GCW show benefits Amelia, Bayou L’Ourse Little Leaguers

Morgan City native Mike Beadle and his buddies spent the better part of Friday night delivering (and receiving) suplexes, full nelsons and measured right hands to the jaws of gruesome opponents inside a wrestling ring at the Amelia Civic Center.

The brawling comes at a price. There’s always the risk of significant injury, and there’s no doubt the participants woke up Saturday morning with aching joints and stiff necks.

But Beadle said the sacrifice will never outweigh the reward, which came in the way of valuable funding for the Amelia and Bayou L’Ourse Little League All-Star baseball team in their quest to travel to the state tournament.

“It’s all about the kids for us,” Beadle said. “They came to us and said, ‘Hey, we in a bind, what can you do to help us?’ So we turned around and said, we’re going to do what we do – wrestle and put some butts in those seats … All of the funding tonight is going to go to help those kids get the money they need to go to state.”

Beadle and his partner, fellow Morgan City native, Mike Giroir own Gulf Coast Wrestling, the federation that put on the event, which featured three hours of action-packed professional wrestling.

In addition to the proceeds from the event, several Tri-parish businesses also stepped to the plate and donated items, which were raffled to fans in attendance to bring the event’s purse even higher.

A rowdy crowd of a few hundred people packed the civic center’s gymnasium, and were on the edge of their seats all throughout the card — never more than when it was Beadle and Giroir’s turn to take center stage.

Outside the ring, there’s Beadle and Giroir the men. Inside the ring, there’s the wrestling personas, as the duo transforms into Mustang Mike and Psycho Mike, the crowd-crazed tag team that took the Civic Center by storm in the main event of the evening.

“We’re not the multi-million dollar performers like you’ll see on TV,” Giroir said. “We do this to entertain people – and specifically the children in our community. That’s what it’s about to us.”

The show featured the typical wrestling customs of heels (bad guys) and faces (good guys). Performing in front of the hometown fans, Mustang Mike and Psycho Mike received cheers. That’s not always the case.

“It just depends on where we are,” Beadle said while laughing. “Here, we’re the so-called good guys, but my partner, especially, he loves being a heel, because he just has that cocky swagger about him … He plays the role of the little cocky runt very well.”

“Some places, the crowd just wants to smack him in the back of the head,” Beadle joked.

In addition to GCW regulars, Beadle and Giroir recruited other local performers to compete in the show and pitch in for the good cause.

The owners of Old School Wrestling and Entertainment also competed in the event. Like Beadle and Giroir, they said performing for the sake of needy children is always a reason to go out and give it your best.

“When it comes to giving back to help kids out, without a doubt, we’re in,” Brian Miller said, who is referred to as ‘Marty Graw’ inside the ring. “Whatever it takes. I’ll go to a school for free just to talk if they want me to talk. Anything for a kid.”

Miller’s business partner, who performs under the ring name “G-Money,” agreed with his partner and said giving back to the community is the responsibility of a local independent wrestling federation.

“This event tonight is going to be for a great charity,” he said. “I don’t mind coming out and doing it. I never mind getting beat up for kids.”

The event was another step in what has been a renaissance of professional wrestling in the Tri-parish area.

GCW has performed regularly throughout the area, and has had a good reception everywhere they’ve been.

“We usually draw 200-250 people at each show,” Beadle said.

Old School Wrestling and Entertainment has also come into the Houma area in recent weeks, and has another show scheduled for July 25th in East Park.

“A lot of people come in and out of Houma, but we’ve come in and I don’t want to say we’ve taken the market over, but we’ve taken over,” Miller said.

The co-owner of Old School Wrestling and Entertainment said he, along with the GCW, will continue to perform chartable shows when they can to give back to the Louisiana people in need.

“It takes the fans to make this show happen,” Miller said. “I’m telling you, if it takes someone beating the bejesus out of me, or me beating the bejesus out of another guy for three hours to get those people to forget that they’re working in the oil field, or to forget we just had a storm … If we can get them to forget their problems for those three hours, we did our job, and it’s worth what we do every time.”

CASEY GISCLAIR