Shooters

by Jonathan Snowden

  Second, has anybody thought that the Briscos might have been trying to maneuver the Funks out of the picture through Eddie Graham? We had guys biting at our asses — they wanted us out. There’s no one-way street in the business, and there never was. But that’s the business. Someone didn’t just decide one day to make Dory Funk or Jack Brisco world champion, and it suddenly happened. Someone had to push for them — it was a promotional thing, and there was a lot of politicking, on all sides, before votes were cast.

  . . . So yes, there were some political struggles between Eddie and Jack and the Funks, but I don’t have a single complaint about it. Geez, that’s the stuff that makes the past worth talking about.

  As far as the Funks were concerned, the way things went down ended up being great for all concerned. It may have hurt Jack temporarily in cities around the country, and they may not have struck when the iron was hottest, but it kept the program with Dory fresh and exciting for years to come.

  WORLD CHAMPIONS: DORY FUNK JR. AND TERRY FUNK

  © WREALANO@AOL.COM

  “That was fantastic for business,” said Funk Jr. “Jack beat Harley Race for the belt. He didn’t win it from me. When we brought the match into the Amarillo territory, everywhere we did capacity business. It was unfortunate the pick-up truck accident took place, but it was good for him.”

  Brisco controlled the title for almost three years. He had developed into a fantastic worker, full of fire on his comebacks, and carried himself in a manner that really emphasized his legitimate athletic background. When announcer Gordon Solie ran down Brisco’s athletic achievements, fans believed him — because Brisco looked the part. Business wasn’t at its best with Jack as champion, but his reign came in the middle of the 1970s gas crisis. Fans were struggling and wrestling wasn’t always the first thing on their minds. It’s a credit to Brisco that the business stayed relatively strong in a period of economic turmoil.

  In December 1974, Brisco, a sharp business man, innovated a new way to get paid. Shohei “Giant” Baba was in the midst of a brutal promotional war with rival Antonio Inoki. To the Japanese fans the NWA world title, carried for so long by the great Lou Thesz, had real meaning. For Baba to carry the belt, even for a short time, would mean the world. Brisco was willing to do the favor for the Japanese star, but it was going to cost him. He negotiated a pay off of $25,000 for a one-week reign. By the standards of the time it was a huge payday — Brisco’s previous best for one night had been $2,600.

  In the end, the schedule wore Brisco down just like it had Funk Jr., Kiniski, Thesz, and every touring champion before or since. Finally it was time to drop the belt. Brisco was so exhausted he was even willing to lose to a Funk, just to get rid of the belt. The champion recalls, “I couldn’t do it anymore. I was mentally and physically drained. The schedule was just more than you can imagine. I spent years on the road with no break. I wrestled every day all over the country, sometimes twice. I was ready to get out and they would tell me, ‘Soon Jack. We’ll do it soon.’ And it went on and on. Finally I just refused to go to their yearly meeting. That riled them up and they finally did something about it. I tried to put that stuff with old man Funk and Junior behind me. I didn’t want to waste time being bitter or mad. I liked Terry fine. We had a lot of fun together, but I didn’t think he’d be a good champion. I would have dropped the thing to anybody though. I was just ready to have it off my waist.”

  Shooting

  Brisco was long considered one of the toughest men in the business. Like most of the tough guys in Florida, he spent time hurting people who wanted to get into the wrestling business, twisting limbs and smashing faces mostly to satisfy promoter Eddie Graham. Graham loved the carnage and always had someone on the roster to stretch the marks. Sometimes it was Buddy Colt teaching them lessons, sometimes Olympian Bob Roop, and sometimes, according to fellow wrestler Jim Wilson, it was Jack Brisco:

  Jack got in with a young guy with a nice body [who] didn’t know anything about wrestling. Jack got him in a full nelson and dragged him down to the mat. With the guy’s arms hanging upward, Jack pushed his face into the mat. BLUUP. He mashed the guy’s face farther into the canvas, as the blood flowed across the ring. He broke his nose.

  It was the first time in my life I witnessed deliberate, sadistic breakage of human bones, legs, arms, jaws and noses. As my stomach turned, Eddie Graham experienced near orgasmic excitement as he stood nearby, sweating a little and giggling. It was a weekly ritual that appealed to Graham’s perverse sadism and functioned as bizarre public relations for Championship Wrestling from Florida. When guys who were beaten up got back on the street, they told their friends, “Hey, that shit is real.”

  But Brisco took the rare thumping too. “Big Cat” Ernie Ladd allegedly laid out both Briscos with a tire iron when they paid him a visit courtesy of Graham. Ladd had been scheduled to drop the Florida title and agreed to do so — but only if the match wasn’t taped for television. When he saw the camera running, Ladd left the ring and took off. When the Briscos showed up to teach him a lesson, at the direction of Graham, Ladd was ready, dropping both and putting them in the trunk of his car. Their final destination? Eddie Graham’s front lawn.

  In the beginning stages of his career, Brisco was tested by another of wrestling’s toughest men. Billy Robinson had been trained at the famed Wigan Snakepit and was tough as they come. Brisco, true to form, admitted Robinson was a man to be reckoned with — while making it clear he felt he was still the better man in the ring. The two were working together for Jim Barnett in Australia when things got out of hand one night back at the hotel.

  “We had a lot of discussions about which style of wrestling was best,” said Brisco. “Billy was a lot like me. He had come from nothing and fought for everything he got. And he was a real tough wrestler. The style he had, the hooking style, it worked with a lot of guys. But I had never met anyone who could get me in the positions to make me vulnerable with it and I told him so. We got to drinking a little beer and we moved all the furniture out of the room. Just me and him, we decided to find out. We would wrestle some, then drink some more beer. Then wrestle some more. We did this for hours. I broke fingers on his hand and his thumb. He had me in some spots too. He really could apply his holds in a real match. We ended up missing our flight, but I proved no one was tougher than an American catch-as-catch-can wrestler.”

  Later in his career, Brisco was best known for his behind-the-scenes maneuvering. He discovered Hulk Hogan at a Florida nightclub, altering wrestling history forever. He also helped pour gasoline on the 1980s wrestling war, selling his share of the Georgia promotion to Vince McMahon Jr., allowing the New York promoter to control the nation’s premiere wrestling outlet, WTBS in Atlanta. That power play led to a final run in Vince’s WWF, but Brisco had tired of the wrestling business and didn’t have much left to give. Unlike all of his contemporaries, when he called it quits, it was for good.

  “I worked for Vince and it was just like being champion again,” Brisco said. “He was pushing hard and we were traveling nationwide. Seven days a week. It was a hard grind. I was with my brother Gerry in Pittsburgh. It was winter and I was tired, cold and worn out. We were lost in the parking lot in the snow looking for a car to drive to Philadelphia and I told Gerry, ‘I’m getting on a plane south and I’m not coming back.’”

  Brisco was among the last of a dying breed in America. Wrestling had become so comical, so over the top, that the amateur community turned on the sport in a major way. The NCAA contenders who were once the backbone of the industry were now few and far between. It was only in Japan that wrestling stuck close to its roots, with real competitors who could handle themselves if things went awry.

  18

  THE UWF and Shoot Style

  Riding his famous fight with Ali, Antonio Inoki became Japan’s standout wrestling star. While Shohei Baba had the NWA and its biggest stars in his corn
er, Inoki had the backing of Vince McMahon Sr. and the WWWF in New York. The relationship gave Inoki’s New Japan Pro-Wrestling access to McMahon’s roster of stars, including Andre the Giant, champion Bob Backlund, and later a young Hulk Hogan.

  New Japan’s success led Baba to attempt co-promotion with his rival, but after a single show in 1979, the two groups parted ways. Inoki’s promotion was just too hot. It was more than just McMahon’s stars and Inoki’s reputation from winning matches with martial arts champions. Inoki and his booker Hisashi Shinma were innovating professional wrestling with a number of great ideas.

  In addition to the martial arts matches, Inoki and Shinma created the “interpromotional” angle that would also spark record business in America when Eric Bischoff borrowed the idea for his WCW vs. nWo program in the 1990s. Inoki had noticed that cards featuring matchups with wrestlers from the defunct IWE promotion in Japan drew better crowds than matchups featuring New Japan wrestlers against New Japan wrestlers. With no other promotions to do business with (except the hated Baba) Inoki and Shinma created their own rival promotions. Former Olympian Riki Chōshū turned to the dark side and attacked Inoki’s protégé Tatsumi Fujinami. The two men picked their squads and Chōshū’s Ishingun, billed as a rival promotion, did battle with Seikigun, led by Fujinami.

  The idea led to a box office bonanza in 1982–1983, selling out 90 percent of the shows during the year, an unprecedented level of success. When Inoki went out with an injury in June, business continued to flourish. Suddenly it became obvious that stars like Chōshū and Fujinami, alongside junior heavyweight sensation Satoru “Tiger Mask” Sayama, were just as important to New Japan’s success as Inoki had been.

  While their popularity was rising, their paychecks weren’t. In fact, some wrestlers received pay cuts as Inoki and Shinma allegedly funneled money into some of their failing side ventures. The wrestlers rebelled, with Sayama leaving the company in a fury. Inoki was forced to resign as New Japan’s president, but it was Shinma who took the real heat. New Japan’s booker and Inoki’s right-hand man for years, he was fired from the company he had helped build.

  Shinma wasn’t done with wrestling though. He created the Universal Wrestling Federation (UWF) in 1984. The idea was for Inoki to leave with him, starting fresh again on their own. When Inoki opted to stay with New Japan, Shinma looked to create a new Inoki with a young prospect named Akira Maeda. Shinma had discovered Maeda in the New Japan years at a karate tournament in 1977 and with his ideal size (6'3", 240 pounds) and a natural athleticism, Maeda was being groomed for big things.

  Maeda wasn’t the only New Japan wrestler to jump ship. Another top prospect, Nobuhiko Takada also left the company, as did Yoshiaki Fujiwara, a Karl Gotch disciple who was one of the first graduates of Inoki’s wrestling school back in 1972. Fujiwara had never been a huge star for New Japan, but his influence was felt keenly behind the scenes.

  Fujiwara, a top judoka in college, where the sport is heaviliy focused on the ground game, was one of Gotch’s first students and his best. He brought the submission holds of Judo with him and combined them with Gotch’s catch-wrestling teachings to create a particularly effective style. When Inoki needed a tough guy to corner him in the Ali fight, he chose Fujiwara.

  The UWF wrestlers proclaimed themselves the strongest martial artists in Japan and were open to any challengers looking to contest that claim. When martial artists came calling, they would send them to Fujiwara, who always cleaned house. Fujiwara credited all of his victories to his teacher, Gotch, who he loved and respected for his single-mindedness.

  Recalls Fujiwara, “One time during training Mr. Gotch got a very bad toothache. His toothache was interfering with his training. So he went to the hospital, or maybe dentist, and asked them to pull all his teeth out. They said it’s dangerous. He said, ‘That’s OK. Pull all my teeth out.’ And he went back to training next day with no teeth. Because he figured if he has no teeth he’s not going to have any toothaches getting into the way of his training. He’s so crazy but I love him.”

  Ironically Sayama, who had quit the company over Shinma’s handling of New Japan’s business practices, joined his former rival in this new venture. Sayama went all in, telling the newspapers that he had quit New Japan because Inoki had been taking advantage of the other wrestlers, and even lashing out at wrestling in general by revealing in his book Kayfabe that wrestling was not on the level. This would have posed a problem for UWF, but the company, which started as a standard wrestling promotion using American and Mexican wrestlers up and down the cards, soon shifted styles, proclaiming their bouts to be real shoots.

  The matches were innovative and very tightly worked, featuring real submission holds, throws, and powerful kicks. There was serious interest in the major metropolitan centers in Japan, but without a television deal, business faltered. The wrestlers, for their part, did all they could to promote the events, breaking all the unwritten rules by not only acknowledging opposing groups in their interviews, but running them down as fakes and phonies. Dave Meltzer explained, “Maeda himself was the most outspoken, mincing no words about traditional pro wrestling offices having worked matches, and insinuating that the UWF was the real thing. Many fans believed it. However, outside of Tokyo where the matches would overflow Korakuen Hall to a scary degree, the first UWF never caught on as more than a cult thing.”

  AKIRA MAEDA

  © WREALANO@AOL.COM

  With business in the dumps, Sayama and Maeda feuded behind the scenes. When Shinma took Maeda’s side, Sayama demanded his old rival Shinma be removed from the company. The bad feelings festered. Maeda preferred a style that featured submissions heavily while Sayama wanted to see a heavier emphasis on kickboxing. The two ended up taking their disagreement into the ring on September 2, 1985. Maeda kicked Sayama in the groin several times and the match disintegrated into a real struggle. Maeda was eventually disqualified and nine days later, the company called it quits. Sayama left to found Shooto, a promotion that would eventually feature real shooting matches but never caught on with Japanese fans. Maeda and the others returned to New Japan.

  Despite the UWF’s struggles, Maeda and the UWF refugees were much bigger stars upon their return to New Japan. The teenagers and 20-something male fans embraced Maeda and his bad boy persona. He was neck and neck with Inoki as the top star in the promotion. It was the natural match to make after Maeda’s return, and at one point a bout was even scheduled — but instead it was changed to a 10-man tag team match at the last minute. Maeda refused to lose to Inoki. As the top star of Japan’s biggest wrestling promotion, Inoki certainly wasn’t going to do any favors for the loser of a promotional war. Wrestling historian Chris Zavisa believes ego got in the way of good business: “The match would have been a classic. In one corner, Inoki, the charismatic star of the ’70s and ’80s. The rock around which a successful promotion was built. A living legend in Japan who himself was something of a young rebel at one time. In the other corner, Akira Maeda. The James Dean of Japanese wrestling and the acknowledged heir to Inoki as the superstar of the New Japan promotion. The only thing that separated the two was the calendar. Inoki wanted to keep postponing the day when he handed the reins over to new blood . . . Maeda wanted the top spot at once, or at least within a very short period of time. Neither was willing to sacrifice or even compromise their legend for the other or for the promotion.”

  Maeda, who had made his name by calling out other wrestlers for being fake, carried himself like his mostly fictional tough guy status was real. He refused to lose to anyone he didn’t feel was “legitimate” and made a lot of enemies in the New Japan locker room, both among the other Japanese stars and the Americans who toured with the company. In April 1986, someone convinced the 6'10" 500-pound Andre the Giant to do something about it in a bizarre match that would immediately become part of pro wrestling folklore:

  The Giant refused to sell for Maeda, shrugging off his
shooter gimmick by no-selling submission holds and even going for his opponent’s eyes. It wasn’t long before the match spiraled out of control, with neither man willing to lose.

  Maeda attempted to take out Andre’s increasingly weak knee, shoot-kicking, then immediately backing away. After 15 minutes, he finally toppled the Giant with a single-leg takedown. . . .

  In the midst of this chaos, NJPW promoter Antonio Inoki ran down to the ring and called for the bell, not even bothering to explain why. The abrupt ending infuriated Andre, who complained that he wanted to go back in the ring and continue the match.

  The match solidified Maeda’s reputation with the fans. He had beaten the Giant, knocking him down, brutalizing his legs, and even asking promoters ringside if he could finish him off. As 1986 rolled on Maeda was quickly becoming the hottest wrestler in the industry. On October 9, 1986, Inoki main-evented a card against boxer Leon Spinks at Tokyo’s Sumo Hall that drew 11,000 to the building. The event was also broadcast live nationwide on TV Asahi, attracting an amazing 28.9 ratings share and millions of viewers. The biggest audience for pro wrestling since Inoki’s ill-fated bout with Ali saw a dull and plodding main event. But they also saw Maeda steal the show in the semi-main-event slot, wowing the crowd with his “wrestler versus boxer” match with Don Nakaya Neilson. The writing was on the wall for Inoki; only one thing was preventing Maeda from wrestling control of New Japan away from him — television ratings.

  While Maeda controlled the hardcore wrestling fans, the UWF style he brought with him to the mainstream was harder for casual fans to support and understand. The over-the-top presentation and style of wrestling they had grown accustomed to had disappeared — and in turn, these fans just stopped watching. The UWF wrestlers were doing gangbusters at the live gate, all while television ratings were plummeting. Eventually, New Japan lost its Saturday night prime-time slot. Something had to change.