Wrestling legend Magnum TA was recently interviewed by the Two Man Power Trip Of Wrestling Podcast for an exclusive interview. You can check out submitted highlights below, courtesy of Chad and John, and the full interview at this link
Revisiting the site of his car accident for his new documentary:
“It was definitely intense. We actually went back to the crash-spot and kind of walked through that and talked about that a little bit and it was truly unique. There is no way that I can capture it. It is sort of like writing a novel and all the things surrounding my career, getting into the business, my time in the ring, my time still with the business out of the ring and I really crammed a life time of experiences in the period of 1980 through 1986 in the ring and from 87-91 working behind the scenes in a production assistant capacity with Dusty and color commentating with Jim Ross, Tony Schiavone and Eric Bischoff.”
“There aren't too many elements of the business that I didn't experience on a very intense level. It is all a part of the education process. I’ve used so many of the things that I learned inside the business from working in the corporate environment with Ted Turner throughout my life and my career and every day is still a learning experience. You can learn something from and idiot much-less be surrounded by brilliant people so I still consider everything all good and everything can be a value added if you just change your perspective.”
Is there one specific opponent that really helped bring you to the next level:
“Butch Reed did more for me as I was developing this main event character than any other one individual that I ever wrestled. I had a program with the Missing Link (Dewey Robertson), worked with Kamala, worked with Ernie Ladd and a few other guys at that time but it was Butch Reed who really was one of the most outstanding performers and main event caliber guys that I had ever worked with up to that point. Ted Dibiase was there too in Mid-South at that point but I didn't get to work with Teddy but it was when I worked that pretty lengthy program with Butch and it really helped me bring my game up to be able to work in a main event kind of program and we really had some intense matches over that North American Heavyweight Title.”
Would Tully Blanchard be the ultimate opponent for Magnum if he could have had one more match:
“If there was one guy that I could wiggle my nose and jump back into that hot-rod body I had and work with somebody one more time that would absolutely be the one. He was that good and I didn't have to slow it down and didn't have to worry about he is going to cry about getting hurt because he could take it but he could also dish it out. He was just a blast. The guy I never got to find out where it could have gone was Jimmy Garvin. Jimmy and I are great friends still today and Jimmy was a super, super talented guy. That program was just kind of a little fluff thing looking back at it that I was doing after Nikita but the reality of it is even had I gone and had the run with Flair and captured the title, Jimmy Garvin and I feuding could have probably been ridiculous. He was such a good worker and such a good guy on the mic and was capable of doing pretty much anything. So if there was one of "what could have been" than he is the guy to see where it could have gone.
