The best days of wrestling. Thanks for these videos

Meant to tell you that you have one of the more interesting ways of taking nostalgic looks back on wrestling by going through the magazines. It's cool. I watch all your vids and should comment more.

@prowrestlingmags

10 ай бұрын

Thank you. Glad you like them! I appreciate ya watching.

So glad I just found your channel. I came from a toxic abusive home and being an only child wrestling mags were my escape from reality. Thanks for your diligent work.

@prowrestlingmags

10 ай бұрын

Yea I get that! They are still my escape to this day!! Thanks for watching!

Great video. I Love that young David Von Erich pic in the Wrestling Enquirer section. Thanks for all the fantastic vids!!

@prowrestlingmags

10 ай бұрын

Thanks for watching

Great videos! I really enjoy them. Keep up the good work! Reminds me of back in the early 80s when I had a subscription to inside wrestling, the wrestler, and pro wrestling illustrated. I would come home and see a big yellow envelope on my bed and be super excited!

@prowrestlingmags

10 ай бұрын

Ahhhhhh yeaaaa that yellow envelope turned a completely shitty day at school into the best night! I was the only lucky one in my friends circle who had a subscription. My favorite aunt would buy me a script of Inside Wrestling and the wrestler every year for Christmas. It was the best gift and she always renewed every year! Subscription holders received the monthly mags about a week before news stands got them. I remember friends calling on the phone asking who’s on the covers of the new issues and what title changes if any happened. I think that’s why I know so much unless wrestling info, I’ve always passed on the breaking news ahead of the others haha. They were great times! When the new cheap ass owners of the publication took over in 1993 94 they stopped the envelopes and stared glueing a shipping label on the front cover. They totally destroyed the covers by doin that I never subscribed after that. I stopped buying wrestling about that time anyway but I still was heavy into buying Boxing mags. Those labels never came off without ripping the cover an it pissed me off! Not to mention cutting down the size of the magazines to a little bigger then a comic book. I had a deep hatred for those new publishers! Thanks for watching. I’m glad your enjoying the look back!

That was a fun little video of looking through the PWI magazines, brother! I am glad you did that, it's neat some times to go through and look at the stories and photos inside of said magazines. I was actually shocked to see a new video already today, but I was glad since I enjoy your videos. As for your question about if PWI still does the posters inside, they do not. However, the last issue that came out did have a centerfold poster in it. Wrestler Ethan Page and PWI collaborated together to have a post of him and his top 5 toy KZread videos he has done. I left a comment on Instagram about it on the PWI page saying how it reminds me of the older posters they used to do. Ethan commented back and said, "Exactly, that's why I wanted to do that." But unfortunately now, PWI is ran by a bunch of marks and not real journalists who actually went to school so the magazine has become a shell of itself.

@prowrestlingmags

10 ай бұрын

Thanks Bill, to often I give PWI shit, mostly because it was the most popular among the novice. But I really liked the first few years of Pro Wrestling Illustrated before the “posed covers”. I love action photos on covers of magazines. That single moment in time stolen out of the air and encapsulated forever on the cover of a magazine. That one single split second in time during a match is captured, and preserved forever. Stanley Weston was a genius in magazine cover layouts. He’s been doing it since 1938 for the Ring Boxing magazine. He was so good because he was a fan of wrestling and magazines. He knew what the fans wanted because he listened to us when we wrote letters in. These new ppl of PWI (I can’t call them publishers) are terrible at their job. If Japan can put out a mag every single week, then pwi can put out a 90 page mag once a month. It’s very simple, just cover more Indy shows across the us and expose fans to wrestlers and companies we never heard of. It’s a formula that’s worked since 1922.

Thanks Bill for digging that magazine out of Steamboat and Snuka in that bodybuilding competition. Both those guys had great physiques. Snuka kept his size for the most part while Steamboat downsized just a bit during his first run in the NWA. Before I forget, Paul Jones was under the mask of Mr. Florida. I never understood why he wore a mask but he was pretty over during this run. He eventually lost a mask vs. mask match against Super Destroyer at the Last Tangle in Tampa. He then left the area and returned to the Mid-Atlantic. He had left the Mid-Atlantic as a heel but returned as a face, apologizing to Steamboat, who he had turned on, and the fans as well. I believe his face run lasted maybe a year before turning heel for the remainder of his career. I totally forgot about the Wrestling Enquirer section in PWI. I liked that as well. Like you, The Wrestler was always my favorite. The only issues I would be interested in of PWI was the year end awards. I wanted action on the front cover of my wrestling mag and PWI come the early 80s were all posed shots. As I said in your last video, the only two great posed shots was of the Road Warriors and Flair, back to back months in 1984. How could you not like those? By the way, I think that one blurb in the Enquirer about Eddie Graham and the two year crash was about Eddie putting Mike on a two year crash course to win the NWA Title. Yes, it was neat to have a new magazine to collect, but The Wrestler was still the best magazine they (Weston) put out.

@prowrestlingmags

10 ай бұрын

Ha i cornered myself when I started reading the Enquirer section. I in no way planned on reading them because I didn’t have my cheaters on! As I started to read it I said to myself wtf are you doing? I can’t see lol but it was to late stop. I’m was trying to read through the phone screen because it’s a little more magnified. So I botched that crash article, and had to just improv lol!! I see Eddie, Mike and crash that’s all I could make out haha. Funny. I really had no intention on making a vid again so soon. I pulled out the steamboat Snuka page last week ready to show in yesterdays vid and completely forgot it. It was sitting right behind me as I stood up from recording and said ahh wtf! So I through together a few pwi’s that I was thumbing through and decided to talk about them. That was Paul Jones??? No shit!! Never would have guess that!! I knew you would know who it was!

@erikk.5202

10 ай бұрын

I have to have a pair of readers on me at all times...lol. A pair everywhere! Jones was pretty popular as Mr. Florida. I a famous TV angle which was repeated in Georgia as well with Tommy Rich, Bobby Heenan and Killer Karl Kox, Super Destroyer jabs a lit cigar of Sir Oliver Humperdink in the eye of Mr. Florida. Gordon Solie sold that angle so well. He even left the broadcast table and went into the ring. Rick Steamboat was one of the best babyfaces ever. He and Barry Windham just knew how to sell their opponents offense like no other face. While I thought Steamboat was a little too vanilla in his last run with the NWA/WCW, and I hated the dragon gimmick from his WWF days, there is no doubting his in ring ability.

Mr. Florida was Paul Jones if memory serves.

Any idea what a mint edition of the first PWI mag is worth? I remember buying mine at a mag stand in Nova Scotia while on vacation as a kid. Kept it for years and years, but now it's gone. I never knew it was the inaugural one. Thanks.

@prowrestlingmags

10 ай бұрын

Hard to say. I’ll tell you according to eBay, Usually over $100 for an average read through issue. I’ve seen them sell for $150. But I’ve also seen several sit for a long time at that $100 range to. I think it’s crazy to pay that, I don’t think any magazine should cost $100. As requested from friends of the ch I made a video on base prices and what mags sell for to try to help collectors get an idea what their in store for when buying, if you check out that vid and read some comments you may get a better idea on prices to.

Which PWI (Weston mags) writer do you enjoy reading the most?

@prowrestlingmags

9 ай бұрын

Don’t like PWI, but Dan Shocket

Hello, could you please tell me - who is Bockwinkel fighting with on a 1980 July cover?

@prowrestlingmags

9 ай бұрын

I believe its Paul Ellering. He just won the AWA Southern Tag Team Championship with Sheik Ali Hassan that March, so that will put Paul in the territory at that time! But will confirm back with you when I look at the mag when I get home if the mag even says. A lotta times they use older pics that don’t go with the stories.

@lukasgrismanauskas775

9 ай бұрын

I thought it was Greg Gagne, by looking at his trunks, but I wasn't completely sure :D@@prowrestlingmags

@prowrestlingmags

9 ай бұрын

@lukasgrismanauskas775 yea I think he’s got to much of a build to be Groovy Greg. But I’ll check into it!

The old pwi covers were great. The cover designs over years keep getting worse. The newest pwi 500 looks like a 10 year old designed it.