Interview with WCW's Lash LeRoux - FROM THE VAULT

<v Speaker 1>Yeah, as Daniel Podcast, The Doctor Show, Fucking Delenda What
<v Speaker 1>Today March.
<v Speaker 2>Welcome everyone to a very special major wrestling for your podcast.
<v Speaker 2>I'm your host, Matt Cardona, Brian is here, small Mark
<v Speaker 2>Strolling is here. But our guest today w c W
<v Speaker 2>Legend Lash LaRue Lash.
<v Speaker 3>What's up, my man?
<v Speaker 4>I'm good man. How in the world are you guys doing.
<v Speaker 4>It's good to see you again to my friend. And
<v Speaker 4>I don't know if I've met the other.
<v Speaker 5>JEMs or not, so corporal ocasion if I will. I
<v Speaker 5>was thinking about this today. I think we missed you
<v Speaker 5>in Deep South by like weeks.
<v Speaker 4>Probably, So I think that sounds.
<v Speaker 6>About right, man, because like.
<v Speaker 7>You know, at a time, there were some new guys
<v Speaker 7>were in there, not just new guys, but the new
<v Speaker 7>generation was sort of coming in while an old generation.
<v Speaker 5>Was going out, right, So we got signed in uh
<v Speaker 5>early two thousand and six, and then we reported like
<v Speaker 5>that spring, and I recall, like you know, and these
<v Speaker 5>people that we met there, like Luke Alo's and stuff that, yes,
<v Speaker 5>we had just missed like you and Jindrak, So we
<v Speaker 5>didn't get like interact with you guys, but we had
<v Speaker 5>just missed you guys or we would have been been
<v Speaker 5>De South alumni together.
<v Speaker 7>That's exactly right. So my Deep South roots go even
<v Speaker 7>deeper than that because Deep South, you know, was sort
<v Speaker 7>of the genesis of what was the power plant in
<v Speaker 7>WW and so that's what kind of got me calling
<v Speaker 7>calling me back there to Deep South a little bit.
<v Speaker 7>And that was my last more last kind of big
<v Speaker 7>hurrah to try to make one more splash before Rodeolph
<v Speaker 7>in Sunset.
<v Speaker 4>I guess for lack.
<v Speaker 5>Of right back with Jody Hamilton. Were it all started
<v Speaker 5>for you?
<v Speaker 4>That's exactly right.
<v Speaker 7>Man's Amanda Pleedge Jody Assassin professional wrestling.
<v Speaker 4>That's what I call it.
<v Speaker 6>Awesome.
<v Speaker 8>So we actually just met at aw a couple weeks.
<v Speaker 7>Ago, correct, Yeah, you and I did absolutely well. Yes, yes,
<v Speaker 7>that was uh that was after or either before or after.
<v Speaker 4>I think I walked down there a little rattle, but yeah.
<v Speaker 8>Well you locked walked out of the locker room and
<v Speaker 8>everybody said, wow, he's still jacked.
<v Speaker 7>The best comment I got on that was from Les
<v Speaker 7>Thatcher who saw me last November and less goes.
<v Speaker 4>Wow, look at you kid.
<v Speaker 7>You wait until you got out of the business to
<v Speaker 7>get in shape.
<v Speaker 2>I saw you at a at Starcast I couldn't believe
<v Speaker 2>how jacked you were and you had just worked at
<v Speaker 2>the night before, right.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, yeah, well yeah, I'll be honest with you guys,
<v Speaker 4>but yeah, I feel like you guys are being way
<v Speaker 4>too But it's just it's one of those things.
<v Speaker 7>I went on this journey and my life and I'm
<v Speaker 7>not going to try to wax philosophical on it. But
<v Speaker 7>you know how the wrestling business is, and not to
<v Speaker 7>jump in the deep end too quickly, but man, it
<v Speaker 7>takes you way way up to the highest highs and.
<v Speaker 6>It takes you to the lowest low We know.
<v Speaker 7>So little of yourself if you let it. And you
<v Speaker 7>won't believe this, man, But about twenty sixteen, I weighed
<v Speaker 7>three hundred and sixteen pounds. I turned forty years old,
<v Speaker 7>and yeah, yeah, man, I let the injuries.
<v Speaker 4>I like the depression.
<v Speaker 7>I like to being out of the business for eight
<v Speaker 7>almost ten years kind of get to me.
<v Speaker 4>And I didn't have to take my shirt off of
<v Speaker 4>National TV anymore. That was plus. But you know, you
<v Speaker 4>also you take medication to cover up injuries and things
<v Speaker 4>like that.
<v Speaker 7>And I woke up at forty years old, man, I go,
<v Speaker 7>you know what this is not sustainable, and I just decided, Man,
<v Speaker 7>I'm gonna do something about it right now. And I've
<v Speaker 7>never had an addictive personality, so any medication I was
<v Speaker 7>taking was more physical than it was psychological for me.
<v Speaker 7>So I dropped all that cold turkey started just trying
<v Speaker 7>to lose weight. I lost one hundred pounds and went
<v Speaker 7>from three sixteen to to eleven before I got back
<v Speaker 7>in the gym, fell back in love with working out,
<v Speaker 7>and just just just love to love how I feel now.
<v Speaker 7>I love where that circle has sort of brought me.
<v Speaker 7>And man, just to say, it took me about a
<v Speaker 7>year and a half to do it. Man, But before
<v Speaker 7>I lost that weight, dude, I looked like a Russian
<v Speaker 7>nesting doll.
<v Speaker 4>I looked like last.
<v Speaker 6>That's awesome.
<v Speaker 2>Well, I mean you look you look fucking great now.
<v Speaker 2>And when I saw you at Sarcas, you had just
<v Speaker 2>worked for GCW. So are you back in the ring
<v Speaker 2>or what's going on here?
<v Speaker 4>So far that's been a one off man, So to
<v Speaker 4>be honest with you, Matt, here's the deal. Man. The
<v Speaker 4>way that that whole thing happened for me was.
<v Speaker 7>This, When I left the wrestling business, I truly left
<v Speaker 7>the wrestling business. I literally, you know, and that thing
<v Speaker 7>is a cumulative effect. I mean, for most people, unless
<v Speaker 7>you've been extremely blessed in this wrestling business, you don't
<v Speaker 7>sit there and plan out your retirement, right, you sit
<v Speaker 7>there and you go it just hits you one day,
<v Speaker 7>or you get a back, that injury that's taking you
<v Speaker 7>out of the ring, or maybe more often than not,
<v Speaker 7>I think it's a combination.
<v Speaker 4>Of all those things. Right, it's in three and those
<v Speaker 4>things start mounting up, while at the same time, maybe
<v Speaker 4>the phone's ringing a little less, while at the same
<v Speaker 4>time you're thinking.
<v Speaker 7>A lot less of your work and who you are
<v Speaker 7>and your value as a wrestler and where your place
<v Speaker 7>is in the business. And mentally you get down and
<v Speaker 7>you get down and you get down till one day
<v Speaker 7>you just decide, Man, this ain't for me anymore. And
<v Speaker 7>you've got a million excuses why it's not. And it
<v Speaker 7>could be the injuries, it could be you know, any
<v Speaker 7>other issues that come along. And for me, man, I'm
<v Speaker 7>wrestling and a little independent in Alabama and I'm wrestling
<v Speaker 7>Bull bu Cannon and we were the main event. Yeah,
<v Speaker 7>and I know me at Barry's gonna have a great
<v Speaker 7>batch so I'll walk up to him and I said, dude,
<v Speaker 7>you're gonna be my last match. I'm retiring tonight. Of
<v Speaker 7>course you are, yeah, and he just hugs me, laughs
<v Speaker 7>about it. His reactions about to say, as yours. I
<v Speaker 7>literally had that match. We finished the match, I rolled
<v Speaker 7>out of the ring. I didn't cut up promo, I
<v Speaker 7>didn't do anything, and I never got a ring again
<v Speaker 7>until thirteen years later, which was about this past July.
<v Speaker 4>I think it was.
<v Speaker 7>You know, I do the podcast with Conrad Thompson, the
<v Speaker 7>whole ad free show thing, and he did his Top
<v Speaker 7>Guy weekend up and Hunt's fa Alabama, which is not
<v Speaker 7>too far from me, and he knows I don't do
<v Speaker 7>autograph signing. I wasn't doing appearances. I wasn't wrestling. I
<v Speaker 7>wasn't taking any bookings because when I swore off wrestling
<v Speaker 7>and said I was done with wrestling, I was done
<v Speaker 7>with all of it. And and you know, I very
<v Speaker 7>rarely even did interviews like this, and so I went
<v Speaker 7>to draw.
<v Speaker 4>Caricatures for him.
<v Speaker 7>He talked to me into that he goes just draw
<v Speaker 7>caricatures and be kind of in the corner. So I
<v Speaker 7>interacted with the fans forgot how awesome it is interacting
<v Speaker 7>with the fans man when they're genuine and it's good
<v Speaker 7>and they love you and appreciate you.
<v Speaker 4>So I'm just drawing all day and keeping my mouth shut. Meanwhile,
<v Speaker 4>they did this mock indie show where they had Eric Bischoff,
<v Speaker 4>Jeff Jarrett, you know, road Dog, and these guy Kevin
<v Speaker 4>Sullivan get together and book a show based on the
<v Speaker 4>local talent that they had, and then they put on
<v Speaker 4>the show in front of the fans. So long story short,
<v Speaker 4>at the end of the day, when we got through wrestling,
<v Speaker 4>or they got through having the show, it was over.
<v Speaker 4>The building's empty, the ring was empty. We're all about
<v Speaker 4>to leave.
<v Speaker 7>And I looked at Conrad and I go, you know,
<v Speaker 7>I haven't even taken a bump or been in a
<v Speaker 7>ring in thirteen years.
<v Speaker 4>And he goes, there's no way. I go, yeah, trust
<v Speaker 4>and I need to get in there and just take
<v Speaker 4>a balt see what it feels like. Yeah.
<v Speaker 7>I stepped in the ring. Kyle took a back bump,
<v Speaker 7>and I went, man, you know that didn't feel too bad.
<v Speaker 7>I backed up into the corner, just took one step
<v Speaker 7>and took a front bump and went that's all right,
<v Speaker 7>grab one of the guys that had a max that night,
<v Speaker 7>shot him in the ropes through a dropkick and the
<v Speaker 7>hot for there Tomy was there, hit him right on
<v Speaker 7>the nose and it felt like riding the bike.
<v Speaker 4>And so I popped up and Conrad's filming this whole thing,
<v Speaker 4>because he goes, you, legit, haven't been in the ring
<v Speaker 4>in thirteen years ago. This is fresh, so it's raw.
<v Speaker 4>He sticks the microphone my face. I looked at it
<v Speaker 4>and I went, man, I'm here for a little bit
<v Speaker 4>of fun my dad and the son. Maybe one more run.
<v Speaker 4>I ain't done. I ain't done. I then I realized
<v Speaker 4>that have the sidebirds No but.
<v Speaker 7>Still, and he plastered it up on Twitter and it
<v Speaker 7>got a little bit of traction. And I got a
<v Speaker 7>call from GCW and Brett Lauderdale and hey, what about.
<v Speaker 4>Having one more match and when we do star Cast.
<v Speaker 7>And at the same time Conrad was asking me to
<v Speaker 7>be a part of star Cast. So I'd be there
<v Speaker 7>for the weekend anyway, maybe get to see some old
<v Speaker 7>friends at ae W and just see what shakes down.
<v Speaker 4>You know, at least I won't be fifty.
<v Speaker 7>Five wondering if I could have had one more run
<v Speaker 7>so so far that's been the only match and the
<v Speaker 7>only time out.
<v Speaker 3>Wow, I mean, man, you wrestled Joey Janella?
<v Speaker 4>Right, yeah, sure did. Man. We did about fifteen minutes
<v Speaker 4>and whoa, just the splits, the whole deal. You know,
<v Speaker 4>I was. I was shot first time in the ring.
<v Speaker 7>I promise you, guys, man, and now I'm one of
<v Speaker 7>those guys I believe playing this game of life with
<v Speaker 7>your cards face up and being completely transparent. I didn't
<v Speaker 7>get in the ring and buff around. I didn't train around.
<v Speaker 7>I didn't have time because.
<v Speaker 6>My character sinned.
<v Speaker 7>My artwork is so busy, and I'm on the road
<v Speaker 7>so much. I just slim in the ring. I said,
<v Speaker 7>let's go out there and see what happens.
<v Speaker 3>You know, now, do you have that match? You know?
<v Speaker 2>Are you bit by that wrestling bug again? Do you
<v Speaker 2>want to have another match? Or what's the deal? Are
<v Speaker 2>you just playing it by ears? Staying in shape? See
<v Speaker 2>what happens?
<v Speaker 7>All the above, Matt, Because here's the weird thing, and
<v Speaker 7>you know, not that Brown knows or anything like that,
<v Speaker 7>but being completely honest with you. As I get older,
<v Speaker 7>one of the things I really am impressed with when
<v Speaker 7>I watch you, and I'm admired from afar is how
<v Speaker 7>you're handling the business aspect of the wrestling business, because
<v Speaker 7>I truly believe that one of the problems with my
<v Speaker 7>generation of wrestlers was this. We came in during the
<v Speaker 7>contract era and came in during the era of television,
<v Speaker 7>and and you know, trying to make the spot and
<v Speaker 7>learn to be a TV wrestler. That we all became
<v Speaker 7>pretty good wrestling talents. For us to be on that level,
<v Speaker 7>I mean, you learn how to work on match, you
<v Speaker 7>learn the psychology, you learn to be a good worker,
<v Speaker 7>but you really don't learn the wrestling business.
<v Speaker 4>And man, I didn't realize that after I was out
<v Speaker 4>of it, you know.
<v Speaker 7>And as I get older, you know, you spend the
<v Speaker 7>first half of your career being about the wrestling aspect
<v Speaker 7>of the wrestling business. Just give me a shot, give
<v Speaker 7>me some TV time, put me in the ring, dude,
<v Speaker 7>I'll get over and then the money will come later.
<v Speaker 4>And now the money don't always come later, you know.
<v Speaker 7>And as you get widow gets smaller and smaller, man, dude,
<v Speaker 7>you go, I better start thinking about the business side
<v Speaker 7>of things. And I'm blessed now that I work so
<v Speaker 7>hard to build up this caricature business that I have
<v Speaker 7>that I honestly do as well off of it right
<v Speaker 7>now as I did when I wrestled for WCW financially.
<v Speaker 7>Oh yeah, and I would love to make one more run.
<v Speaker 7>I would love to marry those things together from a
<v Speaker 7>branding perspective to make myself more desirable to book as
<v Speaker 7>a caricature artist. But you know, I have to balance
<v Speaker 7>that thing where if someone like g c W comes
<v Speaker 7>calling and they want to they want me to do
<v Speaker 7>a one off match or an indie promotion invites me out,
<v Speaker 7>I'm I'm flattered by that.
<v Speaker 4>I love that. I want to be a part of it.
<v Speaker 4>But oftentimes I can make more.
<v Speaker 7>Money going and drawing that day than I can going
<v Speaker 7>and drawing in the ring.
<v Speaker 3>Well I love that.
<v Speaker 8>So for a lot of people that might not know
<v Speaker 8>what what is the what is the drawing business? What
<v Speaker 8>exactly are you doing right now?
<v Speaker 5>I always remember your your spots in WW magazine from
<v Speaker 5>when I was in high.
<v Speaker 4>School exactly you doo of it all, man, dude.
<v Speaker 7>Here's the thing is the way it all started for
<v Speaker 7>me was I was a big fan growing up of
<v Speaker 7>Mad magazine. Like I loved artwork, and I always loved
<v Speaker 7>to draw, and uh, that was never a big mark
<v Speaker 7>for comic books. I love the characters in the comic books.
<v Speaker 7>But if you came to me showed me that you
<v Speaker 7>drew Batman, dude, he's got a square ahead and a
<v Speaker 7>lot of details. You're not impressing me with your artistic
<v Speaker 7>ability on that one. You know, the storytelling is phenomenal,
<v Speaker 7>but the face itself, you know, when I'm tracing those
<v Speaker 7>things out of a comic book, that didn't impress me
<v Speaker 7>as much as Mad magazine that would spoofed these movies
<v Speaker 7>and TV shows and for that to work, just like
<v Speaker 7>the actor or the wrestler, or if they put Hogan
<v Speaker 7>on the cover or whatever, and you're going, wow, you
<v Speaker 7>don't even have to tell me that that's Tom Cruise
<v Speaker 7>in Top Gun. That looks just freaking like Tom Cruise.
<v Speaker 7>So I carried that with me when I wrestled for WCW.
<v Speaker 7>You know, you guys know how it is. You got
<v Speaker 7>to be in a different town every night. You got
<v Speaker 7>to be at the building at nude for a show
<v Speaker 7>that doesn't go live on TV.
<v Speaker 4>Until seven pm. You got some time, you.
<v Speaker 7>Know, unless you're playing cards or doing something else. I
<v Speaker 7>started looking at those dry erase boards in the back
<v Speaker 7>and I bought me a pack of markers and began
<v Speaker 7>just drawing the guys in the back and Kurt hitting
<v Speaker 7>of course, you know, being the consummate river that he was.
<v Speaker 7>Anything that is humorous like that, that kind of pokes
<v Speaker 7>the bear he loves, and he's going to encourage and
<v Speaker 7>he'd sit there man constantly go draw, Hogan.
<v Speaker 4>Okay, I'm like two years old, and he's going, now draw,
<v Speaker 4>I'm really old, drawing with an oxygen mask walker and
<v Speaker 4>oh boy, Yeah, he gave me this great line that
<v Speaker 4>he said, hey, look, you tell me you don't write
<v Speaker 4>the news. You just reported. And so you know, Bill
<v Speaker 4>After and Ross Foreman and some other publishers and editors
<v Speaker 4>for wrestling the magazines saw that, and that started me
<v Speaker 4>doing the cartoons. Well.
<v Speaker 7>It was very forgiving for me because at that point
<v Speaker 7>I was not a professional artist. I was a wrestler
<v Speaker 7>that could sort of draw. So that was the pull
<v Speaker 7>and the novelty, and I parlayed that over the course
<v Speaker 7>of about ten or twelve years of doing that month
<v Speaker 7>in a month out and teaching myself to be better
<v Speaker 7>and better into me having some skills when I left wrestling,
<v Speaker 7>and so I would early two thousands to answer the
<v Speaker 7>question a little bit more directly about the caricature business.
<v Speaker 4>Everybody had a blog.
<v Speaker 7>So all these caricature artists that I hadn'tmired, including Mad
<v Speaker 7>magazine artists and guys like that Theme Park caricature artist,
<v Speaker 7>all of them, they would have these blogs and they
<v Speaker 7>post their working man just like a mark. I'd send
<v Speaker 7>them a little message and go, hey, dude, why'd you
<v Speaker 7>draw this nose like this? And this is really cool?
<v Speaker 7>Here's my drawing. What do you think about this? You
<v Speaker 7>got any kind of advice or encouragement? In ninety percent
<v Speaker 7>of the time, to be honest, you know, not to
<v Speaker 7>Most of their reactions would be wait a second, is
<v Speaker 7>this last?
<v Speaker 4>LaRue the wrestler and Big Wrestlings fan.
<v Speaker 7>They start asking me about wrestling, and I go, ask
<v Speaker 7>me anything you want about wrestling, as long as I
<v Speaker 7>can ask you about caricature.
<v Speaker 4>And then I found out caricature artists have a union.
<v Speaker 4>They've got an organization.
<v Speaker 5>Yes, yes, this man, you gotta way better than being
<v Speaker 5>one of the boys.
<v Speaker 4>Jesus, Well, here's the thing, man, you're one of the boys.
<v Speaker 4>Here's what I hated about Edie wrestling.
<v Speaker 7>And again it goes back to why I admire what
<v Speaker 7>you doing so much, madness that the thing I hated
<v Speaker 7>the most about when the phone did bring is having
<v Speaker 7>to talk to a promoter and sit there and value
<v Speaker 7>myself on what I think I can get from the
<v Speaker 7>promoter versus what the promoter's going to try to pay
<v Speaker 7>me and then go back and then you worry about
<v Speaker 7>overpricing yourself, and you worry about under pricing yourself. Man
<v Speaker 7>for me, and there there's a standard market rate for
<v Speaker 7>caricature artists, and they know what they've got. So if
<v Speaker 7>I don't charge what the standard rate is, I get
<v Speaker 7>blackballed because now I'm undercutting all the other boys in
<v Speaker 7>the business.
<v Speaker 6>That's crazy.
<v Speaker 7>They don't want me around, you know. And so we
<v Speaker 7>all kind of work together in that regard. And so
<v Speaker 7>I do caricatures. I do black and white version on
<v Speaker 7>paper like you see at a theme park that's really
<v Speaker 7>really fast. Or I do a digital version where I
<v Speaker 7>draw directly on an iPad, I have a flat screen
<v Speaker 7>TV behind me. I print it out four by six
<v Speaker 7>on a little lanyard and the name tag people wear
<v Speaker 7>at these uh at these shows and these trade shows
<v Speaker 7>are their caricature plus the company's name imprinted on there,
<v Speaker 7>plus the booth number and the whole deal. And more
<v Speaker 7>often than not, I also get recognized from wrestling, so
<v Speaker 7>they feel like they get a two fur. So they'll
<v Speaker 7>fly me all over the United States and do a
<v Speaker 7>three day deal there and and work their booth to
<v Speaker 7>try to compete with the other boos and draw people
<v Speaker 7>to their booth.
<v Speaker 5>How much money can you get done in like a day,
<v Speaker 5>like at what's the most amount of Like?
<v Speaker 7>Yeah, so this is generally what I average. I average
<v Speaker 7>one face when I'm doing black and white really quick,
<v Speaker 7>just on a sheet of paper, and I do it
<v Speaker 7>on a twelve by eighteen sheet of paper with just
<v Speaker 7>a Crayola marker. And man, I just did them yesterday,
<v Speaker 7>did a wedding last night Memphis. I do one face
<v Speaker 7>every three and a half minutes.
<v Speaker 4>That, yeah, that's exactly right. It's fast. You have to
<v Speaker 4>be because I do a lot of campus Arkansas.
<v Speaker 7>State on Wednesday, and so as soon as you show up,
<v Speaker 7>they know the caricature artists is going to be there.
<v Speaker 7>They'll be five hundred deep in students and you're there
<v Speaker 7>for four hours, and it's one person right up the
<v Speaker 7>other man, just.
<v Speaker 4>Boom boom, boom, boom boom.
<v Speaker 7>And then when I do the digital, the digital is
<v Speaker 7>full color, it's a little bit more involved.
<v Speaker 4>It takes me probably about eight minutes to draw each person.
<v Speaker 7>And so these companies will book me out for volume
<v Speaker 7>and quality, man, and and for the interaction and just
<v Speaker 7>an experience for their guests to have this thing going
<v Speaker 7>on at whatever party, event or anything it is.
<v Speaker 4>Man and I get paid by the hour.
<v Speaker 6>Oh my god.
<v Speaker 2>The Connie and me is thinking, oh my god, why
<v Speaker 2>are you not at every wrestling convention charge of these marks,
<v Speaker 2>like Jimmy comes up, you draw Jimmy, you sign it.
<v Speaker 2>Steve comes up, yet, you draw Steve, you sign it.
<v Speaker 2>And then you're eight your eight by tens a right
<v Speaker 2>there too. If they want to, you know, buy that there.
<v Speaker 2>It is ready to go. That's exactly right. And I
<v Speaker 2>tried to kind of I've thought about that for a long.
<v Speaker 7>Period of time, and I've tried to make that happen
<v Speaker 7>a little bit there at star Cast when I was
<v Speaker 7>just a couple of tables down from you, Matt, and
<v Speaker 7>I don't think people quite got it yet, you.
<v Speaker 4>Know what I mean.
<v Speaker 7>And that's the other thing that will happen. Sometimes I'll
<v Speaker 7>go to a wedding. Weddings are really big right now,
<v Speaker 7>but most people haven't realized it's become a thing in weddings.
<v Speaker 7>So all go into the cocktail hour and most people
<v Speaker 7>will walk by and they think you're gonna make fun
<v Speaker 7>of them. They think it's like the TikTok videos where
<v Speaker 7>you u's nothing but a big schnoz and the goat
<v Speaker 7>keys and the whole deal.
<v Speaker 4>And so they walk buy and they go, hey, you
<v Speaker 4>want to draw it, and they'll go maybe later, Well,
<v Speaker 4>you'll get a couple of brave people be the first
<v Speaker 4>people to sit down, and once they see the quality
<v Speaker 4>and they see what you're turning, everybody starts lining up.
<v Speaker 4>You got to get a few out there, you know.
<v Speaker 3>Wow?
<v Speaker 2>And how did this turn into a podcast? And especially
<v Speaker 2>one with Conrad on his network?
<v Speaker 7>So Conrad hit me up pre covid, I would say
<v Speaker 7>maybe a year year and a half before when he
<v Speaker 7>was first talking about doing the paywall and doing adfree
<v Speaker 7>shows dot com, and he hit me with the idea
<v Speaker 7>of finding out a way to do where I could
<v Speaker 7>draw a live for the wrestling fans and talk about
<v Speaker 7>whatever it is I'm drawing, and he kind of had
<v Speaker 7>the genesis and the idea for the show. And at
<v Speaker 7>that time, Man, I was just in a place where
<v Speaker 7>I still was a bidder is toong of a word, man,
<v Speaker 7>because I've never been a bitter person in my life
<v Speaker 7>at all.
<v Speaker 4>I just have it.
<v Speaker 7>But you know, I just didn't feel good about wrestling, man,
<v Speaker 7>And I didn't want to have anything to do with wrestling,
<v Speaker 7>and I didn't want to do anything even remotely connected
<v Speaker 7>to wrestling. And the excuse I would give to him,
<v Speaker 7>and give to anybody else that would listen, was this,
<v Speaker 7>I don't want to be around the wrestling business. And
<v Speaker 7>if I do a podcast, it's going to lead to interviews.
<v Speaker 7>If I do interviews, it's going to lead to promos.
<v Speaker 7>Promo is going to lead to autograph signings. Autograph signings
<v Speaker 7>are going to lead to me having matches. Matches are
<v Speaker 7>going to lead to me back in the business.
<v Speaker 6>Again, this sounds.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, which is exactly what eventually wind up happening. Right,
<v Speaker 4>So I said no the first time, and then they
<v Speaker 4>hit me up about two years later, and uh right
<v Speaker 4>right in the towards the end of COVID, I think
<v Speaker 4>is when they started hitting me up about asking about
<v Speaker 4>doing We've been doing the podcast, I think now for
<v Speaker 4>about two years, and uh, in that time, it felt
<v Speaker 4>right At that Tommy was right. I was in a
<v Speaker 4>better place.
<v Speaker 7>I had my feet underneath me a little bit more
<v Speaker 7>where I had to have done enough digital that I
<v Speaker 7>had an idea of my mind of what that podcast
<v Speaker 7>could look like. And I still don't feel like I
<v Speaker 7>have done it complete justice yet. In fact, I've just
<v Speaker 7>built a studio in my house, just one room over
<v Speaker 7>from where I'm at right now, where I'm trying to
<v Speaker 7>equip that out and get the right equipment, the right
<v Speaker 7>sound equipment, the right cameras, because I think that there's
<v Speaker 7>a way where I could do it where my entire
<v Speaker 7>behind me would be the green screen so people can
<v Speaker 7>see what I'm drawing as I'm drawing it live.
<v Speaker 6>You know.
<v Speaker 4>I think there's a lot of opportunities there. But that's
<v Speaker 4>how it kind of turned.
<v Speaker 7>Into us doing this podcast, and that turned into me
<v Speaker 7>interacting with fans again.
<v Speaker 4>And I remembered, man that you.
<v Speaker 7>Know, when you push all the bad stuff away and
<v Speaker 7>you get away from the negativity, and you distilled the
<v Speaker 7>wrestling business now to its purest form, which is are
<v Speaker 7>the fans enjoying what I'm doing?
<v Speaker 4>Is it getting over? Is the interaction here?
<v Speaker 7>We're making that connection whatever it is, whether I want
<v Speaker 7>them to fear me, or I want them to love me,
<v Speaker 7>or I want them to laugh at me, or I
<v Speaker 7>want them to hate me, whatever that connect is. Man,
<v Speaker 7>Once you get that back and it's genuine and you're
<v Speaker 7>being yourself and they're they're accepting it.
<v Speaker 4>Man, they're giving you that feedback. They know the language back.
<v Speaker 6>You know.
<v Speaker 4>Wow, I forgot how good this can be when it's good.
<v Speaker 6>Mm hmm.
<v Speaker 2>Well I'm glad you're you're back in the business and
<v Speaker 2>you're all positive. But I do have to bring up
<v Speaker 2>one negative thing. No wrestling figures, no action figure.
<v Speaker 6>Never got a figure, Yeah yeah, you got figure out.
<v Speaker 7>The only ones I've got are the ones that are
<v Speaker 7>kind of indie made, I guess were lack of a
<v Speaker 7>better way of putting it. You know that that people
<v Speaker 7>through the years have just kind of made the tribute
<v Speaker 7>action figures, iizing stuff, you know, And again that goes
<v Speaker 7>back to the business minded me. One of the things
<v Speaker 7>I've thought about about trying to make one more run
<v Speaker 7>is I would just like to be relevant enough, you know,
<v Speaker 7>to have that little bit of merchandise. I've learned to
<v Speaker 7>appreciate mailbox money when you're not actually bumping.
<v Speaker 4>Just go out there, and I need more of that.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, So let's let's backtrack a little bit, because you know,
<v Speaker 2>obviously you were a WCW. Were you a fan growing
<v Speaker 2>up or was this you watch on TV and you're like, WHOA,
<v Speaker 2>I can get into this because you were you were
<v Speaker 2>you started the power plant, right.
<v Speaker 7>Yeah, absolutely, and so extraordinary story if you guys don't
<v Speaker 7>mind me telling it, if.
<v Speaker 4>You'll showl with me for a second. But when I
<v Speaker 4>was a kid, I was a huge fan.
<v Speaker 7>I'm younger than most people probably think I am because
<v Speaker 7>I started the wrestling business so young.
<v Speaker 4>And I also, for whatever reason, got tight casted with
<v Speaker 4>the older guys.
<v Speaker 7>Like even when they brought it in the new Blood and WCW,
<v Speaker 7>the new Blood were all ten years older than I
<v Speaker 7>was at the time. Started when I was like eighteen,
<v Speaker 7>I was youngest guy WCW had under contract at the
<v Speaker 7>time when I started, and I you know, I started
<v Speaker 7>about eighteen, retired when I was about thirty two or
<v Speaker 7>something like that. I'm forty six now forty seven. Yeah,
<v Speaker 7>So I just I got I got in early and
<v Speaker 7>got out young. And that's why most people when they
<v Speaker 7>think back to the nineties, they think I must be
<v Speaker 7>older than I really am.
<v Speaker 5>I would have thought that too, until I looked at
<v Speaker 5>your Wikipedia today exactly.
<v Speaker 7>So I was a child of the eighties, and I
<v Speaker 7>was a whole a maniac like everybody else, and was
<v Speaker 7>there for WrestleMania one and the WrestleMania three and all
<v Speaker 7>these iconic stepping stones and wrestling and became a huge
<v Speaker 7>wrestling fan all throughout my childhood. But I came from
<v Speaker 7>a really, really poor home, and I started working when
<v Speaker 7>I was nine years old. My first job was washing
<v Speaker 7>cars and got grass at nineteen years old, then working
<v Speaker 7>on construction crews cleaning up around homes that were being
<v Speaker 7>built when I was ten and eleven years old, and
<v Speaker 7>then actually building houses when I was twelve and thirteen.
<v Speaker 4>And I played sports also during all this. All throughout high.
<v Speaker 7>School, played football, wrestled, and my junior and senior year
<v Speaker 7>of high school, I was homeless.
<v Speaker 4>When I was twelve years old.
<v Speaker 7>My mom had a boyfriend that on the property we
<v Speaker 7>lived in and he beat her up, and I was
<v Speaker 7>too young to do anything about it. When I was fifteen,
<v Speaker 7>he tried to do it again and I took a
<v Speaker 7>baseball back to him, and I wasn't too young to
<v Speaker 7>do anything about it then. And my family all love
<v Speaker 7>each other. My mom loved us as best she could.
<v Speaker 7>She raised her kids really, really well. She had five
<v Speaker 7>kids and quit school in the eighth grade. So we
<v Speaker 7>live in houses that didn't have running water, electricity, just
<v Speaker 7>because we couldn't afford it. And so when that riding
<v Speaker 7>on the wall kind of came and I knew it
<v Speaker 7>was untenable really for me to stay home any longer.
<v Speaker 7>I started taking care of myself. And I still had
<v Speaker 7>a great relationship with my mom and my family. It
<v Speaker 7>was just kind of an understood thing, even though it
<v Speaker 7>wasn't stated that, hey man, I'm better off financially just
<v Speaker 7>working and taking care of myself.
<v Speaker 4>So the company I worked for also had some clothing stores.
<v Speaker 7>And I slept behind the cash register from midnight to
<v Speaker 7>five am. Yeah, and that was my job. I was
<v Speaker 7>security and they gave me a company vehicle.
<v Speaker 4>I would leave there.
<v Speaker 7>I'd lock it up and I'd drive down the hill
<v Speaker 7>to the high school that I played football at, and
<v Speaker 7>I could take a shower in the athletics department because
<v Speaker 7>I did athletics, And then after school, I'd go to
<v Speaker 7>football practice. After football practice, I'd go home with a
<v Speaker 7>buddy I played football with. I'd eat dinner with his family, shower,
<v Speaker 7>do whatever homework I had, and then be back up
<v Speaker 7>at the store at midnight to sleep there from midnight
<v Speaker 7>to five am.
<v Speaker 4>Those were my hours.
<v Speaker 6>That's great.
<v Speaker 7>So that was my schedule. Yeah, all throughout high school,
<v Speaker 7>we want to state championship. And when undefeated at football
<v Speaker 7>at Alabama that year, so it was like a rudy
<v Speaker 7>story man, and I want to stay championship in amateur
<v Speaker 7>wrestling as well. But I was so busy living life
<v Speaker 7>and surviving and plus wrestling in the early ninety sucked,
<v Speaker 7>so I wasn't really watching it as much. And then
<v Speaker 7>about nineteen ninety five is when I graduated high school.
<v Speaker 4>About ninety six, I started college.
<v Speaker 7>I was already engaged by then to who would be
<v Speaker 7>my future wife, and so we settled in a little
<v Speaker 7>bit more and we were about to start college together,
<v Speaker 7>and I had more stability in my life and all
<v Speaker 7>of a sudden, WCW had Monday Night Drove.
<v Speaker 4>It had just started.
<v Speaker 7>They had all the guys I grew up with under
<v Speaker 7>that umbrella, right they had Now the nWo is just hit.
<v Speaker 7>My mind's blown because I'm watching hul Cogan turnhel and
<v Speaker 7>now he's a bad guy.
<v Speaker 4>You know what's this all about?
<v Speaker 7>And they got Rick Flair, they got Lex Luger, they
<v Speaker 7>got Steamed, they got Roddy Poker, they got the Macho Man,
<v Speaker 7>and then on the undercard, they got.
<v Speaker 4>Stuff I've never seen in wrestling before.
<v Speaker 7>When you see like Billy Kidman and Ray Minsterio Junior
<v Speaker 7>Wrestling and even guys like just go Inferno. We're entertaining
<v Speaker 7>his activity, man, And to watch that stuff play out,
<v Speaker 7>you know, and I'm going, this was a good product
<v Speaker 7>from top to bottom. And then right in the middle
<v Speaker 7>that sen my main event slide. You had guys like
<v Speaker 7>Eddie Guerrero, Chris bin Wan, Chris Jericho, Dee Malinko or
<v Speaker 7>Wrestling weekend and week out, and You're going, man, this
<v Speaker 7>is just a great product top to bottom. And I
<v Speaker 7>watched for maybe three weeks or four weeks, and then
<v Speaker 7>I saw the promos that were running for the power
<v Speaker 7>Plant and they open tryouts, and my mentality at the
<v Speaker 7>time literally was Atlanta is a drive away from me.
<v Speaker 7>I'll never make it professional wrestling. I don't know anything
<v Speaker 7>about professional wrestling. I didn't even know at the time
<v Speaker 7>this will work, you know, I didn't I've never been
<v Speaker 7>to a show, backstage, nothing.
<v Speaker 4>I just thought, man, what a great story to have
<v Speaker 4>for the rest of my life if I go on
<v Speaker 4>a tryout and I meet Steam or I shake his hand,
<v Speaker 4>or meet Rick Flair, and I didn't know what to expect.
<v Speaker 4>So I got this open tryout at the power Plan.
<v Speaker 7>Those were three day long tryouts, and anything you guys
<v Speaker 7>ever heard about about how bad and brutal it was
<v Speaker 7>is absolutely not over exaggerated or overstated. And Sarge, I
<v Speaker 7>don't know if you guys have ever met Sarge. You know,
<v Speaker 7>with Sergeant Buddy Lee Parker, Dwayne Bruce. Yeah, he was
<v Speaker 7>a legitimate like coast Guard drill sergeant. And so he
<v Speaker 7>would come in this fire club that was like five six,
<v Speaker 7>two hundred and thirty pounds and built like a Rubets cube,
<v Speaker 7>and he would just come in and go grab a bucket,
<v Speaker 7>Grab a buck what's the And they had these five
<v Speaker 7>gallon paint buckets. You flipped them upside down and you
<v Speaker 7>did free squats, and you started with reps of fifty
<v Speaker 7>drop down push ups, roll over sit ups, run in place,
<v Speaker 7>reps of fifty again continuously until.
<v Speaker 4>You built up the five hundred squats. And I'm looking
<v Speaker 4>in the tryout class.
<v Speaker 7>Yeah, yeah, So there was like twenty four guys in
<v Speaker 7>the tryout class, and I would say it was a
<v Speaker 7>mix of guys that were like college athletes that weren't
<v Speaker 7>quite good enough for the pros, like football players and
<v Speaker 7>those types of athletes they knew they were wanting to
<v Speaker 7>go pro, but they wanted to continue to be an athlete,
<v Speaker 7>or the bodybuilders that wanted something to do in the
<v Speaker 7>off season to make money, and they thought they had
<v Speaker 7>to look. Or you'd have raw boned guys that were
<v Speaker 7>just naturally six foot eight, four hundred pounds and had
<v Speaker 7>tattoos and.
<v Speaker 4>Mohawks and thought they had to look.
<v Speaker 7>In their mind, all those guys thought if I checked
<v Speaker 7>the boxes, they're gonna see me and just sign me
<v Speaker 7>to a contract, you know. And I'm looking around and
<v Speaker 7>I'm watching drills, you know, Serge get in their face
<v Speaker 7>and when they're falling out and cramping up because they
<v Speaker 7>can't do anymore squats, you know, or the juice gets
<v Speaker 7>to them and they're locked up, they're blood or whatever.
<v Speaker 6>You know.
<v Speaker 7>He would get down in their face. But look, you
<v Speaker 7>called us. We didn't call you if you can't do
<v Speaker 7>it out here, and he's just running them off one
<v Speaker 7>after the other. It took about the first half of
<v Speaker 7>the first day for me to realize this was a
<v Speaker 7>war of attrition, and I looked around, went, oh, that's
<v Speaker 7>the game. Well, I've been through some stuff in my
<v Speaker 7>life by then. You may ask me to leave, but
<v Speaker 7>I'm not gonna quit, you know, I'm not that guy. Yeah,
<v Speaker 7>So that was my mentality.
<v Speaker 4>And once I realized that was the thing, I was
<v Speaker 4>like a Rick flair Mark at that point because every
<v Speaker 4>squat I wasn't just doing them. I would do them
<v Speaker 4>and go oooh, I wanted to be there.
<v Speaker 7>And at the end of three day trap well, at
<v Speaker 7>the end of the first day there were sixteen guys left,
<v Speaker 7>second day, eight guys showed up. End of the second
<v Speaker 7>there was maybe six five six guys left, and then
<v Speaker 7>the third day and all of it was just ten
<v Speaker 7>hours of exactly what I just described and the third
<v Speaker 7>day there was two guys left. Me and one other
<v Speaker 7>guy were the only two that showed up, and we
<v Speaker 7>did the same thing I described for the first half
<v Speaker 7>of the morning. Then we finally rolled into the ring
<v Speaker 7>for the first time. They didn't they still k faved everything.
<v Speaker 7>They didn't tell us nothing about the wrestling business. They
<v Speaker 7>taught us very quickly how to run the ropes, taught
<v Speaker 7>us how to take a back bump, how to take
<v Speaker 7>a front bump, and see if we were athletic enough
<v Speaker 7>to pull that off. And then they pulled us into
<v Speaker 7>Jody Hamilton's office and then you sat down with the
<v Speaker 7>Winston Churchill Professional Wrestling.
<v Speaker 4>And you know he would do the dealry and lean
<v Speaker 4>back and he'd take us off, hold his hands over
<v Speaker 4>his start and look, kid, we're not promising you'll ever
<v Speaker 4>have a job in a wrestling business. I'm not telling
<v Speaker 4>you you're gonna be on TV telling you that you're
<v Speaker 4>going to be a big superstar. You are not a
<v Speaker 4>wc W wrestler. But if you want to pay us
<v Speaker 4>three grand, you've shown us enough to prove to us
<v Speaker 4>that you have.
<v Speaker 3>To pay.
<v Speaker 6>Unreal count shit.
<v Speaker 7>Well, my mentality at the time was this, and honestly
<v Speaker 7>was this. I go, you know what, you pay for
<v Speaker 7>any training you get in this world. I don't care
<v Speaker 7>if you want to be a doctor or if you
<v Speaker 7>want to be a welder, You're going to pay for
<v Speaker 7>some kind of training or schooling. And if I really
<v Speaker 7>thought that I could have any kind of career of
<v Speaker 7>professional wrestling, and for whatever reason, it felt natural to me.
<v Speaker 7>It felt like it came natural to me, just did
<v Speaker 7>from the first time I stepped in the ring.
<v Speaker 4>It felt right. So I said, you know what, this
<v Speaker 4>is my best bet for training.
<v Speaker 7>I'm not there's no place I can go that's bigger
<v Speaker 7>than WCW was at the time.
<v Speaker 4>And get better training. There just wasn't.
<v Speaker 7>And so I go, you know what, I'm gonna get
<v Speaker 7>this thing a shot, and I'm a bet on myself.
<v Speaker 4>I had fifteen hundred dollars in my savings account.
<v Speaker 7>I gave that to w CW and Ted Turner also
<v Speaker 7>owned see an In Center, so I worked the rest
<v Speaker 7>of it off moving furniture.
<v Speaker 4>At the c an N Center.
<v Speaker 7>And I was from Alabama to Atlanta, two hours there,
<v Speaker 7>two hours back, ten hours a day, five days a
<v Speaker 7>week for about ten months before I had my first match.
<v Speaker 5>So my two questions are one, who was the other guy?
<v Speaker 5>Did he ever make it? And what was like the
<v Speaker 5>actual training like when they let you in?
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, never saw him again.
<v Speaker 7>So what happens is they brought us into the office individually,
<v Speaker 7>So I don't know what they said to him, if
<v Speaker 7>it was the same spill they gave to me, which
<v Speaker 7>it probably was, but I never saw him again after
<v Speaker 7>that last day.
<v Speaker 6>That's incredible, yow.
<v Speaker 7>And so the guys that came after me that very
<v Speaker 7>very quickly after that, I don't know how this fell
<v Speaker 7>the way that it fell, But like the very next month,
<v Speaker 7>they had another training, you know, exactly would have these
<v Speaker 7>things monthly. These tryouts were monthly, and then the next
<v Speaker 7>month that tryout through there was Mike Sanders trial Ale Sanders,
<v Speaker 7>you know, and the power plant with us, and then
<v Speaker 7>not long after that was Alan Funk, and then right
<v Speaker 7>whatever Alan Funk was Elix Skipper, and then Mark Jennerak,
<v Speaker 7>and then Chuck Palumbo and then Sean o'harron not too
<v Speaker 7>long after that. We just all kind of came through
<v Speaker 7>together about the same time. And I was the first
<v Speaker 7>of that crew, so to speak, and I was probably
<v Speaker 7>the first of that crew that kind of got a
<v Speaker 7>little bit of a break.
<v Speaker 3>So, yeah, we want to.
<v Speaker 2>Ask you about your obviously your your wrestling career, but
<v Speaker 2>we have some questions from the fans. I think the
<v Speaker 2>questions might come up organically, right Mark.
<v Speaker 8>Yeah, yeah, sure, I mean there's a lot. I mean
<v Speaker 8>we've actually, uh you know, answered a lot of them already.
<v Speaker 4>But you got all right, guys, met So you know,
<v Speaker 4>we asked.
<v Speaker 8>Our fans in our little Facebook group to ask you
<v Speaker 8>some questions. So these aren't going to be sort of
<v Speaker 8>in order or anything. They're just gonna be kind of
<v Speaker 8>all over the place. But uh so here we go.
<v Speaker 8>So Chesley Gobar says, did you enjoy the corporal Cajun
<v Speaker 8>persona or not? How much input did you have in
<v Speaker 8>that gimmick? He says, I loved it?
<v Speaker 4>Ha ha.
<v Speaker 7>Hey, here's the thing about the corporal caguing gimmick. I'm
<v Speaker 7>extremely proud of it. It's probably the better way to
<v Speaker 7>explain that. And what I mean by that is this.
<v Speaker 7>The way all that stuff came about with the n
<v Speaker 7>I A was Vince Russo came in and he just started, man,
<v Speaker 7>you know, changing everything right away. He was really high
<v Speaker 7>on the young guys and wanted to make new stars.
<v Speaker 7>And I think part of that was he had to
<v Speaker 7>feel like he, you know, was proving himself by making
<v Speaker 7>new stars. And he was really big on doing that.
<v Speaker 7>And he brought me and a lot of people don't
<v Speaker 7>don't remember that this was a part of it, but
<v Speaker 7>it was me, Hugh Morris, Chiabo Guerrero, oh man, what
<v Speaker 7>was Big Van Hamer, Van Hammer and Booker T Booker T.
<v Speaker 7>Because Booker T was g I Bro, I don't know
<v Speaker 7>if you got remember that, this.
<v Speaker 4>Gimmick, right. So he brought all of a sudden there
<v Speaker 4>and he said, look, bro, bro, here's the thing. Yeah,
<v Speaker 4>I don't have room for all you guys on.
<v Speaker 7>On the show. But he goes, I got two choices.
<v Speaker 7>I can either send you home are we need comic
<v Speaker 7>relief in the show, and we want you guys to
<v Speaker 7>basically be on the movie stripes. That's the way he
<v Speaker 7>sold it. And they kind of gave us the names
<v Speaker 7>Corporal Cage and and and I think van Hammer was
<v Speaker 7>stashed at first, and uh and then you know, general
<v Speaker 7>Hugh erection and.
<v Speaker 4>Bill hated that he hated that Gipp guy. He hated
<v Speaker 4>he hated the name but what me.
<v Speaker 7>And Hugh and He'll always build a mott will always
<v Speaker 7>forever be Hugh to me for him because that's just
<v Speaker 7>how I knew him. And uh, but me, Hugh and
<v Speaker 7>Chabo were pretty close at the time, and we were
<v Speaker 7>pretty proud of the fact that I think the fact
<v Speaker 7>that that got over when it was booked just to
<v Speaker 7>be comic relief to the extent that it did. I mean,
<v Speaker 7>I realized that this is a a flashpan point of
<v Speaker 7>WCW there where it went a lot of good to
<v Speaker 7>probably look at, but it got over to a certain extent.
<v Speaker 7>And for the extent that it got over, we took
<v Speaker 7>pride in the fact that it was strictly forced based
<v Speaker 7>on our workability. And once we got in the ring,
<v Speaker 7>you know, especially me and Chabo as a tag team,
<v Speaker 7>once you put us in the ring, man, we felt
<v Speaker 7>like we could go with anybody and we could play
<v Speaker 7>whatever part you needed us to play. So when they
<v Speaker 7>came to me and they said you're going to be
<v Speaker 7>corporal Cajun and you guys have to wear camouflage for instance,
<v Speaker 7>because the I think they asked how much input did
<v Speaker 7>we have in it? Well, I had no input on
<v Speaker 7>the name but when they came to me with the camouflage,
<v Speaker 7>you go, well, now wait a second, as long as
<v Speaker 7>I'm wearing this urban camouflage that they just ran and
<v Speaker 7>got from the surplus store, they said some runner for it.
<v Speaker 7>I said, doesn't matter how I wear it, as long
<v Speaker 7>as I'm wearing it. No, no, no, no, as long as
<v Speaker 7>you guys kind of like, okay, well what I felt
<v Speaker 7>fit my personalaws. I take one color of the urban
<v Speaker 7>camouflage and another pair of pants, took it to the
<v Speaker 7>wardrobe and asked Sandra to split them up the middle,
<v Speaker 7>take two alternate colors, and kind of saw them together
<v Speaker 7>so that would look different.
<v Speaker 6>Uh.
<v Speaker 4>Then I took my wrestling boots and I would fold the.
<v Speaker 7>Tops down to make them look a little bit more
<v Speaker 7>like World War two jump boots instead of just wrestling.
<v Speaker 7>I took a bucket hat, cut a hole in the
<v Speaker 7>top of it, pulled the hair through, and I still
<v Speaker 7>wore my money grub beats, you know, just tried to
<v Speaker 7>make it our own. And Chavo wore the you know,
<v Speaker 7>the dow rag and the bandana and that sort of thing,
<v Speaker 7>and uh and and then we.
<v Speaker 4>Pretty quickly threw Van Hammer out of the out of
<v Speaker 4>the group, is there.
<v Speaker 8>Yeah, So actually taking a step back so that the
<v Speaker 8>Last LaRue character, Rob Buck says, was there any inspiration
<v Speaker 8>whether in name or hairstyle taken from the X Men's gambit,
<v Speaker 8>which is his real name is Remy Lebue.
<v Speaker 7>Honest with you, here's the way all that stuff came about.
<v Speaker 7>And this is one hot and and so I promised
<v Speaker 7>with you guys are transparent, transparent.
<v Speaker 4>So my real name is Johnny Mark LaRue.
<v Speaker 7>Anybody can Wikipedia that and see that my real name
<v Speaker 7>since I was eighteen years old is Jonathan Mark Last LaRue.
<v Speaker 7>And the reason why it is the best advice I
<v Speaker 7>got in the wrestling business that really helped me out
<v Speaker 7>so much was again Jody Hamilton and all this wisdom.
<v Speaker 7>He called me Last from day one because he remembered
<v Speaker 7>the old cowboy Last LaRue from way back in the
<v Speaker 7>Western time, right, that guy just spelled his last name differently.
<v Speaker 7>And so as soon as he here last, Hey, he
<v Speaker 7>goes Hey, Last LaRue. And so he called me in
<v Speaker 7>there and he just called me in his office one day
<v Speaker 7>and he goes and this is before ever signed with
<v Speaker 7>WCW or anything. I just really started training and he goes, hey, kid,
<v Speaker 7>so you really think you're gonna use this like last
<v Speaker 7>LaRue name? And I go, well, I don't have anything better.
<v Speaker 7>I think, yeah, probably, So when he goes, he goes,
<v Speaker 7>I would I think it's a good college, got built
<v Speaker 7>in name recognition already. He goes, it's great. He goes,
<v Speaker 7>give you a little bit of advice. Give me all
<v Speaker 7>the advice that you can, Jody, please, he goes. If
<v Speaker 7>I were you, I wouldn't worry about trademarks. I wouldn't
<v Speaker 7>worry about copyrights. I wouldn't think about any of that
<v Speaker 7>stuff because all that stuff expires, or you have to
<v Speaker 7>continue to renew it, or you.
<v Speaker 4>Got to pay more money.
<v Speaker 7>You have to really stay on top of He goes,
<v Speaker 7>Since your real last name is LaRue, I would go
<v Speaker 7>to your local probate office back home, and I would
<v Speaker 7>petition the court to just legally add that to your name.
<v Speaker 4>Don't change your name what anyway, the example he gave me,
<v Speaker 4>he goes, he goes, like a woman.
<v Speaker 7>That goes against married and changes her last name, just
<v Speaker 7>go and fill out that same form.
<v Speaker 4>And I went and talked to my lawyer. I go,
<v Speaker 4>can I do? He goes, Yeah, we do, that like
<v Speaker 4>for twenty five bucks, I added last.
<v Speaker 8>Money before everyone, Oh my god.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah.
<v Speaker 7>And here's the best part of that story. For instance,
<v Speaker 7>w CW was never an issue. W CW never thought
<v Speaker 7>about it. And by the way, as a side note,
<v Speaker 7>as a parenthetical, I knew I couldn't be Mark LaRue
<v Speaker 7>because the first time I ever went to a wrestling show,
<v Speaker 7>I met Terry Taylor, and you guys know Terry, I'm sure.
<v Speaker 7>I walked up to him and I said, hey, mister Ta,
<v Speaker 7>I just want to introduce myself. My name's Mark, and
<v Speaker 7>he goes, I'm sure you are, kid, and guy, I
<v Speaker 7>work in the wrestling business. So I went and changed that.
<v Speaker 7>W CW was never an issue WWE. When I signed
<v Speaker 7>with them, they had in their contract that they owned
<v Speaker 7>Last LaRue, the rights to it.
<v Speaker 4>The name, the whole deal. And so I called them up.
<v Speaker 7>And I said, the only issue I've got with the contracts,
<v Speaker 7>not the money, nothing else is I don't know how
<v Speaker 7>you own the name Last LaRue when that's my name,
<v Speaker 7>And they go, well, we bought WCW, and we we
<v Speaker 7>assumed that they came up with the character and that
<v Speaker 7>intellectual property and we owned that and go No, they
<v Speaker 7>didn't come up with that's my real name. They go, well,
<v Speaker 7>just send us copy of your driver's license. So I
<v Speaker 7>sent a copy of my driver's license. They changed the
<v Speaker 7>contract and it was never an issue. Here's my idea,
<v Speaker 7>my legal name for six or eight years or so.
<v Speaker 5>Wow, I never even thought of something like that. Maybe
<v Speaker 5>you can help me with my geography, raige occasion. You're
<v Speaker 5>from Alabama, so is that right? Can you be a casion?
<v Speaker 5>Is it that region or is the only New Orleans thing?
<v Speaker 4>Like?
<v Speaker 6>Help me out with this.
<v Speaker 4>So here's the deal on that. So legit true story.
<v Speaker 7>My dad was from Lofila, Louisiana, but I never knew them.
<v Speaker 7>I never knew my dad. I never knew that family.
<v Speaker 7>My mom raised us in Alabama. I just got this
<v Speaker 7>legit shoot cage in last name LaRue.
<v Speaker 6>Right.
<v Speaker 4>So when I.
<v Speaker 7>Started at WCW and I come over there and I'm
<v Speaker 7>trying to figure out what I'm going to do with myself.
<v Speaker 7>Like they asked about the hair when I showed up. Man,
<v Speaker 7>my hair was short. I always kept it short for
<v Speaker 7>ball in high school and the coaches made us do that.
<v Speaker 7>They said, kid, you need to grow out your hair,
<v Speaker 7>and you need some facial hair because you look too
<v Speaker 7>much like high school you look actually they said, look
<v Speaker 7>the kid Rudy.
<v Speaker 4>From the movie Rooty. So back when I was young,
<v Speaker 4>I guess I did. And so when I grew my
<v Speaker 4>hair out, all it would do is just curl up.
<v Speaker 7>That's all it would do, is just naturally curly and froy,
<v Speaker 7>and so I just kind of leaned into that. Let
<v Speaker 7>it be crazy. Then when I didn't want to go
<v Speaker 7>to everybody had to go to in the nineties, so
<v Speaker 7>I started going out these big port chop sideburns because
<v Speaker 7>I'm a huge Elvis mark. And now I looked in
<v Speaker 7>the mirror one day and the artist and he said, hey,
<v Speaker 7>I could shave those into my initials and make that different.
<v Speaker 7>And so I put the double l's on that. And
<v Speaker 7>then they stuck a microphone in front of my face
<v Speaker 7>at eighteen years old and wanted me to come my
<v Speaker 7>first promo. And when I graduated high school, I talked
<v Speaker 7>probably about like from Alamma. So while I was from Alabama,
<v Speaker 7>they putting my phone on I my name blast a
<v Speaker 7>real mama. They go, oh, you can't talk like that
<v Speaker 7>on television because Southern's considered ignorant. You got to drop
<v Speaker 7>the Southern accent. I go, I can't drop this. I'm
<v Speaker 7>gonna drop my Southern accent. And I tried, and I tried,
<v Speaker 7>man for about six eight weeks. Man, I'm working every
<v Speaker 7>day on annunciation and everything else, and I'm going, I
<v Speaker 7>this guy can't drop it. And then one day it
<v Speaker 7>hit me. I go, now, wait a second. And by
<v Speaker 7>this point I met Macho, I met Dusty Rhodes, and
<v Speaker 7>those guys they kind of talked like that, but they
<v Speaker 7>had really like Dusty Dusty kind of thought like this.
<v Speaker 6>You know.
<v Speaker 4>But when he's kind of promo because.
<v Speaker 5>He's got anyway, he's.
<v Speaker 7>Gonna really put pronounce it, lean into it. And then
<v Speaker 7>you know, Macho got that gimmick voice and that sort
<v Speaker 7>of thing. Man, And I go, you know what, I
<v Speaker 7>can't hide my Southern accent, but I can go. But
<v Speaker 7>I'm with a Cajun accent because I grew up watching
<v Speaker 7>this thing in Alabama and that came on Alabama Public
<v Speaker 7>Television and it was this guy justin Wilson, and he
<v Speaker 7>was a cage on shelf man and he come out
<v Speaker 7>and he go, We're about to cook a little bit
<v Speaker 7>of cage on food it's gonna be the best thing.
<v Speaker 7>I'll put you about, my Gary, A little.
<v Speaker 4>Wine for the ticket, a little wine for me, and
<v Speaker 4>so I the whole Cajun culture thing.
<v Speaker 7>Man, wow, and the first choice. And then they said
<v Speaker 7>to me, they go, okay, well where's home? And again
<v Speaker 7>the branding and the artist in me and everything else
<v Speaker 7>and the dad's roots, and I go Cajun country, Lofay
<v Speaker 7>at Louisiana. Double L's a little subliminal thing there, so
<v Speaker 7>I can play off that.
<v Speaker 6>So of course, my love.
<v Speaker 7>The first place w cw ever sends me to an
<v Speaker 7>augrass signing is lofaiat Louisiana. So now I'm thinking, all right,
<v Speaker 7>I'm either gonna blow this, this this gimmick right now,
<v Speaker 7>or this is the best test for it. And the
<v Speaker 7>people would coming in wanting an autographs, and I go, hey,
<v Speaker 7>how y'all doing? Where y'all at? Who can I make
<v Speaker 7>this out to? And I and these people are trying
<v Speaker 7>to convince me they know my family. They go, I
<v Speaker 7>knew your daddy or daddy. I want to have a
<v Speaker 7>name and a number or something. I've never met it.
<v Speaker 7>And then it instantly goes.
<v Speaker 4>In my mind. I go, look this may be cheesy,
<v Speaker 4>it may be over the top, but if the people
<v Speaker 4>here believe it and treat me like a hometown hero,
<v Speaker 4>I won't have any trouble in Brooklyn, or say, I
<v Speaker 4>see and then I'll find out really quick too. If
<v Speaker 4>you spend any time in Louisiana, they all have different
<v Speaker 4>accents anyway, every parish you go to, every one of
<v Speaker 4>those cages sound different.
<v Speaker 7>And then you go downtown New Orleans and those guys
<v Speaker 7>sound like they're from Brooklyn.
<v Speaker 5>No figure, that's that's where Red's is at, right, Broski legit? Yeah,
<v Speaker 5>Red's gym in best gym in the country, man, where
<v Speaker 5>the boys are hitting that?
<v Speaker 6>Yeah?
<v Speaker 7>Well, and so with the with the whole gimmick itself. Man,
<v Speaker 7>I kind of came up with all that, and uh,
<v Speaker 7>I just started adding to it.
<v Speaker 4>You know. I went up to Terry Taylor at.
<v Speaker 7>A WCW Worldwide TV taping in Orlando two matches into
<v Speaker 7>my career and said, Hey, Terry, you monif I wrestler
<v Speaker 7>as a last LaRue.
<v Speaker 4>He goes, I don't care what your wrestle erst and.
<v Speaker 6>He did in that time.
<v Speaker 7>I go okay, So I went and knocked on the
<v Speaker 7>production truck, you know, twenty years old. And they answered
<v Speaker 7>the door and I go, hey, Terry Taylor said, I
<v Speaker 7>could wrestle as last LaRue, So if you don't mind
<v Speaker 7>changing the cry on at the bottom there, so instead
<v Speaker 7>of it saying Mark Lewis says last lear they go, sure,
<v Speaker 7>no problem, and they did that, and then now the
<v Speaker 7>announcers are kind of forced by that point to start
<v Speaker 7>calling you that. And then when you come out and
<v Speaker 7>you just went and had your gear made and you
<v Speaker 7>put raging on one side and caging on the other,
<v Speaker 7>they get the hint they need something to talk about
<v Speaker 7>the in your match, and I'll call you the rage
<v Speaker 7>and caging and I added the Martigras beads.
<v Speaker 4>Then I added the side burns and it just kind
<v Speaker 4>of took off from there.
<v Speaker 3>I love it.
<v Speaker 8>So this one's kind of topical with the with the
<v Speaker 8>return of TNA this weekend. Ted Conley Baker says, how
<v Speaker 8>did you get involved with TNA? I remember seeing on
<v Speaker 8>a few shows on the TNA explosion back.
<v Speaker 6>In the ya as you're in the inaugural episode, right, Yeah, yeah,
<v Speaker 6>sure was.
<v Speaker 4>And again it was the only time in my wrestling
<v Speaker 4>career that I really cracked was stuck up in Cincinnati,
<v Speaker 4>and you know, I'm sure we'll get into more of
<v Speaker 4>that at some point. But TNA came round on the
<v Speaker 4>heels of that, and I was out of shape.
<v Speaker 7>Man, looking back, I really squandered probably a good opportunity there,
<v Speaker 7>and and I still had just enough of w CW
<v Speaker 7>gravatas that I was trying to carry around on my
<v Speaker 7>back that I thought that I just kind of deserved
<v Speaker 7>the spot.
<v Speaker 4>Anyway.
<v Speaker 7>Probably I didn't act like that because I've always tried
<v Speaker 7>to not be arrogant or anything like.
<v Speaker 4>That in my wrestling career. I tried to be humble.
<v Speaker 7>But I think in the back of my mind I
<v Speaker 7>probably squandered a lot because I expect more instead of
<v Speaker 7>working for more and with TNA. But I was on
<v Speaker 7>that very first episode. It was because Ed Forera came
<v Speaker 7>in early to help out, you know, doing production and
<v Speaker 7>stuff with him. And Ed gave me a call and
<v Speaker 7>they said, hey, you're a Bama guy and this for
<v Speaker 7>who's going to.
<v Speaker 4>Be in Huntsible. We want to fly you in or anything.
<v Speaker 4>Are you interested in doing it? I said, yeah, absolutely,
<v Speaker 4>I'll do it.
<v Speaker 6>Love to do it.
<v Speaker 4>Let's be a part of it.
<v Speaker 7>So I had that short little stint on that show,
<v Speaker 7>did a couple other matches with Saboo, and then I
<v Speaker 7>kind of got the hint and I go, you know what,
<v Speaker 7>I need to work for this a little bit. And
<v Speaker 7>there was a time there pretty early on, when they
<v Speaker 7>were doing the fair Grounds in Nashville. I would drive
<v Speaker 7>back and forth. It's four hours in Nashville, four hours back,
<v Speaker 7>just to be backstage on Wednesday night, hoping that they'd
<v Speaker 7>give me a little shot. But again that goes back
<v Speaker 7>and at that point, Man, so much stuff had happened
<v Speaker 7>to me in the wrestling business. You would think I'm
<v Speaker 7>a forty year old veteran, but I was probably twenty
<v Speaker 7>four to twenty five man, and I didn't have a clue.
<v Speaker 7>It goes back to what I was saying before Matt.
<v Speaker 7>I knew how to wrestle. I didn't know the wrestling business.
<v Speaker 7>I knew how to have great matches, you know. And
<v Speaker 7>I'm not trying to pat myself on the back. I'm
<v Speaker 7>just saying I think I could go out there and
<v Speaker 7>work with anybody, and they could put me out there
<v Speaker 7>with Saboo and do the job to Saboo.
<v Speaker 4>I didn't know how to protect my gimmick. I didn't
<v Speaker 4>know how to get myself over.
<v Speaker 7>I didn't know how to talk to the people in
<v Speaker 7>the back politics so much is just put forward some
<v Speaker 7>ideas and have some uh, you know, have enough belief
<v Speaker 7>in yourself, enough confidence in yourself that you can you
<v Speaker 7>can be a little aggressive and assertive about going, hey,
<v Speaker 7>use me, you know, do something with me. I got
<v Speaker 7>a lot to bring to the table, and instead I
<v Speaker 7>just kind of hope that they would go, Hey, they
<v Speaker 7>know I work hard and I'm a good hand.
<v Speaker 4>Why wouldn't they hire me, you know?
<v Speaker 7>And I think I squandered some chances because of that,
<v Speaker 7>And then that feeds into the bitterness even more because
<v Speaker 7>then you wonderline the world wand to give me a shot?
<v Speaker 4>What did I do to kiss anybody off?
<v Speaker 2>But I think the most important thing is that now
<v Speaker 2>you know you're talking about you may have been better,
<v Speaker 2>but you're not. Now you know you put the you
<v Speaker 2>hold yourself accountable and responsible, and you're not one of
<v Speaker 2>these old timers sitting here say this guy help me down,
<v Speaker 2>or this person backstad me.
<v Speaker 3>So I respect I respect that a lot.
<v Speaker 4>You know, well, thank you, brother.
<v Speaker 7>I've thought a lot about this throughout the years, man,
<v Speaker 7>And and to be honest with your perspective is a powerful.
<v Speaker 4>Thing in life. Right, you're as good as you think
<v Speaker 4>you are, good as you're not. And I don't mean
<v Speaker 4>necessarily talent skill wise, just where you are right now
<v Speaker 4>in this world. Right, and then whether whether or not
<v Speaker 4>things are going well for you has so much to
<v Speaker 4>do with the perspective. And you let that stuff get
<v Speaker 4>in your head and you think it to yourself the
<v Speaker 4>over they're burying me and they're out to get me. Dude.
<v Speaker 7>Look, I came into WCWWWE at a time when they
<v Speaker 7>just bought the company, you know, and I got bitter
<v Speaker 7>because they signed me to a three year deal and
<v Speaker 7>I took one hundred thousand dollars pay cup when I
<v Speaker 7>could have set on my WCW money, just to prove
<v Speaker 7>that I want to be part of the team.
<v Speaker 4>And I signed a three year guaranteed deal and they
<v Speaker 4>treated me like I was a trainee when it was
<v Speaker 4>a wrestling talent contract. And then they send me to
<v Speaker 4>Cincinnati and tell me I'm gonna be there for four
<v Speaker 4>weeks and that turns into in months and you start thinking, Okay,
<v Speaker 4>why are they messing with me and why they're burying
<v Speaker 4>me and all this stuff. And then you get older
<v Speaker 4>and you look back, you're there. How many people were
<v Speaker 4>on the roster? Look, get any guys that were on
<v Speaker 4>the rosters that had been world champions and are not
<v Speaker 4>getting TV time.
<v Speaker 7>Nobody was out to get lash LaRue. It's about the time, man,
<v Speaker 7>and so you could put all your heart and soul
<v Speaker 7>into something in the perspective everybody else's Oh he was
<v Speaker 7>in the business for a cup of coffee. You know,
<v Speaker 7>it's tough, it hurts, but it's live, man, and then
<v Speaker 7>you pick yourself up, you go next.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah. Absolutely, I love that. I love that perspective. I
<v Speaker 3>love that attitude for sure. Uh.
<v Speaker 8>I guess we got time for a couple more. Brian Harrison,
<v Speaker 8>I don't know what he's talking about here, but this
<v Speaker 8>is interesting. What was it like riding in the Marti
<v Speaker 8>Gars parade? I still have beads from the parade he
<v Speaker 8>rode in.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, yeah, okay, So here's the genius of WCW at
<v Speaker 4>the time. No, I'm kidding.
<v Speaker 6>This is part of part of of.
<v Speaker 7>Me not really having enough foresight and enough awareness of
<v Speaker 7>where I was in the wrestling business to probably make
<v Speaker 7>more out of it than what I did. And now
<v Speaker 7>looking back, man, I would never miss these opportunities. But
<v Speaker 7>because I was the raging Cajun lash LaRue man, they
<v Speaker 7>treated me. They embraced me like I was the hometown
<v Speaker 7>boy in Louisiana, man, And they were great to me.
<v Speaker 7>And I still feel like a big part of my heart.
<v Speaker 7>I'm not trying to be cheesy about it.
<v Speaker 3>Man.
<v Speaker 7>It feels like a wholetown to me when I get
<v Speaker 7>to go to Louisiana, and I love that the people
<v Speaker 7>were proud to think of me as one of those
<v Speaker 7>guys man. And hey, Cajun is caguing. It's more of
<v Speaker 7>a mindset than it is anything else. And so they
<v Speaker 7>had me Grand Marshall and Marti Gras about three years
<v Speaker 7>in a row. In one of those years they actually
<v Speaker 7>had the last year that they did that, they sent
<v Speaker 7>a pretty good group of WCW guys there because it
<v Speaker 7>was getting over so well. As part of Marti Gras
<v Speaker 7>Crew of Caesar Parade they put us on. And that
<v Speaker 7>one that our friend there is probably talking about is
<v Speaker 7>one of the last ones where I was there.
<v Speaker 4>I think Canyon was there, Disco Inferno was there, some
<v Speaker 4>other guys maybe Ravens Stereo, and we were riding on
<v Speaker 4>the float Man and w CW.
<v Speaker 7>I actually still have one and I love it to
<v Speaker 7>this day. They had Marty Grass beats made that had
<v Speaker 7>the big gold belt on it as count of the battallion.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, and then they had these do balloons they had
<v Speaker 4>the w CW logo on it, the coins that they
<v Speaker 4>throw out, and we just rolling the parade threw these
<v Speaker 4>things out and it wasn't I did that three years
<v Speaker 4>in a row, and the last year that I did
<v Speaker 4>at w CW sent a camera crew to film it
<v Speaker 4>and use that as b roll for my entrance, and
<v Speaker 4>that never got made because WWE bought the company.
<v Speaker 1>Wow.
<v Speaker 7>Yeah, obviously hindsight being twenty twenty, the first year I
<v Speaker 7>got to do that, I would have gone to whoever
<v Speaker 7>I needed to go to and go, hey, why don't
<v Speaker 7>we think about going and filling.
<v Speaker 4>This and using this part of my b roll?
<v Speaker 6>Right?
<v Speaker 4>Yeah? Right. Then, when you're young man, you're too naive
<v Speaker 4>and you're too passive, and you're too intimidated by your
<v Speaker 4>circumst as is to really speak up because you're so
<v Speaker 4>worried about heat.
<v Speaker 8>Yeah, Fowers, that's great, great, advice for any wrestler that's
<v Speaker 8>watching this right now, Uh, mark House that asks about
<v Speaker 8>the about the video games that you were in specifically
<v Speaker 8>money wise, or or what was that like for you
<v Speaker 8>being in video games and all that.
<v Speaker 7>The video games from a money perspective was the best
<v Speaker 7>checks I ever got, you know obviously as far as
<v Speaker 7>one check. Yeah, And I can createit EA Sports, and
<v Speaker 7>I can create the video game with really getting me
<v Speaker 7>my first job.
<v Speaker 4>And the reason why is because I've been training at
<v Speaker 4>the power Plant.
<v Speaker 7>I had a few matches on Saturday night and uh,
<v Speaker 7>and you know the way things were geared back then.
<v Speaker 7>They would even tell you at the power Plan when
<v Speaker 7>they do the TV taping in Orlando where they would
<v Speaker 7>do three months worth of Saturday night tapings in like
<v Speaker 7>a week, you could go down there with your gear
<v Speaker 7>and back then. Man, you can knock on the door,
<v Speaker 7>get into the locker room, tell me you're from the
<v Speaker 7>power Plant, you got your gear, and if they just
<v Speaker 7>need an enhancement talent, man, please let me work it.
<v Speaker 4>So my first match ever.
<v Speaker 7>In wrestling was about a four minute squash match with
<v Speaker 7>Perry Sattern, but I wasn't under contract at that point,
<v Speaker 7>and so the one point in my life or in
<v Speaker 7>my career where I can say I really was asserted
<v Speaker 7>in the right place at the right time. I would
<v Speaker 7>be at the power plant every single day, and if
<v Speaker 7>there was an opportunity at the power plant, I was
<v Speaker 7>not shy about jumping in the ring.
<v Speaker 4>One thing was for me.
<v Speaker 7>I may have not been so self assured about my
<v Speaker 7>skills backstage and politic and on behalf of myself or
<v Speaker 7>speaking up for myself, but in the ring, I was
<v Speaker 7>always confident, sure of what I was capable of. And
<v Speaker 7>the EA Sports came to Atlanta all the way from
<v Speaker 7>Vancouver with their crew because they were going to make
<v Speaker 7>the very first video game they had ever made where
<v Speaker 7>they used the motion capture suit, which was new technology
<v Speaker 7>back then, and they're trying to figure out how they're
<v Speaker 7>going to go about doing this. They knew they could
<v Speaker 7>put a suit on somebody. If they put a suit
<v Speaker 7>on somebody with the sensors, they could film that guy
<v Speaker 7>and use that to as the skeleton for any other
<v Speaker 7>wrestler and just kind of change it and distort it
<v Speaker 7>however they needed to from a size perspective, and so
<v Speaker 7>they came down just to film some moves and decide
<v Speaker 7>what they wanted to do. Well, I'm in between, Matt
<v Speaker 7>from meeting me, you you can probably vouch for this.
<v Speaker 7>I'm one of those in between guys. I'm not a
<v Speaker 7>really really big guy. I'm not a really really tiny guy,
<v Speaker 7>and I've got some amateur wrestling background. And i got
<v Speaker 7>the eyes in WCW because right when they first started
<v Speaker 7>that cruiserweight push and brought in all the luchadors, I
<v Speaker 7>was one of the few American guys that could do
<v Speaker 7>that luchador style. Maybe me and Billy Kidman could fly
<v Speaker 7>around with Hoovey and Ray and those guys.
<v Speaker 4>And so when we're.
<v Speaker 7>Standing all around the ring, you know, one of those
<v Speaker 7>types of circumstances. You guys have all kind of been
<v Speaker 7>there where whatever's going on in the ring is going.
<v Speaker 4>On in the ring, and all the other boys, yeah, yeah,
<v Speaker 4>we're standing around the ring and they're talking about all
<v Speaker 4>this stuff, and they go, Okay, who can do some
<v Speaker 4>chain wrestling?
<v Speaker 7>And then their mind they're thinking a lah Dean Malenko,
<v Speaker 7>and I'm going, well, I was amateur. I was amateur
<v Speaker 7>wrestler in high school, so I could always do the
<v Speaker 7>chain wrestling.
<v Speaker 4>Man, I could do it. Without even talking about it.
<v Speaker 4>I could get in there with someone kaz Hayashi who
<v Speaker 4>had limited skills when it came to talking English, but
<v Speaker 4>we could get in the ring and just fill off
<v Speaker 4>of each other and just go, go, go and trade
<v Speaker 4>trade holes. So I got in there and did that
<v Speaker 4>and did a lot of amateur stuff. And then they go, well,
<v Speaker 4>who can do the power moves? Well, I raise my
<v Speaker 4>hand and jump in there. For anybody else strong enough
<v Speaker 4>throw the steinersplexes.
<v Speaker 7>I can press people over my head, whatever I need
<v Speaker 7>to do. I'm pretty strong for my size and stout
<v Speaker 7>for my size. And then who can do or can
<v Speaker 7>run off the top rope? Raise my hand going there?
<v Speaker 7>Do the herd come run off the top rope? The
<v Speaker 7>whole deal, and so they go.
<v Speaker 4>They go to uh W CW after filming all this
<v Speaker 4>for about two days, and they go to the office
<v Speaker 4>and they say, we want Lash to come up and
<v Speaker 4>do the video game for us and be the be
<v Speaker 4>the guy that does all the moves.
<v Speaker 7>And they go, ah, well, you know he's not on
<v Speaker 7>the contract. Can get one of the guys that are
<v Speaker 7>on contract, so we don't have to pay them anything additional.
<v Speaker 7>And EA Sports to their credit they go, now, this
<v Speaker 7>cat has impressed us so much. He can do everything.
<v Speaker 7>We don't have to get three cats. One that does
<v Speaker 7>chane wrestling, one that does power and one that does
<v Speaker 7>of high flying. We won't last because he can do
<v Speaker 7>all that. And that was enough of a mark that
<v Speaker 7>I can mimic the other guy's gimmick.
<v Speaker 6>You know, I can do that's the fun part.
<v Speaker 7>I could do the holding whatever, and so struck like
<v Speaker 7>Flair and so Ea Sports. To their credit, they fly
<v Speaker 7>me up to Vancouver and they pay me. And at
<v Speaker 7>first it started out really really sweet because the first
<v Speaker 7>trip up there, man, was sixteen days straight and they
<v Speaker 7>gave me like eight hundred dollars a day.
<v Speaker 6>For them.
<v Speaker 7>Yeah, and so that that felt really really good until
<v Speaker 7>the second trip up there. They came up to me
<v Speaker 7>and in their defense, they don't know any better. I
<v Speaker 7>was even smart enough back then to know this had
<v Speaker 7>to come from somebody in the office. But they walk
<v Speaker 7>up to me with a new contract and you go, up,
<v Speaker 7>We're gonna have to cut your pay from eight hundred
<v Speaker 7>a day to four hundred a day because you're.
<v Speaker 6>Just a jobber, right.
<v Speaker 3>That was a.
<v Speaker 4>No. Yeah, God, hey, my Alabama place still went to, Hey,
<v Speaker 4>I'm still I'm twenty years old and I'm making you know,
<v Speaker 4>I'm nineteen twenty years old. I'm making four hundred dollars
<v Speaker 4>a day. I'll take it.
<v Speaker 6>Yeah, it's pretty sweet, but damn yeah.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, but that's the way it got worded. But anyway,
<v Speaker 4>so I did about three different stints up there, and
<v Speaker 4>it allowed me to make some really really good money
<v Speaker 4>off of them. It guaranteed that I was in the
<v Speaker 4>video game even though I wasn't really an established star yet,
<v Speaker 4>and it also really got the eyes of w CW.
<v Speaker 7>So when I came back from being up there at
<v Speaker 7>EA Sports, that's when I was just at the Power
<v Speaker 7>Plan on a random Friday not long after that, and
<v Speaker 7>they just call me up and they go, hey, last
<v Speaker 7>can you be at at Nitro in Minneapolis on Monday night?
<v Speaker 7>I go absolutely, And they just wanted me to have
<v Speaker 7>a good match with Billy Kidnon and that was the
<v Speaker 7>debut man, and they had put the strap on him,
<v Speaker 7>made him the Cruiserweight Champion, and they were just looking
<v Speaker 7>for guys to feed him that he could have a
<v Speaker 7>good competitive match with weekend week out and just be
<v Speaker 7>a fighting champion. And I said absolutely, I'll be there.
<v Speaker 7>So when I flew up there, I knew Billy well
<v Speaker 7>enough by then and had done a few matches on
<v Speaker 7>Saturday Night and stuff where he trusted me and knew
<v Speaker 7>what I was capable of. And to his credit, he
<v Speaker 7>wasn't just looking to eat me up. He wanted to
<v Speaker 7>have a good back and forth match. And then you
<v Speaker 7>add to that the fact that by then I had
<v Speaker 7>kind of put my stick together in my mind. I
<v Speaker 7>had worked that gimmick out man had and you know,
<v Speaker 7>again in all seriousness, that there are people that wanted
<v Speaker 7>to be in the wrestling business and they're listening to
<v Speaker 7>this man. You can't over state how important it is
<v Speaker 7>to think through what your character looks like to.
<v Speaker 4>You, What do you believe in? Why do you believe it?
<v Speaker 7>Because if I'm trying to convince the that they need
<v Speaker 7>to believe something about me, I better believe it first,
<v Speaker 7>and I better know it inside out and know who
<v Speaker 7>I am and be true to that, be genuine and authentic.
<v Speaker 7>And I had worked all that out enough and played
<v Speaker 7>that over in my mind so many times, and by
<v Speaker 7>the time I had that match with Billy Kidman, I
<v Speaker 7>wasn't just taking bumps and doing moves.
<v Speaker 4>I was taking bumps, doing moves and looking at the
<v Speaker 4>crowd and going.
<v Speaker 6>You know.
<v Speaker 7>And you know, and the bookers in the back. The
<v Speaker 7>guys didn't expect that. And when they saw a little
<v Speaker 7>bit of charisma along with the working ability in the ring,
<v Speaker 7>they didn't say anything to me. There was no sit
<v Speaker 7>down with lash LaRue moment and talk to him about
<v Speaker 7>putting them on the road. They just started booking me.
<v Speaker 7>I just went from being at the power plant and
<v Speaker 7>now suddenly I'm getting a booking sheet and I'm expected
<v Speaker 7>to be places and they're paying me a nightly.
<v Speaker 4>And not long after that, I have one more run
<v Speaker 4>up to Vancouver.
<v Speaker 7>I was frustrated up there and had to sit down
<v Speaker 7>with tend to Be and Ted dB Issi and I
<v Speaker 7>share a common faith, and so I sat down with
<v Speaker 7>Ted and I asked him if I.
<v Speaker 4>Could talk to him that night after we got through
<v Speaker 4>with the day and everything else. And went to his
<v Speaker 4>room and said, you know, Tam, I'm just frustrated man,
<v Speaker 4>and I'd like a little advice and encouragement. I said,
<v Speaker 4>I don't know what else I got to do to
<v Speaker 4>get their attention, the company's attention. I said, you know, I'm.
<v Speaker 7>Yeah, I've been there almost a year now, I'm in
<v Speaker 7>the best shape of my life. I don't feel like
<v Speaker 7>I could be more prepared physically. There's not a move
<v Speaker 7>in the ring I can't do. And I know how
<v Speaker 7>to put together matches. I could call a match even
<v Speaker 7>on my own, even being in the business for so young,
<v Speaker 7>you know, for such a short amount of time, I
<v Speaker 7>feel like I could be more prepared mentally.
<v Speaker 4>And he said, look, you need to get yourself ready spiritually.
<v Speaker 7>And uh, because you're gonna you're gonna face more demons
<v Speaker 7>and more opportunities to really let your life go off
<v Speaker 7>the rails and things like that in this business and
<v Speaker 7>you are anything else that's gonna be a rock and
<v Speaker 7>roll lifestyle and you need to be ready for that.
<v Speaker 7>Oh man, I didn't think about that. So I really
<v Speaker 7>kind of tried to get myself ready spiritually and mentally
<v Speaker 7>for that. And man, it was like two or three
<v Speaker 7>days later I had called up JJ Dylan, Yeah, you know, randomly.
<v Speaker 7>He was in the office. He was doing talently Ason
<v Speaker 7>and I went in there and I just had a
<v Speaker 7>handful of pages of websites that were tribute websites to
<v Speaker 7>lash Room that I just far copies of because you know,
<v Speaker 7>it was still it was the Internet was such a
<v Speaker 7>small thing at that point, man, and I went in
<v Speaker 7>there and showed that. I said, well, I'm getting some
<v Speaker 7>attention obviously, I've gotten, you know, some fan base going,
<v Speaker 7>and I just need to know, like nineteen years old,
<v Speaker 7>and I can't believe I'm saying this to them even
<v Speaker 7>then something to be said for the balls of youth,
<v Speaker 7>right and you go, Man, I need to know whether
<v Speaker 7>or not I've got a future here in w CW
<v Speaker 7>or if I need to pursue other options.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah. My other option was to come back to Alabama
<v Speaker 4>and dig ditches. Probably.
<v Speaker 6>Yeah, it's track wow.
<v Speaker 4>One randomly in the and I found out while I
<v Speaker 4>was on the road. My wife called me and said, hey,
<v Speaker 4>w CW just fedexed you a contract.
<v Speaker 2>This has been an hour, but it seems like ten minutes.
<v Speaker 2>I feel like we get we've known each other for
<v Speaker 2>years ago. We keep talking. We definitely need a part
<v Speaker 2>two with with last I think our fans are really gonna,
<v Speaker 2>Like you mentioned earlier, you're so transparent, and I think
<v Speaker 2>the fans are really gonna enjoy that. That's you know,
<v Speaker 2>we try to do just one of our mottos here, Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>be authentic and transparent. And I think, you know, the
<v Speaker 2>fans can see through the bullshit and when they listen
<v Speaker 2>to this, they're gonna know that you're the real deal.
<v Speaker 3>So I really appreciate you coming on here tonight.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah, Man, thank you guys for having me man, And
<v Speaker 4>I think that speaks a lot to just the type
<v Speaker 4>of people that we all are and the meeting you
<v Speaker 4>guys and getting to be around you and you Matt
<v Speaker 4>and talking even the short amount of time we did.
<v Speaker 4>You know, you find out really quick in this wrestling business, man,
<v Speaker 4>that there are certain people that you gravitate towards because
<v Speaker 4>we're like minded and we have the same type of
<v Speaker 4>philosophy or the same type of perspective on life and
<v Speaker 4>on the business. And those are the people that you
<v Speaker 4>really feel like you can kind of grow with, you
<v Speaker 4>can depend on, you can trust in the business and
<v Speaker 4>outside the business. And you know, the reason why there's
<v Speaker 4>clicks in the wrestling business is because of that sort
<v Speaker 4>of thing. It's just it's a natural magnetism for one another.
<v Speaker 4>You know, right at the gate, I felt like we'd
<v Speaker 4>known each other forever. So this has been fun for me. Man.
<v Speaker 6>Yeah, it's awesome to meet you and get to talk
<v Speaker 6>to you like this, man, really truly, and.
<v Speaker 3>Lash, if you lace up those boots one more time, Yeah, that's.
<v Speaker 6>What I'm I'm hoping to see you around. Man.
<v Speaker 3>I'm always ready for for a good match.
<v Speaker 4>Baby. I saw Matt, I saw your your your tweet
<v Speaker 4>a while back about some click in the indies. Right, So,
<v Speaker 4>I'm wondering where I signed up to be part of
<v Speaker 4>the car there it is.
<v Speaker 3>I'd rather be on the opposite side of the ring
<v Speaker 3>the Lash.
<v Speaker 5>I know you're good, but you're good enough to carry
<v Speaker 5>Matt Cardona. They're a good one. I don't know, Lash,
<v Speaker 5>Where can you? Where can all our fans find it?
<v Speaker 5>You have social media that plug the podcast, plug all
<v Speaker 5>your stuff here.
<v Speaker 4>All right? You can find me on x I'm an
<v Speaker 4>at Lash can draw literally and and and uh literally.
<v Speaker 7>And physically and then also you can also follow the
<v Speaker 7>show adfree shows dot com. You can find my sixty
<v Speaker 7>minute Tom Leman draw with the last three And that's
<v Speaker 7>pretty much the extent of what I Man. I was
<v Speaker 7>a ghost on social media for about ten years, so
<v Speaker 7>it's all new to me.
<v Speaker 6>All right.
<v Speaker 3>Well, I love it. You get a new fan base
<v Speaker 3>on your old fans, and we love you.
<v Speaker 2>We'd love to keep you part of this major pod
<v Speaker 2>family and do a part two of this interview because
<v Speaker 2>I think our fans are really gonna love this.
<v Speaker 3>So thanks a lot, Lash, Yeah, hey, thank you doing
<v Speaker 3>man gotta do is reach out.
<v Speaker 6>Anything you won't eat, appreciate it. Thank this