TL;DR: Wrestling legend, Terry Funk passes away at the age of 79
Admittedly, I can’t say that I was really ever that big of a fan of Terry Funk the wrestler, but if ever asked to name my Mt. Rushmore of professional wrestling, I do put Terry Funk on it. The guy transcended multiple generations of the business, made money and elevated others around him, and did it in every major territory around the globe.
As much as I wasn’t that big of a fan of his hardcore brawling style, I respect the hell out of his business acumen, and from what I’ve learned throughout the years from his peers and admirers in the industry, he’s always been perceived as a good guy, long before the parade of tributes in his passing started coming out.
And that’s just it, when it comes to the names in the history of the industry that I admire, actual wrestling talent isn’t always the number one criteria. I like it when guys are respectable, and operate in the manner that puts the business first and understands the importance of elevating everyone around you so that not only you prosper, but everyone prospers, and that’s the kind of performer I’ve always heard Terry Funk always was.
I actually don’t have a tremendous amount of memories when it comes to Terry Funk himself, because almost everything I know about the guy stems from his relationship with Mick Foley, his long-time friend and rival, and almost all of my exposure to his in-ring ability is almost entirely in hindsight, watching videos and highlights in retrospect versus ever seeing anything he’d done in the present, save for some of his later time in ECW and the WWE.
Obviously you can’t talk about Terry Funk and Mick Foley without bringing up the legendary IWA deathmatch in Japan where the two of them basically attempted murder on each other in front of a really paltry crowd, that Foley himself has stated in his books as being really ironic that they had such a legendary match to such a small crowd. But even then, he was long past his physical prime, but just on grit, old country man strength and the general insanity that he looked like, it was still a grueling and brutal match that was entertaining in its own way.
But as I said, I always had more admiration of the guy that people loved to say was hanging around too long, but even I could tell that sure, he was around long past his physical prime, and he wasn’t doing his body any favors in doing such, but he was always hanging around, to give back, and pretty much nothing else. No matter the age, his name carried weight, and working with younger guys and be it cutting a promo on them, or taking some ridiculous bumps for them, he was always working his ass off to try and get talent over.
Paul Heyman has been on record reminiscing about how important Funk was to the inception of ECW, and that without his involvement, there would never have been ECW, primarily because of Funk’s willingness to help talent become made, and those are the stories that I always found most endearing about the Funker, regardless of his actual ability in the ring.
All the same, even though it doesn’t seem like I have anything really substantial to say about the passing of Terry Funk, I still wanted to write something about it, because I acknowledge his contributions to the industry I’ve been a lifelong fan to, and I always admired that everyone thought he was such a good guy, which holds a lot of weight in my mind, above all else. And I genuinely feel like the industry has lost one of the most important icons and cornerstones of it with his passing, and with that, happy trails Terry Funk. Forever.
