ohtani's jacket

The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, Boston 10/12/85 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, Toronto 10/13/85 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, Toronto 12/15/85 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, Mid-Hudson Civic Center 1/7/86 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, Philadelphia 1/11/86 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, MSG 1/26/86 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, Philadelphia 2/8/86 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, SNME 2/15/86 The British Bulldogs & Lou Albano vs. The Dream Team & Johnny V, MSG 3/16/86 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, Wrestlemania II 4/7/86 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, SNME 5/1/86 The British Bulldogs vs. The Dream Team, MSG 5/19/86 The British Bulldogs & Lou Albano vs. The Dream Team & Johnny V, Civic Center 10/29/86 Greg Valentine vs. Davey Boy Smith, MSG 4/22/86 Dynamite Kid vs. Brutus Beefcake, MSG 4/22/86 This was a pretty good feud once you get past the fact that it's not Southern style tag wrestling and that there's heel in peril and other structural quirks. You've basically got three good workers involved and Beefcake trying harder than at any other point in his career. For the curious I would suggest just watching the two Toronto matches as the stuff from '86 doesn't really add anything to the '85 matches. I was quite impressed with their TV matches, however. By WWF standards they were quite good and featured plenty of action. I particularly liked the short, non-title match from the Mid-Hudson Civic Center and the first SNME match. That fireman's carry and super diving headbutt the Bulldogs did was insane. The December Toronto version was my favourite. The singles matches weren't bad. The Valentine match was a typically solid Greg Valentine match with some good spots. The Dynamite Kid match was the clipped version from the Bulldogs tape but also had some good action. Thoroughout these matches I didn't see too many flaws with the Bulldogs and I thought DK did some good stuff. There were flaws with the WWF style of tag wrestling, but in general the Bulldogs were pretty good. It kind of reminded me of Strike Force vs. The Islanders in that all of the matches were decent but none of them were great and thus they all kind of blur together into a stream of decentness.

I think the WWF as a whole was over. Hogan was its biggest star, but at the peak of its popularity we were reading about everything that was going on in the WWF magazine and in the television guide and local tabloids that had weekly two page spreads devoted to the WWF (as well as posters of WWF superstars), we collected all of the trading cards and wrestling figures (not just Hogan's) and we each had a favourite tag team or midcard face. I think you only have to look at the heels who turned face like Savage, Roberts, the Hart Foundation and Demolition to see that the popularity there was there for other guys. Whether this translated into drawing power in terms of ticket gates I don't know; from my perspective it was a television product. But late 80s WWF was popular on such a worldwide scale that it was almost impossible for the rest of the roster not to be known. To my mind, WWF Superstars was aptly named. Like I said, whether they were tangible draws I don't know, but there were a lot of memorable gimmicks and care and attention was given to the heel and face turns. So much so that I think anyone who got caught up in that boom would remember some of the workers outside of Hogan and even a few of the angles. At the least they're bound to remember a couple of guys Hogan wrestled.

The implication was that undercard workers weren't able to draw much heat because people weren't interested in their matches or were only interested in Hogan. I don't remember a problem with the heat for undercard matches and I haven't seen any examples recently. If there was a problem with the heat, I'd wager it more to do with the matches being shit than people not following the storylines. And as far as drawing heat goes, I can't understand how anyone would believe that the WWF undercard were trying to draw heat but failed repeatedly. The matches were shit far too often for it to be a coincidence.

So you're saying that the rest of the roster weren't over because their matches didn't draw heat?

That's simply not true. If every match was worked to garner heat then every match would feature guys trying their hardest. Every match is supposed to be worked to garner heat? Or at least the vast, vast majority? I mean aside from the one a show "popcorn matches" - most of which had standard heeling designed to draw heat in them - I'm not sure what other goal promoters would have in mind. "Hey guys don't draw heat. In fact do your best to alienate the audience if possible. We don't want people coming back." If every match on a card was meant to draw heat then you'd have a card where the workers are trying to be actively good in every match. When does that ever happen outside of indies and Joshi puroresu? If you look at an 80s WWF card, it's ridiculous to say the undercard matches are trying to garner more heat than the mainevent. A semi-main may do, but the rest of the matches are just filling in the card. 90% of them could have been 10 times more heated if the workers had tried more. It has nothing to do with whether they're a draw or not, it's simply the way the company was set up. We've all seen 80s WWF workers have better matches in the territories they came from and on the houseshow circuits away from TV and PPV. It's even the case that they were told to go short and have hot matches. If that was the case, every 80s WWF PPV would be exciting and Coliseum videos would be full of hidden gems.

That's simply not true. If every match was worked to garner heat then every match would feature guys trying their hardest.

I haven't seen any examples of undercard matches lacking heat. Then again, how many undercard matches were worked to garner heat?

I got hooked as an 8 year-old not only by the colourful characters but the fact that everyone else at school was watching it. I don't know if wrestling creates that sort of buzz on the playground these days (it was literally a phenomenon like Transformers or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), but what's to stop an 8 year-old getting hooked if he catches a glimpse on TV? The era that you're talking about died a death in the early 90s. You can't reproduce it for today's kids anymore than you can reproduce the glory of 80s toys, cartoons, comic books and arcade games. It belongs to the past. I do agree that the focus on the entire roster was important, though. It wasn't just Hogan. As far as I recall, people followed all the storylines heading into a PPV and were into guys at every point of the card. It was a slickly oiled machine in that respect.

The other day I was showing someone the Mean Gene "fuck it" moment and he said "Rick Rude! I remember him." I don't think people remember everyone from that era, but there's always a handful of names they remember.

This angle was such a defining part of my wrestling fandom that I sought out the hair match. Not good. Neither was Hogan/Dibiase, Dibiase/Jake, Hogan/Bad News or a bunch of other stuff I tried to get into. Is it just me or was there a slump after '87? The most enjoyable things I've watched lately are the coronation ceremonies for Haku, Duggan and Savage. Haku's coronation is awesome (esp Bobby), Duggan's features some great moments with Hacksaw wearing the crown and Savage's has a nice poem from the Genius. Also watched some Backlund matches. The Hogan match and the Race match to be exact. The Hogan match is the best possible technical match Hogan could have in the WWF I guess, but after getting into Backlund during the Smarkschoice WWF poll I was kind of annoyed by him this time round. Way too much lying around in a headlock or some other hold, working a spot, going back to the hold. The Race match was the same. Yeah, it was Backlund's thing and there were cool spots and all, but why would every guy he faced get caught in his headlock and go through the motions? That's as annoying as any other worker's repetitive schtick. The Race match is disappointing if you're expecting something special, but serviceable if you realise it was never going to be an all-time classic. The layout of the match wasn't very good and neither was the selling, but there were some cool spots and the crowd was hot.

There was probably some reason given for it in press conferences or promos or the sports newspapers and wrestling magazines, but basically it's Parejas Increibles. EDIT: Looks like I'm wrong again. The answer is because of fan voting -- http://joshipuro.blogspot.jp/1994/03/hokut...a-and-bull.html

Hulk Hogan vs. One Man Gang, Philadelphia 12/5/87 This was all right, but something tells me there wasn't a hidden gem Hogan/OMG brawl. Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Philadelphia 9/28/85 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Toronto 10/13/85 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, MSG 12/30/85 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, MSG 1/27/86 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, lumberjack match, MSG 2/17/86 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Detroit 4/26/86 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Boston 5/24/86 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Boston 6/27/86 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Rochester, NY 6/3/87 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Toronto 4/23/89 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, MSG 4/24/89 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Boston 6/3/89 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Fresno 8/9/89 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, London 10/10/89 Hulk Hogan vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, Paris 10/13/89 I was kind of amused how these guys could have the same match years apart. I complained that Boss Man and Hogan had the same match over and over again, but this was even worse. Their very first match-up in Philly has insane heat and while it's mostly stalling it's extremely effective when they finally do lock-up. Other memorable bouts are the 1/86 MSG bout where Savage bleeds a gusher and the 5/86 Boston match where Hogan bleeds a gusher. Other than that, the first post-WM V rematch where Sherri pops up makes a change from the Elizabeth schtick they did all the time and the 2/86 lumberjack match offers a different dynamic from their usual bout. I guess my overall impression was that they could've done more. It should've been the WWF version of Flair vs. Luger, but instead of an epic mainevent we got the same 10 minute match each time. Prior to watching these I would've thought that Savage vs. Hogan symbolised the era, but now I'm not really sure. I wouldn't call any of their matches great and I was pretty fucking sick of the match-up by the end of '89. My opinion of Savage as a worker took a bit of a hit watching these and my enthusiasm for Hogan was tempered as well, although '89 Hogan seems to be the big problem so far. Incidently, did Hogan and Piper have a match worth watching?

There's likely reasons we don't know about for why the pairings were made. How much did Asuka's injury influence the '86 TLTB tournament, for example, where rookies teamed with established workers? EDIT: Scratch that, Asuka was Mika Suzuki's partner so it was a planned idea.

Paul Orndorff vs. Sgt. Slaughter, 6/2/84 This was pretty disappointing. I liked the entrances and the early stalling was okay, but everything after that was generic for these two. Paul Orndorff vs. Hulk Hogan, MSG 2/20/84 Paul Orndorff vs. Hulk Hogan, Cap Centre 7/28/84 Paul Orndorff vs. Hulk Hogan, Philadelphia 4/27/85 There were some good spots in these early Hogan/Orndorff matches but it seemed like both guys were still finding their way and hadn't got their formula down pat. A lot of dead air for such short matches. Another batch of matches I found myself multi-tasking during.

Randy Savage vs. Harley Race, Philadelphia 9/18/87 Randy Savage vs. Paul Orndorff, Philadelphia 6/28/86 Harley Race vs. Koko B Ware, Toronto 9/20/87 These were disappointing. They seemed to highlight the difference between having a beef and working a regular match. Perhaps it's only natural, but the regular matches aren't anywhere near as exciting or interesting as the heated brawls. The 20 minute draw between Koko and Race was a chore. Even Bobby ran out of jokes to make about Frankie and the commentary began to drag. Hulk Hogan vs. Terry Funk, Philadelphia 12/7/85 Hulk Hogan vs. Terry Funk, Toronto 12/15/85 Hulk Hogan vs. Terry Funk, SNME 1/4/86 These were good matches but they could have been better. Terry worked a looser style than Race and it seemed like there was less substance to this series. That's not to say the matches aren't fun, however. My favourite part was when Funk threatened a guy in the crowd in Philly with the branding iron and got the double finger. Philly all the way.

Mooney kicked off the first Monday Night RAW, right? But Slick wasn't on RAW until episode three. Don't get the Slick appearance. EDIT: OK, they needed a reverend.

In retrospect, I should have only watched the MSG Hogan/Boss Man matches or the Boston matches, but I watched the matches out of order and by the time I clicked it was too late. I do think it was a particular problem with the Hogan/Boss Man feud, however, as I loved every single match in the next feud: Hulk Hogan vs. King Harley Race Hulk Hogan vs. King Harley Race, Boston 5/2/87 Hulk Hogan vs. King Harley Race, Philadelphia 5/9/87 Hulk Hogan vs. King Harley Race, Toronto 5/17/87 Hulk Hogan vs. King Harley Race, MSG 5/18/87 Hulk Hogan vs. King Harley Race, Texas Death Match, Boston 6/6/87 Hulk Hogan vs. King Harley Race, Texas Death Match, MSG 6/14/87 Hulk Hogan vs. King Harley Race, SNME 3/7/88 These matches were tremendous. I remember This Is Workrate on Smarkschoice was always pimping these, but I really had no idea that Race produced at this level during his WWF run. I also labeled myself a Hogan skeptic in a recent thread, but these 10 minute brawls he had with workers like Orndorff and Race were outstanding. I had no idea Hogan bladed so often on houseshows. I think he bled in all of these bar the nationally televised version. The May matches are essentially the same with the same finish, same post-match beatdown and same challenge for a Texas Death Match where Hogan would quit wrestling if he lost, but Race was so good in each of them that it didn't bother me that the same spots were being repeated. My image of Harley in the WWF was that he was out of place and broken down, but either he saw this as his last big payday or I've been watching the wrong matches because he was busted his ass in these matches. Some of the diving headbutt spots, especially the ones on the outside, were insane. I couldn't really choose one match over the other out of the May matches, but I did think the finish looked better in the Boston, Philly and Toronto matches rather than the MSG match. The MSG Texas Death Match was my favourite of all the bouts. If you ignore the fact that it's not really a Texas Death Match as such and just view it as a no-DQ brawl, it's such an awesome grudge match. And this time round I even liked their SNME match, which was a truncated version of their May '87 bouts but with plenty of solid brawling, including a cool table spot. I had no idea there were so many good WWF matches I'd never seen.

Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, Toronto 11/6/88 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, Los Angeles 11/17/88 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, MSG 11/26/88 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, Boston 12/3/88 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, Los Angeles 12/17/88 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, Boston 1/13/89 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, MSG 1/23/89 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, Philadelphia 2/11/89 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, cage match, Boston 3/18/19 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, cage match, MSG 4/18/89 Hulk Hogan vs. The Big Boss Man, cage match, SNME 4/25/89 Fuck, that's a lot of Hulk Hogan vs. Big Boss Man matches. I think I watched all of them except maybe the first two Boston matches. Towards the end, I just had them playing in the background while I did other things since they were so damn repetitive. The first couple of times I thought they were solid matches, but the shitty finishes and the same, reoccuring matches really killed my enthusiasm for this match-up. The SNME cage match I think is overrated, but the superplex is still an amazing spot. It's too bad they do the double countout spot afterwards where Hogan sits up like the Undertaker at eight. It's interesting to note that they fuck up the superplex in the Boston match and don't even try it in MSG (or the other way around.) Anyway, this series drained my will to live.

Hogan vs. Orndorff Hulk Hogan vs. Paul Orndorff, Philadelphia 9/20/86 Hulk Hogan vs. Paul Orndorff, DQ rule waived, Phildelphia 10/18/86 Hulk Hogan vs. Paul Orndorff, cage match, Philadelphia 12/13/86 This feud happened a few years before I got into wrestling and despite being a fan for about 25 years I never had the inclination to watch it. That all changed yesterday. As with Orndorff's face turn, both the acting and execution of the angle could've been a hell of a lot better to set-up this feud, but I did like how the heels were like one big fraternity in 1986 with Bundy, Studd and Adonis all congratulating Orndorff backstage. I also thought a lot of the other details of the feud like the promos, Orndorff stealing Hogan's music and Hogan continually biting on that string bandana thing he wore were weak compared to a lot of other 80s WWF feuds. I couldn't really understand why the piledriver was used so sparingly in terms of the psychology, either, but I guess it wasn't put over that much during Orndorff's turn. Anyway, their Big Event match and the SNME matches were largely rubbish. The 10/86 title match was okay, but it was an excuse to push the Adonis/Piper feud and ultimately worthless. I did, however, discover this series of matches from Philly that I thought were really fun. The first match is more or less the 10/86 title match, but with blood and a brass knuckles spot that winds up getting Hogan DQ'ed. Hogan's selling is strong in this match and while Orndorff's brawling isn't quite as good as it is in the Piper feud he still puts in a good performance. This leads to a rematch where the DQ rule is waived meaning that the title can change hands on a disqualification. Heenan and Orndorff try to goad Hogan into DQ'ing himself and again there's blood and some decent brawling. I actually saw the same match from Houston (like literally the same match), but there wasn't any blood and it was shot like a studio match which made it seem odd. The blowoff, if you can call it that, is a better version of their SNME cage match, again with blood. It's a WWF cage match so it won't appeal to everyone, but I grew up with WWF cage match rules and they seem normal to me. I don't know what else is available from this period, but comparing the gimmick matches in Philly and then Houston, the way the matches got blood at the Spectrum was interesting. During the WCW poll, I took quite a liking to Orndorff and watched a lot of his stuff from both his comeback and Pretty Wonderful. I wouldn't call him a great worker as the other day I watched a really boring Cowboy Bob Orton/Orndorff match that proved he should've been only working sub 10 minute brawls, but I liked these Hogan matches and the Piper matches a lot.

I didn't know that Kurt Angle still wrestles.

Of course Shawn is going to look better if your match choices are so poor.

Totally random question, but who usually does a worker's face paint before a show? The worker himself?

Don't you think the existence of so many streaming sites suggests that filesharing is more prevelant in Japan than you assumed? I mean Nico Nico Douga is one of the biggest Japanese sites on the internet. There are a lot of Japanese people who simply don't know how to download. The other day a girl I know in her 30s asked me how you download music from the internet. She wasn't against it at all, she just didn't know how to do it. Another girl asked me whether you get a virus when you download things, but I've yet to encounter anyone who's been against it particularly when online streaming is so popular. Whenever I go CD hunting in Japan, I always rub shoulders with older guys. I don't really believe that younger Japanese people have any qualms about downloading stuff. You can burn Tsutaya CDs to your heart's content in Japan, but even they're complaining about loss of revenue from illegal downloading. The rest of the stuff is a bit off topic, but Rob's problem was that the company that hired him is busiest on the weeknights and weekends and doesn't offer much work during the day, which kills your social life. In Kanto you need to make plans in advance as most people are busy seeing other people they know. If your friends are busy you have to go out and meet new people, which you can't do if you're at work all the time.

I didn't buy Piper and Schultz doing that to Andre. I did like the Piper/Orton vs. Snuka/Tongan Kid tag, however. Roddy Piper vs. Bruno Sammartino, Boston 12/7/85 Roddy Piper vs. Bruno Sammartino, cage match, Boston 2/8/86 These were better than they had a right to be. It was basically the same sort of stooging performance from the Piper/Snuka series, but Bruno was a lot more believable dishing out a beating to Piper and the matches were pretty fun. Roddy Piper vs. Rick Rude, MSG 9/30/89 This had the same kind of problems as the Toronto match I talked about earlier in this thread. Piper vs. Rude was a good idea for a feud, but instead of doing the short, frenetic brawls that have been entertaining me over the past few days, they'd start out going hammer and tongs, then Rude would take control of the match and do all of his restholds. Piper would fight back, the match would be thrown out in inspid fashion, they'd brawl about ringside a bit and nothing would be settled. Only the first few matches are worth watching, unless you're a glutton for Rude's camel clutch.

Check out the tag match from MSG with Piper/Schultz vs Snuka/Andre for something more along the lines of what you wished for. All right, I will. I've been mostly concentrating on Piper singles matches, but if there are any good tags fire away.