MLW star Mance Warner is certainly a man of many names. Whatever you know him by, whether it be Ol’ Mancer, the Souther Psycho, Lariats and Light Beers or any of the other myriad of nicknames that he can claim to be his own, there’s no shortage of descriptions for one of the most entertaining professional wrestlers in the game today.
Recently, Warner joined me to discuss his nicknames and his favourite beer-drinking partners in professional wrestling.
Earning all of his nicknames and if one is particularly meaningful:
“There’s so many nicknames there, because I started out doing shows in Ohio and Indiana and the Midwest, out in Tennessee, wherever I could go I would drive and go to the show and hit the pay window and fight people. The one – I got a beer mug that a fan made for me, and they took their free time to make every nickname that I have on the back of it. And they had it cut out, each little piece, and they glued it on there and stuff. So, I’m sitting there drinking beer out of this thing, and it’s cool to know the connection I have with the fanbase to where they’ve given me these nicknames.”
“I guess, for me, Southern Psycho kind of represents everything that I do, because when you hear that, you automatically – if you don’t know who I am, you go ‘what’s happening,’ and then you watch and you go ‘awe, I get it.’ Back in the day, people had nicknames, you would hear it and you knew exactly what it meant. So, for me that kinda represents exactly what I’m bringing to the table.”
“I always feel bad. Nick Manawa, the ring announcer out there at IWA Mid-South, he pinned that tweet on there and he told me to put all the nicknames there, so when people gotta do the introduction, they can look and say the names right there. Guys will come up at different shows and they’ll be like ‘hey man, which one do you want me to say?’ And I always go ‘say whichever ones you want, man!’ And they’re like ‘well, now I gotta read ‘em all, man! That’s like your thing!’ And I go ‘no, no, no. You ain’t gotta waste all your time reading all that s**t. Take some that you like, I don’t care which ones you say, say whatever one you want. Let’s just go out there and do what we’re doing.”
His favourite people to have a beer with:
“I’m gonna pick two, though. I’m gonna pick Dusty Rhodes and Terry Funk would be the two I would wanna sit down and drink with. Currently, I’m gonna say Stone Cold, because he, maybe we get him one more match at some point, but I would like to sit down with him.
”
“Another guy that I’ve drank with – I’m trying to think of the most oddball one I could think of. I drink with a lot of people, man!
It’s hard to think of just one.
Like I said, usually after shows I go out in the parking lot and drink beers with fans, they bring beers (and) it’s a good time. I’ll just say all the fans, man. I like sitting out there, bulls**ting, drinking a beer and talking about life.”
Please credit Spencer Love/Love Wrestling with any transcriptions used.
