The SmarK Rant for Memphis Wrestling – 01.18.86

The SmarK Rant for Memphis Wrestling – 01.18.86

Taped from Memphis, TN

Your hosts are Lance Russell & Dave Brown

Superstar Bill Dundee v. Jim Jamison

Before the match, Bill wants a word with Lance Russell, and because he’s so good-looking and prompts all the ladies watching to get the good loving from their big fat husbands, he doesn’t want to face a scrub like Jim. Moving on, last week Bill got involved with Big Red Reese in a match at the Mid-South Coliseum, but Lance “didn’t call the match properly” and so Bill screened the match for his friends Dutch Mantel and Buddy Landel at his private residence, and they redid commentary for it themselves.

Superstar Bill Dundee v. Big Red Reese

Bill and Budro discuss the hardships of being a sex symbol, and all the people who wrote in against animal cruelty, because Big Red is a WHALE and they were beating on him too much. So Dundee runs away from Reese while Dutch questions why someone named Big Red would be dressed like the Jolly Green Giant. “He keeps sticking his head right into your fist, Bill, I don’t understand it.” Dundee tries to slug it out in the corner and loses that, so he runs away and makes friends with the old ladies at ringside, and then distracts Red with a chair and dropkicks him into the ropes. Bill slugs away on the ropes and chokes him out, which Bill explains was him “giving mouth to mouth to big fat Kermit the Frog because I thought he was gonna have a heart attack and die”, but Big Red makes the comeback. Red misses a splash and the ref gets wiped out as a result, and this brings Dutch out with a chain. Red fights him off, but Dundee gets the chain and knocks him out for the pin to retain at 6:30. Terrible match but Bill and Budro on commentary were hilarious.

Meanwhile, our upcoming main event for Evansville is a loser leaves town match for the Southern title, with Bill Dundee defending against Steve Keirn. I’m assuming Keirn was going back to Florida for a while anyway.

Billy Travis v. The Invader

Travis takes him down and works the arm to start, but Invader fights out, so Travis puts him down with a back suplex and armbars him again. Travis slams him and drops a leg on him before going to a chinlock. Backbreaker and pump splash finish at 3:15. Travis was still finding his personality at this point.

Meanwhile, at the Coliseum, the Blade Runners face Phil Hickerson & Billy Travis in a match where we tragically never learn if it lived up to the pedigree you would expect from that combination of people, and quickly turns into a heel beatdown from Borden & Hellwig as they get disqualified, busting open Hickerson with their manager’s shoe until the Spoiler makes the save with his own boot.

Meanwhile, it’s another plug for the Evansville show, and Lance Russell is way better at hyping that stuff than Randy Hales is.

Austin Idol has a music video showcasing his chops as a top babyface, as he’s hoping to claim the spot left open by the departure of Jerry Lawler. Your soundtrack: “The Kid Is Hot Tonight” by Loverboy, which is actually the complete opposite of what you’d want for your top babyface. The song is about a girl who dumps the singer for a hot new studmuffin, who then turns out to be a dud. Come to think of it, it’s kind of a metaphor for Austin Idol’s career, as he would get hot for a short period, but where will he be tomorrow? Usually somewhere else.

The Raiders v. Tojo Yamamoto & Dirty Rhodes

The Raiders are the latest wacky masked Memphis tag team, and Rhodes, aka Roger Smith, is the morally questionable “cousin” of Dusty Rhodes, who looks kinda sorta like Dusty if you ordered him off Temu. Dirty fights off both Raiders and it’s over to Tojo, who may have been 80 years old here for all I can tell, and takes a Raider down with armdrags before throwing chops in the corner. And Rhodes comes in and drops an elbow on a Raider for the pin at 2:54.

The Fantastics join Lance, and they’re currently running a contest where a lucky lady can win a date with the Fantastics. YOU MUST BE 18 YEARS OLD, we can’t stress that enough. Looking at you, Jerry Lawler. So you need to write a letter of 100 words or less about why you should win a date with them, and although Bobby Fulton would love to pack every woman in Memphis into one limo, there can only be 2 winners. But then Buddy Landel interrupts and annoys the Fantastics into leaving. And he’s announcing his OWN dating contest, and all you have to do is send in an 8×10 photo of yourself, despite the fact that he hasn’t seen any good-looking women in Memphis yet. But for the lucky woman who wins, it’ll kickstart their career like Farah Fawcett. Plus he’s got a poster of himself to give to the lucky woman. ONE GIRL ONLY. Sure he COULD handle more than one at the same time, but he’s only one man. This was tremendous.

Dutch Mantel v. Kevin McQueen

McQueen has a good look like a young Scott Hall, but I don’t think he ever lasted much past this. Dutch absorbs some quick offense from McQueen, but then quickly finishes with the MX suplex at 2:02.

Buddy Landel v. David Johnson

Budro puts him down with a dropkick and snapmares him into a chinlock, then slams him and drops the corkscrew elbow and finishes with the figure-four at 1:24.

Meanwhile, Bill and Budro complain about the upcoming loser leaves town match in Evansville, as Bill was tricked into signing the contract under duress and the whole thing is a huge conspiracy against them.

The Fantastics & Koko Ware & Rick Casey v. Tony Falk & Pat Rose & Rip Morgan & Taras Bulba

Bulba starts with Fulton and gets armdragged and dropkicked as a result, and he tags out to Morgan. Weird that Morgan and Jonathan Boyd were cashing in on the Sheepherders name while the real deal was tearing up the UWF at this point. Pat Rose comes in and Casey quickly handles him with an atomic drop, so Falk comes in and gets destroyed as well. Wendell Cooley going to a generic cowboy character in Memphis was a pretty big step down for him, but he was fine doing that act. Fantastics double-team Falk and pin him at 4:16 after some fast action, and that’s the show.

The Bill & Budro Show rolls on! I’m stunned that I could actually discover a show that would make me CARE ABOUT SEEING BUDDY LANDEL, but here we are.