Recently, I got to speak with Tony Givens, the promoter of NWA Smoky Mountain and the creator of the popular facebook group “You Are NOT Getting Booked”, which showcases indie wrestlers….wrestlers being used in the loosest sense of the word here.
Tell me a little about yourself for the readers. How long have you been in wrestling and who got you into the wrestling business?
I’ve been in Wrestling for 12 years. I started out at 16 as a ring announcer and a runner. I started wrestling at 17 and I started promoting events at 19… I started out training with several different guys: Bryan Wayne, Jeff Tankersley and current TNA star Kid Kash… but I ended up finishing my training with Beau James, who I consider to be my primary trainer. I have had the opportunity to learn a lot from some legendary talents like Tracy Smothers, Ricky Morton, Bobby Eaton and others as well.
How did you get the idea for doing “You are NOT Getting Booked”?
Some guy with Steve Austin as his profile picture sent me a message on Facebook trying to get booked. I immediately posted on my wall: “If you send me a message trying to getting booked and you have Steve Austin as your profile pic… you are not getting booked.” The next day I started posting more things like that and it took off. So the day after that I started the You Are NOT Getting Booked Facebook page.
With focusing on these “wrestlers” and promotions, have you’ve had any problems with them finding out about the page and not being amused?
Almost all of them end up finding out… I’ll just say this: Everybody loves the page until they end up on it.
You also run NWA Smoky Mountain. Talk a little bit about about your promotion and some of the wrestlers that ARE in fact getting booked.
The promotion will be 10 years old in March. However, we didn’t join the NWA and start using the name NWA Smoky Mountain until this past February. We run events in East TN… Our goal is simply to have the best events possible. Myself and my crew try to top ourselves with every single event… We have some great talents in our promotion like “The Real Deal” Chase Owens who represented the NWA in the Chikara Young Lions Cup this year and will be representing NWA Smoky Mountain in the NWA World Jr. Heavyweight Title Tournament on Oct. 7… Our heavyweight champion is “The Party Boy” Keith Knox. He stands 6’3” and is 260 lbs. of pure muscle. He isn’t just a big lumbering hulk either, he’s true athlete. He can do kip ups, up and overs, dives, and all kinds of other things that men his size shouldn’t be able to do… Our whole roster is filled with great talents like Sigmon, Chris Richards, Robbie Cassidy, Jason Kincaid, Wayne Adkins and more… These are all men that in another time and place would be making huge money in this business if it’s wasn’t for the kind of fucks that end up on the YANGB site.
In a short time, you’ve really created something people have latched onto and enjoyed. Did you think this would take off like it has?
No… It all happened by accident. I didn’t plan on it to be anything at all.
If you could book any 5 wrestlers in the indies right now, who would it be and why?
#1 would be Davey Richards (Who I just booked last month)
After that I will go with (in no particular order and I’m just throwing names out off the top of my head): El Generico, Chris Hero, Eddie Edwards and Mike Quackenbush… No reason other than I like their work and I could promote them off of it… I have a TV show, so I have the ability to run footage of any outside wrestlers before they came in so I can familiarize my fan base to what these guys do. In that respect every one of the guys I just named is good enough that they could draw money off of their work.
Even though Facebook keeps taking away your “likes” are there still any plans to run a “Rasslemania” and who would you most like to book for it?
Yes… I’m still going to run Rasslemania… I’m in discussions with WWNLive to do it as an IPPV.
This is the shill portion of the interview. Please feel free to shill anything and everything that you have going on (the upcoming websites, your promotion, your high score in Frogger).
Visit the You Are NOT Getting Booked page at www.facebook.com/