Handicap Match: Andre the Giant & "Incredible" Hulk Hogan vs. Crusher Blackwell & The East-West Connection (Adrian Adonis & Jesse "The Body" Ventura) (11/8/81)

 

This is JIP and Hogan is fresh into his babyface run teaming with his former rival Andre. This was very fun as Hogan was working FIP and taking all kinds of offense from the heels with Blackwell looking strong. Andre was fun on the hot tag with Adonis pinballing for him but he would get worked over as well and took quite a bit of punishment from the heels also before getting the hot tag to Hogan where everything broke down with Hogan slamming Blackwell which got a huge pop. Hogan would then put away Adonis with the legdrop to win and I liked this one more than Dylan did and I think it deserves a look as a nomination.

JIP. This opens up with Hogan beating Blackwell and it really is a joy to watch Jerry take backflip bumps off of punches and hit wild running headbutts. Heels end up isolating Hogan and working him over 3 on 1 with Adonis providing most of the interesting work including some big clubbing blows and a nice diving elbow. Blackwell hits a nice splash on Hogan and Adonis a nice dropkick. Hot tag is really uneventful though we do get to see Adonis bump around for Andre. Andre takes a brief beating and ends up firing up and destroying Blackwell with a serious of seated splashes. Faces finally take the pin with Hogan pinning Adonis. This had some ups but I don't see it as being must see.

 

Edit: I watched this REALLY early on in the process. My memory is that I didn't like the hot tag and I wanted to see more out of Andre. Still this has a novel quality to it, so maybe I should have at least passed it through.

I am with Dylan's initial thoughts. There is a novelty factor but besides Blackwell bumping huge and Andre selling for the heels, nothing really special to grab onto. I am also not a fan of handicap matches in general. If the heels with numbers lose, it makes them look like doofuses. We'll see plenty of heels on the set looking like idiots. No need to add another.