Ron Fuller Studcast – A Friend Saves Me
Release Date: 02/13/19
Running time: 1:03
Recap by: Joe Aguinaldo
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On today’s podcast, Ron continues the story of how he got the $25,000 downpayment to buy the Knoxville Territory and establish Southeastern Wrestling.
-Ron’s dream when he bought Knoxville was to make it into an NWA territory.
-Ron and the owner John Casana set up a meeting to hammer out a deal. Casana wants $150,000 for the territory. Ron will put $25,000 down and pay $500 a week
-At the time, Ron doesn’t have the cash because he had recently purchased a new home and put a large down payment on the house.
-Ron had 30 days to come up with the downpayment or lose the opportunity to buy the territory. He was obsessed to do what his father and grandfather did running a territory and wanted to know if he could do it
-Ron didn’t tell too many people at first because the price was high and thought people thought he was stupid. But he did think he could run 6 nights a week and if he didn’t think that was a possibility, he wouldn’t have bought it.
-Ron knew all the players and promoters of the surrounding territories and how they operated.
-Ron did not have a great relationship with his father or grandfather and couldn’t go to them to get the money.
-Ron met with his assistance Mack in the West Palm Beach territory and told him about his meeting with John Casana. Mack started asking a bunch of question and asked Ron about the deal for the territory. He offered to lend Ron the $25,000 for the down payment in return for bringing Mack to the territory to referee and help run it. Mack said Ron could pay him back whenever he could and they are still best friends today as they were back then.
-When Ron went back to Florida, he gave his notice the day after meeting with John Cassana in September talking to Eddie, Bill Watts and Ron’s father. He personally thanked Eddie the next time they saw each other. Watts and his father thought Ron was crazy. When Ron thinks back, he thinks Eddie would have given him the money.
-Ron spoke to Casana to confirm he was purchasing the town and they set a tentative date of October 11th, 1974 as Ron’s first match in the territory as well as closing date for the deal
-Ron worked 8 more total times in Florida after working out the deal with John Cassana. He wrestled his last match in Florida on Tuesday, July 1st, 1975 for the Southern Heavyweight Title. Ron wrestled 938 matches in the territory which does not include TV matches which would put that number at closer to 1000.
-Ron is jumping into something he’s not entirely sure about doing but he’s excited to do it. He’s dead set on doing this but also knows it will be a challenge.
-Ron is fortunate to have people he can contact for help such as his dad, grandfather, Eddie Graham, Jim Barnett and Sam Muchnick.
-The channel the Knoxville show was on was an issue as it did not have great signal. Ron knew he needed a big affiliate to air his show but that was a problem because the show itself wasn’t that good.
-Ron’s first match in the territory was October 11th, 1974 against Dennis Hall. On October 25th, Ron took ownership of the territory and it became Southeastern Championship Wrestling.
-Next week, the story continues and Ron has to make a huge decision in his career as to whether or not to turn heel for the first time. We also find out where the origin of the Tennessee Stud name.
Review: First off…wanted to make a quick correction. Last week I had said Ron bought the territory for $25K but that was actually the down payment and the actual cost of the territory was $150K. This podcast was OK and mainly revolved around Ron getting the down payment for the territory. That said, it wasn’t as good as some of the previous podcasts. If you missed this one, you wouldn’t be missing much from the narrative. However, I still give this a medium recommend. Rating – 6.5/10
About Joe:
Joe is a long time wrestling fan from Toronto. He is a co-host on the Pull Apart Podcast with Jeff Rush and Caitlin Lavelle as well as a contributor to www.pwpodcasts.com. One of his life goals is to be a guest host on one of Wade Keller’s post-show podcasts. He doesn’t consider himself any sort of expert, he just likes wrestling. Check him out on Twitter and Instagram @ja113.
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