Rollerball Rocco: Mark Rocco's British Wrestling Career

When Mark Hussey went into the wrestling business against his father’s initial wishes, he set out to prove he was willing to put 100 percent into being the best performer he could be, having received the strict warning that “there are no second-rate Husseys”. That instruction gave him the drive to become “Rollerball” Rocco, Britain’s most intense, and arguably best-ever, in-ring performer.

Wrestling had a strong background in the Hussey family: Rocco recalls that his great-grandfather worked in fairground booths, facing challenges from the public, while his grandfather was a skilled amateur competitor. His father, “Jumping” Jim Hussey, had achieved success as a professional performer, known to fans as a hard-hitting and ultra-athletic grappler, and to fellow wrestlers as a notorious prankster. Upon Hussey’s death, Tony St. Clair noted the versatility that allowed him to work credible matches against opponents as diverse as Andre The Giant and the lightweight George Kidd.

Mark’s first professional training came in a particularly informal manner; aged around five or six, he accompanied his father to the German wrestling tournaments, and worked out in the ring with a group of visiting midget grapplers, who lent him some suitable footwear. For the most part, though, Hussey was not keen on having his son follow him into the business, instead encouraging him to pursue an interest in equestrianism. Through Mark’s involvement in the showjumping world, Jim Hussey was persuaded to train a young rider named Peter Kaye in the grappling game. It proved a success, with Kaye adopting the “Tally Ho” Kaye character, and becoming a television regular.

As part of Kaye’s training, Hussey built up a full-scale wrestling gym that became a permanent operation. What Jim didn’t know was that whenever he was away working shows, Mark was being schooled on the quiet by local professionals, most notably Colin Joynson.

The first Hussey heard of this was when he worked a show on which heavy fog had led to a shortage of performers. An 18-year-old Mark had come along for the trip, and Joynson chose this moment to reveal that he had already learnt the basics of the business. With a show to be saved, Joynson carried him through what was billed as an exhibition bout.

Entering the ring in a pair of borrowed trunks, Mark recalls that while he kept up with the moves, he was quickly out of breath, something he put down to nerves as much as physical conditioning. Ironically, once he became more experienced, he says that “pressure wasn’t a problem; the bigger the hall, the more relaxed I was.”

That state of mind was certainly some time away, though. Having decided to give wrestling a serious try, one of his earliest bouts came in the notorious Eldorado Stadium in the Leith area of Edinburgh, where crowds were particularly hostile to villains. Rocco’s debut ended with his heel opponent literally fighting off members of the audience, and when Mark asked if he should return to ringside to help him out, he was told by promoter Max Crabtree, “Kid, you’ve got to feed them sometimes.”

While Jim Hussey didn’t stand in the way of Mark’s decision to become a professional, he did ask him not to use his birth name, reasoning that there was no way to yet tell if he would live up to the family’s standards. Instead, when he began working regularly early in 1970, Mark adopted the name “Rocco”, taken from his Italian great-grandfather. Later on, Rocco helped out with stuntman work on the film Rollerball, prompting Crabtree to insist he adopt it as an alliterative ring name.

Having made his TV debut in November 1970, losing to Brian Maxine, Rocco would only return to the small screen a couple of times over the next two years. Much of his early wrestling career took place overseas, and Rocco explained that it was his father’s influence that led him to make full use of his passport.

“My father told me that wrestling was a hard game, and you can’t be in the business unless you learn the job properly,” he noted. “I tried to impress him by doing as much as I possibly could [to gain diverse experience]. I went to The Snake Pit in Wigan, and learned submission wrestling; I wrestled in India, Turkey, France - everywhere I could think of to give me credibility. I learnt my trade, and anyone who told me I didn’t know my job was incorrect. I learnt it the hard way, from the ground up.”

Another of Rocco’s early trips was to Gran Canaria, where he discovered that locals would gather on the beach before work each morning to compete in “lucha canaria” matches. Much like sumo, the bouts involved grapplers in a circle of sand trying to push their opponent outside the ring or off their feet. After watching for a couple of days, Rocco tried his luck, and eventually began trading tips with the locals, swapping his knowledge of submission holds with their insight into how he could improve his balance. He believes he had an advantage in this area thanks to the core stability of his horse-riding experience, and it certainly helped him keep up his wrestling style of fast movement with few unplanned falls.

GOING FOR GOLD
Back on British shores, Rocco’s hard work eventually paid off in 1977, when he defeated veteran Bert Royal for the British heavy-middleweight title. Rocco would go on to dominate the division for the rest of the TV era, with his first reign ending with a champion versus champion clash against perennial rival Marty Jones in 1978. Immediately, however, Jones vacated the title, choosing to concentrate on defending his light-heavyweight championship. In what was a bizarre booking twist, Rocco then regained his belt in the resulting tournament, defeating Chris Adams in the final.

He went on to hold the title for another three years, at which point promoters considered him worthy of an even bigger championship boost. Until this date, mid-heavyweight had been one of the divisions where the World champion wasn’t billed in the UK, with the logic being that it would be implausible for Brits to hold every World title. The original plan was for Rocco to defeat Sammy Lee (Satoru Sayama) for the “vacant” title on the undercard of the Giant Haystacks versus Big Daddy clash at Wembley Arena, but the match was cancelled when Sayama was forced to return to Japan for personal reasons. Instead, French grappler Joel De Fremery was brought over to wrestle Rocco in Southport, in a match confirming Rollerball as the World titleholder.

According to Rocco, an in-ring celebration with his father after one such title victory was “the proudest moment of my life” and, a little over a year after Jim’s death, he still treasures a photograph of the occasion. Earning his father’s respect for his wrestling abilities had been important to Mark, having latterly been tipped off by his mother that Jim had told Rocco's early opponents to lay into him, and test whether he had the will power to survive in such a physical business.

Despite the title match cancellation, Rocco and Sayama would meet again many times. Back in New Japan Pro Wrestling, Sayama had been repackaged as Tiger Mask - a real-life recreation of a long-running Manga comic book character. In a series of bouts with the likes of The Dynamite Kid, Tiger Mask helped change the concept of junior-heavyweight wrestling; where once it had simply featured smaller performers working a traditional style, it now became a showcase of fast-paced, high-flying action that was years ahead of its time.

New Japan’s Hiroshi Shinma soon began looking for another rival for Tiger Mask, creating the character of an alter-ego, darkside version known as Black Tiger, who had not featured in the comic books. According to Tom Billington, the character was created with Bad News Allen in mind, though this story seems to go against everything that had brought the junior-heavyweight style its original success. Instead, thankfully, the role went to Rocco, who set out to further develop the weight-class.

“I’m certain the Tiger Mask matches helped change wrestling,” Rocco noted. “Just look at Eddy Guerrero [who took over the Black Tiger character in the 1990s]: he ended up as WWE World champion, and he was only my size.”

Having previously toured the Orient for the smaller IWE (International Wrestling Enterprise) group, Rocco now became a semi-regular for New Japan across the rest of his career, making 38 trips in total. The gig proved such a cash-cow that Rocco opted not to pursue other opportunities that might have appealed from a purely artistic perspective, such as the “shoot-style” promotions that sprang up in the era.

“I was very interested in the UWF style, but I was on such a good deal with New Japan that there was no point leaving,” he noted. Similarly, the natural fit of Stampede Wrestling wasn’t a financially viable destination given Rocco’s Japanese schedule, and regular headline slots back home.

That’s not to say working for New Japan didn’t bring new international opportunities. In December 1984, Rocco wrestled fellow NJPW regular The Cobra (George Takano) at Madison Square Garden for the Japanese-controlled WWF junior-heavyweight title. Five years later, he worked with Jushin Liger on New Japan’s first and only show at Moscow’s Lenin Stadium, just months after the Soviet Union began allowing professional sports events.

ALL-ACTION MAN
On World Of Sport screens, Rocco’s ring style was making an impact in both a good and a bad way. Good in that he was winning acclaim for his combination of speed and aggression, but bad in that sometimes, his matches stood out for the wrong reasons.

“I had the same idea for wrestling whether it was on TV or in the halls: I gave my all every night. Not everyone was happy with my style; the TV people thought I was too strong for the wrestling audience, but it did work. They didn’t want the blood, sweat and tears - the intense wrestling. They wanted something more suitable for the mums and dads and grandmas. I never listened to that, and I carried on and did my own thing. Not every match I did for TV got shown; a lot of them where cancelled because of the blood and violence.”

Despite his reputation between the ropes, Rocco notes that he “had more fights in the dressing room than in the ring.” Ironically, many of these clashes came against other wrestlers who he considered close friends, but where their mutual drive and attitude often clashed. A prime example was Marty Jones, with Rocco believing their frequent skirmishes were because both men had a desire to be the better performer. In one fight, Rocco was wearing sunglasses in the dressing room - he later conceded that this “was maybe a bit flash!” - which Jones soon embedded in his ear canal, while the police were called to break the pair up.

At another show in Victoria Halls, Hanley, another bout between the two became excessively physical, even by their standards, leading to a confrontation backstage.

“I was so angry that I kicked the door, and instead of it coming open, all the bloody side of the dressing room fell down. Bricks and mortar and everything, it all fell down.” In the aftermath, an on-duty policeman who came in to investigate ended up part of an impromptu three-man brawl.

Still, it was the violence in front of the crowd that caused real problems for promoter Max Crabtree, who had become the main man in Joint Promotions.

“Mark was crazy,” Crabtree noted in Simon Garfield’s book The Wrestling. “He couldn’t help it. He believed that to be a good wrestler you had to dismantle the ring, hit the referee with the bell, and throw your opponent into the audience. Nobody slept when he was on, but he was dangerous because he could kill someone. So I kept having to pacify the television people who said they didn’t want him on no more, and I had to go back to Mark and say, ‘Silly fella, you’re off for three months.’”

ITV bosses would soon be free from the headache of a rowdy Rocco match, however, as in 1982, he decided to leave Joint Promotions, taking bookings with independent promoters Brian Dixon and Orig Williams. Like Tony St. Clair before him, Rocco took his World title, too, taking full advantage of the fact that the championship was billed as being outside of the control of individual promoters. While most wrestlers who made the switch to All-Star tell FSM that it was purely a financial decision, Rocco was influenced by artistic issues as well.

“At Joint, I was getting a lecture every day about not doing this, and not doing that. I was already friendly with Dixon and Williams. In fact, I was friendly with all the promoters, because I was putting a lot of people in a lot of seats in a lot of venues on a lot of nights. All Star treated me a lot better, paid me a lot more, and gave me a lot more freedom on what I could do. They didn’t try to restrict my continental exploits or my Japanese tours.”

Rocco also noted that leaving Joint meant his status wasn’t overshadowed by Big Daddy.

“When I went with All Star, I was the big star, so I had more freedom. Dixon’s opportunity was a light at the end of the tunnel, because I knew the enthusiasm of the public was going in the direction of the hard American style, rather than the English soft style. The Americans were throwing chairs, jumping up and down doing somersaults, and dressing up like Red Indians. The English guys were coming out in a black pair of trunks and sitting in a hold for 20 minutes. That wasn’t what the English public wanted to see: they wanted to see the more dramatic stuff, which was what I was doing.”

ALL-IN TELEVISION
Leaving Joint certainly didn’t end Rocco’s television experiences. He appeared on broadcasts on French television, and on Orig Williams’ Reslo show on S4C (the Welsh version of Channel 4). He also memorably appeared on Screensport's Satellite Wrestling, where broadcasting regulations were much looser. The prime example of this was a clash with Eddie “Kung Fu” Hamill that might as well have been a public information film showing everything you couldn’t do on ITV: the pair used the foulest of language, fought outside the ring, turned chairs and electrical cables into weapons, and engaged in a full-blown post-match pull-apart.

Rocco then returned to ITV in 1987, when All Star was given a contract to fill several of the Saturday afternoon wrestling slots. Back under the control of the broadcasting authorities, Rocco was again upset with ITV when they aired WWF programming, kicked off by a Hulk Hogan versus Randy Savage clash.

“It was a big contention for me: you’re telling us to tone it down, but you’re showing the American stuff, which was full throttle.”

Still, he played by the broadcaster rulebook (if not the wrestling one), and took on the likes of Chic Cullen (with whom he had exchanged the World mid-heavyweight title), Danny Collins and Johnny Saint. Having had a series of matches on the arena circuit with Fuji Yamada (later known as Jushin Liger), where the title switched back and forth, Rocco finally regained the title on a televised show in Catford.

The best-remembered moment of Rocco’s final TV run came in 1988, when he teamed with fellow arch-villain Kendo Nagasaki, only for the two to fall out and feud. They clashed in a heated tag match on television (with Rocco partnering former rival Wayne Bridges against Nagasaki and future “WWF tribute show” promoter Shane Stevens), though their encounters at All Star’s regular venues were even more violent and rowdy. This was one of the few occasions where Rocco heard the cheers of the crowd, and he admits he was skeptical such a role would work.

“When promoters first put me and Kendo together, I thought, ‘This will never happen.’ I thought that even if I went in the ring and chopped his head off with an axe, fans would not be interested in watching two bad guys fight each other. But the crowd went along with me, and supported me for about a year. I had no problems hurting him, and he had no problems hurting me.”

As the ITV era came to a close, there was one last chance for Rocco and long-time rival Marty Jones to clash on television again, with the bout ending in a double disqualification. Rocco continued to headline for All-Star as the 1980s turned into the ’90s, and business held up surprisingly well for a couple of years, perhaps because dedicated TV viewers were now forced to leave their homes to get their grappling fix.

In 1991, however, Rocco’s career came to a sudden and sad end when, working his second bout of the day, he wrestled Fit Finlay in Worthing. It was a match of arguably the two most aggressive, hardworking grapplers in the British business, and, after collapsing in the dressing room after the match, Rocco was taken to hospital with pain in his neck, back and kidneys that he assumed had stemmed from the combination of a mishap the previous night, and a stiff piledriver outside the ring from Finlay.

In fact, his problems were far more serious. Medical examination showed Rocco’s heart was severely damaged, and that he had an irregular heartbeat. This may have been partly a simple result of the strain he had placed on it through his wrestling career, but it had been worsened by an incident when he hit a ringpost chest-first. The damage had led to a pulmonary embolism, in which a blood clot blocks the main artery to the lung. He had no choice but to retire, eventually moving to the Canary Islands, where he has been involved in a series of successful businesses, including restaurants and car hire services. His family remains part of the ring game, with his son Jonny racking up a 15-2 record as a light-welterweight boxer.

EARNING A LIVING
While his business skills have helped make retirement comfortable, Rocco notes that he was fortunate in being able to make a good living while in the wrestling industry.

“The English promoters were the foremost in the world at making money. They were running six or seven shows a night, and making thousands of pounds every night in the ’70s and ’80s, and didn’t put one penny back in the business. There’s a lot of money in the wrestling business, always has been, but unfortunately the wrestlers don’t get it.

“I’ve been lucky enough to get some of it. When I was in the business, if I ever saw anything less than a full house, I was devastated. We used to turn people away, and there was real money on the table.”

That’s not to say Rocco’s approach to wrestling was purely mercenary.

“I remember one time at Belle Vue, with me and Marty Jones, we turned away 1,400 people on a Saturday night. The following Tuesday, I went back there to see the amateur wrestling World championships, and there were about 100 people in the audience. I was so sad, because I looked up to these guys as icons of wrestling.”

It’s the combination of legitimate skills and showmanship that Rocco believes is the key to being a success in the sport, such as with the crew of TNA’s British Bootcamp, who underwent his scrutiny before moving on to the U.S. The Bootcamp experience was particularly rewarding for Rocco, as it helped mitigate what he refers to as his only career regret: the fact that he didn’t spend more time training new talent. This realisation came during a conversation with former European light-middleweight boxing champion Jamie Moore, who had been forced to retire on medical advice following a brain scan. Encouraging him to teach up-and-comers, Rocco told him: “The talent you have is not yours; it’s been given to you by the people who taught you. It’s not yours to take away.”

“Now I’m saying this to him, but I didn’t practise what I preached,” Rocco added. “I very much regret doing that. One thing can make a difference; just two or three sentences can make a difference.”

Rocco certainly isn’t short of advice for today’s trainees.

“You need to learn the basics, know the job inside out, and keep a balance. You have to learn all the wrestling techniques and styles to get a broad base, and then you can work anywhere in the world. If you’re in with a southpaw or somebody working a different style, you aren’t left with your finger in your mouth wondering what’s going to happen next.

“But you have to be different. There’s no point being a guy who’s just like everyone else. Those people don’t make money.”

Fittingly, Rocco’s number one piece of advice for new wrestlers mirrors the approach he took in those early years, trying to live up to the high standards set by his father:

“Learn your business, and make your money.”