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Bill Watts, (born May 5, 1939 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma), is a former American professional wrestler and promoter.

Watts was famous under his "Cowboy" gimmick in his wrestling career, and then as a tough, no-nonsense promoter in the Mid-South area of the United States, which grew to become the UWF.

In 1992, he was the Executive Vice President of World Championship Wrestling but after clashes with management over a number of issues as well as feeling pressure from Hank Aaron over a racially sensitive piece of correspondence, he resigned.

Contents 1 Wrestling career 2 Booking career 3 Political allegiance 4 Autobiography 5 Championships and accomplishments

He was a former football player and wrestler at high school, and went on to play for the Houston Oilers and the Minnesota Vikings.

As a pro wrestler, he famously feuded with WWWF Champion Bruno Sammartino, but was unable to win away the belt. In the 1960's, he wrestled in many areas, such as San Francisco, Chicago, St. Louis, and even Japan, for All Japan Pro Wrestling. During these periods, Watts challenged for both the National Wrestling Alliance and American Wrestling Association versions of the World Title.

Bill Watts is perhaps even more famous for being a pioneering promoter in the Mid-South area of the USA, with his base of operation being in the Shreveport area. His promotion was known as the UWF. He is often credited with creating the current and popular "episodic" style of TV wrestling, building solid creative storylines week-on-week, with an emphasis on solid in-ring action with dependable wrestlers like Steve Williams, The Junkyard Dog, Ted DiBiase and Jim Duggan. He's an outspoken critic on breaking kayfabe and "smart" wrestling fans. A Watts run promotion always had face and heel wrestlers dress in different locker rooms and to have faces and heels not meet publicly. He has also been known to revamp his booking plans in order to protect the business from such fans. When a newspaper mentioned a wrestling event being the last one Jake "The Snake" Roberts would wrestle in Watts' territory and talked about the tradition of a wrestler jobbing in his last match to put his opponent over and to expect the finish to be in that fashion, Watts changed it so Roberts actually won the match and got put over on his way out of the territory.

After losing over half a million dollars, Watts sold the UWF to NWA Mid-Atlantic's Jim Crockett Promotions, who kept a lot of their stars, such as Sting.

Later on, Bill Watts became head booker, or promoter, of World Championship Wrestling in the early nineties. He took a lot of his old-school values with him, such as banning moves from the top rope (due to its overuse at the time), and the aforementioned babyfaces and heels separation. His tenure was not long, nor were his ideas overly embraced. He introduced his son, Erik Watts, to WCW around this time, who many felt was not ready for big-time wrestling yet.

Bill later went on to a position of booking power in the World Wrestling Federation, his tenure there was short, as Watts stated in later interviews that he was only up there on a three-month contract and had no interest in staying long-term.

Bill Watts is a Republican, and in an ROH shoot interview with Jim Cornette, he criticised Bill Clinton and the Democrats numerous times. He also said, "In the United States constitution it says all men are equal, but some men are more talented than others, and worth more".

In March 2006 Watts released his autobiography The Cowboy and the Cross: The Bill Watts Story: Rebellion, Wrestling and Redemption through ECW Press. The book chronicles his upbringing, his career as first a wrestler then a promoter along with events in his personal life. The book also details his becoming a born-again Christian.

• World Wide Wrestling Federation

• WWWF United States Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Gorilla Monsoon

• Wrestling Observer Newsletter

• He is a member of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter Hall of Fame (inducted in 1996)