Billy Jack Has Done It All
Billy Jack's 1983 debut on World Class Championship Wrestling sees the Oregon lumberjack with the Adrienne Barbeau do go up against Mighty Joe Turner, whom he finishes with a full nelson. (Has anyone else noticed how I've taken a shine to the phrase "go up against"?) Jack, 6'3", 245#, became Billy Jack Haynes only after Tom Laughlin (of the Billy Jack movies) threatened to sue him. He was a face for the majority of his career in the 1980s, eventually turning heel. He spoke out early (1992) against Vince McMahon and the WWF. Later, he got into some trouble as a cocaine mule (though he believed, he says, he was transporting only marijuana), running foul of the big guys for skimming off their profits and getting himself pretty badly busted up as a result.
I loved this man. Career too short, too few matches. I think he had a legitimate beef with the WWE. Another wrestler it just didn't know how to use intelligently or appreciate properly.
ReplyDelete383 matches are too few?. Maybe he just didn't make TV often enough for me.
ReplyDeleteI was checking his stats at Cagematch. I think if I could use a time machine (or find YouTube videos) I'd go back to his 1986-7 matches against Hercules Hernandez and Iron Mike Sharpe. How did the ring stay standing with all that muscled beefcake?
1 Hercules 47 14 29.8. 23 48.9. 10 21.3
ReplyDelete25 Iron Mike Sharpe 6 5 83.3. 1 16.7 0 0.0