WWE Hidden Gems

[Rock_Of_Jericho]

13 hours ago, AA484 said:

How is the uncut Sheepherders/Fantastics match?  I haven't had a chance to watch it yet.

It was really, really good. Is it 5 stars?  I don't think so, but at least 4, maybe more.  As previously mentioned, they had a great with Arn and Tully, too, which I liked just as much, if not more.  Hard to compare, though, because they're different types of matches.  I love the Fantastics during the 80's.  I actually feel they were maybe the best team out there at that point, but never get the credit they deserve.

[Matt D]

Phil and I covered it for NFF.

http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2019/06/new-footage-friday-1986-crockett-cup.html?m=1

[sek69]

7 hours ago, Rock_Of_Jericho said:

It was really, really good. Is it 5 stars?  I don't think so, but at least 4, maybe more.  As previously mentioned, they had a great with Arn and Tully, too, which I liked just as much, if not more.  Hard to compare, though, because they're different types of matches.  I love the Fantastics during the 80's.  I actually feel they were maybe the best team out there at that point, but never get the credit they deserve.

 

I always found it weird that the Fantastics are so underrated at a level usually reserved for people we don't have a lot of footage of, but that's obviously not the case here.  It's like people watched the matches with the MX and think Bobby and Stan were doing all the work or something.  

[Hawkeye12]

I didn't see much of the Fantastics since I didn't really start following wrestling until 1989, shortly after they'd left WCW.  But they are easily one of my favorite teams ever after watching them over the past 30 years as a fan, actually prefer them to the Rock n Roll Express in their role and feud with the Midnight Express.

[SPS]

On 6/22/2019 at 9:49 AM, Matt D said:

Phil and I covered it for NFF.

http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2019/06/new-footage-friday-1986-crockett-cup.html?m=1

Is there any way to go through your guys new found footage blogs chronologically on the site? I've tried searching a few different ways but haven't had success in getting a straight forward list of them so I must be doing something wrong.

I really enjoy them and would like to go back and check out any I've missed.

[Matt D]

On 6/23/2019 at 2:07 PM, SPS said:

Is there any way to go through your guys new found footage blogs chronologically on the site? I've tried searching a few different ways but haven't had success in getting a straight forward list of them so I must be doing something wrong.

I really enjoy them and would like to go back and check out any I've missed.

It's a clunky platform for that and there's no master list, but I'll see what we can do.

[AA484]

On 6/23/2019 at 2:07 PM, SPS said:

Is there any way to go through your guys new found footage blogs chronologically on the site? I've tried searching a few different ways but haven't had success in getting a straight forward list of them so I must be doing something wrong.

I really enjoy them and would like to go back and check out any I've missed.

 

39 minutes ago, Matt D said:

It's a clunky platform for that and there's no master list, but I'll see what we can do.

Aren't they under a certain tag?  You should be able to click on the tag and it will give you listings of all of the "new footage Friday" posts.

[Al]

The Crockett Cup is really such a fun show. Good variety of workers and styles, booking is solid, hot crowd throughout.

[Matt D]

Re: NFF. Some are tagged. Some aren't, and the tag search is generally limited to 10 or 20 posts just by its nature. I think we can come up with a master list at some point soon though.

Re: Gems. Were we to hypothetically get Crockett Cup 87 tomorrow, what's already out there? I know we have the full match of Flair vs Windham, right? Do we have the Ole vs Bubba cage match? 

The tag finals? There are a few really good looking matches at least.

[AA484]

35 minutes ago, Matt D said:

Re: NFF. Some are tagged. Some aren't, and the tag search is generally limited to 10 or 20 posts just by its nature. I think we can come up with a master list at some point soon though.

Re: Gems. Were we to hypothetically get Crockett Cup 87 tomorrow, what's already out there? I know we have the full match of Flair vs Windham, right? Do we have the Ole vs Bubba cage match? 

 The tag finals? There are a few really good looking matches at least.

Didn't Flair/Windham have about ten minutes clipped?  Ole/Bubba cage match had about 5 minutes shown, not sure how much was clipped.  I believe the final was shown in full.  This is going off of the old commercial release, so longer versions may very well have surfaced since then.

[Viking Hall]

The Fantastics vs The Sheepherders was an absolute riot, definitely in **** maybe even ****1/2 territory. Two teams that surely don't get nearly enough credit just going all out on one another. I have seen a couple of their brawls before, so the chaos wasn't too surprising but with the lack of commentary and the crowd reacting right there this one seemed even more raw. The Fantastics certainly live up to their name but The Sheepherders antics really do take it up a notch. What other Sheepherder matches do I need to see?

Besides that match, I've enjoyed the whole show, a real lesson in just how great Tag Team wrestling can be. NWA/JCP/UWF isn't something I've delved into nearly enough so there's lots of people here that I've not seen that much of. Buzz Sawyer in particular really caught my eye. He's someone whose name and reputation outside of the ring I knew about but hadn't really seen much of. I properly popped for the way he put Italian Stallion away in the first match. Young Rick Steiner was already a monster too alongside him. Also loving the Koloffs, Nikita looks like a ready made star but can go too and Ivan is just absolute gold, going to need to see more of Ivan in particular. Weirdly, as well I kind of enjoyed what I saw of Wahoo McDaniel, he doesn't really do that much but has that air of someone who could take your head off too. I'm presuming his career was winding down by this point but I know he had some wild matches in his time so this has pushed me to perhaps search out a few of those too (if they exist).

[AA484]

8 minutes ago, Viking Hall said:

The Fantastics vs The Sheepherders was an absolute riot, definitely in **** maybe even ****1/2 territory. Two teams that surely don't get nearly enough credit just going all out on one another. I have seen a couple of their brawls before, so the chaos wasn't too surprising but with the lack of commentary and the crowd reacting right there this one seemed even more raw. The Fantastics certainly live up to their name but The Sheepherders antics really do take it up a notch. What other Sheepherder matches do I need to see?

Besides that match, I've enjoyed the whole show, a real lesson in just how great Tag Team wrestling can be. NWA/JCP/UWF isn't something I've delved into nearly enough so there's lots of people here that I've not seen that much of. Buzz Sawyer in particular really caught my eye. He's someone whose name and reputation outside of the ring I knew about but hadn't really seen much of. I properly popped for the way he put Italian Stallion away in the first match. Young Rick Steiner was already a monster too alongside him. Also loving the Koloffs, Nikita looks like a ready made star but can go too and Ivan is just absolute gold, going to need to see more of Ivan in particular. Weirdly, as well I kind of enjoyed what I saw of Wahoo McDaniel, he doesn't really do that much but has that air of someone who could take your head off too. I'm presuming his career was winding down by this point but I know he had some wild matches in his time so this has pushed me to perhaps search out a few of those too (if they exist).

These are two I recommend:

vs. the Fabulous Ones in Memphis, 8/6/85

Barbed Wire Cage Match w/Jack Victory vs. the Fantastics & Terry Taylor in Watts' UWF, 5/25/86

[Steve T]

Crockett Cup '86 was an excellent show. Almost every match had an interesting aspect or two. And I didn't miss the commentary nearly as much as I thought I would. The three Fantastics matches and the R'n'R vs. Sheepherders matches were excellent. I was also please to see everyone selling for Baba's chops as they would in Japan. 

[paul sosnowski]

For Thursday 6/27/19 

NWA Western States 02/01/1971 – Father Knows Best [Duration: 06:42]
The patriarch of the Funk wrestling family, Dory Funk Sr., imparts some fatherly wisdom in this training session with Dory Jr. and Terry.

USWA 11/03/1990 – Texas Royalty [Duration: 10:23]
Long-time rivals square off once more when Terry Funk battles Jerry ‘The King’ Lawler.

[clintthecrippler]

That Funk training footage HAS to be from the Florida archive. 

[peachchaos]

1 hour ago, clintthecrippler said:

That Funk training footage HAS to be from the Florida archive. 

It's been forever and I'm probably misremembering this, but I seem to recall this footage showing up on one of those "Film Room With Gordon Solie" bits from FL that aired on 24/7. Would be neat to see those on the Network along with a proper Terry Funk Collection. 

[conker8]

On 6/27/2019 at 3:06 AM, clintthecrippler said:

That Funk training footage HAS to be from the Florida archive. 

It"s actually from the Amarillo territory. I believe a young Steve Stack interview Dory Sr. We saw a video of the three Funks wrestling each other, with Sr. having a couple of tricks under his sleeve.

Now I can dream of a Race / T. Funk chain match shows up on the Network.

[Bix]

23 hours ago, conker8 said:

It"s actually from the Amarillo territory. I believe a young Steve Stack interview Dory Sr. We saw a video of the three Funks wrestling each other, with Sr. having a couple of tricks under his sleeve.

Now I can dream of a Race / T. Funk chain match shows up on the Network.

I think Clint meant that WWE must have gotten it via Florida.

Wouldn't shock me if it was mixed into the Dallas library, though.

[khawk20]

Was thinking the same thing, possibly footage sent to Florida to promote the Funks, given the way we get footage crossovers between territories a lot.

 

Fingers crossed it's part of more Amarillo material though.

[peachchaos]

My gut says if they had full Amarillo TV they would have posted that instead. 

[EricR]

On 6/25/2019 at 11:01 AM, AA484 said:

 

Aren't they under a certain tag?  You should be able to click on the tag and it will give you listings of all of the "new footage Friday" posts.

As Matt covered, most of them are under the New Footage Fridays tag, but tags only go back the last 20 or so posts which is not ideal. Now that I know there is interest I can work on a New Footage Fridays Master List that will have every match in the series listed by year. 

But there's also unseen footage we've written about that wasn't under the NFF banner, so damn, so eventually I'll need to do a full site master list. But my god the scope of that. 

[clintthecrippler]

On 6/28/2019 at 11:13 PM, Bix said:

I think Clint meant that WWE must have gotten it via Florida.

Wouldn't shock me if it was mixed into the Dallas library, though.

Yep that's exactly what I meant but communicated poorly. Given that this was during Dory's championship run I assumed that while this may have been shot out of Amarillo, it was probably sent to the other NWA territories to air on their show, and Florida is the only WWE acquisition of NWA territory footage from that era that's turned up so far. 

[paul sosnowski]

For Thursday 7/4/19.....Two complete shows from Bash 86!!!!    Waylon Jennings!!!!   David Allen Coe!!!!  (maybe)

 

7/05/1986 – GAB 1986 Charlotte [Duration: 02:53:27] 
Ric Flair puts the World Heavyweight Championship on the line against Ricky Morton in a Steel Cage Match as the Bash rolls into Charlotte.

1. NWA World Junior Heavyweight Title: Denny Brown vs. Steve Regal.
2. Robert Gibson vs. Black Bart.
3. The Andersons vs. Sam Houston and Nelson Royal.
4. Bunkhouse Match: Manny Fernandez vs. Baron von Raschke.
5. Indian Strap Match: Jimmy Garvin vs. Wahoo McDaniel.
6. Boxing Match: Ronnie Garvin vs. Tully Blanchard.
7. Double Russian Chain Match: The Road Warriors vs. The Russians.
8. Hair vs. Hair: Jimmy Valiant vs. Shaska Whatley.
9. Steel Cage: Dusty Rhodes, Magnum TA, and Baby Doll vs. The Midnight Express and Jim Cornette.
10. NWA World Heavyweight Championship Steel Cage: Ric Flair vs. Ricky Morton

07/26/1986 – GAB 1986 Greensboro [Duration: 02:41:09] 
The World Heavyweight Championship hangs in the balance as WWE Hall of Famers clash inside a steel cage when Ric Flair faces Dusty Rhodes.

1. Sam Houston vs. Steve Regal.
2. Denny Brown and The Italian Stallion vs. Black Bart and Konga the Barbarian.
3. Loaded Glove On A Pole: Manny Fernandez vs. Baron von Raschke.
4. Indian Strap Match: Jimmy Garvin vs. Wahoo McDaniel.
5. Taped Fist: Ronnie Garvin vs. Tully Blanchard.
6. The Andersons vs. The Rock n Roll Express.
7. Hair vs. Hair: Jimmy Valiant vs. Paul Jones.
8. Best of 7 Series for the vacant NWA United States Heavyweight Championship, Match #4: Magnum TA vs. Nikita Koloff.
9. Steel Cage: Baby Doll and The Road Warriors vs. Jim Cornette and The Midnight Express.
10. NWA World Heavyweight Championship Steel Cage: Dusty Rhodes vs. Ric Flair.

 

 

[Steve T]

That's awesome. How much of this was previously available? I feel like a lot of this was on the commercial tape, but I haven't watched it in years. 

[paul sosnowski]

I don't believe any of the first 6 matches from 7/5 have been seen before.     And matches 1-4 plus the MX cage match have not been seen on 7/26