|
By Les Honig
He’s been UPW’s best-kept secret for a while now but it seems that suddenly everyone has started turning their eyes in his direction; this happy go-lucky, ever less scrawny teenager who has captured the hearts of light show and then major venue fans for some time. Indeed, as amazing as it may seem, Ultimate Pro Wrestling’s
“Lil' Nate” Nickerson is beginning to outshine many of his larger,
somewhat elder counterparts and is rapidly becoming an important player in the ranks of So-Cal’s leading indy fed.
For Nate, who now celebrates his third anniversary as an outstanding UU student and will finally
turn 18 next March, this is a natural progression in a life that has been characterized by a never-ending non-stop wrestling addiction that first drove his folks a little crazy, but now has won their hearts over just as definitively as his multitudes of fans.
“Yeah, in the beginning when I expressed a desire to start training at the age of 14 they kind of groaned and thought, ‘This is a phase he’ll outgrow’,” Nate chuckles, but now that has all changed big-time as they and the rest of the world recognize this is a unique talent that needs to be nurtured and developed.
Visit one of the three or four weekly sessions he trains in, and occasionally helps instruct, and you will see that
Lil' Nate has himself taken on the surprising and mature role of teacher and mentor to the rest of his class of older elite trainees, visiting pros, and above all, novice students, who all respect his advice and savor the opportunity to train with him.
This is quite a change for the high school senior who remembers first entering the UPW training ring and being the “nervous little kid who was afraid to mix it up with the big guys there.” Such inhibitions faded away quickly though as fellow classmates like John Cena, Smelly and Keiji Sakoda, took those extra few minutes to help him out after each session, as he sought their guidance and help with the invaluable pointers that would set him off on the right track.
And there was the first real mentor in his career as well, instructor Maniac Mike Bell, who was present at his initial workout, and who immediately took a liking to him, telling him right off the bat, “I intend to work you much harder because when you’re a small guy you have to develop a toughness that the bigger guys don’t have to.”
He remembers that first pain and the subsequent slow but steady gain which he savored despite the occasional intense physical suffering. After all, it represented for Nate a unique opportunity evolving from those earliest days as a kid in Marina Del Rey where he would “throw pillows off my bed and dive onto them, find big stuffed animals and beat them up, and crash into the couches.” Indeed, he recalls an early passion that saw him watch all available wrestling shows and then study every tape he could get his hands on. “There were three video stores a couple of blocks away and mom would take me to one and get tapes and I’d watch them. Then the following day I’d go to the next and get more. They all knew I never would head for the action comedy. I went right for the wrestling. I’d get every tape in stock and watch each one a hundred times.”
As recalled in a recent “Student of the Month” feature on Nate, the youngster finally transformed this squared-circle addiction into real-world action when he met Big Schwag in early 2000 at the UPW booth during the Anaheim Pond’s WWF Fan fair preceding Wrestlemania 16 and expressed intense interest in starting training. “He thought I’d be the last person in the world he’d ever see again,” but that was to prove false as the scrappy but determined little guy appeared there and began what now has become UU’s longest-consecutive training involvement.
Being one of Ultimate U’s few purely home-grown talents, Nickerson cannot praise his UU education enough as he feels that nowhere else “could you train under so many talented pros from Tom Howard to the Ballards to Chris Daniels to Keiji Sakoda to Frankie Kazarian to Hardcore Kidd,”and take something from all their unique styles and integrate those into creating your own.”
There are two names however of more recent note that have likely helped propel the mat talents of
Lil' Nate Nickerson to even higher levels; that of mat legend Roddy Piper and that of his once teacher and now dear friend, Brian “Spanky” Kendrick.
It is here that this kid with immense heart and soul has seemed to equally touch their own and they have returned those deep feelings creating bonds that have in the past, and in the present, continue to provide the emerging talent with many amazing and invaluable mat lessons.
For Piper, it was his role as a surrogate dad during the month that Nate spent on the road helping Hot Rod to promote his autobiography on a nation-wide tour. Having seen Nathan at a UPW practice he attended and being so impressed that he asked him to participate in a Galaxy show routine, Roddy went on to offer this once-in-a-wrestler’s life chance to travel with him as part of his entourage, an experience that Nickerson will never forget and feels was both extremely hard work but definitely magical as well.
And then of course, there is his relationship with a guy who he, in many ways, looks up to as dear pal and mentor, Spanky. Realizing Kendrick’s extraordinary talents when he arrived on the UPW scene as first a trainee, himself, and then as a teacher, Nate immediately related, as well, to Spanky’s equally driven wrestling commitment.
“I remember I thought I had psychology down until I saw him wrestle the first time. I realized his matches were so much different than anybody else’s; so special, so captivating. I remember thinking, ‘I want to do that. I don’t want to be like everybody else. I want to be unique like he is.’”
Admitting that Spanky is one of the few people he still feels nervous wrestling in front of because of that deep respect he holds for him, Nate recalls with great affection their many post-practice visits to Denny’s where Brian would be brutally honest with him but in a way that only helped him grow as a mat personality. “Other guys might take his honesty personally but for me, I took it only as a sign that he really cared about my success.”
And Spanky gave him one bit of invaluable advice he now makes part of his own credo.
“He said, ‘Hey, ‘we’re not 6 foot 5, or over 300 pounds. We’re small so we have to work harder, learn faster. We’re gonna have to be that much more entertaining; work twice as hard to be equal to guys who are twice as big. So let’s be innovative and not just stick to the basics.’ Whenever I’m in the ring, I always try to apply his commandments.” And he adds, with great pride, “When I see Spanky on Smackdown now, it’s kind of like seeing my older brother in action.”
Asked now to project the future of his own in-ring persona, many of those pointers given him by Kendrick seem to be in place, as Nickerson is more and more at home with his character, now giving him much more depth than the “goofball” image he first portrayed.
“I try and be myself and display the world of a 17 year-old kid. I have to pass my history test at school as well as kick some big guy’s butt.”
Participating in a recent pre-taping WWE L.A. workout and with many local observers shouting his praises, it seems that
“Lil' Nate” Nickerson is well on his way to fulfilling his lifetime dream of reaching World Wrestling Entertainment stardom.
“To have a teenage kid like myself looking at a poster of Nate on his own bedroom wall and saying ‘I want to be like him someday.’ That would make all this worthwhile. That’s what it’s really all about.”
We wish “Lil' Nate” Nickerson all our best in making that very attainable dream come true and award him deserving kudos as August’s UPW Wrestler of the Month.
|
