Episode 8 - Hang In There

Timestamps
 0:09:22 - Fakes in Wrestling (involving The Hangman (Bruce Pobanz) and Fake Stan Lane) 

Bix: I learned this boy was dying and that doctors didn’t expect him to make it through the night. For at least the next hour, I sat on the hospital bed with that boy. We talked, laughed, hugged, and shared a most intimate moment together…”

TGBL: (laughing) I just, I picture some kid dying in his bed and his parents come to the room, they’re like, you know, “Bobby? Guess who’s here?” – “Who?” – “You know how you like wrestling?” – “HULK HOGAN! HULK HOGAN!” – “No, it’s not Hulk Hogan…” – “STING! STING!” – “No,…” and all of a sudden the door opens and there’s a guy in a mask with the noose, like “IT’S ME! THE HANGMAN!” (laughing)

- A discussion during the reading of excerpts from The Hangman (Bruce Pobanz)'s testimonial.

 0:36:04 - Bix's Japanese Wrestling Magazine Haul 

TGBL: I used to have a really big Japanese magazine collection – I got rid of over the years – but I got it because one day I was at home and Georgiann Makropoulos called me up and said “Brian, I have a friend of mine who has to move and he has to get rid of all his Japanese magazines – would you be interested in buying them?” and I said “Well, it depends on the price” and “Well, you know, it’ll be like $3 a magazine or something” and I said “How many magazines are there?” and there was like 80 magazines, and I was like “Alright, I’m interested – have him call me” and the next day the guy called me – it was Mick Foley, who was moving with his family and he had to get rid of all these magazines and he was still on Long Island.

Bix: Now one of my favorite things about the Japanese magazines though are the weird cartoons…I got a few at the Jersey All Pro show in November because George Mayfield was there, and there’s this one I decided to buy it because – we were just talking about Super Strong Machine. Remember how him, Hiro Saito and I guess Shunji Takano were the Calgary Hurricanes because they were all in Calgary together? So there’s this cartoon – I guess it’s when they first went to Calgary – of Inoki with a giant chin gleefully throwing them off a plane into Calgary.

 0:53:41 - Dennis Of The Week 

TGBL: Dennis was going to do something where after a match, Gino Caruso – the Great Caruso – kept beating down his opponent, and they’re ringing the bell and the referee’s can’t pull him off, and he would get on the mic and he would yell “It’s not over until the fat lady sings!” and he’d go back and keep beating the person and he’d go back and yell “It’s not over until the fat lady sings!” and he’d do this like several shows in a row, and finally there’d be a show where he would go “It’s not over until the fat lady sings!” and Dennis was gonna get a fat woman to come out with a viking helmet on and just get on the microphone and she was just gonna go “IT’SSSSS OVERR!!” and he would stop and leave with her (laughing). The biggest regret I have in wrestling, is I never got to see that; that it never happened – of Gino Caruso’s post-match beating of his opponent ending when the fat lady came out and declared it “over.” (laughing)

- recounting Dennis' attempts to get The Great Caruso over by literally having a fat lady come and sing after a post-match beat down.

 0:57:02 - Wrestling Schools and the absurd prices and courses of Wrestle-Tech (as of 1997) 

TGBL: Tryouts: 100 dollars, 25 dollars refundable if you decide not to do it or don’t qualify. $3225 to learn to be a wrestler, $1225 to learn to be a manager or valet, $825 to learn to be a referee, $525 to learn to be a ring announcer, and then there are separate courses. $325 to develop interview and mic skills and another $325 for character development…$10 for ring time per session or you could buy ring-time per month for $40.

Bix: That’s on top of the dues?! Wow…even by the standards of a wrestling school, that’s kind of a racket.

TGBL: I remember when this came out, we would sit at Dennis’ shows and laugh our asses off about this kinda thing.

- On the infamous Wrestle-Tech training school in Delaware and their interesting tiered approach to wrestling training as of August 1997.

 1:04:38 - The tale of Bryan Carrera, the giant bodyguard for Cocaine Cowboys' infamous drug-runner Jon Roberts 

 1:23:39 - A discussion on Marc Gullen (of the House of Gullen) 

TGBL: He looks like a mix between 1984 Mark Anthony from Van Halen and 1994 Dan Scherer from Philadelphia. He’s just the funny looking guy and he’s got this jacket – he’s got this suit on and he’s got a jacket draped over his shoulders and at one point during the interview it falls off and he just no-sells it; it’s beautiful (laughs). He does these two interviews about Teijo Khan coming – and again – the setting makes it a little funnier to me. He’s standing in front of a lake (laughing) it’s just peaceful, tranquil setting, and then there’s this man talking about how he’s bringing how he’s bringing (in Marc Gullen voice) “The great Teijo Khan!” in to destroy everyone. The first video he just talks about it – and the second video on here, Teijo Khan emerges from the water and I cannot in anyway do this justice...Teijo Khan runs out of the water in a manner that’s almost like a fish – if you take a fish out of water and it flops around – he’s rampaging as Bix said out of the water – his knees are up, his arms are up; I’ve never seen anyone – and I lived on the beach my entire life – I’ve never seen anyone exit the water in this way.

- Brian's dissection of the cult promo of Marc Gullen when he was managing in Memphis.

 1:39:21 - Listener Requests 

TGBL: In the late 90’s, I made a failed effort to put together a Terry Funk Record Book and I wanted it to be a record of every match he ever had, because I thought it would be interesting because he bounced around to so many places as well as all the old newspaper clippings and pictures and stories. Terry Funk was cooperative; I’d call Terry Funk and talk to him for hours on the phone and get interviews with him and stuff, and then there were numerous people that would help me: Pete Lederberg, Howard Baum sent me pictures and were incredibly helpful; David Williamson sent me clippings and were incredibly helpful, and Mike Lano got in touch with me – Dr. Mike Lano – and he says “I have some stuff; I’ll send it to you.” Knowing what we know now, I question how many of the pictures he sent me were his – but he sent me this giant envelope and the stamps had been ripped off another envelope. He didn’t buy new stamps and put them on there, he took stamps from another envelope that had already been used and taped them to this- these were used, though! They had the postmark stamp! I don’t know how he got away with it. He’d send them to me and there’d be writing all over the envelope, and I remember one package he sent me it was really bad photocopies of Terry Funk in magazines, and then it was a photocopy of Farah Fawcett in the National Inquirer, and he wrote on it “Man Brian, Farrah’s really gone downhill."

- TGBL's hilarious recounting of the science behind Dr. Mike Lano sending letters - and tapes - via mail during a listener request question on Tape Trading.