Indie wrestling: little money, lots of satisfaction

WENATCHEE — Ryan and Joel lead normal lives by day. Ryan is a student at Central Washington University and maintains a day job in Ellensburg, just like Joel.

But one night a month, Ryan and Joel take the ring as Death Eater and Priest, respectively, to fulfill a dream of becoming professional wrestlers.

"I just took the worst personality traits I had and turned them up to 11," said Priest. "My nickname was Priest before wrestling. That's how they knew me. I just came up with the rest of it."

Before every match, Priest listens to a mix of Type O Negative and Gregorian chants to get into character. He borrows a gravelly voice he heard from an old man buying unfiltered cigarettes, and he becomes the religion-nonspecific priest in the ring, out to cleanse the sport of heathens and sinners.

Ryan describes himself as a "nice, jokey, fun guy" during the day, but when he emerges from the coffin pushed to the ring by Priest, he becomes Death Eater, a ruthless take on the Undertaker from World Wrestling Entertainment.

Together, Death Eater and Priest form the only team from Ellensburg in Pro Wrestling Beyond, one of two independent professional-wrestling companies in Washington.

Priest and Death Eater never expected to be wrestling professionally. They got into it through coincidence and a little luck, as most indie wrestlers do.

"I fell into it, literally," said 38-year-old Mother Truckin' Otis, a seven-year veteran of indie wrestling from Sacramento, Calif. "They were asking for people to help sell merchandise. I volunteered, and they started a training school, and I was one of the first guys they asked to join."

But the wrestlers in Pro Wrestling Beyond were never apathetic about getting into professional wrestling. Most of them watch professional wrestling avidly and are self-described nerds about the sport. Being in the ring had always been a dream job.

"Like any job, you have to know how to do it inside and out," said Pro Wrestling Beyond wrestler Cedric the Hit Man, who also runs two pro-wrestling training schools in Oregon. "This is one of those occupations where if you don't keep on top of things, you're just going to get swallowed up because there are thousands of people who want to do what we do."

The wrestlers never do it for the money, however, and that's because indie wrestling often doesn't have much money to offer. Admission fees are just $10. On Aug. 16, Pro Wrestling Beyond's biggest show of the year, Violent Anniversary III, took place in a sweltering room a floor below a class reunion in the Wenatchee Convention Center.

Because of the schools he operates, Cedric is one of the few wrestlers who can make a living from pro wrestling, but most are not so lucky. Otis said he has wrestled in companies where he was paid $10 to travel 300 miles round-trip for a match, and Priest said arguments have arisen among some wrestlers over amounts as small as $5.

Why do the wrestlers do this, then?

"It's one of the best highs I've ever had," Otis said. "I can't think of a better high than to have 20 to 100 — I've had as many as 1,000 — people cheering for me, and doing something that's fun. God, what a rush."

Even the villains, such as Priest, find the greatest satisfaction in the boos they garner.

"You know you're doing your job when they're booing you," said Priest. "As the heel, you get to do so much more with the character."

One thing the wrestlers will never budge on is the authenticity of the sport. Wrestlers must go to training school to get a license, to learn to take hits and deliver hits properly. Priest said wrestlers normally must go to school for at least a year before anyone will take the ring with them.

"It is real," said Otis, who, in his career, has fractured his L1 vertebra, sprained his neck and broken all his fingers. "It's staged, but it hurts."

But any wrestler will tell you that it's not just about the fighters in the ring. When wrestler Big Ugly won the title belt from villain Christopher Ryseck at Violent Anniversary III, kids from the 100-spectator crowd were invited to climb into the ring to pose for pictures and get autographs. They became a part of the dream.

That is what indie pro wrestling is about: livening up everyday life, if only once a month.

"These kids, their eyes are huge, watching these behemoths in the ring beating the crap out of each other," Otis said. "I see kids that are just scared to ask for an autograph, and I'm like, 'No, here. Let me sign that for you.'

"It's just so down-to-earth, so grass-roots. It's so real. It's not all Hollywood, it's not all big money. It's what small-town America used to be."