He was born August 11, 1973, the son of immigrants from Hungary. "Barron" is a made up first name that his parents thought sounded nice. "Vangor" is his mother's maiden name. "Toth" is his father's last name. Put it all together and you have a pretentious name for a very down-to-earth guy.

We attended Christian Heritage School from Kindergarten through our Senior year. We - Barron, myself, and a few of our classmates - were the first class to ever go through all 13 years in that institution.

In the first grade, Barron was having a tremendously difficult time with mathematics, flunking many basic tests. After having him take several aptitude tests, this difficult time was actually Barron's complete boredom with the level of education. While CHS had students that were advanced by a degree of two or three years (the school regularly places at the top of all schools in standardized testing in the North East), Barron still found the 1st grade math to be too rudimentary. (Although at that time in our lives, he probably just found it too easy.)

While I have no doubt that his being put into math classes five years ahead of us was the right thing for him, intellectually, I question whether socially it was one way in which he began to feel distant from others around him. The school scheduled classes so that when we were having 1st grade math lessons, so was the 6th grade - and Barron would go to that class. This continued on until the eighth grade when there were just no more math classes to take, as he had already gone through all the upper level math courses that the high school had to offer. He attended college during the evenings, taking math classes with adults.

During this time with older students, and later adults, he made other friendships. He mentioned a few from time to time, but he primarily kept them separate from us. It's hard to keep your feet in two different worlds, but Barron tried, tried his whole life.

We played baseball together in Little League and in school. I normally played second base and Barron usually was the pitcher - or sometimes the short stop. Just kidding - he was the pitcher or first base. He made the All Star Little League team during his last two years. The year >after< he stopped playing Little League, though, one of our teams from Connecticut made it all the way to become World Champions. I like to kid him about that sometimes. Playing on the baseball team even through high school was fun, but, when you're in a school so small that basically the team is just anyone who wants to play, there really isn't a point.

During his Freshman year, he started a business with his Dad, selling baseball cards. When he could start driving, he started doing more and more shows and his father did less and less. During a lot of his spare time, he was sorting cards, filling mail-order orders, and organizing inventory for various weekend shows. He also had a paper route, with over 100 customers. He always had an entrepreneurial spirit.

We both decided during our Junior year that we wanted to attend local schools after high school. The two best schools in our state were Fairfield and Yale University - both less than an hour's drive. We both wanted Early Acceptance, but we were unfortunately just under the requirements for EA at Yale … so, at the start of our Senior year, just a few days in, we both found out we had been accepted to FU.

We graduated from Christian Heritage School in 1991. Barron gave a speech at graduation that, to this day, is regarded as one of the best - if not the best - speech ever given at the school. After knowing Barron for over twenty years, I can count on one hand the times I've seen Barron genuinely moved with pure passion for something. This was one of those times, and everyone in the audience knew it, and knew they were there for something special and magical.

At our 10 Year High School reunion, we all re-watched the graduation tape. The moment came for Barron's speech, and he was about to leave the room when he stopped and turned to me and said, looking at himself ten years before, "Mike, I want to go back, go back and tell that kid that I was about the adult I am going to be and what I'm going to do. Go back and tell him not to wait, not to wait for a stupid wedding to get your act together." I hadn't seen him so moved since an odd conversation that we had at University regarding how he wanted to switch his life's path.

While I was in a program for Accounting, Barron was going to become an Actuary. For those of you unaware, the actuarial field is, arguably, the most difficult and specialized field for those proficient in mathematics, dealing with insurance companies and tables and charts and lots of other things I'm not completely familiar with. We commuted together for most of our time there, but, toward the end of the Spring semester, 1992, Barron said something to me in the car ride to University:

"Mike … I think I've seen the end of the tunnel, and I don't like it." I asked him what he meant. "See, it's … the path, the path I'm on now, without … everything that I've been working for. I want to get off the ride and try something else. I've seen the end, Mike. And I don't like it. Not one bit."

I didn't know what he meant; truthfully, I'm still not quite sure. Barron's like that sometimes - he'll often make statements so bold and brazen that you can't believe he had the gall to say them; other times, he'll say something so off the wall that you're sure it's profound, but you just don't know in what way. In small doses, I know people find Barron odd, comical, and fascinating - once you spend a lot of time with him, over the years, and, suffice it to say, you ain't seen nothing.

We stopped at the light before we had to turn into the University parking lot, and he stopped me. "Look," he said, pointing out the window, "the sign."

"No U-Turn?" I asked.

"No," he corrected. "YOU turn … No, YOU turn. Get it?"

I did … and I didn't.

That afternoon, when I walked back to my car, he was already there, with a big smile on his face, something a bit out of the norm for a guy who prides himself on his 24/7 poker face.

"What's up, Barron?"

"I turned," he said, getting into the car. On the ride home he told me about how he went to the Registrar's office and changed his major, and enrolled in mostly English courses for the following year. "It's a U-Turn, Mike, just like the sign said. I saw the end of mathematics … and now I'll take the road less traveled. It's SO not the easy thing to do - and that's why I want to do it."

Even though a vast majority of his credits from high school from college courses didn't transfer over to Fairfield, Barron still managed to graduate in just six semesters, taking 18 credits per semester, and going during the summers as well part-time. The math courses he took were enough credits to be a minor, however, a specific course he didn't have under his belt, so he has no minor - but he does have a double major, in English Literature and English Creative Writing (the other English major is Journalism, one that I guess he didn't feel like pursuing).

During all this time, he had continued his business, stopping with sports cards after we graduated high school, selling off that inventory, and dedicating to a comic book field. After graduating University in 1994, he soon thereafter opened up a full retail outlet for comic books … and a little-known card game known as Magic: The Gathering.

During down times at the store (there were some, as he kept the place open 7 days a week, all year round, even though his hours posted were "noon'ish to six'ish") he pursued his writing. He sold some stories to various magazines, as well as having a comic series published … for all of two issues before the company folded due to contractual problems with people other than Barron.

After five years, a patron of the store approached him to sell his store. Barron talked to his friends about it, telling them that, while selling the store wouldn't make sense financially, as the store was doing quite well, he also felt a sense of wanting to not be in retail for the rest of his life. He wanted to move on.

"The first half of my life I grew up; the second half of my life I've been involved with collectibles. Now … I'm thinking about the next half of my life." I didn't correct his three halves story - most of the time, correcting him will just prove his point.

At the same time, a friend of his from Magic tournaments - Mike Foley - was discussing bringing Barron aboard on a project that Mike was spearheading: a collectible card game based on the World Wrestling Federation. Mike had been working on trying to make it happen, nurturing it along, for over five years, but nothing was happening. Barron told us that he knew he could come up with a mechanic for the property, and that he and Mike could make it a tremendous success.

After talking to Mike some more, Barron talked his whole idea through with us, everything from how the cards would be played, to how there wouldn't be any "land" like there is in Magic, to how it would build, to how there could be this perfect mathematical system to make everything make sense…. It was all rather confusing, and his initial ideas were rough, but he had that look in his eye, and every time he would come back from a meeting with Mike, he would tell us how they had made the game more and more defined and better and better. He even made up a version of the game on 3x5 note cards with Austin and The Undertaker, where he taped cut out pieces of computer paper onto the cards. The game basically played as it does now … except in a much less refined state.

Barron dropped those cards off at Mike's house one day while Mike was at work, showing him that he had actually worked out a good start to what they were talking about in a car ride. It's funny how things so seemingly inconsequential - like dropping off an idea at a friend's house - can springboard into a multi-million-dollar selling game that has breathed new life into an industry missing anything truly original. A game that is responsible for almost a dozen people (never mind thousands of retailers) being able to feed their families.

It's funny, as both of us "Mike's" are a big part of Barron's life, yet we haven't met. I mean, I know about Mike's dog, about Mike's house, about the wallpaper that Barron likes to push in Mike's living room (it's spongy for whatever reason) but … Barron hasn't had us meet.

Barron has a lot of strengths but he isn't as focused on any one thing as maybe he should be. And, maybe, in his way, keeping things separate is a way for him to focus. Actually, in a way, he is out of focus - yet hyper-focused. He has different rooms in his mind where he puts different things. He is wildly creative, yet a lot of times he can't see how his creativity isn't always pure genius right off the bat. I think, in a way, both "Mike's" in Barron's life are approximations of each other - we both ground Barron a little, and that makes him better than he would probably be on his own. Even though I've known Barron longer than anyone alive (except maybe his parents), now that I think about it, for all I know, there is a third Mike … and maybe he, too, keeps Barron focused, helps Barron become more than he would be on his own. Because, believe me, Barron left to his own devices would be a bit too much than this world is ready for.

So, as I was saying, Barron sold his store, and went to work on the WWF Raw Deal game with Mike Foley. He's been working on it constantly for the last few years, talking it through with us (especially Eric) whenever he finds a lull in the conversation. Just like his other passions in his life, he eats, sleeps, thinks, and talks WWF Raw Deal. He thinks it's the purest game in the world, pure and perfect. And, in a way, even with the faults that some will find with the product - it's pure and perfect product, something that shows that something wonderful can be produced by two guys with different backgrounds and different skill sets but can come together to make something just … perfect. Neither Barron nor Mike came from game design backgrounds. Yet, together, with their different strengths, they have made one of the most popular games in the industry, from scratch, doing something "real" game designers aren't usually able to do - make a fun game for their fans. Barron and Mike are, in the only true sense, a Dream Team. The Dream Team.

We one time joked that Mike and Barron were like parents, and Raw Deal was their kid. Barron kidded back that he (nor Mike) would exactly look terrific wearing a dress - and while I agree with him, I think the analogy is solid. It was Mike's kid before Barron's kid … but Barron adopted it and made it part of him, too. They raised it together. And, Barron is a proud parent. You can see his mark on a lot of cards - in the way certain cards do certain things, in just the way that Barron sees the world of professional wrestling. If you know Barron, you know what he's done with the cards. And, knowing him, I know what he hasn't done. Which is why I know, even without meeting the other Mike, that he and Barron are a perfect team. I can see Barron's input on so much … and on so much I can see where his input, without a check or balance, would've put things out of whack.

I realize that I have gone off on a Barron-like tangent (those of you who have read his posts on the Yahoo mail group know what I'm talking about) but when he asked me to write up his life through someone else's perspective, I couldn't just write a paragraph, or a page. Barron, in more ways than just the obvious physicality, is larger than life.

I'm not sure what Barron is going to do next. He's always going to be the co-designer of WWF Raw Deal (the raw energy and ideas he puts into the cards is one of the things that make it intriguing to me, even beyond the tremendous license) but I know there's more waiting for him. What else? I'm not quite sure.

I know he was telling me about this site where he wanted some of his stories, some of his friends' stories, along with fun stuff for WWF Raw Deal and more. I know Barron loves talking about movies that he goes to see, DVD's that he's bought, TV shows that he thinks are worthwhile, books worth your reading time, and stuff like that, so I expect that will be coming too.

Do you listen to Guns N Roses and read Stephen King? If you don't now, you will soon, because otherwise you won't be up to snuff in Barron's mind.

Regardless, welcome to Barron's life. You've already seen a little of what Barron is about, with his contribution to the Raw Deal cards. And, probably, you've gotten to know him (and heard about some of us) through his writings online and elsewhere. Perhaps you've even heard of him before Raw Deal, with his published writing. No matter why you're here, I'm sure you'll enjoy the ride - I know I'm looking forward to it.

Sincerely,
Michael J. Fleming
Barron's friend since 1977.

We here at wrestlingfigs.com send our condolences to the family of Barron Vangor Toth.