What the World Was Watching: WWF Prime Time Wrestling – April 9, 1990

Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby Heenan are tonight’s studio hosts. Monsoon asks Heenan if the Heenan Family is seeing growing defections. Heenan is aghast at what happened with Andre the Giant at WrestleMania, opining that the big man cannot take directions. Monsoon makes a good point that Heenan failed to help get Andre out of the ropes at WrestleMania, thereby costing his team the WWF Tag Team Championship.

Rhythm & Blues squash match from yesterday’s Wrestling Challenge is shown. Heenan says he likes Rhythm & Blues’ new hit single, but he is not a big fan of the Honkettes.

Gene Okerlund does the Update segment to narrate pictures of the WrestleMania VI main event.

Tugboat (4-0) pins Pez Whatley after a splash at 5:50:

This match took place at Madison Square Garden on March 19, which is where all of the other matches on tonight’s broadcast come from. Since the bout was at a house show it is longer than most TV squashes and Whatley gets more offense. He knocks Tugboat down to one knee and tries to do the phantom object trick. After some dreadfully boring action, Tugboat finally puts Whatley out of his misery with a splash.

Heenan says that Tugboat’s big yell is reflective of indigestion because one cannot eat well on a ship. Then he shifts to tell the Ultimate Warrior to keep the WWF Championship Belt shiny for Rick Rude.

The Bad News Brown squash from Superstars is shown. After, Heenan relays what Brother Love told him about the Roddy Piper-Brown match at WrestleMania, which is wrong. Monsoon says Piper and Brown are bound to face off again.

Sean Mooney segways to superstar promos. Tito Santana says that no one is going to stop him from getting a title match in the WWF. Mr. Perfect, with the Genius, puts over his athletic abilities and says that the rest of the WWF needs to give him respect.

Dusty Rhodes’ squash from Superstars airs. Heenan likens Rhodes and Sapphire’s dancing to seeing “two slippery trucks on the highway.” He also complains about Elizabeth getting favorable treatment for showing up at the WrestleMania mixed tag because if he appeared, he would have caught hell for it.

A replay of Rick Martel’s interview with Okerlund on Wrestling Challenge is shown. It is followed after the commercial break with a replay of Rick Rude’s gym promo from Superstars.

Koko B. Ware (5-2) defeats Frenchy Martin after the Ghostbuster at 12:53 shown:

Martin was a Canadian talent who started wrestling in 1971. After wrestling for Stampede Wrestling and International Wrestling, he moved onto Puerto Rico’s WWC promotion, winning the tag team titles four times and the Caribbean Heavyweight Championship. In the early 1980s he competed for Montreal’s Lutte Internationale, winning the tag team titles several times, and then joined the WWF as a enhancement talent in October 1986. His multilingual background let him host studio shows for the WWF’s broadcasts in Canada and Latin America and he transitioned to a managerial role for Dino Bravo in late 1987, a role he held until Ronnie Garvin beat him up at WrestleMania V. After that, Martin returned to in-ring competition but rarely appearing on syndicated shows.

The match is the perfect excuse for fans to go to the bathroom as Martin swallows Ware up and works long nerve holds. At least the bout has fun banter between Vince McMahon and Jesse Ventura, who love blasting the old referee for missed calls and a poor count cadence. After twelve long minutes, Ware finally gets into an offensive groove and finishes with the Ghostbuster. McMahon’s call for the finish is hilarious: “The Ghostbuster, that’ll do it! 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7….” This is the worst match on WWF television this year, but the commentary covered for a lot of it. Rating: DUD

A replay of the Earthquake and Hulk Hogan promos from Wrestling Challenge air. Heenan says that Hogan is nothing without the WWF Championship.

Ronnie Garvin’s squash from Wrestling Challenge is shown.

A replay of the Bushwhackers appearance on the Brother Love Show on Superstars airs.

Dino Bravo’s squash match from Superstars is shown.

Monsoon and Heenan talk about what WWF President Jack Tunney might do with the Intercontinental Championship. Monsoon chides Tunney for not making a decision in years, while Heenan says the Ultimate Warrior is going to have to give up one of his titles because he cannot defend them both.

Time for more superstar promos! Hillbilly Jim says he can only do what he does in the ring because of the fans. The Warlord and Slick put over the Warlord’s physical attributes and how he is going to punish the rest of the WWF roster.

Heenan talks on the banana phone to “his mom” who is irate about not getting the right tickets for WrestleMania because Monsoon gave him the wrong ones. Monsoon promises that Heenan will get no tickets for WrestleMania VII.

Hercules (6-2) defeats Black Bart via submission to a torture rack at 12:19:

Since this match is another long slog, McMahon prefers to talk about Howard Finkel celebrating ten years as a Madison Square Garden announcer, then he and Ventura talk about Ventura eating monkey meat in the Philippines, and they wrap up by discussing Ventura’s Hollywood career. Like the Koko B. Ware-Frenchy Martin match earlier, this lacks crowd heat because Bart controls a lot of the match even though is a television jobber. Whoever the agent was for these bouts should be fired. Eventually Hercules finds a second wind, hits some clotheslines, and gets the torture rack to prevail. This is not worth rating because of Bart’s jobber status.

Heenan insists that the “H” on Hercules’ boots is for “Humanoids” and that Hercules might be their leader. He tells Monsoon that there will soon be another member of the Heenan Family. Monsoon teases Heenan that Andre the Giant is going to hunt him down.

The Last Word: This was easily the worst episode of Prime Time Wrestling this year as all three new matches were dreadful to sit through. It would have been even worse without Vince McMahon and Jesse Ventura shooting the breeze throughout the last two, though.

Up Next: WWF Superstars for April 14!