FRED OTTMAN The Official Website!
BIOGRAPHY PART 2
BECOMING A PRO WRESTLER
My next in-ring persona was The Terminator, as the movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger had just come out in 1984. I wore the black undershirt, the biker kind of look like him with the sunglasses… like at the beginning of the Terminator movie and I was out there doing a gimmick similar to the movie. There was a lot of young talent that they brought in, along with veteran talent because they had just sold Southwest Championship Wrestling and it be became Texas All-Star Wrestling.
But there was another guy, Marcus Laurinaitis. He was also Terminator, and he looked more like his brother Road Warrior Animal than his other brother, Johnny Ace. Fred Baron, who was a promoter also in Dallas for the Von Erichs back in the day, bought that territory. Since we were two guys with similar gimmicks, he came to me and he goes: “Uh, we got an idea for another character in Texas. People that are friends with one another often call each other Bubba. Hey Bubba! How’ you doin’ there, Bubba?” You know, and it's kind of a friendly way to talk to your buddy or something kind of term of endearment. Barton said “We wanna do this Big Bubba character!” They got me a Jeep, and I drove to the arenas in that Jeep. I became Big Bubba! They brought me in, and with my power lifting background, they had me doing strength stuff, bench pressing almost 600 pounds, the whole nine yards!
Jose Lothario was helping me there, the same guy who trained Sean Michaels. It was great! As Big Bubba, I was country-ish kind of guy, happy go lucky, big baby face. That was my first territory there.
HAVE ABILITIES, WILL TRAVEL
And from there I went to Memphis, Tennessee for Jerry Jarrett and Jerry Lawler (CWA). I remained as Big Bubba. I was teamed up with another guy, Goliath. (Robert White) At one point, our manager was Downtown Bruno (aka Harvey Wippleman). He was a little bitty, squirrely kind of guy.
At one point I was Superstar Big Bubba! Believe it or not, when I was in that territory, a very young Rock was there since his daddy, Rocky Johnson wrestled in Memphis. Back then, wrestlers often travelled with their families. I had a dance off on tv versus Johnson which you CAN SEE HERE. You need to watch the video because millions of people watched it and it's another one of those moments where I do something to Rocky Johnson, and, uh, I won't spoil for you! That's all I can say. Watch the video!
I was also involved in matches with Soul Train Jones at that point in time. He’s better known as Virgil, the Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase’s bodyguard.
After Tennessee, I went to Pensacola. Aka & Sika, the Wild Samoans, tried to open a territory there. Then my grandfather died. I went home. I got a phone call, and I went to Portland, Oregon, for Billy Jack Haynes, who had left WWF at that time. He had opened his own territory, Oregon Wrestling Federation, in opposition to Don Owens, who was the original promoter for Portland. I came up there and Haynes gave me the Hercules Haggerty gimmick.
I was there for probably six months, maybe. I was with another friend of mine, J.T. Southern; he had wrestled with me in Tennessee. He looked like David Lee Roth - exactly like him! At one point, he worked for WCW in Atlanta. He later tagged with Scotty Flamingo.