Daily Star’s Chanukah information to ‘who’s Jew in wrestling’ from WWE legend to WCW icon

This month, Jews across the globe will be celebrating the festival of Chanukah. As Adam Sandler once suggested in his song about the festival, it’s nice to do something for the Jewish kids at this time of year and so the Daily Star is bringing the festive gifts by way of our own whos’ who of Jews in wrestling!

Despite making up a tiny fraction of the world’s population, there have been a number of notable Jewish people across many professions, including the Star’s own favourite brand of sports entertainment – wrestling! Some of these stars you might be able to guess, others are likely to be more of a revelation.

So let’s start with the obvious. It will be of little surprise to most wrestling fans to learn that Bill Goldberg is Jewish. Known in both WCW and later WWE simply as ‘Goldberg’ he rose to fame with an undefeated streak of over 150 matches. Goldberg’s autobiography proudly discussed his Jewish roots and the back page features a head shot of the star wearing a skull cap. As a former World Heavyweight Champion in both WCW and WWE, Goldberg is arguably the most successful Jewish wrestler of all time.

The most serious challenge to Goldberg’s status comes from two of the M’s of wrestling. First (isn’t he always?), is the current AEW mainstay Maxwell Jacob Friedman. Widely respected as one of the most successful character wrestlers in the world, MJF as he is better known, retained the AEW Championship at one of the world’s largest wrestling events at Wembley. Second is the ‘Macho Man’ Randy Savage.

Both he and his brother Lanny ‘The Genius’ Poffo were top stars and Savage held both WCW and WWF championship belts. The Poffo’s mother was a Jewish lady whom married a Catholic man. Speaking about her wedding, Mrs. Poffo said: ‘At the reception, all the Jewish people were on one side of the room and all the Catholics were on the other, and his mother said to him in Italian, ‘What have you done?”.

Indeed life isn’t always happy as a Jew in wrestling circles, wrestler Mathias Glass allegedly used antisemitic stereotypes for his character, a CMLL wrestler once went under the ring name ‘La Nazi’, and WWE’s Asuka even once used a Nazi gimmick. Meanwhile, antisemitism has been voiced at shows, including at the well-known CZW promotion.

Back to the positives, Macho isn’t the only Jewish star from WWE’s golden era, the Nasty Boys Jerry Sags and Brian Knobbs are Jewish, as was former announcer, the late Howard Finkel. In fact, Jewish wrestlers pre-date the 80s heyday of WWE. Vince McMahon Senior would have known ‘Jewish Heavyweight Champion’ Abe Jacobs and perhaps, wrestling ‘God’ Karl Gotch or Ida Mae Martinez who wrestled in the 50s.

He will have known Dean Malenko’s father Boris who wrestled in the 60s/70s and Dean and Joe Malenko from the 80s. Indeed, there have been Jews in WWE across the decades. From wrestlers like Ross Greenberg and Barry Horowitz who wore the star of David on his tights, and entered to a Jewish folk song, to managers like Eddie ‘the Brain’ Creatchman who wore a star of David round his neck. Stars from the recent past include but are not limited to Billy Kidman, Brian Pillman, Drew Gulak and Simon Gotch/Grimm (of the Vaudevillians).

NXT’s Noam Dar who has Israeli roots, wrestled in front of a number of Jewish youth at a camp on a card which also included ex-WWE talent Tegan Nox, meanwhile WWE newcomers Jack Cartwheel/Summit and Gal Barkay are new to the company but not to Judaism! Another non-wrestler however, Paul Heyman equals Savage and Goldberg in the notoriety stakes. Referring to himself as amongst other things ‘Brock Lesnar’s Jew’, Heyman is unashamedly Jewish. Born to a Holocaust survivor, he has even offered a Jewish prayer on TV!

Heyman famously established Extreme Championship Wrestling, a brand which remains well respected long after its demise. A number of successful ECW talents also broke big including Raven aka Scott Levy, and Joel Gertner, both of whom are Jewish. Meanwhile other non-wrestling Jewish legends of Sports Entertainment include referee and former WWE/TNA talent Mikey Batts and AEW’s own Justin Roberts and Lexi Nair.

There are a number of other wrestling success stories – AEW’s Angelico is one of the tribe, so are both QT Marshall and Marina Shafir. Colt Cabana had said that his ‘Scotty Goldman’ character was bestowed upon him in WWE because he was Jewish. Apparently ‘Vince McMahon was like, oh, he’s Jewish, lets characterise him …so Goldman was because I was Jewish but I don’t think it was discriminatory or to keep me down.’ Robert Stone of NXT and formerly TNA/Impact has said that as a youngster he visited the synagogue with his father (and still does when home on Jewish holidays) and that the Rabbi is an avid follower of sports!

Another Jewish star is former WWE headliner Chris Masters who when discussing his ‘shoot’ or real last name explained that “my mums Jewish but I’m a mixture of a number of things. Swedish, a little Russian but obviously Mordenzky is my ‘shoot’ last name so obviously I think it screams Polish Jew – whenever anybody hears a ‘sky’ and their attune to it, they automatically know ‘you’re polish aren’t you’ but they don’t usually call on the Jew thing’.

Someone else whose surname was masked for years was Matt ‘Tensai’ Bloom, better known to some as Albert/A-Train. Some have more complex Jewish stories. Diamond Dallas Page aka Page Falkinburg’s great-grandmother was Jewish even though he is not, whilst ex-WWE diva Kelly Kelly (Barbie Blank) has a non-Jewish mother and a Jewish father but was raised to celebrate both religious traditions.

We can also put pay to some rumours. Kane, despite having the surname Jacobs is not Jewish. Kevin Owens (formerly Steen) meanwhile, says he gets asked about being Jewish “all the time’. ‘It’s not a Jewish name. If I’m Jewish nobody has told me about it’. Despite online rumours, Kevin Nash is also not Jewish but he’s a good man for Jews to know. Nash is so well informed, he’s been able to tell prominent Jewish wrestlers when particular holidays have been!

Kurt Angle is not a Jew, nor are the Steiner brothers, despite the Iron Sheikh claiming they all were. Neither are Michael PS Hayes or Alexa Bliss Jewish. Meanwhile in reply to a tweeter stating that ‘she herself is Jewish’ Tammy Sytch (Sunny) asked on X: ‘Since when am I Jewish?’ Whilst there are those that haven’t converted but were asked, like Missy Hyatt, there are those that aren’t Jewish but used to be.

Marc Mero tweeted that he ‘Grew up Jewish accepted Jesus as Lord ‘Savior’. Happy Christmas Marc! So too, former Lucha underground man, Matt Striker (not to be confused with Matt Stryker of Ring of Honor fame who it’s claimed on the net is Jewish himself) was born Jewish but has taken Jesus as the messiah. Another Jew who took a different path is Lisa Marie, better known to WWE/Impact viewers as Victoria/Tara respectively. Despite having reportedly converted, her hair covers a Hebrew tattoo on her neck!

Others whose Jewish provenance remains unconfirmed but have been added to this list by internet folklore include CM Punk, Blake Howard, Lord Alfred Hayes, Matt ‘Evan Bourne’ Sydal, Tommy Dreamer, Rhyno, Steve Blackman, Billie Starkz, Brandon Cutler, Jessie Godderz or Maniac Mark Lewin. Its not yet been properly established that Sean ‘X-Pac’ Waltman is Jewish but he has spoken passionately about Israel and reports indicated Nick Mitchell aka Mitch of the Spirit Squad had found religion and moved there.

A number of Jews have wrestled across the independent scene too. Former wrestlers Aviv Maayan and Max ‘Voltage’ Olesker (of comedy duo Max and Ivan), and current wrestlers Brimstone, Royce Isaacs and Brad ‘Manny Montana’ Jacobowitz. Perhaps most importantly of all, current Progress Proteus champ and internet legend Simon Miller is part of the crew too!

One Jewish man who has wrestled on the independents but has a somewhat wider fanbase is former WCW champ, actor and death match wrestler David Arquette. He’s not the only film connection, Jack Black who is Jewish played the title character in Nacho Libre, a film about a Luchador!

And there’s WWE Hall of Famer Andy Kauffman too. Veterans of the Canadian independent wrestling scene include Xandra Bale, Danyah and Tomer Shalom who wrestled WWE’s Jason Jordan in 2017 under the alias Jean-Pierre Goulet! Then there is the Demon Assassin, Impact wrestling’s Rosemary, who though not Jewish worked in a kosher eatery in Winnipeg, Canada. Christian meanwhile has a family connection to a Jewish centre despite his name!

There are a number of Jews who have worked in and around the wrestling business too, there’s Herb Alpert who composed Tues night titans theme, there are promoters like Gery Roif, and promotion big wigs like OVW’s Craig Greenberg, the late Joe Koff who was COO of Ring of Honor and of course Ari Emmanuel at TKO. Jewish British MP Charlotte Nichols led debates in parliament on wrestling.

There are trainers like Okada’s or Ronda Rousey’s teacher Gene Lebell. There are also those that have worked in or with the press like PR officials Jon Schneider at AEW, Joel Zeitzcer at WWE, and Simon Rothstein at TNA. There’s photographer Oli Sandler, Dave Meltzer who has Jewish heritage, Bill Apter, Keith Elliot Greenberg and then, last but not least the two of us that pulled all this together.

Whether you’re Jewish or not, hopefully this has provided a little eye in to the diversity and breadth of the Jewish community, not least in wrestling, and provided some inspiration to aspiring Jewish wrestlers. A happy Chanukah, merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all.

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