Posted on by bdamage1
Joe King
Turnbuckle Championship Wrestling was founded by Dusty Rhodes in the year 2000 and was huge in my hometown area of Southeast Georgia. I started out setting up chairs and running music. Then moved up to working security. And finally working a match and going over in a 3-Way-Dance against Tom Brock & Hekk Shanxx.
Here are some stories of some of my interactions with the Superstars of TCW that I thought I’d share with you guys from my time there. Enjoy!
•Barry Windham: Redd ran a raffle one night with the winner receiving “A Free Dinner at Captain Joe’s with The Wrestler of Their Choosing”. The winner chose Windham. He said “I didn’t agree to that. I’ve got to hit the road.” Scotty Riggs agreed to do it and went instead.
•Scotty Riggs: Hung out with me and the backyard fed for a good hour+ before the show. Took pictures with us & would wink at us a lot. We asked him if he would watch our tapes and he said “Sure. I’ll watch them in the hotel room tonight(with a wink).” While finishing up his segment with Tommy Dreamer, he got our attention, winked at us and pulled Lodi’s towel off exposing his bare cheeks! Good times!
•Lodi: Knowing us & our reputation as the local hardcore kids, he was one of the first to arrive and tracked us down. He handed us $40 and asked us to go down to Kmart and pick him up some weapons for his hardcore match that night against New Jack. Man…that was awesome! We went and picked up cookie sheets, baking pans, a broom, a mop, some orange road cones, and even swiped a shopping cart from the parking lot(which New Jack used to carry all of the weapons to the ring)!!!
•Reese/Big Ron Studd/The Yeti: We were out back smoking and seen him coming, so we threw the cigarette out. As he passed us he said “Hey you guys, you know smoking stunts your growth. Look what it did to me! HAHAHA!”
•New Jack: He brought me his CD with his entrance music on it. Tom Brock goes “Natural Born Killaz?”…he said “f*** nah. That has too much cussing. I can’t use that s*** here. This is something my cousin made me.” During his match he used a fork from Ryan’s Steakhouse, which Vern Von Roske picked up and asked him to sign. He said “Nah man, I ain’t signing your God D*** fork!!!”
•Kwee-Wee: While sitting front row for a match pitting Kwee-Wee against Lash LeRoux, my buddy Vic kept yelling gay slurs at him. I seen his head tilt and noticed he realized where and exactly who it was coming from! I told Vic not to say it again. Well…he did! All of a sudden, Kwee-Wee leaped over the top rope, got in Vic’s face, flexed & yelled “You got a problem with me boy?!!!!!”! After turning red with embarrassment, Vic immediately sat back down in his chair and after the show went and asked for his autograph. Kwee-Wee asked “what happened to you out there, man? You chickened out.”
•Glacier: Really nice guy and a very hard worker. He did most of the work in TCW from what I could tell. He came to our high school and signed autographs all afternoon one day. Then he came on our local television show, The Wrestling Wrap-Up. He even promoted our backyard fed because we actually wrestled and didn’t do just strictly hardcore stuff like most feds at the time. Thing is: after he said that and introduced the video live on the air, someone put in our hardcore highlights tape instead! He wasn’t too happy about that! But he accepted our apology and actually wound up being the producer for my match in TCW and even had me go over in a 3-Way Dance! We actually kept in contact for nearly 10 years afterwards.
•Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this piece…be sure to check out Part 2 featuring Steve Corino, Billy Kidman, Torrie Wilson, Disco Inferno, Tommy Dreamer, Sonny Siaki, and more…coming soon on Ring The Damn Bell!!!