Shoots Review and Preview thread

[BruiserBrody]

This was suggested - if the mods disapprove please feel free to lock it:

 

 

Timeline World Wrestling 1987 Honky Tonk Man;;

Honky talks of doing vignettes in front of Graceland on a cold winter day. Honky liked the outside of the ring character building despite freezing his nuts off.

 

Honky was stuck wrasslin Koko and SD Jones around the bottom of the card – he was ready to grab any brass ring offered

 

Honky gets confused and talks about Survivor Series 86 as the start of the Hogan/Andre feud – clearly he is just remembering the build from the next year

 

To show the popularity of wrestling at this point – in Jan 87 both JCP and WWF work Philly in the same night and JCP drew 11K fans to WWF’s 15K. No interaction between the workers or office as far as Honky recalls.

 

Honky feels JCP had weak TV to build stars and lacked the merchandising power that Vince had to make stars and make money – thus JCP lost a lot more talent than WWF.

 

Vince paid for Jim Neidhart’s legal fees after he was arrested for assaulting a stewardess. Jim then got pissed when Vince docked his pay to make up for the cash and destroyed furniture at a TV taping in rebuttal.

 

Honky credits Finkel w/ being the guy watching the competition and helping Vince find talent to bring in.

 

Honky had to work Pedro Morales – who Honky says was an old grump who was hard to work with

 

Outback Jack came in and acted like he was bigger than Hogan and thus the Bulldogs and others ribbed him constantly

 

Honky was mad that they spent a lot of money on live plants for the Flower Shop segments that could have went in his pocket instead

 

Honky was happy to be working w/ Jake the Snake as it was a move up the card – he figured he’d job out and move back to low card status, but he’d make some $ in the interim

 

Honky claims the guitar that he bonked Jake with was gimmicked - Honky says Jake’s “injury” was BS and the dust that flew out from the shot was from Jake’s nose… He then mocks Jake smoking crack – but “Oh Jake and I are friends now…” Honky then mocks Tully Blanchard for being a coke head.

 

Honky says WWF was doing OK business in Detroit but the Silverdome seemed like a big leap – the WWF even ran a big Andre vs Hogan Battle Royal angle on SNME in Detroit a few weeks before WM 3 – not fearing burning out the area

 

The guys didn’t get to enjoy the road as they had to work, sleep and move along - so places like Vegas were nothing special

 

WM 3 was nothing special – WWF didn’t approve extra family members being there – the guys were coming off the road, were stinky and tired

 

Honky didn’t watch Hogan vs Andre live as he was in the showers – Honky thought both guys were good workers and the match was fun

 

Honky liked his match w/ Jake – Jake did anything he was asked – Alice Cooper was a problem though as he stalled a bit too long and Jimmy Hart was scared of the snake – Jake had to cling so hard to Jimmy that Jimmy ended up w/ a minor neck injury

 

Honky says Uecker, Vanna White and Steve Allen “got it” while others avoided the workers

 

Honky said he and Muraco and others didn’t watch Savage vs Steamboat – they played cards. Honky finds the modern locker room to be kind of goofy for watching the PPVs and TV so intently. Honky says when he worked Cyber Sunday – he snuck in the building – dressed alone , did his bit and left before the PPV ended. The agents didn’t even know Honky was in the building for the 1st few hours

 

Honky felt Adonis vs Piper was fun – Adonis was a hell of a talent and thinks Piper should have lost a hair match 1st to build to a series

 

Piper claimed to get electrocuted accidentally and claimed the electricity was stuck in his body and would walk around trembling from the shocks

 

Hogan had a private locker room – but would come in to the boys locker room to take nasty dumps

 

Neidhart called into Vince and told him he was going to miss some shows from “cat scratch fever”

 

Patera’s 1st match back after Prison was so bad, they never aired it – Honky liked working him though as Honky was used to bumping for muscle heads

 

Beefcake wanted to shave Honky’s hair during their feud - Honky wishes he had gone for the big pay day now

 

Hillbilly Jim and Iron Shiek both made over 75K on the big rubber toy figures

 

Honky puts over Butch Reed for being able to carry a crippled SS Graham – Honky says Reed went AWOL and led to Honky snagging the IC belt

 

Dibiase got heat for being giving extra perks and money for his Million Dollar Man gimmick

 

Honky feels David Schultz was goaded into slapping John Stossel – Honky cites Mr Fuji being in the background grinning as a sign that somebody knew something was going down

 

Honky says Bockwinkel was a little too hands on in his agent role and had the displeasure of being the “pecker checker” during drug testing

 

They blitz through the last 3 months – Survivor Series is given a sentence worth of time.

 

Overall Honky was almost too jovial here – I was expecting more dirt being dropped. I would have liked more on Honky’s heel tactics and chicken$&it coward antics – probably also more on what it was like to be on top of the card suddenly and then holding the belt endlessly. The Survivor Series and shoving Miss Elizabeth on SNME should have warranted commentary as well IMO.

[BruiserBrody]

Just watched: Larry Zbyszko KC Timeline WWWF 1980

 

LZ says McMahon’s were almost bankrupt in 79 (LOL) since Bruno quit.

 

Backlund was a joke since he looked like Howdy Doody and all the heels were monsters and Backlund was tiny.

 

MSG was losing money w/ Backlund as MSG was taking 50% of the house and the IRS took a hunk and Backlund couldn’t sellout MSG. The promoters were also pilfering funds from the houses and not giving the McMahon’s the full monty owed.

 

Hulk Hogan went to Larry Z for advice “Your my hero Larry!”. He wanted help getting away from being Andre’s whipping boy. He told Hulk to leave WWWF and once Hulk did a star was born.

 

Iron Shiek was crazy even in 80 – Larry says Shieky Baby is evidence for why Iran shouldn’t get nukes. LZ says Shieky would beat up groupies who wouldn’t put out.

 

LZ says he avoided drinking and groupies since he worked in his home area and just went home.

 

Bruno and Vince Sr “hated” each other. Politics. Larry knew that the 1st guy to work Bruno after his “retirement” would be a mega star, so he proposed to Bruno that he be the guy. Vince Sr just wanted Bruno back and figured he could ship Larry Z off ASAP and move Bruno onto a “real” heel.

 

Larry got death threats after turning on Bruno. A shotgun blast went over his head one place – a cab was flipped another – he got stabbed in Albany

 

Bruno wouldn’t work spot shows – so they were able to prolong the angle by feeding Larry the Putzkis and Strongbows of the world.

 

Larry claims MSG was busy in August (uh huh) so Larry proposed Vince run Shea Stadium- Vince is not sure lil Larry can carry such a card

 

Lou Albano bladed his cheek through to his mouth during a wild fit of blading. Then Capt Lou would pour after shave in his cuts to show off how tough he was. Larry says Albano would drunkenly cuss out the McMahons to their faces while they were taking Lou and the other top guys out for dinner.

 

March was the 1st MSG match for Bruno/Larry - Larry says Bruno could pull off working well yet since Bruno had a limited moveset in his prime, so his decline wasn’t obvious. Larry and Bruno wouldn’t go on last so Larry could escape w/o a riot.

 

Bruno intro’d Larry to Frank Sinatra and the Gambino mobsters

 

Larry Z thinks Patera should have gotten Backlund’s spot since he had the Bruno body type

 

Lou Thesz told LZ that “You’re the greatest heel I’ve ever seen”. Bockwinkel and Race put over Larry’s shtick too.

 

Larry Z started a riot vs Putzki by giving him a low blow. Several old men were trampled in the mess trying to get to LZ.

 

Rick McGraw, Buzz Sawyer and others were too crazy for Larry and their deaths didn’t surprise him. Larry did over 450 bench presses w/o roids – those guys did drugs meant for horses.

 

Larry says WM 3 gave away 30,000 tickets – He and Bruno drew 46,000 in Shea and thousands were turned away.

 

Larry says he had to shoot on Johnny Rodz since Rodz talked himself up so much. Rodz then in Spanish threatened to stab LZ – but ironically the guy who later stabbed Bruiser Brody, Jose Gonzalez warned LZ what Rodz was saying

 

Ox Baker came in and bombed so Larry got an MSG title match vs Bob instead in July. Larry felt he should have won the belt and helped to sell the Shea show. Bruno convinced Larry to no show some house shows to try and force Vince Sr’s hand. Bruno and Vince Sr were using Jr and Larry as pawns in their feud, as Vince jr was put in charge of getting Larry back. LZ says Vince was literally crying on the phone at Larry and LZ thinks this is why he was never used in WWF.

 

Larry Z goes back to work and demands and receives 10% of each house and he and Bruno are making record business at inflated prices so Larry claims to be pulling in almost 10K nightly. LZ then demands to be paid the same as Backlund and they give in to the deal.

 

LZ says Inoki and Fujinami weren’t paid to be at Shea – they just wanted a tape of them in front of a big US crowd. Backlund got a tag match because Vince knew Bob wasn’t the draw. Larry says he was paid 25K for the Shea match.

 

LZ says they had to put nets up over the ring to catch all the whiskey bottles being tossed at him – even after Shea

 

LZ says the NJ guys who didn’t speak English were ribbed by the US guys into saying nasty things to US women by giving them false translations.

 

Larry says by Fall Vince Sr was intent on jobbing Larry out to the regular WWWF guys and changed finishes. Bruno had planned for this and had Larry tell the promoters “Bruno never pinned me – how bad will Bruno look if ____ pins me???”

I watch Timeline World Wrestling 1986 George Animal Steele...

 

Steele asks if Sean wants Jim Myers or George Steele? Then playfully chokes him. Steele has near epic Ox Baker like eyebrows here.

 

Steele starts w/ WM 1 and says he was still only wrestling 2-3 months out of the year and Vince wanted him to quit teaching and wrestle full time. Steele sounds more upset over losing his football coaching gig.

 

Steele claims his face turn was impromptu and Vince called an audible while Steele was tearing a turnbuckle up in “anger” over Shieky Baby and Volkoff not tagging him in. Steele was unsure if he wanted to work face.

 

Steele says Cousin Junior quit the WWF after 6 months by showing up in a suit, a limo and a big cigar and declaring “I live in the hills so I’ve already made more money then I will ever need”.

 

Steele says he ribbed Dick Embersol by calling him “Dave” much to Dick’s annoyment…Steele rebelled against NBC wanting to script his matches.

 

Steele says Capt Lou broke him into ribbing by taking him out to eat nightly in the late 60’s and covering Steele’s dinner tab. Then at the end of the summer Capt Lou reveals he hadn’t paid any tabs and Steele might be on some restaurants “S” lists.

 

Steele thinks Adonis created the gay gimmick.

 

Steele says working with Macho Man was difficult since Savage wanted to plan out matches – Steele was handed a lay out by Savage on paper of how their match would go. Steele threw the papers away. Steele would rib Savage by talking about how hot Liz was.

 

Steele feels Tito should have stayed IC champ since Savage was going to be over either way. Steele says he cost Tito a long run w/ Savage by getting the Liz/Savage/Steele angle over so well.

 

Steele says he resented stuff like “The Slammy’s” for goofing on the biz but he liked the theatrics nonetheless.

 

Steele really liked Cyndi Lauper and blamed Dave Wolff for convincing her to pull back her promotional machine and allowing Madonna to become a star.

 

Steele says he wasn’t paid royalties for the “Wrestling Album”.

 

Mr. T had a attitude and didn’t respect the business or the wrestlers. Hogan protected T from the “heat”.

 

Bundy got a big head from headlining WM 2 and Jay Strongbow ripped him and told him he wouldn’t last.

 

Bam Bam Bigelow got a try out pre-WM 2 which would have been when he was plenty green.

 

Steele says Bret Hart wasn’t a strong enough heel to get a run w/ Steamboat.

 

Steele hated Damien (the Snake). Steele put the bag in his mouth during a match and later realized how gross that was.

 

JYD smashed a jobber’s face into a wall who didn’t sell his powerslam properly. Steele wanted the blood to stay there to warn the other jobbers to sell.

 

Vince was terrified that WM 2 would fall apart due to satellite issues.

 

Steele says Moolah won a battle royal in MSG over the men in 84. I don’t recall that…

 

Steele says he walked into a dark room at WM 2 and Ray Charles was in there alone. They were jovial. Steele laughs hard at this – although it sounds like a bogus tale to me.

 

Steele says Bundy was in over his head at WM 2 and couldn’t carry Hulk the way Hogan needed to be.

 

Raymond Rougeau was a great guy – Jacques was stuck up due to his families success.

 

Adonis was let go for cocaine – not obesity.

 

Thinks WWF pushed Steamboat too hard.

 

Steele road with Haku and watched him body slam a drunk who challenged him.

 

Steele claims Steamboat’s Komodo Dragon ate dogs and cats if left unguarded.

 

Andre stiffed Studd because Studd ignored Andre’s wishes. Iron Shiek was tortured by Andre too.

 

Steele says Andre loved him because Andre called for a slam spot and Steele chose to sell his back instead of doing the slam.

 

Steele claims he was 1st choice to be King after Haku. (Steele was retired for a year by then)

 

Hogan wanted Dan Spivey on top instead of Paul Orndorff in Summer 86

 

Steele says the Federette’s started because a hot woman from Detroit wanted to work w/ Steele vs Liz/Randy…Vince says she was too hot to waste on Steele

 

Steele loved Kamala as a worker and put him over hard to help set up Kamala vs Hogan

 

Steele says Curtis Iaukea was kicked out of his hotel once by a super fan, after helping Kamala hurt Steele

 

Steele thinks SS Graham expected another World title run when he returned in late 86

 

WM 3 broke Steele’s heart because he was 14 miles from home and he didn’t wrestle.

 

Steele finishes by implying he cheated on his wife a lot saying “Jim Myers was married, George Steele was not, when I was on the road, I was Steele”

I watched the RF Jesse Ventura Shoot...

 

Jesse was a fan growing up and found it neat to wrestle the old farts like Mad Dog Vachon and Crusher when he broke in, since he was a mark for those guys.

 

Broke in around age 24 – Ventura thought about the NFL, but his love of theater made him aim for wrestling. Eddie Sharkey trained him. Ventura says he became the 1st guy to go to AWA after being in Eddie’s camp since Sharkey and Verne had heat.

 

Ted Oates taught Ventura how to survive on the road.

 

Ventura didn’t like bumping so he learned to stall as much as possible.

 

1st match was vs Omar Atlas in Kanas City – last match was vs Tony Atlas in New York.

 

Omar chose to win via DQ instead of pin so Ventura put him over in the WWF days when Omar was jobbing and Ventura commenting.

 

Never made over 90 dollars a night his first six months. His 1st night in Portland he got 100 dollars.

 

Don Owens put the PCW title on Ventura who only had 9 months experience – over Snuka. Jesse says he and Snuka worked together for almost 2 years. Ventura wasn’t allowed to promo – Bull Ramos did the talking for him.

 

Ventura avoided hanging out w/ wrestlers and not drink since he was a SEAL and wanted to keep his wife and knew that bars would lead to sex.

 

1st gimmick was “Surfer” Jesse Ventura. Worked 63 straight nights for Owens in one clip.

 

After a run in Hawaii, Jesse saved money and quit wrestling and was prepping to open a gym when Portland needed a sub on top for a show, so they called Jesse in to AWA studios to cut a promo on Buddy Rose to send to Portland and Verne heard Jesse promo and wanted Ventura to start in the AWA. Jesse told Verne he wouldn’t job on TV. Verne gave him “The Body” nickname.

 

Jesse says Verne was a dictator and treated the talent like crap. Ventura made Adonis train and Adonis did the bumping. Adonis’ idol was Dr. Jerry Graham.

 

Paul Ellering didn’t tell his family the biz was a work and Paul’s brother tried to hurt Ventura after an angle that saw Jesse injure Paul.

 

Verne wasn’t a good tag wrestler in Jesse’s opinion since Verne wanted to call spots even when he wasn’t in the ring. Verne didn’t want to job to the East West Connection so they ran a no show angle and Jesse got the tag straps.

 

Greg Gagne was an office guy and despite being a great worker, Gagne refused to train in the gym to look the part of the guy who was going over all these muscle heads.

Hulk Hogan dislocated Ventura’s jaw accidently during a test of strength spot but Ventura puts Hogan over as working around the injury masterfully.

 

John Studd and Ventura rode together in WWF and were concerned watching Vince take over the biz. Ventura ended up being one of the first guys to jump ship and saw other options dry up.

 

Ventura said Verne shorted him on main event pay offs when houses went up, which made Jesse’s choice to leave easy.

 

Steve Regal (Mr. Electricity) was told by Jesse he was jumping, so as a rib Regal screamed for “Vince HELP ME!” while giving up the shine in a tag match w/ Jesse that night.

 

Ventura said Backlund got the WWWF belt to spite Bruno.

 

Tony Atlas was a great guy who played w/ Jesse’s son in the locker rooms.

 

Jesse cut a deal w/ Lawler to work Memphis part time, Ventura never jobbed to Lawler as his kid got ill and Jesse had to leave. Jesse said he sent the belt back in the mail. Ventura wrestled the San Diego Chicken in a main event tag there teaming w/ Jimmy Hart vs Lawler and the Chicken.

 

Jesse confirms he tried to unionize right before WM 2 after a prompting from Gene Upshaw. Vince almost fired him but Dick Embersol liked Jesse on SNME and went to bat for him. Plus Jesse got a SAG card from working in Hollywood and didn’t need a union anymore. Jesse thought of Hogan as a friend and didn’t know Hogan ratted him out till the video voice rights lawsuit in the 90’s.

 

Hogan told Howard Stern that Ventura was a wife swapper, which ticked Jesse off.

 

Ventura got paid for a round of main events in the WWF that he ended up missing since he suffered blood clots that for all intents and purposes ended his career.

 

Jesse feels JR was jealous of how much money Ventura was making in WCW. Ventura didn’t want Bruno taken off commentary since Ventura could use him as foil. Jesse claims Bill Murray praised his SNME work during the Hillbilly wedding. Feels Bobby Heenan was jealous of Jesse being on the “A” team announcer team. JR was terrible as a partner – JR wouldn’t feed off Ventura’s lines.

 

Jesse says John Studd was a good traveling mate as both were family men w/ military backgrounds.

 

His favorite memory of “The Body Shop” was asking the Killer Bees “Did you drop any pollen while in Australia” which made the Bees freeze up to avoid laughing.

 

Ventura doesn’t miss the business. Jesse leaving WWF was over a video game that Jesse was offered to be part of and Vince tried to veto it. Jesse gets a WWE check every four months thanks to suing Vince for royalties.

 

Ventura’s biggest pay day was being ref at Summerslam 99. Jesse did it to stick it to WCW since Hogan did an angle mocking Jesse’s governor win.

 

Ventura was paid an absurd amount of money for working with the XFL.

 

Ventura claims he only used one cycle of testosterone a year and 1 cc of steroids a week.

 

Says Dave Meltzer is “a little puke”

 

Bill Watts as booker was a disaster who pushed house shows over TV and Watts didn’t like him since he was paid so much.

 

Eric Bischoff didn’t warn Jesse that Hogan was coming in and Ventura ripped Hogan in the press and thus was benched ASAP once Hogan signed.

 

Jesse feels having guys face to face every week hurts the business. Confrontations should be built to climax at PPV – not weekly yakking side by side.

 

“You give me the money Linda spent and I’ll be President”

 

Ventura lives 100 miles from civilization, has no electricity (solar power) and plans on vanishing forever soon,

 

RF shows his talents as an interviewer by asking Jesse if he wants to be in the WWE HOF someday – Jesse had talked about his HOF speech earlier.

[BruiserBrody]

Here's an oldie but a goodie!

 

Black Bart's shoot is awesome for sheer BS level:

 

He claims Dusty Rhodes came up with the Undertaker gimmick, and that Black Bart was supposed to play that character.

 

He also claims he's the biggest locker room legend in today's WWE (for his antics back in the day)

 

Piper had a warrant for his arrest, so Bart pulled a car up to the ring w/ Piper in the trunk, popped it, Piper wrestled, and then hopped back in the trunk and they took off.

 

Oh God, Black Bart actually just claimed he was offered 180 grand to star in a Fox Network sitcom based on his, Dutch and Moondog Rex "Desperodos" gimmick. Flair told The TBS execs "We can't have these jabronis star in a show" So WCW released them and the Sitcom was canceled.

 

Ronnie Garvin would get sexually excited when you worked "stiff" with him.

 

He actually called himself vs Sam Houston a "Main event" match. Of course the place was sold out, and of course they had such a great match, the other 4 "Main Events" of the evening couldn't compare.

 

Vince McMahon wanted to bring him in and work the upper midcard and offered him a "job for life", Bart declined, so when he went to WWF a year or 2 later, Vince made him a jobber out of spite.

 

A week after Mike Von Erich got out of the hospital, Bart carried him in a match for 45 minutes, then asked the ref "Is this the boy who just got out of the hospital?" After the ref said yes, Bart said "Oh **** " and took Mike down and pinned him.

 

When David Von Erich died he laid in his hotel room for 2 weeks with the A/C shut off and stayed there til Fritz came to Japan 2 weeks later and snagged the body.

 

He claimed to have threatened Jose Gonzalez (Brody's killer) with a knife shortly after Brody's death.

 

Bart said in 1991 the ring crew was all 18 or 19 year old ***** men, and Vince had a tour bus for them, and would spend an odd amount of time on the bus with the gays.

 

He also says Lanny Poffo was gay, and came on to him. Vince found out Bart told Lanny off, and Bart was released shortly there after...

[Log]

Hogan had a private locker room – but would come in to the boys locker room to take nasty dumps

I have new respect for the Hulkster.

 

Beefcake wanted to shave Honky’s hair during their feud - Honky wishes he had gone for the big pay day now

By 87 or so, weren't most guys on contracts or whatever? Was there such thing as a "big pay day" for guys then?

[Loss]

The guaranteed contract was $2600 a year. It was just to keep them from jumping and dictate terms, but they were still paid based on the houses they drew and their position on the card, just like they are now. The only difference is that now, the guarantee is higher. But big shows are still a big payday.

[flyonthewall2983]

Someone please do this for the Flair RF shoot so I don't have to watch it lol.

[Guest Andrews]

Someone please do this for the Flair RF shoot so I don't have to watch it lol.

Nothing really outstanding - but always fun to watch.

 

Hogan recently lent him 15K as he had toruble drawing out cash due the divorce / account freeze issue.

 

Talks about his son in Japan and high hopes for him, which is obviously sad now.

 

Loves drinking with John Cena, and seemed to like hanging around with the young guys in general (James Storm in TNA).

 

Says the people running TNA in Nashville were idiots (many have said this now).

 

Likes Dixie Carter as a person, but not the sharpest knife, in one ear, out the other. Wishes her well, but... can't see TNA going anywhere.

 

Would have gone to WWE HOF in 2012 with or without TNA approval.

[Al]

Zbyszko is amusing. How many times as a commentator did he claim he retired Bruno at Shea Stadium? The fact that he LOST the match wasn't exactly unverifiable inside information!

[Matt D]

The Black Bart one sort of highlights what drives me nuts about these.

 

"So did Vince ever make any promises to you he didn't keep?"

"So, the Von Erichs sure liked to party a lot, huh?"

"What did you feel when Brody died?"

[BruiserBrody]

Guest Booker Greg Gagne 1985

 

I should start by saying I’m a Greg Gagne apologist. The Greg hate stems from Gagne being a victim of circumstance. He was derided for being on top of a dying promotion that his Daddy owned and thus was an easy target to mock. His physique looked bad in the steroid era – but he was able to look legit in the late 70’s and early 80’s. I feel Greg was a real solid talent and could even cut a good promo every now and then.

 

His much mocked megapush only stemmed from the fact that the AWA’s other top options after Hogan left all didn’t pan out for one reason or another: Martel (charisma deficit) Da Crusher (Nostalgia couldn’t hide his age forever) Road Warriors (Jumped ship for big money) Blackwell (Mounting injuries and obesity issues) Sgt Slaughter (skills eroding, one note gimmick and demanding a big guarantee to appear at shows).

 

Snuka came in when the AWA was enjoying its last gasp of success – WrestleRock 86 in April – business dropped off almost right after the 20k+ attending a big name laden effort in the Metrodome (Brody, Rotondo, Windham, Race, Kamala and many others came in from out side of the AWA spectrum). Snuka had drug issues of course and was stuck in a somewhat tasteless racist feud with the talented vet Col Debeers. Snuka left mid-program (drugs???) and then came back months later and failed to re-ignite the heat that had been building. BTW – if you haven’t seen the Snuka/Debeers angle that started that feud – FIND IT NOW! An exhausted Snuka is about to finish off IIRC Larry Zybysko via a Superfly Splash in a No. 1 contender’s match – when Col Debeers trots out, knocks Snuka to the floor and pile drives him onto the concrete. Snuka bleeds like crazy and the fans are disgusted with Debeers – The Col. Is almost attacked by several of the front row patrons as he gloats over Snuka’s broken body. Fantastic stuff.

 

Got off track there – my bad – Greg had one final thing go against him, his partner Jim Brunzell jumping ship to the WWF in the Summer of 85 left Greg without a go to option for working tags on top of the card and being a legit tag title contender. Brunzell leaving and Mr Saito being jailed ruined the AWA’s big plans for the mid- late 1985 timeline as Jim and Greg were to spend much of the time attempting to avenge Verne Gagne being assaulted by Saito and Bockwinkel during a big card on April 21, 1985.

 

Brunzell was replaced on top when Sgt Slaughter – fresh off a hot WWF run – took Gagne into his boot camp and made him wear fatigues that exposed Greg’s belly button and a head band – “Rambo” Greg Gagne was born! Worse yet – when the AWA put the boot camp angle on a VHS release, they replaced the original music (IIRC Bruce Springstein’s “Glory Days”) with something that sounded vaguely porno worthy.

----

The premise for this “Guest Booker” is Greg Gagne is given the head booker spot of Pro Wrestling USA in late 1984– without the politics stopping the promotions from dissolving the group into oblivion.

 

Gagne says Vince stole talent and angles from the other promotions. Verne tried to combine all the territorial promoters together to fend off McMahon’s assault. Greg says Vince bribed his way into established time slots and cut off the ability for others to expand and sustain their territories.

 

Greg memory is bad as he thinks “The Crusher and Mad Dog in a cage” was planned for San Fran in 84 and Vince stole the TV and cut off the ability for AWA to run there. Greg then claims AWA nationally was getting “a 25 rating and a 60 share nationally” MALARKEY!!! Sean Oliver gently tries to call him on his tall tales.

 

He then claims Vince bribed AWA local promoters with upwards of 250K to switch to the WWF brand.

 

Greg says the concept was screwed from the start as Watts, Crockett, Verne, Jarrett etc had huge egos and all wanted Pro Wrestling USA to be in their vision.

 

Vince would rent arenas in 3 year clips to block anyone from getting any shots. Greg regrets not suing Vince over that now.

 

Jim Crockett tried to steal the AWA’s top babyface Jerry Blackwell at the very 1st PW USA card. Greg says Verne felt all southern promoters other than Jim Barnett were untrustworthy.

 

Greg jumps head to 1988 and says the SuperClash PPV was suppose to be divided up by promotional lines and each territory was suppose to pay for their own talent. Then each promoter told their talent that Verne was in charge of pay offs – so Verne got all the heat when everyone was stiffed.

 

Greg says in the Summer of 83, Vince came to Verne and offered to buy the AWA. Verne had partners including Wilbur Snyder and Dick the Bruiser among others who had to be bought out too and they refused. Vince then told Verne “I don’t negotiate!” and soon after Hogan jumped ship.

 

Greg says Hogan vs Bockwinkel in a cage was planned for April 84 – and Hogan was going over for the belt. Greg says the fall of 83 saw Andre and Hogan have a confrontation during a battle royal (this is legit – I’ve seen it) and it was to lead to a series of Andre vs Hogan matches that February to set up Hogan’s big title win. Greg claims Hogan made 17 grand his last week of AWA matches.

 

Greg claims Verne ran a PPV out of Milwaukee in 1983 – I assume he’s misremembering a close circuit event or something.

 

Greg tells an amusing story of rookie Iron Shiek saying “Dropkicks urrr BULLSHIAT!!” So Verne takes him to the barn and KO’s Shieky Baby w/ a flying kick to the mush.

 

Now we dive into the actual “Fantasy Booking”:

 

Greg says he was against going to New York – he thinks the promotions should have run big shows in each of their core areas.

 

Greg explains the difficulty of trying to appease all the promoters who each had their own booking styles. Some hot shotted – Dusty loved blood – AWA ran very few angles and dragged them out through the year etc

 

Greg claims the AWA flopped in attendance every summer – says Hogan drew 260K in March and 60K in May in back to back trips to one particular arena to validate his point.

 

Greg “drafts” Ted Dibiase, Dr Death Steve Williams, Butch Reed, and Kamala from Mid South – Terry Funk, Dory Funk , Slaughter, Tony Atlas and Harley Race from the indies – Kerry Von Erich, Jake Roberts, Freebirds and Jim Cornette from World Class – Rock and Roll Express, Savage and Lawler from Memphis Bockwinkel, Blackwell, Road Warriors, Brunzell, Greg Gagne, Baron Von Rasche and Billy Robinson from AWA – Flair, Magnum TA, Dusty, Ole, Arn, Tully, Nikita and Ivan from JCP

 

 

“The Freebirds were a pain in the ass and drunk most of the time – missing shows left and right”

 

Greg lets Sean Oliver pick the PW USA champ, so as to not show bias – he takes Ric Flair. Then Sean takes the RnR Express as tag champs. – Greg agrees w/ Flair and says the Andersons would have been his tag team pick.

 

Greg says Cornette goes with the Andersons because the Midnight Express wouldn’t get over nationally.

 

Greg switches the tag belts to Tully and Arn – who beat the RnR Express in August in this version of history. They are booking from Oct 84 to April 85 – which is a Supercard

 

Oct – Tully/Arn vs RnR Express – Cornette gets Tully/Arn DQ’d

Nov – Tully/Arn vs RnR Express (No DQ rule) – Ole runs in

Dec – Tully/Arn/Ole vs RnR Express/Kerry Von Erich – later on they switch Kerry out for Dusty

 

Greg decides to build to a Flair vs Bockwinkel – they ramble on for a good 15 mins trying to figure out how to build it – it’s sort of dull to watch – lots of ummm-ing and staring at the roster sheets.

 

Oct – Flair vs Dibiase (1 hr draw)- Bockwinkel promo

Nov- Flair vs Magnum TA – Bock pins Dibiase

Dec Bock over Magnum

Jan Flair over Billy Robinson

Feb Flair over Greg Gagne

March Flair over Kerry VE

Apr Flair vs Bock – Tully/Arn/Ole vs Dusty/Road Warriors in a cage

 

They go over and over the hows and whys as far as each month and match is booked – way too much rotating ideas and off shoots to transcribe. They run short of time and jump right to the April card:

 

Flair vs Bock – 30 mins – Terry Funk costs Bock match

Cage: Dusty/Roadies vs Ole/Tully/Arn – 12- 15 mins Good guys win

Sgt Slaughter vs Snake Roberts (build to bootcamp match) 14-16 mins – Jake DQ’d

Bruiser Brody Squash – 3-4 mins

Gagne/Brunzell vs RnR Express (20 min draw)

Kerry Von Erich Squash – 6 mins

Dibiase vs Butch Reed—10-14 mins – Ted wins – Reed attacks after

Rick Martel/Curt Henning vs Ivan/Nikita -- 8-12 mins – Curt eats pin

 

1st portion was fun – 2nd half was a bit tedious to watch – Oliver says it was almost 4 am when they finished taping, so if true, the guys were probably brain dead…

[flyonthewall2983]

Brutus Beefcake's 1989 Timeline was pretty good. His memory is a little shot because of the head injury but he had some good behind-the-scenes stuff to dish about. Mostly how he hated the Barber gimmick from the beginning, which he "blamed" on Pat Patterson. It is said he made the most of it and got over well with it, but I was surprised at how much he didn't like turning face (Question, was he really over as a heel to begin with? Just by himself, not with Valentine.) As anyone who's seen the youtube clip, he does put down Arn and Tully. Tully is understandable given his rep, but I guess his beef with Arn goes back to WCW (Flair has said in his shoot interview and his book that Hulk & co. wanted Brut-eye to take Arn's place on the roster, basically). And of course, he talks about Hulk about 1/3 of the interview and himself for another third. The match where Bret broke his sternum segues into a diatribe about DDP nearly taking his head off with a chair shot on a Nitro, and making excuses for it instead of apologizing (if anyone knows which show that was on, I'd like to know).

 

"Free James Brown!"

[jackwebb]

The Black Bart one sort of highlights what drives me nuts about these.

 

"So did Vince ever make any promises to you he didn't keep?"

"So, the Von Erichs sure liked to party a lot, huh?"

"What did you feel when Brody died?"

I really enjoyed the Ventura one for that reason. His answers really exposed the absurdity of the whole process. It wasn't like he was being condescending about it either.

[Guest Nell Santucci]

Guest Booker Greg Gagne 1985

 

I should start by saying I’m a Greg Gagne apologist. The Greg hate stems from Gagne being a victim of circumstance. He was derided for being on top of a dying promotion that his Daddy owned and thus was an easy target to mock. His physique looked bad in the steroid era – but he was able to look legit in the late 70’s and early 80’s. I feel Greg was a real solid talent and could even cut a good promo every now and then.

 

His much mocked megapush only stemmed from the fact that the AWA’s other top options after Hogan left all didn’t pan out for one reason or another: Martel (charisma deficit) Da Crusher (Nostalgia couldn’t hide his age forever) Road Warriors (Jumped ship for big money) Blackwell (Mounting injuries and obesity issues) Sgt Slaughter (skills eroding, one note gimmick and demanding a big guarantee to appear at shows).

 

Snuka came in when the AWA was enjoying its last gasp of success – WrestleRock 86 in April – business dropped off almost right after the 20k+ attending a big name laden effort in the Metrodome (Brody, Rotondo, Windham, Race, Kamala and many others came in from out side of the AWA spectrum). Snuka had drug issues of course and was stuck in a somewhat tasteless racist feud with the talented vet Col Debeers. Snuka left mid-program (drugs???) and then came back months later and failed to re-ignite the heat that had been building. BTW – if you haven’t seen the Snuka/Debeers angle that started that feud – FIND IT NOW! An exhausted Snuka is about to finish off IIRC Larry Zybysko via a Superfly Splash in a No. 1 contender’s match – when Col Debeers trots out, knocks Snuka to the floor and pile drives him onto the concrete. Snuka bleeds like crazy and the fans are disgusted with Debeers – The Col. Is almost attacked by several of the front row patrons as he gloats over Snuka’s broken body. Fantastic stuff.

 

Got off track there – my bad – Greg had one final thing go against him, his partner Jim Brunzell jumping ship to the WWF in the Summer of 85 left Greg without a go to option for working tags on top of the card and being a legit tag title contender. Brunzell leaving and Mr Saito being jailed ruined the AWA’s big plans for the mid- late 1985 timeline as Jim and Greg were to spend much of the time attempting to avenge Verne Gagne being assaulted by Saito and Bockwinkel during a big card on April 21, 1985.

 

Brunzell was replaced on top when Sgt Slaughter – fresh off a hot WWF run – took Gagne into his boot camp and made him wear fatigues that exposed Greg’s belly button and a head band – “Rambo” Greg Gagne was born! Worse yet – when the AWA put the boot camp angle on a VHS release, they replaced the original music (IIRC Bruce Springstein’s “Glory Days”) with something that sounded vaguely porno worthy.

----

The premise for this “Guest Booker” is Greg Gagne is given the head booker spot of Pro Wrestling USA in late 1984– without the politics stopping the promotions from dissolving the group into oblivion.

 

Gagne says Vince stole talent and angles from the other promotions. Verne tried to combine all the territorial promoters together to fend off McMahon’s assault. Greg says Vince bribed his way into established time slots and cut off the ability for others to expand and sustain their territories.

 

Greg memory is bad as he thinks “The Crusher and Mad Dog in a cage” was planned for San Fran in 84 and Vince stole the TV and cut off the ability for AWA to run there. Greg then claims AWA nationally was getting “a 25 rating and a 60 share nationally” MALARKEY!!! Sean Oliver gently tries to call him on his tall tales.

 

He then claims Vince bribed AWA local promoters with upwards of 250K to switch to the WWF brand.

 

Greg says the concept was screwed from the start as Watts, Crockett, Verne, Jarrett etc had huge egos and all wanted Pro Wrestling USA to be in their vision.

 

Vince would rent arenas in 3 year clips to block anyone from getting any shots. Greg regrets not suing Vince over that now.

 

Jim Crockett tried to steal the AWA’s top babyface Jerry Blackwell at the very 1st PW USA card. Greg says Verne felt all southern promoters other than Jim Barnett were untrustworthy.

 

Greg jumps head to 1988 and says the SuperClash PPV was suppose to be divided up by promotional lines and each territory was suppose to pay for their own talent. Then each promoter told their talent that Verne was in charge of pay offs – so Verne got all the heat when everyone was stiffed.

 

Greg says in the Summer of 83, Vince came to Verne and offered to buy the AWA. Verne had partners including Wilbur Snyder and Dick the Bruiser among others who had to be bought out too and they refused. Vince then told Verne “I don’t negotiate!” and soon after Hogan jumped ship.

 

Greg says Hogan vs Bockwinkel in a cage was planned for April 84 – and Hogan was going over for the belt. Greg says the fall of 83 saw Andre and Hogan have a confrontation during a battle royal (this is legit – I’ve seen it) and it was to lead to a series of Andre vs Hogan matches that February to set up Hogan’s big title win. Greg claims Hogan made 17 grand his last week of AWA matches.

 

Greg claims Verne ran a PPV out of Milwaukee in 1983 – I assume he’s misremembering a close circuit event or something.

 

Greg tells an amusing story of rookie Iron Shiek saying “Dropkicks urrr BULLSHIAT!!” So Verne takes him to the barn and KO’s Shieky Baby w/ a flying kick to the mush.

 

Now we dive into the actual “Fantasy Booking”:

 

Greg says he was against going to New York – he thinks the promotions should have run big shows in each of their core areas.

 

Greg explains the difficulty of trying to appease all the promoters who each had their own booking styles. Some hot shotted – Dusty loved blood – AWA ran very few angles and dragged them out through the year etc

 

Greg claims the AWA flopped in attendance every summer – says Hogan drew 260K in March and 60K in May in back to back trips to one particular arena to validate his point.

 

Greg “drafts” Ted Dibiase, Dr Death Steve Williams, Butch Reed, and Kamala from Mid South – Terry Funk, Dory Funk , Slaughter, Tony Atlas and Harley Race from the indies – Kerry Von Erich, Jake Roberts, Freebirds and Jim Cornette from World Class – Rock and Roll Express, Savage and Lawler from Memphis Bockwinkel, Blackwell, Road Warriors, Brunzell, Greg Gagne, Baron Von Rasche and Billy Robinson from AWA – Flair, Magnum TA, Dusty, Ole, Arn, Tully, Nikita and Ivan from JCP

 

 

“The Freebirds were a pain in the ass and drunk most of the time – missing shows left and right”

 

Greg lets Sean Oliver pick the PW USA champ, so as to not show bias – he takes Ric Flair. Then Sean takes the RnR Express as tag champs. – Greg agrees w/ Flair and says the Andersons would have been his tag team pick.

 

Greg says Cornette goes with the Andersons because the Midnight Express wouldn’t get over nationally.

 

Greg switches the tag belts to Tully and Arn – who beat the RnR Express in August in this version of history. They are booking from Oct 84 to April 85 – which is a Supercard

 

Oct – Tully/Arn vs RnR Express – Cornette gets Tully/Arn DQ’d

Nov – Tully/Arn vs RnR Express (No DQ rule) – Ole runs in

Dec – Tully/Arn/Ole vs RnR Express/Kerry Von Erich – later on they switch Kerry out for Dusty

 

Greg decides to build to a Flair vs Bockwinkel – they ramble on for a good 15 mins trying to figure out how to build it – it’s sort of dull to watch – lots of ummm-ing and staring at the roster sheets.

 

Oct – Flair vs Dibiase (1 hr draw)- Bockwinkel promo

Nov- Flair vs Magnum TA – Bock pins Dibiase

Dec Bock over Magnum

Jan Flair over Billy Robinson

Feb Flair over Greg Gagne

March Flair over Kerry VE

Apr Flair vs Bock – Tully/Arn/Ole vs Dusty/Road Warriors in a cage

 

They go over and over the hows and whys as far as each month and match is booked – way too much rotating ideas and off shoots to transcribe. They run short of time and jump right to the April card:

 

Flair vs Bock – 30 mins – Terry Funk costs Bock match

Cage: Dusty/Roadies vs Ole/Tully/Arn – 12- 15 mins Good guys win

Sgt Slaughter vs Snake Roberts (build to bootcamp match) 14-16 mins – Jake DQ’d

Bruiser Brody Squash – 3-4 mins

Gagne/Brunzell vs RnR Express (20 min draw)

Kerry Von Erich Squash – 6 mins

Dibiase vs Butch Reed—10-14 mins – Ted wins – Reed attacks after

Rick Martel/Curt Henning vs Ivan/Nikita -- 8-12 mins – Curt eats pin

 

1st portion was fun – 2nd half was a bit tedious to watch – Oliver says it was almost 4 am when they finished taping, so if true, the guys were probably brain dead…

I don't think Greg Gagne is right about Hulk Hogan getting the belt at some point. The reason why Verne wouldn't give Hogan the belt is due to a complex exchange of talent with Japan. Gagne was always loyal to Baba, and Gagne got Hogan through Antonio Inoki. Hence, for Gagne to put the belt on Hogan would have meant his perceived backstabbing of Baba, who was in a war with Inoki at the time. (In fact, I think my timeline is a little bit off, as I think the NJPW and AJPW war began around 1984 with New Japan talent fleeing for Baba, but it could have been around 1983 or earlier, which would have made any title switch even more sensitive than normal.)

[khawk20]

I can see a Hogan-Bockwinkel cage match in April of 1984. Problem would have been, they would have billed it as a title match and nobody would have remembered that cage bouts were non-title until Hogan had won, at which point the belt would have went back to Bockwinkel and the fans would have burned the building down.

 

Really, if Hogan had somehow still been there in 1984, he would have probably faced Bock in the cage, but Bock wouldn't have been champ anymore so it would strictly been a revenge spot. This is from the non-Vince world of revisionist booking, of course...

[Matt D]

The magic bullet for 84 AWA is Greg turning heel.

[Al]

Someone needs to catalog all the Dusty finishes for the AWA Championship from 1980-89.

[khawk20]

Someone needs to catalog all the Dusty finishes for the AWA Championship from 1980-89.

It was prevalent in the 70's as well.

[Matt D]

Verne Finishes.

 

Is this a staple for most heel-driven promotions from the era?

[BruiserBrody]

Breaking Kayfabe with Lanny Poffo

 

http://culturecrossfire.com/wrestling/shoo...ws-lanny-poffo/

 

My review can be found above.My editor felt I gave away too much so here's the stories he deleted:

 

(We're an upstart website so give a look around if you get a chance.)

 

 

Lanny takes us back to 1987 and talks of the WWF old timers battle royal the WWF put together in November that year. Al Costello (of the Fabulous Kangaroos tag team fame) called the Poffos all excited for the event, this leads to Angelo wanting to be in the match and to work with all his old friends one last time. Randy assures the family he can pull off getting Angelo the gig. The WWF brass said no and offered no solid reason why. Randy felt betrayed by this and told Lanny that WWF wasn’t the family he thought it was, but stuck around for the pay.

 

Lanny says Randy stewed over this for the rest of his life. When Randy found out his dad died in 2010, he punched a hole in the wall of his house – still fuming over Angelo’s battle royal snub. Randy called the WWF the” FWWF” after parting ways with them. You can guess what that F means…

 

Randy was a recluse in his later years by choice. Savage was tormented by not fulfilling his father’s wish and kept bitterness toward Pat Patterson, Jay Strongbow and others who he all blamed as part of the problem.

 

At Angelo’s last birthday, Savage was ranting about the Von Erich’s getting in the Hall of Fame and a largely mentally out of it Angelo shed a tear as Randy promised him that the whole family will be inducted or none of them will. “They can induct Chris Von Erich but not Angelo and Lanny!?!?!”.

 

Lanny says as of the day of the interview (a year and a half after Randy died) Vince still hasn’t offered condolences for the Poffo’s loss. Lanny says the WWE staff asked him why Randy went to WCW even though Vince loved Randy like a son. Lanny dives into further heat the WWE and Randy developed as Savage wanted to have a lengthy feud in 1993 with young heel Shawn Micheals, in order to put Shawn over and have great matches. The WWF turned him down and cited Savage’s age as the reason. Randy was bored as an announcer and jumped ship to WCW soon after.

 

Lanny is pissed at Tugboat because he saw a Tugboat shoot interview where Tugboat ripped Savage for how he treated Liz, so Lanny met Tugboat at a convention – found out Tugboat had just got divorced and was appalled that Tugboat could say anything about Savage’s behavior when he himself could not keep his marriage together. So Tugboat gets the “I love you man, but go fuck yourself” treatment.

 

Lanny put Bigelow over town after town and Bigelow never thanked Lanny for his efforts. He also says Bigelow brought bad P.R. to wrestling by being a dead beat dad among other things. Lanny can’t fathom why Bigelow got such a push despite not having a memorable personality, average work rate, unimpressive body etc. The heat seems to all stem because of the fact that Vince picked Bigelow to replace Randy as the Slim Jim spokesman after Savage left the WWF. The potential loss in revenue from the Slim Jim contract is cited as another reason that Vince and Savage never did business after 1994.

 

Then Lanny talks about his limberness and his big penis and how he used those to advantages to suck his own penis. Poffo took a super attractive girl home in the seventies and taught her how to give excellent blowjobs by fellating himself and she spread the story around and thus the secret was out. Lanny discovered this talent at age nine and implies he masturbated this way throughout puberty.

 

Poffo says King Curtis (aka The Wizard) was told by Chief Jay Strongbow that his opinions on matches and angles for Kamala weren’t necessary as “your just a charity case for Vince”. Curtis quit and flew to Hawaii – by the time he landed, Vince was waiting on the phone and got Curtis to come back and the icing on the cake was that Vince ordered Chief Jay Strongbow to apologize to Curtis in front of the whole locker room. Given the general dislike for Jay, Lanny loved it.

[hammerva]

I know the 80's were a weird time but even I can't believe that women would get excited and interested by a guy who sucks his own dick

[flyonthewall2983]

Women can be as freaky as men, believe me.

[goc]

I know the 80's were a weird time but even I can't believe that women would get excited and interested by a guy who sucks his own dick

It only takes 1.

[BruiserBrody]

Barry Windham Timeline WCW '91 Shoot Review

 

This fits right in with the discussion of Flair's firing going on elsewhere.

 

Hope you enjoy my career overview and review of Barry's shoot!

[cabinboy454]

Barry Windham Timeline WCW '91 Shoot Review

 

This fits right in with the discussion of Flair's firing going on elsewhere.

 

Hope you enjoy my career overview and review of Barry's shoot!

You mention in the shoot Barry talks about Vince's love of Mike Rotundo, does he mention why? Has anyone every heard stories of why Vince really like Rotundo? I'd really like to know more about this, it just seems really odd.

[BruiserBrody]

Barry Windham Timeline WCW '91 Shoot Review

 

This fits right in with the discussion of Flair's firing going on elsewhere.

 

Hope you enjoy my career overview and review of Barry's shoot!

You mention in the shoot Barry talks about Vince's love of Mike Rotundo, does he mention why? Has anyone every heard stories of why Vince really like Rotundo? I'd really like to know more about this, it just seems really odd.

 

IIRC Barry doesn't elaborate. Vince did hire Mike like 4 or 5 times so there must be something there Vince likes.