By the time he was hired by the WWE, he was a well-known name among various regional wrestling federations. Today names old and new are in mourning for iconic WWE announcer “Mean” Gene Okerlund. In an obituary the WWE put it best, writing that he was “the most recognizable interviewer in sports-entertainment history. Anyone who ever followed wrestling for any length of time saw Okerlund at work. The WWE announced early Wednesday that the man who for so long owned the mic was dead, age 76. By 1970 he had found his calling as a wrestling commentator, according to TMZ. His star began to rise in the 1980s.
