Posted July 27, 201213 yr comment_5511390 VQ - Excellent (24/7) 1. Moondog Rex vs. Tony Garea Pretty good match. Garea did some early arm work. Rex took control eventually and worked on Garea's back. He applied a long bear hug which wasn't too interesting. There was a cool hope spot with Garea fighting back only to get back body dropped on a rope running spot. There was a botch during the transition into Garea's comeback with both guys fucking up an atomic drop and deciding to go backwards into a back suplex instead. That didn't go well either because Rex landed on top of Garea. Garea blocked a splash from Rex with his knees and officially started his comeback. He got a few great near falls including one off of a cross body. Finally, he went for a power slam but Rex reversed in mid-rotation and slammed Garea instead into a small package for the win. Like I said earlier, this was a pretty good match to start the show. 2. AJ Petrucci vs. Jim Powers This was extremely basic and elementary. That's about as good as Jim Powers gets. Even with that he's still incredibly slow and looks confused all the time. Powers did a dropkick, an elbow smash, a power slam, and a side headlock followed by a side headlock take down. Suddenly, Petrucci got out of the headlock from the mat and gave Powers a swinging neck breaker for the win. This wasn't much of anything at all. 3. Dave Barbie vs. Carl Fury Dave Barbie no sold all of Carl Fury's offense and did mostly shitty offense himself. He did give Fury is good hot shot to start the match. Barbie won with a power slam and an elbow drop. Yeah, this didn't do much for me at all. 4. Swede Hanson vs. Charlie Fulton This wasn't any good at all. Swede Hanson is absolutely terrible pretty much all the time. Hanson did a take down on Fulton. Fulton threw some uppercuts and whipped Hanson into a turnbuckle. Hanson fought back and got mad. He knocked down Fulton then gave him a splash from the second turnbuckle for the win. In the end, this pretty much sucked. 5. Nikolai Volkoff vs. George Wells Volkoff sang the Russian National Anthem before the match which I always enjoy. George Wells is better than Nikolai Volkoff. That is sad. Wells bumped well, had fun offense, and didn't do a terrible job selling. Volkoff was terrible at all of those things. I liked Wells football tackles and how he took bumps off hot shots. Volkoff won when Wells missed a diving Stinger splash in a corner and bumped greatly off of it. This was better than it should have been but still wasn't really any good. 6. Barry Windham vs. Dick Murdoch Very, very good match. I liked the beginning of the match as the crowd is hot and there's this really amusing stare down and trash talking going on. I thought after the initial start of the match things turned down a little bit. Nothing was bad but for about five minutes there wasn't anything that grabbed my attention. It all felt by the numbers. The match got really good when Murdoch hip tossed Barry out of the ring and to the floor. That was an insane bump. They did a great King of the Mountain spot with Barry trying to get back in the ring but Murdoch prevented it. Barry eventually just dragged Murdoch to the floor with him and posted him in the ring post. There was this tremendous camera angle of Murdoch after that where he had this glazed expression on his face and a long stream of saliva just shoots out of his mouth. It was fucking hilarious and great shit. Windham took control for a few minutes with Murdoch stooging for him. However, he missed a big splash from the top rope and took an another insane bump to the floor upside down and on his head. Murdoch took advantage and awesomely stole one of Kal Rudman's crutches to viciously assault Barry with. The finish came afterwards with Murdoch attempting a body slam back into the ring but Windham reversed it mid-rotation and pinned Murdoch for the win. After the match Murdoch attacked Barry with a microphone. This was an extremely entertaining match with a great second half. I do think it's terribly overrated since it finished 13 on the first set. That is absurd. I do believe it deserves a SOLID NOMINATION though. 7. Bruno Sammartino/David Sammartino vs. Paul Orndorff/Bobby Heenan Fun match that could have been better than it was. Heenan was tremendous in this bumping wildly and picking scraps whenever he could. There was a lot of stooging arm work on Orndorff to start the match that was fun but went on a little too long. David was FIP in this and he wasn't terrible but the crowd didn't care for him much at all. He got dropped throat first on an exposed turnbuckle and even had his nose busted pretty badly. Orndorff kneed David in the back which sent David into Bruno for the hot tag. The finishing run of this was good. Bruno tried a bear hug on Heenan but they collapsed and it looked like Heenan got squashed. They tried the bear hug a second time and this time Bruno got it on fine but Orndorff came in with a stool and whacked Bruno with it. He choked Bruno with it afterwards and he and Heenan were disqualified. David made the save for his dad and ran the heels off with the stool. There was kind of a cool image at the end with a bloody David kneeling by his wounded father but this could have been so much better. I was hoping for a better heat segment and maybe some brawling but at least this was still fun. 8. Mike Rotundo vs. Mr. X This was average. Mr. X had Rotundo in a side headlock for awhile then Rotundo got out of it and started working on Mr. X's leg. The leg work wasn't anything special and just basic stuff. Rotundo hit a miserable forearm that looked really ineffective then gave Mr. X the airplane spin and slam for the win. So, this was really by the numbers stuff when it all comes down to it. 9. Tony Atlas vs. Moondog Spot Moondog Rex is pretty clearly better than Moondog Spot from what I've seen. Spot just doesn't have much to give on offense. All of his blows looked weak and he applied a long reverse chin lock. He just isn't very interesting on offense. I'm sure if he was brawling it'd be better but he can't seem to carry the load of a regularly worked match. After Spot smashed Atlas into the guardrail on the floor Atlas got mad and got back into the ring. Atlas withstood a few more punches then gave Spot of few strikes then did an overhead body press slam for the win. Unfortunately, this has been the worst match on the card so far due in large part to Moondog Spot's lack of an interesting heat segment. 10. Hillbilly Jim vs. Rene Goulet Hillbilly Jim is hilarious. He isn't any good at all but he's hilarious. It's just really amusing to see someone doing hillbilly shtick. The Hillbilly won the match pretty quickly with Goulet taking a few good bumps including an upside down turnbuckle bump. Goulet went for a move from the top rope but Hillbilly Jim caught him into a bear hug and won by submission. This was pretty fun but no means any good. 11. Hulk Hogan vs. Brutus Beefcake (WWF Title) Okay match that was pretty fun. Hulk decked Beefcake and then gave him an atomic drop that sent him outside to start. They locked up later and Beefcake won and strutted around. Afterwards both guys strutted around which was funny then Hulk started to wail on him with punches and gave him a good clothesline and elbow drop. Beefcake eventually took control but his offense wasn't too great at first. Hulk had a mini-comeback but Beefcake cut him off and gave him a nasty clothesline in a corner. He got a very good near fall off of a power slam then got another near fall after a few knees and elbows but this time Hogan Hulked up for the big comeback. Hulk did the big boot, body slam, and leg drop but Johnny V jumped on the apron as he attempted a cover. Hulk was distracted with Johnny V and Beefcake kneed him in the back. Beefcake went for the cover and got two and a half before the referee noticed Hogan's leg was underneath the rope. Beefcake and Johnny V thought they had won and celebrated on the apron with the belt but Hulk got back up and rolled up Beefcake who had the title in his had for the win and to retain the championship. The crowd went nuts and Hulk got attacked post-match but fended off the heels so he could celebrate his victory. This match had some fun stuff in it but overall was nothing more than an average match. Final Analysis Solid show. There were a few fun matches and another very good match that got nominated. Philly, Boston, and Toronto are cities where a lot of JTTS get wins against local talents and what not so there was a lot of that instead of a stacked card. It looks like Bruno and Hulk brought in the crowd because the show did good attendance. Ultimately, this was an average card at The Spectrum with some good mixed in.
