South Street Bouncer Stories

Smackdown

by Sam Tremble

Ihba Baskette's most memorable story was the night he kicked out some rowdy Northeast boys, only to have them return with a Navy boxer. Baskette peppered his opponent's nose with light punches while pulling his shirt over his head. When the seaman gave up, Ihba kissed him on the cheek and said if he ever saw him again, he'd buy him a beer.

It's a story of love and disinfectant. Once, a hooker working the crowd for happy hour drinks found a customer and took him into the john. Lucky, who was working the door outside, caught wind of the indiscretion and broke it up. After the guy scrammed, he was left cleaning the compromised area.

During the Eagles' Superbowl, the Pontiac offered an all-you-can-eat buffet and open bar. After one drunken patron swung a beer mug at Mike Greycar's head, the bouncer, barely 5 feet 8 inches, grabbed him by the throat and passed him to the doorman, who kicked him out for the extra point.

Chris Wallenger, a social worker by day, certainly earns his bar keep—one woman owes him her life. She and her boyfriend had been fighting all night, until her man suddenly pulled a knife on her. Wallenger knocked the weapon to the ground. "Not that I feel like I'm knife-proof," he says.

Bulch looks how he sounds: a big boulder of a dude with a big shaved head and two big arms standing on two big legs. Once, he broke up a scuffle between Joel Madden of Good Charlotte and some horny barbacks who'd been hitting on the singer's old lady. Bulch didn't have to hit him, but dammit, he wish he had.