It's the Lapsed Fan Wrestling podcast with Jack and carn s e O and JP
Sorrow. He's a lapsed fan and all my years and wrestling, I never
seen anything And it's the laps fan man by the one in the ring.
Forget about Sado. He the real king of swing. When the bell goes
in the kick like me throwing in the corner, but gets rash like stick.
Even Jerry King gets take off the crowd nodded in his head like it.
Steve low Brown, would you get low down? We go even high
up? Flipp you on your head, But you know cool driver, you
speak more, dragon spits fire, give you more shock than when he treats
higher drop a more truth than the con of sniper unless you with a coconut
Roddy Pipper Jack a JP he like j h D drop the cupcakes and gold
the brain Bob means the best podcast. Frost start the close cloud if you
are it's a flassic and pose Ladies and gentlemen. It's uh, it's time
to go to Milan for the first time ever. Pack your bags, boss,
I shall I say it? The fuck did this show end up in
our little hat of random shows? To Will from WWF European Rampage nineteen ninety
three from Milan, Italy. I can tell you exactly how so when we
got that incredible catalog of shows before the network, when we feared that the
network would completely be destroyed via Peacock, we have I they I when I
downloaded the collection, they were all these fucking shows, these these these fucking
pay per view esque. You know, I put I put down. I
added so much to the to the catalog because of that, just so much
of so much stuff to our to our little, our little bit of goodies.
And this was one of them, I guess. And then out it
came. So you're saying this was on the network, but it's not on
PEACX No, no, no, no, no, it was not on
network. Not on network. This was never on the network, but it
was one of those we got. We got so much stuff from that group
who collected all those shows. Oh pretty much. Yeah, And so there's
as a backstop for us. Yeah, there is there is stuff that like,
for example, this that I had no idea existed on any sort of
platform, and here we have it. And you know, there are so
many random random house shows, random European tour shows that we now have access
to that we wouldn't have had before. It's really something to get a glimpse
into WWF between WrestleMania and nine and King of the Ring. Oh yeah,
oh yeah in terms of you know, Hogan wins the belt at WrestleMania nine,
But that was kind of slapped together. He wasn't set to go on
tour. He wasn't set to be the face of w w F immediately.
Oh that, brother, what I'm the face, dude, I'm always a
face. Well, yeah, what do you mean? Therein lies the rub?
Because who do they put on top here in Milan and across the European
swing? They did here ninety three? Bre ho ho ho ho? Brother,
who's given who the rub? Huh? Who's rub? Wherein lies?
Who's rub? Who's given the rub? Brother? Well? What I mean
we're talking barbecue hero? What I'll think you got the dry rub? It
was Brett. I mean Brett versus Bam Bam Bigelow Before the King of the
Ring. I can't and would the same finish. No, less I know
the for the victory roll? Oh my god, what I know? Exactly
before King of the Ring Brett book calls the match. They have a King
of the Ring of the semi finals, right other finals, Yeah, it
was the finals finals, the best one they had, But this one really
resembles it in so many ways. It does, it does, and it's
just fascinating to see what is essentially a WWF house show circa nineteen ninety three.
Totally yep. But it just happens to be put together as a television
production because there was demand from this Italian sports network that we'll talk about to
show it and across the circuit, including in Spain, I know for sure
where they went to Barcelona. There was also television clearance for the show,
which is what a time to be alive, you know, Oh, totally,
WWF comes to your country, something that you have to watch afar without
internet, so you only get fleeting glimpses yep, yep. And then when
they do come, it's such a big deal that they put it on an
actual television it's just like a one off special event. Insane. So always
been fascinated by the degree to which WWF, particularly in this era pre Internet,
penetrated Europe. Yes, and the degree to wait which they were I
don't know, I don't say household names. But when we hear up from
our fans in the UK over the years, it just seems like in the
Hasbro era they were just taking a smidge more seriously in the UK than they
were in the US, even though of course they were more well distributed in
the US. It just seemed like a bigger deal. I mean, if
look no further of course than Summer Slam nineteen ninety two in the benchmarks that
set for a main event that you know, there's no hul Cogan. There
was really it really wasn't you know, the big drawing cards of the rock
and wrestling era just coming to the UK. They started going there in like
nineteen eighty nine, and with that started going to other European countries. That's
really won the whole idea of going on a European tour after WrestleMania, which
they still do to this day, really started And so we get a glimpse
of the nineteen ninety three flavor of that. But again because of how wacky
the top of the card was and how as we've talked about a nauseum over
the years, over ten years here on the show, Vince going back to
Hogan in Vegas. It just left like this crew behind. That is like
what would have been had they not agreed on that last minute Hulkogan title win
at WrestleMania nine. Yep, I know. And here's Brett, you know,
just like grit in his teeth and like being all pissy about what happened
with Hogan, being promised that one day Hogan will put him over, and
then of course the day never comes and it's actually the aforementioned King of the
Ring, as we've talked about before, that he basically cuss his Hulk out
in the back. Yep, well, brother, is a misunderstanding. Of
course, there's no I didn't. I didn't. I don't, brother,
I didn't do the what you say I did, right. I don't even
know what you're going to say I did yet, brother, But I don't
even see. I don't know what you accused me of. Brother, butro
I can tell you right now, I didn't do it. Just because ult
Hogan is box office, brother, doesn't mean you've got to come at me
wide open. Brother. I'm I'm dude, I'm look. I'm as shocked
as you are that I won the title. Oh, I mean why right?
I mean, I'm sitting there, dude, and all of a sudden,
Vince says, well, you know, derry On, I think you
should have winned the title for real. Cazuna Rustlemania has a great vice imitation.
That's a new that's a new friend to your ten years in lapsed characters
imitating other lapsed characters. Jesse Ventura does Jim Barnett and not on the way
Jim would want a Well here's my impression of of of Jimmy Barnett. Hey,
verity of this is fascinating and delicious. That's like, I mean,
that's a layer upon a layer upon a layer. Yeah, basically a Neapolitan
It's a geez, what is it? Well we are well, we are
in Italy, so we could get a Neapolitan pie down south. Oh my
god, I mean I thought you picked this just because Italy. No,
this was picked out of the hat. And I know, I know,
but uh, chow chow. This is I mean, if you don't count
the Japanese shows we did, which you should, this is a unique challenge
for us, and that we don't have English language commentary to make fun of
exactly well, there's plenty of Italian language commentary to make fun of. So
we've done our level best from from Italian language commentary done by an American.
Oh yeah, there's there's not Ladies and gentlemen, the voice of Italian basketball
who took the assignment here. The name not Lucian. His name is Dan
Peterson, Daniel Lowell Peterson, to be exactly from Illinois. I mean,
what the fuck is Dan Peterson? Ladies and gentlemen, you want to you
want to look upon a lapsed species. Oh my god, take a look
at this fucking guy. How this guy ever? Like, it's hilarious that
this guy became fucking fluent enough in Italian to all of a sudden be like
a head announcer over there, Like what the fuck? We'll talk a lot
about him. He went over there and made himself a legend and in Italy
as a you know, an American basketball coach who went over there to prop
up their their professional basketball league, where you know, basketball is a pretty
serious sport in Italy relative to the other European countries, and that was also
the entree for in some ways for his his colleague on the broadcast. Now,
of course, Dan Peterson is alone in the booth. He calls it
Joey styles style, but wasn't he in the FBI and c W. Guido
Bagatta, who's doing backstage mean Jean style, internomes against the same backdrop that
you would see in the Golden era. He could give a ship, but
he has to funny. He says a bunch of sh in Italian, but
then he has to ask the question in English because the wrest of us have
to understand what he's saying, even though not really because it's fake. So
they're gonna say what they're going to say anyway, right exactly. And there's
a hit ful of times where he doesn't translate the question and they're still exactly.
To me, that's the that's the most fascinating thing when you look at
it, that basically these wrestlers are fluent in every language. They understand every
language, and they know how to respond in every you know, in English,
to every every every question in a different language. Oka is k fabe
in any language? Right? Oh my god, I I really it's it's
it's so funny to see Gueta Bagatt fucking lay in a question on on on
I R S and humd just fucking without even flinching, just talk and it's
so it's just it's so surreal. It's so surreal. How about that Undertaker
Yoko match? How did they not bring their their A game to Italy?
I mean that's like that's a lasagna that came way too early. Let me
tell you they they they didn't bring their A game, but they brought their
pizza gain. Okay, that's for sure. They devoured the pizza Gain before
the show. You know, when you hear Brett in his book described like
bad attitude, go home early Yoko Zun at WrestleMania nine. You know,
WWF champion gets to his head. Yet in a WrestleMania nine it's hard to
like see what he's talking about because you don't, Yes, you don't see
the workaday Yoko. You only see you know, those glimpses that happen to
make it to television. Oh and most of it's you know, pre taped.
But here you see a Yogo that just could give a fuck yep.
He I mean, you've never seen less conviction in terms of a swinging of
AsSalt bucket to end the match, you know, out of absolutely nowhere against
the Undertaker. But that's that's what they had to offer you know, if
you take Hogan under the equation and you really look at nineteen ninety three,
it's particularly in the spring. This is all they have this crew, well,
because you're certainly going to fly giant Gonzales anywhere, No, not at
all. You know, they keep Sean Michaels back because they remember Monday Night
Raw had just launched in January, so they still need people for Raw.
And he's got to lose the belt to Martin Jenny. He does. Yes,
this is that time period. You're right, yeah, so this is
weird and that this is the first year where WWF has to worry about having
a weekly television slot. To to mind, not to say Rob was live
every week, It certainly wasn't. But you couldn't just go on the European
Tour without keeping some guys behind for at least the one live Raw and then
you know, if you're gonna take upy the rows that they don't have all
these trees on the European Tour. I didn't even really think about that,
but that is very that's a very good point that that there are so many
like seos scenario, Like think about it. You know, you look at
the roster in ninety two. You look at the roster in ninety three and
it's so depleted. Yeah, you know, you know you don't have you
don't have Warrior, I meld Savage bull You know if Bulldog Savage is basically
uh, you know, he's just a commentator, he's on the back burner.
I mean to it. They couldn't do. You know what would have
been really great if they if they had flown out Rob Bartlet's do commentary alongside
Dan Peterson. I think I would have loved that. Yeah, it's it
struck me all of a sudden watching this. There there are no Italian speaking
WWF wrestlers and this in this time period. None, no, no,
none, none I can think of. They finally regretted letting Sala BelOMO go,
but not even sal Sincere was in the company. Although I'm not sure
to speak Italian. No, uh, yeah, it's uh does Lombardi speak
Italian? Hu in a way in the same way everybody from Brooklyn does?
Right? I a certain I forgot about it. Yeah, Mozzarell, even
though you Mozzarell and they're like, what the fuck? Why do you pronounce
it like mozzarell? What is that? What? Is you gotta say,
I mean, you say the ad at the end if it's Italian, Like,
why why did Italian America drop that? It doesn't make any sense to
me. It's such New York Italian ship. It's a little you know,
it's kind of weak mozzarell the gabba goo. Yeah, that's it's kind of
like, guys, you're trying too hard, which is weird because you should
be authentic. Yeah, but you're like you're warping the actual native pronunciation for
what reason? Probably the same reason you'd put ketchup on a bacon egg and
cheese. Brother, I didn't need to concern you. It is red,
that's true, and the cheese is yellow red egg. Look past that,
brother, And you're talking about like, I don't know where you're what you're
getting at. That's I don't know. I don't know. I just don't
you know, do not? Hey, you're a bulet? Why didn't you
go to Italy? Very blay, that's what they would call them. Imagine
that making his way down? Oh god, I mean, doesn't the whole
Hogan Holcy media boom period sound just a little lamer? If whatever they went
to Italy, they called them Terry BOLEYA if they called them Hulk Hogan,
Terry Blaya, that's what they needed to call them. Picture the Hasbro Hogan
packaging and only in Italy it says Terry boleas Hull and yes, the Lapstar
system. That is a call for you to get to work photo shopping that
shit when the figure y Balaya. Oh so it's up, brother, How
you doing? Yeah? Well who should make it out to JP? All
right, thanks very much, brother? You got any questions for me?
Yeah? Just one Hulk when you went to Italy? Did you wrestle as
Terry Balley? You want to get security to tackle you in a fucking instant.
Get them, it's creeps, get them to get them. Ah.
Yeah. The most Italian guy they had on the company Bayrol at that point
was probably Ja Strongbow. Oh. They probably thought Tatanka was going to speak
Italian. I probably Isn't this how it works in the wrestlings. Yeah,
I gotta be careful. The French Canadian's gonna slip in there. It's gonna
sound like Pat Patterson by the time we've gone. But we put a call
out to the Solar system. You know, I know we've had listeners over
the years from Italy, not many, but nobody you know that was alive
of the vintage to unfortunately have caught this one. That that's you talk about
a needle in a haystack. Oh yeah, sure. From what I gathered,
I don't know a lot about Italian television. I don't think this was
a particularly like big station. I could be wrong about that, but it
seems almost like an ESPN two or three, you know, as opposed to
ESPN. Yeah. Sure, so, I'm not even sure if you were
alive and a fan back then that you would necessarily, you know, drop
everything to see this ESPN and the way, Yeah, exactly, glorified house
show opened by uh By and the Beverly Brothers and Bushwhackers have like the longest
match on the show, and he does not not tell you everything you need
to know. Oh my god. And there's I have a funny little secret
about that match, but that's for later. I'm looking forward to that.
And you just have like this just pure expression of like little kid wrestling fandom
on this show, Like the front rows are completely packed with kids, or
at least that's all they show. And they cut away. Apparently it was
a huge hit with kids back then in Italy and you know, the bushwhackers
antics get some of the biggest reactions on the show because it's just, you
know, no matter what language, it's a completely absurd yes, and they
like the clown and they like you know these and Brett gets it gets a
good reaction. It's not like the kind of reactions he got in Germany,
where for some reason he was like a heart throb in addition to being a
great wrestler. Yeah. Yeah, Here it's kind of like, I don't
know, it seems a little force to prevent him to present him rather as
like the top baby face that everybody came to see. Undertaker felt the little
bit more like that. Yeah, But they put that match in the middle
of the show, knowing probably that Yoko would you know, blow up in
four and a half minutes. But o, if that we did our level
best. Hugo Dominguez, a great member of the Solar System who's out in
Spain, does give us a little bit of color of what it was like
for WWF to come through in these European tours and have these these random ass
television shows happened that all these years later come into our possession. They won't
be able to hear this, but I think you'll be able to hear this.
Okay, So what does that mean? You know it's fake? Son?
Play it again? They keep saying, what's the word for brother for
Telly for Delly? Yeah, which I thought was hilarious because I didn't know
that until you know it kicked in Because if you've, if you've, if
you're familiar with goonies coming soon, under the sentiment, right, you know
that they're the for Telly family. For tell, brother comes from the Telly
brothers. So for Telly for Telly, it's like the fucking USO's right,
look like Greg Valentine exactly. And yeah, you hear you hear them call
for Telly over and over again when they're discussing how the Steiners are brothers.
So you hear Doc Peterson Dan Peterson rather say it over and over again.
But here's a Hugo lending some color. Here's something here though, by the
way, so listen to this one, future idiot, it means you know
it's fake, you fucking idiot. Future and fucking are the same? Does
Hugo? In Spain, the w BAN presented on a TV channel of Italian
origin called Tel Sinco okay, where we were lucky enough to watch all the
pay per views as if they were part of the normal program on free TV.
I invite you to consider that in the UK as well, for a
while, every pay per view was just like a television special, live and
free. Yeah, yeah, that's true, that's true. Getting color from
folks remembering, like you know, in the UK, you would become aware
of what was happening on WWF Sunday night pay per views on Monday morning when
you woke up for school because there's six hours ahead, and just the stress
of like, oh my god, is somebody gonna tape it for me back
home so I can watch it when I get home. One of the members
of the Solar System you've been said on X that they would try to get
up at like five in the morning so they could watch the whole pay per
view before they had to jet off to school. Now, yep, so
we can never forget when we go back and talk about when it used to
be better, when we talk about the golden age of media consumption, how
different it was for our European brethren and folks in different time zones, and
how that colors their experience and memories. Like just for all of the main
for every live wrestling you've ever seen, to happen in the middle of the
night, it's just wild to me. I mean I'm talking like the wee
hours of the morning. Almost very bizarre. Yeah, you know, I
used to fucking you know, back when we did Milan. Oh god,
he was proud to go there. I'm shore fucking you know. We took
we used to take the A seven right, you know, into into Milan
proper, you know, and we go down via Spezia, you know,
and kind of there was a roundabout there, and then we hid down via
Giovanni Segantini Premi Pasti. Yeah, and we go to you know, there's
there's a place you could get good drinks at Merlino and Mago, you know,
just outside of Piazza Koli. It's good ship. I mean, look,
you can say all you want about Gelato Okay, Giuliti, Okay,
Rome, Geolidic. We got the guys behind the counter, wood panels everywhere.
I'm telling you, you know, it's fucking it's it's the way to
fuck. This is where the fucking real people go. You can't beat it.
No, I go to fucking Asteria del Naco fritough, you know it.
Shit's fucking good, you know, fucking just the fucking best. See
right off of you know, right on the corner of Via Pasquali, Paoli
and uh Ripa deporta t sense they're watching Sean like a hawk. Back then,
okay, I mean we're talking. The spotlet was on and he was
standing in the pantheon. Okay, you might have well fucking walked up the
Spanish steps, you know, shit, I uh, I do have a
vague memory from two thousand and one. I went to Italy on a trip
with my class. Oh and it was a wonderful whirlwind ten days. But
one thing that really sticks with me, and I believe it was Rome.
It could have been Florence. I'm not remembering exactly where it was. We
were walking to a pier and we came back and there was a car that
was parked there. Didn't look abandoned or anything. It just happened to be
parked alone. So I looked in the in the driver's side window, or
it was the back seat window, whatever it was, and there on the
seat was a dead body. Now, in two thousand and one two thousand
and one. Yeah, where the Rockers Hasbros In the package? Get the
fuck out of here? Is that is? That is unfair? It completely
blew my mind. Ah, this is like before you know, let's bring
back all the action figures for the Man Children era. You know, I
hadn't seen a Hasbro in the package since I was in grade school. Of
course, no, why would you? And there it was all the way
in Italy, which told me something about WWF's penetration there and perhaps the the
era where it sunk in the most over there. And that's pretty much what
we're talking about here. Jesus So Hugo continues attele Sinco, where we were
lucky enough to watch all the pay per views, yes, normal free TV.
While in general he writes it was more or less the same, there
were some differences. For example, the show was called prep, the show
was called pressing catch, not just catch pressing catch, that's right. I
don't want to get the wrong idea. And certain names were not the same.
We had our own casters in Spain. I suppose it means broadcasters who
had absolutely no idea about wrestling, and more or less improvised terms about what
was happening on the screen. We called Big boss Man crazy coply not wrong
that one of the cops he used in your fed No, I didn't have
crazy cops. Tug Boat's name was El Marineo Tarugo. I made that Italian
when he's Spanish, but I'm sorry. I know it doesn't matter, which
could be translated into English as the dumbass sailor. It's about right. This
is Fred Oupman Tugboat with a cameo shout out to JP. He asks me
how I feel about the fact that in Spain I was referred to as the
dumbass sailor. Well, I don't know if that's a correct translation, but
I will tell you. When the Ultimate Warrior did his hulking up, it
was called the Saint Vitus dance. Of course, it was things of that
nature. As for fandoms, it was more or less the same as in
the US. We all loved Hull Cogan and the Ultimate Warrior. Everybody's third
favorite hero used to be either Brett Hart or Tito Santana, who opens this
this show Boss. Yes, he does as Elmatador against doing as that was
the only anything that you could more or less say had anything to do with
Spain. But still we all saw Tito as an absolute loser who did nothing
but disappoint us all as that representative. Yeah he's a Spanish bull fighter.
Yeah, I imagine. I imagine he is just a complete disgrace. Counts
the lights. Yeah, that's when we saw that he was Lewis the face
Undertaker. When they visited our country, all we could think was that Tito
was literally going to die in the ring it sis or so we hoped in
our heads people like Undertaker, Earthquake or Legion of Doom were literally indestructible.
So you can imagine our absolute surprise when Tito beat the Undertaker. I don't
understand that whatsoever. I mean, they must have just been thinking he's the
hometown hero and no one in the States is going to see it, so
it can't hurt Undertaker. Let's give the people finish they can get behind.
But I mean that Undertaker some of his first WWAF losses were to Tito Santana
in Spain. It's just mind blowing to me. I could not conceive of
it where we placed Undertaker in our minds at that time frame. I know,
I know, more or less undefeated, you know, minus a few
couple things here and then that just is so bizarre. The next day in
the schoolyard, we started thinking that soon Tito would be the WWF champion.
Of course you would think that. Of course, Jack Tunney, he writes,
Jack Tunny would have no choice but to offer Tito a chance to win
the championship belt. Tto, I want to offer you the chance to wrestle
for the WWWE. Thank you, Hugo, Thank you, Hugo. The
next match is for the WWWWE World Heavyweight Championship belt. The next match is
for the whole Enchilada, the World Wrestling Enchilada Championship. Here we know that
Spain, I don't. I don't think. I think that's Mexican. Yeah,
well it's certainly Mexican, but I don't know if it has its its
origin. I don't. I don't know. I'm not sure. I know.
I know on in those shows they would go to the tapas rope though,
that's right, you know, sometimes they do the elbow off the tapas
rope. We're in Spain. The Wild Bull of THEA like it. I
like it. I like it. I love going to Spain from the Macho
Bull in Spain digging in one, two three, they called them I don't
have that in the notes. They called talk about the idiot sailor. They
called Macho Man the macho bull. This is really funny, like mistranslated w
w F characters in these other countries. I mean, that's the greatest thing
like that, when they figure out some kind of the same thing with movies,
you know something, you know, I haven't done it in a while,
but when we do, uh, when we when we have it under
the cinemat, you know, sometimes I'll do the uh, the international titles,
and how just bizarre they are. Oh my god, they were compared
to them, they're yeah, you know, like they're just they're just wacky.
When you get to like the literal or whatever the translation is that that
means, for some reason, the closest to whatever the fuck this character is,
and the translation is the other language. And Russia, like the Undertaker
would be like the Funeral Assistant or something. What, yeah, like the
deaf Caretaker or something. Everybody saw it on TV. Jack Cane would have
to offer him the title shot Tito one. We never imagined that we were
literally the only ones who saw it on TV, and that Tito would remain
a loser for life. Unfortunately for us. Also, we stopped getting wrestling
on TV in nineteen ninety four due to the constant complaints of concerned parents to
the TV station about their kids performing wrestling moves on their younger siblings. Your
secare falso for to Anthony Anthemy, and he would go provide some great links
to some stuff like Rumble ninety one is presented in the country of Spain.
Thank you, Hugo. That's about as close as we could get to sort
of like, you know, a contemporaneous account of a lapsed fan perspective on
what it was like to be a wwafair back then in Europe. Sure,
and for Brett Hart, it's a fascinating little period of time. After WrestleMania
nine, of course, losing to Yo Kuzun for the championship, he turns
around that show April fourth. The next night he was in Phoenix head of
taping beating Lex Luger, that being for Raw and then he goes to Tucson
and beats Luger again, and then they go to Poughkeepsie on April twelfth of
nineteen ninety three at the Midnuts and Civic Center where he beats Razor ramone and
then he wrestles Bam Bam Bigelow on the first match of the tour. The
European Tour for nineteen eighty three started on April fourteenth, nineteen ninety three,
and Brussels, Belgium, boss a country. Wow, close to your heart.
As we've talked, I love I love the Belgium. So they came
through Belgium and Breteart beat Bam Bam Bigelow right there. That'd have been the
first time the two met. Wow. I'm not sure about that because he
you know, Brett was in the WWF and Bigelow did his first Babyface visit
in eighty seven eighty eight WWF in London on April sixteenth, Brett beats Bigelow
again, so he's wrestling him around the horn on this European tour. WWF
Glasgow, Scotland April eighteenth, nineteen ninty three, defeats Bam Bam Bigelow Whitley
Bay, England. He defeats Bam Bam Bigelow again on April nineteenth and April
twentieth, they go to Belfast, Northern Ireland, where Brett heart defeats Bam
Bam Bigelow, then to Essen in Germany where he defeats Bigelow again, and
then to Frankfort where Brett defeats Bam Bam and Frongfort. I think that was
Bam BAM's favorite stop of the tour. And then we have a I believe
it's Barcelona, yes, in Catolina, not Spain, but Catalina. Don't
get it wrong. I understand the shoot your face off if you don't acknowledge
the Catalina part of it. Brett Heart defeats Bam Bam Bigelow. And then
finally, what appears to be the final top of the tour was this WWF
European Rampage April twenty fifth, nineteen ninety three at the Fort of Massaggo in
Milan. Lombardi Lombardi aspartart defeats Bambam Bigelow. Yes, here on the show,
but to the point about you know what else is happening at WWF and
the other logistics that they have to mind. Let's take a look here at
WrestleMania, and you know the kind of crew that was, I don't know.
I guess you could say left behind or holding down the fort is probably
that's probably a better way to right. So let's look for me because this
is over at a history of thehistory of w W dot com. Richard land
site just an indispensable resource. Long may continue. So Wressellman, it was
April fourth as mentioned, we mentioned Phoenix on April fifth, So when did
I say they went to Brussels. That would have been April fourteenth. So
starting April fourteenth is when they split the crew up. Let's toggle ourselves ahead
to that date April twelve, April fourteen, Yes, so they were a
Newcastle as well, so they have split crewis out there? Wow geez,
yeah, wild I didn't realize this because I was just looking at Brett's matches.
But they're in Aberdeen, Scotland. Sean Michaels does go and faces Bob
Backland for the IC strap. There's a match, and then Newcastle on the
fourteenth is perfect against Luger in the main event, with Michael's and Backland on
the undercard Nasty Boys against Headshrinkers, and then the Brussels match with Brett Bigelow
Otter take a Dryan Gonzalez. They did send Gonzales out there, just not
to me Lan. He didn't make it to Milan somehow, which also reminds
me on that same trip that I mentioned before, my high school trip.
They we were flying in and acting acting up, being stupid high school kids
on the plane and the stewardess. Steward was a man who you know,
had a thick Italian accent, yes, but was very he's very much a
princess about it, and came up to us and said, would you like
to arrive in middle In other words, like you will not arrive in Milan
if you continue acting this way? Yes, I would. Would you like
to arrive in Milan just the way he said it? Would you? Would
you like to arrive in Milan alive? Yeah? Did you say arrive or
alive? But cho Bella Ni Terry Taylor was on the tour. Doink?
Of course? Is there to Tonka and Shango. They go to Brighton,
England on the April fifteenth Bretton. Now did they Now Here's the thing did
they was? Was the what? Which which doing did they have? Do
they have both doings on a different tours? I think they had different doinks.
I don't say they must have had different doing because this is not this
is not. This is not a big Josh Doink. Yeah it is.
This is Matt Born. I think it is. No, I'm pretty sure
it's not. I'm pretty sure it was the Skinner. You think it's again.
I really sad that was Matt Born. I heard his voice at one
point. I said, that's absolutely map Borne. And this is still evil
going time. By the way, Yeah, and and and duo Doink too,
Because this show is April twenty fifth. The next night, April twenty
six, at Manhattan Center to tape Raw and Doink Russell's there's no way this
guy makes it from Milan to Manhattan Center. Whoever played this doink in that
amount of time? Right, So Matt Bourne probably in Manhattan Center. Fascinating.
Also in that raw was mister perfect Lex Luger Crush, mister Hughes Typhoon.
So all these are guys dug in Michael's. They all come back by
the time the show we're talking about this week took place Backland Headshrinkers. Yeah,
Dougan would come back with his fucking onesie outfit. Oh this is when
he did the feud with Yoko. Yeah, this is after Yeah, because
he got injured by Yoko before WrestleMania, and then when he had fucking when
he coughed up blood, remember that, yeah, of course, and then
fucking blood coming out with sacrificial land. I get Yoko over as a big
baby fa a big heel, yeah, top heel. And then and then
he comes back, uh yeah, wearing the fucking singlet. A pleasant sight
for all. It's such a fucking weird outfit. Like, all right,
I think you should what you do is you should look like a real wrestler.
Now you don't have red, white and blue singlet, thoughts doesn't matter.
Well, we're all still looking for it. So yeah, we're all
still looking for your charisma, you fucking fat ass. It's definitely yeah,
it's definitely the arrow where Vince is like, you know, that's the kind
of cycling out that caused Hogan and Savage to go to WCW. Basically,
it's just declaring people of Jim Duggan and their vintage, like you know,
shopborn. Vince had the hubris to think could determine when these guys were too
old to work anymore. You're the old generation. I need the new generation.
Oh yeahn it sounds great, Sign me up to be with your company
and be called old the whole time. I'm definitely down with that. Here's
WTW Danglan guaranteed checks to yeah, reinvigorate the position I had just four years
ago. And do you think about the business today? Four years ago is
nothing? You know what I mean? Oh? I know, I know,
I look like you got old. Between nineteen ninety one and nineteen ninety
three is so laughab And yet you know what, as as as kids,
God didn't feel that long. It definitely didn't feel premature what he would frame
these guys as fading legends. It felt right, No, it felt yep,
this is about right, Yep, I can see that. And that
just does not happen anymore. I mean, I would be surprised if we
went back and watched the tape if they didn't refer to aj Styles as a
kid against Cody Rhones on that backlash show. Oh, I probably did.
Cody's like this young upstart and he's like almost forty, you know, right
right according to our pal. Yeah, you know that's funny because remember remember
they're done about Yeah, he's like this fucking young offstart at forty. Yet
remember when when when when Jake Roberts came back in ninety six. He was,
oh my god, he's so old. He's forty one. I know.
Well, in fairness, Jake put a lot of miles on his body
in the intro. That's a good, that's a Good's that is true.
He did. He did look fifty eight. But if if David von Eric
lived seventy five years and twenty five, god knows how many Jake Roberts live.
Jake's about three hundred at this point. Yeah, I'll say, and
that sounds like it too, and that's on his third life. Yes,
But our pal Matt dug up some stuff about this this time period in the
television clearances. He points out that the April eighth, nineteen ninety three show
in Paris was broadcast on a television station called Canal Plus as an episode in
fact of WWF Superstars. Interestingly enough, okay, the April eleventh, nineteenety
three event in Sheffield, England was broadcast in fact on Sky Sports and released
as the UK Rampage Colisseum home Video. So this is when they take the
UK Rampage tape as yeah, well sure, yeah, I'd imagine that that
that you know, that one's more a little more well known. That's a
call assume videotape. It's different, and in terms of public service announcements,
let us make it abundantly clear because it is a bit confusing. There is
a UK Rampage ninety three show on Peacock. Yes, as it's a coliseum
home video. That is not what we're talking about here. No, this
show you can find it on daily Motion if you type I think it's WWF
Milan nineteen ninety three, should get it for you. Okay, okay,
but it's not very easy to find if you just search for WWF European Rampage.
Yeah, I imagine not got a search for a Milan, Italy.
Because while that's what this show was called, to the point, it was
never really released to an American order in English speaking audience as European Rampage.
So it's really strange how this show came to be called that when, first
of all, it's not in the native tongue of the country that it emanated
from and was broadcast exclusively to. As far as I can tell, I
just don't even know why this event has a name, you know, It's
like the other I don't know the other the other shots on the tour didn't
have names. I guess if it's on television, they come up with a
name for it. Oh, you gotta have a name for you. What
are you gonna just have it called wrestling? They could call it Milan something.
Why is it called European Milan mayhem? Yeah, the act like it's
the only show they did in Europe, you know, so we'll call it
European. It's like, noh, was isn't the European Rampage Tour. Probably
was, Yes, that's probably why it is. The April twenty fourth,
ninety three show on Bartilona was on tell A five the television station Tella to
El E five, and again this April fifth, twenty fifth, nine twenty
three show Tella plus two. I think is what the station went on to
be called. The watermark in the top right of the screen when you watch
this event is not tell A plus two. It's something else. We'll get
to what it is, but it's a Google search tells me that that name
is interchangeable with tell A plus two as well, and and so yeah,
we have a handful of matches from the tour Matt Advisers, including two from
the Milan Show. We're thrown together for Coliseum videos Global Warfare. Did you
know that? Boss? Oh wow, No, I do not know that.
I think I don't take it. Versus Yokazuna from the show and Milana
is on that tape and Columbia House's Best of European Rampage tour. There you
go. Wow. Okay, indeed that's the name of the tour as of
the Everly Brothers versus the Bushwhackers that barn Burner made it to home video in
the UK. Of course, Columbia House was Oh my god, we've talked
about that in the Coliseum collection. Columbia House was kind of like like almost
like a second company, right distributing wh videos. Oh yeah, yeah yeah.
They had their own weird selection of best of videos and I think totally
unrelated to Coliseum really. Oh yeah, absolutely, they were there. Its
online, its own line of of of of videos. We got them.
Oh yeah, we got them. We're ready, We're ready whenever the time
is running for the Colosseum collection to resume. Yeah, we stand round years
years down the line for these uh, for these these Columbia House. It's
like a tlf x X initiative oh, without a doubt, Without a doubt,
the rest of the dates were untelevised, so ho. Matt writes,
Unfortunately we'll never get to see Typhoon versus Damian Demento in Nuremberg, for instance.
One that about that we can always hope. Yeah, I suppose that's
true actually, And also Scott Center versus micro tunder from Milan, he writes
his own global warfare. I think he means I think he means money in
versus the Steiners. This is Scott doesn't wrestle I r S one on one
here. It is pretty funny when I r S takes the microphone and he's
like, it's it's it's it's about the US tax code. His whole gimmick.
Right, I don't know what a you know what a tax auditor dress
is? Like, I'm sure in Italy a tax auditor wears Gucci. You
know, here's this fucking schmuck. I bet, I bet in I bet
in Italy, like the tax collectors are like beloved people, especially Milan.
Right, You're all like, please take my money. But he stands there
and goes. Everyone knows Milan has the most tax cheets, and everyone's like
close to the tax phone, our phone right here in Milan. No great,
okay, on my Jork part Scarpaccio is he like everything? Peterson says,
it's Carpaccio. I know it is. Please ye give me a second.
Here we go, Oh my god, fucking paper. We're close to
the tax cheek phone and our phone right here. Nos a great okay,
major party is already retire from a Milano e. It translates, I'm talking
about taxis. It's like also that he says Italia to what a fucking idiot,
right, I'm gonna say everything else in English, also known Oh god,
I want to see here if I can, if I a fucking joke,
if I can pull up the translations. Is I tried to get some
of the choice lines on the show translated. I want to see what they
might say here, Okay, ruin er Sister A message here, maybe I
This is a rough translation of what Dan Peterson says, A message here.
Maybe Erwin R. Scheister was speaking. We feel, we feel it's no
secret that most of the tax cheess found Itali're found right here in Milan.
It's no secret, okay. And then they have in fact, Dan Peterson
translated as saying, it's no secret that most of the taxes in Italy are
here in Milan. Taxes, not tax cheats. Most of the taxes are
here in Milan, he saw. And then apparently Dan Peterson says, I
don't like this even in English because he imagines it like he's making it up.
Oh my god, what a fucking goof flick at what he says.
Here, here you are, Dan Peterson says. And it gets really the
translation gets really confused because they certainly start speaking English in the middle of what'sposed
to be an all Italian broadcast. But more choice nuggets like that as we
go through this unique experience that is WWA European Rampage ninety three. Limited coverage
in the Observer. Of course, there wasn't a great correspondent network at the
time to report on every punch and suplex throat and landed back then, Meltzer
writes. European tour finished April twenty fifth. The shows in the United Kingdom
largely didn't sell out, although most were about seventy five percent full, and
the building's WCW played in March. Let's not forget that WW was coming on
the regular to the UK to Ireland back then. That's crazy, yep,
sting Vader Bulldog era. That was a big part of getting Bulldog was going
over there and you know, coming off SummerSlam, trying to draw some houses
and they didn't do badly at all in the UK. Actually, on Parers
Meltzer says here in the buildings WW played in March, the crowds were roughly
the same size for both groups. That's why all that, that's why all
these these Brits that listen to the show know about Galooube and stuff right w
probably where they had exclusive Glube figures over there, something Dixie Carter fell for.
Remember how like how like tickled pink she was that you do not have
that thing on fucking trigger. Still, all these years later, all these
months later, I should say, God, that was quick. That was
freaking okay. Now okay, then I should say the Barcelona and Paris shows
were about half houses, melts of reports. The Germany shows were largely full,
and the Italy that is that similar? Is that similar to a half
way house? Uh? But it was Jake gone already, yes, from
both companies half houses? Uh? The Germany shows were largely would that be
a condole sposed away supplex. Did you maybe they call a double SUPLEXI duplex
that called for the Germany shows were largely full and the Italy date wasn't full.
Still, Meltzer writes, with the thirty dollars average ticket price and tons
of merchandise, these tours grows huge amounts of money, and this was a
downtime for WWF. You know, they brought back Hogan for a reason.
Things took a decided nose dive when he exited the picture around Wrestlemaniaate and early
ninety two, and the transition to Brett was kind of a late adjustment.
You know, they didn't go right to Brett as we know, that didn't
happen till October, and that happened kind of like a shotgun fashion, like
all of a sudden, they hey, we're in Saskatoon. We got to
do something. Flair's hurt. They thought Warrior was going to carry them through
nineteen ninety two, and he hardly was up to the task. Sid was
gone within a month after WrestleMania Ate, their top heel, so it was
a really tough ninety three luger. They shoved him into the forefront and these
body sliding ro goo just months after being unveiled as Narcissus to the right,
right, what a strange year nineteen ninety three was. I feel like nineteen
ninety three deserves a lot more examination than it gets. Oh. Absolutely,
it's such a it's such a weird I mean think and when you consider too
that that that Vince gets indicted in November as well, absolutely, and all
that speculation before he does that it's coming any day. Yep, yep,
all the paranoida titan towers, the contingency planning around Jerry Jarrett and such it's
it's such a it's a it's a fascinating time period. And they're not literally
of the past, yet they're being forced to part with the past. The
steroid scandal forced them to push guys like Sean and Brett, you know,
those bodies right, not choose to It was not a new generation initiative,
Nope, Nope, they were. They wanted they they were. They brought
back Hogan for God's sake, right, beating the big monster. They put
a happy face on it, but they couldn't hide their true you know needs,
basically their true biases. And so it's a fascinating time period. And
here you know who knew right when we were watching as kids and on the
other side of the world, across the pond, as they say, Brett
and Bigelow were mixing it up in Milan. No clue, Yeah, no,
no clue. I mean there was scant mentions of European tours and the
Wait magazine, like the Private Eye section, which is mostly photographs. We'd
usually mention, right, they'd have some kind of some kind of very very
brief coverage of the European or international tours wherever they went. Yeah, there's
some pictures from this tour and one of the magazines of like Tito looking at
like some sort of a historic wall etching I believe in Spain. But there's
hardly anything really and there's almost certainly unless I miss something. There is a
magazine from nineteen eighty three. We don't have it our fingertips, so maybe
it was in there. Nothing I did. I looked it up there,
so I was able to find kind of a recap of it. There really
wasn't much about it. Is that a recap of the whole tour, just
a Milan show, just a recap of of like just the time period,
like, so it just says that they like they just talked like one of
the one of the things around the the what do you call it? Not
an article, but the other thing, the thing that's continuous every time.
What do you call it in a magazine when you have a section. I
can't remember what it's called. But I don't know what you're talking about.
Feature. I don't know, not a feature. The features are the are
the special ones, and then you get the regular ones that are recurring.
I can't think of it anyway. So around the Ring was one of the
one that they did, and and and and ed Ricky Udi he mentions that
he says, like in a thing again, this is a this is a
and a you know, like a breakdown of it. It's not the full
thing. But he basically talks about that the life of a w D superstar
is is not easy, and describes how they went from Wrestler Winking ten and
then off to Tucson and then traveled to Europe. But besides that, there's
really not much, right, no no actual like coverage of matches and stuff
and whatnot. It's pretty crazy that that was an extent. I thought maybe
there would be. I mean, there certainly is talk about traveling internationally in
ww Wrestling the Official Book, but there but this book I think came out
in ninety three, so it wouldn't have right that it's either late ninety two
or early ninety three. And this is what for people that don't remember or
no, this is the most incredible book of all time. Yeah, ninety
two is the copyright. It's WWE Wrestling the official book that came out in
ninety two, and it has all this this incredible like it gives a whole
rundown of the roster, each one with her own at least one page bio,
and then all the matches and all sorts of stuff, and then you
know all the different places where wrestling, you know, the w go's global
is what it says. That's what it says. That's Yeah, there's a
whole section on traveling. I could read it if you want, but it
doesn't really include this tour because the year early. That's good to be good.
Let's go to Tito's book quickly. He's got a little bit of reflection
because for him, this is it, like this is the final Tito patches
inf He writes by April four This is in his book, By the way,
Don't Call Me Chico with Kenny Casanova. By April fourteenth, nineteenety three,
I finally decided it was time to tap out and give Vince my notice
of my resignation. At the time, however, I was very sad.
I had just given myself to the WWF for more than a decade and wasn't
sure where I was going to go from there. The al Mattador character teased
me for so long that it was too bad that it didn't turn into any
real, good, long term plans. Vince, I said, meaning up
on them at a show. I think it is time for me to go,
and supplied bluntly Tito, I think you were right. Yep, you
know it's been good knowing you don't ever come back exactly. Don't let the
door hit you in the ass on the way out. Hey, Pal,
what happens when you put sugar in a gas tank? Anyway? What happens
when you put salsa in a gas tank? Nothing? I think, Pal,
nothing at all, Just like you, You're nothing at all. Know
this When you watch Tito wrestle on this show my last days in the w
w F, He rights were miserable. I hate it. Oh my god,
this is w w F Hall of Famer. I've got one of those.
Oh. I don't have it on on on my loaded up, but
I can at least play it for this, for the two of us.
This probably, I imagine it's going to start out to hey, JP,
send send send it to me. I'll play it for everybody they deserve.
All right, I'm gonna send it to you. I'll leave out before leaving,
he writes, I had worked about forty matches with the WF between January
and August of nineteen ninety three, with a European tour being my final matches
with the company. In my final days with WWF, I was working with
and mostly losing to guys like Adam Baum Joined the Clown Bastion Booger, and
Damien Demento. After putting in my notice, I realized that Vince was keeping
me those last years to give me a payday, because he was very appreciative
of what I did for his company. He probably would have kept me around
even longer if I had wanted it. But I really wasn't being used much
as an attraction, nor was I really wanting to do so. So when
I said it is time and Vince agreed, he just didn't want to be
the one to tell me so he wanted to make that decision. He wanted
me rather to make that decision on my own. I wanted you to die,
but that's the way it goes. I wanted you to be dead.
I wanted you to die in the ring. I wanted to work you till
you died. Can we talk about that, pale or now? What would
that look like? Conceptually? You know my dream, Tito. You know,
I appreciate you saying that you want out, and I'm willing to grant
you the release because I'm sick and tired of looking at your ugly face.
But my dream, my dream was to actually have you lying in the middle
of the ring on your own accord and I don't know, dropping maybe yokozuna
from the top of the rafters onto your body and watching you explode, and
then taking a tortilla chip, dipping it in your blood and chomping away.
What do you think, pal, you like that or do you want to
quit? One of these two things is going to happen. I don't care
which, but make the choice, Wow, make the choice, he says,
God damn. So yeah, it ended for Tito. In the summer
of ninety three, that European tour, he wrestled up the predator a bunch
of times, and talking about Terry Garvin, the predator was Boris Hogan.
Did you know that Horace Hogan did not at all what the fuck TV wants.
Maybe has Superstars taping or something as a j brown, But he was
beating the predator. He wasn't losing. He was beating the predator in Berlin
and Edinburgh and Sheffield. And you might recall from the Terry Funk Journey this
is when he started popping his head up in the freshly minted ECW Eastern championshipreso
where Tito had a bit of a run in the very earliest days. Again
fascinating time guys like Tito finally cycling out in ninety three. Ninety three is
that year where it's like every you know things they they shed a lot of
skin in nineteen ninety three, most of it, Uh, yep, yep,
not by not by choice. But did you pass that along? Can
we hear from t as we can? Folks can bear with me here for
a second. What was. What do you remembers the content on this one?
I remember, I have no idea. I don't know when I know.
Well, let's see, this was from February whatever. This must have
been him wrestling Don Morocco on the Hogan Show. Oh, yep, yep,
you're probably right. Or Hogan wins the championship in nineteen and eighty four
and he was second from the top with the ice he strapped on the line.
This is before Morocco. He took about from Morocco and the remat right
right Baltimore or Boston, I remember, or maybe Philly I lost? He
lost? How did you like? That's not him? Oh oh, oh
oh, I know what I did wrong. Apologics, stand by everybody,
and we'll be with Tito in just a second. Brother, This is w
w E. Hall of Famer Tito. Give him a shout out to Jack
that vogue. This is the one if I have any recollection of when I
wrestled down Morocco and HAULK Cogan in nineteen eighty four in Medicine Square Garden.
And I don't remember much of that night. I do remember that everybody knew
that we were going to start something special. There was a lot of changes
going to be taking place in the WWF. Tito Sento is going to be
the new IC title champion, and on and on and on. It was
a great night in Medicine Square Garden. I had a great match. I
believe if I either beat Don Morocco or he he still had the title.
Because I did. I did beat him. You know that doesn't narrow down.
Remember, but Jack, I want to thank you for being a Tito
Santana fan, and without you, none of a would be who we are.
Thank you again. Without you, none of us would be who we
are. Kind of like TLFX now, oh yes, I think so,
kind of like this is wn W Hall of Famer Tino Santana. God,
it's amazing. Can't stop yelling while someone in the background is like, you
want me to get you a drink and he's like waving her off. Tito,
shut up, Tito, stop it talk normal. As we look out
on TLFX, we wouldn't be here without fans like Michael Damn right. Michael
sent us a message here in the last week that we felt compelled to rush
to the front of the queue as it regards the the feedback mailbag because he
did what has meant the most to us, I think throughout the ten years
he it art inspired by the show. Yes, whether it be the the
amazing drawings of our friend Chroma Slam, Yes. Whether it be the lamentable
tragedy music put together by Andrew, whether it be the great drawings that we've
had from a host of other members of the Solar System. Mike Rogers comes
to mind, and so many others. Yes, we've even gotten organists sending
us things. I remember the Braves organists from Major League Baseballs and and something
once. It's just amazing. And this is the latest installment here. It
was a real treat to drop out of the sky. You know. We
had, as mentioned, the song influenced by the World Class Journey, which
of course is very much back on people's minds as Iron Claw hits the streaming
services. Now it's gotten sort of like a new rout of people subtenly talking
about the movie now that it's available. There shadow how awful it is.
Shout out to Houl mccolleny on that particular palm curve. There's a particular podcast
called Time Lapsed Fan, and so now your Time Lapse Fan shirt at Progressing
teas dot Com Slash the Lapse fan Michael. I don't know why. Maybe
he's from Miny or something reached for a different journey, and man, this
had been delicious if WrestleMania indeed was going to Minneapolis. But that is not
going to happen. It's going to be Las Vegas. Can't wait? Ever
will happen? Never will happen. He was inspired to put a song together
based on the life and death of the AWA Wow. And isn't that something
as we talk about and mooring of the WWF in nineteen ninety three and where
the AWA sat and setting up that boom period that begins to wrap up just
about it this point in time. But Michael writes, morning co chairs ive
thought about emailing you. It must be a thousand times since embarking on my
own t left journey in early twenty twenty, A song I wrote in the
occasion of your ten year celebrations finally brings me to the do the deed I
began with your WrestleMania six episode, the first pay per view I ever watched
live on Sky TV here in the UK, So there's crossover here with our
European events. This week of course, as I heard your gasps of joy
as the old Mania theme song played, I knew this was the podcast for
me. It's been an obsession, a lifeline, a full time listening job
ever since. It's not an exaggeration to say that the endless hours of TLF
kept me barely sane during the darkest days of the pandemic. I can't thank
you enough for that. Phrases like it used to be better because it was
real. From SummerSlam ninety two, when Sleeves rolled up ready to book the
towns from r Awa journey more in, which soon have become common parlance in
our household, and by force of will, have become applicable to almost any
situation. So Mania six I went to my friend's house to watch. His
father was a football referee who apparently was caught on the take and fired from
his job. Let's fucking go, boy, don't work. Yes, there's
carnies everywhere, brother, he writes. Somehow we were allowed to stay up
for a show that begin at one am on a Sunday night. Yeah,
probably had something to do with the you the aforementioned indiscretions. Yes, indeed,
I was a warrior guy eleven years old, face painted hating on Hogan,
worshiping future homophobe and all around scumbag Hellwig. My friend wore a handmade
Ogan shirt and tore it and time with Hogan's entrance, I still don't know
how to feel about that Warrior one. I couldn't believe it. With the
guys I love to always win, I guessed, so I gloated, I
flushed with pride. That's one thing we see at the show, and belon
mm hmm, we do see fans that are there to see their favorites win.
Yes, where what the fuck happened to that? I mean, if
they're there, they don't show them on camera anymore. And that's for sure.
They're not the ones that mug enough to get on TV. No,
what cares about is having the match of matches. It was. I'm I'm
here to see a performance, you know, like I'm here to see a
sky that was scary. That was scary. I know that it's not real,
So I'm not really invested in who wins or who loses. I'm really
invested in the performance, Like, you know, what are they going to
do to wow me? You know what kind of incredible athletic maneuvers. Are
they going to pull out in their match? Like? You know, I'm
a big fan of of of really twisty, turny type of moves that that
really you know that the kind of death defying superhero type. Shit, Hulk,
You're not fooling anybody, by the way, this TNA general manager Hogan
trying to work a program with the young Bucks in the extension. Brother,
I didn't know what tnah I mean, dude, I'm all about ec W.
I'm all about extremities. Brother. Remember we cracked a beer with EV
two two point zero. That was great TV. Oh my god. It
was at the the following year when Savage struck that brutal blow with the scepter.
My Warrior lost his hard won title to Sergeant fucking Slaughter. This was
the first time the thought crossed my mind, who books this ship. I
was heartbroken. I was suddenly jaded. I had realized it used to be
better when I was just twelve. Yep, my lapstom my endless ups and
downs with wrestling fandom don't need much further detailing. Let's just say I took
a familiar path of disappointment, elation, pain, shame, dedication and abandonment
of the sport of kings. Finally, recently, I had that old childhood
spark of love rekindled with the emergence of AW and an obsession with pro wrestling
history that began, of course with TLF. Yes. One thing I can
say about my relationship with Falsified Fisticuffs now at forty six years old, Wow,
it's a constant like the Mafia, not the main event kind fuck them.
But once you're in, you're in, and I love it, hate
it. You'll never get away from it. That's right. I'm at peace
with that now. Your AWA and World Class Journeys were the finest examples of
long form audio documentary ever produced on any subject by anyone anywhere. I take
no argument on these points. Your TNH series was one of the funniest and
most genuinely painful experiences I've been through. I thought JP might just up and
quit at some points, but you're but you powered through towardgasmic completion as always.
Yeah. Finally to the meat of the matter, and Martyr's recently put
out a record called Luminism. The closing track is a song called Death of
the Territories, and while it takes its title from ten Hornbacker's incredible book.
Its lyrics are entirely inspired by your Awa journey. There we go, You
get a brought to you by credit on the CD in lay sleeve, Thank
you for that pal lyrics are also attached. It's written, he writes,
from the point of view a Vern, oh boy, and I'll be sure
to give his estate ninety percent of Japanese royalties. It's rose tinted. It's
nostalgic for a time and place I never knew, a time I fell in
love with because of your you pair of fucking poets, he writes. In
the song, Vern comes across as a noble guy fighting against the odds.
If there's one thing I've learned from a lifetime of imaginary athletics, it's that
the truth should never get in the way of a good story. Always working.
Yes, TLF is penetrated finally some but stuff many aspects of my life.
I didn't imagine it would make its way into my music. But hey,
here we are. I really thought I was gonna say to my rectum.
It kind of implied, Yeah, I guess, thank you for everything.
Here's to a minimum of ten more years. He writes of TLF glory,
you have made a positive difference in a lot of people's lives. How
many other podcasts can say that? M Michael and what that We're proud to
present inspired by the life and death of the Awa, we expect more of
this to roll in as we celebrate ten years of Lapstom TLFX. It's death
of the Territories by our friends martyrs. When I got the Panci fifteen nine,
I was writing on you built me a sort of empire around my always
you betcher, we could do no drawing bag. On Christmas Night at the
Saving Game, the Twins saty, freezing cold but feeling ride. How I
hate those sweet mamay When my run was done in nineteen eighteen one, I
put bark Winkle on. I could not let go o the rains of the
show even try to give my sun a shot. Call us corny. Those
knights were realizing any thing. Thousands of kids who loved what we did,
smiling faces when the heroes we I miss the forest for the trees. In
nineteen eighty three, Terry should have left the superccher but start to my guards
and was left with no one. While New York was tightened in the cloud.
A few more fighting the tide, our days at the save, We're
gone. I never lost my bride our way showers by Gondy Man. It
took my house, he closed me down, Vince beat me at my best.
They took the horn soul of the territory, and they took the rest
I got from my window every day night on my own, I see those
smiling faces, and I tell the boys to take it. Had my sleeves
rolled up, a cafe down, ready a bog theatime. I can always
say when evil came lost, but I did not back down. Death of
the territories. M drawing big on Christmas night. That's right at the civic
in the Twin Cities, ready for this freezing cold, but feeling right.
Yes, how I hate those sweet memories. It's all their folks. That's
reality. Thank you, Michael. And you know it's in the spirit of
folks commemorating TLFX by making songs, by making art. Yes that we come
now to our latest announcement in our year long celebration of ten years of dominance,
as verified by Chat GPT. By the way, mm hmm. Indeed,
if you ask chat GPT is the lapsed fan dominant. It confirms the
indeed it is. I mean chat GPT knows. Yeah, I'm in no
position to dispute AI. We're here to announce that on the feed. Over
the next several weeks and months, we are unveiling the inaugural class of the
Lapsed Fan Hall of Fame. It's very exciting. Pang swang Tang Tang tang,
you know the Dealang Kan Kan King King the twenty twenty four W Kang
King King Kang Kang Clang King King, Kang Kan Kan King King Kan King
King King King King Clan Kan Kang Kang Kang Kan Kan Kang Indeed, w
TLF Hall of Fame Induction Class. This has been in the works for quite
a while. It has thanks to some of the more rock solid members of
the TLF Solar system. They put their heads together. They sort of compared
bona fides in terms of, you know, verifying that they're true blue lapsed
fans that have been in it for a long time and therefore have the most
discerning ear you know, Hall of Fame. It can't be a popularity contest,
right, Oh, no, definitely not. I mean, you can't
let that have. It has to be voted on by the people who take
most seriously, you know, absorbing that cast, contextualizing that cast, deciding
what it is the cast, digest that cast absolutely, and all the rest
evacuating that cast on occasion. Sorry. And so a trenchant group of folks
out there in the Solar system, all of whom your co chairmen deeply agree,
deserve the honor of being Hall of Fame class voters have picked one hundred
different moments from ten years of TLF, in varying lengths and of varying themes,
to inaugurate, to immortalize out of the Hall of Fame. And so
what we're going to be doing is unveiling those over the next several months here
on the feed, one at a time, from the archives, sort of
resurfaced, repackaged and given a brand machine as a Hall of Fame moment.
You know, the moments over the years at TLF where you've absolutely had to
pause and double over with laughter, or sat there and looked longingly out the
window at what used to be yeh, or or you know, tragic moments,
you know, reactions to just some of those horrifying things we could possibly
see in a wrestling ring. Yep. It's always a question over ten years,
isn't it, Boss, What would you tell somebody that's new to the
cast to check out first? Yes, and people find their own way in.
Most people start with the journey. They hear about it. We got
a fresh wave of it during the Ironclaw release, for example, and the
lamentimal tragedy is there for a lot of folks. But what's great about the
TLF Solar System is they know that it's not just about the stuff that's easily
digestible as special like a journey. Absolutely, it's equal parts, even more
so about those in between moments, those shows that you might think are innocuous,
those shows that you might think are asides, those shows that you might
think aren't really at the heart of the show, where inevitably most of the
things that define the heart of the show happen. The euro European Rampage ninety
three. Perhaps it is a particular particular example at a particular podcast. So
we're really excited that folks out there in the Solar System put this list together.
It was curated with the help of select Solar System members, validated by
TLFHQ identified by Haystacks Cawloon. Collection of time codes took place from November twenty
twenty three to the beginning of January twenty twenty four. That is to say,
the moments in the individual show files that qualify and the finalized list was
sent to and shared with your co chairman back in January, and these spots
will serve as the inaugural class of the Lapsed Fame Lapsed Fan Hall of Fame
Moments and future Hall of Fame classes you better believe will be curated from the
entire solar system and validated by some of our truest bluest fans. So we
have a couple of things to note. One, these will not come out
in any particular order. This isn't a top one hundred. Yes, as
of right now, these are all equal in equal standing. They have equal
opportunities, equal endeavors. Right this is we are an equal opportunity employer.
I mean, maybe there is something to read into the we are an equal
opportunity Hall of Fame. Indeed, maybe there's something to read in the idea
that you know, these one hundred moments made it in the first class and
the second class therefore, is a peg down might not jump right immediately to
mind as the most absolutely legendary and typical moments, and who knows when or
if we'll even expanded much from here, might not even be a hall of
fame without a haul. Well, we learn from WW that it's very possible,
and so with that we're taking that lead and going ahead and creating a
hypothetical hall of fame here for us at a TLF. So again, as
these moments roll out, don't look at it as you know, to create
like a like a like a digital haul, you know, like like we're
you know, you know how you can Universe on Google Maps and you can
like go down streets and stuff if you click certain ways and stuff. That's
what we should do that, Yeah, metaverse hall of Fame. I love
the idea. Yeah, yeah, you know, come upon some and then
you go down certain you know, go down certain wings and stuff, and
you can click on click on the piece of sound. Yeah. Absolutely,
And do you see this dystopian artwork from Yes, I mean, oh,
it has to be this like the most bizarre, unsettling non you know,
it's like it has it almost has almost has nothing to do with what the
content of the of the audio is, of course not No, you would
have no idea just looking at the imagery. Yes, we come to Philly
to talk about pro wrestling. In the poster as a picture of Philadelphia on
fire with not a not a ring anywhere, not a wrestler anywhere, just
damage. I mean, look, honestly, in ten years, you'll be
able to just open up a program type you know, create me a all
of fame off the Lapsed Fan podcast, right and it'll be generated in about
an hour. Well, it'll probably be able to say, please, please,
create, write and record three thousand episodes of a Lapse Fan right now.
Absolutely absolutely, and get get those coming to a VR headset near you.
Yes, absolutely, Oh no fores. So again, these aren't in
chronological order, per se. I think they might roll out kind of roughly
in the cadence of the shows we decided to do, which, of course,
from the beginning was always in the spirit of what we're doing right now,
arbitrary you know. Yes, we didn't start out with an idea of
what a journey even would have been. One of the magical moments is when
we realized that there were thirty weeks to go to the next WrestleMania and thirty
WrestleManias to cover, none of which we had touched. Yet these things happen
organically because you know, we've been charmed from the beginning of this thing.
We've always had tailwinds, no headwinds. Yep, damn right, and so
well, the clips will roll out, I guess you could say, roughly
in the order of the shows as as to when they dropped them, when
we did them. That is no reflection of like this one's better than this
one or anything like that. We are good parents. We love all of
our children, even the problem children, yes, even the red headed step
children, even the drunk uncles. We love all of our family yep.
And so even the ones that really aren't related but they're bound by you know,
samoan bloodline thing. And so never let it be said again that there
isn't a very handy guide to what TLF is all about, something you can
point people to to say, all right, here are the one hundred moments
if you have the stomach, and there'll be a varying lengths you know,
yeah, of course, but we're very excited to roll this out, So
keep your eye on the feed for the inaugural induction coming soon, and then
just an absolute bevy throughout twenty twenty four in celebration of ten years of the
cast the Lapsed Fan Hall of Fame. Mm hm, we appreciate it,
and again the door swung wide open to members of the Solar System and celebration
of TLF facts. Do share with us your inspirations and let us share them
with everybody else. It is. It's sort of like open mic night.
I like to think of twenty twenty four here at TLF. In that spirit,
we continue to point us to our buddies, Gabe and Blake Yes over
at the whole ballgame as they take a lapsed perspective on the game of baseball,
the American pastime, and we're going to hit you with yet another reminder.
This from the folks over there. We know everything in this life,
wrestling included, used to be better. And we also know that when we
say everything, we absolutely mean it. Two died in the world. Members
of the Solar System recognize that we have the wrestling side locked up, that
is your coach, Chairman, and so they've decided to plumb the depths folks
of America's national pastime. The Whole Ballgame is a podcast inspired by TLF.
On each episode, they highlight two personalities from a particular matchup and then watch
you guess it, the Whole Ballgame. Whole Ball Game is a deep dive
into the personalities, archetypes, trials and triumphs that made you fall in love
with baseball as a kid. You know when it used to be better taking
your CoA chair's lead. No prisoners are taken, no quoter given, No
guys with a face left unrecognized. Then there are no sacred cows. Intellectual
honesty is at a premium, and you'll find it at The Whole Ball Game
and a world of lies. Co Commissioners Blake and gab Gabe find the truth,
even if the truth is made of lies, and as we know,
it almost always is. You understand, Oh yes, You can listen to
the show right here in the main feed of TLF here and in just a
matter of days, as we'll drop another a sample episode for everybody out there
in the Solar system. Proud of these two for the work they put in
and the way they're carrying the torch. You can also add to the Whole
Ballgame dot com or search the whole ballgame anywhere you listen to podcasts to listen
in. If you're a baseball fan, used to be, or just want
more intellectual honesty in your life, give it a whirl. As Harley would
say, Boss, that's the whole ballgame. Indeed, so a tip of
the cap to those folks and also to our continuing support from our friends over
at Tight Nutrition. There's nothing more Titan than this show. You're a Ramphaid
Big Ass copyright nineteen ninety three. Titan Sports is the final frame. Thank
you very oh yes, and Tight Nutrition offers a full line of expertly formulated
nutritional products ladies and gentlemen to help you achieve your health and fitness goals heading
into the shirt off season. By the way, around this time of year,
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and productivity. Comes in six amazing flavors and can be easily mixed and taken
on the go. You can find it at Titan nutrition dot net. You
should be familiar with that url already if you're a listener worth your salt.
Tight nutrition dot net promo code laps to check out a s d at checkout
that'll give you ten percent off your purchase free shipping as well. Tight nutrition
dot Net discount Cold Laps. Let it continue long, May it continue?
Fuck it patreon dot com slash the lapsed Fan, Tell them about it.
Patreon dot com slash the lapsed Fan. The engine where real ones come to
be certified. That is where we've said it before. We'll say it again.
The big swinging dicks. That's where you take your big swinging dick and
you fucking bash somebody in the head with it. That's where you give us
cause to tell people in polite company or you know what, big big swinging
dicks and also the the the giant chomping pussies. Absolutely can forget those all
right, venus fly traps out there. Yeah, it gives us basis when
in Polite Company we unwittingly reveal that we do a wrestling podcast. Yes,
patreon dot com slash lapsed fan is that thing we can dangle out there to
say, shut your fucking mouth, and what you know exactly about getting people
in your corner such that you can count on this base of financial support to
continue the enterprise? Yes, what you know about creating a podcast that does
this besides absolutely nothing? That's what's a proof of concept. The only language
that seems to count these days, dollars and cents. Put your support behind
us and get what boss? You get a ton of shit rock and wrestle.
Mamia for that mote tear russell mommy on Mother's Day? No less on,
absolutely absolutely, come on. You think we fuck around here, you
know better we don't fuck around. What did we hit them with our the
day after Mother's Day? The day after Mother's Day? I believe I'm trying
to make sure I get it right here. I'm pretty sure it was Cody
versus Dustin, Oh my goodness from the aw double or nothing. Yes,
I'm that to that one with Dustin covered in juice. How about family matters
on mothers, she covered absolutely, she was Mama Rhodes. She was.
If you don't know, wrestle Mamia is a special treat exclusively for our highest
pledging tear, the moat Teer, the mother of all tears, in which
the boss man sits next to his mom and shares just like hours and hours
of quality moments watching wrestling matches. And the thing she says, she's every
mother. Yes she is. I don't care if we're talking about here Milan
Uk, don't care. She is every mother that's ever had a son who
was a professional wrestling fan. Yep. And you need you need to get
this in your ears if you want that full three hundred and sixty degree lapsed
experience. And it's not on everyone's priority list, but I'm telling you it's
almost boss You're getting you're getting a glimpse into what it was like before we
ever thought about a podcast. You getting almost formed you into a wrestling fan
that can do a podcast. This is what it was, you know,
and it's it's kind of funny. You know. We we've been I've been,
you know, mentioning if if I've ever watched a show in front of
my mom or someone that even recorded her, and you know, she's she's
been doing this the whole time, you know, making making comments. She
gets drawn into it naturally, you know, and and then she starts commenting
on it and I really expressing fans we all know that feeling, yes,
that exhilaration of like your your parents, who for the most part think it's
pretty fucking lame that you watch wrestling for some reason. Yes, one match,
one promo catches their attention, yep. And it's in that moment where
you're like, oh my god, these men and women are actually good at
what they do, and that they can captivate somebody who could give a fuck
about pro wrestling if they do it just right. And this is the you
know, this Bresselmamia project is very much a monument to that that notion that's
so central to lapst them. It is. It is, without a doubt,
one of the one of the it's hard, it's hard to not it's
hard to keep a straight face during it, and I do my best to
keep a straight face because I can attest it's it is, you know,
because she's it wouldn't play if she knew if I were laughing at almost everything
she said. But I think you put your finger on something important there in
terms of TLFX, like what's what's part of what makes sense about this whole
thing that keeps it going so long? It's pretty much just a bunch of
audio files, recordings of things that would be happening, whether we had a
podcast or not. Right, conversations that would be happening when we got together,
whether we had a podcast or not. Right, breakdowns of movies and
old wrestling events that we would be happening, whether we had a podcast or
not. Discussion yep, yep. That's what's up, and that's what people
can sense. That's what people can taste, and that's what conviensous people that
you know what, I need this, I need this genuine voice in my
in my circulation, in my rotation of wrestling podcasts or whatever form of wrestling
media you consume, because it's that real ship and you can taste it.
And the proof is in the building, absolutely under the cinemat is still rocking
from the toy dollar executive producer and above tier as well. Boy oh boy,
well, we're onto the next leg of the carneiz Are Forever journey.
We've graduated from the rather chaotic Actually, I don't think I even I didn't
even realize it until we were kind of balls deep in it, the very
chaotic Sean Connery years, yes, of the Bond, of the James Bond
franchise, and just the kind of you know and and you know this this
figuring things out, but at the same time dealing with with with an influx
of copycats and also a star who wanted something more and wanted something different and
wanted to get out of a fucking franchise as as fast as possible. I
mean, we we made it. We made the comparison, uh on the
Diamonds Are Forever episode that it was really like it's it's it's like Hogan and
Warrior. You know, it's that golden age there where you have Sean Connery
is hul Cogan and then you know, he he he wants to go make
other movies and so they they give the they give the torch to George Lazenby
the Ultimate Warrior, and it just it it it it doesn't do what they
needed to do, so they go back to the King, an influx of
copycats. I knew, I shared something. I knew we had something in
common with Bond, and uh yeah, and it's it's now's the time of
jump on that. Absolutely, I gotta say, as somebody who really knew,
he always wanted to grasp what's so special about the Bond franchise, but
never had the time or inclination to actually sit down and take the movies in
yep, For a wrestling fan, a wrestling first kind of person, this
is like an absolute, you know, godsend because and the fact that we're
able to you know, the reason why I chose to do it was because
we there were so many there's so many that qualified and that and that there
were films of every era and so we could really cover the entire James Bond
cinematic journey and meet these wrestlers that just are way more famous for their protuligation
in Bond. Oh. I mean, you know, I Peter my v
is an exception, maybe, but still to the wider world, to the
wider culture, Peter my Via perhaps better known for his participation in Bond than
his entering exploits. But what a treat to have an excuse to crack that
story open. And yep, get into the nef Mayava days and he ed
Francis fifty State Wrestling days. What a treat. It's been so great and
we will continue. The Carnies are forever journey forever, right, I mean
talk about TLFX, that's kind of that's like going to be all of our
TLFX UTC stuff. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah, there's just
so much talk about, so much chop up. But as Boss always says,
there's plenty of non bond films on that list as well. Goonies.
I just talked, oh my god, goonies. Goonies says, Yeah,
there are hundreds, literally hundreds of movies, Oh my god. And that's
not even all that's those are the ones that I cared to to jot down,
you know, like you know, you look at I mean, one
of the one of the greatest fountains of of of like there always ever need
to be like a go to the resource source is Jean Lebelle because he was
the stuntman in over two hundred movies. Yep, and it's like I can't
I can't I'm not, you know, I can't write all of them down,
you know, like and also so many of them what the fuck are
they? Which is always more fun honestly when you don't know anything about the
movie. Yeah, like this show right here, I would never have to
watch this, but this is perfect and uh, you know, we've certainly
done a fair share of that. But it's like, ew, yeah,
it's it's it's so there's so many. There's so many, more than we
ever ever possibly could have dreamed of. That's that's what I'm realizing, is
that there are so many. Really, there are so many unknown wrestlers or
at least little known wrestlers in this day and age who have had Europeans.
By the way, yes, a lot of Europeans, especially with this specifically
with the with the Bond Journey, there are it's it's mostly European wrestlers who
get featured, and it's just remarkable that they you know, I'm I'm I'm
honored that even with the limited audience of with the cinemat that they are,
that they get a little more spotlight than they maybe did. Yes, yeah,
totally agree. It's like a it's like a connoisseur only kind of experience,
you know, yeah, and it's great to you know, something else
you get by pledging to our Patreon is you get to engage in the back
and forth, you know, as folks comment on some of the different shows.
And it's sort of like a message board. It's almost like we have
our forum, except it's the comment section under audio files and some really smart,
incisive and hilarious commentary for members of the Solar System in there. We
try to share choice nuggets of that when we do our mailbag shows. But
man, what what a what a thing to get involved in, and no
time like the present, Honestly, it's it's really popping over there these days,
as it should be. And you know, you get not only add
free versions of this podcast, you get the Deep Dives a day early.
You get under the cinemat if you pledge at that amount, if you pledge
at the VIP tier or above, you get our monthly live WD calls,
our pl live calls this year, this month, in fact May, there's
two of them, very did backlaves that's available. Are you ready for King
and Queen of the Ring in Saudi? So it's another fucking it'll be another
premium delayed call of course. Yeah. I mean everything's going to be in
the afternoon apparently now, because when it's a B show, they just go
to an international market that's only going to pay them millions of dollars just to
show up. Therefore, it's got to be on a night that makes sense
for that city, and it's almost always a Saturday, right. Who gives
a fuck about the time code at the time zone. They don't anymore.
They don't have to worry about not being on primetime and not selling pay per
view orders. It's all streaming on Peacock anyway. No one gives a fuck.
It's a different world. It's going to change, though. It sounds
like under the TKO ownership, they're going to try to be doing these these
things where they put together UFC and pay per views on the same weekend,
and so UFC will have the Saturday night WB go back to having the Sunday
night Wow really, which was kind of when we launched the whole idea of
pay per view live calls as a special Patreon feature, it was kind of
like, you know, Sunday nights are pretty reliably open for us, you
know, like, right, it's not going to conflict with you know,
family or anything like this. And then of course the second we hit a
flow where people absolutely need it and will jump off of roofs if we don't
provide it. Yeah, they switch to Saturdays and just blow a hole on
our weekends. We fought bad it back as best as we could, but
relief may be on the way on that front. But yeah, I mean
King and Queen to the Ring. We talk about Brett versus a bam bam
here. Yeah, right, this is what's left of the King of the
Ring concept, folks, I can move the bringing back a whole show for
it. I know. It's actually, uh, it makes some sense when
you think of that, you know, the royalty, the Crown Jewel,
the Crown Prince and all that. Yeah, I guess it seems to be
a mark for like shows that crown best greatest trophy, right, Like this
idea that we're anointing the best on this out he shows, even if it's
like a total k fabe hustle, you know, it seems to be what
they It seems to be what they think he wants to see and hear.
Is this framing of the event, is crowning someone to Leite or something.
I think Exagerer Woods is exactly who he had in mind. You never know,
but they can't get Yokozuna reportedly who he asked about the availability of the
Crown Prince when they first got Ah, my oma, no, oh,
my god, does he come with it? He doesn't care what the Italian
is. The next bural you'll go to you no one in that. So
that said, do check it, check us out. Coming up at the
end of the month for the King and Queen of the Ring live call,
and of course through yet another summer of lapsed. It's going to be it's
going to be a scorcher. It is going to be a scorcher. And
so if this show is going to be about you know, European UH tours
and Brett Hart standing out on said tours and in fact manuventing this card in
Milan, it might be time to finally grapple with the unique relationship that Brett
Hart has with the country of Italy. Let's not forget he once married an
extremely young girl from Italy? Did he really? Oh? All right?
So Brad who you know, fancied himself a Fellini filmmaker early in early in
life when he was decided total lot to study in school. And you know,
we can see those filmmaking. We can see that filmmaking DNA and the
man, I think it's safe to say the way he is, the way
he writes, the way he chronicles, the the care he takes, and
how his visual legacy is preserved and presented as evidence by that first WWDD DVD
set and all the negotiations around that. You know, a guy who cares
about, you know, telling a story, well even if it's you know,
a story with the capital ass and and listen, there's he's he's in
his glorious prime in this era to it. How so he's just he he
I I never I only appreciate it the more the older I get and the
more I watch it. Brett Hart so true of Brett. Everyone's come around
everyone, as much as I can stand him as a person, as annoying
as he is, as as as like just whatever, you look at him
and he just it's it's little things. It's just little little details that that
that make the difference of the whole fucking thing. He is an Italian Renaissance
painter in the in the rest of it, you know, like for for
for example, there's I made a note of this for later on. But
he you know, Bam Bam at one point picks up Brett, and Brett
tries to get out of it, to get out of the hold, but
Bam Bam is too powerful and connects with the backbreaker right right. And it's
like the fact that he tried to wiggle out of it knowing that how devastating
the backbreaker would be. That's that's word counts right, that he's trying to
offer resistance, right. You know, it's little things like that that he's
not just taking the move, he's trying to he's trying to relieve himself of
any suffering that the move will give him. It's it's such a good point.
Like you know, we've talked a lot, and I've talked a lot
about how relevatory it's been for me through you training for the ring and observing
that up close and other things we've seen, you know, watch documentaries like
the you know, the Secrets Revealed and stuff. How it's like seventy percent
the person taking the move that makes it happen. Yep. But the art
is not just in knowing that the art isn't hiding that fact. Yes,
the art is in having a match that does not make it look like the
person receiving the move is doing all the work, which all too often these
days, I would argue, is is abundantly clear the case. Yeah,
we actually sit there and celebrate the person that took the bump instead of the
person who, you know, within the context of what we're watching, was
supposed to have delivered the punishment. Right right, you think of Folly soaring
off the cage. I mean, that's sort of like Exhibit A in a
lot of ways, but it's now reached the point where it's like we are
praising the athleticism of the person who took the move, and it's it's warranted
in a way because very often that is spectacular athleticism on display. But Brett
does it in a way and he's not doing you know, massively acrobatic spots,
I understand, but he does it in a way where even though he's
doing most of the work, it makes it look like the other guy is
the one outperforming. Yeap, the other guy is the one executing crisply.
Did you know there was a There's a clip that went around maybe about six
months ago or something like that. There was a clip going around from that
match that he had with one two three Kid on Raw a match okay,
and there was a moment. There's a moment in there and where I think,
I think Kid does an arm drag or a hip toss to to bretton
he was it was it was like a surprise thing, you know, like
you you imagine Brett's gonna get the upper hand earlier on, but at the
beginning of the match and and Kid gets this move out on Brett, and
Brett gives a little head nod like okay, all right, wasn't expecting that,
but okay, so you know, it just it just like a little
thing. And again it's that that's that's what makes it real. And it's
not about we consider here today and praise Brett for what he did. But
in the moment, everyone's responding at as, wow, look what one two
three kid did? Right, Look how brilliant Brett was And exactly, look,
you know, kid did something so oh so remarkable that Brett Hart was
astonished by it and taken aback, right, and we can have enough confidence
that if he didn't execute it perfectly or didn't execute it. Well, Brett
wouldn't have given him that just because the script calls for you to nod and
acknowledgement. He wouldn't do it if it didn't look good. And I don't
think that the script would have I don't think this. I don't I don't
even think this like the script or the booking of the match would have qualified
Brett to do that. I think that's just him. Well, you give
him carp blanche to go out there, but the point knowing what to do
even if producers, you know, an agent had a meeting backstage and said,
here the two or three things we want to get over in the match.
It's not a script, but it's like, we want to get over
that one, two three. Kid is way more technically proficient than you were
ready for right for example. They can out there and do it on their
own anyway, but sometimes you know that that's part of the direction of the
brief bullet points of what they want to achieve in the match, and then
you give the guys the ability to color it in however they'd like. But
that's an example of it. You know, you know that that's what we
learn from a lapsed funk and a lot of It's like he would go in
there and like, god damn it, he knew how to make you look
good, but if you made him look bad, it wouldn't last long because
he knew how to take that fucking wheel and refuse to let his matches.
Yeah, look like a mockery of combat. Yep. And it is as
wild and wacky as the cell jobs Terry Funk used to do, as zany
as the stuff. It's still felt like something someone like him would do in
a real fight. Yeah, yep, because he's fucking nuts, right,
And we saw him when he wasn't nuts and he didn't do that stuff,
and it was equally compelling as his and every way world champion. And it's
sort of a you know, a working trunks and boots, heel and some
places baby face throughout the seventies. Just look at him in all Japan.
I mean, the versatility is there, but the lessons are what carry yes
and bread is a makes a lot of sense that Brett had great emiration for
Terry of course worked his final show or so it was a spoken about in
nineteen ninety seven and Amriilla against him, despite being WWF champion, went to
Terry's hometown and wanted to do the honors for him. Makes a lot of
sense to me, But just watching Brett in this context was so wild to
me because this isn't a pay per view where everyone's trying their best, and
Brett's match, while excellent, doesn't necessarily stand heads and shoulders, but everybody
else because everybody's trying. This is a show where he's the only one trying
in Bam Bam, yep. Everybody else is working it like you would a
house show. Preserve yourself, do some spots to get a rise out of
the crowd that you know we're safe spots for the most part. Don't get
hurt. You don't have a lot of time. The finish is pretty clear.
You're not working it like anybody's actually going to see this beyond the audience
right in this limited geography or in this building. But when Brett goes out
there with Bam Bam, it's like, no, this was like a whole
level above the work everybody else did in the show. And this is what
Bretdheart was to the WWF in this point in time. You didn't always see
it, you didn't see it every week on television. No, but you
saw it show in and show out on the road. He could do this
and not break his body down to where he wouldn't turn around and keep going.
He did. I mean, we just read the schedule from russele Mainia
nine. He gets right back on the horse. He's still the guy.
He's still the one going out there and doing the standout performances on every show
he's on, whether the cameras or there or not, whether ten thousand or
two thousand, et cetera, et cetera. And this is actually a rare
chance to see it in a televised, well shot, well setting because it's
this unique dynamic where you're you're doing a television show, but no one's really
treating it like that. But you can see, like the responsibility Brett Hart
thought he carried being in the main event of any show comes on really And
I don't know, I don't know if you do you agree, Like the
Brett Bigelow match just seems like it's from another planet compared to the other stuff
on the show. So, without a doubt, without a doubt, he
is just flying a different flag back then, and it took a while for
everyone to appreciate it. I think. But here we are, all these
these years later, and even you know, his his stunt, his staunchest
detractors have come around as the years have passed, and you know, people
kind of let go of the Montreal thing, coloring what they feel about Brett
Hart and Vince moving on. So they're being not so much of a barrier,
not so much of an awkward attention about acknowledge Brett's contributions. Mean,
he's still you know, he's still a saucy motherfucker. We love him for
it, you know, I love that Brett has decided that certain people he's
running too in the business, like Goldberg and Triple H, suck and there's
no reason to over tend he thinks. Otherwise, he's Brett Hart's as the
fuck right. You can do whatever he wants. He doesn't fucking care.
So as we look to European Rampage ninety three and Brett versus Bigelow here in
Milan in April, it's time to crack open my life, my real life
rather in the cartoon world of wrestling hit Man the tomb Mang of Brett Hard,
and we start boss. If you could share with the Solar System on
his very first tour to Italy with the WWF in nineteen eighty nine. It
started very early for Brett in this country, the city specifically. I arrived
in Milan on my first ww tour to Italy on April eighth, nineteen eighty
nine. Do you like to arrive in Milan, Sir hit Malon? Would
you like it to ride to arrive Milan? Or would you like me to
shoot you in the head? Talk about the hit Man brother. I was
exhausted from the long flight when I walked into the dressing room and ran my
finger down the lineup posted on the wall. I was startled to see that
I'd be wrestling Andre. Being a technical wrestler, I didn't have a clue
how to wrestle a giant. I think Andre must have smelled my fear.
He laughed and said, don't my boss, I'll cut him out there.
I walked out to a nice round of applause and tore right into Andre.
I was as surprised as the crowd was when he fell back and tied himself
up in the ropes. I hit him with punches until he told me to
take off into the ropes, where I promptly ran into his huge foot.
I was thrilled to hear the crowd behind me. At one point as I
land under the bottom rope, Andrea put one foot on my That's where it
ends. Oh sorry, I cut you off there. Yeah, well the
rest is it goes into another story about Bamman Bigelow. Yep, go ahead
and go into that. This is this is around that same time where Bigelow
came in. And of course we know Bigelow's history with Andre the Giant in
that period. Definitely some tension there and Andre beat him up in the garden
for having too big a head and all of that. So Brett has a
has a unique advantage on that situation on his future opponent here. Then there
was Scott Bam Bam Bigelow from New Jersey, who was possibly the best working
big man in the business. Bam Bam could dive off the top rope with
the agility of a cat. He had a sculpted red beard. Nope,
nope, never really had much of a beer. I wasn't really sculpted,
that emphasized. Not a bred beard either. He not read at all it
definitely, I mean he was not always clean shaven. He often had something
of a beard, but it was sculpted. Definitely brown and sculpted is not
correct, humbering spirit is sculpted. That emphasized a squared off. Nope,
nope, no, definitely not a squared off jaw al at the Yeah,
definitely definitely a round fat face. All right. Well, and he says
this anchoring his big round. I don't say there's no squared off. He
doesn't know what he's talking about. Yeah, not at all, dude.
That's somehow it works, having fun with the English language. Basically, yeah,
it happens a lot in this book. And framing a missing front tooth.
His bald head was covered with tattoos of flames. He was still green
and soon had a lot of That's how that one ends. So we moved
now to his recollections of the immediate aftermath of WrestleMania nine, where, of
course, bred It agreed to transition over to Hulk one more time. A
few minutes later, Hogan came into my came up to me, excited and
happy and said, oh, thank you, brother. I won't forget it.
I'll be happy to return the favor. I looked my old friend in
the eye and said, I'm remember that, Terry. Brother? Of course,
what do you like? Why would you say that? Brother? You
gonna remember that? Dude? I mean not? What is your dad here?
Did you talk to your dad about me? Brother? Why are you
talking to your dad about me? Dude? Are you is your mom here?
When you're saying to return the favor? Is that sarcasms? Brother?
I mean? Are you talking about like? Are you fucking with me?
Are you remember that? Dude? What do you He goes, do you
remember talking about? Are you fucking with me? He can't even finish his
own thoughts. He interrupts his own psychosis. I'm gonna turn the favor.
You tell me what that means. We're talking since we're talking about I said
I. I said, we're gonna talk return the favor? You said,
I'm going to remember that, Terry? So what are you Are we playing
to hide the ball right now? He said that because I was gonna have
can say, what what are you doing with that ball? Bro? Why
are you going behind the curtain with that ball? Dude? Why are you
hiding the ball? What are we playing framing the picture here? Dude?
Are we talking? Are we talking chopping the lettuce? What's going on?
Bro? And you told me you're going to return the favorit, dude,
And the next thing I know, you're sneaking off into the corner and hiding
the ball. Dude, What are you remembering back there? Dude? That's
funny. I won't forget it. What are you remembering? Jerry wants to
know what you're remembering over there. As for Yoko, I was always a
little pissed off at him for going home on me and not letting me show
Vince Hogan and everyone else that we could tear the house down without that,
without their bullshit finish. Even so, it was the best match that Yoko
ever had. I understand, Like, how is it his fault? His
fault? That what I mean? He's saying, he's blaming it on Yokozuna,
he says, I ask for Yoka. I was always a little pissed
off at him for going home on me and not letting me show Vince Hogan
and everyone else that we could tear the house down without their bullshit finished.
I don't understand. Well his claim, yeah, I left it out,
But his claim is that the match with Yoko at nine was supposed to go
like fifteen minutes, more than it did before oh really yeah, before the
whole Hogan schmas happened. So he's saying like he had a great match planned
out where he would really show that, like he could be of a high
caliber main event working an opponent of that size, and that Yoko just said,
fuck this, let's let's wrap it up now, and Brett was hard
pressed to do anything about it because if Yoko's going home, everyone's going home,
I guess. But so that's the Yoko we see here too, just
weeks later, just like throwing in the towel. I mean, but the
show. This is what I don't understand. The show didn't go I mean,
i'm i'm I just pull up the video of it at the show goes
the time that, yeah, they weren't fifteen minutes. Literally, I don't
know exactly how much about it, but still like it's going two forty three,
which was the average time of a W pay per view at the time.
They would always go about like between two forty and like two forty five.
Yeah, maybe it's another Brett hart Uh fabrication, but his claim is
that he had stuff in that match that he thought would have been awesome that
Yoko cut off that's just so bizarre. I mean, yeah, like the
King of the Ring two forty two. I'm looking me. Look here,
I'm just going through the SummerSlam two forty seven. You know they're all the
same fucking length. I'm very confused two forty seven Survivors Series two thirty seven
Royal Rumble, Like this is smack in the middle of the average time length
of a pay per view, So I don't know what the fuck he's talking
about, but whatever, whatever, this is funny. The title of this
chapter that I'm about to read is fucking hilarious. Brother, you don't know
the whole story. Dateline Barcelona, This tour Barcelona April twenty fourth, so
the day before, Yeah, yes, I believe so, April twenty fourth,
nineteen ninety three. One man's sunset is another man's dawn. The past
ten days touring Europe had been a boost to my pained, empty heart.
I sat on a balcony outside my hotel window, seven floors up, listening
to my walkman and looking out over rooftops, spires, and steeples as a
huge red sun drifted below the horizon. I'd come to know the distinctive smells
of many cities, and as I inhaled deeply, I decided that Barcelonas could
be called Mediterranean milonge. Okay, Brett, tell me less. I've been
working hard with Bam Bam, and I was content knowing that our match that
aired live across all of Spain that night had been excellent. The Barcelona twilight
melted into night until the only glow in the sky was from a silver crescent
moon and a few twinkling stars. My mind drifted to a hazy memory of
Brussels the first night, the first night of the tour, standing drunk on
a corner with Bambam at four in the morning, listened to some street musicians
from Brussels. We went to London when I reeled up where I realized,
by the size of the crowd waiting for me at the airport that losing the
belt I hadn't swayed my faithful fans one bit. I was more over than
before. I laughed to myself as I remember doing a morning talk show in
London where I was supposed to promote a new w W album featuring a sappy
song I recorded months earlier, as horrible as it was, with a little
production magic and miraculous, miraculously reached number four on the UK Music charts.
Talk About a one hit Wonder. A stuffy older man and woman hosted the
talk show, and they had no clue who I was. They seemed skeptical
when I told them that more than eighty thousand fans had filmed Wembley Stadium to
see us the previous Stummer. Step Dane Jordan skep me, So don't take
I don't, you know, give a take? You know what forty to
fifty sixty thousand people is that? You know? I don't. I'm not
trying to I'm not trying to say you don't make money in doing what you
do. But I've been calling for me is it? Yeah, what you
do is not Here's what's always held me up on. I'd love for for
you to speak to this, if you could. How are we to think
about the idea that it's it's not real, that what you do is not
actually competition. I mean, it's all it's you know, I don't I'm
not saying this to be rude in any way, but it's all faked,
right, It's all scripted, you know, like you know, like you
sit there and you put on you know, your body slam your opponent on
padded paper. Right, It's like a trampoline, is it not? You
know, it's like it's like jumping up and down on your bed. You
know, I could, I could pick you up and drop you on my
bed and it's not gonna hurt. So I imagine that's what that's what it
is, right, you know, But do you all you know the little
phony baloney? And I assure you that I've heard the line of you know
this idea that you we it's not fake. We we, in fact,
do very much get hurt. And I hear that, however, the you
don't get hurt, And that's that's I guess. I guess the thing about
it is that that's all a lie to tell the fans, right you say
that, oh no, you know, Oh it's entertainment, you know.
But you know, we we we really do hurt ourselves, but you don't.
And I mean that's just the way that it all is. And we
accept that. You know that you're putting on a formulaic, choreographed, you
know, farce of sorts. It sits there and takes this while he's supposed
to be promoting the upcoming tour. He just sits there and takes it because
he's got to be on TV to promote the show and he is in the
crosshairs. I mean, this fucking morning, Telly douchebag. I mean,
Brett, doesn't it kind of wear it your you know? You like,
do you have pride in yourself? Do you just kind of let go of
that because what you do is such horseshit embarrassment. Thanks for time, Brett.
Speaking of what's coming up next, the man with Britain's largest penis comes
on to talk about how that greats difficulties for him in his life. It's
not the pleasure. Let me tell you, I've never seen a cock that
big before we'll come back. I have a big, fat cock in my
face and it won't make it a number one. I'll tell you that,
Brett. Thank you for being here. They scheme skeptical when I told them
that more than eighty thousand wrestling fans had filled Wembley Stadium to see us the
previous summer. They droned on about where they're wrestling was really a sport at
all. I assure you I did not know. I know. Do you
do you consider it to be a sport. Really. I know that people
call it a sport, but it's not really because I mean, a sport
implies that you don't know who's going to win. You know, it's it's
it's real athleticism. What you do is it's it's like a it's like a
fake gymnastics of sorts. My wrong in saying, oh, you're correct in
saying it's like a fake gymnastics of sorts. No, in fact, you
could be more correct about that. I just don't I don't understand how you
can be proud of yourself, you know, Like I mean, listen,
everyone needs a job. I understand that everyone needs to work, but what
you do is disgraceful. Wow. I can hear his voice start to turn
into a thick Brooklyn accent. Now we've got let's tell you what. We've
got a caller, believe it or not, from from the United States calling.
He apparently he works for a newspaper. He somehow knows which newspaper,
but he knows he's somehow aware that you are on our show. And then
we're talking about you know, this is if it's you know, eight in
the morning in the UK time, we're talking it's it's going to be what
two in the morning over in the over in the States? Is that right?
Two in the morning, two in the morning over in the States.
So he's up very early now, sir, can you can you tell me
exactly what it is? You know what what you're calling about? What do
we owe the pleasure? This fucking guy here is a fucking fraud. I'm
glad. I want to tell you right now, I am proud. I
am proud of my British kuthin for fucking calling out this piece of shit.
Yep, pret heart is a falsity. They show his face. Well while
the guy's saying this, Brett tight shower of Brett's face. Brett, you
know it. You know what you are. You know you're a fucking fraud.
You know you're a bitch. You know you're an asshole. You know
that you lie for a living and that you you make money off of the
lies, off of the deceit that you put on. The general public of
the world calls in and says, Brett, you know you're a bitch.
Brett, he called you. He said that. Not only did he call
you this, but he says, you know you are a bitch, What
is you to say about that? Well? Uh, I am well and
that's all we get from Brett Hart will be back in a moment with Cox
and vaginas beyond back in a moment with Cox and Vaginas. It just shows
like a train go into a tunnel. Morning talk, you know, a
unique breed. But we'll do it with sweaters, collars under the sweaters and
that'll make it, you know, a little bit a little more refined.
There's nothing, there's nothing a dresser. We'll saying with a you know,
open collared you know, a dress shirt with the with the sweater vesta or
sweater over over toll and that will be and that will be you know,
it makes it seem you know, professional but casual the same time, so
we can talk about things like sex and and and anal fornication, anal fornication
with a with a cashmere sweater on marino wool sweater on. In June,
I mean I was at I'll tell you what I was out last night.
And you know I don't usually go out there in the in the in the
evenings before we have to, you know, with the appear pretty early in
the morning to come to work. And I'll tell you, but I went
out and I'll tell you something. I had, without without a doubt,
the greatest anal sex of my life, just fucking amazing. I began to
at a certain stage, I begin to feel as if I was blossoming.
I'm I tell you that that what we that this, this this young lady
had without a doubt, the smoothest anal pal Come on. There's a certain
acceptance that happens at a certain stage, right, there comes a moment.
You know, at first, you know that the ainus does not want the
penetration to happen. It's like, it's no, this is the wrong hole.
You know, people at home you understand that. You know, you
know, it's like sticking a square peg in a round hole. You know,
not that I got a square cock. I'm not saying that. I'm
not saying I guess you know, a regular round you know, injector if
you will, and and and so you know. But but at one point,
there comes a moment where the would the aim is just accepts that something
is coming in rather than going out and it just I'll tell you, you
know, I have had anal sex with a multitude of partners, this one
just slid in like she'd grease the motherfucker. We have to go to a
break, Brett, thanks for being here. By the way, he's sitting
there horrified for this guy goes into exacting detail. So how's my how's that,
Brad? How are you doing? How's my champion? So tell me
more about that. I heard about the thing this morning I was watching in
the hotel. Did did he say anything else about that? Ah? I
guess not. Please continue for the fans. I admit to being tired and
cranky, and I was even less amused when some pear shaped bloke in a
red devil outfit join us on the set and kept poking me in the stomach
with a cheesy plastic pitchfork. I did my best to respond to their uninformed
questions. During a short commercial break, I jerked his plastic pitchfork and told
the startled devil that if he poked me one more time, I'd shove the
pitchfork up his ass. The most interesting part of our tour had been Belfast,
where the dreary sheets looked tired streets sheets. I mean, Jesus,
it's gas station food, Brad, I mean where the dreary streets looked tired
and downtrodden. British soldiers with machine guns stationed on many corners. We'd stayed
at the Europa, whose claim to fame is that it's the most bombed hotel
in the world. Why did Rick Flair stay there every time? What's that?
Was Rick Flair stay there every time? Good thing? This wasn't a
bomb all right? As I checked in, I was approached by a timid
taxi driver who mentioned that his two boys were my biggest fans. He offered
to give me a free tour of the real Belfast. Soon we were driving
past political murals. As he showed me various bombed out sides, we talked
some. His name was Sean. Really, he's talking to a guy named
Sean in a car all by himself. That's that's trouble, isn't it.
Why his name is Sean? So Sewan? He was thirty four, but
he looked ten years older. We passed the cemetery were only a few months
before at an Ira funeral, mourners attacked and brutally killed some spying Ulster loyalists
who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Whyt the Inflation Reduction
Act, have a funeral before Trump gets re elected. I don't get it.
Sean gave me an Irish Catholic history of Belfast and drove me to killer
triangle streets, which he explained were intersections where kills could be made from three
different angles and where people were randomly murdered all the time in the crossfire.
You get to give Bret credit for this. He does get out and about
when he's in the you know stories. Most of these guys just hang out
of the hotel and look for the gym and act like douchebags, right,
and they just want to eat American food. Oh god, it gave me
pause when he said it's not bad, nothing like America. When he was
showing me the h block, we got pulled over by an Ulster special police
officer and Sean broke into a sweat. He hurriedly filled me in that this
officer, whom he'd seen many times before, was nicknamed Lurch by Catholics such
as him, and had killed many of them. Lurch, who was about
six foot five and dressed in an all black uniform that reminded me of an
SS stormtrooper, approached the taxi suspiciously machine gun in hand. It was a
tense few minutes as Lurch questioned us. I handed over my passport while Sean
explained while Lurch ran a check on us. A terrified Sean confessed to me
that he had a criminal record for gun running and that he'd done two years
in the H block himself, where there'd worked him over pretty good. He
was in and around the same time that Bobby Sands died while on a hunger
strike. But after a very long ten minutes, Lurch let us go.
Sean invited me for tea at his house. While we sipped from our cups,
his wife told me that one of the hunger strikers lived two doors down,
and she explained how the death of Bobby Sands eventually led the way for
some positive change in the Catholic cause. IRA prisoners were now treated now to
be treated as POWs rather than common criminals. Meanwhile, Sean pulled his young
boys out of the school across the street. They were shaking with excitement to
meet me. They showed me their room, where magazine pictures of me were
plastered all over their walls. They also told me not to worry because I
was better than hul Cogan. Wow, brother, what wow? I'm sure
they said that, by the way, and I'd win the title back in
no time for this exclamation point. That night, at the show in Belfast,
a mixed audience of Catholics and Protestants were content to let out their aggressions
watching wrestling. Many hugged me and held tightly onto my hands as I walked
around the ring. After my match, Sean gave me a decorated and varnished
hurling stick to take home with me to Canada. A hurling stick? What
is that? No clue? All right? I thought it was nice of
him to do something like that, since money didn't come easy for him.
On the drive to Dublin, I found the Emerald Island I'd hoped for,
dotted with quaint moss covered cottages and farms with sheep grazing and rolling pastures.
A wooden stick used in the Irish sports of hurdling and camoji. Oh okay,
so there you go, there we go. At the show, I
was amazed to find an even more adoring crowd who wrapped me in Irish flags
after my match with Bambam. They seemed to regard me almost as a son
who'd come home. Few people could imagine the life I lived. I'd come
to feel like an explorer who traveled to far and distant lands and was loved
by the people he encountered. I would never forget this breathtaking, spectacular,
surreal time in my life. Excellent, so Brett, reflecting on some of
the highlights of this particular European tour, as perhaps epitomized by the show in
Milan. He would go back in nineteen ninety four. The next year,
and in his book he actually reflects on the Milan stop in particular where he
wrestled Owen Oh. He remembers after the match, standing in the middle rope
in the corner, watch him start down the aisle, turning back to flip
me the bird, Owen Heart, that's funny. I nearly burst out laughing
as he jammed his thumb under his armpits and flapped his elbow, shouting,
you're a check in. My music blared as young kids pressed in and around
the barricades, and I high five hundreds of eager hands. As I made
my way down the aisle, I couldn't help but feel as though my hand
had been touched by angels. The next day, the bus drove by the
ruins of the Colisseum in Rome, where gladiators had once fought, starved and
tormented lions, tigers, and bears to the death. As a form of
entertainment. Near the Colosseum hung color posters trumpeting the rivalry between Owen and me.
Whatever it was that we were doing certainly made more sense than what they
did back then. Who'd have ever thought the two heart brothers would battle it
out in Rome, right across from the Colisseum. Sometimes it was too much
for the both of us. Art went on to marry an Italian woman,
as I mentioned in two thousand and four, if you remember in his Hall
of Fame speech, he shouts her out, or if you remember that no
his Italian prince says or something, he calls her this first thing I thought
of when the show lent jed. He recalls in his book that summer of
two thousand and three, I took Blade along with me his son on a
trip to Europe. We toured the battlefields of Dune and then hit Paris,
London, and Milan. I let Blade be my my seeing eye dog,
because I still had limitations from my stroke, especially regarding my vision. I
didn't appearance in Manza, Italy. The promoters were just kids, but they
pulled it off nicely. An action packed, small outdoor show on a beautiful
night. They hired some American wrestlers and whatever workers were in Italy, wrapped
it around a question an answer session with the hitman, including a full buffet,
and got a nice turnout. Even Blade answered a few questions. I
found myself staring at a beautiful girl with long, dark hair and piercing blue
eyes. When she came by for an autograph. She bent down and kissed
me on the cheek. As she handed me a letter. I noticed her
hand was shaking. I read her kind letter and asked the promoters to bring
her to me, and we talked for more than an hour. I promised
to stay in touch, and we swapped email addresses. As I watched her
walk away, I thought, well, I can dream, can I?
I was swapping bodily fluids. We now turned to heart Strings, Oh Boy
by Julie Hart. Oh. Yes. We spent Easter as a family.
Bread acted upbeat, but I could tell that something was wrong. I asked
him what he wanted. I don't know anymore, he said slowly. The
next morning, I was in the bathroom and glanced over a pile of reading
material he kept by the toilet. There were some emails sitting on top.
He'd been printing them out since the stroke had made them easier to read.
I read them now I knew what was up. I was electrified. I
couldn't stop reading what this girl had written. Yes, it was from a
girl he had met in Italy, and it was quite suggestive. I read
it over to make sure I wasn't blowing things out of proportion, and then
got angry at myself for allowing Brett to use me. I was hesitant to
confront him about it, because I knew he would just deny everything. The
first thing I said to him was, Brett, please don't lie to me
about what I found something in your bathroom, and I want the truth.
I found an email from some girl in Italy. Are you seeing someone?
Were they still married? Apparently? Yes? Wow? I didn't hear,
I thought to worry. Long divorced by this time. I don't think they
efectuated, because Brett said that when he suffered a stroke riding his bicycle in
two thousand and two, I think it was or one that he was actually
riding to finalized divorce papers and he was going to spring them on to my
God. And there's a scene in her book where they're lying in bed and
he says like that was a sign from God or whatever. They're both blessed
them very melodramatic in their books about the stuff. Something very melodramatic. I
felt like a small child about to be shipped off again. She writes,
what, No, Brett, please don't lie. I'm not What do email
are you talking about? Let me see it? What are you doing reading
my personal email? It was in the bathroom? Are you seeing anyone?
Why are you doing this again? I told if I met anyone, I
would tell you. I told you, if I met anyone, I would
tell you. I think you're lying, I said, sadly, I'm leaving.
It's not what you think. I met these girls. Well. I
was in Italy was Blade last fall, and we've been emailing harmlessly. I
told him i'd be back around for an autograph session. He doesn't talk like
this, but I got to do it. And then Bruins in the playoffs,
so I've got this hearing the Canadian commentator and they offered to take me
around and show me some of the history. I left, saying I needed
time to think. Once again, it seemed like Brett was making his escape.
He called me that night, again, insisting that nothing was going on
and that I was making a big deal out of nothing. I fell for
it. Compared to the phone number written on hotel stationary i'd found a few
years ago, it seemed relatively innocent. How was it innocent, Juliet?
The email described like sex acts or something. I don't know, Juliet,
don't listen. They came to me with the sex acts. I didn't didn't
say anything back to them. Reciprocates, I didn't. I didn't look they
send me the nude pictures and the videos of them. You know I didn't.
I didn't send them a dick pic or any videos of me masturbating.
Right ever, right right? You can't prove that, can you. Father's
Day was coming up by all the same time, a year. Oh my
god, So I took the kids shopping for presents. I wanted to make
it a special day for him because he was leaving on a promotional tour the
next day. He said he was coming to England or Amsterdam. He wasn't
sure which one yet. We got him some new clothes for his trip,
and I picked up his favorite pie, key Lime. That's hilarious. Oh
my god, like the key Lime pie. Of course he does. I
also wrote him a letter telling you how much I loved him. During his
Father's Day dinner, Brett kept getting up and leaving the room to do something
or call someone. We went to bed early and tried to have sex.
But my what a fucking shot going through life thinking, oh, any day
my wife's my ex wife's going to publish a point about how I went limp.
I thought I couldn't. He couldn't do it, That's what was wrong.
He was tired. We were lying still in the dark, and suddenly
he said, Jewels, no matter what happens, I will always love you.
Oh my god, he's such an asshole. It sounded like a goodbye.
The next morning, Brett woke up early, and you can picture like
his shaved chest to what he says that. Yep. Yeah. The next
morning, Brett woke up early to do some last minute packing. While I
waited to drive him to the airport, I was grabbing some of his bags
to take them to the car when I noticed his ticket lying on the floor.
On it, in big black sharpie was written Italy. I stood frozen
staring at it. Brett came into the room and I said, don't lie
to me. Where are you going? He saw the ticket and lied,
anyway, I don't know. I think I start in England. I walked
out, got into my car. I sat there with my head on the
steering wheel. I was going to drive away when he came out and put
his stuff in the car. I decided to drive him to the airport anyway.
I wanted to get rid of him, to make sure he got on
the plane. We drove intense silence until he leaned over touch my arm and
said, Jewels, Julie, it's not what you think. I pulled my
arm away and said his vicious as I could, don't touch me. Yes.
We pulled up to the airport. I screeched to a halt and told
me to get the fuck out of my car. I didn't know what to
do with myself and started smoking like crazy. Oh my god, Davy are
you there. When I got home, I immediately told Jada, all,
oh, oh, so Julie's smoking. It's it time to smoke. Miss,
this is Hord. This is it, man? Are you smoking the
crock? Go it to me? Wow, Julia need a crock, mister
Bulldog for you? This is it, man, he said, He said,
I need it. Hoh did I? Bulldog has been as d l
f X as it gets. Man, this guy just keeps showing up and
it's organic. It's like there's always a reason to bring him up. Oh
my god, everywhere. When I got home, immediately told Jade all about
it. It sounds sounding as though I just it's their daughter, as though
I had just witnessed some horrific accident and was still trying to process it.
Dallas heard and told me to shut up about it. We're sick of hearing
about him and you. Dallas page again to teach them to yoga. By
that point, I was shocked, but understood why he reacted like I would.
Eventually find out that Brett had gone to meet sins Ziero sins Zetto,
a woman he had met at an autograph session. She had shown up with
the intention of marrying the hit man. She'd been in love with him since
seeing him wrestle as a little girl. Apparently, her entire bedroom had been
plastered with posters of Brett, including pictures of him with the kids. I
like to think, Boss, that she's in the audience in this. Indeed,
I'd like to as well. Let me get this watching, let me
watching him and touching herself. Ready, Yes, this girl was everything Brett
needed to feel like the hit man again. Yes, steering take devastation direct.
Yes. When he returned to col I turned to call. He tried
to downplay the affair, claiming all they did was go sightseeing. Oh yeah,
did you see rolling mountains deep the deep Covardoue crevasses, and I saw
the whole of the Pantheon. I didn't believe. Oh my god. He
tried to get close to me again. He would reach for my hand when
he spoke to me and refer to me as mom and plying with your family
again. I guess Italy hadn't gone as he had hoped. Oh brother.
I told him I needed some space and went back home to Regina to figure
things out. A few weeks after we had moved in, Bread showed to
my door with a turkey and hit on me. Remember this chose up with
the turkey? Oh my god, yes, I found it amusing and disturbing.
I asked if Cinzia knew he was here. He said yes, that
she didn't have a problem with us being friendsh I let him in and showed
him around my new house. We made small talk, but I tried to
move things along quickly. My boundaries were stronger than they had ever been with
him. He picked up on it and said he'd better go. I walked
over to the door. Before I could open it, he said, Julie,
I still have strong cravings for you. Oh my god, get the
shirt. I still have strong cravings for you. Let that mean whatever it
means. And it's been really hard. Okay, I have strong cravings for
you, and it's been really hard to overcome. Oh my god, God,
bless wrestling. Write books. That's all I can say. The dirtiest
fucking thing I've ever heard my entire life. Honestly, you know, chocolate
chip cookie. I gotta get back. I gotta make sense. I'm backed
up on sure creation. Tell me no, no, it's got to happen.
Now, what is it? I still I still have strong cravings for
you. I still have strong can we do it? Valentine's Day line?
I still have strong cravings for the Yeah, let that mean whatever whatever you
want it to mean, you will, I said sympathetically. I hugged him
and shut the door. Wondering what that was all about. I called Brett's
assistant Marcy, who told me that Cinzia was in Italy. Oh my,
my god, Julie, she leaves and on the same day he shows up
with a turkey looking for sex. Mm hmmm. Yes, the fact that
he has a turk is too much. Man, Oh you might like a
turkey, Oh God, make a turkey, you know, like the old
days, like Brett Brett with like no shirt on, with an oven mint
Julie. Yeah, yeah, he right, he had no shirt on,
oven mitt and then an apron wrapped around his waist, all right, wearing
jeans, fucking bread. No, he's such a thing to observe. Yeah,
he really is. He's like he's definitely like a product of the nineties,
without a doubt like that. That's that's his that's it, you know,
right, the the nineties were his fucking were the best times of life.
Obviously, they were the best times of his life. They were,
you know, like like, why can't be nineties again? I found out
about their marriage a few days later. She didn't even know they were married.
Wow. They had been married for a while, but Brett had been
keeping it a secret. He eventually gathered the kids and told them. Blade
came home right after slamming the front door. I recognized the look on his
face. It was the same one I had had so many times over the
years. I asked him what was wrong, and he couldn't even speak.
He was so mad. He took a piece of paper and scribbled, you
better call Jade. She will tell you. I said, no, you
tell me. He blurted out, Dad married that girl. I felt my
stomach bottom out and my throat tightened. Oh. Dallas came home and just
started shaking his head when he saw me. I said to him, I
guess you've heard. Huh. I don't know what to say. Dad is
a fucking idiot. My god. Yeah. When he was walking out,
he just kept saying it. God, he just kept saying, tell your
mom. Make sure you tell your mom. My heart was beyond shattered over
his cruelty. Perhaps the marriage had been too hasty. That winter, Brett
called to tell me that Cinsya had gone home. She was homesick and didn't
like the cold. He was planning, Oh my god, he was planning
to split his time between Calgary and Italy. Hearing that made me want to
run too. But where home. I booked a flight and told the kids,
I was going back to Vagina to clear my head. Oh my god,
stop running back to Regina. Breck keeps running back to Hergina. That's
true. Bret concludes with some reflections on this Italian flame that he had Calgary
flame, if you will. I was just a kid when I started out.
I had big dreams and I lived through them. Twenty three years later,
I was finally home. Not broke, not broken, but I had
a lot of scars. I was called a young lion once, and I'd
also soared like an eagle. I feared after Julie and I finally divorced,
that I'd become a cold, lonely polar bear, patting his way across the
Arctic snow, lost and empty. But in September two thousand and four,
I married the beautiful Italian girl with the piercing blue eyes. Cinzia showed me
her diary from nineteen ninety five, when she was fourteen. Do you think
she was a fan of nineteen ninety three. When she was where she'd written
for someday she'd marry me, she'd I mean, I mean I can't.
She did. But by the time I'd finished writing this book, we'd called
it quit, simply because she could never be so far away from her home
country and family. After thirty years of being away from home, I knew
exactly how she felt. But polar bears never slowed down. They move ever
forward, and I've always been a survivor bright hard mm and Italy mm hmm.
And if we're getting quintessentially Italian here on this episode, let's learn quickly
about Dan Peterson. Shall we oh yes please? A legend of Italian basketball
and sports commentating. He fucking went to high school in Evanston, Illinois.
Of course, Northwestern University Michigan. The most Midwestern guy you can imagine is
calling the action in full Italian because after coaching in a series of universities in
basketball in nineteen seventy one, according to Wikipedia, he went abroad and began
coaching overseas teams, and from seventy three to seventy eight he coached Vertus Bologna.
And do we know what he did in the fifties. No, because
he would have been in high school. Looks like no, he was born
in thirty seventy. He could have been I'm sorry, sixty two was when
he was a coach in college at ten. I wait, wait, was
he born in thirty seven or twenty seven? I don't have his date of
birth right here? Let me see here thirty six? All right, now,
this wouldn't have been him. Then I found an article. I wasn't
sure, but there is a Dan Peterson. But I guess he's from New
York City who's mentioned in this article that it says. The article is titled
I won't read it, but I'll just read you the headline. Wrestling rehearsed
played by script with announcers mostly helping to ruin act. Sounds like my kind
of guy. Seriously, So let's pull up that article I found, yes
on mister Peterson as as appearing in the pages of the Chicago Tribune. Indeed,
they wrote up nineteen eighty six kind of a profile piece of who this
gentleman is. Let's talk about this Evanston native boss all right in the basketball
section. Yes, indeed, of course, little man makes it big in
Italy. Evanston native a TV sports idol, Dan Peterson looks unimposing enough to
disappear into the smalls of crowds, but that will never happened to him again
in Italy. On the streets of this sophisticated city, they didn't name a
city yet Italy. I mean Milan, But no they do, But that's
Milan is labeled there, but not in the body of the text. Here
so far, on the streets of this sophisticated city, he is repeatedly hailed
with wishes of good luck and questions about basketball. In restaurants, head's turn
and voices whisper to confirm his presence in his team's home arena. The crowd
breaks out in a rhythmic chant of Pete Errson as soon as it spies him
walking to the dressing room an hour before a game. The five foot four
inch native of Evanston, who was always too small to play in Italian basketball,
Why in Italian? Oh no, no, sorry to play the game,
has become the biggest man in Italian basketball. When Peterson turned fifty in
January, one of Italy's three daily sports papers, Corrie del Dello Sport,
gave him what amounted to a full page birthday card with tributes from the Italian
basketball community. The newspapers and Italy's two basketball magazines call him Little Big Dan,
alluding to both the paradox and his stature and the link to the American
West he has manufactured by wearing cowboy boots and playing country music on his guitar.
What he has made of himself as a one man conglomerate whose extensive essence
was captured perfectly by a drawing in Italy's weekly super Basket magazine is that for
the like the supermarkets, the circular has the discounts two for one on apples
or whatever. It's like, you get, yeah, what two for one
special on cantil open pursoot. Is that what that sounds good? Actually,
you know, and uh, you know. Unfortunately, the you know,
honey is wholesale price. In Italy, they didn't called wwro Wels. They
call UFC. Exactly taken tyk in tyk Inty Sky. In the illustration,
Peterson was one foot on a basketball or has one foot in a basketball,
and is juggling a pen, a microphone, a book, a clothing manufacturer's
trademark, and a teapot the objects referred to his various roles as coach of
SIEMAC Milan, Italy's top professional team, writer for various papers and magazines,
TV per oh writer for various papers and magazine, TV personality, author of
books on basketball and American folk history and as opposed to American fake history,
which is all about professional wrestling, and spokesman for Sergio Takani's clothing and Lipton
Tea. I'm the dandy Don Meredith of Italy Peterson, says one of his
guy from Evanston and one of his typically immodest and accurate assessments of his status.
He has reached such a level of fame and fortune with an income estimated
at three hundred and seventy five thousand dollars a year though relentless hustling and the
power of through relentless hustling, in the power of television. For the first
nine of his thirteen years in Italy, Peterson was merely the highly successful coach
of teams in Bologna and Milan. That all changed once he started doing a
variety of sports shows on two Italian TV networks. It was like having Hubie
Brown and Brent Mushburg Mussburger rolled into one. Peterson says. Also part of
the package is his being a father of four whose family lives outside Chattanooga,
Tennessee. Peterson sees them so rarely that he learned the births of his two
youngest children via telegram. Fuck. His wife, Sue, wants to celebrate
their upcoming twenty fifth wedding anniversary by renewing the vows in Italy. Yeah.
The only thing she insists is the ceremony being English, so she will know
what she's getting into. Peterson says she needed no translation when one week after
their original ceremony he left for a summer basketball tournament in Indiana. Right there,
right then, I knew what was in store for me, he says.
I'm sure she's I'm sure he's had many Cinzia's. Sue Peterson had married
a man on a fast track, even if the road would take some unusual
detours. Between coaching Evanston YMCA teams and La dolce Vita, he quickly came
to terms with the sweet, languid pace of life in Italy, which demands
an adjustment that most aggressive Americans cannot make. He still found plenty of ways
to run the fast break in a country where, blessedly, time is often
allowed to stand still. It is the night before Siemok, the Italian League
champion in nineteen eighty five and twenty three to two so far this season,
would play Sibona of Yugoslavia in a European Cup game that is the hottest attraction
of the season in Italy. Peterson has just finished running a brief practice session,
calling out instructions to his three American born players and nine natives, including
four time Olympian Dino Menigan, Meneghini, Menigan Menigan, Manigo Cabago. I
think Manigo is probably right, Manigo Manigu, Manigatti, Manigotty in English Dino
stuffed Mannagotti in English and Italian. One hundred fans have come to watch the
late afternoon practice at Pallolido, the five thousand seat airplane hangar style building Siemok
was forced into when the roof on Milan's bigger indoor arena collapsed under last winter's
snow. Once practice is over, Peterson is in a hurry. As usual,
he jumps into a visitor's car, one of the few trips he will
take at anything but a taxi, and they head out to dinner. It
is seven thirty pm, so early to eat by Italian standards, that Peterson
has to turn on the lights in the dining room of a favorite restaurant a
few blocks from his modest Milan apartment. You can't take the Evanston out of
the boy, not at all, Not at all. He wants to have
a glass of milk with dinner as a face man exactly you know, I
mean, you know where's his fucking steak and potatoes? You know he doesn't
want fucking pasta, meatballs and whatever mama's fucking gravy over a meal of spaghetti
with white clam sauce. Brother, Exactly, we got, I got clam
sauce, brother Bosmania is See. I knew he was a real Italian.
It's so funny that I am a real American? Was this song? I
Am a real Italiano with hots iant oil and hots on that Please on that
real Italian over a meal of spaghetti with white clam sauce, grilled soul salad
and mineral water. Calm down, Jesus Christ, we need all that detail,
yes we do. What about the half caraffe of wine? God,
I know it's all about food, but I'm like decrying that I'm not.
Peterson says he drinks nothing else. Oh, I guess he doesn't drink.
I only eat. I only drink mineral water, and I only eat mineral
water for that, you know, sometimes eat I order food at a restaurant,
but I don't ever eat it. I just eat the mineral He just
feels badly, Yeah, feel badly about you know, I'm enjoying the company
of others and I'm not ordering any food, So I just I'm not eating
any food. So I just ordered it and I let it sit there and
go to waste. Pretty fell to eat the mineral water to the table.
That takes you know, you know, quality dining so seriously, and the
proshoot to deparm or whatever. Yeah, right right, and he grabs it
and he stands up with the waitress right at the table, and he like
makes sure she watches as he walks across the dining room and throws it in
a garbage cannon. It's fine, he says, that don't or he sits
there with it and he you know, and then the way the you know,
the server goes away and come back, Well, did you not have
Were your eyes bigger than your stomach? Now, I just don't eat food.
I only eat mineral mineral water. You can, oh, do you
well? Do you do you want to? Do you want a doggy bag?
Nope, you can just throw it away. No, we talked about
European rampage. You know a lot of people don't know about the announcer on
that show, Dan Peterson. Yeah, apparently he eats only mineral water.
No p fast for me, No, no mind, mineral water. Please,
thank you. He narrates his life story almost as if the conversation were
a TV broadcast. Ah, I knew I like this guy. The words
come in staccato bursts that reflect his immersion in the lyric rhythms of Italian speech.
It was Jack Burmister, the former Evanston High School coach, who convinced
Peterson that being too small to play would not keep him from coaching. He
started coaching while still in high school, getting a delusional impression about his ability
by working with Evanston YMCA teams that included such exceptional athletes as Dave Tremaine,
later the most valuable player at Navy, Art Schwarm and Schwarma. Art Schwarma,
an MVP at Halal Food at Michigan State, and Jim Purnell, who
played eight years in the National Football League, five of them with the Bears.
You know, when you got talent like that, you start thinking,
I'll tell them something and they'll learn it, and you're right, Peterson says.
Because they're naturals, you get to thinking, heck, this is easy.
It was enough of a stimulation to get Peterson into the usual track for
US coaches. With a Northwestern undergraduate degree in education and a Michigan master's in
sports administration, he took assistant coaching jobs at McKendree College in Lebanon, Illinois,
Michigan State, and Navy before getting the head job at the University of
Delaware after five decent seasons there, sixty nine to forty nine record. Two
people changed Peterson's life, one directly, one inadvertently. One was a Peace
Corps the other Villanova coach Roly Methemino. The Peace Corps, more significantly,
is subsidiary the Sports Corps. Thought Peterson was just the man needed to coach
the Chilean national team, which was trying to improve because the country was to
host the nineteen seventy five Pan American Games. His ability to speak Spanish was
among the reasons why the State Department thought Peterson would succeed in an environment under
the leadership of Marxist President Salvador Alende that was generally hostile to Americans. By
the time he got the job in nineteen seventy one, my first reaction was
forget it. Then they started talking about things like a job from my wife,
and it kept looking better and better. The offer wound up being a
house with a maid, plus a car, gas, food, living expenses,
and a chance to get caught in the crossfire of the coupdata that toppled
Alan Allende. I don't know, you know, I don't want to talk
about chili because people think I'm making it up. I've seen dead bodies in
the streets, cars overturned, gunshot buses, cars and flames, you know,
but don't make it seem like a big deal. It was like you
and I sitting here talking. You get the attitude. Hey, you know
they're not shooting at me. I'm cool, fucking awesome. Yeah, just
shoot him, not me. I don't fucking care pretty much. I don't
care who dies, just as long as it's not me. It wasn't being
in a line of fire between radical students and the police as he drove to
work that convinced Peterson to leave Chili. Nor was it having to buy food
on the black market because of the trucker strike that played a big role in
bringing down a Lende. I left because guys couldn't get to practice with the
gunfire in the streets. Every day I'd call twelve guys and four would make
it. Some days I couldn't get there. The military takeover came twelve days
after Peterson left in late August nineteen seventy three. His leg see a fourth
place finish for Chile's basketball team in the nineteen seventy three South American Games.
Peterson, who could see the end coming, began looking for a way out.
At the nineteen seventy three NCAA Final Four in Saint Louis in the Flesh
in the flesh market for coaches that is part of every Final Four, he
was asked about taking a job in Bologna, Italy if the if the leading
contender, Messamino, turned it down. Peterson said he was interested, but
forgot about the possibility and went back to Chile. When Messamino took the Villanova
job, the Bologna owner, who had advertised he was getting an American coach
to rebuild his team, quickly turned to Peterson. I went over there and
the team practice for me, and I fill in love with Italy. Immediately
fucking ted Lasso over here, thinking he would be in Italy a year.
Peterson left his family, which then included two children, in Tennessee. But
Bologna won the Italy Cup in its first in his first season, and one
year became five. And then the Milan team president called it was like going
from some other city to New York. I mean Milan is the prestige team
of Italian basketball. In his twelve plus seasons in Italy, Peterson is credited
with turning around teams in both Bologna and Milan. His teams have won seventy
two percent of their games, three league championships and a Korak Cup, one
of the three europe Wide cup competitions that run concurrently with league seasons. Yet
few Americans have succeeded as coaches in Italy. Don Casey tried a year at
Pesaro, only to be fired after losing six of the first seven games on
an Italian replacement. The Pasaro team went on to lose to SIEMAC in the
playoff finals. You put Jay in front of Pesaro. We got your name.
You're damn right there it is. And Don didn't learn a word of
Italian, and you can't communicate through an interpreter. It is his language skills
that have made Peterson the foremost interpreter of American sports in Italy. Speaking rapid
Italian mixed with both a Midwest twang and an American slang. Peterson does four
sports shows a week on two privately owned channels. The shows include a weekly
pre broadcast of a National Basketball Association game, on which Italians have learned that
a Julius Irving basket is called doctor j house call. His income and exposure
from TV endorsements, publications, and even a little player agent work on the
side. Damn right. He has his hand in everything, says He has
his hand in everything, says SIEMAC playmaker Mike Dent. Me give Peterson a
nationwide president. Succeeded only by soccer players in Italy. It is why no
coaching job in America looks as attractive. Peterson is also the overseer of a
rapidly growing youth basketball program in Italy. He has had at least a little
to do with the general improvement that helped the Italian national team win the nineteen
eighty three European champions He broke the Italian's box, says Dan TONI West Virginia.
What West Virginian whose heritage makes him an Italian? For accounting purposes,
only two foreigners are allowed for team, but Seemike has a luxury of three
Americans. Dan got them to be hard workers and top of them played defense.
Now that he is sure of himself, he's mellowed out. I think
he retired as a coach about three years ago. So I'm looking an Italian
to me. I love them Italians, right, Yeah, he definitely pronounces
the eye. Peterson would agree with all of that. You know, we're
the least coach team in the world. Except feeling sure of himself. Coaches
have painfully little job secured in Italy. Eight of the code country's top thirty
two teams changed coaches in the first one third of this season. The pressure
here on the pressure here is so stifling you can't breathe. If we play
against bona and all these uh, those achievements I've been telling you about will
mean nothing. Is in college where you can say we're gonna teach you these
guys today and we'll win tomorrow. You lose today, You're gone in a
cab going to the pavalido. For the Chabona game. Dan Peterson does not
act like a man feeling any heat. The ovation before the game is comforting,
so is Seamok's early burst, producing a thirty to sixteen lead after ten
minutes. Only when the Yugoslavia whittle a twenty one point lead down to twelve
in the second half does Peterson become animated, running to the other end of
the floor to call a defense. As the referee notices and pushes the SIEMOK
coach toward his own bench, the sellout crowd erupts in a chant of raw,
Raw, Peter Pete Raw, Rob Pete, her Son Wow. When
the ninety sixty six SIEMOK victory is over, Peterson does interviews in English and
Italian and joins the rest of the team for dinner at a restaurant, intent
on disproving the maxim that you can't get a bad meal in Italy. Two
big screen TVs show a delayed broadcast. At the game, one table breaks
out in the words of a song composed on the spot to commemorate the victory,
but dandy Dan of Italy picks it as risotto. Listening quietly as his
praises are sung, Dan Peterson takes another sip of mineral water and drinks it
all in. Oh my god, this guy. What a gift, Dan
Peterson. I mean, who would have thought we'd get the chance to be
acquainted with Dan Peterson. Oh not, not, not ever, an Italian
legend. Peterson. I didn't even know there was a fucking Dan Peterson from
Chicago who fucking was a legend in Italy. This cause is almost like a
John Nadden calling a wrestling show. Yeah right, exactly fascinating that this guy
was such a cultural institution, get somehow, Yeah, I just you know
that aired this show and yep, got the assignment. Believe in you know,
I believe in sports, I believe in entertainment. I feel like wrestling's
got a kind of calling for me. And if you think this guy's fascinating,
how about backstage interviewer and his co host, Guido Bagot. I mean,
just just read this paragraph from an article about an American basketball player who's
going over to Italy and the papers here we're trying to make it. I
think in Ohio we're trying to make heads or tails out of you know what
this this Italian league is like and what the upper unbelievable it do? I
have it? The article says, well, things such as press facilities are
NBA caliber statistics are a mystery. The press can't get seasoned stats of any
Italian players. If you want to know the numbers, you ask Guido Baga
how the fuck is this even a thing? There is a player named I
guess Bob Ferry. No, no, it's his father, Danny Ferry,
who was in play for an Italian league. Spot and Guido bagattas all over.
This is like a spokesman for the for the team. So he's like
a PR guy. He's like a mover and shaker in the PR world.
Wow. He studied English and literature at UC Santa Barbara, according to Wikipedia,
and was a commentator for NFL football games as aired on Italian television.
Wow. So he became you know, if you watch the Super Bowl in
Italy or the NBA Finals in Italy. You knew this guy quite well.
Apparently that became his thing, was commentating American sporting events on Italian television.
And yeah, I worked for Canal five and unbelievable to get to know these
guys in the rolely they held in the country. But that's uh, that's
Guido, the man with the stats. They'll just have to wild. You'll
just have to trust him, right, I guess. So the venue,
the Forum d Milano, I guess is where it takes place? Yes,
yep, an indoor sports arena in Osago. You see a forum Asago,
I think on the on the Chiron on the show. Oh yeah, yep
yep, which is outside of Milan, capacity of fifteen hundred, primarily used
according to Wikipedia, for basketball, ice hockey, tennis, and live concerts,
and in fact hosted. I forgot all about this. I read this
a pair of episodes of Raw when they broadcast Raw from Italy in two thousand
and seven. Oh my god, yep, well that was that was you
remember that at all? Also boxing championships, some ice hockey there as well,
and heard ninety three with Dan Peterson doing comment. Man, those are
the days, and coming up with the twenty twenty six Winter Games, which
will be held in Italy. The figure skating and short track will take your
places in the same arena that hosted WWF European Rampage teen ninety three. Boss,
I think it's safe to say we would like to arrive in Milan.
Before we do that, we need to rock that fucking death toll. Oh,
yes, we do. We have seven yeah? Seven? Uh?
Virgil? Yeah, right, is in the dark match? Oh well here,
you know what you talked about, Scott Center pinning IRS. He does
in the dark This is a dark match, Okay, I din't even know
other dark match? Yeah, yeah, yeah, Virgil, Yeah, Scott
Center pinned Di r s. Virgil defeated Terry Taylor. Yeah, Virgil,
mister Fuji Yoko Zuna Butch Yes, the Bushwhacker Bam Bam, Bigelow, Paul
Bearer and the Undertaker. Wow all dead right, all no longer with us?
Right? You're confirming that right here, right now? Yes? Yes,
So there you have it, the death toll for a show that,
man, I thought we'd get to in a part of the world I never
expected to get to. The show I didn't even know existed really until until
it until it came our way. It's time for the deep dive into WWF
European rampage nineteen ninety three April nineteen ninety three to be specific, from Milan,
Italy. On the other side of this break, it's that fucking cast