How I Became A Pro Wrestling Fan

In this edition of The Wrestling Estate roundtable, we answer the age-old question: “How I Became a Pro Wrestling Fan.”

How did you become a wrestling fan?

John Corrigan: I was watching Street Sharks on Channel 48 in Philly on a Saturday night, and when the next show began, it was a gruff sounding guy with a towel over his head threatening the screen. “Beat me if you can, survive if I let you.” Then came a flurry of images showing flaming tables and crazy stunts. I was hooked.

Sam Gladen: I was friends with a guy when I was 10 years old who was a massive fan. He bought SummerSlam 2005. We watched it together and I was hooked.

Steven Jackson: I became a wrestling fan in 1999 after my older cousins began talking about it so I began watching it. We didn’t have satellite TV, so I watched WCW on terrestrial UK TV and was instantly enthralled.

Chad Gelfand: My first memory of wrestling is my brother giving me his action figures when I was 3 or 4 years old and it feels like wrestling has been part of my life ever since then.

Jack Goodwillie: The story goes that my parents, more specifically my mom, forbid me and my brother from watching wrestling due to the violence, even though I was always intrigued by my friends’ wrestling video games and action figures. One day, I was channel surfing and saw a SmackDown promo with Paul Bearer and The Undertaker.

The next week, my brother and I caught it again and left it on. We saw The Undertaker wrestle some guy named John Cena and became instant Cena fans, which is partially why Cena is one of the most organic stars of his time. They just don’t make ’em like that anymore. We liked what we saw so much, we convinced our mom to order us and our friends The Great American Bash that Sunday night. I’ve been hooked ever since.

When did you learn pro wrestling is predetermined?

Corrigan: Wait…what!?

Gladen: Probably my freshman year of high school. I got access to a Hulu account so I started watching RAW and SmackDown. A friend of mine said who would be winning a match on a Wednesday that would be taking place on Friday…I didn’t believe her. But she was right. Then she showed me where she found the spoiler.

Jackson: I can’t remember. Probably when I found Gerweck.Net and began reading “backstage news.” That’s where I found out about booking and pre-determined decisions.

Gelfand: It was sometime in 2005 or 2006 and The Undertaker was basically controlling lightning with his mind and for whatever reason, that was the straw that broke the suspension of disbelief.

Goodwillie: Somewhere around two years in. I used to play a browser-based MMORPG called NoDQArena, which derived its name from the wrestling news website of the same name. By the way, shoutout to Aaron Rift, Jeff Meachem and all the guys over there. As I started to browse around the site, I noticed that SmackDown had “spoilers.” It never occurred to me the show wasn’t live (and I didn’t really care). Meanwhile, there were other stories around the site that led me to believe there were wrestling insiders like in football and basketball, such as an exclusive interview with Kazarian discussing his decision to sign with WWE.

A year or two later, I went to my first set of SmackDown and ECW tapings in Reading, PA and the Major Brothers, who had just become Hawkins & Ryder, had to retape their entrance not once, not twice, but three times. People had the shits of it by the end, and “We’re in the Middle of It” wore out its welcome. That played a factor in the conclusion I came to, but so too did the whole setup of the show. Something reeked. It felt like things were “too perfect,” and don’t get me wrong, I’d had my suspicions all along, but that was the first time I pieced the puzzle together, in terms of how matches and segments are laid out, etc.

Did you wrestle with your friends growing up?

Corrigan: Absolutely. We wrestled for real from like second grade through sixth grade, just beating the shit out of each other. I have a scar from being spinebustered on some kind of toy that busted my back open. As we got older, we finally learned to “work.”

Gladen: Nope. My friends and I weren’t big on acting it out for ourselves. We preferred to watch it done by the professionals.

Jackson: No, because they were more into football or just not interested. I mimicked John Cena and Randy Savage a lot at home with my Mum and sister. Many of wrestling’s more unique quotes are now part of our own family banter (Iron Sheik, to name one haha).

Gelfand: Yes, when I was little, but mostly with my brother. That’s how I found out the Walls of Jericho is painful as hell for a shoot.

Goodwillie: Yep! My little brother and I used to wrestle in the basement, blast Nu-Metal out of our iPod player and come down the basement steps for our entrances. My theme was “Superstar II” by Saliva because it sounded a little reminiscent of Batista’s theme. Then we would have sleepovers, and do the same thing with our friends, while simultaneously playing Legends of Wrestling II and SmackDown: Shut Your Mouth and then flipping it over to TNA iMPACT! after midnight.

My brother and I would also test moves on each other, and one time he tried to get me up for a Pump Handle Slam, but he ended up slamming me right on my clavicle, shattering it to bits. It’s the only broken bone I’ve ever had, and if you think it made us think twice about wrestling, think again. We invested in a trampoline instead.

If so, what was your favorite move to do?

Corrigan: The superkick, a flying elbow off the couch and the Walls of Jericho. On the other hand, I took a backdrop and tore my meniscus.

Jackson: Move wise, I always loved doing the Randy Savage elbow drop and axe handles off the couches onto the cushions…I still love it really!

Gelfand: I liked jumping off of things, but I never learned how to do a flip so doing a frog splash or an elbow drop were my favorites.

Goodwillie: I love my submission holds. The Boston Crab is such a great move because as we learned as kids, it can actually be a painful maneuver, particularly if you can get a knee on the back. When I finally figured out the Sharpshooter, that was a great day for me. On the trampoline where I could get some leverage, I also had a mean, but totally safe, German suplex to a sit-out uranage.

How did you get involved in writing about pro wrestling?

Corrigan: I wrote one-off pieces for various sites as a kid, but when I joined Temple University’s newspaper, I pitched a pro wrestling column. It took until senior year for the green light, and the staff quickly realized it was a great idea because my pieces, such as interviews with Gabe Sapolsky, Bill Apter and Nigel McGuinness, drew tons of traffic.

Gladen: I took a chance and sent an email to The Wrestling Estate.

Jackson: Many years ago, I was an avid watcher and listener of Eric Santamaria’s “The Wrestling Roundtable” and wrote a few pieces for it and on the message board. Then, I was asked to join “Pro Wrestling Powerhouse.” But due to university and personal commitments, I couldn’t continue. But in 2018, The Wrestling Estate began following me. I read the available articles and loved the platform. I was between jobs and had some free time, so I thought let’s give this a try. Messaged via Twitter I had an article idea, wrote it up and the rest is (as they say) history.

Gelfand: I remember wanting to write about wrestling for a while and then one day after discovering this very site I decided to go for it with my first article in 2018 making the case for a Kofi Kingston WWE Championship reign, which has aged spectacularly.

Goodwillie: While I enjoyed U.S. history quite a bit in my younger years (and still do), the English component came very natural to me. While many would complain about the classic five-paragraph essay, I always saw it as an opportunity to speak my mind and transfer what’s actually on my mind onto paper. I had a really cool Professional Writing I teacher in 11th grade as well. He liked my stuff and got me into a KYW/Philly Media six-week course on Temple’s campus where there would be keynote speakers, tours of all the major news mediums in the city and we would even get to produce our own 30-second news radio bit.

At the same time, I’d go onto sites like NoDQ and WrestleZone and think, “I can do what they’re doing. I wonder what it pays?” Meeting Mark Whited through a mutual friend at Temple also helped. Mark got me writing for Wrestledelphia.com, which is how I connected with John Corrigan. All of that sort segues into the genesis of this very site, so that’s a very cool thing to be a part of.

Have you ever fallen out of love with wrestling?

Corrigan: Nope. I’ve stopped watching WWE, but there isn’t a week that’s gone by over the past 21 years that I haven’t watched some form of pro wrestling.

Gladen: Absolutely. That happens for any passion. You stop for a bit, but the good shit always brings you back.

Jackson: If you read my “Speaking Out” article, that’s the closest I’ve come to leaving behind my fandom.

Gelfand: I don’t think I’ve ever fully fallen out of love with wrestling, but there have been periods where I watched way less of it. The first lull in my wrestling watching came after Chris Benoit’s double murder-suicide and the second one is when I started college.

Goodwillie: I haven’t. Sure, sometimes I’ll lose interest, but I can never fall out of love with wrestling. It’s a big part of the person I became as an adult, weird as it is to say. But I’m always going to follow it, always going to comment on it and if it ever sucks to the point I can’t watch it anymore, I’ll always have my old tapes, DVDs and files to go back to. And when it’s done well, there’s no form of entertainment in the world that can compare.

Why do you still watch today?

Corrigan: I’ve invested too much time to turn back now. Although I must confess that I definitely don’t watch as much as I used to. AEW Dynamite is the only show I watch with any regularity. However, going to live events like the indies has certainly kept my passion strong. Plus, I’ve been enjoying IWTV and the Wrestling Legends Network.

Gladen: The characters, the stories and the spectacle. There is nothing as entertaining or enthralling as a great wrestling match.

Jackson: I love professional wrestling. It grabbed me like nothing else ever has. It is a special art form which brings a community of people together who (regardless of race, religious views or gender) can instantly connect.

Gelfand: Wrestling is just ingrained in my life at this point whether it’s AEW, WWE, Impact or the indies. I’m always going to have a love for wrestling. When it’s bad, it’s the worst thing on television, but when it’s great, it gives you a feeling like no other form of entertainment can give.

Goodwillie: Because the stars of tomorrow when I was a kid are the folks running the game today. Check out the 2009 Ring of Honor roster if you’re not sure what I’m getting at. It seemed clear as crystal guys like Bryan Danielson would have successful careers, but to see the heights he’s reached, I can’t help but be over the moon for guys like that. Today’s stars are the payoff to everything I watched in my impressionable years. The product? Not so much, but 90% of the WWE’s wounds are self-inflicted, so it’s tough to feel too bad.