May 1977

Flair and Valentine defend the NWA World Tag Team Titles in a Steel Cage!!!

This is the final match of the 1977 Champion Carnival, whose existence on tape I was unaware of until discovering it on YouTube last night. What you have to know going into this is that, in the semifinal immediately prior, Baba got a DQ win against 1976 Carnival winner Abdullah the Butcher, but weathered one of his postmatch assaults. This of course recalls the circumstance Baba found himself in during the previous Carnival, when he had to wrestle Abby in the final immediately after finishing his semifinal match, and got ambushed by the Butcher. Not only is this Jumbo's first Carnival final, it's also likely the best chance he's ever going to get to defeat his mentor. …

The Superstar's first televised title defense from MSG!!! Available on WWE True Giants DVD

Bruno lost the title sixteen days earlier and returns to the Garden. You have to search a little harder, but this is on the Network. Type "ITALIAN SUPERMAN" in the search box and this will come up. Facing the Italian Superman, May 16, 1977

This is pretty great. Kader is from Morocco with a background in Greco-Roman Wrestling. Kader does a beautiful job of keeping up with Saint in the majority of grappling exchanges. He pulls off a great counter to Saint's stranglehold counter and a beautiful counter to a full nelson which leads into a face off. Saint usually gets a rep of being too exhibition-y, but I don't get that vibe from this match as the the majority of the exchanges seem gritty and the struggles are noticeable throughout the exchanges. Great match.