Posted on by bdamage1
Brian Damage
Grappling with Tragedy is a series of articles that deal with unfortunate, tragic incidents that have occurred throughout the history of professional wrestling. It is unlike the ‘Wrestling with Sin’ series that deals more with the seedier side of wrestling like arrests, murders and suicides. Grappling looks more at particular tragic incidents that have in some instances altered pro wrestling in some way.
Big Ike Eakins
James Davis ‘Ike’ Eakins was a former college football player from Duke University. He had a brief career in the NFL playing for the Green Bay Packers and New York Giants. After serving in the Army and fighting in World War II, he began his pro wrestling career in 1946. Ike Eakins was mostly a journeyman wrestler who competed in several territories including Georgia, Florida, the Carolinas, Amarillo, Texas, San Francisco, Calgary, Canada and Japan.
Fellow wrestler Don Leo Jonathan was once asked who were the toughest wrestlers he knew and named Danny Hodge, Bronko Lubich and Ike Eakins as his top three. Eakins also wrestled under a mask as The Clawman and the Masked Rasputin. He was a frequent tag team partner with Eddie Graham and won titles with him in Florida and Georgia. Aside from his wrestling career, Eakins dabbled in acting and appeared in a few Joe Palooka films in the 1940’s.
Big Ike’s wrestling career lasted over 20 years, with his last match coming in 1967 for Georgia Championship Wrestling. He wrestled Bad Boy Hines in Atlanta and suffered a broken collarbone as a result of that match. Instead of seeing a doctor, Eakins decided to go back to his hotel room. While he was sleeping, his collar bone split completely and cut up his insides. Eakins bled internally and was throwing up blood. He died that night in his room.
When his body was discovered the next day, police were called and originally made his hotel room a crime scene believing he was brutally murdered because of all the blood from his vomiting. Ike Eakins had died from massive internal bleeding. Ike Eakins was 50 years old at the time of his death.