{"id":90272,"date":"2019-12-10T21:27:19","date_gmt":"2019-12-11T03:27:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/?p=90272"},"modified":"2019-12-10T21:28:42","modified_gmt":"2019-12-11T03:28:42","slug":"parks-reviews-of-hornswoggles-autobiography-and-greg-oliver-steve-johnsons-latest-pro-wrestling-hall-of-fame-book-on-the-storytellers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2019\/12\/10\/parks-reviews-of-hornswoggles-autobiography-and-greg-oliver-steve-johnsons-latest-pro-wrestling-hall-of-fame-book-on-the-storytellers\/","title":{"rendered":"PARKS COLUMN: Reviews of Hornswoggle&#8217;s autobiography and Greg Oliver &#038; Steve Johnson&#8217;s latest Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame book on &#8220;The Storytellers&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"pwtor-1381825081\" class=\"pwtor-before-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><hr \/><b>SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)... <\/b>\r\n\r\n<iframe src=\"https:\/\/widget.spreaker.com\/player?show_id=3076978&theme=light&playlist=false&playlist-continuous=false&autoplay=false&live-autoplay=false&chapters-image=true&episode_image_position=right&hide-logo=false&hide-likes=false&hide-comments=false&hide-sharing=false&hide-download=true\" width=\"100%\" height=\"140px\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe>\r\n<hr \/><\/div><p>Two recently released pro wrestling books are very different in their subject matter, but both offer unique glimpses behind the curtain.<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u2022First up, \u201cLife is Short and So Am I: My Life Inside, Outside, and Under the Wrestling Ring,\u201d by Dylan Postl a\/k\/a WWE\u2019s Hornswoggle.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s another in a long line of wrestling autobiographies, but with a twist. Postl, who wrote the book with Ross Owen Williams and Ian Douglass, describes the challenges and rewards of breaking into the business as a little person, and managing expectations of the fans and other wrestlers versus the expectations he set for himself.<\/p>\n<p>He comes across as clear-eyed and reflective not only of his time in wrestling, but with his family as well. Oftentimes in wrestling autobiographies, wrestlers discussing their upbringing is just window dressing, something necessary to complete the picture.<\/p>\n<p>Readers are generally more interested in the behind-the-scenes dirt of the industry. I found myself just as captivated by Postl\u2019s complicated relationship with his father and mother. He seems honest and forthright about mistakes he made in handling those relationships.<\/p>\n<p>Then of course, there\u2019s the wrestling. With a gimmick like Hornswoggle, Postl was knee-deep in some of the most outrageous storylines and angles in WWE during his time with the company. It\u2019s fascinating to read not only his thoughts on those particular segments, but also the thoughts of others in the company, specifically those he was working with at the time.<\/p>\n<p>Postl broke into WWE as the \u201cson\u201d of Finlay at a time when the current backstage producer was still an active competitor. It was cool to read about Postl\u2019s connection with Finlay and how it continued throughout both of their WWE runs. Just as Finlay was Postl\u2019s on-screen protector, he seemed to play that role behind the scenes as well.<\/p>\n<p>One of the questions many wrestling fans likely have is, \u201chow can you stand being under the ring for so long?\u201d The Hornswoggle character basically lived under the ring and would appear from there more often than from backstage.<\/p><div id=\"pwtor-2064959252\" class=\"pwtor-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280 __336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n<p>Postl answers that question in detail, with some funny anecdotes in accompaniment. Having grown up a fan of the business, Postl also talks about meeting some of his childhood heroes, all the while trying not to appear as a mark for the business. Backstage etiquette is weird like that.<\/p>\n<p>One of the strangest detours Postl writes about is when he appeared for the WWE Films movie Leprechaun: Origins. It\u2019s a section of the book that\u2019s a good reminder that while there are many benefits to a company being as large and having as many tentacles as WWE, there are also some major downsides to it in terms of communication among departments and creative components.<\/p>\n<p>There were times throughout the book where the warts of WWE\u2019s creative process came to the surface. This could\u2019ve just been shorthand by Postl for something that was really more thought-out, but the amount of times a storyline was given up on or radically changed with the excuse that \u201cwell, no one\u2019s going to remember that,\u201d or \u201cno one cares about that,\u201d is genuinely worrisome.<\/p>\n<p>Intentional or not, it came across in the book as if some in WWE truly relish how nonsensical some of their storylines can become. It\u2019s almost the attitude of, \u201cit\u2019s no big deal, it\u2019s just wrestling,\u201d which is how you end up hemorrhaging the kinds of viewership numbers we\u2019ve seen over the years.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to being a part of some wild and wacky lower card stories, Hornswoggle was also a part of a few major feuds. He was active in Money in the Bank matches, was part of the rebooted Degeneration X, and was eventually revealed as the Anonymous Raw General Manager.<\/p>\n<p>One of his proudest moments was the Wee-L-C match against El Torito at Extreme Rules. He didn\u2019t have much of import to do after that, was eventually suspended for a Wellness Policy violation (which he discusses in-depth) and subsequently released.<\/p>\n<p>Postl has kept busy, making cameo appearances for WWE over the years as well as being a part of TNA, most notably on the Total Nonstop Deletion episode of Impact Wrestling TV. Overcoming the odds is a major theme in Postl\u2019s life story, and he was able to do it to the point that he reached the pinnacle of sports entertainment.<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u2022While not an autobiography, \u201cThe Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame: The Storytellers, from the Terrible Turk to Twitter\u201d by Greg Oliver and Steven Johnson, is just as enthralling a read for different reasons.<\/strong> This book is the fifth and possibly last in the acclaimed \u201cThe Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame\u201d series by Oliver and Johnson, following in the footsteps of \u201cThe Canadians,\u201d \u201cThe Tag Teams,\u201d \u201cThe Heels,\u201d and \u201cHeroes &amp; Icons.\u201d<\/p><div id=\"pwtor-3559167464\" class=\"pwtor-content-1 pwtor-entity-placement\"><!-- Tag ID: pwtorchcom_test_300x600 -->\r\n<div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280 __300x600\" id=\"pwtorchcom_test_300x600\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x600\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x600\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n<p>This tome focuses on how the in-and-out-of-ring stories have developed in the pro wrestling industry from the very early days to today. The research undertaken by Oliver and Johnson to unearth some of the earliest newspaper coverage of pro wrestling is breathtaking.<\/p>\n<p>What really struck me in reading this book is just how wrestling was covered by newspapers around the turn of the 20th century. Not only were the results printed and written about, often tongue-in-cheek, but the flowery prose of those writers put to shame the staid and stale newspaper copy of today.<\/p>\n<p>As voracious of a reader as I\u2019ve been when it comes to pro wrestling history, there were many names in the first few chapters of the book with which I was unfamiliar. Some for good reason, as they didn\u2019t necessarily leave a lasting impact on the business, but still played an interesting role in the early days.<\/p>\n<p>The outrageous way promoters and wrestlers stimulated their craft a century ago disabuses the notion that wrestling was always an all-class affair with only the likes of Lou Thesz and George Hackenschmidt. They played a major role, yes, but so did the wrestlers who fought bears, or who wrestled in mud, or who were attractions because of their sizeable dimensions.<\/p>\n<p>As Oliver and Johnson work their way through wrestling history, you can see how the business changes over time in terms of how stories are told. There was the famous Verne Gagne Minnesota training camp that produced the likes of Ric Flair and the Iron Sheik.<\/p>\n<p>There were the announcers, whose job it was to get across the personality of the wrestlers and sometimes, when called upon, become part of the story themselves. There were the celebrities, trainers, jobbers, all who play their own part in getting over the mat game.<\/p>\n<p>The discussion of job guys, especially those I grew up watching in the late 80s and early 90s, I found really interesting. Unless you\u2019re a student of shoot videos, there really aren\u2019t a lot of other places that give space to those wrestlers, their mindset, and what they do.<\/p>\n<p>Wrestling seems to be slowly embracing the squash matches again today, though I don\u2019t think we\u2019ll ever have the weekly job guys like Barry Horowitz and Reno Riggins that a previous generation had. In the more modern chapters, the authors give credit to newsstand magazines and newsletters like this one for the development and coverage of the industry.<\/p>\n<p>Of course, the Attitude Era gets a chapter unto itself with insight into the creation of the New World Order as well as the episode of Monday Night Raw when Shawn Michaels collapsed in the ring in a match against Owen Hart, playing off the real-life attack he suffered weeks before outside a nightclub in Syracuse, New York. Hello, reality era.<\/p>\n<p>The authors talked to Eric Bischoff, who gave his philosophy on storytelling in pro wrestling. I wish we could\u2019ve seen him helm Smackdown for longer to test that philosophy, as his explanation made a lot of sense. Who knows if it would\u2019ve passed the Vince McMahon smell test, however.<\/p>\n<p>One of the final chapters discusses the advent of the writing teams in WWE, plucking Hollywood scriptwriters to pen television. To listeners of Wade Keller\u2019s interviews with numerous creative team members through the years, nothing said will likely surprise anyone: The writers seem to have both positive and negative memories of working there, with the scales tipping slightly one way or the other depending on the particular writer\u2019s experiences.<\/p>\n<p>The best line in the book though comes from Dan Madigan, former WWE Smackdown writer and the man who wrote the Kane-led See No Evil movie, where he compared professional wrestling to the stories in the Bible.<\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re looking for a book to get a fellow wrestling fan this holiday season, or are just looking for one for yourself, you can\u2019t go wrong with either \u201cLife is Short and So Am I\u201d or \u201cThe Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame: The Storytellers.\u201d Both are published by ECW Press and are available through their website or wherever books are sold.<\/p>\n<div class=\"pwtor-end-article-groups pwtor-entity-placement\" id=\"pwtor-3158231500\"><div id=\"pwtor-4089547798\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\nTHANK YOU FOR VISITING<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Two recently released pro wrestling books are very different in their subject matter, but both offer unique glimpses behind the curtain. \u2022First up, \u201cLife is Short and So Am I: My Life Inside, Outside, and <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2019\/12\/10\/parks-reviews-of-hornswoggles-autobiography-and-greg-oliver-steve-johnsons-latest-pro-wrestling-hall-of-fame-book-on-the-storytellers\/\" title=\"PARKS COLUMN: Reviews of Hornswoggle&#8217;s autobiography and Greg Oliver &#038; Steve Johnson&#8217;s latest Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame book on &#8220;The Storytellers&#8221;\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":86746,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[52,57,53],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-90272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opnionandanalysis","category-takes_parks","category-opinion_stafftakes"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/post\/2019\/09\/Hornswoggle_3x2_600.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90272"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90272\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90274,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90272\/revisions\/90274"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/86746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}