[Please note: This is the first version of what would become the Ring Report TV update. I wrote it as a kid on an old fashioned typewriter in the 1980s. Presented “as is” in original format. There was no internet, I couldn’t spell, so please be kind.]
Wrestling Report for the week of 7/27/86
AWA
- On the old AWA show shown on mistake in a different time slot by ESPN I found that Gene Okerlund was once an AWA Commentator.
- Larry Zybszko’s new word of the week: “Spudhead.” Reportedly meaning “ignoramus lowlife.”
- Earthquake Ferris is still acting as a referee, and is still giving quick counts to prevent injuries to the preliminary bums that get beat up.
- The Barbarian (NORD) is carrying around a stretcher ala Bruiser Brody (who is nowhere to be found in the AWA).
- Ali Kahn is a new member of Sheik Adnan Al Kasie’s army, he looks almost identical to Mad Dog Vachon, except he has a stupider grin, and really looks dumb.
- Scott Hall is still injured . . .
- The AWA is repeating old Stan Hansen matches, Stan or the old AWA belt haven’t surfaced yet.
- Ali Kahn and Sheik Adnan Al Kasie attacked Brad Rheigans after Rheigans won by DQ over Kahn when Kahn punched the referee. Al Kasie and Kahn beat Rheigans to a pulp and then grabbed the microphone and yelled that Kahn “was the best athlete that ever came out of Afghanistan.” Kahn looks more like he is from New Jersey than Nikolai Volkoff does (and he is said to be a long time New Jersey native).
WWF on TNT
- TNT has received a new set. It looks like the old set.
- Randy Savage and Elizabeth were greeted by Mean Gene, who was wearing women’s glasses. Then Gene introduced the president of the “macho madness fan club” who turned out to be some beer bellied guy wearing a wig of hair that was identical to Macho Man’s hair, along with identical sunglasses. He brought out his valet, “Esmerelda”, who was one of the good looking girls from “the mating game” where Jim Niedhart chose the Fabulous Moolah. The guy had Esmerelda take off his jacket for him, and treated her the way Macho Man treats Elizabeth. Macho Man responded by saying “right on, that’s the way to do it” and so the dude with the New Jersey accent (New Jersey? Isn’t New Jersey getting a lot of coverage?), ordered Esmerelda around for a while, then showed off his muscles (cough, choke). He did a rear view, which showed off his shirt that said “Randy who?” on the back.
Macho Man go up and ran to the guy, ripped off the shirt, the hair, and the glasses to reveal Lord Alfred Hayes with a beer belly! Macho Man stormed off the set with Elizabeth and Lord Lord Al had to spend the rest of the show recuperating in the dressing room. - Adrion Adonis brought the Flower Shop set with him, and his personal florist Mr. Bruce. Yes, Mr. Bruce was acting to be gay, and doing a bad job of it. He said he was nervous, and Adrion was ordering him to cut the flowers, do this, d that. Then a sound track of a bee sound “buzzzzz” was played and Bruce freaked. He screamed that he was terrified of bees, and that Adrion should protect him. The bee sound then disappeared.
Mr. Bruce went on to show Mean Gene how to arrange flowers, and then the bee sound came back, and Bruce grabbed a squirt bottle full of water. He yelled that the bee was on Adrion, and Adrion freaked, Bruce chased Adrion around the set squirting his rear end with water.
Out of Mr. Bruce, Mean Gene, Adrion and Jimmy Hart, Hart actually looked more macho and fierce than any of them!
World Class Area
- Kerry Von Erich is such a dweeb! He had an update from the hospital where he is recovering from his Motorcycle accident. He sounded like someone had taken out his brain instead of fixing his knee. This man was once NWA World Champ? I prefer Flair, at least Flair can put a full sentence together without sounding like an @hole.
- Skip Young is a new comer to the World Class Area. He looks in shape, wrestles like a prelim bum, and beat the hell out of Killer Brooks in their match.
- Steve Simpson (yah, he still sounds stupid in interviews), and Chris Adams have formed a tag team. They don’t do quick tags, and Adams (surprisingly), is the weak factor in the team (Adams is also now wrestling without his eye patch). They took on the Great Kabuki and Rick Rude.
Now Percy Pringle is only managing Rude, and Kabuki knows that, but signed the match anyway. It was highlighted by Percy Pringle’s interference with his cane. He was trying to hit Simpson with the can while Kabuki held him down, but missed and hit Kabuki. Simpson rolled Kabuki over and pinned him. Kabuki then went crazy and attacked Rude and threw Pringle over the top rope. He demolished Rude and Killer Brooks ran in to help kill Rude. Results: Rude and Pringle had to go running back to the dressing room. - Kevin Von Erich took on Matt Borne in the main event. I was surprised by Borne! Borne dropped his bleached blonde hair and Rip Oliver style brown beard. He used to be almost identical to Oliver, but now he has a grayish-black hair and the same color beard. This made me think of the days when he and Rip Oliver were feuding, and seeing Borne destroyed in the Seattle Civic Center by Rip Oliver at my only live wresting experience.
The match was up and down, Kevin showed that rabid fan support and Borne showed Kevin a couple of right hands. But eventually he got Borne in the Iron Claw and it looked like lights out time. When Buzz Sawyer ran into the ring (swear the man is insane), and attacked Kevin! He and Borne double teamed Kevin then Buzz piledrived Kevin on to Borne’s knee, Kevin was left out cold . . .
NWA Florida
- The Fabulous Ones are top seeded (not seated), at the up-coming U.S. Tag Team tournament to decide the holders of the US Titles (it’s been a long time coming.
- Kendal Windham received an eye injury from a brawl where the Cuban Assassin wrapped a leather belt around his hand and “Sunday punched” Windham. Kendal will be out for about 2 weeks (nothing to worry about).
- Pat Rose got his first loss in the area, on TV he lost to rookie Mark Star in a scientific Match.
- Barry Windham and Lex Luger took on Ed “the Bull” Gantner (Gordon Solie said “Brantley” last week), and Cowboy Ron Bass. It was a brawl highlighted by Kendal Windham’s outside the ring attack on Ron Bass with his leather belt (yes, Kendal, not Barry). Which brought the Ninja running out to attack Barry (inside the ring), the Ninja and Gantner threw Barry out of the ring as Ron Bass ko’d Kendal. Bass entered the ring, and the Ninja, Bass and Gantner triple teamed Luger. Luger was not able to fight back because he ended up being hung with the leather belt that Kendal whipped Bass with, and which Bass took with him into he ring.
Kendal was out cold (and if my spelling of “Kendal” changes from letter to letter, it’s because I’ve seen it spelled both ways “del” or “dal”), and brother Barry tried to come back into the right, the triple teaming of Luger stopped as Bass threw Luger over the top rope. Gantner and Bass held Barry as the Ninja took the metal pick (the metal you stick into the holes on the belt to keep your belt around your waist), and jammed it into Barry’s head, opening up a huge cut. Bass, Gantner and the Ninja then headed to the dressing room. - The next match had Shawn Royale destroy Jerry Gray, which turned into a wild brawl.
- Jim Backlund then took on the Cuban Assassin, and the Cuban Assassin was beat up, but won by pinfall.
- Chris Champion destroyed Ricky Santanna, then issued a challenge to Lex Luger and Barry Windham.
WWF
- Billy Jack Haynes finally got some decent competition on the Monday Night WWF show. He took on Brutis Beefcake, and won by DQ when Johnny Valiant tripped Haynes.
- The British Bulldogs had 2 them songs (so far), “Loving every minute of it”, and the classical “Rule of the Champions,” which is a very British Tune.
- Dick Slater is in the WWF calling himself “the rebel”, waving a Confederate flag, and having an opening tune ‘Dixie.’
- The Rogueau Brothers have made a reappearance in the WWF, and got more than their fair share of fan support.
- On the Paul Orndorff attack on Hogan thing: Bruno Sammartino says “I’ve lost all respect for Orndorff.” While Vinnie says “Hulk is ok physically; but I don’t know about it mentally.” Vinnie must know something, because the Hulk Hogan vs. Paul Orndorff match has been signed for the World title belt. I applaud Orndorff, it turned around his sagging career, and he finally gets a title shot. More wrestlers should do this to avoid the unwritten WWF rule of not paring fan favorites vs. fan favorites.
- Jack Tunney (WWF President), was interviewed, and says if Bobby Heenan can prove that Andre is the Giant Machine by taking off the mask, then Tunney will suspend Andre for life from the WWF! Good luck to Heenan, because Vinnie already has to get rid of his Hillbilly Jim merchandise, his Roddy Piper merchandise — so what will it hurt if he gets rid of Andre’s merchandise too?
- “Handsome” Harley Race was almost destroyed by Ton Atlas. Tony “preliminary is my destiny” Atlas? Race pulled out a win (barley).
- Paul Orndorff was on the flower shop and yelled at the fans, he is now managed by, you guessed it, Bobby Heenan. I’d like to see him and “horrible” Harley team up.
- Is it me, or are the WWF officials and referees looking more and more like Vinnie McMahon?
- Jake Roberts is still raising hell with that g.d. snake! People are actually cheering for it.
With the entrance of Dick Slater to the WWF (as a rulebreaker), I wonder what Roberts is thinking. It was an incident with Slater over the North American Heavyweight Championship (now called UWF Championship), that brought Jake and hi snakes to the WWF. What is going to happen between the two? Nothing probably, but keep and eye out, because Roberts is now getting cheers (remember the Road Warriors being hated by everyone then they started getting cheered by the fans and they didn’t do anything to change their style. Look at those Road Warrior fan favorites now) . . . - Fred Blassie reportedly (from his own mouth on TV), sold 1/2 the contract for Nikolai Volkoff and the Iron Sheik. Next week we find out to whom, I don’t think it is to one of the managers in the stable of the WWF yet. I know the mystery owner isn’t Sheik Adnan Al Kasie, but maybe Gen. Skandar Ackbar? Or somebody new . . .
- The highlight of the 6-man tag team match pitting Sivi Afi, Ricky Steamboat and King Tonga vs. e preliminary bums was the pre-match “festivities.” Sivi Afi did the fire dance, Ricky Steamboat looked for a place to put his Dragon’s cage, and King Tonga looked sick. Needless to say, they won the match.
- Cousin Luke is back in the WWF, except it isn’t the Cousin Luke that replaced Cousin Jr. It is a new guy in old Hillbilly Jim clothes, dancing to “Don’t go Messing with a Country Boy” tune. He and his partner got their @sses kicked by Greg Valentine and Brutis Beefcake.
- Leaping Lanny Poffo wrestled Tony Atlas and lost on the Monday Night Show . . .
NWA World Championship Area aka Mid-Atlantic
- Dusty Rhodes was attacked by Big Bubba in a cage match that put America’s Team (not the Atlanta Braves), up against the Midnight Express and Jim Cornette.
- Magnum TA is still down 3-0 to Niketa . . .
- Ronnie Garvin won the Nation Title from Tully Blanchard, when JJ Dillion jumped into the ring on top of Garvin, he then slipped a pair of Brass Knuckles into Ronnie’s tights — Ronnie thought JJ was getting fresh, and pounded him. The ref. gave Ronnie the belt when JJ demanded that Ronnie’s tights be searched, the brass knucks were found, and the belt was given back to Tully . . .
That’s all