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RIP Tracy Smothers


KawadaSmile

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First think I think about is Tracey dancing to that Bee Gees remix song and it was hilarious. He was an amazing pro-wrestler, a legit great, great worker.

Legend also tells that during an incident involving whoever in ECW (New Jack or Sandman probably) and cops showed up with K9s, Tracey got his fists up and was shadow boxing the damn dogs, ready to fight. Tracey Smothers ladies and gentlemen.

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Very sad news. Tracey was the real deal. As a kid, I liked the Southern Boys/Young Pistols and remember recognizing Tracey when he became Freddie Joe Floyd a couple years later.

What immediately comes to mind with Tracey Smothers, though, is that he became a semi-regular here in Cleveland, wrestling for Cleveland All-Pro run by JT Lightning (and Johnny Gargano's stepdad, I think), which sorta morphed into Pro Wrestling Ohio which sorta morphed into Absolute Intense Wrestling. For the past 15 years, Tracey was just always on these shows and I know its true for other regional/indie promos throughout this half of the county (if not the whole country). And he always seemed like he was having a good time, glad to be there, and appreciative. 

Its also fun to look at some of his opponents over the last decade on Cagematch - its a real who's who of "true" indie guys like Grado and Luke Hawx and Mad Man Pondo and the list goes on. 

 

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If you can judge a person by the impact they left on others, Tracy was a great guy. Seems like he never missed an opportunity to give young folks advice/support and not in a "do it the old timer way or it sucks" style that so many veterans utilize, 

He just seemed so happy to be able to go do some pro rasslin', no matter if it was on a major company show or some rinky dink indy in front of 50 peopl

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Great talent . I recall.Tracy Smothers starting out in Memphis . One can only wonder what would have been if  Jarrett had gotten behind Tracy instead of pushing his son. Tracy and Steve Armstrong seemed  to be the logical  successors to  Lane and Keirn .

I always enjoyed  Tracy 's  work . on weekends the  guy work as the top Babyface in the dying days of SMW , while during the week he worked  Memphis as the evil  Smoky Smothers trying to destroy the USWA . Loved every second of it. Then he went and worked the FBI gimmick in ECW. The man was just brilliant and he had on hell of a run . . Rest in peace Tracy 

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6 hours ago, Memphis Mark said:

Great talent . I recall.Tracy Smothers starting out in Memphis . One can only wonder what would have been if  Jarrett had gotten behind Tracy instead of pushing his son. Tracy and Steve Armstrong seemed  to be the logical  successors to  Lane and Keirn .

He might have gotten a good USWA run or two, but he would never have had the career Jeff had. I don't see Tracy getting a serious midcard run even in mid-90ies WWF or a upper midcard to main even run in late 90ies WCW. For the national landscape of that time, he was just "too southern".

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I'll always look back fondly on his run with Full Blooded Italians in ECW. I kinda like to think that Tracy was a jack of all trades; comedy, serious, cookie-cutter babyface, dastardly heel. Whenever the situation called for it, it seems like he could flip a switch and become what you needed him to be for a night. He surely will be missed.

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5 hours ago, Robert S said:

He might have gotten a good USWA run or two, but he would never have had the career Jeff had. I don't see Tracy getting a serious midcard run even in mid-90ies WWF or a upper midcard to main even run in late 90ies WCW. For the national landscape of that time, he was just "too southern".

Tracy was light years ahead of Jeff Jarrett in the 80's . Jeff was a really thin former  basketball player, who only had a spot because of his last name.  . It took Jeff years to get to Smother's level. IMOO , Jarrett and Lawler should have moved Tracy into the the spot the spot that Lane or Keirn held for years . Tracy was a home town guy that could have build that emotional connection with the fans. However they pushed Jeff and too a lesser degree guys like Billy Travis and Pat Tanaka.

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I'll never get why Billy Travis got pushed as much as he did. Jeff is understandable for obvious reasons and he at least eventually grew into his push, but Billy was Just A Guy his entire career but always seemed to have a role higher on the card than his talent would seem to warrant.

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On 11/2/2020 at 12:17 AM, sek69 said:

I'll never get why Billy Travis got pushed as much as he did. Jeff is understandable for obvious reasons and he at least eventually grew into his push, but Billy was Just A Guy his entire career but always seemed to have a role higher on the card than his talent would seem to warrant.

Could be a case of him being there and reliable in a time when they were losing everyone else and unlikely to lose him, and it's also possible he was buddies with the right people.

I haven't seen much of his work, but I don't remember anything particularly special about him.

The magazines hyped Jeff Jarrett and Brian Christopher as a huge deal in the early '90s, so I was excited to see them both make the jump to the big time. Needless to say, while they may have been "magazine main eventers," they weren't WWF main eventers. As a kid, I found that kind of disappointing - especially Brian Christopher, who I really liked and thought would quickly become a top heel. I guess he was considered "too small"? Jarrett kind of underwhelmed me at first, TBH - his style was a little too basic for me at the time - but he eventually got that main event spot in WCW and later TNA. Those pushes never once felt legitimate or organic to me though. They were as forced as his goofy Slapnutz catchphrase.

Speaking of disappointing WWE runs, I will never fucking understand the point of Tracy Smothers being repackaged as goofy Southern jobber Freddie Joe Floyd, Tony Anthony as T.L. Hopper, "Wild" Bill Irwin as The Goon, Alex Porteau as The Pug, whoever the fuck it was that played Mantaur, etc. Why purposely derail these guys with terrible gimmicks and no push? May as well flush money down a toilet instead of pay these guys, because the result ended up being the same anyway. Vince couldn't have felt that threatened and insecure about Smoky Mountain Wrestling, could he? 

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Knowing Vince, I would pretty much guarantee he felt Smothers and Anthony were too "southern rasslin'' but at the same time realized they were the type of guys the competition at the time could use to program potential new stars with. 

I suppose Vince might have felt some kind of threat from Smoky Mountain being bankrolled by  a famous record producer, as he tends to when he thinks there's someone who might be able to compete with him financially. 

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SMW wasn't a threat to anyone, the promotion was done by that point. These guys got hired because WWF needed veteran JTTS who could work and help other talent get over, and since this was the era of "everyone is a gimmick", well, there you go. TL Hopper was by far the worst though. The Freddie Joe Floyd name was a rib on the Briscoes I seem to remember. 

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SMW was already dead and buried by the time Smothers went to the WWF. SMW's last show was on 11/25/95 and Freddie Joe Floyd debuted at the 6/25/96 TV tapings. There was nothing more to it than bringing in guys who could work to serve as enhancement talent. The Observer mentioned at the time that there was a chance they would get regular work if their gimmicks got over, but there was never a plan to give them any kind of push. Chris Jericho was one of the guys they offered to bring in, but he turned it down because he thought working as a TV jobber would hurt his career. Smothers was never taken seriously as a top guy after his WWF run, so Jericho obviously made the right call. And yeah, the name Freddie Joe Floyd was a rib on the Briscos. Jack's real name was Freddie Joe Brisco and Jerry's was Floyd Gerald Brisco.

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5 hours ago, El-P said:

SMW wasn't a threat to anyone, the promotion was done by that point. These guys got hired because WWF needed veteran JTTS who could work and help other talent get over, and since this was the era of "everyone is a gimmick", well, there you go.

Cornette (who was involved in bringing them in) has said as much. I guess giving them shitty gimmicks was to make clear that they were just JTTS.

Mantaur (Bruiser Mastino, a cousing of Cannonball Grizzly / PN News) was a year earlier than the other guys, so there might has to be other reasons for his gimmick (maybe for a short-term Undertaker run on house shows?).

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9 hours ago, Robert S said:

Mantaur (Bruiser Mastino, a cousing of Cannonball Grizzly / PN News) was a year earlier than the other guys, so there might has to be other reasons for his gimmick (maybe for a short-term Undertaker run on house shows?).

Cornette actually managed Mantaur, which made me think he was in line for a push.

Either Vince didn't like Cornette or was ribbing him, because...oof.

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4 minutes ago, The Thread Killer said:

It was a rib on Cornette by Vince and Bruce, according to Cornette 

What a shitty, unprofessional, shortsighted company. Hire a guy, pay him, and give him an awful gimmick solely to rib someone else you can actually make money with.

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4 hours ago, C.S. said:

What a shitty, unprofessional, shortsighted company. Hire a guy, pay him, and give him an awful gimmick solely to rib someone else you can actually make money with.

I mean, yeah, but that's been a Vince trademark forever. Look at how Terry Taylor went from an up and coming young babyface pushed as a draw for young female fans to being turned into an all time career ending gimmick.  He turned One Man Gang into an embarrassingly racist gimmick just to make fun of the competition's booker, then ended up signing the guy they were making fun of to try to humiliate him too. 

 

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