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Review Of The New Junkyard Dog Biography

Posted: Jun 2nd 2012 By: CMBurnham

?Big Cat? Ernie Ladd. Ron ?R-Truth? Killings. Ron Simmons. Dwayne ?The Rock? Johnson. Rocky Johnson. Tony Atlas. Kofi Kingston. ?Thunderbolt? Patterson. Those are some of the best African American stars of yesterday and today just to name a few. But none of them not even ?the Rock? could equal the popularity of Sylvester Ritter during his run in Mid-South. What did you say, who is Sylvester Ritter and what is Mid-South? Fans of the WWF of the 1980?s will know Ritter better if I call him by his Hall of Fame stage name, The Junkyard Dog. Mid-South was one of the hottest territories in the United States at one point drawing better money in venues than the NWA and then called WWF.

Author Greg Klein revisits that era with his new book ?The King of New Orleans: How the Junkyard Dog Became Wrestling?s First Black Superstar?, (ECW Press, $19.95, 178pp). Mr. Klein went to the still damaged French Quarter to speak with former wrestling fans to see what kind of legacy the JYD had in the city. From there he takes the reader on a time travel trip to the late 1970?s when Mid-South promoter and wrestler ?Cowboy? Bill Watts broke off from his business partner Leroy McGuirk. Watts had ?Big Cat? Ernie Ladd as one of his top heels but he longed to break the still horrible racial barriers in New Orleans, wanting to rally fans behind a superstar. That man was Sylvester Ritter who came to the territory from the famed Stampede territory where he was the dreaded ?Sweet Daddy Ritter? who feuded with Jake (before the Snake) Roberts. Mr. Watts used some of the tactics used to help build up the former WCW World champion Bill Goldberg. That was short hard hitting matches highlighting JYD?s power while hiding his lack of technical wrestling skills. However unlike Goldberg, JYD had charisma and could work the crowd like no other babyface (wrestling good guy.) He also had Watts? creative booking skills and the fans of New Orleans with the other Mid-South cities seeing him weekly in person.

Mr. Klein takes time to give interesting background on Mr. Ritter?s upbringing in North Carolina and how football led him into professional wrestling. Klein admits being a fan of the JYD so I am sure it was difficult to address the substance abuse issues that plagued JYD from Mid-South to the WWF and probably until he died in 1998. I agree with Mr. Klein that current wrestling fans probably do not know the legacy JYD created for the modern stars and they like wrestlers across the globe should read this book. Like Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair, JYD was only as good as the people he worked with and Mr. Klein talks to them about their careers too. I hope you buy this and share it with your wrestling friends.

The book is available through www.ecwpress.com, www.amazon.com and book retailers across America. Alan Wojcik is the host of Kayfabe Wrestling Radio heard Tuesdays 9pm EST on the Wild Talk Radio Network (www.wildtalkradio.com) and can be reached through mynameiswojcik@gmail.com and www.twitter.com/MyNameIsWojcik