The Name on the Marquee: Inside the Steel Cage (1986)
Posted by Adam Nedeff on 05.24.2009
Coliseum Video brings you the finest of man vs. man vs. metal.
-Your hosts are Gorilla Monsoon & Johnny V, who says that the V stands for “Valium.” What the hell?
-Everything here is a cage match, duh. So I won't be going to the trouble of mentioning that in the bold line.
ANDRE THE GIANT vs. BIG JOHN STUDD
-Joined in progress at the Maple Leaf Gardens. Studd tries to ram Andre into the walls, but Andre counters. Headbutt and we have a really looooooonnnngg delay after that while Studd blades. Andre keeps bouncing his face off the walls until Studd punches him down. Studd collapses after that, though, and Andre nearly makes it to the door before being stopped. Andre bites Studd’s bloody forearm and tries for a slam, but Andre blocks it with a front facelock and a kneelift. Andre tries a falling headbutt and hits canvas as Studd begins crawling for the door. Andre stops him and then they just lay there and spoon forever until Studd starts choking Andre. Andre fakes passing out until Studd starts to go to the door, and Andre just rolls over and grabs his foot. Clever giant. Andre “sucks him back in like a vacuum cleaner” but Studd fights him and they lay around forever again. I’m serious, they’ve just been laying on the mat and clawing at each other for two minutes now. Andre finally gets to his feet and rams Studd into the wall. Studd gets a low blow and goes for the door, but Andre stops him and they lay there again. Andre headbutts him and that leads to a fistfight. Andre clotheslines him and charges at him, but Andre boots him down. He follows with a slam for $10,000, but not satisfied with that, Andre goes to the top rope(!) and splashes Studd dead. A calm walk out the door follows, and it’s a win for the giant. 0 for 1. Hell of a finish, but, 50% of the bout was devoted to laying there and pretending to exert force.
ANDRE THE GIANT vs. KAMALA (with Friday)
-Kamala is absolutely freaked out by being inside a cage, but Andre handles it well, so he has a psychological edge. Andre chokes and punches Kamala, and even counters Kamala’s chops. Andre headbutts him, and in a moment familiar to anybody who’s ever watched a Coliseum Video, Andre bodyslams him and Kamala sells it with a lot of quivering and twitching. Andre splashes him, but then goes to the top and then “goes old school” by walking the ropes and splashing him again. Andre heads out the door for the win. 0 for 2. Not enough here, although Andre again pulled out an impressive finish that makes you shake your head at what he became when his illness and injuries caught up with him.
INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE: MAGNIFICENT MURACO (Champion) vs. JIMMY “Superfly” SNUKA (w/Buddy Rogers)
-Joined and copy-pasted in progress. Muraco goes for an Irish whip, but Snuka reverses it and Muraco does a GREAT sell off of it. Snuka with a headbutt and now Muraco is busted open. Superfly with a forearm off the second rope. Snuka fires away at Muraco. Snuka headbutts Muraco off the ropes, and unfortunately, he headbutts him too hard because Muraco falls backwards through the door and onto the floor, retaining the title. We’re seeing some creative finishes on this tape, I’ll say that. Snuka isn’t pleased, so he drags Muraco back into the cage, KOs him, and seals his place in history by getting a Superfly splash off the top of the cage. 1 for 3, but barely, believe it or not. The finish and the splash are keepers, definitely, but the match itself was actually a bit of a disappointment, given the legend surrounding it.
TITO SANTANA & BRUNO SAMMARTINO vs. RANDY “Macho Man” SAVAGE & ADORABLE ADRIAN ADONIS
-Heels attack as the faces enter. Savage deals with Santana and Adonis pairs off with Bruno. Faces come back right away and they switch opponents. Bruno overpowers Savage while Adonis dominates Santana. Bruno throws punches while Adonis prefers elbows. Savage fights Bruno off and goes for the door, but Bruno stops him. Meanwhile, Adonis gets launched face-first into the wall. Savage tries to bolt again, but both faces work to stop it. Savage elbows Tito down and tries to go over the wall, but Bruno grabs a foot. Adonis goes into the wall and Tito begins his climb, but gets stopped.
-Things FINALLY start to slow down a little bit as Bruno puts the boots to Savage. Tito & Adonis trade fists with Tito and Tito is on the winning end of that. Savage gets Irish whipped and turned upside-down in the corner. Adrian suplexes Tito and starts to climb, but Bruno won’t allow it. Savage goes for the door again, but Tito DIVES to stop him while Adonis loses his footing and gets crotched on the top rope. Axehandle by Savage onto Tito and Bruno runs over to apply a chinlock of vengeance, but Adonis breaks it.
-Savage rams Tito into the cage while Bruno rams Adonis into the walls. Savage comes off the top rope again and goes for the door, but Bruno stops him. Tito is busted open and Adonis sends him into the walls and cheesegrates him. Bruno gives Savage a hard boot and goes over to tend to Adonis with kicks and punches. Irish whip and Adrian goes face-first into the door. Adrian tries to take advantage of that but Bruno stops him. Savage goes to the top rope this time, but Tito catches him with a boot to the stomach. Adonis tries to escape through the door, and when Bruno pulls him back in, Adonis works so hard to resist him that he strips the wood boards off the stairs. Adonis uses it as a weapon as Savage is now busted open. Adonis comes off the top of the cage, but Bruno moves. Everybody gradually recovers and we have a traffic jam in one corner of the ring as all four men brawl. Tito and Savage brawl on top of the cage. Tito punches Savage so hard that he falls off and lands on Adrian, KOing both men, and Bruno & Tito both head out of the cage for a hard-earned win. 2 for 4. Holy crap, that was awesome!
INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE: GREG “The Hammer” VALENTINE (Champion, with Jimmy Hart) vs. TITO SANTANA
-More copy-pasting-in progress. Valentine fights his way back to his feet and back suplexes Tito. Valentine rams Tito into the cage walls a few times, then rams him HARD into the opposite side. Elbow off the second ropes makes Gorilla glad he retired (I always got a kick out of that line) but Tito stops Valentine from making it to the floor. Tito throws a punch so hard that Valentine’s head snaps backward into the cage, but Tito is so tired that he really can’t do anything to capitalize and collapses. Valentine tries the figure four again and Tito kicks him into the cage and starts climbing over the top of the cage. Valentine climbs up to stop him but gets knocked off. Valentine runs right over to the door to make his escape, but Tito kicks the door in his face and drops to the floor to win the match and regain the title. GREAT brawl. 3 for 5. Post-match, Greg throws a fit and destroys the title belt, leading to the new design that lasted for 13 years.
WORLD TITLE: BRUNO SAMMARTINO (Champion) vs. GEORGE “The Animal” STEELE
-More recycling! We’re joined in progress with Steele mauling Bruno with chokes and stomps. And more stomps. And more stomps. Bruno gets to his feet and kicks the shit out of Steele. Steele tries to escape, but Bruno yanks him down and sends him into the cage a few times. Steele is out cold and Bruno calmly goes to the door and retains his title. 3 for 6. Whole lot of stompin’ goin’ on.
BRUNO SAMMARTINO vs. ROWDY RODDY PIPER
-Okay, remember that Bruno Sammartino tape I bitched about a while back? This is the match that SHOULD HAVE been on it. We’re in Boston and it’s February 1986, and Piper, good as he was at getting heat, is not above doing it the easy way. He heads to the ring with a Super Bowl t-shirt and hangs up a Refrigerator Perry poster on the wall of the cage. He goes to the opposite side and hangs up a Jim McMahon as Bruno makes his way to the ring.
-Bruno runs right in and lights into Piper, ramming him from wall to wall effortlessly. Bruno hammers him and Piper is already bloody. Bruno rams him into the walls and shoves the Perry poster down Piper’s shirt. Then he grabs McMahon’s poster and tries to shove it up Piper’s ass. Bruno tears off Piper’s shirt, strangles him with it, then uses it to ram Piper into the walls. He stomps him, but then decides he was having more fun strangling him with the t-shirt and goes back to doing that. Bruno goes for the door, but Piper uses his last remaining ounce of strength to exert a low-blow. Piper boots him and drops a fist. “Bruno” chant starts up in the Garden and a camera shot reveals that the huge dot matrix signs at the Garden are blinking “BRUNO.” I’ve never seen that done in wrestling.
-Piper takes his turn at t-shirt strangling and goes for the door, but Bruno stops him because the sign apparently began blinking “DE-FENSE.” Piper fights him off and goes for the door, but Bruno fights him off again. More punches are thrown and Bruno heads for the door again, but Piper stops him and they sort of duel for the door now. Bruno decides to just start playing dirty and yanks the tights to bring Piper back in and just boots the hell out of him. Piper, being reliably insane, doesn’t bother adjusting his tights and leaves his ass hanging out for the remainder of the match. Piper blocks another escape and hammers Bruno, then bites him and stomps a mudhole. Piper starts to leave but Bruno catches him with a low blow. Bruno heads for the door and Piper tries to yank him back in. As he does so, Bruno reaches for a wooden chair next to the door and KOs Hot Rod long enough to finish his crawl out of the cage. 4 for 7.
WORLD TITLE: BOB BACKLUND (Champion) vs. PAT PATTERSON
-Patterson is the reigning Intercontinental Champion here. Fistfight to start things and Backlund takes the upper hand. He drops the leg and starts to make his exit, but Patterson stops him and goes for the door himself. Backlund yanks him back in and rams his face into the cage. Kneelift and Backlund heads out again, but Patterson hooks an ankle and stops him. He rams Backlund into the cage and sprints to the door, but Backlund BARELY stops him. Backlund grinds his boot across Patterson’s face while diving to the door in one fluid motion, but Patterson brings him back in and chokes him out with the bottom rope. Patterson begins his climb. Backlund stops him but Patterson gouges the eyes and tries again. Backlund goes to the top rope to join him and drives forearms into his face. Patterson fights back and gouges the eyes, then swings an elbow and knocks him off the top rope. Patterson begins to make his way out again, but Backlund forces himself to his feet and pulls Patterson back in.
-Integrity preservation goes to Backlund bleeding and Patterson punching away at the cut. Patterson darts toward the cage wall again but Backlund keeps pulling him back down. More punching and a double shoulderblock wipes out both men. Both men recover and starts to make his escape, but Backlund is going faster, so Patterson stops and goes over to yank him back. Another fistfight, but Backlund dodges a punch and slingshots Patterson into the cage. I actually expected that to be the finish, but Patterson is able to stop the escape. Backlund whips him into the cage a few times and drops a fist. He tries to use Patterson as a battering ram, but Patterson shoves him into the cage. He attempts another escape, but Backlund pulls him off the top rope with an atomic drop, which was just a notch below the Touch of Death button in the late 70s. Backlund starts to escape, but Patterson recovers and produces a set of brass knuckles. Backlund successfully blocks & dodges everything that Patterson throws at him. Patterson gets hung upside-down in the ropes, but Backlund falls off the cage and hits the mat. He heads for the door and Patterson tries to stop him, but Backlund casually kicks him away and hits the floor. 5 for 8. Both men provided equal quantities of It for this match, and we got an awesome brawl. Only complaint is an anticlimactic finish, but even sitting here and thinking about it, that might have been deliberate storytelling. Both men throw everything at each other, and then Backlund just plain gets lucky and wins? Okay, I don’t agree with that, but I get it.
WORLD TITLE: HULK HOGAN (champion) vs. KING KONG BUNDY (with Bobby Heenan)
-From Wrestlemania 2. Bundy rams Hogan into the cage and tries to leave but Hogan stops him. It should be noted that Dave Hebner is doing all the referee work, even though Robert Conrad was the announced guest referee and it’s a cage match with escape rules. Robert Conrad, therefore, wins the award for Laziest Wrestlemania Celebrity Ever.
-Bundy rips off the tape around Hogan’s ribs and ties him to the ropes, which is rather clever. Hogan manages to free himself in time to stop a Bundy escape. Hogan keeps chopping and kicking and chopping and kicking. Hogan rams Bundy into the cage to draw blood. Hogan punches the wound and rakes Bundy for good measure. He rams Bundy into the cage more and more. Hogan climbs to the top rope and steps on Bundy’s head and alleged neck. Hogan goes for a bodyslam but collapses. Bundy tries to escape but Hogan chokes him with the tape to get him back into the ring. Bundy fights back with an avalanche and a splash, but Hogan stops another escape. Bundy avalanches Hogan again, but Hogan no-sells and powerslams Bundy. Legdrop by Hogan and he attempts an escape, and despite Bobby Heenan’s best efforts, he makes it to the floor. For good measure, he chases Heenan into the cage and beats the crap out of him to make it a perfect evening. Typical Hogan formula, but no true suspense to it. I mean, I’m watching this with the perspective of time, but watching this, I didn’t find myself thinking for a moment that these fans were giving Bundy a chance. 5 for 9.
The 411: Really good collection of stuff this time around, with two Bruno matches that belonged on his tape and a GREAT 70s brawl. If you're a fan of Tito and/or Hammer, I'd recommend the Grudge Match version, but that's a keeper, too.
