Early Career (1997–2001) Roll began training under
Les Thatcher in October 1995 at the age of twenty. He debuted on May 3, 1997, in Thatcher's
Heartland Wrestling Association, wrestling as the
masked El Piranha. An HWA mainstay, Roll also occasionally portrayed the
character of Dean Baldwin, the purported fifth, lesser known
Baldwin brother. Later that year, Roll debuted in the
Independent Wrestling Association, where he developed the
cartoonish character Shark Boy, partly inspired by the
1995 song "
I Come From the Water" by the
Toadies. In 1998 and 1999, Shark Boy received a flurry of media attention. He was featured on
ABC in an episode of
20/20 featuring professional wrestling, on the
Discovery Channel as part of the annual
Shark Week and on a documentary produced by
MTV entitled ''
True Life: I'm a Professional Wrestler''.
World Wrestling Entertainment (2003) On March 11, 2003, Shark Boy wrestled a dark match for the
World Wrestling Entertainment where he lost to
Chris Kanyon. A month later on April 21, he lost to
Christopher Nowinski on
Sunday Night Heat which aired on April 27.
Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (2002–2015) On July 31, 2002, Shark Boy made his
Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) debut in a dark match losing to
Jimmy Rave. On the August 14, 2002
weekly TNA pay-per-view, Shark Boy showed up on
Disco Inferno's talk segment
Jive Talkin' without his mask playing the character
Dean Baldwin, a fictional brother of the famous Baldwin actors. In 2003, he had a team with
New Jack that involved getting New Jack to play board games such as
Chutes and Ladders with Shark Boy. When New Jack left,
Mad Mikey started teaming with Shark Boy before his untimely death in November 2003 and in 2004, he teamed with
D-Ray 3000 which was his most successful tag team run. In 2008, he returned to TNA after a brief hiatus from a
kayfabe coma suffered from multiple ambushes, and tweaked his Shark Boy
gimmick into that of a
Stone Cold Steve Austin tribute, even going as far as to drink "Clam Juice" (a reference to Austin's infamous beer drinking) in the ring after his matches. Upon his gimmick change, he would occasionally team up with
Curry Man to form a comedic tag team that was a moderate success. After this gimmick change he started to talk, something he had not been heard to do before. Shark Boy took part in TNA's TerrorDome match on May 10, but it was won by
Kaz. Because of that TerrorDome match, Shark Boy was injured; he returned backstage on the July 17 episode of
Impact! with Curry Man and
Super Eric as part of a Justice League knock off, called The Prince Justice Brotherhood (a reference to
Abyss' former name Prince Justice), where he got whipped by
Beer Money, Inc. during a backstage segment. He appeared again with the Brotherhood on the July 24 episode of
Impact!. Roll returned on the February 5 edition of
Impact!, only to lose to the debuting
Brutus Magnus in a squash match. He returned at the August 18 tapings of
Impact!, only to lose against
Sheik Abdul Bashir in a match broadcast on the TNA website. He was again featured on a web match after the August 31 tapings of
Impact!, in another losing effort to
Consequences Creed. This was his last match with the company for some time, and on October 13, 2010, Shark Boy's profile was removed from TNA's website while he spent some time working as a referee and road agent for the company. On December 5, 2010, Shark Boy made his return at
Final Resolution, forcing
Cookie into a shark cage during
Robbie E's and
Jay Lethal's match for the
TNA X Division Championship. After the match, he gave Cookie a
Chummer. He changed his theme back to the theme he used before the Austin gimmick began. He made his return to the ring on the December 24 edition of
Xplosion, in a losing effort against Robbie E. On March 3, 2011, Shark Boy announced on his website that he had requested and was granted his release from TNA. On July 10, 2011, Shark Boy made an appearance at
Destination X teaming with
Eric Young defeating
Generation Me. Shark Boy made his return to TNA on the May 23, 2013 episode of
Impact Wrestling. He wrestled against
Robbie E in a losing effort on the following episode of
TNA Xplosion after his TV appearance. On March 17, 2013, Shark Boy appeared on TNA
10 Reunion where he was in a 10-man Gauntlet match, which was won by
Matt Morgan, that aired on August 2, 2013. On March 19, 2013, Shark Boy next appeared on
Hardcore Justice 2 where he won a nine-man Hardcore Gauntlet Battle Royal, which aired on July 5, 2013. He then made another appearance on November 21 at
TNA Turning Point, facing
Ethan Carter III in a losing effort. On October 2, 2014, Shark Boy made yet another appearance facing off against Manik and losing, then lost again on the October 15, 2014 show against
Tyrus. He made an appearance in the October 29 taping during a backstage segment where he was signing autographs, getting a pep talk from road agent
Pat Kenney to get back to being "the real shark" referring to when he was in his prime. Shark Boy said he would do it. On the July 9, 2015 episode of Impact, he returned as a competitor in Ethan Carter III's 3 vs 1 Gauntlet Match for the
TNA World Heavyweight Championship in a losing effort. This would be his last known appearance and would eventually parted ways from the company.
Return to the independent circuit (2013–present) In August 2013, Shark Boy challenged Billy Mattern for the NWA Supreme United States Championship. Billy Mattern was disqualified due to interference by Mortimer Blankenship giving the win to Shark Boy, but Mattern would retain the championship. Shark Boy started wrestling a lot less starting in 2014, where he only wrestled a half dozen matches. This would be followed with even less in 2015 and only one match in 2016. The following two years saw him competing in less than a dozen matches total. He didn't wrestle from November 2018, until April 2019 when he was involved in a six way scramble match at
Joey Ryan's Penis Party WrestleCon event during
WrestleMania 35 weekend.
Return to Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (2022–present) On May 1, 2022, it was announced that Shark Boy would make his return to Impact Wrestling for live events on May 7 and 8 in
Newport, Kentucky. At
Slammiversary, on June 19, 2022, Shark Boy won the
Reverse Battle Royal by last eliminating
Johnny Swinger. ==Other media==