SOLACE ON THE MAT
After a family tragedy, Toby Willis turns to the sport he loves–wrestling
By Michael Hirsley
Tribune staff reporter
NASHVILLE — When Toby Willis lost five brothers and a sister in a gruesome traffic accident that had a bitter political aftermath, he knew of two places to seek solace.
Both had been shown to him by his father, Rev. Scott Willis, a Baptist minister.
One refuge the younger Willis sought was “in the Good Book, “the Bible. The other was in wrestling.
“Once you’ve wrestled, everything else in life is easy, “said the ex-Northwestern wrestler and Illinois high school champion.
His terse candor neither glorified his sport nor trivialized something that had been unimaginably harsh.
“I don’t talk about that much with most people, “he said of the freakish freeway tragedy on Nov. 8, 1994.
His parents and six of the family’s nine children were heading from Chicago to an outing in Wisconsin with Rev. Willis driving their van when a loose taillight assembly fell off a truck onto the pavement just ahead of them.
Their van ran over the 42-pound chunk of metal, rupturing the gas tank and setting the vehicle ablaze. All six children, from 6 weeks to 13 years old, burned to death. Rev. Willis and his wife, Janet, survived. Toby and his brother, Dan, and sister, Amy, were not in the van.
Since then, through ramifications from negotiating a $100 million legal settlement to revelations that the truck driver was among those who had received commercial driver’s licenses by paying bribes to then-Illinois Secretary of State George Ryan’s office, the Willis family has struggled with trace memories of brief lives.
While the bribe scandal has built to an expected trial of former Gov. Ryan this year, part of the Willises’ quiet remembrance last winter was building six snowmen at their loved ones’ gravesite.
But 34-year-old Toby Willis, whose own wrestling career was interrupted by a broken wrist, broken collarbone and torn knee cartilage before it was ended by a neck injury, is pursuing a different memorial.
He has put millions of dollars from the traffic accident settlement into wrestling, the sport he loves.
“I lost one set of brothers, “he said. “Now I’m trying to help another set, my wrestling brothers.”
To do that, he has invested in Real Pro Wrestling, which he founded with former Northwestern teammate Matt Case. They have recruited top Olympic-style wrestlers into a league of teams representing eight cities from New York to Chicago to Los Angeles, pitting individuals one on one in seven weight classes from 121 to 264 pounds. The 56 competitors wrestled last fall before a studio audience in a Los Angeles arena built especially for the matches and equipped with cameras to record the action for later telecasts.
Those telecasts are to begin Sunday on the PAX network (WCPX-Ch. 38), with a rebroadcast Wednesday on Fox Sports Net. That will begin an eight-week schedule of telecasts at 3 p.m. each Sunday on PAX and nine weeks at 2 p.m. each Wednesday on Fox Sports Net.
Using his degree in computer technology and skills he has honed since graduation, Willis wants to give the telecasts production value that will expand the audience from hard-core wrestling fans to viewers simply seeking sports entertainment.
As the debut telecast neared, he was still editing and adding music and voice-overs for the matches taped last fall. His Nashville office is on the third floor of the High Five Building, alongside music producers who also are helping Willis put the finishing touches on his wrestling shows.
High Five is part of a neighborhood crisscrossed by streets such as Chet Atkins Place, Roy Acuff Place and Music Square. The lawns are dotted with a musical row of two- and three-story buildings occupied by a mix of mainstream to obscure record companies and recording studios.
This is where Toby Willis works. He lives in rural Ashland City, Tenn., far from the Chicago neighborhoods where he grew up.
He moved here 4 1/2 years ago not to distance himself from the family tragedy, he said, but to find open spaces, wooded acreage and a large home with a gym, a library and room for a state-of-the-art computer and recording studio. He bought that kind of a place from country music star Randy Travis and made it his home and office as he produced his wrestling series.
But the day after Christmas, when he and his wife, Brenda, and their eight children were away, fire destroyed his dream home and part of his tape inventory.
“We don’t know the cause, “he said.
The family has rented nearby, intending to rebuild on the original site.
If Willis has cause to question the misfortunes dealt to him and his family, he doesn’t seem to make time for such reflection. Instead, drawing from the Bible and Shakespeare, he said, “We were raised on the Good Book, which says God’s method of operation is to make you stronger through hardship.”
That may mean “taking a hard path rather than an easy path, “he said before shifting to paraphrase Shakespeare: “All the world’s a stage, and we’re its actors. We don’t get to choose our script.”
But, he insisted, “You do get a choice of folding, being a wimp or being strong, being a hero.”
Beyond profit
Rev. Scott Willis says his son “is a very focused, disciplined guy. We know that Real Pro Wrestling is a risky thing, but there’s no doubt in my mind that wrestling can get public attention.”
Toby Willis’ parents also have moved to the outskirts of Nashville, where Rev. Willis still preaches occasionally. He’s also a substitute teacher and coaches wrestling at a middle school, similar to what he did years before becoming a minister. In addition, he heads an inner-city and foreign-missions program he founded using money from the accident settlement.
While Real Pro Wrestling is not intended as a non-profit venture, Rev. Willis said: “Making money isn’t the prime objective for Toby. He wants to get recognition for these athletes. It’s part of his worldview. Toby wants to give back to a sport that has been good to us as a family, with scholarships and a passion for us to share.”
Rulon Gardner, a 2000 Olympic gold medalist in Greco-Roman wrestling, agrees.
“Wrestling has meant so much to me that however I can help this project I will, “said Gardner, who is an analyst on the telecasts. “We need to get people involved, to raise public opinion in favor of our sport.
“On one hand, we’re trying to show moves that have existed for thousands of years. On the other hand, we’re trying to give a boost to our current Olympic wrestlers. Our national team money is so little it’s embarrassing.”
Each competitor in Real Pro Wrestling received $7,000 for participating, and $250,000 in prize money is awarded to winners in seven weight categories, Toby Willis said.
If the first season succeeds, he envisions investors and team owners joining to build the league into multiple hometown arenas “with thousands of fans at matches that can become live telecasts.”
Risky business
While all of that is wishful thinking for now, Willis said, “There are a million talented wrestlers out there making no money . . . as talented as athletes in other sports, but getting zero.”
He and his peers view what has been billed for years as professional wrestling as dramatic entertainment and acrobatics without legitimate competition. But Willis insists he is not blaming the popularity of that endeavor for his sport’s struggles.
“We’ve been our own worst enemies, “he said. “I’m trying to get wrestling off welfare.”
Even the sport’s strongest advocates see Willis’ venture as risky, following others that have failed. But they concede that he is committing more time, research and money than any predecessors.
Chicagoan Wayne Gerenstein knows the obstacles all too well. In the late 1980s, the former Elmwood Park High School teacher and wrestling coach left that career and invested his pension in a fledgling National Wrestling League similar to Real Pro Wrestling.
“I wanted to be the George Halas of pro wrestling, “quipped Gerenstein, invoking the name of the founder of the Bears and NFL pioneer. “I read everything I could get my hands on about forming new sports leagues.”
He was adept enough to raise $500,000, establish teams in eight cities, including Chicago, and stage “seven or eight events, “he recalled. The league fell apart because “the guy who committed corporate money came up about $6 million short, “Gerenstein said. “It was a gross misrepresentation.”
In 1988 and 1989, as he struggled to keep his project afloat, “I aged about 10 years, “he said. “At first it was a labor of love. But it became a nightmare. I lost everything I owned, and it destroyed my credit rating.”
Gerenstein, 53, turned his lessons into financing. He now helps businesses find funding sources. He has discussed Willis’ and Case’s project with them.
“They definitely have a better chance than I did when I threw my $30,000 into my dream, “Gerenstein said. “They have the money, staying power and Internet marketing skills I didn’t have.
“My assessment is I wouldn’t have done what I did if I didn’t believe there was an audience for it. I had seen it. When I was a high school coach, I saw 10,000 to 20,000 fans at wrestling finals in Champaign. I wanted to tap into that fan base as a start, then grow into a more general contact-sport audience.
“I just ran out of resources before I ever had a chance to test my strategy.”
Sense of purpose
Willis and Case saw the same fan base as athletes in the sport. Although Toby Willis and his siblings were home-schooled, he took enough courses at Morgan Park High School to wrestle there and become the 1988 Illinois 155-pound champion, the first state champion from the Chicago Public League in eight years. The next one did not emerge until this year, when Travis Hammons of Hubbard won at 160.
Though Willis competed as a member of Morgan Park’s team, his home schooling meant he needed to get his diploma by taking the General Educational Development tests.
“I got into Northwestern with a GED, “Willis recalled with a smile. “I guess you could say our family has always taken the path less traveled.”
He said that sustains his confidence in Real Pro Wrestling.
“It’s a challenge, a big one, “said Ken Kraft, former Northwestern athletic director and wrestling coach. “I truly hope this goes. It would be great for the sport. A critical element is TV outreach and revenue.”
Kraft has been associated with attempts to expand wrestling’s space on the sports landscape, including organized competition for high school and college athletes. But collegiate programs have been cut drastically, among the first sports dropped due to financial struggles to accommodate Title IX requirements for greater inclusion of women’s sports.
“The question is whether enough Americans will accept any sporting activity that doesn’t involve a ball, “said Mike Chapman, founder of the International Wrestling Institute and Museum, the sport’s showcase in Newton, Iowa. “Can a combative sport ever make it on a mass-market level?
“I think this is the best shot I’ve seen for wrestling in 50 years.”
As Toby Willis counts down to his project launch, he recalls the hours he spent baby-sitting brothers Ben and Joe two days before their deaths. Then, he remembers, he consoled his mother when she agonized that all the time she had spent as her children’s teacher was in vain.
“One day, she’s teaching six kids. Next day, they’re gone, “Willis recalled. “I told her, `No, mom, it wasn’t in vain. You finished your task.'”
Brenda Willis also is home-schooling their eight children, with a ninth on the way.
“Three days before the freeway accident, “Toby Willis said, “I told my wife, `Something big is going to happen. I don’t know if it’s good or bad.’
“Some people have said our family is sustained by faith. But it is not blind faith. We have read all the tragedies in the Bible, and we don’t discount the supernatural. If we’re just a product of chance, if there’s no supernatural, there’s no reason to do right and not to do wrong.”
In light of the accident and settlement, he said: “I tried to decide what I could do for the rest of my life. I couldn’t sit on the beach and eat bonbons.”
He calls Real Pro Wrestling “my attempt to take something tragic and make something worthwhile out of it. Hopefully, I have deep enough pockets to last. This is a worthy cause.”
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