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This message was edited by garretta on December 16th, 2023 03:11 GMT
I haven't finished my S.D/Iron Mike thread yet, but this thread is going to be huge, so I'd better get started.
I think I counted ten videos made by Job Guy concerning WWF jobbers in 1985, I'm going to try to focus on one at a time to make it easier of all of us,
The first gut out of the box is Tony Garea. In our opening bout, he teams with Matt Sampson and Joe Mirto to oppose the Heenan Family, consisting at the time of Adrian Adonis, Big John Studd, and The Missing Link:
1. This match was taped at the Mid-Hudson Civic Center in Poughkeepsie, New York on Tuesday, July 30, 1985 and aired on Championship Wrestling the weekend of August 10, 1985.
2. The briefcase chained to Adrian's wrist at the start of the match ended up being a symbol of his upcoming transformation to "Adorable", although it's not clear if Vince had thought of that yet. At this time, It seemed like he was a replacement for Ken Patera more than anything else.
3. All three members of the face team try to slam Studd mere moments after they get in the ring with him, which is ridiculous from both the kayfabe and real-life perspectives, Mirto and Garea barely get John off his feet, and Sampson can't even lift him,
4. I wonder who thought of Link being limited mostly to headbutts. (He actually pulled off a nice-looking front bodyslam in a Florida match I just saw.)
I know that Dewey Robertson was a very good worker before he became Link, so maybe he came up with that idea to make the character as far apart from him as possible,
5. Link busts out the slam I just talked about as part of the finishing sequence, which also includes a flying elbow from Adonis. Studd gets the submission from Sampson with an over-the-shoulder backbreaker at 3:49,
Next: Garea teams with Salvatore Bellomo to take on the Hart Foundation,
Thoughts?
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This message was edited by garretta on December 16th, 2023 19:32 GMT
Now let's check out Mr. Garea as he teams with Salvatore Bellomo to take on the Hart Foundation (with Jimmy Hart):
1. This match was taped in Poughkeepsie on Monday, September 9, 1985 and aired on Championship the weekend of October 5, 1985.
2. The History of WWE website assumes that Championship aired on Saturday in a given market, so it uses Saturdays as airdates. Individual markets may vary.
3. Vince calls Bret and Jim "The Hart Foundation" on commentary, but Howard doesn't use the name in his intro, so it must not have been completely official yet.
4. The Harts are wearing red pants, which isn't a look we see too often from them.
5. Tony and Sal control the majority of the match, as short as it was. The only way the Harts can get control is to attack from behind; they were nowhere near the well-oiled machine they would become, and Bret is presented as the weak link. Tony even gets to dropkick him out of the ring.
6. Bret gets the pin at 2:13 following the Hart Attack.
7. This copy of the match came from KVOS-TV in Bellingham, Washington, which is about twenty miles south of the Canadian border, fifty-two miles northwest of Vancouver, and ninety miles south of Seattle.
8, Bruno says several times throughout the match that he's surprised how good the Harts really are. He's not the only one; it took until after they won the belts for that realization to hit me.
Next: Tony takes on Randy Savage,
Thoughts?
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The original tag team name of Hart & Neidhart was supposed to be the Violators, with the Hart Foundation being the name of Jimmy Hart's entire stable. Somehow though the name never quite took and the Hart Foundation just became Bret & the Anvil.
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This message was edited by garretta on December 16th, 2023 20:53 GMT
i think we can all be glad things happened the way they did. The "Violators" name certainly wouldn't have stood the test of time, with its sexual connotations,
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That would have been a terrible name, it actually could have hurt the team chances to succeed...
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In our next bout, Tony takes on Randy "Macho Man" Savage (with Elizabeth):
1. This match was taped in Poughkeepsie on Tuesday, November 12, 1985 and aired on Championship the weekend of November 30, 1985.
2. Vince is certainly complimentary to Liz, but his manhood isn't popping through his pants like it would be later on.
3. Tony holds the ropes open for Liz while she's leaving the ring, and his reward is getting backjumped by Randy.
Vince and Bruno highlight Randy's insecurity and jealousy concerning Liz as reasons for the way he acts toward her. and we would see that theme explored in many different ways over the next six years.
3. Tony catches Randy coming off the top with a right hand to the midsection, then hooks him in a sunset flip for two, The only other guys that I recall catching him off the top are Tito and Hogan.
4. Tony gets two more two-counts, but Randy catches him going for a rollup and rams his head into the top of the corner post. That's enough to knock Tony for a loop, and Randy wastes no time dropping the elbow for the win in 1:22. (Tony sells like he has trouble breathing, so maybe it was his throat that was supposed to hit the post.)
5. Randy demands to be kissed on the cheek by Liz no less than three times after the match. You would think that the kissing would have carried over once he turned face, but I don't recall any physical contact between them unless he was putting her on his shoulder after a big win.
6, Randy goes back into the ring to tear up a poster just before the tape cuts out, but we don't get a chance to see what it says.
Next: Tony's final bout in this thread, as he teams with Red Walsh against Nikolai Volkoff and The Iron Sheik.
Thoughts?
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This message was edited by garretta on December 21st, 2023 02:39 GMT
Now for tag team action, as Tony teams with Red Walsh against Nikolai Volkoff and The Iron Sheik:
1. This bout was taped on Tuesday, October 1, 1985, in Poughkeepsie and aired on Championship the weekend of October 12, 1985.
2. Instead of the Russian National Anthem, Nikolai chooses to sing his version of "Cara Mia" from The Wrestling Album. If we're being honest, he's not a bad singer, but he could have been the Russian Pavarotti and no one in the WWF would have given him credit for it.
3. I take back what I just said; both Bruno and Vince give him credit for not having the worst voice in the world. They also give a brief history of "Cara Mia" and agree that if he'd stopped to think that it had once been recorded by Jay and the Americans (note the bold), he never would have recorded it.
4, Tony was in the match during our little music lesson; his partner Walsh was put away in a twinkling, with Volkoff's press backbreaker getting the pin at 1:48.
That's all for the TV matches in Tony's comp; the rest of the matches in it come from house shows, and I'll cover them in my "Jerking the Curtain" thread.
Next: To be determined,
Thoughts?
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This message was edited by garretta on December 25th, 2023 03:36 GMT
The next man up in our look at 1985 is Rusty Brooks. Unless otherwise noted, all of the matches in his comp were taped in Poughkepsie and aired on Championship.
In his first match, Rusty teams with Charlie Fulton against Barry Windham and Mike Rotundo:
1. This match was taped on Monday, December 17, 1984 and aired the weekend of January 5.
2. This tape is from the Boston area, as Howard's voiceover concerns a card coming to New Bedford, Massachusetts and the Keith High School Gym on Wednesday, January 9.
3. Fulton short-arms Rusty when it comes time to tag. I think it was an accident, as he made it on the second try.
4. Rusty is obviously not being treated as the typical McMahon superheavyweight; one dropkick from Windham knocks him down, and Barry follows up with a slam. Later, Rotundo executes a fireman's carry on him with ease.
5. Rusty gets a bit of an offensive flurry against Rotundo punctuated by a rather stiff-looking kneedrop and tags out, but Fulton tags him back in just seconds later, and soon after he's bulldogged by Windham and pinned at 3:13.
6. Vince makes a comment during the replay to the effect that Brooks wishes he weighed 215 pounds after taking the bulldog from Barry because the extra weight he carried worked against him. What did he (Vince) mean by that?
7. Albano isn't with Barry and Mike yet; his face turn after the incident where Piper broke the gold record over his head at MSG aired for the first time on this very program.
8. The lucky people in New Bedford got an Intercontinental title match as their main event, as Greg Valentine defended against the Junkyard Dog in what turned out to be a WrestleMania preview. JYD won on a disqualification.
Next: To be determined, I think there are a couple of other matches from this hour on these comps, so I might do one of them.
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This message was edited by garretta on December 29th, 2023 03:34 GMT
In our next match, Rusty battles the Junkyard Dog:
1. This match is from the third hour of the December 17, 1984 taping in Poughkeepsie. It aired on Championship the weekend of January 19, 1985.
2, JYD wears pants that I don't recall seeing before: solid black with a red stripe at the waistband. There's no sign of the word "THUMP" on them.
3. Count me as one who prefers "Another One Bites the Dust" to "Grab Them Cakes". The latter isn't too bad as a novelty number, but it stinks as entrance music.
4. Bruno mentions that JYD seems to be more serious than usual, but I don't really see that. He was presented more seriously here than he would be later in his WWF run, though.
In a way, you can blame Terry Funk leaving the company for JYD's downfall from a booking standpoint. Personal demons aside, with Terry gone after getting the (megaphone-aided) winning fall in the Mania 2 tag match, there really wasn't much else for the Dog to sink his teeth into, so to speak. Once Harley Race beat him clean as a sheet at Mania III, it was all over.
5. Rusty gets control briefly, but he forgets himself for a moment and tries a dropkick, which misses badly. Not wanting to herniate himself by attempting a powerslam, JYD busts out Hacksaw Jim Duggan's three-point clothesline, which puts the big man down for the count at 2:09.
After the match, JYD helps Rusty to his feet and gives him a gentle shove through the ropes to the outside, Rusty's selling of dizziness and bewilderment has to be seen to be believed.
As he leaves, JYD shakes hands with both the referee and Howard Finkel, then gives a few extra jukes for the front row,
Next: Rusty teams with Dave Barbie to take on Jimmy Snuka and Tama (The Tonga Kid).
Thoughts?
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December 29th, 2023 11:41 GMT |
 
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Brooks and Barbie aka Slow and Slower. Can't wait. Poetry in motion, those two.
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This message was edited by garretta on December 30th, 2023 03:49 GMT
Now for some tag team action, as Rusty teams with Dave Barbie to take on Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka and his "cousin", The Tonga Kid:
1. This match came from the fourth (and, mercifully. final) hour of the 12/17/84 taping in Poughkeepsie. It aired the weekend of January 19, 1985 on Championship.
2, Assuming a 7:30 PM Eastern bell time, it had to be right around midnight by the time this match hit the ring. Thus, I won't fault Howard a bit for introducing Rusty as Barbie's opponent rather than his partner.
3, Tama (as I'll refer to the Kid throughout the match) is shown talking to Jimmy as they're heading to the ring. Wouldn't you just love to know what he could possibly be saying?
4. In non-worked sports, "phenom" usually refers to talented young guys with a bright future. So why is Jimmy, who is a grizzled veteran compared to Tama, stuck with that label?
Vince must have liked the sound of the word, because The Phenom became Jimmy's unofficial second name during his 1989 run and was much more famously assigned to The Undertaker a few years later.
5. This match has very little action, which doesn't surprise me a bit given the circumstances. The referee breaks up a headlock when Rusty reaches the ropes, Rusty gets to push Tama around a little, then Barbie tags in and gets no offense in (as in zero) before Tama starts to set him up for Jimmy's Superfly splash, which hits dead center. Tama cuts Rusty off as the referee tolls the fatal three-count in 2:29.
Next: Rusty tries the tag ranks again, as he teams with Bob Wade to take on the Junkyard Dog and Tito Santana.
Thoughts?
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You are right regarding your guess as to the length of time that taping must have taken. I attended a TV taping in Rochester Minnesota in May of 1988 where it was a rare occasion that they taped 4 weeks of TV rather than the usual three. Bell time 7:30, and it was about 12:30 a.m. before we got out of there.. needless to say my parents weren't too happy since they had driven us and went to dinner and a movie and then were waiting to drive us home, this was a Wednesday so it was a school and work night lol
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Now for some more tag team action, as Rusty teams with Bob (or Bobby) Wade against the Junkyard Dog and Tito Santana:
1. This bout was taped on Tuesday, March 26, 1985 in Poughkeepsie and aired on Championship the weekend of April 6, 1985.
2. Mr. Wade's on-screen graphic reads "Bob". but Howard announces him as "Bobby".
3. Vince proclaims JYD and Tito as top contenders for the tag title then held by Volkoff and Sheik. That would have been a hell of a match if it had ever been put together, but it wasn't.
They did get a clean victory at MSG against Valentine and Beefcake that could have been used as a reason to give them a title shot once the Dream Team won the belts, but Vince didn't choose to go that way, either.
4, Trunks watch: JYD is in white with a big red "THUMP" across the back, while Tito looks fetching in basic black.
5. At one point in the match, Vince refers to JYD as "Superdog". Throwaway comment or possible marketing idea that went nowhere? You decide.
6, Wade and Brooks actually trap Tito in the corner and begin to tag in and out, just like a good team should do. Vince: "I don't understand (why they would do) that at all."
More to come!
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7. The finish comes when JYD knocks Wade down with a huge clothesline, then tags Tito, who slaps on the figure-four for the submission at 3:53.
Next: Rusty tries the tag ranks again, this time teaming with A.J, Petruzzi against The British Bulldogs.
Thoughts?
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