Wrestling Observer Flashback–08.17.87

Still nothing I’d consider a “major story” this week, what with the Bash over and all.

You know what IS a major story? SCOTT’S PODCAST OF DOOM, which will be recorded TONIGHT.

– Dave can now confirm that the show in Houston on 8/28 will in fact be the retirement for Paul Boesch, as he ends his promoting career with the WWF. Officially, Boesch is selling the Gulf Athletic Club of Houston to the WWF as a part of his retirement, and he’ll be writing a book about wrestling. They’re actually adding Terry Funk and Mil Mascaras to the show as special attractions, and even Verne Gagne will make an appearance, which Dave more or less thinks is the sign that hell has frozen over.

– The Road Warriors have actually been talking with the WWF about leaving the NWA, but their asking price is $1 million. EACH. This came about because of the supposed mega-promotion in California that was going to be headed by Verne Gagne and bankrolled to the tune of millions of dollars, which had been rumored to make the same offer to them. Dave (rightly) thinks it’s all bullshit on both sides, because if someone legit offered the Warriors $2 million why wouldn’t they take it instead of going to Vince and trying to extort that kind of money out of him?

– Updating the legal troubles of Al Blake (aka Vladimir Petrov), who was in fact convicted of all kinds of bad stuff in his trial. In addition to being guilty of selling cocaine and conspiring to sell cocaine, he also managed to get busted for running a whorehouse! That’s actually kind of impressive. Apparently Blake’s “job” as a “bouncer” was all a front for a pretty extensive drug trafficking scheme. However, the real kick in the pants is that many of the other people charged got off, but Blake got convicted because he’s a giant musclehead who LOOKS like a thug, when really he was probably just guilty of hanging around with a bad crowd. Sentencing will likely land him somewhere between 15 and 25 years in prison. (Oddly, Wikipedia completely ignores this rather important phase of his life, skipping ahead to 1991 when he was doing jobs in the WWF under his real name. So I guess he ended up serving about 3 years? Also, his Wikipedia page has one of my rants as a citation, with my name wrong. I’m anxiously awaiting our resident Minnesota expert tamalie to jump in here and update us on what happened to Blake and how long he served, because all I know is that he was thankfully retired from the business by 92.)

– And away to the territories we go, as former UWF referee is in Memphis as King Carl Fergie, due to his real life relationship with Jerry Lawler, as cousins.

– In Japan, Bam Bam Bigelow finally did the first job of his entire career to that point, and I bet you can’t guess who got to beat him first. Go on, try to guess. You’ll never guess. It’s too shocking.

– Flair was supposed to be doing a tour of Japan during the last week of August, but Jim Crockett is so paranoid about the Paul Boesch show ruining his show on the next night that Flair v. Windham has now been added as the main event and the status of the Japan tour is unknown.-

– Shane Douglas won his first major title this weekend, upsetting Eddie Gilbert to win the UWF TV title with help from Sting.

– Despite the Precious skit not moving Dave, he LOVED the altercation they had on the syndicated show this week, calling it “one of the tightest things I’ve seen this side of Takada v. Koshinaka in Japan”. (Yeah, that doesn’t really help me at all, Dave.)

– The Rock N Roll Express are beating Tully & Arn clean all over the country, so Dave’s title change senses are tingling.

– Dusty is now referring to himself as “The Living Legend”, so clearly humbleness has remained one of his virtues over all these years.

– In Florida, Steve DiSalvo and Konga the Barbarian are teaming up as the Untouchables, which Dave notes “must be no picnic for their opponents.”

– To World Class, where Kevin Von Erich beat Brian Adias in a cage match with the claw and then beat up Al Perez afterwards as well, “which is a uniquely stupid way to build up their feud”, notes Dave.

– Kerry Von Erich has now moved up his timetable to returning full-time by Thanksgiving. Dave is just so over this whole deal, and he recommends trying to walk with your ankle in a fixed position and then you tell him if Kerry is ready to come back yet.

– In the AWA, Larry Nelson collapsed while doing interviews and may have suffered a heart attack. (He only died two years ago, so whatever it was, he recovered well.)

– Dave notes that JT Southern will be coming as DJ Southern. (I think Dave got his lines crossed there. He definitely was still JT Southern.)

– The tense standoff with Deep South continues, as Tommy Rich and the Midnight Express have been given until the end of the month to finish up with Deep South, but they’re all booked through October, so who knows how this will resolve.

– The Russians “will almost surely” drop the tag titles to Wahoo and DJ Peterson by the end of the month. (Oh no, Dave, it was an even WACKIER team if possible!)

– In the WWF, as the only thing of note to come out of the recent TV tapings was Paul Orndoff turning back to babyface over jealousy with Rick Rude.

– Also, Ken Patera may have suffered a legit major injury, thus screwing up main events for the next few months. (Really? Did anyone in 1987 ever utter the phrase “Oh man, I’m so bummed that Ken Patera won’t be wrestling Hercules tonight”?)

– Baron Von Raschke randomly debuted for the WWF on a house show in Winnipeg, against Don Muraco. Dave is pretty sure it’s just some one-shots.

– Wrestlemania IV will be March 27 1988.

– More details on Patera’s injury: He was tossing a jobber around the ring and ripped the hell out of his shoulder, suffering severe tendon damage, and he’ll be out until Christmas.

– Titan is planning on making back some of the summer losses by scheduling SIX SHOWS A DAY in the fall (A, B and C matinees and then evening shows). Good lord.

– Martel & Santana will indeed be “The Strike Force”. (I feel like “Attack Squad” just didn’t get the consideration it should have warranted.)

– The rather lengthy legal troubles of Davey Boy Smith began in Winnipeg, as a fan named Guy Seymour came up to the Bulldogs in a bar under the guise of asking for an autograph and then started mouthing off about how he could whip either one of them. The guy apparently tried to double-leg Davey Boy and Smith slapped him around, and now the guy is suing because he got his teeth knocked out. (This would be the first in a series of troubles for Davey Boy around this time.)

– The recent Stampede show saw a gaggle of Hart grads debuting, who will mean nothing to most people but will elicit nostalgic oohs and aahs from my Alberta readers: Todd Olson, Gilles des Fosses, and Judah Rosenbloom.

– And finally, Dave has a reader poll at the end, wanting to know if he should continue using his nicknames like “Junkfood Dog” and “Hectortron” for wrestlers. I guess we know what the majority voted for.

TILL NEXT WEEK.

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