Dustys Pencil

Another fun ep but unfortunately i listened to it at the gym so none of my stream of consciousness ranting

More pooping on mentally handicapped babyfaces haha I remember getting in so much trouble in 87 for calling the WCW 900 number lol Sometimes i like watching these shows on youtube as i listen...its great seeing the "hot tag' in the renegades match as chad mentions the lack of reaction..you can look at the crowd sitting on their hands as the youngblood comes in with the chops i enjoy a little bickering with the face and heel announcers but this was a bit over the top knowing michael hayes as we do i wonder how i treated poor rocky king behind the scenes FINALLY some love for the Steiners and yes watching this match was great...two big brawling teams taking big crazy bumps I definitely thought the Tag title match was strong I love Sid as a main eventer but something never clicked and same with Sting which is probably why i was all but done with wrestling at this point...and yes the ending of this was confusing as all hell The booking on this show reminds me why I was done with wrestling at this point Good show though guys

Finally listening to this Its EL HE-GON-TEH lol LPWA actually aired in quite a few markets late night in the early 90s. It was wrestling so I watched it but didn't do very much for me. The lower top10 would have been great if it was 1984 This was just a dull era of wrestling. I'm currently watching the spring of 89 on the weekends and its crazy how fast this ship sank

Sonya Live was a CNN talk show...I'm dying to find this segment now Great point by the guest bringing up the lack of gimmicks in WCW at this time as opposed to the WWF I kind of like mixing matches in that have no context.(re: the Race/Rich match) it makes it feel more like a sport...i remember really liking that match(Tommy Rich was a favorite in Continental) Parv going way harsh on Gorgeous Jimmy but yes he was completely unmotivated by this point and they looked like two middle aged stockbrokers that were dressing up for halloween as a cover band I'm going to go out on a limb and say that The Wrestling Bear was a better worker than El Gigante The Southern Boys were such a mid card tag team in comparison to the Fantastics and the RnR it was hard for me to take that match with the same level as I would any other MX classic Love the discussion on pops versus actual drawing ability. Sid being the best example And yes going to house shows in the early 90s...before the shows started people we chanting HOOOO throughout the entire building...Hacksaw was super over but not a super draw Gotta agree with Derek on Sting/Flair. This was huge for me at 12 and I still got excited watching it now. As a Mid South fan it was cool seeing Rick Steiner be there to congratulate him. I'll disagree this felt bigger than Savage winning at Mania 4 Savage beat Dibiase in crappy tournament. This felt way bigger at the time. I think the Sting promo was 10 years ahead of its time. Had that promo been cut in the late 90s or early 2000s people would recognize it as him saying that this was the beginning of a new era Parv you're a WWF mark but I hate(and I do mean hate) to agree with you in that the Warrior win was bigger because A. the two had never wrestled and B. Hogan hadn't lost a match in so long that it made it bigger...The Sting win was still huge at the time though Listened to this over two days but this was fun and a great listen guys thanks

wow so fast

The Steiners to me are kind of like the Dudleys...they were "decorated" by being champions in every promotion and I wasn't usually a mark for the big power guys growing up but I loved the Steiners...The mentally disabled schtick was always silly to me but was never really a turnoff and yes as somebody that was Hawk for Halloween in 1985(I was 7)...I always bite my tongue when listening to your critiques of my "first favorite wrestler"LOL

I hated all racial angles I would say Guns N Roses were the greatest band by 1990 I always liked Tom Zenk more than most and I couldn't even sell you on why lol The Southern Boys confederate reenactment gimmick as faces didn't exactly help my feelings towards WCW during the time Loved this match though...The Birds as a lower mid card tag act was fine with me as they had long since stopped being cool Not to speak ill of the dead but El Gigante was one of the worst memories of early 90s wrestling One of the things that always made me hate WWF was that they never debuted their wrestlers with footage from anywhere else. WCW having this Vader NJPW footage made you want to see him more and when he got over would also help get the other Japanese guys over when need be Flair trained Stan Lane in his backyard or Crocketts backyard or something like that I remember Stan saying that in a MX Express shoot interview Furnas was still pretty young in the business in this match and I know he had quite a few world records but 30 seems ridiculous You guys are always so hard on the Steiners. They were hugely over for a long time Agree wholeheartedly about Flair working himself in this match...this is one of those ones where even Flair couldn't save it

Ill be listening to this after lunch so expect my usual stream of consciousness soon. I've been watching NWA 89 the last few weeks so I'm sure at some point I may catch up...The tv from the Flair booking era is really strong Edit: for some reason this ep won't download on Itunes...ahh well I'll be back with my thoughts later

I was always under the impression that ECW ran the same towns on pretty much the same schedule not necessarily weekly(which a lot of territories didn't run weekly towns anyway)

Fun show the best thing about these shows is it makes me go back and watch some wrestling that I probably wouldn't look back on...so WCW 89/90 will be a part of my weekend viewing. As a sports fan I always enjoyed Ross giving college sports credentials There's a possibility that they made big money on that 900 hotline. People were really into match results(back when who won matches mattered) and I'd wager a large portion of the fan base was still without pay per view capability. And they would give match results on the hotline at $2 for the minute and $.45 each additional minute it wouldn't have taken that many calls to get to $80k. 900 numbers were ridiculously profitable for companies in the 80s The 89/90 booking situation is probably the most fascinating aspect of the early WCW. Luger was disliked by seemingly everyone except Sting so I'm sure thats why Flair refused to drop the strap to him Robocop was such a big deal with kids which is really weird considering it was a Rated R movie. They even had a cartoon for awhile(shows how times have changed WWE couldnt even show clotheslines on their Saturday Morning Wrestling show) And I agree there were too many tag matches using the same formula on this show Boy do I hate that flimsy jungle gym cage

I consider ECW a territory they ran a regular loop in the same area with the same talent and pretty much a small tv syndication deal. yes they ran florida but Georgia also ran Ohio

It's the White tux that puts it over the top. Doom looked like the most bad ass prom dates in history on this show. Which is your favorite Fantastics/MX match. The only one for me that rivals the RNR/MX match here is the clash 1 one but they have had a ton of great matches. I didn't want to belabor the point on the show since we were going long (go figure) but I agree with you on the talking to especially in regards to hearing Patrick's instructions prior to the main event. That gave that match a big time and important feeling. There's a match from Dallas in I believe 85...I'll get back to you on the date but the over all feud was also slightly better IMO

Oddly enough the Von Erichs and World Class Championship Wrestling was huge in Israel and drew ridiculous tv ratings. They toured there a few times to big crowds as well I have to disagree that only hardcore fans were ever watching. The ratings they were doing even at some of their worst times were usually pretty strong all things considered. They couldn't draw worth a damn at the house shows during their lower periods but booking for the masses was still necessary. Typing this as I listen at work That being said I do agree that Pillman beating Flair would have turned the fans on Flair. I think Steiner winning could have been interesting(you then need to educate your fans to a different style of main event world title match) You can't have a monster of the week(or in this case bum of the week) when your champion is a heel. Flair vs Brad Armstrong is a different dynamic than Hogan vs King Kong Bundy I like the Steiner Bros/Muta situation As a black man I now feel the need to find a reason to wear a black tux...warning from now on whenever i disagree with Parv I'm going to blame it on the fact that he was a Diddy fan lol I was always a bigger fan of the Fantastics/MX matches but THIS RnR match was definitely excellent I'd go 4.75 stars The Freebirds went from being cool in 87 to ridiculously uncool so fast and without the cool factor their matches bored me to tears Maybe its just the WCW mark in me but I always liked the talking to the camera...the camera is there...you're on tv acknowledge it...its more of stephanie and vince pretending that they are taping a traditional tv show IMO Gorilla didn't necessarily make the bad matches themselves entertaining...HE was entertaining with jesse and bobby so that gave you a reason to sit through the bad match(which there were tons of bad matches in those days)

I believe Doug Somers shows up on Global that has been airing on ESPN Classic in big 8 hour blocks lately I'm actually going to watch the controversial match here at work while i listen to the show lol

It is literally impossible to overstate Vince McMahon's willpower and work ethic. You can't compete with him because he will grind you down, no matter how many mistakes he makes. When Vince finds something that works he will milk it better than anyone could hope to. Look at how over Goldberg was in mid '98, and look at how little WCW did with him in the 2+ years after he lost the title. Compare to how Vince used every megastar he's had: Hogan, Austin, Rock, Cena. Vince will wring every penny from his successes because he knows how to get everyone in the company behind his vision. Even if he isn't pointing in exactly the right direction, the ship is moving forward. Again, compare to WCW's internal politics leading to booking sclerosis. The fact that he turned a ton of wrestlers into marks for him(listen to the way Hall and Nash talk about him they idolize HIM) that in and of itself is quite a feat. That being said he is the most successful person in the storied history of his particular field

LMAO i was going to say this looks like a hold over from another thread

You MUST be a WWF mark to say something this obviously silly lol

Big argument and I haven't even listened yet lol

I grew up in California...My friends that liked WWF during the Hogan era liked it because of the gloss and the big muscle guys...our friends that were WAY more into wrestling liked the NWA and World Class...the fast pace the blood and its very true...WWF has always been more about characters than wrestling. I don't even think Vince himself would be offended by that statement.

Kudos on an excellent show boys(my favorite of the entire series thus far)...you guys pointed out things on the dvd that i didnt notice were missing(the lack of focus on the NWA title the way they skipped around certain aspects of who was booking and how they decided who would be in charge once Ringley lost power etc) They also didn't mention that they bought out Central States and messed up Florida David Crockett stayed with WCW at least into the Nitro era as I remember meeting him at a Nitro in 97 or 98 I'm glad you guys have finally started to respect how over Johnny Weaver was before our time LOL The Greensboro vs Chicago deal seems a bit overblown. The bigger issue is that the card itself isn't any good Heel Flair chasing a lame duck champion is not what you main event the "Granddaddy of them all" with. Dusty vs Luger is the 12th incarnation of Dusty feuding with a horsemen Kollof vs Taylor was built OK but the UWF TV title vs NWA TV title is pointless when the rest of the UWF titles weren't brought over and the promotion was slowly phased out anyway The opener looked like a thrown together match on a spot show same with Barry vs Doc The Roadies and the Horsemen tag match killed the city of Chicago(and they had drawn well in Chicago before this) I found it interesting that this thing didn't focus on the actual wrestlers feuds as much as the over all promotion...a different take than usual docs about promotions I'm not sure Magnum TA would have been Hogan but he would have drawn big with women in the 80s with his in some ways he was Goldberg(the fast finish wins really putting over his finisher) As far as the bigger picture on how they could have survived if they just ran the southeast. They probably would have lasted longer if they would have been fiscally responsible. The bigger issue is that Crockett didnt know what to do with a national company. As outdated as people talk about Verne Gagne at this time, he even sold action figures in 85. Crockett also didn't fully grasp the reach of his TV. He had the Watts tv slot and would cherry pick markets in that region then hop back across the country..I know wrestling didn't have priority in a lot of the newer areas(even vince did this) but crockett would literally come to new mexico and arizona one weekend then head back east then come to la and vegas and sf the next weekend then head back east They also should have used their contacts at Turner to get their videos in more national retailers. Turner Home Ent had pull I could go on and on about this though...interested to hear everyone's thoughts on this episode and the dvd...also going to try to find that territory thread Parv mentions

I usually listen to the shows while at work and the show before this one I listened to at the gym...so I didn't have my usual stream of consciousness posting that you guys usually see..I listened to this show at the gym but took a few notes so I'd remember what to post last night An interesting thing about Steve Williams...I've been watching UWF(Watts) from 86 in chronological order and hes a ton better there than he is in the NWA. So maybe it was a motivation thing And yes Crockett seemed to have a few variations of cages. I was always more fond of the mesh cage as that was what I was accustomed to from Continental and most of the territories(even my toy cage from AWA was the mesh style) The Tower of Doom was visually cool but an extremely poor concept that led to a really stupid match IMO Quite a few reasons I stopped watching wrestling(NWA specifically)...age(jr high my focus started to shift so much to girls and playing sports) and the overall feel of the NWA/WCW product was starting to look less like the product I grew up on. I tried to stay pretty loyal up until Flair left. I remember really enjoying the Power Hour on Friday Nights. But I believe the aesthetics are subliminally important to wrestling fans. I think the way the product looks is a very underrated aspect of what makes a promotion important to a certain segment of fans. Once they took WCW out of the studio it lost some of its flare(no pun intended) certain production changes. The talent obviously was up and down(Tully and Arn leaving) The lack of babyfaces and the horrible integration of Mid South UWF talent(I'm one of the few people that DON'T believe there should have been an invasion angle)

Can't seem to retrieve my password from the original board so I finally decided to sign up here(this is NWA Fan btw) A few things...the flimsy bar cage was just another sign that my beloved NWA was no more I remember getting in trouble for calling the 909 9900 number to hear "live house show play by play" We are now creeping into the era of wrestling where I hold less nostalgia as I started to hit puberty and "grew out of wrestling" for a few years I may start watching these shows on the schedule you do so I have some point of reference to what I'm listening to