Wade Keller: How did you first become
interested in becoming a wrestler?
Jerry Lynn: Ever since I can remember,
I grew up watching roller derby and wrestling every weekend, so I've always loved it but I
never even thought once about trying it because I always knew it was mainly a sport for
big guys. Years down the road, my ex-wife was working with a gal who started dating a
wrestler in the AWA, Soldat Ustinov. We went and watched independent cards that Eddie
Sharkey ran that Soldat was on just to go see him. Then after the card when I met
him I told him I always loved wrestling and I wrestled a little bit in high school and
community college. He said "Well, you should try it." So he introduced me to
Eddie. I knew at the time I wasn't ready.
WK: How old were you at that moment?
JL: Oh jeez, 24 I think. Maybe 23. I
knew I wasn't ready yet, but I found out how to get into wrestling which is going through
a training camp. So I started working out a couple of years and then I found out about
Brad Rheingans' camp and I decided to go to his camp and give it a try.
WK: How much did you get charged to go through
his camp?
JL: I think it was like 2500 dollars.
WK: At the time, was that a hardship for you?
Did you have to save up ahead of time?
JL: I actually took out a loan. At the
time I had a house.
WK: You had the collateral but you didn't have
the cash.
JL: Right
WK: I know a lot of people who have wanted to
become wrestlers but it was that up front fee that delayed it or stopped them.
JL: Yeah, I just took out a loan.
WK: how long was it from the time you went to
Rhiengans' camp versus your first matches for Eddie Sharkey's PWA?
JL: Well, I had already met Eddie
before I went to Rhiengans' camp. But then I actually started working for Eddie in 6
months or something like that. Yeah, because my first actual matches were with Jim Koch
when he ran the IWA. I worked for a TV taping in New Ulm (Minn.) and had 3 matches in one
night.
WK: Were those your first matches in front of
a crowd?
JL: Yeah
WK: How was that? Nerve racking?
JL: Yes, very. (Laughs).
WK: Did you not sleep the night before? Walk
through what that first day was like.
JL: I don't think I had any problems
sleeping the night before. I was nervous on my way to the building. It was a good
hour-and-a-half drive or so. I was pretty nervous but then I got there and found out my
first match was a tag. I can't remember who my partner was but it was against the
Terminators, Wolf and Rignotti. So I was pretty nervous because those were some big guys.
But it worked out well. My second match was a six man tag and that was against Steve
Olsonowski, Tom Zenk, and Derrick Dukes.
WK: Did you find out right away that the
veterans were easy to work with or did they kind of looked at you like "Pay your
dues"?
JL: Back then, it depended on who you
worked with. I've got to say that night most of them were pretty good to work with.
But back then there was still... well, there always should be a pay-your-dues mentality.
But I think it was more so back then because nowadays you don't see it as much since they
take these guys out of the camps like the Power Plant and stuff and just throw them right
into the ring on Nitro. Nowadays there isn't so much paying your dues.
WK: Would you say from your experience of
being around those guys who got thrown in right after camp. Bill Goldberg being an
exception, that it takes a while to gain any kind of respect or acceptance from the
veterans even if you do go through the WCW camp?
JL: It depends on your attitude and
personality, I think.
WK: From all of your years being around
wrestlers, what are the bigger mistakes often made by a wrestler fresh out of camp.
Either mistakes you made early in your career or other mistakes you've seen other young
wrestlers make. What kind of advice do you have for rookies?
JL: You don't see as much respect for
the veterans who've been around for years and that's pretty sad because to me, this is my
eleventh year in the business and I'm still learning every time I go in the ring. To me, a
veteran is somebody who's been in the business for, like, 20 years. You just don't go
walking into a locker room thinking you know it all and whatever and have that attitude.
It's sad but it seems like you see it a lot more now these days.
WK: Are there any specific types of things you
see young wrestlers do that you just roll your eyes and think, "Man, that's not
helping them".
JL: I guess something like that would
be when people go to get some ideas for a match and right away they're throwing out all
these ideas. "Well, I want to do this and I want to do this move and I want to do
that, and I want to do this and that..." That is a very big mistake.
WK: And why is that? Maybe the person whose
reading this interview and not involved in wrestling thinks there is nothing wrong with
showing enthusiasm and wanting to get a lot of exciting moves in a match. How do you
counter that argument?
JL: Because it's not very
professional. From people who are very professional, when I've gone to talk to them, you
know, go over ideas for a match, this is what I always do since I've learned this from
people who are very professional, is I'll ask a guy, "What would you like to do? What
are some of the good things that you do?" Instead of running up and saying "I
want to do this and I want to do that" I ask them right away. To me, the secret of
having a good match, which Brad Rheingans taught me, is if you and the other guy go out
there and try to make each other look like a million bucks, you cannot fail at having a
good match. So the first thing I'll do is ask the guy what his specialties are.
WK: So the guys who go out and talk to someone
who's been in the business five, ten, fifteen years longer then them and try to dictate
the content of the match, or even dominate the conversation, that's a sign of disrespect?
JL: Oh yeah. You see too much of
people who want to go out there and just blow their whole load in one night and want to
get all of their shit in. That's not the idea of having an actual wrestling match. To me,
nowadays, a lot of people think having a good wrestling match is throwing out as many
highspots as you can. And that's not it. Having an actual wrestling match is becoming a
lost art form now.
WK: Why do you think that so many young
wrestlers have that attitude towards it becoming Highspot Central? It's like every match,
the more outrageous moves you can do, the better. Why is that attitude so much more
prevalent today than it was even ten years ago and especially fifteen years ago?
JL: Because wrestling has changed so
much now and the new wrestlers that are coming out today, I don't think a lot of them,
well, they're young so they didn't get to see a lot of the old time wrestling with all of
the psychology and stuff back when matches were matches and not like a Chinese acrobatic
exhibition.
WK: Let me play devil's advocate. You used the
words "wrestling has changed". If it has changed and the fans have seen all of
these wild highspots and non-stop action, are these young wrestlers simply a reflection of
wrestling fans today? They don't have the attention span for that psychology, they don't
have the attention span for Jack Brisco against Dory Funk Jr., building up a match slowly.
And these young wrestlers don't want to be lost in the crowd. They want to stand out with
athleticism. How do you counter that type of argument that the audience is different too?
JL: It's how you put the match
together, it's not just going out there doing highspot after highspot after highspot. You
can still tell a story while still using the exciting moves.
WK: When you've wrestled some of the younger
guys in ECW or even wrestlers in other groups in other countries, has it been hard when
you've wanted to ground the match in kind of a storyline to get that across to someone who
just wants to showoff moves?
JL: It can be at times. It just
depends on that person. Some people can be difficult to work with and you just try
to make the best of it.
WK: Starting from your indy days to some of
your Japan tours to your days in the WWF and WCW, but not counting your ECW stint, who
have been your most effective opponents to show off what really makes you look good? Even
when you weren't getting a push and there wasn't a storyline to help establish the match,
which opponents stand out as your favorites?
JL: Well of course, years ago with the
Lightning Kid (Sean Waltman, aka X-Pac). After he got his call to New York there was Ricky
Rice. He and I have gone at it quite a bit. And Horace the Psychopath and J.B. Trask. As
far as Japan, I guess there is a tag team called Gedo and Jado, they were fun to work
with. Gran Naniwa too. Most of the guys in Michinoku were fun to work with and easy
going, laid back.
WK: Did they have a good mix of psychology and
highspots?
JL: It depended on certain matches, I
think.
WK: How about in the WWF or
WCW?
JL: WCW... (pause, laughs). That's
tough. Of course, I had fun and enjoyed working with Eddie Guerrero, (Dean) Malenko, and
(Chris) Benoit because they're great workers who can do just about anything and they liked
have matches that told stories and stuff. Chris Jericho and... It was hard in WCW because
I wasn't written into storylines and it was mainly my job to put guys over and try to have
a decent match with them.
WK: How about in the WWF?
JL: Oh yeah, Taka Michinoku, Louie
Spicolli, and uhh... I really didn't wrestle too much in the WWF. I just had a couple of
little, different tryouts but nothing ever came of them.
WK: How many matches do you think you had with
Sean Waltman?
JL: Oh God, I couldn't say. A lot.
WK: Is 50 exaggerating?
JL: It might even be around there
because we wrestled each other for like two years straight. After that we tagged with each
other for a year but that would be hard to say because we were wrestling each other on
every card we worked.
WK: Do you have a most memorable match with
him?
JL: It would be the bloody one at
George's that got a lot of attention.
WK: Is that where he dove off the top rope
onto you in the crowd before anyone was doing that move or receiving it?
JL: Yeah, that was right after I got
back from Memphis.
WK: Do you consider yourself in some ways
rivals with Waltman? Or not really more than anyone else?
JL: Not at all. There are so many
things that determine whether you get a break or not. The politics and timing has such a
great deal to do with it as far as what a company is looking for at times. There are so
many different factors which determine whether or not you'll get a break.
WK: Have you guys remained friends over the
years?
JL: We haven't been able to see each
other very often. Every once in a while we'll see each other on the road but since
I moved out of state, we haven't been able to see each other very often. But whenever we
see each other we catch up.
WK: I ask because you guys are so identified
with each other because in a way you guys made each other national names on the indy
scene. Has there ever been a falling out or bitter feelings between you two over anything
that either of you accused the other of doing or thought the other did?
JL: No. It seems like there are so
many other people throwing rumors out there. A lot of people were saying "Oh, Jerry's
jealous that Sean made it in New York and he didn't" or whatever. I'm not jealous.
I'm envious and I'm happy for the guy. I'm happy for anyone who gets a break and makes a
buck in this business because it's a very tough business to make it in. It's just
sad that so many people throw out so many rumors but I wasn't jealous or anything.
WK: What's the quick progression of your job
so far? You started off in the Minnesota indy scene, mainly in the PWA. Then you went to
Memphis right after?
JL: I went to Memphis in, I think it
was October or November of 1990, and then came back in the spring of '91. Then at the end
of '91, I went to work for Global (Wrestling Federation in Dallas Tex.) and then came back
in the spring of '92. After that I think is when I started going to Japan quite a bit.
WK: After Japan, a little more indy work and
then WCW? Or was there a short WWF tryout stint?
JL: No. I think I did a short little
three day loop with the WWF for TV tapings. Umm, WCW I got the deal there and right after
I was done in WCW...
WK: After how long?
JL: I think it was around two years.
Right after that, I got the tryout with the WWF again with the match with Taka.
After that I didn't hear anything again and like two weeks after that match aired on TV,
ECW called and I've been there ever since.
