OK, so let's unpack this. When we usually sit
down to talk about the absolute titans of an
industry, we have been conditioned to look for
the physical outliers. Oh, absolutely. You know,
in the tech world, it is the billionaires with
the space programs. In sports, it's the genetic
freaks who run the 40 -yard dash in four seconds
flat. And in professional wrestling. In wrestling,
it is almost exclusively the land of giants.
I mean, you were looking for the 6 '5 guys carved
out of a granite, the Hulks, the Rocks, the Roman
Reigns types. Exactly. But today, we are flipping
that script entirely for you. We are looking
at a resume that is just staggering. It spans
Ring of Honor, WWE, Impact. And AEW. A truly
massive footprint. Yeah, and we are looking at
a creative mind that has fundamentally shaped
what modern wrestling television looks like.
And we are talking about a guy who stands 5 '7
on a good day. On a very good day in wrestling
boots. Right, a guy who was once most famous
for crying while singing a love ballad in the
middle of a wrestling ring. And wearing nail
polish. You really cannot forget the chipped
black nail polish. Never forget the nail polish.
We are talking about the zombie princess himself.
Jimmy Jacobs. Or Christopher Scoville, if you
want to get government about it. Yes, Christopher
Scoville. And honestly, looking at the source
material for this deep dive, it feels less like
a standard wrestling biography and more like
a case study in pure survival. It really is a
masterclass in adaptation. And that's the mission
for our deep dive today. We aren't just recounting
match results here. We are trying to figure out
how a teenager from Grand Rapids, Michigan, who
started out moving furniture for a living, ended
up writing specifically for the biggest wrestling
company on Earth. Only he fired for taking a
selfie. Exactly. Fired for a selfie and somehow
coming out of it with more leverage and buzz
than he had before. It is the art of failing
upwards that isn't actually failure at all. It
is cow... Calculated reinvention. So let's go
back to those Grand Rapids days. Because looking
at the timeline, the hustle starts terrifyingly
early. We're talking, what, 1999? May 1999 is
the official in -ring debut. He is 15 years old.
15. I mean, at 15, I was just trying to figure
out how to get my learner's permit. And he is
taking bumps in a wrestling ring. He is. He's
losing to a guy named Michael Stryker. But the
fascinating part isn't necessarily the wrestling
matches themselves at that age. It is the context
of how he got there. Because he didn't just walk
in, right? No, he didn't just walk into a wrestling
school and pay tuition. He actually started in
1998 as a general assistant for a promotion called
Pro Wrestling Worldwide. Doing basically whatever
they needed. Everything. He was the webmaster.
He did color commentary. He was a referee. He
was the kid who just desperately wanted to be
in the room. He was making himself indispensable.
And that is a theme. you will see for the next
20 years of his career. He figures out what a
company needs and he becomes that thing. But
the reality check here is brutal. The sources
highlight that while he is doing this on weekends,
living the dream, so to speak, his Monday through
Friday was strictly manual labor. Yeah, he was
a furniture mover. That is not easy work. That
is blowing out your back. Moving armoires and
sleeper sofas up three flights of stairs. Only
to go to a VFW hall on Saturday and get thrown
on your head. It is wild to think about. But
it builds a specific kind of grit. And you see
that grit manifest really early on with his run
in IWA Mid -South. This is where the polite kid
who is willing to referee disappears and the
disruptor shows up. Oh, you're thinking of the
trash can incident. I am absolutely thinking
of the crash tan incident, November 26, 2005.
The story is just wild. So let's set the scene
for you. He is the champion at this point, right?
He is holding the IWA Mid -South Heavyweight
Championship. That is the top prize in the company.
Okay. But independent wrestling is, well, it
can be very volatile. Shows got canceled that
weekend, and the promoter didn't have his pay.
The classic indie promoter line, I'll get you
next time, kid. Right. And most guys in that
position would just grumble, maybe complain to
their friends and ultimately take the loss. But
Jacobs, he goes to a completely different promotion.
Yes. AEW, he walks to the ring with the IWA belt
and he literally throws it into a garbage can.
In front of a live crowd. In front of a crowd
on a live microphone. That is burning a bridge
with napalm right there. Basically saying, pay
me or your belt is trash. It is a massive power
move. It established him as someone who understood
his value. He wasn't just happy to be there anymore.
He demanded his worth. Exactly. And crucially,
he could back it up in the ring. Around the same
time he is having these insane ladder matches
with guys like Delirious, he is winning the light
heavyweight title. So he had the athletic chops.
He was proving he could do the high -risk athleticism,
but he also had the guts to play the political
game. But if we're being honest, the Jimmy Jacobs
that lives in most fans' heads, the version that
really proved he was a creative genius, is his
run in Ring of Honor. Specifically, the emo era.
At least he's angels. Yes. Now, for anyone who
wasn't watching wrestling in the mid -2000s,
you really have to understand the landscape.
This was the era of work rate. Ring of Honor
was all about who could wrestle the most athletic,
hard -hitting Japanese -style match. And then
here comes Jimmy Jacobs, and he doesn't care
about the belt. He cares about the girl. It was
a brilliant subversion of the entire genre. You
had his tag team partner, BJ Whitmer, who was
this rugged, hard -hitting, traditional wrestler.
And then you had Jacobs, who was portraying this...
lovesick, vulnerable, emotionally unstable character.
Just completely obsessed with their manager Lacey.
Right. And we have to talk about the ballad of
Lacey. We have to talk about the music video.
It is iconic cringe. It really is. It's him singing.
Noticeably off key. Yeah. With eyeliner running
down his face. It was just so different from
everything else on the show. And that is exactly
why it worked. It connected with a demographic
that wrestling usually ignored. The emo kids,
the outcasts who felt those big, messy feelings.
Because wrestling is usually just about being
tough. Exactly. But this wasn't about being tough.
It was about being heartbroken. But of course,
because it is professional wrestling, it couldn't
end with a wedding. It had to end in violence.
Which brings us to the breakup with BJ Whitmer.
Which leads us to Detroit. March 31st, 2007,
the steel cage match. People still talk about
this match. The Pro Wrestling Torch actually
called it an instant classic, but I want to focus
on the cost. Because we talk a lot about his
creative genius, but sometimes we forget the
physical toll of this business. Yeah, the damage
report from this match is brutal. Jacobs wins
this match, but look at the notes. I know he
lost a tooth. He lost a tooth. And he tore his
ACL. During the match? He had a pre -existing
issue, but the match completely blew it out.
And he finished the match on that torn ACL. Plus,
BJ Whitmer suffered a neck injury. They effectively
destroyed their bodies to pay off a soap opera
storyline. That is the juxtaposition that makes
Jacob so interesting to me. He is singing love
songs one minute. and then locking himself in
a steel cage and tearing his knee apart the next.
And look at how he handled the injury. He didn't
just disappear to rehab, he kept making vignettes.
He kept the story alive on YouTube. Right, this
is 2007. Exactly. He understood that in the internet
age, which was still early for wrestling back
then, content never sleeps. Which sets the stage
for his return. And if the Lacey era was emo,
the next phase was basically a horror movie.
The age of the fall. Even the name sounds ominous.
This is arguably the absolute peak of his influence
in Ring of Honor. He spent months teasing this
thing called Project 161 on cryptic blogs. Doing
viral marketing before everyone in wrestling
was doing it. It's very ahead of his time. And
then at the Man Up pay -per -view in September
2007, he finally returns. With Tyler Black, who
we now know as WWE superstar Seth Rollins, and
the NecroBitcher. Right. But it wasn't just a
standard wrestling run -in. They attacked the
Briscoe brothers and they hung Jay Briscoe upside
down from the rigging above the ring. The visual
is just burned into my brain. Jay Briscoe is
bleeding profusely. Yeah. And the blood is dripping
down onto Jimmy Jacobs, who is wearing this pristine
white outfit. And Jacobs is cutting a promo,
essentially bathing in the blood. It was grotesque.
It was almost too much, wasn't it? Didn't Ring
of Honor actually pull the footage? They did.
They removed it from the initial broadcast because
it was considered way too graphic for their pay
-per -view provider. But... And here's the ultimate
business lesson. That censorship made it legendary.
Because suddenly everyone had to see it. The
buzz was so massive that fans demanded to see
it. Ring of Honor eventually had to release it
on their video wire, and they put a special blood
edit on the DVD release. He turned controversy
into cash. again he created a moment that you
simply couldn't look away from and the character
work during this time was so layered remember
the cry jimmy cry chance oh absolutely yeah this
was after at least he finally left him for austin
aries right april 2008 jacobs isn't just angry
He portrays a complete mental breakdown in the
ring. He's hitting himself in the head with his
trademark railroad spike. That spike was such
a grim prop. It really was a weapon of self -destruction.
The fans are throwing streamers at him, chanting
cry Jimmy cry. It was humiliation as performance
art. Which is so rare in wrestling. It is. He
wasn't afraid to look weak, which ironically
made the character so much stronger. He really
deconstructed the whole idea of the cool heel.
He was just a mess. A very dangerous mess. So
fast forward a bit. He leaves Ring of Honor,
comes back, does the SCUM faction with Kevin
Steen and Steve Carino. But I want to jump to
the decade because this feels like the most ironic
chapter in hindsight. The decade formed in 2013.
This was Jacobs, his old rival B .J. Whitmer
enemies turned allies and Roderick Strong. And
the whole gimmick was that they were the guardians
of Ring of Honor. They were bitter that guys
were using the company as a stepping stone to
go to WWE or TNA. They were attacking the sellouts.
They were hazing the younger guys, the young
boys, telling them they hadn't paid their dues.
Which is just hilarious because where does Jimmy
go next? To the biggest corporate machine of
them all, March 2015, Jimmy Jacobs joins the
WWE creative team. The anti -establishment punk
rocker puts on a tie. Well, knowing Jimmy, probably
a scarf and a vest, but you get the point. It
shocked a lot of people. But when you look at
his body of work, it makes perfect sense. He
had spent 15 years proving he could tell long
-term stories that engage people emotionally.
WWE needed writers who understood wrestling logic.
And by all accounts, he was really good at it.
He wasn't just fetching coffee in Stanford. He
was the guy behind the list of Jericho, right?
He was instrumental in that Chris Jericho run,
yes. He brought that weird, slightly offbeat
comedic timing to the biggest stage possible.
He was thriving in that corporate environment.
Until the selfie. Probably the most expensive
photo in wrestling history. So break this down
for the listener who might not know the backstage
politics here. Why did a simple picture get him
fired from his dream job? Context is key here.
It is October 2017. The Bullet Club, this incredibly
popular faction from New Japan and Ring of Honor,
decides to stage an invasion of WWE Raw. Kind
of playing off the old WCW invasion angles. Exactly.
They drive a limo outside the arena where Raw
is happening. They are shouting on megaphones.
It's a massive publicity stunt for the indie
guys. They are technically the competition. Right.
And Jimmy Jacobs, who is employed by WWE as a
writer, goes outside, sees his friends because
he knows all these guys from the Indies and takes
a photo with them. And then he posted on Instagram.
And the powers that be did not like that at all.
The Wrestling Observer reported he was let go
specifically for that post. It was seen as fraternizing
with the enemy during a hostile act. Most people,
if they get fired from WWE, they go quiet. They
apologize. They try to get back in the good graces
of management. What does the zombie princess
do? He leans all the way in. This is his absolute
superpower. He realizes, OK, I'm the guy who
got fired for the selfie. That is my new gimmick.
He literally showed up at a Ring of Honor show
days later. Global Wars Chicago, October 15th,
just days after. the news broke. He appears in
the crowd and what does he do? He takes a selfie.
Takes a selfie with the fans. The place just
explodes. He monetized his own firing immediately.
He even started selling t -shirts that just said
unprofessional. That is brilliant marketing.
It's blurring the lines between the real person
and the character once again. And it signaled
to the rest of the industry that I am available
and I am the most talked about guy in the room
right now. So he bounces from WWE to Impact Wrestling.
And this is where his role really shifts, right?
He's not just an onscreen talent anymore. He
had a brief onscreen run managing Congo Kong,
but the real value was backstage. From 2017 to
2023, he was a key member of the Impact creative
team. He was helping format the show, writing
long -term television arcs. And then he jumped
to AEW in June 2023. As a coach and producer.
Can we clarify that for the listener? What does
a producer actually do in modern wrestling? Because
I think people imagine they just hold the camera
or something. No, in wrestling, a producer, sometimes
called an agent, is the person who helps the
wrestlers structure the actual match. They make
sure the timing is right to hit the TV commercial
breaks. Ah, so pacing the live broadcast. Right.
They help bridge the gap between what the writers
want creatively and what the wrestlers can actually
physically execute in the ring. It requires a
massive amount of wrestling IQ. the director
of the scene precisely and think about the journey
there he started as the 15 year old kids substituting
as a referee now he's the guy in the headset
telling the main event stars when to hit their
finish it's a complete evolution and he was even
mentoring people way back in the ring of honor
days wasn't he he wasn't entirely new to him
he was during the decade storyline we mentioned
earlier they had this young boy character colby
carino steve carino's son Jacobs was his on -screen
mentor, but the sources say that was really art
imitating life. He was guiding the next generation
even while he was still an active wrestler. Always
looking at the big picture. So, bringing us up
to the now. He left AEW in late 2024, but as
his nickname suggests, you can't kill a zombie.
He popped up again recently. May 2024, he returned
to Ring of Honor, which is now owned by Tony
Khan and AEW, to wrestle Satnam Singh. Satnam
Singh is literally over seven feet tall. He makes
Jimmy look like a toddler. Which brings us completely
full circle. The 5 '7 underdog versus the absolute
giant. Of course, Jacobs lost. He got destroyed.
But that wasn't the point. The point was that
he was out there at all. Decades after his debut.
After throwing the trash can, after hanging Jay
Briscoe upside down, after the WWE writers room,
he was still willing to go out there and take
bumps for a giant. It's actually kind of inspiring
when you lay it all out like that. It's this
refusal to be categorized. If you ask him, am
I a wrestler, a manager, a writer, a producer?
The answer is just yes. And if you look at the
trajectory, it's a story about the evolution
of influence. In the beginning, he had to scream
and bleed and jump off ladders to get anyone
to pay attention to him. The blunt force trauma
approach to getting over. Right. Then he learned
how to manipulate emotions with the Lacey era.
Then he learned how to manipulate the wrestling
media with the age of the fall blogs and the
selfie. And finally, he became the architect
helping other people become stars. He went from
the kid moving the furniture to the guy designing
the house. That is a fantastic way to put it.
And he proved that you don't need to be 6 '4
and 250 pounds to change the wrestling business.
You just need to be smarter, louder, and willing
to take the risk that everyone else is too scared
to take. Like hanging your opponent upside down
and letting their blood drip on your white coat.
Or taking a selfie with the competition when
your billionaire boss is watching. It really
makes you wonder about the nature of controversy,
doesn't it? We're so often taught to avoid scandals.
Keep your head down. Do your job. Don't make
waves. But look at Jacobs. Every single time
he broke a rule throwing the belt, the graphic
violence, the selfie, his stock actually went
up. So maybe in the entertainment business, controversy
isn't a mistake. Maybe it is a carefully cultivated
currency. If you know how to spend it. And Jimmy
Jacobs has always known the exact exchange rate.
Definitely something for you to think about the
next time you see someone canceled on your timeline.
Maybe they aren't ruined. Maybe they're just
setting up their next angle. Thanks for taking
this deep dive with us. See you next time.