ROUND TWO

One word of advice writers should follow is, "Write what you know."

An example of somebody who's really nailed that bit of advice is Michael Francis "Mick" Foley, who initially became famous as a wrestler for WCW, ECW, WWE, and TNA and has cultivated a second career as a writer with "Have a Nice Day: A Tale of Blood and Sweatsocks," "Foley Is Good: And The Real World Is Faker Than Wrestling," "The Hardcore Diaries," and "Countdown To Lockdown: A Hardcore Journal," as well as a series of children's books starring his own characters, the Wrescles, (illustrated by Jill Thompson, who has also illustrated a certain Amazing Amazon) and two novels for adults, "Scooter," and "Tietam Brown." If you haven't purchased them from your favorite book provider or borrowed them from your local public library, by all means, please do.

John Grisham? Not so much.

Wait a minute, I hear you say, John Grisham is the maestro, the king, the zenith, the Motorola (got a little carried away) of legal fiction. Well, I WILL give him what the Girl Scouts would call "Brownie points" for creating an entertaining, interesting antihero in Sebastian Rudd, the titular ROGUE LAWYER of his most recent book. Bernie Sanders would love him for hating the one percent, and you gotta admit, he DOES defend some very interesting characters, BUT, and here comes the big
BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUT........................He's involved with MMA, and any MMA fan worth his UFC Fight Club membership knows that UFC fighters, unlike WWE Superstars, for example, are real athletes who see no reason to hide behind fictional personas. John Grisham doesn't exactly have the world of MMA nailed, as the athlete Sebastian is involved with has a pretty hokey stage name.

On a scale of "NO MAS! NO MAS!" to KNOCKOUT, this would have been a twelve-round victory (slightly below KNOCKOUT) if it weren't for Grisham's errors, this is more like a "Referee-stops-the-bout-at-ten-rounds-out-of twelve," for  want of a better analogy. John Grisham should dance with the one what brung him, a/k/a the legal profession.

Before we ring the final bell, I would like to wax anecdotal about the piece of fan fiction I shared with Mick Foley a few years back. This was after The Rock guest hosted SNL (with Mick and Triple H crashing the party) and he played Superman as only he could. (His super-muscles bulged through his Clark Kent cover.) Right after The Rock and the cast said good night, I worked on a story treatment of a possible DC-WWE crossover comic involving the Man of Steel and the Big Johnson (His publicists call him that, not me.) in a knock-down, drag-em-out fight with Lex Luthor and the Undertaker.(Lex pulled a Kryptonite rock out of his wrestling boot and showed it to Supes who used his last ounce of super-strength to tag The Rock who leveled the 'Taker with the People's Elbow.) Mick loved it when I showed it to him at a sports expo at the Javits Center and promised to show it to Mr. and Mrs. McMahon, but Mike Carlin, DC's Superman group editor at the time (and, ironically, the man who took old Supes out leaving fans around the world in mourning and the Marvel Bullpens on both sides of the Atlantic gloating) told me that much as he loved it, he couldn't see somebody like Superman hanging out with anybody from the WWE. Oh,well! At least his one time colleague Mark Gruenwald (May he rest in peace!) created a comic relief character to play off Captain America named D-Man who happened to wrestle for the fictional Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation. and believe me, D-Man was NO Rock!

Turn out the lights, the party's over! See ya in the ring!
Steve