"Quoth the Raven" - Scott Levy, Pro-Wrestling Veteran: Part 1 The Early Years (1987-1993)
Created | Updated Aug 18, 2003
"The never-ending saga...the story of the loner, the slacker, the tortured soul known as Raven, who craves acceptance yet destroys it once he achieves it."
-Paul Hayman (former owner of ECW), Prodigy Chat, 1997
Professional wrestlers fall into a number of broad categories, all of which can be seen plying their particular brand of the art on a primetime US wrestling show. The steroid monster specialises in power, power and more power as he tosses his hapless foes about the ring. The technical assassin pinpoints the chink in his opponent’s armour, his Achilles heel, and focuses on that one target to render him helpless. The luchador ascends to the top of the ring-ropes and launches himself through the air to catch his opponent in a breath-taking aerial attack. The brawler, on the other hand, uses the most immediate and most devastating line of offence available; most often with breathtaking and stomach-churning effect.
On top of these considerations of style, there is then the work ethic of the individual wrestler to be taken into consideration. Some grapplers are gifted athletes easily able to make the transition to the ring. Of course there are men and women whom, while impressive physical specimens, have little real talent or presence in the squared circle. Others still are clumsy or just plain lazy. But in the face of these mediocre talents, the wrestling promoter has a weapon in the form the worker. The worker can be virtually any kind of wrestler when it comes to style, but the one thing they have in common is the willingness and ability to produce a consistent level of quality ring-work (hence the name, duh!) in their matches regardless of the opponent they are pitted against. To put it simply, a good worker can make a mediocre wrestler look good, he can sell him to the crowd and convince them of his prowess as a result of his own skilful reactions to the opponents moves.
After nearly two decades in the wrestling business, Scott Levy is renowned as both a skilled brawler and a superlative worker who has competed under various ring-names in many different promotions over the years. This entry and the subsequent parts to follow will document his long and varied career charting the highs and lows along the way.
The Early Years
Born on 18th September 1964 in Short Hills, New Jersey, Levy attended the University of Delaware where he majored in criminal law. Opting for the hard road of the professional wrestler, he trained under the veteran Larry Sharpe at a wrestling school known as the Monster Factory.
Making his professional debut in 1987 at the tender age of 23 in the NWA Pacific North West promotion, Levy adopted the moniker Scotty "The Body" Anthony. Here he made a resounding success of his rookie year and went on to lift firstly the promotion's tag-team titles with Top Gun and later in his tenure the NWA TV title.
Moving on to pastures new in the form of the GWF, where he shortened his ring-name to simply Scott Anthony, Levy didn't linger there long and soon arrived in the more high-profile environment of the WCW. At that time in the early nineties the Atlanta promotion was home to a style of booking heavily influenced by the territories of the deep south and boasted the likes of Ric Flair and Arn Anderson as its top echelon of stars, whom though past their prime still drew the crowds by reputation alone.
Adopting the brash and arrogant persona of Scotty Flamingo, Levy joined the ranks of the then vibrant cruiserweight division of the promotion alongside the likes of the late "Flyin" Brian Pillman and Jushin "Thunder" Liger. The highlight of Scotty Flamingo's tenure in the WCW came in 1992 when he pinned Pillman, relieving him of the WCW Light Heavyweight belt.
Stanford calling
When the opportunity presented itself, Levy jumped ship from Atlanta to Stanford and inked a contract with Vince McMahon's WWF. Once there it was time for Levy to learn at first hand some of the rather harsh realities of working for the WWF. First and foremost was (and still is) the fact that Vince is the boss, and what he says goes.
For a start Scotty Flamingo was out, the WWF had always been loathe to market any but the most popular, recognised and revered grapplers under the ring-names they had used elsewhere for fear of loosing its well cultivated image as the most innovative and original force in sports entertainment. Thus "Johnny Polo" was born, a spoilt brat who sported the riding boots and pants of the sport he was named after and carried with him at all times a polo-mallet that inevitably became a part of the in-ring action. Secondly the fact that Levy had worked main-events and lifted his fair share of championship gold over the short years of his career meant nothing in the WWF. The well documented bias against wrestlers of a smaller stature in the promotion and Levy's status as an unproven quantity there relegated him to the status of a manager rather than an active member of the roster.
That is not to say that Levy was kept out of the public eye. Johnny Polo accompanied Brian Clarke to the side of the ring in his time as "Adam Bomb." Thankfully Polo was soon elevated to the position of manager to the promotion's top heel tag-team of the time, the "Quebecers." Becoming embroiled in the team's feud with the Steiner Brothers and their eventual rise to the position of tag-team champions meant that Johnny Polo enjoyed much time and exposure on WWF programming. The point even came when Levy was allowed into the ring himself under the premise that Polo had tried his hand at managing and now wanted to try wrestling as well hoping to add yet another string to his already formidable bow. Unsurprisingly the few matches that Johnny Polo got to compete in were hardly classics and usually followed the formula of the plucky manager being pitted against a mid-card performer of little or no consequence and muddling through to a victory with the help of his charges the Quebecers who would be on hand to waffle the opposition with a foreign object at the critical moment.
While his time as a manager did little to raise the value of his stock as a wrestler, it did allow Levy to develop and hone his skills in other areas. In the arrogant but increasingly roguish and irrepressible character of Johnny Polo he was able to spend time working on interview skills and mic work that would later shine through in his most famous in-ring incarnation. This refinement of Levy's already charismatic nature was further endorsed by the WWF when the powers that be in the promotion decided that rather than assign Johnny Polo to a new managerial role when his time with the Quebecers came to a logical conclusion he would instead assume the role of "colour commentator" on television broadcasts on a regular basis.
The role of the colour commentator is a well documented piece of pro-wrestling tradition and without doubt one of the most demanding outside the wrestling ring itself. Paired with a "play-by-play man" who's job is to offer a commentary on the actual in-ring action, the colour commentator is charged with the responsibility of bringing (in the best cases at least) an equal element of antagonism and humour into the equation. More often than not the play-by-play man falls into the role of good guy to the colour commentator's bad guy simply by default as the formers outrage at the antics of the heel wrestlers provides a brilliant foil for the more outrageous proclamations of the latter. Johnny Polo played the role of bad guy well, but when teamed with such old veterans as the late "Gorilla" Monsoon, literally shone as a mischievous wipper-snapper alongside the almost paternal qualities of the older hand. When working together Polo and "Uncle Gorilla" as he insisted upon calling Monsoon, were a lively and amusing pair that never failed to spark off one another well.
But as with all good things, both Levy's time as Johnny Polo and his tenure with the WWF came to an end as he left Stanford for Tennessee and the small-time USWA. Here he once again resumed the ring name Scotty Flamingo and returned to the role of grappler full time. Levy tarried long enough to lift the promotions tag-titles with Brian Christopher (later Grandmaster Sexay in the WWF tag-team Too Cool). But times were changing and Levy soon went solo and headed to the cooler climes of Philadelphia where a new and vibrant promotion was making waves.
-Paul Hayman (former owner of ECW), Prodigy Chat, 1997
Professional wrestlers fall into a number of broad categories, all of which can be seen plying their particular brand of the art on a primetime US wrestling show. The steroid monster specialises in power, power and more power as he tosses his hapless foes about the ring. The technical assassin pinpoints the chink in his opponent’s armour, his Achilles heel, and focuses on that one target to render him helpless. The luchador ascends to the top of the ring-ropes and launches himself through the air to catch his opponent in a breath-taking aerial attack. The brawler, on the other hand, uses the most immediate and most devastating line of offence available; most often with breathtaking and stomach-churning effect.
On top of these considerations of style, there is then the work ethic of the individual wrestler to be taken into consideration. Some grapplers are gifted athletes easily able to make the transition to the ring. Of course there are men and women whom, while impressive physical specimens, have little real talent or presence in the squared circle. Others still are clumsy or just plain lazy. But in the face of these mediocre talents, the wrestling promoter has a weapon in the form the worker. The worker can be virtually any kind of wrestler when it comes to style, but the one thing they have in common is the willingness and ability to produce a consistent level of quality ring-work (hence the name, duh!) in their matches regardless of the opponent they are pitted against. To put it simply, a good worker can make a mediocre wrestler look good, he can sell him to the crowd and convince them of his prowess as a result of his own skilful reactions to the opponents moves.
After nearly two decades in the wrestling business, Scott Levy is renowned as both a skilled brawler and a superlative worker who has competed under various ring-names in many different promotions over the years. This entry and the subsequent parts to follow will document his long and varied career charting the highs and lows along the way.
The Early Years
Born on 18th September 1964 in Short Hills, New Jersey, Levy attended the University of Delaware where he majored in criminal law. Opting for the hard road of the professional wrestler, he trained under the veteran Larry Sharpe at a wrestling school known as the Monster Factory.
Making his professional debut in 1987 at the tender age of 23 in the NWA Pacific North West promotion, Levy adopted the moniker Scotty "The Body" Anthony. Here he made a resounding success of his rookie year and went on to lift firstly the promotion's tag-team titles with Top Gun and later in his tenure the NWA TV title.
Moving on to pastures new in the form of the GWF, where he shortened his ring-name to simply Scott Anthony, Levy didn't linger there long and soon arrived in the more high-profile environment of the WCW. At that time in the early nineties the Atlanta promotion was home to a style of booking heavily influenced by the territories of the deep south and boasted the likes of Ric Flair and Arn Anderson as its top echelon of stars, whom though past their prime still drew the crowds by reputation alone.
Adopting the brash and arrogant persona of Scotty Flamingo, Levy joined the ranks of the then vibrant cruiserweight division of the promotion alongside the likes of the late "Flyin" Brian Pillman and Jushin "Thunder" Liger. The highlight of Scotty Flamingo's tenure in the WCW came in 1992 when he pinned Pillman, relieving him of the WCW Light Heavyweight belt.
Stanford calling
When the opportunity presented itself, Levy jumped ship from Atlanta to Stanford and inked a contract with Vince McMahon's WWF. Once there it was time for Levy to learn at first hand some of the rather harsh realities of working for the WWF. First and foremost was (and still is) the fact that Vince is the boss, and what he says goes.
For a start Scotty Flamingo was out, the WWF had always been loathe to market any but the most popular, recognised and revered grapplers under the ring-names they had used elsewhere for fear of loosing its well cultivated image as the most innovative and original force in sports entertainment. Thus "Johnny Polo" was born, a spoilt brat who sported the riding boots and pants of the sport he was named after and carried with him at all times a polo-mallet that inevitably became a part of the in-ring action. Secondly the fact that Levy had worked main-events and lifted his fair share of championship gold over the short years of his career meant nothing in the WWF. The well documented bias against wrestlers of a smaller stature in the promotion and Levy's status as an unproven quantity there relegated him to the status of a manager rather than an active member of the roster.
That is not to say that Levy was kept out of the public eye. Johnny Polo accompanied Brian Clarke to the side of the ring in his time as "Adam Bomb." Thankfully Polo was soon elevated to the position of manager to the promotion's top heel tag-team of the time, the "Quebecers." Becoming embroiled in the team's feud with the Steiner Brothers and their eventual rise to the position of tag-team champions meant that Johnny Polo enjoyed much time and exposure on WWF programming. The point even came when Levy was allowed into the ring himself under the premise that Polo had tried his hand at managing and now wanted to try wrestling as well hoping to add yet another string to his already formidable bow. Unsurprisingly the few matches that Johnny Polo got to compete in were hardly classics and usually followed the formula of the plucky manager being pitted against a mid-card performer of little or no consequence and muddling through to a victory with the help of his charges the Quebecers who would be on hand to waffle the opposition with a foreign object at the critical moment.
While his time as a manager did little to raise the value of his stock as a wrestler, it did allow Levy to develop and hone his skills in other areas. In the arrogant but increasingly roguish and irrepressible character of Johnny Polo he was able to spend time working on interview skills and mic work that would later shine through in his most famous in-ring incarnation. This refinement of Levy's already charismatic nature was further endorsed by the WWF when the powers that be in the promotion decided that rather than assign Johnny Polo to a new managerial role when his time with the Quebecers came to a logical conclusion he would instead assume the role of "colour commentator" on television broadcasts on a regular basis.
The role of the colour commentator is a well documented piece of pro-wrestling tradition and without doubt one of the most demanding outside the wrestling ring itself. Paired with a "play-by-play man" who's job is to offer a commentary on the actual in-ring action, the colour commentator is charged with the responsibility of bringing (in the best cases at least) an equal element of antagonism and humour into the equation. More often than not the play-by-play man falls into the role of good guy to the colour commentator's bad guy simply by default as the formers outrage at the antics of the heel wrestlers provides a brilliant foil for the more outrageous proclamations of the latter. Johnny Polo played the role of bad guy well, but when teamed with such old veterans as the late "Gorilla" Monsoon, literally shone as a mischievous wipper-snapper alongside the almost paternal qualities of the older hand. When working together Polo and "Uncle Gorilla" as he insisted upon calling Monsoon, were a lively and amusing pair that never failed to spark off one another well.
But as with all good things, both Levy's time as Johnny Polo and his tenure with the WWF came to an end as he left Stanford for Tennessee and the small-time USWA. Here he once again resumed the ring name Scotty Flamingo and returned to the role of grappler full time. Levy tarried long enough to lift the promotions tag-titles with Brian Christopher (later Grandmaster Sexay in the WWF tag-team Too Cool). But times were changing and Levy soon went solo and headed to the cooler climes of Philadelphia where a new and vibrant promotion was making waves.
