Jack Zabarsky helped spark Gulak's intense interest in the sport at Greenberg Elementary in Bustleton. Now Gulak is a teacher of sorts himself.
The King Kong Bundy picture resting on the chalkboard inside the elementary school science class had nothing to do with the periodic table, plate tectonics, or the structure of an atom.
And now he learned his teacher was a fan. Gulak and Zabarsky bonded over wrestling. The teacher at Greenberg Elementary in Bustleton told Gulak about the wrestling he watched on the weekends in an old South Philly freight house under I-95.Extreme Championship Wrestling once tried to take on WWE. Its story begins in a Philly pawn shop.
The 36-year-old Gulak’s career — perhaps the longest in WWE by a Philly native — has been impacted by teachers. First, there was Zabarsky. Next there was Mark McCready, a Northeast High chemistry teacher who recruited Gulak and his other buddies in the magnet program — “It was a bunch of us nerds,” Gulak said — to join the wrestling team. They warmed up for practice by running up and down nine flights of steps with bricks in their hands. It was nuts, Gulak said.
His school in Kensington is open to everyone from novices who have no idea how to run the ropes to trained professionals who want to sharpen their skills. CatchPoint has two levels: fundamentals and foundations. After students complete the six-week fundamentals course, they’ll have their first matches and be fit to work for other wrestling companies.
He was booked to wrestle his first match in April 2005 on a CZW show in Northeast High’s basketball gym. The promoter asked Gulak to help sell tickets, so he set up a table in the cafeteria and hustled his friends. He told his art teacher before class started that he would have to step out to take a phone call. The show’s promoter would be calling. The teacher said it was fine.
“I got to the ECW Arena one day early for practice and the bleachers were put out,” Gulak said. “Chris Hero was sitting by himself on the bleachers watching DVDs of old World of Sport wrestling. Guys like Johnny Saint and Steve Grey. I sat next to him and watched this and said, ‘Whoa. They treat this completely like a sport. Very cut and dry.’ It comes from that moment. I try to focus on making everything as realistic as possible.
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