Wrestling Observer Flashback–12.17.90

Previously in the Observer Flashback… http://blogofdoom.com/index.php/2016/11/17/wrestling-observer-flashback-12-10-90/

Time for Dave to figure out what the heck is going on with Maeda and the UWF…

– But first, speculation is still running rampant in the wake of Ole Anderson getting fired as booker. Dusty is certainly the top candidate, and that theory is bolstered by the house show results from the past week, which saw Dusty doing 90 second jobs to VIRGIL at every show. As others have joked about the situation, this week he’s losing to the valet, and next week he’ll be putting over the agents. And yet, the top guys in WCW insist that no one’s even spoken to him about the job. Their list supposedly included Terry Funk, Eddie Gilbert, Ken Mantell and Jerry Jarrett, with Bill Watts having already turned them down. Of those names, three of them (Funk, Gilbert, Jarrett) appear to be moves that would directly screw over Joe Pedicino’s new promotion.

– So time to clarify the UWF situation. It turns out that Maeda met with all the wrestlers before the show and convinced them to stand together with him, which basically forced Shinji Jin out of power. Jin responded by publicly firing every wrestler in the promotion and folding the UWF, while legally preventing anyone else from using that name. So now speculation is that Maeda and all the guys will form a newer, better promotion and go hit each other in the face elsewhere.

– As noted last week, after the long and difficult battle to win the rights to the NWA name, all references to it are being phased out. NWA Main Event is now officially changed to WCW Main Event, for example.

– Issue #1 of the WWF’s “Bodybuilding Lifestyles” magazine launched this past week, and it was a major disappointment. It was basically fluff with subpar graphics. They even had a letters page in the first issue! Also, unlike the other WWF properties, this one makes no attempt to pretend that they are alone in the bodybuilding world. In fact, the issue was remarkably free of Vince in general, mostly focusing on taking shots at Joe Weider and ignoring the steroid issue completely. Of course, they wasted no time in looking like scumbags, denying that they were even interested in creating their own bodybuilding federation week after week to the bodybuilding media, before suddenly being called out as liars. In fact, now the Weider people are talking with Ted Turner about having him produce shows for them. On the bright side for McMahon, he’ll probably get a lot of interested bodybuilders because of his zero tolerance on steroid testing. As in, he doesn’t tolerate any testing for steroids.

– Dave asks if anyone noticed that Dick Slater was the one doing the stunt work for Tommy Gunn in the new Rocky movie? (Geez, I should hope so, I can think of two or three issues where you TOLD US THAT, Dave!)

– Giant Baba will in fact be returning to the ring when his broken leg heals. Although he can’t really work much any longer, the exercise he gets from being in the ring is what keeps his diabetes under control.

– The WWF has been surprisingly selfless with the SWS deal thus far, letting guys like Ted Dibiase do clean jobs to Tenryu in an effort to keep the relationship working. At the same time, New Japan is currently trying to set up their own deal with Hulk Hogan in order to screw SWS over.

– Stan Lane has reunited with Steve Keirn as the Fabulous Ones in Memphis again, but the team has been shaky because they’re not on the same page thus far. (After 3 years with Bobby Eaton, it’s hard to change partners!)

– Despite the debut date for the GWF approaching rapidly, there has been zero local publicity for it in Dallas and people who have called the building have been told that no one knows anything about no wrestling show on that date. But hey, they’ve still got millions of dollars from Nigeria and lots of expansion plans!

– Jesse Ventura has a new syndicated TV show, a courtroom show with Lyle Alzado where people present their cases to them and then battle it out with novelty boxing gloves while Ventura does commentary. (Sounds like a winner to me.)

– Nasty Boys are set to debut this week in Florida at the WWF TV tapings, so forget about that Japan tour.

– Dave really dislikes the impending Virgil babyface turn, in the sense that Dibiase is being super-racist about it and saying that he’s “lower than a Texan” and having him shine his shoes. Apparently there would be a lynch mob if WCW tried that, but since Vince does it, he gets away with it.

– Andre the Giant has been announced as returning for the Royal Rumble.

– Hey, here’s a shock: Since the NWA shows tailored to New York (Or should we say LAWRENCE TAYLOR’D?) are doing so well in the ratings, the WWF has now decided to start doing their own custom made shows for New York so they can assert their authoritah as the premiere New York wrestling show.

– Ultimate Warrior was allowed to do some very very rare press interviews, rare because he doesn’t ever want to break character, and they were green-lighted because Vince is of course trying to suck up to the bodybuilding community at the moment. Dave goes over some the crazier stats that were revealed in the interview (like Warrior weighing 155 pounds at high school graduation and now weighing 262, which is kind of terrifying). He also goes into the bodybuilder nerd stats, and talks about how Warrior never watched wrestling in his life before debuting (well duh) and how he does no aerobic training whatsoever (also not a shock).

– The NWA section is now back to WCW again, hopefully for good this time. JUST ACCEPT IT, DAVE.

– The Minotaur debuts on Christmas night at the Omni against the Juicer, who he will be beating like a drum until Barr is gone.

– The TV tapings at Center Stage saw Tom Zenk win the TV title from Arn Anderson in what was said to be a great match. (Yup. Although admit it – you forgot that Arn Anderson was champion by this point, too, right?) They’re also doing a big winning streak gimmick with Zenk, so he’s apparently in line for a big push with the new booking regime.

– Jim Herd gave an interview to another newsletter where he said that he actually liked Ole Anderson and “hoped to bring him into the 20th century.” Ole, meanwhile, has gotten completely out of wrestling and is managing a mill in Wisconsin and much happier doing so.

– El Gigante returned to Argentina for the holidays, and everyone pretty much assumes he’s not coming back. (If only we had been so lucky.)

– The TV situation is a complete mess right now in between bookers, with angles setting up Steiners v. Freebirds, only to have all the TV focused on Steiners v. Master Blasters as an example.

– Gobbledygooker actually worked the Orlando show and got booed out of the ring when he was done.

– JYD managed to tear Harley Race’s rotator cuff by falling on top of him accidentally during a bodyslam attempt, so Race will be out of action a while. (For good, I think.)

– And finally, the upcoming WarGames main event will apparently be Sting & Pillman & The Steiners v. The Four Horsemen, so better days might be ahead for Brian. (Well until the finish of that match, that is.)

PEACE!