This is the art of wrestling with professional wrestler called Cabana. All right,
how you doing? Come on in, sit down, Relax, You're about
to listen to the art of wrestling. A professional wrestling podcast. It's a
life podcast is a personal journal. Tonight your ways, the minds of souls,
hearts and lives of people involved in the world a professional wrestling. I
am your host. My name is Cold Cabana. I am a podcaster,
I am an actor, I am a dog owner, I am a fringe
performer. Most supportedly though, I am a professional wrestler, and I am
coming to you live from my studio apartment in Chicago, Annois. Before I
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slash Cold Cabana. I'm back with two episodes for August. These all happened
at the National Wrestling Hall of Fame show that happens every single year in Waterloo,
Iowa. We did a live show, which I will put on next
week, but this week it was important to me to have Joe Milenko on
the show. Brother of Dean Milenko, Joe Milenko, son of the Great
Milenko. Perfect timing as I head to the gathering of the Juggalos this week.
But Joe Milenko is his own person, and I met him last year
at the National Wrestling Hall of Fame and he was so nice, very personal,
just like his brother, and I knew I was coming to the show.
I knew he was coming to the show. Seems like a guy who
wouldn't mind talking about the past of wrestling. Seems to really love wrestling,
has such a history in professional wrestling, and I don't think a lot of
people ever kind of sit down and ask his story. So here I am
a throwback to the art of wrestlings where I would grab the ones where we
want to know their story and we talk to them, and that is Joe
Malenko. I was curious about his path as a Malenko brother and of course
of his father, so we get into it. Very fun to sit back
down and talk with wrestlers and Joe as a pleasure. We will get to
that, but I do want to make an announcement. I am headed back
to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and if you are in Scotland or near Scotland,
August nineteenth to the twenty first, we are just doing three days myself and
John Hastings where we watch bad wrestling and do comedy and commentary to it.
Tiny urel dot com slash ed Fringe Wrestling for tickets. They're just ten dollars.
The fringe is a favorite activity of mine for so many years now.
I didn't think it was going to happen, but luckily work is sending me
to Germany, so I was able to sneak in a little trip to Edinburgh
and we are going to do some fringe shows. As for me, this
is usually the part where I described my tales every single week. We haven't
done an art of wrestling for a couple of months. I haven't really wrestled
for a couple of months. I think last time I was like, I
haven't really wrestled, but now starting to get back into it a little bit.
Opened the Ring of Honor Death before Dishonor show Me and Anthony Henry.
Anthony Henry a hell of a professional wrestler. Hope he gets more of a
shot him and j D. I wrestled in Lowell, Massachusetts. I wrestled
at this show with Joe Malenko in Waterloo, Iowa, the show that I
wrestled at every single year. I'm gonna be wrestling at the Gathering of the
Juggalos. I'm gonna be wrestling in the Mall of America for first wrestling.
I'm gonna be wrestling in Mesa, Arizona. Trying to get back on some
kind of wrestling schedule, but also very very grateful that at my age forty
two years old, I'm able to slow down a little bit. I was
given that time off through COVID and then through a reshuffling of my professional contract,
and it gives me an opportunity to understand who I am as a person
where I don't have to be so super focused on professional wrestling. Gives me
an opportunity to work more here on the computer with my Twitch, trying to
grow my Patreon, maybe trying to grow some projects where I don't have to
constantly travel all over the world every single week. But then I remember that
I'm going to be doing one PW in Doncaster in October, I'm doing scott
I'm doing the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, I'm going to Germany. I got booked
for Qatar. So as I'm grateful for the slowing down, I don't know,
it always seems to speed up. But I will never complain because I
do know that there are some people who would love to have the opportunity to
do what I have done and what I am doing, and I will always
be grateful. That's the point of this podcast. That's the point of this
listen. It's the point of having someone like Joe Milenko on the show.
We all have our stories, we all have our rich history, and we're
gonna get into it with Joe Milenko in just a second before we get into
it though. Today's podcast is brought to you by Manscaped, and this catchphrase
is actually what they want me to say. Here we go. If you
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sack summer. You know, most most Sunday mornings we'd have bagels and then
there was a little uh delia CRUs the street. So he go, he
go get locks, he go get herring. Good filter fish. Actually,
my grandmother made good filter fish, something best you ever had if you happen
to like a filter fish. But she's not here any longer, so you
can't get My grandmother could fill to fish anymonger, did you that's on the
recipe? No? Would you have? Would you even make it anymore?
You can't't even know where to start, right, I would just I just
end up throwing a fish in a blend or somewhere. Yeah. Do you
cook? No? Right? Like? No, grand of course my grandma
did. I don't. I don't like I don't cook. Yeah, do
we do? Us Jewish men not take that on or um? I don't
you know it's funny that you. I do like to cook. I just
don't take the time. So maybe that's a wrestler's thing of pure laziness pretty
much what you're you're on the road. I mean, the most we did
in Japan as we grabbed the the ramen soup canisters and put a little water
in there and heat them up in the room. But yeah, yeah,
just short of that, you're eating out all the time. Well, uh,
okay, I appreciate you coming on and talking to me. Have you
done anything things like this before? Once or twice? Once or twice?
Yeah, So I think that's why I think I'm curious. I think a
lot of people are curious. I guess there's like a couple of things I'm
kind of interested in. Otherwise it's just bullshitting. Um. I think you
know I'm important. I'm interested in like hearing kind of like your father's side
or your father's story through your lens, and then obviously like getting you know,
getting into wrestling and your wrestling aspect and all that stuff. Yeah,
it was my life. And before we get going, I got to my
dad's song was Bagel's Bagels two for five. That's what keeps us Jews alive
now probably nowadays politically insensitive and people would scream in hollar, but he sang
that when I was a little kid. Well, and then and then you'd
go get bagels. I mean, you wouldn't just sing me the song and
say, okay, you're on your own. He makes me and then he
gave me a bagel. Yeah, like okay, and you ate that way
for the next twenty five years. Yeah. Well, my story was so
Bagel's bagels two for five. You'd get two bagels for five cents, which
is crazy because I was thinking like five bucks for two basics. No,
no, no, no, Because um, in Irvington, New Jersey,
so where we where we were, my grandfather was across the street. He
had a hit a tailor shop. Because you know, the Jews came over
the United States and a lot of them did certain things, and a lot
of them besides besides taking over the movie industry and some other things, they
became tailors and um, the cobblers, you know, shoe shoe people.
Actually, his brother went down to Argentina and became a cobbler. They were.
My grandfather was across the street from us. If you go down his
street, there was a synagogue to school, and just across the street from
that was a was an actual bagel factory, wasn't it wasn't like an Einstein
bagel. It was a bagel factory and they made thousands and thousands, and
so you could just head on over to and on over grab a couple.
They were hot. They're right off the right off the bagel Express, right,
boy, what was your bail of preference? Mine? Egg bagel?
I mean I liked so, I'm a pretty regular plane bagel guy. I'm
not am I'm like a purist when it comes to certain things. Um,
the only other thing was salt bagels. I love salt bagers. So you
like your bagels like you like your wrestling. Plane borings, but pure boring,
right him? Playing? So New Jersey is where you grew up.
Yeah, that's that, I assume hearing that. And it's interesting that you
say that your dad would go and get you bagels every morning, just like
my dad did. But my dad wasn't known as a legendary professional wrestler.
Well, I mean in our neighborhood. I'm trying to think back because you
know, obviously we're talking to sixty years ago. Yeah, but I think
of like just thinking of I guess wrestlers are on the road all the time.
That's what I think when I think of a son of a wrestler.
Oh he was, Yeah, he was so. I mean when I say
he went to get bagels, it wasn't every day. Okay, Well when
he was in town, and especially on Sundays. Sundays was when he got
bagels, and then he got other stuff from the Delhi across the street,
because I was like, a you know, the special thing you got whitefish
whitefish was the other thing, whitefish herring. Um, My dad loved Borsh.
He is a big Borsh guy. I can never I can ever really
acquire a taste for beet juice. No, I'm not into it. I
didn't even know what that was. Sport. Yeah, So your dad Boris
Milenko, Um, well that was part of his name, Okay, his
full moniker was the Great Professor Boris Maximilianovic Milenko. And would he stress that
to you. No, not at all. Just to get the record straight,
just to get the red Okay. Your grandfather, you said right away,
was so it was your grandfather And was he I'm guessing he wasn't in
the wrestling industry, wasn't even a sports guy. Interesting, he was just
he was just a small guy who could sew a whole suit from scratch.
Yeah, amazing Taylor, but not a sports guy. And then you are,
so your father just picked up wrestling, do you know, like,
I don't know how much you have talked with your dad or know all these
ins and outs of you know, I mean the same thing about all of
us, um or at least most of us grown up. You don't.
You don't really sit and say, hey pop because my dad was popum,
Hey pop? You know, tell me about your life before I came around
and you ruined everything? And is there like, is there much on record
about him that you've like since when did he passino? So since ninety four,
have you like ever gone and started like research stuff or since the internet
became prevalent the only thing the only thing that I ever researched, Well,
I didn't research my daughter did um? So I was telling telling you previously,
you know I have My grandfather was a tailor and he had a tailor
shop and he had he actually owned the building, and then the building was
a pest control place and he had the tailorshop on the ground floor, and
then if you go up his stairs to the second floor, he had an
apartment and then there were two apartments above that, so he had he owned
a building. There were three apartments. There was a tailor shop, and
I mean I could still smell that place to the day. Not it wasn't
a bad smell. It's just the smells of a tailors shop, you know,
the the cleaning materials. And he had this big steam press and stuff
like that. Well when he came and he did that when he came from
Europe, and he did that. He came through in the changed his name
to Simon, which our name was legally Simon. It's always been that,
but I knew that it really wasn't before he got to the States. Now
he had a brother, and his brother went down to Buenos Aires. They
never saw each other again. In sixty years from the time that they split
up coming over from Europe, they never saw each other again. So I
never really knew what our full our real last name was. Karl Gotch gave
me the name Joe Sarkoff when I went to was kind of a funny name
rather than jerkof Jello Sharkoff when I went to Japan, so I thought,
okay, maybe it's Sharkoff. And I don't remember why I even thought that
he would give me a name and it would be the correct name of my
grandfather as he came to States. So my daughter, my younger daughter,
she researched it Ellis Island stuff, and she found that it was Sierkin s
I r K I N it was. It was seen in the records.
She had the records of him, you know, arriving on Ellis Island,
the change of the name from Syrkin to Simon. And so now, if
I wanted to do, I could check out when his aires and probably find
a whole side of my family down there. Wait, but Carl got kind
of got that close. He did get it pretty close. And maybe he
did, and maybe he did that because my dad. I don't think my
dad knew what well, I can't say. I don't think I never heard
my dad say here was your last name before it was changed to Simon.
So I would think that my dad knew. And maybe my dad said something
to Carl and he just said, okay, starkoff, right. Maybe that's
that's what he remembered, that's what he remember. Yeah, who the hellmet
were they? Buddy? Were they buddies? Carl and my dad were very
close for instant yea, yeah. Yeah. When when Carl came into the
States, he came into Minneapolis first through God in his territory, and my
dad was up there, and nobody wanted to Nobody wants to bother with Carl
for a number of reasons he was. He was a bit of a countrarian.
At that point. My dad walked up to him in the dress room
and said something to the fact, which is kind of strange because carls ten
years older than my dad, or was ten years old in a minute.
Um, my dad came up to Carl and said, hey, kid,
you know you want to go grab a bite. It was after the matches,
and from that moment on, Carl took a liking to my father because
he was the only guy who extended his hand and said, hey, you
know, let's go talk. So from that from that point they were great
friends for most of their life. Kind of fell apart a little bit last
few years for a couple of reasons, but then re regathered their steam as
friendship right before my dad dynastic. Yeah, because when I think of so
people of my generation, I guess like I think of the Gotchas and Milincos,
I think of like Florida, like both of them training people probably in
like in their backyards. Like you know, I think there's something like ma
Noor Suzuki doing like squats with Carl Gotch watching him in the other Japanese lads.
And then you know you hear the stories of like the Malinco camp in
Florida. So yeah, it was all I mean, it was all one
big happy family, although was separated at some level Karl's Karl's training and the
submission style stuff that he did, which was the precursor to MMA as we
know what today. He had a lot of Japanese guys coming over to the
States and they would go to there, you know, I would, They
would a couple other guys here in the States. We'd all go out to
his house and we trained his house. There were many days and I lived
out there in the back room. That was one thing. But then we
also had our wrestling school, wrestling school, and a lot of guys came
there to learn pro. Some of the guys that came there to learn pro
also wanted to learn to shoot, so you know, shoot fighting, so
we called it shooting. They would get on the mat and they you know,
they wanted to go through what it took to become a submission wrestler,
and you know, they would do a little bit of that, and a
couple of guys even went overseas as part of UM yeah uf U WFI at
the time. Fujiwara Gumi. Um he came. Glenn Jacobs, Yeah,
he was over there shoot fighting. He went over there and did well,
you know these were worked, Yeah, a lot of them were worked fights.
But yeah, he went over there once. So like, help me
with that timeline then, because in my head, if if the Minco school
was in Florida, but you were up in Jersey. So did you move
down to Florida at the young age? Yeah, I moved down when you
moved down. It wasn't just me because I was a kid. I was
twelve or so. Okay, we moved down in sixty eight. Hey,
the shows are at free over on Patreon. But let's take a quick break
and we'll be right back. So we came down the first time in sixty
two sixty three. Things get a little fuzzy after a few years on the
earth. Um, sixty two sixty three, we came down the first time.
That's the first time I ever met gotch as a twelve year old.
Oh no, you were younger than I was. Yeah, at sixty two
sixty three, so I would have been So I was born at fifty six,
so I would have been six seven years old. Do you have like
viving like not hell yet memories. I was scared to death, It's right,
I was scared to death. I mean he was a he was a
He was just a big, bony, scary some bitch. And what would
you what would you call him, sir? Like grandpa Grandpa Goche? No,
No, yeah, I mean I called him. I think I called
him Carl when I was a young kid even and uh so that was sixty
two sixty three. We lived on clear Water Beach for a little bit.
Then we then we went from there, we traveled more. We ended up
in San Francisco. We ended up out in Ohio, uh No, Omaha,
Nebraska, Saint Joe, Missouri. We were in Charlotte, North Carolina.
We eventually made our way back to Tampa, and we ended up back
in Tampa in sixty eight, at sixty nine. And the rational reason for
that, rational in my mind my dad's eyes, was I need to I
need to get someplace and settled in because my kids need to stop being gypsies
and um, you know, being at a school and stay there and get
to know the kids. Yeah. Well, so the family was in Jersey,
but you were a traveling family then and ball you mean your grandpa,
No, my grandfather stayed put. My grandfather, That's what I'm saying.
So like you were there, just like to have those memories. But for
the most part, you were. You were flying around. Yeah, we
were on Well you didn't fly I mean very rarely. I didn't mean in
the actual Sano. We Yeah, you were driving around. We drove everywhere,
okay, and who twenty four hours straight? Forty eight hours straight?
Um, and and you know it's that typical thing. You got to sit
and look back at those days and you gotta laugh. Because the place that
I the place that I resided in the car was that back ledge under the
rear window, and I would lay out there. It was nice and toasty,
especially if you were driving in the wintertime. It's nice and toasty because
you have got the sun coming through. You didn't have a seatbelt, you
didn't have it. I mean, you were laid out as a little kid.
You you were, I mean if if my dad stopped short, I
was a projectile. Yeah, I was gonna hit two cars in front of
us. I mean, and I was thinking there's no internet obviously. So
and you're driving forty eight hours. What do you just being the crap out
of your brother? He's been, he's he's annoying you. You're being the
crap out of it you're doing. Mom and dad are yelling at you.
Your dad put you out of the car. Your mom says, Laby,
you can't leave him here in the middle of Ohio. You gotta let him
back in the car. Wow. Is it comic books or anything or just
there should have been? It was a comic book? My mom my mom.
My mom was a chance smoker. I mean she would just smoke and
smoke a smoke, so be in the car and you know sometimes I mean
be dead a winner. Yeah, she'd have the window crack, maybe just
a little bit, but it barely did anything. I'm surprised. Yeah,
I've got so much secondhand smoke. God knows. And is it just you
and your brother? Yeah? Yeah, and another guy who wrestles. Yeah.
Did either of you pick up smoking or I guess I don't want to
speak for him. And sometimes that's the thing, is like Jesus, like
Mom smokes, it's so gross, or Mom smokes, I'm gonna start smoking.
No, I hated it, Yeah, of course I hated it.
So your your dad's lifestyle was constantly wrestling, and were you constantly going to
the wrestling shows? And like, I don't know, like an overall like
how did you feel about it? Were like looking back on it, like
were you happy with how that maybe those first twelve years kind of worked or
do you have do you have any kind of feelings of like maybe that wasn't
the lifestyle for for us or a father shouldn't be doing that. I don't
know, think and Andrew is see all of the about you know, yeah,
because you know there were those moments, man, where you're There's not
much that I can say today that I haven't said before, at least at
some point in my life to somebody. And I would always talk about the
fact that you know, I was I was a kid in the early sixties
and I'm sitting in Madison Square Garden. It's my dad, and it's Wahoo
McDaniels and Bobo Brazil and Bruno Sam Martino and Um you know Pedro more Alice
a little bit later. I mean you you you know, the the stalwarts
of wrestling history, and in the Northeast, you know, these are legendary.
Mark Sam Martino was a god in his day. Right, So you're
this little kid, You're around all these people, and I always, you
know, I always laugh about the fact that. And I another story I
tell all the time is here, I live in this little place in Irvington,
New Jersey, you know, small house because I looked at it the
other day on Google Maps and I went, oh, my god, how
we even live really? That's pretty funny looking. Yeah, and uh,
you know, we used to have we used to have the Kentuckians come over,
so, um, you know Jake's dad, Jake the Snake's dad and
uh Sam Houston. Yeah, so their dad was one of the Kentuckians.
And then you know, so one day we'd have the Kentuckians show up.
So these guys are sixteen sixty nine, and then the next day we'd have
Lord Littlebrook or sky Lolo, you know, three foot two. So you
were one of those houses that had like the revolving door of wrestlers all the
time. Do you think it was because there was a sense of family in
your household. Um, I don't know what was that. Look, my
dad loved the business, okay, so that was you know, that was
his that was his woman. It was was the business. So as much
as he could, he wanted to be around the boys. He really didn't
like being around too many other people there. And it wasn't that he was
a jerk or anything. He just he just he hung in the business to
which he you know, put forth all his effort because it was easier for
him. And you gotta remember back in those days, you know, the
days of k fabe, which we would have never said twenty years ago.
Um, you just want to You just wanted to hang by yours. You
didn't want to have to deal with, you know, being grilled about the
business. So I was gonna say explaining it, right, You just didn't
want to deal with it, so you you just stayed with the boys.
I don't remember really having I remember my mom having other friends besides the people
in the business, but I really don't remember my dad having maybe a couple
through the years later on in his life as he got much older. Yeah,
he had friends who weren't pros but dry sense of humor. Um.
Really, he was a he was a very funny man. He was he
was he was a he was very strong with you know, that whole self
deprecating kind of thing. Um. Yeah, he would say things and be
off based on purpose. And my mom would be historical ant number one number
his number one UM comedy fan for about two days out of forty years.
The rest of the time not so much. And then, um, so
you went to all these shows. Yeah, were you like this little kid
like running around everyone playing with you or were you into it? Maybe?
You know, I don't want you to speak for your brother, but were
you Were you both into it? Was? Yeah, because I was.
So. I'm four years older than my brother, and that's not you know,
that's not significant, but especially in those earlier days, I was a
guy. I was a kid running around, more and more interactive my kid.
My brother was a small child, so I got to know the old
timers. I was more out and about than my brother was. Um,
but it wasn't it wasn't just happening. A lot of times I would just
sit there and sit there next to my mom and watch some matches, you
know, would be in the back and watch some matches in fact one one
h you know, And this happened a few times because I was I still,
you know, you can be told certain things as a small child,
but you still don't grasp it fully. And I remember there was one house
show. It was a small town somewhere out in the wherever, the Midwest
or something, and my dad hits a guy and guy goes out of and
my dad was a heel. Guy hits My dad hits a guy now refers
in the middle, arguing with my dad, and the guy goes under.
The ring comes down, it comes through the under, the ring comes back
up the other side of the ring. My dad's standing looking I'm a little
kid, I'm dad, watch out. And my mom my mom, My
mom almost threw me under the chair. She's like, shut up, boom
because yeah, it's my dad. Man, this guy sneaking up on my
father. Of course, did he give did he ever give you a sit
down and be like you gotta boom me? Did you say you gotta boom
me? Nah? Not really? And then any any guys that like like
looking back to find memories of someone being like not like a big brother,
But I don't know, there's a special place in my heart for like the
wrestler that always goes over the kids and makes friends with them. I had
a lot of I had a lot of second dads, um, And not
to take anything away from my father, because here's here's he was my pop.
But I had a lot of I had a lot of guys who really
stepped up and were really great with me. Don Curtis was one. I
didn't spend a lot of time around down but he was just a phenomenal man.
In fact, I just talked to his wife, Dottie half an hour
ago. EDWARDO Perez, who wrestled in the h He was from Buenos Aires.
He wrestled in Florida for a long time. It's from Kansas City originally
and then well through one of his areas to Kansas City back down to Florida.
Um, he was like he was like a dad, you know,
m Jacob Groby, Hans Mortier at the time. So I had had a
half a dozen, had had a half a dozen pro wrestling fathers who watched
out for me and took care of me. And in fact, I was
just down at the at the Dragos Says Museum here in Waterloo, and they
had a thing about Abe Jacobs, who wrestled with Don Curtis as a tag
team. Abe was a New Zealander. Um, I think he's still around.
He's gonna be in his he's gonna be in his late eighties, maybe
I think so. I don't. I don't. I think he's still with
us. But Abe, you know, before I so in seventy seventy eight
or seventy seven, right before the summer of seventy eight, I guess,
I was up in Charlotte and Abe worked with me to get me ready to
go down to Mexico City because I was going to go down there work for
Flores at the time for that summer. So this would have been seventy summer
seventy eight. And just guys did then, you know, they they kind
of if you were if you were a son of one of the guys in
the business, especially my dad, because you pretty well thought of Yeah,
you know, they just all they just all kind of took care of me.
Um. I mean that out of a place to be. That obviously
makes me think. I think of Abe Jacobs, I think of your father.
I think of me as a Jewish wrestler. And then is that so
is that stuff that both you you know or your father? Is that stuff
that was talked about? Was would you was like I feel like Abe Jacobs
is like probably one of the more famous ones, as is your father.
Right, So I don't know if that was like in the atmosphere at that
time. I guess anytime it's you know, you mean, you mean the
thing Jewish Jewish side of this? Um did did you know? Did the
bad stuff was talked about? Not the good stuff, Okay, the bad
stuff, the anti Semitism that existed, and it was strong, you know,
and he was It was strong. It was strong with me as a
kid when I lived in Jersey, and it was strong with my dad when
he was trying to make it in the business. And even when he succeeded,
there were a lot of you know, there were a lot of issues
of being a being a Jew. Would he come home and talk about it
or would you see it at the matches? I mean I I experienced it
firsthand through his eyes, and yeah he would. My dad wasn't a complainer,
so he was he was a pretty you know, he was a pretty
easygoing person. He loved life. Yeah, He didn't complain about it,
but he he made me aware of it. You know. I think it
was one of these things that, hey, Jody, you're gonna be out
there and you're gonna try and make things go for yourself whatever that means,
you know, come to some modicum of success measured by whatever. And in
order to do that, you're gonna find that you're probably at some point to
fight against you know, who you are as a you know, as a
Jewish man. Okay, I'll deal with it, right, And that was
there like a brother ship though I think of because I think of a Jacobs
are just um, not really not that you know, not that I not
that I recollect them. And it wasn't like it wasn't like all the Jews
gathered together, got to stay together, right, Okay, Okay, so
you move when you're Jewish ress room. Yeah, there's a Jewish dressing room.
And now you're two doors down. Jews are down two doors now,
and there's a missus daughter. Right, don't forget. The shows are ad
free on Patreon. But right now we'll take a break. We'll be right
back. So you moved it when you're when you're twelve to Florida. I
guess maybe let's talk about your galloping into the industry. But it's like you
you were one of these kids who was probably in it since you were a
child, right, Yeah, you know, the one the one thing that
I said about my dad, he my dad made things available, didn't push,
didn't persuade, didn't course, none of that stuff. Definitely not at
a level that was, um, you know, like a stage mom or
something like that. It was, hey, this is what I do for
a living. You know, if you if you like it. I'm not
gonna tell you whether I like it or not to like it, but if
you do end up liking it and you want to do something, I'm trying
to help you if I can. Um. And you know, my dad
ran a lot of independent stuff at some point in his life. So you
know, obviously book my brother and I on his shows. Before my brother
end up really doing well here in the States. I picked up in Japan
mostly because of Carl and my dad's my dads connections, and I mean very
early. You said I never did this for a full time living. Yeah,
was that I don't know, like was that a conscious but it was
by design, by design that I was almost I was on you know,
at times, I was almost prideful about the fact that I and this is
gonna sound terrible, and I'm almost, you know, almost like umpany.
But I was one of the guys that used the business instead of being used
by the business. And for a lot of guys who's being used and spit
out by the business, you know, I always wanted to make sure that
whatever happened in the ring, I had something to fall back on. My
dad. My dad, I almost said, he drove that home with me.
He really, and you know it's not like he drove it home,
but he he through everything he did, he helped me to understand. And
I guess I guess I watched him too, and I knew that my dad
had nothing to fall back on, and so I just figured, Okay,
well I've better, I've better make sure, I better make sure something is
there. And so yeah, I went to college. I went pharmacy school
and got my pharmacy degree. Always dabbled in the resting business because it was
just fun. I mean, you know, in pharmacy, no matter what
you're doing, whether or not you're working a you're working in a hospital job,
you're working for the pharmaceutical industry, or you're working in community based practice
setting or something along those lines. I'm an oncollegy pharmacist, so I've played
in the area of cancer care for thirty years. But you know, at
no point in your time as a pharmacist, and no point in your career
as a pharmacist, you ever have you know, sixty seventy thousand people chanting
your name, you're right? Or do you ever go wow, this is
a lot of fun. Yeah, and yeah, and if you show up
the pharmacy in a paradise greased up. Okay, So what what age was
your first match? In my head, it was fourteen? Well, I
mean I played around, you know, I played around at a young age,
but my first real match probably probably eighteen eighteen nineteen. And what were
the steps? Was it like Dad teach me or Carl teach me for X
amount of weeks or like you had to have known how to do this stuff
or maybe yeah, I don't know, No, I did, I you
know, like I didn't. I didn't have the I didn't have the finer
points um pulled together yet. But I had the basic mechanics of how to
work a match and at least I could go in and out of holds and
yeah, that was that was pretty easy, and it was. It was
really only later on in life by you know, then understanding what I needed
to do in the ring. I could then talk to my dad and other
people and go, okay, so how do you how do you really have
a match out of this? You know? I mean you can you can
go through the paces or you can have a match that that takes a house
down right, you know, And they're two different things. And who was
the first one to like really to explain that to you? Um? My
dad, Yeah, my dad, my dad. It's hard to talk about
your dad in such glowing turns because he's your dad, and people go,
well, he's your dad. But it's beyond that my dad had. If
he wasn't my dad, I would still say this. He had an amazing
ring psychology. And again this is one of those stories. So, um,
you're not getting this new so Ford Homer astute Armory. My dad's in
the ring. So first, first off, Tony Charles and Billy Robinson two
British men, two british men who had a well. Tony wasn't British,
he was from he was a Welshman algi only to Tony Um. So they
had a they had an amazing match. I mean they pulled out all the
stops and they did all the gimmicks and it was it was it was great
to watch for me because I enjoyed. I enjoyed what they did because I
know, I knew what it takes for them. I knew what it took
for them to do that. But the rest of the crowd at Ford,
Homer, Hastley, Armory Um didn't get off their hands. And for the
listener, I mean it's very like technical they put on Yeah, they put
on a Tritish they put on a typical British technicals show. Yeah, and
they were amazing, and they were great and and even even their you know
their English style, you know their English style upper cuts and stuff I did.
It looked like tear your head off. And Tony Charles had a drop
kick that was amazing. I mean, these guys they were they were great
hands. But it was a typical style and it was a lot of back
and forth. It was just it was just too much for the crowd,
and the crowd really couldn't pull the psychology from what they were doing it.
Just it didn't it didn't tell any story, you know, it was just
it was just a lot of athleticism, like a lot of stuff todays.
So so you know, I'm watching this and Tony and Billy get done,
and they get upstairs, and my dad's now down and Tony comes and I'm
standing at the top of the railing and Fort Homer Hestley Armory by the dress
room. You'd have to know the place. What's what state? Oh,
this is Florida, Tampa, Flarida. Okay, yeah, they used to
call the Madison Square Garden of the South, so they oh, this is
Florida championshipress Claria Championship, breshing Um. This was probably mid seventies or right
as I was so seventy four. I graduated high school seventy four, so
probably some time around there, because when my dad came in, I think
just for a couple of shots towards the end of his career there because he
was up in the Carolina's So he comes in, ton Charles and Billy Robinson
get done. Tony comes up through the dress room. He stands next to
me on the on the balcony. We're overlooking the ring and my dad gets
in the ring. You can just my dad starts out slow and I forget
who he was in with. It really didn't matter at the time. He
could have been in wing with a broom you know, the proverbial broomstick,
right, and he's doing his thing, and you could just feel the crowd,
you know, just you can just feel the pulse of the crown and
all of a sudden, you know, you feel the heat gathering and my
dad just did two fingers in the eye and the polace erupted. I mean,
you would have thought you would have thought that my dad just did this
spot that was like amazing. He just did the old you know, three
s two, just two fingers in the yeah, because he was known for
that. It was it was it was a silly gimmick. In fact,
Luthez He used to make fun of him for his silliness. And Tony Tony
Charles would stand next to me. He looks over me because he didn't see
it, and he's looking at me like this, he's what do you do?
What crazy thing? Like, what do you do? And I said,
did he did this? You just and you just see him trying to
process this and his mind, and you know, you can tell that he
was thinking to himself, I just went out there and destroyed my body for
twenty minutes, did everything that I could ever possibly do in a ring,
and this guy does two fingers in the eye. He took the house down.
He brought the house down, and I and my thing after that was
it wasn't just that he did that, it was when he did it.
He didn't do it one second too early, he didn't do it one second
too late. You know, it's it was his timy. Man, he
just knew, he just knew when he had to do something to make that
crowd pop. And you couldn't hear yourself think in that place at times.
And he was good at that. And really, you know, there's a
level of that that you can't teach. You can get to a certain point,
but you know, there's only so many guys that have that kind of
timing where they just know they had that sense of the crowd. And it's
years of years of years of matches, yeah and things, and you're dead
put. A little bit of luck I've had. I've had a couple of
matches like that in my life that just kind of popped up and yeah,
and after the match, you're like, holy crap, that felt really good.
Yeah, that was a good match. Yeah. Okay, So the
first match was just on an independent I don't even remember where it was.
I mean, it wasn't for all Japan. It was Madison, Yeah,
probably yeah, probably on the outskirts of Tampa somewhere, just a random Okay,
but your trajectory is Japan. I think that's where I did. That's
where I did most of my stuff whatever my stuff was, okay, yeah,
most of Japan. Okay, I did you know I did. I
did show for w c W. I did a couple of things there,
a couple of things for w W at the time. But I think I
wrestled to Dark Match for WWE, and did I forget even what I did?
And then and then we had yeah, I had a very non memorable
um US career. And then you know, then again we had independent productions.
One was called Global Wrestling Alliance, which ran out of Miami, South
Florida. It was actually it was actually a penny stock at the time.
And then we uh, you had Don Curtis and Louis to lettum Ran ran
a promotion out of Jacksonville for a while. Um, we had TV up
there, so you know, we we had TV a few times. Smaller
promotions never really got anywhere. It was so hard, especially in the days
of the territory right before you know, the explosion of Vince and Crew and
Turner. Would you couldn't you couldn't compete against the guys who owned the territories.
Would you travel with your dad to these shows? Yeah? Sometimes?
Yeah? Or was it uw F I or UWF when you was that like
your that was my intro into Japan, right, and so like how long
did it take to get to there? Well, out to LA was about
it for four or five hours, and then from LA to thank you,
thank you beautiful well man, I don't know, probably uh when did I
go the first time? Eighty three? Maybe to Japan down It probably took
me six or seven years before you were doing little shows, and literally I
was just doing little which maybe we were also, you know, keep in
mind, probably the greatest if if the Molco family has a legacy besides you
know, having matches, and some of the match has been pretty damn good.
We trained a lot of guys we were Yeah, we had the school
we placed a lot of guys. I lose track of some of the boys
that we got into the business. Both we WCW WWE guys who went out
to you know, major promotions around the country when the you know, when
the regional efforts were still running strong and did well. Um, so so
tell me, like if you're if you said it from eighteen to twenty four,
you were doing that, but you were doing the school Like how would
how would it work? Like you go to you go to college, you
come home, you helped training, you're there, you're watching it. I
would I would get there as much as I could. You know, my
dad really was the school. Well, we had in different places. We
had uh we had in the back of a judo plays in Tampa called ed
Mally's Florida Judo. Then we had a building out in Stepfner or something one
of the rural areas of that your real last name who what my real last
name is, serkan Yan? Yeah. Yeah. Then we had like a
in in a field behind some guy's house. Um, he was a pipe
fabricator, but he let us use this warehouse that he had behind his house.
So we uh, we wrestled out the warehouse and then warehouse their house,
um you know, Frankenstein and then uh and then um Brooks was Jewish
dude, and I've never seen it. Don't yell at me, are you
seriously? Oh my god? You know, being with a Mazza Bryers,
um so. And then we got a little place. We actually wrestled out
of a mattress factory, Florida mattress for a while. We with Wally von
Strohei, and my dad got Wally to let us open the place and go
in there. We wrestled out there for a while, and then we wrestled
in an industrial park, Dab's Industrial Park. And at this time, you
know, you hear the stories. It's like maybe the Monster factory and like
the mid eighties was the first one to like publicize like we'll teach you the
business. Um. So it's always weird to hear about wrestling story like wrestling
schools kind of like seventies and eight like early eighties and not exposed. But
like you know, like there wasn't like an actual well to my knowledge,
like these like mass schools. I guess no, I mean they didn't have
the you know, they didn't have first of all, I mean you know
WCW. You know w c W, the power Plan, you know WWE
had, uh, you know, the Championship Wrestling Florida deal with Steve with
current and at the time who took over a lot of our guys when my
dad and my brother closed up shot because getting back to our school, my
dad and my brother really ran. I would show up, work out,
teach a little bit, you know, play some games, and then get
the hell out of there. We were we were, I mean we were
we were one of the few schools. First of all, my dad barely
charged people a lot of times. Yeah, he was. He was a
terrible businessman. Yeah, in my head, it's like a racket, Like
he's like, no, it wasn't. But for my dad it was.
It was anything. But I mean he just he just loved the business.
And it was sad because he probably could have done fairly well because he had
the you know, he had the pedigree and he had the uh, he
had the results of guys who went and did pretty well. You know,
the Canes of the World and the Mark Muros and the tugboats and I mean
the list goes on. You know, Gang Grell and a bunch of guys
who came out of school who did okay, um, so he could have
played off of that, and he probably could have milked the hell out of
guys who came in. He just didn't do that well. I always laugh
with you know, you know Norman smiling. Yeah, Norman one of the
greatest guys around. Man. Norman's awesome guy. Um trade trained me in
a little bit in the w W system. I mean we trained, you
know, we trained Norman. Yeah, and uh yeah, I think Norman.
I think Norman's feet of my dad was like seven hundred bucks he came.
I may be I may be wrong about this, but I don't think
I am. If Norman never corrects me out say okay, yeah, but
yeah, I think I think his few was like seven hundred bucks or something.
My dad to start or you know, for however many weeks, and
then he came to my dad later, I says, hey, late Larry,
I you know, I'm a little short. My dad said, you
know, sort of, don't worry about it. And I don't think.
I don't think Norman ever paid him back anything. It was funny at an
event one time, I said, hey, Norman, my dad before he
passed away. He said, get that son of a bitch's money from him.
Last thing, the last thing. It was the last thing you ever
do you need to collect the money from Norman. Yeah, but that that
was who he was. Man, He just he he didn't he didn't care
about this stuff. He wasn't the guy. He wasn't the guy to hit
you for two thousand dollars, tell you that you were going to be a
superstar, and then you know, two weeks later you were looking for him.
Right, Which, there's a lot, so many, a lot of
stuff that goes on my dad guy and guys and guys who never did anything
themselves, who opened up at school and say I'm gonna make you something,
and you know when there's opportunity that that's when they come out, right.
Yeah, it's it sucks. Don't forget. The shows are ad free over
on Patreon. But right now we'll take a quick break and then we'll be
right back. When I think about you, like then, the most notorious
thing for me is kind of watching the Malaco Brothers in All Japan. Um,
so I guess maybe you can help me tell like getting there and tagging
with your brother. Yeah, I mean we uh don't tell me to lay
my jokes. Only flying well one time per per podcast. So yeah,
Lord Blair's was in Hawaii, and I think I think Mark Karl, I
think Karl made the connection with Lord Blairs at the time for me, but
it was from my brother as well. And so Lord Blair's got us book
the first time, and then uh yeah, I mean we just started going.
Things kind of clicked. You know. The nice thing about the nice
thing about Baba was he recognized before the States recognized that he could get a
lot out of his junior heavyweights, you know, that he could get a
lot out of his smaller guys. Um. And a lot of that was
due to the fact that a lot of the Japanese boys were smaller guys,
but they were just phenomenal performers. I mean, I love the working over
there because I never you know, with the exception of a couple of the
guy Jane and I never got on the ring with a guy who I looked
at one with a slacker, you know, he who's who's just holding back
and not giving you everything he needs to give to make a match happen.
Um. So it was, it was. It was a great place to
be in Baba. Baba was just good about cultivating that. And he you
know, if you if you worked, if you worked hard for him,
he'd take care of you. And he you know, he took us up
and pay and rewarded us. You know, we were never going to be
and we were never going to be at the level of the World Warriors or
the stand Hanson's of the world. But you know, he took care of
us and brought us back and we had we had the opportunity pretty much within
reason, call our shots as to how much we wanted to be there.
I was restricted because I was a farm. Yeah, So tell me about
like what your gaps were you there or what? What do you think like
eighty eight to something? Well, start, I think I started. So
I started with u WF in eighty three. If I'm not again, that's
famous, if I'm not mistaken phrase. Yeah, Um, everything else is
a blurner. I mean, I know, I know, the like tours
of late eighties, I was going pretty strong with all with All Japan.
You were going, I'm doing a bunch of tours, right, Yeah,
I was doing a bunch of tours. Yeah. So then my brother kind
of pulled away for a while because he started here in the States, and
so I ended up going and doing my own thing. I was tagged up
with you know, Kobashi who became pretty special became Yeah, shamrock Can was
my tag partner, and that was fun experience. How are you taking off
of what do you because? Correct me if I'm wrong? Like your vision
is like I got to make sure I have this job to go back to,
right, Yeah, So what tell me about your thoughts as uh as
that kind of the struggle, that kind of struggle of thinking, you know,
as all I can say, it was a blur. Man. I
look back and I think, if I add all the things up that I
was doing at the time, looking back, you know, hindsight, if
I if I add all the things up, it was more than twenty four
hour a day, and it took up more time than than than was available
on a clock. Did you I'm not sure. How the hell did you
have a pharmacy job? Yeah, and you said I need three weeks off
every seven weeks. I would just I would just get time off. You
know. The new thing about So here's anything about pro wrestling. It's a
novelty. There's not a lot of pro wrestlers out there, and there's not
a pro a lot of pro wrestlers, you know, there's a lot I
run into guys who say, yeah, my my cousin was a pro wrestler.
What's his name, Yeah, the masked Uh, you know, the
massed assassin. Oh, that massed assassin, the guy in you know,
the guy in some small town in Minnesota. There are diamond does, but
guys who really do it and who can talk about it and who've had a
chance to work in the ring with some you know, some big, some
big guys. That's a novelty. So the people that I worked for and
the people that I deal dealt with back then and even today, I'll be
doing business deals and you know, people will say, so I heard you
wrestle, and I'll say, yeah, here's what I did. And they
were like, oh my god. And then they'll check on the Internet and
they're like, I can't believe I was dealing with a What's just dealing with
the company in Belfast. They're an Informattish company. They deal in they deal
in data coming out of labs off of these milecular tests, off off of
tumors. And here I am talking with these people, you know, these
high brow folks, and the guy said something about wrestling, and before you
know it, the whole conversation was about wrestling, because it's a novelty.
And sometimes I get bored and you know, think, oh my guy,
we're talking wrestling again. But it serves a purpose. It's got me the
opportunity to do a bunch of other stuff, and it gets me sometimes.
It gets to me business deals because it's I'm the guy who's a wrestler.
Well, and also you're you're not masked Assassin number seven. They see a
clip of you a boudicon right or whatever it is, which is pretty well.
And then look, my brother had. My brother had a lot of
notoriety. He was a phenomenal hand in the ring. If they have no
clue on God's Green or who the hell I was, most people most because
I'll say Milenco, somebody they'll say Dean Minco again. My favorite, my
favorite, my favorite story is I met a fan fest in Charlotte. I
was brought in because they were getting my dad an award um as part of
the mid midst mid Atlantic Championship Pressing deal back in the day. So they
bring me in I'm talking to Paul Orndoff, and Paul's talking to me,
and some fans seeing me talking to him, and then I go to get
on the elevators, the elevator with these fans and they're like, oh,
you know him, Do you know Paul? I said, yeah, you
know, we used to We used to know each other in Tampa pretty well.
You know, when he was dressing I was drestling and stuff. And
they went, you wrestle. I said yeah, I said Molenco And they
look and they go Dean Molenco and I said no, Joe, and they
went oh, and then they turned and they started talking. But I,
I mean, you know, was I was, I a little bit maybe,
But I was also laughing. I mean because I I knew my players.
I know my players. My brother had a hell of a career and
he was probably one of the best technicians ever, even Jerry Jerry Briscot one
time just walked up to me out of the blue, and so I just
want to let you know that of all the people who I ever considered,
you know, the technical guys, your brother may have been the best.
I'm damn yeah, yeah, you're not too shabby yourself, Yes, for
sure. And then and and I guess those tours, years of tours of
all Japan, who was who are you hanging out with? And I don't
know if it's like the scrape like because I have my experiences of Japan,
of Japanese tours, and and I'm a romantic like that, Like when I
when I toured Japan, I always think like these are the this is what
the ones before me did or England, like this is the you know I
used to do those buttling camp if you remember those, Like I'd be like,
you know, the ones before me did this. And there's something that
always sticks with me. And I feel like I'm doing the job and I
am a wrestler and so you know, and I like to be in the
moment of what I'm doing though, so is your touring with all Japan,
which is huge at the time, like who are you with? Who are
you hanging out with? And then also like how are you taking in these
experiences? So when my brother was there, my brother and I spent a
lot of time together. Um, Doug fur Nest was probably my arguably maybe
my best friend overseas, so we spent a lot of time. I would
train with him because he was just you know, he was a freaking beast
man. Um, you trained Doug. You trained legs with Doug Furness,
you trained legs. No, No, if hans are butts, well the
only butts are your butts to the ground, because you don't you don't squat
halfway down, and you squat with Doug for ness. Uh And then um,
stand Hanson, I got to be I like him. He's just a
he's just a good guy. And so you know, I would hang I
would hang around him a lot because it's the great thing about hanging with stand,
especially if you're going out with him at night, is all you had
to do is hang back and just walk behind him, because he was a
bowl in a china shop, and he would just go through the entire city.
It was almost like zillah, yeah, run everybody, oh real Japanese.
Yeah, he was just and he just bulled his way through the whole
city and you just walk behind him and laugh your ass off. But also
like right, a monster in the ring, but seemed like a sweet man.
No, he's he's a great guy, great attitude. Great Yeah.
I was gonna say not, may you tell me? Probably not an egomaniac
or I don't know, no, but but knew that he was good.
But I knew that he was good. Yeah, I mean definitely knows.
He definitely knew that he was top dog over there. Cool no no,
no, no, no questions ask you. He knew, he knew who
he was. And I did have a question about Baba, because it's I
don't know as an American who just like you know, I don't know you
hear Baba an okie like you hear these things, um like who was he
a nice man? Like? Who was he was? Do you have experiences?
So I had, I had, you know, I had minimal direct
interactions with him. Okay, Baba, just you know if look, if
you were staying or if you're you were the road Warriors or maybe you were
Abbey abdulla um. That's the stories for another podcast. Yeah, if you
if you were any of those guys, you probably got more Baba time,
gotama time song. And I see some guy in big, big parachute pants.
It's time. But I think it's like an old grandpa with giant parachute
pants. But he, um, he was Baba, you know it was
it was a giant um and I I'm almost worried. You know, he
would talk to me about and just briefly you know, oh he's had that
d voice and just call you over and you ask you what you want to
do, if you you know, you wanted to you know, you talk
a little bit about Monte Air and maybe talk to you about how many more
tours or you know what, what you want to come over for the year
or something if you were lucky enough and we had you know, we had
that kind of mid mid tier space where we could talk to him about money
and time in Japan. Um. And this was sort of right about the
time my brother was leaving and doing back here in the States. So,
I mean, I know he was larger than life. But like, did
you see him that way? Were you like intimidated or anything or no,
not at all. No, he was No, he was just he was
a fixture, you know. I mean, he wasn't he wasn't intimidating.
He didn't try to be intimidating. He was just a he was just a
big He was just a big big man. Okay. Um he even went
so far one time. So Kobashi and um this kid Kokuchi. Yeah,
yeah, Kobashi and Kokuchi. They wanted to they were they were up and
comers, you know, they wanted to push them. So Baba flew my
brother and I did to um Honolulu, and so we stayed in Hawaii and
we had a week long Malenco school in Hawaii, and we just trained Kobashi
and Kokuchi. So we spent a lot of time when we were there with
Baba and those guys and a couple of other his you know, his his
underlings. Yeah. Um, that's the most time I ever spent with Boba
directly. And now when you talk about that, like, are you like,
oh, wrestling is the best I did? I went to Hawaii for
a week or is that just one of like so many memories And you're I'm
pretty I'm pretty good about stopping, you know, smelling the roses sort of
thing. I realized and recognized at every juncture that was pretty lucky to be
where I was and to experience what I was experiencing and to see what I
mean, even look, we travel up the coast and Mount Fuji would be
sitting there in the you know, in the distance, but not so distant
that you couldn't see it, and you're just you just sit there and you
go, holy crap, that's freaking gorgeous, you know, or you'd be
driving up into into a guido and supporting you know, the snow would be
falling down and it's just the most beautiful landscapes. And I mean, and
they just people just treated you so well, you know, they they just
they were they were kind, and they were friendly, and they were um,
you know, they were appreciative of you as an athlete. They didn't
you know, no, no, at no time did you ever get all
you know that stuff's fake or they just you were a sportsman and they treated
you like that. Even though it was professional wrestling. You were no different
than you know, one of their sumo guys. It was. It was
pretty amazing stuff. And you would go out and they would you know,
you know, they called the service, right you you know, people would,
people would take care of you and and they were just so appreciative just
to be with you somewhere. And the sponsors, yeah, the sponsors where
they provide for you. And right hey, the shows are ad free on
Patreon. This will be our last break stick with us. We'll be right
back as you. I think he's slowed down because you always had this plan
of like, I'm in pharmacy, But was there a point of realization of
just like, wow, this is kind of winding down. I'm gonna go
back to I'll be I'll be the pharmacy guy. I think it's um So,
it's a two pronged deal. One is just the nature of trying to
succeed in this world and make serious money and do really well. And that
wasn't you know, the rest of the world wasn't my place. I wasn't
that wasn't going to happen. I wasn't six six, I wasn't two eighty.
I didn't have I didn't have the tool. I wasn't gifted the tools
to be the superstar, you know. I was gifted some other stuff to
be where I was at, and I was okay with that. So if
I was gonna do anything special, was going to be outside of the rescue
business. But then the other prong, which is a more hurtful one.
Your body just starts not being able to do what it did. And you,
I mean, I don't care who you are, it's inevitable, right,
um No, you made you. He's not not for Ric Flair,
maybe not for Ric Flair. But you know, I mean and we all
we all have one more match. I mean, in my head, I
could get out there and wrestle again. And then if I go out there
and I do that and I go to take a bump, I embarrassed myself.
I did. I did a couple of matches not too long ago.
I'm sixty six now, so this would have been, you know, four
or five years ago. I'm in the ring and yeah, I'm taking a
bump, but I'm taking it and I'm going down in sections you know where
where I used to just I mean, I used to splatter. I didn't
take a bump. I didn't take a bump as good as some of the
Japanese kids who just used to. I used to say they splattered because they
went down so far ass and hit the canvas so hard and you just got
this amazing pop when they went down. It was just it was so quick,
and it's just I love that. I think it was um Terry Gordy's
cousin, Richard Slater, Okay, yes, sladdic Richard. Yeah he was
a Noah guy. But all Japan before that, yeah, yeah, I
mean, and you'd come off the ropes and ed him hit him with tackle
and unbelievable. I mean he just damn just right down and so fast.
You're like, holy crap. Yeah, when you say that, I picture
like different coaches being like attack the mat. That's what I hear it attack
the mat. Yeah, that sounds familiar. Well, but I mean that's
so you couldn't do that at a sixty two. I couldn't do that at
sixty two. I definitely can't do it that. I know. I can't.
Your mind tells you you can, right, I mean Terry, you
know, Dorry Functional comes over to Japan and uh gets in the ring.
Yeah, I don't want to do that though. Two things for me and
I really I really hit heavy on this when I was a kid to myself
because I saw I saw people trying to hang on too long. I said,
I'm not gonna do that because I'm not gonna embarrass myself. I'm you
know, if if I can't have a decent match, I'm not gonna do
it. And I've actually gone against that because I probably should have stayed out
of the ring the last time I was in the ring. But the second
thing is is just hanging around the business I don't. You know, people
say, hey, you do watch this if you you know, did you
go to a raw it was in town last night, or like, no,
I don't want to be I don't want to be that guy. I
don't want to be that guy who you know was hanging outside of the dress
room and hey, you know how you doing right? Used the russ right,
Yeah, yeah, I get it for sure. Yeah, I just
I thought that was always made me. It just always made me sad when
I was a younger kid and I would watch some of the quote unquote old
timers hang around still. Well, I mean, it's great that you were
at the Iowah Hall of Fame, the National Wrestle of Hall of Fame.
So like, what's inspired you to come here? I guess I came here
last year. Jerry Briscoe told me about it. I mean a few people
told about Jerry. Jerry said, hey, you need to go, and
I said okay, and I came up here and on I had a good
time. Number One, Jerry and I have a history. He's considerably older,
and I'll remind him of that every day. But you know, we
have a history that goes back to the early seventies. So you know,
we're talking fifty years worth of knowing each other when we were kids. He
was an older kid. But when we were kids, I didn't like him
and he didn't like me, and we talked about that all the time.
Well, we just we didn't like each other. We were jerks, um
to put it nicely. Yeah, And then you know, as you get
older and you start talking and yeah, now I was realized, you have
a lot of comments. We have a lot of comment Our history is a
lot of the same stuff. Just growing up in Tampa. You know,
his brother, Jack was phenomenal. He was Jack was a sweetheart, and
you know, I knew him real well through my dad and um, so
Jerry and I've become pretty good friends. And when he came up here the
first time last well it wasn't his first time. When he came up last
year, he said, hey, you know, you need to come up
to this thing. This thing is pretty good. And then you know,
then I got here and it was nice to see some of the people I
hadn't seen for a while. Yeah, that's great. And and Dan Gabele
was like this, yeah, mega hero of mine. Back in the early
seventies, when he you know, when he took gold in the seventy two
and um, I have a chance to which was which was an awkward meeting
because I'm looking at him going hey, um here ago it was like a
hero you're you're a hero of mine, I was hero of yours. Well
somebody was a hero of somebody. And he was looking to be going,
oh that's nice. Yeah, yeah, I need to go now. And
at that at your age, you don't maybe you're like, well, my
days of feeling these feelings are probably behind me, right and then boom here
you are like being nervous to a man. It was Dan Gabele. I
appreciate you coming on. This is so nice to talk to you. Parting
words scan the rest in business, stay time, I'll go to a good
go to a good school. I don't spend two thousand dollars again. Nowhere
you still if you want to do that, send me two thousand dollars school.
You're starting a new one. But yeah, it's a post office box.
When I asked Joe what he'd like me to plug, he told me
to convince someone to start a gofund me for him so he can retire.
But I would say, maybe donate to cancer research so cancer can be cured,
and then he'll be out of a job and forced to retire. About
that. We got another show next week, but before we leave, I
do have some plugs and coming my Patreon paton dot com slash col cabanas where
you can listen to ad free archives of almost five hundred episodes of the Art
of Wrestling, ad free archives of Wrestling Anonymous and new bonus Wrestling Anonymous episodes
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This month was with Ian Ricabani and we listened to calls and we gave our
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Check out older episodes of Wrestling Anonymous and Pro Wrestling Fringe. New ones
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business stuff. Send me something fun to my po box, which can be
found at the bottom of my Websitelcabana dot com. Upcoming events this week,
I'll be at the Gathering of the Juggalos Tuesday, August ninth, Championship Wrestling
in Irvine, California. Of course the nineteenth through the twenty first at the
Monkey Barrel and then bro Scotland. Come see me and John Hastings at the
Edinburgh Fringe Saturday September three. I'll be in Mesa, Arizona for Party Hard
Wrestling's final show. September tenth, I'll be at the Mall of America for
First Wrestling Saturday Night trow and October first, i head back to one PW
the Doncaster Dome, where I will team up with my buddy mister Burridge,
and we will become Team Shag once again. Podcast cover art designed by Jimmy
Lee. Photo by James muscle White. Thanks to our forever sponsor, One
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next week with a wildlive show, and then we got shows in September and
October. Stay subscribed. The podcast was never gone and it's not going anywhere
anytime soon. As long as I could sit down with some people that I
think are super interesting, the show will go on. This has been the
art of wrestling for Cold Cabana. I'm Cold Cabana. Thanks. I guess
maybe your back off very easy, just chit chat. I want to say
hello. Tell me what you had for breakfast this morning? You hear your
levels? What do you think I had for breakfast this morning? What am
I? I'm a Jew? What did I have from boxing? Bagels?
Well? I didn't have locks, but I didn't have a bagel I was
given when I was a kid, my dad would sing, bagels, bagels
two for five. That's what keeps us Jews alive. Can we can?
I keep that as the start of this whole thing. If you want a
bagels, bagels two for five, that's what keeps us Jews alive.