YUMA On Sunday night All Star Wrestling paid tribute to a local wrestling legend
ASW was back at the Special Occasions Event Center at Yuma for Sunday Night Main Event. Before the event got underway, the promotion honored the legacy of Steve Podunavac who died April eleventh at the age of eighty-three.
The Flying Pollock as he was known started wrestling in the early seventies. Former WVOW Radio morning personality and ASW Hall of Famer, Dave Allen made it clear to the packed house that Podunavac meant a lot to the local wrestling scene.
“If it were not for Steve Podunavac,” Allen said, “I wouldn’t be here, nobody on this stage would be here and chances are you wouldn’t be here.”
Flanked by wrestlers Tommy Gibson and “Adorable” Danny Ray, Allen reminisced about the glory days of wrestling in southern West Virginia
“There was no WWE,” Allen said. “It was Saturday night rasslin’ on the old WOAY with people like Steve Podunavac, and people like Big Bob McCoy, and people like Dan Christian and the Madrid Brothers. This is what laid the foundation for what Gary Damron and ASW has got going on here.”
Jeff Lane, also known as “The Doctor,” was unable to make it to the Sunday Night Event that featured Ricky Morton, “All Ego” Ethan Page and the deliberately cruel Chance Prophet. Like Allen, Lane attributes his time in “rasslin” to the mentor he had in the “Flying Pollock.”
“How lucky I was to have had the childhood experience of seeing Steve wrestle and then getting to work with him on his own promotion,” Lane wrote in a social media post. “It was a pleasure to know Steve, and remember him always smiling, laughing. We all had great fun on his shows.”
Steve spent much of his wrestling career on Saturday night wrestling from Oak Hill with Shirley Love. He later became an owner and promoter himself until his retirement. He was also employed by Pepsi for nearly forty years.
Steve's wife of sixty years, Bonnie, and their children were in attendance. As is custom, Steve received a ten-bell salute.
Podunavac was laid to rest at Forest Lawn Cemetery