[1978-09-28-Houston Wrestling] The Spoiler vs David Von Erich

[shoe]

This is a match designed to make David a player in Houston. He gets a lukewarm reception coming out partially based on his Dad being a huge heel in the State. So these guys go broadway with the goal to make David look like a million bucks . By the way the crowd responded to him post match the goal was accomplished.

 

Things I liked about the match and things that missed.

 

1. David's leg work was done well.

 

2. David had a great sleeper.

 

3. Spoiler setting up ways for David to get the one upmanship.

 

4. David's fire in the match was right on point.

 

5. Spoiler needed to show more hatred .

 

6. Spoiler's heat needed to be more focused. I liked the neck work, but needed to be longer.

 

7. The finish was perfect to establish an up and coming baby face.

 

2 1/2*

[NintendoLogic]

SirEdger assigned this match to me as part of the Secret Santo project (note to mods: this needs to be moved to 1979). During his lifetime, David was regarded by most in the business as the best worker of the Von Erichs. However, revisionist history has deemed him to be the worst of the "good" Von Erichs. I'm not sure any of the Von Erichs were all that good, although Mike and Chris were obviously on a completely different level of terrible. I do like what I've seen of the Spoiler. He was a solid brawler and quite athletic for a 70s big man. I also get a kick out of the fact that he was billed from Singapore. Masked wrestlers with completely random kayfabe hometowns need to make a comeback.

 

As for the match, these two obviously weren't setting out to steal the show, and this isn't a barnburner by any stretch of the imagination. We get fifteen minutes of basic matwork, bland clubbering, and 70s heel tactics like hair pulls and back rakes without much of a storyline hook to tie it all together. The only real excitement comes from David's attempts to remove Spoiler's mask. Other than that, the highlight of the match was David on his knees crawling between Spoiler's legs and then turning around to hit a picture-perfect dropkick. Nothing about this was actively offensive to my sensibilities, but it never got out of first gear. After I finished this match, I watched some footage of David in Florida as a heel television champion, which was far more entertaining.