Episode 133 - Legend of a Mind

Kevin Sullivan, King Curtis Iaukea and Mark Lewin. Sullivan passed away on August 9 at age 74.

Before we start, an apology for no podcasts during or after the Tragos/Thesz Hall of Fame a few weeks ago. During the travel to the event, we had some weather-related issues at home that necessitated putting any recording plans on hold. But we are now back, although we were it were under better circumstances.

We’re very grateful to Mike Sempervive (@sempervive) to take some time to discuss the recent passing of the great Kevin Sullivan at age 74. There’s no rhyme nor reason for how we talk about the great man’s career: We go from Florida to Knoxville (all six more or times he worked there) to WCW to ICW to Hawaii and all points along the way. We discuss our favorite angles, try to place the Prince of Darkness gimmick in historical context, our favorite angles and promos, including The Dream Mike Davis, the Slaughterhouse, the Varsity Club, the third Head Hunter, the Sheik, Mark Lewin, King Curtis and so much more.

It’s great when Mike has time to fit us in. If we had him on more often, maybe the shows wouldn’t be as long, but the winding road takes us to where we want to be, in the end.

Episode 130 - Some Jackets Required

Don Fargo and his new Fabulous Fargos (Ken Timbs and Pat Rose) with host Christopher Love (Bert Prentice) from a 1987 episode of World Organization Wrestling

We’re happy to welcome back Al Getz (@AlGetzWrestling) to discuss the latest edition of his Charting the Territories books, this one covering 1971-1973 Gulf Coast Wrestling. We talk about the main players in the territory at this time, including Cowboy Bob Kelly, Bobby Shane, Don Fargo and Rip Tyler, as well as future stars like Kevin Sullivan, Steve Keirn, Ron Bass and Greg Valentine, wrestling as Don’s brother Johnny Fargo. We talk about the towns the promotion ran and some of the interesting ways they crowned champions there (not with belts or trophies).

Then, as we did recently with Beau James, we talk about the travails of being a wrestling historian, covering a business that’s built on a lie. How hard is it to get “accurate” data on things like shows, box office and the like? And Al talk us through his methodology, both online and boots on the ground research.

We chat about Al being inducted into the Tragos/Thesz Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame in Waterloo, Iowa, getting the James C. Melby Historian Award.

The show ends with some quick baseball chat, with the season just a week old and Al’s Atlanta Braves being the only National League East team with a winning record. He also tells us about his first road trip of the year and dealing with weather issues with early spring baseball in the Midwest.

And the next episode of the Charting the Territories will look at Dick the Bruiser’s WWA in Indianapolis coming next week.

Episode Ninety-Five - New Math

Danny Hodge on the cover of the April 1, 1957 issue of Sports Illustrated.

We’re happy to have the debut on the pod this week of Al Getz (@AlGetzwrestling) from Charting the Territories for a wide ranging conversation.

First, we discuss the life and times of Danny Hodge, who passed away last week at the age of 88. One of Al’s main areas of research is the Leory McGuirk territory, Hodge’s home for most of his career. We discuss Hodge’s amateur accomplishments in both wrestling and boxing, his transition to pro wrestling and his career highlights. Al has a number of great stories about Hodge, both in his younger days and the unfortunate end of his in-ring tenure following a car accident.

After that, we talk about an article Al wrote about the early career of pod favorite Buddy Landell. We talk about his start in Poffo’s ICW and his journey up the card until becoming a main eventer in Memphis, during his infamous run in 1986 teaming with Bill Dundee. We talk about his time in Mid-South, Mid-Atlantic and Puerto Rico. This leads to a wonderful digression about the journey wrestlers go on in finding the right persona to adopt in the ring.

We also talk about the statistical-based Al uses on his website and podcast to evaluate wrestlers, how it was inspired by baseball sabermetrics and the folly of using traditional sports metrics to try and analyze pro wrestling. There are also some fun stories about indy wrestling, involving folks like King Kong Bundy and the Honky Tonk Man.

Thanks for listening. Work is slowly continuing on our new It’s A Family Affair project, with a few weeks of Continental TV recapped on the website. We hope to have the next episode of the podcast up soon with a former wrestler as guest. Stay turned for more information. We hope you enjoy the show.