Go figure-four
MASKS, CHAIRS NOT ALLOWED
By John Ryan
Mercury News
Our head is spinning. We grew up in the glow of baseball’s purity, and now we don’t know where to turn.
But wait. There’s something new, something real, to restore our faith.
Pro wrestling.
Pro wrestling?
Pro wrestling.
“What makes our league different from all the other leagues out there is we have a zero-tolerance policy for any performance-enhancing drugs, foul language, showboating and bad behavior,” said Chris Chickering, VP of marketing for Real Pro Wrestling.
Again we ask: Pro wrestling? What in the name of Sergeant Slaughter is going on here?
The circuit makes its TV debut on PAX with a one-hour show at 4 p.m. Sunday, the start of a seven-part series featuring 56 wrestlers on eight teams who battled during a tournament in October. (Reruns will air on Fox Sports Net.) Borrowing from the format of the boxing reality show “The Contender,” it highlights personal stories from each athlete. It’s an introduction to what promoters hope will be a league that will begin in 2006, perhaps with a live tour.
That it’s on PAX, the family channel, is no accident. The idea comes from Toby Willis, a former Northwestern University wrestler who is contributing equal parts passion and money. In 1994, six of Willis’ eight siblings were killed when a van driven by their father, a Chicago minister, caught fire from a piece of roadway debris. The accident uncovered a scandal involving truck drivers obtaining their licenses through bribery, and it resulted in a $100 million settlement for the family.
Now the proud father of eight children, with a ninth on the way, Willis is taking a proud-parent attitude with the league as well. He’s providing the foundation. But eventually it will have to stand on its own with more investors.
The 56 wrestlers competed for about $250,000 in prizes. That’s one reason the biggest names on the circuit are announcers, spokesmen or coaches: Olympic champion Rulon Gardner, legendary coach Dan Gable and, close to home, Olympian and former Independence High star Eric Guerrero.
But if Willis’ project — four years in the making — comes to full fruition, Olympic wrestlers won’t have to rely on pile-drivers and chair-smashing to continue their careers. But he isn’t such a purist that he dismisses current pro wrestling. He enjoys some of it, actually, and plans to borrow some production techniques. He’ll just ditch the risque and family-unfriendly storylines.
Here’s an odd concept: reality TV with people doing what they really do in real life.
“You’ve got shows where people get voted off the island,” Willis said. “Nothing against those shows, but why not take the world’s best athletes, throw them into the world’s premier sport and have them toss each other off the island?”
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