Clean Slate

[Dan Herrera]

[ Begin Scene I | Surprise, Surprise ]

[ Setting: AMC Theatres ]

[ Location: Raleigh, North Carolina ]

[ Cast: Dan Herrera, Peaches ]

(Sitting in the movie theater, I feel my phone begin to vibrate in my pocket. Peaches hand is resting on my leg as I hold it and she looks over at me hoping I won’t pull my phone out in the middle of the theater. I give her a quick nervous smile as I let go of her hand sliding my hand into my pocket. She leans over whispering into my ear.)

Peaches- Watch the movie! Who cares about the phone?

(Leaning into her ear now catching a glimpse of the guy behind us giving me a dirty look, I reply.)

Dan Herrera- What if it’s important?

(Peaches shakes her head and I already know what she’s thinking. “Nothing can be that important right now.” But despite her objection I pull the phone out looking over the tweet that was just sent to me. It’s just a number and my twitter tag from the FGA official twitter. I point it towards Peaches confused and the light lights up her face and the poeple next to her. She shoves the phone down apologizing to her neighbor.)

Peaches- What Dan?

Dan Herrera- I just got a random tweet from the FGA account. I’m not sure what it’s about.

Peaches- We’ll find out when the movie’s over.

Dan Herrera- I can’t wait. I’m sorry.

(I laugh nervously as I stand up from my chair on the aisle and begin to walk out of the theater. I give her the pointer finger as if to say, just one minute and she scoffs at me. I then head out of the theater standing out in the hallway as I begin looking through the FGA accounts twitter to get a little context as to the tweet that I was just mentioned in. Immediately I realized that my name was selected for the Wildcard Lottery Tournament for the World Championship. An excited exclamation escapes my lips before I can contain it.)

Dan Herrera- Hell yeah!

(The movie patrons in the hallway stop looking over at me. I give them assurances that I’m okay before I continue to look through the tweets. It’s not very long before I realize that not only have I been selected for the tournament, but in the first round tag matches, I’ve managed to be set up randomly with my tag team partner. It’s almost as if it was meant to be. Talking to myself I whisper.)

Dan Herrera- Wow. This is one hell of a surprise.

(I continue to look through my phone as I look at the responses of Evan Envi, even responding to some. I see Tony Carmine not happy, but what’s new. I see Rother complaining about the board of directors decisions. Who cares. I keep scrolling as I watch all the participants being announced. This tournament is stacked and I know it. But it’s one hell of an opportunity I don’t look to squander. I immediatly log onto my Vegas Sportsbook app to see if they have odds out yet, but they don’t. As I’m closing the app, Peaches walks out of the theater.)

Peaches- You said one minute Dan. It’s been five.

(Holding my phone out to her with the twitter app open to FGA’s page, I hand it to her.)

Dan Herrera- Remember I mentioned that I was in consideration for the World Championship tournament coming up?

Peaches- Yeah.

Dan Herrera- I’m in!

(Peaches smiles at me leaning in and giving me a hug. She can sense my excitement, and even though she’s less than excited to be out of her seat in the movie theater she shows me it means as much to her as it does to me.)

Peaches- That’s really great Dan. I know you weren’t seeking out any singles opportunities right now. But that’s a big one. I’m sure you’ll do well. You always do.

Dan Herrera- Thanks Peaches. Yeah, this is going to be one hell of a tournament. With the competition in place, I’ve got a lot of work to do to get ready.

(At this moment is when Peaches expression changes. She puts a hand on her hip and begins talking with the other. I know I’m in trouble now.)

Peaches- No you don’t Dan. You’ve got more than a week til that match. Now is definitely not the time.

Dan Herrera- There’s no time like the present Peaches.

Peaches- In the present we’re missing our movie because you HAD to know what was going on. And besides the fact that it’s great news, it’s not news that makes any big difference right now.

Dan Herrera- It could though. What if the difference between winning and losing comes down to me training tonight.

Peaches- This is why you retired the first time around. Remember? You were driving yourself into the ground because you wanted to impress everyone and you felt as though it was burning you and your wrestling love into the ground. You do just fine in the tag team division without running yourself into the ground. This is no different, you’ll be ready no matter what you do.

Dan Herrera- I remember. It’s just, this is a big opportunity for me to make an impact.

Peaches- Dan, you’re not in the singles spotlight you once were. No one is expecting you to win this.

(My brows furrough.)

Peaches- I’m not saying that you won’t. All I’m saying is that you don’t have the weight of the world on your shoulders Dan. You are free to go into this tournament without worrying about anyone else but yourself. So how about you relax a bit and maybe you’ll do better without trying to carry all that weight on your back going into Vertigo.

Dan Herrera- Hmm… you may be onto something.

Peaches- I’m always right.

(Peaches laughs)

Peaches- It’s only a matter of whether you listen to me or not. You know you’re hard headed.

(She winks at me and I laugh.)

Peaches- So let’s go watch the rest of our movie. And then tomorrow morning you can begin your preparations. Do whatever you want, but make sure that you take time for yourself instead of trying to do everything for everyone else. What do you say?

Dan Herrera- I say… we’re gonna have to annoy our neighbors more now that you left the theater to find out what we missed.

(I put my arm around Peaches and we begin to head back into the theater. Peaches laughs before responding.)

Peaches- Well that’s on you. If you knew the difference between one minute and five, I’d of never left my seat.

Dan Herrera- Fair enough.

(We make our way back into the theater doors. As the close behind us the scene then fades out to black.)

[ End Scene I ]

---

[ Begin Promo | Clean Slate ]

If you’re in the new school of FGA, you seen Dan Herrera as a Tag Team Champion.

I’ve fought alongside Cordelia Stevenson in Status Quo since I made my return to FGA for the Dynamic Duos tournaments. We went on and won the tournament. Then we went on and won the tag team championships. And since then we’ve been fighting like hell to keep them. And if you’re new school, that’s all you know of Dan Herrera. The hard nosed, team player that puts his nose to the grindstone alongside his trusted team mate to get the job done at all costs.

But..

If you’re an old school fan of FGA, you know Dan Herrera in a completely different light.

I’ve fought countless singles matches in FGA. I’ve fought in several Lions Cups. I’ve fought in several Gold Rush Rumbles. Coming in second in both of them. And that’s where the stigma of Dan Herrera is personified. If you’re old school, you know that Dan Herrera has racked up many singles wins in his FGA career. But when it came down to the big matches at the Pay Per Views, Dan Herrera was always second best. The epitome of that being when I went head to head… to head with Jimmy Page and Dom Harter for the FGA World Championship and after a grueling match, came up short.

I’ve put my heart and soul into FGA since the closure of Global Division of Wrestling. All I ever wanted once I stopped owning and started competing was to be the best at what I do. To go from the top of one position to becoming the man that lead the charge in a whole nother job field. I loathe people like Chandler Scott and Zero McHannon. While yes, it is because in many situations they are just deplorable human beings. The other reason is pure jealousy.

That’s a hard thing to admit for a man like me. And you may or may not get the gravity of that statement, but it’s true. They have what I want. They’ve proven that they are good at what they do when their backs are pushed up against the wall. I on the other hand have not. In the case of being the Tag Team Champion, if I have a bad night I know Cordy will pick up my slack. And vice versa, if she’s off her game, I am there to help her up. 

But for me as a singles wrestler, I’ve not been one that can be trusted to go out there and get the big wins. In fact, Vegas odds on my matches have been less than flattering. In fact, if I were to win many of my old PPV matches, I’m sure I would have made somebody rich. 

This has to change. 

I retired from FGA awhile back because it all just got to me. The lights. The expectations. The crushing defeats when I’d go out to the ring saying that this was “my time” to finally achieve what I was going for. I walked away. Maybe that was quitting. Maybe that made everyone mad. I understand if many of the fans I had just for being me and continuing to push ahead despite the outcomes decided to leave then. I’d get it. But I wasn’t making myself happy anymore. I was starting to obsess about it to the point where it made my relationship with Peaches suffer because I was constantly away trying to train just that much harder for my next match. I walked away because I didn’t believe in myself anymore.

When Cordy asked me if I wanted to join with her and tag for the Dynamic Duos tournament as we both came out of retirement. I had to think long and hard about it. I wasn’t sure that I wanted to put myself into a situation where I was going to let myself obsess and burn myself out again and put a stain on this sport that I love so much, in my head. But I finally said yes and look what we’ve done.

The success. The championships. The jealousy of wrestlers like Kevin Hardaway, Chris Tryon, Ruby Tyler, and Jason Marx is now going towards me. That’s a feeling I never have had in my wrestling career. And i can tell you right now that this is the feeling I had been searching for with all my fighting. It’s renewed my belief in myself. It’s renewed my drive. And it’s renewed my interest in making up for the mistakes in my past. 

This Wildcard Lottery Tournament is just the chance that I needed. When my name was announced on the FGA Twitter as a participant, I took it as a sign. I didn’t plan to seek this out. I didn’t plan to look for this opportunity. It’s been presented to me without any work on my part. And maybe it’s undeserved, but I’m taking it and not throwing it away. I am going to go to the Prairie Capital Convention Center in Springfield with every intention of walking out of that building as one of the 4 Quarterfinal winners. 

I have to watch myself. Because if I don’t I’ll sit here and tell everyone watching this that once again this is “my time”. That I’ve put in all the work to get this far and that the chips have all been bet and the cards dealt. That I’m the aces in the hole that will tilt this tournament in my favor. All the same tropes and phrases I used to describe every opportunity placed before me in FGA in the past. 

This is not “my time” though. In fact, there’s about ten other people on this roster at this point that without a doubt have earned their time to attempt to capture the World Championship. I’m the underdog in this tournament for the first time in a long time. And I like it that way.

There’s no pressure for me to succeed. There’s no belief that it’s all or nothing for me to win this tournament or else it’s just another black mark on the resume of FGA’s Mr. Business. It’s just Dan Herrera’s name on a piece of paper with the chance of a lifetime. I can walk down to that ring free of burden and fight like hell the type of matches that most know I am capable of.

And if I do that, there’s no telling how far I can go. First round exit? Second round exit? Finals? Anything’s possible. And I’m going to ride this tournament as far as I can go. I did pretty well in the last one I was a part of, I’m hoping that 2016 is my year when it comes to them. 

Now, on the note that in the first round, somehow whether rigged as some want to say or totally random as advertised… Status Quo is teaming up. Karma and Noelle have a hard road ahead of them. Neither of them is a slouch in their own right, but they’re facing off against the tag team champions in a randomly paired tournament.

It almost doesn’t seem fair. But once again, things just happened to fall this way and I’m not going to complain. We’re just going to go out there and do what we’ve done for the last four months. Fight hard, and fight together. And if we do that, no matter how good Karma and Noelle are individually, our team work and familiarity will give us the advantage we need to advance. So on that note, Karma I have a lot of respect for you. I wish I knew exactly where you fell on the Dan Herrera respect forum, but regardless it wouldn’t change the fact that I see you as a mainstay of FGA and a wrestler that will always be a hard out. And Noelle, you’re no slouch yourself. You’ve gotten singles accolades in FGA the same as Karma, which I am jealous of myself. You two will be a great way to start this tournament off. And I do wish you the best of luck. You’re between a rock and a hard place, let’s see if you can fight your way out.

But should the position arise, I’ll find myself in an interesting place after the first round. If me and Cordy do advance, then we immediately turn around to fight each other in the next round. 

Status Quo exhibition match.

I don’t mind it at all. And I’m sure that Cordy doesn’t either. No matter what happens, we’ll move on from this tournament and continue to fight together for our tag team championships. But I’m sure this is a match that many in the FGA World would be happy to see. 

Myself included.

We’re partners. But we’re also competitors. Bragging rights are always welcome in friendly competition between friends. Whomever wins this match, should it happen, will hold it over the other's head, no doubt. But that’s what happens in a friendship. People will want to turn it into something else. They’ll say if she beats me that it’s proof of people like Tony Carmine’s claims of me being dead weight. And should I win, I’ll be considered “lucky”. Regardless of the words of others, I’ve never cared for them.

Me and Cordy will go down to that ring, if called upon, and fight til one of us has their hand raised over the other. That’s the long and short of it. 

I’ve had a lot of time this week to think about what this tournament means to me. It means a chance to make up for past mistakes. It’s a chance to once again show the world what exactly Dan Herrera can do. My chance to possibly grab hold of the World Championship that’s eluded me my entire time in Frontier Grappling Arts. But the most important thing it means is me being able to prove to myself that I can do it. If nothing else, I just want to do that.

Becoming Tag Team Champions was an idea that I signed up for. Did I believe that I’d make it all the way their to win it and continually defend it? No. But I was going to fight like hell to do it. And here we are. Is this tournament mine for the taking? No. But I’m going to fight like hell again and see where I end up. And hopefully by the end of things, once again I’ll impress myself and everyone else. 

If there’s one thing you can count on in FGA, you never know what’s next for Dan Herrera.

Stay tuned for my next great accomplishment.

I’m ready to show you all, worry free, what I can do.

I’m coming, Illinois. 

Get ready for a show.

Thank you, That is All!

[ End Promo ]