khawk20

I first remember The Sheik terrorizing squash opponents on Superstars of Wrestling in the 70's...one of Cannon's outfits. They had an hour on Saturday afternoons most weeks. Only George Cannon could get Sheik to break the camel clutch when it was locked on by getting up from the announce desk and moving towards the ring. That promotion also featured El Santos I and II as the main heel tag team, with faces like Gino Brito, Domenic DeNucci, Arriba Luis Martinez and even Spiros Arion as a face. Never showed arena clips that I could recall. My most vivid memory and the one that hooked me was Greg Gagne beating Nick Bockwinkel in June of 1979 in a non-title match on AWA TV. Bobby Duncum tried to make the save for Bock when he was trapped in the sleeper and Wally Karbo stopped him as he tried to climb in. Was amazing to see the World Champion beat at the time, non-title or not. Gagne had a title match in July in Minneapolis off of that win which ended in a DQ. It was as I recall a one-off, so it was likely designed to fill the summer void that the AWA had at times. So I was always interested in wrestling, but first memory and being hooked for life were two separate events for me.

Ultimate Warrior Voodoo angle with Papa Shango. Was done for quite few years after that. And the backdrop thing...interesting as when someone does a backdrop that's gonna work he goes down in sync with the rebound and it looks good. When the kick to the face spot is about to happen the guy getting kicked almost always sets up before the other guy is rebounding off the ropes or close to him. If they did the kick spot the same as the actual backdrop spot it wouldn't be such a piss off to so many I suspect. However, doing it in proper sync would almost always mean there was an excellent chance the backdrop attempter was gonna take a real kick to the teeth...so I get why they set themselves early. It just looks the shits.

Regarding the Mirror article, I've learned not to trust any paper that uses phrases like "confided in pals" in their articles. Whatever really happened, I suppose we will know at some point. Damn shame at the end of the day whatever that turns out to be.

You know the mindset of Perez there mystifies me for that specific time frame. But if he had done that, we would all know a helluva lot more about and talk a lot more about Al Perez today than we ever will otherwise.

n/m, found them.

Dates?

Oh wow, that's awful news. RIP. One of those guys that the more you see of him, the more you appreciate his work.

You're possibly thinking of their title win over Regal & Garvin that was, for years, thought to be a phantom change. It was listed as being something like 57 minutes long or something. But a few years ago proof of the card and change were turned up (don't ask me what the proof was - KHawk would remember). There's a thread about it on the old KM board. I don't remember all the details but evidence was presented that it was an actual match in Alberquerque, NM. ​

Otto Wanz winning the AWA title from Nick Bockwinkel. That one won't be topped in my head ever.

Would Beefcake have been in the finals instead against Dibiase? I've heard this story from various shoots about Dibiase supposed to win but back in 1988 would Vince really have let a Bad Guy win the Mania Main Event? Back then Vince wanted to send the fans home happy. Always wondered that myself. Would have been a real departure for the WM finale, even though it was only the fourth one.

I think they would want the inherent goofyness that a Duggan brought to the table. Hogan had that as his reign went on and the programming became more and more kid/marketing driven. The "HOOOOO!" itself was an easy marketing bit. Things like that would have been a big deal I imagine.

Thanks, I get my years mixed up sometimes in the time frame. But something like an SNME change would work too.

I would have Andre rule supreme for a few months and then pull a Honky-Warrior type of thing at Summerslam. Whomever the challenger was supposed to be gets injured by Andre et al and can't wrestle the match on the PPV, so Andre and Heenan put out a no DQ open challenge. Duggan comes down, 2 x 4's him, and scores the pin and becomes champ in two minutes. The pop I think would be similar to Hogan's win over Sheik, and Duggan could continue as champ for the year and fall into place for The Main Event and title tourney. You plug Savage or DiBiase in after the Tournament. From there it gets a little muddy and the timeline changes drastically, but that's how you survive a Hogan fluke WM loss. Duggan was cartoony enough and his gimmick was very over in everything I have seen. He'd have worked, and because he wasn't the invincible Hulk Hogan challengers like Race and Orton would be actually viable matches people would view outside of the spectacle of Hulk Hogan (nobody went to see Race-Hogan thinking Race would win the title. Duggan-Race, not so far fetched in comparison).

Doug was a very under-rated bump taker and to my eye was very smooth on offense as well. Nobody took a Rocker-plex better than him, and he was the perfect compliment to Buddy Rose as a tag team partner...Buddy could do all the talking, all Doug had to do was hang with him in the ring, and he was quite successful in that regard. I don't think just anyone could have hung with Buddy and the Rockers as well as he did. RIP. *** I made Doug a comp of his matches through someone that knew him years ago. Sent me a nice thank-you and an autographed picture, and seemed genuinely happy to have some video record of his career. Times like that I remember that for most of these guys it's a job and looking back comes later for them.

A Bockwinkel vs. Martel match should also be in there. One of the two Winnipeg bouts from later in 1984 would be my first choice.

There are tons of wrestlers that, after their career has ended, find ways to make contact with video guys to get some stuff from their career as they have nothing. It's a job to them, and most, whether they enjoy it or not, don't dwell too long on it while it is happening. It's not everybody but it's like that for an awful lot of old time pros.

Tommy Young's job in the Flair-Steamboat match at Chi-Town Rumble was excellent.

At this stage of the game I have no idea how you could not talk about NWA on Demand and do a podcast on Houston Wrestling.

That's about as ridiculous a review of the service as one could write.

Any idea how the test roku app worked? I recall Bruce asking for someone with a roku to test drive something a few months back.

Were there clips of it on the NWA doc release a while back? There was a section of footage shot by one guy from ringside that was included from that era.

Kenny Jay vs. Angel Rivera, AWA TV 8/10/74. On the WWE 24/7 showing it is the last match, right after the angle where Larry Hennig turns face and saves Greg Gagne from the Heenan Family. The finish of that Jay match alone should merit inclusion, it's so bad it actually takes the drama of the Hennig turn out of your head and seeing as big angles happened on AWA TV that rarely, that is quite something. I mean, just awful.

Watched the last Southeastern TV show form June 1985 followed by the first three Continental shows right after. Pretty fun stuff and very cool to see clips of things like Bob Armstrong and Humongous vs. Flair and Fuller in a cage, The Nightmares vs. The Rat Patrol, Tommy Rich coming in to take up for his cousin Johnny, Bill Ash, the Flame shooting fire with a purpose and Flair being trotted out to put over the new NWA-affiliated Continental promotion with such gusto. Sometimes a little too Armstrong-heavy for me but it was overall fun and I thought a solid kickoff to the "Continental" brand at the time.