It's taken Mark Henry 18 years to learn his best value as a professional wrestler. At year eight of being a wrestler bearing a strange similarity to Henry, WWE actually threw in the towel too soon. George Murdock was a bodyguard for Snoop Dogg. Mark Henry was an Olympic-level bodybuilder. Both got into the wrestling business because of their size, and early on showed minimal knowledge of the psychology and killer instinct that WWE requires of its plus-sized brawlers. Similar to Henry, it's not as if WWE really ever gave him any considerable assistance in learning that skill, as similar to Henry, Clay was a bodyguard for Alberto del RIo, then taken off of TV for awhile, re-packaged as a jovial, dancing fat man, and when that showed no staying power, put in a tag team with the then Tensai, now Jason Albert. WWE is not a kind environment for newcomers to the wrestling industry. If brand new, it requires more than you know, and oftentimes much more than you can learn with mastery at any given time. If put in situations because of size and charisma that don't actually allow you to hone the skills ACTUALLY required to succeed in the role in which the company would ideally want one to succeed, it's an uphill battle. There's ten years of growth, development and promise left in the Brodus Clay story. Here's to hoping that he's able to find the space and drive to master certain abilities and make it back to WWE.
Besides having been an independent professional wrestling manager for a decade, Marcus Dowling is a Washington, DC-based writer who has contributed to a plethora of online and print magazines and newspapers writing about music and popular culture over the past 15 years.
