Growing up in the Charlotte, NC area, I've been a wrestling fan all my life. I grew up on the weekly NWA exploits of Ric Flair and the Four Horsemen, Dusty Rhodes, Magnum TA, Nikita Koloff and all those guys. As I got older, I watched wrestling less and less, but have always enjoyed the entertainment value, and the sheer athleticism that some of those guys have.
I remember watching a new show called ECW some years ago, and it was a one-hour program featuring a bunch of guys who had been fired from the major promotions or were up and coming wrestlers. One of the first ECW shows I ever saw was a match between Eddie Guerrero and Dean Malenko, neither of whom I had ever seen before. This was a best of three falls match, and it took the entire broadcast. These two guys performed the most amazing aerial moves, combined with incredible mat wrestling, holds and counter-holds that I had ever seen. For a solid 45 minutes these two guys fought like cats & dogs, bouncing around the ring with incredible energy, landing moves with incredible precision, and generally entertaining the living hell out of the audience, both live and broadcast.
I was hooked. I was immediately a fan, and when Eddie moved to WCW and then to WWE, I always enjoyed watching his matches, and his mic skills were unsurpassed. He had the ability to manipulate a crowd into living him one minute and hating him the next. It was a joy to watch him work a crowd.
I've watched wrestling all my life, and I'm not at all ashamed to say that. There have been three nights that I have watched wrestling that have brought tears to my eyes. The first was the night after Owen Hart fell to his death in a stupid stunt entering the ring. The second was a live broadcast where Ric Flair returned to wrestling after a REAL forced retirement after some disagreements with management. The third was tonight. WWE Raw tonight was a tribute show to Eddie Guerrero, who was found dead in his hotel room yesterday morning. As yet no other information is available about his death, but it isn't outside the realm of speculation to think that the drug and alcohol problems he faced thoughout his life caught up to him and may have caused an early heart attack. That's just my guess, based on what I know about the effects of drug abuse on the body, and the fact that Eddie had been clean and sober for the past several years.
Raw was a tribute, and I only caught the last hour, but it was amazing. I watched Sean Michaels put over Rey Mysterio Jr. in a singles match. I watched Ric Flair get a clean pinfall on Steven Regal, but the thing that got me the most were the testimonials. When you look at some of these guys like Batista, who's something like 7' and 300+ pounds and they are just sobbing because they have lost one of their best friends, it can't help but touch you. And deeply. These guys, who we usually only see through their personas and muscles and machismo, went on camera tonight in what they call in the business a shoot, or a real-life interview. And they said goodbye to their friend. And they weren't ashamed of the tears they shed for the man that they loved and respected. And I'm not ashamed of the tears I shed tonight for the man who entertained me so much with the obvious love he brought to his craft.
Adios, Eddie. Viva la Raza, mi amigo.
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