Can I Take Just One Good Picture with Zack Sabre Jr.?
The saga of one man being incapable of photographing nicely.
You hear it all the time: “Don’t meet your heroes.” Generally, this saying is because often times it’s a sobering reminder that even the ones we look up to the most are still humans with flaws just like the rest of us. As someone whose two favorite things in life are stand-up comedy and pro wrestling I understand, likely better than most, that my favorites are often complex, flawed people that are not exactly what you’d imagine from seeing them perform.
My reason to not meet my heroes is much simpler, and much more vain. I could not take a good picture with these guys if my life depended on it. Hell, just this week I had my girlfriend take headshots for me for Linkedin and my work bio and I made her take no less than 40 pictures. I eventually settled on the one I hated the least just because I could tell I was just not having a photogenic day (which, to be honest, a photogenic day for me happens about as often as a lunar eclipse). The pressure of taking a good photo already gives me anxiety in a normal setting. Add the fact that I’m standing next to one of my favorite entertainers in the world and don’t get unlimited (or even forty) reshoots? You could make the next Mission: Impossible movie just about me trying to take a good picture with Tom Cruise and it’d be the least realistic of that whole franchise when I pull it off at the end.
I’ve met British technical wrestling wizard Zack Sabre Jr. three times. Three times I’ve gotten a photo and three times I’ve despised how it turned out. Let’s go through them and my problems with each, one by one.
The first one is just glaringly bad. I somehow look like the celebrity that was ambushed by a fan for a photo and just wants to get the hell away.
The second one is a step up. However, I’ve never done that peace sign pose in a photo before or after taking that one. I went full Ricky Bobby with my hands. Let’s not even bring up how dumb my hair looks in it.
The third photo. The third photo I took I hated so much that I deleted any record of it. I genuinely tried to find it but I somehow managed to beat the Streisand Effect and successfully wiped it from the face of the Earth.
At one point, I got so desperate to get a picture with Zack that I didn’t hate that I did what any rational fan would do—I commissioned a drawing of Zack, Ethan Page and myself running through a field holding hands.
With Zack being pretty heavily involved in NJPW now and Evolve no longer touring, I don’t know if I’ll ever get another shot at a redemption photo with Zack but I’ll continue to wake up every day hoping for just one more chance.
