I was almost six years old the night the Freebirds broke Texas, and I thought it was the coolest thing I’d ever seen.
It was just after Christmas, 1982. Most kids were playing with new toys
or sneaking extra dessert, but I was sitting cross-legged on the carpet in our
apartment in California, spinning the UHF dial until the signal came
through—static, wavy lines, and then there it was: World Class Championship
Wrestling, beaming in from some far-off place called Reunion Arena.
I didn’t know much about Texas. I didn’t know anything about
regional loyalty or family dynasties or who was supposed to be the good guys.
But I knew what looked cool. I knew what sounded like the music I liked. I knew
who felt like they were having the most fun in the room.
And the Von Erichs, well—they were fine. They were handsome
and athletic and probably great if you were from Dallas. But I wasn’t from
Dallas. I was from the coast. I was rock ’n’ roll, not country. I didn’t want
barefoot boys with feathered hair and football muscles.
I wanted Michael P.S. Hayes.
The first time I saw the Freebirds, it felt like someone had
snuck a rock concert into the middle of a wrestling match. They wore sequins
and sunglasses and attitude. They didn’t jog to the ring, they arrived.
Hayes, Gordy, Roberts—they moved like they owned the world. When that entrance
music hit, it felt like the whole screen was shaking.
They didn’t belong, and that’s exactly why I loved them.
So, when they showed up as friends of the Von Erichs, it
felt like maybe the world was making room for something new. The country boys
and the outlaws, the blue bloods and the leather jackets, Texas and Georgia and
maybe even California, all getting along. It felt like possibility.
Then came Christmas.
Kerry Von Erich vs. Ric Flair in a steel cage. Title on the
line. Michael Hayes as the special referee. I was buzzing before the bell even
rang. The Von Erichs looked ready. Flair looked like a villain out of a
cartoon. And Hayes? Hayes looked like he had a plan.
The match built like a storm. You could feel it through the
screen, even on that grainy broadcast with its rolling lines and static pops.
And then came the moment: Kerry had Flair right where he wanted him. Hayes
opened the cage door. Told Kerry to walk out. Hand him the win.
And Kerry said no.
I remember sitting up straighter, eyes wide. This wasn’t how
I thought it would go. Hayes was helping. Kerry should’ve taken it.
That’s what made sense to me. But he didn’t.
So Hayes shoved him.
And then Terry Gordy—big and silent and waiting like
thunder—slammed that steel door on Kerry’s head like he was closing a chapter.
Like he was declaring war.
And I, six years old in California, watching through static
and wonder… I cheered.
I jumped up. I laughed. I whooped like I'd seen my team win
the Super Bowl.
My Dad’s girlfriend peeked in from the kitchen, confused by
the noise. “Didn’t your guy just get hit in the head with a door?” she asked.
“No,” I said, “my guy slammed it.”
I didn’t see betrayal. Not then. I saw rebellion. The Von
Erichs represented something I didn’t understand yet—homegrown pride,
tradition, family. The Freebirds were something else entirely. They were cool.
They were loud. They were what I wanted to be.
But over the next few weeks, things got harder to explain.
I watched as the Texas crowds turned, furious and hurt. I
watched Kevin come out fists flying. I watched David talk about loyalty and
blood. And I started to feel it—not guilt, exactly. But weight. Complexity.
That strange feeling in your chest when you realize the thing you love might
not be for everyone. Hell, it might not even be on the right side of history.
I didn’t stop loving the Freebirds. I couldn’t. They were my
first wrestling love—the way they moved, the way they talked, the way they made
everyone feel something, whether they wanted to or not. But I started to
understand what they’d done.
I started to understand that sometimes, the people who look
like they’re having the most fun are also the ones doing the most damage.
That was my first wrestling heartbreak. Not because my
heroes lost—but because they won, and I had to figure out what that
meant.
Looking back now, it all makes a kind of poetic sense. I
didn’t grow up in the Sportatorium. I didn’t carry the Von Erich name in my
heart. I found wrestling on my own, on a scratchy UHF station in a cluttered
apartment in California. And the Freebirds—their swagger, their sound, their
defiance—spoke to me.
I still pull up that match sometimes, watch it on YouTube
through the grain of memory. The cage door still slams. The crowd still erupts.
Kerry still falls.
And even now, all these decades later, part of me still
smiles.
Because that was the night I learned wrestling, just like life, wasn’t black
and white.
It was neon. It was noise. It was chaos and charisma and heartbreak all wrapped in glitter. It was Badstreet.
And I’ve been cheering ever since.
