By Scott Bowden
February 23, 2005
KFR Heat Lamp: Scott Bowden looks at no-holds-barred wrestling matches between students and teachers, examines “Rowdy” Roddy Piper’s induction into the Hall of Fame, and answers your questions regarding Eddie Gilbert.
Because of the Feb. 17 column regarding Eddie Gilbert, I didn’t get around to some other news items the wrestling public was talking about last week. Enjoy.
Miss Monday NitrHO: Most self-respecting women probably think that there couldn’t be anything more humiliating than being crowned Miss WCW Nitro in front a national TV audience, wearing only a bikini and a crown, while hordes of high-school and college kids in attendance at the live wrestling event in Panama City Beach salivate over her every high-heeled step. Pamela Rogers Turner, who earned the title of WCW royalty on a episode of TNT MONDAY NITRO in 1997, recently topped that accomplishment with her arrest in McKinnsville, Tenn., for having sex with a 13-year-old male student at Centertown Elementary…the same school at which she taught PE and coached basketball. Yeah, talk about a physical education. What happened to the good ol’ days…when female basketball coaches and Girls-PE teachers were all lesbians?
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Rogers was a mere college student herself when she earned the title of Miss Nitro, so you could say she didn’t know any better. (How she earned the crown is open to speculation, but I’d bet Kevin Nash was involved.) But these latest charges are even more disturbing, as she and the boy allegedly had sex dozens of times. An older gentleman living in the area described the boy (who recently turned 14) as “a tremendous athlete—a real superstar.” Yeah, he’s a stud in my book. Apparently, the kid even “started shaving when was 7.” I mean, how could she resist? The affair began with a series of instant messages, which quickly escalated from the innocuous to the incredulous. According to THE NEW YORK POST, Rogers admitted via IM that she thought that the boy was “cute.” Perplexed about what his next move should be, the kid asked a romantically seasoned 19-year-old, who advised him to IM her that she was “hot.” Good one. (Hey, it worked, didn’t it? Well, allegedly.)
In other statutory-rape news: OK, this was one’s not really wrestling-related, but…is it or me, or does the kid who’s marrying his former school teacher look like a younger version of The Rock? Yeah, it’s probably just me.
Piper gets paid: “Never say never in the World Wrestling Federation.” Ah, yes, the catchphrase that Vince McMahon would utter after even the slightest odd occurrence in the former-Fed during the late ’80s and early ’90s still holds true in today’s World Wrestling Entertainment. More than a year after he was released by WWE in part for comments he made condemning the industry as a breeding ground for drug addicts and other individuals with “the sickness” during in an interview on HBO’s REAL SPORTS, Roddy Piper is being inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame.
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Personally, I’m glad to see Piper get the recognition he deserves as one of the most entertaining performers of his era. And with the current Rock ‘n’ Wrestling Connection motif with this year’s inductees, I guess it’s only fitting “Rowdy” Roddy is honored at this time. But McMahon’s Hall will never be taken seriously by the fans with the omissions of guys like former Federation champions Bruno Sammartino, Bob Backlund and Bret Hart. I realize the difficulties in getting those guys involved, but the fact remains that the Hall really is a joke, no matter how classy the company handles the inductions.
Yes, it’s refreshing that McMahon is being respectful of wrestling’s past after years of ignoring even his own company’s rich history. (Ignoring the death of Adrian Adonis was unforgivable, though.) And, yes, honoring past greats is a nice gesture. But it’s not exactly coincidental that McMahon’s growing sentimentality comes at about the same time as his realization that he could make a ton of money off the past. (Those wildly successful FLAIR DVDs further piledrived that point home.) For a few years now, he’s been rounding up videotape from all the territories he helped destroy for future DVD releases and for the WWE 24/7 on-demand cable channel. Starting with last year’s class, WWE is also releasing HALL OF FAME DVDs, with the entire ceremony and classic matches included.
Piper and the rest of the mid-’80s-era crew have a special place in the hearts of thousands of fans who discovered wrestling when it became sports entertainment. Hip-toss Hulk Hogan into this year’s HOF festivities as well, and you’ve got a DVD that should do very well. Nonetheless, congrats, “Rowdy” Roddy, whom I recall as early as his appearances as a color man alongside Gordon Solie on Ted Turner’s SuperStation. (Solie, by the way, is rumored to be a future inductee as well and deservedly so, despite the fact that I don’t believe he ever worked in any capacity for the McMahons.)
Kentucky Fried E-mail
Thanks for the memories. Well, not memories for me, seeing as I'm only a 15-year-old “smark” who does some occasional writing for NWA Florida. I am always trying to learn
more about the Golden Days of the NWA. You wrote a great story on Eddie Gilbert, a worker who I have been studying on and learning more about through articles and tapes. My question for you is, did you ever work down in the NWA Florida territory and if so what were your experiences there?
-J.P. Gilbert
Bowden: No, my work was limited to the Memphis area. I can hear some of the USWA boys now: “Florida, are you kidding? We used to have to threaten him to convince him to go to Louisville, Kentucky.” Although I suppose it would have been a natural for me to work Florida…y’know, with my Uncle Bobby Bowden being such a celebrity in the Sunshine State. I miss those days in Memphis, crowning Jerry Lawler regularly with my Florida State football helmet…which the King himself helped gimmick up with his superior artistic abilities.
I have been reading your column from day one here on the “Poopshoot”. For 15 years I was a loyal fan of all things wrestling and still have a soft spot for the sport (and YES I do mean SPORT). And while in the last year or so I have found myself drifting away from wrestling (mostly because the WWE/F has killed off any real push of characters I once found compelling) I come back to Poopshoot every week to read your column. While I am not even that familiar with Memphis or the time you spent there, you always manage to capture that part of my imagination that has made Sports Entertainment so special to me. There are so few things about the current wrestling climate that interest me today but as long as you keep writing your columns you will afford me the opportunity to stay connected and hopefully find something new I can get excited about. But for you, I would have written wrestling off a while ago.
PLEASE keep up the incredible work. I live for Thursdays.
--Christopher A. Brenn
Bowden: Thanks for the kind words. Nice to know the column is appreciated, as it’s truly a labor of love. Don’t write off wrestling just yet—maybe the McMahons will figure out once again what their public wants. And with the strides (at least as far as product quality goes) that the Jarretts are making with NWA:TNA, the business is getting interesting again. Whenever I’m frustrated with watching WWE, I just keep slowly telling myself, “peaks and valleys…peaks and valleys”—a reference to the cyclical nature of the business. Helps keep me sane.
That was actually a beautiful column. I love and miss Eddie Gilbert as well.
One of my all-time favorite heels. I read your column regularly, and I enjoy
it very much. Thanks.
--Steve Hogan
Bowden: Thanks for writing, Steve, although I believe my head is starting to get as big as Boris Zukhov’s melon right about now. (Some would argue it was already physically that size.) Give my regards to Dizzy and the Hulkster.
Hi, Scott. You’re a must-read for me, and I always love the Eddie Gilbert stories. As a kid, I just always assumed he would be the eventual new King of Memphis...or make it big somewhere. He had the talent. He also had a lot of problems. I wish he could have worked past them. We all may have been watching better programs right now if he had.
Eddie let a lot of guys have their moments. I just wish his had been a little longer. Who knows? If Eddie had stuck around life a little longer, Scott Bowden may have stuck around the wrestling biz a little longer.
And honestly, who wouldn’t have gotten a smile on their face, if they picked up the Wrestling Observer this week and read: “Triple H in trouble; Eddie Gilbert just fucked Stephanie McMahon!”
--David Jett
Bowden: For those of you who don’t know, David worked for a while as the play-by-play announcer of the Memphis Mid-South Coliseum shows in the post-Lance Russell era, as well as served as the host of his own magazine-style wrestling show on a local cable access station. I believe he also participated in Kevin Lawler’s Neighborhood Wrestling Association (NWA) shows, but that may be a vicious rumor.
Good to hear from you, David. Unfortunately, having a lot of problems seems to be a prerequisite for having a lot of talent. (At least that’s the way it works here in Hollywood.) Yes, the two go together like wrestling and nepotism. While I’m not certain of what Eddie would say about today’s WWE product, I’ll bet it would be along the lines of, “It’s the drizzling shits.” I’m sure his opinion of Steph, though, would be much higher.
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