411's AWA on ESPN Classic Report 09.03.08

Posted by Randy Harrison on 09.04.2008

Wayne Bloom and Brad Rheingans face off in a Greco-Roman main event match that is MOST CERTAINLY a fresh match and in no way a retread from the Team Challenge Series. Nope, it surely isn't..



411's AWA On ESPN Classic Report





AWA Championship Wrestling


Bisch and Lee welcome us to ESPN and run down the show, featuring the same wrestlers we've seen over and over again, including Col. DeBeers, Curtis Hughes and a Greco-Roman main event featuring Brad Rheingans vs. Wayne Bloom. My guess is that they're recycling that from a Team Challenge Series episode of All-Star Wrestling. Anyhow, The Trooper will be kicking things off after the break, and they beg for us all to stay tuned.


Match One:
Tom Stone vs. The Trooper

Stone attacks Trooper from behind and rams him into the buckle, whipping him across into the corner. Trooper sweeps out a leg and drags Stone into the corner, wrapping his knee across the ringpost a couple of times before slinging him back into the ring. Kick to the stomach and an elbow to the knee of Stone from Trooper and he turns that into a toehold, stepping over with it and cranking away. Stone, with full-on farmer's tan, kicks Trooper away to get out of the hold, but Trooper goes right back to it. Rake of the eyes from Stone and he rams Trooper into the buckle again, whipping him into the ropes for a hard reverse elbow. Into the ropes again but this time Trooper kicks him in the face and whips him into the ropes for a left hand to the gut and a kneelift. Another Irish whip into a back bodydrop from Trooper and there's ANOTHER Irish whip into a dropkick. There's the NECK MASSAGER!! Stone's nodding off, he's fading, HE NEEDS HIS BINKY!!! Trooper writes out a citation for Stone and stickies it onto his forehead after the match.

Winner: The Trooper (submission, neck massager)

Match Analysis: Not bad because Stone knows how to make any squash watchable, but there wasn't a lot of fun stuff in it.Trooper seems to rely WAY too much on rope-based offense for my liking, which reminds me of an old wrestling adage that I can't exactly remember, but it was something along the lines of "Why would you Irish whip someone in a real fight?"


Match Two:
Todd Becker and Spike Jones vs. The Texas Hangmen

Marshall and Bischoff point out that the Hangmen have become a very predictable tag team and that could make them ready for a loss. Jones and Psycho start things out, trading forearms ebfore Psycho goes to the eyes and hammers away on Jones in the corner. Jones with an Irish whip reversal and he hits a big slam on Psycho out of the corner. Tag to Becker and he works an arm-wringer on Psycho, cranking away on it until Killer grabs Becker's hair and drags him into their corner, letting Psycho make the tag. Snap mare from Killer into a hard elbow to the top of the head and he picks Becker up for a shoulderbreaker. Killer chokes Becker across the top rope and tags in Psycho for their modified AWA Special move before he just chokes Becker blatantly. DEEP belly to belly suplex from Psycho gets a two-count and he tags Killer back in for a double-axehandle to the back. RUNNING POWERSLAM from Killer and he covers for a two-count, picking him up before the three count. Tag to Psycho and he hits a running bulldog after Killer kicks him in the gut, leading to a pin attempt with Psycho covering Becker for two and rolling off of him before the three. Tag to Killer and he hits a DDT, getting up to elbow Jones off the apron. Tag to Psycho and they set Becker up for the HANGMAN'S ELBOW FOR THE THREE-COUNT!!

Winners: The Texas Hangmen (pinfall, Hangman's Elbow)

Match Analysis: Hangmen lay a beating and we now know why Becker decided to be a referee. I think there was so much more they could have done with the Hangmen if there was any depth in the tag team division. Imagine having them there a year before with the Hangmen against the Midnight Rockers, maybe after they'd hung Michaels or Jannetty with a noose. That could have been as hot as the Rockers vs. Rose/Somers feud.


Match Three:
Nacho Berrera vs. Mike George

NACHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! This looks like a REALLY old match from George as he has short, brown hair as opposed to the bleached blond, longer hair he had against Nikita Koloff. Either this match is old, or the Koloff match was old. Either way, he looks completely different and a LOT older. George explains to the fans what he's doing, talking about how he's going to put a time limit on how long it's going to take to beat Berrera. He tells Donna it's only going to take him two minutes to win the match, and even sets the clock right in front of her. The look on her face is priceless. Two minutes on this one and the bell rings, with George jumping right into a lockup and a belly to back suplex!! Forearms from George and he runs Nacho's head right into the turnbuckle, picking him up for a well-executed vertical suplex. Nacho tries a comeback in the corner with some shoulderblocks, but George just goes to the eyes to break it up. Irish whip into the ropes by George and he knocks Nacho down with a clothesline, following that up with a PILEDRIVER!! That only gets a two-count with one minute left in the match. Bodyslam from George and he comes off the second rope with a knee to the chest, covering Nacho and getting the 1-2-3, with thirty seconds to spare. George's ring music of "Another One Bites The Dust", actually fits in this instance and for once, Verne used music that furthered someone's character.

Winner: Mike George (pinfall, second-rope kneedrop)

Match Analysis: I appreciate George at least trying to introduce a gimmick to the squash-fest, but it was really not a very good gimmick. It was essentially George hitting a move, stopping to stare at the clock, hitting a move, trying for a pin, stopping to stare at the clock. Meh. Of course, if it had been the WWF, they'd have had little clocks made for him and he would have been one of the stars on Superstars or Wrestling Challenge or something in one of the B-level storylines that they would run exclusive on those shows.


Match Four:
Curtis Hughes vs. The Russian Brute w/Ox Baker

Marshall and Bischoff have to continue to do the lying thing, acting "shocked" that Ox Baker is managing the Brute again and that he's back in the AWA. They thought he had dropped the Brute and was long gone, but apparently they've "settled their differences", which is code for "we needed an explanation for how we could make this match from six months ago seem current". Hughes slaps some fives and dances away before getting into the ring and he WAFFLES BRUTE WITH A FOREARM, SENDING HIM OVER THE TOP TO THE FLOOR!! The bell finally rings to start the match and Hughes slings Brute back in, whipping him into the ropes for a BUTT BUTT!!! He whips Brute into the corner for ANOTHER BUTT BUTT!! Irish whip into the corner and Hughes charges in blind, eating a HUGE boot from Brute. Brute finally takes off his shirt, choking Hughes with it before moving to a reverse chinlock. Hughes bulls Brute backwards into the corner to break the chinlock and he works some right hands to the face, putting Brute down on his face. Brute back and firing away with forearms, ramming Hughes into the turnbuckle and headbutting him to no effect. Hughes drops to his knees and headbutts Brute outside of the ring Junkyard Dog-style, even doing the JYD dance afterwards. Brute drops to his face on the floor and Baker yells at him, getting him back up to the apron. Brute slings over the ropes into a SUNSET FLIP that gets a two-count. Dear God, that was incredibly ugly. Irish whip from Brute into the corner and he charges in, clamping a nerve pinch in on Hughes' neck while Ox Baker grabs a leg from the outside. Big bodyslam from Brute and he comes off the ropes with a legdrop for another long two-count. Irish whip into the ropes and Brute locks in the RUSSIAN SLEEPERHOLD!! Hughes is starting to fade a little, dropping to a knee and Brute just drops him to the mat, choosing to go up to the top rope. He tries an INCREDIBLY awkward looking splash off of the second rope, but Hughes rolls out of the way, following that up with a legdrop to the gut. Bodyslam from Hughes and he bounces off the ropes MISSING an elbowdrop, letting Brute lock the chinlock in again. Brute powers to his feet and elbows out of the hold, but Brute just clotheslines him back down, motioning for the heart punch. Gary DeRusha gets in the way of things and Brute ends up whipping Hughes RIGHT INTO DERUSHA!! They both just kind of look at him and now Brute's holding Hughes from behind and HERE COMES OX BAKER!! Heart punch from Baker, but HUGHES DUCKS!! BAKER PUNCHED THE BRUTE!! Hughes recovers and puts the pin attempt on Brute and the referee recovers to count the 1-2-3!!!

Winner: Curtis Hughes (pinfall, heel miscommunication)

Match Analysis: Not a bad match at all actually, which is surprising considering how bad the Brute is and how green Hughes is, but I get lost when he tries too hard to be like JYD. He could have used glimpses of that and then added his own deal to it to make it his own, but his direct rip-off of the gimmick kind of turns me off.


Match Five:
Pete Sanchez vs. Col. DeBeers w/Sheik Adnan El-Kaissie

I'm offering up a prediction. DeBeer WILL stomp with his combat boot, he WILL choke Sanchez at some point, he WILL score with some knee-based offense and WILL finish with the pancake. They start out with Sanchez hitting a big shoulderblock, but DeBeers cuts it off and whips Sanchez into the ropes for a knee to the midsection. Kick to the gut and a pair of right hands from DeBeers and he rams Sanchez into the top turnbuckle. Snap mare from DeBeers and out comes Jake Milliman again, with Marshall STILL desperately trying to play it off as a current situation when it CLEARLY isn't. Now he claims that Milliman must want a re-match of the Turkey match. DeBeers keeps working over Sanchez and hits his knee to the middle of the back, curb stomp-type spot from the top rope, actually getting the pinfall. Color me surprised.

Winner: Col. DeBeers (pinfall, top rope knee dropping on the back thingie)

Match Analysis: I guess I owe myself a buck. This is honestly the first time I have EVER seen a DeBeers squash not end in the pancake piledriver, but I'm guessing that they were going with him trying to finish quick to avoid being distracted by Milliman at ringside. I know I say it all the time, but it's so sad to see them try to pass it off as Milliman wanting a re-match with the turkey. You'd think they would pick matches that it wouldn't be so easy to see that they had been taped months or in this case, nearly a year before.


Back from the commercial, we see a rundown of the entire saga between Brad Rheingans and The Destruction Crew, including them attacking Rheingans and Ken Patera during some weightlifting contest in the back of the arena, putting Rheingans out for eight months. It's funny to see the AWA try to run a video package and have it look so bush-league, even down to the font that looks like it's the standard block font that came with the video editing machine. Marshall actually says "hell" as they beat Rheingans up and lay a hurting on him. Bloom whipping Patera with a weightlifting belt is a real highlight for me. Fast forward a few weeks ahead, with Rheingans hooked up to a muscle stimulator for his shoulder and showing a HUGE scar on his knee from surgery that put him out. Fast forward again eight months later with Brad Rheingans being re-introduced to the AWA as Paul Diamond's partner against The Destruction Crew. We see highlights of a cage match between those four men, with Rheingans locked outside the ring and being forced to watch as The Crew hit the WRECKING BALL on Diamond!! They cut to an absolutely SWEET camera angle from the top of the arena as Diamond flips and slams onto the mat. I don't know why they didn't use that camera angle more really, it looked awesome. If they were trying to do something different to compete, why not use a different camera angle like that once in a while to see if it works. Rheingans runs down to make the save and chases off Bloom and Enos. From here, we head straight to the main event.


Match Six: Team Challenge Se...errrr..Greco-Roman Match
Wayne Bloom w/Mike Enos vs. Brad Rheingans w/Baron Von Raschke

Three, two-minute rounds for this one and they start out with a fingerlace, with Rheingans pushing Bloom into the ropes for a break. Another fingerlace and Rheingans ducks his head under and hits a suplex for two points, trying for a pin, but Bloom ends up on the ropes. Bloom ducks under and grabs a single-leg, but that's against the rules in the Greco-Roman match, leading to a clean break. Armdrag takedown from Rheingans gets him another two points and he's trying for the pin with Bloom fighting it off all the way to the end of the round. Rheingans is up 4-0 after round one.

Enos and Bloom start out the second round by complaining about Rheingans pulling the tights and the bell rings for round two. Rheingans with a bearhug-style lock, looking to go for a belly to belly suplex and he gets it as Bloom is trying to get an underhook in. Go-behind from Bloom into a belly to back suplex and he looks fairly confident suddenly. HUGE gut-wrench suplex from Bloom and he's making a big comeback, hooking a snap suplex in before talking shit to the camera about his style. Clothesline from Bloom, but that's against the rules and he's chastised by referee Gary DeRusha for it. Bloom tries an Irish whip, but Rheingans ends up behind him with a beautiful German suplex into a bridge. The bell sounds to end the round before Rheingans is able to get the pinfall though. Rheingans leads again after round two, but it's a lot closer with the score being 8-6 heading into the third and final round.

HARD right hand from Bloom to start the round into a side headlock, but Rheingans gets a belly to back suplex, riding Bloom on the mat with a gut-wrench into a front facelock. Rheingans tries to roll Bloom over for a pin, but Mike Enos comes in to break it up and Bloom takes over with some bootrakes across the eyes. Right hand from Bloom into an Irish whip, but Rheingans is able to reverse it and throws Bloom into a gut-wrench suplex, covering Bloom for the one-count and the pin!! Baron and Rheingans hug in the ring and Enos and Bloom attack from behind, sending them out to the floor. Baron and Rheingans recover and get back to their feet, chasing the Crew to the dressing room.

Winner: Brad Rheingans (pinfall, gut-wrench suplex)

Match Analysis: Yeah, at least this would have made sense in the Team Challenge Series context. In this context, it just seems like a match that Bloom stupidly asked for, giving the advantage to Rheingans. Not an easy match to rate because it's not a real match, but it was better than the earlier Greco-Roman match with Baron. This one was believable at least.

Lee and Eric jabber about the main event with Lee thinking that Bloom blew it at the end and Eric feeling like Bloom had a lot more Greco-Roman expertise than anyone expected. Bischoff asks about the "return debut" of Ox Baker and they mock him and the Brute, saying that they're never going to work together. It's painful to watch them trying to spin these old matches into current angles. Funny, but painful. The show just kind of ends with them laughing about a joke about Brute and Baker being like a troubled marriage.



Final Thoughts

These mish-mash repeat shows are REALLY sucking the joy out of this AWA gig for me. Seeing the continuity go all over the place with wrestlers in terms of the championships, angles, hairstyles, allegiances, and everything else is really depressing. It would be just as easy to look through the Championship Wrestling program and the All-Star Wrestling show and just go ahead and use matches that don't really have any tells, but they insist on trying to re-write history. I will say that in the comments, Verne is thought of as "the most progressive booker of all times" by some commenters and in this case I'd agree again. I just read that Lynn Johnston, author of the For Better or For Worse comic strip, is going back to the beginning and re-doing the entire series with a fresh perspective and fresh stories, starting back at the first strip almost thirty years ago. It's funny because that's what Verne seems to be trying to do with these shows by using old content to try to further fresh angles. I realize that it's a long way to get to my point, but it just makes me laugh how similar the situations are. Bad show, three jugs, let's get to some comments!!





Fun With Comments


From Guest. :
"Favorite parts of the show:

1: Larry Zbyszko in his entrance, they take the time to censor out Donna calling him the former champ, then leave the Former Champ graphic on the TV.

2: Tommy Jammer using a cradle Russian Leg Sweep, which I think could be a cool finisher if used today. Still humorous that he screwed up an abdominal stretch and Leone probably said cradle him to save the match.

3: Col. DeBeers showing off his lucha roots, and doing two Flying Headscissors, and botching them both less than Candace did. And really, DeBeers doing lucha, how's that the same as usual? He spices things up now and again.

4: The main event tag, trying to cover for everyone there, and seeing one of Tully's last matches."

I actually admit that I was wrong. I've been so programmed into watching the same DeBeers match over and over, that I had completely forgotten about the headscissors. My bad. I agree with the rest of everything, including how laughable it was to edit out the introduction, yet forget about the graphic.


From piperfan01:
"I was falling asleep during this show, squash, rinse, repeat...Until Tully showed up out of nowhere. Perhaps you can help me with the timeline here in regards to Tully. From the NWA to Brainbusters in WWF, is this after or pre WWF Brainbusters? Was he in the AWA for long? Playing a Tully like heel would be ideal for Cody Rhodes. Anyways, like I said this show was all about Tully Blanchard a rare highlight in this terrible show. "

The Blanchard answer comes later in the comments, and he was literally in the AWA for that one taping, maybe two or three shows if my memory serves.


From PMullin1987:
"Been a while, apparently my stomach just wasn't strong enough for the best of the worst of the AWA for the past few weeks.

This would have been fine if it were an introductory special to try to introduce fans to some of the AWA's "stars" and "prospects", but not to the regular tv audience which diminished week after week. It was just insulting to their/my intelligence. Then again, so was 1990 for the AWA.

Honestly, I know how much we all harp on Verne for pushing a green rookie like Jammer who was all show and no go, but come on, he wasn't much more offensive than guys like Ted Arcidi or Bill Kazmaier when both the WWF and WCW had stacked talent rosters to boot, unlike Verne & co."

Oh, everyone was guilty of pushing green guys that they thought had "the look", the problem with Verne was that he wouldn't stop pushing them, even after it was obvious they weren't going anywhere. A few months after their initial pushes and Arcidi and Kazmaier were as good as gone, but they still kept going and going with Jammer right to the bitter end. Add to that, the fact that WWF and WCW both had talent while the AWA had dregs, and you know why people were so hard on Verne for guys like Jammer.


From piperfan01:
"Along the same lines of the Apter mags, one of my favorite shows back in the day was Pro Wrestling Illustrated, hosted by Pedicino and Solie. Thats the only way this So Cali born kid could learn about Jerry Lawler, and Florida wrestling. Loved waking up every Saturday for this and then wait until 3:05pm unless there was a Brave game for NWA. Those were the days... "

I remember seeing that show once in a while, and it was a LOT of fun for me to see the territories from around the world. There as also a Canadian version of the show on TSN, called Pro Wrestling Plus. Here's the open for the show, looking like a terrific 80's mess.



While we're on the subject, here's the open for the Pro Wrestling This Week show as well!




From Steven:
"Well, tonight's (Wednesday's) show is going to be the nail in the coffin when it comes to ESPN Classic showing the 1990 stuff. Unfortunately, it looks like we're going back to March 1986 by the time that 1990 shows are done. It's sad, because I enjoyed your reviews of the AWA shows from 1986-1990 (Of course, without 1989)."

I'll be glad to get back to 1986. It can't be much worse than these god-awful 1990's disaster shows. Hopefully, we stay away from too many repeats so I can keep the AWA goodness rolling.


From Dave:
"Watching this episode is weird since they act like the matches are current when it's fairly obvious they're months old. In the first match we see Ox and the Night Stalker, when was the last time Brian was around anyway? Then on to the Zybsko match. So Donna introduces him as the champ and during the whole match Lee and Verne keep saying that his rants in the ring are because he's so pre-occupied with figuring out what to do with the money they won in the TCS. Too bad at the start of the match they accidently included the text that said he was the former champ and he came to the ring without the belt.(Wow, that Larry must be able to fortell the future to know back then he'd win, that he'd have problems figuring out how to split up the money, and then get so bothered to rant about in months before it happened.)
Oh well, there were more continuity issues with the Jammer match since yesterday he had short hair and today his hair was long.(And to be honest why would pick this match to reshow anyway? He completely blew an abdominal stretch attempt so if Verne was thinking he would have never reshowed this match and pretended it was new. You're right though, that sort of back suplex was better than what he had originally planned.)
Oh, and that leads into the final match. Yeah, nice cover there Verne. Bloom and Enos can be seen handing the belts to the ref. Yup, they wanted to see them again and it isn't just the case that this is an old match and they were champs at the time.(And they didn't edit enough off the beginning of the match to cover up the fact.) And I'm sure Baron is there with guys that used to be on the Blitzers for old time sakes and not because this was probably a TCS match. Actually you know what the most amazing part was? Lee was one of the commentators for this match and part way through it you can see him when the Trooper and Bloom fight near the announcing table and his lips aren't moving. It's even better seeing him scurry away when the Trooper rams Bloom's head into the table and yet his commentary is unaffected by the lack of lip movement or running or anything. Oh well, if anybody was still watching at this point it was obvious they were done. "

I pretty much agree with everything there Dave. Spot-on, including how silly it was for them to continue to insist that they were fresh matches. Desperation makes smart men look like fools, and pretty much everyone with the AWA was looking pretty foolish by then.


From Guest. :
"To address the point on Tully Blanchard: This was right after he got released from the WWF for testing positive for coke, effectively sabotaging his run with the NWA, and forcing him into retirement as he was blackballed from the top two organizations. He tells it differently, but without major work, he'd need to find God to survive.

And rereading the DeBeers match, that bump off the kneelift has to be enough to elevate it into a good Colonel squash. "

As I stated before, I was wrong about the DeBeers match and I actually re-watched it, seeing it as a little better than the usual DeBeers beatdown.


From Robert Tivari:
"Being that we're getting to the end of the 1990 shows. I kind of just wanted to throw something in. A lot of people say that 1986 was the last decent year for the AWA, but I would have to disagree. In fact, I actually thought 1987-88 were decent years for them as well. You still had Hennig, Rock N Roll Express, Midnight Rockers (for the first half anyway) all of the CWA and WCCW guys coming on, not to mention we got to see one of my all time favorite and most underrated tag teams, Badd Company kicking ass and taking names.

To me, 1989 is when the decline began, and I really wish they would play these episodes. Although we saw the return of Patera and Zybyszko that year, their top babyface Lawler, and a slew of other people left. Not to mention that damn turkey match and the pink room that all of us want to see again. "

I agree, 1989 is when the wheels started to come off completely. 1988 was pretty close to a disaster, but there were still the odd bright spots like you mentioned. By the time it got to '89, the writing was on the wall, guys were fleeing left, right, and center, and you were left with Zbyszko and not a whole hell of a lot else.


From Bryan:
"Great description of Jammer's botched stretch. Can't believe you left out DeBeers backstage mustache twirling before his intro. That alone should have brought this down to a two jug show."

That part was pretty funny, and it actually reminded me of the few times that the WWF showed guys backstage heading to the ring. I always thought it was kind of cool when they did that in the WWF, but the funny thing is that like in everything else, the AWA did it in 1990 and the WWF had already done it four or five years before.


From mjd1999:
"Just a side note going back to rock n roll bucky. I work for an indy promotion here in Minnesota and lemme tell you, Buck's gotta be the least liked guy out of anybody that works for wrestling in Minnesota. The shows he puts on are worthless, nothing but trash. Most of the guys he's "trained" don't like him either because he threw them right to the wolves without any sort of training and just took their money. He's got one decent wrestler that works for him and he's got him warped into doing his dirty business for him. Basically, the rule in this state is, you work for Buck, you don't work for anyone else. "

Wow. You hate to hear stories about guys like that, but I can't say I'm terribly surprised at it because I'm sure that Buck's demons have taken a toll on him. Shame because he was one of my favorites when I was really young, but again, it's not a big shock.


From Heretic:
"If you thought Verne's comment about the tag team belts was crap-tastic, just wait til tomorrow's show when the announcers have to sell a "reuinion" between Ox Baker and the Russian Brute.

I've been a pretty staunch defender of "the last days of the AWA" in the wrestling blosophere (i.e., it's not as bad as you think, there were some valid worthwhile things, etc.), but enough is enough. Leaving 1990 will be a considerable relief. I can't say that I look forward to these shows anymore as I did when they first started running. "

Yeah, the bloom is definitely off the rose and I'm find that I'm not quite as excited as I have been to do them. I'm excited in the sense of how bad it's going to be, but not excited to actually watch the shows now.


That's it for the comments and for the report, leaving us with nothing except to wait for tomorrow and hope that it gets better. I have my fingers crossed for 1986.


THE COUNTDOWN...42 Days Until The Assault Begins...