Hello guys, I'm one of those silent readers now taking the scary step of posting for the first time. I've often read comments about wrestlers paying their dues, which I think means having to settle for jobbing status before being allowed main event spots. A couple of questions. How long does this last? And which big name paid their dues for the longest before becoming a star?
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Didn't because transition from independent s who were convinced ,early eighties weight , and lack of credentials ,experience ,fitness, plus location was all that was needed
Regarding Colin's question of how long to pay their dues it also depended on the time period. In the 1930s wrestling gained rapid popularity and so the route to main event could be swift, though still for the chosen few. Post war, again fairly rapid for heavyweights but odds stacked heavily against lighter wrestlers until the 1960s when TV came along and they all looked the same size. In the fifties and sixties competition was huge, and more so in the second half of the 1960s with all weights becoming almost equally popular. In the 1980s it seemed anyone whose face fitted, or worked cheap and could get bums on seats for a few matches, i.e. oversized heavies and masked men who came from nowhere and went nowhere, could get main event status overnight.
Some wrestlers made a virtue of losing.Mick McMicheal was in the top five wrestlers for the number of ITV appearances over twenty five years but was a perennial loser
Again, to be picky, it's not that they were all "content" to be down the bill. It's like a corporation: some seek promotion for years and don't get it. Brian Maxine is in some respect interesting. He got this huge push from jobber to dual champion and top-of-the-bill status from 1969 to 1971 and then onwards. Since Clayton Thomson publicly stated Maxine's technical ability was "zero", it leaves us to understand which factors were at play that gave Maxine such privilege.
That's why we continue to come on here and try to work things out. In the Maxine case, we still don't specifically know; but we keep digging because there must be reasons.
Nagasaki took 18 months and a BIG helping hand from Ct Bartelli to go top. Rocky went top once he had the British title. Some seemed destined for stellar careers but flattened out once it was clear they lacked the versatility to wrestle much outside their usual routines: Tibor is a prime example, then Czeslaw, Marino and others. Pallo, Kellett, Masambula and McManus had wrestling brains to vary and surprise.
There sometimes seemed to be some nepotism at play, Wolfgang Starck the biggest example, yet the likes of Barry Douglas and Dave Barrie seemed to be paid few favours.
Thank you for all your answers. I understand what Anglo Italian is saying about those who were content lower down the bill. I was also wondering about how long it took to become a main eventer. Sounds from what has been said it was a case of ten years and more.
Welcome Colin,
I just want to couch the three replies so far within the scenario that transition from jobber to main event was not a God-given right. Many never achieved that status, of course. Maybe we can assume that many would have hoped to achieve main event status, though not all. I don't think Bob Kirkwood did; and Caswell Martin couldn't.
And it's not a final climax. Maybe only Kellett remained top of the bill to the very end. McManus donned a T-shirt and started losing to one and all. Alan Garfield seemed to rise very fast early fifties but had a long slow decline in terms of poster value (not in-ring quality) over his final seven ring years.
Masambula started out huge, as Bernard has shared with us, in 1952. He managed to hang on near the top for 25 years, but not at the very summit. More of a Mallory than a Hillary.
A bit of anonymity was probably appreciated by many like Steve Best and Leon Fortuna, who had day-jobs. McManus and Pallo had to live their roles for many hours every day.
McManus and Kellett are well known names that come to mind. McManus started just after the war but wasn't regular top of the bill until after the feud with Pallo started in 1962. Kellett started even earlier, but only seems to have become a big name in the 1960s with his tv exposure.
Well welcome Colin. Howard has pretty much said it all but I noticed at a recent isit to the circus that the old tradition of trapeze stars having to flog popcorn as well is still alive and kicking.
Before you're even a jobber, you get to erect the ring, sell merchandise, fetch refreshments for the wrestlers, be a second and be a timekeeper. Once you are in the ring, you could wait years for a win. After his debut, the great Jackie Pallo didn't get a fall for four years!