Taking the job as booker for Eddie Graham:
I was called in one day in Tampa and Eddie (Graham) said go get an assistant (which ended up being Jerry Brisco) because we are going to make you the booker. What I learned about booking talent was with Eddie allowing me to have the open door to say I’m turning this over to you, take off with it. I used it as a motivation when I was booking. People always say, well Dusty always booked himself on top. I put myself on top because the seats are 17 1/2 inches apart and I’m selling out 12,000 seat arenas. That’s why I was on top. If you don’t have an ego and you don’t have a goal, you ain’t worth a damn.
What he teaches in NXT & his connection to his students:
Given the talent right now, I teach all my kids in my communications classes down in NXT that us giving them the opportunity to be free and do things on their own and what will fit their own body of work, it is the best thing they can do. In the last 2 ½ years you can see that in the kids that have made it up to RAW and Smackdown. These 70 or 80 kids that we have down here now in NXT look at me at 69 years old and say you are the coolest 69 year old guy they’ve ever met. It’s because I’ve changed with the times and I haven’t just stayed stuck in one hour Broadways with Bob Orton Sr. and Eddie Graham.
His matches with Ric Flair and the NWA title chase:
All of us together being able to make something really special. With “Naitch” it was easy because he had already crossed that threshold of the entertainment being brought into our industry. But we also could go 7 nights in a row. At the Great American Bash tour we went 7 in a row for one hour a night and made a story that you could understand and that made the people almost in a riot. My chase was the best. I learned from Eddie one night at the Armory that he didn’t even need to make me the NWA Champion because my chase is what’s best and eventually that became me getting short spurts with the title, but that’s all you needed. To walk out as the prestigious NWA Champion it was amazing.
Dusty Rhodes also talks about his chemistry with Gordon Solie, what made him vs. Superstar Billy Graham so special, his feelings on WCW booking him in the nWo, Larry Zbyszko and more on the history of Championship Wrestling from Florida.
Nick was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, and lived there until the age of 18, when he decided to pack his flack jacket and move to New York City.
