Hey peeps its Mike Draven & I’m here with another opportunity for all of you to get to know another fantastic Indy star here in Southern California. The interview is with non other than the “Dreamer of Dreams”, “The big pink light that shine’s bright”..this is Pinky.
1. First of all, how are you & how are you feeling today?
Pinky: right now while I’m answering your first question it is 130 am so I’m a littl bit tired but honestly this is the only time of the day that i would have any real time to go ahead and answer the questions fully. In short tired but good.
2. Do you remember the first time you saw a wrestling match & if so do you remember who was wrestling?
Pinky: Honestly i know that I’ve seen wrestling before this because my older brothers would watch nothing but wrestling all day, but the moment that stands out in my mind is the casket match between Undertaker and Yokozuna. It suprized me that Yoko was the bigger man and yet he needed so many guys to come out of the back to help him get taker into the casket. But the reason that it stays in my mind is what happened after they got him in the casket. The screens lit up with Undertakers face he woke up and then levitated out of the screen. as a young kind you dont really know what to think at this point other than these guys are larger than life it self.
3. Who was your inspiration to get into the wrestling buisness?
Pinky: I can name so many names of the wrestlers that inspired me to get into the buisness from Bret Hart to Kevin Nash to Undertaker To Bam Bam Bigelow to Mick Foley. But as a child It was just horsing around with my older brothers that became my inspiration, being able to be any character that you wanted to be at that point in time just seemed like fun that i never ever wanted to end.
5. Where did go for your training & who were your instructors?
Pinky: Well the training school i went to started out as HPW’s (Hybrid Pro Wrestling) Dynamite Fury wrestling school. The class was taught by Joey (now Rico) Dynamite, Fabe Fury And HPW Owner Johnny “Nightmare” Suarez. One day johnny has me and the other guys gather around the ring as he tells us that he felt that he got us as far as he possibly could, and that he and rico were bringing in some people that could get us ready to be at the next level. At the time it felt like Tough Enough with a guest trainer coming in. low and behold we turn around to see JOEY KAOS, ANGEL, & MONGOL SANTINO walk through the door and Thats How Santino Bros Wrestling Academy came about. A Few weeks later a few more trainers that have helped mold me came in also, including Robbie (I always spell this wrong) Phoenix, BC Killer, and last but can Never Ever Be Considered Least “THE HUMAN HORROR FILM” SUPREME.
6. How do you feel about where you trained to be a pro wrestler? Where your teachers a positive infulence on you?
Pinky: I believe in my heart of hearts (and I’m sure that everyone else feels the same way about where they trained) that I trained at the the very best school in So Cal with the very best instructors in So Cal. And all of the instructors had huge positive influences on who I am and how I look at the buisness. Its funny because when i really sit and think about it, every one of my teachers had a seperate part in the making of the man that i am today
*Angel – Almost everything that I have ever learned about Lucha Libre and just sticking to a character, living that character, and making everyone believe that character have come from this man.
*Mongol – Along with learning to be a tough nosed beast inside the ring, I am always learning something new about the business as a whole from him. He is also a very good critique on what you can work on and what you did well in the ring.
*Fabe Fury – He isn’t one of the instructors at Santino’s but he did teach me many things, he taught me how to lead a match with a partner when he told me that he wanted me to call everything in our first tag match.
*BC Killer – with this man i learned how to fire back and stand toe to toe with a beast that will rip your head off if you let him. And on the flip side i also learned that you can be this tough scary big man and still know how to work in that ring better than anyone would ever expect.
*Robbie – He is the most blunt out of all my trainers, but if he is telling you something you really need to listen because about 90% of the time he is telling you something that is in your best interest to learn. And this man taught me so much when it comes to chain wrestling, if I’m ever stuck on what to do next in a match he usually has a pretty good answer.
*Supreme – When it comes to a death match legend, I’m sure you’re waiting to hear how the man taught me to be extreme. But in all reality what this man taught me was respect. Respect for my brothers and sisters in the ring, respect for my teachers and the lessons that they are teaching me, respect for the business as a whole, and what was most important for me, respect for my self. People see me now a days as a monster but back then i was a quiet soft spoken kid that would stare at someones feet because I didn’t have the confidence to look that person in the eye. One day he pulled me aside and screamed at me “YOU ARE A FUCKEN BIG MAN! WHY ARE YOU WALKING AROUND LIKE IF YOU 5FT TALL. YOU WORK JUST AS HARD IF NOT HARDER THAN EVERYONE IN THAT RING. BE PROUD OF WHO YOU ARE, BE PROUD OF YOUR SIZE AND DON’T LET ME CATCH YOU WITH YOUR HEAD DOWN. GET IN THERE AND BE A FUCKEN MONSTER!!!. Any man that is shorter than 6ft but can make you believe that they’re 10 feet tall deserves that respect. And if not he can beat your ass to get it.
*Kaos – The Boss. This is the man that glues every lesson that I’ve learned over the years from all of my trainers together. He is a man that demands respect but will give it right back to those that are deserving of it. He is a man that keeps you going and never lets you stop learning “because when you stop learning is when you need to hang the boots up for good” He is a man that keeps the fire burning inside you when you think that you cant do one more he is right there to make you prove yourself wrong. He is a man that was chosen by another great man to keep a dream that these men had their whole lives alive. He is a man that i have no problem following any day any time any where because i know that he will lead me in the right direction. Once again He Is The Boss.
*Joey “Rico” Dynamite – In all honesty, i don’t have the words to express what a great influence this man has been in my life. I started learning from him when i was only 10 years old and I’m still learning from him to this day. I really don’t know where id be if i hadn’t met this man almost 13 years ago, I most likely wouldn’t be living the dream like i am today if it wasn’t for him being there when in all honesty he didn’t have to be. he will still let me know when he feels that I’m getting a little bit of a big head that he has known “this kid” since before he even had hair on his balls. In all honesty, JRD is like a real big brother to me and I’m glad to have had the pleasure of learning everything i could from him, inside and outside of the ring. (PS. If any one of us deserves to make it big, its him).
7. Who were some of the other students in your class & do they still continue to wrestle?
Pinky: Some of the guys that started out with me you may not know, and others you will know very well:
*Oso Loco -Here is a guy that picked up everything very fast and was super agile for his size (I bet you wouldn’t know it by looking at him but that man can hit a whisper in the wind off the top) You can still catch him wrestling but mostly in the Lucha circuit
* Lucha Machine- The man that was kicked out of Lucha Lords because he said,”Just because I have the name Lucha in my name doesn’t mean I gotta wrestle that way” but in all reality he is a tough wrestler that can almost go toe to toe with anyone when it comes to chops. This last year he won quite a few tag belts as one half of The Silver Heart Radicalz with Ray Rosas. You can catch him around the Indy scene in shows like Lcw, and BPW
*Thunderkitty- I can’t be thankful enough to this girl because for about the first year and a half she would wake up extra early every morning just to give me a ride to training & this was when I was still in high school so I didn’t have a license to drive at all & I’ll never forget that she did that for me. She recently moved out of So Cal, I’m not exactly sure where but I know she’s still wrestling out there
*Damien Arsenic- Probably the most under rated wrestler that I was training with at Santino’s, if I was a promoter and I got a new talent that I didn’t know much about, I’d throw him in there with Damien because the man can wrestle any style, plus he’s a wrestling encyclopedia. You can catch him working for LCW and EWF
*Famous B.- If ever there was a guy that could piss you off just because of how naturally good he is, its famous B and honestly I don’t need to say much about him because I’m sure you already know who I’m talking about. He’s a good guy that I know has my back if I should ever need him. You can catch him all over California, he isn’t hard to find.
*Ray Rosas- The heart of Santino Bros, when he started he would drive almost two hours just to get to training every Tuesday and Saturday, I’ve seen him wrestle hurt with bumps and bruises and he just keeps going. He puts everything into what he does in that ring and it shows when you watch it. You can also catch Ray all around So Cal, and along with myself at BPW and Championship Wrestling From Hollywood
All these people are my brother’s and sisters, I have been through so much with all of them. Together we are the Santino Bros.
And still just to go a bit further, with the exception of Ray Rosas, these are just the guys that started training when I did, there are a few more names that trained with me like Seville Alvarez, Ryan Ramos, Both members of the Black Knights, Sean Black and Sam Knight (Sam trained with us for a bit then finished his training with Knox pro I believe) and the only transgender wrestler in the U.S. Amanda.
8. How long did you train before you had your first match?
Pinky: I would say that the original Santino Bros class trained for about a year and a half to two years before we did our first official show, we had done charity shows in the parks of Montebello but the first show for most of us was the first ever Evolucha show that ran in the city of Newhall
9. Exactly how long have you been wrestling?
Pinky: Well I started training when I was about 17 years old and I am just about to turn 23, so that would almost make it six years now.(It still kinda weirds Kaos and Sylvia out when they think of how I pretty much grew up right in front of them)
10.I’ve seen you wrestle for Championship Wrestling of Hollywood & Battleground Pro Wrestling but is there any other promotions you compete for? If you do compete for other promotions, do you have a favorite & why?
Pinky: I really don’t wrestle for many other promotions not to say i wouldn’t like to, I just really haven’t had the opportunity to do so. A few companies that I’ve had the pleasure of working for are EWF, WCWC (when they were still running their own shows), DCW and a few Lucha Libre shows. And Id love to return to any of these shows if ever given the opportunity to do so again. A Big part of my wrestling life that you didn’t mention was LCW, I am a regular there which is a show that i believe has the potential to be one of the biggest companies is So Cal. I love working for CWFH, I’m given the opportunity to really show off what i believe are my strengths to the wrestling business which is my character and how well I portray it, but all in all I have to always say that my favorite has to be BPW. The reason that I feel that way is because they took a chance on me when not very many companies were willing to. For that i could never be more greatful to the men that run BPW past and present.
11. Have you or do you want to wrestle in other countries?
Pinky: I have not yet had the opportunity to work outside of the country, but it is one of my biggest goals to do so. I have family that live in Mexico so one of my biggest goals is to be able to go down and work a city even remotely close to them so that they would be able to come see me.
12. Please tell me about Pinky & how that came about? Is your persona based from something or someone?
Pinky: To be perfectly honest with you I have no idea where the name originally came from, it was just a name that i always carried with me since i was very young. The character of The Emo Behemoth came because i needed it. On the first show I worked on i was teamed up with a crazy clown character named JOK, i just figured that anyone that teams with him cant exactly be normal. But to be perfectly honest I am Pinky, in all reality i am not a happy guy I’m usually very hard to be around people around me always have to learn that’s just who I am. If you notice any of my videos about how ugly the world is and how people are the ones who make it that way it comes out very natural because from time to time thats really how i feel. Honestly Ive come pretty far this past year starting last November and I believe that its because I’ve had some terrible incidences happen to me that it shows. Starting last November i lost someone that I thought was gonna be in my life forever, that took months to even start to try to get over. Just when i felt that i was digging myself out of my ditch, i find out that my father just up and left my family due to the fact that he is a 50 year old man and he thinks that he is still young and he hasn’t lived his fucken life. This means that everything that he ever taught me about being a man and being honest was all bullshit. I think that all my emotion this past year has really reflected on the character of Pinky because in all reality its not a character, Pinky is a chance to express the thoughts and feelings that i can never express in real life because i need to be strong for my family. So is it based on someone? yea its based on me
13. I know you started off in The Disorder with CWF Hollywood but are were you part of any other factions in any other promotions before The Disorder?
Pinky: Yes I was, believe it or not the original idea for The Nobodies was made by Kaos for the company Evolucha. The group consisted of Thunderkitty (at the time she was known as Mistress May), Jok ( The crazy clown character that i mentioned in your last question ) and myself. After I broke away from them i kept the Nobodies moniker as a name for all of my fans, and now its grown back into a group.
14. Has Pinky changed over the years? Meaning did you start your career with a different style compare to now?
Pinky: To tell you the truth Pinky started as a face working for lucha libre companies. so before i really learned how to be a good bad guy i learned how to be a good guy. (Honestly i think at this point i can work either character well at this point). But i also believe i started out too nice especially when i was working as a heel, now I’m meaner, tougher and more confident in my own abilities in the squared circle.
15. Tell me about the other members of The NoBodies, Angel Lopez, Luis Tapia, Hector Canales & your newest member Brian Weston? How you do like working with these guys?
Pinky: Honestly prior to joining the Disorder, the only one of these guys that I had met was Hector because i had wrestled him in the past. But each of these guys have come to become guys that i can really rely on to be there.
*Angel – this is a guy with so much potential, he can move better than some guys that are half his size.
*Luis – this guy has so much heart in everything that he does, going in there with him you know that he is going to give you everything he has for every second that he is in that ring.
*Brian – He has been someone that I have really enjoyed working with, he has the ability to be compatible with almost anyone and he also has the ability to get that crowd behind him
*Hector – Well what’s there to say about him that wasn’t already said in your last interview? I guess i can say that he is just like me, committed to having a great character and committed to telling a great story in the ring.
These guys are great and if there is anything that i could do to help them succeed, i will and i hope they do.
16. Throughout your career, how many championships have you won & is there any that means alot to you & why?
Pinky: I haven’t won too many championships, in fact i have only won 2. The first title that i ever won was a tag team title with Fabe Fury and in all honesty, I feel that we just won those titles at the beginning of a show to lose them at the end of the show to the Latin Heartthrobs ( Hector Canales & Val Viper )
The second and without a doubt most important title to me I still hold, that is the BPW World Heavyweight Championship. The reason that its important to me is because i really feel like I worked hard for them month after month just to work my way all the way to the top of the ladder. Now I am honored that they would trust me to carry the company’s championship for them.
17. Any other talent you enjoy working with from any promotions & why? any matches stand out to you as your favs?
Pinky: Two guys that i know that i could always have a really good match with are Lucha Machine and Tito Escondido
For most of 2011, I just wrestled against Tito back and fourth and i can honestly say that more times than not, our match was one of the best if not the best on the show.
And believe it or not the best match that stands out in my mind is a match that will probably never be seen again at the worst venue in So Cal. It Was for Mr. California’s company XWW, The match was me vs Famous B vs Kaos, and we blew the roof off of that tiny venue that was about 1 foot taller than my head when i was standing in the ring. ( Iknow wierd huh?)
18. Is there any Indy talent in Southern california or anywhere that you would like to eventually work with?
Pinky: Believe it or not the person that I have always wanted to work a whole program with has been right by me for almost my whole career. The man trained with me and I think that we would be able to tell a great story together. Sadly enough no promoter has booked it yet, the closest thing to a match with him would be when i teamed with him in a tag match. So if any promoter is reading this, i know we can put a good story together, that would be Pinky vs Ray Rosas
19. Do you have any road stories or any fond memories with talent outside the ring you would like to share?
Pinky: Yeah man, i have a few I’ll go ahead and just give you three stories off the top of my head:
* The funnest car ride I’ve ever had was driving to a wrestling show with Sean Heads, Famous B, and Willie Mack. Each of those guys are pretty funny but get them all together and they’re fucking hilArious. It was a two hour drive ( btw Sean’s grandma packed us a whole cooler full of snacks, drinks and other stuff as if we were gonna be gone for three weeks or something ) but with them just talking bull it felt like half an hour.
* This next one is not so much a story as it is a description of a place. A few months ago, Sasha Darevko, Ref Jason McCord, Ray Rosas and I drove up to Nor Cal for a show called HoodSlam ( if you don’t yet know what that is Id recommend looking it up to Anyone over the age of 21) Originally we’d planned on splitting the price of a room up there, but a few of the wrestlers kept talking about this place they lived called The Victory and how we should just stay there. When we got there, the best way i can describe this place is being Peter Pan’s lost boys hide out, where everyone went so they didn’t need to grow up and damn it was pretty awesome. The Victory was once a warehouse used to make couches I believe but it is now a place for wrestlers. The first thing i notice when i walk in is people making sandwiches out of a cooler, l looked into the fridge and realized that the reason food was kept in the cooler was because the fridge was full of booze. We walk more, the furniture in there is about seven lazy boys facing a big screen TV with guys just watching wrestling dvds and videos, yes they watch on a vhs. Then they took me up to the game room which seemed like a balcony they built over a bathroom. You literally had to climb a ladder and dive into this room to get there. But once you were in they had every video game ever from NES TO PS3. We hung out there for a few hours and the way it worked is you slept where you passed out. Luckily I got a lazy boy & in the morning we woke up, watched lucha libre and then the movie that is regarded as the “snuggezt movie of all time” Home Alone 2 on vhs. They say that marve takes perfect bumps in that movie. After the movie we all got ready and it was time to go. To this day, I can’t thank all of the Nor Cal guys enough especially Levi Shapero ( the most underrated wrestler in Nor Cal) for taking us in and taking care of us while we were there. I still hope to go back one day soon.
The third is probably the most interesting show that the four of us ever did that hardly anyone even knows about. Angel got a booking for who ever wanted to do this show for 50 bucks, for most wrestlers in So Cal that’s a lot of money. So Ray Rosas and I agreed to team up against The Rainbow Warriors Angel and Amanda, but it wasn’t your everyday venue, it wasn’t even a normal gay bar, it was a bear bar (a bear bar is for large muscular gay men to hang out at.). We were given a tiny storage closet to change in. And it felt even smaller in there when we were joined by a huge Austrian bodybuilder that was a dancer there to make some money. When we went out to the ring, we saw that the ring they had was the smallest ring I had ever seen, it was specifically made to fit inside the bar, I’d say the ring measurement was no bigger than 7 by 7. We went out there & had our little match where Ray and I were the team of pretty in pink (I stole Sexy Sonny Sampson gimmick that day from top to bottom, the only difference is that after I hit the world’s sexiest elbow I was asking where the girls were). At the end of the match the rainbow warriors won, while we went back to the closet we felt our tights being pulled, turns out we were getting money put in our tights while I heard at least three different guys yell to me”good job big boy” all I could think about was why can’t I ever get that reaction from girls. But at least I wasn’t stared at like a steak like Ray was, and let me tell you one guy who was staring at him was hungry. When we got to the closet Angel told me something that I would have just felt better not knowing his words were, “Oh yeah about that bronco buster, sorry I put my asset hole in your face” honestly if he wouldn’t have told me I wouldn’t have noticed and I would have been much happier that way. So that’s my story & oh yeah me and Ray are still waiting to this day for the 50 check that was supposed to be sent in the mail. To my knowledge none of us has got it yet.
20. What do you think makes a good match in the ring?
Pinky: I think that a good match must incorporate everything, but most of all I think you need a good story. If I really just wanted to watch two guys fighting with no story I’d just watch UFC, but wrestling fans want that drama, they want to know what’s coming next, and I think if you can keep the crowd guessing at the edge of their seat till the end of the match, then you have just had a good match.
21. Do you watch WWE, TNA or Ring of Honor? if so what do you think of the product?
Pinky: Yeah I do watch the big two companies, I don’t really watch ROH very often . It seems like the style of wrestling is changing to be a more real. It seems like they are riding the fact that MMA is so popular right now. That is the only reason that guys like CM Punk and Daniel Bryan have been given the chance to shine. I think that anyone that says they don’t watch the product is making a mistake, because all in all if they don’t know what the main product is, they will never get there
22. Speaking of the bigger companies, have you had an opportunity to wrestle for them in any dark matches, tryouts or gut checks?
Pinky: I have not yet had the pleasure of going and doing any tryouts for them and I would love to do it, but let’s face it at this point in time I don’t think that I’m exactly what they are looking for right now.
23. How do you feel about the current Indy Scene here in So Cal?
Pinky: I feel that it’s always on the rise here in So Cal especially when you see guys from here in the big two companies but just as I’ve always thought, So Cal is a very tough place for a big guy. Here in So Cal the fans want to see amazing flips and acrobatic moves (and more power to the big guys like Terex and Biggie Biggs that can do stuff like that.) But I’ll be honest I can’t do that stuff. What I can do is create a good story with a face wrestler and really make the crowd hate me. But promoters want to (and honestly I don’t blame them because it’s smart for business) put on those guys that can do the acrobatic moves because they are the ones that draw the crowd. You haven’t seen me in many companies not because I don’t want to its more that I haven’t gotten the chance to do so. And my true belief is that it may be the acrobats that bring in the crowd but it’s story tellers like me that keep them coming back for more.
24. Some talent has set a goal for themselves saying if they don’t make it, they’ll walk away. Some are in college while wrestling, some have full time careers. So do you have a goal in trying to succeed in the buisness or do you have something to fall back on if things don’t turn out the way you want it? Or will PINKY continue to wrestle & enteraining fans for many years to come?
Pinky: I can’t say I have an exact goal for myself that once I complete that one goal I’ll walk away. I do have a job outside of wrestling and I have always been taught that that is always the top priority because “you gotta work to feed your wrestling addiction” I know u wouldn’t survive if I wasn’t working. And at this point in my life it’s not only me, I gotta take care of my family too. I feel like I can do this for years to come, I’m still a young guy and I feel like I have a lot to offer, the day I hang the boots up is when I feel that I have nothing to offer the business and I’m just taking up a spot that some hungry kid that has paid his dues and is better than me deserves. I’d rather help the business than hurt it, and if the best thing I can do for it one day is leave it behind, then so be it
25. Tell me about your “Dream Match”?
Pinky: For myself I have a few matches that I’ve wanted in So Cal. The one with Ray, but I think that i would need a whole story with him because just one match won’t do it, we need to be able to tell that story. Rico Dynamite is another one, and although I know it’d be a good match, the main reason I wanna do it is selfish because I honestly just wanna wrestle this guy that I’ve looked up to for years and years. And last but probably the closest thing to a dream match for me should have happened in November, but I want Pinky Vs Mikey O’Shea, more than anything else I wanna show what the big men of So Cal can do when they are given a chance to shine on that big of a stage. Plus think about it The Irish Juggernaut Vs The Emo Behemoth it sounds like a God Damn monster movie (yes I did get that line from Rocky)
26. Did you have a manager in your career & if so, who?
Pinky: I did have a manager at one time, that was thunder kitty as mistress may. But after a while she wanted to get in the ring herself, and honestly I didn’t feel that I had the need for a manager either. But I did get managed for one show by a guy that I wish I could have worked with a little bit longer and he was known as Kraze
27. After a grueling weekend of wrestling, how does Pinky relax? (gym, yoga, video games, drinks, etc)
Pinky: Honestly at this point of my life I don’t really relax during the week. If I’m not wrestling it’s because I’m working, if I’m not working its because I’m taking care of business at home. I’m usually always busy, and to be honest I didn’t want to be delt this card but this is the card I was delt so I gotta play it the best I can. When I do have time off I try to hit theme parks and go see things that I haven’t seen while I still can
28. Last Question: Do you have anything to say to the fans of southern california & especially to the fans of PINKY & The Nobodies?
Pinky: I have some things to say to a few people in So Cal:
To fellow wrestlers: thank you for all the matches and the camaraderie that you guys have shown me through the years I’ve been in this crazy business that we call our own
To my family at Santinos: thank you for teaching me everything I know, if it wasn’t for you guys I wouldn’t be living my dream like I am today. Much love to all of you, thank you for letting me grow up around you
To So Cal promoters: thank you for those of you that were willing to take a chance on this big guy that can’t do a Moonsault if his life depended on it, but I could carry a story and give you a good match almost every time. And to the promoters that haven’t given me a shot yet, I have never dropped the ball after its been handed to me, so if you read this and you have a spot, give me the ball and let me run with it.
And finally to the fans of So Cal: I could never thank you guys enough, whether you love me or you hate me you go out of your way to give me a reaction every time that I go out there. So more than any thing my fans are the nobodies and I guess we were right when we said nobody cares because they do and that’s more than any wrestler can ask for.
To all of you from the bottom of my heart, Thank you
Well peeps, I want to say Thank You to Pinky for taking some time out of his busy schedule to give us this in depth interview for SoCalUncensored.com & like always I want to Thank You for checking out the next installment of interviews here on SCU. The next time you can see Pinky & The Nobodies will be at Championship Wrestling from Hollywood’s weekly shows at Santino Brothers Dojo in Bell Gardens starting tomorrow night, January 3rd or at the next CWFH TV Taping at the Glendale Studios in Glendale on January 13th. Be sure to continue to support that great talent here in So Cal, until next time this is Mike Draven signing off.