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Interview with Jody "The Assassin" Hamilton

Posted: Jun 22nd 2007 By: mikeiles

What happened the last day at Deep South when John Laurinaitis and Mike Bucci walked in?

They had a brief meeting with the talent. Then they had a brief meeting with me and that was it.

How much communication was there from WWE about their dissatisfaction with Deep South?

Very little.

Was there anything they told you needed changing?

They wanted me to run a few more towns and everything, which I was in the process of doing.

That was it?

As far as I know. That?s all that was ever told to me.

It?s been reported that Bruce Prichard visited Deep South the week before it was closed down and then made a negative report back to the WWE office. Did he give you any indication that there were problems?

No he did not.

So you were caught completely off guard.

Yep.

You said they wanted you to run more towns. Let?s talk about the economics of running house shows for a minute. Did WWE provide any financial support for running house shows?

No.

What did they provide besides talent?

That was it.

No other financial support at all?

No.

Given the importance of developing new stars, it seems to me that WWE doesn?t put enough resources into their development system. Do you agree with that perspective?

As far as financially you?re talking about? Oh, I don?t know. I just think that if you?ve got someone that knows how to run a town and knows what needs to be done in these various cities, and so on, then I think WWE should offer more support. Because there?s certain things you can do, and certain things you can?t do as far as running these towns without spending an exorbitant amount of money that there is no way to recoup at the gate. To be able to promote a town and promote it properly costs money, as anybody that has ever been in promotion knows. Sometimes I got the feeling that the people putting pressure on me to run more towns, run more towns, run more towns, had never run a town, so they really had no clue what it entails to properly run a town. It takes a good deal of preparation. It also takes building a good, solid foundation for your company before you attempt to venture into the realm of promotion. Consequently, anybody that knows anything at all about promotion or anything about that specific end of our business should know that when you?re talking promoting towns and small venues and so on, you?re not talking about making a great deal of money. If you?re going to make any money, your money is going to be made on bought shows and paid for shows, such as Six Flags and auto shows. The best you?re going to do running events on your own is break even, and most of the time you?re going to lose money. Consequently, unless you have a really good, solid foundation built for your company, it won?t take long to put your company out of business if you?re trying to go out and promote towns just on a whim.

The irony is you had a lot more shows planned going forward than at any time in the past.

Absolutely, we had a lot more shows. Plus, I had contacted and made an agreement with promoters that would have given us the adequate amount of towns that they wanted us to be running. All that would have been put in place by the first of June.

Was WWE aware of those plans?

Of course they were.

What else, in your opinion, were the problems that WWE didn?t tell you about?

I have no clue.

One of the things that was a bone of contention during Jim Cornette?s tenure at OVW was the use of non-contract talent on television. I know you did some of that at Deep South as well. Was there ever any issue made of it?

I never used that many, and if I did, they were always working with contract people.

How did you get along with Tom Prichard and how would you compare him with Bill DeMott as a trainer?

Well, they?re two completely different styles. I got along fine with Tom.

How would you say his style differed from Bill?s?

Well, just more laid back.

When Bill was fired, that could have been taken as a warning shot over the bow concerning Deep South?s future. Did you take it that way?

No.

Nothing was said that would indicate that was the case?

No.

It was rumored that one of the problems was that DeMott was still around some at Deep South after he was let go. Is that true and if so, do you think that was a problem?

I don?t know who it would be a problem for. First of all, you?re running a place of business and one night, he and his wife and some friends of theirs came to the matches and sat in the seats. When they came through the front door, they all bought tickets. I can?t refuse to sell them a ticket. On their way out, they stopped by my office for 30 seconds to say hello. On two other occasions, Bill stopped by to ask me questions that were totally unrelated to the business. It was something that had to do with something personal. He could drop by to ask me that. He went nowhere but in the back door and stepped three feet from the back door into my office. We shut the door because it was a personal, private conversation that had nothing to do with the business, and was totally unrelated to Deep South. If that?s letting him hang around, then I?m guilty as hell. I don?t think anybody has the right to tell me who I can choose for friends.

How about the ?Learning the Ropes? series that MAV TV shot? I thought that was some pretty incredible stuff. Did WWE authorize that?

Yes.

They had no problems with it?

No.

In terms of character development, I was really interested in what you said on the ?Learning the Ropes? shows about developing what was already inside of the person, as a personality and a character. That seems to differ from WWE?s approach of giving characters to people. What are your thoughts on that?

Everybody has there own way of doing things. That?s my particular way. I think it?s a lot easier for a person to develop what?s already inside them, than it is to take something that is completely foreign to their true nature and try to develop it. You can?t always, unless you sit down and know the talent personally, successfully create a scenario or create a character and then just pick someone at random and say ?you?re going to be this or you?re going to be that,? when that particular character may not fit that individual and their true personality in any way, shape or form. Especially talent coming up at a young age and experience wise at a very young level, if they have to force something or have to stop and think ?Oh, am I in character? Am I doing this right or am I doing that right?? They?re just never going to get over anyway, and they?re never going to do it right. So consequently, isn?t it a lot easier and doesn?t it make more sense ? it does to me at least ? if you can take something that?s already inside a person? Because each and every one of us has our own individual character, and it?s as different and distinctive as individual fingerprints. Wouldn?t it be easier to go ahead and develop that type of personality or a character that?s within the person originally anyway, than it is to force something on them that they may or may not be able to handle?

Were there situations where it came down from above in WWE wanting to force certain characters on certain individuals?

No, not really. No.

They didn?t suggest characters for the talent at Deep South?

No, not really. They were basically letting us handle the thing and letting the kids develop their own characters.

Who were you most proud of in terms of their development during their time at Deep South?

There?s a bunch of kids that deserve a shot. One of the guys that?s already up there is MVP. He came a long way in a very short period of time; so consequently, I think he?s probably the most outstanding. The rest of them, I?ll reserve comment until later on.

Going back to the television show, were you the primary writer?

Only.

Given the limitations imposed by injuries, call-ups, etc., you tried to keep everything making logical sense in the way you laid out the stories on the show. Could you talk a bit about your philosophy of doing wrestling television?

Well, you know, for me to try to compete against the spectacle that Vince is able to produce is counterproductive. That?s basically what WCW tried to do. They tried to do everything Vince did, but they did it very poorly. They couldn?t do it nearly as well as Vince could do it. The paying audience looked at WCW as a cheap imitation of the original product, which is basically what they turned out to be and that?s what put them out of business. In comparison to the budget WWE has for their television production, our budget is non-existent. We have to do the best we can. The best we can is, instead of using all the glitz and the glamour with the pyrotechnics and everything we try to do it with smoke and mirrors. So as far as the lighting and so forth, Neal Pruitt did a magnificent job. To me, he?s one of the best around as an executive producer. As far as the guts of the show itself, I know that the popular thing today is to cater to the male crowd from 18 to 35, but there?s a vast audience of people out there that don?t fit that demographic that are hungry for a good wrestling show. Consequently, I tried to have a little bit of everything. I tried to cater somewhat to the 18 to 35 crowd, but I also tried to cater to the older wrestling crowd, plus create some new fans in the teenage area.

You were drawing a lot of kids to the live shows at the DSW Arena and more so as time went on.

What happens is you actually get a fan base established. Fans are your best medium of advertising. You can buy ads in newspapers and ads in television and radio, but the best medium of advertising for wrestling is word of mouth. The word got around that for the price we were charging for tickets, the Deep South shows were great shows, great programs, and it was the best two-hour entertainment value on the face of the planet. That?s where our fan base was coming from. We had enough loyal fans that were going to be there every week to just about fill the Arena.

One of the things that struck me about your TV was how sparingly angles were used. I think there was one table spot in the entire history of the show and only one time blood was used, which seems very different from what goes on in most of indie wrestling today.

It?s like having 20 masked men on the card. After you?ve seen 12 of them, what do the last eight mean? Do you understand where I?m coming from with that? If you?ve seen masked men all night long, then when you see the main event masked men, they don?t mean nearly as much as they would if you hadn?t seen any masked men before. If you give them good competitive matches, then when there is something that you want to put emphasis on, it means a helluva lot more than if you?re trying to do this wild, crazy crap all night long.

It appeared that your emphasis was on solid, basic wrestling technique, and making sure that everything looked good in the ring. It has been written that some of the talent felt they got better training at Deep South than at OVW. Do you attribute that to Bill DeMott and yourself?

That?s our philosophy. That?s our M.O. And I don?t see where anyone should vary from that particular M.O. What these kids need, and what they all deserve, is the very best education they can get. This is like an advanced course in college, like a doctorate degree. So many times, we had to take these kids that had been introduced to the profession via the independent route, and by God. There are some very good independents out there. Don?t misunderstand me. But by the same token, there are some terrible ones out there also, and unfortunately, from the really, really bad ones, these kids pick up a lot of bad habits, and things that are really counterproductive to becoming a polished performer in the ring. So consequently, sometimes we have to spend a helluva lot of time on them trying to break those bad habits, before we start teaching them the right way.

Who would rate as some of the good independents out there?

I don?t want to get into rating the good and bad. There are some good and there are a lot of bad ones. Unfortunately, the reason for that is most areas are unsanctioned, so just about anybody and there brother can say, ?I?m going to be a wrestler? or ?I?m going to be a wrestling promoter,? and that?s basically what they do. You end up with a bunch of no talent jerks that couldn?t under any circumstances ever get booked on a legitimate professional wrestling card, so the only way they could ever be on a show is promote it themselves and put themselves in the main event and call themselves champions.

Did you happen to read what Kevin Matthews wrote, primarily about his experience with Bill DeMott as a trainer?

No, I did not.

A lot of it was about his dislike of Bill?s training techniques and the repetition of the drills, and negatively comparing DeMott?s class to Dave Taylor?s class.

Dave Taylor does repetitions, too. Repetitions are how you learn to do things instinctively. The things that they?re doing repetitions on are the things that you?re going to have to learn to do instinctively without having to stop and think, ?Oh, what am I going to do next?? That?s why we do repetitions. I tell every kid that comes down here that in your training here, you?re going to get bored as hell, because you?re going to be doing the same things over and over and over and over and over, until one day, you?re going to wake up and your going to say, ?God, why do I have to do this again? I already know how to do this.? But, can you do it instinctively without having to stop and think about what you?re going to do? When you reach that point, where you don?t have to stop and think about it, then we don?t have to do the repetitive drills all over again.

It?s been alleged that some of talent got hurt in DeMott?s class due to too much of that kind of stuff. Your comments?

Well, the last couple of weeks that we were in business, we had a tremendous amount of injuries. What the hell. Injuries are going to happen, whether you?re doing drills over and over and over again or not. And a lot of the drills didn?t have to do with taking a lot of bumps and stuff. It had to do with making certain moves at certain times and under certain conditions. Let?s face it: if you?re going to be a wrestler, you?re going to have to learn to live with pain. Something is always going to hurt. I don?t give a damn whether it was 40 years ago in my era, or whether it?s now. If you?re going to be a professional wrestler, you?d better learn to live with pain, because something is always going to be injured. Something is always going to be hurt. You?re always going to have these little nagging injuries and so on. To me, the difference between the ones that are going to make it, and the ones that ain?t going to make it, are the ones that sit around, cry, whine, bitch and moan, and want to sit out because they?ve got a hangnail.

When you look back at Deep South, I?m curious about what you?re most proud of and do you have any regrets?

The only regret I have is the way everything came down, and I still have never been told exactly why. What I am most proud of is the fact that as far as independent productions are concerned, Deep South stood out amongst all of them, and I think we stood at the top. I think we?re the best independent production, television wise, that?s ever been out there. The talent that was on our program, as far as I?m concerned, 90 percent of them deserve to be up there. I think most of them eventually will be up there. The level of intensity that these kids could muster up on Thursday night, which was game day for them, was unbelievable. You know, we did 74 shows. Of the 74 shows, I can?t remember us doing what I would consider a bad show that I didn?t want to be seen on the air. I defy anybody else to say that.

I saw all 50 shows that aired on CSS, and I can recall very few truly bad matches.

I don?t think we had any that I would call really bad matches. We had some that didn?t live up to expectations. As far as bad matches, or bad shows, we did not have a bad show. We had a couple of shows that I thought were kind of mediocre, that weren?t really up to our normal standards, but you?ve got to expect that out of 74. I think I could probably count on one hand the number of shows I wasn?t really overjoyed with.

One thing I wanted to ask about the TV was how much talent was on their own with the promos, and how much was coached?

On our live, I gave them an outline and wanted them to put it together themselves. I hate people going out there and trying to recite lines as far as their interviews are concerned, because what you?re trying to do is take a bunch of jocks and make Shakespearian actors out of them. To me, that?s counterproductive.

So none of the promos were tightly scripted as sometimes happens on WWE?

Well, I don?t know how they do it up there. I never sat in on one of them. But I do know from my personal experience, that it?s far easier for someone to give me an outline of what they want, and let me put my own personality into it. Because I can?t write for you. I can?t sit down and give a word for word interview for you to do, because you would deliver it differently than I would deliver it, and I would deliver it differently than Bill DeMott would deliver it. So for me to sit down and write it out verbatim, you?re losing the true guts of the character or the personality of the person that is going to be doing the interview. So I like to give them a good outline. If they?re stuck with certain things on it, I would help them out.

Who at Deep South was particularly good at translating your outline into the finished product?

I thought Krissy Vaine did a marvelous job. I?d give her an outline, and Angel Williams was the same, talking about the girls, and I thought all the guys who I gave outlines to did a marvelous job. And again, I thought that not only about the way that they not only performed in the ring, but the way they conducted their interviews was a compliment to our system because they did it so well. There again, my system has always been to give them outlines, and let them fill in the gaps.

Other than the way things went down at the end, you have no other regrets?

The main thing I regret is that I don?t think it was fair to the kids. I don?t think it?s fair to the business to take a mind like mine ? I?m certainly not the physical specimen that I used to be so far as in the ring ? but there?s nothing wrong with my mind, although I guess that?s up to debate, too. (laughs) I would like to take this 51 years of knowledge that I have stored up in my head and keep relating it to these kids, because I think it?s very important at this stage of their careers, that they be exposed to people like myself, and my philosophies and my knowledge of how things need to be done and should be done, because they can always adapt later on if they learn the basic fundamentals. They can always expand on their characters and they can always adapt to different situations that the office, or whatever the promotion might be at that time, wants them to be. They can?t expand on anything if they don?t have the foundation.

You talked about being in the business for 51 years. What are the things that you think are being lost in translation from the older era to the new era that are really important to hold onto in pro wrestling?

Of course, I?m not one of those disgruntled old timers who think that everything in modern day wrestling is bad. I think that the level of respect fans have for wrestling is higher probably than it has ever been. I don?t think that anyone, probably not even Vince, had any earthly idea as to how far this thing could go like it has. You know, I don?t think anybody could have predicted that. I don?t think anybody did predict it. And I know that there were times when Vince fell under a lot of criticism. But by the same token, under the old system, the superstars that we know today would never be the superstars that they are. All you had were territories. You would go from territory to territory, and you had maybe three or four guys that were well known and used well in various territories. Every time that I hear an old timer say, ?Well, the stuff that Vince is doing is the shits? ? I don?t agree with that. I think the stuff that Vince has done has not only elevated wrestlers on a pay scale, but I think it has elevated wrestlers image-wise to the point that no one ever had in their wildest dreams the expectations that it was to going to be the most watched sports program on television. They can say what they want to say about baseball, football, basketball, this, that, and whatever, but consistently, year in and year out, professional wrestling is the most watched program. And who?s got professional wrestling? For all practical intents and purposes, the only professional wrestling promotion around is WWE. And that?s all because Vince had a vision. He had foresight. He had guts enough to go ahead and jump into it with both feet, and play it as it lays. He?s made mistakes, but hell, if you don?t make mistakes, you ain?t doing nothing.

After 51 years in the wresting business, where does Joe Hamilton go from here?

Well, I?m going to continue. Probably do a little training, and try to run a few little towns in conjunction with some people. I?m not ready to retire. I?m not going to roll over and play dead just because I?m not running a developmental program for WWE anymore. I have guys calling me all the time asking me for advice. I?ll go to a few shows and give some guys tips and advice. Last Friday, I got nine tapes in the mail. And then, I got phone calls over the weekend from four of the guys wanting to know if I had seen their tapes, and asking me to critique them.

Do you retain the ownership of the name Deep South Wrestling?

Absolutely.

Recently you made an announcement about Deep South Wrestling continuing. Can you share any more details?

Hey, I?m not going to roll over and play dead for anybody. I?m not ready to do that. We?re going to run a few towns and stuff.

You did some fun storylines at Deep South: the three way battle for tag team supremacy, the break up and reformation of Team Elite, DeMott vs. Gymini, and Jay vs. O?Reilly. What were your favorites?

I liked the tag team situation with Knox and Neikirk and I also liked the situation with Brad (Jay) and O?Reilly. I?m sorry we didn?t get to culminate that.

How about the thing with Bag Lady and Freakin? Deacon. Bag Lady had already turned babyface by the end. Where was that going to go?

Oh, nowhere really.

Obviously, Palmer Canon was a key player in the early Deep South television shows. What were thoughts on him?

I thought he was a good piece of talent.

When Angel Williams was released, I was surprised to read reports that her attitude was a contributing factor. Can you talk about your experience with Angel at Deep South?

What was the problem?

That she had some sort of an attitude problem.

(chuckles) Yeah. Ok. I found her to be very cooperative, and I thought that by far she was one of the better performers, as far as the girls were concerned.

Bill Behrens was included in the deal that WWE put together with you for Deep South, presumably because of his experience with television and talent development. As things turned out, he decided to leave before the first TV show was even filmed. Why was that so in your opinion, and is it your view that he would have been asset to DSW if he stuck around?

I?m not going to speculate on whether he would have been an asset or not. You can make all kinds of predictions. I was actually surprised when he decided to resign.

What was his role going to be in Deep South?

My understanding was that he was hired to produce a television show.

At that point, was Neal Pruitt already your choice to be the television producer?

No. Nobody asked me anyway. I was told ?Here?s Bill Behrens. He?s going to produce a television show.? I don?t know how many months went by and no television show got produced and Bill resigned.

Was it expected that he would have done more in that regard by the time he left?

He had a deal with them, and I wasn?t privy to it. I don?t know what his contract stipulated. All I know is that I was under the impression that he was there to produce a television show, and that never happened.

It wasn?t your choice for Behrens to be at Deep South, and WWE made the deal for him to be there.

They did. Nobody asked me about it.

Do you have any favorite moments from Deep South television?

I guess the very first one we did would still be my favorite, the big battle royal, because battle royals are very, very difficult matches, and this was a very good and very exciting battle royal. It was our first show out of the box and I was extremely pleased with everyone that participated in it, and I don?t think they could have improved on it.

I?m not much for battle royals, but that was one of the best ones I?ve ever seen.

Thank you. I enjoyed that one myself, and sat and watched it over and over. And for me to sit and watch it over and over and over again, and not be a John Wayne movie, it?s got to be pretty damn good.

What about High Impact (Mike Taylor and Tony Santarelli)? I was surprised they never got a shot at the main roster.

As far as their talent was concerned, I considered them to be excellent talent.

Is there anything set as far as when Deep South my resume running shows?

As soon as I get things reorganized, I?ll make an announcement to let everyone know where we?re going to be, and what we?re going to be doing, and who?s going to be doing it with us.