Wrestling Observer Rewinder

September 14, 1987

Wrestler Scott “Hog” Irwin passed away this past week from cancer at the age of 37. One of his biggest claims to fame was wrestling under a hood as Super Destroyer, under which gimmick he held the National Heavyweight and National Tag Team (with Masked Superstar) titles in Georgia Championship Wrestling back in 1982. He was the older brother of “Wild” Bill Irwin, and he is also famous as the first American wrestler to regularly use a superplex as a finisher. In April 1986 he was diagnosed with an inoperable malignant brain tumor which caused numbness on the side of the head. He tried to make a comeback in Florida and Montreal later in the year, but his career was pretty much finished. Irwin was trained by Verne Gagne and debuted in 1976. His battle with cancer has received significant news coverage in his hometown of Duluth, Minnesota.
November 27 is looking to be really interesting, because WWF has just announced a show called “The Survivors’ Series” to be broadcast on pay-per-view. That puts two big shows in competition with each other for the evening, and it’s clear that WWF’s show is an attempt to counterprogram Starrcade, which will be Crockett’s first attempt at a pay-per-view show. No lineup or venue has been announced yet for Survivor Series, but WWF is coming off the biggest pay-per-view show in history (Wrestlemania 3 grossed $10.3 million) which was headlined by Hogan/Andre. A rematch could potentially stall Crockett’s attempt to get Starrcade on ppv. If given the choice between Andre/Hogan 2 or the unknown commodity of JCP, cable companies will almost certainly make the easy and obvious choice. WWF is also offering this show as part of a package deal to cable companies that includes the right to air Wrestlemania 4 (this point becomes very important soon). There should be some very interesting developments in this story in the coming weeks.
It looks like the Florida Championship Wrestling office will be basically finished by the end of this month. Crockett’s booked only ten dates in Florida for October, and it’s expected they’ll fill those cards entirely with wrestlers from the Charlotte office. Regular monthly shows will only happen in the major Florida cities. Rumors have swirled for a while that Florida was dying, as the local wrestlers have failed to draw ever since Crockett took over the territory earlier this year. Here are a couple lessons to the industry - fans won’t support a local group when outsiders (Crockett’s Charlotte guys) come every month. When Ric Flair, Dusty Rhodes, etc. are on the cards, local main eventers become curtain jerkers and fans lose their heat for them. So ultimately, the fans stop investing in the local guys and wait for the monthly shows with the big stars. Dave hopes this doesn’t happen with the UWF area. If JCP book there in a way that makes the NWA guys seem like bigger stars in the old UWF territory, fans will do exactly what was described above - stop going to shows without the big stars. Several Florida guys look UWF-bound (The Sheepherders, Kevin Sullivan, and Dory Funk) and a few NWA-bound (Mike Rotunda, Bugsy McGraw), and others will be let go. Blackjack Mulligan walked out on August 29 because he wasn’t happy with his paycheck, and both Mike Graham and Steve Keirn probably won’t go anywhere because they’re past the point of their career where the travel requirements of a major promotion are really worth it to them.
WWF’s third annual King of the Ring Tournament took place on September 4 in Providence, Rhode Island to a sellout 12,000 fans. Lots of surprises and a reportedly good show. Haku vs. Brutus in the first round was the worst match of the show, and Haku was eliminated in round two after a 15 minute draw with Rick Martel (also eliminated). Randy Savage’s face reactions continue to grow, and surprisingly Jim Brunzell got booed more than any other heel on the night during his match with Savage. In the end, Savage beat Bundy in the finals. Dave thinks a lot of the fun for fans is the novelty of the tournament setup allowing face vs. face and heel vs. heel matches they don’t normally see, as well as other matchups you don’t get often, both of which break away from the usual formula of WWF matches.
Pro Wrestling This Week is sponsoring a Caribbean cruise in February which will have the PWTW hosts as well as wrestlers like Bruiser Brody, Wendi Richter, Jerry Lawler, and Roddy Piper. They will also go to San Juan, Puerto Rico for a live show. A prototype for the Jericho cruise, you might say.
Lia Maivia hasn’t learned that her promotion doesn’t draw in Northern California and is thinking about promoting matches in the area again. AWA is also reportedly planning to return to Northern California in November.
[Puerto Rico] A guy named Maelo Huertas wrestled for the Jr. Heavyweight Title here, and Dave has no idea who he is but wonders if he might be El Hijo del Santo. Dave’s reasoning is that the real last name of El Hijo del Santo is “Huerta, so perhaps it’s Santo Jr. under a [different] mask.” Dave’s logic here is flawed and based on not understanding Spanish naming conventions, as El Hijo del Santo’s name doesn’t include Huerta anywhere. El Santo’s last name included Huerta because his mother’s last name was Huerta, but his son’s last names are Guzmán (from his father’s side) and Rodriguez (from his mother’s side). I’m not sure when Dave eventually figures this out, but Maelo Huertas is the younger brother of Invader #1 (fuck Invader #1).
”Duke” Pete Doherty has been added to WWF’s announce team as a heel color commentator, likely to replace Ventura if the latter’s movie career takes off. Doherty’s got a “unique” voice, but he doesn’t seem to show much promise yet.
WWF’s August 22 MSG card was the best in a long time, and Dave goes through and rates the matches and stuff. Final total was an excess of 18,000 fans and $221,000 at the gate. A few really good matches (Honkytonk vs. Steamboat, Martel vs. Haku, Santana vs. Ron Bass), and only two bad matches (Billy Graham vs. Butch Reed and Demolition vs. JYD and George Steele). Lanny Poffo ended his losing streak against Jose Estrada with a “front flip into a splash” like Perro Aguayo does.
Randy Savage’s face turn should be expected on the September 23 taping gainst Honkytonk Man. Dave’s not sure it’s the best idea to turn Savage with Honkytonk as the opponent, as they haven’t been drawing great. Turning against the wrong heel can kill your draw as a face.
WWF will be running a new concept, the “Royal Rumble,” in St. Louis on October 4. What Dave hears is something along the lines of a combination of a battle royal and a non-violent WarGames. The format as Dave understands it right now is there are 12 guys who each draw a number, and two start for 5 minutes under battle royal rules. Every 2 minutes after that a new guy’s number is drawn and he joins until only one man is left after over the top eliminations.
Did you know that Hulk Hogan got paid only $11,000 to play Thunderlips in Rocky III?
Terry Taylor has become UWF “World” (Dave’s sick of all these titles getting the word World thrown in) TV Title, winning it from Shane Douglas on September 2. Douglas had a bad hand injury from the night before, and Taylor was working with a hyperextended knee. Eddie Gilbert hit Douglas with a chair after a ref bump, and Terry won by pinfall with the Figure Four. He held the leglock until Sting and Chris Adams ran in, so it looks like they’re setting up Sting/Adams/Douglas vs. Taylor/Gilbert/Rick Steiner as a six-man feud. The same tv taping had Steve Williams beat Black Bart to retain the UWF Title, only for Scandor Ackbar’s guys to steal the belt until Ron Simmons made the save, so maybe Williams/Simmons vs. Bart/Bubba matches are coming. The show did a really poor $7000 gate.
Watch: Terry Taylor wins UWF TV Title
UWF’s tv program will have the big NWA names featured weekly starting with the show airing September 19. It seems like the format will be an in-studio set with video tapes of the big names rather than shooting everything all at one location and having the big names show up in person. Jim Ross, Tony Schiavone, and Magnum T.A. look like they’ll be hosting, with Missy Hyatt doing an interview segment. Missy will no longer do color commentary on Power Pro because of tension between her and the Freebirds. Apparently most of her commentary on Freebirds matches was a shoot, or at least Hayes and Gordy believed it was, and they each had at least one promo where they fired back that had to be edited out because of poor taste.
Speaking of the Freebirds, Terry Gordy won’t be around UWF much the rest of the year because he’s got a couple consecutive tours in Japan with All Japan. He’s also still suffering the lingering effects of pneumonia, and his bad knee. Additionally, Buddy Roberts has gone AWOL from UWF so no idea what his status is. That leaves Michael Hayes as the only remaining Freebird in UWF. Gordy won’t be at Starrcade due to his Japan commitments, which includes Baba’s tag team tournament running the same time as Starrcade. That timing means that the Road Warriors won’t be in the tournament since they’ll be at Starrcade.
[Stampede] The Bruce Hart vs. Jason the Terrible match filmed on August 28 was not aired on TV due to being too bloody. Ed Whelan announced on the show that he was not allowing the match to air.
Watch: Ed Whelan announces Bruce Hart vs. Jason the Terrible will not air
[Stampede] The Harts have been talking about trying to set up a Ric Flair vs. Owen Hart match. Given the realities of the wrestling business, this will probably not amount to anything.
Shawn Michaels and Marty Janetty are in Alabama now as the Midnight Rock’n’Rollers. Verne Gagne threatened to sue if they kept using the Midnight Rockers name, as he apparently has that trademarked.
They’re hyping up a big Thunderdome match in Alabama for the Knoxville show at the end of October. There will be four poles, one in each corner, and each pole will have a box. One is empty, one has a chain, one has brass knuckles, and one supposedly with a check for $100,000.
In perhaps the least surprising news you could imagine, POWW canceled the September 1 show at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. Break-even for that venue is a $100,000 gate, and they had sold only 500 tickets out of 70,000 capacity.
As Florida fades into nothing, the only notable bit from them recently is a Blackjack Mulligan return angle that aired on tv. He came back and put a rope around Johnny Ace’s neck and kidnapped him in his pickup truck.
[JCP/NWA] There was a surprise wrestler Paul Jones was supposed to bring in this week. There was no surprise wrestler on any of the shows filmed this weekend.
[JCP/NWA] Looks like they’re building to Ric Flair vs. Ron Garvin for Starrcade, with Garvin’s career at stake against Flair’s NWA World Title. That was what they looked to be building to last year, but the Magnum T.A. accident and Nikita Koloff turn led to it being scrapped.
[JCP/NWA] They ran two cards on September 5 in Philadelphia and Baltimore, and while the Philadelphia show ended at 10 pm, Baltimore became a game of stalling for the Horsemen to arrive. Ivan Koloff and Lex Luger went to a double countout after 42 minutes which was probably one of the worst matches of the year, as neither has the endurance to last that long. All the matches were worse than they sounded on paper except the Ron Simmons vs. Barbarian opener, all leading to a six-man cage match between Road Warriors/Dusty vs. Flair/Arn/Tully that didn’t even start until after 11:30 pm. Animal pinned Tully, by the way.
The Eddie Sharkey and Dave Strecker lawsuit has had the charges of robbery against Strecker dropped, but Strecker was convicted of extortion and awaits sentencing. In other Sharkey news, he ran a 24-hour card as part of the Jerry Lewis telethon on September 6 and 7 featuring most of his wrestlers. At one point a wrestler fell asleep in the ring which is the first time Dave’s ever heard of that happening. Small crowd, but they had more than 60 matches and taped a lot for their tv show.
[All Japan] Negotiations with Bruiser Brody to get him to come in for the tag tournament in November have fallen through. Baba offered the same pay as he gives the Road Warriors and Stan Hansen to tour ($10,000 per week), but Brody wanted to be the highest paid foreigner and Baba was unwilling to change the pay scale. Expect Jimmy Snuka, Dick Slater, Abdullah the Butcher, Terry Gordy, Dory Funk, and possibly Terry Funk in the tournament.
The early favorite for main event at Wrestlemania 4 is Hogan vs. Bigelow. Dave thinks Wrestlemania is too early to do that.
WWF’s wrestlers passed AIDS testing and are HIV negative. With all the bleeding Crockett’s guys do, Dave thinks they should follow suit.
One letter in this week thinks Dave is underestimating just how important the Road Warriors are to Crockett. They’re a big asset in the north and midwest, and the fact that they get a bigger response than Steve Williams in his hometown. With WWF and JCP having taken every major name from smaller promotions, the Road Warriors would be the first major acquisition in a while by either if they could lock them down. If they go to WWF, how will Crockett’s other wrestlers react, and how many might follow suit? In a two-horse race, any jump is important (this letter writer is basically looking a decade in the future now).
Another letter asks what Dave thinks about the idea of Lex Luger being the eventual successor to Hulk Hogan. Meltzer says that, contract aside, there’s no way Luger will be Hogan’s successor for one key reason. When an act runs stale, and Hogan’s will eventually be stale, the stupidest thing you can do is try and replace it with a copy of that stale act. Look at WWF’s title history and how each long-term face champion was different from the last. Bruno was an Italian immigrant, followed by Pedro for the Latino audience, then Bruno again. Following years of ethnic champions, you get Bob Backlund who’s the “ultimate lilly-pure wasp.” Then you get Hogan, who is almost the opposite of Backlund in every way. Dave expects Hogan’s successor to be cut from a different cloth entirely.
Awards time is incoming, so Dave spends some time covering some of the categories and some of the favorites. Awards will be released in the 1987 yearbook issue, which should be 50-75 pages and come out around mid-January. Names he gives for wrestler of the year include Ric Flair (on a 6 year win-streak), Riki Choshu (who has single-handedly made New Japan the hottest promotion on the planet), Hulk Hogan (similar or even higher level of impact as Choshu, though match quality is lower). Dave thinks Choshu is the easy pick thus far. Best Brawler is a question mark, as the usual picks haven’t seemed to warrant it this year. Dave thinks Ted DiBiase (early year work), Eddie Gilbert (lots of good brawls this year), and Steve Williams (believability) are the top three right now. Hardest worker probably goes to Flair, but Dave thinks Owen Hart and Eddie Gilbert definitely deserve mentions. Best gimmick performer is another question mark. Everyone’s favorite seems to be Ted DiBiase’s new gimmick, but his drawing power with it is untested. Road warriors? Brutus Beefcake? Honkytonk Man?
In Minneapolis only, AWA is holding up the AWA World Title between Curt Hennig and Greg Gagne. Apparently, Verne can’t/won’t continue paying Curt’s very lucrative guaranteed contract (the Tribune deal has fallen through) and Curt’s talking about jumping ship. If anything like that does happen, Greg Gagne will wind up world champion, and that's something Dave finds terrifying.
A couple of new names join WWF’s tv announcer stable: Mike McGuirk and Bruce Prichard. Dave hopes McGuirk gets better because she’s pretty bad right now.