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The World According To Dutch: Video Blog A New Twist

Posted: Mar 2nd 2010 By: CMBurnham

I apologize for not being more punctual with my blogs. I've been under the weather lately but hopefully but I'm OK.

Today's blog will be totally different from what I've done before. Have you ever heard the words, a picture tells a thousand words? Well, it you haven't, then you have now. I'm going to present the...

FIRST EVER
DIRTY DUTCH VIDEO BLOG

There's a reason I'm doing this. On my FaceBook page, last week I started posting some short YouTube Memphis clips and I was amazed at the people who commented. The majority of the comments were from people who had never seen the clips and from a lot of young fans who never knew Memphis even existed. A lot of them have only seen WWE and TNA. Now thanks to YouTube, fans are starting to see there was a 'wrestling history' before WWE and with the Memphis clips...old Memphis wrestling is HOT AGAIN.

I'll tell you a brief story. While I was in TNA, one day in Orlando on a taping day, Bubba and Devon Dudley were scheduled to go to Japan and they asked Jimmy Cornette, who has all the old Memphis footage, if he would prepare a DVD for them with just Memphis wrestling on it. They wanted to watch the old Memphis tapes on their long trips while on tour because, as they explained to Jimmy, they had never seen the Memphis stuff. They said that they'd studied a lot of old Georgia, Texas and Mid Atlantic tapes but never really seen Memphis. Jimmy couldn't believe what he had just heard. Cornette informed Bubba and Devon that if they had, indeed, missed seeing Memphis wrestling, they had missed the very best wrestling in the world at that time. Lots of action, great wrestlers and storylines that were believeable. Cornette told them that they were in for a treat.

Jimmy prepared them a tape and sent it to them and the old Dutchman was all over this DVD. So off went Bubba and Devon to Japan armed with several hours of old Memphis wrestling. A couple weeks went by and on the next set of tapings, Bubba and Devon had returned from Japan. When Bubba saw me, he immediately called me over, shook my hand, hugged me and told me that he was HIGHLY IMPRESSED with the old Memphis footage and me in particular. I didn't know what he was talking about because Cornette had not told me that he made a DVD for them. Bubba relayed the story and told me that he loved the Memphis footage and it made the tour much shorter. . He also said the Japanese boys were highly entertained by the Memphis stuff. Bubba told me these exact words, "Dutch, I've never seen you work before but I had heard that you were one of the best but I thought that was just talk. But when I saw you on that Memphis footage, you were good. Damn good!!!" I mean..what can you say? I thanked Bubba and then ran into Devon who more or less repeated what Bubba had said.

Bubba made me feel good because if you know Bubba, he doesn't put anybody over unnecessarily and I knew that. Bubba grew up around Philly and basically, had never been exposed to any Memphis wrestling. Actually, what Bubba saw in ECW was an exact extension of the wide open style that Paul Heyman had learned and seen in Memphis a couple of years before ECW was born.

So today, I'm going to take you on a video look back at a few clips from my career thanks to the beauty and technology of YouTube. One thing that I think you'll see is that these clips have survived the test of time and still are as entertaining today as they were when they first debuted. I wrote about some of these very clips in my book, The World According to Dutch. If you've read the book, you know exactly what went down with all of these. If you haven't, then you should order my book. So sit back and enjoy because this could be one of the best World According to Dutch ever. Enjoy.

YouTube Clip #1
Dutch vs. Snowman
Shreveport, LA. TV Tapings
That's the Way to Throw a Chair Shot!!!

Wow!!! Wait until you see this chair shot from hell. Video 1 is a clip when I was in the Mid South territory owned and operated by a ruthless bastard, but I loved the guy, Bill Watts. Watts had a very believeable TV program that was, in many ways, ahead of its time. To those who never knew Watts or even about him, to describe him is a job unto itself. He was a kind of monolithic figure who wanted things his way and his way only. If I had to compare him to an historical figure, Watts would best be compared to a Joseph Stalin who was a hard core bastard and was ruthless enough to back it up. I would have compared him to Hitler but Bill never wore a moustache. I like Bill but I never had any doubts about his end game. His end game was to make money and he would run over anybody who stood in his way. With Watts, his business (wrestling) came first before anything else. Before his family, before friends and before everything.

The Mid South territory was a bitch to work too. Watts didn't care if he sent you 3,000 miles per week. Hell, that was an average week. When I was in the Mid South, I drove more miles than professional truck drivers. If some of the new guys in WWE had to work this territory in those days, I think you would see a rash or resignations. Watt's territory extended from New Orleans to Jackson, Mississippi to Little Rock to Tulsa and to Houston. Watts was not only just the owner of the Mid South promotion, he was also the head booker even though he hired bookers, at different times, to hold the position such as Ernie Ladd, Bill Dundee and Eddie Gilbert. Those guys were bookers in name only but it was no secret who the BOSS was. In the Mid South, Watts wore every hat possible...the booker, the owner, the hirer and the firer who booked all the towns and who is responsible for giving Jim Ross his first announcing gig in the wrestling business. Watts is also responsible for giving guys like Jake the Snake Roberts, Ted DiBiase, Junkyard Dog, Jim Duggan, Butch Reed, the Bezerker and others their first big breaks before Vince McMahon waved a checkbook under their noses and they took off to Titanland.

In this particular match on YouTube that you're going to see...its a match between me and the Snowman at the TV tapings in Shreveport, Lousisiana for the TV Title. It was summertime, hot as hell outside and I had been droving all over 5 states working with the Snowman every night and, truthfully, he was beating the dog crap out of me but not on purpose. He didn't mean to hurt me but damn, it still hurt. I have a chapter in my book about this time in my wrestling life and I am thankful for YouTube for bringing it all alive one more time. Well, not really because looking at it again...I still feel the pain. But the chapter in my book was titled, That's the Way to Throw a Chair Shot so you have some inkling of what's to come.

This was in the days that if somebody used a metal chair, it was special. Great video and a great look at how wrestling used to be. Jim Ross handles the play by play. Also during this clip, you can see why Jim Ross is the best in the business as play by play announcing and why WWE hired him. Watch closely around the 2:50 mark as you can see my eye cut open courtesy of the always fluid and mobile, Snowman. If the link doesn't work, just copy and paste it in the YouTube window.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTPGK35lRfg

YouTube Video Clip #2
The Winner Takes It All
Dutch vs. Jerry Lawler

In this clip, you'll see one of the things that never, never happened in Memphis and when it did, fans sat up and noticed. I pinned Lawler clean in the middle. Not too many wrestlers can say that. In my book, I detail the Lawler feud as one of the greatest things I ever did in the wrestling business and we did sell-out business. The match took place at the Memphis Convention Center on a Sunday afternoon with approximately and there were about 5,000 people in attendance which was very good especially considering the Convention Center was in a bad part of town...like downtown Memphis. That was one of the reasons we held the match in the afternoon because it was hard to get people to go downtown at night. I'm not saying Memphis had a lot of crime but Memphis had a lot of crime. I was damn near afraid to go down there myself and I was fearless. Seriously, a Memphis cop told me once that not even the police went downtown at night in the area of the Convention Center. Brother...that's always been one of my rules...no cops, no Dutch. Yes, I was a chicken s**t. That was a big tipping point for me.

This is a one camera shoot with the camera right at ringside and it's a grainy, gritty look but for those of you who've never seen how wrestling used to be, this is it. Granted, the production values today blow away anything we ever did but if you just judge the match on its contents, the match still holds up to this day. Don't anybody email me and ask who put the music on this video...I had nothing to do with it but for sake of identification, it was Lawler. The story behind this match is that Lawler did an interview where he said that if he didn't win, he quite possibly would quit the wrestling profession and in those days, fans were convinced that if it was said on TV, then it must be true. You only get about three minutes of the match here in video form but the entire match lasted probably 25 minutes. Great match, great crowd and the crowd was one of the easiest I'd ever worked in front of. On a side note, the match was held on a Sunday afternoon and for trivia buffs out there, following the match, Lawler married his second wife, Paula. He lost to me in the afternoon...10 years later, he lost again. Check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5C8xSVW5ZlQ

You Tube Video Clip 3
Dutch vs. the Macho Man Randy Savage

Savage was one crazy bastard...in the ring and out. We had great matches everywhere we went and one thing you had to be with Savage, was aggressive. If you left "aggressive" in the dressing room, Savage would just beat the crap out of you but I liked that. Not getting the crap beat out of me but I liked a physical style. Savage, to me, was one of the greatest performers ever to set foot in a wrestling ring.

The Macho Man and I had great matches every time we stepped into the ring against each other. I probably wrestled Savage more times than any ohter guy I'd ever worked with before. In the wrestling business, that's called being 'married' to the guy. But I digress.

The video you're going to see is Savage attacking me before the bell in the venerable Mid South Coliseum. The attendance that night was probably close to 10 thousand in the Mid South and Savage and I turned it up a nothc. Wild crowd, wild match and everything the fans had paid to see. The video looks almost in black and white but I'm not showing these clips for the production values...I'm showing them to give readers a gauge on how the regional promotions used to draw. You have to remember that we were in Memphis 52 weeks a year and for a performer to stay ALIVE and appear that often in the same town and the same arena in front of the same fans, we had to be a little more creative than what you see on WWE. To literally compel someone to spend money weekly...you really had to get off your ass and do something.

To take that comment a little further...what if WWE ran shows 4 weeks in a row in Madison Square Garden? They would start out with 21,000 sellout attendance the first night...and drop every week until finally on the 4th week, there might be 3 thousand people there. That's where I think wrestling has lost the 'art of the game'. Memphis never did that..it stayed consistently over the 8,000 mark for several years during the Glory Years in the early 80's.

Also on this clip, you'll see how this appeared LIVE on Memphis TV with Lance Russell and Dave Brown as the commentators. Lance to me was on the same level as Jim Ross. You'll see an interview that Savage and I both did to promote the Monday night battle. Great stuff and sadly, I really miss those days. Fans do too. You don't see anything like this from WWE today. Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bD5KqAMprYM&feature=
PlayList&p=FDBFC494C23BC718&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=28

Hope you've enjoyed this because each video that I've written about and you've watched has a chapter about it in my book. If you haven't order the book, you can order now at the email adddress listed below. This was a look about how the wrestling business used to be.

I will be appearing at LegendsMania March 12th/13th in Atlanta and I hope to see all of you there. Thanks for reading. Have a very dirty day.

They Called Me Dirty For A Reason...Dirty Dutch

Leave comments below or contact me personally at:

dirtydutchmantell@gmail.com

dirtydutchman1@twittter.com

dutchmantell@facebook.com

Tags: Dutch Mantell, WWE, TNA, Jim Cornette, ECW, MSW, Bill Watts, Ernie Ladd, Bill Dundee, Eddie Gilbert, Jim Ross, Jake Roberts, Ted DiBiase, Junkyard Dog, Butch Reed, Jim Duggan, Bezerker, Snowman, Jerry Lawler