Matches From 1989

[Loss]

Sting v Lex Luger - NWA World Championship Wrestling 12/23/89

 

Fun match. 1989 Luger did have a lot going for him, and you could actually put together a series of his matches from that year against widely different opponents where Luger brings something different pretty much every time out. Other matches, like Luger/Murdoch, see him bring a surprising amount of offense, but here, Luger is all about the heeling and playing to the crowd. Luger uses basically no big offense at all in this match, but he plays the crowd so well by yelling at them, begging off from his opponent and sneaking in cheating tactics when he can that the match still works quite well for other reasons. In this match, he also apparently decided he wanted to be Terry Funk and decides to do Terry's trademark drunken selling, which is highly entertaining. They work some good nearfalls toward the end with Sting coming back strong after Luger is in control, but Luger ends up holding up a chair when Sting tries the Stinger splash, which both draws a DQ and prompts a big brawl with all the top stars in the promotion running in. While Lex was never truly a great worker, even if he was good for a spell, he does an admirable job playing to Sting's strengths here by giving him plenty of openings and making him look really good. It's easy to see why they were the hottest young stars in the company at this time.

[Loss]

Midnight Express v Bobby & Jackie Fulton - NWA World Championship Wrestling 12/23/89

 

The Midnights are heels again, but you wouldn't know it from this crowd. Cornette, to his credit, does everything he can to try to turn the fans against them, but none of it quite works in the big picture, even if it does at times on a smaller scale. The Midnights start off strong on the Fultons, but they quickly fight back and clear the ring, which enrages Cornette at ringside to a point where he wants to come in and _box_ both of them, but Eaton and Lane talk him out of it. The Midnights were great for stuff like this. No one can sell a punch like Bobby Eaton, as both Fultons' punches leave Bobby staggering, and they finally calm things down and work over Eaton's arm. Of course, no one can throw a punch like Bobby Eaton either, as we'd later find out. The crowd is still booing, and Cornette is yelling at them all and calling them rednecks, but to no avail. The use of blind tags here is really fun, with the faces doing lots of that and catching both Eaton and Lane off guard several times. Lane gets in some great kicks in terms of variety, and Bobby acts as the face in peril, with Eaton getting in two great backbreakers and Cornette sneaking in a tennis racket shot behind the ref. They cut off the hot tag, but Bobby Fulton rallies back with an octopus~!, but gets clotheslined behind the ref's back. Fulton fights back more with a facebuster and a hot tag, and man, can Jackie Fulton throw a great dropkick and even a leg lariat! All four end up in the ring soon enough before Jackie falls victim to a double guzzle. This match was incredibly fun, and they did all of this in 8 minutes!

[shoe]

Ric Flair v The Great Muta - NWA World Championship Wrestling 11/25/89

 

 

 

I really liked this a lot when I watched this about 6 months ago. They really work well especially when incorporating Muta's strengths into the match. I thought Flair was great here as well. I don't remener the specifics of the match but I rated it as 3 3/4* as well. This was argubaly Flair's greatest year as a worker, and this is another notch on his belt.

[Bix]

Rick & Scott Steiner v Cactus Jack & Rick Fargo - NWA World Championship Wrestling 12/16/89

 

This is Mick Foley's national television debut!

Aww c'mon, World Class had good TV coverage.

 

The storyline was that he'd have a different partner every week, usually a jobber, who would be on the losing end of the deciding fall, and he would snap and destroy his partner after the match. That's what happens here, at least after they get going and Rick decides to stiff the fuck out of Jack early on for no real reason.

The culmination of this angle was a lot of fun, as Lee Scott decides to get really pissed off after Jack turns on him and challenges Jack to a match the next week. Then Lee Scott is killed forever in that blowoff.

[Loss]

Wasn't the World Class shown when Mick was there a year old by the time they showed it? I remember watching the Embry v Devastation Inc stuff, but I thought it aired on ESPN in the summer of 1990.

[Bix]

They had really good syndication for the current stuff besides the Legends shows on ESPN.

[jdw]

I thought the Cactus stuff in World Class/USWA-Texas aired in 1989 on ESPN. I didn't think it aired that far behind the times. Cactus won the Light Heavyweight Title from Embry about two weeks after Super Clash III, and ESPN had been decently close to being up to date on World Class at the time. Since I didn't get Memphis at the time, the dualing AWA-USWA thing was on World Class for me. I seem to recall one or more Lawler vs. Kerry matches in early 1989 where I actually thought Jerry was going to lose the title to Kerry since... it's freaking Texas.

 

Also, don't forget that this was on Super Clash III:

 

Chavo & Mando & Hector Guerrero beat the RPMs & Cactus Jack

 

 

John

[anarchistxx]

Edit; wrong year!