[1988-01-02-NWA-Worldwide] Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard vs Dusty Rhodes & Nikita Koloff

[Loss]

The going narrative was always that fans were sick of Dusty by 1988 but this crowd sure loved the guy and that’s what made this match fun to watch. Arn and Tully are definitely a team that will maximize any opportunity they have to work with a super over babyface, so they went in a direction you might not expect with Dusty as FIP. Tully is such a great heel opportunist. The stone face during ring intros is a great contrast to the try-hard types like Jeff Jarrett who pander for the heat. Tully can be an asshole just by standing there – he’ll do asshole things, but he gets heat because he *is* an asshole, not because he acts like one. Nikita had a really fun hot tag before the match ended in DQ when Tully threw Koloff over the top. Flair hit ringside but Luger made the save and went right for Arn. They were wisely keeping Flair and Luger apart in these types of segments at this point. Super fun TV match.

 

***

[Clayton Jones]

Agreed that this is a great case of maximizing an opportunity on Tully & Arn's part. They have a great ability to strike a balance where they get eaten up for stretches making the faces look like a trillion bucks but then flip a switch when it's time for them to get their heat. Their timing really is impeccable. Dusty certainly did his part and this made for a really fun television tag.