Matt Rodriguez
DICK'S
CENTER
Matthew John Rodriguez bought his first board with cash he earned from working at a
flea market. For the first couple of years, Matt stuck to going fast, grinding the edges of
curbs and overexaggerating boneless ones. Eight-and-a-half years later, Matt spends his
time between San Francisco and San Jose, sticking the clean shit like you've never seen.
When did you start to get good at skating?
Probably when me and my grandpa moved to
a different part of San Jose and there were two
new guys I always skated with. They were all into
the Bones Brigade and this one guy Paul was all
into the Gonz. His whole room was plastered
with Gonz shit. I was like, "Damn, he's dope."
And it was hella funny because he always used
to say I looked like him, so I was all stoked. He
used to kick me down his old Gonz boards. That
was like my first good board, a green Gonz, and
after that, I got another one, and then I got a
Rob Roskopp, with the face.
Did you ever check out Raging Waters?
Nah, I lived in Sacramento then. I never got to
see that place. I moved to Sacramento after the
fourth grade.
Was it different skating over there?
There was more skaters there, the slashers,
but I never hung out with those guys until later. I
had my own friends, we always skated down-
town Sacramento, and that was five years ago.
Who were some of the people you first skat-
ed with in San Francisco?
Back then I used to skate with Shelby Woods
and James Kelch. I skated with all the under-
ground dudes like Shelby and Jake Vogel, and
54
sometimes I'd skate with Sean Mandoli because
he'd come up to Sacramento because his cousin
lived up there and he knew people in SF.
Did your parents like or dislike your skating?
They always supported me, Like my mom,
she'd let me stay out late because that's all I did.
She'd let me go to contests all the time, like fly
out to San Diego to the trade show or wherever
I had to go.
Were you into contests back then?
Yeah, never to win, but I used to like them to
see how good I could be. Not even to like,
"Ooh, I'm better than him," because that shit
don't do nothing. I grew out of it. It was like a lit
tle kid thing. "Aw, contest, cool," but you grow
out of it. The more you're away from it, the more
it's just kind of a bad trip to you after a while.
Would you still like to do good in one now?
I think it would be cool, but I'm not into it. If I
entered a contest, I'd try, but I'd never take it
down on myself if I didn't do good. I never have.
What's it like being on tour?
The last tour that passed was fun, but some-
times I'd be bummed because we didn't have
boards or we had to stay up late just to find a
hotel, but things like that happen. Traveling was
fun, just like bam, the next day, you know you're
going to be somewhere different, you just didn't
care, you just skated. That was the best part of
it, that, and seeing new stuff.
Are skaters in the Midwest or out on the East
Coast different than skaters out here?
It seems like they were a little behind only
because where they were from is not where it
started. And it wasn't even their fault, it's just
they had to wait for everything to get to them.
Their attitudes were cool and they were stoked
to see us, but then some were rude because
they expected some crazy skating. They didn't
understand, we just skated. We're here to skate
with you, not to basically show off, we're going
to just skate. And that's what we did, we skated,
and most were cool about it, but some of them
were kind of dicks like, "This ain't California,
you're here, you've got to respect that." But!
didn't really trip. I just ignored it.
What do you think about politics in skating?
It seems like it's not even for the spirit any
more. Like turning pro, it's kind of rad, like,
"Yeah, turn pro, get a board, that's cool," now it
seems like it's just all pressure, it's all just gossip.
Who deserves it? Who's not good enough or
good enough to be on our team? It's kind of
bavady
FABRICS E CRAFTS
Matt (opposite) ponders the
meaning of life in front of Dicks. High
altitude kickflip to the street fabove) in San Jose