Matt Riviera
| Matt Riviera | |
|---|---|
| Birth name | Matt Riviera |
| Born |
May 18, 1983 (age 33) Russellville, Arkansas |
| Residence | Hollywood, California |
| Website | https://www.facebook.com/kidriviera |
| Professional wrestling career | |
| Billed height | 6 ft 2 in (1.88 m) |
| Billed weight | 232 lb (105 kg) |
| Billed from | Hollywood, California Russellville, Arkansas |
| Trained by | Bill Ash David Taylor "Nature Boy" Buddy Landell |
| Debut | 2001 |
Matt Riviera (born May 18, 1983), is an American professional wrestler currently wrestling for the National Wrestling Alliance where he is currently one half of the NWA World Tag Team Champions with Rob Conway as the tag team The Iron Empire. He has wrestled for several of the NWA's promotions as well as various other independent promotions. He also has promoted wrestling events. In addition to the wrestling business, he has also appeared in movies and television shows. Matt Riviera currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Cauliflower Alley Club.
Matt Riviera was born on May 18, 1983 in Russellville, Arkansas. At the age of 12 after coming across a television program, WCW Worldwide, Matt began his love for Professional wrestling after watching Dick Slater wrestle. Pro wrestling's blend of physicality and theatrics appealed to him and he soon became passionate about professional wrestling. After being told at the age of 15 that he was too young to legally being training as a professional wrestler, Riviera began doing everything he could to get his foot in the door of the wrestling business such as creating wrestling programs. This included writing articles and taking photographs. He also began his first foray into promoting professional wrestling events at the age of 17 after meeting his mentor, wrestling trainer and promoter Bill Ash. He began promoting wrestling events under the name of Global Pro Wrestling. Once he finally began to train to become a Professional wrestler, he discovered that the physicality it takes to be a pro wrestler might be too much for him. He quit wrestling school on three different occasions. However, at age 21, Riviera stuck with wrestling as he trained for six months as well as attended wrestling school for four months. Matt Riviera also obtained a college degree in broadcast journalism, graduating from Harding University out of Searcy, Arkansas in 2006.
Matt Riviera had his first professional wrestling match in 2001 for the Arkansas Association of Wrestling by teaming with Running Wolf to take on the team of Frank Thornton and "Big" Wes Jones. Matt would go on to wrestle for various promotions throughout Arkansas and expanded to many other states and promotions. While wrestling, he was still involved in promoting wrestling events, as well as beginning college. Riviera promoted Global Pro Wrestling, which after a name change, became Traditional Championship Wrestling. Traditional Championship Wrestling was able to secure a national cable deal in 2013 with Cox Sports Television that would allow people all over the country to see Riviera and other TCW stars perform weekly. After TCW folded in 2014, Matt would then move on to focus more on his own in-ring career.
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