Post by Head Booker on Dec 20, 2006 7:34:07 GMT -6
They didn't have this category when Booker T. Huffman graduated from Jack Yates High School, but Huffman would have been voted ''Least Likely to Kick Anybody's Butt."
''I was a scrawny kid, barely 150 pounds, and I didn't play any sports. I was a drum major in the band. What I really wanted to do is be an entertainer," Huffman said.
He's entertaining millions of fans now, in addition to kicking some booty, as King Booker, a 250-pound muscle-bound, rule-breaking superstar in World Wrestling Entertainment.
Huffman mostly wrestled under the names Harlem Heat and Booker T during his 16-year career in World Championship Wrestling and World Wrestling Entertainment. Earlier this year he created the character King Booker, an English dandy (from Houston's Fifth Ward), complete with crown, cape, scepter — and very ridiculous British accent.
"The King Booker character was actually my wife, Sharmell's, idea," Huffman said. ''She was Miss Black America, so she's used to that world of wearing tiaras and crowns. This is my most successful character because it allows me to show off my acting ability."
I thought just being a pro wrestler allowed you to show off your acting ability. You need a crown, too?
King Booker has the slowest and funniest stage entrance in wrestling history. As he moves toward the ring, greeting his subjects — I mean fans — with a royal wave and a fake tear in his eye, the announcer bellows, ''All hail King Booker!" over and over.
And over and over.
''My record is seven minutes to get to the ring and 54 'All hail King Bookers.' The ring announcers hate having to do that," Huffman laughed. "But it's great because it gets the crowd into my character. Those boos are music to my ears."
Even though he recently dropped the world-title belt to Batista (hate him), Huffman said he's riding high in the WWE.
''I can't believe I've come this far. After a lot of years of wrestling locally, I finally got signed by World Championship Wrestling in 1990. That was my first serious paycheck. I even got to wrestle in Japan, which was my first time on a plane. Now I've been around the world many times, and things are really great for me."
He is the most successful black pro wrestler ever, having won major titles (several times) in World Wrestling Entertainment and World Championship Wrestling.
Still, there are only so many bumps and bruises left in his 41-year-old body, so Huffman is plotting his post-wrestling career.
''I've got a wrestling school in downtown Houston (Booker T's Wrestling Academy) , and I've formed a new group called the PWA — the Pro Wrestling Alliance. I want this group to be based in my hometown and bring back the glory days of Houston wrestling, when we had shows here every week. I have the blessing of the WWE, and I'll be using WWE stars on our shows in addition to my students," he said.
The next Pro Wrestling Alliance event, dubbed Christmas Chaos, will be Dec. 21 at the Pasadena Convention Center. For ticket information, call 713-222-0588.
''I'll be wrestling Charlie Haas that night, and we'll have WWE stars like Umaga and Boogeyman on the card, but I want just as much attention put on the younger wrestlers. The goal is to have my group become a training ground for future WWE superstars."
•The first time I saw Booker T, well, it wasn't exactly a formal introduction.
This was about 17 years ago, when he was still wrestling on the local circuit for $25 a night. He was known as G.I. Bro, the meanest, most dangerous ... and certifiably craziest wrestler in Houston.
There was a one-time wrestling show at a nightclub in the Galleria area, and I was supposed to interview one of the good-guy wrestlers. I asked the promoter, which dressing room are the ''baby faces," or good-guy wrestlers in?
He said, ''That one over there."
Everybody's a comedian.
He sent me into the "heel," or rule-breaker, dressing room.
Back then, wrestlers took their roles seriously. If your wrestling character was insane in the ring, you lived that character outside the ring, too.
Rule breakers were bad dudes, and G.I. Bro was the baddest, and someone like me didn't just waltz into their dressing room.
I opened the door and ...
Huffman screamed, ''Who are you?" and threw a chair a me. Then he came rushing toward me with a twisted look on his face. ''I'm going to kill you!"
I was lucky the door was still open, because I was leaving, door open or closed.
Hello, King Booker.
credit The Houston Sun
''I was a scrawny kid, barely 150 pounds, and I didn't play any sports. I was a drum major in the band. What I really wanted to do is be an entertainer," Huffman said.
He's entertaining millions of fans now, in addition to kicking some booty, as King Booker, a 250-pound muscle-bound, rule-breaking superstar in World Wrestling Entertainment.
Huffman mostly wrestled under the names Harlem Heat and Booker T during his 16-year career in World Championship Wrestling and World Wrestling Entertainment. Earlier this year he created the character King Booker, an English dandy (from Houston's Fifth Ward), complete with crown, cape, scepter — and very ridiculous British accent.
"The King Booker character was actually my wife, Sharmell's, idea," Huffman said. ''She was Miss Black America, so she's used to that world of wearing tiaras and crowns. This is my most successful character because it allows me to show off my acting ability."
I thought just being a pro wrestler allowed you to show off your acting ability. You need a crown, too?
King Booker has the slowest and funniest stage entrance in wrestling history. As he moves toward the ring, greeting his subjects — I mean fans — with a royal wave and a fake tear in his eye, the announcer bellows, ''All hail King Booker!" over and over.
And over and over.
''My record is seven minutes to get to the ring and 54 'All hail King Bookers.' The ring announcers hate having to do that," Huffman laughed. "But it's great because it gets the crowd into my character. Those boos are music to my ears."
Even though he recently dropped the world-title belt to Batista (hate him), Huffman said he's riding high in the WWE.
''I can't believe I've come this far. After a lot of years of wrestling locally, I finally got signed by World Championship Wrestling in 1990. That was my first serious paycheck. I even got to wrestle in Japan, which was my first time on a plane. Now I've been around the world many times, and things are really great for me."
He is the most successful black pro wrestler ever, having won major titles (several times) in World Wrestling Entertainment and World Championship Wrestling.
Still, there are only so many bumps and bruises left in his 41-year-old body, so Huffman is plotting his post-wrestling career.
''I've got a wrestling school in downtown Houston (Booker T's Wrestling Academy) , and I've formed a new group called the PWA — the Pro Wrestling Alliance. I want this group to be based in my hometown and bring back the glory days of Houston wrestling, when we had shows here every week. I have the blessing of the WWE, and I'll be using WWE stars on our shows in addition to my students," he said.
The next Pro Wrestling Alliance event, dubbed Christmas Chaos, will be Dec. 21 at the Pasadena Convention Center. For ticket information, call 713-222-0588.
''I'll be wrestling Charlie Haas that night, and we'll have WWE stars like Umaga and Boogeyman on the card, but I want just as much attention put on the younger wrestlers. The goal is to have my group become a training ground for future WWE superstars."
•The first time I saw Booker T, well, it wasn't exactly a formal introduction.
This was about 17 years ago, when he was still wrestling on the local circuit for $25 a night. He was known as G.I. Bro, the meanest, most dangerous ... and certifiably craziest wrestler in Houston.
There was a one-time wrestling show at a nightclub in the Galleria area, and I was supposed to interview one of the good-guy wrestlers. I asked the promoter, which dressing room are the ''baby faces," or good-guy wrestlers in?
He said, ''That one over there."
Everybody's a comedian.
He sent me into the "heel," or rule-breaker, dressing room.
Back then, wrestlers took their roles seriously. If your wrestling character was insane in the ring, you lived that character outside the ring, too.
Rule breakers were bad dudes, and G.I. Bro was the baddest, and someone like me didn't just waltz into their dressing room.
I opened the door and ...
Huffman screamed, ''Who are you?" and threw a chair a me. Then he came rushing toward me with a twisted look on his face. ''I'm going to kill you!"
I was lucky the door was still open, because I was leaving, door open or closed.
Hello, King Booker.
credit The Houston Sun
