As I sit to put the finishing touches on this piece, we are less than one week away from the first 365 show of 2025 in Victoria and there is ONE MATCH announced for the card. But it doesn't really matter because it's a title match, a dog collar match (A famously violent match type) between the living legend Devon Shooter and the champion, our beloved champion – and funnily enough, the most hated guy in Portland wrestling – Elliot Tyler. And when Elliot Tyler is in the main event, people are going to come out.

But it's not just 365 where he overcame the longtime heel champion, Devon Shooter, where he has become a staple. Tyler has been a force in PNW wrestling scene,. I've talked to multiple people who have been to one wrestling show here on the west coast who said that the wrestler that stood out – sometimes the only one they really remembered – was Elliot Tyler. There are few wrestlers I've encountered that just click with everyone in the audience, no matter who they are – be they younger, older or my mom. It could be the entrance music that makes you want to slide down a rainbow. It could be the barking – who doesn't love barking in a pack? It could be evident hydration on he is always displaying. It could be the opportunity to chant “BEEF!” - who doesn't love a good, strong one-syllable chant? It could be his Big E-like combination of an adorable face and silly-yet-hard-nosed demeanour. (I'm putting the following here because this is still a music blog, for now, and I'm not going to assume you know about non-Stone Cold/Rock-level WWE champions: If you need context for this, please do yourself a favour and do a search for former WWE hampion Big E. He rules so hard.)

A champion about to be made. All photos contained in here are courtesy the gawd Darren Ho.

Beyond all of that, the thing that stands out when Elliot Tyler gets between the ropes is a legimately radiating love coming from the man himself. He looks like he's having the best time, all the time, and it's a completely infectious energy. The kind of energy that drew all of us to our favourite wrestlers when we first started watching. Thankfully for all us watching independent wrestling on the west coast, in the pacific northwest and beyond, a young man stumbled across something that drew him in more than a decade ago. “Honestly, it was just an accident. I was having a sleepover with a buddy and he fell asleep, and I was flipping through channels and I found a rerun of Friday Night Smackdown! and watched it and I got hooked,” Elliot recalls, telling me about his entry-way into wrestling. “It definitely wasn’t the first match that got me hooked – I think the first match was someone who is cancelled now, and they were notorious for never being that entertaining, from 2010/2011, so I’ll let you pick out from the roster who that could be – the main event had Kane and Edge and Rey Mysterio. I was like 'This is crazy. This is everything I want in life. The absurdity of it all.' A lot of people go 'I saw this match and that’s when I knew.' I never had that. There was never a specific moment where I said, “I have to do this.” It just kind of started as me watching, and it turned into me hitting moves on my pillows, which turned into me hitting moves on my friends in the backyard and then it progressed to me getting into a school. It started with beating up pillows, and it went way too far.”

Luckily for him, and for the rest of us, one of the most-renowned training schools was basically in his backyard, the legendary Lions Gate Dojo. “[The Dojo] means the world to me, truthfully. That old saying goes, 'You can’t pick your family,' but I feel like I kind of did with them. Even when I took that almost year off, 8 or 9 months off of wrestling, I was still pretty frequently at the Dojo, doing fitness and cardio classes. The support system I have there, and the kind of reliability I have there is unmatched.,” says Tyler, his voice filling with a noticeable light as he ponders what Lions Gate Dojo means to him. “It’s truthfully just so important to me and who I am as a person. Even outside of wrestling, the people I’ve met through the Dojo who have helped me out in non-wrestling life has been so incredible. I can’t say enough good things about the Dojo.”

For everything they’ve taught Elliot, I don’t think Lions Gate Dojo prepared him for this. OUCH!

2024 was a landmark year for Tyler that saw him not only capture his first singles title - the aforementioned BIG GOLD for 365, while wrestling for 15 different promotions (!!), but a year that featured his appearance in a real, honest-to-goodness Death Match – the first of it's kind here in my hometown Victoria. It was a bloody, chaotic war against the Don of 365, Eddie Osborne and the always electric Vile Villain, Tara Zep. Shockingly I was unable to attend personally but I know it left a mark on not just wrestlers, but my friends in attendance. “My thoughts kind of went up and down about it before it happened. I was very excited,” Tyler recalls of the time around that very violent night. “There was a short time right before lockdown where I was really trying to cement myself as the new hardcore kind of guy on the scene. Then, through covid, I softened up a bit. I didn’t have as thick of skin coming out of it. So I kind of left that behind, but to get this opportunity was huge. Afterwards, boy did that suck. About three weeks later – this is disgusting, so I apologize if you’re squeamish – I had a big zit on the back of my head and I popped it and it was a glass shard. It was a little piece from a light tube.” Lest anyone think that such a disgusting incident would scare Tyler away from the more extreme sides of professional wrestling, you can rest easy. “That was a little tough. That was the moment I decided, 'Hmmm, maybe I don’t need to another death match.' But now that I’m some months removed from, I would definitely do another. Not a doubt in my mind.”

As we flip the calendar and step forward into a new year, I – and the rest of 365 Nation – will cherish this current run with the belt, however it runs it last. I mean, it's genuinely awesome to have a wrestler holding that big, beautiful belt that I don't want to boo and hiss and scream at. But even if/when he loses that belt, the army will continue amassing behind Elliot Tyler, wherever his wrestling adventure takes him. Get on the train now or get left behind and mocked by us forever. Until the stop, enjoy this absolutely delightful Championship instalment of 5 Questions with Rags, where we talk about Tyler the Creator, cat care and the importance of therapy. It was a joy and a privilege to get talk time with one of the goodest guys we have in our scene and a dude I wish for all the best things for, both in the ring and out of it. Enjoy!

1. What’s the first album you remember buying with your own money

Okay, great question. BUYING. The first album I bought was a My Chemical Romance album for my ex-girlfriend in high school. I had albums before that but I got them for Christmas and birthdays. So the first one I paid for was a greatest hits album from My Chemical Romance.

When’s the last time you bought an album? Do you buy many albums?

I have a huge vinyl collection. Last time I bought one would have been Tyler the Creator Igor.

Fuck yeah, that’s some good raps.

I just got into him, actually.

It’s funny, when Tyler the Creator first hit the scene, I couldn’t really get into it. It was too extreme and too much for me, but then he grew up a bit, Flower Boy came out and I started to get it.

I honestly took kind of the same path. When he was really big all my friends told me he was the best. I just for some reason, my brain being the way it is, was like, “Ah, everyone loves him. I’m not going to give him the time of day.” And I regret that. I wish I was there when he was producing all these hits in real time and Odd Future was going on.

2. What's your favourite household chore?

You know, I will have to go with feeding the cat. That’s a good one. I would say mowing the lawn because I used to love doing that but I don’t own a lawn so I feel like it’s a copout saying that. So I’ll go with feeding the cat and doing the litter for cat – cat maintenance.

What’s your cats name? He’s a handsome cat.

His name is Murphy.

3. Ooooh, my mom had a cat named Murphy who lived until he was 26 years old. So, long live Murphy. If you could spend the day with anyone living or dead, who would it be and what would you do?

It would be my grandfather who passed away in 2018. I would probably – there was a day when I was 16 or 17 where we hung out all day during Spring Break. He took to like, three different museums and I think I would just recreate that day because I truly feel like that was one of the best days of my life.

Here is Elliot getting stretched by a man who is not a grandpa, but has the (wrestling) wisdom of a grandpa.

4. When is the last time you did something for the first time?

I think the last time I did something for the first time would have been May 21st of last year, when I got married. To this day, it’s the only time I’ve done it. And it is going quite well. My mother in law gave me very great advice: You get married once for love and twice for money. So if this one doesn’t work, you can find me with an old, rich lady in the suburbs.

5. When's the last time you cried, happy or sad tears?

Would have been two weeks ago, on Monday. I go to therapy every two weeks. I think therapy is very good. I didn’t do it for a long, long time because, in my mind, if I went to therapy or took anti-depressants – which I take – I thought that would be admitting defeat to myself. Now I am medicated and regularly go to therapy with great support from my family and my wife. And I would say every two weeks, I cry. It’s good to talk about things that you don’t always talk about.

I appreciate you saying that. I’m also a big proponent of therapy and it’s something that’s helped me a great deal in the last few years as well.

I think everyone should go through it. Even if you’re perfectly normal – there’s no better reason to go because if you’re perfectly normal. There’s actually no better reason to go through with it because if you’re perfectly normal you gotta figure out what’s going on. <laughs> I’m very lucky that I have a very big support system that helps me get over my, I don’t wanna say ‘toxic masculinity’ but, probably something along those lines.

6. Your guest question comes from one of the best dudes and someone you're quite familiar with, Bigfoot’s best friend, Eli Surge – What’s a piece of advice that you hear many people give in wrestling that you disagree with?

I’ll say it and then I’ll explain because I think the way I’m going to say it is different from how I’m going to explain it after. It’s not said as much anymore, but the people who say “Watch your back in wrestling. You don’t make friends in wrestling.” I think it’s some of the worst advice that’s given, truly. I think back in the 70s, sure. But nowadays you just hear bitter, angry people who didn’t get exactly what they wanted say it. And it’s disappointing. Some of the closest people in my life I met through wrestling. My wife, I met through wrestling. Some of the current people that I’m hanging out with more now than I have in the past. I have formed such great connections with people from Alberta, Washington and Oregon. I don’t agree with “Don’t make friends in this business.” I think it’s terrible advice and will actually stunt your growth and projection within the industry, if you choose to shut yourself from everyone.