- Bill Camp

It seems like it's been a little while since I've written a column, and I think I may have missed the "theme month" but since I said I would talk about enhancement talent on my next column, I'm going to do just that. When most people think of enhancement talent, they think of the word jobber. And I think the populous believe that these individuals lost every time out because they were very poor wrestlers, and poor workers, or something similar to that. 

Well most in the biz look at enhancement guys as people who were good at doing what they did. They made their opponents look like a million bucks. They made it appear as if these wrestlers were incapable of getting offense because their opponents (the stars) were too good to allow them any offense. 

And one other discrepancy, as you'll read in this column, is that many enhancement guys were well trained professional wrestlers, it was just that at the time they were putting guys over, their careers were heading in one of two directions; it was either on it's way up, or on its way back down. 

On the other hand, I remember these one time stars doing many jobs in the mid-80s to put over the new guard: Tony Garea (5-time co-holder of the Tag Team Titles), Chief Jay Strongbow (Title contender and multiple time Tag Title holder), Pat Patterson (1st Intercontinental Champion), Swede Hanson (tag partner with Rip Hawk and once challenged Backlund for the WWF Title at MSG), Rene Goulet (WWF Tag Title co-holder), Butcher Paul Vachon (multiple time AWA Tag Title co-holder), Don Kernodle (NWA Tag Title co-holder), and Baron Mikel Scicluna (contender to Bruno's title and another former co-holder of the WWF Tag Titles).

There was also another squad of enhancement talent who were given some kind of a push at another time to make them a legitimate threat to any opponent. 

These would include: Iron Mike Sharpe, Salvatore Bellomo, Tiger Chung Lee (actually a star of the Orient), "Unpredictable" Johnny Rodz, Jose Estrada, Charlie Fulton, Pete Sanchez, Steve Lombardi (later Brooklyn Brawler) and of course everyone's favorite Special Delivery Jones. Many of these guys were some of the most talented men in the federation.

Finally, there was the squad who almost never won matches, and were usually not given much offense. They usually only wrestled on TV, although some did make rounds at spot house shows. They would include Rocco Verona, John Callahan, Israel Matia, Bob Bradly, Steve King, Tony Colon, Chuck Tanner, Charlie Brown, Victor Mercado, and again everyone's favorite and most remembered Frankie Williams, who made EVERYONE look good. 

But for one short period in the late 1970s, Doherty was given a push as a masked wrestler called The Golden Terror. He wore a full body outfit that was pretty similar to The Conquistadors from the 1980s. He was managed by Captain Lou Albano, and around 1977 went on television to get a win or two. But soon, Doherty was being used for what he did best, making other guys look good. They used him to have some exciting matches on TV with the likes of Larry Zbyszko, Tony Garea, Dominic Denucci, and Gorilla Monsoon. 

Eventually, Albano tired of the Terror's losing ways. And after one such television loss, Albano took off his belt and threatened to whip Terror with it. Terror went pleading for mercy, in typical heel fashion, but it spelled the end of the Terror's push.