One night in Blytheville, Arkansas, all of us got in the ring for a battle royal. There was a guy in the audience who was working on the pipeline. Big arms, beefy build, the typical small town tough guy. He jumped up and yelled, "You bunch of phony wrestlers. I can beat any of you bums!"
Now, the promoter was a guy named Mike Meroney. He was in his 70's, half his face was eaten up with cancer, and he didn't weigh 100 pounds. He said, "I'll tell you what you do punk. Get up in the ring. If you can beat any of my boys, I'll give you a hundred dollars." That guy jumped in and we all started getting out of the ring. We figured on leaving him in the ring with Lester (Welch). Lester could get in there and work with him the best he could and still half kill him. I'm just kidding. Actually, to be honest, Lester was the best worker of all the Welch boys.
Anyway, the guy says, "No, no. I get to choose my opponent." Meroney said, "Alright, anyone you want." The punk says, "I'll take Chico Cortez."
Now Chico's sitting there thinking, "What am I gonna do?" He got in the ring and said, "The guy has to take those big boots off." So while the guy is unlacing those big boots, Chico is psychologically blowing him up. He's saying to the crowd, "Hey, everybody. I'm gonna take his left arm off and stick it (where the sun don't shine). I'm gonna tear his right arm off and stick in in his left ear." So, by the time that guy started unlacing that second boot, he's slowin' down a little. He's starting to think about this stuff. Come time to ring the bell, that guy's standing in the corner with his hands up on the ropes, lookin' at Chico, who's acting like a man possessed.
Chico was blind in one eye. He had an artificial eye for many years. And he used to wear his hair just like Buster Brown, bangs down to his eye brows. You ask Lester Welch. He was there and will tell you this is the truth. Chico came running out of the corner, jumped straight up in the air, screamed as loud as he could, pulled that black hair straight down over his face, and the guy fainted dead ... fainted!
Now little old Mike Maroney got up there with his shoes on and said, "Why, you SOB. You mess with one of my wrestlers. I'll kick you right out of here." He kicked the guy right out of the ring onto the floor, cussing him and calling him all kinds of names. The funny thing was, Mike forgot the microphone was still turned on.
