Reported by Adam Martin of WrestleView.com
On Friday, August 11, 2006 at 10:50 PM EST

In Your Head sent in the following recap:

IYH can be heard live every Wednesday at 6:00 PM Eastern with your hosts Jack, OneInchBiceps and Barbie Richards and all our archived interviews free at www.inyourheadonline.com.


Jack : Welcome to In Your Head



Ian Rotten : Thanks guys for having me.



Jack : How you doin’ man?



Ian Rotten : Pretty Good.



Jack : Cool.. You got a big show coming up for Pro Wrestling Unplugged August 19th, Fahrenheit show.



www.prowrestlingunplugged.com

www.capitollegends.com

www.superstarbillygraham.com



Ian Rotten : Yeah, it will be an opportunity for people to see what’s been increasingly a more violent feud each time it occurs. This is about the 3rd time in my career I’ve wind up feuding with Corporal over something and each time it gets worse and worse. I don’t know if you can say it gets worse because the first time he almost died. But the violence level each time, we keep taking it up a notch and this time, its panes of glass. Taipei Death, and steal cage and you know every imaginable object to cut someone and shred someone that there is.



Jack : Did you realize he was hurt so bad in that match where he almost died?



Ian Rotten : Oh yeah.. He was squirting blood into the 3rd row. I mean he didn’t realize he was hurt so bad. I mean he was literally soaking like a 11, 12 year old kid with a white t-shirt on in blood. I mean every time his heart pumped it sprayed, the cut was just above the temple and it was just pouring. We’ve had some pretty bad incidents happen in our ten year running of things but the thing with Corporal ranks up there as far as nasty stuff. We’ve had Mitch Page lose half the side of his head from a Grandfather clock. Had a kid named Richard X get 3rd degree burns on his body from a flaming table. When he hit it, it looked like it exploded. But I mean, Corporal’s, I would say from just sheer blood loss was the worse, I mean it was just pouring out. Every time his heart made a beat it sprayed and the thing was, it wasn’t a bad cut



Jack : It was because where it was.



Ian Rotten : Yeah it was a hole at the temple but every time it nicked that artery in his temple and every time his heart beat it would spray. I put my hand over the top of his head to trying cut it off and my white tape was covered in his blood. Just poring everywhere.



Jack : Yeah. That’s pretty bad.



Jack : What is the worst injury you have received in the ring?



Ian Rotten : Just about a year ago I got a skull fracture that almost retired me. I guess you could say it was my stubbornness of going to doctor to doctor to doctor to find one to tell me “Oh you will be alright". It worked out for me but I really thought I was finished because I’d stand up and fall down and couldn’t do anything that was physical. I couldn’t ride a bike or couldn’t wrestle around with my children, couldn’t do anything like that because I would lose my balance. My equibrelium was totally gone. I had a bruise on my brain from it and which was at the time was probably my 23rd or 24th concussion. They put a the chair on the floor and then my head then a chair on top of it and then double stomped off the ring apron.



OIB : Ahhhhh.... gosh..



Ian Rotten : Yeah, [laughing] it was just absolutely brutal. I faded to black almost immediately. One of the few times I have been knocked out in wrestling. It was pretty scary because I couldn’t do nothing. Every doctor I went to said the next blow to your head you, even though its not from that (Parkinsons), that would all tell that you could be talking like Muhammad Ali if you get another blow to the head. I was like it’s going to be Parkinson Disease? The doctors here in Louisville like to bring up Ali when it comes to not being able to put your words together and things like that. I have great respect for them because I felt I use to be a lot more articulate and things and even do better promos and all that stuff. Now a lot of times it takes me a second to get put my words together and my thoughts together.

I definitely say that and Corporal Robinson gave me a double stomp off an18 foot balcony through a table and dislocated my hip in Milwaukee. It was suppose to be a splash but his ass chickened out and he double stomped me and as soon as I we hit the ground I just felt my hip just blow out.



Jack : So you got to stay away from the double stomps?



Ian Rotten : Yeah the double stomp is a bitch. I guess J C Bailey is the only one that takes care of me on those things.



Jack : Someone here in our chat room, Riren, he wants to know your thoughts on the future of Tyler Black.



Ian Rotten : Tyler’s an incredible athlete and has a great future ahead of him I just don’t think he wrestles enough for us. Sometimes he misses dates because he wrestles other places that aren’t going to be as beneficial for him as IWA. I think give him another year or two, I’m sure Gable will swipe him up and you will see him in Ring of Honor. He is an incredible athlete.



Jack : Earlier you mentioned a Grandfather clock in a match. Was that something you guys had planned out or is it something like a fan brought to the arena?



Ian Rotten : No, Pondo’s dumb ass bought it a yard sale. What had happened is, years and years ago when IWA first started, Pondo did a match involving rubbing alcohol. He was wrestling a guy named Ox Harley and the guy threw him into the pit. Like you would see in a movie where a guy would go down the bar and Ponders mouth was open and he ate a mouthful of rubbing alcohol and since then he cant stand the smell of rubbing alcohol, meaning its Ponder’s kryptonite.

If anything is Ponder’s kryptonite it is rubbing alcohol and in the match before that, we had used rubbing alcohol and it was still on the ring and stuff and Pondo got a whiff of it and needed to end the match quickly and they wanted to do what they needed to do to end the match and Pondo hit him with the clock and it looked like, I mean literally the side of Mitch’s head comes off. It looked like his ear was hanging but it wasn’t his ear it was really the side of his head.



Jack : Man !



OIB : Yikes !



Ian Rotten : Samoa Joe is always saying “Hey Mitch Paige, ever get your side of your head back together."

Man the brains were all hangin’ out but man it was crazy stuff.



Jack : Anything like that a fan brought that you thought was like too crazy to use?



Ian Rotten : Sometimes fans bring shit with the intention I think of seeing us get hurt. At Tournament of Death a couple of years ago, Pondo had taken a bump on his pencils, that is just lead poisoning waiting to happen. People have brought very thick sheets of glass and things like that and I wonder what the hell they’re thinking.

Really, most of the time there’s not a weapon I can’t use in some form or fashion. The fan might not like the form or fashion I use it in. They might have wanted to see a full swing with it going over someone’s head or something like that. You might not be able to use it in that fashion. There is really not too many weapons that you can’t use.



In the old K-Mart days of IWA we use to have North Bullock County High on one side and South Bullock County High on the other and I guess these guys would spend all day in shop class and metal class and stuff like that just making shit for wrestling all week. Me and Pondo used metal mace balls that they made and I mean we have used some stupid shit but the real thick panes of glass that people can bring can really just f*** someone up. It’s just dumb shit. Most of the time you pick it up and drop it accidentally if you know what I mean.



Jack & OIB : Yeah, right right.



Ian Rotten : And sometimes it don’t even break!



[laughter]



OIB : T-Money from our message board, he has a question. He wants to know how did you come to form IWA mid south?



Ian Rotten : I moved to Louisville in ’94, ‘95 and I started a hot line and stuff like that and people would call me every Tuesday night after the USWA show with Jerry Lawler and Jerry Jarrat’s group. They would go “Man this just sucks. I would do anything to go see some of the ECW stuff" and things like that. After literally 8, 9 months my hotline would be completely full of people just bitching about Lawlers’s product. I thought, well hey there is defiantly a market for it. People want to see it, so lets try it. First show we drew 99 people. Next show we drew a little bit more than that and the next show we drew a little bit more than that. By thanksgiving we were up over 300. We were doing real well until the Athletic Commission in Kentucky started all their stupid shit. Then we eventually had to move it to Indiana. Basically it started up from fans in the area wanting something different without wanting to see the same shit every week. USWA one night had 6 matches on the card and 5 of them ended in a schoolboy. If I was a paying a fan, which you know I was for several years before I broke into the wrestling business, I don’t want to see 5 out of 6 matches ending in schoolboy and the 6th one was a disqualification. So, I mean people wanted to see other finishes and they wanted back the olden days of methods which you know was one of the coolest territories there was with the blood and guts and concession stand brawls and all that good shit.



Jack : You mentioned about being a wrestling fan before you got into wrestling. What was it like when you got to like tag with Abdullah the Butcher?



Ian Rotten : Abby was real cool to tag with but you know the big was when I got to team with Dusty. You know Dusty was the reason why I wanted to become a wrestler. I grew up on the east coast and when my parents got divorced my Dad moved to Florida and that was the first time that I saw Dusty and I was there for all kind of shit. I was then for when Superstar Billy Graham beat Bruno in the arena which was the centre for the WWF title.



Jack : Who will be on the show after you by the way.



Ian Rotten : Who will be?



Jack : Superstar Billy Graham.



Ian Rotten : Oh great guy. Absolutely fantastic guy. I got to meet him at a Toys-R-Us figure signing that he had during Wrestlemania weekend and absolutely great guy. You guys will have a fantastic time with that.

Getting to team with Dusty and getting teamed with Terry Funk and Abdullah, all those great hard-core guys was an absolute pleasure to do but you know, Dusty was the one that, you know, I truly felt, no matter what if I never ever go to Wresltlemania as a wrestler, I had my Wrestlemania with that guy. When somebody is your hero and stuff you just pray to god that their not an asshole and he was absolutely great except for his Yankee sandwich but we cant hold that against everybody……….. Absolute pleasure to deal with and be with and made my career complete. Addy is a different breed of individual but definitely was fun to team with.



Jack : Somebody in here in our chat room, Goodbadugly Man he wants to know if you have a good rib story



Ian Rotten : Yeah… we have a really good rib that’s not my rib but I have stolen it and used it over time and time again and the funny thing is it comes from Gary Young. Do you remember who that guy is?



Jack : Oh yeah,



Ian Rotten : We were wrestling in this place in Dallas called Big D Championship wrestling and Gary Young told this kid he needed him to get juiced and he said I don’t know how to do that and Gary said I already made the blade and it is a very special blade so you cant hurt yourself or anything like that and until you’re ready to do it don’t touch the blade but when you’re read to do it squeeze the blade real hard.. Squeeze the tape real hard and the blade will come out and you will be ready to go ahead. So the time comes and of all people it’s Bradshaw that is hitting him in the head with a chair and Bradshaw hits him in the head with a chair and you see the kid go down and he is down there forever. Nothing nothing.. nothing.. nothing.. and he comes back up and Bradshaw hits him in the head again and nothing nothing.. nothing.. nothing... Finally this kid has taken the tape and rubs his head so much he has rubbed it raw and it has starts bleeding. He comes back after the match and he is like “I don’t know my brother I don’t understand why I couldn’t get it to do more than this I kept trying and I didn’t feel nothing sharp" and Gary goes.. Ahhhhhhh I gave you the wrong one that one didn’t even have a blade in it". So he just gave him rolled up tape [laughing] and he just rubbed his head eventually back and forth with electrical tape enough to make his head bleed. Since that time I have done that rib, I don’t know, probably15 guys with guys that are juicing. The best thing was…..



Jack : Did Bradshaw know beforehand?



Ian Rotten : No.



Jack : Because he is probably getting pretty mad.



Ian Rotten : [laughing] He didn’t know about the joke at all. Yeah, the second chair shot he walloped the shit out of him.



[laughing]



Ian Rotten : One of the funniest ones we did that to this kid in IWA and afterwards we all come back and it was like me, Bull Pain, Axle, Doug Gilbert all screaming at this guy. “We just asked you to do this one little thing the crowd was so hot and you F**** blew it, you took all the heals heat away" and all this other stuff and I mean tears were welling up in his eyes and I was like, you know what would have F**** really helped there and he said “What?"…. “If there had been a blade in that tape" and you see the guys absolutely relief that it was joke and it went from a moment of crying to sheer happiness..



Jack : We have to bring up too that Hayabusa is going to be on the Pro Wrestling Unplugged show.



Ian Rotten : Is he?



Jack : Yes they just announced that.



Ian Rotten : I am impressed the shit by that!



Jack : I think Tod Gordon just announced that. It was the big announcement Tuesday



Ian Rotten : Wow no wonder I cant get no more money there. I am just kidding they pay me great.



Jack : I don’t know if he will be billed as a wrestler or not. He can’t wrestle anymore can he?



Ian Rotten : I don’t think so that’s why I was even more impressed by that.



OIB : I think he is doing something like a musical performance or something like that.



Ian Rotten : Hell whatever he is doing I mean it’s a great opportunity for the fans in Philadelphia to show up to just get his autograph.



Jack : Yeah definitely. What do you think about Tod Gordon. Do you think he doesn’t get enough credit for ECW’s success?



Ian Rotten : Oh definitely. The man gave everything he had and the thing about Tod is, Tod was always honest and upfront with me. Paul you know he was lying because his lips were moving. Tod was always upfront, honest. I mean the night I quit I went up to Tod… I was like “Tod I gotta get more money" and he said “yeah I know, bit it’s not my company anymore, I can’t help you. You gotta go to Paul." By that time the HHG Corporation and all that stuff.

Tod always told me that “If I had another company that was doing this and that I would be more than happy to have you in". Pretty much as soon as he took over, booking with PWU, he called me. So I mean he was always been upfront with and a good guy and I think that if anyone got shafted huge by Paul it was definitely Tod. Especially since that thing was his baby, it was his start. Paul is always the one that gets credit for it but a lot of fans should know and I saw it very well that a lot of the fans thank Tod a lot at the Hardcore Homecomings and stuff like that.



Jack : Yeah, there use to be the Tod is God chant.



Ian Rotten : Yeah, Philadelphia fans are some of the best wrestling fans that there is in the world because if you’re the sh**s they will tell you you’re the sh**s.. If you’re good, they will give you credit for it and the fact they know they’re suppose to boo Heals and cheer Baby Faces and stuff like that is great also. I have had fans spit on me at one point at the arena and then want to buy me a beer at the hotel. God bless ‘em.

Tod is definitely a fixture of Philadelphia wrestling and the independent scene and people should be happy that he is around he is definitely good for business and a very fan friendly savvy guy also. I mean it was Tod Gordon who first thought of the cyber slam things and that kind of stuff.



Jack : Right, really like get the internet involved



Ian Rotten : Yeah, I don’t know any man that loves the business any more cause he certainly has not made a lot of money out at it but has put a whole lot in.



Jack : Is there anything you want to tell the fans out there, why they should come to Fahrenheit August 19th for Pro Wrestling Unplugged.



Ian Rotten : You know I think that about PWU is they give fans a little bit of everything. You got a champion in 2 Cold Scorpio who is the most underrated worker of all time as far as I am concerned which is ridiculous. This Friday night in Illinois we’ve got 2 Cold Scorpio versus Low Ki for the first time anywhere. You got a guy like Scorpio who can go out there and do anything you need as far as wrestling the young guys or the established veterans. You got some young kids out there that are doing some really cool to watch shit. You got the SAT’s. You have that kid, what’s that kids name? Devon Moore, I believe his name is, who I think is gonna be a really good up and comer.



Jack : Trent Acid..



Ian Rotten : Yeah, you got Acid and Cashmere, who are always bust their ass.



Jack : Gary Wolfe..



Ian Rotten : If you’re a blood mark your gonna get some of that too. But what I am saying that if you are into tag team wrestling your got SAT’s, you got the Brisco Brothers. All kinds of stuff like that, all money is legal.

If you’re into blood and guts you got that too

If you’re into the high flying you got that too

If you’re into stupid comedy stuff you got the Ugly Baby. Which I think is one of the best gimmicks ever and I am usually not into gimmicks but that just kills me. Anyone who knows my partner Jim Fannin, he is like the biggest hard ass in the world and he actually even laughs at that.

Got some hot chicks around and Annie Social who I like dropping on her head and watching her tits hit her eyes and blacking both her eyes. This show has got my girl Mickey Knuckles against Amy Lee.



Jack : Yeah that is like the first ever…..



Ian Rotten : Yeah, first ever in Pennsylvania, first blood match.

I don’t give a shit what anybody says.. I might be partial, whatever but you know doesn’t matter, Sara del Ray, Julia, Melissa or any of the rest of them.. if you want to see the best women’s wrestler today come see Mickey Knuckles, she can do it all. From hard-core technical hold for hold catches catch can wrestling, chain wrestling, beating the shit out of somebody with something. So if you are into women’s wrestling you got that too. PWU gives you a total show which is a lot like what ECW use to give you and that’s a good thing and they don’t charge you an arm and a leg for ticket either.



Jack : We really appreciate you coming on here. We’d love to have you back some time.



Ian Rotten : Any time, I’m sorry I forgot about you guys in the first half an hour



Jack : Ahhhh… no Problem.



Ian Rotten : But I get hit in the head a lot and smoke a lot of weed



Jack : [laughing]Yeah just like a lot of our fans.



Ian Rotten : All right guys, take care.



Jack : Thanks man, seeya.



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