Athletes - Tommy Rich

Home > Listing Index > Athletes > Tommy Rich

	Athletes - Tommy Rich

Thomas Richardson (born July 26, 1956 in Hendersonville, Tennessee), better known by his ring name, "Wildfire" Tommy Rich, is a American retired professional wrestler. He is best known for his wrestling career in Georgia and Memphis throughout the 1980s.

Career

Tommy "Wildfire" Rich started wrestling in 1974 in the regional promotions in Tennessee. Throughout the 1980's, he alternated his time between Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama territories of the NWA. He won dozens of NWA regional titles during this time. He is best known as one of the original stars of the TBS wrestling shows from the 70's and 80's. His bloody feuds with "Mad Dog" Buzz Sawyer, Ole Anderson, Ivan Koloff, the Fabulous Freebirds, and every other major heel to come through the Georgia territory made Rich one of the most popular wrestling stars of the period.

On April 27, 1980, in Augusta, Georgia, he became one of the youngest NWA World Heavyweight Champions in pro wrestling history. He dropped the belt back to Race four days later in Marietta. Many who follow wrestling couldn't understand the logic in the short title reign, although it was believed to give Rich a rub as a title challenger while at the same time leading the fans to believe that a world title might change hands at any time.

He had a memorable and bloody feud in Georgia Championship Wrestling with the late "Mad Dog" Buzz Sawyer for the NWA Georgia National Title. The feud lasted close to two years and culminated in 1983 in the "Last Battle of Atlanta," which featured Sawyer and Rich in a fully enclosed, Last Man Standing cage match, which Rich won to blow off the feud. Sawyer and Rich tried forming a team for a short period of time afterwards to feud a new team called the Road Warriors. The team didn't last very long, and Sawyer went to the WWE and later Florida, and Rich was directed into a feud with Ted Dibiase.

Rich then returned to the Memphis office, where he formed a team as "Fargo's Fabulous Ones" with Eddie Gilbert after the previous Fabulous Ones, Steve Keirn and Stan Lane, walked out on the territory. They held the AWA Midsouthern tag them titles in 1984, dropped them to Phil Hickerson and the Spoiler(Frank Morrell). Afterwards, Gilbert turned heel and Rich and he had a brief, but intense feud.

Rich briefly wrestled in the AWA in 1987 and had an unsuccessful feud with Adrian Adonis.

In 1991, he joined Alexandra York's York Foundation and became "Thomas Rich". He teamed with the other members, Terrence Taylor and Richard Morton to win the WCW Six-Man Titles.

When the York Foundation disbanded in early 1992, he became a heel jobber until he left WCW for the independent circuit again. From 1993 to 1996, he wrestled for the USWA and Smoky Mountain Wrestling mostly as a heel. He was the last Smoky Mountain Wrestling Champion.

He next went to ECW in 1996 as the "Big Don" Tommy Rich and joined the Full Blooded Italians (FBI), a heel group that included Little Guido and Tracy Smothers. He left ECW sometime in 2000 and has been wrestling in the independents ever since.

Richards had a cousin who also wrestled, Johnny "Crash" Rich. Davey Rich was billed as a cousin but was a former Jarrett Promotions preliminary wrestler named David Haskins.

Wrestling facts

Finishing and signature moves

Lou Thesz press
Piledriver
Flying fist drop

Managers

Paul Adams
Billy the P
Jim Cornette
Paul E. Dangerously
Downtown Business Brown
Robert Fuller
Eddie Gilbert
Jimmy Hart
Rockin' Robin
Rico Suave
Miss Alexandra York

Nicknames

"The Big Don"
"Wildfire"

Championships and accomplishments

American Wrestling Federation

:*1-time AWF Tag Team Champion (with Greg Valentine)

CWA

:*t-Time CWA International Heavyweight Champion

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Tommy Rich ]

This page is based on the copyrighted Wikipedia article Tommy Rich; it is used under the GNU Free Documentation License. You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the GFDL.