“Redd” Reddick — The Other Side of the Ropes
Year End Blowout? Could Be
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I figured I’d kill two birds with one stone with this particular write-up. First, I wanted to get the next piece out of the way since I was already due, but at the same time, I’d be a week or so early for celebrating my column’s 5th anniversary. I know, it doesn’t sound like a big deal to most people, but if you think about it, there aren’t too many people who actually wrote their own columns online for as long as I have, in spite of the fact that I’ve never had a fixed schedule to follow, I’ve just written when I felt it was time to do so. I mean think about it: if no one’s paying you to meet any deadlines, therefore no pressure but at the same time you’re putting out a product where people are reading at any given time throughout the world (and this is true. My column is not just posted on Myspace and Facebook, but it’s also posted on Pro Wrestling Digest, where the readership is literally global) so I’m sure that at least one person on the other side of the globe has read my stuff once, and if I didn’t know what I was talking about it, even they probably wouldn’t hesitate to call me on it. Seeing how that has yet to happen, I must be doing something right. That being said, I can press on…
Pro Wrestling and Credibility
Now I know I’ve been going on for a while about this argument and honestly, I think I may put it to rest. Yep, I’m done defending credibility in this business. Looking back on the past 20 years, I see where the cracks in the dike got bigger and it burst nearly 10 years ago. It has nothing to do with the Territories, but what happened even after they faded. One of the things that kept wrestling a credible sport was the fact that the people who got into the business were actually athletes with pedigrees. Now I know I brought this up last time, but let’s recap it – the cats I grew up watching who became top draws either had athletic backgrounds, were trained by someone in the wrestling business, had a reputation for being some sort of bad ass, or a combination of all three. Case in point, the Funks, Dick Murdoch, Dusty Rhodes, Bruiser Brody to name a few all played football for West Texas State University. The Funks were also trained by their dad, Dory, Sr. The Harts were all trained by their father Stu and a lot guys passed through the crucible that was Stu’s basement, more commonly known as the Dungeon. Live to talk about that ordeal and nobody doubted you. Before there was a Mark Henry there was the Olympic powerlifting medalist Ken Patera. 2 decades ago, there was Ted Arcidi, who after bringing the world bench press record to 702.5 lbs would sign to the WWF.
But that’s now a bygone era. One of the last NCAA level athletes to compete in wrestling is now in the top Mixed Martial Arts promotion in the world and currently convalescing from surgery. I don’t think another Olympic medalist, gold or otherwise would want anything to do with Vince McMahon. I know I kept saying that Vinny Mac was the culprit for why the game is what it is now, but he had some help. Okay, he had a lot of help…
Sure, he put out product that got cheesy plenty of times, but people were immune to the point where they let it slide. If you look at what Paul Heyman had with Extreme Championship, it not only gave people a choice, but it made other people focus on the aspect that didn’t actually involve wrestling at all, and we drank the Kool-Aid. In fact, people who got into the business around the late 90s wanted to emulate ECW so bad that when promoters tried to get venues, the owners didn’t want their places torn to bits due to guys who wanted to get their ya-yas off by going though tables, so they either jacked up their insurance fees or flat out refused to allow any events.
As for Vince spilling his guts about not being real? That was a CYA move. When you’ve been indicted for steroids a decade back, then your stock goes public just months before the advent of Y2K, what would you do? Plus, seeing how your competition tanks and you buy them out, what else are you going to do? By 2002, Vince had bought out both World and Extreme Championship Wrestling and bought all the back footage from the past 2 or 3 decades of the NWA, so pretty much monopolized pro wrestling, so he had one thing left to do. He said it wasn’t real. Crazy, right? Nope.
See, for anyone who hasn’t done their homework, monopolizing a business in the United States is illegal, which is why you won’t hear about Coke buying out Pepsi and vice versa, so the people have a choice. Now, back in 1954, the promoters running the National Wrestling Alliance at the time were indicted for violating the Trust Acts that were put into place about a century before (check out the Tammany Hall scandal). Vince did what he did so he wouldn’t have to take the stand again, plus it would save him the headache of paying the athletic commission of the regulated states when his shows came through, so he came up with Sports Entertainment. Now, for the promoters on the independent scene who wanted to follow suit with that: that’s all well and good, but since we’re all pretty much under the radar anyway, you needn’t bother. If you couldn’t afford to pay the promoter fee then you didn’t have any business trying to run anyway.
Does any of this mean that wrestling can’t be credible again? Of course not, but it’s gonna take a lot of work. The problem is trying to find people in the new generation with an intense level of dedication. With this age of high-paced information, consumption and gratification, I’ve run into a lot of kids who have strong sense of entitlement, who want high reward for little to no effort. Of course, they aren’t all like that, but we’ll see what happens. If we can get more people who will support wrestling as a sport and respect it as a business, it’ll get there. Plus I recall what Terry Funk said about Shoot style, which brings me back to…
Mixed Martial Arts
I finally had my first experience in the cage nearly 2 months ago, and I can finally say that not only is MMA a different breed of cat than pro wrestling, but I’m definitely a changed man now. Let’s say that both sports have always been in the same office building, but they’re different departments. Going in I didn’t know what to expect, and during the rounds there was definitely clarity in my mind. 11 years of experience in a ring lead to that moment in the cage and I was both surprised with how I did and enlightened with what I was capable of and what I had to do next when it was time to train again. It truly is a sport for warriors and gladiators. America, as usual, was late on the uptake, but better late than ever, right?
The weird thing is this – this year has been the most reflective and the slowest year of my wrestling career. I can count on one hand how many matches I’ve had, but made them as significant as possible. I’ve actually trained harder than I have even in my days of Basic Training, and that was 20 years ago. I’ve dropped down and maintained my current weight to where it fluctuates from 190 to 182 lbs, which was the weight I fought at last month. I couldn’t do that before, so that marks another change. If wrestling is ever going to be respected any time soon, then the people within its ranks are going to have to step up. Not just their looks, everything. If we want to be taken seriously then we need to change the way people perceive us and the way to go about it is change what we’re doing now. It didn’t stop anyone from imitating Heyman and everyone else, so what’s stopping us now? Trying to be Sports Entertainers apparently isn’t helping, so try being a Combat Athlete. Otherwise, find some other way to be seen by your friends and family on someone else’s time…
Out/Aus/Uit
Redd
shaka57@hotmail.com
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