The following was transcribed by Andy J. of wrestlingweekly.com:




On 31st October, Wrestling Weekly hosts Doc Young and Les Thatcher were
joined by NECW and WWW owner Sheldon Goldberg and WWE Hall of Famer and
wrestling legend, ‘The Boogie Woogie Man’ Jimmy Valiant.

Doc and Les were first joined by guest Sheldon Goldberg, owner of New
England Championship Wrestling (NECW). Goldberg stated that NECW has been in
business for seven years, and that was overlapping with another promotion
until they joined forces. Les says that Evan and Eddie Edwards, who he has
worked with, saying they have tremendous futures. Sheldon agrees, saying
they want to learn and have tremendous attitudes. Goldberg continues by
saying he’s blessed with a crew with a positive attitude. Les says that the
building were NECW runs show is ideal for independent wrestling and Disney
paid to renovate it and scenes from Dwayne â€�"The Rock” Johnson new movie was
filmed there. Doc talks about NECW having a weekly wrestling show on their
website. Goldberg states that the online show gives people a window in to
the product and helps in the future if NECW is to get television deal as
they are in the habit of producing a weekly show. Sheldon Goldberg then
discussed how he got into the wrestling business, stating he was a fan for a
long time and published a newsletter for the collectors of wrestling
memorabilia. He continues by stating he worked with independent promoter
Tony Rumble for 5 ½ years before he passed away then decided to run his own
promotion, New England Championship Wrestling.

Les Thatcher then discusses Sheldon’s women’s promotion, mentioning Mercedes
Martinez. Goldberg say’s he brings in girls here and there, saying currently
they are on a driving distance, which means they are localised talent. He
then highlights that there were enough girls to do something with and ran
two successful women’s shows and then gave it it’s own distinctive brand
name, ‘World Women’s Wrestling’. The first WWW show was in March. After
November, they will be going monthly and say’s it’s a house show and DVD
company. Sheldon then says he is friends with Dave Prazak who owns the
‘Shimmer’ women’s promotion and discusses his plans for ‘World Women’s
Wrestling’. Les then talks about Billy Wolfe and the movie â€Å"Lipstick &
Dynamite”, saying he made women’s wrestling. Sheldon Goldberg then discusses
women’s wrestling and the Fabulous Moolah. He then states which women are
wrestling for WWW who include Nikki Roxx. Sheldon then says both NECW and
WWW are cross promoting each other and his plans for next year, which
include the aforementioned running monthly shows for World Women‘s
Wrestling.

To check out the official website for New England Championship Wrestling,
visit: https://www.necwwrestling.com/ and for ‘World Women’s Wrestling’,
visit: https://www.worldwomenswrestling.com/

You can listen to the entire interview at: https://www.wrestlingweekly.com

The second featured guest was WWE Hall of Famer, â€Å"The Boogie Woogie Man”
Jimmy Valiant. Jimmy begins by discussing his growing up in Hammond, Indiana
and Doc highlights they both grew up in the same town. Valiant then
continues talking about his growing up, managing a club, one of the Koloff
brothers broke him into the business in 1964. Jimmy states that Les Thatcher
was the hottest baby face and was on top of his game. Les asks about the
music, first tag team to come out to music in Madison Square Garden with
‘Beautiful’ Bobby and The Grand Wizard as his manager. Valiant that
highlights that he made records with Sam Phillips at the Sun recording
studio in Memphis. Music took off in 1980/1981 in Mid-Atlantic (Jim Crockett
Promotions), when no one was coming out to music, he re-invented himself to
become ‘Boogie Woogie Man’ instead of ‘Handsome’ Jimmy. Les then talks about
Ernie Roth (Grand Wizard), saying he had a great mind for the wrestling
business, Valiant agrees and say’s he was his mentor and that he discusses
the Grand Wizard in his autobiography. He continues by saying he met Roth in
the late 60’s in Detroit when he was managing The Original Sheik.

Les states that Jimmy Valiant has now retired and asks if his retirement is
legit. Jimmy says he is now completely done, wrestled for forty years and
had ten thousand matches. Valiant states he is currently on his booking
signing tour and goes somewhere every week. Will be a special referee,
manager, announcer, good will ambassador for professional wrestling. He’s
now hung up his boots and has retired. Les then talks about the tag team of
Jimmy and Johnny Valiant and that tag team wrestling of today seems to
fading out. Valiant says that it’s a shame and managers seem to be fading
out too. He continues by talking about being with Johnny for five years,
holding the WWWF tag team titles, working in the major territories of the
time like the WWWF, WWA amongst others.
Boogie’s camp is open from 12pm - 4am and has a â€Å"Hall of Fame” which include
Les Thatcher. No charge to visit and he continues by saying he teaches both
the new and old school to his students.
Les calls tag team wrestling and managers a ’lost art’. Doc says that Jimmy
wrestled one of his favourites in the WWWF, Andre The Giant. Valiant then
talks about Andre, saying he was super and that being on the road was hard
for him but he never complained. Les then talks about travelling with Andre
and that he was polite, a gentleman and a good guy.

Professor VNS in the chat room asks about the ‘Charlie Brown from out of
town’ gimmick after he lost the Loser Leaves Town match for six months and
that it got over as a million dollars. Valiant continues by saying people
still talk about the ’Charlie Brown’ gimmick even though he had it for just
a short time. Jimmy then talks about writing his autobiography with his
wife, which took five years to write and that it’s 566 pages. At this time,
you can only buy it from his website, from the ’Boogie Woogie Training Camp’
and at his book signings. Each will be personalised autographed by Jimmy
Valiant. Les says that Jimmy loves and he bonded with the fans. Valiant says
the fans are everything, he has time and took time for all the wrestling
fans. In the 60’s/70’s had to hide his car when he worked as a heel, didn’t
want to bring the heat onto his wife and children, wouldn’t associate with
his family in public to save them from going through what he did as heels
back then as serious heat. Jimmy said he enjoyed being a good guy,
re-inventing himself to the Boogie Woogie Man for twenty years and feuding
with Ivan Koloff, Jones and Ole Anderson, who Jimmy says are all the same
age.

DeCapo asks about working with Rufus Jones, the ’Freight Train’, who was a
’super cat’, great, great man, good performer and had good times with him.
He then talks about the â€Å"Boogie Woogie Jam” in 1984, feuding with Paul Jones
and his Army which lasted for over four years in the Mid-Atlantic territory.
He then talks about having his beard cut by Jones and a hair vs. mask match
against The Assassin and that it was big time box office which broke
attendance records. Another question from the chat room about Jimmy’s tag
team with Johnny in the AWA, working with The Lumberjacks, High Flyers,
Crusher and The Bruiser. He then states that him and Johnny were the only
heels at the time. Jimmy then talks about wrestling in Chicago. Final
question is what’s Jimmy’s best story ’Crazy’ Luke Graham, Valiant says he
discusses him a lot in his autobiography. He continues by saying that him
and Graham were in upstate New York, both had long blonde hair, walking out
of a bar. A drunk guy called them both Santa Claus. Luke was hot and punches
the drunk right in the nose. He then says the drunk would tell people he got
punched by Santa.

You can visit Jimmy’s official website here https://www.jimmyvaliant.com/ ,
where you can find details on how to buy his autobiography â€Å"Woo Mercy Daddyâ€Å"
and about his wrestling school, ‘Boogie Woogie‘s Camp.

Next weeks featured guest will be Ring of Honor head booker Gabe Sapolsky.
For more future guest information, visit www.myspace.com/docyoung (the
official Myspace site of 'Wrestling Weekly'.

Wrestling Weekly is part of Audio Wrestling https://www.audiowrestling.com
The Wrestling Weekly radio program featuring Doc Young and Les Thatcher can
be heard every Tuesday from 8:00-10:00pm EST at www.wrestlingweekly.com