Kyrax's Korner: Small Man in a Big Man's Ring

At just 5 feet, 11 inches, Mike Lockwood was truly a small man in a big man's world. Lockwood, also known as “Crash Holly” in the WWE, was only in professional wrestling for a little over a decade, but the impact he made in the style of “hardcore” wrestling was immense... usually the impact of his unique weapon he'd bring to the ring with him; a scale.

Lockwood debuted in 1989 in Bay Area Wrestling (under the monicker “Johnny Pearson”). He stayed in BAW until 1994 when he was forced to take time to heal an aggravated injury; several dislocated shoulder incidences. Lockwood would spend a couple of months on the independent circuit known as “Irish” Erin O'Grady before moving to APW and changing his ring name to “The Leprechaun Erin O'Grady.” It was here that he would become famous in his matches with Vic Grimes.

It was around this time that a couple of the major wrestling promotions had caught attention of Lockwood. ECW came first when Taz (then a talent coordinator) contacted him about working for ECW, in which he had a small amount of time there before being thrown into a WWE tryout match with long-time friend Vic Grimes. This leaded to the two of them being put under WWE contract in the beginning months of 1999. They were sent to WWE's (then) farm territory Pro Power Wrestling in which they won the PPW tag team titles. Lockwood would later go on to win the PPW Young Guns title, and eventually be thrown into Monterrey to wrestle for a Spanish crowd to get him ready to go on WWE Spanish television under the name “The Green Ghost.”

Knowledge from Kyrax (Fun Fact): Did you know that “The Green Ghost” was also the name of AAA's biggest star in the 1970s?

Played by Luis Loretiz Jr, he was known as “The Green Ghost” only for a couple of weeks before quitting the industry completely.

It was only a matter of time before Lockwood debuted as the cousin of “Hardcore” Bob Holly in the summer of 1999 as “Crash Holly.” The older, wiser cousin; Hardcore Holly, would always want to wring Crash's neck, especially during Crash's phase of telling everyone that he weighed over 400lbs (where the famous scale weapon came into play). Early in Crash's career in the WWE, he tasted gold, beating out one of the most famous tag teams in history; The Rock'N'Sock Connection, winning the titles the night after No Mercy 1999. The duo of cousins held onto the titles for a good couple of months before dropping the titles to Mick Foley and Al Snow.

Only 1 year after being signed to a WWE contract, Crash has singles gold. Beating Test (Andrew Martin) for the WWF Hardcore Championship in February 2000. Crash then decreed that the title should be defended 24/7, and thus started the most hectic run of any title in the WWE. The title would be defended whenever, wherever, mostly having Crash losing the title, and then winning it the next week during a run-in. Crash soon became a fan-favorite due to his antics in (and out) of the ring. Later in 2000, Crash would go onto win the European title from William Regal at WWF Rebellion, only to lose it 2 days later back to Regal.

Knowledge from Kyrax (Fun Fact): Did you know that Crash Holly won the Hardcore title an unprecedented 22 times during his career? His antics in and out of the ring gave him the nickname “Houdini of Hardcore.”

In the beginning of the WWE Brand Split, Crash was sent to Raw. While he was shown very little success on Raw, he jumped ship to Smackdown!, in which he'd spend the rest of his WWE career. It was not very long until Crash saw him in the Cruiserweight (CW) title scene, fighting off and on with Jamie Noble, ultimately ending with Noble defeating Crash to retain the CW title. Later in his tenure on Smackdown!, Crash partnered with Bill DeMott to face Noble and Nunzio (of the Full Blooded Italians), in which Crash and DeMott won, but Crash was taken out by DeMott after the match and was not seen on WWE television for 4 months. Crash would make his return in the spring of 2003 and quickly aligned himself with Matt Hardy and Shannon Moore during Hardy's “Mattitude” phase, trying to recreate his previous WWF success. Sadly, he was not able to capture the spark again, and the WWE

released Lockwood on June 30^th, 2003.

Knowledge from Kyrax (Fun Fact): Did you know that Crash only had 4 televised wins on Smackdown! His first match on Smackdown was a win against The Hurricane, many of which said to be the future of the CW division based on that match alone.

Lockwood would move onto Total Nonstop Action (TNA) in 2003 as “Mad Mikey” where he lost his debut match against Elix Skipper in an open invitation match. He would later tag with Rory Fox and defeated Quinten Lee and the Human Time Bomb in his last televised match before hanging up the professional boots, leaving TNA in September 2003 and wresting a couple matches for Pro Wrestling Iron in October 2003.

Knowledge from Kyrax (Fun Fact): Did you know that Lockwood opened up his own wrestling school in his hometown in North Carolina? “Crash Holly's School of Professional Wrestling” opened it's doors in 2002 in Salisbury, North Carolina.

Untimely as it may seem, Lockwood was found on the floor of wrestler Stevie Richards' home in late November, 2003 in a pool of vomit, surrounded with prescription pill bottles. It was later ruled that Lockwood committed suicide, a divorce letter from his wife being the motive. Lockwood would be remembered at ECW's One Night Stand in a video tribute to fallen ECW wrestlers, as well as a benefit show by New Breed Wrestling. Nora Greenwald (Molly Holly) also released an autobiographical DVD with a portion of the profits going to Lockwood's daughter's education fund.

Mike Lockwood, a man of mere 5 feet, 11 inches, was a man who made an impact on what we now know as Hardcore Wrestling. His untimely death and lack of later success in his career make Mike Lockwood's life seem insignificant... but us fans truly know he did more for us than just a couple of big bumps; he entertained us. And for that, I thank him.

Finishers:

Corner Springboard Dropkick

Crash Course (Over-The-Shoulder BtB Piledriver)

Crash Landing (Belly to Back inverted slam)

Flowing Snap DDT

Signatures:

C.S.T. (Crash Stole This) – Lifting Double Underhook Implant DDT

Tornado DDT

Sunset Flip Powerbomb

Reverse DDT

Kyrax's Korner: Small Man in a Big Man's Ring

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