Men don’t read. I know that’s a gross generalization, but for every guy that reads a book there are probably three or four women that do the same thing, except the guys would brag about having just ‘read a book’. Guys are certainly more attracted to certain writers, like Stephen King, Brad Thor or other authors with last names of Marvel superheroes. 3X World Champ doesn’t have any of those things, yet guys will love this book and their wives will even borrow the book from them and read it before they can.
In place of superhero surnames we have Ted Pryor and the book’s subtitle being the bait that works like potato chip laced catnip. 3X World Champ: The Death-Defying TRUE STORY of a Kickboxer Turned Drug Smuggler…..Turned Business Icon, it’s a great title that uses the long-tail approach and does not disappoint. The centrifugal pull people will dig from the title is exacerbated by the illustration on the book’s cover. There’s a military-style helicopter firing its weapons on a speed boat that has dumped its illicit cargo into the ocean. This is a case of truth is stranger-than-fiction that’s in a semi-autobiographical book that follows a remarkable life, warts and all.
In the case of 3X World Champ we need to travel back in time to southern Florida, circa 1981. The concept of “MTV cops” wasn’t even an idea. Guys wearing pastel jackets were still an outlier, but all manner of drugs were running rampant. Pryor was just a kid who wanted to take karate lessons. He was a big, active teen and karate came naturally to him. In short order Pryor became friends with Big Joe Hess the owner of the dojo, where he started to teach the students and was able to beat Hess inside the ring.
Because Pryor was so good at kickboxing he was able to teach, in addition to work as a body guard, which allowed him to quit his job at the correctional facility for the criminally insane. He meets a beautiful girl on the beach and starts to fight professionally, but loses his first five matches. Pryor is not used to losing and doubles his efforts to becoming the best that he could and proceeds to win the next 80+ matches before retiring. Somewhere along the way he provided security for Elvis, Don Johnson and some unscrupulous types who sell and smuggle narcotics.
Unfortunately, he got deeper and more involved with the latter people. He never became a user, but he did transport product using boats and trucks, all the while continuing to teach kickboxing to various folks, including some policemen. The drug trade became more dangerous, his risks in that world, although extremely profitable, got more serious until he realized that the gig was up. Due to Pryor’s work with that ilk, he knew a lot of people that were bigger than him, but it was the 80’s and the justice system needed more than a pound of flesh.
Jail was unavoidable for Ted, but instead of treating as a form of punishment (which it is), he treated it as a chance to think about his crimes (which it should be. He did and when he left prison he leveled the same degree of dedication to life as he did when he lost his first five fights. There were ups and downs, but his ability to connect with people in business turned out to be as effective as his body kicks in the ring. Through networking with people and consistently following up with what he said he’d do he became a very successful entrepreneur.
The chapters in 3X World Champ are blitzkrieg fast. Each snippet of Pryor’s life could’ve had more text written about it. It’s quick and to the point, but provides enough context and build-up for readers to care about him. Yeah, he smuggled drugs, but it’s obvious from the book that he’s a nice guy. He’s a nice, smart guy who did bad things, got caught, paid his debt to society and built a business empire once he was released. Even though you like him, you want him to get caught because he’s doing a bad thing. This isn’t a book that glamorizes the lifestyle or any repercussions that come down because of it. Pryor is a guy who had a bright, endlessly high future when he started to do the bad things. He then got dependent on the money, but the dangers that it presented and illegality of it all led to his time in the pokey.
3X World Champ has fun in setting up the story and does so in a way that’s very easy to understand. Looking at the story now, we know that he ends up on top. It’s his attitude and ability to recover from the bad situations and their appropriate penalty that makes the book so rewarding. The happy ending is realistic.
Adult readers will stop throughout the book and ask themselves how much of this is fictitious. It’s billed as non-fiction, yet the story is paced so quickly and the stories are so fantastical they seem more like the best episode of Miami Vice that you never saw. This is where you need to remind yourself of the first page of the book that you hopefully read. It’s not a disclaimer, but it establishes the impermanence of our memory and how the minute details can fall between the cracks of our gray matter.
Pryor says the story is true in so far as he remembers, which is a great way to describe how we would recollect what happened to us 40 years ago. We’re all the hero to our own story. Was that period of time in our 20’s really that stupid, or do we just have much better common sense now? It’s safe to say that any of our stories wouldn’t rival Pryor’s which is a good thing for the first 80% of the book. The remaining 20% is a motivational primer that any of us are capable of doing anything. While each of us has varying abilities or differences, when they’re looked at through a different perspective or lens it can be an asset. These lessons are alluded to throughout 3X, so that even when things aren’t going bad for Pryor and are prosperous; he lets audiences know that his neon dream soured and he was lucky to escape.
3X World Champ: The Death-Defying TRUE STORY of a Kickboxer Turned Drug Smuggler…..Turned Business Icon by Ted Pryor and is available on Ben Bella Books.
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