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00:00We're here to slice and dice the world of wrestling, and you're not going to know what hit ya.
00:08It's going to rock your world.
00:12Wrestling legend Hulk Hogan and former World Championship Wrestling President Eric Biscoff are reuniting for a new kind of wrestling league.
00:21Real American Freestyle is an unscripted competition, putting America's best male and female wrestlers head to head.
00:29This is awesome.
00:30They both join us now, along with their new chief operating officer, Real American Freestyle of Izzy Martinez.
00:35Welcome, guys.
00:36Welcome.
00:37So, Hulk, this is not the flamboyant WWE style.
00:42This is real wrestling, right?
00:45Yes, it is.
00:46It's freestyle wrestling, and it's professional now because we get to pay the athletes.
00:51And Izzy's our linchpin.
00:52He has trained all the Olympic athletes, all the NCAA champions, all the college kids that really have made it.
00:59And he was our source to pull in all these great athletes and get everybody signed.
01:04And our goal is not to be competitive with Dana White, the UFC, or the WWE, but to be just as big or bigger because this is an underserved market.
01:13But Izzy, these guys have swagger, right?
01:15They're different.
01:16They got the profile.
01:16But that's the goal.
01:18The goal is to showcase the world, the sport of wrestling, and showcase these athletes and give them an unbelievable opportunity to be stars, megastars.
01:26Yeah.
01:27And, Eric, you've already signed, I think, 40.
01:30So, three or four dozen guys you've got lined up.
01:33They're going to be able to make real money.
01:35So, yeah, it's taking, you know, freestyle wrestling, amateur wrestling at the collegiate level, Olympic level, we're all familiar with that.
01:43But there's nowhere for those athletes to go once that career is over.
01:47And this is going to give them an opportunity to make a living doing something they love.
01:51And many of them have been doing it since they were, like, five years old, right?
01:54And, Izzy, we were talking during the commercial break.
01:56I was saying, are they going to make their own personalities?
01:59I know it's unscripted.
02:00And who are some of the athletes that are your favorites that you think are going to rise to the top?
02:04Well, on the women's side, we have Kennedy Blades, a 2024 Olympic silver medalist, 21 years old, pound-for-pound best woman wrestler in America and collegiate level this year.
02:15She's a star in the making.
02:17And then on the men's side, we have some of the top wrestlers in the world.
02:20We've got Ben Askren, Zahid Valencia.
02:22And we just have a lot of great wrestlers that are coming together for this.
02:25So, Hulk, you usually have an option if you're a great wrestler, WWE or UFC, and then you've got to learn different type of disciplines.
02:33Now, we saw the emotion in Pennsylvania when President Trump came out at the NCAA Finals.
02:38We see the crowds in Iowa.
02:40We see it in certain sections of middle America.
02:42How do you capture that and bring that to the major cities?
02:46Well, you make—basically, you know, we're going to go to all the major venues.
02:49Our first one is August 30th in Cleveland.
02:52But the main thing is, like, because Eric's so darn important to this venture, he knows how to deliver, produce, and make the fans care about these athletes.
03:01Like, when Eric was explaining it to me, he goes, it's like The Voice.
03:05You shoot the back story, you know.
03:06He broke his leg when he was younger.
03:08His family fell apart.
03:09Or he had—
03:10Right.
03:11Rewards, you know, for wrestling growing up.
03:13But once we find out what the back story is, when these guys come through the tunnel, you already care about the athletes.
03:19Plus, I was worried when I first hooked up with Izzy because of the charisma and the business I did.
03:25You know, we like to entertain people, too.
03:27That's right.
03:27I was worried about these young guys being, like, flat white bread, you know.
03:31And once I got around them, they all got that Conor McGregor swagger.
03:35They've been watching TV.
03:36They've been watching promos.
03:38They know about branding.
03:39They understand the opportunity not only to make a ton of money doing what they love, freestyle wrestling, but also the licensing, the merchandising.
03:47Here's what's different.
03:48Sometimes it's boring.
03:50It's great for wrestlers to watch, but you're just hooked up forever and then the out of bounds.
03:53Do you change any of the rules?
03:55There's going to be incentives to—much like you'll see in the UFC.
03:58So there'll be incentives that are different from collegiate rules or Olympic rules that will incentivize some of the more dramatic kind of takedowns and tosses and things that are just—
04:09When should we watch it?
04:10When can we watch it?
04:11Yeah, when can we go?
04:12August 30th is our first event in Cleveland, Ohio.
04:15Wolstein Center.
04:16Okay, Hulk, you're famous for this.
04:18How about a promo?
04:19We'll give you 20 seconds.
04:20Right to that camera.
04:22Tell us what it's about.
04:23It's going to be crazy, brother.
04:24You know, I'm in New York City.
04:26I got all lit up last night.
04:27I saw Hulk Hogan's Sports Bar right down the street next to Madison Square Garden.
04:33Everybody in New York City is drinking real American beer.
04:36And now I got the best of the best with me.
04:39We're taking amateur wrestling and we're making it the black and blue.
04:43All right, very nice.
04:44The black and blue of professional freestyle wrestling.
04:46So what are you going to do?
04:48Awesome.
04:49We're going to watch.
04:50That's what we're going to do.
04:51Well, good luck to all of you.
04:52Thank you, brother.
04:53More Fox and Friends coming up.
04:54What does it say?
04:56More Fox and Friends, brother.