McGuire’s Mondays: There was Sabu, and then everybody else

By Colin McGuire, ProWrestling.net Staffer

Have you ever been in a brainstorming session?

Maybe you want to throw an event, and you’re meeting with a few of your closest confidants. You’re encouraged not to hold in any idea that might cross your mind. Can we get a dunk tank? Who knows? Put it on the list. Maybe giraffes, too. Boy, going to a party and seeing the Gin Blossoms play “New Miserable Experience” in its entirety would be wild. Write it down.

Perhaps you’re in a band and you’re writing songs. Here’s a part I’ve always wanted to include in something. Let’s try that out. Here’s a drum pattern I’ve never been able to fit into a song. Let’s see if that works. These lyrics? Let’s write everything down that we know we want to say, and we’ll worry about refining it later. No idea is too big. No thought is too impossible. Here’s a blank canvas. Go to work. Hold nothing back. See what’s on the canvas.

Sabu was on that canvas.

Every wrestler in today’s generation owes something to Sabu. He was the guy who took every idea anyone could have in order to make pro wrestling different, and he tried those ideas. In real time, even. In front of our eyes. At 2 a.m. on local access television. On VHS tapes. He took every single possibility one could fathom about their body, and he gave it a go. Tables. Chairs. Barbed wire. The list is endless. The scars were real.

And so, when the news broke on Sunday that Sabu had passed away, it felt surreal. If all those cuts and all those miles and all those broken bones never got to him, it felt like nothing ever would. He was larger than life, superhuman, indestructible in ways few who ever lived appear to be indestructible. In so many ways, he was transcendent.

He transcended the medium of professional wrestling and brought so many people into its orbit. So many wrestlers wanted to wrestle after they discovered Sabu. So many fans had their passion for the pro wrestling medium rekindled after they finally got their eyes on him. If you didn’t see it, you didn’t understand, and if you didn’t understand, you never wanted the pro wrestling business to evolve in the first place.

Such is why every wrestler in today’s generation owes something to Sabu: The high-flying acts take from his innovation. The hardcore acts take from his fearlessness. The story-based acts can pull up any beat from his feud with Taz and send either guy a check for residuals. Since Sabu changed the game, everyone else has had the opportunity to pick and choose which part of him they wanted to draw from and refine it into something sparkly enough to get them on national television.

Sabu never cared about being sparkly. He gave the wrestling business so much more than he got back from it, and I know I’m not the first person to say that about him. He left such a mark on the pro wrestling business that I’m not sure we even see things like AEW today if he didn’t knock down doors, open people’s eyes, and blaze a trail for an alternative style of wrestling. At a bare minimum, the brand would look almost entirely different if Sabu never switched things up the way he did it when he did it.

It’s a shame how the most influential of influencers never get the amount of notoriety they deserve until they are no longer with us. It takes time, perspective, hindsight … the list goes on, and because we are inherently imperfect, it’s a reality in life that will likely never change. I just hope that in Sabu’s 60 years, there were times that he was able to feel a sense of purpose, appreciation, and love from the pro wrestling community, be it through fans, colleagues, or the constant display of his mark on the industry.

I, for one, owe him a debt of gratitude for keeping my flame alive for the pro wrestling product when I was in my early teens and ready to tune out. Without his work, who knows if I would have ever cared that wrestling existed outside of the WWF and WCW/NWA. But, through his flaming tables, barbed wire ring ropes, steel chair imagination, and an undeniable commitment to pointing towards the sky, here I am, lucky enough to even have the opportunity to write a few words about a guy that had such an influence on this industry so many of us love.

So, rest in peace, Sabu. You were one of one. You were, indeed, the canvas.