The most recent wrestling personality to appear on Chris Jericho's Podcast One show was former WWE Champion and current announcer John Layfield, better known to fans as JBL. The man formerly known as Bradshaw has had a lengthy career with WWE, dating back to late 1995 when he signed his contract, debuting the following January as Justin "Hawk" Bradshaw, a Texan roughneck heavily inspired by Stan Hansen. He had a respectable career as a tag team wrestler, most notably as one half of the APA (Acolyte Protection Agency) with Ron Simmons before a sudden dearth of name talent forced WWE to repackage him as John Bradshaw Layfiend--JBL, for short--and shove him into the main event scene. While his matches may not have been lighting the world on fire, he was doing his job in the ring and getting tremendous heat through his promos. The character was great at infuriating the audience, with his persona being that of a filthy rich Texan who thinks everyone is beneath him, a direct analogue of JR Ewing from the television series Dallas. JBL was a classic overachiever, admitting himself that he made it farther in wrestling than anyone ever expected him to, including himself. He's one of only 10 grand slam champions in WWE history, winning all of the promotion's championships during his active tenure. Nowadays he spends every Monday night in our ears while he has Vince in his, as one of the three voices behind the commentary desk of Monday Nitro. Much can be said about the announce team and very little of it would be good, but JBL is a guy who does a job, so there's that. Knowing the way that job is micro-managed, it's hard to fault them for their performance, at least entirely. Outside the ring he's a fairly interesting guy, and he touched on some of his non-wrestling passions as well as giving us an interesting look into his history and some important moments in wrestling during his appearance on Talk Is Jericho. So sit back, relax, and find out 10 things we learned.
Brad Hamilton is a writer, musician and marketer/social media manager from Atlanta, Georgia. He's an undefeated freestyle rap battle champion, spends too little time being productive and defines himself as the literary version of Brock Lesnar.
