Post by Old Line Jeff on May 20, 2021 0:57:02 GMT -5
Jeffrey Daniels had never been overly given to introspection.
Many people involved in professional sports get involved in them because some kind of torment, be it internal or external, drives them in a way that most people will never be driven. He had played peewee soccer as a small kid, played in the small potatoes local league, and remembered being at practice and watching the kids on the “travel teams” play. Without exception they were sweatier, scruffier, and their peewee soccer shirts were ripped and faded.
“You keep a clear birth from those travel team kids” his mother had said, “they’re too intense and I don’t want you picking up that attitude.”
And he had gone along with it.
Years later when he first joined the wrestling team in high school, his parents had tried to talk him out of it. His mother was worried about staph infections and other ‘social diseases,’ his father had gone in the opposite directions, trying to get him to find a private coach and devote himself to amateur wrestling. Jeffrey, though, had only seen it as a gateway towards getting into pro wrestling, and having resolved himself to the fact that he’d be getting his ass kicked by the guys who’d been wrestling since they were in preschool, drifted through wrestling, mostly losing but never really caring, because what’s a textbook double leg takedown compared to a textbook shooting star press?
His dad was a good guy, and when Jeffrey had finally told him about his lucha libre aspirations, suggested… sticking to amateur wrestling until further notice.
Jeffrey ignored him. He already knew what path he wanted to follow as a pro wrestler, so he ignored all suggestions about more ‘legitimate’ forms of combat and went to the Wrestling Tsunami and trained with Ike Stevenson, then spent the next couple years on the Texas indy scene. With parents who, while not entirely approving of his career choice, were still ready to help him out a bit with rent and stuff, he didn’t go through the same grind that a lot of kids trying to get into wrestling did. He made contact with his idol, got his foot in the door, and landed in the XHF. When he joined the AWF and somehow just didn’t enjoy it, he simply left until the NPW contract offer came along.
He and Lee had followed the directions of Jeff Andrews and Cole Christenson, doing the training routines Andrews assigned them, letting Christenson negotiate their contracts, and, basically, marking out for themselves living the dream each and every day.
Then Jeff quit. Or went on indefinite leave, same thing really. And the feud with The Syndicate, the feud that really dated back to 2014 when Jeff Andrews and Eric Dane fell out over the creative direction of DEFIANCE, had landed on his shoulders.
Oh, sure, it had landed on Scott Steel’s shoulders too, but Scott’s shoulders were far broader - one might even call them Colossal - compared to Jeffrey’s, and Scott had a dangerous veteran partner in Jesse Jamester and a manager taking care of both the back end and camera-facing sides of the business. Like he, Jeffrey, had had before Jeff left.
The thought, like the sting of a tarantula hawk wasp, had blown through his brain in a burst of emotional agony, and left him more or less unscathed in the long run, but not quite unchanged.
Gravity had come to the boy who had irreverently dubbed himself the New King of New School.
The Colossus wanted revenge on him, personally.
The Dark Stars were incensed that Lee Scott Rothlesberger had stated he was ill during his loss.
Kirsty McKinney hadn’t been booked in a month and she was stewing over it.
Half the roster couldn’t remember that his team was called the New Untouchables.
“If it weren’t for the fact that The Colossus, Scott Steel, first laid hands on me because a man I’d never interacted with before that night gave the word, there’s a pretty good chance I’d be on his side.”
Jeffrey had decided to make a small change, and he was not sitting in front of a beige cinderblock wall. He was sitting in front of a pale yellow cinderblock wall. The total lack of shadows and environmental effects and the resulting inability to produce narrative poetry was as stark as… as a dude talking against a nearly monochrome backdrop.
“Kirsty got pretty fed up with the Dark Novas being unable to say her name. Apparently, the inability to learn names is a problem that extends to pretty much half the roster. I don’t get as easily frustrated as she does, I just think it’s kinda lame and makes them look bad. As Zakk Wylde would say, ‘deaf and blind, in sync and out of line.’”
A brief pause. Jeffrey brought one hand up, then held it there awkwardly as he forgot why he raised it in the first place.
“Names do have meaning, you know. At least they’re supposed to. You grow into them. Think about it - how many hot Gertruedes or ugly Deannas do you know? But anyway. Lee and I chose to be the New Untouchables. And we choose to keep being the New Untouchables.”
“The Untouchables had two codes. One - jump on one of us, jump on us all. Two - next time, bring Kryptonite.”
“This is why we saved Gaz Maybury. This is why we stepped up to the Colossus again. This is why we’re stepping into the ring with the leftovers of what once ruled NPW and telling them to bring it.”
He briefly contemplated that still pointlessly raised hand.
“Jump us? We’ll jump back. Threaten us? Hope you brought Kryptonite. We ARE the New Untouchables. And we will finish what we start.”
“No matter what you call us.”
Snort.
End.
Many people involved in professional sports get involved in them because some kind of torment, be it internal or external, drives them in a way that most people will never be driven. He had played peewee soccer as a small kid, played in the small potatoes local league, and remembered being at practice and watching the kids on the “travel teams” play. Without exception they were sweatier, scruffier, and their peewee soccer shirts were ripped and faded.
“You keep a clear birth from those travel team kids” his mother had said, “they’re too intense and I don’t want you picking up that attitude.”
And he had gone along with it.
Years later when he first joined the wrestling team in high school, his parents had tried to talk him out of it. His mother was worried about staph infections and other ‘social diseases,’ his father had gone in the opposite directions, trying to get him to find a private coach and devote himself to amateur wrestling. Jeffrey, though, had only seen it as a gateway towards getting into pro wrestling, and having resolved himself to the fact that he’d be getting his ass kicked by the guys who’d been wrestling since they were in preschool, drifted through wrestling, mostly losing but never really caring, because what’s a textbook double leg takedown compared to a textbook shooting star press?
His dad was a good guy, and when Jeffrey had finally told him about his lucha libre aspirations, suggested… sticking to amateur wrestling until further notice.
Jeffrey ignored him. He already knew what path he wanted to follow as a pro wrestler, so he ignored all suggestions about more ‘legitimate’ forms of combat and went to the Wrestling Tsunami and trained with Ike Stevenson, then spent the next couple years on the Texas indy scene. With parents who, while not entirely approving of his career choice, were still ready to help him out a bit with rent and stuff, he didn’t go through the same grind that a lot of kids trying to get into wrestling did. He made contact with his idol, got his foot in the door, and landed in the XHF. When he joined the AWF and somehow just didn’t enjoy it, he simply left until the NPW contract offer came along.
He and Lee had followed the directions of Jeff Andrews and Cole Christenson, doing the training routines Andrews assigned them, letting Christenson negotiate their contracts, and, basically, marking out for themselves living the dream each and every day.
Then Jeff quit. Or went on indefinite leave, same thing really. And the feud with The Syndicate, the feud that really dated back to 2014 when Jeff Andrews and Eric Dane fell out over the creative direction of DEFIANCE, had landed on his shoulders.
Oh, sure, it had landed on Scott Steel’s shoulders too, but Scott’s shoulders were far broader - one might even call them Colossal - compared to Jeffrey’s, and Scott had a dangerous veteran partner in Jesse Jamester and a manager taking care of both the back end and camera-facing sides of the business. Like he, Jeffrey, had had before Jeff left.
The thought, like the sting of a tarantula hawk wasp, had blown through his brain in a burst of emotional agony, and left him more or less unscathed in the long run, but not quite unchanged.
Gravity had come to the boy who had irreverently dubbed himself the New King of New School.
The Colossus wanted revenge on him, personally.
The Dark Stars were incensed that Lee Scott Rothlesberger had stated he was ill during his loss.
Kirsty McKinney hadn’t been booked in a month and she was stewing over it.
Half the roster couldn’t remember that his team was called the New Untouchables.
“If it weren’t for the fact that The Colossus, Scott Steel, first laid hands on me because a man I’d never interacted with before that night gave the word, there’s a pretty good chance I’d be on his side.”
Jeffrey had decided to make a small change, and he was not sitting in front of a beige cinderblock wall. He was sitting in front of a pale yellow cinderblock wall. The total lack of shadows and environmental effects and the resulting inability to produce narrative poetry was as stark as… as a dude talking against a nearly monochrome backdrop.
“Kirsty got pretty fed up with the Dark Novas being unable to say her name. Apparently, the inability to learn names is a problem that extends to pretty much half the roster. I don’t get as easily frustrated as she does, I just think it’s kinda lame and makes them look bad. As Zakk Wylde would say, ‘deaf and blind, in sync and out of line.’”
A brief pause. Jeffrey brought one hand up, then held it there awkwardly as he forgot why he raised it in the first place.
“Names do have meaning, you know. At least they’re supposed to. You grow into them. Think about it - how many hot Gertruedes or ugly Deannas do you know? But anyway. Lee and I chose to be the New Untouchables. And we choose to keep being the New Untouchables.”
“The Untouchables had two codes. One - jump on one of us, jump on us all. Two - next time, bring Kryptonite.”
“This is why we saved Gaz Maybury. This is why we stepped up to the Colossus again. This is why we’re stepping into the ring with the leftovers of what once ruled NPW and telling them to bring it.”
He briefly contemplated that still pointlessly raised hand.
“Jump us? We’ll jump back. Threaten us? Hope you brought Kryptonite. We ARE the New Untouchables. And we will finish what we start.”
“No matter what you call us.”
Snort.
End.