Good news from Oklahoma today (Aug. 12), as Conrad Thompson shared that his podcast partner Jim Ross has undergone brain surgery and the legendary pro wrestling announcer is recovering in the hospital. JR shouldn’t be there long, though:
Happy to report that our pal @JRsBBQ had a successful procedure this morning!
I heard from his lovely daughter this morning that everything went well and good ole JR is expected to be back home by Friday! Please keep JR in your prayers as we hope for a speedy recovery!
The 74-year-old Ross announced the surgery last month, and just yesterday explained more about what it entailed:
Thanks for the outpouring of support regarding my upcoming brain surgery.
A hole will be drilled in my skull and a small tube will be inserted reachinto my stomach to better manage/drain excess brain fluid.
I’m optimistic. Thanks to all. 🤠
Earlier this week on his Kliq This podcast, Kevin Nash spoke about meeting with Ross and his longtime Raw commentary partner Jerry “The King” Lawler last week before the surgery. Nash reflected on the role JR played in his career as well. He also spoke openly about the losses the three wrestling legends have experienced in recent years, and dealing with those while going through the aging process themselves:
“I got to see JR Saturday night, I got to see JR and ‘The King’ [Jerry Lawler] and catch up with them. JR is going in for a procedure, so everybody out there, give a prayer for JR. It’s funny because, in my career, I always say that Vince [McMahon] was the first person that ever saw anything in me. And that’s wrong because when I first signed with WCW, Jim Ross had a sports show on the radio and he would have me in studio — maybe every couple months — but he would just have me in and we’d just talk sports and talk shit. He saw something in me, and I look at it as, I know that Jim carried a lot of weight at WCW early. And I think he kept me employed when it came down to making cuts, I’m sure a couple of times, the early years.
“It was great to see him. It’s like, here’s King, JR, and Nash. And Jerry lost his son, JR lost his wife, and I lost my son. I just looked at them, I said, ‘JR, from all of the shit that the three of us have been through, it would have been so much easier to fucking eat a bullet or at least a handful of fucking pills to this point.’ I said, ‘But here it is, all of us four years into it, and we’re fucking still wanting to live.’
“And Jim says, ‘Fuck yeah. I’m getting a fucking shunt put into my fucking brain.’ Like, ‘Yeah, I want to live.’ Everybody talks shit, and — life is so precious, and you don’t realize how precious it is until you get [near the end] — and I’m not talking about the back nine, I’m talking about when you can see the fucking clubhouse.”
