CHICAGO — The tenets of Izzy Style Wrestling are displayed with prominence inside the suburban Chicago gym where Israel “Izzy” Martínez has molded legions of kids into believers, and the best of them into champions. The principles hang on a banner amid the lingering smell of stale sweat and constant work, near the mats that have launched journeys to national championships and the Olympics.

Martínez feels most at home here, inside the gym he built at the end of a road in a modest industrial park. A great many Chicago-area youth have walked through his doors and found purpose, direction and self-belief. Martínez gets as much, if not more, out of it as he puts in — and he put in enough on a recent Wednesday morning to be covered in sweat soon after a workout began.

“This place is a sanctuary,” he said about two hours later, after guiding more than two dozen of his wrestlers through an off-season summer training session. “There’s nothing like it.”

It begs the question, then, of why. Why is Martínez, who has turned his once-humble gym in Addison into the epicenter of a wrestling empire, stepping out of the comfort of a self-described sanctuary? Why is he risking his name and reputation to launch a startup professional league, Real American Freestyle Wrestling, that aims to be the first of its kind?

Part of the answer is among those tenets in his gym, the ones taped up to the back of a door between the mats and the weights and the custom-built, high-handle-barred motorcycle that’s out of place yet perfectly at home inside Martínez’s gym. There’s some flash mixed in with the substance, but Martínez knows better than anyone there’s nothing without those principles.

Call them the Four Izzy Commandments, meant to be repeated aloud:

“I am thankful for the opportunity to wrestle.”

“I am aggressive and relentless.”

“I have no fear of losing or making mistakes.”

“I never ever give up.”

It’s the third of those, along with the fourth, that helps explain why Martínez is doing what he’s doing. In the history of American sport, there has never been a successful, enduring professional wrestling league. Not one, anyway, for an authentic version of the sport, the one without costumes or scripts or Ric Flair and an army of imitators screaming into a microphone.

It requires a lack of fear — of losing or mistakes — to believe such a venture could work. It requires a certain kind of perseverance, and Martínez has been tested again and again in recent months during the lead-up to the launch of the Real American Freestyle Wrestling, which plans to debut later this month in Cleveland.

“It’s a concept to change the sport of wrestling,” Martínez said, sitting across from the banners honoring the best of the best to come through his gym — Kennedy Blades, the Chicago native who won a silver medal last summer at the Paris Olympics, among them. In starting a new and real wrestling league, Martínez said, he aspires “to do something that will be here forever.”

And so that explains part of his motivation, but not all. The answer isn’t complete without understanding his past and the depths to which Martínez once sunk. In some ways, he’s forever frozen in the passenger seat on a long ride home from Iowa, his disappointed mother behind the wheel and his own youthful dream lost in the rearview mirror in a blur of cornfields and regret.

In time, it fueled a relentlessness within. It spawned Izzy Style.

And then he met Hulk Hogan.

Izzy Mania

Almost three months before he died of a heart attack in late July at 71, Hogan posted a pair of slickly produced black-and-white videos and shared them with his audience of more than 2 million followers on X. The videos, the first posted on April 28 and the other on April 30, were vintage Hogan, a lifelong showman in his element.

He wore the bandana and wraparound sunglasses. His hoop earring dangled. His tank top stretched tightly around his torso. A kind of clubby, macho music thumped. The first video began with Hogan, his trademark horseshoe mustache manicured just so, laughing strangely, almost maniacally. After some brief theatrics with Eric Bischoff, the longtime scripted, made-for-TV wrestling executive, promoter and performer, Hogan got to the point.

“We’re here to slice … and dice! … the world of wrestling,” he said in his character’s cadence, familiar to anyone who grew up in the 1980s and ’90s when Hogan was at the top of his pop cultural relevance. “And you’re not gonna know what hitcha!”

The translation was that Hogan and Bischoff planned to launch a new venture. Two days later, on April 30, they revealed their “third man.” And there, in another one of those strange yet oddly captivating videos, stood Martínez, his back turned to the camera until Hogan and Bischoff, both fanning wads of cash, introduced him as their partner in Real American Freestyle Wrestling.

“Izzy Mania … is gonna run wiiiild! … over the whole world of wrestling,” Hogan said.

It turned out to be the last thing he ever posted on X. When Hogan died on July 24, Martínez suddenly felt as though he’d lost a member of his family. He’d never expected to form such a bond with Hogan, who as much as anyone is responsible for creating the behemoth of not-real wrestling — the scripted, soap opera-like, make-up-and-cape version of the sport that rose to prominence in the ’80s and ’90s, a fixture on Saturday mornings and cable television.

That version of wrestling may be entertaining and even captivating, to some, but it is not the kind of wrestling to which Martínez has devoted his life. And yet “when he died,” Martínez said of Hogan, “it was very sad for me.”

“People ask me, you know, about Hulk, and how well did I know him. And I tell people that he became a brother of mine, and he became a friend.”

Martínez turned toward a garage door open on one side of his gym and pointed outside. A still-new Mercedes Sprinter van, fully loaded, sat parked against a fence, decked out with “Izzy Style” branding on the sides. It’s one of two vans that now belong to the gym, one that Martínez uses to transport his kids to tournaments and meets throughout Illinois and the region.

“Hulk Hogan led the fundraising on that one over there,” Martínez said of the van in the back. “Hulk Hogan believed in us so much … He fell in love with the program.

“Fell in love with what we were doing.”

To underscore his point, Martínez pulled out his phone and searched for a video. When he found it, there he was on the screen, amid a van full of jubilant high schoolers returning home from winning a state championship. In the clip, Martínez is holding up his phone so that the kids behind him can see the screen. And on the screen, there’s a familiar face with a familiar handlebar mustache.

It’s Hulk Hogan, celebrating a bunch of Chicago-area teenagers winning states. Hulk Hogan, making Hulk Hogan faces on FaceTime, joining in the reveling. In the video, the kids go crazy at the sight of him, this larger-than-life figure, a polarizing one, now, who was at the height of his fame before they were born. They begin chanting his name in the van:

“Hulk! Hulk! Hulk! Hulk!”

“So we were just tight,” Martínez said, growing quieter after closing the video. “And he loved wrestling. He became my friend.”

The friendship began by chance, and through a mutual connection. Last summer, Martínez coached Chad Bronstein’s son in one of his Izzy Style camps. When camp ended, Martínez said in his own colorful way, “he goes back to Florida and kicks the (expletive) out of all the guys he used to lose to.”

As Bronstein recently recalled of the experience, “Izzy’s an electrifying coach, and the kids love him.” Bronstein was impressed by his son’s time with Martínez. So was Bronstein’s friend and business partner, Hulk Hogan.

The two were already working together, through the Hogan-branded Real American Beer. Soon enough, Bronstein and Martínez were thinking about a project they could embark upon related to wrestling.

Martínez, who’d long been interested in providing a professional path for the best of the best in the sport, knew everything about wrestling but needed help with the business side. Bronstein had business experience, but not nearly the connections in the wrestling world.

And Hogan, well, he was Hulk Hogan, and no stranger to lending his name to any number of ventures — from the action figures that became ubiquitous 40 years ago to the 4.2% ABV light beer, the canned version that features an illustrated Hulk, in all his muscled glory, waving an enormous American flag.

It wasn’t long before Martínez — “Coach Izzy” to those he’s built into college stars, and one of the nation’s most accomplished wrestling coaches — found himself on Hogan’s private jet. He pulled up another video, this one from a Real American Beer promo, and there he was taking a few sips alongside the Hulk in a made-for-commercial party, pretty girls abound. Moments later came another clip. It was one of the new Mercedes van, and Martínez recording a ‘thank you’ to Hogan.

It explained part of the why. When American Freestyle debuts on Aug. 30 at the Wolstein Center, in Cleveland, its first event will include a 10-match main card. Some of the sport’s most recognizable names, including Kennedy Blades, will take part. If there are doubts surrounding the viability of the league — and there are, plenty — Bronstein offered an assurance.

“There’s no gimmick here,” he said. “We’re extremely serious. We’re backed by venture capital. We put the time and effort in this. … I don’t really care about the skeptics, to be honest. This is a passion and a vision that we have, to build something out for the community of wrestling and to give athletes, young kids, something to be inspired by.”

Martínez might be even more optimistic.

“It was just a dream that’s now a reality,” he said. “We’re rolling. Aug. 30. We’ve sold 3,000 tickets already. WWE was in the building two weeks ago, and they sold 2,600. We’ve already passed WWE, a billion-dollar company. Yeah, we’re rolling. We’ve got the best wrestlers in the world. We got the best coaches in the world.”

That was part of the dream behind Real American Freestyle, Martínez said. The other?

“To keep Hulk Hogan’s legacy (alive). And I’m a man of my word.”

A new day

At the end of a recent workout, Martínez addressed his wrestlers like he usually does. They sat on a small set of metal bleachers and listened as he offered a mix of quips and more serious talk. After their next practice, tomorrow, he told them, they’d run 2 miles around a pair of nearby lakes.

His eyes perked up at the thought of a side mission to go along with the run.

“You guys know the lake that we run at?” Martínez said. “It’s got a ton of bass in it. I’m gonna bring my pole. If you guys are under 18, you don’t need a (fishing) license.

“If you’re over 18, don’t play around. It’s 12 bucks. I’ll pay for it.”

Martínez continued on while his guys sat and took a breather, or packed their gym bags.

“Do not get in trouble,” he said, sounding genuinely concerned about the prospect of one of his kids getting nabbed for fishing without a license. “Keep your names off all records. Do whatever it takes to keep your names off the records.”

Police records, tax records, driving records. All best for those to be clean, Martínez told his guys.

“There’s some things you just can’t do. How do I know? Don’t ask.”

He laughed.

It was a small but telling moment about Martínez, who’s now 43 but was once a lot like many of the kids who come through his gym — full of hopes and big dreams, with everything in front of him. Except Martínez was more talented than most. Far more talented.

At West Aurora High, he went 118-1 and won three consecutive state championships, between his freshman and junior seasons. But then what happened? There’s a gap on the résumé his senior year, and then another after he straightened himself out long enough to go to North Idaho College, a junior college, where he went 27-0 and won a national title at 157 pounds.

With talent like that, Martínez could’ve gone places. And in fact, he was on his way to the University of Iowa, home of the most successful and revered college wrestling program in the country, when he accepted a scholarship offer there in 2003. What awaited him in Iowa City?

An NCAA title, or two? Years of All-American honors? A good shot at the national team?

The Olympics?

Martínez will never know. After leaving North Idaho on undesirable terms, he never wrestled a match at Iowa. There was an arrest for public intoxication. A fight. Next thing you know, Martínez said, “You get kicked out. You get sent home.” His mom came to pick him up in Iowa City and they drove east across endless miles of cornfields, only stopping to eat, Martínez can still remember, because she feared there’d be no appetite after he had to face his father when they arrived back home.

The drive was three hours but, “Man, it felt like 10,” Martínez said.

“And it was nothing like looking your mom in the face knowing that she had a failure of a son. And that’ll be something motivating for me for the rest of my life. And I think about it a lot, and I think about my mom telling me, ‘You know, tomorrow’s a new day,’ and you’ve got to get up and you’ve got to work.”

“And I tell myself that every day, and I tell our kids that. It’s true. Every day, when I wake up, I look myself in the mirror. I go there, and I do it on purpose. I find a mirror immediately, and I look myself in the mirror, and I say, you made it another day.

“You better work your ass off. You better go kick today’s ass.”

He has imparted that attitude on many of those he has trained, and the most successful of them read like a who’s-who of wrestling. There’s Blades, who is something of a pioneer in Illinois wrestling, who won all 25 of her matches at Iowa last season, after winning silver in Paris before that. There’s Real Woods, a three-time All-American at Stanford and Iowa.

Jordan Blanton, a three-time All-American at Illinois. Mikey Caliendo, a three-time All-American at North Dakota State and Iowa. And on. And on. As a coach, there is little if anything for Martínez to prove. But as the chief operating officer and co-founder of Real American Freestyle Wrestling, there’s plenty.

There are doubts, as there are doubts that surround any startup. If there was a market for a freestyle professional wrestling league, for instance, then why hasn’t one already emerged? And besides, what does one make of a venture that announced itself with a campy promotional video featuring Hulk Hogan? Is it to be taken seriously?

It’s serious enough, at least, that Martínez has helped compel 52 wrestlers to join the league, which in the circles of the sport is commonly known by its acronym, RAF. Among those who’ve signed on, Martínez recited a long list of their collective accolades: 12 Olympic medalists, four Olympic champions “and, I think, 34 NCAA champions.”

“The cream of the cream,” Martínez said.

Woods is among those who’ll be featured, along with Blades, who is approaching her senior season at Iowa. College wrestlers cannot accept a salary from RAF, but can receive compensation through name, image and likeness deals to promote the league. Blades, who became a national name during the Olympics last summer, admits she was skeptical at first about the launch of RAF.

When Martínez initially told her about it, she didn’t quite get it. There was mention of Hulk Hogan. A boast from Martínez that “this is gonna be huge” and that it would change the sport.

“And I still didn’t understand what he meant,” Blades said with a laugh during a recent phone call. “But I was just like, ‘OK, Coach. Whatever.’”

Soon after, though, she learned more about it. The comical skepticism, or early misunderstanding, turned into genuine belief. After deeper conversations with Martínez, Blades said, “I thought it was such an amazing business plan.” If it works, it will provide athletes like herself with a viable professional path to pursue their sport. One hasn’t really existed, unless college and Olympic wrestlers aspire to pursue a career in mixed martial arts.

Part of the plan for RAF to build an audience will be for wrestlers to share their personal stories. Social media will figure prominently. Influencer-style content will play a leading role. The league wants to develop and sell personalities. Even before Hogan’s death, Martínez’s personality was as large as anyone associated with the endeavor. He’s bullish about the prospects, in part because he doesn’t have a choice but also because that’s how Martínez, a relentless optimist, is built.

“Whenever something bad happens to me in my life,” he said, “I always turn it into a positive. I have an arrogance about me. That is confidence, but it’s also …”

He paused, searching for the word.

“Maybe I’m delusional, right?” he said, smiling.

While he explained the future he believes is in store for Real American Freestyle Wrestling, Martínez’s speech quickened. He lauded the partnership with Left Lane Capital, a New York venture capital firm that is the league’s primary investor.

There’s already a title sponsorship — hardly coincidental — with Real American Beer. He said RAF has raised more than $10 million, and that its wrestlers, at least those not in college, will earn compensation similar to an entry-level Ultimate Fighting Championship salary, with a chance to earn more.

There are bound to be major challenges. For one, nothing like this has ever been done. In losing Hogan, meanwhile, the startup has lost its most recognizable partner and promoter. Despite the controversy that has long surrounded him, he likely would have generated a certain curiosity factor that could’ve sold tickets, or attracted viewers. Martínez, too, is adapting to a new world.

It’s much different than the one in which he’s most comfortable. He has learned, for instance, that it’s frowned upon to unleash profanity-laced screeds at people who work in television and entertainment. In trying to build a new league, it’s not as straight-forward as getting on all fours — as he often does in his gym — and barking instruction while he sweats.

Still, there’s a sense that if anyone can make something like this work, it’s Izzy.