After being released from WWE in June 2003, Holly joined NWA Total Nonstop Action as Mad Mikey, where he remained until his death later that year.

In 1996, he joined All Pro Wrestling (APW), where he became known as "'The Leprechaun' Erin O'Grady"[4] and had several matches with Vic Grimes.

[citation needed] Lockwood joined the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania-based Extreme Championship Wrestling promotion in November 1997 after ECW wrestler Taz viewed a tape of a match between O'Grady and Michael Modest and referred him to ECW owner Paul Heyman.

[2] When they took the gimmick of claiming to be "super heavyweights", over 400 lb each, Crash would carry a scale to ringside to "weigh in" before matches.

[2] Crash made his pay-per-view debut at SummerSlam in August, where the Holly Cousins wrestled in a Tag Team Turmoil match, won by the Acolytes Protection Agency.

[18] The next night on Raw is War, they defeated the Rock 'n' Sock Connection for the WWF Tag Team Championship.

[2] This meant that the title was permanently contested, not just in sanctioned matches, and could change hands anywhere, anytime anyone pinned the champion, so long as a WWF referee counted the fall.

Holly was frequently attacked by other wrestlers in unlikely locations, including an airport, a funhouse, a circus, and his hotel room.

[22] He frequently defended the championship against non-wrestlers, including referees and road agents, like Gerald Brisco and Pat Patterson.

[23] In the course of this feud, Molly began a romantic relationship with Spike Dudley, leading to internal disputes within each family, as well as a Romeo and Juliet-style angle between the six of them.

[23] On the March 18, 2001, episode of Heat, Crash defeated Dean Malenko to win the Light Heavyweight Championship.

At Survivor Series on November 18, 2001, Holly took part in a battle royal that would guarantee the winner immunity from being fired that was won by Test.

Earlier, Raw General Manager Eric Bischoff was informed that a Raw wrestler would leave to reunite with a relative on SmackDown!, and ordered a beatdown by 3-Minute Warning on Hardy, who he wrongly suspected of planning to join his brother, Matt Hardy, until Crash revealed that he was the one who was leaving, planning to join his cousin Hardcore Holly on SmackDown!.

On November 1, 2003, Mad Mikey and Rory Fox defeated Quiten Lee and The Human Time Bomb with Ricky Steamboat as the special guest referee for the Heartland Wrestling Association in what turned out to be Lockwood's final match.

[citation needed] Lockwood met his wife, Christeena Wheeler, when she escorted Mark Henry to the ring at Unforgiven 1999, in Charlotte, North Carolina.

[1] In 2002, he opened "Crash Holly's School of Professional Wrestling" in Salisbury, North Carolina, where Wheeler grew up.

[2][34] Lockwood died on November 6, 2003, at his friend and fellow wrestler Stevie Richards' house in Florida.

In August 2005, Nora Greenwald, who performed alongside Lockwood as Molly Holly, released an autobiographical DVD titled "Nora Greenwald: Shootin' the Shi Crap", and a portion of the profits from the sale of the DVD went to Lockwood's daughter's education fund.

In March 2005, the New Breed Wrestling Association held the "Mike Lockwood Memorial Tournament", which was won by Michael Modest.