March 28, 1994
- Smoky Mountain Wrestling's latest big show, called Sunday Bloody Sunday, drew a record 3,950 fans, which crushed their previous attendance record. The main event of Terry Funk vs. Bob Armstrong was a crazed bloodbath. Funk did the first ("and probably last" Dave wrongly says) moonsault of his career.
- WATCH: Terry Funk vs. Bob Armstrong Texas Deathmatch highlights
- WCW's big TV tapings took place this weekend, which will carry their TV through May. But the main drama came from backstage. The shows were said to be disorganized and much of the crew was angry and disgruntled because it seems Dusty Rhodes is still "unofficially" booking the company. Eric Bischoff appeared to be in charge of running the overall show and wrestlers say his approach to dealing with the wrestlers is less diplomatic than they're used to. The lineup for the upcoming Spring Stampede PPV was made official at the tapings and it appears the main event will be Ric Flair vs. Rick Steamboat, which should at least be a great match if nothing else.
- Sherri Martel debuted at the tapings as manager for Kevin and Evad Sullivan. They're scheduled for a match against the Nasty Boys and Sherri was brought in to be in the Sullivans' corner to counteract the Nasty Boys' manager Missy Hyatt. But that will no longer be the case because...
- WATCH: Sherri Martel debuts n WCW
- Missy Hyatt was fired last week by Eric Bischoff for reportedly going over Bischoff's head during her contract negotiations. Hyatt's contract was set to expire at the end of the month and she had privately expressed concern that she wouldn't be re-signed. Negotiations with Bischoff evidently weren't going well, so Missy went to Eric's boss, Bob Dhue about it. When word got back to Bischoff, he canned her. Hyatt actually went to the TBS offices a couple of days later with two lawyers in tow to find out if she had really been fired and was told that, yes she was. Hyatt is said to be moving to New York to take acting lessons and unless WWF hires her, she's probably going to leave the wrestling business (this becomes a much bigger story later).
- Sting became the first WCW star to get an appearance on the Arsenio Hall Show, after years of trying. In the past, only WWF stars appeared on the show. However, in promos for the show, Sting was referred to as "the current WWF world champion" so, yanno. In the past, an appearance on Hall's show was considered a big deal, but the show is nowhere near as popular as it was just a couple of years ago.
- A meeting was held at the WCW tapings with some new policy changes announced. For starters, WCW will no longer be paying for the wrestlers' rental cars, as they used to. They also issued a new company drug policy, which is basically the same as it was before and said random testing will start soon. WCW has only held two drug tests in the last 2 years (as opposed to the weekly tests WWF does now) and even though many people failed those tests, no one was ever suspended or punished.
- Curt Hennig was rumored to appear for WCW at the tapings, but it didn't happen, so evidently, whatever negotiations may have been going on haven't amounted to anything yet.
- Hulk Hogan's possible deal with WCW got more interesting this week. WCW filmed an interview segment with Hogan, Gene Okerlund, and Bobby Heenan. The segment was primarily to promote Hogan's Thunder In Paradise show, but they did tease the possibility of a Hogan vs. Flair match, which leads Dave to believe it's happening. Because the #1 rule in wrestling is you don't tease something on TV if it's not going to happen (you hear that, Miz and Daniel Bryan?!). The latest Dave knows for sure is that WCW has made a strong offer to Hogan for him to come in but that nothing has been signed yet. Jimmy Hart and Hogan are also still reportedly looking into starting their own promotion and running shows in Europe. As of now, no one seems to know which option Hogan will choose.
- WATCH: Mean Gene interviews Hulk Hogan on the Thunder In Paradise set
- The New York Daily News had a huge story on the Vince McMahon indictments this week. It was largely just a rehash of the same old facts, listing all the scandals the company faced in the last few years. It is believed that it could end up being a landmark case when it comes to steroid use in sports. It's the first time an owner or organization has been charged for steroid use among its athletes and could trickle down into other sports (like the NFL) if it's successful. The story reported that Hulk Hogan is believed to be a key witness for the government. Vince McMahon's former secretary, Emily Feinberg is also expected to be a key witness, as she signed for packages of steroids delivered to McMahon. Dave reiterates that WWF potentially dodged a huge bullet due to a recent Supreme Court ruling that prevents the government from seizing property after a conviction before an appeal. There was real concern that they could seize WWF's $9.5 million dollar office complex if Vince is convicted, which would have financially crippled the company and very possibly put them out of business. Regardless, the company still faces the possibility of $1.5 million in fines and even without a conviction, the legal bills to fight this case are already piling up.
- Canadian Vampiro Casanova's band called El Teatro de la Vampiros ("Vampire Theater") has a concert scheduled in Mexico City later this month. In other news, it's been said the reason Vampiro (let's just call him that from now on) missed a few weeks of wrestling last month is because he took time off to have a nose job.
- Bull Nakano will wrestle Alundra Blayze on the WWF shows in Japan in May.
- Atsushi Onita has been hired by an AIDS awareness group in Japan to be a celebrity spokesman, doing PSAs on TV and warning young people about reckless behaviors that can lead to HIV and AIDS. Dave reminds us that this is the same man who wrestles in the bloodiest death matches in the world and, just last year, had several bloody open wounds on his body and then dove into a polluted river and ended up having to miss several months of action due to the infections he got from it.
- USWA TV this week was an awkward show because most of Memphis was without power due to an ice storm. They ended up just having Jerry Lawler and Dave Brown in the studio airing old clips because they didn't have enough juice in the generator to run the lights and do live matches (Yuuuup. I remember that storm vividly. We still haven't had one here worse than that yet in my lifetime. Power was out all over the city for days and weeks in some places. I remember schools were closed for about 3 weeks and they ended up tacking on extra time at the end of the school year to make up for it, which didn't make a young daprice82 very happy).
- New England indie wrestler Perry Saturn is headed in to USWA soon.
- The Bushwhackers will be appearing on the show Family Matters this week on ABC and it's said that the network is considering a Saturday morning TV show that would feature them as regular characters. (I didn't edit this video, somebody decided to put Natural Born Killaz over it. It's all I can find. Just imagine New Jack is gonna come out and kill Urkel).
- WATCH: The Bushwhackers on Family Matters
- Cy Sperling (the Hair Club For Men guy) has been announced as a guest celebrity for Wrestlemania. He will be doing some goofy hair wig thing for Howard Finkel. Dave thinks it's sad that a loyal employee like Finkel is constantly being put in humiliating situations like this on TV. "It's the kind of stuff we all used to do in elementary school but when it's middle-aged men who are bullying loyal employees, it's really quite sad." Yup, that's basically Vince McMahon's sense of humor in a nutshell. Ask J.R. Anyway, other celebrities at Wrestlemania will be Little Richard (singing the National Anthem), George Steinbrenner (guest timekeeper) and Burt Reynolds.
- After making his return at Royal Rumble, Ted Dibiase is negotiating with WWF for a full-time manager or announcer role. Due to his current neck injury, he won't be wrestling again until 1995 at the earliest (we also would have accepted "never again" as an answer).
- The WWF show on 2/3 in Fredericton, New Brunswick had to be canceled because the ring was mistakenly sent to Halifax, Nova Scotia (That's some WCW-level incompetence).
- Miss Elizabeth was considering going to WCW but her contract release from WWF last year included a non-compete clause through 1995, so that won't be happening.
- Steve Austin's WCW contract expires soon. It's well known that WWF is interested in him. Austin's current deal is for $190,000 per year and he'll want a raise if he decides to stick around. Brian Pillman's contract also expires soon. He's making $240,000 a year and there's word WCW may try to cut his salary. And finally, Ron Simmons is currently working without a contract and has been for some time.