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YOUR ALL-NEW WRESTLING BOOK THREAD


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  • 2 weeks later...

Apologies if I'm late to the game, but I just found out that Darren Wilson Johnson (Beta Ray Bill, Wonder Woman: Dead Earth) has a new wrestling comic with Image, Do A Powerbomb!. It's basically puroresu mixed with DBZ, and it is magnificent.

IMAGE_DWJ_DAP_GOLDEN_APPLE_VAR_copy_1512x.jpg

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  • 2 weeks later...

Just an update on the Brutus Beefcake book, I'm 75% done it and I'm 100% loving it. The chapters don't drag no, he has great stories, and it's an easy read. he devotes a whole chapter or section more than likely, on Dan Spivey and Adrian Adonis, the Bulldogs and The Rougeaus (?), Mr. Fuji, the only thing I dislike about is he likes to brag about how easy he could get laid back then, and he mentions it quite a bit, and lots about his accident which he never should have survived, all in all wayyyyyyyyyyyy better than I thought it would be.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Recap of various books I've read somewhat recently.

Hardcore History: The Extremely Unauthorized Story of ECW. A little on the short side at only 245 pages but a fun read. A lot of stories you probably know but some very interesting stuff about the end of the promotion and what they where owed vs what they owed people. Basically even if Paul Heyman got his money form PPV it wouldn't have kept the company afloat.

Nitro: The Incredible Rise and Inevitable Collapse of Ted Turner's WCW. Really good in-depth coverage of WCW side of the MNW. You've heard the "death of wcw" type of stories before but the inside baseball stuff on turners front offices make it worth the read.

Accepted: How the first gay superstar changed WWE by Pat Patterson. Really enjoyed this one. Talks about being gay in a very macho straight world (read Rob Halfords bio back to back with this). Started wrestling in the 60's which is an era we don't hear a lot about. Also talks about working for Roy Shire in San Francisco and Don Owen in Portland two territory's that seem to get over looked. Denies ever using his position to sleep with anyone. (also claims him and Louie where exclusive in the 80's due to the aid pandemic). Uses the phrase "even superstars need to be produces" sees him self as more of a producer than a star. 

The Cowboy and the Cross: The Bill Watts Story, Rebellion, Wrestling, and Redemption. Talks about the territories in the 60s and 70s which is interesting. talks ALOT about finding Jesus (to the point where as the reader Im like we get it don't need it every chapter). Also apparently he was toughest man on earth. The WCW stuff is interesting in that much like Eric Bishoff's book while I don't agree with ever decision he made I now understand where he's coming from on those choices. This also reads like a reference manual to Good Ole JR. So much stuff I could hear coming out of JRs mouth and so much of JR AEW commentary sounds like this books. (Bill Watts loves guys who played football and/or had amateur credentials. really explains JRs love of Josh Woods)

The Hardcore Truth: The Bob Holly Story. Interesting because he was kind of an underneath guy for pretty much his whole career. Someone vince saw as a mechanic or a carpenter. Talks about being a racecar driver (which lead to the Sparky Plugg gimmick) , working as mechanic and a welder, and doing toughman (and talks about brawl for all). Thoughts on his concepts of wrestling (says womens wrestling doesn't draw, I would agree that shitty sable matches didn't, why he prefers to loose clean in a hard fought bout than screw jobs, liking to work stiff especially against bradshaw) Actually talks a lot about The Benoit Tragedy which makes me think that a lot of people want to dismisses the CTE due to the fact that it could happen again. He blames it more on alcohol  and says that alcohol kills more people than steroids which is true but there is way more alcohol using in general society. Very forth coming on his thoughts on both Vince and HHH. talks a lot about steroid using in WWE (says he was never told to get on them but he looked around the locker room and knew what was expected physique wise) and testing (guys got prescriptions for testosterone and no GH testing). Says when Booker T came in he kept his head down and didn't act like a big shot compared to Buff who acted like he was hot shit. Also spends half the book talking about how tough he is (talks about how he was tougher than Daniel Puder) yet was worried old man patterson was gonna try to fuck him 

Masked Decision's: The Triangular Life of Dick "The Destroyer" "Doctor X" Beyer From American Athlete to International Icon. Dick Byer is the guy who wrestler Rizidozan with 70 million people watching on TV in Japan. Started in the 50's Worked in the  60s and in the LA (last Gorgeous George matches), Portland, and Hawaii territories. Also new Zealand, Australia and Germany in addition to being a big star in Japan.  Enjoyed hearing about eras and territories that historically get overlooked don't look for mudslinging as its probably the most positive wrestling book I've ever read. Seems to have had a great one of a kind life.

ChokeHold: Pro Wrestling's Real Mayhem Outside the Ring , untold stories of Greed, Abuse and Betrayal. By Jim Wilson. Over 500 pages so cover quite a bit of ground. Started wrestling in the 60's while playing pro football realized the boys where getting screwed (and Jim Barnett tried to screw him in Australia) so tried to unionize and ended up getting blackballed. Then him and T-Bolt Patterson tried run opposition in Georgia (he also worked opposition for Anne Gunkle) ended up suing the NWA for illegal business practices and being a monopoly. Reading it I kinda wonder why he kept banging his head against the wall when he couldn't get the boys to go along with him. Was college educated and could have made a good living in real estate. Good look into the NWA's business practices.   used the FOI to get a look the 1956 consent decree by the justice department that the NWA was a monopoly, and how the NWA simply didn't abide by that. Discuses the various scandals of the 90's (sex abuse, steroids, Ventura lawsuit, Sable lawsuit) and actually uses the documents from the cases. Also claims The NWA changed the title three times to kill his opposition business  Harley Race/Tommy Rich/ Dusty Rhodes (Ed Farhat told him the Tommy Rich fucked Jim Barnett to get the belt) all in three months in 81. Lot of history of Georgia wrestling (GCW/Championship wrestling from Georgia/JCP/ WCW). Lot of NWA politics and and Wrestling TV Politics. In many ways a history of the NWA from a different vantage point, talks alot about dealing with Jim Barnett who was kinda the man behind the curtain for much of wrestling since the 60's (including working for Vince)  

Edited by zendragon
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  • 3 weeks later...

A couple more....

Long Bomb: How the XFL Became TV's Biggest Fiasco by Brett Forest, Short on wrestling content but long on McMahon craziness A good fun look at the debacle that was the XFL. Follows the whole timeline of that one ill fated season, with plenty of details that I don't think I knew before.

Bodyslams! Memoirs of a Wrestling Pitchman by Gary Michael Cappetta, GMC worked for Vince Senor, Junior (including the transition between the two), Verne Gange, Crockett and WCW pre and post Bishoff taking the reigns (which probably puts him is some select company). Published through ECW press so he pulls no punches on his life in the wrestling business. Tells stories about road trips with Abdullah the butcher, Catcus Jack, Ron Simmons & Scorpio and Mark Calloway. Another book that has an interesting inside look at the politics of how WCW was run. Wild stories about the WCW European trips from hell and some interesting stuff about WCW's media relationships in Germany and why they managed to do such good business there.

Also a wild story about a show he worked in Houston that featured all women wrestlers and a predominantly lesbian audience (who loved Luna).

He talks a lot about the business side of wrestling, with promoters trying to financially squeeze talent and everyone more or less being out for them selves. The expanded edition in 2005 talks about his work with ROH and various thoughts on the indie scene and indy wrestling

Edited by zendragon
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Under the Black Hat: My Life in the WWE and Beyond by Jim Ross

Picks up where the last one left off but a lot more raw. two main themes run through the book one is that its a love letter to his late wife Jan and her death is dealt with in one of the final chapters. The other is an unflinching look at his relationship with Vince McMahon. Vince wrote the forward to slobberknocker he didn't here. JR is very open on his thoughts on his mistreatment. Joining the kiss my ass club, getting fired r(multiple times) getting his bells palsy mocked, having to get in the ring, THAT infamous sketch that mocked his Diverticulitis surgery. In many ways it reminds me of someone in an abusive relationship who keeps returning with the hope that this time it will be better

Other topics include, Owens death, him having to fire Steve Williams, handling talent, payoffs and how he calculated them,  Double J holding Vince up for money, plane ride from Hell (almost feels like he might be mixing up multiple incidents based on other accounts), The Invasion and the aborted plan to run WCW as a separate brand, Steve Austin "taking his ball and going home" , Doing NJPW on AXS and meeting Tony Khan. One thing that seems counter intuitive about JR is how he champions smaller wrestlers. Getting Chris Jericho and Eddie signed with Vince having concerns about their size, putting AmDrag as an all time great, talent triumphs over size. 

Bit of a brisk read at less than 300 pages, but fascinating with how open it is about the topics and how much is covered 

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  • 3 weeks later...

I've been reading the Stan Hansen autobiography, and one of the best things about it is that it gives a very good look at the Amarillo territory (NWA Western States) in the early 70s, which is one of the toughest territories for us to really know anything about as we have no meaningful footage. So far, however, my favorite thing was the story about Terry Funk and a cop from Happy, TX.

Funk would speed like crazy, including through towns where the speed limit dropped from 55 to 25. He'd be going 100 at 2 am the same time every week since they had their weekly loop.

So apparently there was one cop in Happy, TX that waited for him every week and tried to chase him down to give him speeding tickets and Funk would try to outrace him.

Every week.

There needs to be a movie about this. Just this.

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10 hours ago, Matt D said:

I've been reading the Stan Hansen autobiography, and one of the best things about it is that it gives a very good look at the Amarillo territory (NWA Western States) in the early 70s, which is one of the toughest territories for us to really know anything about as we have no meaningful footage. So far, however, my favorite thing was the story about Terry Funk and a cop from Happy, TX.

Funk would speed like crazy, including through towns where the speed limit dropped from 55 to 25. He'd be going 100 at 2 am the same time every week since they had their weekly loop.

So apparently there was one cop in Happy, TX that waited for him every week and tried to chase him down to give him speeding tickets and Funk would try to outrace him.

Every week.

There needs to be a movie about this. Just this.

7-BCCD600-7415-4-E83-8-A96-68314-EA05904


E00217-C0-0840-4-FDF-8339-CD096-DDF0469.

Edited by Octopus
Added Funk
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On 11/30/2022 at 11:12 AM, Matt D said:

I've been reading the Stan Hansen autobiography, and one of the best things about it is that it gives a very good look at the Amarillo territory (NWA Western States) in the early 70s, which is one of the toughest territories for us to really know anything about as we have no meaningful footage. So far, however, my favorite thing was the story about Terry Funk and a cop from Happy, TX.

Funk would speed like crazy, including through towns where the speed limit dropped from 55 to 25. He'd be going 100 at 2 am the same time every week since they had their weekly loop.

So apparently there was one cop in Happy, TX that waited for him every week and tried to chase him down to give him speeding tickets and Funk would try to outrace him.

Every week.

There needs to be a movie about this. Just this.

I'm pretty sure Funk was just running interference so that his buddy could haul an illegal load of Coors Light so that some rich Texans can settle a bet.

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13 minutes ago, Cobra Commander said:

Video game idea: a travelling wrestler mission on a car racing game where you have to make the next town without being pulled over as Dick Murdoch throws beer bottles at road signs

Now I want a video game based on the Indie wrestler experience where you have to level up the size of your gimmick table to make money.

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On 12/1/2022 at 8:04 PM, Cobra Commander said:

Video game idea: a travelling wrestler mission on a car racing game where you have to make the next town without being pulled over as Dick Murdoch throws beer bottles at road signs

My God; I never realized how much a GTA game world could easily be a Territories-era wrestling life game. Missions are constant driving from town to town to make the shows; working your way up the card makes you more money; then at the end of a chapter the promoter finishes you up and you drive off to a newly-unlocked territory on the other side of the country. Evading the police, petty crime side missions, avoiding hostile fans. Set it beginning in 1983 and the background plot is a Vince figure going national and taking over the game map.

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20 minutes ago, Hamhock said:

My God; I never realized how much a GTA game world could easily be a Territories-era wrestling life game. Missions are constant driving from town to town to make the shows; working your way up the card makes you more money; then at the end of a chapter the promoter finishes you up and you drive off to a newly-unlocked territory on the other side of the country. Evading the police, petty crime side missions, avoiding hostile fans. Set it beginning in 1983 and the background plot is a Vince figure going national and taking over the game map.

GTA: Billy Jack Haynes. Where you're working Arkansas and flying in drugs for Bill Clinton at the Mena Airport.

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On 12/3/2022 at 8:26 PM, Hamhock said:

My God; I never realized how much a GTA game world could easily be a Territories-era wrestling life game. Missions are constant driving from town to town to make the shows; working your way up the card makes you more money; then at the end of a chapter the promoter finishes you up and you drive off to a newly-unlocked territory on the other side of the country. Evading the police, petty crime side missions, avoiding hostile fans. Set it beginning in 1983 and the background plot is a Vince figure going national and taking over the game map.

You have to level up your fanny pack in order to store more "gimmicks". Instead of a "Wanted" system for breaking laws, you get "Heat" by not shaking hands, stooging to the office or breaking kayfabe.

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29 minutes ago, Execproducer said:

GTA: AWA - Plane trips with Mad Dog, driving Andre, late night food runs with Ken Patera, marrying into the Gagne family, protecting Heenan from little old ladies with hat pins.

Trying to break up Gne during promos?

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