Born in Perry, Georgia on May 15, 1958, Ron Simmons was active in sports since he was in high school, participating in American football games as a tight end and line backer. While pursuing his education at Florida State University, he was an All-American football player under coach Bobby Bowden. By 1988, his jersey number was retired by the university and it was the third time a number was retired in the history of the university. He later had a brief career in the National Football League, playing for the Cleveland Browns, the USFL's Tampa Bay Bandits in 1984 and the Memphis Showboats in 1985.
Ending his football career, Simmons was recruited and trained by Japanese professional wrestler Hiro Matsuda. In 1986, Simmons teamed up with Butch Reed to form Doom, who later defeated the Steiner Brothers for the NWA World Tag Team Championship and were recognized as the first (Black) holders of the WCW World Tag Team Championship in January 1991. A year later, Simmons defeated Big Van Vader and became the first ever African American WCW World Heavyweight Champion.
From 1994 to 1995, Simmons worked on Extreme Championship Wrestling. In 1996, he joined WWF and debuted on July's Raw is War. Simmons and his new manager, Clarence Mason, also formed a stable named Nation of Domination, loosely based on the Nation of Islam. However, Simmons kicked out White American Crush and Puerto Rican Savio Vega, thus Vega and Crush formed their own rival factions. Simmons in turn recruited more members for the Nation. In 1998, Simmons teamed up with Bradshaw (John Layfield) and formed Hell's Henchmen. They later renamed themselves to the Acolytes. In 2002, Simmons was drafted into WWE's Smackdown brand. However, in his last WWE storyline, he was fired by former Smackdown general manager Paul Heyman after he disrespected Heyman. Simmons finally retired from his in-ring career and accused Bradshaw of not being a faithful friend. He finally retired but continued to make appearances for promotional purposes.
(Photo courtesy of WWE)