Just when you think you're totally lost, that you must have missed a turn or misread the directions or stumbled upon the wrong Days Inn, there's a sign: a weathered hearse, lurking at the edge of the half-empty parking lot. Your second clue is the pair of men lingering near the motel's side entrance, puffing cigarettes. The gangly one stands 6'4", with long, curly brown hair, a beak nose and Coke-bottle lenses. He's decked out in full combat fatigues and army boots. (Think Howard Stern as G.I.) His pal has black, shoulder-length locks, a goatee and a half-dozen face piercings, including a gold bolt through the bridge of his nose. He wears black tights and a T-shirt that advises, "Stop Pretending You Don't Want Me." The hand without the butt cradles a red Teletubby. He introduces himself as Chuckie Manson. His pal goes by John Rambo.

For better or worse, Manson and Rambo are the typical fare of World Xtreme Wrestling, one of America's few dozen minor pro leagues. You know, those Springer-meets-Trekker-convention WWE knockoffs. Only the WXW, though, is run by a soft-spoken, 400-pound wrestling legend. The Wild Samoan was one half of the most feared tag team of all time, but now everyone in eastern Pennsylvania knows Afa Anoa'i as Pops. And on this unseasonably warm, late September Sunday, his WXW is camped at the Days Inn in Allentown.

Pops is a 30-year wrestling vet, but he's nervous. The event is going down inside the hotel's banquet hall, a room with chandeliers, rubber corn plants and, for today only, a 16'x16' spring-loaded ring where the dance floor usually is. Problem is, the show is set to begin in 45 minutes, with local TV carrying the first hour live (a WXW first), but just two dozen fans, mostly tow-headed toddlers and blue-haired grannies, mill about the "arena." Maybe it's too nice a day to be indoors. Still, shouldn't someone have told Pops the Eagles would be hosting the Texans just down the road? He gets word of that as he and his creative team script today's program. Pops' eyes bulge cartoonishly. "Oy! Will it be over by 4?"

Wrestlers straggle in: Evil clowns walk with street thugs in prison jump suits. A chubby Amish guy named Malachi and two lineman-size guys in game jerseys storm around. There's even a dumpy, 5'6" skinhead toting his own gas mask and hoping to sieg heil his way to stardom. The show is a recital of sorts. Many of the wrestlers are Anoa'i's protégés from his Wild Samoan Training Center. The rest are nomads who spend weekends moonlighting on mats, carpooling all over the Northeast to scrap for $20, maybe $50. They do it because they love the business and because they want to work for Afa. He still has plenty of juice -- and a developmental deal with Vince McMahon. But 99% of the wrestlers here have no shot at the big time. Aside from the ex-football players (both actually played for Mizzou in the '90s), very few have the size -- or image -- that the WWE covets.

One wrestler here, though, could definitely make it big: "The Samoan Storm," he of the buzz cut, piercing black eyes and narrow moustache that does a poor job of hiding a baby face. At 6'2", 260 pounds, the Samoan Storm dwarfs most of the other WXW wrestlers, yet he has the agility to slither around the ring like a rattlesnake. His moves are sudden and sure: He backflips off the top of the turnbuckle, tightropes around the four corners of the ring, body-slams opponents like he's tossing sacks of laundry. The Samoan Storm is the WXW's heavyweight champ. He is 18 years old. And his real-world name is Afa Anoa'i Jr.

Junior is slated for three matches, two with his belt on the line. But first the kid has to tape a promo in which some guy (character: gangbanger; real life: vacuum salesman) tries to run him down in a limo to hype an upcoming grudge match. Of course, this assumes Junior doesn't surrender his belt today. Junior, bouncing one of his nieces on his lap, looks not the least bit worried. Filming the promo? Now that's the tough part. It requires five takes, and the limo almost backs over his foot. On the bright side, the guy who owns the stretch tells Pops he can cut him a deal for prom night.

Junior is the youngest of the Wild Samoan's three sons. He's also a second cousin to The Rock, a.k.a. Dwayne Johnson, arguably the biggest phenomenon in pro wrestling since Hulk Hogan. Pops thinks Junior could someday be bigger than his cousin. The boy, however, has other dreams.

Despite having played organized football for less than three years, Junior is a star fullback and nose guard for Bethlehem (Pa.) Freedom High. He was invited to play in the U.S. Army All-American Bowl, a high school all-star game in San Antonio. Scouts marvel at his power and agility (he can dunk a basketball with ease). Sure, they'd like to see him get bigger but, hey, look around. His brothers, a tag team called the Samoan Gangstas, each go about 340, and Pops is a cement truck with a Fu Manchu. Huge is in Junior's blood.

When Junior first put on a helmet and pads in 10th grade -- mostly to hang out with his buddies on the team -- he didn't know very much about shedding blocks or splitting double-teams. Instead he relied on the advice of a certain former Miami Hurricanes lineman: "The Rock said suck it up and stay low," Junior remembers. Soon, young Afa was wreaking havoc on every snap. In his first big game, against archrival Easton Red Rovers, he laid the smackdown on the QB five times. The buzz Junior gets from the real mayhem of football is different from any feeling he gets from the orchestrated chaos of wrestling: "I love hitting people," he says, with surprising sheepishness. "I love the physical nature of football. I know some guys love to play the games, and I do, man, I do. But I even love being out there at practice."

His coaches figure Junior's amazing explosiveness and deft hand-eye coordination come from his years in the ring. "He's as good technically and knows how to use his hands as well as any prep defensive linemen I've ever seen," says one college recruiter, who's barred by NCAA rules from speaking about any prospect until signing day, Feb. 5. "The way he can separate, swim and rip, it's like he's been coached in college for three or four years." Last summer, on the advice of Freedom High coach Jim Morgans, Junior attended camp at the U. of Pittsburgh. He hammered through a few lineman drills, ran a 4.7 40 -- and got a full-ride offer before lunch. Rutgers and West Virginia were after him too, but Junior will likely sign with Pitt because he loves its facilities and recognizes that the school's program is on the rise. Knowing that Pops would be able to see his games doesn't hurt. The kid knows how important that is to the old man; he's never missed one of Junior's games. But he also knows how important this Days Inn show is. After all, the Anoa'is are the Kennedys of pro wrestling.

Pops broke into the business 32 years ago, after getting booted from the Marines. (Something about using a billiard ball to knock out all the teeth of an officer who called him a "coconut eater.") His uncle Peter Maivia, a wrestler known as the High Chief, was already starting to develop a following. Quick to take a hint, Afa recruited his younger brother Sika. They cast themselves as savages, wrestling barefoot in black tights, with menacing scowls and huge afros. The Wild Samoans terrorized fans and opponents (and promoters) throughout the '70s, inspiring a generation of cousins and nephews to practice dropkicks and headlocks. "We were rough," Pops says, with a gleam in his eye. "We beat up everybody -- in the ring and out."

It doesn't take much to get Pops waxing nostalgic. Like that night in Mississippi when the Junkyard Dog got his thumb wedged into Pops' eye socket and popped his eyeball out like it was an olive. Pops supposedly caught the dangling orb and crammed it back into his skull while clinging to the bottom rope as his brother finished the match. The next day, doctors told him if he hadn't acted so quickly, he'd probably have lost the eye.

Pops has mellowed since his WWF days. He gushes over his 18 grandkids, sends holiday e-cards and punctuates his e-mails with smiley-face emoticons. His relationship with Junior is different from those with his older boys. Sam was born when Afa was 20, Lloyd when he was 26 -- in the days when Afa was spending 300 nights a year hopping area codes and chasing tag-team titles. In short, not a great time for familial bonding.

By the time Afa Jr. was a teen, his dad had taken off the tights and started putting on the shows. You get the sense the old man wanted to spend more time with his youngest son than he had with the first two. Maybe that's why he dragged his family along on the shows he promoted in the U.S. and Europe. On one trip -- to Vienna, in 1998 -- Junior experienced what rightly could be called a Wild Samoan Bar Mitzvah. When a wrestler no-showed, Pops asked Afa Jr. if he was ready to step in the ring with the "Bambi Killer." The kid was only 13, but at six feet, 190, he was already built better than most of the pros there. Plus, he knew the moves. Junior improvised some grimacing and grunting, pinned his foe and drew an ovation as loud as anyone's on the card.

And, man, that was pretty cool. Think about it: You're 13, in a country where most people don't speak your language, and suddenly they're cheering for you like you're a rock star. And over there, near the corner, is your old man, the Don of pro wrestling, and he's practically misty-eyed. After the family flew home, Junior got a crash course in the business, training three hours a day twice a week. Two and a half years later, he was the WXW champion.

Along the way, Junior has picked up a few scars, several concussions and a bruised sternum. All part of the deal, the kid says, sounding more like a 40-year-old ring veteran than a boy who just got his driver's license. "I've been hit with chairs, thrown off the top of cages, jumped off a 15-foot-high cage and slammed a guy through a table," Junior explains matter-of-factly. "But I'm not crazy. I don't do bottles or fire."

Crazy, in fact, is what some people might call a top college prospect risking his neck and future in wrestling's minor leagues. Especially a prospect who says he'd rather watch Monday Night Football than Monday Night Raw. The Samoan Storm's dirty little secret is he's not much of a wrestling fan, at least not the kind of wrestling that emphasizes soap-opera plots and sex over body slams and gore. And that's fine by Coach Morgans, who watches the Days Inn show on TV with one eye closed, praying his star doesn't get hurt doing one of those "moonpies," or whatever the kid calls that backflip off the top rope.

Even Pops -- who knows there are lots of Junior's cousins to carry on the family tradition -- sees where his youngest son's future lies. A proud dad who brings his camcorder to every Freedom High football game -- he's in the stands two hours before kickoff, before the band or cheerleaders arrive -- Pops loved it when Junior said he wanted football more than wrestling. Maybe what he loved most was that his boy wasn't afraid to tell him he wanted to buck family tradition. "My dad wanted me to wrestle for the experience," Junior says. "If football doesn't work out, I'll have something to fall back on."

So, after he graduates in June, Junior will relinquish his title. (He holds onto it easily at the Days Inn.) Pitt, not surprisingly, isn't especially thrilled with Junior's wrestling career. He's already beginning to lay off a bit. "If I ever got hurt wrestling and couldn't play football, I'd never forgive myself," he says. Not that The Rock's cousin is going soft, mind you. Being cautious in the ring, Junior explains, is the surest way to get injured. Still, the kid has decided to cut back on the high-flying stuff. No more backflips, either.

Just don't tell Manson or that Amish guy.

This article appears in the January 20 issue of ESPN The Magazine.