This Past Weekend with Theo Von - #576

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00:00:30.000 Today's guest is a WWE Hall of Famer.

00:00:33.140 He's a member of one of the greatest wrestling families of all time, the Von Ericks.

00:00:38.000 You may have seen their family story told recently in The Iron Claw.

00:00:43.260 He's an inspiration.

00:00:44.860 He's a motivation.

00:00:45.720 He's pretty funny.

00:00:47.020 And I just feel honored to be able to spend time with him today.

00:00:53.540 Today's guest is Kevin Von Erick.

00:00:55.840 I'm feeling good.

00:01:13.700 I feel like I can throw this off.

00:01:15.120 If that's a good thing.

00:01:21.160 Yeah, because you were always the barefoot guy.

00:01:23.580 You were a barefoot guy.

00:01:25.260 Yeah.

00:01:27.380 I sure was.

00:01:28.320 I always...

00:01:29.220 I've got these really big toes, you know.

00:01:31.580 And once you stub your toe on the mat a few times, it gets bigger.

00:01:34.440 And so at first, I just took my boots off because it felt comfortable in the ring, you know.

00:01:39.260 Just to move around better, I felt like I could fly.

00:01:42.060 But with the boots, you know, they fill with sweat.

00:01:47.780 You know, your socks absorb the sweat and all.

00:01:50.400 They get heavy.

00:01:50.940 I had some knee surgeries, too, you know.

00:01:52.780 But I'll tell you, I go barefoot all I can.

00:01:55.500 Yeah?

00:01:55.920 Yeah.

00:01:56.260 This is good for you.

00:01:57.100 It really is, you know.

00:01:58.460 Yeah.

00:01:58.780 Well, I'm sure.

00:01:59.240 I know you moved out to Kauai, was it?

00:02:01.560 Or Hawaii?

00:02:02.160 Yeah, Kauai.

00:02:04.320 That's the barefoot capital of America.

00:02:06.300 I'll bet it is.

00:02:07.300 I'll bet it is.

00:02:09.300 We all go barefoot out there.

00:02:10.640 I say I'm always kind of crazy about that.

00:02:13.200 But I just hate for my toes to touch each other, you know.

00:02:17.340 I was always like that.

00:02:18.300 I hated shoes when I was a little kid.

00:02:19.900 And I guess I got old enough to say no.

00:02:22.620 And I just didn't wear them anymore.

00:02:24.780 Did you ever wear those toe separator things?

00:02:27.260 You know what I'm talking about?

00:02:28.460 Those are great.

00:02:29.240 You know, I wear them in the river at home, you know, to walk in the river.

00:02:32.740 But you can walk by a vine, and they'll catch your toe, you know, and it can drift you, you know.

00:02:38.300 It's a little hazard for those things.

00:02:40.660 Did you feel like a caveman kind of?

00:02:43.800 Yeah, yeah.

00:02:45.100 The good kind of caveman.

00:02:46.520 You know, I felt like, I mean, I'm going to drag around and pound by the hair, but.

00:02:50.740 Yeah, no domestic disputes or anything.

00:02:52.600 Yeah, you know, because, like, you feel the ground.

00:02:54.500 You feel the earth.

00:02:55.240 It's just something about it.

00:02:56.260 I didn't know there was anything to it.

00:02:58.000 But Ross tells me, my son Ross tells me that it's, there's an energy in the earth that your feet can pick that up, you know.

00:03:05.840 And I think I've been digging that for a long time without even knowing it was a thing, you know.

00:03:11.260 But now I'm, I caveman it all the time out in Kauai.

00:03:14.580 That's the way to live.

00:03:15.940 Yeah, I bet it's, well, it's called, yeah, right here it says it's grounding.

00:03:18.520 Grounding, also known as earthing, is a wellness practice that involves direct contact with the earth's surface.

00:03:23.100 Like walking barefoot on grass or sand to potentially connect with the earth's natural electric charge.

00:03:28.240 I think it makes sense, because even if you look at a tree or a plant, you don't see them wearing shoes or nothing.

00:03:33.600 Like, that would be crazy.

00:03:34.380 If you saw a plant, like, wearing shoes, you'd be like, oh, that guy's, that plant's out of his mind.

00:03:38.720 Like plants, you know what I'm saying, they're connected to the earth, so I think that makes good sense.

00:03:42.320 Oh, oh, I see what you mean, yeah.

00:03:43.580 Probably kept you pretty locked in.

00:03:46.500 Your family lives, you live on your family's ranch, right?

00:03:49.520 Or you live on a ranch here?

00:03:51.480 We bought a ranch.

00:03:52.540 We sold it.

00:03:53.500 We had, I lived on my family ranch in Texas.

00:03:55.460 We sold it about 20 years ago and moved out to Kauai and built a big place, you know.

00:04:00.060 But we, but I wanted to give my wife that kind of house, you know.

00:04:04.540 So everything that was in the house was something that I really liked about room service or some hotel overseas, you know.

00:04:12.200 I had a bathtub.

00:04:13.280 You could do a cannonball in it, you know, splash it all over the wall.

00:04:16.600 And it had a drain.

00:04:17.800 It was just, every room had something like that.

00:04:20.240 But it was, it's real expensive in Kauai.

00:04:23.460 And I have a lot of kids, you know.

00:04:24.880 And so they all go off to their house and no one wanted to live in the big house.

00:04:30.600 And so we happened to trade that to a guy that just happened to have 27 acres, a waterfall on the land, a big, nice spring, and five houses, you know, for my sons.

00:04:42.880 And so we traded that house for that 27 acres.

00:04:46.760 And that's where we are.

00:04:47.940 No way.

00:04:48.260 Just an even trade.

00:04:49.200 Even trade.

00:04:50.020 Yeah.

00:04:50.320 Dang, you don't see a lot of that anymore.

00:04:52.180 No, no.

00:04:53.000 I'm glad the guy, I couldn't believe he did it, really.

00:04:56.400 Did you have one of those open back verandas or something it's called maybe in Hawaii?

00:05:00.280 What's that back patio?

00:05:01.220 You know what I'm talking about?

00:05:01.940 Those porches.

00:05:02.500 Oh, yeah, yeah.

00:05:02.760 And it's just so perfect.

00:05:03.680 Yeah, they call it Lanai.

00:05:05.340 Oh, God.

00:05:06.460 Yeah, man.

00:05:07.560 At my daughter's house there.

00:05:09.480 Oh, that.

00:05:09.800 When we stay with her, she's got a bed set up for me out there.

00:05:14.040 And so I sleep in the wind, you know.

00:05:15.740 Yeah.

00:05:15.840 It's great.

00:05:17.020 Yeah, dude.

00:05:17.740 You're like that Legend of Zelda character.

00:05:19.920 What's that little guy's name?

00:05:20.960 Yeah, you're like Link from Zelda.

00:05:23.360 That guy's always in the wind, man.

00:05:24.900 That guy's a real nature dog.

00:05:26.620 Zelda?

00:05:27.480 It's a character from a video game.

00:05:31.860 So the ranch you have now, all your family can all live there?

00:05:35.320 Yeah.

00:05:35.780 Oh, that's awesome.

00:05:36.700 Yeah, that is, man.

00:05:37.900 I'm telling you, Theo, that's like, that's so important to me.

00:05:42.460 You know, I had a lot of brothers.

00:05:43.680 And man, I loved them so much.

00:05:45.160 We were really close.

00:05:46.460 Super close.

00:05:47.220 For sure.

00:05:47.500 Well, I mean, I only knew so much, but, you know, I just saw you guys in the ring and stuff

00:05:50.880 like that.

00:05:51.300 And, you know, there's been a lot of documentaries and smaller documentaries.

00:05:54.100 There's been the Claw movie.

00:05:55.540 So there's been a lot of, you know, references to you guys for sure.

00:06:00.040 Your father was from Texas and he was a wrestler.

00:06:04.900 So I'm assuming that's where you guys all kind of got into it.

00:06:06.920 Yeah, yeah.

00:06:07.720 Just even knew about it.

00:06:09.100 Yeah.

00:06:09.540 This is, you know, it's kind of an ugly turn.

00:06:13.060 I don't want to bum me out, but my dad was living up in New York and we were all living

00:06:17.360 up there and I was a baby, but my brother, Jackie, was like six years old.

00:06:21.520 And he touched a house trailer that had a short in it and it killed him.

00:06:25.760 It electrocuted him, knocked him out and he hit a puddle of frozen, water was frozen.

00:06:31.240 He drowned under the ice, you know, and broke my dad's heart.

00:06:34.800 My mother, you know, just killed him.

00:06:37.100 You know, I can't imagine I have sons, you know.

00:06:39.000 But I tell you, Theo, I lost my brothers and that was hard, but I could not lose a son.

00:06:44.540 Wow.

00:06:44.960 Yeah, I couldn't get up.

00:06:46.140 I couldn't stand on my hind legs, you know.

00:06:48.520 Did they have to go to therapy and stuff like that when that first happened to your,

00:06:52.140 because I guess that was your oldest brother.

00:06:54.360 Yeah.

00:06:54.960 Did they have therapy back then and stuff like that or what did you?

00:06:57.580 No, no, there was no, they didn't, my dad was like a rock though, you know.

00:07:02.040 I couldn't believe he was, he just, he didn't want my mother to suffer so we wouldn't suffer

00:07:08.320 around her, but I'm sure my mother suffered so much.

00:07:11.340 And also when she got married, her little brother, David, died of a brain hemorrhage thing,

00:07:20.780 you know, what he called it, a tumor, a brain tumor.

00:07:23.300 And so just like a year later, her son dies too, you know.

00:07:26.580 It was just bang, bang, you know.

00:07:29.240 Yeah, I mean, and at those times too, things, I think there was more probably tragedy at

00:07:36.740 those times, you know, things were, you know, you'd have a lot of, people had a lot of children

00:07:40.720 and a lot of them work in farming and people would get injured a lot.

00:07:44.280 There was just, I think it was a different time probably when it came to safety and stuff,

00:07:48.520 you know, and they'd have loose wires.

00:07:49.880 I mean, just things were just less regulated, you know.

00:07:52.340 Yeah, that's right.

00:07:53.020 It was, you know, the kind of stuff we did as kids, like, shoot, I can tell you a lot of

00:07:57.140 times, you're lucky to be alive, you know.

00:07:58.880 Oh, God, I've been lit up a couple of times, damn.

00:08:01.920 I was walking by a damn crab restaurant and stepped on an outlet.

00:08:06.580 You did?

00:08:07.380 Just took me down, brother, yeah.

00:08:09.080 You stepped on an outlet?

00:08:10.700 Something, I don't know.

00:08:11.940 Next thing you know, I just thought I was, thought the earth was just sucking me into it.

00:08:16.380 How long were you out?

00:08:17.940 I don't know, probably 40 seconds, maybe.

00:08:20.980 Wow.

00:08:21.380 Not long enough to give up, I guess.

00:08:23.940 You didn't have, like, an experience beyond the door or anything.

00:08:27.360 I didn't get anything.

00:08:29.680 I'm like, God's not giving me any previews or nothing, you know.

00:08:32.980 That might be a bad sign, brother.

00:08:34.560 Yeah, that's true, actually.

00:08:35.780 If you start seeing the light, I'm like, nah, nah.

00:08:39.580 So, yeah, so your family had that.

00:08:41.440 So your parents had to deal with that so early, man.

00:08:43.960 Yeah, I guess people suffered in silence more back then, huh?

00:08:46.760 Yeah, people were tough, you know.

00:08:48.380 They were.

00:08:49.020 Well, I was just going to say, you know, you brought up the movie.

00:08:52.440 And the movie was like, I heard a lot of people talk about it.

00:08:56.340 It was like.

00:08:57.080 The Iron Claw movie?

00:08:58.100 Yeah, you know, that my dad was really hard on us.

00:09:00.140 When the fact was, you know, that we were hard on each other.

00:09:03.360 You know, we answered each other.

00:09:04.840 It was like a brother thing, really.

00:09:07.400 And, you know, to tell the truth, the suicides and all, that was not because Fritz made us wrestle

00:09:14.420 or Fritz was a big monster or anything like that.

00:09:17.260 That was a shame.

00:09:18.160 My brothers were ashamed.

00:09:19.760 With Carrie was, you know, when you're in the public eye, you really feel a lot of pressure.

00:09:25.520 You really do.

00:09:26.180 You know, you don't want to let those kids down.

00:09:27.780 And when something happens, you know, you do feel like you really let them down.

00:09:32.340 And you, you know, I don't know, Matt, everybody's not like this.

00:09:36.000 Sometimes you just can't forgive yourself.

00:09:37.720 And Carrie just couldn't let it go.

00:09:40.680 And, yeah, Carrie is one of your brothers.

00:09:42.320 Because I know you had David, Carrie, Jack, Chris.

00:09:50.140 And Mike.

00:09:50.880 And Mike.

00:09:51.920 Gosh, that's all the boy names they had at the time.

00:09:54.500 Yeah.

00:09:55.440 Y'all couldn't have had another brother because what were you going to do?

00:09:58.660 I'd have to be a girl.

00:10:00.000 I would have had to have been a girl by default, man.

00:10:03.020 Oh, we wanted a girl so bad.

00:10:04.980 Did y'all?

00:10:05.520 Did your parents?

00:10:06.060 My whole life, I never knew anything about girls, you know?

00:10:08.400 Oh, yeah.

00:10:09.340 I mean.

00:10:10.180 Y'all had enough beautiful hair in that family.

00:10:11.600 At least you got an idea of how to use it.

00:10:12.640 Go figure that one.

00:10:13.980 Golly.

00:10:14.460 I know what's with that.

00:10:16.340 I never took care of myself.

00:10:18.040 I never expected to live past 50, you know?

00:10:20.420 Oh, I bet.

00:10:20.880 I was having fun my whole life, you know?

00:10:23.140 Oh, I bet.

00:10:23.800 But y'all had so much dang hair.

00:10:25.560 Y'all were very, very true.

00:10:27.020 Y'all would have been considered trans, beautiful, tall trans women these days.

00:10:32.100 Y'all would have been because you guys were ahead of your time.

00:10:34.400 Even, like, all the rock bands back then had, remember, Poise and all those bands, they had

00:10:39.060 the big hair.

00:10:40.200 That's the truth.

00:10:41.300 Did you guys have hair do's?

00:10:43.060 Y'all had some hair do's.

00:10:44.260 Was that something like a pride?

00:10:45.920 Was that almost like a lion's mane type of thing amongst the guys in your household?

00:10:49.560 Or what was that like for you guys?

00:10:50.800 Because you guys had some great hair.

00:10:52.580 No.

00:10:53.100 You know what?

00:10:53.520 It was just laziness to tell the truth.

00:10:55.680 I mean, you know, I cut it.

00:10:57.900 I keep it out of my eyes, you know?

00:10:59.420 But then I cut my own hair, you know, because I don't have to pay the kind of money.

00:11:02.640 Hell yeah, I can tell, dude.

00:11:03.100 I cut my own shit.

00:11:04.040 Yeah, well, I can't see the back, you know?

00:11:07.040 I don't have a mullet on purpose, you know?

00:11:10.400 But I can cut this up here, you know?

00:11:15.200 So your dad, I do want to know a little bit more about him.

00:11:18.000 So you said that the film kind of portrayed him as being more of a stickler.

00:11:22.960 But what was he like?

00:11:23.800 Was he a businessman?

00:11:25.320 Was he quiet?

00:11:27.420 I mean, I guess he wasn't quiet, because I could see, like, his wrestling persona.

00:11:30.320 But was his home persona like, well, I guess, what was he like as a father?

00:11:33.560 And what was he like as a businessman?

00:11:35.260 But let me tell you, my dad was like a mountain of a man.

00:11:39.340 He was really a considerate, full of love guy.

00:11:44.640 But, I mean, he was serious.

00:11:46.060 And when he would, he wouldn't say anything.

00:11:48.680 Like, you know, before you go to sleep at night, you think, oh, man, I wish I would have said that.

00:11:52.280 I wish I would have thought of that.

00:11:53.480 Well, he thought of it right then.

00:11:55.360 And he would say it right then.

00:11:57.520 At night, you mean?

00:11:58.580 No, I mean, like, whenever the subject came up.

00:12:01.260 Yeah, whenever he thought of it.

00:12:02.180 It was just right there.

00:12:03.140 I thought, man, perfect answer.

00:12:05.120 You know, but, I mean, he was the president.

00:12:07.340 Okay, you know that movie, The Iron Claw, where Fritz says, the NWA always wanted to screw me.

00:12:13.540 You know, kind of like, but the truth is, he was the NWA.

00:12:15.960 He was the president.

00:12:16.660 But, you know, and he was, the other wrestlers, I mean, world champions, I mean, when my dad came in the room, I mean, they were, like, rolling on their backs like dogs.

00:12:29.520 They respected him?

00:12:30.260 Well, I mean, they, yeah.

00:12:32.060 Are they feared him?

00:12:32.980 Like, because his business acumen or just?

00:12:34.920 I think it was his business acumen.

00:12:36.560 I really do.

00:12:37.200 And the way he shaded himself, he didn't ever pop off.

00:12:41.120 He didn't ever brag.

00:12:42.000 He always had the accurate thing to say.

00:12:44.920 Not too much emotion at all, just business.

00:12:48.920 And people respected that.

00:12:50.320 I think in the wrestling business, we have a lot of personalities, you know, the big egos.

00:12:55.280 And sometimes these guys don't want to do something, you know.

00:12:58.920 But my dad had the respect, and it made a great business.

00:13:04.960 It's just, I think you have to have that in you.

00:13:07.200 Myself, man, you can talk me out of anything, you know.

00:13:11.400 Oh, is that all the money you have?

00:13:12.700 Well, I'll take less.

00:13:13.940 You know, I don't know why I'm like that.

00:13:16.540 Not like my dad at all.

00:13:17.620 He was great.

00:13:19.560 He was a business guy.

00:13:20.400 He was, yeah.

00:13:21.680 And what was he like with your mom?

00:13:23.460 Like, do you have a nice memory of them being together?

00:13:25.480 Like, some, like a moment that you remember that was, that meant something to you?

00:13:30.160 Yeah, I guess so.

00:13:33.640 One time I was in the den, and my mom and dad were kind of whispering, and they disappeared.

00:13:39.700 And my brothers were really young.

00:13:40.800 And so they went into the little study there, I guess, to talk.

00:13:45.300 And I thought, they've been in there a long time.

00:13:47.680 And so I took the little coat hanger and straightened it out, you know, and pushed it in the door and opened it up.

00:13:52.960 You know, they were at it.

00:13:55.180 And I'm like, oh, man.

00:13:56.060 And the way I said, so, as a little boy, I thought, why are they so mad?

00:14:02.560 You know, why are they so mad about it?

00:14:04.240 You know, it sounded like they were having fun.

00:14:08.060 It sounded like two out of three falls, huh?

00:14:10.500 Well, I just felt like I needed to go in there, you know, and break this up, whatever it is, you know.

00:14:15.920 And it was kind of one of those moments, I guess.

00:14:20.300 Break this up.

00:14:20.980 You bring a whistle in there?

00:14:22.560 That's hilarious.

00:14:23.840 Break.

00:14:24.780 She needs air.

00:14:25.700 That's really something you remember, though?

00:14:27.600 Yeah.

00:14:28.080 I remember that.

00:14:29.180 I'm trying to think of that beautiful moment.

00:14:30.680 That's what came up.

00:14:32.920 So everybody was wrestling, huh?

00:14:35.140 I guess so.

00:14:36.460 Yeah.

00:14:37.220 Wow.

00:14:37.700 Did you feel like you had to be a wrestler in your family?

00:14:43.740 Like, was it?

00:14:45.300 Well, you know, the truth of it is, my dad didn't want us to wrestle, you know.

00:14:49.780 In fact, you know, he was so, his finger was stuck, you know, and his hands didn't move right.

00:14:56.440 Oh, yeah.

00:14:56.740 He probably walked around like a damn crossing guard.

00:14:58.380 Oh, God, he was.

00:14:59.840 In his lower back and knees.

00:15:02.280 And so, you know, I actually said to my sons, you don't want to do this.

00:15:07.820 I promise, you know, here we are in Hawaii, and I can't even run on the beach.

00:15:10.740 And I was a high hurdler, you know.

00:15:12.460 I used to high jump over my head, you know, and I loved to move.

00:15:17.440 But a day comes, you know, where you traded that, traded that away, you know.

00:15:21.400 So I told my boys, you don't want this, you know, you really don't.

00:15:25.480 But you can't tell them that.

00:15:26.840 You know, they were just like I was.

00:15:29.740 I wanted to do what my dad did.

00:15:31.220 I thought he was great.

00:15:32.360 And so did my brothers, you know.

00:15:33.680 And we thought everything he did was great, we thought.

00:15:37.880 And that's why I wanted to do it like that.

00:15:39.240 I'm sure my sons are thinking the same stuff, you know.

00:15:43.940 Well, I think there's nothing more.

00:15:45.780 There's something inside of a son you just want to make your dad proud.

00:15:48.620 You know, you want him to look at you and, yeah, just feel a sense of pride.

00:15:53.500 That goes deep.

00:15:54.700 Yeah.

00:15:54.880 I mean, I think it's probably the deepest thing that there is.

00:15:57.600 Me too.

00:15:58.800 I really, I don't think there's anything less.

00:16:00.260 I mean, you ask anybody, do you feel like your dad's proud of you?

00:16:04.520 It's like that, you know, it really takes them to a place when they're thinking about that or answering that, you know.

00:16:08.840 Yeah.

00:16:11.080 Were there, was people using steroids and stuff back then?

00:16:13.440 I used to use steroids in high school.

00:16:14.820 Was it a thing when you guys were growing up or no?

00:16:17.220 Yeah, it was.

00:16:18.760 It sure was.

00:16:19.560 Because they, you know, it was, I didn't really ever want to really get into that, you know.

00:16:28.380 Because we had naturally good bodies, but my brother Kerry was a bodybuilder.

00:16:34.080 You know, he'd peel the skin off the chicken and eat the rice with no soy sauce on it.

00:16:38.700 Yeah.

00:16:39.080 I'd never do that, man.

00:16:40.220 I mean, I eat Twinkies, chocolate milk, five or six glasses a day, really.

00:16:44.620 I love chocolate milk sugar.

00:16:46.500 My favorite food is sugar, you know.

00:16:48.180 Oh, I'll eat damn two grams of sugar, dude.

00:16:50.340 Me too, man.

00:16:51.100 I mean, if it tastes good, then my body must want it.

00:16:53.920 Yeah, because when I was growing up, yeah, he's so fit, huh?

00:16:56.840 Yeah.

00:16:57.220 He was probably the most romantically fit of you guys, huh?

00:17:00.020 He was, man.

00:17:00.920 I just used to see him as a little kid.

00:17:02.760 He was the, girls all loved him.

00:17:06.280 The teachers loved him.

00:17:07.620 Damn straight men loved him.

00:17:09.000 He was.

00:17:09.620 I mean, you got to look, if you can go further enough past women where you get straight men

00:17:15.140 to love you, you could have straight, I mean, this is, you know, in rural areas, you could

00:17:20.240 have men that are, were like, no gays, but then they'll go and watch and then just adorn

00:17:26.280 this gentleman.

00:17:28.000 I mean, you know, those are the times kind of, but yeah, Barry, he was, he was super fit.

00:17:33.140 Did, um.

00:17:33.700 And we, I'll see that picture.

00:17:36.620 I remember, he was a little boy, he was so cute, but he said, uh, we, we went in the

00:17:40.840 barn one day, there's a big old wasp nest up there, a red wasp, you know, how they stuck

00:17:46.140 the ceiling up there.

00:17:47.140 And so, you know, they're in the barn, we're all alone.

00:17:49.920 And so, uh, so we, uh, you know, those things that you should, uh, the gift wraps, the long

00:17:55.560 tubes, they come in the Christmas present.

00:17:58.940 Yeah.

00:17:59.140 So we lit one up and said, Curie, hold it under those, those, those red ants.

00:18:03.700 But remember to hold your breath because they can't sting you if you're holding your

00:18:06.940 breath, you know?

00:18:08.040 And so, but so don't breathe.

00:18:10.180 And so we light it up and we're watching him go in there, you know, and he, you know,

00:18:14.820 they drop all on him and he runs out crying.

00:18:17.220 And we said, stupid, we told you not to let, to breathe.

00:18:20.520 And he said, it's hard to hold your breath when you're crying.

00:18:25.980 That is a great, it is hard to hold your breath when you're crying.

00:18:29.480 Yeah.

00:18:30.100 He was right.

00:18:30.880 My favorite, when we were kids, we used to pick on each other at dinner so bad.

00:18:34.900 And the best part was to get somebody to cry when they had a mouth full of food, right?

00:18:38.960 Because they couldn't swallow because they were crying so hard.

00:18:41.500 So the food just got, it'd be like, it just got stuck in the mouth, you know, just that

00:18:47.220 shit was so funny, dude.

00:18:49.080 Having siblings was so much fun, huh?

00:18:51.160 Did you guys do like Halloween and stuff together?

00:18:53.160 Any, like, did y'all do that?

00:18:54.560 Yeah, yeah.

00:18:55.740 You mean go out and throw eggs at people and stuff?

00:18:58.240 Yeah.

00:18:58.480 And we did all that.

00:19:00.940 And what was, like, birthday parties and stuff like at your house?

00:19:05.600 Because with so many kids, would you guys combine some of them or everybody got the rest?

00:19:09.000 Well, we had a lot of boys, you know, a lot of us in our house.

00:19:11.380 And I remember, like, ladies saying, oh, it smells like boy in here.

00:19:15.900 You know, because we, they smell like boys, I guess.

00:19:20.300 But I do remember that it was really hard for mama to get babysitters because, like,

00:19:25.580 we would, we were really hard on them, you know, just playing with them and stuff.

00:19:30.340 You know, we'd kind of make a joke out of it.

00:19:32.360 And they'd be crying and they're never going to watch these kids again.

00:19:36.380 I was climbing the walls and stuff like that.

00:19:38.940 Oh, you need Abdullah the Butcher to be your babysitter, I feel like.

00:19:42.460 Probably so.

00:19:43.700 You need somebody big.

00:19:45.900 But at that time in wrestling, were steroids, like, a popular thing?

00:19:49.540 Like, I remember when I was in high school, we would, people would use, like, Test 200.

00:19:52.940 But even growing up, like, in Texas, was it, did people even know that steroids were bad for you?

00:19:56.900 Or was it just, like, a medicine that was, like, kind of common in wrestling, do you feel like?

00:20:01.920 Well, doctors would give it to you.

00:20:04.940 I mean, I didn't, I had trouble gaining weight when I was, like, well, my whole life I've had trouble gaining weight.

00:20:11.480 But, and so I took, die on a ball when I was in high school, but I took one a day for, like, two weeks and then lay off for two weeks and then take it again for two weeks and lay off for two weeks.

00:20:25.820 And that was what kind of, that was, like, of a little boy pill is what that was for little boys that weren't getting puberty.

00:20:32.680 And then back then, like I say, there weren't all these rules and all.

00:20:37.180 Steroids weren't necessarily a dirty word.

00:20:39.360 But doctors did give them to people, like, after surgery and things like that to improve their appetite and things, you know.

00:20:46.620 And it makes a difference.

00:20:47.860 But if you don't lift weights, if you don't really have a strict regimen, then it's just going to give you pimples on your back and make your hair fall out and your breath stink and all that stuff, you know.

00:20:58.300 Yeah, it's, yeah, if you're not, yeah, if you're just shooting steroids and then just watching, you know, I Dream of Jeannie or shit like that, yeah, your life's going to fall apart.

00:21:09.420 Yeah, look, look, those guys that get the injections to make their muscles look big.

00:21:14.560 Can you believe, have you seen some of these guys with these, they don't even work out.

00:21:18.100 They go in, they get silicone injections for muscles, you know.

00:21:21.380 I got to tell you, Theo, muscles are nothing, you know, it's all, you want to know your, in wrestling, I would lift weights because I wanted to be a better wrestler.

00:21:33.020 I want my kick out, I want to push my man off, I want to be able to bench, you know, a lot because it's important.

00:21:40.040 But I mean, it's, to look pretty in the mirror, I mean, that's just a few shades short of fruity, if you ask me, you know.

00:21:50.140 Oh, yeah, I mean, look at this guy.

00:21:52.280 That's the stuff, that's what I'm talking about.

00:21:53.920 What in the hell is that?

00:21:55.300 No, I mean.

00:21:56.760 The guy looks like he's stealing from Target.

00:22:01.040 Really?

00:22:01.920 What is that guy doing?

00:22:05.080 What is that guy doing?

00:22:07.780 Yeah, yeah.

00:22:08.900 Oh, my God.

00:22:10.040 That guy looks like a little.

00:22:12.740 Oh, God.

00:22:15.240 And I'm going to take that joke out, that was, that's offensive.

00:22:19.240 I just wanted to make you guys laugh.

00:22:23.000 Which, yeah, we used to use them, I'm trying to think, and we used them, yeah, I just like,

00:22:27.920 we got in and we were weightlifting pretty heavy and it was fun using them because it definitely

00:22:31.520 made things easier.

00:22:33.020 You know, that was fun and you, I felt, you felt way more invigorated, you know, for sure.

00:22:39.380 What kind, what kind did you do?

00:22:40.660 We were doing like Test 200 and then people would, some people would do Deanna Ball.

00:22:44.260 I never got that.

00:22:45.120 We just would go on spring break and get Test 200 or some people worked on farms and

00:22:49.200 we'd get Test 200 from them, you know, testosterone or something.

00:22:53.040 Yeah, well, some of that stuff, I mean, I have to say that some of that stuff, you could

00:22:58.960 see veterinary use only on the box, you know, I mean, equine, this and all that.

00:23:04.520 Oh, some of it, you'd open up and it'd be like.

00:23:06.120 Like, even when you took the top off, you're like, shit, that ain't for us.

00:23:10.480 That's what it was.

00:23:11.560 It really, yeah, I was never into that because you really can kill yourself with it, you know.

00:23:17.540 It's like, it messes your whole body up, you know.

00:23:19.940 Was it popular in the sport when you got into it?

00:23:22.580 I'm just trying to wonder what the times were like and how men felt like they had to.

00:23:27.860 For your old man.

00:23:28.800 Well, and did, and you guys were, because your family was in, your family was in good

00:23:32.620 shape overall, but some of the shapes in wrestling weren't, it wasn't as much about

00:23:37.880 the shape, you know, there was a lot of guys out there that were just big, tough guys.

00:23:43.220 Well, we wanted to put the best show on television we could do, and if that meant take steroids

00:23:49.700 too, we didn't care.

00:23:51.180 I mean, priority one was our body.

00:23:54.000 Yeah.

00:23:54.140 I mean, was our, was delivering that punishment, you know, we move quick and explode.

00:24:00.360 Have you ever, you've seen our wrestling, it was different.

00:24:02.120 Oh, man, Kerry was so, it's unbelievable watching him.

00:24:05.120 Well, we just, that's the thing we wanted to, and that was the attitude back then.

00:24:09.020 If the guys we wrestled are going to do steroids, well, then it's only fair that we do them too.

00:24:14.020 Now, we didn't, don't get me wrong, it's like, it's not like we were really into it.

00:24:18.900 Kerry went down to the University of Houston and was still in the discus for Coach Tellez

00:24:23.640 down there of U of H. And the stuff he learned down there was all this, like, expert stuff

00:24:30.620 about weightlifting and weight events and all, you know, they would take a cigarette and puff

00:24:37.140 a cigarette right before they'd throw.

00:24:38.860 Uh-uh.

00:24:39.360 And yeah, if something in the nicotine would kick the muscles in, you know, kick your body

00:24:43.560 just a little, it would give them just a little edge, just a little more, or they drink,

00:24:48.420 or they drink ice-cold water before you have a go-max on your bench.

00:24:52.980 It helps just a little bit.

00:24:55.400 You hear that, Coach Hester?

00:24:56.460 Kurt Hester, he's a speed and strength coach of mine.

00:24:58.500 I think he coaches at the University of Houston now.

00:25:00.720 But I'm going to make sure he hears that.

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00:27:43.320 So when you guys were, cause didn't Kerry almost throw the disc, didn't he almost go to the

00:27:48.280 Olympics?

00:27:48.980 Yeah.

00:27:49.260 But the Olympics got canceled that year because what year was it?

00:27:52.880 Didn't Johnson cancel the Olympics?

00:27:55.120 80.

00:27:55.600 It was the 80, no wait, yeah, 1980.

00:27:58.020 That's what it was.

00:27:58.700 The president canceled the Olympics, right?

00:28:00.140 We didn't go?

00:28:01.500 No, it was that thing.

00:28:03.580 I believe that was a, there was a airliner flying over Korea and a Russian shot it down.

00:28:09.080 It was over a sensitive area and they, and I believe it was Jimmy Carter.

00:28:14.540 Oh, Jimmy Carter.

00:28:15.460 Yeah.

00:28:15.840 Yeah.

00:28:16.220 And we didn't do the Olympics that year.

00:28:17.900 Yeah.

00:28:18.380 But he would have competed.

00:28:19.160 Kerry would have competed.

00:28:20.200 Well, you know, uh, I think he would have, but I'm not really sure what, because they

00:28:26.060 would have had to have the, uh, I think he went to Champaign for those, uh, uh, pre games.

00:28:32.320 Yeah.

00:28:32.600 Nationals.

00:28:33.400 But, uh, I don't think he went to the other, they even took it that far.

00:28:36.900 I'm not sure, I'm not sure how it went, but.

00:28:39.560 Which one of you guys was kind of the leader of you guys' brothers?

00:28:42.960 Well.

00:28:43.260 And I know sometimes it goes by age, right?

00:28:45.060 Because there's always a.

00:28:46.180 I was the big brother, you know, and no doubt about that.

00:28:49.200 But my brother, Dave, had a real responsibility streak.

00:28:53.360 He was just, my dad would come to him and say, okay, I want this fence to be, I want it

00:28:57.100 to go down there 200 yards and I want a good post or I want it double fenced and I want,

00:29:01.620 uh, and I want everything just right.

00:29:04.180 And he told Dave.

00:29:05.140 And so, Dave would tell me and Kerry what to do.

00:29:07.580 He's the foreman.

00:29:08.480 Yeah.

00:29:08.840 He's the foreman.

00:29:09.760 Yeah.

00:29:09.880 And so, and kind of worked that way in wrestling too.

00:29:12.720 And, uh, he had, he was good on the microphone too.

00:29:16.100 Oh yeah.

00:29:16.560 It's important.

00:29:17.100 You got to be good on the mic.

00:29:18.620 Was there a time where all, all of you guys were wrestling at the same time?

00:29:23.520 Yeah.

00:29:23.960 Just briefly.

00:29:25.160 It was, man, that was so much fun too.

00:29:27.100 Cause we never got to go to Japan together.

00:29:29.020 Dave and I went to Japan together.

00:29:30.660 Kerry and I went to Japan.

00:29:31.620 Never together though.

00:29:32.760 So, but when we could all three to be together, just for the, when we first started out, you

00:29:38.320 know, for that first year, we could, all three of us could go to towns.

00:29:41.540 We got so much fun, man.

00:29:43.160 We always would stop.

00:29:44.580 We'd scuba dive all the way there.

00:29:46.120 You know, if we, if there's clear water, if it's just a river or something, we'd dive

00:29:50.920 in and swim.

00:29:51.780 It was just, uh.

00:29:53.220 Oh, along the way.

00:29:54.240 Just, yeah.

00:29:54.960 We had fun all day and we wouldn't even go to the dressing room.

00:29:58.300 We'd get dressed out in the, in the woods where the swimming hole was and we'd get our

00:30:01.580 rest and stuff on and go right to the show, get in the rain, come back out into our stuff.

00:30:05.780 You know, we had it down.

00:30:07.900 We had fun.

00:30:09.000 And you got a leech in your tights, brother.

00:30:10.900 You know?

00:30:11.500 Yeah.

00:30:11.740 Hey, don't call it that.

00:30:14.420 Yeah.

00:30:15.240 Uh, were you all, do you all train together at home at a certain place?

00:30:19.100 Like, what was that kind of?

00:30:20.560 Yeah.

00:30:20.900 We had a gym outside the house and, uh, on an adjacent property.

00:30:25.200 And, uh, and I'm probably the cause of all the pressure because I, I would put up, uh,

00:30:31.980 Vince Lombardi posters all the time for myself.

00:30:35.460 You know, I wanted to be the best I could be.

00:30:37.500 And that was what it was like to live in my home.

00:30:39.320 Back then it was like, we lifted weights, uh, three times a week, but we ran, we swam.

00:30:46.200 Everything was about getting better because I wanted to play in the NFL and, uh, Carrie,

00:30:53.180 uh, well, Carrie just wanted to wrestle, but, uh, and Dave wanted to wrestle, but I was,

00:30:59.560 I was a football player.

00:31:01.240 And, uh, and so that's what it was all about.

00:31:04.240 It's just do your best to quit.

00:31:06.280 It's never quit.

00:31:07.260 Winners never quit.

00:31:08.200 Winners never win.

00:31:09.800 You know, that kind of stuff on, I had posters everywhere on the gym and, and we'd spot each

00:31:13.780 other and push each other and call each other sissies if we couldn't do it, you know?

00:31:17.360 And I mean, we would spit on each other, you know, we, we were savages and we wanted to

00:31:21.880 get good as we could be.

00:31:24.140 And when we, we wrestled, it was hard.

00:31:27.440 You know, we, we, we, we were rough because we, anything worth doing is worth doing right.

00:31:33.300 You know, we wanted to be like successful moms, my dad was, but it would meant just go all

00:31:38.120 out, you know, completely commit.

00:31:40.660 And that means every day.

00:31:42.340 On Wednesdays, we're on 500, 400 meter, uh, five, one lap around the tracks, 400 meter.

00:31:48.420 We'd run five, 400s on Wednesdays.

00:31:51.300 We'd time them.

00:31:52.640 And Carrie and I, uh, we're both high jumpers.

00:31:55.300 Carrie high jump too.

00:31:56.780 And we, we could bench, Carrie and I figured as long as we could bench twice our weight and

00:32:02.020 high jump over our heads, then we would, we'll always be in shape.

00:32:05.580 And well, yeah, for knee surgeries and I can't do that again, but that was the theory we wanted

00:32:11.400 to go with.

00:32:12.020 And Dave was the same.

00:32:13.480 Dave didn't work out in the gym as hard as we did, you know, but Carrie and I did.

00:32:17.660 We, we, everything we did was too exhaustion.

00:32:20.200 And when we were kind of nauseated, when you think you're about to throw up, now you've done

00:32:24.200 enough.

00:32:25.160 Dang.

00:32:25.360 We really did, man.

00:32:26.340 It was all the way.

00:32:28.020 I quit way before that.

00:32:29.620 I realized.

00:32:30.360 Yeah.

00:32:31.360 Well, everybody does, man.

00:32:32.660 That's the, if you want to look different, you have to do what everybody else doesn't

00:32:35.560 do, you know?

00:32:36.280 And I mean, fight through that.

00:32:38.940 And did, were all your brothers kind of subscribed to that same mentality or did some of them come

00:32:42.700 along just because that, with that mentality, just because they were your brothers?

00:32:48.620 No.

00:32:49.340 Does that make any sense?

00:32:50.280 Yeah.

00:32:50.660 Yeah.

00:32:50.980 I guess.

00:32:51.740 Yeah.

00:32:52.080 Nobody was just along for the ride.

00:32:53.720 Yeah.

00:32:54.020 I think they were all pretty much just wanting to be like me, Dave and Carrie wanted to be

00:32:58.520 like dad, but you know, things got kind of different when we were in, when we were

00:33:02.620 kids, when I was in junior and high school, sophomore in high school, my mom and dad were

00:33:08.460 going to get a divorce, you know, and my dad was going to move out.

00:33:13.660 That was my freshman year is what it was.

00:33:15.940 And I came into the kitchen one day, my mom and dad are talking and dad said, Kev, I'm

00:33:23.420 going to move to Dallas and just get an apartment and y'all are going to stay here and it's going

00:33:28.120 to be just great.

00:33:29.080 Y'all go to school and come see me on the weekends.

00:33:31.860 And I said, are y'all talking about a divorce?

00:33:34.800 And he said, yeah, son, we are.

00:33:36.800 He's trying to describe it to you without saying we're in a divorce.

00:33:39.280 Yeah.

00:33:39.300 I said, well, I want to go with you, dad.

00:33:42.160 And Dave heard me and Carrie came in and said, we do too, dad.

00:33:45.320 We want to go with you.

00:33:46.200 And so my mom's going to be there alone, it looks like, you know, and I guess they, but

00:33:51.700 I was the mediator with that, you know, and they kind of worked it out.

00:33:55.160 But with the deaths, you know, then my mother was kind of damaged inside.

00:34:01.620 It made her like, um, she was suffering so much.

00:34:05.140 She, you know, with Dave, she was tough.

00:34:07.340 I mean, like her little, own little brother and Jackie, but then with Dave, she toughed

00:34:10.980 it out, you know, but then baby Mike, he was the baby of our family.

00:34:15.220 You know, Chris was even younger, but Mike was the, we'd been traveling around and we

00:34:20.440 weren't home that much.

00:34:21.700 So when Mike was the baby, you know, traveling with wrestling, you guys had been traveling

00:34:25.460 with wrestling.

00:34:26.100 Yeah.

00:34:26.960 See, Dave and the movie doesn't have the suit, but Dave and Carrie were both married,

00:34:30.820 you know, and Carrie had, Dave had a daughter, uh, died a crib death, but Carrie had, uh,

00:34:37.300 two daughters and, uh, Holly and Lacey and beautiful sweet daughter.

00:34:42.120 They, they, they spend every Christmas with us and what we told you, we, I got the big

00:34:46.340 house for all to have, all to have our Christmases and, uh, because family is just like we were

00:34:52.480 saying, there's nothing more important than family to me after any thinking man.

00:34:58.120 And then again, there's the, uh, being wrestlers and our brothers, I mean, my dad's a bad guy,

00:35:04.460 you know, and they're booing him.

00:35:05.680 It kind of makes you feel like it's us against the world.

00:35:08.240 You know, these people are booing my dad.

00:35:09.700 But if they hate him, then we hate them too.

00:35:12.660 You know, what was that about?

00:35:14.780 So they, cause at what point did they, did the, what the audience turned on your father

00:35:20.480 or just part of the, no, he was like the perfect bad guy.

00:35:25.220 He was a Nazi.

00:35:26.400 And, uh, after my brother, Jackie died and they're up in New York, he was like his wrestling

00:35:31.680 changed.

00:35:32.360 He was different.

00:35:33.100 And he was a, he was wild inside.

00:35:35.620 And I think it was like, he wanted to just take it out on people.

00:35:41.080 And it showed in the ring.

00:35:42.780 Theo, when people would, when the wrestlers would come to the, out of the dressing room,

00:35:46.160 get in their cars, the fans would stand around and boo, you know, from a distance.

00:35:50.380 But when my dad came out to get in his car, silence, they were like fear.

00:35:57.100 It was like fear.

00:35:58.340 He might run over here.

00:36:02.240 Oh, it was such an exciting time back then when the wrestlers would come into the ring.

00:36:05.900 I mean, there was just, God, I remember being a kid and we would lose our fucking minds and

00:36:11.780 just beat the shit out of our sister.

00:36:13.360 The second the fucking wrestling program came on, we would beat the shit out of our sister.

00:36:18.900 Oh man.

00:36:19.660 For no fucking reason.

00:36:20.940 I guess she was, she just couldn't get used to the schedule and no promise stay away at that

00:36:27.000 time of day or something.

00:36:29.260 Oh, if it was more than an hour broadcast, she knew she was in for it.

00:36:32.760 I'll tell you that.

00:36:35.060 You hear a lot of stories about how wrestling was like, you know, we had to wrestle one night

00:36:39.140 and then the next night you had to wrestle again.

00:36:41.360 And did you go on road trips like that where it was like a few days at a time?

00:36:44.760 Was it weeks and months?

00:36:45.880 I mean, what was it really like back then?

00:36:47.480 You know, in 1984, I wrestled 386 times.

00:36:51.460 God.

00:36:51.900 And that's, a lot of those were triple shots, double shots on Sundays.

00:36:57.680 You know, we'd wrestle TV shows or we'd do two or three times.

00:37:02.060 But after the, started to be the deaths, you know, then I would have to, my dad had it

00:37:09.340 work.

00:37:09.700 Dave could sell out a building.

00:37:11.580 Carrie could sell out a building.

00:37:12.500 I could sell out.

00:37:13.840 But Mike was not quite there, you know.

00:37:16.220 And so when Dave died, either Carrie or me had to fill his slot, you know, work another

00:37:23.420 town.

00:37:24.640 And that was hard.

00:37:25.780 But then Carrie with the foot, now I've got two slots to fill, you know.

00:37:30.820 And so I was wrestling three times a day, almost a couple of times a week, but I was

00:37:35.520 wrestling every day.

00:37:36.460 Was it an option to take, take those, some of the slots off the schedule?

00:37:41.320 Or did you guys feel like as a family, we have to fill this?

00:37:44.300 Did you feel like your dad was like, we have to fill this?

00:37:47.240 Or it was just, that's what you did?

00:37:49.960 Well, I got to tell you, we, you know, after the deaths, we were, we were down, you know,

00:37:55.860 and we sure didn't feel like getting back in that ring.

00:37:58.040 But, you know, you have to, because after death, there's all the publicity and dad's

00:38:02.820 saying, you know, it's been a week, it's been two weeks or whatever.

00:38:06.860 But I mean, there were times when we said, dad, I can't do it yet.

00:38:09.580 Can't do it.

00:38:10.760 You know, but he did want us to get in that ring.

00:38:12.920 But it was a family business.

00:38:14.380 I don't want to hold it against him.

00:38:15.400 I understand.

00:38:15.840 But it was brutal to make yourself do that.

00:38:23.900 I mean, what's on your mind is a love and brotherhood and seeing him again in heaven.

00:38:29.480 But you want to project, I'm going to kick that guy's ass.

00:38:32.460 You know, it's kind of, you're torn, you know.

00:38:35.580 A lot of life's like that, huh?

00:38:37.360 Yeah.

00:38:37.980 It's like having two feelings at the same time.

00:38:40.060 It's like, especially with death, because it's like somebody's gone, but they're the

00:38:45.900 one that's gone, but you're the one that hurts.

00:38:48.440 And, and you don't even know what they're feeling like.

00:38:52.260 And you almost don't want to like mourn too much because then it's like, are you just using

00:38:57.600 the morning for yourself?

00:38:58.800 Just like all that kind of stuff has always hit me.

00:39:01.160 I know.

00:39:01.420 You wake up in the morning and there's nothing else.

00:39:03.640 You can't think about anything else, man.

00:39:08.340 I'm old enough.

00:39:09.200 If I can tell you a little something now, I never wanted to endorse marijuana or put

00:39:14.500 it over because, you know, I had a position, you know, but when I would wake up in the

00:39:19.940 morning, I could not think of anything else.

00:39:21.980 That's all I thought about.

00:39:23.200 And if I smoked a joint, I could daydream, I could think of something else, you know,

00:39:28.680 and I, I had to, I was grateful for that stuff.

00:39:31.880 I mean, it helped me.

00:39:34.520 Well, I'm sure, especially out in Kauai, it was probably.

00:39:37.620 Oh, shoot.

00:39:38.400 Yeah.

00:39:38.580 I was helping everybody.

00:39:39.940 Well, so I had my knee replaced, you know, and it didn't go very well.

00:39:44.680 It's kind of, I rehabbed it too quick.

00:39:47.100 See, in college, when you have a knee surgery, you, you fight like hell to get it back, you

00:39:51.580 know?

00:39:51.920 And, well, I got out there and I got a knee replacement, but I'm a senior citizen.

00:39:57.280 And so instead of, I shouldn't have rehabbed it like that.

00:39:59.840 You know, I like, I, I was doing flips off the cliff with the boys and it knocked something.

00:40:05.560 I smelled glue on my breath.

00:40:06.940 I thought, oh, that can't be good.

00:40:08.300 Because they use glue in there.

00:40:10.240 Really?

00:40:10.720 Yeah.

00:40:11.040 And you think some of it came up your bloodstream, you could taste it a little bit?

00:40:13.340 I tasted it.

00:40:14.300 Yeah, I tasted it.

00:40:14.920 That's bad.

00:40:16.620 Anyway, so.

00:40:17.880 Damn, they're using damn glue?

00:40:19.400 Well.

00:40:20.880 God.

00:40:21.120 Yeah, they do.

00:40:21.780 They use glue.

00:40:22.660 Well, shit.

00:40:23.240 We could use glue.

00:40:24.460 I mean, I mean, they have the power tools.

00:40:26.760 Really?

00:40:27.320 I mean, working on you, they got to drill the whole deal.

00:40:30.500 You know, they hide it from you.

00:40:31.900 Yeah.

00:40:32.400 With that anesthesia, dude.

00:40:33.960 Oh, man.

00:40:34.520 They just bring in a couple of Cub Scouts in there and they're doing damn woodwork on

00:40:38.360 you in there.

00:40:40.860 Playing?

00:40:41.180 With wrestling, did you have to be as tough at the wrestling part as you did at the partying

00:40:50.160 part?

00:40:50.620 Like, there seemed to be this thing when I look back on like wrestling and a lot of

00:40:54.760 the stories, especially coming up out of like the 70s, 80s, 90s, where not only did

00:41:00.420 you have to prove yourself in the ring, that you were the toughest guy, that you were able

00:41:05.080 to do the matches, but then you had to prove yourself again, like at the drinking table.

00:41:09.440 Was that part of the culture as much as?

00:41:12.360 Oh, man.

00:41:12.900 It was that was the easy part for us because neither none of us really like taste of booze.

00:41:18.180 You know, we I mean, I'll have a drink or even two, but I'm done.

00:41:23.380 I can't drink six of anything, you know, and I'm a lot of people can, but I think that

00:41:28.780 was a big thing for us.

00:41:30.020 We never did get that big stomach, I guess.

00:41:32.460 A lot of my friends, you know, love that beer.

00:41:34.880 All my teammates, you know, my wrestling colleagues love beer, but I never did get into it.

00:41:40.640 And I'm glad I didn't because it it's taken its toll on a lot of good men.

00:41:44.440 And yeah, but I'll tell you this, after those knee surgeries, I had to take three Oxycontin

00:41:51.260 a day.

00:41:52.040 Yeah.

00:41:52.600 Shoot.

00:41:53.160 One in the morning, one in noon and or one at one o'clock and then one at sundown.

00:41:58.340 And because they have time, they had time release in them, you know, and it can work great.

00:42:02.580 It didn't make you goofy or anything, but I could ride a bike, you know, and stuff and

00:42:06.340 I could, I could, it kind of hurt worse later, but with the pain pill, take another dang pill.

00:42:12.520 Oh yeah.

00:42:13.240 I feel like a damn Care Bear if I take one of them.

00:42:15.680 Shit.

00:42:16.920 Well, then COVID came and I went to get my medicine because we never left our ranch except

00:42:21.820 for go to the doctor, you know, I mean, we had everything there.

00:42:24.560 In Kauai?

00:42:25.300 Yeah.

00:42:25.580 In Kauai, I grow four different types of avocado and we trade them with our neighbors.

00:42:30.500 We have turkey.

00:42:32.880 We raise sheep.

00:42:34.060 We have tilapia, a fish full of thousands of fish and every kind of fruit you could think

00:42:39.520 of, you know, it was, we had a reason to go.

00:42:41.500 The boys are sparing fish and throwing the net and catching crabs.

00:42:45.300 And so it was a great way to live, you know, so we just didn't really leave.

00:42:50.040 But COVID came and so I go to get my medicine and it's like twice as much.

00:42:56.260 I was already paying 900 bucks a month for it.

00:42:59.020 It's like $1,800.

00:43:01.120 And I said, well, I'm quitting this stuff.

00:43:02.740 And so I quit, but man, I got these flu symptoms like, you know, I felt like I was weird and

00:43:11.220 well, I fought through it, you know, but Ross got me the stuff called Kratom.

00:43:16.960 It's a leaf on my tree and we could grow, we grow the tree out there.

00:43:21.220 You can crumble it up or it comes at, you put it in a powder, put it in a pill.

00:43:24.440 So, and I was able to kick that OxyContin in 10 days.

00:43:29.080 I wouldn't even want another one.

00:43:30.400 By using Kratom, you were able to kick it?

00:43:32.260 Kratom did that, yeah.

00:43:33.420 And then were you able to get off the Kratom?

00:43:35.260 That was easy to quit Kratom.

00:43:36.880 I never liked that stuff.

00:43:37.920 It smells like hay anyway, you know, but it was easy to get off of it.

00:43:40.660 But, but, so, you know, I decided, I told you when we came on, I wanted my life to kind

00:43:47.880 of be, help someone, all that suffering, you want to look at something good, you know?

00:43:54.020 And, and if anyone is suffering from any kind of addiction, like the opioids and all, bear

00:44:00.520 that in mind, they're Kratom places all around.

00:44:02.460 I'm not saying I'm not getting any money for it.

00:44:04.220 I'm just saying it sure helped me.

00:44:05.960 And if you're an addict and it was bothering you, I mean, I, I could, I couldn't believe

00:44:10.720 I was addicted to this stuff.

00:44:12.320 I mean, I wanted to quit and I got sick.

00:44:14.840 I thought, shit, never going to let something happen like this to me again.

00:44:18.480 How bad did the, did it, did Oxy, like feeling like you had to take OxyContin's get?

00:44:23.840 Well, I never kind of let it get to that point.

00:44:26.880 You're supposed to take it at one o'clock, supposed to take it in the morning, 10 night

00:44:29.620 before you go to bed.

00:44:30.220 And so that's what it always did.

00:44:31.560 Yeah.

00:44:31.800 And you don't walk around high.

00:44:33.240 Eight, you just don't hurt, you know, cause it's got the pain relief, the time release

00:44:37.520 in it, you know, but.

00:44:38.820 But that Kratom was helpful, huh?

00:44:40.420 Oh yeah.

00:44:41.040 Wow.

00:44:41.400 Sure was.

00:44:41.880 Yeah.

00:44:42.000 I have a friend who got addicted to Kratom.

00:44:45.200 So I think there's probably, there can be a slope there, but I certainly could see

00:44:48.780 how it could be used to help people get off of OxyContin.

00:44:51.860 Yeah.

00:44:52.240 It's illegal in some countries.

00:44:54.060 Kratom is?

00:44:54.620 Kratom is.

00:44:55.240 It must be addictive.

00:44:58.180 Was, was addiction ever part of the, any of your brother's issues or no?

00:45:02.820 Did addiction run in you guys' family?

00:45:04.220 It runs in my family.

00:45:05.180 Well, you know, I don't think it does.

00:45:07.940 My brother, Kerry, you know, was, uh, he went to the Betty Ford clinic and all these

00:45:14.920 places, but he was never addicted to anything.

00:45:18.020 He just liked all of it.

00:45:19.360 I mean, he'd do cocaine one day.

00:45:20.840 He'd do pain pills the next day.

00:45:22.540 He'd do acids.

00:45:24.220 I mean, mushrooms.

00:45:25.960 It was, it was something different all the time.

00:45:28.060 And I'm like, Kerry, what are, you know, and I'm not saying I'm so good.

00:45:31.000 No, but it sounds like it was a, it sounds like he was addicted.

00:45:34.220 He was addicted to the feeling.

00:45:36.860 Ah, to the feeling.

00:45:38.120 Mm-hmm.

00:45:38.700 I see what you're saying.

00:45:39.700 Just getting out of his skin, you know?

00:45:41.380 Oh, yeah.

00:45:42.820 God, that's a steel cage match.

00:45:44.300 I don't want to be in my own skin.

00:45:46.360 Yeah, I know, man.

00:45:48.120 But you know, that's life.

00:45:49.480 You got to fight through that crap, man.

00:45:51.640 You got to just fight through it.

00:45:53.540 Well, yeah, because to me, it sounds like he might've had, he could've had addiction

00:45:56.360 problems, like if they had looked at it by today's standards.

00:45:59.640 You know, I think things were definitely looked at differently then.

00:46:02.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:46:02.780 Might as well, because if you can't stop, then what do you call it, you know?

00:46:05.980 Yeah.

00:46:06.560 Because he, I know he wanted to stop, because it was, because he had those beautiful daughters.

00:46:10.860 He loved them so much, you know.

00:46:12.380 Holly and what was the other one?

00:46:13.320 Holly and Lacey.

00:46:14.400 Lacey.

00:46:15.000 Lacey lives out in LA, and Holly is out there in East Texas now.

00:46:18.680 And hopefully they'll be with me soon, because, you know, I've been going back to Hawaii every

00:46:24.360 few months, every month, you know, and, but I haven't been back in a couple of months

00:46:28.680 now, and man, it is hurting me, because Benji, my little treasure's out there.

00:46:33.820 Jill's, Jill has four.

00:46:36.200 She has a boy and three daughters.

00:46:38.460 And who's Benji?

00:46:39.480 Benji is the six-year-old, and we're like this.

00:46:42.180 We go everything together.

00:46:43.420 Oh, that's a grandchild?

00:46:44.440 Yeah, yeah.

00:46:44.980 Oh, got it.

00:46:45.520 No, I've got a lot of grandchildren.

00:46:47.020 Oh, you do?

00:46:47.280 His son, Marshall, has given me two.

00:46:49.320 Okay, well, he can get more out of them.

00:46:50.960 Yeah, yeah, I sure can.

00:46:52.620 Fire him up.

00:46:53.860 And then Kristen has given me plenty, and, but that boy and I, being five, you know, four,

00:47:02.980 three that age, he was just with me all the time.

00:47:05.100 Oh, it's fun.

00:47:05.840 And now, Marshall has given me a grandson, and he's just about to turn five, and we're

00:47:12.220 like that.

00:47:13.220 I mean, it's either monster trucks, or we're turning over rocks.

00:47:16.000 We're just throwing rocks and catching snakes and bugs and lizards and all, and it's just,

00:47:20.340 it's just fun all the time, you know, but it's like.

00:47:23.720 Yeah, I could see that for sure.

00:47:25.480 You remind me also, I mean, if you were my grandfather or something, that would be awesome.

00:47:30.740 And you remind me of Tommy Lee, actually, about probably, like, does anybody ever tell

00:47:35.900 you that?

00:47:36.980 Who's Tommy Lee?

00:47:37.980 Tommy Lee from Motley Crue.

00:47:40.260 Oh, that band came to Sportatorium.

00:47:43.740 They're a bunch of nice guys.

00:47:44.800 I know those guys.

00:47:45.800 Of course you do, dude.

00:47:47.220 That's you, dude.

00:47:48.140 That's why you know him.

00:47:49.400 But Tommy's a great guy.

00:47:52.420 Tommy's great.

00:47:52.980 You guys just remind, the way you guys talk and stuff, does that make any sense to you,

00:47:55.820 Nick?

00:47:56.480 Yeah.

00:47:56.940 Tommy's the greatest dude, man.

00:47:58.760 He's nice.

00:47:59.460 Just the way you guys sound and stuff like that, he's a super guy.

00:48:02.340 Yeah, they're good, man.

00:48:03.940 Did you ever fight somebody high?

00:48:05.680 Could people fight high in the ring?

00:48:07.120 Did people ever fight high in the ring?

00:48:10.860 I don't think so.

00:48:12.580 I mean, not on purpose.

00:48:14.500 Right.

00:48:14.960 You know, but I couldn't remember, though.

00:48:18.920 Oh, golly.

00:48:21.240 Yeah.

00:48:22.480 Oh, we did before.

00:48:25.780 There was this stuff called GHB, and it's this super drug.

00:48:30.580 But they sold it in, like, athletic stores, you know, and sporting goods stores, because

00:48:34.840 it was like a fat burner.

00:48:36.180 And so we're going to this town, and Kerry's going there.

00:48:41.500 He told us to not take too much of it, but by the time we get there, you know, your body's

00:48:48.480 going to be burning your fat off, you know?

00:48:50.820 So we took that crowd, and golly, shoot.

00:48:54.620 I don't know how we got through that night.

00:48:56.600 It was terrible.

00:48:57.700 Are you just zombies?

00:48:59.060 Yeah.

00:48:59.720 Yeah, we were.

00:49:00.260 We're always like, we're just sitting there dozing off.

00:49:03.260 It's right at the match time, and it'd be just one of the brothers trying to wake you

00:49:07.080 up, you know, shut up, you know?

00:49:08.520 And it was terrible, terrible.

00:49:11.760 That stuff was something.

00:49:13.320 Yeah, I could just imagine what that's like at that time.

00:49:15.900 You're almost like anything to kind of get an edge.

00:49:18.840 Everybody's testing out the cool stuff, or I know where the new thing is.

00:49:23.260 I guess that's always been a part of that bodybuilding world, too, I think, you know?

00:49:27.540 When you're big into bodybuilding, a lot of those things kind of come along.

00:49:30.640 Like, you know, there's different creatines.

00:49:32.440 There's different uppers.

00:49:34.040 There's like these testosterone revigorators or whatever.

00:49:38.020 Sometimes it comes in, like, a huge set of balls, the powder or whatever.

00:49:43.200 Like, what the hell is this?

00:49:44.520 But, yeah, there's all types of – bodybuilding's always been on the edge of, like, using –

00:49:50.340 So competitive, yeah.

00:49:51.300 Using – and finding an advantage.

00:49:55.040 Yeah, you know.

00:49:56.840 That's when two guys are going to look at the mirror with each other.

00:50:02.500 I got better things to do.

00:50:04.480 Yeah, at a certain point, I think so.

00:50:08.020 It's interesting that you refer to other wrestlers as, like, a team,

00:50:11.200 or you refer to it as your team or something.

00:50:13.760 Is that how you guys thought of y'all's wrestling organization, as a team?

00:50:18.760 Yeah, it was a family business, and it was like a team.

00:50:22.020 It was like – you know, we never were jealous of each other, you know?

00:50:26.920 As to – the real truth to it is, you know, when my dad and I flipped –

00:50:32.580 when Kerry and me flipped the coin for the world title,

00:50:35.440 well, the truth to it was that I had a family, and I'm married,

00:50:40.500 and I have children, you know, and Kerry wanted to be the world champion.

00:50:44.080 But to be the world champion is a special kind of wrestler to do that,

00:50:49.200 and not a Kerry.

00:50:50.680 You need somebody that makes the other guy look good.

00:50:54.380 That's really what it's all about, you know?

00:50:56.180 And Dave could have done that, but – and I think Kerry may –

00:51:02.020 I couldn't have done it, though.

00:51:03.120 I've been a babyface my whole life, you know?

00:51:05.840 I kiss the babies, and I do all that stuff.

00:51:09.380 But the real difficult work in wrestling, the hard stuff, is to be a heel.

00:51:14.520 That's the creative stuff, you know?

00:51:16.300 And for our listeners that don't know what a heel is –

00:51:18.720 Well, a heel's the heavy, the bad guy, you know, the Bruiser Brody's

00:51:22.100 and the Kamala's and the King Kong Bundy's, you know?

00:51:26.360 Why is that the tougher spot to be?

00:51:31.220 Well, because you're limited.

00:51:32.920 For a good guy, what you can do, you know?

00:51:34.920 But a bad guy can do anything, and he better do it, too,

00:51:38.360 because it's all about, you know, it's like you're slaying a dragon, you know?

00:51:43.260 There's the knight in shining armor, and there's the big, ugly dragon.

00:51:48.280 You know, when I first went out to Atlanta on WTBS out there,

00:51:53.940 I was 19 years old and, you know, handsome kid, you know, and the hero.

00:52:01.380 And here comes the big monster to wrestle me.

00:52:03.960 It's this Terry Gordy.

00:52:05.620 Yeah.

00:52:06.360 Big monster.

00:52:07.140 Bam, bam, was his name?

00:52:07.740 No.

00:52:07.900 Yeah.

00:52:08.340 And I found out, talking to him, he was 16.

00:52:12.620 Oh, my God.

00:52:13.460 He was a teenager all that time.

00:52:15.440 What the hell?

00:52:16.020 He is.

00:52:16.600 Y'all are being damn sex trafficked, you know?

00:52:18.960 That's crazy, dude.

00:52:20.300 Yeah.

00:52:21.980 That's hilarious.

00:52:23.200 You're both scared of each other.

00:52:24.480 You're both having to even finish schoolwork.

00:52:27.380 Well, that's it, you know?

00:52:28.720 You want each...

00:52:30.420 Bring that picture of him up.

00:52:31.480 I'm sorry to interrupt you, Kevin.

00:52:32.580 Bring that picture of him up.

00:52:33.520 Look at that fella, dude.

00:52:35.400 Yeah.

00:52:36.440 That's wild, huh?

00:52:37.560 Yeah.

00:52:37.940 He was something else.

00:52:39.600 You would have loved him.

00:52:41.120 Yeah.

00:52:41.380 I'm telling you, Michael Hayes is a...

00:52:43.480 He's a character, Buddy Calvert, but that guy was 100% gold inside.

00:52:49.160 Oh.

00:52:49.520 He would fight to the death, but he had a heart for little kids and for girls, and he was just nice.

00:52:56.980 He was such a good guy, man.

00:52:58.840 But he was a battleship, too.

00:53:01.280 What...

00:53:01.840 Did he pass away?

00:53:03.000 Yeah.

00:53:03.680 Yeah.

00:53:04.180 What happened to him?

00:53:05.620 Oh, shoot.

00:53:06.340 He was...

00:53:07.440 He overdid it on the plane.

00:53:11.900 He OD'd on a plane, and they had to restart him.

00:53:15.900 Shoot.

00:53:17.620 And then something...

00:53:19.120 I believe that his blood will stay away from his brain too long, and it starved his brain.

00:53:24.540 And he had some damage.

00:53:25.840 When he came out of that, then I talked to him, and he just, Kev, I hurt myself, brother.

00:53:33.120 I said, no, Terry, you're fine.

00:53:34.560 He goes, no, I'm not fine, Kev.

00:53:37.060 So he could talk to me, but he was real slow.

00:53:40.920 He didn't have any of this hand-eye kind of coordination.

00:53:46.200 So it cost him something, huh?

00:53:48.160 Dang.

00:53:48.880 But then, I'd always heard that he fell off the jetway getting on a plane one time, too.

00:53:53.260 I think he did.

00:53:54.320 He fell off the jetway drunk, landed on his head, and got back up and got on the plane

00:54:00.140 and made the show.

00:54:01.140 Yeah.

00:54:01.580 But...

00:54:02.220 So I thought that was why he was like that.

00:54:05.300 But he said, no, something else.

00:54:07.880 You know, yeah.

00:54:09.660 So many guys went through so much, man.

00:54:13.060 Terry Funk, he's still alive, I believe, isn't he?

00:54:16.020 Man, I hope so, but I hadn't heard the bad news if he had.

00:54:21.400 Oh, no, he says he passed away in August.

00:54:22.760 I love that guy.

00:54:23.960 And Dory, too.

00:54:24.980 So I hope that I...

00:54:26.620 Terry Funk was, man, he was incredible to watch, wasn't he?

00:54:30.720 He sure was.

00:54:32.300 He taught me so much, too.

00:54:34.980 Me, my brother Dave, and I, we're 19, 18 years old, and we're the bad guys.

00:54:40.120 And Amarillo wrestling Dory and Terry, who are the great, good guys.

00:54:44.140 You know, they loved them.

00:54:45.080 And Dory Funk as well?

00:54:46.900 And Dory, they're brothers.

00:54:48.560 And their dad was Dory Funk Sr.

00:54:50.900 Okay.

00:54:51.760 Super badass.

00:54:53.800 Well, these two were in the ring, and Dave and I, we're just learning, you know, we're

00:54:58.180 just learning about this.

00:54:59.200 Dave, pretty good, he'll, but I didn't know what to do, really.

00:55:03.060 And so we're in the ring, and Dory's telling us everything.

00:55:07.680 He goes, spit on me, kid.

00:55:09.440 And I said, sir?

00:55:10.860 He said, spit on me.

00:55:12.380 And I go, so...

00:55:13.760 I spit on him.

00:55:15.500 And so Dave unloads on Terry, too.

00:55:17.620 And the crowd went wild.

00:55:20.240 They hated our guts.

00:55:21.360 So they beat us, you know, and I get on the mic, and I say, you're in trouble now.

00:55:25.360 I'm going to get my daddy.

00:55:27.000 And so then, oh, they booed me good, you know.

00:55:29.880 And so I love being a heel, but I just wasn't good at, like, you know, like Dave was, you

00:55:35.260 know.

00:55:35.720 Irving, can we...

00:55:36.680 So that was the real...

00:55:37.980 So that was something that was tough to be a heel.

00:55:40.600 Yeah.

00:55:41.060 It's a lot harder.

00:55:42.340 You have to have some creativity about it, you know.

00:55:44.700 Yeah.

00:55:45.180 And then you've got to have a personality that we're, I mean, that you're projecting.

00:55:51.440 It's got to come from in here, you know.

00:55:53.180 Right.

00:55:53.420 And you can't get upset if people don't like you, because you're almost the guy that people

00:55:56.880 don't like.

00:55:57.500 And, well, Dave and I come back from the ring in Florida one time, and this cow...

00:56:01.220 And Dave's a bad guy, and so I'm a heel, too.

00:56:03.900 And so this guy steps up.

00:56:05.220 You remember people would dip skull, and they'd spit in those cups?

00:56:08.040 So we sloshed that stuff on us, you know.

00:56:11.580 And I thought, well, you know, we've been begging them to hate our guts.

00:56:16.120 Finally, we're there.

00:56:17.240 And I look, and Dave's running up in the bleachers after the guy.

00:56:21.860 Kicked his ass up in his stands and all.

00:56:24.060 But, so I said, Dave, we worked our butts off to make him hate us.

00:56:28.340 He goes, Dave was just, you know, you couldn't talk to him.

00:56:31.660 He was so mad, you know.

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00:59:21.700 So, Kerry, do you think he was the most athletic?

00:59:27.980 Yeah, Kerry was a really good athlete.

00:59:30.140 He was?

00:59:30.940 He was just everything.

00:59:32.520 It just came easy to him.

00:59:34.200 In fact, when I watched him play his senior year in high school, it looked like a—

00:59:40.460 Played football?

00:59:41.420 It looked like Terry Gordy playing against so much of Peewee guys.

00:59:44.860 You know, he was that big.

00:59:46.320 And I sound like I'm exaggerating, but he carried the ball five times, and he scored five touchdowns.

00:59:53.360 And the coach took him off offense.

00:59:55.220 He said he wanted to save him for defense, but he was great on offense.

00:59:58.540 He was a good linebacker, too, but he was really a good running back.

01:00:02.680 I've never seen anybody just run through people like that.

01:00:05.680 Dang.

01:00:06.080 But he didn't like football.

01:00:07.780 Texas, University of Texas offered him a scholarship.

01:00:09.920 He didn't want to go.

01:00:11.280 He didn't want to play football.

01:00:12.420 He wanted to do track.

01:00:13.840 No, he wanted to do track.

01:00:14.800 He wanted to do track.

01:00:15.340 And Dave, the same way, basketball.

01:00:17.400 Dave loved basketball.

01:00:18.660 I love football, you know.

01:00:21.020 But we go to North Texas, and Dave has his scholarship.

01:00:26.340 We're both there, you know.

01:00:28.580 And so I look up on that hill one day, and it's a real hot day, and I hear a pop.

01:00:34.620 And so he hits the ground.

01:00:36.100 And so I look up there, and I can see through the dust.

01:00:39.240 Dave's big old frame getting up off of that ground.

01:00:41.600 He's playing wide receiver, and we had some defensive backs who were killers.

01:00:45.340 You know, and so Dave gets up, and I see the coach is parked over there watching practice.

01:00:51.860 And he walks out to Dave, and he tells Dave, we're practicing in that air-conditioned gym out there.

01:00:58.460 And when we get thirsty, we get a drink of water.

01:01:01.220 It's not like this out here.

01:01:02.600 And so Dave quit and went to play basketball at North Texas, and I played football.

01:01:07.400 But we all each are at sports.

01:01:09.260 Dave was a basketball player.

01:01:10.480 I ran.

01:01:11.280 I played football, and then Kerry was discus, you know.

01:01:14.760 And your other brothers, Mike and Chris, were you guys a little bit disconnected from them because of age?

01:01:18.960 Yeah, that was it.

01:01:20.220 Because by then, we were wrestling, and we weren't home very much.

01:01:23.120 And Mike was the big brother to Chris.

01:01:25.400 Got it.

01:01:26.340 Yeah.

01:01:26.580 So that was almost like a second.

01:01:27.680 It was almost like a second installment of children in a way.

01:01:32.440 Yeah, it was.

01:01:34.000 Yeah, I saw that match with Kerry and Ric Flair.

01:01:36.780 There's one match I remember.

01:01:38.100 It was during the daytime, right?

01:01:40.380 Yeah.

01:01:40.640 And I think it was in 84, maybe?

01:01:43.060 Yeah.

01:01:44.120 Is it?

01:01:45.180 Daytime.

01:01:45.660 It was 84.

01:01:46.360 This was after David had passed away.

01:01:48.400 Right.

01:01:49.440 Were you at this match?

01:01:51.020 Oh, yeah.

01:01:52.180 I wrestled on this card, too.

01:01:54.700 Because he looks so much more athletic, and no judgment to Ric Flair.

01:01:59.820 I mean, their age difference may be huge here.

01:02:01.720 But did he ever have to slow down with other wrestlers to make it look more real?

01:02:06.220 Does that make any sense?

01:02:07.860 Well, I suppose.

01:02:08.840 But, yeah, you know, it's all about.

01:02:10.640 It's, he had such charisma, you know, that his charisma was really his thing.

01:02:19.040 I mean, he had a great body and a beautiful build.

01:02:21.000 And I'm going to tell you, Tony Atlas and I were bench pressing, and I had a good bench

01:02:26.900 press.

01:02:27.120 I could bench 445 pounds.

01:02:29.120 But my brother and Tony were benching 520, both of them.

01:02:33.480 And I mean, repping it, you know.

01:02:34.860 And I've never seen anybody as strong as Kerry was.

01:02:37.900 I mean, Kerry, for his size, had the most power I've ever seen anybody be able to bring

01:02:44.520 up.

01:02:47.000 And he was agile, too.

01:02:49.020 I mean, I told you he could high jump or a really good high jumper.

01:02:51.420 What was it like when Flair came to town?

01:02:53.740 That must have been a ride, huh?

01:02:54.980 He's quite a character.

01:02:56.180 Yeah, he was.

01:02:57.660 He's something else.

01:02:58.680 He's something else, man.

01:02:59.780 You got a show with him, right?

01:03:01.520 And the best time.

01:03:03.080 Because he's just, he's got stories, and he, you know, he likes to, you know,

01:03:07.540 it's fun.

01:03:08.400 He's all fun all the time.

01:03:10.580 And there's no other side to it, really.

01:03:12.300 No.

01:03:13.040 There kind of isn't.

01:03:14.020 He is a real gentleman.

01:03:16.580 He's got a great voice.

01:03:17.820 You know, when you hear his voice, you think, that should be a radio man.

01:03:20.900 Yeah.

01:03:21.280 You know, he really does sound good.

01:03:22.700 But when he comes to your town, he's going to give an interview that's going to rile.

01:03:28.600 I don't care who you are.

01:03:29.500 He's going to make you furious, and you're going to come down and see him get his butt kicked.

01:03:32.380 And so, you've got to have that.

01:03:35.440 You know, that's Rick.

01:03:37.140 Now, Harley Race and the other champions, the, I'm throwing a blank, but I mean, the Briscoes.

01:03:48.920 And they were great, but these had something else they brought to the table.

01:03:53.060 Harley was, you know, he had his rep at all of his different holes and moves.

01:03:56.240 But Rick, what an interview he gives, and he's got the experience, too.

01:04:00.840 You know, he's something else.

01:04:01.840 And he's got a good head for when to do what he does.

01:04:05.080 But you see what I mean?

01:04:06.040 That was, a guy like me really wouldn't fit the bill like Rick would.

01:04:11.180 Right.

01:04:11.460 And he's going to bump all night.

01:04:13.020 He doesn't ever get tired.

01:04:14.320 You know, he's going to have, he's going to be dragging out to an hour.

01:04:17.820 He's going to try to.

01:04:19.200 Yeah, just magnetic, man.

01:04:20.820 That was a magnetic time.

01:04:22.300 He is, man.

01:04:23.160 What was one of the most traumatic things that happened to one of your brothers in their life while they were alive?

01:04:30.980 Was there anything that kind of started, changed their life a little bit that we didn't really see as much?

01:04:38.000 Well, probably so, yeah.

01:04:40.720 My little brother, Mike, you know, with the toxic shock syndrome, he had a, we were wrestling in Tel Aviv.

01:04:46.600 And we were going to do some shows in Lebanon, too.

01:04:49.520 And so, Mike's wrestling the guy, but his shoulder had been dislocated.

01:04:56.360 And he popped it back in the dressing room, got back out there in the ring, and it popped out again.

01:05:01.380 And it had really popped out bad this time.

01:05:04.020 So, we flew him back to Texas to get surgery.

01:05:09.940 And with the incision, it got toxic shock syndrome.

01:05:14.620 It's a tampon thing ladies get, but they had such a huge incision where the arm was, or the shoulder was, that they had shaved gauze in there.

01:05:25.720 Oh, and some of it got left in.

01:05:27.100 I think that might, it didn't get left in, but it got septic or something, maybe.

01:05:30.820 But whatever it was, his fever went up to so high, 106, 100, I even heard 107, but that, it didn't kill him, though.

01:05:41.580 In fact, the doctor came down, I say to him, you wouldn't believe it, the hospital was filled with fans.

01:05:49.820 Fans, you know, they wanted to offer their kidneys or their liver to Mike, you know, to, such love, you know, but the docs told us that he's just, his fever is too high.

01:06:01.140 He's not, he's not going to come back, and he's, he's not going to make it through the night.

01:06:05.460 And so, rather than go up there and say goodnight, like he told him to, like he told us to, then we had, my parents were down in this waiting room at the hospital up here at Baylor, and we had, Gary Holder was, we had a chaplain that would go with our, to shows, you know, big shows, and he gave a prayer where he talked about, he said,

01:06:28.120 God, you say anything we ask in Jesus' name, then you will do it, so we're asking you to stand on your word, and he slammed that Bible down on the desk.

01:06:39.840 Man, I wanted to hide my head.

01:06:41.880 I thought he went too far, you know, but it was just a few seconds later, the door opened up, and he said, the fever's broken, there's hope, and we ran up to see Mike.

01:06:53.180 Just like that, it was, and David Manning was right.

01:06:58.120 There, my dad was there, my mom, Carrie saw it, it was a miracle, man, it was really a miracle, and beautiful, but, look, I don't want to get in an argument with people, but I would love, like I told you, I'd like my life to have an experience that people could benefit from, you know, if you're somebody that's, like, maybe I was at a time, like, life is overwhelming, and you know what, it's, it's like, when you overcome something, you're so much,

01:07:27.720 a better man than you were before, it's like, when you're pushed to your limit, and you have to adjust, or die, you get stronger, you get stronger, and go, and I would just say, to anybody that's out there lost,

01:07:40.620 if you want to feel like you'll never be afraid of man or beast again, you will not be afraid of dying, if you know where you're going to go when you die, and I mean, I know where I'm going to go, and I, I have no fear, I mean, it's a, it's a great life.

01:07:54.060 Did you, did you have a religion instilled in you when you were growing up, did you have, like,

01:08:00.080 No, that's the thing, we went to church on Easter, you know, I remember, but, this is a pretty odd story, but, I spent the night with, this, my dad's real estate partner was a doctor, and I spent the night with him one night, and the next day was Sunday, and they took me to church with him, and so, I went to church, and so,

01:08:20.440 the only reason I went, because if you spent the night, you're going to sleep with the dog, and I love their dog, you know, and.

01:08:26.720 Oh, yeah, dude, I've stayed over places just to be by the animals.

01:08:29.720 Uh-huh, well, we go to church, and he, these men surround me, and ask me if I want to accept Jesus, and so, I knew that song, Jesus loves me, you know,

01:08:43.100 and I'd been to wrestling before, and I'd seen people poke the finger, and stuff, and I knew that was bad, you know, and I thought, I don't want to be bad, I want to be good.

01:08:50.440 You know, so, so, I want to be on that side, you know, because I've kind of seen a little of those words, you know.

01:08:56.440 Yeah, you weren't a good heel.

01:08:57.520 Yeah.

01:08:58.720 No.

01:09:00.480 This was the, this was, this was choosing not to be a heel.

01:09:03.380 Yeah.

01:09:03.840 For eternity, I mean.

01:09:05.840 Well, that's, well, you know, now that I understand what was going on, because I was just a little boy, you know,

01:09:12.220 so, I said the prayer, you know, and they asked me if I could believe Jesus died, you know, I did,

01:09:17.380 and I felt something move in my, something weird in my chest, and I thought somebody,

01:09:23.260 there were men standing behind me, I thought they did something to me, like, but I actually

01:09:26.440 felt something move inside me, and I think it was that little bit of evidence gave me a

01:09:31.140 lot of courage, and I knew God was with me, I knew he was, and that night, I was, got on

01:09:38.840 my bed, and I went, and I looked on my porch, I was just looking at the outside, the stars,

01:09:43.020 and I'm a little boy, I could have imagined it, but I could have sworn I saw an angel fly

01:09:49.020 across the field with a horn in his mouth, like he was blowing a horn, I didn't hear any

01:09:53.040 sound, it looked just like a Christmas ornament, so a Christmas tree, but, but in my mind, this,

01:09:59.200 this was my best day of my life, and I belong to God now, and I have never been afraid of

01:10:03.120 anything since then.

01:10:04.500 Amen.

01:10:05.880 Yeah, it's, it's interesting, I think people get, sometimes people get scared to share,

01:10:10.400 like, their testimonies or moments that they've had where they've just felt like something

01:10:13.460 stronger than them took care of them, you know?

01:10:16.880 Yeah, I remember a feeling one time where I was just broken down, man, I was really banged

01:10:22.380 up about a relationship, and just not sure what I wanted to do with my life, I'd moved

01:10:26.160 back in with my step-parents, and man, I remember one time I was just, well, just on my knees,

01:10:32.980 ball, and, and I felt something come around my heart, man, I can't even explain it, just

01:10:39.440 like this, this, this warm thing, just, I mean, I'd never felt where my heart was, I

01:10:43.740 mean, I'd put my hand on it, hoping for the best, but I was pledging allegiance.

01:10:46.760 Oh, Theo, he's knocking on the door, you know?

01:10:48.660 But I mean, shh.

01:10:49.300 You're a little boy, you're beautiful, and you're all alone, suffering like that, God,

01:10:54.540 that was God, Theo.

01:10:56.020 Yeah.

01:10:56.680 He came to you.

01:10:57.440 And, you know, we got one lifetime to learn it, you know, that there is such a thing.

01:11:03.920 I mean, let me tell you, there is a double, and people want to say there's no such thing,

01:11:07.660 but there is, boy.

01:11:09.080 I could tell you a really weird story, but it's 100% true.

01:11:13.540 Yeah.

01:11:14.000 I mean, your life's full of craziest stories ever.

01:11:16.400 Listen to this one.

01:11:17.120 Okay, so I'm going to wrestle Big Daddy, King Kong Bundy, and the Will Rogers Coliseum

01:11:25.140 in Fort Worth.

01:11:25.840 So on the way to the ring, Kerry said, Kev, come here.

01:11:28.820 I said, what, Kerry?

01:11:29.520 He said, I was dad on the phone.

01:11:31.480 Mike's just been in a terrible car wreck.

01:11:33.200 He's dying now.

01:11:34.760 Dad said, don't try to get there fast, because he'll be dead before we get there anyway.

01:11:39.200 And I said, what?

01:11:40.420 And so I ran to the ring.

01:11:43.180 I said, ring the bell.

01:11:44.300 They ring the bell.

01:11:44.860 I grabbed Bundy's leg, schoolboyed him, one, two, three, ran to the back,

01:11:48.560 carrying a hauled ass to the hospital, stealing my rust and stuff.

01:11:53.400 And so we get there, and there's cops everywhere, and they're standing by the doors,

01:11:58.000 and I run right into them.

01:11:59.360 I bust open, and there's this black lady out there, and she said, my baby, my baby.

01:12:04.880 And when I crash those doors open, there's a little black kid laying there dead,

01:12:10.440 and blood and stuff.

01:12:11.660 And so I go out the other door, open the door, and there's Mike.

01:12:16.420 Hey, Kev, he was fine, just fine.

01:12:20.520 And so I'm like, I'm numb, you know?

01:12:23.840 And so I knew my parents were on their way down here, and so I go outside,

01:12:27.680 and I see them walking down the ramp, and I said, he's okay.

01:12:31.000 And my dad just about fell down.

01:12:32.560 My mom and I fell down.

01:12:33.860 Well, so I'm going to get my car to come home, and Abilene is west, but Denton is north.

01:12:40.080 Well, for some reason, I went west, and I went almost to Abilene, Eastland.

01:12:46.440 I was so out of it, just driving.

01:12:49.180 By the time I got home, I was so sleepy.

01:12:52.120 His son had already come up.

01:12:53.160 He hadn't been waiting for me.

01:12:54.080 And so I was going to take my bulldog down to the lake and wash him.

01:12:57.920 I had to cast your soap.

01:12:59.120 You know, it's okay for the environment.

01:13:01.160 No, I was so washing my dog.

01:13:03.800 And, oh, I'm sorry.

01:13:06.000 I'm sorry.

01:13:06.840 Maybe it's concussions.

01:13:07.920 But before that, I said, God, thank you for giving me my brother back.

01:13:12.080 Let me fight the devil.

01:13:13.680 I said, Satan, I'll fight you.

01:13:16.800 I'll fight you.

01:13:18.080 And I said, let me fight him, God.

01:13:20.960 It was stupid, a stupid boy.

01:13:24.100 And so I go to the lake.

01:13:25.080 I'm washing my dog.

01:13:26.080 And Theo, I swear this happened.

01:13:29.600 So my dog, everything's real still.

01:13:33.400 And I'm feeling weird a little bit.

01:13:35.880 And I look, and I see there's a bush here and some more bushes here and a hill here.

01:13:41.320 And I see these little black things taking position against me and advancing on me.

01:13:46.880 I felt like I could smell blood.

01:13:49.420 I could smell death.

01:13:52.140 And I said, get in the car, Pam.

01:13:53.580 And I put my back to the car.

01:13:55.320 And I was like this.

01:13:56.780 And I would see them going from trees.

01:13:59.080 They're getting these positions.

01:14:00.860 And I was ready.

01:14:02.380 And next thing I know, I'm out.

01:14:03.900 I'm having a seizure in my car.

01:14:07.260 And so Pam's screaming and crying.

01:14:10.660 And these fishermen have run up to help.

01:14:12.800 And I must have hit one or kicked one or something.

01:14:14.860 But a girl ran up and said, I know his parents.

01:14:19.140 I'll get them.

01:14:20.420 And an ambulance came and all that.

01:14:22.300 But I know it's because I'm a man.

01:14:25.020 And I challenge the devil.

01:14:26.840 And we have Jesus in us that fights the devil.

01:14:29.720 We don't have anything to do with the devil.

01:14:32.300 And so that was my lesson that I learned.

01:14:34.840 But I know that happened.

01:14:36.120 And it's just in me, like, written on my heart with a nail.

01:14:41.660 Look, it's a testimony, man.

01:14:43.300 I thank you for sharing that.

01:14:45.160 Yeah, I think sometimes we don't think that the devil is real.

01:14:47.380 And that is the devil's way to trick us.

01:14:49.560 I believe that.

01:14:50.480 You know, if you don't think that evil is real, then it's how quick.

01:14:53.860 You don't know how close it is to you either.

01:14:55.900 You know, you don't know how intertwined it could be in your own veins.

01:14:58.620 If you don't even believe it's real, that's a pretty masterful trick.

01:15:01.600 Yeah, and we think with a man's mind.

01:15:04.140 And the devil is an angel's mind, you know.

01:15:07.020 I mean, he's way smarter than we are.

01:15:08.600 The devil is a thug, you know.

01:15:11.980 That is the truth, man.

01:15:13.460 Thank you for sharing that.

01:15:15.000 I've had friends share some really strong testimonials,

01:15:18.720 some moments where they just felt that, you know.

01:15:20.540 I mean, there has been moments in my life where, yeah, I just felt,

01:15:24.080 you just get that feeling so nauseous.

01:15:25.460 You ever get overcome with that feeling?

01:15:26.720 You're just so thankful that God has been with you.

01:15:29.040 Yeah.

01:15:29.720 Man, because you thought you did it yourself.

01:15:31.600 And you realize you didn't, that God was there with you.

01:15:34.300 Man, when I've had that feeling come over me, God.

01:15:37.720 I mean, it just, it'll, you just, you almost feel like you thaw out some,

01:15:43.180 you know, like you thaw out.

01:15:44.380 And then we get to a position where we, where something bad comes along.

01:15:47.800 We're, oh, no, God, don't let this happen, you know.

01:15:49.720 And he saves us again.

01:15:51.720 And like, oh, I forgot the other times, too, you know.

01:15:55.280 And, you know what I'm saying?

01:15:55.860 No, I'll forget.

01:15:57.540 I'll forget pretty quick.

01:15:58.440 You're the little southern boy.

01:15:59.600 Well, I know what kind of, you caught copperheads and water moccasins and stuff like that, I'm sure.

01:16:03.980 Oh, I definitely, I got electrocuted a bunch.

01:16:06.300 I was definitely beaten a lot.

01:16:08.180 Yeah, we got bit by things, attack.

01:16:10.200 I got attacked by a bunch of stray animals.

01:16:11.740 I grew up in the stray animal belt.

01:16:13.460 Really?

01:16:13.940 So they had just.

01:16:14.700 What kind of stray animals?

01:16:15.600 Oh, anything, brother.

01:16:17.160 Snakes, raccoons, birds, dogs.

01:16:20.960 Man.

01:16:21.540 They, uh, I don't even know.

01:16:23.740 Just, they had dogs wearing jewelry.

01:16:26.460 All kind of shit was out there looking for us.

01:16:29.520 Man, that's a, you got a good memory.

01:16:31.820 It was dangerous out there.

01:16:33.340 Well, um.

01:16:34.740 You know, I used to get, I got chased by a goose when I was a little kid.

01:16:37.780 By a ghost?

01:16:38.480 A goose.

01:16:39.240 Oh, a goose, yeah.

01:16:40.260 I'd rather a damn ghost.

01:16:42.240 Gooses are dangerous, dude.

01:16:43.920 They were like and bite, you know.

01:16:45.640 But for a little kid, it's scary.

01:16:48.380 They don't care.

01:16:49.380 And they're violent.

01:16:50.560 And dude, a goose will come at you to just be one of them.

01:16:53.120 Some animals will have four, five or six of them.

01:16:55.220 Raccoons are like that, you know.

01:16:57.060 Um, ants are like that.

01:16:58.740 You know, they won't come at you just one.

01:17:00.360 But a goose, that thing will roll up on you solo.

01:17:03.940 That's pretty savage when you think of it.

01:17:06.780 Yeah, look.

01:17:07.980 Is that you?

01:17:08.720 That's a goose that's thinking Rambo.

01:17:10.940 Yeah, dude, that's crazy.

01:17:12.580 Um.

01:17:13.660 Oh, what were the, your parents?

01:17:15.140 What were your parents' lives like?

01:17:16.120 What was like, um, are your parents, either of your parents still alive?

01:17:19.100 No.

01:17:19.560 Okay.

01:17:20.100 Are they buried in the same place?

01:17:22.980 Yeah, they are.

01:17:24.140 Yeah, we, uh, we had my mother, uh, you know, we, when we moved out, I couldn't move to Kauai

01:17:29.440 without taking my mom with me.

01:17:30.820 Oh, she took your mom with you?

01:17:31.880 Yeah.

01:17:32.340 Oh, dude.

01:17:33.060 And she lived in the house with us, too.

01:17:34.600 Did she love it there?

01:17:36.180 Uh, you know, my dad used to wrestle in Japan a lot, and so we would meet him in Hawaii.

01:17:42.440 And I didn't realize it, but Hawaii reminded her of her sons.

01:17:45.800 Mm-hmm.

01:17:46.520 And she didn't want to go anywhere.

01:17:48.580 She wanted to stay in her room, and she wanted to grow her flowers, and that was it.

01:17:52.860 She just, she did love it.

01:17:54.880 She loves her flowers, you know, but it was like, um, it reminded her too much of that.

01:18:00.020 But, but she, and she passed away up in our, our guest room upstairs, and, uh, but all

01:18:06.300 my granddaughters and my, my son's wives were standing around her singing hymns while she

01:18:13.500 passed away, and Theo, before she died, she was a super good woman.

01:18:17.700 She was so sweet and thoughtful to everyone.

01:18:20.360 When she'd come to school, I'd be so proud of her, you know, because all the kids would

01:18:24.500 like her, but when she was laying in that bed, and she breathed her last breath,

01:18:30.020 even as she, like that, her hand went up like that, and I could just picture him touching

01:18:36.480 Jesus's hands and going to heaven, you know.

01:18:38.800 She was probably ready to go see her sons, huh?

01:18:41.000 Oh, I know she was.

01:18:42.640 You know, my dad, I didn't tell you all this personal stuff, buddy, but, uh.

01:18:47.560 Well, I could match you if you need, but we've heard my stories a lot.

01:18:52.080 No, I just can't imagine, I bet she was ready to go see her sons, you know.

01:18:55.220 He was.

01:18:55.620 I bet she'd been gone away from them long enough.

01:18:58.160 And, you know, my dad, too, because really, when you think about it, my dad lost more

01:19:02.520 than my mom.

01:19:03.760 My dad lost his sons, but he didn't, he didn't ever show it.

01:19:07.060 I mean, but he hurt.

01:19:08.260 He was hurting, but he was like, uh, it was just that he, at his latter, in the final days,

01:19:17.920 he was so torn up inside.

01:19:20.020 Dad, I think when he saw me, it would remind him of all the sons he'd lost.

01:19:23.980 And he pulled that .44 out one day, and, uh, and he pointed his head, like, I'm just

01:19:30.860 going to shoot myself.

01:19:32.000 No, don't do it.

01:19:33.080 Don't do it, Dad.

01:19:33.740 And he pointed the gun at me, and I said, he said, you're afraid to die, aren't you, son?

01:19:40.260 He said, you'd have the guts, you'd do it, too, if you had the guts.

01:19:44.660 And I said, Dad, it doesn't take guts to live.

01:19:47.480 I mean, it'd take guts to kill yourself, Dad.

01:19:50.240 It'd take guts to stay alive on this earth.

01:19:52.660 And, uh, he was hurting so much.

01:19:56.160 He would just go, oh, God.

01:19:58.800 He'd rub his face to go, oh, God.

01:20:00.900 And when he, I'd hear that, you know, I actually wanted him to die.

01:20:06.020 I wanted him to pass away.

01:20:07.440 He was, he was just miserable.

01:20:10.640 And I know that when he died, he was right there with Dave Carey.

01:20:14.600 It was beautiful.

01:20:16.940 But my dad had gotten away.

01:20:19.580 He said, look, son, uh, if you kick an old dog enough times, he's going to bite you.

01:20:25.480 And that's how I am with God right now.

01:20:27.680 He's kicked me too many times.

01:20:29.960 And so I, I said, Dad, it's going to be, you're going to be so surprised, but I couldn't

01:20:35.960 convince him of it, you know?

01:20:38.520 But we, yeah, I can't, I can't imagine what it's like to be kind of the soul, the surviving

01:20:44.760 son.

01:20:45.180 Did you feel chosen or did you feel deserted?

01:20:49.580 Does that question make any sense to you?

01:20:50.920 Sure.

01:20:51.240 It's funny you say that.

01:20:53.620 Yeah.

01:20:54.080 Because I felt chosen in the way that my dad gave me a tape recorder back when I was in

01:21:01.200 fifth grade.

01:21:02.220 It was a bell and how, you know, and you could talk into it and I couldn't believe I could

01:21:06.200 hear my voice, you know?

01:21:07.960 And so, uh, and so I thought I love my dad so much.

01:21:12.200 I filled the tape up with, okay, one day dad's going to die and I'm going to talk and here

01:21:17.220 I am alive while he's still alive.

01:21:18.800 And so I'm going to say something to make me feel better.

01:21:20.980 Man, I'm sorry, Kev.

01:21:22.500 Sorry, buddy.

01:21:23.280 And I just filled the tape up with that.

01:21:24.860 Oh, as if you were impersonating your dad?

01:21:27.640 Yeah.

01:21:27.920 Yeah.

01:21:28.080 Like I can comfort myself later when I don't work.

01:21:30.880 No, dude, that's really interesting though.

01:21:33.180 Yeah.

01:21:33.440 That's so interesting.

01:21:34.080 But I remember saying, uh, uh, Dave and Carrie, we loved each other so much.

01:21:38.700 I thought I can't bear to lose them.

01:21:41.280 I could not bear it.

01:21:42.680 And I thought, but they love me that way.

01:21:45.300 And so I said this, even in a prayer, I said, God, if one of us has to stand back, if one

01:21:51.980 of us has to be the only one, let it be me.

01:21:54.840 Wow.

01:21:55.320 Because I'm hard and I'm strong inside.

01:21:58.540 Lord, God made me that way, but I didn't know it would ever happen, but I did say it,

01:22:04.500 you know.

01:22:04.840 You know, I used to have, I mean, this is like silly, but like, so when I was growing

01:22:09.840 up, I didn't have any, like whenever my dad died, I didn't have any thing of his, right?

01:22:13.680 I didn't have like a shirt or like a button or just anything to remember him by, you know?

01:22:17.580 And so I used to write postcards to my kids, right?

01:22:23.160 Whenever I was on the road, just traveling over the years doing comedy, I would write

01:22:26.340 postcards to my kids.

01:22:27.200 I don't have any kids yet, but I would send them postcards just so in the future they would

01:22:31.980 be able to see that I was thinking of them, right?

01:22:34.080 Like, I just wanted to, I wanted to prove, I was like, so smart, bro, but right.

01:22:38.600 But I just think it's the same type of thing.

01:22:40.180 It's like, you're just trying to like, I don't know.

01:22:42.900 You're always thinking of like, um, how do I make sure that every, that somebody knew

01:22:48.700 I cared or that somebody knew somebody else cared?

01:22:50.940 I'm going to die someday.

01:22:52.180 Yeah.

01:22:52.360 I'm going to die someday.

01:22:53.880 It's just stuff like that is interesting.

01:22:55.580 I think a lot of people do little things like that.

01:22:57.820 Um, but that's interesting because you could have felt like you were deserted, but to end

01:23:03.540 up feeling that you were chosen, that's pretty powerful.

01:23:06.540 Well, I don't think I'd say that we're chosen more like I'd say that I, I would not want

01:23:11.600 to put them through that.

01:23:13.040 Ah.

01:23:13.860 Yeah.

01:23:14.140 Like you were the one that could handle it.

01:23:16.180 Then I think I, I would not want them to go through it.

01:23:19.220 Yeah.

01:23:19.480 I would rather me go with it than they did.

01:23:21.500 And I think.

01:23:23.160 That's sweet of you.

01:23:23.880 God might've gave me some credit for that, you know, because it's all about this.

01:23:28.760 We're in a struggle, you know, it's like, we're not on this earth to laugh it up and have

01:23:33.500 fun.

01:23:33.860 We have tests, real tests and life is hard.

01:23:36.520 And that kind of stuff that kicks you in the nuts is what makes you stronger.

01:23:42.120 Yeah.

01:23:42.300 Makes you more strong.

01:23:43.500 And without that, you can't give advice to people about things you haven't been around,

01:23:47.940 you know, but once you've had it and been, and suffered yourself, now you can say, listen

01:23:53.000 up.

01:23:54.260 Well, with that said, like, um, and I agree, you know, I was just thinking about that the

01:23:57.780 other day.

01:23:58.020 It's like, I've always had this outlook and they kind of don't teach you that when you're

01:24:01.560 a kid as much that, and they really shouldn't when you're a young child, but I think they

01:24:05.160 should teach you at some point that life is a test, that it is full of a lot of tests

01:24:08.460 and it's not all just going to be like this perfect thing or everything might not work

01:24:12.880 out the way you think it, you know, you never really kind of get that education maybe, or

01:24:18.200 maybe some parents do give it to their kids.

01:24:20.240 Um, but with what you said a second ago, if you had to share something with somebody who

01:24:24.820 had lost a sibling or who had dealt with, you know, some grief from loss, something that

01:24:30.000 you've learned because, I mean, you're like almost the, the Neil Armstrong of loss.

01:24:37.540 I mean, you've, you've had, you've endured a lot in your life, you know, and watch and

01:24:41.740 watched other loved ones endure a lot, you know, um, what, what, what have you kind of

01:24:46.520 learned that you feel like you could share if anything?

01:24:50.320 Well, thank you for giving that opportunity because that's what I want to do is to try to

01:24:54.940 make it positive for somebody, buddy, but, um, you know, it's tough because I want to

01:25:01.340 tell people like when somebody dies, it's going to get better, but it doesn't get better, man.

01:25:06.820 You don't even get used to it.

01:25:08.340 It's just keep tolerating it and you just, somehow it gets a little better someday, but

01:25:15.080 there's no good word to say to them.

01:25:17.160 But when somebody's really busted up, you know, and it, when you overcome that and are

01:25:25.780 able to, um, um, maintain through that, well, then it's, it's now you, now you've, uh, you've

01:25:35.840 achieved through a struggle.

01:25:37.320 You've achieved over on a, uh, an obstruction or you've gone over a hurdle, you know, and

01:25:43.500 it's like, now you can say you won.

01:25:47.400 Now I can say you won something because without a fight, there can't be a winner.

01:25:50.880 There can't be a champion.

01:25:51.860 There can't be a success unless there's that adversity, you know?

01:25:55.920 And so God wouldn't put you through that unless you're going to benefit.

01:26:02.340 And Theo, you got a great mind.

01:26:04.520 You're intelligent.

01:26:05.400 God can tell.

01:26:06.660 Oh, thanks, man.

01:26:07.620 Life is, he's knocking on your door too, my friend.

01:26:11.500 You two, I feel like you and me are probably pretty similar in some ways.

01:26:14.660 You feel that?

01:26:15.500 Sure do.

01:26:16.560 I do too.

01:26:18.200 Um, do you, uh, was how, how, how therapeutic was having your own family for you?

01:26:27.480 Everything, man.

01:26:28.280 That was what did it is what saved me because, uh, man, when you can have anything you want,

01:26:34.480 you know, and your brother's going to have anything they want and, and they come over and let's

01:26:39.580 go do this, let's go.

01:26:40.880 It's like, what a life.

01:26:42.920 I mean, it's, uh, it's a whole lot, but I don't mean to bum me out now.

01:26:50.140 I don't want to start.

01:26:50.900 I don't feel like you're bumming me out at all.

01:26:52.520 Really?

01:26:53.120 No, I was just thinking like, well, I was going to ask you what's something that you

01:26:55.940 admire about each one of your children.

01:26:57.340 And then I was going to ask you what's something that you, um, maybe like something funny or

01:27:02.680 something silly that you kind of admire or maybe miss something goofy or something about

01:27:08.180 each one of your brothers.

01:27:09.200 Maybe just like a nice thing, like a, like a band they like to listen to just something

01:27:13.780 like that.

01:27:14.500 Oh yeah.

01:27:14.980 Well, we love good music.

01:27:17.240 I can tell you, I've never told anybody this story, but, uh, we had our, we had a, like a

01:27:25.600 tree house, but it was built on stilts, uh, a little room on stilts, my dad brought us.

01:27:30.320 And so, uh, we had a cut.

01:27:33.080 My mother was a third oldest, but there were, she had an older sister.

01:27:37.840 And so her older sister came over and she had two sons and they were, they could pick

01:27:41.760 on us, you know?

01:27:42.580 And so we're hiding up there and they were trying to get it.

01:27:45.420 We'd pull the rope up, wouldn't let them go.

01:27:46.920 And we had rocks, we're throwing rocks at them.

01:27:49.260 And so there, it got really bloody, you know, we're chunking rocks and hitting each other.

01:27:53.860 And, and, you know, and, and so, uh, uh, I think I'll let one go and hit one of the

01:27:59.160 guys right in the head, you know, and, uh, my cousin, it would have kicked my ass if he

01:28:03.300 could have caught me, you know, but, but so he runs in the house to tell on me.

01:28:07.700 So we'll get in trouble, you know?

01:28:08.880 And so, uh, me, Dave, and Carrie are come down from the tree house, you know, we're watching

01:28:13.480 out.

01:28:13.900 They're not going to, uh, ambush us and beat us up over the house, you know, but they run to

01:28:18.960 the house to tell on us, you know?

01:28:20.160 So we, we run up there and, uh, so the guy's bleeding.

01:28:24.320 My cousin's bleeding.

01:28:25.340 My cousin, Steve, bleeding all over the place.

01:28:27.520 And, uh, dad said, what the hell happened?

01:28:30.200 And, uh, and, uh, I was about to fill something down.

01:28:32.800 Carrie said, dad, he got a little razor blade, cut his head.

01:28:37.180 And my dad started cracking up laughing, you know?

01:28:40.560 And, uh, and, uh, and so Dave and I kind of go with the story, you know, and I think he

01:28:47.100 started laughing and just let it go.

01:28:48.900 But I think back on that, Carrie was such a cute little kid, you know, he was lying about

01:28:54.220 it, huh?

01:28:54.600 He did.

01:28:55.520 He was that way.

01:28:57.240 He was quick, huh?

01:28:58.360 Another time we were riding in the car and, uh, uh, uh, my friend had a BB gun.

01:29:03.740 So we were riding on the BB gun and, uh, shooting signs and warning lights and stuff, you know?

01:29:09.460 So we drive by pickup and he shoots the windshield and-

01:29:13.420 Of your own vehicle?

01:29:14.160 No, no, it was a friend of ours, a friend of ours, an old man that had a ranch just south

01:29:19.940 of us.

01:29:21.000 And so shot up-

01:29:22.100 You blew it out?

01:29:22.760 Yeah, shot the window out.

01:29:24.320 And, uh, the cops were going to get us, you know, and we're running from them and all

01:29:28.620 and, uh, got in such trouble.

01:29:30.500 And so we're answering for it all.

01:29:32.440 We got away.

01:29:33.840 And so they weren't sure that we were the ones, you know?

01:29:35.960 And so the cops were all talking to us and my dad was there and I hear my dad say, my

01:29:40.600 sons won't lie to me.

01:29:42.160 So I'll- I'll ask them, my sons will not lie to me.

01:29:46.820 And so, uh, he calls Carrie over there.

01:29:49.820 I know, and, uh, Carrie had already lied to him, you know?

01:29:52.740 And, uh, and so I heard dad say that.

01:29:55.340 He said, come here, Kev.

01:29:56.600 And, uh, I went- Carrie's over there.

01:29:59.120 We're going with the lie, you know, but I'm busted.

01:30:01.200 And so I'm going to say, I want to- I can't get the word to Carrie.

01:30:04.060 I get it to Dave.

01:30:05.000 Dave can't get it to Carrie.

01:30:06.720 And I said, yes, sir, dad.

01:30:08.140 We did it.

01:30:09.160 We all did it.

01:30:10.600 And I said, Carrie, come here, son.

01:30:15.000 Carrie, look me in the eye.

01:30:16.960 I want you to tell me the truth.

01:30:18.620 Did you do it?

01:30:19.380 He said, no, sir, dad.

01:30:21.480 I swear.

01:30:22.240 Oh, man.

01:30:26.980 He never forgave me for that.

01:30:28.640 So Carrie could lie.

01:30:28.660 Carrie could lie.

01:30:29.460 That's all right.

01:30:30.160 Somebody's got to lie, man.

01:30:31.460 Man.

01:30:31.840 Yeah.

01:30:33.200 And what about Chris?

01:30:34.360 What was something that was fun or just neat about him?

01:30:36.500 What was something he liked to do?

01:30:38.340 Well, he loved Indian stuff, you know?

01:30:40.740 And he had a- so he had- he stacked the rocks and all and Indian stuff.

01:30:45.620 He knew all about Chief Bowls and the Wonka Tonka.

01:30:52.580 I don't know.

01:30:53.160 I can't know.

01:30:53.620 Wampum, something like that.

01:30:54.900 He knew a lot of Native American lore.

01:30:57.240 Yeah.

01:30:57.460 He loved all that stuff.

01:30:58.780 And so where they lived, they had all arrowheads and spearheads.

01:31:02.220 He found that stuff all the time.

01:31:03.720 So that's what he was really doing.

01:31:05.140 But he was a great artist.

01:31:06.400 He could draw anything, you know?

01:31:07.960 And so I thought that- but he was- he had asthma.

01:31:12.500 And so because he had to take medicine, it made his bones brittle.

01:31:15.960 And he just wasn't going to get big and strong, you know?

01:31:20.280 It just didn't- when he worked out, it didn't really do anything.

01:31:23.840 Well, y'all took all the bigness, too.

01:31:25.360 If he was the last one, y'all didn't leave any bigness for him.

01:31:27.640 That's what I thought.

01:31:28.420 I thought maybe we took all the big because-

01:31:30.300 Hell yeah, you took all the big.

01:31:31.100 Man, he wanted to be- I could have cared less, but he wanted to be big so bad.

01:31:36.060 And what about Mike?

01:31:38.180 What was something that Mike liked to do?

01:31:39.700 What kind of music did he listen to?

01:31:41.440 Oh, he liked Metallica and ACDC and-

01:31:49.060 Did y'all ever go to any concerts together?

01:31:51.120 Oh, always.

01:31:51.960 A lot of concerts together, yeah.

01:31:53.520 What was one y'all went to?

01:31:55.900 ZZ Top.

01:31:56.980 I loved them.

01:31:59.300 But that was about to rock.

01:32:00.500 Yeah, and then-

01:32:01.440 Isn't that ACDC?

01:32:02.140 We went to a Fogcat concert, and I think the band that warmed up for them was I Am Just

01:32:09.840 a Cowboy, right around the trail, with Starry Nights, Campfire Lights.

01:32:15.060 What was that song?

01:32:16.340 The Cowboy song.

01:32:17.200 Thin Lizzy?

01:32:17.720 Thin Lizzy.

01:32:18.380 Thin, what is it?

01:32:19.340 Thin Lizzy.

01:32:19.920 Thin Lizzy's?

01:32:20.560 Yeah, that was a great concert.

01:32:22.780 Cowboy song by Thin Lizzy.

01:32:24.740 Yeah.

01:32:25.060 I haven't heard that.

01:32:25.500 I gotta listen to that one.

01:32:26.120 Well, that was, oh, that's a great song.

01:32:27.940 And that was gonna be Dave's song.

01:32:29.440 See, I picked the music, but with Kerry, picked his song.

01:32:32.520 The walkout music?

01:32:33.480 I always did the music, and I picked that song for Dave, but he said, no, Kev, I'm a cowboy.

01:32:39.120 And he picked, when I die, I may not go to Texas.

01:32:44.120 It was nothing.

01:32:45.300 You want music.

01:32:46.620 Like Tanya Tucker?

01:32:47.700 Yeah, but I mean-

01:32:48.800 Good God.

01:32:49.580 But it was terrible for Go to the Ring, too.

01:32:51.520 I'm sure it was, dude.

01:32:53.380 You want to sound like an interesting sound, and then a crescendo, and you'll kick the

01:32:58.340 door off, and the lights and all, so you don't want something like that.

01:33:00.940 And he's blasting some damn Shania Twain or whatever.

01:33:03.440 Yeah, yeah.

01:33:04.260 Yeah, that's a different level, man.

01:33:07.120 Okay, and so, and Jack had passed away before you.

01:33:11.040 What about Kerry?

01:33:12.060 What's something you remember about him that you like?

01:33:14.760 Shoot.

01:33:15.520 Kerry was just-

01:33:16.720 Were you all the closest, probably?

01:33:19.260 Well, me, Dave, and Kerry were real close.

01:33:21.520 And then Mike was our baby, you know, so we were, we were really close.

01:33:26.940 And, but, you know, Chris was a little bit, I told you about the divorce thing when I was

01:33:32.000 a kid.

01:33:32.400 One thing my mother insisted on my dad was that my dad not discipline Mike and Chris like

01:33:38.840 he did me, Dave, and Kerry, because he used a leather strap on us, you know.

01:33:42.400 But, I mean, we're boys, you know, and we got-

01:33:44.320 It was kind of common back then.

01:33:45.420 It was, yeah, yeah.

01:33:47.220 And-

01:33:47.860 My principal beat me in the office one time, a couple times, I think.

01:33:50.720 It was back when your principal could spank you, you know.

01:33:52.520 Yeah, I've been beating there, too.

01:33:54.220 I mean, you know, we had it coming.

01:33:55.840 Hey, that's all right, brother.

01:33:56.900 Yeah, we had it coming.

01:33:58.020 Did we?

01:33:58.560 I don't know.

01:33:59.500 Well, you know, if we got away with it, and we just done it again, you know.

01:34:03.940 Look, he got me, I got away, I got over on him more times than he got over on me.

01:34:07.420 I'll tell you that, Mr. Brady.

01:34:09.860 Yeah, I think, same with mine.

01:34:12.040 I had a principal like that.

01:34:13.940 He'd come down in the office, and he'd open your classroom door and say,

01:34:18.280 Who parked on my grass?

01:34:20.840 You know, if any car was touching grass, it was his grass, and you had to move it.

01:34:26.080 You know, he was a really obnoxious guy.

01:34:29.080 Did you guys finish high school, you and your brothers?

01:34:31.540 Yeah, yeah.

01:34:33.360 Yeah, we did.

01:34:35.140 Of course, I hated school, and I hated it.

01:34:38.760 I don't know if you did or not, but-

01:34:39.940 Oh, if I could wrestle good, I wouldn't like damn spelling.

01:34:42.800 Well, I wasn't wrestling then, you know.

01:34:44.540 I was a little kid.

01:34:45.360 I had to do my homework and all that stuff, but I had to listen to all that junk in class

01:34:49.400 and about Susie has two dresses and, you know, all that crap.

01:34:53.340 I couldn't stand it.

01:34:54.380 I was bored to death, and I just, and I'm not a very good parent.

01:34:59.560 I told you, I just, when I see little boys, I say, I hated school.

01:35:02.780 I wouldn't, I don't blame you for not wanting to go.

01:35:05.520 You know, there's a lot better stuff to do.

01:35:07.240 You got a dog, you got a BB gun, and that's all you need, you know.

01:35:10.760 So, when you think back, what about your own parenting?

01:35:16.460 So, you have four children?

01:35:18.560 Yeah.

01:35:19.180 Okay.

01:35:19.800 And what are they like?

01:35:21.060 You have two boys and two girls?

01:35:22.680 Yeah, two boys and two girls.

01:35:24.180 But my oldest two are daughters, Kristen and Jill.

01:35:28.080 And Kristen has always been my soft spot.

01:35:34.160 I love her so much, and she's brilliant.

01:35:36.280 She does everything for us, you know.

01:35:38.600 She's so, she's so, and she's such a good foster mom, or, and she, in Hawaii, she'd take

01:35:48.480 the kids for the, the police would, what do you call the ID, the, when the parent, when

01:35:54.300 Oh, CPS?

01:35:55.300 CPS.

01:35:55.900 She would get those kids, and then for foster parents, she, they loved her there, and so many

01:36:01.680 people that loved her in Hawaii, so many kids.

01:36:03.700 And then there's my daughter, Jill.

01:36:07.160 She was way more like me.

01:36:09.200 She's like, she can swim endlessly.

01:36:14.720 I've swum out to reefs before that were way too far for anybody without a boat.

01:36:19.140 She'll swim out there without flippers and go down and dive with lobsters with me, and

01:36:23.920 grab them with their hands, too.

01:36:25.240 I mean, I'm using gloves, but she's just, she's something else.

01:36:28.820 She can, she can run like a deer, she, and she's, she loves her, and her sons are all

01:36:35.960 athletic.

01:36:36.460 I could go overboard talking about her.

01:36:38.380 She's such an athlete.

01:36:39.880 And, and then there's Ross and Marsh.

01:36:42.220 And Ross and Marshall got into wrestling.

01:36:44.160 Yeah.

01:36:44.700 Did, were you scared when they got into wrestling, or did you have any thoughts about it, or that's

01:36:48.000 just what they wanted to do?

01:36:48.980 Well, not with Ross.

01:36:52.320 I knew Ross is, he's been an ass kicker his whole life, and he fights easily, you know,

01:37:00.120 and that's not usually, there's not much for a man like that to do in today's world except

01:37:03.920 for wrestling.

01:37:04.880 And so Ross is going to be good.

01:37:06.300 But Marshall, I did worry about him because Marshall was a super athlete.

01:37:11.720 He went out to Hawaii, and he was the quarterback, and he was throwing the bombs.

01:37:16.260 He was, the newspapers were just, people would just want a picture of how far he could throw

01:37:21.140 the football.

01:37:21.760 He was, he was just a great athlete.

01:37:24.900 But I worried about him getting that sun, that heat stroke out there, you know, because

01:37:28.740 he had a heat issue one time.

01:37:31.440 So that's the only time I've ever been worried of him, because they're both like bulls, you

01:37:35.700 know, they're strong and healthy.

01:37:37.080 And I wouldn't worry about it either way.

01:37:40.080 With their wrestling now, too, they, they know what they need to know.

01:37:43.880 They're, it's, I believe that the wrestling business is about to really explode, because

01:37:49.660 it was just like this when my brothers and I got started.

01:37:52.600 And when this COVID got in, they had to wrestle in empty buildings.

01:37:56.160 I don't think I could have ever done that.

01:37:58.140 But it made it where the, the people really have not seen them explode yet.

01:38:04.780 They've, they've worked for a little, they went to Japan and wrestled, and they worked

01:38:10.640 for a little operation at MLW, and now they're with AEW.

01:38:15.920 Oh, really?

01:38:16.700 AEW's been popping off, dude.

01:38:18.400 Oh, yeah.

01:38:18.740 I keep hearing about it all the time now.

01:38:20.640 Yeah, they're, they're going to, they're really going to be special, I believe.

01:38:24.140 And will they tag team?

01:38:26.320 They've done both.

01:38:27.240 They, they work tag teams right now, though.

01:38:28.960 I mean, it's a lot of, you know, there's a, tag teams are such an interesting, exciting

01:38:33.420 match, you know, because the guys don't have time to get a hold.

01:38:36.660 But they can do either one.

01:38:38.600 They can wrestle single, they can work a tag, but probably they'll work a tag team.

01:38:45.720 As a matter of fact, I don't want to talk out of school, but we have a neighbor in Bernie,

01:38:51.100 and it's Bill Goldberg, the guy that wrestled at WWE.

01:38:54.640 Oh, yeah.

01:38:55.600 Yeah, he, he, he's a Texas boy, I think, isn't he, or Oklahoma?

01:39:00.920 Bill Goldberg, yeah, I think it's from Oklahoma.

01:39:02.340 Where is he from, Norman?

01:39:03.440 No.

01:39:03.740 Tulsa, Oklahoma.

01:39:06.360 Did you ever fight Rocky Johnson?

01:39:09.500 Uh, he, I was too young, but my first black and white pictures, uh, that was trying to

01:39:17.180 flex, you know, and I've never, I didn't know, you know, I didn't expect to have muscles,

01:39:21.660 but that's Rocky.

01:39:22.980 And so Rocky's was really good at flexing.

01:39:25.160 And so Rocky taught me everything about flexing, you know, he was standing right behind the

01:39:29.040 car room and doing this and doing all these things.

01:39:31.060 And so, you know, whatever Rocky did, I did for the picture, you know.

01:39:35.520 So you learned a little from him then.

01:39:37.300 And Rocky's son is the Rock, you know.

01:39:40.980 Oh, yeah, Dwayne Johnson.

01:39:42.600 And so we would like, that's, that's actually the picture.

01:39:46.080 That's hilarious, dude.

01:39:47.880 But Little Rock was there.

01:39:49.740 Oh, was he?

01:39:50.360 Yeah, yeah.

01:39:51.220 He's a, he's a little boy.

01:39:52.660 I mean, he was the cutest little kid.

01:39:55.160 People say that Rocky was the night, is a, is a very nice guy.

01:39:58.300 He's still alive.

01:39:59.020 He is.

01:39:59.460 I don't know.

01:40:00.200 I don't know about that, but, but Rock was a great guy too.

01:40:04.000 I mean, he, he was, uh, we, he was a little younger than us, you know, so we'd wrestle him

01:40:08.220 and, uh, like, like his, uh, we'd frustrate him and boy, to see if he'd have the courage

01:40:14.820 to belt, to pep up with us and he would too, Dwayne, John, the rock, he would fight.

01:40:19.220 He would want to fight.

01:40:21.320 He's that pup was snit will bite you.

01:40:24.580 He was a beautiful little kid.

01:40:26.200 Oh, y'all might've put the, y'all might've excite y'all might've put that fire in a man.

01:40:29.800 Um, what about bruiser Brody?

01:40:31.520 Remember him?

01:40:32.220 Yeah.

01:40:33.140 He was something else.

01:40:34.600 Smart guy.

01:40:35.380 Uh, on his wake at workout routine, he would just put on leather gloves and lay into that

01:40:41.660 heavy bag and it thickened his chest.

01:40:44.560 And I mean, he did bench presses too, but he had an awesome bench press, but also his

01:40:50.100 body was built so powerfully because he had, I think he worked out different.

01:40:54.320 He did a lot of strikes, you know, and that thickens joints and all it made him, makes

01:40:58.340 you have kind of that raw strength, you know, and he'd have that.

01:41:03.200 Uh, if you want to talk about Puerto Rico, well, I can tell you too, that what happened?

01:41:09.200 Well, he was killed in Puerto Rico, you know?

01:41:12.220 Oh, he was killed in Puerto Rico?

01:41:13.420 Yeah.

01:41:14.000 I didn't know that.

01:41:14.620 Well, gosh, I never told this story, but I could tell you this one too, that, uh, he

01:41:19.960 was, Brody got, was real temperamental and he would get pissed off real easy.

01:41:25.700 Well, the Puerto Rico wrestling office owed him about 80 grand.

01:41:30.640 And so my, my dad was president of the Alliance back then.

01:41:33.180 And so we worked out a payout schedule where they'd pay him a little each show, but Brody

01:41:39.880 got to that show and he wouldn't work for him because they owed him that money.

01:41:43.860 And so dad worked it out where he would come back.

01:41:45.880 And boy, when they came back, they sold out, uh, um, San Juan and it was a great crowd where

01:41:52.800 Brody wanted his money that night because he saw that they had it.

01:41:56.020 And, but, you know, there are other things that they've, you know, and, uh, that's all

01:42:01.280 that started.

01:42:02.160 That's all that started.

01:42:03.220 So he, uh, wanted his money and, um, uh, wanted to be.

01:42:09.200 And so he kicked the guy's ass, you know, and the guy's a little, that invader, you know,

01:42:14.960 uh, forgot his name.

01:42:17.460 Um, but, uh, man, this is an ugly story too, but, uh, the guy who, and so they got in a

01:42:24.960 fight and the guy Brody beat him up and he knifed Brody in the shower, but, uh, this is

01:42:32.580 the kind of guy though.

01:42:33.560 I mean, the guy that did it just about a week before that, his little daughter drowned in

01:42:39.240 his swimming pool.

01:42:39.880 Oh, so he's on edge, you know, and, uh, so I can't really, I know him both, you know,

01:42:48.080 and they're both men that want to earn their living, you know, and, uh, it's sad.

01:42:54.260 Oh, that's him.

01:42:55.120 Jose Gonzalez.

01:42:56.700 Yeah.

01:42:57.760 Hmm.

01:42:58.660 Yeah.

01:42:58.960 Life is, you know, like I said, we suffer, we find the beautiful moments in between those

01:43:04.800 ugly ones, you know, and it's good.

01:43:07.140 It's got good and bad.

01:43:09.880 Yeah.

01:43:10.520 I, um, I'm trying to think if there was something else that you talked about using a medicinal

01:43:14.740 marijuana.

01:43:15.420 How did you get into that?

01:43:16.420 And then how did it help you?

01:43:18.360 Do you feel like, well, if you want to talk about it, if you don't want to, that's fine.

01:43:23.740 Yeah, I did.

01:43:24.520 Well, um, well, I had a lot of knee or certain knee surgeries too.

01:43:29.520 And, uh, and you can take a pain pill, but if you do, then it's going to take an edge off

01:43:36.240 of it.

01:43:36.540 And so you'll want to take more.

01:43:38.320 And if you do, you're going to get in a problem.

01:43:40.300 And so I didn't want pain pills.

01:43:42.380 So I wanted a natural, uh, pain relief.

01:43:46.180 And so I tried cannabis and I liked it.

01:43:48.600 Um, and, uh, it was, it's, it was just good all around for me.

01:43:53.640 It was good.

01:43:54.820 And so I actually grow it out in Kauai.

01:43:57.300 And, uh, and, uh, and so that's how I, you know, have, have, have it, you know, I'm so

01:44:04.140 grateful for it too.

01:44:05.160 I mean, I hope they don't make it illegal again because it was, it's like a wonder drug to

01:44:10.280 me.

01:44:10.500 It really was.

01:44:11.100 Did you ever get involved in any other type of plant medicine or anything like that out

01:44:15.900 there?

01:44:17.160 Um, I know there's like ayahuasca ceremonies and stuff like that.

01:44:19.800 We've done, I've done that before.

01:44:21.020 And a lot of our listeners have, um, I think have considered it or tried it.

01:44:25.260 Yeah, there's a stuff called, um, uh, oh, it's a, uh, what's the name of that?

01:44:32.780 Ka, Kiff.

01:44:33.920 No.

01:44:34.480 Kava.

01:44:35.180 What?

01:44:35.640 Ka, Kava.

01:44:37.260 Kava.

01:44:38.000 Yeah, Kava roots good for you.

01:44:39.740 I say good for you.

01:44:40.820 It's, I read about the contraindications on that and it's kind of, it can make your skin

01:44:46.660 like, uh, um, have, um, what do you call those things?

01:44:52.020 Shingles.

01:44:52.700 Scales or whatever?

01:44:53.600 Scales like, yeah.

01:44:54.640 Damn, make a damn dragon out of you, dude.

01:44:56.600 I guess that's if you do too much of it or something.

01:44:58.680 I tried it.

01:44:59.480 It's not bad for you.

01:45:01.620 But have you ever done like ayahuasca or like a plant medicine ceremony where they put

01:45:05.400 you under?

01:45:05.700 I've never even heard of that.

01:45:06.040 Yeah?

01:45:07.420 Ayahuasca.

01:45:08.700 Ayahuasca.

01:45:09.340 Oh.

01:45:09.800 It's like a, um, medicine that you take and you kind of sit in a group of the shaman

01:45:13.520 and it's usually, it's like a two day ceremony and, um, you kind of go through these bouts

01:45:17.580 of like, um, it's kind of like an emotional journey that you go on.

01:45:21.980 It's really fascinating.

01:45:22.980 Like a sweat lodge kind of thing, maybe?

01:45:24.640 Mm-hmm.

01:45:25.100 Wow.

01:45:25.860 Really, really fascinating if you ever get curious about it.

01:45:28.660 I got a friend in Israel that writes comedy shows, that writes, um, soap operas and he

01:45:35.840 does that.

01:45:36.500 He goes to Africa and South America and finds indigenous people and does stuff like that

01:45:41.640 with them.

01:45:42.000 And he does, I mean, he's a wealthy guy.

01:45:44.380 So he does it all.

01:45:45.040 Yeah, it's Aaron Rodgers.

01:45:45.460 We know who it is.

01:45:46.180 Um, what's your physical routine like today for yourself, uh, Kevin?

01:45:51.760 Physical routine?

01:45:53.000 Yeah.

01:45:53.220 Do you have like a daily routine or?

01:45:54.820 Yeah.

01:45:55.980 Uh, well, uh, Solomon comes in my bedroom about eight 45 or nine o'clock and, uh.

01:46:03.640 That's your grandson?

01:46:04.500 Uh-huh.

01:46:04.760 And, uh, and, and we go either catch lizards or snakes or frogs.

01:46:08.040 We've caught, uh, we've caught four rattlesnakes on our ranch last year.

01:46:13.340 And we've caught, uh, king snakes and, uh, uh, uh, turtles, uh, sea turtles, soft-shell

01:46:19.880 turtles, uh, you name it.

01:46:21.940 That little boy and I have so much fun together.

01:46:25.160 And, uh, and he's the, uh, I love him to death.

01:46:29.600 And, uh.

01:46:30.980 Does he remind you of any, one of your brothers in particular at all or no?

01:46:34.100 Yeah, he reminds me of Marshall and Ross.

01:46:36.340 It's like I'm able to be dad again, you know?

01:46:39.420 It's like I, well, I, I, I enjoyed being their father so much.

01:46:45.900 I really love my sons and my daughters.

01:46:48.180 But having Solomon again is just like having Marshall again, you know?

01:46:52.340 And he's got Ross in him too, though.

01:46:54.360 You know, it's beautiful.

01:46:56.120 For anybody that's wondering, I, Kevin Von Erich, I consider myself the luckiest guy in the world.

01:47:01.880 I mean, I know for that movie coming out, you may not believe it, but I am happy all day, every day.

01:47:07.060 Like, and I mean, I look forward to tomorrow and, uh, I couldn't ask for a better way things turned out.

01:47:13.760 And to, to bitch about my brothers dying too young, the truth is we had a great time.

01:47:19.100 We had a great time, a long time.

01:47:20.960 Hell yeah, we're still talking about how good the time was.

01:47:23.240 Yeah, yeah.

01:47:23.540 You know what I'm saying, dude?

01:47:24.780 So I'm not, I can't call it a bad day.

01:47:28.040 Is there any message you think that your father brothers, like, felt like that you think that they would want to have given,

01:47:33.100 but they didn't get a chance to?

01:47:34.180 Is there ever anything like that, that?

01:47:35.500 Like, yeah, I want to tell you something.

01:47:39.480 Now, we watched my dad wrestle when we were little boys, and we had an idea to make a wrestling show that would be different.

01:47:46.720 It would be two different, two hot cameras the whole time, so nothing's going to look bad on television.

01:47:53.540 It was just the best camera shot.

01:47:55.100 It would have done some, some extra time editing, but, you know, we wanted wrestling to be, instead of the 20 and 30 minute matches, one hour time limits,

01:48:07.240 we thought 20 minutes was plenty of time for a match to just, and pick up the pace, you know, and, and just make it more intense.

01:48:15.840 And I think our shows were like that.

01:48:18.360 I'm proud of them.

01:48:19.140 I'm proud of all of our shows.

01:48:20.100 My brothers and I, especially Dave and I, and dad had a great idea one time, and it was going to be to put our new style of wrestling on the show, and it was great.

01:48:34.640 We had a great TV rating, and Vince offered us a big part of his, half of his company up there to come in with him.

01:48:42.440 And I sat there with my dad, and I said, nope, what's in it for us?

01:48:48.040 And you never disagree with family in a business meeting, but I was thinking, he's got everything we need, dad, everything we need.

01:48:58.380 But dad wouldn't go, wouldn't go with him.

01:49:01.880 To partner with WWE, you mean?

01:49:03.760 Yeah.

01:49:04.380 Wow.

01:49:05.120 And they were going to let dad keep San Antonio and Dallas, too.

01:49:10.780 But who knows, huh?

01:49:12.440 Yeah.

01:49:12.780 Who knows what would have happened?

01:49:13.960 Yeah.

01:49:15.000 Because there was many a slip twixt the cup and the lip, you know?

01:49:18.820 But, I mean, we would have been ready.

01:49:20.940 We would have jumped all over that because we were little boys that had seen it for a whole life, and we just knew how to make it better.

01:49:26.460 We'd watch the NFL, you know, and the slow motion, the collisions and all, and concerts with the lasers and all, the music, the way it fills you out of your chair, you know?

01:49:38.680 We had it.

01:49:39.440 We had how we wanted to do it.

01:49:41.240 And so, you know, that didn't come about, but we had a great time aiming at it.

01:49:49.020 Yeah.

01:49:49.360 And who knows?

01:49:49.860 Maybe things would have been different, you know?

01:49:51.620 Yeah.

01:49:51.900 I mean, you guys, yeah, I mean, I just, yeah, I mean, on behalf of like, yeah, any kid that was like me, I mean, the second you guys, they put the name on the screen or it's just, man, it was awesome, dude.

01:50:04.900 You felt like everything was possible.

01:50:07.040 You could fucking rip the drywall to the living room.

01:50:09.880 You could fucking do whatever you wanted, dude.

01:50:12.000 You knew mom was coming home in an hour and a half, but you had 90 minutes until she got there where you were free as a bird, boy.

01:50:18.840 I'd break every damn chair we had and then spend the next two hours gluing them bitches back together for dinner, dude.

01:50:24.280 You would have loved to step in the business.

01:50:26.280 I know you would have liked it.

01:50:27.640 You would have loved it.

01:50:29.940 Well, Kevin, man, thanks so much, dude.

01:50:31.820 We got a show tonight.

01:50:32.800 Yeah, we got a show tonight.

01:50:33.720 I'd love to take you to dinner, but you're busy.

01:50:36.040 Yeah, tonight I'll be busy, but you know what?

01:50:37.560 I think I'm going to be down to Austin in September.

01:50:44.260 Oh, you are?

01:50:45.980 Shoot, call me up, man.

01:50:47.240 That's what I'm saying.

01:50:47.600 I'll show you Texas.

01:50:48.540 When I am, I'll come out and see the ranch, man.

01:50:50.580 Do it.

01:50:51.300 That would be cool.

01:50:52.340 That would be, man.

01:50:53.300 What plants do you guys have out there?

01:50:55.180 What plants?

01:50:55.980 Yeah, do you plant any avocados or anything like that here in Texas or no?

01:50:58.680 Oh, no, no.

01:50:59.920 It won't grow in the subtropics, but I say that.

01:51:05.920 I went to Israel.

01:51:07.100 It's on the 33rd degree ladder from the equator.

01:51:10.400 I mean, that's way far north.

01:51:12.060 They have mangoes there, papayas.

01:51:14.960 I couldn't believe it.

01:51:16.060 Yeah, they got it.

01:51:16.580 Can't grow that in Texas.

01:51:17.820 Yeah, you can't grow that in Texas, huh?

01:51:19.480 Yeah.

01:51:21.720 Bud, you can grow a batch of Von Ericks, dude, that are pretty damn impressive.

01:51:25.720 I'll say that.

01:51:26.560 They sure can.

01:51:28.560 Kevin, thanks so much for your time, man.

01:51:30.260 Just thanks for you and your family.

01:51:31.860 Just all the enjoyment and excitement and invigoration and possibility over the years.

01:51:37.200 I think it's inspired a lot of people and it was so much fun as a kid.

01:51:40.660 Just fucking, when you guys came on the screen just getting to be a Von Erick for a few minutes, man.

01:51:45.580 It was fun, man.

01:51:46.580 It was a lot of fun.

01:51:48.160 And I'll think about it.

01:51:50.180 And, you know, when you get some stress built up, you know, you can just get in the ring and kick ass.

01:51:57.020 That's a motto for life, guys.

01:51:58.320 Those days are gone.

01:52:00.000 But they're pretty close in our minds, you know?

01:52:02.300 Yep, right there.

01:52:03.180 You can still feel them right on the edge of your skin sometimes.

01:52:05.320 Dang right.

01:52:06.140 Dude, I'll beat the shit out of somebody in the lobby here if we need to.

01:52:09.820 Well, let's find a quiet spot and I'll take you down somewhere and we can make a little news.

01:52:17.000 Kevin, Von Erick, thanks so much, man.

01:52:19.040 My pleasure, buddy.

01:52:19.820 Now I'm just floating on the breeze

01:52:22.540 And I feel I'm falling like these leaves

01:52:25.500 I must be cornerstone

01:52:28.820 Oh, but when I reach that ground

01:52:33.380 I'll share this peace of mind

01:52:35.540 I found I can feel it

01:52:37.600 In my bones

01:52:39.720 But it's gonna take

01:52:42.320 In my bones

01:52:43.960 Where'd I live

01:52:44.560 And we can be

01:52:46.200 In my bones

01:52:47.780 And I feel it

01:52:48.300 Anything

01:52:50.620 For everything

01:52:51.440 And I feel

01:53:01.480 I feel at rounding

01:53:02.740 Might

01:53:03.900 And target

01:53:04.800 The

01:53:05.180 At

This Past Weekend with Theo Von - April 17, 2025

#576 - Kevin Von Erich

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