Younger wrestling fans do not even know about John Studd. John William Minton was the real name of the wrestler and he was trained by Killer Kowalski. Both of them started working together and Big John's first ever major title was the WWWF Tag Team title won in tag team with Kowalski. We loved this team, named Masked Executioners, as both wore masks.

When Big John left the company he changed his ring name as well, using aliases like the well known Captain USA. A lot of wrestlers had feuds with him at the time and one that is worth mentioning is the American Dream, Dusty Rhodes. Older fans of professional wrestling will always remember the heel gimmick that he had and the well hyped stretcher he came with in the ring. The Nature Boy was to face Big John in a feud in 1982 in NWA. That was when he started a huge feud with the WWF World Champion of the time, Hulk Hogan. During the period we saw Studd being managed by Bobby Heenan and we will always remember the huge feud against one of the greatest wrestlers of all time, Andre the Giant. Andre the Giant had his hair shaved in a tag team match, only to lead to a huge feud ending. The professional wrestler was offering $15,000 to any person that could body slam him. This led to a huge feud with legend Andre the Giant and a conclusion at Wrestlemania 1. This wrestling match had its highlight when John Studd was body slammed by Andre the Giant. The feud with Andre the Giant was probably the best feud that Big John Studd had in his wrestling career, at a time when the wrestler Sting was not even known to the public (so that you understand how long ago this was).

Big John Studd also participated in the well known Wrestlemania 2 Over the top Battle royal match. Even if Andre the Giant also participated in the Battle Royal, Studd was set on William Perry, only leading to him being eliminated. Andre the Giant eventually won the Battle Royal. Next was a tag team run together with King Kong Bundy and eventually left the WWF for a period of 3 years. We will remember his comeback as he had interesting feuds with Heenan and in 1989 he did win the Royal Rumble. We saw this as the highlight of the professional wrestler's career. Big John Studd needed to take time off and had to retire after the biggest highlight of the time for him was acting as an important special referee in the match between Jake Roberts and Andre the Giant. Unfortunately Studd died in 1995 because of liver cancer and Hodgkin's disease. Please remember that if it wasn’t for wrestlers like Big John Studd, working hard, there will be no popular wrestlers of the day, like John Cena or Rey Mysterio or Dave Batista.