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Wrestler's Long Career Far From Over

Posted: Jul 19th 2010 By: CMBurnham

He spent decades in the ring delivering the "bionic elbow" to opponents, and now it looks like wrestling legend Dusty "the American Dream" Rhodes actually needs one.

Sitting down and talking with the 64-year-old Rhodes in Sebring Friday night as part of a five-city tour with Florida Championship Wrestling, it's hard not to notice the golfball-sized swelling found at the bending point of his right arm.

"It's got bone chips and stuff in it," Rhodes said of the elbow. "I've had it drained and operated on."

Yet the swelling remains, serving as a testament to all those times Rhodes smashed his elbow on top of a fellow wrestler's head. The inspiration for the name of his signature move came from the television show "The Six Million Dollar Man," where Lee Majors' character is rebuilt with bionic replacements, including one for his right arm.

"And it just stuck," Rhodes said. "People picked it up."

For the most part, Rhodes is retired from action. He still makes an occasional appearance on WWE's Raw and does work for the FCW.

But you won't find him back in the ring competing at his age, unlike "The Nature Boy" Ric Flair, one of his former rivals who has continued battling opponents in recent years.

Rhodes said Flair still gives "100 percent" any time he steps back in the ring, but it's just not for him anymore.

"I don't want to go out and embarrass WWE, the product, my kids, my legacy," Rhodes said. "And he's (Flair) not embarrassing anybody yet, but you do see some old timer still trying to do it and it's just hard to watch them."

Rhodes made his name in the '70s and '80s, a time when wrestling was a lot different than it is today. For one thing, he said back then, performers would travel to their events by car.

"It was really different and it was more old school ... dog eat dog and going out and busting your (expletive)," Rhodes said.

Today, the WWE stands for World Wrestling Entertainment, and that is exactly what everyone involved is trying to do.

And if that includes wrestlers branching out and doing television and movies, such as Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Rhodes' son Cody, who just shot an episode of Syfy's series "Warehouse 13," so be it.

"I think (WWE CEO) Vince (McMahon) has a saying that we all kind of look, right now, at putting smiles on people's faces," Rhodes said. "I think it still boils down to the entertainment value.

"Back then, it was a little more like gory, blood and guts and (expletive) kicking."

Wrestling attracts fans all over the world. Some are like the young kids standing outside the Highlands County Fair Grounds Friday night, waiting to get tickets and meet Rhodes, while talking about whether he'd be joined in the ring by some of his past rivals.

Others are like George Steinbrenner, the late New York Yankees owner who wrote the foreword to Rhodes' 2005 autobiography "Dusty: Reflections of An American Dream."

"He just sat out there like a fan and just screaming and hollering and just ... we hated to lose him," Rhodes said.

Steinbrenner, 80, passed away Tuesday at his Tampa home from a heart attack.

Rhodes recalled that "the Boss" came from a core of big businessmen who were also fans of wrestling, whether they wanted to admit it or not.

"He wasn't a closet fan," Rhodes said. "He would come out and support it."

Tags: Dusty Rhodes, WWE, Ric Flair