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JR's Blog: Saturday Morning...Vader at JR's...Q&A's Updated..Order Today for Summer Grilling Season & get FREE SHIPPING

Posted: Apr 18th 2010 By: CMBurnham

Nasty, rainy day in Norman which may put a damper on the Sooners' Annual Red-White game today at 2 p.m. I'm gonna have to break out some rain gear. Let's start the grill and smell the sauce.

Yours truly enjoyed a nice visit and a great dinner with Big Van Vader aka Leon White and his son Jesse White at JR's BBQ Friday night. Vader has really made some significant changes in his life including becoming a Born Again Christian and dropping about 60 pounds or so. Leon is still a big man but at 340 he looks great for a guy who still wants to occasionally step in the ring. He's training differently and certainly eating differently these days. Some indy promoters, etc may be missing some unique opportunities by not using Big Van Vader on selected cards with the right creative around him.

Vader and Jesse will be teaming in Tokyo later in April which I am anxious to see a DVD of when possible. Jesse came to Oklahoma University as a big time high school football center, #1 in America, but injured his hip while at close to 300 pounds. That injury ended Jesse's football career. Jesse is now a month away from graduating and weighs approximately 235 and looks terrific. His hip issues were largely resolved after he dropped the excess pounds. Jesse turns 24 on Monday and has a bright future in the wrestling business of which we throughly discussed.

For those keeping score at home, Leon had a Tabasco Chicken Salad and smoked chicken soft tacos and pinto beans at our place, with no cold beer, and no fried pie for desert.

Vader and Jesse are teaming at a small, Oklahoma indy show on Sunday afternoon.

Check out the Cauliflower Alley Club story on Slam Wrestling's website. The folks at Slam really do a nice job of covering wrestling in general and are more fact based than many wrestling sites who are seemingly on an endless search for the New York Post-like headline of a sensational nature. Slam Wrestling's coverage of the death of Gene Kiniski was superb plus I appreciate the story they did about me receiving the Art Abrams Lifetime Achievement Award from CAC this Wednesday night in Las Vegas.

For more info on CAC and all the great work that they do, I invite you to check out their website at www.caulifloweralleyclub.org.

I had some social time with some friends from Nike Friday late night in Norman which brought up the question as to why Nike doesn't work with WWE in some capacity. A conversation ensued and a phone call placed to one of Nike's V.P.'s who was in Hong Kong to address the question and to perhaps get the ball rolling in that direction. I could see John Cena, for example, as Nike's WWE guy. When the proper people get into a room, the potential synergy between Nike and WWE on a global basis is interesting.

Old friend Taz received his J.R.'s BBQ shipment that he ordered on line earlier in the week and had a big, Long Island styled cookout Friday night at his home. I'm anxious to hear how it went. He liked my suggestion of taking some Chipotle Ketchup and mixing it, to taste, with some Original or HOT BBQ Sauce to make a great steak sauce or burger condiment among the many other possible uses for our delicious products.

I spoke to Paul Heyman this week to get some pointers on content for my, potential, book concept. Paul is presently writing two books including one that includes Paul's career and, more importantly, his family. This includes the amazing story of Paul's mother's journey that included narrowly avoiding losing her life in a Nazi concentration camp. Her mother and sister were not so fortunate.

As of Saturday morning I have updated the Q&A section of this site. This particular round of questions and feedback was better than most. I hope that you take the time to check them out.

Remember, that we have NEW photos now available that are FREE and AUTOGRAPHED and that come with many of our packages in our on line store that also come with FREE SHIPPING.

WWE talents got in travel hell in Europe due to volcanic ash. Mother Nature never loses and can make even the most ardent traveler tap. There will be some weary folks that will arrive back in the States over the next several hours and then be asked to turn it on Monday night and Tuesday night at WWE televised events. As always, once the red light goes on most talents forget their jet lag, etc and allow their adrenaline to take over.

Speaking of WWE, my weekly blog is posted at www.wwe.com on the Smackdown page. It's a quick, hopefully entertaining read and I invite you to check it out.

Chris Jericho's Tweets from the European sojourn have been entertaining. Plus you can follow my escapades via Twitter at http://twitter.com/JRsBBQ.

Have a great weekend and keep an eye on your grill...don't burn the burgers.

Boomer Sooner!

J.R.

Tags: Jim Ross, Big Van Vader, WWE