Ask 411 Wrestling 09.09.09: The Hogan/Jarrett Shoot, Tag Champs Switching Partners, and Educated Wrestlers!

Posted by Ryan Byers on 09.09.2009

Where was the Vince McMahon death angle going before it was derailed? What was Great Muta doing in WCW? Where did the Undertaker's "Sara" tattoo go and why? All of this and more awaits you in Ask 411!

Welcome, my friends, to Ask 411 Wrestling. I am Ryan Byers, once again filling in for Matthew Sforcina who is at, ahem, a top secret location this week. However, do not fear! I am here to guide you through the world of professional wrestling questions, quotes, and queries all with (hopefully) the same grace as your favourite Aussie. Without further adieu, let's head in to the meat of the column!



From time to time, I've been helping Matt out with some coverage on puroresu questions. I guess we'll start with one of those, which has been posed by Laszlo Takacs:

What was the deal with WCW allegiance to NJPW and AJPW in the early 90's? Between 90 – 93 WCW had Vader and Muta who seemed to be under contract with NJPW as well as having Stan Hansen, Steve Williams and Terry Gordy who were all AJPW performers. To the best of my knowledge WCW signed talent (other than Stan Hansen, Steve Williams and Terry Gordy) only wrestled for NJPW in Japan; what exactly was the relationship with AJPW?

This is a bit of a tangled web to unweave. I suppose that we will start by saying that there was not much of a formal working relationship between WCW and AJPW during the period that you are asking about. Both of the promotions were members of the National Wrestling Alliance for many years, but All Japan seceded from the NWA at some point between the years of 1986 and 1990. (Different sources list different dates.) For what it is worth, WCW remained an NWA member until roughly September of 1993. There was a formal working relationship between WCW and NJPW, but this really didn't start rolling along until 1991.

So how do the timelines of the wrestlers that Laszlo mentioned fit in with the timelines of the relationships between these promotions? Well, it goes a little something like this:

The Great Muta was a young, relatively unestablished pro wrestler in New Japan who was sent to the United States in the mid-1980's to go on a "learning excursion" meant to polish him so that he could become a reliable main eventer when he returned to his come country. Muta spent time in many different promotions, including World Class and Championship Wrestling from Florida before ultimately winding up in Jim Crockett Promotions and later WCW. However, his learning excursion and thus his first WCW run ended in 1990, at which point he went back to his home promotion.

Stan Hansen's run with WCW was also in 1990, and it came after he finished a run with All Japan Pro Wrestling. However, he lasted less than a full year in WCW, as he had a significant disagreement with the bookers over whether he would be involved in an angle with a comedic trio of wrestlers known as the Desperados. He almost immediately returned to AJPW.

Dr. Death and Terry Gordy were members of the WCW roster in 1992. They were wrestling with All Japan that year as well, and they actually left WCW because the company's brass wanted them change their Japanese allegiances and wrestle for NJPW as opposed to AJPW.

Essentially, all of what you saw was a bi-product of the fact that, in the late 1980's and early 1990's, American wrestlers were much closer to being true "independent contractors" than they are in 2009. Though guys might have been locked in to competing for a particular American promotion, they were still largely calling their own shots as far as which foreign companies they wanted to work for. On top of that, Japanese companies generally did not (and still do not, for that matter) offer long-term contracts to foreign wrestlers. Instead, the Japanese promotions, which go "on tour" for several weeks and then take several weeks off, will bring their foreign wrestlers in for individual tours. The result of this was wrestlers like Gordy, Williams, and Vader being able to compete for the American promotion that they were contracted to when they were in the United States and simultaneously being able to compete for the Japanese promotion of their choice when they were in Japan.

Of course, this did lead to tension from time to time. As noted above, Williams and Gordy left WCW over the fact that they felt pressured to begin wrestling for New Japan instead of All Japan, a promotion to which they wished to remain loyal. The end result was a more formal structure in which it became quite rare to see a wrestler competing in a foreign promotion without that participation being signed off on by the company he was contracted to in his home country.

Ian is a thinking man's wrestling fan, and thus wants to know:

How many wrestlers do you know of that have a college degree, and what is each degree in?

Boy, oh, boy. I will preface this answer by saying that this is one of those questions that has such a broad scope that there is no way I will be able to come up with an exhaustive list, so please do not chastize me for leaving anybody out. I will include as many notable examples as I can think of, though.

The wrestlers that immediately spring to mind in response of this question are the wrestlers who had college attendance as a part of their gimmick. Rick and Scott Steiner obviously both graduated from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, though I cannot for the life of me tell you what their degrees are in. Similarly, the Varsity Club featured wrestlers wearing lettermen's jackets of their legitimate alma maters. Mike Rotunda graduated from Syracuse, Steve Williams graduated from the University of Oklahoma, and Danny Spivey graduated from the University of Georgia. A wrestler with a similar gimmick in more recent years was Chris "Harvard" Nowinski of Tough Enough fame, who majored in sociology.

Of course, the Steiners, the Varsity Club, and Nowinski, were all college athletes. However, they are not the only college athletes to later turn to professional wrestling. West Texas State University, which is now formally known as West Texas A&M University, has a long history of graduating professional wrestlers. Bruiser Brody, Tully Blanchard, Ted DiBiase Sr., Dory Funk Jr., Terry Funk, Stan Hansen, Dusty Rhodes, and Tito Santana all attended the school at various points, and almost all of them played football for the school.

Two great professional wrestlers also emerged from Florida universities. Ron Simmons was a student and a football player at Florida State University. Several years later, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson played football for the University of Miami. When Rocky concluded his college football career, he had a degree in criminology and physiology.

Of course, not every professional wrestler who went to college had a memorable career as a student athlete. Though I do not know whether she ever graduated, Tammy "Sunny" Sytch studied both at the prestigious Wellesley College in Massachusetts and then later at the University of Tennessee once she began performing in Smoky Mountain Wrestling in the south. She desired at one time to be a medical doctor, but obviously that did not happen.

It was often mentioned early in his career on WWF television that D-Lo Brown has in the past legitimately worked as a certified public accountant. Of course, that requires some sort of accounting degree, which in D-Lo's case he acquired at the University of Maine.

Educated professional wrestlers aren't confined solely to the United States, either. If you watched WCW in the late 1990's, you probably remember seeing Villano IV and Villano V on the show. Those men were two members of a large professional wrestling family. Their father, legendary luchadore Rey Mendoza, had five sons, all of whom became wrestlers under the Villano name. One of the interesting things about the family is that Mendoza required that ALL of his sons obtain degrees before beginning their wrestling careers. (However, some of the brothers actually wrestled before completing their studies under masks, using gimmicks that they hid from their father.) From what I understand, Villanos I and III obtained degrees that would allow them to teach the Mexican equivalent of high school physical education. Villanos II and V I am not as familiar with. Villano IV is the most interesting of the group, as he is actually a CERTIFIED DENTIST in addition to being a professional wrestler.

I guess that means that, after he knocks an opposing wrestler's teeth out, he can put them back in.

Stephen W. Hall gives us a question that can be resolved relatively quickly:

Why has the WWE removed the "Sara" tattoo from the Undertaker in all of his pictures? I have read articles that state the WWE has done this, but never gives an explanation. Could you fill me in on this?

There's an old philosophical principle known as Occam's razor which states that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one. That principle definitely applies here.

The Sara tattoo has been removed from the Undertaker's neck because the Undertaker is no longer involved with his former wife Sara.

It's as simple as that.

Dent Kelly wants me to answer a question about Mick Foley. Yeah, that'll put asses in seats.

When Foley won his first WWE title I clearly remember him winning it on the last RAW of 1998. Yet most said it happened on the first RAW of 1999. I clearly remember that night as when WCW killed itself with that god-awful show of Nitro. You know, the two nWo factions merging and killing Goldberg's momentum once and for all. So, did Foley win the title on the last Raw of 98, or the first Raw of 99?

Depending on how you want to spin the facts, it is correct to say that he won the title on either the last Raw of 1998 or the first Raw of 1999. At the time that Foley began his first title reign, certain episodes of Monday Night Raw still did not air live. Mankind's title win was actually taped on December 29, 1998 but did not air until January 4, 1999. It was the last Raw taping of 1998 but the first Raw episode of 1999. The tape delayed nature of the show was what allowed Eric Bischoff to confidently give away the results of the show in the competing episode of WCW Monday Nitro, infamously and smugly claiming that Foley as champion would really "put asses in seats."

I'm not quite sure why you would remember him winning title on the last Raw of 1998 when you would have watched it in January 1999, but people's memories are funny like that. If I recall correctly, the WWF blurred the lines a little bit themselves when they posted the results of the match on their website immediately after the tapings, which is a rare (but neither unprecedented nor unrepeated) move.

Adam presents a six pack of questions, one of which is about a six pack:

1) Was the idea of the Dudley family father (who impregnated hundreds of different women from everywhere) a rib on or reference to the old school manager & Vince Snr's Limo Driver James Dudley?

Not that I am aware of. According to Raven, the Dudley family was actually inspired by the Hanson brother characters in the 1977 hockey movie Slap Shot. The Dudleys' father, a prolific propagator, was referred to on commentary as "Willy Loman Dudley" and was supposedly able to knock up many different women across the country because of his job of as a travelling salesman. Of course, "Willy Loman" is the name of the lead character in Arthur Miller's classic play Death of a Salesman.

So, the Dudley Boys were certainly inspired by many different sources, but I have never heard that James Dudley was one of them. In fact, I have heard absolutely nothing about Dudley's sexual appetites which would lead to the character being based on him.

2) In the current WWF opening video there is a short black and white clip right at the beginning, of two wrestlers in a collar and tie up, do you know who these two are and/or what match it is?

This is one of those answers which is actually very difficult to confirm without access to the WWE video library . . . and even then it may be impossible because who knows how well the information there is actually indexed. However, the few sources that do speculate as to the subject of this footage believe it to be of a 1901 match at Madison Square Garden between Ernest C. Roeber and August Faust. Roeber, who was of German descent, twice held a certain European Greco-Roman Heavyweight Title, which is important because it would go on to be one of the many championships that George Hackenschmidt would win in the early 1900's en route to being recognized as one of the first world heavyweight champions. Of course, Hackenschmidt would have a series of matches for that title with Frank Gotch the were among the biggest stories in sports during the early days of the twentieth century.

It's interesting to note that, even though this clip opens up most WWE TV shows these days, it is not even of a match promoted by WWE or any of its predecessor companies. Jess McMahon, the grandfather of Vince McMahon Jr. and the first member of the family to promote wrestling shows, would have been a teenager at the time that it took place and not yet involved in the business.

3) On 14th April 1894 the first ever commercial films were released (ten in total) at Holland Bros Kinetoscope Parlor, among the films on offer was a wrestling match called "wrestling". Who was featured in this match?

Frankly, I've racked my brain and checked all of my resources, and I just can't figure this one out. Readers are willing to help out if they can. If I were to make an educated guess, I would not be surprised to learn that one of the participants in the match was the aforementioned Ernest Roeber, as, if you take a look at the information available about early cinema, he was the subject of many early films related to wrestling. However, I have not been able to confirm that he was involved in the original Holland Brothers' short.

4) On the 19/10/84 WWF ran an outdoor stadium event in Pueto Rico, the event became infamous because of the show taking place in a thunderstorm. The Studd/Hogan match from the card was on the Hulk Still Rules DVD, do you know the rest of the card?

The show took place on October 19, 1985 (not 1984) in San Juan, Puerto Rico in a baseball stadium that seated 18,000 people. The show was not only infamous because of the rainstorm but also because, even though it was held in a relatively large venue, only 1,200 people attended.

The card was as follows:

1. Ricky Steamboat defeated Moondog Spot via pinfall with a version of the enziguri. Many years later, Spot, a former WWWF Tag Team Champion, would go on to become a sad footnote wrestling history, when he died from a heart attack during a match held on November 29, 2003 in Memphis.

2. WWF Women's Champion Wendi Richter w/ Cyndi Lauper & David Wolff def. The Spider Lady w/ The Fabulous Moolah with a top rope cross body block. I am not 100% certain who was playing the masked Spider Lady for this appearance, but I believe that, the majority of the time, lady grappler Penny Mitchell was under the hood. Of course, on November 25, 1985, Richter would wrestle the Spider Lady for the title again, and this time it was Moolah playing the character. Richter thought that she was winning the match, but, much to her surprise, she was cradled and pinned in the middle of the ring. Supposedly, this pre-Montreal "screwjob" was orchestrated by Vince McMahon and WWF brass when Richter refused to sign a new contract with the company.

3. WWF World Heavyweight Champion Hulk Hogan defeated John Studd via count out when Studd walked out on the match. This was the bout most heavily affected by the rain, and the count out finish may well as come as a result of the fact that the weather prevented them from doing a damn thing.

4. Corporal Kirschner def. Tiger Chung Lee via pinfall with a clothesline. The rain had cleared up by this point.

5. WWF Intercontinental Champion Tito Santana defeated Randy Savage via pinfall with a small package. These two were severely hindered by all of the water that had built up in the ring during the card.

As you might suspect from the inclusion of the Hogan/Studd match on the "Hulk Still Rules" DVD, this entire card was video taped. It has recently aired on WWE Vintage Collection, which is a television program showing classic wrestling footage that airs in most of WWE's major international markets but not in the United States.

5) Has there ever been a Six Pack Challenge match contested under Elimination Rules?

Well, that depends on what you mean by "Six Pack Challenge." If you're talking about a "Six Pack Challenge Match" held in the WWF/WWE and therefore called by that name, I was not able to find any record of any of those matches being contested under elimination rules.

However, there have been some six-way matches contested under elimination rules. The one that springs to my mind immediately was hosted by the old World Wrestling All-Stars promotion. For those of you who may not remember the WWA, it was a group that promoted a handful of shows in 2002 and 2003 and taped them for pay per view release in the United States, essentially trying to capture some of the wrestling PPV market after both WCW and ECW went under.

WWA's February 24, 2002 show, which was taped for pay per view in the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas Nevada featured an opener that pitted AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, Tony Mamaluke, Nova (later Simon Dean), Low Ki, and Shark Boy against one another. In roughly twenty minutes, Ki pinned Sharky, Styles pinned Mamaluke, Daniels pinned Ki, Styles pinned Daniels, and, finally, Nova pinned Styles to win the match.

There is also an independent promotion named Maryland Championship Wrestling which pays tribute to a deceased member of its roster with the annual "Shane Shamrock Memorial Cup" tournament. Every Shamrock Cup show features six singles matches, with the winner of each singles match moving on to a six-way elimination match in the main event. Though it is a smaller indy group, MCW has managed to stay alive for many years and regularly brings in top independent talent. Generally they use the outside talent to put over their own regular stars, as can be seen from the following list of Shamrock Cup winners over the years:

1999 – Christian York
2000 – Qeenan Creed
2001 – Joey Matthews (later WWE's Joey Mercury)
2002 – "Reckless Youth" Tom Carter
2003 – Christian York
2006 – Ruckus
2007 – Josh Daniels
2008 – Derek Fraizer
2009 – Ryan McBride

You may notice that, in 2004 and 2005, there were no Shamrock Cup winners. That is because in 2004, there was an agreement between MCW and ROH under which ROH would take over promoting the Shamrock Cup shows. However, ROH kept the concept but renamed the tournament "Survival of the Fittest." The six-way elimination matches remained, and we have seen the following Survival of the Fittest finals over the years:

2004 – Bryan Danielson def. Colt Cabana, Mark Briscoe, Austin Aries, Homicide & Samoa Joe
2005 – Roderick Strong def. Samoa Joe, Colt Cabana, Jay Lethal, Chris Daniels & Austin Aries

(In 2006, Survival of the Fittest was downsized in to a five way. Delirious defeated Austin Aries, Jay Briscoe, Mark Briscoe, and Matt Sydal.)

2007 – Chris Hero def. Claudio Castagnoli, Austin Aries, Rocky Romero, Roderick Strong, & The Human Tornado

6) Apart from Ric Flair has any Champion ever been fired whilst still holding a championship?

Well, the answer to this question depends in part on what your definition of the word "fired" is, but here are some incidents which at least come close to fitting the description:

1965: In the Japan Wrestling Alliance, the first wrestling promotion of note in Japan, the All Asia Tag Team Titles were at one point held by Giant Baba & Toyonobori. Toyonobori was forced out of the promotion, and, as a result, the team was forced to vacate the titles. The All Asia Tag Titles later became a part of All Japan Pro Wrestling after the JWA folded.

1969: In a similar situation with the All Asia Tag Team Titles, Michiaki Yoshimura & Antonio Inoki were forced to give up the belts when Inoki was forced out of the promotion.

1984: New Japan Pro Wrestling had control of the WWF Junior Heavyweight Title, a championship created by the World Wrestling Federation but very rarely defended in the company after the 1970's. Though his reasons for leaving the company aren't entirely clear, the Dynamite Kid left NJPW while holding the title and jumped to rival All Japan Pro Wrestling. Wrestlers Black Tiger and the Cobra had a match to fill championship that was vacated as a result of Dynamite's departure.

1985: Stan Hansen, then the AWA World Heavyweight Champion, had a falling out with the promotion. The AWA stripped Hansen of the title and awarded it to Nick Bockwinkel, though Hansen still took the physical AWA Title belt to Japan with him for a tour and wrestled matches that were billed as title defenses.

1985: The AWA had more problems, as Light Heavyweight Champion "Rock 'n Roll" Buck Zumhofe was sent to prison. He was ostensibly done with the AWA after that and was stripped of his championship, with Mike Graham popping up as the next man recognized as the titleholder roughly three years later.

1994: In a situation similar to the Dynamite Kid scenario described above, Villano III held the WWF Light Heavyweight Title in Mexico's UWA promotion but vacated it when jumping ship to CMLL. Aero Flash defeated Fighter in a decision match for the vacant title.

1995: WWF Women's Champion Alundra Blayze was let go by the company. Of course, she infamously appeared on WCW Monday Nitro very soon thereafter and threw the title belt in to a garbage can. The title was not revived until 1998, when Sable defeated Jacqueline in a decision match.

1995: IWA Japan was a member of the National Wrestling Alliance and was temporarily given control of the NWA World Tag Team Titles, which were vacant. Tarzan Goto & Mr. Gannosuke won the belts after a seven-team round robin tournament. However, Goto, Gannosuke, and many other wrestlers had a falling out with the IWA that resulted in them leaving the company. Goto & Gannosuke were stripped of the titles. Pat & C.W. Anderson become the replacement champions as a result of a decision match held in 1996 in North Carolina.

1997: The NWA created a new version of its North American Title as part of its "invasion" angle in the WWF. Jeff Jarrett won the title on Monday Night Raw in a decision match against Barry Windham. Jarrett was forced vacate the title when the WWF/NWA relationship ended. The title was next awarded to "Colorado Kid" Mike Rapada.

1997: While the Gangstas held the ECW Tag Team Titles, Mustafa Saed either quit or was told to leave the promotion, depending on who you believe. The titles were awarded to the Dudley Boys, who beat PG-13 in a match for the gold.

1999: Jeff Jarrett was the Intercontinental Champion, and his contract with the WWF expired the day before a pay per view title defense against Chyna. The contract was not renewed, though it is not entirely clear whether Jarrett wished to let it expire, whether the WWF wished to let it expire, or both. In any event, Jarrett did drop the title to Chyna on the pay per view, but only after "holding up" Vince McMahon for a significant amount of money. This is reportedly the source of the ill-will that has kept McMahon from doing business with Double J for the last ten years.

2000: Bret Hart is forced to vacate the WCW Title due to the concussion that he suffered in a match with Bill Goldberg that would ultimately result in his career being ended. Sid Vicious and Chris Benoit were set to wrestle each other in a match for the vacant title. At the same time, Benoit was demanding his release from the company because his real-life nemesis Kevin Sullivan was potentially being given control of the promotion's creative direction. Benoit won the title but still left the company. (He was released from his contract but only because he asked to be, so whether he was "fired" or "quit" can be argued either way.) The next night on Monday Nitro, it was revealed that Benoit's foot was under the bottom rope when Sid tapped out to the Crippler Crossface that ended the bout. Depending on your perspective, either the decision was reversed and he was never champion or he was champion and was stripped of the title. Vicious defeated Kevin Nash for the vacant title the next week.

2001: Chyna was the WWF Women's Champion, and her contract was not renewed by the company after negotiations broke down. She did not return to television to drop the title. Instead, without explanation, it was held up and decided in a six-way match at the 2001 Survivor Series. Trish Stratus defeated Jazz, Ivory, Jacqueline, Lita, and Molly Holly to claim the belt.

2002: Dan Severn was stripped of the NWA World Heavyweight Title when the NWA decided to affiliate with TNA Wrestling and Severn was either unable or unwilling to make the company's first show to defend the title. It's hard to say that Severn was "fired" because no wrestler was truly under contract to the NWA at the time, but he was stripped of the title due to a disagreement with the company and was never used in the TNA promotion, which became the flagship product associated with the NWA.

2003: The NWA Women's Title was held by Lelani Kai. She was stripped of the title and taken out of contention because she no-showed several title defenses. Again, like Severn, it is difficult to say that she was "fired" because nobody was under contract to the NWA during this period, but she definitely had her recognition yanked due to some ill-will with the promotion. The title was then won by Kiley McLean, defeating a wrestler named Kameo in a match for the vacant championship. McLean would gain some infamy on a national level when she played "Rosie O' Donnell" in the Donald Trump vs. Rosie O' Donnell match that was considered one of the all-time worst segments in the history of Monday Night Raw.

2005: Brock Lensar won the IWGP Heavyweight Title, the main championship of New Japan Pro Wrestling. Lesnar and NJPW had a contractual dispute, which resulted in his leaving the company. Brock was no longer the champion but kept possession of the physical IWGP Title belt and "defended" it in a match against Kurt Angle in Antonio Inoki's promotion, the Inoki Genome Federation. This is the belt that Kurt Angle carried around on TNA television for quite some time with TNA billing him as the IWGP Champion. However, he was not IWGP Champion and was only carrying around the version of the belt that Lesnar kept after leaving New Japan. Ultimately, NJPW got their belt back when Angle agreed to drop it in a match to Shinsuke Nakmura.

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Jacob Leo, who writes the column Music History X in the 411 Music Zone has a question.

My question stems from the current tag champs. How many other champions in major promotion history have switched partners during a championship reign? Has any team had a partner switched multiple times during the same reign?

There have been several examples of a champion switching partners in the middle of a tag team title reign. What follows is a list of examples of those switches from major promotions.

Note that I am not including situations in which one half of a tag team is injured and replaced for only one match in which the titles are dropped. I am only counting those scenarios in which a new partner is selected for an existing tag champ and the new partner has a reign of some substance with the existing champion. I am also not including the scenario in which one partner of a team cannot continue as champion and the title is officially "vacated" by the promotion and a match held to determine new champions with one of the prior champions winning. I omitted that sort of angle because the question asked by Jacob was based on the Jericho/Edge/Big Show storyline, which is a different sort of angle altogether.

1953: Millie Stafford and grandma June Byers were the NWA Women's Tag Team Champions. Stafford was injured, and a tournament was held to select her replacement as Byers' partner. Mary Jane Mull won the tournament and received half of the Tag Team Titles.

1959-1960: The version of the NWA United States Tag Team Titles promoted by Capitol Wrestling (the promotion that evolved in to WWE) were held by Jerry & Eddie Graham. Jerry was injured, and the team was forced to vacate the titles. Eddie Graham and new partner Johnny Valentine defeated Mark Lewin & Don Curtis in a match for vacant titles. However, when Jerry Graham returned from his injury, he replaced Valentine on the team and the Graham brothers were once again recognized as champions.

1961: Hard Boiled Haggerty & Len Montana (two men with great, great ring names) were the AWA World Tag Team Champions. However, Montana broke his leg and was unable to continue defending the straps. Haggerty selected Gene Kiniski as a replacement partner. However, the Haggerty/Kiniski partnership did not work out so well, as the two men argued and later split up. They had a singles match to determine who would get to keep the Tag Team Titles. Haggerty won and selects Bob Geigel as his new partner. However, Kiniski & Haggerty lost the titles to Wilbur Snyder & Leo Nomellini before winning them back and splitting up, so Hardboiled did not switch partners more than once during the same reign.

1966: Around this time, there were several different versions of the NWA World Tag Team Titles being defended in different territories. The version recognized in Tennessee was held by Tojo Yamamoto & Tamaya Soto. For reasons that have been lost to history, Soto was replaced by a man billed as Professor Ito.

1967: Larry "The Ax" Hennig and Harley Race were the AWA Tag Team Champions, but Hennig's leg was broken in a match with Verne Gagne. Race was allowed to choose a replacement, and he picked Chris Markoff.
1969: Bruno Sammartino & Battman (yes, a guy doing a Batman gimmick) defeated Toru Tanaka & Mitsu Arakawa for the WWWF International Tag Team Titles. For unknown reasons Victor Rivera later replaced Sammartino on the team.

1971: There were more problems with the AWA World Tag Team Titles. Red Bastein and Hercules Cortez were the titleholders, but Cortez was tragically killed in an automobile accident. Bastein selected the Crusher has his new partner.

1975: The WWWF Tag Team Titles were held by Dominic Denucci & Victor Rivera. Rivera left the WWWF for the IWA and was replaced in the team by "Irish" Pat Barrett.

1981: Moondogs Rex & King were holding the WWF Tag Team Titles. King, a Canadian citizen, had problems with his United States work permit and was unable to enter the country. As a result, he was replaced by Moondog Spot.

1983: Afa and Sika, the Wild Samoans, were WWF Tag Champs. Sika was injured, so they brought in the unnamed "Samoan Number Three" to defend the titles with Afa. Number Three was Afa's son and Sika's uncle Samula Anoa'i, later known in professional wrestling circles as Headshrinker Samu. Sika would return from his injury and begin defending the titles with Afa again before the title reign came to an end.

1983: The Mid-Atlantic version of the NWA World Tag Team Titles, which have a common lineage with the WCW Tag Team Titles, were held by Ivan & Nikita Koloff, who were later joined by Krusher Khrushchev (Barry Darsow). Khrushchev was automatically recognized as part of the championship team and defended the titles with the Koloffs.

1985: The main tag titles in All Japan Pro Wrestling at the time were the Pacific Wrestling Federation Tag Team Titles. Stan Hansen & Bruiser Brody were the first champions, defeating Giant Baba & Dory Funk Jr. in a tournament final. Ted DiBiase was selected as Hansen's new partner when Brody jumped ship to New Japan Pro Wrestling.

1987: We've got more problems with the PWF Tag Titles. Hansen & DiBiase were in the middle of their second reign with the belts when DiBiase was brought in by the WWF. He gave up his half of the titles and was replaced by Austin Idol.

1987: Soldat Ustinov & Boris Zhukov were the AWA World Tag Team Champions, but Zhukov left the promotion for the WWF to become the new tag partner of Nikolai Volkoff. Ustinov replaced Zhukov with Doug Somers.

1990: Demolition were YOUR WWF Tag Team Champions. Bill "Ax" Eadie was having health problems, so Brian "Crush" Adams was brought in to replace him and regularly defended the titles on his behalf. When the titles changed hands to the Hart Foundation, it was Smash and Crush who were defeated.

1993: The ECW Tag Team Titles (still the EASTERN Championship Wrestling Tag Team Titles at this time) were held by Chris Candido and Johnny Hot Body. They were joined by Chris Michaels to form a three-person championship trio.

1998: Sting & The Giant were WCW Tag Team Champions but had a falling out. As such, the two were booked against each other in a singles match, with the winner being allowed to pick a new partner and continue on as champion. Sting won, and Kevin Nash was selected as his partner.

1998: More wackiness with the WCW Tag Team Titles! Rick Steiner & Buff Bagwell defeated Scott Hall & The Giant for the straps, but Bagwell turned on Steiner immediately afterwards. Rick selected Buff's mother, Judy Bagwell, as his new partner and defended the titles with her in at least one match. The Judy Bagwell angle is considered a big flop, so she was replaced very quickly by Kenny Kaos of the tag team High Voltage. (Kaos' regular partner, Robbie Rage, was out with an injury.) So, between Buff Bagwell, Judy Bagwell, and Kenny Kaos, Rick Steiner did have three different partners during one Tag Team Title reign.

1999: Diamond Dallas Page & Bam Bam Bigelow won the WCW Tag Team Titles by defeating Raven & Perry Saturn. They were later awarded the right to defend the titles in any combination with their Jersey Triad partner Chris Kanyon.

2003: Lance Storm and William Regal were the World Tag Team Champions on the WWE's Raw Brand. Regal developed a nasty stomach virus on a WWE tour of India and was sidelined. At the time, the wrestler most fans know as Val Venis had been repackaged as Raw GM Eric Bischoff's "Chief of Staff" Sean Morley. Morley stripped Storm and Regal of the titles as a result of Regal's illness but then awarded the titles to himself and Storm.

2004: New Japan Pro Wrestling's IWGP Tag Team Titles were held by Minoru Suzuki & Yoshihiro Takayama. Takayama was injured and attempted to hand his half of the titles to Kensuke Sasaki. However, New Japan refused to let its titles change hands in this manner and vacated them.

2008: Cody Rhodes & Hardcore Holly held the Raw version of the WWE Tag Team Titles. Ted DiBiase, Jr. debuted and hyped up a "mystery partner" that he would bring in to the company to face Rhodes & Holly for the titles. The mystery partners wound up being Rhodes himself, and the future Legacy members double teamed and beat Holly to set up the title change.

Alvin Hussey (Think he might be related to the Berzerker?) writes:

I like to sometimes browse Wikipedia for wrestling articles and sometime title histories. Anyway I was wondering why both WCW and ECW had TV Championships while WWF/E never did? I can imagine because WWE already had the Intercontinental Title as their second-tier belt. However WCW had both the US and TV Championships. The only reason I could come up with was that both WCW and ECW were eager to get decent ratings so thus they create belts that suggest title changes on PPV and not PPV. And was there any difference between the two TV championships regarding the stipulations?

World Television Championships were established by many regional wrestling promotions when TV programs started to become integral parts of their business models in the 1970's and 1980's. You see, in these older promotions, virtually the ONLY reason that television programs existed was to serve as a thinly-veiled infomercial that sold fans on the concept of buying tickets to see live events in the local arenas. (This was in the days before pay per view existed, so it was a non-factor.) Television shows were not intended to be stand-alone entertainment, as they in large part are meant to be today in WWE and especially TNA. You would almost never see a title match on television, and, though they would appear on the shows doing interviews, it was just about as rare to see the champions on TV wrestling. Why? Because the promotion wanted you to pay to see the champions and the most important matches on its live events. The whole point of the World Television Title, as the name implies, was to give back to the fans by providing them with a championship that would regularly appear on the promotion's televised broadcasts.

Why did WWE never have a TV Title? Your guess is as good as mine. My suspicion would be that, for whatever reason, they felt that they were giving their fans enough on their TV programs that they did not need an additional championship to entice them to watch the hour long commercials for their house shows.

Of course, by the time the Monday Night War rolled around, television became the primary vehicle through which a wrestling promotion got its storylines across as opposed to live shows. In fact, live shows almost became third on the scale of importance behind pay per views. As a result, the TV Titles that still existed became "just another belt" behind the World Title and whatever secondary title existed at the time. The reasons that you do not see Television Titles now is because virtually every title in WWE & TNA is a "television title" in that you will see it regularly defended on Raw, Smackdown, or Impact.

As far as rule differences are concerned, there were very few if any. In WCW, it was said for a time that all TV Title matches had ten minute time limits. However, this very rarely played in to storylines aside from heel champions occasionally using the time limit to their advantage, retaining the title on a draw instead of by actually beating the babyface. Steven "William" Regal used this tactic a fair deal in WCW, and he had one mini-feud in particular against Psicosis on WCW's b-shows in which the time limit played an important role.

Smokey Mountain Wrestling, the regional promotion run by Jim Cornette in the early 1990's, put an interesting spin on the Television Title concept when they introduced their "Beat the Champ" TV Title in 1992. In SMW, the TV Champion would defend his belt every week and earn $1,000.00 for every successful defense, ultimately earning an additional $5,000.00 bonus if he was successful in five consecutive defenses. The title would also be vacated if the five consecutive defenses were reached, with a new champ being crowned in a battle royale the next week. In the history of the promotion, no man ever made it to five defenses.

J thinks about ink:

Any truth to the rumor MVP's full shirt/long sleeved wrestling attire is covering possibly objectionable tattoos?

That depends on your definition of "objectionable." MVP does in fact have a tattoo of civil rights leader Malcolm X on his left pectoral muscle. Here is a picture that shows the tattoo somewhat, taken during MVP's days on the independent scene wrestling under the name of Antonio Banks:



Whether the man's WWE gear was designed specifically to cover up this tattoo I do not know, though it is hardly outside the realm of possibilities when you consider the fact that X was one of the more controversial individuals in the US civil rights movement.

Dustin Miller has a very rare opinion, but at least he's aware of how rare it is.

I may be the only person wondering this, but whatever happened to Todd Pettingill? I enjoyed his commentary and thought he was a funny guy. Thanks.

Before he was an on-air talent for the World Wrestling Federation, Todd Pettingill was a radio disc jockey for 95.5 WPLJ, a New York station. Todd actually maintained this role while still working for the WWF, and he still works for the station to this very day. You can find Todd's website, on which he sells CD compilations of his work on his radio show, here. The WPLJ website, which allows you to stream the station live on the internet (and presumably listen to Todd's show in the process) is located here.

It's a threesome of rasslin' stumpers with Eric Moldanado

1. If TNA becomes bigger like they wished they would, and they'd have to start traveling more and going live and perhaps make the move to Monday nights and become a legitamte contender against the WWE, do you think that a lot of the talent would digress because they're used to the comfy, light schedule? Or do you suppose that the talent and management wants TNA to become something so big that they'd be willing to go all the way? Did WCW have an easier road schedule than the WWE and still manage to knock Vince on his ass for a few years? If so is that something TNA can accomplish as well?

WCW did not technically have a lighter road schedule than WWE. During the peaks of the two promotions in the late 1990's, they were running virtually the same number of shows. However, even though the two promotions had roughly the same number of live events, the difference between WWE and WCW was that, on the WWE end, almost all of its top stars (with a few exceptions) worked almost every house show date. In WCW, meanwhile, top stars did not have to work house shows if they did not want to do so. Chances were good that, if you were going to a WCW house show during or after their peak, you almost certainly weren't going to see Sting, Hulk Hogan, or Randy Savage. You had about a fifty-fifty shot of seeing Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, or Ric Flair.

I have a feeling that, if TNA were to shift to a road schedule comparable to WWE's, you would see something similar. TNA's road schedule currently is nowhere near as strenuous as WWE's, and even now many big names still do not make the house show rounds. It's quite rare to see Kevin Nash, Sting, Scott Steiner, or Booker T. on one of these shows. Kurt Angle, Mick Foley, and Jeff Jarrett appear more frequently than those names, but even still it's not as though they appear on every card. The people making the majority of the appearances and carrying most of the load on the house shows are guys like Samoa Joe, Christopher Daniels, and AJ Styles.

In short, TNA would probably make concessions to the majority of the old guard to keep them from working a WWE-esque schedule, and then it would be up to the young guns to pick up the slack.

2. Is it true Owen Hart will never be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame because his widow will not allow it?

It is true that Owen Hart's widow Martha has not cared to have much of an affiliation with WWE since the time that her husband passed away while performing on one of their shows. Frankly, I don't see how anybody can blame her, no matter how much you believe WWE to be at fault or not at fault for Owen's death. She probably never will participate in any sort of WWE Hall of Fame induction for her husband.

However, with that being said, I do not believe that there is much that she could do to prevent the company from inducting Owen in to its Hall if they really wanted to forge ahead in spite of her wishes. I doubt that they will, though, as making the induction over Martha's objection would lead to much negative publicity. Further weakening Owen's chances of getting in to the Hall of Fame is fact that, in recent years, WWE has intentionally tried to stay away from making too many posthumous inductions because they do not want to draw attention to the unacceptably high number of wrestlers who have passed away at a young age. Between the wishes of Martha Hart and the company's general aversion to inducting those individuals who are not alive to represent themselves, the potential for negative P.R. will probably prevent Owen from being inducted for quite some time.

With that said, I do wish to take a second to point out that, in the ten years since Owen's death, his wife has operated a charitable foundation in his name, the main foci of which are college scholarships for Canadian high school students and providing opportunities for low income individuals to become home owners. I would strongly suggest that everybody reading this article check out the webpage of the Owen Hart Foundation here and consider making a donation if you have some money to spare.

3. Is there a particular reason the WWE favors high-pitched-voices for play by play? Vince in the 90s was terrible. Always sounded like he was gasping for air while talking. And today with Michael Cole, Josh Matthews and at times Matt Striker, and then-employed Jonathan Coachman just don't have those distinguished, "man" voices and are often times annoying, and sound like they are whining. Kevin Kelly is another example. I've always preferred the gruffness of the likes of JR, Gorilla,The Body, Tazz, JBL, Piper, Perfect and the Brain. Lawler is decent but he still has that "yelp" factor. I just don't understand why the WWE insists on Mickey Mouse impersonators calling matches.

Part 2 of that question - If you can have a fantasy broadcast team that are NOT associated with pro wrestling doing play by play, who would you have? I've always thought it'd be kind of fun to see Al Michaels and the recently retired John Madden calling Monday Night Raw.

I do not think that there is a particular "type of voice" that WWE favors for its announcers. My understanding is that, as opposed to voices, they favor a particular pretty boy look for the men wearing their headsets. As a general rule, men with that look do not have particularly gruff voices, which probably explains the phenomenon that you are complaining about.

As far as a "dream team" of announcers is concerned, I'm the wrong person to ask because I do not watch sports at all and therefore know next to nothing about non-wrestling announcers. Besides, a big part of what makes an announcer great is his knowledge of what he is announcing. For all we know, John Madden is the greatest football announcer to ever live but wouldn't be able to lend a thing to a pro wrestling broadcast because he does not understand pro wrestling.

A guy calling himself SAVE_US.Y2J has a bit of a conspiracy theory to discuss. Why am I not surprised?

A man whose name I accidentally deleted while copying and pasting this question in to my word document wants to talk about Akeem.

Watching the Ultimate Warrior documentary recently got me thinking about strange wrestling gimmicks that I just accepted without question when I was a kid. The one that always jumps to mind is Akeem the "African Dream". There's something about a 400 lb. white guy with a beard wearing a dashiki to the ring and being billed as from "Deepest darkest Africa" that seems a little off to me. Who came up with this gimmick? Was it MEANT to be a joke? Why isn't this ever mentioned among the worst wrestling gimmicks of all time?

It says on the Wikipedia page for George Gray that the gimmick "received some criticism". I never heard anything about it at the time and the gimmick did last quite a while and had some pretty high-profile feuds. Has there ever been a gimmick that had to be called off due to how controversial it was?

The Akeem gimmick was absolutely meant to be a joke. If you want proof, look no further than this footage of the Twin Towers and Slick appearing on The Arsenio Hall Show:



The character was clearly being played up for laughs. As far as its status in discussions of the "worst gimmicks of all time" is concerned, I don't know that it is completely disregarded as this reader suggests. If I'm not mistaken, it has been inducted in to the annals of WrestleCrap as well as being scheduled for inclusion for the Wrestlemania XVII gimmick battle royale until a last minute change resulted in the One Man Gang appearing instead.

As far as controversial gimmicks being cancelled is concerned, there was at least one documented instance of this occurring. In WCW, Lenny Lane and former Raven's Flock member Lodi formed a team known as the West Hollywood Blonds, in which they played off of a variety of gay stereotypes. Even though it was eventually revealed that they were "brothers" in storyline and not gay at all, the "standards and practices" division of Turner Broadcasting deemed the gimmick to be too potentially offensive and prevented it from going forward. This particularly stung for Lane, who was made Cruiserweight Champion as a result of the gimmick's popularity. He was not even allowed to drop the title on TV, as WCW manufactured a phantom title change to Psicosis, who was introduced as having won the title on a house show before losing it to Disco Inferno in his first defense on Monday Nitro.

Then there's Muhammad Hassan, but you all know about him, right?

I've seen a lot of people ask a lot of questions before, but Kevin Wallace takes the cake, asking TEN QUESTIONS at once. As a result, we'll let him close out the column:

1. What is Sheik's problem with B. Brian Blair? Also, considering the end of the Sheik Roast, is it a work?

The Iron Sheik legitimately does not care for Brian Blair because he believes that, during the height of Hulk Hogan's popularity, Blair was a complete and utter Hogan kiss-ass instead of being his own man. Sheiky made this clear in an infamous shoot interview that became a bit of a viral phenomenon among internet wrestling fans a few years ago, ultimately leading to the Sheik getting some gigs on the Howard Stern show.

With that being said, even though he is legitimately a little bit on the crazy side, the Sheik is still smart enough to know what people react to and how to milk their reactions . . . so I have a feeling that, once he realized that his comments about Blair had gained some momentum among wrestling fans, he began exaggerating his hatred for the man for the sake of entertaining people.

I have not talked to anybody about this, but I would be amazed if the end of the recent "Roast" of the Iron Sheik (which featured Blair appearing and slapping him across the face) was anything other than a work. Blair has a career in local politics in Florida these days, and I somehow doubt that he would jeopardize it by assaulting a senior citizen.

2. How succesful was MMA's Kazushi Sakuraba in wrestling? He was an incredible mixed martial artis but im not familiar with his wrestling career.

He really wasn't that successful at all. He broke in to professional wrestling in UWFi, a pro wrestling promotion in Japan which focused on making its matches look as much like shoot fights as possible. He was technically proficient in that style, but he was nothing more than a midcard wrestler for the majority of his run in the company. He did manage to compete on some shows for Japan's largest promotion, New Japan Wrestling, in the mid-1990's as part of a UWFi/NJPW inter-promotional feud. However, even though he had an opportunity to work with some of the biggest stars in the country as a result of the cross-promotion, Sakuraba lost virtually all of those bouts and was not presented as a major threat.

UWFi died off in 1996 and was replaced by a similar promotion named Kingdom Pro Wrestling. As one of the more technically gifted UWFi alums, Sakuraba was booked as a main event star there from the get go, but the promotion was a flop and did not last long at all. From there on out, Sakuraba's career was virtually all MMA, all the time.

3. Carl Oulette and Kevin Nash do not get along, when I went to see the UFC in Montreal a man was handing out flyers to an event a few weeks later in Montreal where the main event was Nash vs Oulette. I didn't go but do you know how this went?

For those of you who do not know the backstory, there was bad blood between Ouelett and Nash which resulted from a WWF house show in Quebec that took place when Nash was the World Champion as Diesel and Ouelett was in the promotion as Jean Pierre Lafitte. They were booked against each other in the main event, and Ouelett refused to do the job because he did not want to lose in Montreal, where he was a draw before his WWF run and presumably could still be once he was done there. It was rumored that his refusal to lose this match resulted in the end of any push that he would have had in the World Wrestling Federation.

Fast forward fourteen years to present day, and Ouelett is the stop star of the International Wrestling Syndicate promotion based out of Montreal. For that promotion's tenth anniversary show, they decided to bring in Kevin Nash to wrestle Ouelett in the main event. The company played off the history between the two men from the WWF house show many years prior, suggesting that they hated each other so much that the wrestling match might break down in to a legitimate fight. When the match took place on May 30, 2009, the two did work it like it was an actual brawl as opposed to a pro wrestling bout. Ouelett ultimately made Big Sexy tap out to an armbar.

4. I recently watched a match from an event called Super Ex Showdown from Ottawa a couple years ago. Many stars were on it including, Greg Valentine, Koko B Ware, Lanny Poffo and Sid. There was a match between Hannibal and Abdulah the Butcher. In the match Abby smashes Hannibal with a coffee pot and Hannibal begins bleeding buckets then Abby begins to stab him with the fork. I have heard at times that wrestlers may allow other to blade them but Abby starts stabbing him and theres an obvious hole in Hannibal's head and skin begins to peel off his head. Do you know anything about this? It is the goriest thing I've ever seen and I've seen anything in wrestling. Like did the two start shooting on one another or do they have heat? Did anything ever come from this.

Basically what you saw was every Abdullah the Butcher match from the independent scene in the last ten years. It may have gone a little bit further than some Abby matches because of a particularly game opponent or because of a particularly bad mistimed shot, but what you have described is exactly what you will see if the Butcher is wrestling anywhere in this day and age.

5. Was Owen Hart going to win the WWE Intercontinental Title from the Godfather at Over the Edge before his death?

Yes, he was. The Blue Blazer character he was playing at the time was becoming rather popular, and the title was going to be put on him to capitalize on that popularity.

6. I remember hearing hype for a Nash vs Bret World Title match that was to take place on Jay Leno the night after over the edge when Owen died. What was to happen if the match went through?

I have never heard this story before at all. Readers, feel free to plug in any gaps in my memory.

7. Did 10 people really die when watching a match including Classy Freddy Blassie?

This is a wrestling urban legend which is virtually impossible to confirm given the time that has elapsed since the event supposedly occurred and the fact that correlation does not always equal causation.

For those not familiar with the story, "Classy" Freddie Blassie, the man who most people reading this site probably only know as a WWF manager, was actually a hell of an in-ring heel in his heyday. In addition to being a big draw in California, he was also a major name in Japan, where a big part of the gimmick was that he would file his teeth down to points and then bite his opponents behind the referee's back.

The match in question took place on April 23, 1962 in Japan against Rikidozan, who was essentially that country's version of Hulk Hogan, Bruno Sammartino, Ric Flair, and El Santo all rolled in to one. The amount of blood spilled in the ring that night was something that Japan had never seen before, and the legend alluded to by Kevin was born as people supposedly had heart attacks which they died from as a result of the emotion generated by the battle between Blassie and Rikidozan.

Of course, this story sounds exactly like the kind of yarn that a professional wrestler would spin in order to get himself over, but the story appears with no qualification in the Top 100 Pro Wrestlers of All Time, a book written by John F. Molinaro and edited by Dave Meltzer and Jeff Marek. All three of these men tend to be incredibly reliable sources when it comes to professional wrestling history, so I would imagine that there is some truth to it. However, the exact number of people who passed away seems to be in dispute, as Kevin claims that he heard ten people dropped dead whereas other versions that I saw put the number as high as ninety-eight.

8. Had the Benoit situation not have happened, where would the whole Vince is dead angle gone?

Actually, the storyline was meant to bring about several plot twists that we have seen in WWE television over the last several years. A few weeks after McMahon's death, there was supposed to be an episode of Raw which would feature the reading of his will. Vince would appear in a reading of his own will supposedly taped before his death, with it being revealed that he was leaving everything he owned – including WWE – to an illegitimate son that nobody knew he had: Ken Kennedy. (Sound familiar?) This would lead to a Triple H vs. Kennedy feud based on the revelation of HHH and Stephanie McMahon being married. (Sound familiar?) Ultimately, Vince would return to the company with it being revealed that he faked his own death in order to get the company in to the hands of Kennedy, who he thought would be a better replacement for himself than Trips, Stephanie, or Shane.

Of course, this was the original, long-term plan and WWE's plans seem to change on an almost daily basis, so who knows how many times this would have been altered if it actually got set in to motion on WWE programming.

9. Who did Chris Benoit make do 1500 squats in front of the boys? Triple H mentions this I believe in the Benoit tribute.

I somehow doubt that there was only one person that this happened to. However, I know that one person who had some real difficultly after trying to keep up with Benoit in the squat department was Shawn Daivari, who is currently Sheik Abdul Bashir in TNA. In one interview that I heard with him not long after he left WWE, Daivari mentioned that he tried to do as many squats as Benoit did to warm up and wound up with "Dr. Pepper colored" urine for the next several days. A doctor informed him that the unusual coloring was due to the fact that he did so many squats that muscle proteins in his legs were beginning to break down and be expelled by his body.

10. What gives a World title, World title status?

There are no set criteria whatsoever. If a promotion calls one of its titles a "World Title," then it's a World Title. Period.

However, there are some people who are way too full of themselves who will try to argue otherwise. For example, some fans refused to a title as a "World Title" unless it was listed as a World Title by the magazine Pro Wrestling Illustrated. Ring of Honor refrained from calling any of its titles "World Titles" until they were defended outside of North America. Really, though, those limitations are completely bogus. If I open up Ryan's Championship Wrestling next week and book a title match between a stuffed penguin and one of my old work boots, I've got as much right to call the title a "World Title" as any wrestling promotion does. After all, pro wrestling is fake, not a legitimate sport with championships that must meet specialized criteria.

And, with that important note, this edition of Ask 411 draws to a close! Mr. Sforcina will be back in one week's time. Until then, keep on sending questions to him and keep on keepin' on.