The Gathering wrestling convention in Charlotte, North Carolina
Dpeck100
Posts: 10,912 ✭✭✭✭✭
I am heading to Charlotte tonight and will be there through Sunday helping my friend Greg Weiss run his booths at The Gathering. Greg is an attorney from Miami but in his spare time he runs his wrestling vendor business GW Promotions and brings in wrestlers to a few conventions each year. For this show he is bringing in over ten wrestlers who have a card in one of the three Wrestling All Stars sets.
Here is the guest list for the show. http://www.tmartpromotions.com/vedndor-guest-list-
Greg is a pretty convincing guy and not only am I going but he talked Rob England aka Wrestling Card KIng into going and he is making the journey from CA to North Carolina and will be working the booths too. I am looking forward to getting to see Rob in person.
The event kicks off Thursday night and then there are two days of signings. This will be my second time helping Greg and for compensation he lets me get my items signed and so I put together a nice stack of cards and cracked a few out.
We are staying at the hotel where the event takes place so I am hoping to have some fun wrestler stories to share and interesting comments from some that we will be working with.
If anyone who is reading this is going make sure you stop by and say hello and if you have any pics please share them in this thread.
Here is what I am bringing and I will be updating the thread over the next few days.
Comments
David, I live in Charlotte and will be in the University area tomorrow. Maybe I will stop by with my son and say hello.
I collect: 80’s Rookies and 86 Fleer Basketball
That sounds great. Hope to see you guys there.
Masked Superstar is Bill Eadie isn’t it? Is he not allowed to use the Demolition Ax moniker?
Yes that is him.
Not sure what the deal is there. I saw him wrestle probably five years ago for the local independent wrestling promotion I go to watch and he was advertised as Ax from Demolition. Might be a WWE trademark issue for shows like this.
I will ask Greg his thoughts and get back to you. In line to board my flight and will post again later tonight.
Well this will certainly be a great follow over the next few days.
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Dpeck and the King with drinks with Abdullah The Butcher. His family wanted our picture too so we were tagged on his Instagram. Great people.
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
My wrestling pc. These cards are at PSA currently.
I collect hall of fame rookie cards, https://www.instagram.com/stwainfan/
I was buying drinks for Abby and his crew and ran to the room to get my card I had to get signed and then Rob did too and came back with the real stuff. He paid $100 and got the awesome stuff signed!
Well. 3:23pm. I assume you guys will be waking up any time. 😂
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Jake Roberts today.
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
1982 wrestling all star Joyce Grable.
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Great photos guys. I have heard Abdullah is nothing like his ring persona - very nice and family oriented in person. Figure he is what 5’8-5’9 in real life. I know wrestlers age poorly but Austin Idol looks horrible - almost plastic in the face. Dpeck - you running these days? You look much lighter than a couple of years ago with your picture with Flair. Those were some cool photos and stories and well worth the $$.
KC
Had Abdullah seen those Japanese cards before?
Never seen the 1976 card before....
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
I worked with Magnum TA today.
Yeah I do a ton of cardio. Just trying to be lean and feel good.
Will add lots of pics and content tomorrow and Sunday.
Great thread and pics fellas
Tully Blanchard and Ivan Putski before we headed off for dinner tonight.....
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Wrestlingcardking, do you mind if I share that Ivan Putoski photo in my wrestling Facebook group?
I don't mind. He is such an awesome guy. I really enjoy him.
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Great photos. Must have felt great to be able to get all those cards done.
A belt collector came by Magnum’s table with this. Terry said that is the original US Title that is in the picture. Everyone has heard the term “I marked out”. Well I did. Got to pic it up and it was so awesome. The same guy has the North American title from Mid South that Magnum held at one time too. Amazing!
Story time at lunch with Baron, Bob, and Joyce. So cool.
What a super nice lady Joyce is.
no better feeling than getting an in-person graph, and you guys are killing it
thoroughly enjoying this thread
you'll never be able to outrun a bad diet
Jake "the snake" Roberts. I used to love when he wrestled. DDT!
Me and Bob Backlund
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
Lots of comments to add in the next few days.
Here are a few pics from today.
Honestly so much more to add to the thread but we have been constantly busy....
Looking to BUY n332 1889 SF Hess cards and high grade cards from 19th century especially. "Once you have wrestled everything else in life is easy" Dan Gable
I am back in Orlando and now have a chance to make some more detailed posts. What a great trip! It was so nice to get to see Rob and Gregg and hang out with the wrestlers. We all had a great time. As we were heading to the car for Rob to drive Gregg and I to the airport we got someone is the parking lot to snap a pic.
I got it in pretty late Thursday night because there was a big storm and so my flight was delayed. When I got in the cab the driver and I started making small talk and I said I was heading to a wrestling convention and he said he doesn't watch anymore but his all time favorite was Bob Backlund and I said OMG small world I am working with him tomorrow. I promised I would tell Bob the story and I did.
Once I got to the hotel I met up with Rob and headed up to Gregg's room. It was beyond shocking how much stuff he brought to get signed and the depth of the material. There is no other collector who has more signed wrestling stuff than Gregg and good stuff too. I was ready to get down to the action so Rob and I went down to the bar and started ordering some drinks. We started talking to Abdulla The Butcher and he remembered me from Orlando and on cue started asking us to buy him drinks. Once I obliged he now wanted drinks for his crew. We were chatting it up and someone came up for an autograph and he turned them down. We started showing him pictures of his cards as Rob brought the mother load of his rare stuff and I bolted up to the room to get the one card I had of him and brought it back and wanted him to sign it. At first he was hesitant and pointed to how I said I understood why he turned down the guy and I said but he isn't buying you Tito's and Patron and so he signed the card and then Rob ran and got his stuff and paid him the $100 to get it signed. We knew we were off to a great start. Around 1:30 we shut the party down and went to our rooms.
When I drink late I have no choice but to workout in the morning and fully intended too anyways. I set my alarm for 6 and so I didn't get much sleep and hit the very limited workout room. Not but five minutes into my workout in walks Jake The Snake Roberts. I was like OMG how cool and just knew it was going to be a great time. I had no choice but to sneak a pic.
After I was done working out I went downstairs and met up with Rob and he was with Joyce Grable and Baron Von Raschke and then Bob Backlund joined us. The service at the Hilton in Charlotte was easily the worst I have ever experienced and so breakfast was a real challenge. I headed to the conference ballroom and helped set up the tables with the photos. Unfortunately Bill Dundee had health issues and so Greg got Magnum TA Terry Allen to fill in for him so instead of working with Dundee and Idol I handled him and floated a little. Terry was very busy on Saturday and it was great chatting with him. He had a nice array of items with some figures, his DVD, photos, and a little custom made card of his 1984 Wrestling All Stars calendar card. I filled him in on the cards and we talked wrestling and it was going great. A number of people kept mentioning Tessa Blanchard and I blurted out to him "Do you think she is taking something? Her face is starting to look kind of manly and is looking really built." He said "No she is just working out really hard." About twenty minutes later I said so what is the connection between you and Tessa and he said I married Tully's ex wife and she is my daughter and I have raised her since she was very young. I honestly felt my stomach turn and was mortified. The level of embarrassment is hard to convey and I just carried on. An hour or so later a guy walked up and they started chatting and he pulled out a belt. Lots of people are getting replicas signed but this looked different he said this is the belt in the photo. It took me a minute to put two and two together and it was The Belt. I was dying. The guy apparently has a tremendous wrestling collecting of rare belts and robes including two from The Nature Boy. We did good business and as we wrapped up he thanked me and said you really did a great job and did everything you could to make the fan experience a great one. I was very pleased to hear that and we snapped a pic and I breathed a little sigh of relief.
We wrapped up and headed to the restaurant and grabbed some lunch and drinks. I had a chance to chat with Joyce Grable and she was incredibly nice and I loved hearing the stories of her past. Barron and Bob joined and then the rest of the crew and we had a great time listening to each of them share stories of how they broke into the business. It is surreal sitting side by side next to legends from wrestling.
I was pounding the Tito's and then we moved to the bar area after they headed to the airport. The next wave of arrivals was coming in and Ken Patera arrived. He is amazing. I met him at a dinner that Gregg put together in Orlando at Wrestlecon and couldn't wait to hang with him. He is a blast and loves to drink. We were knocking them back then Valentine arrived and Jimmy Garvin and Spike Huber. Ivan Putski came next and the hours were passing. Many had moved to the restaurant behind the bar and so I went and sat with Backlund, Patera and Spike in there. It was taking for ever for people to get their food and it was very frustrating. We shut things down around 11:30. During this time it was so fun to talk wrestling with the guys and it is crazy how ripped Spike is and how tiny Putski is at this point. Ivan loves to talk about working out and how built he was and Spike was just thrilled to be there. Backlund even had a few beers and him and Patera were joking about how he used to be able to drink 20 of the 22 ounce Japanesse beers. Incredible.
I once again got an early start and got my workout in and then met up with Ken in the restaurant. We were enjoying ourselves and Backlund comes storming in. He said they stole my TV. I said are you sure about that? He said yeah. He had a TV with video player that is easily twenty years old. I had instructed him to just leave it under the table the day before and he was a little worried it would get stolen and I said don't worry no one is stealing your TV. He was adamant it was gone and that it had been replaced with one that looked similar but it wasn't his TV. I said I don't how anyone would be able to swap out the two TV's and somehow find one like his. Rob and him headed down there to check things out and I said if there was really a problem I would get with security and see what we could find out. I said to Patera there is no chance someone could have found a TV like that I am willing to bet money it is the same one. I carried Patera's bag down and escorted him through the crowd as we walked into the ballroom and as we hooked around the corner and were approaching I said that is definitely the same TV. It was. We were dying laughing and I was relieved it was still there. I guess the cleaning crew moved it a little and there was an issue with his video but everything was fine and we moved on. I got Patera situated and then Valentine shortly after. We were super busy and they did really well. After a few hours Patera was insistent he have some beers. Greg said it was a no no and there was a zero tolerance policy and so Ken got a guy he knew to go get him one and worked on that and his Copenhagen. An hour or so later Gregg caved and his buddy Todd who was super cool went and got sandwiches and Starbucks cups with lids and ice cold beer. That was nice.
I didn't spend much time with Backlund because Rob was handling him but man was he nuts. Every ten or fifteen minutes it seemed he was going berserk in his Mr. Backlund gimmick and he was loud. Some of the guys were getting a little annoyed. He would put people in the cross faced chicken wing and I think hurt one dude. He tried it on Slaughter! He also did a headstand and Rob followed him and did it as well!
I brought a good number of cards to get signed and my primary goal was to get the slaughter PSA 9 signed. I kept pestering Gregg on where we stood with him and it was the last item I needed to get signed. He kept saying not to worry he would get it worked out. Finally around 2 he had the arrangement in place. I was very vocal with Slaughter that we needed to be very careful with this one as it was in really great condition. He signed it and wanted to look at the back but I said hang tight and let it dry and put it in the card saver and then let him read the back. He was interested in what it had to say. We then took a pic and he did the cobra clutch on me and my weekend was made. I got a chance to snap some pics of Rob getting his signed and the same treatment. I had all of my cards signed and shortly thereafter we wrapped up the show.
We headed back to the restaurant and had some lunch which was horrible but good company. Greg paid all of the guys and then Rob who played taxi driver and took them to the airport. We sat around having some drinks with Candi Devine and then just kept drinking and then Todd started ordering shots of tequila and then fireball. I was feeling a little rough this morning after having beer, pinot noir, vodka, tequila, and whiskey. Nothing a quick workout couldn't fix. Rob took Gregg and I to the airport and the trip was over. It has been so nice forging such great friendships through wrestling cards. We are very lucky to have gotten to know each other and one of the best things about collecting is meeting new people with similar interests. I posted a few pics that were already posted just so they would go with the story. Here are the cards I got signed and I will post some more random shots. What a great time!
I purchased a card a little over a week ago that has been on my want list for some time and it came Saturday and I was anxious to see it. I now have the blue and yellow version of both the Topps and OPC in a PSA 10. What a great way to wrap up such a fun wrestling adventure!
Dpeck !! Gnarly !!
Different world but completely correlates to my world. When I go see or run in to old school Heavy Metal band members from back in the day, it's the same type of deal. Total awe. Total this is friggin cool. Total (add in a little of) What the Hell Happened to You !!!!' heh heh heh
Congrats friend.. very nice experience.
BTW and I don't care what anyone here says.. You are the STUD MUFFIN of that show
heh
Thanks for checking it out!
There was definitely some missing teeth so the bar isn't very high! LOL
Sounds like a great time. I liked the write-up.
Always looking to buy or trade for Andre the Giant autographs
psacard.com/psasetregistry/non-sports/famous-personage/andre-giant-master-set/alltimeset/180400
Well, I have certainly enjoyed this thread all weekend long! I'm just speechless. What a thread! This thread has been so much fun reading. Thanks for the entertainment!
Thanks for checking it out!
Am I the only one that thinks The Hammer is starting to look a lot like Mama from Throw Mama Off The Train?