Barry Darsow On Vince McMahon Pitching Him Smash, Demolition's Record Title Run, Today's Stars

Today The Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling welcomes former 3x WWE Tag Team Champion, Barry Darsow AKA Demolition Smash. The full episode as well as the entire Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling catalog can be downloaded at this link.

Why is the "1980s" wrestling era still so popular amongst old-school fans?

"I think back in the 80s I'm not saying we cared more about wrestling but we treated it more like it was really a professional sport. You really protected the business and I think that was kind of a major part of it. When you try to protect the business you are better at it than when what you are now."

What would the generation of wrestlers that Barry learned from think of today's wrestling scene in 2016?

"Oh my God, they are probably rolling over in their graves and the guys who are still alive are probably losing their minds and want no part of it now. Not saying that now is bad it is just that it is so completely different it's just not like professional wrestling anymore. The guys that are on TV right now with WWE or TNA they are phenomenal at what they do and with the whole wrestling profession changing and how it has evolved over the years, the bottom line it all gets back down to "wrestling". If a guy is out there and can't wrestle and all he does is high spots he is not going to get over like that a wrestler would. It all goes back to that old adage of come-on you have to know how to wrestle."

How would Demolition from back in their prime work with the top stars of today?

"I think we could probably just after having a few matches with them and teach them exactly how to tell a story out there, I think we could tear the house down. I just don't know if teams could keep up with us. With both Ivan and Nikita Koloff as well as with Bill (Eadie) the whole thing that we did was our endurance. We could wrestle hour matches and I don't think that these guys could go a half hour without having their tongues hanging out and they would have to wait up for us and I am not saying that in a bad way because that is just how we were trained. When me and Ivan were together we wrestled the Rock and Roll Express in one day wrestled three-one hour long broadways. First wrestled an hour on TV on WTBS, we wrestled in Columbus Georgia and that night we wrestled an hour in the Omni. Who in the world wrestles three hours in one day?"

Being able to work with and learn from Ivan Koloff on a nightly basis:

"Ivan first of all is the greatest guy in the world when it comes to the wrestling business. Outside the business he truly is a great man. I thought that I really knew how to wrestle before I got to Crocket's territory and when I hooked up with Ivan there were so many different things that I learned from Ivan that I never knew you could do and following him to me made me ten times better than what I was. Ivan was just incredible and is a true professional."

How he was pitched Smash by Vince McMahon:

"The way it happened was when I quit Jim Crocket Promotions it was Earl Hebner who I was really good friends with that had called (his brother) David Hebner and who had also talked to Ricky Steamboat and both of those guys went to Vince and told him about me that I had just quit my job. It was Vince McMahon that called me about a week or so later and said that he would love to have me in his territory. Of course I jumped at the chance and they flew me in and I signed a non-dislosure agreement and he showed me exactly what I was going to do and that Bill Eadie was going to be my partner and the way I felt about that was that was the best partner I could ever have. It was a good move leaving Jimmy Crocket."

"Vince said that he had been watching me for the last few years and liked how I looked and the fact that I was a power-lifter, strong and I learned how to work with Ivan. At that time not just anyone could go to New York. You had to have some pretty good experience to go up there and he liked the idea that I was in a smaller territory down South because nobody would recognize me up in the New York territory and when I came out the first time in the makeup nobody had a clue who I was. That kind of made it and when I signed the contract up there and he asked me if I would be partners with Bill and I told him how much I loved it and I hadn't got the job yet until he (Vince) met with Bill again and he told Bill that I was looking good and I was excited about being there and if Bill would be partners with me and (thankfully) Bill said yes. That is how the team formed and it took a couple of weeks to happen because Bill was in Japan at the time when I signed my contract but I believe I would have had a job up there no matter what even if it wasn't going to be with Demolition but I'm not exactly sure what that would have been. Once I was at my first TV show that I worked and we walked out of the dressing room, I realized I was the youngest guy in the territory at that point at probably about twenty-five years old. Think about it , you walk into a dressing room and here you see Hulk Hogan, Andre "The Giant", Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka, Paul Orndorff and you see these guys who have been the top guys in every territory they were ever in and they are the top guys in New York and all of a sudden Barry Darsow comes in, thank GOD I had Bill Eadie as my partner."

Demolition holding the WWE tag belts for 478 days, the longest in company history (contrary to what they say today):

"It went really fast. We were very proud that we could hold them that long and for Vince McMahon to trust us with them was something that we must have done something for him or otherwise he would have taken them off of us. But it was pretty wild and we never thought that we would have them that long and it was actually exciting to get rid of them and go for them again because when you have them for so long you kind of want someone else to have them and go against them but overall it was pretty neat."