My Friend Tambo
Jun 10, 2013 8:33:55 GMT -6
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Post by Vitamin G on Jun 10, 2013 8:33:55 GMT -6
My Friend Tambo
by "Vitamin G" Gideon Reece
Like many wrestlers who came up the hard way, I spent most of my early career wrestling in warehouses and gyms, for crowds that usually maxed out around three hundred. While those small promotions don't have anywhere near the publicity that a global outfit like GroundZero does, it's not like you're wrestling in total anonymity. Fans and insiders alike love to pay attention to the little promotions, to try and identify who the up-and-comers will be who'll someday make it to the big show. So it doesn't surprise me that one of the quesions I get asked by fans most often is "What happened to Tambo?"
See, back in my early independent career, my name was always mentioned in the same breath with one other: Tambo. He was my tag team partner and my best friend for four years, and I believe our work as a team is a huge part of what made it possible for me to have had the career success that I've had. But about seven years ago, just as my solo career was starting to take off, Tambo disappeared without a trace from the wrestling world, and out of respect to him, I've never spoken publicly about it. No surprise that fans found the whole thing mysterious! But as HotWire has given me this space to clear up some of the mysteries about my career, I felt it was time to tell you all what I know about Tambo's disappearance.
As usual, I'll try to start at the beginning. In a town in the Rocky Mountains, so small that it didn't even have a name, much less telephone service, I met a tree-feller named Andras Tambo. For those of you who haven't heard of Tambo or seen bootlegs of any of our old matches, the man stood about 7'3", looked like he had never shaved or bathed in his life, and could dead lift almost nine hundred pounds. When I met him, he had never laid a violent hand on another human being in his life, but I knew that with his size and strength he could be a phenomenon in professional wrestling. I convinced him to come with me and learn the trade, and he learned very quickly. Eventually, I brought him into the promotion I was working for at the time as the third member of a short-lived stable called the Immovables.
Andras and I together came up with the idea of billing him as a "wild man," (though it really wasn't that far from the truth), and of shortening his name to just Tambo. I sometimes get asked if he was really as dumb as he was played, and the answer is no. I don't think he would be upset with me for acknowledging that he was never what you would call a genius, but most of the naivete that came out in our promos was just shtick. He was a good wrestler, but not a great one, and as I had thought, his size, his strength, and his attitude made him an instant hit. Before long, we were wrestling as a tag team, and it launched both of us down the path of success.
Tambo.
This may be a bit of a cliche in our business, but I have to say it anyway: Tambo was the gentlest and most compassionate man I have ever known, and he became like a brother to me. His belief in me made me push myself harder, and I started to climb the ladder that would eventually bring me to the global level of competition. Unfortunately, Tambo never got the offers and opportunities that I did. In truth, he didn't have the level of technical skill or mic presence that I did. On top of that, there were one or two mistakes in the ring where a wrestler got badly injured, and most of the better-known promotions considered him a risk. There came a point when the company we were working for went on hiatus and it seemed as though the best thing for us would be to part ways temporarily. I continued to climb the ranks of independent singles competition, and that path eventually led me here.
The rest of this, I have had to piece together through my own investigations, as I wasn't around for any of it. After we parted ways, Tambo started working for a tiny promotion in the midwest, the kind of questionably-legal outfit that only advertised by word of mouth and mostly wrestled in basements. For the life of me, I have no idea why he chose that kind of company, but he wrestled there for about three months, and totally dominated the competition. One night he was wrestling on the short side of a five-on-one handicap cage match against a group of brawlers wrestlers called the Dogpack or the Wolfpack or something like that. One of them was named Daniel Drake, I don't know the names of the other four. The way I've heard it, the match was very one-sided as five-on-ones tend to be, and Tambo tried more than once to submit, but the referee wouldn't end the match until the pack decided to make a pin. So Tambo started to fight back harder, and to make a long story short, he tore Drake's arm off at the shoulder. The match was ended, Tambo fled the building, and as far as I know no one in the wrestling business has seen or heard from him since.
By the time I was able to learn all of this, that company had disbanded, or at least changed its name and gone even deeper underground. Daniel Drake spent some time in intensive care, but he did recover, although obviously they weren't able to reattach his arm. I understand that he's even returned to wrestling and is doing fairly well. I spent a long time trying to track Tambo down, headed back to his hometown in the Rockies, and everywhere he's ever lived or said he wanted to live, but I've never found any sign of him. I don't even know whether he's alive or dead, although my heart tells me that he's still alive.
And that's really the whole story. I've never spoken about it out of respect for Tambo, knowing that that incident does not reflect the good, kind person that he is. I've also been unwilling to face my shame at my part in all of this. But mostly, I just miss my friend.
by "Vitamin G" Gideon Reece
Like many wrestlers who came up the hard way, I spent most of my early career wrestling in warehouses and gyms, for crowds that usually maxed out around three hundred. While those small promotions don't have anywhere near the publicity that a global outfit like GroundZero does, it's not like you're wrestling in total anonymity. Fans and insiders alike love to pay attention to the little promotions, to try and identify who the up-and-comers will be who'll someday make it to the big show. So it doesn't surprise me that one of the quesions I get asked by fans most often is "What happened to Tambo?"
See, back in my early independent career, my name was always mentioned in the same breath with one other: Tambo. He was my tag team partner and my best friend for four years, and I believe our work as a team is a huge part of what made it possible for me to have had the career success that I've had. But about seven years ago, just as my solo career was starting to take off, Tambo disappeared without a trace from the wrestling world, and out of respect to him, I've never spoken publicly about it. No surprise that fans found the whole thing mysterious! But as HotWire has given me this space to clear up some of the mysteries about my career, I felt it was time to tell you all what I know about Tambo's disappearance.
As usual, I'll try to start at the beginning. In a town in the Rocky Mountains, so small that it didn't even have a name, much less telephone service, I met a tree-feller named Andras Tambo. For those of you who haven't heard of Tambo or seen bootlegs of any of our old matches, the man stood about 7'3", looked like he had never shaved or bathed in his life, and could dead lift almost nine hundred pounds. When I met him, he had never laid a violent hand on another human being in his life, but I knew that with his size and strength he could be a phenomenon in professional wrestling. I convinced him to come with me and learn the trade, and he learned very quickly. Eventually, I brought him into the promotion I was working for at the time as the third member of a short-lived stable called the Immovables.
Andras and I together came up with the idea of billing him as a "wild man," (though it really wasn't that far from the truth), and of shortening his name to just Tambo. I sometimes get asked if he was really as dumb as he was played, and the answer is no. I don't think he would be upset with me for acknowledging that he was never what you would call a genius, but most of the naivete that came out in our promos was just shtick. He was a good wrestler, but not a great one, and as I had thought, his size, his strength, and his attitude made him an instant hit. Before long, we were wrestling as a tag team, and it launched both of us down the path of success.
Tambo.
This may be a bit of a cliche in our business, but I have to say it anyway: Tambo was the gentlest and most compassionate man I have ever known, and he became like a brother to me. His belief in me made me push myself harder, and I started to climb the ladder that would eventually bring me to the global level of competition. Unfortunately, Tambo never got the offers and opportunities that I did. In truth, he didn't have the level of technical skill or mic presence that I did. On top of that, there were one or two mistakes in the ring where a wrestler got badly injured, and most of the better-known promotions considered him a risk. There came a point when the company we were working for went on hiatus and it seemed as though the best thing for us would be to part ways temporarily. I continued to climb the ranks of independent singles competition, and that path eventually led me here.
The rest of this, I have had to piece together through my own investigations, as I wasn't around for any of it. After we parted ways, Tambo started working for a tiny promotion in the midwest, the kind of questionably-legal outfit that only advertised by word of mouth and mostly wrestled in basements. For the life of me, I have no idea why he chose that kind of company, but he wrestled there for about three months, and totally dominated the competition. One night he was wrestling on the short side of a five-on-one handicap cage match against a group of brawlers wrestlers called the Dogpack or the Wolfpack or something like that. One of them was named Daniel Drake, I don't know the names of the other four. The way I've heard it, the match was very one-sided as five-on-ones tend to be, and Tambo tried more than once to submit, but the referee wouldn't end the match until the pack decided to make a pin. So Tambo started to fight back harder, and to make a long story short, he tore Drake's arm off at the shoulder. The match was ended, Tambo fled the building, and as far as I know no one in the wrestling business has seen or heard from him since.
By the time I was able to learn all of this, that company had disbanded, or at least changed its name and gone even deeper underground. Daniel Drake spent some time in intensive care, but he did recover, although obviously they weren't able to reattach his arm. I understand that he's even returned to wrestling and is doing fairly well. I spent a long time trying to track Tambo down, headed back to his hometown in the Rockies, and everywhere he's ever lived or said he wanted to live, but I've never found any sign of him. I don't even know whether he's alive or dead, although my heart tells me that he's still alive.
And that's really the whole story. I've never spoken about it out of respect for Tambo, knowing that that incident does not reflect the good, kind person that he is. I've also been unwilling to face my shame at my part in all of this. But mostly, I just miss my friend.
