Alabama wrestling legend Bobby Eaton passes away

On Aug. 5, professional wrestling legend Bobby Eaton passed away in his sleep at the age of 62.

The cause of Eaton’s death has not been released but he was hospitalized in July following a fall in his home that led to a broken hip. His wife, Donna, passed away on June 26.

Eaton was born and raised in Huntsville and first made his name wrestling all over the State of Alabama and Tennessee in the late 1970s and early 1980s, including events held in Dothan, Enterprise, New Brockton and Ozark.

Eaton worked for a number of wrestling promotions all over the world, including in Japan, but found his most success in Jim Crockett Promotions (JCP) and later World Championship Wrestling (WCW). While Eaton was known as one of the most underrated wrestlers in his era, he was most known for his prowess as a tag team wrestler.

Eaton formed a number of successful tag teams including his team with Sweet Brown Sugar (Koko B. Ware) in the Tennessee territory, his team with the legendary Arn Anderson in WCW and most notably his teaming with Dennis Condrey – another Alabama native – and Stan Lane as the Midnight Express.

Condrey formed the original version of the Midnight Express with Norvell Austin and Randy Rose in 1980 and in 1983 Eaton and Condrey were put together in Mid-South Wrestling as the new version of the Midnight Express with legendary manager Jim Cornette in their corner.

Eaton and Condrey went on to be considered one of – if not the – best tag teams in the world and in 1987 Condrey left JCP where the two were a top tag team. JCP quickly paired Eaton with Stan Lane and that pair found even more success together.

Eaton would go on to form teams with Arn Anderson, Brad Armstrong and Steven Regal in his later years. He would end his career holding the NWA/WCW World Tag Team Championships three times, the Mid-South Tag Team Championships twice, the NWA U.S. Tag Team Championships three times, the AWA Southern Tag Team Championships four times, the NWA Mid-America Tag Team Championships six times and the NWA American Tag Team Championships once. He also won the NWA World Six-Man Tag Team Championships four different times. As a singles wrestler, he was a one-time NWA Georgia TV Champion, one-time WCW World TV Champion, one-time CWA Heavyweight Champion, 11-time NWA Mid-America Heavyweight Champion and a one-time SMW TV Champion.

Eaton has also trained a number of future pro wrestlers and worked as a trainer at the WCW Power Plant in the late 90s. He was inducted into the Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2019. Following his death, dozens of his wrestling peers wished condolences for Eaton’s family and spoke of what he meant to them and to the wrestling business.

“The world lost its finest citizen,” Anderson said. “If there was a kinder, gentler person I would sure love to meet them. I could spend all day talking about how special he was in a wrestling ring. That’s easy.

“What’s hard is to do justice to the person he was. To his family, thank you for sharing Bobby with the world. I will treasure the memories of him forever.”