Johnny Walker
116 Cant Stop
San Antonio, TX 78202
https://www.angelfire.com/ny2/Lansky2000/index.html
lansky2005@aol.com
https://www.angelfire.com/ny2/Lansky2000/index.html
lansky2005@aol.com
(This is a compilation of a series of interviews conducted with Broadway Turk Superstar, punk rock cult legend of the 80's in NYC and underground wrestling star of the 90's in San Antonio TX. Superstar expressed his views of different topics and revealed his plans for the IWA for Y2K+.)
Your career spans over two and a half decades if we don't count your underground background of the 70's. Isn't it late in the game to be planning a comeback?
This is a changing world we live in. Society, particularly the Baby Boomers, is graying and it's taken a new perspective on life. Nowadays it's common to see fiftysomethings racing around tracks across the country. You had George Foreman in boxing, you've got Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair in wrestling, you've got In Juh Soo in Kuk Sool Won. The list goes on and on. I'm a vampire myself. I'll go on until about 200.
You still consider yourself the Butler Street Hardcore Wrestling Champion.
Right. I started the club back when we were kids and didn't know what hardcore wrestling was. It was during the Sammartino Era in NYC and we swore it was all real. We started out on a 20x20 patch of concrete in front of the fire exit of the Cobble Hill Theatre in Brooklyn. We built a backyard ring at 18 Butler Street where the 4x4 posts still stand. We later moved on to the Columbia Boxing Club on the waterfront. I got beaten quite a few times on concrete but made my bones in the backyard. Since then I've never been beaten. There's a tough kid named Hector Merced who I'm going to invite for a match. His brother, Ray Merced, wrestled in a backyard show way back when. Hector's the only one in the neighborhood I can think of who is worthy to step into my boots.
You spent a year in American Scorpion karate before detouring into punk rock.
The late John Pineda brought me into the discipline and I moved up the ranks pretty quick, as I usually do. I won second place in an inter-school competition after the finals match I was involved in degenerated into a fist fight. I next entered the Mas Oyama world tournament at the Felt Forum and got jobbed by a home referee just like the first one. I left the Scorpions after that and resumed my Butler Street Martial Arts Club but, like you said, the punk rock stage was waiting.
It seemed ironic that you left your punk band, the Spoiler, and made your way into pro wrestling after meeting Spoiler II.
Paul Trigo had been in the business for a long time and used the hood gimmick to keep his professional life separate from his private life. He was a trucker by trade and had a mutual friend who introduced us. He was a feared shooter, and I think I would've fared much better training under him than by going in with Savage Anguiano. Yet, as they say, the Lord works in mysterious ways.
You make lots of references to shootists and how they ruin the game for newcomers.
First of all, let's remember that pro wrestling has its roots in the circus. All the terminology is from back in the day. Most people in the business pride themselves in their knowledge of rasslin' craft. These are hardcore believers in the P.T. Barnum philosophy. They bring you in and tell you all this stuff about taking care of the other guy, protecting the business, and next thing you know you have someone in there trying to take your head off. If I would've known what I know now, some people's careers would have been ended quite some time ago. I'd go as far as to say that half the guys in the business can't fight and they're glad that you're taught not to fight back.
You've changed your perspective quite a bit over the years.
They say hindsight is 20/20. I had some private dealings with Manny Villalobos and I heard him say behind my back he would've liked to get me back in the ring again. I certainly would enjoy that opportunity. The Texas Wrestling Association mollycoddled him throughout his reign as champion. He wouldn't enjoy that luxury in the IWA. The Biker was another guy who depended on his stepfather, Jackie Moy, when he was bullying everyone at the Valadez Arena in SA. If he was ever in a real shoot he wouldn't know what hit him. Ken Johnson was another guy who liked taking runs at fans and talking trash in the local saloons. I never saw him do anything but jobs when he went to the WWF. Same with Rudy Gonzalez. The only other guy out of SA who ever amounted to anything was Tully Blanchard, and where is he now?
You don't have a lot of good things to say about Shawn Michaels, the only world champ from SA. What is there to say? The guy retired from the WWF and came home to roost in SA. He bought a piece of a cowboy nightclub on I-35 and started a spinoff of the TWA. They ripped a bunch of kids of for a few grand, which he proceeded to shove up his nose. The promotion and the wrestling school folded, and he went back to the WWF and got placed on drug rehab. Next he goes to Houston and joins an evangelical church, telling everyone he's 'born again'. Only I see him on TV with the NWO. You show me where he's born again. Maybe he should go back to SA and give some of those jabronis of his some refunds. Or help Marty Jannetty's career get born again. You've said that the IWA is the last hope for American wrestling. Definitely. There's no respect for pro wrestling at all these days. The day of the Verne Gagnes, the Theszes and the Briscoes is long gone. You have Kurt Angle, who has no chance of ever showing fans what true wrestling is about. Wrestling needs to go back to the basics, back on the mat where it all begins. Missouri, with its rich amateur background, is an ideal nurturing ground. We can get the kids who are interested in pursuing a pro career and build on their amateur experience. If the fans were able to see true wrestling skill beneath all the hype, we'd have so much more credibility. It'd be a 180-degree turnaround from sports entertainment, but I really think American wrestling would be all the better for it.