The hosts of the “Behind the Bastards” podcast recently started their six-part series on WWE Chairman Vince McMahon, shining a light on some of the worst people in pro-wrestling.
However, the show also shone a light on the exploits of Fritz Von Erich, the patriarch of the infamous Von Erich family.
Once one of the most respected families in the sport, drug issues and suicide crippled the family, making them one of the most depressing tales in wrestling history.
With big stars like former NWA World Heavyweight Champion Kerry “Texas Tornado” Von Erich, they were one of the most successful families in wrestling, whereas now they are barely represented on the big stages at all.
The hosts of the “Behind the Bastards” podcast spoke about the head of the family, Fritz Von Erich, calling him “the Joe Jackson” of pro-wrestling.
Joe Jackson was the father of Michael Jackson, and the rest of the Jackson five. He was known as a cruel father, abusing his sons to get the best work out of them, and remains an infamous character to this day.
Fritz Von Erich Was The Joe Jackson Of Wrestling
Starting off from the time David, Kerry, and Kevin were just adolescents, he would immediately follow up their sports training after school with 3 hours of wrestling training every night, even though they just wanted to focus on high school and sports.
David was exhibiting a lot of bad health signs before he died, and people outside the Von Erich family insist it was a drug overdose that Fritz tried to sweep under the rug. Fritz is basically the guy that got them hooked on every drug under the sun so that they could perform night after night after night.
So him insisting David wrestle while he was in bad health AFTER maybe being the reason he was in bad health to begin with pretty much directly caused David’s death. After David’s death and at his funeral, Fritz hiked up the prices for coloured photographs of David to 10 dollars because he knew people would buy it. Just pimping out his dead son basically.
When Kerry had his motorcycle accident that required the amputation of part of his foot, he was whisked away to the hospital for major surgery, and right after the procedure was done, Fritz took him away to do a wrestling show that injured his foot even more and caused him to require a bone fusion that made the rest of his wrestling career horribly painful.
It’s speculated that the drugs in Kerry’s system was the reason for his motorcycle accident, which would indirectly damn Fritz because Fritz is the one who encouraged his boys to get hooked on painkillers so they could perform. Kerry would end his life in 1993 after nearly a decade of horrible pain from the injury.
Mike Von Erich, who by many accounts never wanted to be a wrestler at all and was pushed into it by his father, underwent a shoulder injury that required surgery. In Tel Aviv, Israel, he underwent surgery, and then contracted toxic shock syndrome which nearly killed him, gave him permanent brain damage, and caused him to drop from over 200 pounds to somewhere around 150 pounds.
A week after he beat the toxic shock syndrome and began his recovery, Fritz wheeled him out in front of a crowd of people to announce his return to wrestling. Mike was slurring his words, sitting in a wheelchair, and obviously could never actually return to wrestling. It was just adding more humiliation and pain to him when he was barely making it as-is. He would later get into a car accident himself, and took his own life after failing to live up to Fritz’s expectations.
By some telling of the story, he left a note to his younger brother Chris, as well as a bottle of painkillers (the same thing he would use to kill himself), saying to use them when the time came. The reason for this is he suspected Fritz would push him the same way he pushed all of his other sons.
Chris Von Erich was called up a few years after the deaths of Mike and David to fill in for the family and continue their legacy. The problem with Chris is that he was a very small man, from a lifetime of illness and taking prednisone to deal with asthma and upper respiratory conditions. This made his bones very brittle and he couldn’t even take normal wrestling moves without it seriously hurting him. Like his brother Mike, he also experienced severe depression and drug issues, and felt immense pressure to perform for his father, which culminated in his suicide in 1991. Kevin found his body after discovering the suicide note.
Kevin Von Erich is the only son of the 6 to make it out and have a relatively normal life, but even he has dealt with a lot. When his father was entering dementia, he pointed a gun at Kevin’s head and threatened to kill him. This is probably not really Fritz’s fault, but I think it’s a testament to how he could be controlling and refused to get help the way he also refused to get his sons help when they needed it most.
Chris Von Erich was called up a few years after the deaths of Mike and David to fill in for the family and continue their legacy. The problem with Chris is that he was a very small man, from a lifetime of illness and taking prednisone to deal with asthma and upper respiratory conditions. This made his bones very brittle and he couldn’t even take normal wrestling moves without it seriously hurting him. Like his brother Mike, he also experienced severe depression and drug issues, and felt immense pressure to perform for his father, which culminated in his suicide in 1991. Kevin found his body after discovering the suicide note.
Kevin Von Erich is the only son of the 6 to make it out and have a relatively normal life, but even he has dealt with a lot. When his father was entering dementia, he pointed a gun at Kevin’s head and threatened to kill him. This is probably not really Fritz’s fault, but I think it’s a testament to how he could be controlling and refused to get help the way he also refused to get his sons help when they needed it most.
I think it’s under-appreciated how much of the tragedy of the family is a direct result of Fritz’s machinations. Often it barely gets talked about, if at all. Even the Dark Side of the Ring episode pulled punches about how involved he was in all of this. Grooming teenaged boys into being indentured servants to him, basically. And most of them died. It’s horrible.
