Wrestling With Sin: 420

Brian Damage

This is the 420th installment of the ‘Wrestling with Sin‘ series. A group of stories that delves into the darker, underbelly of pro wrestling. Many of the stories involve such subjects as sex, drugs, greed and in some cases even murder! As with every single story in the Sin series, I do not condone or condemn the alleged participants. We simply retell their stories by researching interviews, newspapers, magazines and various other sources of media.

Riddle’s Diddle

A former girlfriend of WWE superstar Matt Riddle has come forward accusing the wrestler of being “toxic.” The woman named Daniella, stated that Riddle mentally abused her during the course of their relationship. She says that Riddle sent her pics and videos of himself having sex with other women beside herself. She said she tried countless times to escape the relationship and end it…but always ended up back under his control.

She claimed that she talked to several other women who Riddle dated and slept with and they all claim how mentally abusive he was to them as well. This isn’t the first time Riddle has been accused of mistreating and mentally abusing women. We covered another incident involving Riddle in a previous post which you can read here. Matt Riddle or WWE have not commented on the latest accusations.

Joshi Love Me Or Joshi Not?

Two Japanese wrestling icons in Akira Maeda and Chigusa Nagayo were once an item away from the ring. Maeda even helped train Nagayo, who became famous as one half of the ‘Crush Gals’ tag team in Japan. As Nagayo’s popularity soared, Maeda reportedly became more and more jealous of her success.

Nagayo allegedly began sleeping around with other men….at least that according to Maeda. The situation came to a boil, while the two were out on a date. Maeda accused Nagayo of cheating on him, to which she denied it. The couple allegedly became involved in a physical altercation at a bar. The incident, led to the wrestlers permanently splitting up.

Memphis Mugging

In the early 1990’s, the Eliminators of Perry Saturn and John Kronus wrestled down in Memphis, Tennessee for the USWA for approximately $40 a week. Saturn admitted that their stay in Memphis was very rough financially. Saturn said that he and Kronus rented an apartment in a very seedy part of town where drug dealers and hookers often paraded around in broad daylight.

Saturn recalled one day, Kronus wanted to go to the store to purchase cigarettes. As the tag team was returning from the store, a man approached them and asked for a cigarette. As Kronus handed the smoke to the man, the individual then pulled out a gun and said…’Now give me your money.’ Saturn said that is when Kronus took his finger and stuck it in the barrel of the gun. As the would be mugger looked confused, Saturn noticed the mugger’s finger was off the trigger and grabbed the weapon away from him. Kronus began shouting at Saturn to shoot the mugger in the face…but the individual was able to run away.

Saturn them dumped the gun down a sewer and asked Kronus…why he stuck his finger in the gun? Kronus and Saturn started talking about Bugs Bunny cartoons and how if you stuck your finger in a gun and it was fired…the gun would explode in the shooter’s face. Totally shocked by Kronus’ answer…Saturn reminded his partner that that only worked in cartoons. Kronus agreed, but said the mugger probably didn’t know that.

The Other Deep South

Tony Salantri is a former WWE developmental talent who was once assigned to Deep South Wrestling. He wrestled under the name of ‘Tony Stradlin’ and was one half of the inaugural DSW tag team champions on the team called ‘High Impact.’ Salantri also wrestled on the independent circuit until his retirement in 2008.

After life in the squared circle, Tony Salantri found work in another form of entertainment…the porn industry. Salantri performed under the name of ‘Leo Christiansen’ in several pornographic films.

You can read all previous ‘Wrestling with Sin’ pieces here.