This was a fun match. We start off with both guys throwing hands at one another. Tommy starts sticking and moving. Playing a game of cat and mouse.Tommy even mimmicks Kamala a bit. Finally Kamala is able to get Rich to try a test of strength. Kamala busts Rich open and works the cut with chops. Kamala is even licking at the blood. Tommy starts his comeback and the crowd is solidly behind him. Finally Wildfire knocks Kamala down and the crowd goes nuts. Then it erupts. Akbar, Johnny Rich is in the ring. Friday is in the ring, the crowd goes nuts and it's Hacksaw. Rich pins Akbar with the Thesz press. Of course this makes 0 sense. I loved the match up till the chaotic finish. 2 3/4*

When Rich was on offense this was pretty great--great fire (no pun intended) in just throwing everything he can to try to knock Kamala down and Kamala doing some great weeble-wobble selling. Like Abby and ZombieTaker, the best way to get a good match out of Kamala is to beat (or try to beat) the shit out of him. The run-ins themselves are fun and draw tremendous heat, but the idiotic finish kind of sours this. Paul Boesch doesn't even try to proffer an explanation. Why couldn't they just do a DQ?

Psychology of the finish was to prevent Kamala from losing his heat with a clean finish. By pinning Akbra - Tommy Rich gets his hand in the air - the house show crowd goes home happy - and Kamala didn't get pinned. I don't think there was more analysis than this back in the day.

I got a big kick out of Rich playing bullfighter at the beginning. I really liked seeing Duggan and Rich interact too. It all felt like a really big deal. The finish was fine for what it was, an attraction setting up another match. It wasn't ideal, but it's also not like there are kayfabe rankings in Houston. Past things like the brass knucks title or those occasions when the NWA title came on in, Houston feels more like a special attraction battleground where wrestlers from all over the country can meet to face each other. It means that there are both more and less consequence to victory.

 

This was a match where a wrestler from one territory was facing a monster pulled from deepest, darkest Africa. Pete or Bruce could maybe speak more to how the fans in that arena might have felt, but I don't think they were thinking about the effects of a victory on NWA rankings here.

Psychology of the finish was to prevent Kamala from losing his heat with a clean finish. By pinning Akbra - Tommy Rich gets his hand in the air - the house show crowd goes home happy - and Kamala didn't get pinned. I don't think there was more analysis than this back in the day.

I get the psychology of the finish. It was set up to protect Kamala. In the grand scheme of things it didn't matter as long as Kamala wasn't pinned, and Tommy got his hand raised. Just thought their was more sensical ways. For example both are brawling on the floor at 9 Rich sneaks in. Or both are brawling in the ring. Akbar throws fire at Rich misses and hits Kamala and Kamala gets counted out. Or Kamala doesn't break on 10 when Rich is caught in the ropes .

 

Still a super fun match and a great showcase match for Rich.

For as much as we might look at the finish and think it doesn't make any sense (and logically it doesn't) clearly it made sense from Boesch's point of view because the crowd went NUTS for it. I mean seriously they went crazy over Rich pinning Akbar and didn't seem to really care that there was no reason that should have actually been allowed. I don't think a countout or DQ would have gotten the same reaction and at the end of the day that's what it is all about in wrestling.

 

The match itself is a ton of fun while it lasted. It felt short but then it was still probably the right length because any longer and we would have wound up with some long Kamala nerve hold as a control segment.

 

As an aside this is a stacked card with Rich/Kamala, Duggan/Dibiase Street Fight and JYD/Reed North American title match as the top 3 matches.