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Name: Junkyard Dog
Year Inducted: 2012
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Junkyard Dog
Few in
the professional wrestling business enjoyed a more meteoric rise to stardom
than Sylvester Ritter. As the made-for-prime time character “Junkyard Dog,”
Ritter became a major box-office attraction only two years into the business
and was one of the sport’s top draws during the WWF’s national explosion in
the mid-1980s.
“The
Dog was not a great technical wrestler, there were a few moves that he did,
and he’s never going to go down in history as one of the greatest ring
technicians,” said Ted DiBiase.
“But I’ll tell ya what,
when it comes to charisma and what we call the ‘it’ factor, well he had it.
When you talk about a guy with charisma and a guy who can pick up that
microphone and appeal to everybody, black, white, you name it, and of course
everybody saw that in him.”
The
Junkyard Dog, with his full-length red tights with white boots and a dog
collar that had a large chain attached to it, was one of the biggest drawing
cards in the business from 1980-1986. A 1980 match at the New Orleans
Superdome drew 26,000 fans who came
to watch a “blinded” JYD battle Michael Hayes in a dog collar match that
catapulted him into superstardom. The match solidified his spot as a major
attraction until he left the Mid-South promotion in 1984 to work for Vince
McMahon and the WWF.
Born
December 13, 1953 and raised in Wadesboro, North Carolina, Ritter played
football at North Carolina’s Fayetteville State University. When the pro
game didn’t pan out, he trained to be a wrestler with Sonny King and headed
to Tennessee in 1977. He worked as Leroy Rochester and then toured Germany.
His first proper territory, with a push, came in the Calgary-based Stampede
Wrestling, where he was the heel Big Daddy Ritter.
But it
was in the Mid-South territory where he became the Dog and a star.
For
the last years of his life, Ritter worked independent shows and worked
part-time repossessing cars. He died in a single-car accident on June 2,
1998 on Interstate 20 near Forest, Mississippi. He had been returning home
to Magee, Mississippi after having been to his daughter Latoya’s high school
graduation in Wadesboro. The name Junkyard Dog, however, will forever assume
its spot in pro wrestling history.
- Mike Mooneyham and Greg Oliver
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