SLAGLE:  Is there any way that you could see, as a promoter or the individual groups, are there any steps that they could take in order to avoid some of these casualties?

ANDERSON:  It's very tough, it's very tough.  I'll tell ya what, I am a promoter myself, and I get caught in the exact same traps that I tried to avoid myself.  I have shows booked in Monterey, CA., which is a five hour drive, and I'll tell my guys, "Guys, we gotta drive right after this show. We have to leave, I have to disassemble the ring, drive all night to the show, set it up at the fairgrounds, and then we gotta drive back home because the building people aren't giving us any hotels."  So, we have to drive all night.  Well, ok, one shortcut for that is -- and I don't want to do it, and I hope the guys aren't doing it -- but, what if you take drugs to take comfort in yourself?  You're tired, you need sleeping pills to help you sleep or something to pump you up and keep you awake on the road, and you develop these addictions and get these problems going.  It's because of the hazards of being on the road.  It's the performance.  You're always there to perform and to do good.  You want to strive -- always -- to do good, and you don't take care of yourself properly.  And, like I said, I'm guilty as a promoter of...I don't want that to happen, but I get put in a position of having X amount of hours to get X amount of miles.  And, it's like, we gotta get there guys, we gotta do this, and we gotta look sharp when we're there.  Then. we gotta get right back because I have a school to run and I need my ring back up.  Or, I need this done or that done.  It's tough, it's really tough.  I find myself in the same predicament that I tried to avoid as an active wrestler, but I'm doing it as a promoter at times.

SLAGLE:  What do you think about, not necessarily a union, but if the promotions offered some sort of insurance benefits?  I mean, I know guys get to take time off a lot more now than they used to.  In the old days, they never took time off.  Still, I mean, they're still not being protected like people in other professions and other sports and other forms of entertainment.  Do you think that maybe providing insurance would help these guys?

ANDERSON:  Um, it's possible, but to be very honest with you, with the egos of the wrestlers and promoters, I can't see it working.  Unless someone comes in and does a complete overhaul of the business.  There would be too many scab wrestlers that would be more than willing to step in and if such-and-such superstar won't go out and perform, the next so-called big name would come in and take his spot at less money.  It would have to take such an overhaul of this business and I can't see Vince allowing it, or Ted Turner or Eric Bischoff.

SLAGLE: Or Hulk Hogan, Stone Cold or anyone else that's on top...

ANDERSON: Exactly.  They're already making their millions, so they don't really...it doesn't matter to them that the poor opening match guy isn't getting taken care of.  But, the problem is that guys like Hulk are the influential guys in the business.

SLAGLE: It just seems like it's a Catch 22 situation.  Even as a fan, too, because I love wrestling.  I've been watching wrestling since I was three years old.  But, sometimes it's like...maybe I shouldn't be watching this.  Maybe I'm helping to create a situation where people are put into positions where they do have to start taking drugs or whatever.  I don't know.  Something needs to be done, but I don't have the answers...

ANDERSON: I know.  And, see, the sad thing is that I've been doing it twenty-six years, I'm involved right now in it, and I don't have the answers either.  It's very hard.  I feel bad, because I feel like I'm part of the problem, and I don't know how to rectify that.

SLAGLE:  Well, let's get back onto the topic of The Superstar.  I have a question for you:

If you could take Billy Graham, exactly as he was in his prime in, I guess, `75 through `78 or whatever, he looks the same, acts the same, everything is exactly the same, and you put him into 2000 wrestling, today, in the WWF or WCW...do you think he would go to the top again?

ANDERSON:  I would think so.  Again, it goes back to...he could back up it up with his skills in the ring, but he could also back it up on the interviews.  A lot of the guys today can't talk their way out of a paper bag.

SLAGLE: Or wrestle their way, for that matter...

ANDERSON: True.  And, the guys that can work, or do gimmick matches like the Hardy's, can't talk.  It's a weird situation where you either get guys that can talk but can't wrestle, Hunter Hurst Helmsley comes to mind, or you get guys who can wrestle but can't say a word.  Billy was just great on the interviews, like some of the old-timers, he kind of reminded me of John Tolos, the Golden Greek.  John was one of those great interview guys, and he'd go out there and perform and kick butt out there.  People loved him, or loved to hate him.  But, I think Billy would rise.  I'd like to think without steroids.  Because now everyone knows what steroids can do to your body, and what some guys are going to find out in the years to come, like Scott Steiner.  They will know.

SLAGLE:  Well, also, there are a lot of training methods that you can do nowadays that weren't really available to Billy that can increase muscle mass.

ANDERSON:  True.  The equipment in the gyms is much better.  Dieting, there's different diet secrets that are available now that weren't then.

SLAGLE: So, people who would say, "Billy Graham couldn't do it without steroids"...that's not really true, I don't think.  Again, it's all hypothetical, but I think he'd have a really good chance of succeeding..

ANDERSON: Right.  And, when I say Scott Steiner is doing steroids, I personally have never seen him do it, I want to make that real clear.  It's just that I assume...

SLAGLE:  Well, yeah, you gotta kind of wonder.

ANDERSON: Yeah.  I don't mean to use him as the scapegoat for the business, because there are others doing things, too.  It's just that...

SLAGLE:  He's the obvious example if you think there's something going on.  And, again, we're not saying anything one way or the other about Scott Steiner, but, well, he is gigantic...

ANDERSON:  You know, what I'm concerned with is, after watching Billy's health problems, I'm concerned about losing more friends in the business due to steroid problems.  Rick Rude was a good friend of mine, and he had problems that stemmed from that.  Guys like that, you lose them, and they're buddies, friends, you wrestled them on the road, you were hanging out with them, and then they're gone, and it's sad.  I hate to see anybody lose family members, and I'd hate to see, ten years from now, a guy like Scott Steiner or any of the guys like that, be lost.

SLAGLE: Or just encountering the kind of health problems...let's say that they don't lose their life or anything, but, I mean, the quality of life when you have seven different hip operations like "Superstar" Graham -- I don't think that's something anyone wants to see a wrestler to go through.

ANDERSON: Yes.  Billy is a perfect example of...unfortunately, we often need to learn through other people's mistakes.  Billy is a perfect example of some of the things not to do to your body, and I would hope that everybody would wake up and listen and learn from another man's mistakes.  And, you know, all he wanted to do was be the top man, to perform and entertain.  He did it, but at a big cost to his health in his later years now.

I talk to Billy all the time, we remain very close, and there's not a man on earth I respect any more.  I have spoken at churches with Billy, and I even took my eleven year old son to hear Billy talk a couple of years ago when my son was only nine.  Billy was talking, giving his testimony to a youth group at a church in Ontario, California and my son was there.  He was crying like a little baby listening to Billy, because this man is so powerful with his testimony and he speaks the truth at all times.  And, he couldn't even talk, just listening to Billy talk about what life had done for him, and done to him, and how the Lord has changed his life, it made such an impact on my son, I'll always remember that.  It showed me, it reiterated the fact that Billy needs to be out there in the public, telling his story.  Because if he can help save people from the problems that he's endured, it will mean something in this world.  If he changes one person, it works.  And, you know, he changed me.  I'm living testimony to Billy, to the power he has.

SLAGLE:  Yeah, you know, I have a copy of The Empty Ring...

ANDERSON:  Oh, man! (laughs)

[Note: The Empty Ring is a play that Billy Graham wrote and performed in during the mid-nineties. The play depicts the life of a wrestler and the battles that one faces while travelling on the road.  It starred Jake "The Snake" Roberts, who at the time was trying very hard to quit his much-publicized bad habits and live a more rightous lifestyle.  Bill Anderson was also a cast member, and during an intensely emotional moment at the end of the play's premier, a tearful Anderson broke down onstage and asked Jesus Christ to enter his life]

SLAGLE: No, actually, I was quite impressed by it.  Billy, he did a really good job putting it all together and everybody who was involved did a really good job of performing.

ANDERSON:  That was...that was incredible.

SLAGLE:  It was, um, it really was quite a moving play.

ANDERSON:  One of my best friends is an atheist, and I had him watch it, and he was crying at the end.  And, that impacts you when you see things like that.  When you see a guy who says, "I don't believe in God, but go ahead and but the tape in, it's not going to mean a thing to me."  Then, the guy's got tears running down his face, well, you know it hit home.  And, there's a lot of things that hit home.  Jake Roberts, who's going through a lot of problems now, I hear...

SLAGLE: Yeah, I was going to mention that...

ANDERSON:  Well, Jake, at the time, was very straight and sober.  I loved the man, I respect him immensly, I always will, and I'm so sorry to hear about the problems he's going through.  But, Jake was right on the money at that time.

SLAGLE:  Yeah, I mean, the video, and someday it might be available for the public to see, but in the video, Jake basically is telling the story, his life's story, his story as a wrestler and as a person, and man, you know, it's just...

ANDERSON:  Well, it's a lot of things the fans don't see.  They don't see the problems that a man goes through.  They see the glitz and the glitter, they see a guy standing up there, a multi-millionaire, and they don't realize that wrestlers are not unlike everyone else.  Everybody's got problems.  But, you know, these guys have been through some troubles lives, they try to battle back, and they get into the business to make amends for lack of security in some other part of their lives.  It's a tough business.

SLAGLE: Did you see Beyond the Mat?

ANDERSON:  Yes, I did.  I...I, like I said, I love him, and respect him so much, I hate to see that happen.  I've seen Jake at his best and I've seen him at his worst.  It's a very, very sad thing.  I've worked with the man many, many times in the ring.  I've had the snake crawl all up and down me, he stuck it in my tights one time and pulled it out the other side, you know?  He's done it all to me, but I have tremendous resepect for Jake.  I remember I spoke at an Athletes International Ministry conference in Princeton, N.J. back in `96, about thirty days after we did The Empty Ring.  We did an A.I.M. conference and I was a guest speaker, along with Jake "The Snake" Roberts, Ernie Ladd was there, Evander Holyfield, a lot of great celebrities and people there.  I remember sitting next to Jake and I told Jake -- and I think at this point he was going back, having some problems -- and I said, "Jake, I just want you to know how much you've influenced me, and how much you've changed my life by being straight, and I appreciate it."  And, he just busted down, he broke down on me.  He went to the stage and he says, he got up there and he couldn't even talk.  He says, "I just had someone tell me how much I mean to him, and I don't know, I don't know what to say."

I think he'd already slipped back into his habits at that point, and he lost it because he was feeling guilty.  It's tough, it's a tough business.  I just wanted Jake to be straight, I wanted him to prove to the world that he could do it.  He was at one extreme of being the worst bad guy there is on the streets to being a clean living guy.  I really wanted him to survive with this.  I feel terrible that that it's possible that, well, I guess very possible, that he's not surviving with it, as evidenced on Beyond the Mat.  It's very sad, I hated to see that.  I've seen the other side of Jake, the kind, sincere, dedicated man, and then you see that, and it's very sad.