Show: Wrestling Epicenter
Guest: Bill Anderson
Date: 08/07/2025
Your Host: James Walsh
Bill Anderson is an accomplished former professional wrestler, ring announcer, referee, and trainer. Having wrestled and defeated the likes of “Mr. Wonderful” Paul Orndorff, trained the likes of the Ultimate Warrior, Sting, Angel of Death, CHeerleader Melissa, Missy Hyatt, and beyond, and ring announced matches for Hulk Hogan amongst others, Bill Anderson’s career in pro wrestling, which started 50 years ago, was one that has a lot of wonderful stories. And, in an hour plus interview, we discuss many of these stories and really pick the brain of a wrestling legend who might well be the definition of an unsung hero.
Bill Anderson also appeared on the recent edition of Dark Side of the Ring about his personal friend “Superstar” Billy Graham. We, the Wrestling Epicenter, were also featured on that same episode with clips of our Billy Graham interview airing during the special. So, we figure that makes us friends by proxy!
Below is a detailed transcript of a lot of what is talked about. But, there is so much more if you listen to the whole thing which you can for free on YouTube. The embedded video is below.
You can also listen on our website, http://www.wrestlingepicenter.com. Our site is 100% free and we have presented interviews with everyone from Hulk Hogan to Batista, Sherri Martel to Lita, and beyond over the past 25 years. All we ask ks that you check out our site, store, and enjoy what we do. And, if you post this interview, please remember to link back to us! Thank you!
YouTube Link: https://youtu.be/RLN3G-huZLg
BILL ANDERSON:
On his thoughts on the finished episode of Dark Side of the Ring on his friend Superstar Billy Graham:
“I thought it was good. I was disappointed, I have to say, with his children’s input. I was nervous about saying something negative that could be found offensive about him during the interview myself. I mean, everybody knew he did steroids. I don’t think I was revealing anything. But, I really felt his kids did him a disservice.”
On how he fell in love with pro wrestling:
“I can tell you exactly when. It was 1971, it was John Tolos versus Freddie Blassie. When I saw Tolos throw the powder in Blassie’s eyes, I was captivated. I said, “Oh my God! This is what I want to do with my life!” And, I was so proud. I actually got to become friends with John Tolos! I wrestled him many times. And, in a WWF ring, I got to present Freddie Blassie, in the LA Sports Arena, with a plaque celebrating his 50 years of pro wrestling. I don’t know exactly what year that would have been – Possibly 1988 or 1989. But, I got to know my legends. I never stopped being a mark for them and respecting the history of pro wrestling.”
On the origin of the expression “Marijuana Pills” :
“(laughs) Poor Nick Goulas! He was one of the promoters in the Memphis area and he was so far behind the times. He was certainly a business man. But, he thought you got high by taking marijuana pills, that it was in pill form. I was partnered with Chris Colt, I was Bill Colt, and “The Hippie” Mike Boyette was our partner. He came to us in the locker room and said, “If you weren’t taking those marijuana pills!” (laughs) I wasn’t taking ay pills. I was drinking milk! He said, “If you’d only get off those marijuana pills, you’d be making twice the money you’re making!” I thought, as a smart ass kid, “I’m happy with the money I’m making!” I was making $750 a week! That was damn good money for a teenage kid to be making back in 1975! But, that was Nick Goulas. They didn’t have a clue. They also didn’t have a clue that the baby faces were coming up to us in the locker room asking if we had any drugs. Which, by the way, we did not have. It was such a stereotype. We were the long hairs. I had long blond hair. I was supposed to be a hippie and a Hell’s Angel Biker. (laughs) But, we didn’t have any marijuana pills!”
On when he realized WWE, WWF at the time, was taking over the world:
“I would say it was around the time of WrestleMania 2. That was the night they did 3 locations for WrestleMania. I was in Los Angeles and helped set up the cage for the main event between Hulk Hogan and King Kong Bundy. WWE was doing a lot of shows like that, 3 shows in one night at the time. Hogan would be on the A show and maybe Don Muraco or Pat Patterson would headline the other shows. That was when I realized they were doing something that was really massive.”
On how he got in with WWE:
“I owe that to Mike LeBell. I only worked for his promotion for the last 6 months before he sold to Vince McMahon. Vince McMahon didn’t want to pay trans for everybody so they would use local talent on shows and Mike MeBell suggested me and a number of other guys to work the WWF shows whey they came to the area. I got in good with Chief Jay Strongbow, Rene Goulet, and, especially, Pat Patterson… And Terry Garvin! Pat Patterson helped me quite a bit. He put me over some guys much bigger than me. He put me over Paul Orndorff one night in the LA Sports Arena in 1984, I believe. He put me over Magnificent Zulu in San Diego. I had seen Zulu wrestle in Cobo Hall in Detroit for The Sheik. I’m from Detroit. That meant a lot to me. But, Patterson said I was going over. I did what I was told!”
On the passing of Hulk Hogan:
“I got to work on shows with Hulk, I was a ring announcer and a referee for shows with Hulk in California and personally, he was never anything but a nice guy. That said, standing in the ring, there was nothing like standing in the ring and the goosebumps you’d get when Hogan would come out. There was nothing like it! Maybe the Ultimate Warrior a few years later had some of that. But, Hogan’s was something special. I also had other experiences with Hulk. I set up the ring for Dolly Parton’s first show where Hulk Hogan wrestled “Iron” Mike Sharpe! I have to say, I got goosebumps just standing next to the guy. I hate to sound so markish but the guy really did have that much of an “It Factor” about him. Eric Bischoff always used to say, “You got to put asses in seats.” Hulk Hogan did just that.”
On the negative remarks about Hogan online after his death:
“It just shows their ignorance. That kind of ignorance and that mentality is why I closed my school in 2001. I had a wrestling school in Riverside, California for a number of years. And, that kind of ignorance is why I closed it. I had students that would look at the pictures on my wall after training for almost a year and they’d say, “You used to wrestle, didn’t you?” I would go, “Oh my God, are you dumb! Do you not study the business? You have to know the history of this business!” I remember being in Mexico, and I know this will make me sound like the biggest mark in the world, but I would have Lucha Libre magazines in my bag and even if I was main eventing, I would get the guys on the card that were in the magazine to autograph the magazine… And they loved me for it! Because, I didn’t speak a word of Spanish. But, they knew I respected them. Respect is the key word!”
On training the Ultimate Warrior and Sting:
“I trained those guys at Red Bastien’s school. Well, calling it a school is kind of like the WWE Hall of Fame. It was a wrestling ring set up in a racquetball court in a Nautilus Aerobics Plus studio in Reseda, California. There were six guys in that training class and all of them were bigger than me. So, I let those six guys pound the living Hell out of me. I mean, Red would say, “Show them what a bodyslam looks like” and I’d go up for these guys and take slams from all six of them. Little did I know that it would impede my life later on down the road, taking all of that physical abuse to my body as I got older.”
On Sting’s unique abilities:
“I noticed very quickly that Sting had an unusual amount of spring in his legs. I mean, I truly believe he would have been a big success in any sport he may have played – No different than Curt Hennig. Steve would have been a great football, basketball – and I mean NBA, or any sport… He could have been the world’s greatest golfer! He was going to succeed and be the best at what he did, the same as Curt Hennig.”
On his initial view of the Ultimate Warrior:
“Ultimate Warrior, I didn’t notice anything quite as remarkable about the Ultimate Warrior in training. He didn’t take to it as quickly as Sting did. But, one thing he had, and always had, was a remarkable belief in himself. He always said, “Always Believe.” Well, he and Steve split off from the other guys and started to stick together. They sent 8×10’s to Jerry Jarrett and Jerry Lawler in Memphis. Meanwhile, Red Bastien put in a call to Stu Hart in Calgary to get them up there. And, one day, I remember this vividly, they approached me outside the gym in Venice Beach, we were sitting on someone’s car in the sunshine, and they asked me, “You have no vested interest in us…” I wasn’t even getting paid to train the guys. I was going through a divorce and Red Bastien offered me an apartment to live in if I helped him train. Red couldn’t get in the ring and work because he had two artificial hips. Red was like a father figure to me. They asked, “Where should we go?” I said, “I went to Memphis and worked for Jerry Lawler and Jerry Jarrett in 1975. You’ll get nothing but experience. But, that is all you need right now. I don’t think you’ll make a lot of money. But, you’ll get a lot of experience.” They said, “What about Calgary?” I said, “Calgary is great. Stu Hart is a legend. But, it is September. Do you want to go to Calgary now and deal with the snow or go to Memphis and see what weather that brings?” So, they asked, and I told them, “Go to Tennessee.” And, that is exactly what they did.”
On if Sting or Warrior would have succeeded had Sting gone to WWE and Warrior to WCW instead:
“Good question. I’ve never been asked that before. No, I don’t think they would have enjoyed the same success. Sting, as was proven later, didn’t like the WWE schedule where they had to work almost every night. Plus, he then would not have worked with guys like Ric Flair who helped him so much. And Warrior, I don’t think Warrior would have succeeded with the different factions that held power in WCW around that time like Kevin Sullivan and his guys, Jim Herd, or Hulk Hogan’s faction… I don’t think they would have put up with Warrior and Warrior really needed to have one voice guiding him. In WWE, he had Pat Patterson and Vince McMahon really as his guidance. And, they helped mold him into what they wanted him to be. Theyw anted him to run to the ring, shake the ropes, and give you that kind of energy in the entrance and in the performance. I think with Sting, they (WWE) would have screwed it all up. Sting would have been relegated to an Arn Anderson type role adnd just put down to nothing. And, I love Arn. But, look at what a talent a guy like Paul Roma was…. And they did nothing with Roma.”
On the Ultimate Warrior kind-of sort-of working for NWC in Vegas in 1995:
“It did and it didn’t happen. TC Martin, the promoter of NWC, needed a big name to get them over the top. He asked if I could get the Ultimate Warrior. I called him and asked and he said, “You know, Bill. I don’t usually do smaller shows. But, I have this gym that I’m trying to promote.” So, it worked out because we ran advertisements for the Warrior’s gym and wrestling school on the show. And, it worked out because Jim (Warrior) was in Scottsdale, Arizona which wasn’t all that far from Las Vegas. So, we did have him up for TV and we did shoot some interviews. I know because I was the one doing the TV interview with him. It was all leading up to a match with the Honky Tonk Man. And, maybe this is an example of why so many had issues with Jim but the day of the scheduled match with the Honky Tonk Man, Jim drove up to the building and on the billboard, he saw it say “The Honky Tonk Man versus the Ultimate Warrior ” and he flipped out and kept on driving because his name was second on the marquise. It never happened.”
On training Louie Spicolli:
“I took Louie Spicolli to his very first match at a WWE TV taping in Deluth & Rochester, Minnesota. They asked me to bring 4 guys and I did. I knew Louie would not fall apart. So, the first night, they put him with “Outlaw” Ron Bass. And, the next night, Greg Valentine. Each night, they came back and as soon as Greg and Ron came through the curtain, TOny Garea came up and asked, “How’d he do?” They said, “He did fine!” He came up to me, ‘Why haven’t you been bringing this kid more foten?” I had lied and said he was working for a year. But, this was his first match in front of a crowd! Later on, I confided in Cheif Jay Strongbow. He called me on Christmas and I told him, “I lied. Spicolli had never worked a match before.” He said, “Well, you did a good job!” And I said, “I know, but if you knew he had never worked before, you never would have booked him.” He said, “You’re God damn right!” (laughs) I told him I had to do what I had to do.”
On Louie Spicolli being liked by polar opposites like Chris Candido and Scott Hall:
“I can tell you why Candido liked him. Spicolli liked to work, and obviously, Candido liked to work. I remember I took Louie Spicolli to a show in Edmonton and Calgary (for WWE) and they asked, “Do you think he could have a good match with Steamboat?” I said, “Hell yeah, he can have a good match!” Well, I told him and he went over to Ricky and he said, “I want to do every high spot, in order, that you did with Randy Savage at WrestleMania III.” Ricky said, “Do you think you can do it?” He said “yeah”, and they went out and they did it! Strongbow had enough faith in Spicolli to go out and have that TV match. That is how good he was.”
On training female wrestlers, namely Cheerleader Melissa:
“Doug Anderson was her father and I trained him also. He was one of my very best friends. He was 29 years a LA police officer… I knew Melissa from when she was 3 years old. As time went by and she wanted to get in the business, I helped train her. Myself, Mondo Guerrero, and others. Everybody trains differently. But, she was good. Her dad, unfortunately, has passed away. That was hard. But, I still am in contact with Melissa to this day. She lives in Vegas.”
On training Missy Hyatt to wrestle:
“Well, Missy was a little different than Cheerleader Melissa. Missy wanted to learn how to do some moves and to bump a little. But, at the time, she was dating Jason Hervey from the Wonder Years… And, problems with Jason Hervey would sometimes impact her willingness to come in and train. But, she did do some training with me, sure.”
On training the Magnificent Mimi:
“Another girl I trained, you may not even know I trained, was Magnificent Mimi. She had a ring set up in the living room of her house. She had high ceilings. She used a 12 foot ring. But, it was weird hitting the ropes while in the living room of a mansion in the mountains of LA! Oh, I loved Mimi. Oh my God! I wish I would have married her!”
On doing the LPWA women’s promotion in NV:
“I worked with Mimi there too. I got to know her well. That was a fun promotion. I was the ring announcer. The time keeper was “Crippler” Ray Stevens! Can you imagine? Legendary wrestler reduced to time keeper. Jim Cornette was there. Joe Pedicino and Boni Blackstone…. Norman the Lunatic, who was Mike Shaw, Bastion Booger.”
On Billy Graham’s passing:
“The one thing I did want to say is I was very disappointed with the turnout at Billy’s funeral. There weren’t many name stars that turned out for it. In fact, there were more pro football players than pro wrestlers at the funeral. I expected to see a whole lot of names that just didn’t come and that was a bit of a let down for me. I feel he deserved better.”
