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Chick Foley Lounge: Q&A w/ Smart Mark Sterling
40 Plays6 years ago
This week Phil sits down with Smart Mark Sterling, producer of the Major Wrestling Figure Podcast and co-host of Off The Hop Rope. Mark discusses how he got into the wrestling business, his holy grail wrestling figure, the origin of the Major Brothers podcast, and much more!
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Welcome
00:00:11
Speaker
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. The third edition now. Third time's a charm for the Chick Foley lounge. I am your host Phil Gentile, the hot take kid. And I have a very special guest. One of my favorite folks from the world of podcasting. Mr. Smart, smart Mark Sterling from the major brothers wrestling figure podcast. What's going on Mark? How are you this evening? Hey Phil, happy to be here. Thank you for having me on. Ready to get down to it.
00:00:38
Speaker
Awesome.
Social Media and Fitness Challenge
00:00:39
Speaker
You guys can follow Mark on Twitter at silverintuition. If you, I'm sure if you're listening to this, you definitely listen to the Major Brothers. You are a big part of that show. So you've been on there more and more increasingly over the last weeks and months, but we don't know too, too much about you like we do the other guys. So I'm glad to talk with you. And I was hoping to share some beers with you, but
00:01:00
Speaker
my wife and the major brothers have both teamed up to make me eat and drink healthy for the last, uh, since the year started. So I've been off of beer, especially after the Ravens lost. So, uh, can't really talk too many IPAs with you. Are you, I know you're doing the major fitness challenge with those guys. Have you, have you given up alcohol or are you still drinking in moderation? Well, I didn't give it up. I, uh, I for sure am partaking in some drinking, but
00:01:26
Speaker
I'm sort of a guy who would like pop open a nice IPA and just enjoy it at night while I was watching a movie or something like that, but it's very easy to cut those out. So not doing that sort of recreational midweek drinking and sort of only just drinking during special occasions, which may be the recording of my other podcast, the Off the Hop Rope podcast, which is about beer and wrestling. So we kind of have to crack
00:01:54
Speaker
crack open a few beers for that show. Of course. Yeah, that's that's something you've been doing. You've been doing that before, even before the Major Brothers podcast started. Tell us about that and how that all came together.
Podcasting Passion and Talk Radio Influence
00:02:05
Speaker
Well, to be honest, I've always loved podcasts, even since like the dawn of podcasts. I remember listening to when I used to watch Lost every week.
00:02:18
Speaker
And that was the first time I can remember hearing about like what a podcast was. The, the loss creators would come out with like this 15 minute podcast every week they would put on the internet and they would sort of like say some of the mysteries and they sort of got in depth. And I remember like specifically waiting. I can't, cannot wait until this comes out. Um, so that was my first thing in podcasts, but then, uh, I've sort of, I always grew up listening to talk radio. My, my grandmother who, uh,
00:02:44
Speaker
sort of raised me with my mom, she would wake up in the morning at eight a.m., put on talk radio and not turn it off until she went to bed. So it was just like a constant stream of sports talk and political talk. And just like I just always heard like voices talking all day. So that's why I was just naturally into the idea of long form talk shows, podcasting, things like that. So that's why I
00:03:11
Speaker
enjoy podcasts. And then I started the beer and wrestling podcast because I just wanted to mix my, my sort of two passions are both of the dudes that do it with you. Are they both professional wrestlers as well? Yeah. Top shelf. Troy Nelson's kind of like a half wrestler. I guess he hasn't, he's probably, I think he's wrestled probably four times in the last year. He's got a really funny gimmick. His gimmick is that he's a bartender. Okay. So, so it works out, but you know, he's just kind of like, he's very funny, very charismatic.
00:03:39
Speaker
He does it when he can but it's not really like his his goal. The other guy CPA Just changed his name to Nick Stapp recently. He will travel across the country and back on it in a 24-hour span like in his car he is he says a slogan he will die for this and
00:04:02
Speaker
and like we all sort of believe it he tries really hard so he is uh he's definitely a pro wrestler you guys can check them out at on twitter and instagram at off the hop rope and um i'm with you man i'm in my car all day so i'm constantly listening to podcasts and then when someone asks me like what my
00:04:20
Speaker
know what kind of music i listen to somebody asked me that the other day and i just like stared at them for like 10 minutes like i don't even know like i couldn't name you anything besides like 90s alternative uh as far as music i just never listen to music anymore i'm just uh you know i have like seven or eight podcasts in the feed at all times and uh
00:04:37
Speaker
The Major Brothers are certainly
Wrestling Memories and Action Figure Collecting
00:04:38
Speaker
one of them. But I want to go back with you and kind of see how you got started as a fan of wrestling back as a kid. Do you remember your earliest memories of becoming a wrestling fan? What it was? Did your parents take you to show? Tell us the story. Yeah, I guess I've always sort of really been interested in wrestling Hulk Hogan, Ultimate Warrior, people like that. I remember vividly getting my first action figure ever.
00:05:06
Speaker
action figure was a LJN, uh, George animal steel. I don't even, I'd see only LJN head. I just remember that was the first action figure had. Uh, and then later on I remember specifically getting the Hogan has bro and the, uh, um, Jake, the snake has bro. And then sort of just like being enamored with those figures and how cool they were and colorful and muscly and things like that. So then when I would see those guys on TV, I was,
00:05:35
Speaker
which I wasn't really allowed to watch wrestling or nobody really pushed it. Nobody had told me when it was on. If it was on, somebody would be like, what's this crap? So I kind of had to watch it in secret, if that makes any sense. But I used to love watching the figures that I had, the Hasbro figures.
00:05:56
Speaker
It's weird because my dad showed me Rambo when I was like four, so I don't know what the... Wrestling seems a little bit tamer than that as far as violence. So that's how you started collecting figures, obviously. Did you ever take a break? Is Gungho, is Matt, and Brian were all the way through high school and college?
00:06:15
Speaker
Like for me, I just got into it a couple of years. I was hardcore into it as a kid. And I think it was you guys' podcast and just the figure community bringing me back into it, following a bunch of people on social media. Did you take a break or have you been kind of a diehard ever since you started? I took a big break. And actually, that's interesting that you say you just kind of came back because I saw the picture you posted and you have a whole detail of
00:06:40
Speaker
Hasbro's there how did you just reap reap pick that up or your boy has still toy helped me with some of them But I would say half of them were from my childhood Obviously like them, you know the more common ones I never had any of the green cards and I've had you know buddies that were selling off their collection and all you know the Facebook groups that I'm in just just picking them up randomly I have yeah, you can't see but I have another detail for an exit of all the other retros as well. So I
00:07:04
Speaker
I mean, yeah, in the last two years, I would say, I mean, before that, I didn't have anything besides, you know, half of these Hasbros. So it's, you know, it's become a pretty big, I don't know, I want to say addiction, but I mean, you know, once you get that itch, man, it's you know how it is. But I prefer hobby. Okay. Yeah. Good word. It's expensive hobby, but it's a fun. Yeah. To your question,
00:07:29
Speaker
This whole thing, and maybe I'm being romantic about this, but this whole thing to me is like a whole path. Like one leads right to the other that leads to the other. And so I think it's interesting, but maybe it's boring, I don't know. But I was always like just wrestling figures, not wrestling figures, action figures in general was my entire childhood. I had sort of everything, that's all I did all day.
00:07:59
Speaker
I had, you know, fig feds with the wrestlers. I had, you know, a giant, uh, you know, superhero world that I would build cities like that. That was just sort of my nerdy childhood and I loved it and I collected, right. I don't even know. Collected. I just bought tons to play with until I would say like, uh, 98, 99, 2000, uh,
00:08:25
Speaker
I guess just kind of like when I was like ending high school and hitting college and like I think going to college just ended that completely. So I never bought another barely maybe one or two from like 2000. I remember specifically I graduated right before I went to grad school in 2008. I went to my mom's basement. I took all of my toys from childhood. I sold them in
00:08:56
Speaker
Huge lots on eBay and then used all the money and took a trip to Europe. So at least it was for something good. You know, it was great. Yeah, that's great. But I sold everything except my childhood. Arne Anderson, Gloob and a Deadpool figure. I have no idea why I kept that.
00:09:15
Speaker
Hundreds and hundreds all my Legos things like that, but so I remember I think it was around Christmas time Maybe it was before that that you just completed your your Hasbro collection. That's all been Re-bought from that wasn't you don't have any originals left That was all kind of pickups from eBay and different people. Yeah, not a single one, but also I was very rough Yeah with the figures and and you know I specifically like an eighth grade seventh eighth grade I had a joint fig fed with my friend Steve and
00:09:42
Speaker
And we made belts and we took my figures. He took his figures and we had just like a massive. The guys don't talk about this, but I used Hasbro's with bendoms with gloobes. Oh, no. So basically anybody that was like that height. Yeah. Yeah. They were they were in our fed. So together we had like hundreds and hundreds of wrestlers, but we were rough with them. We drew on the Hulk Hogan to make them NWO Hulk. You know, like they're there. I don't even know how they sold. I think I sold.
00:10:10
Speaker
All of them in a lot for $60, something like that. They were destroyed. Nice. Yeah, it's interesting how a lot of people, I mean, Zach talks about that as well, just going back and buying things. You think he has everything the way he talks on the show, but he's had to go back and buy a bunch of stuff that he's sold off and gotten rid of. And you kind of like, I come downstairs sometimes, and I'll see, I have like 30 figures that I came in and fit on my shelves. I'm like, I just need to get rid of some of these. I know the minute I do, though, I'm going to regret it. So it's a Catch-22 for sure.
00:10:40
Speaker
I want to ask you, so that's how you became a fan, how you became a collecting, and now let's go full circle. Then you became a professional wrestler. It seems like a no-brainer here. When did you know you wanted to do that? Was that like while you were in school? Did your parents support it? Obviously, you're on Raw recently, so you've definitely made a name for yourself. Take us back to the beginning.
Wrestling Career and Family Inspiration
00:11:07
Speaker
Uh, no matter what happened, I was always very passionate about my fandom in wrestling. So like, I may have not been collecting the figures or the toys, but I still just loved wrestling so much, especially, uh, that attitude era 97 through 2000. And so I loved it so much that I, uh, you know, started doing backyard wrestling with my friends. I met some friends in high school that just loved it so much.
00:11:36
Speaker
that we sort of put together, fed in our backyards, and we were very serious about it. But the other thing, which is also part of this journey, is I was very interested in the producing of the shows. I used my grandmother's VHS camcorder. I formatted the shows. I would literally write on paper, segment one, segment two, books the matches. Basically, I mean, the guys did their matches,
00:12:05
Speaker
So I was like very interested in, in the production part of it, which leads me to sort of why I went to school for television and radio production. But, um, as far as wrestling goes, I'm going to be totally honest. Uh, I was not interested in it per se. My dream job in my life was to work for the WWE editing, uh, video.
00:12:30
Speaker
And my good friend who backyard wrestled with me, his name is Srot, he's actually the husband of Sasha Banks. He said to me one day, hey, I found a wrestling school in Chickabee. That's like the next town over. I said, what? He said, I don't have a ride. He in some reason didn't have a license for years. He's like, can you bring me? And I was like, sure, I'd love to see what a wrestling school is. I'd love to see the ring. So I gave him a ride.
00:12:59
Speaker
the teacher guy by the name of Kevin Landry, he was like, he had done a few like dark matches for the WWE. He did like the first Funkin dojo way back in the day with like edge and Kurt angle and those guys. He was just like a big, big dude. Um, and he was the teacher and he thought I was there for class too. So he let me get in the ring and try it. And I remember they made you do, it made us do a hundred bumps.
00:13:28
Speaker
That was like the first day you have to, you know, a bump is like, you know, when you fall on your back or whatever. So they made us do 100 bumps, which is insane. And I did it and got through it. And then he was like, all right, I'll see you next week. And I'm like, I guess I got to come back next week. That's cool, man. Yeah. Are you involved with Creative Pro? Are you like a part trainer? Do you like, you know, do you help out with like behind the scenes stuff or are you just strictly part of the talent? How does that work?
00:13:57
Speaker
Well, I guess that, that also is sort of leads me to the next part, which like I said, this is all a big line. I stopped wrestling in 2007, uh, when my dad passed away, I just like sort of wanted to take a break anyway. And then I sort of gained a lot of weight and that same year I got accepted to grad school. So I left where I was in Massachusetts to move to New York in 2008 to go to grad school.
00:14:26
Speaker
And I always said like, Oh, you know, when I stopped wrestling, I was like, I'm going to take two months off. This is 2007. And I never went back. I did grad school. I started working in, uh, film production. I started working as a video producer and just never did it. And even though in the back of my head, I kept saying like, I'll go back and do wrestling again someday. Uh, and it wasn't until 2015, uh, when we found out that, uh, I was going to have my child.
00:14:56
Speaker
I have a, I have a four year old daughter. Um, that's when I was like, Oh no, I have nine months to be a, a like a carefree individual. Yeah. I remember those, I remember those nine months as like a countdown. Yeah. And I was like, if there's one thing I want, what's the one thing you wanted to do or you regret not doing, and that was go back to wrestling school. So it was in New York at the time, the closest school was create a pro.
00:15:24
Speaker
Uh, I was a very reputable school. I had no idea how I would shake up with them. Um, if I would even, if it would even work, I signed up, I think for the first, like I just a four month thing, just not knowing if I would be able to do it. I was a little, I was older. I was like 33 at the time. So, uh, I just kind of dived into it. Like I do a lot of things just like, uh, with everything I had tried really, really hard. Um,
00:15:54
Speaker
ended up loving it, really making friends, the creative pro wrestling school and the community is just like one of the best things in my life. It's so awesome. The, the camaraderie, uh, the team that we have, it's, it's really awesome. And in that time, obviously that's when I met Brian. Um, and the school, it's just like kind of like, I can't really explain it. Like you, when you're there, you just want to help, you want to help them.
00:16:20
Speaker
You want to help the school be good. You want to help the shows be good. And I would just do everything that I possibly could with my talents and help the school grow, which was video production, sound production, just anything technical that Brian needed done because he's a caveman. So I just kind of like started helping Brian, you know, grow the school and like, uh, keep the school running and promote the shows and things like that.
00:16:49
Speaker
That's one of the things, I try to support indie wrestling as much as I can, but that's the biggest thing you notice when you're attending a show or you follow some of these smaller companies on social media that the production value, the money, you can't compete with what the WWE does, but from following CapTV and all that stuff, they do a really good job and I don't know how much of that
00:17:09
Speaker
you're still involved with, but it's definitely the social media aspect, what you guys do as far as the clips that you show and all that kind of stuff. It's definitely well done. I think that makes a big difference and kind of sets you guys apart. So you became involved with that there. You met Brian. How far into that did you start talking about wrestling figures? Is that something that even came up in the first years, though?
00:17:35
Speaker
He, uh, maybe not. I'm not sure exactly when it was, but, um, like literally right before I went back to, uh, wrestling. So I twirling cause like may of 2015, I think right around the, the mania of that year, maybe or something. Um, I had just like restarted my Hasbro collection. I saw an announcement made about the retro figures, the Mattel retro figures with like the picture of the Cena and the Brock and
00:18:05
Speaker
the Reigns figures. I'm like, what? They're remaking the Hasbros, they're continuing that line. So I was like, okay, well, if I'm gonna get all of those, I need to get my Hasbro figures back. So I started collecting just like the cheaper ones, like series one Hulk Hogan or whatever. And I started like posting pictures on Instagram. And this is when Brian was like, oh, this guy likes, this guy collects figures, this is awesome.
00:18:35
Speaker
my student, this guy that I train with, and that sort of, we bonded on that. And then we started talking about the retro figures and things like that. So that's sort of how, whatever. Yeah, so it was right around the same time going back
Podcast Creation and Collecting Philosophy
00:18:50
Speaker
to wrestling. That's when I started recollecting.
00:18:52
Speaker
I think that's what got a lot of people back into collecting was not only the podcast and all that kind of stuff, for me it was the the retros too because I mean it was something so different but it felt so familiar to anybody who collected Hasbro's back in the day and you know we won't go down that that rabbit hole but
00:19:09
Speaker
So you became closer with him about that, and whose idea was it to start a podcast? Was that something, I mean, obviously you had more of a technical background than him. He had been friends with Zach for a long time, and we've heard all, you know, we know about his collection going back to all the shows he's been on and stuff like that. I think you guys had touched on it a little bit on their podcast, but tell me, whatever you remember, whose idea it was and how it first got started.
00:19:39
Speaker
Yeah. So, you know, podcasts, they're friends with Colt. Uh, and he's like the godfather of wrestling podcasts. So I think these two guys love podcasts too. Like they listened to all the, um, Conrad podcasts and broskis got this huge list of Disney and rides podcasts he listens to and Brian, the same thing with like Mets and all that. So they just like the medium as well.
00:20:06
Speaker
Um, and I, I remember specifically, I was good friends with Brian at the time, obviously helping him with creative pro to the point where, you know, we text and all that stuff. So I remember he put up a tweet just randomly, and this might've been a year before we actually did it. He put up a tweet that said, what if me and Zach started a podcast about wrestling figures? And I looked at that and it was like that.
00:20:30
Speaker
Going to kill that is going to be a great thing and I immediately texted him and said if and when you do this I'm your guy nice So and then you know, maybe nine months later. I started my own podcast So I had it and and I just kind of like did that just I figured it out I researched a little bit about the equipment I found out how you host the podcast and how much it costs and what you need and I did that like
00:21:00
Speaker
maybe four months before they started their site. So when they decided to do it in August of 2018, I had art had, I had to know how the equipment, you know, the whatever. So it was very easy for me to get them up and running.
00:21:17
Speaker
It's crazy how everything came together, man, for sure. I mean, it's probably the story of a lot of podcasts, but it just feels like, I mean, such a big community and really didn't have a voice before you guys came on the scene. And you guys have done a great job of, I mean, I'm a Patreon subscriber of you guys from the beginning. It's a great community that you guys have built on Facebook and it's something that me and Sheena really strive to kind of emulate too. You guys are, you know,
00:21:44
Speaker
It's a fun listen. If anyone listens to our show and doesn't listen to the Major Brothers, I don't know what's wrong with you. You need to start. But you guys do great work. Let's go back to the collecting aspect on your side a little bit. My wife is kind of like, my wife, it's kind of like Brian's wife, doesn't collect anything. So she doesn't really, she helps out and she'll like look when she goes to Target or something. But she'll come downstairs and see that half the basement is now taken up from the collection here.
00:22:11
Speaker
How's how's your family, your friends? How are they with with everything that you have? I've never seen yours, but I'm sure it's it's probably dwarfs mine. I don't know. Yours is I think you probably have me beat. I am trying to. I'm trying to think of how to say this. I I'm holding mine back a little. I don't necessarily I if you just recently watched Brian's Toyroom,
00:22:42
Speaker
I love it. I love being in that room. I love the cleanliness of it. I love the way he's got it laid out. Um, it's, it might be too much stuff for me. Um, I, my room right now has two detox and like three built in shelves and that might be enough. So I'm going to have to, from now on, like kind of try to, I say this now, but in, you know, year I'll probably have two more details, but
00:23:05
Speaker
I don't know. I'm trying to hold myself back a little bit, I guess. I forgot the original question. I did too. Are you are you loose with everything? Is that how you go? I mean, I've seen your I've seen your Instagram posts and it looks like you do have a lot of like loose figures in your details. Is that you have anything mint on card or is it all Lucy? Yeah, pretty much. I have a few on card things. For the most part, it's loose, especially like if if the value
00:23:33
Speaker
You know, Browski got me the Rick Flair and Larry Zabisco AWA two-pack, like mint on card, like fresh out of the case. It's unreal. The hole's not even poked. I could not in a million years open that. Oh, God, no. I have a Rick Flair. Yeah. Yeah. So
00:23:58
Speaker
You know, some of the more valuable pieces I have a, like one of my prize possessions is, is the Hasbro Ric Flair on card. Wow. Nice. He's my favorite wrestler and it's right on top of the Hasbro detail. So just a, it's kind of like a perfect like crowning piece to me on the top. I remembered the original question. I don't know how we sidetracked, but it's all right. Yeah. Family, friends and collecting. How are they mixing? I think fine. And it's like, like, I think the reason I went in that direction was because
00:24:27
Speaker
I kind of hold back a little bit. It's more than most, but it's not insane. So, you know, I think everybody is sort of fine with it and it's not like, you know, it is what it is. It's decoration, really.
00:24:40
Speaker
Yeah, that's the fun thing about kind of this community you guys have built is, you know, you get to see everybody, people will post their collections and some people will have, you know, it'll be a total mess of everything put together. Some people, it'll be like, you know, a fine-toothed comb and, you know, just a thousand figures. And everybody just does it differently. There's no right or wrong way to do anything, which is pretty cool. What did I want to ask you? My daughter loves it. She loves the toys. And she has a lot of
00:25:10
Speaker
figures that she plays with and we play wrestling figures and things like that so she she loves it and thinks it's cool and that daddy has toys for sure. I can't count this just happened the other day so many times my son will climb into the the car seat but he'll face like the trunk before he like flips around and yesterday he right on top of all my crap was just the Masters of the Universe ring with Cena and Triple H there just on top and I
00:25:36
Speaker
I was going to give it to him for his birthday or something. And it was like, well, I guess I have to give this to you now. So he's been playing with that, taking him apart and stuff like that. So yeah, that is the fun part, too, is he came down the other day and wanted to put, you know, I have one of the shelves on my DTOF is empty because the Hasbro has only took, I mean, the retro has only took up a couple of shelves. So he brought down a bunch of his Mattels and wanted to put them in and stand them up. I was like, yeah, sure, man, no problem. Whatever you want to do, man. Yeah.
00:26:03
Speaker
Your collection, what's the figure that you, when you look at it, you're like, I mean, I guess you've probably already touched on it, the Ric Flair-Minton card. Is there one that you don't have that's kind of like that holy grail for me? It's the Bret Hart defining moments. What's that for you? You sent these questions before I was thinking about it. Right now, it's that Bret Hart defining moments. Wow, okay.
00:26:29
Speaker
It's there. It's not like it's impossible to find. You can click two buttons right now and get it. That's the hard part, but the price tag is steep. I agree with you. I'm two Hasbros away from finishing my collection. It's almost like watching Breaking Bad, binge-watching. I could watch all the episodes now.
00:26:51
Speaker
once I have those two, it's like, you know, what am I, you know, it's just kind of like the fun has been trying to find all these and people hooking me up and going to flea markets and eBay searching and stuff like that. So yeah, that's 100%. Yeah, I'm not going to just pay an overpriced, you know, amount for the thing. And yeah, I mean, the guys helped me out. Like I was going slow on the Hasbro, to be honest. I mean, the guys gave me, I think 11 figures to finish it out. And there was all the most expensive ones, but I,
00:27:22
Speaker
I was theoretically having a good time looking for those. I bought an atom bomb, which I thought I got for a really good price. It was like 67 bucks. I won an auction on it. I was like, okay, this is great. If I just slowly build these, I can get a lot of these for a cheaper amount.
00:27:42
Speaker
Yeah, that defining moments, man. I want to get it, but not for $275 mint on cart. Yeah, somebody, one of the Facebook groups, somebody put an entire collection of all the defining moments in one of those raffle things where you put, I think it was like 40 spots, everybody would put in 50 bucks, and I was like, oh my God.
00:27:58
Speaker
I mean that's that's I mean it's a pretty expensive raffle but I mean that's I think it's over like two grand worth of figures I mean if you think about some of those I think it's because I'm sober is why I'm jumping around here so much but I hope that's alright I want to know how your week goes with with the podcast
00:28:14
Speaker
and the editing that goes into it. I mean, you get the episode up for the Patreon subscribers, you know, I would say within 24 hours of when those guys record.
Career Transition to Podcasting and Wrestling
00:28:24
Speaker
Obviously it drops on Fridays. I don't know if this is just inside baseball for me. I don't really care. I'm interested and I don't care who is it that's listening. How does your week work with those guys? I mean, they're on the road all the time. Walk us through like a normal week of how the podcast becomes the finished product.
00:28:42
Speaker
Yeah. So I am, I am very blessed right now. Um, where, uh, currently this podcast and professional wrestling is my job. So, uh, and, and I'm trying this out right now for, uh, however long, uh, you know, you can call me freelance, I guess, um, I would pick up jobs, but I, I just started doing this.
00:29:12
Speaker
the day before Thanksgiving, technically, or the first week of December is when I left my shoot job of eight years. So yeah, thank you. Cool. You got the mansion up in Massachusetts. Yeah. Yeah. Keep saying that. I got to hold him when he sees it, he's going to make, Oh, this is just a house. But, um, uh, where was I? Oh, um, the, the, yeah. So back in the day, uh, for like a year and a half, it was very difficult. I,
00:29:42
Speaker
And like literally right now breathing for the first time. And I don't necessarily talk about this a lot with the guys or in public, but I worked a real job eight to five. I was a video producer for a website. Um, did that for eight years. I would go to work. I would make videos, forum commercials, product videos, things like that. I would punch out at five. Um, I would come home. I would edit.
00:30:11
Speaker
their podcast, I would edit my podcast, I would shoot promos for my wrestling, I would go to wrestling training, I would have shows on the weekends, maybe I have a Friday night show, maybe a Saturday night show. I didn't have a life, like not a single thing. I haven't watched like a television show in two years. I haven't, you know. It's insane, like come home at five, do dinner or whatever with the fam, start working,
00:30:40
Speaker
work until one a.m., do it all over again. Yeah. I mean, you have something you love, man. I can totally relate, you know? It's a gift and a curse, you know? For sure. I mean, it's a lot of work, but I mean, it's gotten to where you are now. Were you able to quit the nine to five? And with those skills that you have, you're going to be able to fall back on that if you need to. But it sounds like the major brothers are keeping you busy, man.
00:31:04
Speaker
From behind the scenes, not to sidetrack here, but from behind the scenes from someone who's done podcasts for seven, eight years, I can tell how much work that you put into it, and I don't think they would be where they are without you, and I'm sure they would be the first to admit that.
00:31:19
Speaker
These guys are super talented and they know the ins and outs of everything they talk about, but the behind the scenes shit that you do is, I mean, just from listening to the podcast, I can tell you, doing the editing and bleeping out all of Broski's curses.
00:31:36
Speaker
adding in all the drops and that stuff. I mean, that takes some serious talent, man. I don't, I can't really, I mean, I've listened to every episode. I don't think I've ever noticed a skip or any kind of continuity error or dead air or anything. So I mean, you do, you do a great job with what you do on that show. Thanks, man. I really appreciate it. But you know, you know, like, uh, and I've been doing this for a long time, the editing, uh, and I worked at this real job for eight years and it allowed me to,
00:32:03
Speaker
Like I said, shoot and edit every single day and get better at my craft and learn technicals and just get sort of really good with equipment. So like, you know, I recommended the equipment that we bought for the podcast. So the stuff that we use is very important to me. You know, the, the quality of the sound, I always yell at them when I think that they're recording like an allowed room or an echoey room. So like, uh, you know, we, we are really thinking about that kind of stuff. Um,
00:32:32
Speaker
I never ever want to record over Skype. That's why I pulled out my microphone for you. You sound good. You want me to record it on my end. You can't even take a break and just be a guest on the show. You're trying to produce my podcast, man. I was like, just sit back, man. Relax. Have a beer. I appreciate that. But I guess what I mean is the phone calls.
00:33:01
Speaker
when pods do like the phone calls or whatever. Yeah. There's, there's some shows out there that just don't, I mean, it's just, you know, it's just a shoe string, whatever. But I mean, you can, when it just takes you out of it, it just doesn't sound, you know, especially if you're in the car and you're driving, it's hard to hear like some, some sounding good story. But, um, so yeah, so, so the week they record on, they record after raw on Sundays or Mondays. What are they? Yeah. So back to the week, um, we, we sort of, we,
00:33:29
Speaker
usually like around Thursdays, we'll start to talk about the upcoming week. Like for a while they were on the road Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday. They had plenty of time to record the podcast. So Broski has the equipment. He packs it in a bag. He brings it wherever they go. They go, okay, we've got, you know, Sunday night open. We'll record then eight o'clock sounds good. I will send them the ads they need.
00:33:59
Speaker
whatever they need to touch on that week or whatever by the recording time, they record it. Broski, the next time he gets internet, takes the files, he sends it to me via Dropbox, and then as soon as I get it, I edit it. That's like my number one thing, I wanna get this podcast out as soon as possible. So lately, after the title run, they've been just doing
00:34:27
Speaker
They do the odd house show loop, but for the most part, and they talk about this on the pod, for the most part, they just get our book for TVs lately, especially with this. It's actually really sense, the change this, the smackdown change. Um, so it's the whole travel loop is totally different. So the guys are getting booked for the Monday spots. Um, sometimes they fly in Sunday. They got Sunday night to record or they fly in Monday.
00:34:55
Speaker
And then after raw, they, they don't fly out until Tuesday. So they record after raw, like 11 o'clock, um, you know, to get a couple hours of sleep and pop on a flight early in the morning on Tuesdays. Um, if I'm in the area, if they're in New York or they were going to court at Brian's or, or a hotel near me that, you know, I'll pop, I'll drive to them while they're recording and produce it while I'm there.
00:35:21
Speaker
But basically, I just get the files as soon as possible and try to get it up on Patreon as soon as possible. Yeah, it's a lot of work, and I'm sure they all, it's kind of like our podcast, we all have our parts, we have a group chat we all talk about, one of us does the script, one of us sets up all the topics we want to talk about, but it seems like it runs like a pretty well-oiled machine, that's for sure.
00:35:49
Speaker
I will put Browski over on this. His level of dedication to the podcast is insane. It seems always top of mind for him. He's always thinking, when are we going to record? Is that enough time? He is really the driving force behind making sure that we record every week.
00:36:19
Speaker
I mean, that's how you have to be, to be successful. I feel like you have, like I'm constantly thinking of people that I want to have on this show or topics I want to talk about or how something can relate to, you know, if March Madness is coming up, oh, how can we turn that into something on the show? It's just, you know, there's, there's so many podcasts that I do listen to that are kind of, they're great, but they just will follow the same routine every single week and you listen to it 52 weeks a year and it just kind of gets,
00:36:45
Speaker
repetitive, so it's fun to be able to change things up a little bit and make it enjoyable for the listener. And that's what we try to do. I'm sure you guys try to do as well and you do it very well. As a wrestling fan, what current WWE superstars or just wrestlers in general? It doesn't have to be WWE. Do you enjoy watching as a fan? And can you still, at this point of where you are in the business, can you still enjoy and sit down and watch wrestling as a fan? I'm sure you critique it and all that kind of stuff.
00:37:14
Speaker
Yeah, I think that, um, I, of course you can, of course you, I, some guys say that they can't watch it as a fan. I think that's bull crap because, um, you can still watch it and enjoy it for the art and, um, the performances and you know, you, when you're inside baseball and movies and you understand how the movies are produced, you can still get lost in a movie and love a film or a TV show. So,
00:37:43
Speaker
But so yeah, I still watch, I really enjoy NXT UK, I watch that when I can. A lot of those guys I love. Our truth is great, right? Yeah, that was awesome. He's been very, I mean, the guy never seems to talk about reinventing yourself. I mean, the guy has been awesome and one of the most entertaining parts of wrestling in the last year or so for sure.
00:38:09
Speaker
I love the big fights, so I've always been a big Brock Lesnar guy. I loved watching him in UFC, so I just sort of love this big time, big bad super heel that he is.
00:38:24
Speaker
on top. So I love any of his segments and any of the big matches that they build too. So I'm not down on wrestling. You people complain about it. I could not possibly. I never really hear wrestling fans complain about wrestling. I don't know what you're talking about.
00:38:40
Speaker
No, but going back to the Lesnar thing, I'm totally with you and I feel like people will complain until you get to that build up for that big match, that WrestleMania match, and it's like you get that big fight feel. And with so many pay-per-views and so much wrestling, I mean, we can literally watch wrestling every day of the week live. It's kind of nice to have... When we were kids, we had four fucking pay-per-views.
00:39:02
Speaker
And they made it work. It didn't feel like he had to wait long because the storylines dictated it and they kind of spread things out a little bit. But that's kind of what you're getting with Brock Lesnar now, whereas it has a special feel when he's in the ring because he's not in there every single week, so yeah. Yeah, my argument has always been that people need to look at wrestling, the WWE especially, but wrestling as a whole is like Netflix, right?
00:39:32
Speaker
You have Netflix, you pay $9.99 for Netflix because you like it. That does not mean you like every single thing they put up there, but you don't have to watch that.
00:39:45
Speaker
It's like if somebody was tweeting, I can't believe they just added 13 episodes of Barbie, the animated series. I don't want to watch that. Yeah, so don't. Yeah, because that's a good call. That's a good call. Yeah, I mean, there's so many different types, not only companies, but male-female wrestling. And now you have so many different styles of wrestling that you can watch. And it's like, yeah, I don't need to know that you don't like something.
00:40:11
Speaker
I say that, but I mean, I'm criticizing stuff about wrestling all the time on our social media and stuff like that. But yeah, to a certain extent, it's like, you know, especially if you just don't, like, I don't want to watch AEW, I don't like it, I'm never gonna watch it. Like, okay, well, I don't need to know that. It's not something that you have to watch, you know? You can be an indie wrestling fan, you can be a WWE fan. It's just, you know, we all like the same thing. It's pointless to break it down into these micro groups and just, you know, dissect it.
00:40:39
Speaker
Yeah, the people love to say the three hour raw or whatever. It's too boring. Like you don't have to watch it. There's a shorter version on who the next day you can always fast forward and see the segments you want. And basically, honestly, if you subscribe to them on YouTube, they basically put the entire robin into clips by the next day or at the exact moment. My Viking Raiders match was in full.
00:41:05
Speaker
on YouTube before I even like got my gear off. So that's insane. It's up there quick and you can basically watch raw and clips on YouTube. So if you don't like the three hours, don't watch the three hours. But you brought up AW. I love AW and a lot of that has to do with like I know a lot of people on there. MJF is a great friend of mine, Chris Datlander. I wrestled like
00:41:32
Speaker
17 times this year we train together. She's awesome. Um, so I, I literally cannot. That's appointment television for me to watch my buddies do such good things on TV every week. I just love it.
00:41:47
Speaker
He's been a big part of what they're doing there, man. It's been a year now. I think I've noted the struggles they've had or what I view as struggles, but it's nice to have an alternative and something else to watch. For everything that they're doing that I think they need to correct,
00:42:05
Speaker
I think there's a lot of things they're doing that I like. So it's a double-edged sword, for sure. Before we get into my final question, I want to know, when you are drinking IPAs, give me a couple of your favorites. And let's not go deep cut. So let's not go specific regional things that we can't get. Give something to somebody that's listening in like Oshkosh, Wisconsin can pick up at their local store. I don't know if there's anything that you drink that is more readily available.
00:42:35
Speaker
Well, I'll give you the style. So I am a big IPA guy, but more specifically up here, they call it a New England IPA. But I think nationally it's known as either New England or Northeast IPA. And that is like the really juicy and like citrusy, not like bitter, not like pine tree tasting IPAs. So it's like a very kind of like
00:43:04
Speaker
sweet flavor profile, a lot of mangoes, a lot of citrus. So in New England or Northeast IPA, which basically every brewery has a NE IPA that you can get. I cannot get enough of those drinks. Back in the day before I was really into craft beer, I used to love me a Blue Moon. So this is, in my opinion, the natural progression. But over the last couple of years, I've really just started to enjoy all beers, you know, stouts and
00:43:36
Speaker
traditional West Coast IPAs that are more hoppy and piney. But one of my favorites, and we always talk about this on the show, this is a very standard, very easily accessible standard IPA. It's called HiLi. It's from Cigar City Brewing Company. They're out of Tampa. Very good beer, and you can find that sort of everywhere. And it's in a lot of bars. It's on tap. It's a very standard.
00:44:04
Speaker
nice IPA. And I will also add in the same style, the the stone cold broken skull IPA is actually really good. Really? I enjoy it. I have one here on my desk that I have some one of my listeners sent me that I have not opened up because I don't know when I'm ever going to see them again. They haven't become distributed to this area. But oh, really? Oh, they're they're out there now. I just walk into stores there in New York and at least where I am in Massachusetts. They are readily available.
00:44:34
Speaker
Cool. They're very good. Yeah. I'm going to put a vote in for Oscar blues, Cannobless. It's a hazy IPA. It's very, very fruit forward. If you're, if you've never had it before, I would definitely check it out. But yeah, that's, that's some beer talk. And now I'm, now I'm craving a beer. Mark really enjoyed having you on here. The final question I asked all the, all the guests that we have on our show here, if you were on death row, obviously we hope this never happens, but if you're on death row, what's your final meal going to be? If you could eat anything you want.
00:45:03
Speaker
I think I, uh, I really like, uh, sandwiches and my favorite sandwich is a sort of, uh, that Thanksgiving leftover sandwich. So, man, this is great answer so far. Yeah. So rye bread, mayonnaise, a little bit of mayonnaise, uh, Turkey stuffing,
Fun Segment: Death Row Meal
00:45:23
Speaker
cranberry sauce, a little bit of mayonnaise rye bread, nice and thick, uh, good, uh, inside the bread, uh, bird stuffing. That's my sandwich.
00:45:33
Speaker
Damn. Okay. What are you, what are you washing it down with? What do you, what do you got anything on the side or just going sandwich? Good point. Uh, Oh yeah. I can have sides, huh? Hmm. I don't know. Oh, waffle fries. Nice crispy waffle fries on the side. And I will drink a Julius. It's an IPA. It's a hazy, juicy IPA from treehouse brewery, which is in my opinion, the best brewery on planet earth.
00:46:01
Speaker
Wow, okay. Good call, man. Mark, thank you for joining us again. You can follow Mark on Twitter at silverintuition. I enjoy what you do for the major brothers, but I really enjoy when you're actually on the show talking. You balance those guys out really well. You call both of them out on their bullshit, which is fun, and you just make the show better. So I think hopefully we get more of you in 2020.
00:46:24
Speaker
continued success for you and the boys and uh we love uh you know not partnering with you but we love you know retweeting your stuff and supporting you guys and uh you've been nothing but awesome to us and uh great for the community so uh keep up the great work appreciate it thanks man thanks for having me no problem mark thank you to the one and only mark retell hold the plane
00:46:46
Speaker
from the Major Brothers Wrestling Figure Podcast. Again, Mark, thank you for joining me. Our third edition of the Chick-Fully Lounge, we had our good friend Chris Van Vliet, who just interviewed Chris Benoit's son. Go check that out. Geez. And last week we had Stack Guy Greg on from Cheap Heat.
00:47:09
Speaker
And we have a nice little group going on here, man. I've enjoyed all three of these interviews for many different reasons, and I hope you guys are enjoying them too. I know Sheena and Marcos enjoy listening, and they thank you guys for listening to our shows, and we will be back. I'm not going to tell you who the next guest is going to be. I'm going to leave you hanging. But we have another edition of the Chick Foley Lounge coming up very soon. So until then, stay classy, Marcos. We'll talk to you soon.