Wrestling Observer Flashback–03.04.91

Previously on the Flashback… http://blogofdoom.com/index.php/2016/11/30/wrestling-observer-flashback-02-25-91/

Time for WRESTLE WAR! Now typeset via futuristic LASER PRINTING!

– But first, our top story is that people overall really don’t like pro wrestling. That’s right, in a survey done in November 1989 by SMG, 39% of respondents said that they either disliked or even HATED pro wrestling compared to other sports. Of course, the survey lumped all wrestling together under the name “WWF Big Time Wrestling”, so scientific accuracy wasn’t necessarily the #1 priority here. But still, not great for the already faltering reputation of the WWF at the moment. Specifically, advertisers look at stuff like this and use it to justify their already terrible ad rates for pro wrestling shows.

– Interestingly, the WWF was shown to be popular with 18-25 year olds, with men twice as well represented as women. (Total change from today, of course, where all of the 18 year old fans grew up to be grumpy old farts like me.)

– WCW hit a home run with Wrestle War ‘91, and although Dave hasn’t watched the tape yet, it was the best live show he had seen since Bash ‘89. (Agreed. It was a HELL of a show. Love me some WarGames)

1. Eddie Guerrero & Ultraman beat Huichol & Rudy Boy in 7:40 in the dark match. They were nervous early and missed a bunch of moves, but it got good by the end. Eddie pinned Rudy Boy with a rana and everyone applauded them, so that’s nice. **3/4

2. JYD & Ricky Morton & Tommy Rich beat the State Patrol & The Big Cat in 9:52 to retain the six-man titles. They don’t have belts made at this point and no one cares about the titles or the champions, so that’s a problem. Surprisingly good match, thanks to Morton doing all the work (surprise, surprise). Dog hit Wright with the Thump and Morton pinned him. **1/2

3. Bobby Eaton pinned Brad Armstrong with the top rope legdrop at 12:50. Eaton played heel, but the crowd treated him as a babyface. Started slow, but it was excellent in spots. ***1/4

4. Itsuki Yamazaki & Mami Kitamura beat Miss A & Miki Handa in 6:47 when Yamazaki pinned Miss A with a victory roll. Crowd wasn’t into it and it never got heated, but suddenly the crowd woke up once A started throwing stiff kicks. ***1/2

5. Dustin Rhodes pinned Buddy Landel with the bulldog in 6:32. Buddy was sucking up to the boss and bumping like a pinball for Dustin. **1/4

6. The Young Pistols beat the Royal Family in 12:03. Crowd was dead, but they were working hard. And then the lights went out halfway into the match, Because WCW. Steve pinned Jack Victory for the win. *1/4

7. Terry Taylor pinned Tom Zenk in 10:59…as PREDICTED BY THE COMPUTER.

Anyway, this turned into a great match, since Taylor was the only heel on the show actually being a heel. Taylor got a rollup for the win while Zenk was distracted with York. ***1/2

8. Stan Hansen DCOR Big Van Vader in 6:21. They worked Japanese style and there was a lot of crowd interest, and they just kind of brawled to the back after the non-finish. **3/4 (I feel like Dave was underselling this one a bit, in that it was a crazy brawl that turned Vader into a legit star in the eyes of WCW’s fanbase.)

9. Lex Luger pinned Danny Spivey to retain the US title in 12:52. Best Spivey Match Ever! Danny was working Japanese style and had his BOOTS on tonight, and Luger looked bigger than ever. Finish saw Spivey try to slam Luger off the top, only to see Lex reverse into a cradle for the pin. ***3/4 (This match was a crazy freak of nature that you NEED to watch. It’ll seriously blow your mind watching Luger having this kind of match. With someone that’s not Flair.)

10. The Freebirds beat Doom to win the WCW World tag titles in 6:58. They were kind of in the death slot here, having to follow that last match. Doom miscommunication for the finish, as Reed hit Simmons with an international object by accident, and Garvin pinned Simmons for the titles. Dave notes that perhaps it would have given the Birds a bit more credibility to actually win the titles BEFORE losing them to the Steiners. **1/2

11. The Horsemen & Larry Zbyszko beat Sting & Pillman & The Steiner Brothers in WAR GAMES in 22:05. Dave’s summary: “Suffice it to say that this is the one best matches I’ve ever seen live. 22 minutes of solid mayhem with the crowd on its feet screaming from the opening of action.” The match was built around getting Pillman over as a star, but still finishing him with destroyed and carried out on a stretcher, and somehow they made it work. On the other hand, Pillman was legit knocked out by the first powerbomb from Sid, as his feet slammed into the cage and resulted in him getting dropped on his head. It was supposed to be the finish anyway, but he legit went out on a stretcher and went to the hospital. ***** (We’ve gotta be getting close to the squeegee story, right?)

– Dave actually thinks that if people are going to spend so much time putting Dusty Rhodes over, he might as well come out of retirement and wrestle. Because otherwise what’s the point?

– Crowd was around 3500 paid, papered heavily up to somewhere around 7000 in a building set up for 12,000. Not a great night for financials. PPV looks to have done so-so.

– In a funny bit, apparently Larry Z was in the main event as a kind of pre-match false finish, because literally everyone expected the ending to be him submitting and then they swerved everyone by having Pillman lose instead.

– Missy Hyatt is apparently dating Jason Hervey, which Dave promises is a real thing even though it sounds ridiculous.

– Meanwhile, the WWF ran Arizona State University the night before, with a not-so-subtle goal of putting on the longest-running house show humanly possible to burn out the crowd in advance of the WCW PPV the next day. In fact, the show ran from 7:00 to 11:30 as they did everything possible to stretch it out. And of course Dave was there for this one, too.

1. Barbarian pinned Koko B. Ware in 8:40. DUD

2. Davey Boy Smith pinned Warlord in 10:38 with a rollup. Very dull. 1/4*

3. The Hart Foundation retained the tag titles over Power & Glory 14:12. All comedy, but it got over. *1/4

4. Roddy Piper beat IC champion Curt Hennig via countout in 11:12. Very entertaining thanks to Perfect bumping all over the place. More of a series of comedy spots than a match. Finish was all kinds of confusing and messed up. ***1/4

5. Jimmy Snuka pinned Haku in 12:17. (Are you seeing a pattern with these match times yet?) Dave feels like they should take out warrants on whoever booked this match. They were deliberately stalling and avoiding contact, trying to have the worst match possible. -**3/4

6. Bushwackers beat the Orient Express in 8:44. The Bushwackers are uniquely talented in that they can mistime even the simplest moves and make them look terrible. Finish was the exact same one from the Harts-P&G match, but it was so many hours later that no one even remembered. 3/4*

7. Jake Roberts DDT’d Rick Martel in 13:47. Martel’s sister passed away earlier in the day, so he could be forgiven for being distracted. The entire match was a chinlock, but Jake’s ring psychology was incredible and saved it somewhat. *1/2

8. Sgt. Slaughter beat Ultimate Warrior in a cage match in 19:37. Match didn’t even start until 11:00 pm and the crowd was asleep. Slaughter didn’t come across as anything special at all here, which Dave notes “doesn’t bode well for Wrestlemania.” (Yeah, a LOT of things didn’t bode well for that show.) Sherri Martel was going like crazy here trying to do all the work and carry the match from the outside. Just a terrible match, but asking them to go 20:00 was a ridiculous request anyway. DUD

– Hulk Hogan is promising that when he pins Slaughter at Wrestlemania, Iraq will surrender because they’ll realize it’s fruitless to continue at that point. Good to know. (Maybe they should have called in Inoki to negotiate his surrender, too.)

– Lex Luger was supposed to be working the New Japan Supershow against Riki Choshu (and jobbing), but his lawyer intervened and discovered that his contract was only valid for the US and Canada, so WCW actually had no right to send him to Japan in the first place. And thus hell no, he won’t go. (Sadly, this wasn’t even the last time THIS YEAR that Luger’s contract would come back to bite WCW in the ass.)

– JC Ice is getting “rave reviews” for his heel manager act, but it’s actually so convincing as a scummy white trash wannabe thug that he’s getting “bad heat” instead of effective heel heat at times. (I believe Dave is referring to what we call “X-Pac heat” these days.)

– OK, guys, like for real now: Joe Pedicino’s GWF debuts 4/28 at the Omni in Atlanta. For REAL.

– After failing in California and New York, Herb Abrams is moving south, and will be doing his next TV tapings in Florida.

– Gary Hart’s TWF promotion announced that Matt Borne is the new TWF champion, having defeated Al Perez in a fictitious match in El Paso. Of course, the problem is that Matt Borne is already in WCW as Big Josh. On the bright side, there was only 100 people at the show anyway.

– Owen Hart was backstage at the last Center Stage taping for WCW, but wasn’t used. The tag team with Pillman is already history so they have no plans for him at the moment.

– Dave read that someone named “Black Blade” will be at the next set of house shows, but he has no clue who it is. His guess is Black Bart.

– Although Doom is set to EXPLODE, chances are good that Butch Reed is just going to walk and go back to the rodeo anyway. (Which he eventually did. And he actually stayed retired!)

– The WWF is pretty openly expecting Tugboat to walk and go back to WCW as part of Dusty’s Knights of Nepotism crew, so they’re having him pre-emptively do a bunch of jobs on TV, just in case. (Because GOD FORBID someone leave the promotion without looking like a complete clown on the way out.)

– Paul E. Dangerously continued his feud with Missy Hyatt at the TV tapings, and when the crowd was chanting “We want MIssy”, he responded “If you’ve got $10, you can have Missy.” Sadly this won’t make the TV show.

– They’re repackaging Big Cat into a bodyguard for Alexandra York. (Funny how that one gimmick change would define the rest of his career.)

– There’s some concern about the impending Warrior-Undertaker feud this summer, because Undertaker is so over as a heel that he’s getting over as a babyface, and that won’t really help Warrior’s cause.

– The WWF advertising department is already sending out stuff to trade magazines for the Wrestlemania home video release, showing Hulk Hogan victorious and “draped in the flag”. So you know, just in case there was any suspense at all about who’s winning.

– The “new” Prime Time Wrestling did a slightly better rating than the Monsoon/Heenan version, but still lost to WCW.

– They’re DESPERATELY toning down everything around Slaughter and Adnan at the house shows, leaving the flags in the back and distancing themselves from all the war stuff. However, Hogan is still going full steam ahead with the “I’m a hero to millions and an American hero” stuff because he’s so popular that he can say whatever he wants and his fans will still be loyal. Dave notes that this is the correct way to continue an angle that you don’t have the guts to acknowledge that you’re doing.

– And finally, Shane Douglas has left the company to go be a teacher, but he’ll be back someday. (And that gives Vince an idea…)