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JerryvonKramer

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Everything posted by JerryvonKramer

  1. Brian two things: 1. If you read my argument above, the 4 "exhibits" are ways in which he completely transformed the product he inherited from his dad. It wasn't SIMPLY a case of raiding talent was it? He completely changed the way wrestling was presented on TV. 2. I don't get why you want him to do things beyond wrestling. "That Bob Dylan can sure write a song but he's a terrible actor and a lousy painter too" It doesn't hurt Dylan's case for being a genius that he's not good in other areas. Why does it hurt Vince's?
  2. My favourite of all wrestling lies is Manny Fernandez's claim that his match vs. Abdullah was primarily responsible for selling out The Omni for Starrcade 85. A newcomer though is Don Kernodle's "There were 20,000 people who couldn't get in" claim for the Final Conflict. Most common: "I created hardcore wrestling"
  3. A thread on "most common lies in shoots" would be quite entertaining. Hope someone will make it.
  4. I shouldn't have bothered.
  5. Has anyone watched any of it though? Despite what Matysik says, I imagine it to be quite boring, but do feel curious.
  6. Ok, I have a few mins. Here are the two main pegs I'd hang the "Vince is a genius" argument on, but the first of them has at least four smaller pegs: 1. He turned wrestling into entertainment that competed not with sports, but with other TV shows by making it more about the CHARACTERS and STORIES than about the action in the ring. Exhibit A: TNT. Mock while you will, that's a wrestling show with no wrestling on it. After watching that Albano-Lauper stuff recently back-to-back with the way wrestling was presented by WWF in 1979 for the Titans show, the change between his vision and what his dad was putting out is night and day. What's the difference: - Bob Backlund putting Greg Valentine in a headlock for 10 minutes = change of channel for casual viewer or "Can we please watch something else now?" from the wife. - Cyndi Lauper telling Albano to stick it on Piper's Pit = ooh this is interesting for casual viewer or a wife who is as invested in the storyline as you might be. Is that "genius"? It's certainly something that few other promoters had had the vision to do. He changed the demographic from just men or sports fan to "the whole family". I think it's perfectly possible that the Andy Kaufman and Lawler on Letterman stuff served as a catalyst for some of Vince's ideas -- in fact, you can probably draw a direct line from that angle to TNT. But y'know, who's the genius? Is it Lou Reed and Iggy Pop who sold about 10,000 records between them in the 1960s or is it David Bowie who took those ideas and ran with them in them in the mainstream and sold millions? Exhibit B: Presentation of product. I'm not just talking Titanrons and Pyro here: - Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby Heenan on Primetime. - Vince and Jesse on SNME You can rag on Moonsoon as much as you like as a play-by-play guy, but thinking mainstream, think of successful show formats, think of people who don't like wrestling being converted into fans. When you consider that the competition here is Bob Caudle falling asleep on Worldwide, it's not difficult to understand why as a TV product the back-and-forth banter of Monsoon-Heenan or Jesse-Vince got over. Again, we might think about Russell and Dave Brown on Memphis TV, but y'know Vince was able to scale it up on a bigger stage. Exhibit C: Packaging of stars. Sure, gimmicks are a standard wrestling trope, but Vince turned them into an artform. Just go and watch those Million Dollar Man or Mr. Perfect vignettes. Vince's "genius" lies partly in being able to get guys over before they've even put a foot in the ring. His grand innovation is in thinking about the product as a TV show first, traditional wrestling logic that says "a guy gets over through wins" takes a backseat. This stuff is only "obvious" or "easy" once someone with the vision to make it happen shows you how to do it. We might also look at some of WCW's attempts at aping this sort of thing to see that it's isn't that easy. He understood that get over with a mainstream audience EVERY wrestler needed their own identity. Vince took wrestling from being an underground carny "sport" to something mainstream credibility. Exhibit D: Packaging of moments and "history" I can't remember who said it here now, but an often-over-looked part of what made Vince special was his ability to capture those postcard moments. Hogan slamming Andre. Hogan nose-to-nose with Warrior, and so on. We've looked recently at how he spun the 1-month reign of Iron Sheik into something with symbolic significance far beyond the reality. Vince isn't just a storyteller -- in fact I'd point to Bill Watts as being much more effective at simple ABC narratives -- he's a mythmaker. That's his true genius with presenting wrestling on TV. He has always been obsessed with the total control of how the history of a given star or angle is presented. But look how effective it has been. Look how many people think Shawn Michaels is the GOAT. It borders on genius for me. Vince is the fucking Joseph Goebbels of wrestling. 2. Balls like melons. Absolutely fearless every step of the way. He said "up yours" to the old boys' network and dared to be aggressive. If it meant raiding talent, being ruthless with booking venues, absolutely killing Verne Gagne, so be it. There is a certain Machiavellian genius to that. This fearlessness also means that he has been able to dream big and on a scale that most people wouldn't think of. Now anyone can be a dreamer. Dusty dreamed big. But Vince did what it took, whatever the means to get to the ends, and Dusty never did. In addition, he's been totally fearless on screen too. We all remember the PUKE scene in Beyond the Mat, but does anyone even for a second doubt that Vince wouldn't have done it himself on screen if the situation required it? He leads from the front. If you had a boss crazy enough to do the things that Vince has done on international television, then it's hard to be too timid yourself. So we could argue his fearlessness breeds fearlessness in others.
  7. I think it's a really really weird thing to make up. It's also not the sort of thing that you'd misremember. Flair was close to Brody, if he wasn't there that night, he'd know he wasn't. The details are strange too, why a 60-minute match with Colon rather than a regular main event? Odd thing to fabricate. What's he even selling or trying to get over there?
  8. JerryvonKramer

    Current WWE

    I kinda felt sorry for Ted Jr. watching his youtube vid. I listened to that DiBiase intereview with Gary Cubeta recently, which was recorded just as he was breaking through and Ted was talking about how he was told by Vince and others that he destined for a megapush, headlining Wrestlemania and all the rest of it. What happened? I really think they saddled him with the legacy of his dad a little bit too much in his various pushes. The Million Dollar Man 2k deal was horrible. He might as well have been coming out with a massive sign stuck to his forehead saying "I am not my dad and I'll never be as good as him, ever". The posse stuff is just horrible too. I agree with the assessment that he'd have been best as a white meat babyface. You can see what a sincere guy he is in that video he posted -- that's what they need to tap into from him. It may take going to Japan or whatever for him to step out from under the shadow of his father though, I don't think that had anything to do with Ted Sr. either, it's just that on TV they barely gave him room to breathe without making sure that it loomed large over him. I understand why for the initial rub, but after a few years it was suffocating for him. Beyond all of that, he was buried. Look how many times he unsuccessfully bid to be IC champ on various PPVs. Completely wasted.
  9. Still working through Matysik, but does anyone have the St. Louis DVD he keeps mentioning? How much St. Louis footage is out there? It sounds fascinating.
  10. So anyone else wondering who the hell this "Pitbull" is? I've never heard of him. Can't believe I'm less down with the kids than Mr. Williams.
  11. Hey, I got no problem getting bumped by these guys. In terms of timeliness (assuming you've listened to Will's Lucha show), you should listen to this first, then the review we did of the recent Crockett documentary (#47), then before the 15th September deadline the AWA show we did (with Dylan and others, #48). Then if you have a spare 100 hours in a rainy week, you could delve into our NWA archives. I usually skip on "current wrestling" shows, but I have an interest in Summerslam and caught the tail-end of last week's RAW with Bryan getting decked by The Shield. So will probably give this a whirl. Dylan, I saw two new wrestling shows crop up on the UK digital channel "Challenge" this past week. I've recorded them. One is a roundtable affair discussing current goings on in the British scene, but the other is this: http://www.challenge.co.uk/wrestling/new-f...-for-debut.html Don't know if that is on your radar, I've not watched it yet.
  12. I think Vince is the only genius in wrestling. I am unfortunately super busy today, but am ready to argue his corner later on.
  13. For fuck's sake. Boom there goes my evening. Won't forgive you for introducing me to this. EDIT: Giving up on it to watch football, somehow Grease seems rooted to the top slot. A wrestling version would be awesome.
  14. Consider this a companion piece to Loss's ambitious tackling the 80s thread. Anyone else who is catching up on 80s sets (Brad?) could post their thoughts in here too I guess. As mostly everyone predicted I didn't even try to start sticking to the original schedule, so my plan is to work through Mid-South, Memphis and New Japan alternating discs every time. So all the disc 1s, then all the discs 2s, etc. I'll try to slip in matches whenever I can. I'm officially skipping on Texas. The territory doesn't hold much interest for me. I may see if I can track down the top 10 matches at some stage, but it's low priority. I'm going to start with Mid-South. I've already seen some of this stuff, but it can't hurt to watch it again. Plus it's been a while since I saw his DiBiaseness in his prime. What do my ratings mean? ***** - one of the best matches I've ever seen, all-time classic ****3/4 - superlative match but not quite all-time best level for whatever reason ****1/2 - excellent match that you could point to as an example of "great" for any of the workers involved **** - very very good match but with some reservations or otherwise something is missing to stop it being truly "great" ***3/4 - very good match ***1/2 - solid stuff but with some flaws or issues *** - solid but not setting the world on fire, a lot of "fun" stuff will find its way to this rating. Generally anything of C+ and up is something I liked. **1/2 - solid but with serious flaws that significantly undermine it ** - getting into territory here where I really didn't like the match *1/2 - I didn't like the match and think it actively sucked * - serious levels of suck now DUD - total crap -* - total crap that caused me to actually get angry at how bad it was -** - as above, squared -*** - contender for worst match I've ever seen Midsouth 1.1 Bob Roop vs. Mike George (12/16/81) Even though Roop is the incumbent North American heavyweight champ here, for some reason when I think of a "gatekeeper", Roop is always the first guy who comes to mind. According to Matysik, Roop was unpopular with NWA promoters because he worked for a lot of outlaw territories (especially Poffo's). This might explain why he's with Watts here. Technical Ted is on commentary with Boyd Pierce. He's sizing up his next opponent, Roop, which tells you who is going over here. The awesome old couple are in the front row. Love the setting for these Mid-South TV matches. Mike George is pretty stacked. He hits an atomic drop which Roop sells well. Roop gets on top with what Boyd calls "cruel tactics". George makes a comeback with a few big rights. Nice payback spot where George rakes Roop's face over the top rope. Big back drop. Back suplex. George looks decent here. Goes for a Russian legsweep, Roop counters. Georges hits a couple of dropkicks. Action goes outside, George gets his right arm posted. Big running knee by Roop and that's enough for the three count. Solid TV match. *** Midsouth 1.2 Mr. Olympia vs. Paul Orndorff (2/3/82) Olympia is the Mississippi champ here. Things start off quick. Awesome old couple are in the front row again. The old man looks deep in thought. Some nice counters in the early going here. Boyd and Watts on commentary. They talk a lot about how Orndorff is "consumed by his ego". Orndroff hits a clothesline from the top. Nice legdrop. Orndorff is nice and snug here during this control segment. Big scoop powerslam gets a 2 count. Orndorff goes for the figure-four as an insult to DiBiASS. Olympia gets the sleeper on and Paula fades fast. Watts talks about the science behind the sleeper. This puts Orndroff out cold and Olympia wins. Another very solid TV match. *** Mid-South 1. 3. Bob Roop vs. Ted DiBiase (4/2/82) The old man in the front row has his cowboy hat on today. Ted starts strong and hits FIVE brutal kneedrops on Roop's arm during the shine. Watts praises Grizzly Smith's booking for getting such a top match on TV. There's a moment here where the old man seems upset at someone in the crowd behind him and turns around, think he's telling them off for cheering too loudly. He needs to concentrate dammit. DiBiase keeps working on the arm. Pretty scientific I'd say. Watts puts over Roop's athletic credentials. DiBiase is relentless working on the arm here. He keeps the hammerlock hooked in and then stands up and falls back on the arm. Hits a few more great kneedrops on the arm too. Very focused work. Roop manages to gain control and applies a step-over-toe-hold. Watts is great at explaining why these holds hurt and which muscles they attack. He's a great commentator, makes the matwork at least 25% more interesting. Reverse neckbreaker. Roop is targetting DiBiase's injured knee now. Roop goes for the figure-four, DiBiase comes back with some Texas jabs. Reverse elbow. I think Boyd Pierce has fallen asleep on commentary because he hasn't said a word in about 5 minutes. TEXTBOOK scoop powerslam by Ted. And that's the 3-count. But this is a non-title bout, so he's not the new champ. Post-match DiBiase hits Roop's own shoulderbreaker on him and counts another 3-count himself. That's called putting someone over strong in their comeback match. Things are set up now for the title shot, and there's no doubt who the better wrestler is. This was aces. Two different, focused gameplans go head-to-head, arm vs. leg, with one clearly coming out on top. Told a great story. **** Midsouth 1.4 Junkyard Dog vs. Nick Bockwinkel (6/11/82) Change of setting here as we're in The Sam Houston Coliseum. Believe it's Reeser Bowden on commentary, but could be wrong -- going to assume it is him ... thinking about it, it's probably Boesch. Queen's Another One Bites the Dust is playing which can mean only one thing, JYD is coming! Bockwinkel and Heenan bail as JYD comes in swinging his chain. The stip here is that if Bock wins he gets a crown. Nice looking one too. If JYD wins, he gets 5 minutes with the weasel. Bock's hair is looking nice as ever. JYD is announced as "the king of wrestling". It is explained that he was crowned by a committee after a public vote. With respect Lousiana, I don't think you understand how monarchy works. I know this is technically a Houston show, but perhaps khawk can explain why or how Bock is working an angle for Mid-South here, the AWA has not been mentioned at all although he is referred to as "The World Champion". Collar-and-elbow tieup. JYD hits two punches in 4 minutes during the shine, and Bock bails. JYD is in pretty decent shape here. Bock gets back in and then begs off and immediately bails again. Ha ha. Bock is cagey on his re-entry. JYD hits a big headbutt to Bock's gut. Side Russian legsweep. Wow, I don't recall JYD doing moves that aren't punches or headbutts. Bock applies a front headlock. JYD gets Bock up for a Gorilla press, but doesn't do it just throws Bock across the ring. JYD stays on top until the action goes outside and Bock posts him. Heenan sneaks over and gives him what Bowden / Boesch calls "a Sunday punch". Bock slams JYD into the turnbuckle which, amazingly, he sells as if he's Mr. Perfect! Bock goes for a bodyslam but JYD reverses it into an inside cradle. Bock is pissed and hits JYD down and Heenan immediately sneaks in with a flurry of cool Heenan-y offense (stomps and such). JYD starts hulking up now. Heenan is just amazing selling the punches. Big bodyslam. Bock has seen enough and they start double-teaming him. Bruiser Brody comes out now and clears house! Fans are happy. JYD is still the king. It's not going to be a workrate classic with the Dog in there, but this was as good as it could have been. Bock made JYD look good and Heenan's bumps add at least a grade. *** Mid-South 1.5 Mr. Olympia vs. Bob Roop (7/15/82) Roop has lost the NA title to JYD by this point. Did that not make the set or don't we have it on tape? Watts talks about a tag match involving Killer Kahn and One Man Gang on the same side. Mentions that Kahn hospitalised Andre the Giant. The old man is wearing a yellow cowboy hat today. Tremendous snap armdrag by Olympia. Watts mentions some "girl wrestlers ... fans always enjoy that". Ha ha. High knee by Roop who takes over on offense now. I am wondering if Verne had ever tried making Brad Rheingans a heel whether he might have developed into someone like Roop by the late 80s. Watts mentions that Roop ran Orndorff out of the area, but is glad to note that Paul is doing well someone else now. But make no mistake "Mid-South is known by the 'in-crowd' as a the toughest competition in pro wrestling". I have no doubt that if I'd have been 14 and had access to it -- rather than what I was actually doing in 1982, which is born in a hospital in Aberdare -- I would have agreed with that statement. Olympia goes for a sleeper but Roop counters with a Dino-Bravo-style side slam. Roop gets the sleeper on himself now. Olympia manages to go over the ropes to apply the sleeper himself. Roop's in trouble here. Yep, that's it. Not quite as good as the other TV matches so far. **1/2 ---------- Taking a small time out here to watch the title switch in where Ted wins it from JYD. I can see it's on the extras. Junkyard Dog vs. Ted Dibiase (6/23/82) This is no DQ. DiBiase is still babyface here and gets some cheers from the crowd here. JYD comes out to Queen and shakes the hand of his best friend Ted. Bob Roop is on commentary. He argues that Ted has boxed himself into a corner here. JYD was his best man at his wedding. When JYD was blinded, Ted was there to help him see. They are friends to the end. Roop thinks that Ted can't possibly beat Junkyard Dog and will end up having to leave the area. The old man in the crowd is in that same cowboy hat. The old couple have brought two friends along -- possibly their son or daught plus in-law -- who sit IN BETWEEN them. Remarkably, for once, the old man leans across to talk to the old woman. Roop is doing an excellent job on colour here getting over the this angle. Boyd Pierce basically says nothing. DiBiase hits his TEXTBOOK scoop powerslam out of nowhere and goes for the the figurefour. JYD hits him out of the ring and then seems concerned that Ted is injured out there and HELPS him back in the ring. Roop notes the affection he's showing and disapproves. Ted has something in his tights and slips it into his the tapes he has round his hand. Oh no! What's he doing. What a cheap shot by Ted! 1, 2, 3. He put something in that glove. Bob Roop shouts "I knew it!" and claims Ted had that planned for him. "His ambition is a lot stronger than his sense of honour. He just stabbed his best friend in the back". Crowd seem stunned into silence. So that's how it all went down. ---------- Mid-South 1.6 Junkyard Dog & Mr. Olympia vs. Ted DiBiase & Hacksaw Duggan (8/18/82) Ted is in full-on heel mode by this point with the black glove. Another One Bites the Dust hits and your tag champs JYD and Mr. Olympia arrive. Olympia is wearing a red mask. This match is happening because DiBiase refused to put up the NA title unless he first got a shot at the tag titles. JYD and Olympia beat the Somoans for the titles and also have a victory over Killer Kahn and One Man Gang. Of course, both Pierce and Watts call Duggan "Doogan". Although Watts seems to alternate between "DiBiase" and "DiBiASS". Duggan and Dog to start. Duggan goes to tag Ted, who doesn't want to tag in and refuses it. Olympia in now with some armdrags. Duggan tags in Ted. Olympia tags in JYD. Ted immediately tags back out. Awesome. Duggan gains advantage and of course now Ted comes back in, but JYD immediately fires up and starts decking him. Ted backs off and tags back out. Olympia back in. This is some good storytelling. JYD comes back in and Ted gets a cheap shot from outside while he's running the ropes. This is top antagonism. Duggan is on top solidly now and NOW Ted tags in and starts going to town on the Dog. He starts to lose advantage after JYD hits a headbutt and rakes the eyes and immediately tags out. Olympia back in. All four men in. Ref has lost control of this one. JYD hits an atomic drop on DiBiase. Olympia finds himself isolated but dives over to make a tag to JYD. Duggan hits an "illegal" spear on Olympia as he's making the tag and JYD takes a big bump to the outside. JYD is legal. DiBiase in and hits the powerslam and into the figurefour on Olympia. JYD is still legal! Confusion among the heels and JYD hits a slam and pins Ted. This is fantastic ABC storytelling here The work from JYD is obviously not stellar but the way the other three work around him is great. Very-effectively booked match that showcases why Mid-South TV was so great. ***3/4 Mid-South 1.7 One Man Gang vs. Buck Robley (Lumberjack Match) (9/15/82 Robley in the bright yellow here. 11 men are outside the ring. OMG in red and spry by his standards. Gang bails early but everyone immediately pounces to roll him back in. Great visual. Robley gets OMG in a front facelock that verges on a choke giving Watts license to talk about oxygen. OMG hits a bodyslam and a kneedrop. Iron Mike Sharpe is cheering Robley on. Dick Murdoch is in an All Japan shirt and Watts notes that he's an international star who has been to Japan 18 times. It's entertaining to see all the characters outside the ring. Kneedrop by Robley. Watts: "I even heard one kindly old lady over there shout 'break his arm'" That's our girl! OMG takes a tumble over the top rope. Rolled back in. OMG misses a splash from the top rope. Crusher Blackwell he's not, but he's been decent here. Robley loads his glove and that's enough for the 3-count. Fun lumberjack match. **1/2 Mid-South 1.8 Junkyard Dog & Mr. Olympia vs. Ted DiBiase & Matt Borne (Loser Leaves Town) (10/27/82) Watts is with Paul Boesch. And he talks to some kids from Texas. There's a chap in a Gorilla costume jumping up and down and playing there too. The stip with this match is, of course, that the loser of the fall has to leave town. Boesch is here because this has an impact on his Houston promotion, so he has a vested interested. He wants JYD to win. Boesch was the man who crowned JYD king. Watts presents this as "the confrontation between DiBiase's group and Junkyard Dog's group for supremacy of Mid-South wrestling". Well put. In one of the great angles, we're told that Duggan can't make it tonight because he's been detained by the police after getting into a bar-room brawl. Perfectly believable. So DiBiase has flown in Matt Borne from Atlanta to tag with him here. I want to pause at this point to note just how great this booking is. The mastermind DiBiase has created a win-win situation as Watts notes: 1. If he can get a pin on either of the faces, then good. 2. If the going gets tough then he can hang Borne out to dry and nothing's lost, he flies back to Atlanta. 3. By agreeing to this being no DQ, Borne can use his legdrop off the top-rope which would be banned under normal rules. Ted has got this all figured out. Boesch notes that "he's a thinker like his old man". Even before anything has happened, there is this extra level of intrigue. Borne's an unknown quantity from outside, and no one is going to give a shit if he has to leave town. Anyway, the match starts and the faces hit the ring on fire. Heels bail. Ted has his beard by this stage. Yay. JYD hits an early inside cradle and the side Russian legsweep on Ted early, who bails again. Watts mentions on commentary that Hiro Matsuda and Yatsu are a "new team from Japan" in the area. Watts talks up this idea of Borne being DiBiase's "sacrificial lamb" here as he locks up with Olympia who hits his armdrags. JYD comes in two and Ted bails leaving Borne alone in the ring -- exceptional little touch demonstrating exactly in the ring the narrative Watts has been pushing on commentary. This is a lesson in storytelling. We get a quick shot of that Gorilla in the crowd who is peeling a banana. Borne and Olympia are back in the ring going toe to toe. Ted comes in and eats a couple of armdrags before tagging in JYD. Ted bails again as Borne comes in and finds himself 2 on 1 again. Ted and Borne regroup outside the ring as the commercial break comes in. As we come back it's Ted and JYD in the ring. Snapmare by JYD and a big punch across the bridge of DiBiase's nose. This is probably JYD's peak as a worker right here. Ted is heel-in-peril now as Olypia comes in to work him over. Ted regains control with a big back suplex and tags Borne back in who hits a slam and a kneedrop. Olympia is FIP and Ted methodically goes to work. Second-rope elbow, backbreaker. Borne in with a chinlock. Notice how this has been worked. JYD's overness has been maximised in the shine with that neat snapmare and punch and now he's being kept out of the ring as the hot tag. Watts was an expert at working around his limitations. The heel control segement on Olympia has been very good. Borne hits the "bombs away", that leg drop from the top. Watts: "That's what DiBiase brought him here for, he wants to injure him!" TEXTBOOK scoop powerslam by Ted. JYD breaks the cover. Olympia makes the hot tag. Crowd goes nuts. JYD is a house of fire. Headbutt city here. DiBiase goes to the tights to load his glove. JYD blocks it. Flying mare. Borne climbs the ropes as JYD grabs the "load" from the glove and nails Borne with it. He has it now and targets Ted. But what's this? The Gorilla outside! He slams Olympia and the Gorilla head falls off. Thats ... that's DOOGAN! He hits the spear on JYD. DiBiase has the foreign object and totals JYD. That's it, DiBiase and Borne are new tag champs and the Junkyard Dog has to leave the area for 90 days. No matter how many times I watch this match and angle, the quality of the storytelling never fails to impress me. This is not only Exhibit A in the Bill Watts handbook of "How to execute an angle perfectly" but also a perfect example of how you can take a guy who can't work a lick like JYD and still have him in a great match. Russo take note that this is how you do a SWERVE. Watts plays up the intrigue around Borne coming in, so you kind of forget about Duggan and that Gorilla. Very good match, and an angle for the ages. ****1/2 Post-match, Bill Watts refuses to interview DiBiase so Paul Boesch does it instead. DiBiase does his trademark laugh with a belt over each shoulder, plus the NA title. Duggan has the Louisana title. They talk up how Duggan made a sacrifice. Duggan talks about "ingenuity and brainpower". Boesch talks about the "ace in the hole". DiBiase: The name of the game is money, and when you got all the belts, you get all the money, it's very simple. Boesch: Did you ever hear of sportsmanship? DiBiase: MONEY is the name of the game. I put bread on my table at whatever expense! And it just so happens Junkyard Dog it was at YOUR expense. They call you the king? You're looking at the new king here. HA HA HA Excuse me while I spend a few minutes marking out. Mid-South 1.9 Stagger Lee & Mr. Olympia vs. Ted DiBiase & Matt Borne (12/18/82) Another loser-leaves-town stip here, it's No DQ again and the titles are on the line. DiBiase jaws with the ring announcer because Wrestling II can't make the match and so is not happy about defending against an unknown quantity (that's rich after he brought in Borne). I wonder who this Stagger Lee chap is. Stagger Lee gets the better of DiBiase to start. And cleans house. There's a pretty bad spot here where Stagger Lee clearly makes no contact with Ted but he still sells it like a clothesline. Watts notes that this doesn't look like the first time Stagger Lee and Olympia have teamed up. Note how Watts is in no way treating his audience as stupid here. It's clear who Lee is, that Watts and everyone else is in on it. Faces are mostly on top here until Duggan sneaks in wearing a hard hat and lays out Olympia. Ted covers for the cheap three. So the heels win again and Olympia has to leave for 60 days. ** for the match, but look at the booking again here. Match 1, heels win, Match 2, heels win. So they've built up a 2-0 advantage through pure skullduggery. All of a sudden, now after just two matches you've established: 1. That Borne is now a player here in Mid-South and good enough to hang as Ted's partner 2. That the ratpack are a force to be reckoned with 3. That DiBiase is going to keep using Duggan as an unfair secret weapon Mid-South 1.10 Mr. Wrestling II & Junkyard Dog vs. Matt Borne & Ted DiBiase (2/16/83) This is non-title. The 90 days are up now so JYD is back, Olympia is still out and so Wrestling II is brought back in as his partner. But as the commentators note "it doesn't matter" because this is purely for pride at this stage. This is a war. JYD has dubbed the heels "Ted and Sue". Watts goes through the key plot points to date. The faces work over Ted's arm. Cool spot as Wrestling II has Ted in an arm bar and flicks Borne over with his feet. Twice. JYD hits an atomic drop on Ted which sends him flying out to the outside. Big bump. Wrestling II has looked good in this match. Big ref bump now which lets Duggan come in for a spear on Wrestling II. He goes for the spear on JYD but Tiger Conway Jr is out with a chair to "waffle" him. Kamala is out now. Akbar is out now. JYD has the chair and nails DiBiase. JYD helps up Alfred Neely the ref who raises their hands (DQ for Duggan). ***, some of the stuff by Wrestling II was nice here. That's a good start, next 10 matches coming soon.
  15. Guys at this point I don't think anyone is going to change their minds. All anyone is doing is repeating themselves at this stage (although I didn't know that nuance about the second half in Matt's argument till just now). We covered it on the show because I felt it was one of the stories of the set, but let's not have part 26 of the feud now. It'll just go round in circles again.
  16. It sounds like Wayne and Garth, but I wouldn't think they'd be on your radar, Parv. Course they are. You got it from that little bit?
  17. Reading over on KM, and seemingly Cubeta had his meltdown shortly after the 1965 part 1 show, so they never finished the 60s. I do think on the 65-6 shows Cubeta seems bored, disinterested and asks pointless questions about The Miz out of nowhere. Dylan, can you and Dave please track down Larry M to finish the job? I want to know what happened in 67-71. lol EDIT: Hold on, later in the thread Maybe they do exist.
  18. So there's a gap now after 1966 part 1. Does anyone know if he ever got to do 67-71? I'll move on to 1972, but would be good to have the missing ones if they exist. Things were just heating up.
  19. Into 65-6 and Matysik's "and they say there was no blood in St. Louis", "And they say there were no angles in St. Louis, "And they say St. Louis was boring" schtick is getting old, fast. Some points of interest: - Dory Funk Jr is 23 at this point and breaking through to the main event. Apparently he had some John Cena heat - Terry Funk is just paying his dues breaking through - Rip Hawk was a much better worker than Swede Hanson - Sam Muchnik has some very odd policies regarding masks. First of all, he's against masks because he wants to see facial expressions. Ok, I can understand that. But if there was a guy who worked with a mask, like the Destroyer, his rule was that if you lost the match, you had to remove the mask -- every time, no exceptions. This meant he didn't book a lot of masked guys who wouldn't want to remove the mask. Pretty bizarre that. Why institute that rule? - Ernie Ladd was meant to be phenomenal in the 60s until his knees went. I can imagine that to be true
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  21. I do wonder if the show itself was what gave Linda the confidence to push for the divorce in the first place, know what I mean? Now all of a sudden she was kind of a star in her own right, so why should she put up with his shit anymore? Even if the show helped to put Hogan into financial trouble, I think it extended his shelf life as a guy who is legit famous now (rather than "that guy who was big in the 80s and 90s"). Don't know how many extra years it added to his shelf life, but from a fame point of view it added a ton of people -- twitter followers, recognition from teenage girls, etc. etc.
  22. Thought I'd paste my comments here too because some of the guys here shouldn't skip on the wrestling content of this show, it's an interesting debate. Only about 40 mins into this so far but it's a ton of fun. Love the Morning Radio Show feel and things seems like it could go on to be the PTBN community pod. Just a few points: - I laughed out loud at Justin's sweatshop line. - Find the idea of Brad as a kind of blank slate pretty interesting. Know exactly what Chad means about giving someone who is shitty like Bravo a break, just because of the familiarity factor. - When Chad said that he's a "list guy", that was amusing to me because for years in a different social group I was known as THE list guy. Ironically, I find it hard these days to come up with lists, especially for wrestling because I have this overwhelming feeling of the stuff I haven't seen. I can't make a call on Rose or Lawler and so my list is incomplete. You know what I mean?
  23. This particular ep of TNT deserves some screen grabs, been my favourite one so far by some distance: Alfred with basically nothing at all of note to say. Vince barely able to conceal his delight about going back to Minnesota with Hogan. Hogan's parents Hogan vs. Schultz Vince's faces when singing Irish songs with The Butcher Monsoon's confrontation with Ali Albano checking that the piano is in tune Cyndi Lauper meets Roddy Piper Groovy cool cat David Wolf
  24. Cheers Chad, I put that in the top post. In the second show there's a bit where we get about 30 seconds of Dylan clipped in during the Hogan talk. I'll give a cookie to anyone who can tell me where the dissolve sound effect comes from.
  25. You might want a week to listen to this, because it took a month to make it ... Hope this serves as a nice reminder to guys who are still putting together their ballots, or I guess as an intro to AWA for anyone who hasn't yet picked up and watched the set. Thanks to everyone who took part. As far as who is on what: first show is about 50 / 50 with Dylan and Brian mostly in the first half and Pete and Pete in the second half; second show is all Pete and Pete; third show is mostly just Dylan. Listening through, Matt D is almost like a missing 5th guy on these shows -- we should probably dedicate them to him. EDIT: Get them all here: http://placetobenation.com/where-the-big-b...48-awa-special/ In a pretty full 3-part show, Chad and Parv welcome by turns Dylan Hales (aka Dylan Waco) and Brian Samec (aka Smack2k), and in a separate recording Pete (aka shoe) and Pete (aka PeteF3) to talk about the AWA in the 1980s with particular reference to the DVDR 1980s set. Show #48a: - Process of making the set and how the matches were chosen [12:49] - Pre-conceptions of the AWA [20:17] - Quirks of the AWA [33:24] - Discussion of workers: Big John Studd [41:37], Rick Martel [46:23], Crusher Blackwell [01:01:01] - Rankings, DVDR being down and Chad's plans to make a book of Matt D's match reviews [01:08:05] Show #48b: - Discussion of workers continued: Larry Zybysko [2:46], Sgt. Slaughter [12:15], Jerry Lawler [19:55], Curt Hennig [31:10], Buddy Rose and Doug Somers [44:14], Hulk Hogan [1:00:22], Wahoo McDaniel [1:22:41] - Rose & Somers vs. Midnight Rockers Christmas Cage match / Matt D vs. goodhelmet discussion [51:12] - Should Hogan have been made champ or was he always going to New York? Did he even need the title? [1:07:34] - Worst workers [1:13:25] - 150 picks [1:27:41] Show #48c: - "Revelations": Col. DeBeers [Pro: 3:18, Anti: 10:44], Jim Brunzell [16:40], Stan Hansen ("in the USA") [17:57], Boris Zhukov [25:28] - Worst matches [30:21] - Two camps or "factions" in the watchers of the set: the fetishism of violence vs. the worship of structure [37:38] - The complete and total awesomeness of Nick Bockwinkel [51:37] - Final thoughts [1:07:05]
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