Patriot Games!

A two-for-one here, a tribute to Del Wilkes, the Patriot, who died a few days ago of a heart attack, as well as a themed Independence Day review. Wilkes started off as the Trooper in the AWA’s dying days before becoming THE star of the nascent GWF, subsequently leaving when the money dried up and having a decent career wrestling in WCW, Japan and the WWF. In 1991, as a fan aged 9, I didn’t get to see the GWF in the UK but the magazines we got had me believing he could be as big as Sting and Hulk Hogan. Not quite, but still a star that could’ve really shone.

Starting off with a demolition derby!

The Patriot vs. Axis the Demolishor

Bill Eadie left the WWF after doing the job in infamous fashion at the 1990 Survivor Series, returning to the independent scene. In a pre-match promo he’s closer in delivery to the Masked Superstar and his gear is a longer leather jacket and a new mask with a silver face. Off the juice and no gel in his hair and a less ornate makeup job, pretty much down to a pair of red triangles. Joe Pedicino and Scott Hudson on the call. Eadie was also the booker early on too. As was the promotion’s problem, with no history yet, the commentary relies on allusions to stuff that happened in other places. Even just holding a side headlock early on the Patriot looks fucking jacked. His gear looks a little bit create-a-wrestler at this point, but the mask is one thing he got right from the beginning. Axis reverses to his own rear chinlock as it’s all working on the mat with minimal effort, although the paint has almost entirely run off with sweat. Finally a bit of something nearing interesting, with Axis dumping Patriot to the outside and throwing him onto the interview stage. Clothesline back in and Axis goes to the cobra clutch. Patriot reverses out, Axis misses a flying clothesline off the ropes. Patriot goes to the top and finishes off with the Patriot Missile for the win. Almost hit him with that too. Boring match with Bill keeping it in a low gear until the end. 0/1, with the only thing of interest being Ax slumming it.

The Patriot vs. Cactus Jack

From some repackaged show from the late nineties, with the announcers talking about Jack now being Mankind and Dude Love. Jack attacks Patriot as he comes into the ring, knocking him back outside, then quickly follows with the somersault senton off the apron! Back in, a kneedrop gets two. To the outside, Jack gets rid of some padding and slams Patriot to the floor and drops the elbow off the apron to the floor. He’s definitely letting it all hang out. Patriot manages to get a back suplex onto the concrete to start his comeback. Back in, he slams Cacti and goes up for the Patriot Missile, which hits, however Jack’s follow Cartel members Rip Rogers, Scott Anthony and Makhan Singh run in to save Jack. The likes of Chaz and Terry Garvin try to help out Patriot, but it’s Chaz and Terry Garvin, so that doesn’t go well until Conan Chris Walker and the Handsome Stranger run in. As exciting a match as the first one was boring. 1/2.

The Patriot vs. Hollywood John Tatum

If Tatum wants to do anything it’ll be decent, if not then it won’t. Tatum gets some stiff chops to start, but Patriot no-sells it as Tatum sells the hands being more sore than Patriot’s chest. Tatum slams Patriot, who’s up before John has finished his karate and muscle posing, turning around into a military press. Craig Johnson calls him the master of the “bionic pout”, which is more accurate than you’d know. Papa Shango inspiration Rasta the Voodoo Mon comes out to distract, as John feigns a knee injury to open up Patriot for a superkick that the camera almost forgets to catch. Rasta then walks off as Patriot makes his comeback with a dropkick and powerslam before finishing with, you guessed it, the Patriot Missile. You probably have to like John Tatum to enjoy this one and luckily I do, as he carried it all the way to the end with his folderol. 2/3.

The Patriot vs. The Soultaker

Now the guy who would go on to become Papa Shango. The entrance music they’re using for a lot of these matches is obviously manufactured stuff that doesn’t really sound like anything or have any sort of catchy tune. Soultaker has the V-shaped double mohawk that Berlyn later had. Joe and Scott talk about a potential Soultaker/Bad News Allen team, which in the Attitude Era would’ve made an awesome pair if Godfather could’ve carried Allen with the ringwork. After a bit of plodding stuff Patriot clothesline Soultaker out. Charles Wright as a wrestling heel generally turns into a charisma black hole, so the announcers have to remind us how big he is as his unique selling point. Bear in mind it’s a guy who has his entire arms and almost all of his chest tattooed in ’91. Patriot walks out of the corner into a side suplex back in the ring. ST can’t work out how to get the abdominal stretch on for a moment, or the standing guillotine as Joe calls it. Rope pulling for the first bit of heat. Patriot hip tosses out of it when the ref catches and breaks it. Future Ho Train avalanche off a reversed Irish whip into the corner, leading us into a thrilling nervehold, broken with elbows to the gut, although ST dumps Patriot off a charge. He grabs the boot and posts the knee twice. Patriot Missile is avoided, but Patriot avoids a final charge and rolls up his opponent for a win. Good that they were putting their top good guy over, but at the same time it looks like they were burning through guys. This would’ve been alright six years later in the WWF under a good agent, but both were as green as grass at this point. 2/4.

The Patriot vs. Bad News Allen

Joined in progress, with Patriot running into Allen’s stiff clothesline, but not going down until the third attempt. Choke on the ropes after some “judo” chops to the throat. I do wonder how Canada-based New Yorker Bad News ended up working for a Texas promotion. Patriot starts Patrioting up, with some crazy striations showing up on his chest as he tenses up. Clothesline and slam, followed by a VERY low impact elbowdrop. Weak Boston crab, with barely a bend on the knees, leaves Patriot susceptible for a sneak attack from the Soultaker for the DQ. Patriot makes his own comeback on both with a double Patriot Missile. Not much to this one. 2/5.

The Patriot vs. One Man Gang

Gang just passing through after his weird WCW run in ’91, here wearing his bizarre black tights and red “t-shirt” gear. He does his old routine where his head is rammed into the corner and he keeps on going when his attacker has stopped. Even though there are a lot of similar components, Gang looks more like a fat Animal than the giant he did in the eighties. He gets some shots in and bends Patriot’s neck. I imagine he was hired because they wanted a big guy who would let Patriot slam him. Gang gets some clubbing blows behind the neck but hits boot on avalanche attempt #1, leading to attempt #2 squashing the referee and a second ref coming in to stop the match, with both guys choking one another on the mat. Felt like the first match of a series, with them holding back stuff for the later matches. The order-restoring referees have haircuts worse than Gang’s mullhawk. 2/6.

The Patriot vs. Stan Lane

Still time to get this back up to a 50% success rate. Scotty the Body, or Scott Anthony, is on commentary. Corny and Sweet Stan were working pretty much anywhere before Smoky Mountain started up. The knockoff version of Chase they come out to sounds more like Tubular Bells. Corny’s topical reference is to Stan causes more riots than Guns N’Roses, so Stan brings the class down a little lower by referring to Corny as Jeffrey Dahmer’s favourite manager. Scott reveals that he has high friends in low places and that Patriot is actually Vladimir Badenoff of Leningrad, Russia. Sounds reasonable to me. Stan wants to waste time by insulting the audience one-by-one, so Patriot goes out and bitch slaps him and rolls him back in for a beating. Patriot goes back outside, presumably smelling some caviar, and gets hit back by Stan with the karate kicks. They exchange blows while trying to see who can stay on their feet longest. Patriot wins that before getting a screaming clothesline and dropkick. He goes to the top for the Patriot Missile, but Corny pushes him off. Stan gets two from that. The ref gets thumbed in the eye errantly, allowing Corny to hold up the racket in the corner, but it’s Stan’s head that goes into it and down he goes for the pinfall. Short but good, with Scott not letting up with the Russian allegations. 3/7.

The Patriot vs. Scott Anthony

Scotty the Body is a far better name, but Levy had pretensions of getting into acting, hence the more realistic/boring name. In a pre-match promo he boasts about eliminating the Handsome Stranger from Global, which should make him a good guy by default, then shits on his former Cartel compatriots. Patriot has been using a muzak version of Jump by Van Halen for some of these matches, which at least is a break from Springsteen, even if it’s not a good fit. Patriot powers out of top wristlock attempts early and gets a slam, as Scott sells and kvetches about as much as possible while Craig Johnson babbles on about the stupid Boss/Max Andrews storyline. Never a fan of that guy, he strikes me as the kind of guy who would spend his time talking about building suppliers while the Berlin Wall was coming down. Scott gets a nice butterfly suplex, but Patriot reverses another to a backslide for two. Patriot no-sells punches and gets a clothesline and dropkick. Quite interesting to see his regular series of big moves so often. Scott skips a powerslam and tries a sleeper, but is run into the corner. Anthony ducks a shoulderblock, taking down the ref, and Patriot gets the Missile with him down. He counts two upon recovering before Scott gets his foot on the rope. Scott gets a back suplex with the crowd fairly excited. Patriot reverses a second one. Sunset flip attempt leads to some cradles on the mat. Anthony goes for a chain but misses a loaded punch and is rolled up for two. Ref sees the chain and disqualifies him for having it in a weird finish. Shit finish, alright match. Strangely, Scotty was the one they were trying to keep going for him as an ongoing opponent, which makes sense as far as pushing the new guy and using the stars to put someone over, but jarring when you consider where he was in the lineup. 4/8.

The Meltdown: Some decent matches as well as some crap ones, but I would’ve bought the Patriot as the big hero when I was that age. RIP Del.