Author: The word "greatest" and the phrase "greatest of all time," or being the GOAT as it’s referred to these days, is a term that gets bandied around far too often. But if you ask anyone in professional wrestling or a true historian of the business, "The Crippler" Ray Stevens will be somewhere right at the top of their list.
You have ring naturals, mic naturals, and guys that live the code — but rarely do they land in one person the way they did Stevens. He was one of the greatest heels in the history of the wrestling business, and this is his story.
Jim Phillips, author of this article and one of the great wrestling historians here at Pro Wrestling Stories, is in the challenge of his life after being paralyzed on January 21st, 2023. Learn his story and how you can help him reach his goal of taking his first steps again!
The Crippler Ray Stevens
Carl Ray Stevens was born in the middle of the Depression Era ’30s in the poverty-stricken state of West Virginia.
He left his Point Pleasant home for greener pastures and opportunities that were to be found in nearby Columbus, Ohio. Stevens packed his few possessions and made the one-hundred-thirty-mile trip while still a teenager.
He became enamored with professional wrestling and frequented the Toe Hold Club, where many local wrestlers could be found. He started training and took his first match at the age of seventeen, working for Al Haft.
Ray took to the ring like a natural, and what would take others years to absorb and perfect, the youngster did in months. He rose up the card and paid his dues the old way, but the veterans noticed his potential and began to school him.
At the Midwest Wrestling Association in Ohio, he cut his teeth and started his lineage of acquiring territorial gold.
He picked up the MWA Tag Team Titles with his partner, Don Stevens (no relation), in May of 1956 and followed that up with his first singles title the next month when he took home the MWA Junior Heavyweight Title.
Not a huge man, at five feet seven inches tall, Ray made up for that in mass and ring savvy.
The road began to call to him, and promoters were keen to take a look at the youngster. The NWA had formed eight years earlier, in 1948, and it opened the doors for exposure on the national scale for workers like Stevens.
He traveled to Florida and worked the CWF promotion in its infancy under the leadership of Cowboy Clarence Luttrall in the fall of ’56.
He made a good impression on the Cowboy, and on November 21st, he beat Harry Smith in a match to be crowned the inaugural Television Champion in Florida.
He held that title for a period of time before he was on the move again, and the title was put on the shelf, not to be awarded again until 1970. Stevens was the original, though, as he was in many aspects of his career.
Building a Reputation as a Solid Worker
Fall that year proved to be wrestling season for many cities across the country. It would also be when Ray Stevens continued his conquest travels as he moved onto the Alabama/Tennessee territory.
His ring prowess was growing, and his reputation for being a solid worker could be counted on to show up and trusted to protect the business.
He had taken a wife at the tender age of seventeen, and she, among others, helped him grow his abilities in the ring.
NWA Heavyweight Champion Buddy Rogers also had a hand in his development, and, as did anyone who worked with Stevens, he saw the potential in him early on.
While Ray was in Alabama, he took their coveted NWA Southern Junior Heavyweight Title on three separate occasions in 1957 and ’58.
The bubble of his success was ballooning out, and he began to look to his next port of call, which would be the West Coast of the United States, where he rose to the top of the business.
Roy Shire owned and operated Big Time Wrestling in San Francisco, but in the years before this, he was working the tag team scene and had worked with Stevens as the Shire Brothers, garnering them much attention as well as the NWA World Tag Titles in the summer of 1959.
Shire also had a hand in Steven’s training before he [Shire] had moved on to run the NWA San Fran promotion and reached out to his old partner to offer him a job with a big push in the territory.
Stevens gathered himself and headed to the Bay Area of California to spread his banner and build his career.
1960 would mark the start of a decade where The Crippler Ray Stevens would not only make his biggest impact but would be felt in the decades that followed.
The wrestlers that he worked with would remember him as maybe the best of that era, and it all started with the NWA United States Title in San Francisco.
He took that title in November of 1960 and held it nine times over during his tenure there, after being awarded the belt as its first champion.
Stevens would go to war with Pepper Gomez, establishing himself as the top heel to go along with the promos he cut, dogging the locals and bad-mouthing San Francisco in general.
He always billed himself as coming from another city or the other side of the country to further separate himself from the locals, which lent to their dislike of the "outsider" and added to his heel antagonism.
Wilbur Snyder, King Curtis Iaukea, and Dominic DeNucci also battled Ray Stevens for the title over the years that followed.
Stevens even got a shot at and defeated "The Living Legend" Bruno Sammartino on one of his stops in California. Bruno actually challenged Stevens, as was the norm for the McMahons to do with their champion from time to time, pitting title versus title in many instances, but never really putting their gold in jeopardy.
As in this case, when Stevens beat Bruno two out of three falls, the WWWF used the loophole that the title doesn’t change hands on a DQ — a rule which they still maintain today.
With that, Sammartino was able to bring his title back home. The fans knew that their boy, hated or not, had beaten the great, exalted NYC Champion, and sent him packing, even if he still had his belt to take with him.
Another milestone in Stevens’s career happened while at Big Time Wrestling, and it came in the form of meeting a Canadian transplant with the right attitude to build a team on.
The Blond Bombers – The Crippler Ray Stevens and Pat Patterson
Pat Patterson was working in Portland, and hearing about the name that Ray Stevens was building, and after being told how they would be the perfect fit, he went down to the City by the Bay to see for himself.
Although Patterson would at first challenge Ray, claiming he was going to become the new top dog in the promotion, they’d soon come together as a team.
The two clicked immediately, and after a hair dye job to match Stevens, the Blond Bombers were born. They were not the first nor the last team to work under that name, but I believe they were the best combination of any of the others.
With the accompanying Bombs Away knee-drop finisher that Stevens used off the second or top rope, they were a force to be reckoned with. The pair took the World Tag Team Championships there as The Bombers in April of 1965.
They held the Tag Titles there twice but took that team on the road and found gold across the territorial map, even beyond the scope of the NWA. They split in late 1967 when Patterson left for a run in Japan. Stevens continued on there, making a rare face turn in 1968-69.
Working the Territories
Before we continue, we need to check our passports because Stevens’s next stop on the road to gold is down under in Sydney, Australia. Ray got the call from Jim Barnett and committed to head to the World Championship Wrestling promotion there in 1965.
Even though he was still working for Shire, since he and Barnett were close, Shire let his star go and didn’t look at it as a jump since it was not only in another market but on another continent.
Ray made the trip and won their IWA World Heavyweight Title from Dominic DeNucci in January of 1965 on his first run there.
He returned in 1966 and retook the belt from Spiros Arion during Halloween time. He also teamed with Art Nelson on that trip and won the IWA Tag Team Titles in November of that year.
People talk the talk, but the line of gold can’t be disavowed because wherever he went, he took their titles and added them to the list.
The Crippler Ray Stevens would move on to the Big Apple during the Summer of Love in ’67. He would enrage the fans at the act as he was so good at playing the role of a man from out of town, causing an insurrection of a hometown hero.
Striking while his popularity was at its peak, he also headed across the ocean to Hawaii and competed in the NWA 50th State Big Time promotion run by Ed Francis and James Blears.
They were creating a resurgence of the product there, and Ray went to compete for them in 1968 while using San Fran as a base of operations to work out of.
He took the NWA Pacific International Championship in May of that year and only kept it for a month, but sealed his name in their record books, fattened his wallet, and enjoyed the sunbathed beaches while there.
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The Crippler Ray Stevens – Living on the Edge
The Crippler Ray Stevens was known for living the hard, on-the-edge life long before the term adrenaline junkie was coined. He competed in rodeo, as well as motor racing, including both cars and motorcycles.
In the summer of ’69, he suffered a severe leg break during a motorcycle crash that left him convalescing. He would have no choice but to vacate the NWA US Title he held in San Francisco.
Pat Patterson stepped back into the fray, took the title from his ex-partner, and ignited the sparks of a feud that would see Stevens return and reclaim the title that the backstabbing partner had looked to make his own in a Texas Death Match.
It told a great story and made it much better for the fans and the business.
With The Bombers now defunct in that market, Ray Stevens took on partners Peter Maivia in 1969, and then again almost nine years later with Moondog Mayne in November 1977, to win the NWA World Tag Titles there.
However, elsewhere, the Bombers were still a commodity that could be counted on to draw, and they surely did.
Becoming "The Crippler"
The end of the sixties brought the desire for change, and Stevens looked elsewhere to establish himself.
The San Francisco market, while being so good to him, was nearly tapped out for him, so the time to move on had finally come. He set his sights on the frigid land of Minnesota, which was a serious departure from the California coast in more ways than one.
He found another long-standing tag team partner when he got there, as well as a manager in tow.
They gelled in short order and then began to take on any team that wanted to face them. Nick Bockwinkel had made a name for himself around the NWA and AWA at this point, and the two captured the AWA World Tag Team Titles in January of 1972 from Verne Gagne and Billy Robinson.
This was the first of three reigns for them, with the belts until 1974 before finally being unseated by the Crusher and the Bruiser.
During that time, they also traveled to Florida and won the NWA Florida Tag Team Titles in the summer of ’72.
During 1972, he took on the now well-known nickname of "The Crippler" after he dropped the bombs away onto the leg of Dick Beyer, who was working as Doctor X, helplessly tied up in the ropes.
They played out the story angle that portrayed Stevens as having put the Dr. out of commission, which helped to secure even more heat for Stevens as a heel, as well as allowing Beyer to take time for a run in Japan as The Destroyer, under which he had become enormously popular over there. This was good business and protected them both for a better payday.
Stevens also took the time to get down to the Western States Sports promotion and work for the Funks. He won the Amarillo version of the NWA Brass Knuckles Championship three times quickly from June to September 1975.
I’m not sure that taking gold everywhere was his passion as much as it was breaking into new markets and getting that fresh, newly pressed heat from fans who may not have seen him.
Either way, the gold finds the talent as much as the talent finds it, and accordingly, championships were never far away from Stevens.
Like all great tag teams, an eventual split up and feud is always imminent. That occurred in 1977 after they came into a dispute over his treatment at the hands of Bobby Heenan and the obvious favoritism that was shown towards Nick Bockwinkel.
The two men held the belts longer than any team up to that point in AWA history. Stevens took a short run as a face during and after the split.
This was short-lived as he reunited with his old Blond Bomber partner in 1978 to retake the AWA World Tag Titles after the High Flyers had to forfeit due to Jim Brunzell being hurt outside of the business at a softball game.
The pair held the titles for nearly a year after that before Verne Gagne and Mad Dog Vachon came calling in June of 1979. Not long after, Pat Patterson began cultivating his long-standing relationship with the McMahon family and its various promotional incarnations.
The Crippler Ray Stevens took to the roads after the split and headed back to Florida to team with Mike Graham and once again become one-half
of the NWA Florida Tag Team Champions in October of 1979, then traveled to Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling the following month to beat Jim Brunzell for their Heavyweight Championship there as well. He lost that title back to him, though, in a rematch on Christmas Day that year.
Stevens would travel back to San Francisco to honor his commitment to his old partner Roy Shire and pick up the tag team titles there, putting butts in the Cow Palace every time he showed up.
The new decade was closing in, and with the Eighties came a change for The Crippler.
The Crippler went back to Mid-Atlantic after closing up for Shire and picked back up where he left off and pursued the NWA World Tag Team Titles, this time with Greg Valentine.
The two men dominated their competition until they were beaten by Ricky Steamboat and Jay Youngblood, who were in the rise of a strong babyface run there as well.
However, Stevens wasn’t going to be discounted and returned with new partner Jimmy Snuka and manager Gene Anderson to regain the belts on June 22nd, 1980.
\They held them until the fall of that year when the Masked Superstar and Paul Jones beat them for the belts.
Ever resilient and not willing to take the loss lightly, Stevens returned yet again but with the Russian Bear this time and won the titles for a third time in February of 1981, but dropped them back to the pair of Jones and Superstar the next month.
Seeing that it wasn’t his time there any longer, he took to his nomad roots, moved again, and headed back to the Northeast.
A Short Stint in the WWF and Retirement in 1992
From 1982, Ray worked in the WWF for a few years. He worked an angle that saw his turn on his old teammate Jimmy Snuka, and after giving him a sound beating, cemented a babyface run for Snuka.
The life on the road and wear and tear on his body took him out of the ring there though for a period of rest that saw him put on the blazer and work commentary with Vince Jr. He left there after a few years and headed back up to Minnesota with his new job on the stick and did announce for their ESPN show there as well.
He eventually retired from professional wrestling in 1992 after 42 years in the business.
The Crippler Ray Stevens – His Death and Legacy
Ray Stevens was tailored and fitted into the suit of the heel, and it was there that he always found his greatest success. He was a natural that was considered by many to be the best ever to lace ’em up, and certainly the best wrestler of the sixties.
This is easily accounted for by the sheer number of titles he won and his ability to draw big money no matter where he worked.
He was a thinking man’s wrestler who knew how to brawl with the hard hitters while taking you apart at the joints and making it sell the whole time without ever really hurting you.
He was a master of the art of professional wrestling and made it all look so easy. A man that the simple giving of his word could count on, he embodied so many things that the old-school way of doing business was about then and still should be today.
He would pass away at his home from a heart attack while he slept in 1996. He was sixty years old.
"He had made millions of dollars, and should have made millions more, but very little if any of it was still in his possession," Jim Cornette once remembered.
"He was once the center of attention everywhere he went and lived in opulent surroundings, now he was in a dark apartment in a town no one even knew he was living in.
But that man had probably had more fun in his lifetime than you, and me and any other ten people we know put together. That? That couldn’t possibly, ever be taken away from him."
Like many others of his generation, The Crippler Ray Stevens has yet to be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame but was inducted into the Professional Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2006 as a part of The Blond Bombers as well as the NWA Hall of Fame in 2013 on his own.
Though, being an old-school guy at heart, I’m sure that while recognizing a promotion and being added to their HOF is nice, the opinions of his friends and fellow wrestlers meant more to him in the end.
Ray Stevens rose to prominence in the business during a time long before the sports combine style of finding stars that they employ now. It was a time of earning your way in through honor, toughness, and respect for the men that came before you.
A time when paying dues meant a little more, and your feelings meant a little less. They did it the old way, the right way, and to be considered the greatest among that generation is an accomplishment that few coming up in the business today will ever understand.
These stories may also interest you:
- Buddy Rogers: The Man Who Drove a Wedge in the NWA
- Ox Baker – The Endearing Heel Who Loved To Hurt People
- Wildmen of Wrestling | 12 Outrageous Heels Who Pioneered Hardcore
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