RIP JC Bailey

[jayboro]

I just heard the news that JC was found dead this morning. I am not sure what to even say, just thought I would share this with you folks....RIP JC

[iketurner]

This is extremely sad. His family are in my thoughts and prayers. JC was always one of my fav's on the indy scene. Very very sad over this. I spoke with him a few months ago and i was happy to see him doing better. Gone way to soon.

[cavedweller73]

I am extremely shocked by this news. I know is not the time to wonder what happened, but I can't help BUT wonder. I do know that at KOTDM a few months ago, he was talking to some guys in line in front of me and saying how he was going to have to have surgery to have some glass removed from his lower back that he had embedded in there during his match with Drake Younger at the "Death in the Valley" tournament in Ohio. He showed the lump on his back and it was VERY nasty-looking! He said that he was going to hold out until after Tournament of Death to have it removed. As far as I know, after TOD, he hadn't worked any shows and I figured it was because of the surgery. I also know that when I heard him talking to those guys at KOTDM, he seemed REALLY out of it. So, I don't know....

I won't speculate, but I will say that I'm very sad about this because J.C. was, by far, one of the reasons I got into indy wrestling, and especially, modern "hardcore/ultraviolent" wrestling. Hell, just today I got two DVDs from IVPVideos.com that have his matches he did in Big Japan Wrestling back in 2006.

I found these two articles about him on some web sites: The first is the statement issued by CZW and the second is a long article about J.C.'s career and life...it even mentions how he got his start in Evansville for CCW.

Joseph Carl "JC" Bailey Jr.
8/23/1983 – 8/30/2010

It is with great sadness that CZW management has the unfortunate duty to again report on the news of the passing of another one of its own. Early this morning, CZW officials learned that Joseph Carl "JC" Bailey Jr. passed away in his home at the age of 27. JC was a beloved member of the CZW locker room, and a member of the extended Combat Zone family for nearly a decade.

As a performer, JC was fearless. He was renowned and admired by fans and colleagues alike for his toughness, his resilience, and for the undying passion he showed for the sport of Professional Wrestling… the sport he loved.

Away from the ring, JC was a true friend to so many people, and today, we all remember him, and mourn his loss. Rest in Peace JC Bailey.



Joseph Carl Bailey, Jr., known professionally as J.C. Bailey, was found dead early this morning by his father. A cause of death is unknown. He was 26 years old.

As the son of Bad 2 the Bone Wrestling (BBW) promoter Joe Bailey, J.C. spent most of his life around the wrestling business. Too young to legally wrestle or train in the state of Kentucky, he'd hold backyard wrestling matches with friends and would help out his father at shows before eventually being allowed to train in Evansville, Indiana under Tracy Smothers at the age of 16. Unlike Kentucky, Indiana didn't have an athletic commission requiring promoters, wrestlers, and even managers to get a license. As Bailey went through training he'd would begin refereeing for local organizations, including Ian Rotten's Independent Wrestling Association Mid-South, before eventually making his debut as a professional wrestler in 2001.

His first year of wrestling took place mostly in Eric Acker's Coliseum Championship Wrestling (CCW) in Evansville, Indiana. CCW ran weekly events at the Soldier & Sailor's Memorial Coliseum on Wednesday evenings, which appealed to area wrestlers because it was an extra show every week that they could do in addition to their regular weekend bookings. The weekly shows for Bailey, especially at such an early stage of his career, helped him improve at a rapid pace compared to his local contemporaries that didn't have the benefit of working as often. After turning 18 he'd begin working on his father's BBW shows in Kentucky. BBW at the time was one of the most active independent groups in the country, running sometimes as many as 6 shows a month, making it another group that appealed to wrestlers in the area that were looking for as many bookings as they could get.

Both CCW and BBW were particularly appealing to wrestlers that worked for Ian Rotten's IWA group. The IWA was running weekly out of Clarksville, IN by this point, so working for IWA and CCW alone gave workers at least 8 steady dates a month, plus BBW dates and whatever other bookings they could get in or out of the area. While Bailey had worked for the IWA as a referee and had attended IWA events with his father, who'd help out and even promoted a couple of IWA shows in the late 90s, it was the connections he made through working other shows with IWA talent that helped get him in the door.

Bailey would make his IWA debut against Corporal Robinson on January 4, 2003, in Clarksville, IN. His IWA work would be a stark departure from his high flyer roots, as right off the bat he got thrown into the IWA's vibrant death match scene. He brought a uniqueness to the scene, as he was a small high flyer that did death matches, as opposed to the larger and less athletic wrestlers that fans were used to seeing in those roles. Almost overnight he became one of the IWA's top guys and Ian Rotten, seeing Bailey's potential, took him under his wing. Rotten would tell anyone that would listen that Bailey was the future of death match wrestling and would actively try and persuade promoters to use him. In addition, Smart Mark Video (SMV) owner Mike Burns had become one of Bailey's biggest supporters, something that would help him later in his career.

His innovative style and ability to take ridiculous amounts of punishment endeared Bailey to death match fans who followed him live or on video. With the help of the IWA's distribution deal with SMV, his reputation began to spread outside of his home area of Kentucky and Indiana. He appealed to Combat Zone Wrestling (CZW) fans in particular and pretty soon his name would come up whenever fans talked about workers that CZW should begin using. They didn't have to wait long, as Bailey would begin appearing for CZW in the summer of 2003 as a part of an IWA invasion angle.

The IWA invasion angle came about when CZW sold a series of shows to a bar in Dover, DE. While CZW was prohibited from having death matches in their home state of Pennsylvania, Delaware was a different story. To help draw and sell videos, plans were made to have an IWA invasion that would play out over the course of these summer events. By this time CZW was at the forefront of the change in death match wrestling, emphasizing action as opposed to just gore. There was far more diversity in CZW's death match ranks than IWA's and Bailey fit in perfectly. He'd appear several times during the course of the angle, both in death matches and in junior heavyweight competition. Though his initial stint with the company was short, the impression he made on the fans was overwhelmingly positive and fans clamored for his return.

Bailey would return to CZW the next summer as a participant in the 2004 edition of CZW's Tournament of Death, making it to the semi finals of the tournament. Around this time Mike Burns had become heavily involved in CZW's booking, which lead to Bailey getting a full time spot with the company. Bailey would be paired with Chris Cash, Sexxxy Eddy, and Nate Webb in a feud with BLKOUT, a CZW stable that included Ruckus, Sabian, Joker, and Eddie Kingston. The feud would culminate in the Cage of Death that December, where his team were victorious in winning the match and the CZW Tag Team Championship, which would be defended under the terms that any two members of the foursome could defend the belts.

It was during his second run with CZW that Bailey's role in the IWA began to diminish. Rotten was finding it increasingly hard to find buildings that would allow death matches, as he'd ended up getting kicked out of most of the ones that would allow them. As a result he began using fewer death match guys, with Bailey being among those who found themselves with fewer IWA bookings. While Bailey was a capable junior heavyweight wrestler, he'd become associated with death match and hardcore wrestling to the point where a lot of his fans weren't interested in seeing him do anything else, or at least that was the opinion of many promoters. While he'd spent the majority of the previous couple of years finding a balance between doing death matches and being a junior heavyweight, from 2004 on he mostly did just death matches.

His role as a regular with CZW would also come to an end after Mike Burns quit the booking committee. With the exception of the yearly big death match tournaments, Bailey again went back to doing most of his wrestling locally in Kentucky and Indiana.

It was also around this time that Bailey's personal problems with drugs began to cause him both legal and professional trouble. Bailey was arrested in September of 2006 and charged with possession in the first degree for cocaine, attempted burglary in the second degree, possession of drug paraphernalia in the first degree, and criminal mischief in the third degree. He'd spend a year in prison before being paroled and released on August 31, 2007. He'd make his return to wrestling the next day, appearing on an Insanity Pro Wrestling event in Indianapolis, IN. He'd also return to both the IWA and CZW a few weeks later, however his freedom would soon come to an end.

Bailey and another man were arrested in late October after attempting to steal a 27-inch Samsung Slim Fit TV from a Wal-Mart in Bardstown, KY. The arrest received notable media attention locally after an activist group, who after hearing about injuries Bailey sustained during his arrest, held a vigil and lodged a formal complaint to the town of Bardstown on his behalf. Photographs, including his mug shot, were released to the public showing a bloody Bailey prior to his receiving medical treatment at a local hospital for his injuries. It was never reported whether or not anything ever came of the complaint filed. Though only charged with a misdemeanor, his arrest caused his parole to be revoked. He would spend the next two years in jail until he was released once again in December 2009 on parole.

After his release Bailey would return to CZW, which was once again being booked by Mike Burns. The coming year would prove to be one of his most successful, as he would go on to win the 2010 edition of the IWA King of the Death Matches, the Ohio Hatchet Wrestling Death in the Valley death match tournament, and was a finalist at this year's CZW Tournament of Death, where he had arguably one of his career's best performances.

Despite his problems, Bailey was one of the most well liked wrestlers on the independents. As someone who'd been involved in the wrestling business from such a young age, he was highly respected by his peers despite his young age. While saying someone loved the wrestling business has become a cliche, in the case of J.C. Bailey it was the truth. He was someone who loved it even when it didn't love him back, because it'd been all that he ever dreamed about. His unrequited love for the business made it a better place for a lot of people and helped inspire other people's passion for it. That alone should be enough for any fan to thank him and mourn his passing.

Indy Wrestling News sends our condolences to the friends, family, and fans of J.C. Bailey.

[iketurner]

This is just so sad. What a shame!

[cavedweller73]

I'm just shocked beyond words. It's so, so sad! I can remember when I first started going to indy show, he was one of those guys on my "I wish I could have seen him!" list, since he was still in jail at the time. I know that I came into the whole indy wrestling world kind of late and missed his "classic" moments, but at least I got to see some of his last, great moments....his return at "Cage of Death XI", him winning "King of the Deathmatches", and his matches at "Tournament of Death IX", which I read on some site that someone said was one of his best performances of his whole career. I can't say that I disagree. The matches with Danny Havoc and Scotty Vortekz were awesome, but it was his match with Abdullah Kobayashi that really stood out on that afternoon, in my opinion. That was such an awesome match!

Even the IWA:EC show I attended back in March where JC faced Madman Pondo in a barbed-wire bat match was good. His mom was even at that show! I was really looking forward to seeing him in the "Masters of Pain" tournament this year.

It's just such a terrible loss. RIP JC!!

[a truthful opinion]

Yesterday was truly a sad day for me when I found out about J.C.. He is an old friend of mine and I will miss him. But to throw my two cents in of my favorite J.C. Bailey matches. His matches with Simon Sezz were some of my favorites. They knew each other so well that the match could have been an hour long and you still couldnt get enough of it. J.C. take it easy buddy you're on the Big Stage now.

[cavedweller73]

Man, what an insane day. First there was JC and now, it looks as though John Zandig's son committed suicide yesterday as well. There's just been WAY too many wrestling deaths this Summer, that's for sure.

Anyway, here is something I found over on the CZWfans board. It's a post made by Billy Gram, who is the Alice Cooper-looking Indian guy who manages Cult Fiction, the group that JC was part of in CZW.


<<<It is with deep regret and sadness that I share this news with the world.

I have just gotten off the phone with Joe Bailey, JC's Father. Joe asked me to make this statement on behalf of JC, His Family and Friends.

Contrary to the assumptions of many,...assumptions that most wouldn't have made, if they knew the truth surrounding the last couple of months of our brother's life,...JC DID NOT die from drug use. JC had been clean and sober for months now.

JC Bailey has died as a result of multiple concussions and traumas to his brain. These are the official findings of The Medical Examiner assigned to the case.

The last two days have been even more tragic due to all those making the assumption that JC had passed as a result of drug abuse, when all of us close to him knew that this was unlikely. JC really had turned his life around.

Where does this leave us all? Well, the first thing is that JC's Family and friends still have a loved one to lay to rest,...I ask you all to bear this in mind. Can we all be respectful enough to wait until that sad business is attended to before getting on a soap box? Please? JC's family, friends and loved ones implore you.

A few other thoughts that Joe Bailey has asked me to express...

For every harsh criticism of wrestlers who become plagued with addictions to pain killers,...there is also a fan who demanded more, more, more. Is anyone forced to be a pro wrestler? No. Most participate because they love wrestling more than the fans. Most participate to entertain the fans. In that participation, risks are assumed. My brother was well aware of these risks. He took them, and now he has paid the ultimate price for assuming these risks. And you know what? JC BAILEY LOVED PRO WRESTLING. Did he do this for fortune or fame? No,...he did these things because of a burning passion that he embraced. He only loved his family and friends more. He was so dedicated to entertaining the fans that he truly gave 100% every time he stepped near a ring. Ultimately, he has given more to entertain all of you, than anyone can conceive. JC has given his life to entertain us all. Tragic? You bet your ass it's tragic. Should we all stop? NO way. It's not what JC would have wanted.

Do not mourn for JC Bailey,...Celebrate his amazing life, his amazing toughness, his personality, his genuineness and his self sacrifice,...it's what he would have wanted.

[iketurner]

Everyone talking trash about JC and his drug abuse needs to take a step back and shut the hell up anyway. Its not like they knew him personally and what this kid went thru. People should not judge anyone else and spend more time worrying about themselves and their own personal demons. This TMZ era of garbage news about people has really made this world just a nasty place. Makes this even more sad. Somewhere tonight there are close friends and family with holes in their stomachs over this loss and yet we have tons of morons out there running off at the mouth. RIP JC.

Like that last little spot says, celebrate his career and life. I was sitting around tonight and this has just been bugging me all day so i thought id sit down and take the time to highlight some of my fav moments of JC's career as witnessed by me. So here goes and if I leave any out, someone remind me of them......

-IWA MS, Circus of Death Match vs Pondo.......To me, this one sticks out more than any. Just for the fact that me and Jasper drove to Louisville in a complete snow storm just to see this match and AJ Styles of course. Before the match started, they were setting up the scaffold and JC came up to me and Jasper and looked seriously concerned about the violence that was about to take place. I kind of feared for both him and Pondo to be honest. Once the match started it was electric. I have never and prolly will never see anything like that in person again. Yeah he had been tearing it up in Evansville for months, years before, but this was on a grand stage and put JC on the map.

- vs Simon Sezz.......like truthful said, any match with JC and Simon was top notch. One that really stuck out to me was IWA MS Freak-a-thon. To me, it was some of their best work together. The brainbuster on the chair was brutal if i remember correctly.

- vs Hero, 2 out of 3 falls in CCW......This is when JC started to show his talents not just as a deathmatch worker, but as a wrestler in general. Up until that point, we had never seen this kind of action in CCW. I remember the match ending with a reverse powerbomb off the top rope. It was pretty epic to us at that time.

- vs Pondo, fans bring the weapons, CCW........it was just your usual Pondo/JC CCW war, until the end of the match, which saw Pondo piledrive JC thru a fooseball(sp) table from the top rope. Just an insane ending.

- vs Necro Butcher, Blizzard night, CCW.......the night that everyone thought the show was canceled and like 14 fans were in the house, including me because i won a free ticket the week before and the hell if im going to miss a free ccw show. This was the night Necro drug JC thru broken beer bottles, and then tried to set him on fire. Stuff got out of hand and next thing you know both guys are being put out with a fire extinguisher! Just insane stuff for a sellout crowd of 14!

- His fued with Nate Webb in IWA MS.......Very underated by many in IWA at the time. Prolly because of all the crazy talent that was coming thru IWA at that time over shadowed this awesome fued that ran for nearly an entire year. IMO, it was Nate Webb's best run as a wrestler.

- vs Necro at IWA KOTDM 03??........it was a light tube coffin match is all i know. To me it was the night of the tournament. Anytime you got these two together in the same ring, it was going to be the best hardcore anywhere. Period!

Thats about all ive got for now. I know that there are thousands more memories from every single wed night at CCW! To a guy who i didnt know personally, i somehow feel like i did. He always came up to us and asked our advice on what we liked and didnt like about his matches and what he could do to get better. He'd sit with us durring the show and talk wrestling match after match. I miss those days.

[MorrisDay]

Man..........this still doesn't seem real.
I don't have much to say. Just want to point out that every time I got the chance to talk to JC he was nothing but nice. The last time in particular I'll never forget...
The only reason we went to CCW about 4 months ago was because we got word JC would be there. When we got there and found our seats JC just so happened to be hanging around where we were sitting. We have talked to JC many of times ever since he started coming to the coliseum and whether he remembered our faces or not....he always made it seem that way.
He was so excited to be back in the ring. He asked us what we thought he should end the match with.....a double stomp off the top onto lightubes on top of someones chest....or a spring board leg drop onto said lighttubes and person. We told him what we thought sounded cooler and sure enough....he did it.
JC was a class act. I know he had a lot of problems, more so than others, but one thing is for certain.......he had a heart of gold

RIP JC

[cavedweller73]

I honestly wasn't trying to say that I thought he died of an overdose. That's why I said that I didn't want to speculate on what happened to him. In my first post in this thread, I was just trying to give some "insider" facts on what I saw the last few times I saw him in person. The fact was that when I saw him talking to those guys in front of me at KOTDM, he seemed pretty out of it....but it could have been from him being tired or on pain medication or anything. Then, knowing that he was having that surgery after TOD, all of this made me wonder if maybe he was on some sort of stronger-than-normal pain medicine and then maybe he mixed that with something else...even mixing in alcohol with that kind of stuff is a bad situation.

I honestly didn't expect to see the cause of his death to be something related to concussions or brain injuries. That's why when I read Gram's post on that other board, I had to repost it over here, since the info (most of it speculation) about what happened is so all over the place, so to speak. There's even a guy that I talked to at the 2009 KOTDM who said he knew a lot of wrestlers personally and Monday night, he was already posting on the IWA:EC board that he had heard it was an overdose. I also know that Gram can be a source of misguided information sometimes, but apparently now even Drake Younger is posting the same things on his social network pages. He's saying that he too has spoke to Joe and that is indeed the cause of JC's death.

Thanks for the info on some of your favorite JC moments, Ike. I obviously never got to see any of his classic CCW matches, but back when I first saw CCW on that little TV show they had, I remember seeing JC working matches against guys like Pondo and Necro and thinking, "Why is that young kid putting himself through that kind of stuff?" That was before I had a better understanding and appreciation of modern "hardcore" wrestling, obviously! That's awesome that you got to see the Circus deathmatch with Pondo in person. I literally have that match on about 4 or 5 DVDs and it's one of my favorites as well. I'll have to check out some of those other IWA:MS matches. I don't think I've ever seen any of the ones where he faced Simon Sezz, but I've been reading all over the boards that those matches were classic. Next time there's a sale on Smart Mark Video's site, I'll have to pick up some of those DVDs.

In the very early days of You Tube, during that Summer of 2006 when I was spending literally hours at a time looking up indy wrestling matches and learning and gaining a better understanding of what it was all about, JC's matches were some of the ones I watched the most. Some of his CZW matches that I really enjoyed were his match with "Sick" Nick Mondo from TOD 2, his match with Chris Ca$h at TOD 3 and his match with Nick Gage at TOD 4. All of those matches are WELL worth seeing. Also, he did a no-rope barbed wire match with Necro once at the ECW Arena (I can't remember what show that was from), but that one is really good too.

As I said before, I know that I came into this whole world kind of late, but I'm just so glad that I got to see some his last, great moments. And as Morris said, it was JC that got me to go to a CCW show. I went the week after you guys did just because I knew he was going to be working. I had seen him a couple of months before make his return to wrestling at Cage of Death when he did that run-in on the Thumbtack Jack/ Nick Gage match and attacked TJ. As I've said before, if you see that match, you can see me in the crowd with a "Holy sh*t, that's JC Bailey!!" look on my face....and that's literally what I said when it happened. At the time, I had never seen him in person at all. Anyway, then I was dying to see him work a match, so I made my first trip to a CCW show just to see him. As Morris said too, he was in GREAT spirits the night I saw him too. I remember him running around before the show saying, "I'm out of jail, free and clear and I'm BACK!!!" He looked as though he was having a blast!

I thought a lot about it all yesterday too and even though I never really went up and talked to him, I know he was a cool guy who had quite a passion for what he did and I felt pretty emotional about all of this as well.

[hmmmm]

I'm not posting under my name because I'm sure 27 people will have a problem with what I'm about to say. But it's the truth.....

Definitely, very very sad!

But, with all due respect, not a surprise.

I knew JC very well. Stayed at his house several times after bbw shows. Hung out. Was on the road with him several times, etc.

I don't know about class act or being placed up on a pedestal, but yes, he did have a lot of demons to try and fight off. I hear he was successful at sobering up this summer. Too bad the drugs and stupid a$$ $hit he did in the ring did a number on his brain.

This is a real shame. People can freely blame it on the drugs because that's partially the reason he's no longer around. But, in all honesty, he would have never started drugs if it weren't for trying to cope with the pain of all the $hit he did in the ring to try and be accepted.

I remember being on the road with him and him trying to do the "pro wrestling" thing and he realized he wasn't ever going to be taken seriously because of his lack of size and lack of technical skills. So he eventually resorted to going back to his "backyard" roots of hardcore just because he finally found something in the actual indies where fans took him serious.

The very sad thing is that there are only 60 to every 7,000 fans who actually care for and even sometimes obsess over "hardcore" and freakin blood and in my opinion (no, he didn't have to do it), but if there wasn't that outlet and that made up "style" of "wrestling" (just because you don't want to or can't learn how to do it right), he might still be around.

This might piss a lot of people off and frankly, I don't give a $hit!

JC was ONLY 26 years old.. I miss him already.. I'm struggling dealing with it.. but, the indy world of wrestling, the FANS, the commissions in every state, the promoters, the workers, the wannabe promoters and workers - all need to WAKE UP!! and STOP the stupid $hit in the WRESTLING ring. Hell, even the original ECW was somewhat controlled.. but everybody thereafter ECW decided to try and mock it and took it beyond what the human body can handle. Just learn how to work.

Hardcore crap needs to be outlawed.. it needs to be against commission rules AND against the law.

I know this will get a lot of reaction, but keep in mind, hardcore leads to pain.. pain leads to pills.. pills lead to other drugs.. and the mixture of drugs, "concussions and traumas" from hardcore matches - obviously leads to DEATH!!

Help stop it now. And fans, stop being so demanding of hardcore (once again, not saying it's the fans fault). But the more it's demanded, the more these kind of wrestlers want to please the fans and the more they do to their bodies it becomes the more they hurt and the more chance they turn to drugs and most of all, die off from the damage to their bodies.

Sorry. I just don't get it. JC had so much life left to live and now he's gone @ age 26 to "hardcore wrestling".

[iketurner]

First off, i wasnt refering to you Dweller when i was talkin about people talking trash. Hell im with u. When i first heatd the news the first thing that crossed my mind was, please dont let it be drugs. Thats prolly wrong of me but true. Drugs, brain injuries, whatever, hes gone now just the same and its just as terrible.

I somewhat agree with hummmm. I just dont see the point of hardcore wrestling. Dont get me wrong, i was entertained by it often. Especially since JC was the most hardcore dude out there. But for every badass lightube bump he'd take, id just as soon seen him in a technical battle. See my list fir example. I was just as much entertained by his matches w Nate, Hero and Simon as i was with Necro, Pondo and Corp. If this kind of wrestling is causing head trama, then it should be looked at. I think its def up for debate. If a 26 year old can die from blows to the head then something is def wrong somewhere.

[Josh Stratton]

I miss the hell out of you JC Bailey. He started in CCW about a year after I did and I loved him to death. The love for wrestling in his eyes and when he spoke made everyone want to break their neck in the ring.

One thing I will never forget about JC is when you were at a show that he was on you remembered his match. Whether it was against Simon Sezz, a scaffold match against Pothead John, the aforementioned match against Necro, or the Shoes on the Powerline Pole match for IWA EC every one of them burned down the house.

Then after the show he was just as memorable. Him and my wife flirting with each other (just to piss me off) or him falling asleep on the sidewalk outside The Tank in Charleston WV he was always fun to be around.

I love you JC Bailey and I dedicate all that I do in wrestling to you and that sense of awe and have fun attitude that you brought with you.

He may of had his demons but he knew it. He would tell anyone. He wasn't ashamed. He got help and turned his life around. Too bad it was a little too late.

We not only lost a great wrestler, but a great friend, and a d**n fine human being.

Here's to you JC!

See you when I get there!