Where the Big Boys Play #46

[JerryvonKramer]

Due to a strange quirk of this particular recording, and my technical inability to figure out how to merge the tracks into a single mono one, for this show only, I'll be coming out of the left speaker and Chad out of the right. Where the Big Boys Play in STEREO like The Beatles.

 

Where the Big Boys Play #46 – Clash of the Champions 10

 

 

Chad and Parv march bravely into the 90s with Clash of the Champions 10: Texas Shootout. In this show:

 

- [6:21] a lengthy trawl through the Meltzer newsletters from January and February 90: AWA's days numbered on ESPN! Kendal Windham caught counterfeiting money! Mike Tyson! Pedicino gets engaged and walks! Joe Isuzu! Geraldo Rivera! Vince goes to Japan! Chad considers arguing that SMW was bigger than WCW for a while in the early 90s! Plus speculation on Meltzer's informants.

- [40:20] Solie's Wrestling News Network roundup.

- [45:51] Review of Clash 10 including: discussion of the Flair heel turn and booking options around that time, analysis of the lyrics of the Wrestlewar Rap, some general thoughts on Mick Foley and The Undertaker, and considering the idea of Great Muta as a face.

- [1:56:10] End of show awards and listener comments.

[PeteF3]

Random thoughts as I go:

 

- Man, that Tyson/Detroit card kind of died on the vine, didn't it? Meltzer was always a sucker for "who would win in a shoot" digressions, both in the newsletter and when he was semi-regularly posting on Classics. For such a non-starter of a topic he did go on about it for awhile.

 

- Joe Isuzu was a commercial spokesman for Isuzu Motors, who would put on a transparently-phony-sincere act and make outrageous claims like their trucks sat more people than the Astrodome, or how you could save $2 million by buying 2,000 cars during their latest sale. I don't quite get the tie-in with Brother Love and Geraldo Rivera either.

 

- Lance Russell was on WCW Pro at this point in addition to his hotline duties. But he didn't do the localized versions of Pro that aired in Chicago and NYC, which are most of the shows in current trading circulation. Caudle seemed in and out, but he did co-host WCW for awhile with Ross.

 

- The WNN Kerry stuff is interesting--he was apparently practically signed, sealed, and delivered to debut with the NWA but no-showed a taping or something and that was that.

 

- I remember Nitron from the '90 Yearbook, but that could well be leftover stuff taped from '89.

 

- To Chad's point about the babyface roster: in the newsletter discussing Sting's injury, Meltzer justifies the Luger turn by pointing out that otherwise the company's #2 babyface was...Norman the Lunatic.

 

- Ah, the MOD Squad, the poor man's State Patrol. "Rudimentary but better than expected" pretty much summed up their stuff with the Nightmares on the Memphis set. Granted, the Nightmares were probably an even better team than Pillman & Zenk.

 

- I can see both sides of the Mascaras/Foley deal. Foley was going to still be around, Mascaras wasn't. That Mascaras was unwilling to meet his opponent halfway is a legit criticism, but Foley can't do a whole lot at this point besides take crazy bumps. One other thing I'd add to Foley's legacy that separates him from the other garbage/ECW guys is I still would have him as a top 10 all-time guy on the mic.

 

- Speaking of the babyface roster, if they could have cajoled Muta into staying overseas, there was clearly some potential in babyface Muta. I get that he was Japanese, but he was also flashy and exotic, far moreso than Jumbo or Tenryu or any other Japanese visitor. I think he had similar "exotic" appeal that Jimmy Snuka had circa 1983.

 

Interesting that Chad brings up a Tully babyface act. I'm more on Parv's side on that front. I don't think I'll go full-bore into Fantasy Booking (but I might). The true upper-midcard feud with wheels was not Face Tully vs. anybody, but Heel Tully vs. Babyface Arn. I would much rather have seen that than an Arn/Tully reunion, in fact.

[JerryvonKramer]

Thanks for listening Pete.

 

- The WNN Kerry stuff is interesting--he was apparently practically signed, sealed, and delivered to debut with the NWA but no-showed a taping or something and that was that.

That's really interesting. Kerry surely would have been one solution to their babyface problems. Was he much of a draw outside of Texas though?

 

On paper at least Sting / Kerry / Steiners / Road Warriors doesn't look too shabby on the face side, and that's assuming they still turn Flair.

 

The other thing I wonder about is if they couldn't have made better use of guys who couldn't work but who could talk. Think of JYD. Whenever they've used him, he's looked exposed and fat. Why not develop something like "The Junkyard" talkshow segment? I mean they are willing to waste Terry Funk on that (who could still go). Dusty himself might have been better utilized in something like that too before he left. Using a vehicle like that, they could then build up a younger guy from the rub. Let's say JYD takes a guy like Pillman under his wing for a few months, almost use him as a sidekick on the talk segments. Then when a heel comes on and brutally attacks poor old JYD, boom there's your pretext to elevate Pillman. That would have been a smarter use of JYD than trying to use the dying embers of his name as a drawing card.

[soup23]

I probably didn't convey this well doing the show but I'm certainly pro to a heel Tully vs. face Arn and Flair or even heel Tully/Arn vs. face Flair if they had signed Tully before they did the angle where the Horseman turned on Sting. I was just spitballing thinking of possible options after Clash 10 aired with the Horseman turn and Sting injury.

[Loss]

I really think there are so, so many booking possibilities at this point in time for WCW that would have been better than what they ended up doing. But it's one of my favorite things to talk about -- how to handle Sting being out, booking of Ric Flair and his turn, booking of Lex Luger and his turn, what to do with Tully, etc. Lots of moving parts during that time that could have created something magical and simply didn't.

 

Looking forward to listening to this show over the weekend.

[soup23]

The other thing I wonder about is if they couldn't have made better use of guys who couldn't work but who could talk. Think of JYD. Whenever they've used him, he's looked exposed and fat. Why not develop something like "The Junkyard" talkshow segment? I mean they are willing to waste Terry Funk on that (who could still go). Dusty himself might have been better utilized in something like that too before he left. Using a vehicle like that, they could then build up a younger guy from the rub. Let's say JYD takes a guy like Pillman under his wing for a few months, almost use him as a sidekick on the talk segments. Then when a heel comes on and brutally attacks poor old JYD, boom there's your pretext to elevate Pillman. That would have been a smarter use of JYD than trying to use the dying embers of his name as a drawing card.

Dusty had the Bull Drop Inn in 1991. Only seen the PN News segment from the 91 yearbook but it was some great wrestlecrap.

[shoe]

The SMW talk was interesting. They did draw some decent houses behind the Rock N Roll Express and some special attractions. It is also true that SMW drew more in certain cities more than WCW. I would never contend it might have been the # 2 promotion for a small time. I will say from working on the SMW project with a few others I saw a lot of their house shows . From 93-94 they were putting on the best houseshows in the states from top to bottom. For 92 WCW was. The WCW shows I saw in Houston were good , but not as good as SMW. The WWF shows in Houston from 92-95 really lacked depth.

[BrickHithouse]

Fun show. Even as bad as this Clash was, listening to this makes me want to go back and watch it again.

 

If they were hellbent on turning the Horsemen on this show, instead of the turn on Sting in an interview segment, why not do the turn in the cage? Sting starts the match and is unstoppable, makes a tag and then Flair, Arn, & Ole annihilate Sting.

 

Maybe Norman or Dr. Death can blow their ACL's trying to get into the cage to help Sting. Buzz and the Dragon Master could bail or join in the beating, then Muta clears house of the Horsemen and saves Sting, turning face. Going forward, Terry Funk (or Sting) can be Muta's mouthpiece. Would that work, assuming Muta sticks around?

 

I still don't understand how failing a single drug test totally sunk Tully's career, especially during this period when "everyone" was on something.

[Loss]

That's actually a great idea! They could have also had Luger holding off people from making the save at ringside, which could be a tease of if he's joined the Horsemen or not, but could actually just play out as Luger hoping Sting would get injured so he could step into the spot. They could do touch-and-go hype around Sting actually showing up at the pay-per-view, which would involve Luger in the hype for the match and create some real intrigue.

[Dustys Pencil]

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

[BrickHithouse]

Dustys Pencil (great name btw) - was there a specific happening that put you off of the NWA, or was it just a gradual thing over time?

[JerryvonKramer]

NWA Fan! Welcome. Glad you made it to PWO. I was honestly worried that we'd offended you forever over our little disagreement about Ron Garvin. There's plenty of good shows coming up in the next few years that should be great to see if you've never seen them.

[soup23]

Yes, glad you are here NWA Fan. One thing to discuss is that Crockett probably had more cages made than any other promotion. This looked different from the Havoc thundercage and both are different from the Wargames and Tower of Doom cage.

[Dustys Pencil]

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)

[BrickHithouse]

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.

Could not agree more.

[bradhindsight]

I thought Flair would maybe take the MVP here after that awesome bump he took flying into the group holding Sting back. He did not get a lot of help there given Sting's limitations. He certainly found out Sting was legit hurt the hard way. Of course his work with the heel turn was great too.

 

I liked Buzz Sawyer's work too. Gotta give WCW credit, they captured his big splash pretty well with the different angles.

[Smack2k]

Always wonder what Sting is thinking as Flair is running at him about to jump knowing his knee is fucked...."Oh shit, here he comes...Ric, dont dont...."

 

I swear when he lands (Flair), Sting says to him "I'm hurt" or something to that effect..

[soup23]

I let the booking going on sway me in regards to Flair being in MVP consideration.

[JerryvonKramer]

It takes a lot for Chad not to pick Flair for MVP. If you look at the record books, in the 20 shows we've looked at from Starrcade 87 till now, Chad has picked Flair for MVP in 10 of them. For those same 20 shows, I only gave it to Flair 4 times.