Authors: Mick Foley
I ran into Vince McMahon in the gym in Providence and we spotted each other on the bench. I helped him squeeze out a couple of extra reps by yelling, “Feel that pump, Vince, feel it burn!” Afterward, he thanked me and told me he’d been following me on the independent scene for a long time.
Actually, he just said a quick hello in a two-second encounter that he forgot as soon as it was over. For some reason, I just like the sound of the first story better.
When I got to the Civic Center in Providence, I basically stood around and stared at all the stars I had been watching on television and in the arenas for years. I wish I had possessed the Dude’s confidence and charisma, but instead I just sat in the room like a 235-pound slug (weight training and emergency food relief from my parents had plumped me up). Some time later, Pat Patterson (of current stooge fame) asked to speak to me. Pat informed me that along with my partner for the night, Les Thornton, I would be taking on the British Bulldogs-Davey Boy Smith and Dynamite Kid-who were the current tag team champions.
“What’s your name?” Patterson asked me.
“Cactus Jack” came my reply.
“Well, we can’t let you use a gimmick name,” Pat told me. “We’ll have to use your real name. Also, kid, you’ll have to get rid of the bandanna.”
Patterson then asked me how many matches I’d had, and I made the mistake of telling him the truth. “Just one,” I quickly answered, while Pat shook his head in disbelief.
“Well, what can you do out there?” he wanted to know.
“I can take a lot of bumps,” I was glad to inform him.
By this time, the Bulldogs had walked over to get a look at this guy they would be facing. “Hey Dynamite, it’s nice to meet you,” I said to the man who pound for pound may have been the top wrestler in the world. In addition to his World Wrestling Federation matches, I had seen tapes of many classic encounters in Japan that, for my money, were among the best matches of all time. I felt privileged to share the same ring with him, and I wanted him to know that I was going to be doing my best for him. “You can give me that snap suplex if you want,” I offered the man who had been responsible for bringing high risk into the Federation, and who would also be responsible for my inability to eat solid food for the next month.
“Thanks, mate,” he said with a smile, as he turned and winked at Davey.
Hey, I didn’t want to forget about Davey-1 had something special lined up for him too. “Hey Davey,” I offered. “I throw this really great elbow, and I was going to try to work that in. Is that okay?”
I saw Davey and Dynamite laugh, but didn’t think anything of it, as Davey said in his thick British accent, “Yeah, sure, I think we’ll do a lot of great stuff out there.”
I went out to the ring and started yelling at the fans. There was a whole world of difference between the 300 who were scattered about the armory in Clarksburg and the 18,000 who jammed the Civic Center in Providence, so I actually had a little bit of a rush going through my body when the fans responded to my verbal taunting. At this point in my career, with Dude Love still off in the future, I figured I would concentrate on making Cactus Jack kind of a rebel with an attitude. Really, for a beginner, a lot of finding a gimmick is simply throwing as much crap at the wall as possible and seeing what sticks. And what usually ends up sticking is not all that much different from the guy who is throwing it, although I was too green to see that at the time. In Providence, Rhode Island, in 1986, I thought I was doing just fine.
The Bulldogs came to the ring accompanied by Captain Lou Albano and their royal English entrance theme. I began to feel slightly out of my element. When the match started, I knew instantly that I was in trouble. Les Thornton was, like the Bulldogs, an English wrestler, and a technical expert. For two minutes, he and Davey did some fine technical wrestling, and then Davey tagged the Dynamite Kid, and Les tagged the scared twenty-year-old kid. An announcement might as well have been made, saying, “Ladies and gentlemen, the scientific part of the match has just concluded, but please stay tuned for a major ass whipping.” It was devastating. I tied up (began the match), and right off the bat, in accordance with my previous wishes, I was snap suplexed nearly out of my boots. The suplex offered me my first chance to experience the Federation ring, and although stiff, my body seemed just fine, at least for the time being. A snapmare came next, followed by a diving head butt so painful that I could see my eyes crossing on the video replay. As I struggled to get to my feet, Davey Boy was tagged in to resume the fun.
A big horizontal suplex and a powerslam followed, but hey, these were both moves I’d endured countless times at DeNucci’s gym, and when Smith hooked me in a loose front facelock, I figured it was my time to have some fun. I immediately began firing weak-looking elbows at his midsection, in a quest to get in my big elbow on national television. Davey could have no doubt clamped down on the hold and shut me down completely, but instead he let go. Knowing Davey as I do now, I think he was probably just getting a kick out of my youthful exuberance and wanted to see where it would take us. It took us right to the ropes, where I fired off my amused opponent, and caught him coming off the opposite strands with my big flying elbow. I’d done it-I’d landed my big move on Federation television. Sadly, instead of the “ooh” or “aah” that I felt such a devastating move would merit, I heard laughter, and looked up to see Smith smiling. One headbutt later, which thankfully didn’t hurt, Davey tagged out, and a fired-up Dynamite Kid came in with bad intentions in his mind.
Dynamite had broken into wrestling as a skinny fifteen-year-old in England, where for years he’d been told he was too small to make the big time. As a result, he had worked harder and became more vicious in the ring than anyone I’ve ever seen. I also believe he had a genuine mean streak in him. With 225 pounds of muscle packed onto a frame that was probably never meant to hold more than 180, he was a devastating mental and physical presence. Looking back at it, I honestly think that he saw my weak attempt at offense as a slap in the face, and his body started physically shaking on the ring apron as he begged for the tag. When he tagged in, there is no doubt in my mind now, as I believe there was none in his then, that he planned to hurt me. He shot me into the ropes and followed me a half step behind the whole way. When I came off the ropes, he clubbed me across the jaw with his biceps, in what I guess was technically a clothesline. I never saw it coming, and the effect was devastating. Pain shot from the tip of my jaw through my ears. Then, with my ears still ringing and my head was pounding, I was suplexed backward off the top rope, and I fell in an awkward way onto my shoulders and the back of my head. As future Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura called the slow-motion replay, I could see Dynamite looking back at me with a combined look of concern/satisfaction.
I was helped to the back by one of the referees, and when I got there, saw a look on veteran wrestlers’ faces that was comparable to that of an observer of a car wreck. Even Greg Valentine, whose career had not exactly been characterized by touching displays of affection, gave me a concerned, “Are you okay, brother?”
“Do you know where the Bulldogs are?” was my only reply.
“They went in there, brother.” Valentine smiled, and I could see others raising their eyebrows in surprise at what they probably viewed as the beginning of some stupid retaliatory locker room attempt. I have since seen many a locker room incident over wrestlers “taking liberties” on their opponents, and if anyone ever had just cause to be a little bit peeved, it would be me.
I opened the door and saw them standing together, looking like the cumulative cat that swallowed the canary. I didn’t hesitate a bit in telling them what was on my mind. “Thank you very much,” I said, while shaking hands with both men. “I really appreciate it.” They smiled with a touch of disbelief, and let me know that they too had enjoyed themselves.
Wrestling is strange in that way. Respect for the veterans is a necessity, although, in my mind, so too is respect for your opponent’s body. I learned a long time ago that in the wrestling business, as well as in life in general, you run into the same people on the way down that you did on the way up. It is my hope that through kindness and respect, these people will see fit to let me down gently instead of dropping me. Unfortunately, it seems that the Dynamite Kid has been dropped, and his ex-wife told me he lives, unable to walk, in his native England. Although I don’t agree with what he did to me in my second match, he was extremely nice to me when I toured Japan with him in 1991, and I recently spoke to his ex-wife about organizing a benefit that may one day help him walk. After seeing how much he gave to his sport, and how little it left him in return, I would consider it an honor to try to help him.
I traveled to Hartford for the second set of World Wrestling Federation tapings. It was several hours before the show, but my parents were standing out in front of the building nonetheless. They had been in attendance, and wanted to tell me how much they enjoyed my match. “Great job out there,” my dad informed me. “Your mother was so impressed that she even put her book down when you went out.”
I gave them a “Thank you,” but I guess my dazed eyes gave me away, and my concerned mother asked me if I was all right. “Well, my jaw is really hurting, and I can’t close my mouth or eat food, but other than that, I guess I’m all right.”
My mom seemed stunned and offered the same sentiment that I’d heard so many times before-“But I thought it was all fake?”
Even in my clouded state, I offered up words that were a pretty good synopsis of the previous night-“Mom, nothing has ever felt so real in my life.” I don’t think my mother has enjoyed a match since then. Even to this day, she will tape my matches, and then only watch them when she finds out I’m all right.
In the dressing room, I sat down and minded my own business, but I felt like I had somehow become slightly accepted because of my previous night’s mugging. Both Bulldogs asked how I was, and King Kong Bundy extended his hand in friendship, even though he immediately rescinded after seeing me adjusting my balls with my shaking hand. A couple of guys talked about possibly seeing the Jeff Goldblum movie The Fly, and they wondered if anyone had seen it. When I raised my hand, and offered my Siskel-like thumbs-up, Les Thornton chimed in, “You looked like a fly yourself last night, mate.” The laughter of the boys made me somehow feel like one of the guys. Unfortunately, my efforts on this night made me feel like the greenhorn I truly was.
I was scheduled to team with veteran Terry Gibbs against the Killer Bees, Jim Brunzell and B. Brian Blair. I saw Blair just a couple of weeks ago, and he remembered me only as the guy who kept pulling his pants up and bleeding from the mouth. That basically sums up the match. I was shot in early in the match for a back bodydrop and landed fine. Unfortunately, the injury from the night before caused my jaw to swell, and my bite to become misaligned. As a result, when I landed, instead of my mouth closing as normal, my teeth smashed together, and the two front ones were knocked in. Now anyone who has seen me wrestle for the past ten years knows that my front teeth are gone anyway, but back then, all I could think of was that my perfect smile was gone. Blood was coming out of my mouth, I was still out of it from the Bulldog beating, but for some reason I pulled up my pants after every move. It was miserable. We were the second-to-last match of the night, which meant that no one made a peep after four hours of tedious wrestling, and I was at my absolute worst.
I left the dressing room despondent and got into my Fairmont to head up to school. These two shows had actually taken place on the first two days of school, and I needed to make some time on the 300-mile trip back so as not to miss another day. As I pulled out of the back lot, I saw some familiar figures at the gate. Danny Zucker, John Imbriani, John McNulty, Dan Hegerty, and Ed Fuchs were there waving me down, and when I stopped they were all sporting the biggest smiles I’d seen since we all used to pile into a car with our fake IDs and a fistful of ones for Pepper Night at Centerfolds. It didn’t matter to them that I’d stunk up the place-1 was their buddy, and they thought that my just being in the sold-out Hartford Civic Center was good enough. We went out to eat, and their spirits brightened mine. I left the diner with a different outlook-an outlook that said, “I have made it. I accomplished my dream!” With that in mind, it seems that the past thirteen years have just been a constant readjusting of my dreams-with my current one being to retire in one year with my health intact.
I rolled into Cortland about four in the morning, and was awakened early by Jake and Steve, who had seen my trusty Fairmont outside in the drive. “We know you’re wrestling,” yelled Steve, “and your name is Catfish Jake.”
I smiled as I thought of my vow not to share my wrestling with them until I’d had my one match. “You’re right,” I admitted, while the two teeth that would require root canals to save them throbbed in my mouth. “I’ve been wrestling this whole time.”
I took a couple weeks off from the wrestling wars while my jaw shrunk back to normal size, and I enjoyed being a college senior. I had actually had a short-term girlfriend at the end of my sophomore year, but she had made seeing other guys look like an Olympic sport that she was extremely dedicated to. As a result, I came out of the relationship wounded, more insecure than ever, and determined not to let the same thing happen again. So I shut off my romantic feelings almost completely and threw all of my emotions into wrestling. To be quite honest, I enjoyed thinking about wrestling nonstop during my eight-hour commutes, and I became a great visualizer of future triumphs. My mind has always been-my best asset in the ring, and I certainly developed my propensity to “think wrestling” during my first year in the business. Sometimes I would have to force myself to calm down when the images got too strong, especially when my favorite road song, “The Ride” by David Allen Coe, was playing.