 raymond fernandez (may 7, 1956 â march 6, 2004) was a professional wrestler who primarily wrestled in florida and texas before joining the world wrestling federation. he was best known by the ring name hercules hernandez or simply hercules. fernandez was also a featured bodybuilder, appearing in several muscle magazines. ==professional wrestling career== ===early career (1981-1985)=== fernandez started wrestling in 1981, mainly performing in the florida and texas territories, as âherculesâ hernandez. in 1982, hercules joined the nwa central states territory (which ran out of kansas city and promoted shows in kansas, missouri, and iowa). while in central states, hercules teamed up with dewey robertson, the future missing link, and the two won the central states tag team championship on two occasions; they beat mike george and mark romero (aka mark youngblood) both times. he also held the central states television title for a little over 6 months, winning it from, and losing it back to, his main rival, mark romero. his two other notable feuds in the central states territory were with manny fernandez and harley race. his feud with race garnered hercules significant attention in the national wrestling scene, due to race's stature as a former nwa world champion. this feud began because race had an issue with oliver humperdinkâs house of humperdink stable, which hercules had become a part of soon after joining the promotion. one match between the two had the stipulation that if race won, he would get 5 minutes inside a steel cage with humperdink. hercules was caught using brass knuckles and disqualified, which meant that the cage match was on. when the match was about to start, hercules ran to ringside, knocked race out and threw him into the ring with humperdink. in the end, race recovered and piledrove humperdink o
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