![]() ![]() “And two weeks after I poked my head in the back, I was learning how to become a WWE superstar,” Bullard said. He initially resisted, but while getting a pair of shoes repaired in south Tampa, he popped his head into the headquarters of Florida Championship Wrestling, a developmental territory for the WWE. Ultimately, he evolved into an All-American defensive end at Live Oak’s Suwannee High and a four-year letter winner at the University of Florida, where he was elected student body vice-president and graduated in 2000.įollowing a brief arena football career, Bullard was coaching at Chamberlain High when close friend and WWE legend Dave Bautista urged him to give professional wrestling a crack. ![]() I was doing so well that neither the ranch administrators nor my mother thought it was a good idea for me to return to south Florida.” “The average stay at the Boys Ranch is 18 months,” Bullard said in his book. Adults warned him he was headed for prison or an early death. His mother had three more sons by a boyfriend with whom he never got along, compounding his misery.īullied at school for wearing tattered hand-me-downs and glasses, he channeled his insecurities into disruption and disrespect of authority. Augustine home in the summer of 1976.īullard, conceived as a result of that rape, spent his childhood in the bleakness of both foster care and single-parent rearing in Delray Beach and Boynton Beach housing projects. On of his autobiography, There’s No Such Thing as a Bad Kid (co-written with Tampa Bay Times staff reporter Paul Guzzo), he reveals how his mother, Daria Bullard, was raped at age 11 by someone she knew in her St. The Bullard back story has been chronicled by many, including Bullard himself. Thaddeus Bullard, also known as WWE superstar "Titus O'Neil, spearheaded the installation of a synthetic turf field at Sligh Middle School in Tampa. “So you see all the transformation going on, where’s the best place to start any transformation? Education.” ![]() These families over here, a lot of them have been here for years, and I want to develop a culture of health and wellness and pride. “I feel like gentrification is coming down this way, if you look at Seminole Heights and Tampa Heights. “I want this to be, like, a haven for this neighborhood,” Bullard said. Sligh Middle Magnet, a Title I school at which more than 96 percent of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, is that school. His dream, borne from his own inner-city rearing during a mostly impoverished childhood, is to create a school that serves the whole community, not just its kids a scholastic and social hub that educates and enriches. When not on the road four to five days a week performing as his brawny, brash alter ego, Bullard, a 42-year-old dad of two, often can be found at his adoptive school, nestled in a low-income area in the city’s solar plexus. Related: WrestleMania 36 to go on as scheduled. ![]()
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