RIPPA Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 Since word is getting around that Ox Baker has passed away - only fitting to make today's WOTD in his honor 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cool arrow Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 I was trying to find Ox's scene from "Escape from New York" but I couldn't. So watch this instead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RIPPA Posted October 20, 2014 Author Share Posted October 20, 2014 I was trying to find Ox's scene from "Escape from New York" but I couldn't. So watch this instead. It doesn't seem to be on Youtube but I did find it embedded here http://www.joblo.com/videos/movie-clips/killoftheday489 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RIPPA Posted October 20, 2014 Author Share Posted October 20, 2014 If Ox Baker tells you to adopt a dog, you adopt a fucking dog 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DouglasC Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 If you don't at least smile while watching the Price is Right clip, there's nothing that would. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Babylonianfrost Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 Very few human beings have ever looked more like a professional wrestler than Ox Baker. And the "Price is Right" clip IS something awesome to behold. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.T. Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 RIP, Ox Baker. I cannot find a good pic of the Ox Is King or Ox is #1 In Texas shirts, so here is this one. You know damn well that clock was worth over $500 but there was no way it was going to cost less than $215 or over $300 with Ox standing there on Contestant's Row. I always thought it was great that Ox spun the shit out of the Showdown Showcase wheel with no visible effort. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 http://youtu.be/R0TOlZOX58Y Ox Baker, the early years. Ox Baker, the really REALLY early years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
odessasteps Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 Ultramantis Black posted this on his twitter. From the EARLY days of Chikara @UltraMantis: Ox Baker was the first old school vet to give me real advice in wrestling. King of the airbrushed crewneck. RIP Ox. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DEAN Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 I may have to go up in my attic and find the tape of Ox Baker being whipped with a chain by his manager Handsome Johnny Starr while Ox Baker screams "I LOVE IT! HARDER!" and Johnny Starr just saying, "You're beautiful Ox, you're the best!" Ox Baker was fucking terrifying when I was 10. The stretchering of Skip Young by Ox is indelibly etched in my mind. The way he got over a move as goofy as the heart punch was ingenius. There is no way to explain now. It is all completely contextural. Younger people will not totally understand the riot in 1974 but if Ox Baker ever came to your territory in the mid 70s, you instantly realize that the riot is the only RATIONAL REACTION BY A GROUP OF CARING HUMAN BEINGS WITNESSING A HORRIFIC ACT BY A HORRIBLE HUMAN BEING. Ox was unlike anyone else. 14 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Babylonianfrost Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 ...The way he got over a move as goofy as the heart punch was ingenius. There is no way to explain now. It is all completely contextural. Younger people will not totally understand the riot in 1974 but if Ox Baker ever came to your territory in the mid 70s, you instantly realize that the riot is the only RATIONAL REACTION BY A GROUP OF CARING HUMAN BEINGS WITNESSING A HORRIFIC ACT BY A HORRIBLE HUMAN BEING. Ox was unlike anyone else. My god, he KILLED Alberto Torres and Ray Gunkel with the dreaded heart punch...of course it was the only humane response. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 APRIL 30, 1976 (FRIDAY) – ATLANTA, GA – OMNI AUDITORIUM (Paul Jones – Promoter / Georgia Championship Wrestling)> Greg Valentine d. Ervin Smith> Bob Armstrong & the Great Goliath went to a draw> Midget Tag Team Match: Little Louie & the Haiti Kid d. Little John & Lord Littlebrook> Dick Slater d. Black Gordman> Mark Lewin d. Moondog Mayne> Mr. Wrestling #1 & #2 d. Stan Stasiak & Ox Baker> Dusty Rhodes & Thunderbolt Patterson versus the Spoiler & the Sheik ruled a NCNotes: Gary Hart managed the Spoiler and the Sheik. I have a new favorite tag team. Holy crap, even better. War of the heart punch! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.T. Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 The way he got over a move as goofy as the heart punch was ingenius. The Heart Punch always had that Far East mystique that exotic finishers like the Asian Spike had. They were always sold as having an air of lethality about them and it helps that they were well protected finishers. If Ox punched you in the sternum of if Killer Khan jammed his thumb into your voice box, that was the end of the match. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cobra Commander Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 http://youtu.be/kKCAaUA3QnU Here lies Ox Baker. Heart puncher of men. He loved steak Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee B. Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 Ox Baker was indeed very special. I'm sorry to read the last phase of his life was kind of rough. Back in 1991 I interviewed Ox at a wrestling fan convention outside of NYC. I should have bought one of Ox's t-shirts he was selling, which read "Ox Baker: Big, Mean, and Ugly." Ox was very kind to speak to me. Here is what Ox told me: "I'm from Waterloo, Iowa. I was 25 [when I began], 25 years ago. I'd been an amateur wrestler in high school, and I wanted to go on to a professional career, because I'd wrestled quite a few of the guys. I'd seen the profession, I knew I could handle myself, and so I got into professional wrestling. I really enjoyed wrestling. I got to meet hundreds and hundreds of people, and I enjoyed it very, very much. When you're in wrestling, you get to meet people, and if you like people like I do.... For five years I had actually been starving in wrestling, and one night I happened to hit a guy with my famous "heart punch," and he dropped over dead. And I was an overnight sensation. It was onward and upward after that. It was a shame that it happened, but the man actually was ordered never to be in professional sports. But he got in there, and me hitting him caused his heart attack. The fans turned–at that time I didn't know whether they liked me or hated me–but they turned overnight on me, and they started sending me hate mail. And I found out the fans are very, very vicious, and over the years they put lit cigarettes on me, threw pop in my face, did a lot of despicable things. So I started my legendary saying, "I love to hurt people," because you find out that you can't really worry whether the fans like you or dislike you. You've got to do your own thing. For 25 years I've been "the bad guy," and for 5 years in a row I was voted "The Most Hated Man in Wrestling" because the man who died in the ring was quite popular. The fans, not knowing it was not my fault, blamed me for it and really rode me for the longest time. I found out that it helped my career quite a bit, so in helping it, that was all right with me. I'm not proud about it, but it happened, and we just go on. I had a six-year run with the NWA around Florida and Atlanta that I enjoyed quite well. I've been trying for the last two or three years, maybe the last five years, to get into the WWF, and I haven't been successful with it. I'm still trying very, very hard, and one of these days I might make it. Vince McMahon–of course, who at the moment is the czar of wrestling–he can point to you and you can get in, or he can not point to you and you can't get in. So you have to be very, very careful, and I'm still looking for that moment or break. I have a boy in Texas, and I just recently got married a second time to a fine lady in Connecticut. My first wife got killed in a horrible car accident. A lot of times I'd come home a little scarred up, a little scratched up, and [my family] didn't like that. But we bought a 400-acre farm out of it, and a large herd of cattle, so it paid off in the long run. I wish I hadn't been injured as much as I was. It ended quite suddenly when the arthritis in my leg, which I had tried to fight for years, slowed me down to where I had to quit. I've had a couple of organizations talking to me about trying to sign me up. My future career is actually being a manager. I've been in security for quite a few years, and I like the security work. Right now I'm working for Wells Fargo. I've been with two or three security outfits. They're not high paying, but I'm trying right now to get into corrections. Twenty-five years ago you actually had to wrestle more. I think the athletes are a little better athletes at this time, but they don't have wrestling skills that we had, where we went long periods of time. In other words, [today] you have a whole card in an hour and a half, where in the old days, you had to wrestle one hour and a half. So it's quite a difference." Thanks for remembering Ox Baker with me. --Lee 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt McGirt Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 After watching that riot footage, I would be demanding police be at ringside to hustle me out if I was him. Also, Bob Barker is kind of a dick. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 Back when I was in high school, Ox used to haunt the NYC comic/sci-fi conventions based off his "Escape from New York" gig to the point where I would groan every time I heard him somewhere on the con floor (you could hear him bloviating a mile away at these things). At some point I came around on him because he was such an awesome heel in his job, with one of the greatest looks ever, and super-nice to everybody away from it. Makes me a little sad I never got a shirt or other doodad from him given the opportunity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jstout Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 I never got to see him wrestle live, but man, he had this Apter-mag-reading kid scared to death as the man who killed people with the heart punch. He just had to be the baddest man alive. KILLED PEOPLE. Who can top that? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Web Conn Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 w/Karl Von Krupp vs Dick The Bruiser & Andre The Giant Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rev Ray Posted October 21, 2014 Share Posted October 21, 2014 If Ox Baker tells you to adopt a dog, you adopt a fucking dog When I saw the gas can at the side, I was expecting a "ADOPT A DOG OR I'LL BURN YOUR HOUSE DOWN" to be part of that promo. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
driver Posted October 21, 2014 Share Posted October 21, 2014 RIP OX.On a somewhat related note, about a month ago I ran into a guy who has Ox's look and he was wearing an "Ox Baker Jr." t shirt. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Evans Posted October 21, 2014 Share Posted October 21, 2014 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cool arrow Posted October 21, 2014 Share Posted October 21, 2014 RIP OX. On a somewhat related note, about a month ago I ran into a guy who has Ox's look and he was wearing an "Ox Baker Jr." t shirt. This guy? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cobra Commander Posted October 21, 2014 Share Posted October 21, 2014 RIP OX. On a somewhat related note, about a month ago I ran into a guy who has Ox's look and he was wearing an "Ox Baker Jr." t shirt. there appears to be a cottage industry of indy guys claiming to be sons of 60s/70s midwest workers. Dick the Bruiser Jr, Bobo Brazil Jr, and the Ox Baker Jr that you mentioned. also, kayfabe lives Percival Friend, a long-time manager and sometimes commentator was the first victim to fall to Baker Jr. and the "hurt punch." Friend was on the receiving end of the move and had repeated trouble with his heart which eventually resulted in open heart surgery coming close to costing him his life. Bull Miller, who is a mainstay on the indie scene, especially in the Ohio area, squared off against Baker Jr. and after falling to the "hurt punch" had to undergo a triple bypass which left the legendary grappler clinging to life for a number of days. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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