Ted DiBiase Page 11

  Embarrassed, Harley cocked his head and mumbled, “Harley Race.” And that concluded the introduction.

  As Mike was leaving the ring, some guy at ringside caught the error and proceeded to say something smart. Mike looked at the fan and, with an open microphone so the entire building could hear, said, “This is my goddamn town and I can do any fuckin’ thing I want!” I’m sure the people never forgot that incident.

  Shortly thereafter, the Funks sold their promotion to Dick Murdoch and Blackjack Mulligan. Terry and Dory Jr. didn’t want to be tied down and were clearly making more money traveling to other places. Although Dick was my friend and unequivocally a great wrestler, he wasn’t a good promoter. The same can be said for Mulligan. Business was down and the territory wasn’t doing as well as in the past.

  To make money, I continued going to Kansas City. Bob Geigel and Harley Race liked my work and they continued to book me. My angle with Bob Sweetan was over and I was making decent money. I was making a name for myself and picked up lots of exposure. St. Louis was a wrestling hotbed, with some of the best talent in the business.

  In early 1978, all my hard work finally paid off. Sam Muchnick, the promoter in St. Louis, gave me an opportunity to work in his territory. St. Louis was like a one-city territory. It was its own entity. The talent that came into St. Louis was from all over the country.

  The paydays in the St. Louis territory were much better than most places. I was making about four to five hundred dollars a week wrestling in Amarillo. When I went to St. Louis, I would average that much a night. If I was fortunate enough to be in the main event, which I was a few times, I would get paid close to six thousand a night.

  BOB GEIGEL:

  The St. Louis territory was effectively promoted by Sam Muchnick. Sam was president of the National Wrestling Alliance for many years. I also served as president for about four years. Verne Gagne, Pat O’Connor, Harley Race, and I eventually bought the territory from Sam. We wanted Teddy in the territory because of his great work ethic and in-ring psychology. He was never selfish in the ring and an absolute class person in the dressing room.

  Soon thereafter, Sam came up with an idea that would give me more exposure than I’d ever had before in my wrestling career. Sam knew that Harley and the DiBiase family had a great history and that he could build up the match. He said, “What if you were to wrestle Harley Race for the NWA Championship?”

  I ecstatically replied, “That would be fantastic!”

  In March of 1978, at the famous Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis, Harley and I wrestled in the main event to a one-hour time-limit draw. I didn’t win, but the match gave me the exposure I desperately needed to move to the next level. I knew that if I performed well in St. Louis, then I would have many opportunities to wrestle in the larger markets such as New York City. Sure enough, in April of 1979, Vince McMahon Sr. inquired about my availability.

  HARLEY RACE:

  At one point in Teddy’s career, he was in line to become the NWA Heavyweight Champion. We had many good matches together in St. Louis. He had all the skills to become a heavyweight champion. He was very athletic and extremely smooth in the ring. Despite losing his father at an early age, Ted achieved success in the same profession that took his father’s life, and that speaks volumes about his character. He was a man’s man.

  I was very fortunate to be part of World Wide Wrestling Federation. At the time, they were known as the “big body” territory. Some of the guys that worked there were Bruno Sammartino, Pedro Morales, Ivan Putski, Andre the Giant, and Superstar Billy Graham. Their champion was Bob Backlund. I was young and had four years of wrestling experience, but I knew I was a solid enough wrestler to make it in the territory. I was in great condition, but I didn’t have a very muscular physique. I was always told to work out and look athletic, but to not overdo it by looking like a muscle head.

  Vince liked my work and brought me in as both a babyface and the North American Heavyweight Champion. Jaynet, Michael, and I moved into a two-bedroom apartment in Parsippany, New Jersey. It was a forty-five-minute drive to New York City.

  It was the first time there had ever been a champion in WWWF besides the heavyweight and tag-team champions. I didn’t actually beat anybody. It was part of the angle to introduce me to the territory. There was no explanation where the title came from or how I had won it. Vince’s agents treated me very well and I learned a lot from Angelo Savoldi, Arnold Skaaland, and Gorilla Monsoon. It was also the first time I’d met Vince McMahon Jr.

  At the time, Vince’s son worked exclusively as an announcer. The only time I saw Vince was when I’d wrestle at Madison Square Garden and at the television interviews and tapings in Allentown and Reading, Pennsylvania.

  At Madison Square Garden, wrestling Pat Patterson.

  We always got along and he conducted himself in a very professional manner.

  In the Mid-South territory, the main champion held the North American Heavyweight Championship. When I got to New York, I told Vince that there was a problem with the angle. Being the class act that he was, and not wanting to step on Bill Watts’s toes, a few weeks later he had me dropping the title at a TV taping to Pat Patterson. To change the name of the title, the company made up a story about Pat Patterson going off to some international tournament. Pat put up the North American heavyweight title to enter the tournament in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He won it all, unifying the North American Championship with the South American Championship to create the Intercontinental Championship. Pat was then crowned the first ever Intercontinental Champion.

  PAT PATTERSON:

  I had just come to New York as a heel and Teddy was this good-looking babyface. The first time we wrestled was at a TV taping in Allentown. The fans were really into him. I beat Teddy using a pair of brass knuckles and it almost caused a riot. Teddy and I put on such an excellent and fast-paced match, which was in direct contrast to the slow-moving matches the fans were used to at that time.

  But the one match I will never forget was at Madison Square Garden in 1979. It started my career in World Wrestling Federation and I still think about it quite frequently. We wrestled in the main event on the card. We had a great match and wrestled up until the Madison Square Garden’s curfew—which was eleven. We did everything right going in and out of the ring, near fall after near fall, and you could feel the ring shaking from the crowd stomping their feet. The crowd went absolutely insane. I beat Teddy right before the bell went off to retain the new North American Heavyweight Champion title.

  I always liked Teddy. He was a fun guy to be around and was always happy. He was also good for the business. Win, lose, or draw, he could have a great match anywhere. He was entertaining the people and doing everything right.

  The move to World Wide Wrestling Federation offered me a tremendous opportunity to both get more exposure and wrestle in front of packed houses in some of the grandest venues in the country: Philadelphia, D.C., Boston, and New York. I will never forget the first night I wrestled at Madison Square Garden—then and now the ultimate wrestling venue in the world. At twenty-five years old, I attained more notoriety and made more money than ever before.

  Wrestling in WWWF was different than the Amarillo and Mid-South territories. First, the wrestling wasn’t as stiff. Moves, punches, and spots weren’t as snug. Also, the drives weren’t bad. Most cities were within 150 to 200 miles. I still worked every day, but I was home almost every night.

  I had come to the territory with Tito Santana. A great friend, Tito lived in a nearby apartment complex, and he later met his future wife in the same town.

  TITO SANTANA:

  When Ted and I first arrived in New York in 1979, we traveled everywhere together. We also got lost a lot. One of our first shows together was in Long Island. We couldn’t find the Van Wyck Expressway or Southern Parkway. When we stopped and asked for directions, nobody knew anything or wanted to help. Ted and I were two Texas boys and people were a lot friendlier back home. It didn’t take us long to fig
ure out that nobody trusted anyone and people just didn’t want to talk to us.

  During my run, I had singles matches against Pat Patterson and the Iron Sheik, and tagged with Tito Santana, Ivan Putski, and Andre the Giant. I enjoyed working with Pat Patterson because he was so knowledgeable. I learned a lot of ring psychology from him and did everything he told me.

  The Iron Sheik and I had a few good matches. It was about the same time as the U.S. hostage crisis in Iran. At a match in Pittsburgh, the Iron Sheik was getting booed. He was beating the tar out of me. But the tough, blue-collar crowd was so loud that the “USA, USA” chants were deafening. As the fans kicked up the noise and got behind me, the Sheik looked at me as if he was getting scared of the crowd. He said to me in his Farsi accent, “I don’t think I beat you tonight, brother!” I put him at ease the best I could and the match continued. He ended up pinning me as planned.

  The Iron Sheik and I used the crowd’s energy to fuel our matches.

  Andre and I had been friends since we met while I was in college. He always called me “boss” and we had a lot of great times together. Andre was one of those guys that either liked you or didn’t. Fortunately, he took a liking to me. But Ivan Putski wasn’t as lucky. Andre didn’t like him.

  One night in Providence, Rhode Island, Andre, Ivan Putski, and I were scheduled to be in a six-man tag against the three Valiant Brothers—Jimmy, Johnny, and Jerry. Before the match, Andre came up to me in the locker room. “Hey, boss. Tonight, you tag me. You tag nobody else!”

  I said, “Okay.” Throughout the entire match, Andre made sure that I never tagged Putski. I’m sure Putski figured it out, but what could he do to the seven-four, four-hundred-and-fifty-pound giant?

  After a match at the Boston Garden, Andre, Tito Santana, Arnold Skaaland, and I headed to the hotel bar after checking in. All four of us were sitting at the bar drinking. Andre decided to challenge me to a drinking game. “I tell you what, boss. You get five shot glasses and you can put whatever you want in them: beer, whiskey, water, milk, whatever. I will get five large glasses filled with beer. We’ll line them up, five shots for you and five beers for me. I’ll bet you I can drink all five of my beers before you can drink five shots. If I win, you buy everybody a round. If you win, I’ll buy everybody a round.”

  I looked at Arnold and Tito. I knew full well that I couldn’t outdrink Andre. But I only had five small shot glasses to his five twenty-ounce beer glasses. I could certainly drink those faster than he could. “Okay, Andre, that’s a bet.”

  “Now, don’t mess around. The only rule is that you don’t touch my beer glasses and I don’t touch your shot glasses.”

  “Okay, that’s fair. Let’s do it.”

  The bartender poured whiskey in my five shot glasses and Andre got his five beers. Arnold was the referee. As soon as he said go, Andre had inhaled one beer as I had finished my fourth shot. After he finished his first beer, he turned his glass upside down and placed it over my fifth shot glass! Since the rules stated we couldn’t touch each other’s glasses, there was no way I was going to get my fifth shot. I shook my head in disbelief and Andre casually finished his four beers. Then with a smirk he said, “Kid, buy a round for everyone.”

  Another night after wrestling in Portland, Maine, Andre, Tito, and I went back to the hotel. We had a few drinks in the bar to wind down. We then headed up to Andre’s room to drink some more and play his favorite card game, cribbage. Andre was good and he never lost. After a few hours of playing, we decided to head down to the nearby Denny’s to get something to eat. I basically had to carry Tito, because by then he was three sheets to the wind.

  We each ordered breakfast, and before our meals arrived, Tito just dozed off right there in the booth. The waitress finally brought the food and set our plates down. Andre and I finished, but Tito was still out and hadn’t touched his plate. With a smirk on his face, Andre reached over and took Tito’s plate. He put half of the food on his plate and the other on mine. Andre quickly put the plate back in front of Tito and we ate his food. Andre inserted a knife in one of Tito’s hands and a fork in the other. Then he pushed Tito. “Wake up, it’s time to go.” Half asleep, Tito looked down at his plate and hands. He then looked up at us and asked, “Was it good?”

  I love New York City. When I first flew into New York from Amarillo, I was overwhelmed by the size of it all. To me, after having lived in Willcox, Omaha, Baton Rouge, Kansas City, and Amarillo, New York was a concrete jungle. But I loved the attractions, food, people, and entertainment. My only regret was that I never went to the top of the World Trade Center.

  At a television taping in Pennsylvania, I was there when Terry Bollea (aka Hulk Hogan) showed up for the first time. Hogan was bigger than life and was unbelievably ripped. It was the first time that Vince Sr. had laid eyes on him. Terry wasn’t there to wrestle, but to meet and greet Vince Sr. The kid from Tampa had long blond hair, a deep tan, and an incredible body. You could see the dollar signs in Vince’s eyes. Hogan came into the territory as a heel and he was assigned a manager, Freddie Blassie.

  In December of 1979, I left. I only spent eight months in WWWF, but time had passed. They had given me the opportunity and let me have a run of it, and now it was time for me to go. I wasn’t the physical specimen they wanted. In spite of my work, I didn’t stand out. I didn’t have a gimmick. Chief Jay Strongbow was a great guy and had a big influence in my life. He told me, “Kid, you have to have a gimmick.” I never had one. I was just Ted DiBiase.

  I was scheduled to wrestle my last match in Madison Square Garden against Hulk Hogan. At that point, Hogan wasn’t a big star. It was actually his first WWWF match and his first at the Garden. I knew Vince Sr. wanted to make a star out of him. Before the match, I went up to Vince. “I know you really want to get Terry over. What would you like for me to do?”

  Vince’s response made me feel really good. “Teddy, you do it any way you want to, because I know you will do it right.” Vince’s confidence in me assured me that he believed in me and knew I was up to the challenge.

  Terry was a heel back then. Hogan and I had one heck of a match, and he earned his first victory at the Garden. After the match, he thanked me. A few years later when Terry came through the Mid-South promotion to wrestle a few shots for Bill Watts, we saw each other in the locker room. He walked up to me and we shook hands. Winking, Hogan said, “Brother, I owe you one.” He still remembered the night that we had the match at the Garden and what I had done to help him get over.

  The next day, the family and I headed back to Amarillo for the Christmas season.

  11

  TAKING THREE STEPS

  I contacted Bill Watts and returned to the Mid-South in January of 1980. I rented an apartment in Baton Rouge and once again began the grueling Mid-South road schedule. In late February, I defeated Mike George in Shreveport to capture the North American title. Mike was a mainstay with the NWA and worked in various territories. We had a great match that night. I would work on and off for Bill Watts over the next seven years.

  With all the moving around, not to mention our immaturity,

  That’s me with Michael Hayes.

  my marriage to Jaynet had deteriorated. We decided to get a divorce; it was amicable. Even though Michael lived full-time with her, I could see him any time I wanted. In February of 1980, I drove Jaynet and Michael to the airport, where they flew to Amarillo to stay with her parents. Saying good-bye to Michael was the hardest thing I had ever done. It about killed me.

  For the next six months, I stayed in Mid-South wrestling and tried to get my personal life back in order. Terry Funk, Bob Geigel, and Harley Race all advised me that I should leave the Mid-South and go to the Atlanta territory. Atlanta was the home of Georgia Championship Wrestling as well as the Superstation, TBS. I could get national television exposure. TBS was the only cable network that carried wrestling throughout the whole country. I was told that they were pushing for me to become the next NWA World Heavyweight Champion. I was ov
erwhelmed by having such an honor bestowed upon me. It made me work even harder.

  TERRY TAYLOR:

  I first met Teddy while working the Georgia territory. I had only been in the business six months and was extremely green. Teddy was just so nice to let me ride with him and tried to help me with my work.

  When we were together in the Mid-South territory, I remember Teddy was supposed to get a shot at Ric Flair for the NWA heavyweight title. But he was heading off to Japan, so an angle was crafted to open the door for me to wrestle Flair. During a match, Dick Murdoch attacked Teddy beforehand. Dick gave him a Brain Buster on the concrete floor. Teddy proceeded to bleed over everything. It was the bloodiest thing I had ever seen.

  Before I left Mid-South, they told me not to say anything about being pushed to become the NWA Heavyweight Champion. The other territorial promoters were pushing for two other guys, Dusty Rhodes and Ric Flair. The decision to crown the next NWA champion was a political decision. Bob told me that he would talk to Sam Muchnick and the others. I was advised to just work hard in the ring and to keep everything on the down low. While in Atlanta, I was to simply get over with the fans and get as much television exposure as possible.

  It was in October that I relocated to Atlanta. Jim Barnett was the promoter. He was openly homosexual and rumor had it he was one of Rock Hudson’s lovers. Ole Anderson was the booker. Ole was real stubborn but I got along with him. Other talents that came in and out of the territory were Jake Roberts, Jim Duggan, Terry Taylor, Dusty Rhodes, Tommy Rich, Tony Atlas, Ronnie Garvin, Steve Keirn, Terry Gordy, Michael Hayes, and Bob Roop.