Customer Reviews

Grappling Glory: Celebrating a Century of Minnesota Wrestling & Rassling

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grappling glory is a fun, nostalgia romp through the awa and amateur wrestling. it brings back fond memories watching the wrestlers on tv, then running to the auditoriums and see them live. although very informative, i think it could of been more objective. it does mention the shaddier side of the sport here and there, but should of talked more about it. the book discusses the fall of the awa, mainly focusing on the wwf and how it took wrestlers away. ross does causally mention weak story lines, but should of make more of it. there were times on tv, where the audience was booing, and yelling "boring" (along with other words)throughout the matches. when they started taping shows without audience, it was miserable. ross spends a lot of time being very, very kind to the gagnes. although he mentions greg as being undersized compared to most wrestlers and their steroid use, he really misses the point that greg was a stiff. greg was the reason i turned off watching awa wrestling and in my opinion, was the final nail in awa's coffin. he had no personality, and was dull to watch. he had no business to step into the ring. watching him do car commercials was bad enough. with regards to wrestlers, i believe verne introduced new headliners about once a year. this made for many, many "rematches". sometimes you'd see the same main events 3 times in a row. i believe they were losing audience with that redundancy. ross only mentions the jobber/heel george "scrap iron" gadaski once, (yet he was a regular on tv and the cards) along with kenny yates, who is not mentioned at all. ross does not discuss verne gagnes "gera-speed and gera-lac" products he pushed on tv. both were taken off the market by the fda. the book is roughly divided in half, the first being spent on amateur wrestling. i would have like less of that and more on the professional end. overall the book is a fun, recommended read.

I enjoyed this book a lot. Interesting and funny. Tons of pictures, and some great insights.