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WWF thread is still over there. I've got a shitload of DVDs to watch to add to it. Maybe with football season over, though Lacy somehow talked me into watching Troy's bowl game this Saturday. When you can be talked into that, it's easy to see how I keep *not* having time for WWF 80's. John

I'm guessing there still are some dvr's out there that can only tape one show at one time. John, about to watch the ManU-Gunners game that was taped at the same time as another show I wanted...

The Philly match is the one in circulation. It's solid, and a pretty good example of how old school workers filled 60 minutes. The Cap Centre match is the blow off in that city for their first feud. Looks like in the first feud, the 2nd MSG, 2nd Cap Centre, and both Philly matches are out there. There also are silent clips from the Boston cage match that makes you weap when watching it: this looks like one of the Grails that wasn't shot, and you wish they ran the cage in Philly to blow off the feud there. Looks really awesome. John

Why do I get a feeling that someone thinks Josh should have cut a heel promo after: "I was in control of the fight until the cut. I would have whooped his Canadian ass if he hadn't gut lucky like that!" Yeah, a money heel interview. John

Yeah... wow. John

Beyond that, he's Dave Meltzer. He could have someone record it, burn it, and send it to him overnight. John

Agree with the notion that Dave watches it. I don't even think time is that much of an issue, as there's less to watch these days than when this was on the monthly slate back in 1996-99. The wrestling schedule now is pretty light. His MMA schedule is up, but doubt that all of what he watches in a 3 month stretch is up. John

I wouldn't make the case for "taste". I don't think there was a lot of great stuff on the various Mania's of the 80s. But they were important, so I watched them. Bryan came into wrestling in the 90s at an extremely high level of fandom: only the most hardcore actually start their own newsletter in any genre. It's "fan club" level stuff. Then to keep at it and turn it into a business, that's hardcore. Folks who are casual wrestling fans can point to us as being wacky hardcore fans because of the time and money we spend on it, but Bryan, Dave and Wade are at an entirely different level. Not saying they're nuts, or any more of nuts that we are. But to build your *life* around pro wrestling and turning that obsessive fandom into a business is as hardcore as it gets. Given that, you'd think that the Manias and Starcades of the 80s would be the basic Wrestling 101 stuff that Dave or Wade coming along in the 80s would eventually watch. Especially when it's pretty easy to find, without even getting to the level of tape trading / buying that some of us did in the 90s. Bryan was the Dave/Wade that came along in the 90s. I could see someone not going back to watch say the original Wrestling Classic PPV. Or even that Bunkhouse Stampede PPV, though someone with a historic jag to their fandom might want to watch all of those early PPVs as insight into Crockett starting to fail: good leasons there. But the original Starcade, which launched the Big Show movement? It's a bit surprising. John

Like Soup says, I wouldn't expect them to watch a ton of 80s if it was before them. But would have thought over the years that they would have watch the Big Stuff that's easily out there. Starcades, Manias, etc. Looking at the Piper-Valentine from Graham's site: The Best of Starrcade: 1983-1987 video tape was one of the holy grails for folk before finding out about "hardcore tape collecting". If a copy of that was in your video store chain, you'd rent it. Perhaps he isn't a tape collector or even viewer, so didn't rent or buy that when a kid. The other two are recent WWE dvd's: 06/14/05: WWE Greatest Wrestling Stars of the 80s 11/14/06: WWE - Born to Controversy: The Roddy Piper Story You'd think he'd get at least one of those. John

Don't apologize for bumping it. Despite the title of the thread, this hasn't been a terribly sleazy or edgy thread. Mostly good conversation and quite a few good, thoughtful posts. I tend to think after initial phase of the thread, most of us have avoided being over-the-top with it because it frankly is one of the more interesting comps to pro wrestling. Probably one of PWO's better threads that revolves around a single subject. John

Forgot about the Backlund-Orton. That would be very interesting as it's longer than their Philly matches: 05/22/82 Philly #1: Bob Orton Jr. defeated Bob Backlund via count-out at 16:12 06/26/82 Philly #2: Bob Backlund defeated Bob Orton Jr. in a lumberjack match at 12:12 08/02/82 MSG: Bob Backlund defeated Bob Orton Jr. at 23:38 Longer, and after they had their spots down pat. No need to build to a rematch, so go out there and just have a match. I thought that was a positve thing for the Bob-Rose match later that month in MSG, which was really strong for their only MSG match. Yeah, Bob-Don 60 and Backlund-Orton would be a pair of the 80s Grails in the vault. The second Slaughter match in 1983 would be interesting if it was taped. The first one was much better than espected, and very heated in a period when Bob supposedly was dead in MSG. Second Pater-Backlund isn't out and about. First and third matches are excellent. There are lots of things from the 70s that would be Grailish in the vault. John

That's strange. The top Starcade '83 matches have been out for two decades, and the type of thing you'd think someone like Bryan would have tracked down back in the 90s. John

GSP > Wayne Gretzky That's funny. John

As far as we know, the show wasn't taped. I think someone on this board had a source in the WWE with some knowledge of the WWE Library. He might want to ask. The other Holy Grail in the vault, if it was taped, is this: This isn't in circulation from way back when, if it was taped. It hasn't hit 24/7, or the web or any dvd release. John

Here are the 500K+ metros for Canada: Canadian Metros 1991 Census (in 000) 3,898,933 Toronto 3,208,970 Montreal 1,602,590 Vancouver 941,814 Ottawa - Hull 841,132 Edmonton 754,033 Calgary 660,450 Winnipeg 645,550 Quebec 599,760 Hamilton Known shows in 1987: 15 - Toronto 10 - Montreal 4 - Vancouver 1 - Ottawa - Hull 1 - Edmonton 4 - Calgary 6 - Winnipeg 1 - Quebec 3 - Hamilton John

They were in TN earlier: Memphis, TN - Convention Center - June 24, 1984 Louisville, KY - Convention Center - June 25, 1984 Louisville, KY - July 23, 1984 Nashville, TN - July 24, 1984 Memphis, TN - July 25, 1984 Louisville, KY - October 23, 1984 Nashville, TN - Municipal Auditorium - October 24, 1984 Only one listed card in TN in 1985: Nashville, TN - Municipal Auditorium - January 16, 1985 They did more in KY. The return to TN/KY looks to be here in the second half of 1986, possibly in answer to expecting Crockett to try to run there: Louisville, KY - Freedom Hall - August 14 1986 Memphis, TN - Mid-South Coliseum - September 11, 1986 Nashville, TN - Municipal Auditorium - September 25, 1986 Nashville, TN - Auditorium - October 20, 1986 Louisville, KY - Louisville Gardens - November 17, 1986 John

Blow is the right word: Total Receipts: $50,232,567 Candidate Loans: $49,500,000 Candidate Contribution: $604,984 Someone who has more time (since I need to hop in a meeting), could sift through the "LINDA MCMAHON FOR SENATE 2010" committee to see how much she raised from other folks. That won't include outside PACs, the RNC, etc. John

On Salt Lake City, I wonder if Dave lost a source in the state: Graham has five listings from July 24, 1984 to July 24, 1984 September 15, 1984 October 18, 1984 November 10, 1984 January 14, 1985 That's extremly regular. Those shows in three months gives the indication that they're running montly. Then there's nothing until January 15, 1986. A full year without listings. He has 5 listings for 1986, where they average an announced 9,363 with really only one bomb out of the four. There's not even loaded up shows: January 15, 1986: Valentine & Beefcake vs Bulldogs May 1, 1986: Savage vs Tito August 8, 1986: Battle Royal with middling talent October 11, 1986: Bulldogs vs Sheik & Volkoff November 23, 1986: Hogan vs Orndorff That doesn't look like them "coming back" into the city after being gone for a year. They draw well, they roll out Hogan only once. Suspect that there might be a lot of missing SLC cards in 1985, and perhaps some in 1987. Verne did seem to holdup in SLC for a while. John

I'm not sure what "free" means. Free from the AWA cards or other cards you have of his? Looking in both the Super Catalogue (which gives each tour for the major wrestlers) and a Japan Wrestling 40 magazine that list each promotion's series and the gaijin on it, Gordy didn't work in All Japan in this stretch. AJPW's series was 8/23 - 9/19 and he's not on it. His appearance on the May series is listed as his 4th, and the October as his 5th. Series was 5/17 - 6/13 and he appears to have been on it start to finish. 10/4 - 10/31 series, and appears to have been on all of it. Riki's promotion ran 11/1- 11/7. It's not among Gordy's tours in the Super Catalogue. It is listed in the Japan Wrestling 40, which kind of breaks the kayfabe by including Riki's promotion within All Japan. Gordy is listed as one of three gaijin on the series, but unlike the others who have numbered bullets after their names to indicate which overall tour of theirs to Japan it's been, Gordy instead has some characters. When he's next back in Japan, the numbering picks up where the 10/4 - 10/31 left off: moving from the prior 5 to 6. Not sure what to make of that. When did the Birds debut in AWA, when were they done as "regulars", and how consistently were they on cards. Not really in the sense of a detailed date dump, but some date ranges. I wonder how much those two primary stretches of being gone in May-June and October impact the AWA's booking. John

What's the match listing on the Bruno set? John

November looks like Riki's promotion. Would have been a short trip. From the TV matches, May/Jun and October look like longer visits. August is odd. Guys like Killer Tim Brooks got seven TV matches off the prior series. Steve Regal got four. Texas Red got five. Blackwell got seven. Tim Horner got three, everyone of them with stars on the other side. Same tour, Marty Janetty got four TV matches, with the lowest ranked guy opposite him being Tigersawa: Baba, Dory, Tenryu, Choshu, Yatsu, Hamaguchi, Tiger Mask. Brooks may have been getting a minor push as Tiger Jeet's partner, and Blackwell a little but of a push. But none of those guys were Gordy. I suspect it either was a one-shot appearance (the 8/31/85 big show), or he was scheduled and cancelled. The 8/31/85 went deep as far as what appeared on TV, and he's not among those listed. So I'm wondering if he was pulled. I'll look in the Super Catalogue. John

Gaijin didn't work as many tours back then as they would come the 80s. I'd have to look in the Super Catalogues to see how many series he worked in 1985, but seems like it was limited based on tv: 6/1/85 AJPW TV Baba/Jumbo/Tenryu vs. Singh/Gordy/Milano 6/8/85 AJPW TV Jumbo vs. Terry Gordy 10/5/85 AJPW TV Jumbo/Tenryu vs. Gordy/Robinson 10/21/85 (match date via AJ Classics) Funks & Tiger Mask vs Billy Robinson & Terry Gordy & Chavo Guerrero 10/22/85 (match date via AJ Classics) Funks vs. Terry Gordy/Art Crews 11/16/85 AJPW TV Choshu/Khan vs. Kabuki/Gordy That looks like just two tours: one in May/June, and one in October. He wasn't in the Tag League, so the tag opposite Choshu's Army was a left over tv taping to fill the week before Tag League started. Gordy is the type who usually would be on TV by that point if he was on a series. His work in AJPW picked up a bit more in 1986, but I don't think he was on the majority (4 out of 8 tours) in a year until the 90s. John

Did the MSG cards air live, or on later days? Lennon was shot shortly before 11 PM, so if MSG card were typically broadcast live, that wouldn't have been the reason. If on tape delay, I would wonder why that would impact MSG's decision to eventually air it. Those were the early days of programing, so I wouldn't expect MSG to have so many other "live" items that there wouldn't be a date to air it before the next WWF card. They would have had the Knicks, Rangers, probably boxing... hard to think of what beyond that that also could get bumped around. If some of those matches haven't bubbled out to the public over the years, it's possible that it never was filmed. John