The Wild World of Professional Wrestling | #206
+ watch the video of the first ever Mastermind winner >>
Hello friends
Nothing hits the spot like nostalgia, and for some of us 90’s kids, peak nostalgia is watching World Wrestling Entertainment on Star Sports back in the day. Who here hasn’t imitated the People’s Eyebrow 🤨 or scribbled their name followed by “3:16” on their school desk? Okay maybe that was just us, but in any case the WWE was and continues to be, ridiculously popular the world over.
This week’s newsletter is about the WWE and some interesting connections to India.
Things we learnt this week 🤓
Here’s a quiz question - In February 1996, in which city did the WWE (WWF back then) record their second highest open-air audience?
The answer: Bangalore on WWF’s first tour to India which had 30K fans, the author of this post being one of them. The list of performers included Bret Hart, Yokozuna, HHH and of course the legendary Undertaker. They also performed in Bombay, Calcutta and New Delhi.
JinderTaj Majal
Here’s a news report about the tour of India with a sterotypical 90’s depiction of India. Take a shot everytime you see a third-world country cliche in the video. Also, it must be stated that while the fact about “second largest attendance” is from the news report, it could be inaccurate given WWE’s history of embellishing facts.Speaking of The Undertaker, Indian audiences have probably seen “The Undertaker” in the 1996 movie Khiladiyon Ka Khiladi, fighting Akshay Kumar.
This wasn’t THE Undertaker (real name Mark Calaway) of course but a wrestler named Brian Lee who did appear in the WWE as a fake Undertaker in a Undertaker vs Undertaker match. Yes the WWE is weird has hell but that’s for another post.
The WWE has tried really hard to appeal to the Indian market with various wrestler gimmicks - both The Great Khali and Jinder Mahal (he’s actually Canadian) were at some point champions on TV. But the wildest story belongs to the wrestler Veer (real name Rinku Singh Rajput). Singh took part in a 2008 reality television show The Million Dollar Arm on Zee TV. He was then signed by the Pittsburgh Pirates and became the first Indian to play professional baseball, and the story got made into the Jon Hamm starrer ‘Million Dollar Arm’. His baseball career dwindled so he then got really jacked, and joined the WWE. For months they hyped his debut with “Veer is Coming” but once he actually did debut, audiences didn’t really take to it and his WWE career fizzled out.
From IWTK, with love 💌
India’s first ever Mastermind winner was a school teacher from Dehradun. See how she absolutely smashed the finals. A MUST WATCH!
One of India’s finest sports films released 32 years ago. A thread capturing some fun facts about it.
Only In India 🇮🇳
There is always room for one more person in any vehicle in India.
❤️ IWTK