William Alfred Robinson (18 September 1938 – 27 February 2014)
Robinson is known for training professional wrestlers and mixed martial artists in the catch wrestling style, including Josh Barnett, Kazushi Sakuraba, Kiyoshi Tamura, and Shayna Baszler. His favourite saying as a coach was "do it again", which came from his trainer Billy Riley. He acted in several movies, including The Wrestler, and inspired the Kinnikuman character Robin Mask.
Early life
Robinson was born in
Manchester on September 18, 1938 to William James and Frances Hester (nee Exley).
The men in the family were
Boxing and he started between four and five years of age. He also worked in his family's grocery store, where an eye injury between eleven and twelve years of age required hospitalization for five months and disqualified him from ever getting a boxing licence.
Robinson began amateur wrestling at fourteen. After a year, his father introduced him to Billy Riley, a reputed catch wrestling trainer who ran a gym in Wigan. Riley's Gym (later dubbed "The Snake Pit") was one of the most famed catch wrestling training schools in the world, had a rough training environment and produced wrestlers such as Karl Gotch, Bert Assirati, Jack Dempsey, and Billy Joyce.
It has often been repeated that Robinson was also a "European Open Champion in the light heavyweight class, beating an Olympic Games bronze medal winner in the finals" in 1958, without stating who the medallist was.[ Search "European" in the events section and "Robinson" in the athletes section.]
Professional wrestling career
Early days in Europe (1958–1970, 1978)
As a professional wrestler, Robinson became a double-crown British and European Heavyweight Champion for
Joint Promotions. In 1963, he wrestled in a match at the Royal Albert Hall that was attended by Prince Philip.
He defeated fellow Riley's wrestler and mentor Billy Joyce for the European title on 12 June 1965
and then beat Joyce again for the British title on 18 January 1967,
vacating both titles in 1970 when he went off to America.
He also had a high-profile feud with masked wrestler
Peter Thornley.
In 1978, Robinson made a brief homecoming tour of the UK including a televised win over Lee Bronson.
North America (1969–1988)
Robinson traveled to North America in 1969 for
Stu Hart's Stampede Wrestling where he defeated
Archie Gouldie to earn a title shot at NWA World Heavyweight champion Dory Funk Jr. Soon afterwards, he began wrestling for
Verne Gagne's American Wrestling Association. He was one of the most successful wrestlers of the American promotion known for hiring the "Real Deals" in wrestling. He was a three-time AWA British Empire Heavyweight Champion, reigning and defending in the United States and Canada. On 12 October 1974, his reputation as a legitimate wrestler landed him a role in the film
The Wrestler alongside Verne Gagne and
Ed Asner. He wrestled in
Montreal in 1982 and 1983 becoming the International Champion beating
Dino Bravo and was also International Tag Team champions with Pierre Mad Dog Lefebvre. He wrestled to a 60-minutes time-limit draw against then
WWE Championship Bob Backlund in 1982 as well in Montreal. Robinson continued working for American Wrestling Association until retiring in 1988.
Japan (1968–1992)
Robinson traveled to Japan where he became popular as a wrestler versed in submission holds. He had a series of matches with Canadian
George Gordienko. The pair had a notable match in 1968 as part of a "world championship tournament" where the pair wrestled to a draw in
Sapporo.
He participated in a professional wrestling match against
Antonio Inoki in 1975. The match was billed as "The Match Between the World's Top Two Technicians" by the Japanese press. Japanese professional wrestlers learned the art of "hooking" and "shooting" from other catch wrestling icons including Karl Gotch and
Lou Thesz. The new movement led to the formation of the Universal Wrestling Federation. The UWF wrestlers like Yoshiaki Fujiwara had also been to the Snake Pit in Wigan. In his last match, he advanced the
shoot style movement when he worked for the Union of Wrestling Forces International against fellow AWA champion
Nick Bockwinkel on 8 May 1992.
Retirement
Robinson, having previously trained wrestlers in England including
Marty Jones and
Johnny Saint, began training wrestlers in catch wrestling at the UWF Snake Pit Japan, including James Maritato,
Kazushi Sakuraba and
El Signo.
He also managed a convenience store and was a security guard at the Gold Coast Hotel and Casino for a time.
He moved to Little Rock, Arkansas in 2001 to be closer to his son's family.
His autobiography,
Physical Chess: My Life in Catch-as-Catch-Can Wrestling, was published in June 2012.
He continued to coach catch wrestling into his final years, in his adopted home of Arkansas along with seminars in the United States, Japan, Britain, and Canada.
Death
Robinson died in his sleep on February 27, 2014, at the age of 75.
Notable students
Championships and accomplishments
Freestyle wrestling
-
British Wrestling Association
-
1957 British Senior Championships - 1st place, light heavyweight
Professional wrestling
-
All Japan Pro Wrestling
-
NWA United National Championship (1 time)
-
PWF World Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
-
2 January Korakuen Hall Heavyweight Battle Royal (1980)
-
World's Strongest Tag Determination League Technique Award (1978) - with Wild Angus
[ Real World Tag League 197 at purolove.com retrieved 7 October 2018]
-
World's Strongest Tag Determination League Technique Award (1980) - with Les Thornton
-
American Wrestling Association
-
AWA British Empire Heavyweight Championship (3 times)
-
AWA World Tag Team Championship (2 times) - with Verne Gagne (1) and Crusher Lisowski (1)
-
Cauliflower Alley Club
-
Championship Wrestling from Florida
-
NWA Southern Heavyweight Championship (Florida version) (1 time)
-
Continental Wrestling Association
-
CWA World Heavyweight Championship (3 times)
-
George Tragos/Lou Thesz Professional Wrestling Hall of Fame
-
International Wrestling Enterprise
-
IWA World Heavyweight Championship (2 times)
-
IWE World Series (1968)
-
IWE World Series (1970)
-
International Professional Wrestling Hall of Fame
-
Joint Promotions
-
British Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
-
European Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
[
]
-
Lutte Internationale
-
Canadian International Heavyweight Championship (2 times)
-
Canadian International Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Pierre Lefebvre
-
New Japan Pro-Wrestling
-
Greatest 18 Club inductee
-
Professional Wrestling Hall of Fame and Museum
-
Pro Wrestling Illustrated
-
PWI Most Popular Wrestler of the Year (1974)
-
Ranked No. 151 of the top 500 singles wrestlers of the "PWI Years" in 2003
-
Stampede Wrestling
-
Stampede Wrestling Hall of Fame (Class of 1995)
-
Tokyo Sports
-
World Championship Wrestling (Australia)
-
IWA World Heavyweight Championship (1 time)
-
Wrestling Observer Newsletter
-
Wrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame (Class of 1996)
External links
