goc

Consider it your penance for forcing the rest of us to watch a stupidly long Buck Zumhofe/Steve Regal match.

Yes, I thought they really dropped the ball on Palumbo in that run as I actually liked the feud with Jamie Noble. I agree with what he said about it in interviews though, eventually he needed to just kill Jamie Noble dead but apparently that wasn't where they wanted to go with it.

Let me know which territory TV you've seen that on.

I don't know how but TNA has managed to create a very special kind of delusional fan.

This is definitely a good one and it also reminded me of "most exciting hour in all of professional wrestling" because I've been using both those tropes in my Southwest fantasy writing.

Southwest Championship Wrestling @ San Antonio, TX - The HemisFair Arena 11/27/83 Steve Pardee & Larry Hamilton vs. Bruiser Costa & Terry Adonis - Larry Hamilton starts the match with Terry Adonis and just ties him up like a pretzel on the mat. He wears him down with various holds with Adonis having no real answer for Hamilton's AAU amateur wrestling skills until Bruiser Costa comes in and kicks Hamilton in the head during an Oklahoma Roll to break the pin and Adonis is able to use that to his advantage raking Hamilton's eyes as he tried to clear the cobwebs after the kick to the head and then shoving him into the corner and making the tag to Bruiser Costa. Costa and Adonis keep Hamilton isolated in their corner and work him over for a while including an abdominal stretch from Costa with Terry Adonis providing illegal extra leverage while the referee is out of position to see it. The ref finally catches Adonis and makes Costa break the hold. Costa tries to put the abdominal stretch back on but Hamilton instead hip tosses out of it and makes a dash into his corner to tag in Steve Pardee. Pardee comes in and dropkicks a charging Bruiser Costa but then gets hit from behind by a cheap shot from Terry Adonis. Costa whips Pardee into the ropes and ducks down for a back body drop but instead Pardee grabs his head and Bulldogs him! Pardee makes the cover and Hamilton keeps Terry Adonis from breaking the pin, giving the new team of Steve Pardee and Larry Hamilton their first victory in the HemisFair Arena. Winners: Steve Pardee & Larry Hamilton in 7:17 after Steve Pardee hit the Bulldog on Bruiser Costa Timothy Flowers w/Jim Holliday & Goldie Rogers vs. Man Mountain Link & Tiny Anderson - Rogers and Flowers both started the match refusing to get in the ring with Man Mountain Link. The referee got tired of their antics and rang the bell and started counting them out on the apron so they would just take turns going outside the ring until the count of 9, coming back inside to make a quick tag and then the new legal man would go right back outside the ring. Finally Link got tired of waiting for them to engage so he tagged out to Tiny Anderson. At that point Goldie Rogers came in and started mocking Tiny Anderson, telling him he'd probably never had a woman in his whole life while Goldie could pick any woman he wanted out of the crowd. Tiny responded by slapping him in the face and grabbing him into a side headlock which caused the HemisFair crowd to explode. Tiny tried to pull Rogers into the corner so he could tag in Link but Rogers slipped out of the headlock and quickly retreated to his corner and tagged in Timothy Flowers. Flowers challenged Tiny to stay in the ring so he went back into the center of the ring where Flowers wanted a test of strength. The crowd tried to warn Tiny not to go for it but eventually he was goaded into it by Flowers, Rogers and Holliday all mocking him. Flowers quickly gained the upper hand in the test of strength and forced Tiny down to his knees then started jawing at Link on the apron. Suddenly Anderson started to come back and work his way back to his feet but Flowers cut him off with a kick to the gut and then broke the test of strength and punched him and whipped him into the corner. Flowers & Rogers worked over Anderson in their corner, making tags in and out while being extremely arrogant and mocking Tiny and the crowd for supporting him. Flowers hit a bodyslam on Tiny and tried to cover him with one foot on his chest but Tiny kicked out at the count of 2. The crowd started to chant for Tiny which seemed to get his adrenaline going but they Flowers cut him off as he made a tag to Rogers and the two of them hit a double suplex on Anderson. Rogers went for a cover but then pulled Tiny up at the count of 2 and started slapping him around. Rogers got Flowers to hold Tiny while Rogers bounced off the ropes and came in with a big forearm but Tiny ducked out of the way at the last second and Rogers hit Timothy Flowers instead! Tiny quickly darted to his corner with Rogers chasing him but Tiny made it there first and tagged in Man Mountain Link! Rogers started backpedaling but Man Mountain Link grabbed him up and crushed him with the Falling Powerslam and pinned him as Timothy Flowers just looked on from the floor. Winners: Man Mountain Link and Tiny Anderson in 8:58 after Link pinned Goldie Rogers following a Falling Powerslam David Von Erich w/Sunshine vs. Yoshi Seito - David started this match fired up and was all over Yoshi Seito from the sound of the bell. David beat on him for a while until getting him down on the mat in a stomach claw. Seito had to keep fighting to keep his shoulder off the mat while he worked his way to the ropes and then finally got the break. Seito slipped outside the ring to try and regroup but David went out after him and Seito had to quickly roll back in the ring to avoid him. David came back in after him and caught a kick to the throat as he came in under the ropes after Yoshi Seito. Seito kicked and stomped on David and then put him into a side headlock but David quickly powered out of that with a big back suplex. Seito got up groggy and David whipped him into the ropes and hit a high knee on Seito as he came back and then put Seito in the Iron Claw as he was down on the mat. Seito tried to get to the ropes but David kept him from making it and eventually Seito had no choice but to submit to the Iron Claw. Winner: David Von Erich in 6:42 after making Yoshi Seito submit to the Iron Claw After the match Mr. Saito ran down to the ring and attacked David from behind while he was having his hand raised. Saito had David down on the mat and started chopping him in the throat when suddenly Sunshine got in the ring and jumped on his back! Saito shrugged her off and reached back to slap her when suddenly Yoshi Seito grabbed his hand! Mr. Saito started beating the crap out of Yoshi Seito and David Von Erich grabbed Sunshine and pulled her out of the ring. David started to try and go back to the locker room but Sunshine pleaded with him to go back and help Yoshi Seito. David looked conflicted about it but finally Sunshine convinced him and David grabbed a chair and ran back into the ring and chased off Mr. Saito who was just lighting into Yoshi Seito with stomps and kicks to the throat. Sunshine stayed on the opposite side of the ring from Saito as he went nuts at ringside and promised to hurt all 3 of them. Saito finally went back to the locker room and David Von Erich helped Yoshi Seito back to his feet at the urging of Sunshine. Yoshi Seito looked confused at first but eventually bowed to David Von Erich and left the ring by himself with David and Sunshine following shortly after Eddie Gilbert & Ken Lucas vs. Yin & Yang - Yang started the match against Eddie Gilbert and the two of them shook hands before locking up. Yang got Eddie Gilbert on the mat and tried to control him but Gilbert showed a lot of fire and ability by countering out of Yang's holds or quickly pushing himself into the ropes. After a few minutes of that, Gilbert and Yang both tagged out and Yin came in fired up and wanting a brawl with Ken Lucas. That didn't work out so well for the man in the black bodysuit and white mask as Lucas got the better of their brawl. Yin wanted to go for another round only to get the same results and then retreated to his corner and tagged out to Yang. Yang came in and wanted a handshake which Ken Lucas obliged but then Yang pulled him in and headbutted him which dropped Ken Lucas like a ton of bricks. Yang quickly went for the cover and pinned Lucas for the count of 3. Winners: Yin & Yang in 5:33 after Yang knocked out Ken Lucas with a headbutt and pinned him Eddie Gilbert came in and wanted referee Carl Fergie to check Yang's mask but Yin & Yang were already half way up the aisle with the crowd suspecting some shenanigans just took place and starting to boo them. Eddie Gilbert and Carl Fergie had to help Ken Lucas out of the ring as he seemed totally out of it following the headbutt from Yang. El Gran Apollo vs. The Cuban Assassin w/Jose Lothario - El Gran Apollo attacked The Cuban Assassin as soon as he got in the ring and started hammering him with punches. The Cuban Assassin tried to backpedal away but Apollo stayed right on top of him just pounding away at him with punches and forearms with The Cuban trying to fight back but to no avail. Finally referee Jack Howe got in the middle and tried to get Apollo to open up his fists which allowed The Cuban Assassin an opening to rake Apollo's eyes and then chop him in the throat. Jack Howe got on The Cuban about his illegal tactics but he only ignored him and started pounding on Apollo's back with forearms and then slammed him down to the canvas and put him into a chin lock. Apollo quickly was able to break out of it however and started firing away again with punches and had The Cuban staggered on the ropes. Apollo charged at him but The Cuban Assassin was able to duck his clothesline and pick Apollo up and drop him throat first across the top rope. The Cuban Assassin then dropped a big elbow down on the already injured throat of Apollo and tried to cover him but Apollo got his foot over the bottom rope to break the pin. The Cuban Assassin put another chin lock on Apollo and Apollo struggled back to his feet only to have his hair pulled and taken back down which the referee missed due to Jose Lothario causing him to be distracted. Apollo was able to work his way back to his feet again and this time drove himself backwards into the corner and kept slamming The Cuban Assassin's back into the turnbuckles into he finally broke free. Apollo climbed on top of The Cuban in the corner and started raining punches down on his head and then got down and slammed The Cuban Assassin's head into the mat. Apollo went up to the top rope and was looking to come off with his Flying Crossbody but Jose Lothario got up on the apron to try and shove him off. Instead, Apollo kicked Jose and sent him falling back down to the arena floor but it gave The Cuban Assassin the time to recover and grab Apollo and slam him off the top rope. The Cuban Assassin then covered El Gran Apollo and pinned him with his feet on the ropes for added leverage. Winner: The Cuban Assassin in 8:19 after The Cuban Assassin pinned Apollo with his feet on the ropes after Apollo was slammed off the top rope following interference by Jose Lothario After the match Jose tossed a spike into the ring and called for The Cuban Assassin to use it on Apollo but Apollo got up to fast and blocked The Cuban's attempt to spike him in the head! Apollo kicked The Cuban Assassin in the stomach and grabbed the spike away from him and went after The Assassin with it but Jose helped him get out of the ring in time to avoid it and they both quickly headed back to the locker room as Apollo stood in the ring with the spike challenging them to come back Jim Duggan & Ron Starr vs. Tully Blanchard & Mr. Saito - Duggan started the match in the ring alone as Tully and Saito mocked him about not Ron Starr not showing up from Puerto Rico. They had stood jawing with Jim Duggan with their backs to the aisle and Starr suddenly ran out from the locker room and grabbed their heads and smashed them together and then he and Duggan started firing punches at Tully & Saito which sent them scurrying from the ring. Duggan challenged Tully to come in back in against him but Tully was having none of it. Duggan and Tully kept having their war of words while Mr. Saito tried to sneak around behind Duggan to attack him from behind but Duggan turned just at the last second and blasted Mr. Saito with a big punch that sent him down to the mat. Tully rushed in and tried to attack Duggan from behind but Duggan turned and hit him too and then he grabbed Tully and Saito and slammed their heads together and they rolled out of the ring together as the crowd went wild. Saito & Tully had a fit outside the ring as Duggan just stood in the ring with his hands on his hips. Saito slowly started to get back in the ring, complaining to the referee to keep Duggan back and Tully tried to sneak around Duggan's blindside while he was focused on Saito. Saito started into the ring just as Tully charged at Duggan but Duggan sidestepped out of the way and Tully and Saito crashed into each other and then Duggan slammed their heads together again much to the delight of the HemisFair crowd. Saito and Tully rolled out again while Duggan went into his corner and started doing his patented stomp as the crowd went nuts. Saito got back in the ring again and this time he called for Jim Duggan to make the tag out to Ron Starr. Duggan asked the crowd but they didn't want him to tag out so Duggan went back into the center of the ring and Saito retreated to his corner. He and Tully both kept calling for Ron Starr to come in and finally Duggan went back to his corner and tagged in 'Rugged' Ron Starr. Ron Starr came in and locked up with Saito and the two of them circled around trying to gain the advantage but neither man was able to and they broke off. They circled and went for another lockup but this time Saito hit a knee to the gut on Starr and then started blasting him with hard karate chops. Saito tried to whip Starr into the corner but Starr reversed it and sent Saito into the corner with Duggan and Duggan nailed him with a big punch that sent him staggering backwards into a dropkick to the back by Starr. Starr then grabbed an arm bar and started working it but Tully distracted the ref to allow Saito to break out of it with a rake to the eyes and then a chop to the throat for good measure. Saito then got Starr into his corner with Tully and the two of them kept Ron Starr isolated there and took turns working him over. Tully went to work on Starr's leg to try and neutralize his big running knee lift. Tully put Starr into a figure four and just as Starr looked to be about to turn it over, Tully was able to reach out and make the tag to Saito who came in and cut off Starr's comeback with a big chop to the throat. Saito put Starr into his Scorpion Deathlock but Duggan ran in and broke that up with a big punch to Saito. Starr started to crawl his way to the corner but Saito tagged Tully who came in and dropped a big elbow to the back of Starr's head to cut him off from making the tag. Tully and Saito continued to work over Ron Starr when suddenly Sgt. Slaughter came from out of nowhere and pulled Duggan down off the apron and blasted him with the Slaughter Cannon! Slaughter started putting the boots to Duggan out on the floor and then picked up the big heavy wooden ring steps and dropped them down on Duggan's chest. Tully was distracted by this which allowed Ron Starr to hit him in the gut and double him over and then blast him with the big running knee lift. Starr collapsed again and then started crawling to his corner, not knowing that Duggan was down out on the floor. Slaughter's assault on Duggan was finally ended as arena security and police came and removed him from the ringside area. Tully and Starr both made it to their corners at the same time and Tully tagged in Saito but Ron Starr finally realized Duggan wasn't there and looked around confused until he saw Duggan laid out on the floor. Just as Starr started to turn around he got grabbed from behind by Mr. Saito and dumped on his head with a Saito Suplex and pinned for the 3 count. Winners: Tully Blanchard & Mr. Saito in 14:25 after a Saito Suplex on Ron Starr. During the match Sgt. Slaughter appeared and attacked Duggan at ringside Southwest TV Title:Roy Lee Welch vs. Mike Masters w/Jim Holliday - Mike Masters started out the match with his usual tactics of going out between the ropes to keep his opponent away from him and doing everything he could to avoid contact while strutting and posing whenever he had the referee in between him and Roy Lee Welch. Finally Roy baited him into contact by calling for a test of strength. Masters looked full of confidence as he put his hands up for it only to get a big punch to the jaw from Roy Lee Welch and get grabbed into a headlock. Welch just wrenched and wrenched on the headlock, grinding Mike Masters' ears in the process and forcing him down on the mat. Masters uses his strength advantage to work his way back up and tried to drop Welch back with a suplex but Welch shifted his weight and pulled Masters over with a headlock takeover instead. Masters tried again for the suplex only to get the same headlock takeover result. Masters then tried to push Welch off into the ropes but Welch held on. Finally Masters was able to break out of the headlock after Holliday jumped on the apron to distract Welch which gave Masters the momentary lapse he needed to drop Welch back with the suplex and dump him on his head. Masters then got up strutting and posing some more while Holliday yelled at him to stay on his opponent. Masters went to grab Welch but Welch started firing punches into his midsection and tried to grab the headlock again but got shot off into the ropes and came back into a hard shoulder block from Masters that put him down on the mat. Masters tried to follow up with an elbow drop but Welch moved out of the way. Welch grabbed Masters and tried to whip him into the ropes but Masters reversed it and whipped Welch into the corner and Welch did his usual bounce off the 2nd turnbuckle into a crossbody but Masters caught him and turned it into a hard powerslam and went for the cover but Welch was just able to get his shoulder up before the count of 3. Masters grabbed him up and hit a big bodyslam and went for another elbow drop that this time connect and tried another pin but Welch again was able to get the shoulder up. The ring announcer announced that there was only 1 minute left in the match and Masters seemed to get motivated to put him away as he grabbed Welch up and bodyslammed him again and then picked him back up and bodyslammed him two more times and went for another cover but Welch was still able to kick out. Masters then signaled for the Full Nelson and waited for Welch to get back to his feet. Welch got up and Masters went behind him and started to put him in the Full Nelson but Welch dropped down out of it and kicked his feet up and caught Masters right under the chin which put Masters down on the mat just as it was announced that there were 30 seconds left in the match. Welch then went for his Spinning Toe Hold and successfully got it on! He started turning it and turning it as Holliday yelled at Masters to hold on and not give up! Masters was screaming in pain and looked on the verge of quitting when suddenly Jim Holliday jumped in the ring and dove at Roy Lee Welch to break up the Spinning Toe Hold. Winner: Roy Lee Welch by disqualification in 9:51 after Jim Holliday ran in the ring and broke Welch's Spinning Toe Hold Roy dropped Holliday with one big punch and then put HIM in the Spinning Toe Hold much to the delight of the crowd but that turned out to be a poor decision as it allowed Mike Masters to get up and blast him in the back of the head with the Television Title. Masters picked up his manager and helped him limp back to the locker room as Roy struggled to get back to his feet in the ring. Southwest Tag Team Titles: The Assassins vs. The Fabulous Ones - The Assassins attacked The Fabulous Ones just as they were stepping through the ropes and started beating the crap out of them. They threw Stan Lane over the barricade and into the crowd and then grabbed Steve Keirn and started smashing his shoulder into the ring post. Then the picked up up and dropped him shoulder first on the ring steps and Steve Keirn looked to be hurt badly. They continued pounding and kicking at the bad shoulder until Stan Lane grabbed a chair from the crowd and hopped back over the barricade and came after them. They just narrowly avoided Stan Lane swinging the chair at them and retreated to the safety of the ring. Stan checked on Steve Keirn and Steve seemed to be seriously injured. Carl Fergie came down to ringside and the scheduled referee Jack Howe who was already in the ring went outside to assess the situation. They decided to call of the match due to Steve Keirn's injury but The Assassin grabbed the microphone and said that they had a signed contract to wrestle for the Southwest Tag Team Titles and that if The Fabulous Ones didn't wrestle then that meant The Assassins would win via forfeit and be the new champions. Carl Fergie and Jack Howe refused to let Keirn wrestle with his shoulder in the shape that it was in but Stan Lane would not forfeit the match and declared that he would go it alone against The Assassins. Stan Lane came in alone as Assassin #1 mocked him having to go at it 2 on 1 which only earned him a karate kick from Lane and then Lane jumped on him and started pounding the crap out of him. Lane started going after #1's mask which brought Assassin #2 in to boot him in the back of the head which caused Lane to slump down to the canvas. Assassin #1 bounced off the ropes and hit his big elbow drop on Stan Lane and rolled him over to pin him but Lane was able to get his shoulder up just before the count of 3. Assassin #1 tagged out and Assassin #2 came in and just started mauling Stan Lane with his hard hitting, mauling style. He tried numerous times to pin Stan Lane but couldn't keep him down. After wearing down Stan Lane in some holds Assassin #2 set up for his big Running Boot but Lane was able to duck it and grab him into the Russian Legsweep! Lane made the cover but it was broken up by a big elbow drop to the back of the head by Assassin #1. As the referee was focused on getting Assassin #1 back out of the ring, #2 loaded up his boot and this time caught Stan Lane with it right to the side of the head as Lane was struggling to get back to his feet. Assassin #2 pinned him for the count of 3 to win the Southwest Tag Team Titles! Winners and the NEW Southwest Tag Team Champions: The Assassins in 8:40 after Assassin #2 pinned Stan Lane following a kick from his loaded boot

Most of the audience who doesn't post on wrestling boards, I think, like Roman at this point, but yeah, this is one of the only places where I've seen that match acknowledged for being as good as it was. Most other places, Roman Reigns matches devolve into contests for whoever can post that Roman is gassed first.In the MOTYC thread on my local forum it's the match with the most yes votes and the match with the best overall score. I know that Jimmy James frequents the SomethingAwful.com wrestling forum and would agree that when I was over there I really never saw too much hype for that match. Unless it was somehow related to Roman Reigns hate and "god it was so awesome to see Brock slap the shit out of him." It's kind of a Roman Reigns hate circle jerk so no one is really going to go out of their way to praise one of his matches. Seems like 1 out of every 5 posts about WWE is some variation of a totally not tired or run into the ground joke about "gotta keep Roman strong"

The company might have but it wouldn't have been DiBiase himself and that's the difference.

I knew about the Sr. bringing in young guys a lot but I was almost sure Ron Fuller had never worked North of the Mason-Dixon line and thought Flair's first MSG match was the one with Piper. Still fits into the trope of lies about MSG though as they didn't team up there.

Yeah, it should be easy to see why it works with NXT because he's not an active part of the roster. But I'm talking about how those "HHH is going to be the savior of wrestling!" people are now trying to rewrite history to say HHH never buried anyone and he only beat those people because they "weren't on his level." The shitty "who buried more people HHH or Cena" poll that I mentioned from wrestlingforum had 72 votes for Cena compared to 36 for HHH.

I'm not sure how wide spread it was but "lies about Madison Square Garden" seems like it might fit. God knows they used to LOVE lying about MSG in Portland with them hyping up Stan Stasiak as someone who was in tons of main events there and almost never got defeated. Just saw a promo from Continental on youtube with Ron Fuller hyping up a tag match with him teaming up with Ric Flair and talking about all the arenas all over the world they had teamed in and throwing in Madison Square Garden when I'm 99% sure neither of them had ever worked the Garden in 1985 much less teamed together there.

I love Billy Joe Travis but think there is really no case for him as a Top 100 guy. He just never stuck around anywhere long enough to put together a good run anywhere, very much like Buddy Landel in that regard. This is a really cool Billy Joe Travis match to check out though with him in a Puerto Rican baseball stadium being a heat magnet against Hugo Savinovich https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkCQwnNZInE Not matches but a nice compilation of Billy Joe's best antics: *Gotta give props to Mark Lowrance's call of "Chris Adams just had a soft drink bottle smashed over his head, he may be dead!"

Well he welcomes you to your first edition of Southeastern Championship Wrestling

I get what you're saying as "here in the Southeastern area" is very frequently said by ol' Charlie Platt. Probably "here in the ____ area/region" would work.

So after watching a Southeastern episode where Charlie Platt talked about the TV main event between Ron Fuller and Jimmy Golden being a "main event anywhere in the country" I thought it would be fun to come up with a territory wrestling bingo card. Something similar to this other wrestling themed bingo card: Obviously "this is a main event anywhere in the country" goes on there. I'd also add "this is my time" for arguments when someone's interview is interrupted, "I'm gonna put him out of wrestling/rasslin for good" for your frequent injury threats and "greatest action anywhere in the country" which I've heard in some form or other from every territory I've watched. What else would you add to the territory wrestling bingo card?

It seemed like pantherwagner's post about that very thing was based on current viewing.

Gotta go with the HTM vs. Warrior match. People were dying to see Honky lose and went nuts for The Warrior coming out because they knew it was gonna finally happen and then went even crazier on the finish. The HHH squash wasn't nearly as iconic.

The amount of mental gymnastics that the most die hard NXT fans do over HHH makes even my head hurt. I don't know how they do it.

That would be pretty cool to be able to watch the whole tournament at once. I'm pretty sure the tournament took up the entire card didn't it? I'd definitely enjoy being able to watch it all at once. Some pretty cool matchups in the first round with Duggan vs. Buddy Roberts, Kamala vs. Blade Runner Flash (Sting), Chavo vs. Buzz Sawyer, Dr Death vs. Rick Steiner, Koko Ware vs. Terry Gordy, Terry Taylor vs. Michael Hayes, Jack Victory vs. Bart Sawyer and Blade Runner Rock (Ultimate Warrior) vs. DiBiase

So yea we're jumping ahead a few months to 5/16/81 and we start the show with Charlie Platt at the desk talking to the new Southeastern Tag Team Champions Bob and Brad Armstrong who will be defending the titles on TV. We'll also see Stan Lane vs. Jerry Stubbs and Ron Fuller vs. Jimmy Golden on TV and Charlie then talks about Ray Candy coming in to the area. I'm intrigued at seeing Ray Candy show up. Our first match of the day is MY MAN Roy Lee Welch taking on Ron Bass. Poor Roy. As an aside, I asked Rip Rogers on twitter if he knew why Roy was really only wrestling on TV around this time and not active on the arena cards and he said Roy did a lot of other stuff as the part owner including concessions and box office, so I suppose him getting more active in the Continental days was just a sign that the talent pool was a lot thinner. Still, Roy is really quite good for a guy who pretty much has no rep at all. Jimmy Golden comes out and calls the match with Charlie Platt and puts over Ron Bass' heart punch. Golden says all the Welchs, Fullers and Hatfields are good rasslers but have evil minds. And they aren't as good as the Goldens. Welch is one of the weird "jobbers" that gets a ton of offense and actually kind of controls the match but gets cheated at the finish. Like, I've never seen him win on these early Southeastern shows but he usually gets more of the match than the guy who beats him. Golden is great antagonizing Roy from the desk and getting on him about using punches. Roy controls a headlock for a lot of this until finally Bass is able to suplex his way out of it. Welch gets a short comeback but then misses a splash into the corner and lands nasty taking the brunt of the blow right on his throat and then Bass hits the Heart Punch on him to finish him off. I liked this match a lot by itself and the added bonus of the Jimmy Golden trash talking puts this over the top as maybe the best Southeastern studio match I've seen so far, just edging out the Saito/Charlie Cook match I uploaded to youtube. After the match we get Randy Rose & Dennis Condrey out to the desk to talk about losing the titles and they show some footage of the match with the Armstrongs from the arena. Dennis says the Armstrongs aren't the champions they're just carrying the belts around for he and Rose. Haha Condrey says they are introducing Bob Armstrong to P A N E pain. Apparently Bob Armstrong has a leg injury and they are working hard on it. Rose says the referee is ignoring all the 15 cries from Bob Armstrong that he wants to give up so they're just going to tear his leg right off. Condrey & Rose demand they cut the tape off just as Bob is about to make the tag. Nothing like a good sore loser heel promo. We come back from commercials to the card rundown which includes Ron Fuller vs. Ron Bass in a Bullrope match, The Armstrongs defending the tag titles against Condrey & Rose, Ken Lucas defending the Southeastern Title against Mr. Saito, Robert Fuller vs. Jimmy Golden, Stan Lane defending the U.S. Jr. Title against Mr. Olympia, and Dennis Condrey against Brad Armstrong in a singles match. Odd to throw that Condrey & Brad match in there when they're already in the tag title match against each other. After that we get another promo from Condrey & Rose talking about how they're gonna get their belts back in Boutwell and the Armstrongs rebuttal. Bob says they stretched his leg so much he's 2 inches taller on the left side. I say this every time but it's still true, Bob is such a good promo. After another commercial we get Charlie Platt talking to Ken Lucas who has both the Southeastern and Alabama titles. Before Charlie talks to Lucas we get a video promo from Mr. Saito who says he has the #1 sleeper hold and Ken Lucas is a not so good American wrestler with a not so good sleeper. Lucas is doing nothing for me as a promo so far, sorry to say. Then we've got Stan Lane at the desk with his U.S. Jr Title talking to Charlie Platt about how he beat Jerry Stubbs for weeks and weeks and he's done getting any rematches for that belt. Stan stills sounds weird to me. They show some video of Stan taking on Stubbs from the arena and Lane says Stubbs is so down from all his loses that his wife left him and he's so humiliated he's had to leave the area. Lane complains about a scientific wrestler like himself having to be hit with punches from Jerry Stubbs. We get a really really shitty ref bump as Lane hits Stubbs with a patented Stan Lane karate kick and Stubbs barely bumps into the referee who takes an NBA level flop. Lane gets ready to try and throw Stubbs over the top rope but Stubbs reverses it and tosses Lane over and the ref saw it and disqualified him. Lane starts really laying it on thick now talking about how he complained about wanting better competition so they found him Mr. Olympia who he claims was the Bronze medalist in the 1968 Olympics and he's excited to face a former Olympic champion. This must be the very first time Stubbs put on the Mr. Olympia mask, rather historic footage in my opinion. Stan gets in the ring and Olympia comes out and Stan pretty much immediately figures out who he is and so does the crowd and Stan hops right back out of the ring and complains to Charlie Platt about how he knows it's Jerry Stubbs. Olympia grabs him and tosses him into the ring and the match is underway and we get a great false finish as Olympia slides under Stan Lane off a back body drop attempt and sunset flips him but only for a 2 count. Interesting to see that even on the very first apperance of Mr. Olympia, everyone already knew he was Jerry Stubbs. I always figured it was at least a secret at SOME point but apparently not. Lane is shouting complaints the whole way through this. Olympia has an arm bar on and there's a whole lot of "break it Jerry" comments from the crowd. And some people have the audacity to say 80s rasslin fans were stupid. I thought this was kind of going to be a quick "Olympia upsets Stan Lane" match but they're getting a lot more time than I expected. And right after I type that, Lane throws Olympia over the top rope and gets disqualified. Lane goes out after him and tries to take off his mask but Olympia fights back and ends up running him off. I will say that Mr. Olympia looks tougher than Jerry Stubbs even if I do know who it is. Just something about covering up the baldness that makes him more of a bad ass. Same deal with Tennessee Stud looking way more menacing than Ron Fuller. We come back from commercial to a Personality Profile with the Fuller brothers. Ron Fuller has wound up with Ron Bass' bullrope and he wants to show the footage of how he got it. They show some tape of an arena match that looks like a tag match between The Fullers and Golden/Bass. Ron Fuller pins Golden at the same time that Bass pins Robert Fuller and the referee seems to count both falls at the same time. So then we get Ron vs. Ron fighting at ringside and Bass runs off to the locker room. Ok so apparently this is a Texas Death match as Fuller is talking about how the referee is counting for the 30 second rest period. Ron Fuller gets in the ring and starts cheering on Robert Fuller to get up as the referee is making the 10 count on both Robert and Jimmy Golden. And of course, Ron Bass comes back out with his bullrope and attacks The Stud from behind Ron Fuller from behind. Golden holds Robert for Bass to hit him with the cowbell but Robert ducks and instead Golden eats the bell. Ron Fuller then gets the bullrope from him and Golden is counted out and loses the match. Ron Fuller tells us that Ron Bass has challenged him to a Bullrope match to try and get it back and then we cut to a video promo from Jimmy Golden and Ron Bass. Golden puts out a $5000 bounty on Robert Fuller and dangerously says you don't even have to be a rassler to collect it, it can be a fan as long as they put Robert Fuller in the hospital. Ron Bass complains about Fuller stealing his bullrope and says he's gonna crush Ron Fuller's head with the cowbell in their bullrope match. Oddly enough, I didn't know Jimmy did this bounty gimmick and I had him offering the same exact same amount of money to Bill Ash to injure Roy Lee Welch in my 1983 fantasy Southwest. Robert says no one is gonna collect that money and nobody is going to put him out of wrestling, he'll leave when he wants to. Good stuff here. After the Personality Profile we head to the ring with Mr. Saito in the ring with Bob Owens who I suspect is going to get stomped into the ground here. Platt puts over the importance of being a champion by saying the champions get a bigger portion of the gates. Ken Lucas joins in for commentary and still isn't doing a whole lot for me as a talker. Saito does some cool takedowns in this match and I like Saito on the mat as he really just ties Owens up. It's Saito though so then we get some chops to the throat leading to the Japanese Sleeper and Owens is done very quickly. Saito is the man, another fantasy Southwest superstar. Actually a fair amount of my fantasy roster is on this show with Ken Lucas, Stan Lane, Mr. Saito and Roy Lee Welch. Ken Lucas gets into the ring to wake Owens back up as Charlie talks about the danger of Mr. Saito leaving the ring without doing so. I've never really cared for that whole "wake your opponent up after the sleeper" gimmick. Then Lucas comes back to the desk and they start showing a clip of Saito and Ken Lucas from the arena and man I wish I could see that in full. Saito is in control but Lucas makes a slowburn comeback and then gets his sleeper in on Mr. Saito. Condrey & Rose run out and Lucas lets go of the sleeper to drop Condrey with a punch and then puts the sleeper on Rose. Jerry Stubbs runs out to help and starts fighting with Condrey at ringside and Saito hits Lucas to break up the sleeper on Rose but gets distracted by Stubbs at ringside and gets rolled up by Ken Lucas and pinned. Kind of a goofy finish as there's no good reason for there not to have been a DQ. But anyway, that's how Ken Lucas won the Alabama title. Lucas says the belts he's got aren't just his he shares them with all the people who have supported him. I will say that Lucas speaks well and is a good promo in that sense it's just that he's so plain especially compared to the top babyfaces promos in the area like Bob Armstrong and Ron Fuller. We come back from commercial with Charlie Platt running down the Boutwell card again as he sits at the desk with Stan Lane and Mr. Saito and then throws to a video promo from Mr. Olympia and Ken Lucas talking about their title matches in Birmingham. Well, there really is no hiding that Olympia is Jerry Stubbs once he starts talking. Damn I love Saito promos. "I'm more strong sleeper hold man! American sleeper hold not too good, Japanese one more strong, more power" Poor Stan Lane having to follow that. He must know too because he keeps it real short and sweet. Now we go to our TV main event with The Tennessee Stud Ron Fuller taking on Jimmy Golden. I expect a ring full of people by the end of this. Charlie says this could be a "main event anywhere in the country" and inspires me to come up with territory wrestling bingo. And yea it doesn't take long before Ron Bass is out and attacks Ron Fuller with the bullrope and Robert Fuller comes out too. Bass busts open Ron Fuller while Jimmy Golden and Robert Fuller brawl on the floor and then Bass gets in the ring and hooks the bullrope around Robert's neck and hangs him over the ropes. Always thought that was a great visual. After a commercial we get fired up bloody promo from Ron Fuller and Robert Fuller has an equally fired up promo without the blood. And that's all for this episode.

I actually saw some awful "who buried more people HHH or Cena?" thread on wrestlingforum where people were using that bolded part in DEFENSE of HHH. Of course Cena is the devil himself and HHH is our lord and savior because NXT but the amount of mental gymnastics was ridiculous. "Well why should HHH make Kozlov or Curtis Axel look good he's had so many world titles and they're not on his level" yet Cena was supposed to put over every brand new guy to the roster over the last 5 years. When you're saying that Cena buried Umaga and HHH didn't you've gone past the point of ridiculousness into insanity.

Backlund is another great pick and one I can see both sides. If you were a fan at the time watching him and you were used to face champ Bruno cutting great promos (at least the ones I have seen) and then you get Backlund I can see how you would hate him. I've not seen a promo from Backlund in that time period that even approached being good, especially when he's almost immediately following a heel who just finished cutting a scathing promo on him and he starts in with his "oh gee golly I respect my opponent and I don't know why he can't respect me" stuff. I've liked a lot of his matches though. He's a good comparison to Cena because I can see how people would hate his character but can't see how people can not like his matches or at least respect his ability even if they don't care for his style.

Ricky Morton pretty much kept the same ring gear after joining the York Foundation and becoming Richard Morton. He turned in Summer of 91 but even in 92 he was still wearing the handkerchiefs and had the tassels.

Actually yea Ziggler is a great pick, especially lately where even the smarkiest of places like wrestlingforum have started to turn on him. And there's not a lot of middle ground when people start talking about him it's either "he's fucking great and WWE should make him the champ" or "he sucks and needs to get the hell off my TV"