Karl Fredricks still has something to prove.
The 36-year-old Reno, Nevada, native has already made a name for himself. He was the 2019 Young Lion Cup winner in New Japan Pro-Wrestling, he won titles at All Pro Wrestling, appeared in WWE NXT as Eddy Thorpe and was named one of the best 500 singles wrestlers by Pro Wrestling Illustrated in 2021. But one of his most meaningful accomplishments will come Monday when he appears at Produce Wrestling by Orange Crush’s Skoden event at Roulette Intermedium in New York.
Fredricks will be one of the wrestlers with Native American ancestry on the card as the show celebrates Indigenous Peoples’ Day. He will be taking on Javi in a singles match. He talked about the upcoming event with OutKick Dropkick and suggested he wanted to show he was more than what he described facetiously as being a “cartoon Indian.”
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“I’m a damn pro wrestler, and that’s what Karl Fredericks is. That’s what this has always been about. It was my love for pro wrestling, my love for performing, what I learned in Japan, that fighting spirit, the true heart and soul of professional wrestling and going out there, b—s to the wall. Not for four minutes, 4-7 minutes at a time,” he explained. “That’s what TV wrestling is. That’s just playing the character I was (as Eddy Thorpe) being, being what I felt like was a cartoon Indian at times and doing all that stuff.
“Working for a company like Produce is a blessing to be. I’m blessed to be here with people that give me a platform to be myself, to wrestle my match, to wrestle my style.”
Fredericks opened up about growing up with a Native American background and being unable to see anyone on television or in movies that looked like him. He lamented films portraying Native Americans as the bad guys. He said that being able to open up and be true to himself inside and outside of the ring has helped him get to where he is now – and he’s heard about it.
He said he’s received messages from those of a similar background who were happy to see him on TV regardless of the role he was playing or the type of character he was asked to portray on television.
“I would get messages all the time, and they did so much for me … Just the fact that we got a guy. Regardless of how they, I’m sure they had opinions on, you know, the way things were, but like they were just happy to have a guy. And so, I knew at the same time it was like, it was just important to be there giving my best effort regardless of what I was doing and I believe I did that, and now it’s just it’s going back out into the world as myself with a point to prove, and that’s on both ends cause like I’ve experienced this struggle with cultural identity.”
Fredericks described a deep pain he felt growing up because, to some of his Native friends, he was a “White boy,” but when he would be with his White friends, he would be the “native friend.”
“There are days when I’m, again, in the spirit of being facetious, and then there’s a lot of pain in the experience behind it where it’s just like, man, maybe I am just a f—ing Indian, whatever that means, and I don’t know what that even means, because that’s also, that’s still something that, you know what I mean? Like I would, I wouldn’t call myself (that). I do for the sake of the situation, essentially. So, I think it really is just up to me.”
Fredericks recalled one instance in the WWE Performance Center where tapping into his true self showed he was on the right path. He said the wrestlers he was with on one particular day got a chance to do promo work in front of John Cena.
He said he grabbed his choker, jewelry and dressed up before bolting to the facility. He ended up cutting a promo on Roman Reigns.
“I cut a promo on Roman Reigns, calling himself ‘The Tribal Chief, because culturally that’s not in their vernacular and he was heel at the time, so I remember saying things like, ‘Where I come from, the chief is the wise man.’ The chief’s a protector or provider, like the all of these good things, so I call out, I do this promo and John had no notes, said he loved it, said he understood who I was from top to bottom.”
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Fredericks said, later in the session, he essentially asked Cena how he could stand out in the ring where nobody who was watching looked like him and didn’t feel like he was supposed to be to others unless he was “covered in animal bones.” Fredericks said Cena described his question as “beautiful” and it clicked to him that whatever he was doing in the ring and whatever he was trying to portray was solely up to him and him alone, including saying no to a hair vs. hair match idea.
“The last year and a half has been very tough mentally, just processing a couple years of my life, as well. Didn’t have too much time to really process the end of the New Japan run and now all of a sudden, I’m here and I’m Karl again, and it’s been a lot of that,” he told OutKick Dropkick.
“I’m really excited for this opportunity to celebrate the Indigenous Peoples’ Day, help out some other homies, some kids that I’ve been either watching or know of or had asked around, … It’s gonna be a good day. I’m really excited for it.”
Fredericks made clear that Javi was in for the fight of his life as well. He said he believed he was one of the best wrestlers in the world and vowed to prove it Monday.
“If I was a betting man, I’d bet on red.”
