This past Summer, June 30th to be exact, My former tag team partner and one of my best friends in the entire world Del Wilkes aka The Patriot passed away at the age of 59.
For those who may not know, we were a popular tag team in WCW called Star And Stripes and were former 2 time WCW World Tag Team Champions.
We had 107 matches total as a tag team. We faced many classic tag teams including Harlem Heat, Pretty Wonderful, The Nasty Boys, The Southern Posse, The Blue Bloods, The Stud Stable, Just to name a few.
But my friendship with Del was much deeper than that. In a business where you have so many acquaintances and very few friends, Del Wilkes was a true solid friend.
He was the guy who always stood up for me when others would bad mouth me, He was the guy who first saw my love for the business and the work ethic that I had and he was the guy that was man enough to apologize to me for introducing me to Somas.
A lot of you know who Buff Bagwell is but very few people know who Marcus Alexander Bagwell is and even fewer people wanna know. Del Wilkes was one
of those people who knew who Marcus was and has stood by me through my most difficult times. And he continued to be that guy long after he retired from the business.
To say that I was sad about his death would be an understatement, but what helped me get through it and what continues to help me get through it was remembering all the fun times we had together. In the ring, out of the ring and even on the road traveling together in a van with Sting as the third wheel.
Interestingly enough, today is the anniversary of the second time we won the WCW World Tag Team Titles. And in the spirit of that I want all the Stars And Stripes fans to know that if you wanna see the absolute best of Stars And Stripes, you can go to the online store and purchase yourself a DVD that features some of our classic matches (click the pic to go to the store)
Also you can check out the interview that my manager Vinny Bucci and I did with Del Wilkes Below.
Finally, I wanna take this time to thank all the fans that loved and supported Stars And Stripes during our run. I also wanna say that my heart still goes out Del's family and I hope that are able to get back to some type level of normal after grieving for so long.
And of course I wanna thank everyone for taking the time to read this and I look forward to seeing you soon in a town near you.
Peace Out!
