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Brooksville Prepares For Dusty Rhodes Tour

Posted: Aug 8th 2010 By: CMBurnham

Florida wrestling legend the American Dream Dusty Rhodes announced plans to extend his month long series of shows dubbed The American Dream Tour.

By popular demand, the tour will make a special stop in Brooksville, Fla. at 8 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 21 at The Brooksville Armory, 16836 Springhill Dr.

The Dream will meet and greet fans during an autograph session in conjunction with Florida Championship Wrestling, the feeder group to WWE.

Rhodes became a household name during the 1970s and 80s competing for the original Florida Championship Wrestling. Rhodes then moved onto the NWA/WCW where he would capture multiple world titles before joining Vince McMahon's WWE, formerly WWF.

? Rhodes started as a bad guy with Dirty Dick Murdoch as the Texas Outlaws in the Midwest for the AWA. Upon venturing to Florida, Rhodes made the `turn heard round the world,' leading to his meteoric rise to superstardom and ultimate fan favorite.

Pak Song Nam means what to Dusty Rhodes?

Rhodes: ``The American Dream.''

``Pak Song Nam, God rest his soul, along with [manager] Gary Hart, God rest his soul, they were the two guys who elevated this character, this guy, me. Here was this dreaded Korean assassin that could actually go out onto the street -- and I've seen him do this; we have tape of it -- take a rock, not a brick that's pre-fabricated or something, but a real rock and bust it. He can take his hand or foot and put a perfect whole through a full watermelon without cracking the rest of it.

``Here he was, and he was facing The American Dream -- this chubby plumber's son from Austin, Texas. The common man and this Korean assassin. It don't get no better than that. That's what movies are made of. You can't write stuff like that.

``So when I think of Pak Song, I think of two things: The American Dream, and when he went back to Korea, all the money he made he had in cash in a suitcase because he didn't know what to do with it here in America. He didn't know to put it in a bank.

``I remember looking at Gary Hart and him, and he was leaving the area to go back home, and he had this huge suitcase -- like you see in the underworld -- with all this cash in it. I'm thinking, `This is some cool stuff.' You can't write stuff like that.

``Pak Song Nam helped start it all for me.''

? Rhodes was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2007.

``If it wasn't for the fans all throughout the state of Florida, there would be no American Dream,'' Rhodes said. ``Initially, we said the tour would only take place during the month of July but having the chance to come to Brooksville and personally say thank you to those fine folks was too good to pass up.''

? Good vs. evil, Rhodes had a big run in Florida against the demonic Kevin Sullivan.

``People believed [Sullivan] was the devil,'' Rhodes said. ``They really did, and I would be able to reel them back in and suspend their belief a little bit because I was fighting this bad, evil guy.

``I remember in Orlando at the Eddie Graham Sports Complex, the parking was fenced in, closer to the building, and there was a group of guys who sat in the second row who were fans of Kevin Sullivan. They were dressed in cult looking stuff. I'd see them every week, and the cowboys and the rednecks and the black community.

``I don't know who was to blame here, but as I was leaving the building after a heated battle one night with the devil. I call him the devil all the time. I'd call Kevin up now and say, `Hey devil, what are you doing?' Kevin was so creative and so unbelievable.

``I was leaving, and they had it blocked off and said, `Mr. Rhodes, you can't get out right now. The fire department is here,' in the middle of this parking lot. These guys drove a van, and the people, somebody, set it on fire and burned it to the ground. That's how serious they were about this.

``I looked at them all standing around it, away from it, of course, and I said [chuckling] to the devil, `I think this thing is really heating up.' Call them off. Somebody call these guys off. That's a true story.

``But the worst night that I can remember was at the Bayfront Center in St. Petersburg on Christmas night. Always the biggest time for us was Christmas night, and this was a huge show with me and Sullivan in a cage, and if I lost, I'd be suspended from Florida for 90 days.

``I remembered there were a bunch of Santa Clauses out there giving out presents. Then in the middle of the match in this cage, Santa Claus comes up and hands this rag to the devil, and the devil puts this rag over my face. I pass out. He beats me 1-2-3.

``Santa Claus nearly got beat up before they could get him to the back, and then when I left that night, behind the Bayfront Center -- without any exaggeration -- there were about 2,000 people there, and they were going to hang Santa Claus.

``Santa Claus ended up being Jake The Snake Roberts, a disciple of the devil. I was like, `Man, these people,' it was just amazing. It was an amazing time and a great time.

``Because of our brotherhood with each other, you had to watch and protect. In Nigeria, 65,000 people, me against Bobby Jaggers, and they overthrew the government in the middle of our match.

``Tear gas started, and riots started, and you were scared for your life. I had to go to the airport and spend the night there to get back out to Kennedy and then find out the money I had been paid was counterfeit. There were some dangerous times.

``I got a scare on my chest, from someone while walking to the ring, before the rails were out there with plenty of security. In Hampton, Virginia at the Coliseum, I guy had a can opener with the jagged part of the can opener and ripped me, and I was a good guy. I was loved by everybody, but you never know. The Funks can tell you.

``The devil, the Funks and Race, they were my big nemesis at the time, but it all started with Pak Song.''

Ernie Ladd, Freight Train Joe Leduc and King Curtis.

``King Curtis's interviews were unbelievable. Ernie Ladd and big Joe Leduc. So I had some great runs in Florida with some great bad guys. They were the best, but the Dream is always going to win in the end, hopefully.''

? Rhodes will be available prior to the show in Brooksville to meet and sign autographs for fans in attendance. Free Dusty Rhodes bobble heads will also be available to Gold Circle Ticket Holders.

Tickets are $12 kids and $15 adults. Gold Circle reserved are $25 and are available at Buddy's Home Furnishings locations in Brooksville and Inverness. Tickets are also available at FCWWrestling.com.

? For nearly half a century, Florida Championship Wrestling has been the Sunshine State's primary wrestling promotion providing a home for such wrestling legends and WWE Hall of Famers as The Brisco Brothers, Gordon Solie and of course Dusty Rhodes.

Officially sanctioned and reorganized by WWE during the summer of 2007, FCW has become the training ground for future WWE superstars. FCW seeks to give fans a preview of the potential superstars of tomorrow while providing exciting ring action that leaves the entire family with smiles on their faces.

More than 50 men and women have progressed to WWE's Raw, SmackDown or NXT television brands.

``The current WWE champion Sheamus came from FCW, SmackDown Intercontinental Champion Kofi Kingston, the list goes on and on,'' said FCW promoter Steve Keirn, a former standout wrestler in Florida, WWF and abroad.

Other current WWE superstars who come from FCW include Jack Swagger, Drew McIntyre, Dolph Ziggler, Ted DiBiase, The Usos, Primo Colon, Ezekiel Jackson, The Bella Twins, Evan Bourne, Tiffany, Divas champ Alicia Fox, Trent Berretta, Caylen Croft, Savannah, Yoshi-Tatsu and more.

? FCW holds weekly TV tapings each Thursday night at its home location, dubbed the FCW Arena, in South Tampa. Former and current WWE stars make appearances, and the shows include WWE NXT talent. On weekends, FCW travels to various cities for live events.

FCW airs 6-7 p.m. EST Sundays on Bright House Ch. 47 across Central Florida.

Tags: Dusty Rhodes, WWE, NWA, WCW, WWF, Dick Murdoch, AWA, Gary Hart, Jake Roberts, Bobby Jaggers, Ernie Ladd