Q&A With Koloff- #161

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When only the best is needed, see Dr. Johnny Gayton at eyesightassociates.com. This is the Truth Network. Ladies and gentlemen, the following contest is set for one flaw. Introducing first, from Lithuania, he weighs 123 kilos, the Russian nightmare, Nikita Kolob. Welcome to another episode of Q&A with Kolob, the Devil's Nightmare. You get to ask me the questions, because normally, if you're listening to the Man Up show, and I hope that you are, it's time to man up with Nikita Kolob. You know that I'm usually asking all of the questions, or at least a good majority of the questions over there, but here, I give you the opportunity, you the caller, the opportunity to ask me a few questions. And today, on the show with me today, I have a special friend, Don Brown Esquire.

Welcome to Q&A with Kolob. Good to be here, Nikita. It's an honor to be here. Thanks for having me. So, Don Brown Esquire, for those who may not be aware of who Don Brown is, how about taking a minute and just kind of filling our listeners in on who Don Brown is?

Thank you, Nikita. I am, first of all, a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ, and beyond that, you could say that nothing matters, but he has given us the opportunity for friends and family, so other things do matter. So, I'm also a father of three, two daughters living here. I live in the Charlotte area, I've moved into Union County recently, and my daughters are grown, and one's a nurse, the other one is a judge here in the Charlotte area, and my son is a staff sergeant in the United States Army stationed overseas as a paratrooper, and those guys are in my prayers all the time.

Also, I'm a practicing attorney, have written a few books, and I'm just a guy who's very blessed and happy to be here above all else. Well, and of course, you are in the Charlotte, North Carolina area, and I know you have a military background as well, right? The US Navy?

That's right. I was a US Navy JAG officer, spent 16 years altogether, five of that active, the rest in the reserves, and left the Navy, but it was the best, probably the five years active were the most exciting professionally of my life, and one of the things I always wonder, you know, you've got all kinds of what-if questions, you know, what if I'd stayed, and I wrestled with that, so I'm not doing any good, but those were great years, and it was a great time. I'm honored to serve our nation in uniform, and I hope to continue to defend it the best I can to defend our Constitution, so the Lord has given us a great nation. I hope that we can once again begin to appreciate what he's given us. We have not done such a great job in the last few years, but we've got to go back to the basics, and go back to the basics.

I think we'll be okay. Yeah, and you know what's amazing to me, and I'm sure you can relate in all of your travels as well, and to date I've been to 36 different countries so far, and Don, I remember the very first time I went to a third world country. Prior to that, I'd been outside the state, I'd wrestled in Japan, and went over to the Middle East, and wrestled over there, and traveled some to Europe, but to go to a third world country really will open your eyes. I remember coming back going, every single person in the United States should go to a third world country for like a week, and they'll come back and really appreciate what we have in America. And it sounds kind of overinflated in a sense to say we're the greatest nation on the planet, but the truth is, the reality is, why does everyone want to come here? Well, because we are the land of opportunity, right? We truly are the greatest nation on the planet, and like you, if we ever needed to fight to maintain that status, now is the time, right?

That's exactly right. Our nation is a trust given to us, it's being held in trust, given to us by the Lord, the constitutional republic that we've been given, which is designed, the constitution is a document designed by nature to serve as a restraining device against excessive government power. Because when you restrain a bunch of your opponents, I see you many, many times, we'll talk about that in a second, but when you restrain excessive government power, you allow freedom to flourish. But we've got to be more disciplined.

As a great internationally acclaimed professional athlete, you know discipline better than anybody. As a nation, we've got to be more disciplined, we've got to be physically disciplined, we've got to be disciplined in many, many areas spiritually, we've got to return to discipline and return to protecting that cherished gift that we have. We're the richest nation on the face of the earth, in part because of the US dollar, but as I mentioned to you when you interviewed me on another occasion, with a $33 trillion national debt, that's $100,000, you divide that up, that's every man, woman, and child owed $100,000 just to settle the debt. We've got to turn that back around or else we could be headed to the very third world status that you're talking about, because once we lose the dollar, when Britain lost the pound sterling, it became much, much weaker, like any other country.

So we've got to protect what we have. But you're right, you know this better than most because of your international travels and you've seen what it's like on the other side of the fence. I have, and I do my best to try and enlighten others to really appreciate and understand what we have here in America. And speaking of that too, and fighting for our freedom, I always thank you for serving in the military, I know that might go without saying, but I still like to say thank you. And your son, you said he's serving overseas as well, right?

Yeah, he is overseas, I can't say exactly where for security reasons, but I can tell you that his unit is gassed up and ready to go if they have to go. So we pray not only for our nation, but I would ask a special prayer for the United States military, those men and women serving are under a lot of pressure. We have not met our recruiting goals, the Army and Air Force, the last few years, and there are a number of reasons for that.

But keep them in prayer as well. I am from a military family, my dad was in the Army in the DMZ at the very end of the Korean War, and that got me interested. My uncle Walter was a turret gunner on a B-29 in World War II, so I'm the only Navy guy in my family. I tried to talk my son into going to the Navy, but he wanted to follow both of his grandfathers, so more power to him, I'm very very proud of him, but thank you for bringing that up. Well, and in addition to your serving, of course in the Charlotte community there you have a very thriving law practice, but there's something else that you are in the midst of pursuing in addition to being an attorney there, and that is a run for Congress, right?

That's right. The Wednesday before Thanksgiving, I made a late-breaking decision after a lot of prayer and back and forth to seek the Congressional seat being vacated by my good friend Dan Bishop in the 8th District of North Carolina. I had lunch with Dan last New Year's Eve, he confided in me, he was thinking about leaving the Congress to run for Attorney General. I try to talk him out of it because he's been such a great Congressman, he will be a great Attorney General, but he elected to pursue running for North Carolina Attorney General, leaving that seat open in the 8th District. So we have a Republican primary for March 5th, and so by God's grace I'm going to give it a shot, and I hope to take the battle of Washington to try to help ramp in some of this out of control spending and some of these crazy woke policies that the Democrats have been pushing. Anybody that wants to check my website out for my campaign is brown4nc.com. Thanks for the opportunity to pitch that for a second Nikita, I really appreciate it.

Yes sir, absolutely. We're going to keep all of that in prayer for you as well. You mentioned, I know we didn't really touch much, we mentioned being a book author, if people wanted to go and find out more about your books, where might they do that? Well I go to Amazon, type in Don Brown, my author website is DonBrownBooks.com, I'll say that again, DonBrownBooks.com, you'll probably find a Wikipedia article or two out there also if anybody wants to look a little bit. But if anybody wants a book, if you'd like to see them in my office, I'm happy to autograph, we'll mail them back to you. We really appreciate our readers, and I've been privileged to, as you mentioned, have 15 published, most of my major publishers, and I've met a lot of friends and I've learned a lot, so it's been a real blessing in many ways for me. It takes a lot of work, but something I've enjoyed, so thank you for also allowing me to speak about that for a bit. Yes sir, well you have a very diversified background and it's certainly been fun to watch your journey, and continue to watch your journey and see what direction and where the Lord takes you, so I appreciate your story. Well it is Q&A with Koloff, and so I want to give you the opportunity to ask me a couple, two or three questions and just see where you take this, because I have no idea what you're going to ask.

Just two or three man, now we're going to do the fun part of the show. Okay so listen, so here, I'm your big fan, one of millions, so you've got millions of Nikita Koloff fans, millions of NWA fans, my first question is this, the great Jim Crockett was a legend in helping to get all this started. Can you talk to us a little bit about your relationship with him, what he was like behind the scenes, how that evolved, I mean, I know there's many of us on the edge of the seat. So Jim Crockett Jr., because it was Jim Crockett Sr., so I didn't get the opportunity to meet or get to know Sr. because he had already passed by the time I had jumped into that crazy world of professional wrestling, and I'm always amazed Don, by the way, let me just say this too, and I will get to answering the question, you know, as to who is a wrestling fan, because some may look at you and say, hey, I got your background, right, a very successful attorney, you know, a JAG officer, worked in the Pentagon, you know, been on Fox News, authored 15 books, and go, wait a minute, this guy's a wrestling fan, wait, how'd that happen, right?

You better believe it. But some don't really, because you're a North Carolina native, and wrestling was big in the Carolinas, right? Oh, no, no, I remember Mitt Roddy many times, they used to call it the Cow Palace, Dorton Arena, you know, they were, I get to watch this thing live in Dorton Arena, man, and then watch on TV, and I just grew up with it. So anyway, that's why I asked the question about Crockett, because I know Crockett Jr. was the guy you were dealing with, but you know, it's something we all wonder about, but yeah, so no, absolutely, I think, you know, you don't know where you're going to find your fans, man, and it's the best unadulterated sports entertainment out there. You know, more bang for your buck than, I mean, I like the NFL, okay, but I gotta watch four hours of it, man, but this is like, NWA is like dynamite, man, it's like instant bang for your buck with every move, so I don't need to, you're supposed to be answering the questions, not me, but you know.

I just want you to understand why. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I love it, well, and for our listeners out there too, so you bring up something, and I am going to get the answer, I am going to eventually answer your question, but so you mentioned the Dorton Arena in Raleigh, now you may or may not know, so here's a little side note for you, so the Dorton Arena in Raleigh was where I debuted in my wrestling career. Yeah, and it kind of ties into answering your question, because I didn't know who Jim Crockett was, Jim Crockett senior or junior, I didn't know what the NWA was, now, you know, I grew up, you know, in Minnesota, in Minneapolis, right, so, you know, just burst somebody's bubble, I'm not from Russia. No, no, but the Russian nightmares, not even, it has a drop of Russian blood in him, but anyway, that's a whole other story, but so for many, I was familiar with the AWA, American Wrestling Association, Vergania, but not really a wrestling fan, but I was familiar with that, so my introduction to the NWA was from a five minute phone call that I had with Jim Crockett junior, and that came via Road Warrior Animal, is who that came through, the infamous Road Warriors, Animal and Hawk, right, I had recruited Animal out of high school, Iredale High School, in New Brighton, Minnesota, to play college football with me, he played for a couple years, he dropped out, the next thing I know, he's on this channel called the Super Station, TBS, you know, with his head like shaved in a mohawk, and all this paint on his face, and he randomly calls me one day, and tells me about this storyline of they're looking for a big guy to shave his head, become a Russian, and team up with a guy named Ivan Kolov, right, the legendary Russian, my uncle, Uncle Ivan, that's right, Uncle Ivan, and the infamous Russian bear, right, and again, I didn't know who Ivan Kolov was from Adam's house cat, right? If you would like to support Kolov for Christ Ministries, for a gift of $25, Nikita will send you his two CDs, Adoration and Declaration, for a gift of $50, Nikita will include his book, Wrestling with Success, and for a gift of $100 or more, Nikita will include a signed copy of his newly updated life story, A Tale of the Ring and Redemption.

Go to www.kolov.net and donate today. You're listening to the Truth Network and truthnetwork.com Nikita Kolov here, and I am excited. Did you hear the huge announcement, the big announcement? Well, maybe it's a minor announcement.

Anyway, Facebook, go look up my new fan page, Nikita Kolov Fans, and like it, and follow today. You're listening to the Truth Network and truthnetwork.com. He goes, yep, and I go, well, what's next? He goes, well, be in my office on such and such a day with your head shaved bald. I'm like, that's it? He goes, that's it.

I'm like, okay. I hung up the phone. In fact, just yesterday, just last night, a friend of mine sent me a picture of the old Crockett office on just off of South Boulevard. It was a converted convenience store, Don. Did you know that? I did not know that, no. Fascinating.

The NWA headquarters was a converted convenience store. I did not know that, right? But I now have that picture on my phone. So all that to say, I show up the day he says to be there, introduce myself. He takes a look at me, and I don't always tell this part of the story, but he's like, hey, take your shirt off.

I'm like, well, that's kind of weird, but okay. And he goes, wait right here. He walks out, walks back in. He's got two guys with him.

He goes, take a look at you. This is your new partner here. It was Don Cardona, Ivan Koloff, the World Tag Team Champions. And they're like, he needs a name, right? Now, I knew I was going to be the nephew of Ivan, right? And so they gave me Nikita and some other name, Russian, you know, but I don't even know what that was to this day. But when I heard Nikita, I'm educated enough to remember Nikita Khrushchev. Yes.

Right. And so I'm like, Nikita Koloff, that's got a pretty good ring to it. And so I look at Mr. Crockett and I said, I like Nikita.

He goes, okay. So Nikita Koloff's born in the hallways of Charlotte. We do hours of interviews. And then he says, be in Raleigh, North Carolina, my night, the Dorton Arena, you're going to debut on television, having never been in a ring. You've had some television experience from football at this point though, is that correct?

Some, yeah, but not talking on microphones in front of cameras and, you know, wrestling in front of crowds, but yes. So yes, that part is true. But all that, so let me just kind of wrap all this up as a long-winded answer, I know.

Good answer, man. Well, hopefully you and our listeners are enjoying this. So here's something about Jim Crockett Jr. that I don't always share, but you asked the question. And that is, I guess in a sense, you know, Crockett must have seen dollar, you know, there must have been dollar signs like rolling through his eyes, you know, thinking when he met me, thinking if this guy can do anything, I think I can make some money off this guy. Well, I eventually became a, I guess you'd say a favorite of Jim Crockett Jr. And I'll never forget, he eventually bought a couple private planes, and I'll never forget the pilots one time telling me, they said, we have permission to take off as long as, it's seated 10 guys, Don, right? This private Falcon jet, seated 10 guys. And he said, as long as these four guys are here, we can take off. If any one of these four are not here, it doesn't matter if all the rest are here or not, we're not allowed to take off. And those four guys were Ric Flair, Dusty Rhodes, Magnum TA, and Nikita Kolov. As long as those four guys were on the plane, the pilots had permission to take off.

If any one of those four guys were running late, they could not leave the runway, right? And so, you know, I took that as a real compliment that Jim Crockett, I guess I had favor with Jim Crockett, right? Obviously, obviously, that's a great story. You got time for another one?

Yes, sir, absolutely. Alright, let me tell you, I believe you were telling me one time, you were wrestling somewhere in the Middle East. It might have been UAE, I can't remember, but the Russian ambassador was excited about you being there. Did I get that story right?

Tell us about that one again. Yeah, so it was Kuwait. We were going to be, it was unique, it was kind of an unusual deal, we were going to be in whatever the capital of Kuwait was, you probably know, I don't remember. But we're going to be wrestling, we're there for 10 days, but we're in the same hotel, wrestling in the same stadium for 10 nights in a row.

And in my mind, I'm like, after the first night, who's going to come, you know, the second or third, anyway. So what happened is, the promoter in Kuwait, you know, I've got these, you know, I've got the old CCCP, you know, headband on, the hammer and sickle on my tights, right? You're right. And this is plastered on all of the advertisement all over the city of Kuwait, right?

Right. And so the Russian ambassador to Kuwait, you know, the dude staying at the Russian embassy, sees all this advertising and promotion, and he seeks out the promoter. And he's like, hey, like, who's this Nikita Kolov guy, you know, like CCCP, hammer, sickle. And he's like, if he's like from Russia, we want him staying at the embassy while he's here.

That's great, man. And if he's not, why is he impersonating a Russian, you know? It's like, and so the, and word got back to us, I'm like, yo, like, I have no interest in staying at the embassy.

I want to get back to America, right? You'd still be in Moscow if that had happened, man. Exactly. I'm like, I would have never got out of the Russian embassy. Anyway, so the promoter says to, he tells the guy, he goes, no, no, no, no, no, he's, that's just like a character. And so like the ambassador was like, like, like mad, right? Because I was impersonating, you know, a Russian, right? So he made the promoter go around to every poster, every advertisement, and like he had to black out the CCCP and the hammer sickle thing, like, right? For whatever reason.

All that to say, fast forward to opening night in the stadium. Guess who was in the stands, like I'm down in the locker room and they're like, hey, like the Russian ambassador and his wife are like up in the stands. And I'm like, what?

Apparently he had to come check it out. Well, here's the other thing, Don, so I'm in America, I'm like the baddest of the bad, right? Like death threats, people hate me in America, right? I walk out that night to the ring and they're all cheering me.

And I'm like, all right, I don't know how to respond to this because I've never been a good guy, right? Fortunately, I'm wrestling a guy by the name of Sarge and Slaughter. Well, for whatever reason, he walks out and the people start booing him, right?

So they're booing Sarge and Slaughter, but they're cheering the Russian nightmare. Sarge gets in the ring and I'm like, Sarge, I don't have a clue how to be a good guy. And he's like, just follow my lead, kid. And I'm like, okay. So I just like a two-step dad, I just followed Sarge's lead, I got my hand raised, people cheered, the Russian ambassador and his wife went home happy.

He should have, it looks like he kind of finally got with a program, you know? Exactly. So yeah, all that doesn't – I was – honestly, I was nervous.

I was nervous about going there and I'm like, this guy, what are they – anyway. So yeah, that's the full story there. Yep. Yep.

Gotcha. Who do you – and I know we're probably running out of time, but who are the guys that you still stay in touch with who are in the ring with you? Or do you still stay in touch, like I know you mentioned Rick and Dusty and a couple of other ones.

Yeah. Or do you – or how's that going? Yeah, so – and I do.

I guess mostly, or probably the numeral uno, the number one, is Lex Luger, right? Because in fact, he and I have a – we've done a lot of ministry together over the years. We have a camp together called Man Camp that we do every spring, every fall down in Georgia. And so Lex and I are together quite a bit, or at least communicate, talk to one another a lot, and again, facilitate these camps.

And I've done other ministry outside of that where we see each other at autograph signings periodically from time to time as well. Magnum TA. You remember my – never said – Sure.

Because I call it Maga-TA, you know. Mm-hmm. Magnum. Like we were just not long ago in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, doing an autograph signing together at a small indie wrestling show up there. And so Magnum and I talk quite a bit. He still lives in the Charlotte area, so we'll even see each other from time to time.

Sting, I still keep in contact in touch base with the Stinger. And then the other guys, we just kind of cross paths, you know, at all these different signings. A guy by the name of Lody, who was big in the 90s, is part of Ravens Flock.

He and I connect together. He's got a personal training gym and a wrestling school in Charlotte. A guy named Chad Lael, who wrestled most recently with WWE as Jackson Ryker. Okay. He's a more recent guy.

But as far as like the old school or my era, you know, Ricky Steamboat, you know, Flair. So we cross paths, but mostly at autograph signings and those sorts of things. Gotcha. Yeah. Well, it's a unique and distinguished fraternity. Let me throw more at you. For the man camp that you do with Lex, if you have a gentleman out here who are interested in coming to that, is there a website or how would someone who felt led to come to one of the man camps get in touch or follow up with that?

No, it's a great question. And for the record, we have, you know, from 18, 18, the oldest to attend so far has been 75, has been the eldest. And men who, in fact, you'll appreciate this. I'll tell you a quick story related to that. The fall of 2023, we had a 71-year-old man drive about nine hours from Ohio, 71 years old, a former Green Beret, Special Forces, Silver Star recipient. He's 71 years old. He comes into camp and I said, you know, I just said, I go, you know what, I'm curious, you know, why are you here? And he goes, you know, I don't know how many years I have left, but I have children. I have grandchildren. I want to be the patriarch of my family.

I want to model Jesus, the remaining, you know, remaining years of my life. And I remember on the last day before he got in his car to drive nine hours back to Ohio, he looked at me, Don, and he said these five words, eye to eye, he said, Nikita, this was life changing. And, you know, here's a former Green Beret, Special Forces, Silver Star recipient, who was impacted over those handful of days that we gathered together there in Georgia. And so, you know, regardless of your background, you're out there listening. You know, Don posed the question, you know, if it piques your interest to want to attend man camp. Does it matter your background? You don't have to be in ministry.

You know, it doesn't matter. You know, if you have a, if you want to draw closer to the Lord and be empowered and equipped, you know, as a godly man, a godly husband, godly father, godly grandfather, then go to mancamp.info, mancamp.info. And I feel confident to say in the 75 or 80 camps I have now done since 2006, if you make a decision and a commitment to come, you will be impacted. You will go home.

And maybe you'll be saying this was life changing for you as well. So, Don Brown, thank you, man, for being on the show today, and I appreciate you. And one more time, give your website for, if people want to find out more about your run for Congress, give that website. The campaign website is Brown4NC.com, Brown4NC.com, and that will take you there. So, keep Don in your prayers for his run for Congress.

If you need a good attorney, North South Carolina, you can look up his attorney, Brown and Associates attorney firm, and go to Amazon or his book, book citing, and check out some of his books as well. Don, thanks for being on the show today. Thank you, brother.

You have a good one, Nicky, and I hope to see you soon. Thank you, sir. God bless you and all of you out there in Listening Land. Go out and live a God-filled, God-blessed day today. This podcast is made possible by the grace of God and your faithful prayers, support, and generous gifts. May God bless you for your continual contributions. Go to Koloff.net and donate today. If you are enjoying Q&A with Koloff, would you help us spread the word? Tell your family, tell your friends, tell your neighbors to download, subscribe, and leave a comment. Nikita Koloff here.

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