
Dusty Yes, Uh, you know, to this day, I'm not sure
exactly why that changed. I mean, right up until we were in New

(01:08:38):
Orleans. Uh, in the lockerroom. I don't remember if it was
because Dusty was slated for a matchwith Rick. There was a little power
struggle that wiggled his way through politicaldeal there towards the end of end of
that deal, and you know,Dusty had to run with the world titled

(01:08:59):
a little run with the World titlein that time frame. And while,
as a matter of fact, whileI was having the feud with Tully and
into the feud in Tikita and Idon't I can't. I don't know whether
it was that they knew how theycould slip Ronnie and I out of the
you know, all on the BananaPeel to put the Red Warriors over in

(01:09:24):
the finals and the Crockett Cup.I don't know exactly what happened, but
there was there was some little politicalthing animal that happened. But at that
time, I wasn't even concerned aboutall that stuff because knew where I was
going. I was looking at thebig picture of things. Ronnie and I
ended up, you know, havingsome really shortened matches by what they should

(01:09:46):
have been because it was a twoday tournament and we only had a certain
amount of time out there, andgosh, I mean we wrestled I don't
know, four or five times,and I don't think they all toled up
together to twenty minutes when it attackteam tournament. But uh, uh,
the the that was the first CrocketCup, and uh there may have been
some power struggle of warning the RoadWarriors to be the first winners of the

(01:10:11):
of that of that cup. Youknow, I don't know, but I
don't know. There's a one againinto the accident. Uh there's a lot
of rumors that there was no alcohol, drugs. There was just Leaver.
Just what would you do to tellus exactly what happened? Well, there
was alcohol involved in our everyday life. I mean, I'll I'll never you

(01:10:31):
know, try to be so youknow, short minded to s, you
know, try to insinuate anything tothe contrary. But the accident that I
had, quite frankly, was justthat was an accident. We had wrestled
in Greenville, South Carolina. UHwrestled UH Jimmy Garbon that night the lumberjack

(01:10:51):
match. I had come back toCharlotte. H Dick Murdoch had rode back
with me. I had dropped himoff at Benniggins where I'd dropped him off
with some other friends, and hehad gone to Bennigans and I ended up
going by there and making sure thathe had his bags and he was set

(01:11:13):
down right home. And from Benniginsto where I lived was not probably five
to ten minutes, and it wouldit rained so hard that night you could
aladly see your hand in front ofyour face. And the road going to
my house at that time it wasa two lane road and there was a
little dog lead tournament, and Ihad that nine to eleven turbo Porsa and
had the engine in the back.It only had the car a couple of

(01:11:35):
months, but I had the carlowered it and I didn't realize when I
lowered it that they didn't They didn'trealign the wheels and it changed the canber
on the tires and the inside bothinside tires on the back were like slick,
were worn, and I had youcouldn't see it because walking around the
car, you just looked like hehad tread. And so I went around

(01:11:58):
a little dog lake corner running aboutfifty miles an hour. And you know,
I won't lie. I've been downthat road twice that ready to speed
when it was dry, and Iwas not known for driving slow, but
this particular night, I was runningabout fifteen. It was a forty five
mile an hour zone, but inthat car that didn't feel like anything.
And I hit a pretty heavy patchof water right in the middle of this

(01:12:19):
corner in a car hide the plane, and you know I've been I probably
had a million miles of driving itunderneath my belt at that jumpaturing time in
my life. But it had alwaysalways in front engine cars and when the
rear end went out of the car, I took my foot off the gas
and turned into it like I've donecountless times in my past. And it

(01:12:42):
doesn't work that way in a rearengine car. You have to put your
foot in the gas to regain tractionbecause it's got a squat because if not,
it works like a slingshot. Well, I lost control of the car,
spun one way, spun back theother way. I saw a telephone
pole coming and had about this muchheadroom in the car and a broadside of

(01:13:03):
the telephone hole and the blow justtook me straight up and I hit the
top of my head on the carwith the greatest force I've ever felt in
my life, and it drove Ididn't have a seatbelt on. It drove
me down into the floorboard and Icouldn't move and it didn't knock me out
it I didn't hurt, but itwas really having to fight not to panic

(01:13:27):
because it was very bad claustrophobic feelingme laying down the floor of the car,
motors running and hear it running.You can see see things out of
the corner of your eye. It'spouring down raining, And never lost consciousness
and a student was riding down theroad, uh, going to his house
or something and or going home.I don't remember exactly the circumstance, but

(01:13:49):
he found me, called the police, called the rescue squad, and they
came, cutting out of the carall that kind of stuff, and uh
again you know the police were,I mean, and they stripped my car.
I had a briefcase in the backseat. They tore it shreds,
cut the lining out of it,trying to find drugs and everything. And
would any drugs, you know,I mean it was a drinking involved,

(01:14:12):
sure, I mean I drank.You know, we all drank every night
we drove home from anywhere we drovehome from. Well as I drunk,
you know, I don't think so. Was it impaired on a legal scale,
You know, quite possible if youdrink one or two beers real quick
and boil a breath lyser to servethe legal limit. So I don't really
contribute that as a reason why ithappened. Driving too fast and bad conditions,

(01:14:36):
yeah, I mean, obviously thatkind of car tires bad. Don't
know it or not, you know, if I'd been driving thirty miles an
hour, it wouldn't have happen,so, you know, but that's the
fickle finger of fate. You know, all the times I'd driven and mock
seven with my hair on fire,you know, I never had you know,
even a hiccup if anything go wrong. So you know it happened.

(01:14:59):
It was. You know, it'sdevastating, single thing that's ever happened to
me. Uh, twenty seven yearsold. You know, think you got
the whole world in front of youand uh, you know, in a
blank and eye, you have adoctor standing every top of you. He's
got you know, thirteen years ofeducation telling you that you're never gonna move
again. And it's very sobering.Uh, you know, words to hear

(01:15:21):
coming out of somebody's mouth. It'sright. So there was never even right.
Thinks that there was a cover upthat had profit facilitated to cover up,
which it wasn't anything. It wasn'tanything to cover up. They did
a complete investigation and blood work onme, and and uh, you know

(01:15:43):
there wasn't you know it it believedme had had there been something to expose
the way the media is and thenews is, you know, there wouldn't
there wouldn't have been anything there tocover up if you'd seen the bag of
stuff that think gave me back afterthey destroyed you know what was in my
car. You know, they wereyou know, digging pretty hard. You
know, they got a fifty fourthousand dollar car setting their total wrapping around

(01:16:05):
a telephone pole. And uh,you know, a pretty high profile person
that's all over the paper and everythingelse. News being what it is,
Uh, they don't cover stuff likethat. You know. The the most
ludicrous thing I've ever heard is,uh, some somebody on one of the
websites or something was saying that Iwas such a dedicated individual that I was

(01:16:30):
just working this injury and I've beenworking it for fifteen years cause I I
I was protecting the business. Youknow, it's just you know, assing
on crazy. But you know,I was given a horrible prognosis and told
I had, you know, nothingphysically to look forward to, and uh,
you know, by the grace ofGod, you know, I'm here,

(01:16:50):
and uh overcame some overwhelming odds andUH had some great support, fan
support. Lots of people you know, came out of the woodwork to show
that they really cared about me asa person. Besides just you know,
Magnium Ta the wrestler and uh,and that was you know, that was

(01:17:11):
a real eye opening experience. Youwork so hard and you you, you
know, you go on a schedulethat would kill some people if they weren't
doing something they loved that you don'trealize really what a great impact you have.
I got one hundred thousand letters whileI was in the hospital. They
had twenty four hour security guards onme while I was there for five months.

(01:17:32):
I hired additional operators to answer thephone the first month I was in
the hospital. You know, thingsthat it was overwhelming to me because I
was laying there in this thing theycall a rotokinetic bed, turns back and
forth continually. I'm on a tray, can't talk, can't do a whole
lot of anything, and I'm hearingall these things that are going on,

(01:17:54):
and it's very overwhelming to all ofa sudden realize what kind of impact you've
had you in this thing that youdo that they pay you for, that
you love. And uh, itwas a very humbling experience. It was
something that it gave me a Itgave me more incentive than just that of

(01:18:14):
my own too, to overcome whatwas in front of me, because you
know, for a week in andweek out, I was portrayed as this
hero overcoming all the odds on televisionand something that was scripted and laid out
and thought out and nonetheless of personathat that I enjoyed, and that that

(01:18:35):
it was a magnification of what youknow I would ultimately, you know,
and you don't want to be myself. And then all of a sudden,
I have a challenge of epic proportiondropped in my lap that you're either going
to sink or swim. You're eithergoing to listen to the experts and roll
over, or you're gonna dig inand go inch by inch, and you

(01:18:57):
know, whatever it takes to getback on your feet, and trying to
re establish a life, and andtrying to find a way to fit back
in the world, and and andhaving been a professional athlete, which whether
you know where entertainers or not,make no bones about it, everybody in
that ring as a professional athlete.To to do the things that it takes
to entertain it takes a level ofprofessionalism that you can't juste anybody do.

(01:19:23):
And so therefore, you know,that was a long five months in the
hospital, a year and a halfoutpatient therapy after that, trying to find,
like I said, a niche,dabbling in the color commentating world and
the managing world and all the otherthings that that usually people do later in

(01:19:45):
their careers. You know, I'mtrying. I was trying to do under
pretty challenging circumstances after by accident andthen being there when Crockett ultimately sold out
to Turn and Broadcasting and kind ofbeing lost in the shuffle for while.
That was some interesting times in mylife. Now you know what happened to

(01:20:10):
me at twenty seven. Nobody's everprepared for. I don't care if you're
one hundred and five, but uh, I really, out of all the
things that I had projected from myfuture and ambitions and goals, I mean,
I would have never foresaw a millionyears that I would end up,
yeah, doing the things I've beendoing over the last fifteen sixteen years.

(01:20:31):
How much uh, returning to thering with Dusty when you did, how
much that was you wanted to comeback to see your fans, or how
much that was see your fans tryingto bring closer For that, I wanted
them to see me and know thatyou know that I was gonna be alright,
you know, cause I mean firstthirty days, they didn't know I
was gonna live, Uh with thattraumatic of an injury, and knowing that

(01:20:55):
that many people cared was important forme for them to be able to see
me. Uh, it was importantfor me to be able to get out
there in front of him on myown and very emotional deal, you know,
the Crockett Cup deal in uh Baltimorewhere I went out to the regular
Dusty and to keep it and itwas a very hard thing. You know,
it's hard for me emotionally, andit wasn't it wasn't closure because you

(01:21:21):
know, it's just twenty seven yearsold. Didn't know what I was gonna
do. Every day in life wassuch a challenge at that point, Uh,
from a physical standpoint, let alonean emotional standpoint, trying to keep
it all together and uh keep yourdriving goals and focus, you know,
and moving forward. So uh,they wanted to make me a part of

(01:21:45):
it. I mean, Jimmy Crockettagain, it was a family and you
know, him and Dusty and Ihave spent so many hours together on planes
and in cars, and you know, spent so much time together that I
mean it it was just like everyone, you know, my brother, just
all of a sudden yanked from youand not being able to move in that
circle for a pretty long period oftime and laying there in the bed and

(01:22:09):
really watching the business change just drastically, just over that little period of time
in five months, because frankly,there was quite a built built around me
with not a whole lot of alternateplans B, C and D. And
if you'll trace history, you'll seethat when I crashed, Barry Wyndham came

(01:22:30):
back, Lex Luger was interjected,Spin was interjected. You know, new
faces were brought into an abundance totry to keep things rolling. And they
did. You know, they tookit. You know they they took the
momentum and of course turned ni Keiababyface in a very dramatic way, you
know, having him step in,because Dusty and I were slated to meet

(01:22:53):
the Anderson's and a steel cage match, and you know, in the Key
to my arch nemesis, you know, turns babyface. You know, it
comes to a you know, aDusty side, and I mean that was
that was probably one of the mostdramatic scenes played out because of the because
of what all had happened, hisbattles of mine tell these battles and mins

(01:23:13):
over that title, just everything all, you know, like chapters in a
book coming to you know, thisdramatic thing that nobody could have ever predicted,
because you know, it was anaccident. You know, you don't
take your your start, and youknow, when you're starting, uh people
out of the out of this oneact play, you know, prematurely without
having to you know, do somethingpretty exciting to turn it around, and

(01:23:38):
you know, and they did,and you know, the business that continued
to evolve. And I think theone thing in you know, hindsight's twenty
twenty, so it's easy for meto sit on the sidelines and look back
and philosophizes about what should have beendone and what could have been done.
But one thing I haven't mentioned whenI came, you know, when I

(01:24:00):
came to work for Jimmy, itwasn't a big guarantee, verbal guarantee,
but they started implementing contracts after I'dbeen been there about six months, and
myself and Tully and Rick Manny Fernandez, I think one morning, maybe Larna,

(01:24:25):
we all had contracts, but theywere guarantees, they were incentives.
They were if he fell off,as I was sitting in the in there
with Jimmy and his attorney, ifI fell off the curb walking across the
street and broke my leg and couldn'twrestle for a year, I was gonna
make X number of dollars. Andit was the first time in the history
of the business ever ever done sucha thing. Well, when I went

(01:24:49):
down and they started cutting deals withthe road Warriors and this thing and with
this guy, with that guy,they quit being suddenly quit being guarantee,
and they became a salary and theyput big dollar marks on it because they
were doing big business. They wereaveraging, you know, probably one hundred

(01:25:12):
thousand dollars a day in revenue,and you know, saw the stars just
being the limits. But they weren'tat the point of being undercapitalized on pay
per view. Saw it's still basedon bringing them into arenas. And it
still cost a lot of money toput them in arenas and to travel to
people here and do this and thatthe other. But there was a lot
of money in generated but by guarantee, by guaranteeing contracts where they became salaries

(01:25:35):
rather than the incentives to perform.They kind of paid theirself in a corner
because the business always is gonna haveas ups and downs and and they might
go great guns for six months orthree years, but it's gonna have a
dip in there somewhere. And ifyou don't have means of adjusting moneys when

(01:25:56):
things go down on one end,it's got to go down somewhere else to
coincide. Then, uh, you'regonna get yourself in trouble. And that's
how, you know, Jimmy gotsome you know, a lot of unsecured
debt you know, created as aresult of that, and traveling expenses that
you know, mounted up on themand all kinds of things. But uh,
without the advent, before the adventof television becoming a revenue generator and

(01:26:20):
pay per view being a uh,you know, the great generator of moneys,
and then the marketing and all theother things that that subsidized that those
cash flows. Uh, they theykind of put the car before the horse,
and they had a great, great, big, huge nut of payroll
hanging out there that you know,had to be met, and uh,

(01:26:43):
I think that's how they put themselvesbehind the eight ball. What about some
of the times when when you whereby saying you went into announcing what?
And so for car Well, initiallyhe was he had gone into Bill's old
stomping grounds. I think it wascalled the UWF for something back then.

(01:27:04):
Does that sounds right? And JimRoss was of course still affiliated and established
from ound that area, and Iwas flying back and forth to Dallas co
hosting a show with Jim that wewere basically doing voice overs. We weren't
doing them live. We did acouple of live, but we did something
the studios too, And I hada pretty good ability to communicate and a

(01:27:30):
presence on camera, and even withthe injury that I'd had, I could
sit in front of a camera andtalk and you know, do those kinds
of things. And it wasn't areal satisfying thing for me. It was
a challenge because I was trying tointerject myself in another avenue and trying to
build some other potential money stream formyself in a way to make myself valuable

(01:27:54):
to the company. But it wasvery frustrating as someone of my age to
sit there and try to talk aboutmatches going on that, you know,
and try to sell them as beingsomething that to me obviously maybe they weren't.
Or even if they were great matches, it was just very difficult to
be a part of it that closeon, and it was still very fresh

(01:28:16):
to me. I was still,you know, licking emotional wounds of wanting
to be out there. Had Ibeen the only thing that would have made
the accident more palatable in terms ofthat part of the transition where I have
to have been the age I amnow and it had happened, it had
been an easier transition to say,well, you know, I had twenty

(01:28:40):
years in the ring, and youknow, yeah, I can sit and
talk about it for another fifteen ortwenty and I'd be perfectly happy with that.
I still had a lot of unmetemotional things that I had wanted to
obtain from the business that I knewweren't ever going to It wasn't ever in
change. I mean, I wasvery thankful for what I had been able

(01:29:00):
to bring myself back to, butbeing that close in the thick of things
and hearing guys you know, squabbleand Billy Ach They're making you know,
tens of thousands of dollars and don'twant to don't want anybody to tell them
how to do anything or try togive them any constructive criticism because if if
they need to be told, theywouldn't be being paid as much money as
they are, you know, Imean money breeds, uh, you know,

(01:29:23):
a different mindset in everybody. It'sjust human nature. So it brought
with it a lot of frustrations.But but I, you know, I
did the I gave it all Ihad. I worked with Jim on a
lot of shows and on several payper views, and and I tried to
to study him. He's I mean, he's a true enigma in this business,

(01:29:46):
and that he created this role forhimself from a simple announcer as was
Tony Shabani, you know, justa stick man to someone who who gathered
to opinions that were very worthwhile andlearned how to really enhance people's performances and
how to do quite a few things. And I had trouble, frankly,

(01:30:10):
I had trouble learning how to relatewith Jim on that level because Jim,
to me, had been the guywho just held the mic when I was
in Mid South. But Jim hadcontinued to school hisself and learn and really
hadn't warranted invalid things to offer.But I had an opinionated view of him

(01:30:31):
initially that you know, he hadn'tbeen out there and paid his dues or
taking any legs or any backdrops orall those things, and therefore he didn't
have a voice in this or itshouldn't be there. But he carved a
niche for himself. He became ultimately, you know, better school than probably
nine out of ten of any ofthe boys. And what he learned about

(01:30:55):
the business, knows about the businessand was able to you know, help
be a part of and create eightand make something better. But during those
stages of my life, I didn'tfind that satisfying, and it was it
was a very mixed bag of emotionsbeing out there, you know, calling
matches, doing it, and itwas a struggle physically for me at that

(01:31:15):
juncture time. I wasn't as strongphysically as I am now. That injury
was you know, just a yearold, and it was very hard for
me to get from point A topoint B. I was flying around the
countryside, getting through airports and doinga lot of things that were just physically
wearing me out. And then notbeing you know, getting the real emotional
satisfaction from what I was doing.It was, uh, you know,

(01:31:38):
real kind of struggling time for me, trying to find myself, find my
way back, you know, intothe business and what I was going to
do. And I said, thenJimmy sold out, and uh and when
Turners people bought it, I hadbeen out of the the dynamic of being
in the ring for you know,over a year and a half period of
time. And those people are lookingat dem graphics and this and that and

(01:32:00):
the other. A lot of peoplethat really don't know wrest them were coming
in making decisions about where they shouldbe moving forward. And Jim Hurd was
hired as the CEO running the organizationand we had a very short relationship.
He he met with me one dayand when Jim and I were going to

(01:32:20):
be co hosting the Saturday night showtogether, I was to be the colored
man and and that was my role. Though he was giving me a very
significant pay cut, but kind ofletting me know that's the best he had
to offer. And basically six weekslater he had his secretary called me and
told me he no longer required myservices. And it was pretty cold hearted,

(01:32:44):
you know, dismissal if you will, from the from something that I
you know, been a part ofmy whole life, my professional life,
and that that had some poetic justiceas I came back and was brought back
as Dusty's assistant, you know,back in nineteen ninety and ultimately watch Jim

(01:33:05):
Hurdby ushered out. So you know, it as they say, and that
our business, what goes around,does come around, and you just kind
of, you know, gotta becareful with what you do with the people
as you come along the way,because it will you may be cycling up
when someone else is cycling down.Everybody has their you know, if they

(01:33:26):
stay in this business long enough andhave enough talent, they're gonna have their
moment in the sun. Whether it'sa moment or a year or a month
or or a long career. Alot of that's got to do with you
know, some good fortune and luckalong the way with that talent. But
but you know, nobody's gonna beon top forever. A lot of people
will only know anything about just watchingTV and watching wrestling, and that they

(01:33:50):
think that because you didn't fulfill everything, that maybe it wasn't successfully. But
in fact, you have a verysuccessful business. And I know there's a
lot of rumers. What saw inthe business, or well, tell everybody
what you did after ustening. Sure, well, I I was involved,
you know, as I said,Dusty and I worked together with Turner in

(01:34:15):
nineteen ninety, nineteen ninety, nineteenninety one, and I got a real
education there in that. Now Iwasn't being brought in as a talent I
was being brought in basically as atalent director along with you know, Dusty
being the you know, the headof what was going on, was basically
his right hand, but assisted inwhat we were doing in all of our

(01:34:38):
productions as well as our live arenoevents as far as directing what was going
on. And I got a realeducation dealing with a lot of people and
working with lots of egos and allthose kinds of things, And saw all
kinds of transitions from from Jim Hurdto Kip Fry to Bill Watts coming in

(01:35:00):
only jumping back and forth in therea little bit too. And uh,
ultimately what happened they were running meat a very mad cap pace. That
was that was not really what I'dsigned up for when I when I negotiated
the deal to come in as Dussy'sassistant. It was basically supposed to be
three four day a week office typejob, which turned into a seven day

(01:35:25):
a week you know, Bond's eyeCoast to Coast affaire. And I was
brought in basically like any able bodiedyou know, person off the street,
and uh, not giving any extraconsideration fact that I had a pretty severe
spinal cord entry and I was walkingthrough a curtain before we were getting ready

(01:35:46):
to have a to the Clash ofthe Champions. I believe down and down
in Georgia somewhere, and I steppedthrough a curtain and they had a little
footer turned down in the in theconcrete that you couldn't see it as a
curtains hanging there, and it hungmy right foot, which is my bad
leg, and I crashed headfirst intothe concrete, and it is because it

(01:36:06):
spun me to my right side.My right arms got the nerve damage and
I couldn't catch myself and I tooksuch a hard fall that I broke my
hand in three places and got apretty good blow of the head and beat
myself up pretty good and like onefell swoop and I went to the one
to the doctors, and as theystarted checking me out and reading my job

(01:36:27):
description of what I did, theysaid, you can't do that. You're
I mean, you're not physically capableof doing what you were once doing.
And I had a good insurance policywith Turner, and consequently I got a
long term disability insurance payoff from fromthis freakish little thing that happened at work.

(01:36:48):
So I sat around for literally severalyears after that, went home and
just took time and started doing physicaltherapy again, trying to to work on
the old problems. And but Iquickly got bored with what was going on
because I wasn't challenged, didn't haveanything to really make me drive me to

(01:37:12):
want to get up and get outof bed in the morning. And in
nineteen eighty nine, I had gonein with my dad in Chesapeake and we'd
had a tower built on what wasmy dad and my father's business of thirty
years. They were in steel constructionand erection, and I'd worked with them
as an iron worker when I wasin my senior year of high school freshman

(01:37:34):
year of college, and been aroundthat kind of working my whole life,
and on this particular site. Wedecided that we were going to erect radio
talent to lease out to potential cellularcustomers. And a fellow that I had
met, made acquaintance to it,had been in the business just kind of

(01:37:55):
made me aware of that kind ofopportunity. And we had erected this in
nineteen eighty eighty nine with great expectationsof the money it was going to generate
and everything, and frankly about brocos. And it didn't start out anywhere remotely
like we thought, but it grew. It kept growing a little bit each
year, and I watched the activitycontinue to grow on it. And as

(01:38:16):
I did, all of a sudden, I started realizing that there was a
lot going on in the construction endof the cellular industry. So the same
fellow, a fellow named Jerald Richardson, who had made me aware of the
the opportunities of owning and renting atower, He had also been in the
construction business himself for thirty years ofcellular communication towers, and he suggested that,

(01:38:43):
you know, try my hand atit. So I didn't have a
fortune or anything saved up, despiteyou know, any reports to the contrary,
I didn't didn't have any insurance whenI had this initial accident, and
the Jimmy made good on my guaranteedcontract. I didn't make didn't have millions
of dollars or anything that was Imean, I was surviving, but that
was basically it. But we tookan initial twenty thousand dollars investment and started

(01:39:09):
a construction company in nineteen ninety five, and that company, with less than
ten employees, grew from a littlethree four hundred thousand dollars year business,
which is a little but into amillion dollar year business within three years.
That I eventually sold in two thousandto a large consolidation company. And when

(01:39:33):
I sold the business to them,I stayed on as director of operations for
their work in the Southeast and workedwith them for two years. And they
made some poor business choices along theway. As they were plotting their way
through this construction business. They viewedit more as an investment, wanted to

(01:39:57):
grow it, sell it to WallStreet Public and everybody, take their millions
of dollars and go along their way. And a little thing called nine to
one one happened, and the economywent upside down, and the threat of
war and all those kinds of thingschanged the economy and the folks that I
sold my company to decided to pullout of it entirely, and as of

(01:40:19):
today, I believe chapter seven.But it opened the door for me to
go back in business for myself oncemore. And in January of this year,
I incorporated a new company. It'scalled Magnum Cellular Service. The original
company was Magnum Tower. This wasMagnum Cellular and we specialize in cellular communication

(01:40:40):
installations for the likes of Singular wireless, AT and T everyone that's a player
in the cellular industry, and wework predominantly here in the Carolinas. But
it's a whole different animal than thegenre that I come from. But it

(01:41:00):
comes from my background and my upbringingand being around the construction business of you
know, my my dad's and mygrandfather's. Uh. It's something in my
blood that that I have some sometalent in and uh and it is satisfying
to go go out and build somethingand walk away from it and have something
staying there three hundred feet in theair that wasn't there before you got there.

(01:41:23):
You'll be there a long time,you know. Show somebody well,
thank you and you know it's andI'm not saying that that will be the
last chapter in my professional endeavors.That I still I still like the uh,
the wrestling world. I like,you know, the people surrounding the

(01:41:45):
business. I'm intrigued by the thenew and innovative things they keep coming up
with to try to intrigue viewers.UH. Sometimes it's enlightening, sometimes it's
disappointing. Uh. I think it'svery difficult to call it family entertainment today.
And not that I'm such a prudethat I, you know, think

(01:42:06):
that you know, we're not inprogressive times and things shouldn't be fast and
furious and exciting, but it's it'sa little sad that, you know,
it used to be neat. Youcould see kids from four years old to
grandma's ninety five years old, andthere was something for everybody at the matches.
And I think the progressiveness of tryingto meet society's expectations is taking it

(01:42:31):
to a greater generation X type podiumthan than then. I think neat it
needs to be for the masses.I mean, I enjoy it as an
adult and there's things that I wouldsit and watch that I wouldn't want my
six year old son to even bein the same room when it was on.
And that's the only that's the onlything about the business that I you

(01:42:54):
know, would say, you know, I'm saddened by a little bit.
It's not that, oh, well, we could work better, or we
did the you know, the benlaws and and uh, you know,
the Triple H's and Stone Cold SteveAlston's can go out there and tear the
house down. Uh you know,I mean, and the list goes on.
I don't want to slight anybody.There's lots lots of you know,

(01:43:16):
great, highly talented people out there. They're capable of going out there and
having an hour match if someone wereto give them the platform to say we
need one. You know. It'suh, it's not that the skill sets
aren't there, or that the levelof athleticism is not there. It's just
that they give the public what thepublic wants. And if if when the

(01:43:38):
public wants panilla, they're gonna givethem vanilla. If they want raspberry,
they'll give raspberry. Uh. Youknow, Vince McMahon is a very shrewd
uh you know businessman. I've neverhad any dealings with him. Myself,
but your hat has to be offto somebody that's taken you know, what
used to be regionalized. You knowbusiness that you know, I remember years

(01:44:00):
and years and years ago, youknow, them talking about Florida doing a
million dollars in revenue for the year, for the whole year. And then
we were to the point where wewere with the Crocketts in the early eighties.
Know we were doing we did sevenhundred and fifty thousand dollars in one
night, you know when we didstart eight eighty five, and then it

(01:44:21):
went to the next level with thepay per view. And so people that
are innovative thinkers that can bring anddraw this talent together and capitalize on it
and continue to mold it and formit and take from the public what they
want and sometimes get the public someof them that they don't even know that
is what they want. But beingable to read that is nothing short of

(01:44:42):
genius. And so there's a hostof towns and towns of people out there
that make that magic happen. It'snot just having the best cameramen or power
technics or lits and glamour. Ittakes some real vision to you know,
bury all those elements together in onecohes an envelope that you know comprises what

(01:45:04):
you see on a pay per viewor you know or whatnot. So I
still got a little bit of thatin my blood. And and uh,
maybe one day of my brain willsettle down long enough that I can uh
dedicate enough thought to something like that. Maybe I could think of something of
enough merit that it would uh youknow that I would be able to help

(01:45:25):
be in an addition to the creativeprocess of something you know like that.
Uh, But uh, I wouldnever I would never belittle myself to to
ever even attempt it, and unlessI could give it a hundred percent of
what I'm capable of doing. Anduh, you know know that I was
on a platform not to Uh,I don't embarrass myself, but you know,

(01:45:50):
belittle what you know, I thinkis really a tremendous business. That's
every guy. That's for Jim Crockettthis question, Uh, tell tell us
your best fish store. No.We we wrestled up before things popped and

(01:46:12):
went absolutely just crazy. We Uh, Ricky Steamboat was still this before he'd
gone to New York. Ricky Steamboatwas here and we had wrestled and up
in Philadelphia, I believe, andit was like two foot of snow and
it was just an absolute mess.And we went out there and gave him

(01:46:33):
a good show. And I meanit was probably a a twenty thousand dollars
house that should have been a onehundred thousand dollars house, but in the
middle of the snow storm, andit might have been fifteen grand. I
might be in belching even yet.But we all were staying at a hotel
like right across the street, andit wasn't a matter of worrying about any

(01:46:54):
marks following us over to the hotelbecause there wasn't that many of them and
they couldn't get bit the snow anyway. And we set our in our and
in a little bar over there andhad some drinks, and somehow we got
the idea we were going to goto this diner. We were going to
go out to eat. And Rickwas always real big on going out and
going out to eat and ordering allkinds of food. So we went to

(01:47:15):
this little diner. It was atruck stop, and we had the cabs
take us, and we had likea line of cabs pull us up to
this truck stop and Rick orders foodlike we're in the Hemsley Palace or something.
We're in a truck stop and wehave one of like everything on the
menu all sprought out on this table. And there has been quite a bit
of drinking going on, and itwas, you know, a little intoxication.

(01:47:40):
But somewhere in the midst of allthis, Rick decided that he was
going to start a little food fight. Well we had. We ended up
with quite an animal house type foodfight in this diner and and I think
I think Rick actually passed out,and we took him to the took him
to back to the hotel. Well, the next morning he has to go

(01:48:01):
to Japan. And Rick Flair walkingthrough the Philadelphia airport, bags in hand,
three piece suit with egg yolk andevery kind of can catch up what
you name it, all running allover his suit as he's in a drunken
stooper walking through the airport, thechampionship champions on his way to fly only

(01:48:24):
ten hours to Japan, not rememberingwhy it happened, how it happened or
what was just a picture worth athousand words? And uh, and he
was a trooper. He played hard, he worked worked harder than anybody in
the anybody in the business. Uh, he had more than his fair share
of good luck and good fortune,but uh, I don't think he ever

(01:48:45):
took it for granted. And uhyou know I wish him and his family
well, really did kay, Andwe know that you're an afician. Knight
over speeding cars, touf's the besttime you ever made? The ninety mile
drive between Columbia and show. Ohgetting us Well, we had a little
we had a little deal going backthen. Ronnie Garvin had a plane and

(01:49:06):
he had to go from the airport. He had to go from the building
over the airport and get its planeand fly back. And I had to
Porsche the Turbo then and I beathim back to the bar and he flew
and we made it. We madeit under an hour. Yeah it was

(01:49:29):
it would it stupid fast, butUH live to tell about it. An
answers you by asking any more questions, because UH, one thing I met
with all you guys from the NBA, I think the real match it was
in your own personalities, in yourown know to close out in the interview.
So I want to give it achance to do that. Now.

(01:49:49):
It's it's all the people are watchingthis well, I'd just like to say,
you know, to all the fans, the the die hard fans,
the fans that were there before itwas real fashionable, and the people that
loved it for what it was andwhat it became. Thanks because it is

(01:50:10):
an honor, first of all,to be able to do something that you
love, and it's an honor tohave people that take you into their lives,
their hearts, and their homes theway that the wrestling fans that I've
met all over the country have.We a very unique position because we talk
to you and not at you.When you sit on your couch and you

(01:50:31):
see, you know, myself orone of my countless counterparts talking, it
was always something personal to you,and a lot of times I didn't realize
that. But I would like tosay thank you because the trust that you
put in us as just human beings, because that's all we are. But

(01:50:54):
the fact that you bring us inthe way you have and haven't forgotten,
and they're so loyal is something thata lot of people will never know.
I think maybe the NASCAR fan isprobably the closest thing to a wrestling fan
that I've ever seen, because thoseguys go out and lay it on the
line and put their lives on theline for nothing more than entertainment. It's
not a competition of sorts. It'sentertainment. And we did the same thing

(01:51:17):
in uh day in and day out. So my hat's off to you because
without you, we wouldn't have hadthe the the canvas on which to paint
in the picture and

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