Guest Dangerous A Posted January 11, 2006 Report Share Posted January 11, 2006 I'm only 4 chapters in, and already I'm declaring "Wrestling at the Chase" required reading for any serious wrestling fan. Just absolute gold. First chapter was on David Von Erich. Very surprising to read that Bruiser Brody and one of the referees found David dead in his hotel and that Brody made a judgment call to flush the remaining prescription pills of pain meds David had left down the toilet and chuck the bottle to hide a potential suicide. IIRC, they diagnosed David's death as an intestinal inflammation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Dog Posted January 11, 2006 Report Share Posted January 11, 2006 I got that Tag Team Hall of Fame book. I didn't see the Crusher and Dick the Bruiser mentioned at all in the table of contents. Seems like a horrible oversight to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted January 11, 2006 Report Share Posted January 11, 2006 I got that Tag Team Hall of Fame book. I didn't see the Crusher and Dick the Bruiser mentioned at all in the table of contents. Seems like a horrible oversight to me. What tag teams are listed? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Dog Posted January 11, 2006 Report Share Posted January 11, 2006 Top 20: 1. Fabulous Kangaroos 2. Road Warriors 3. British Bulldogs 4. Dusek Riot Squad 5. Pat Patterson and Ray Stevens 6. Minnesota Wrecking Crew 7. Fabulous Freebirds 8. Assassins 9. Rock N Roll Express 10. Midnight Express 11. Great Goliath and Black Gordman 12. Harley Race and Larry Hennig 13. Bruiser and Crusher - opps missed it, now I feel like an idiot 14. Ben and Mike Sharpe 15. Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard 16. Interns 17. Mike and Doc Gallagher 18. Kalmikoffs 19. Von Brauners 20. Rip Hawk and Swede Hanson Next 5: Nick Bockwinkel and Ray Stevens Fabulous Fangos Hollywood Blondes Royal Kangaroos the Vachons Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted January 11, 2006 Report Share Posted January 11, 2006 Are these mini-biographies on each tag team? If so, I don't know much about alot of these teams so I may have to pick this one up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Dog Posted January 11, 2006 Report Share Posted January 11, 2006 Yeah, each team HoF team gets about 5 pages worth of a bio. There's about 50-60 other teams in there that get a page or two. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dangerous A Posted January 11, 2006 Report Share Posted January 11, 2006 They also have a book by the same publishing group that deals with Canadiens. I wasn't much interested in that one, but do own the tag teams book. Very good and a must have for anyone who like pro wrestling history. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Dog Posted January 11, 2006 Report Share Posted January 11, 2006 Yeah, I saw the Canadian one and had no interest in it. They should've just done a singles wrestler HoF. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Mike Campbell Posted January 12, 2006 Report Share Posted January 12, 2006 I'm interested in picking up Wrestling At the Chase, especially after DA's comments. Also "The Sheik of _______" sorry, blanking on the rest of the title. But it's about Sheik Adnan Al Kaisee. Seems like a good read. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Dog Posted January 12, 2006 Report Share Posted January 12, 2006 Been reading the tag team book. Only complaint is the author had a pretty negative approach to the Road Warriors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest brian Posted January 13, 2006 Report Share Posted January 13, 2006 Stampede book is awesome. Gobbled it up. Little Hart-heavy (have any of the workers authored anything?), but I doubt that can be helped. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Some Guy Posted January 15, 2006 Report Share Posted January 15, 2006 I just got: Wrestling At The Chase - Just started it. Cheating Life, Stealing Death - Very good. Secrets of Wrestling Revealed (The Get in the Ring book) - Kind of stupid Walking the Golden Mile (Regal's book) - Haven't read it yet. King of the Ring (Harley Race's book) - Very good, but like Funk's book it is far too short to do his career justice. Superstar Graham's book is OTW. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dangerous A Posted January 18, 2006 Report Share Posted January 18, 2006 I'm halfway through Wrestling at the Chase and it's fascinating. It should be required reading to anyone remotely interested in booking as well as booking disciplines that would really help the current wrestling scene if it were more adhered to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted January 18, 2006 Report Share Posted January 18, 2006 I'm halfway through Wrestling at the Chase and it's fascinating. It should be required reading to anyone remotely interested in booking as well as booking disciplines that would really help the current wrestling scene if it were more adhered to. Why? What's in it that makes you say that? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dangerous A Posted January 18, 2006 Report Share Posted January 18, 2006 Basically, Larry Matysik points out Sam Mushnick's booking philosophies and disciplines. Just a couple of points about Sam's booking... - He didn't like to hotshot. Sam felt hotshotting might work to pop a crowd once or so, but then there is a letdown that you can't match. Sam was all about consistency and respecting the audience. Sam never refferred to fans as "marks" because he felt it disrespected the people putting money in your bank and food on your table. - Sam subscribed to the 6-8 interchangeable guys on top to keep main events fresh versus one guy knocking back challenger after challenger, although Mushnick has seen that approach work. Sam came from a real sports background and was of the theory that a 4-5 team pennant race was more exciting than a one team runaway. - They booked backwards. If the champion is going to be in town in April (NWA champ came to St. Louis every once in awhile) they'd better start building up whoever was going to be facing that champ starting in January. - Was adamant about guys doing jobs and if you didn't want to job, you couldn't work for Sam. Was of the thinking that if you were built up to face the champion and didn't beat him, it didn't mean you went back down to midcard status like today. Nick Bockwinkel also said that doing jobs actually convinced him to work harder because he wanted to put doubt in the promoter's head about whether or not the right guy went over and a good performance jobbing to a champion actually raised your value. - Was huge on protecting the championship versus protecting the champion. Sam felt the championship was the most important thing. - When booking always ask yourself "Does this make sense?" when it comes to storylines and "Will it draw money?" when it comes to angles for the main event and who should go over. There are a bunch of other things. I may do a more in depth synopsis or book review for this particular message board once I finish the book. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted January 19, 2006 Report Share Posted January 19, 2006 Awesome write-up DA. In fact, that gives me an idea I will expand on in another thread. However, I went on an Amazon binge this weekend and received 3 books... Wrestling at the Chase (It couldn't have arrived on a more appropriate day) The Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame: The Tag Teams (So far, this looks very interesting. Some of the bios are a little on the short side but it also serves as an introduction to wrestlers and teams I have never heard of or know little about.) Lucha Libre: The Masked Superstars of Mexican Wrestling (The best $17 I have spent so far. This book is a combination of articles on famous lucha stars and photographs captured by Lourdes Grobet. I was a little concerned when I saw all of these Spanish sentences leaping out of the pages but after a couple of minutes I realized that they have every article written in Spanish AND English. Since lucha is my next conquest after Mid South, I think this book will be a valuable resource in hunting some of the stars mentioned.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest savagerulz Posted April 6, 2006 Report Share Posted April 6, 2006 For my birthday I got "Hardcore History" by Scott Williams. I hope to write a review when it's completed but in the meantime here's the first one I've seen: Hardcore History reviewed on WO Williams, who daylights as a court reporter, shines in his presentation and examination of the subject. He asks the right questions of the right people, and provides motivations and depth to the story. I?m certain the WWE sponsored offering will be the definitive, authorized history, having the likes of the ?mad scientist? Paul Heyman, as well as Tommy Dreamer and Taz(z) and assorted voices captured under contract. While John Lister?s Turning the Tables painted an excellent picture of what ECW looked like in literary form, Hardcore History though is far from being superficial, and undoubtedly touches more truths than the WWE would ever dare. Should be a blast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shoe Posted April 6, 2006 Report Share Posted April 6, 2006 I just finished up the Watts book. It was a really good read. The keeping it real, and the land of the tough guys were really good. I also liked the chapter on the blockbuster trade. It was a little heavy handed on the relegion that sometimes felt like a lecture. Overall, just a really good read for the most part. I just got Tributes 1 in the mail so I'm looking forward to that book. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted April 6, 2006 Report Share Posted April 6, 2006 - Was adamant about guys doing jobs and if you didn't want to job, you couldn't work for Sam. Was of the thinking that if you were built up to face the champion and didn't beat him, it didn't mean you went back down to midcard status like today. Nick Bockwinkel also said that doing jobs actually convinced him to work harder because he wanted to put doubt in the promoter's head about whether or not the right guy went over and a good performance jobbing to a champion actually raised your value. I agree with the sentiment, and for the most part, this is probably true, but there are exceptions to this in St. Louis, Bruiser Brody being the biggest one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dangerous A Posted April 6, 2006 Report Share Posted April 6, 2006 I think Matysik protects Brody quite a bit in the book because the two were so close. I'm sure Mushnick had to deal with people being hard asses about jobbing and what not the same as anyone promoting at the time. Matysik kind of romanticizes the period quite a bit in regards to guys agreeing to job and coming to finishes. During the period of St Louis, fans were also a lot more accepting of time limit draws, double count outs, and DQ finishes a lot more than today's wrestling fans so that sort of makes up for top guys and drawing cards not having to do the honors so much. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest DylanWaco Posted April 9, 2006 Report Share Posted April 9, 2006 I started the Funk book today, and I just got the Watts book. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sek69 Posted April 9, 2006 Report Share Posted April 9, 2006 I think Matysik protects Brody quite a bit in the book because the two were so close. I'm sure Mushnick had to deal with people being hard asses about jobbing and what not the same as anyone promoting at the time. Matysik kind of romanticizes the period quite a bit in regards to guys agreeing to job and coming to finishes. During the period of St Louis, fans were also a lot more accepting of time limit draws, double count outs, and DQ finishes a lot more than today's wrestling fans so that sort of makes up for top guys and drawing cards not having to do the honors so much. I know people probably hold back because of what happened, but Brody was really quite the douche to almost every US promoter. He would win titles then vacate them due to some injury that he always seemed to come down with when he was leaving the territory and was asked to job to someone. Was Brody even enough of a draw to justify him behaving the way he did? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted April 9, 2006 Report Share Posted April 9, 2006 In St. Louis and in Japan, yes, probably. Everywhere else? Probably not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Thread Killer Posted April 9, 2006 Report Share Posted April 9, 2006 He was pretty big in Texas with Fritz Von Erich too, in Puerto Rico of course, and also in the Montreal territory. He had a run in the AWA too, didn't he? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted April 9, 2006 Report Share Posted April 9, 2006 In World Class, Brody was a special attraction but not necessarily a draw by himself. That territory was so hot because of the VE boys & Freebirds that anything else they brought in was just icing on the cake. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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