It’s March. That means everything has to be a tournament, right?

This year, we’re playing along. We’ve built an incredible, incredibly funny community of wrestling fans at With Leather thanks to the popularity of the Best and Worst of Raw and Impact columns, and with WrestleMania fast approaching, I thought now would be the perfect time to organize a reader input fueled, wrestling themed tournament.

So, I hereby formally announce the 1st Annual With Leather Bad Wrestling Theme Lyrics March Madness Tournament. Here’s how it’s going to work:

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On Monday, we shared with you the best (Cactus Jack) and very, very worst (Hail) of World Championship Wrestling’s 8×10 promo photos from the 1990s. If you thought Dave Sullivan petting a rabbit was as deep as the well ran, you’re in for a treat.

Behold, part two of our epic WCW promo photos quest, once again visiting the pro wrestling company that threatened to put WWE out of business before collapsing in on itself and folding in the shadow of stars like Kwee Wee and Disqo. The next 50 WCW photos tell the story of the company … full of amazing pro wrestling talent, but also (unfortunately) full of everything else. Take a long, hard look at that picture of Ric Flair. If you can’t see the terror in his eyes, you’ll start to pick it up around slide 30.

If you showed part one to everybody you know, follow-up with this one.

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Update: Part 2 is now up. Check it out!

Back in September, we shared A Golden Treasury Of Cheesy Late-80s/Early-90s WWF Promo Photos, a collection of the best photos from pro wrestler 8x10s. If you missed that … yeah, you should click the link.

Anyway, I was never a WWF kid when I was growing up. I was born in southern Virginia and was raised on the National Wrestling Alliance — if you’re a WWF lifer, that means we had Ric Flair when you had Hulk Hogan — and eventually what the NWA became, World Championship Wrestling. You may remember WCW from its sudden, crazy popularity in the late 1990s when Hulk Hogan became a bad guy, Sting became The Crow and WWF put as many curse words and dick jokes on television as they could to combat it. Spoiler: the dick jokes won.

That said, WCW is still my favorite thing, and if I’m going to share the worst of WWF’s promo photos, I might as well dip into the endless well of embarrassment that is the WCW library. What follows is only part one of a series, because holy shit you will not believe some of these pictures.

Enjoy, and show this to everyone you’ve ever known.

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Last night, while Dwyane Wade was kicking Ramon Sessions in the balls on purpose and then acting all offended that someone could even insinuate that he’d ever commit a dirty foul, LeBron James was distracted by the Charlotte Bobcats’ No. 1 fan (I assume) and former WWE and WCW champion Ric Flair. It turns out that Flair was sitting courtside as the Bobcats lost their 16th consecutive game with a 105-92 ball-stomping by the Miami Heat.

Apparently James was a huge wrasslin’ fan as a child, and the Nature Boy had quite the impact on his, specifically in that Flair possibly invented the baller lifestyle.

“When I was a kid, I loved wrestling,” James told the Associated Press. “He was one of the guys I loved, too. I think he’s one of the creators of what we call swag these days with the Rolexes and the stretch limos and all the girls and all that stuff. He’s one of the creators of swag.” (Via CBS Philly)

In case you’re wondering, the other creators of swag include Richard Nixon, Phyllis Diller and my dad, because he can totally beat up your dad.

But before we slide a little further into love with James, let’s just remember that he’s been on a non-stop PR tour ever since the Heat won the NBA title. He wants the common man and average American to love him, so of course he’s trying to relate to our love of cheap cell phone plans, colorful shoes and one of the most entertaining wrestlers of all-time.

You see, it starts with Ric Flair and then soon he’s like, “Hey, you know what was an awesome TV show? Perfect Strangers.” And you’re like, “Yeah, that was a good show, let’s do the Dance of Joy.” And then he hesitates while one of his boys drugs your drink and you wake up in a dumpster. Fool me once, LeBron. Fool me once.

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If you haven’t seen it by now, WWE.com put together their list of the 50 Most Beautiful People In Wrestling Sports-Entertainment History. Like a lot of WWE.com lists, it was fine, but it was also full of sketchy choices. Erick Bischoff? Jack Brisco? Sable higher than Maryse? Triple H at #44?

For better or worse, the list got us talking. Pro wrestling wasn’t created as a job opportunity for pretty people, but a lot of beautiful people have wandered through it in our lifetime, so who would I pick? Who would my friends pick, or the people I know who write about wrestling online, or wrestlers themselves?

The answer? We’re doing a re-list.

I got together with 27 (!) important internet wrestling types — including pro wrestlers from WWE to the independent circuit, comedians, writers, podcasters, the UPROXX network staff and even fans — to put together a more in-touch rebuttal to WWE’s list. It’s a look at who we think really deserves a spot on the top 50, and … you’re already flipping through the list, aren’t you? Fine, I’ll shut up.

Here is your CELEBRITY (AND OTHER PEOPLE) GUEST PANEL. These people were nice enough to help out, and deserve your love and follow:

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If I told you that former UFC fighter Tank Abbott had taken a break from fighting to the death at cookouts to write a trilogy of old-adult novels about a legendary bar brawler who totally never fought someone at a cookout and is instead a college student and also a WANDERING VIGILANTE who hates “posers” and “bullies,” what would you say? What would you expect him to include in the narrative?

If your answers were “hahah what,” and “dogs named after Adolph Hitler” respectively, BOY, ARE YOU IN FOR A TREAT. Welcome to the wonderful, wonderful world of Before There Were Rules, A Trilogy By #1 MMA Cagefighting Legend David “Tank” Abbott, Book One, Bar Brawler, A Novel. At least, I think that’s the formal title. He should’ve written “A BOOK” and “BY ME” under A Novel, just to make sure.

Here are the opening lines. PREPARE YOUR ASSES.

“Gunslinger of the bars, where a duel was a fist-fight without weapons or you backed down by calling the bouncers. It was just kicking ass or getting your ass kicked. The gunslinger didn’t care if he won or lost, but only about his personal integrity and being satisfied when he woke up in the morning that he had delivered justice to a deserving cockroach.”

There’s no way this is real. The guys at Progressive Boink are just f**king with me. This is a Story Of Intrigue, right? God, I hope the original draft of that paragraph read: “My name is Tank Abortt, I’m am a MNA Fighter, one thing I know is that your a pussy and if we got into a fight I would win because I aren’t a pussy. I’m Tonk Abbott, most legendary of all the bars. Come phase me so I can put the BOMB on you!!” I also hope Bob Sapp is the only person who got to read that draft.

The book description from the book’s — ahem, novel’s — Amazon page is below. Read every word of it. You cannot understand how wonderful this is. His dog is named after Hitler.

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