Speaker 1: And we are back the complete Hull Cogan, the Lapsed
Fan Wrestling Podcast WWF. We're All Star Wrestling Showdown at
Shay nineteen eighty Hogan, Andre Sibisco Bruno and so much more.
And we've been on lots of empty seats.
Speaker 2: Hold on one second, though, because you know what, it's
been a while, so I know we're a little bit
rusty here. Oh my god, how could I forget? Because
this is the first time we've done this on the
complete well the first time we've done a death toll.
And here we go. We have including you know, my
commentary tracks that I that I gathered, I included those
as well. We have twenty five, twenty five people and
this is nineteen eighty I mean, yeah, God's sake, it's
I mean, the fact that there are people who are
still alive is the miracle workable? Yep. Cal Rudman, Sure Angels, Maravilla,
Dominic Denucci, Baron, Michael Secluna, Chaffo Guerrero and Tony Minocchi,
Larry Sharp, Pedro Morales, Lou Albano, Alfa, Sika, Pat Patterson,
tour Caamata, the Fabulous Mula, Beverly Shade, Canned him, Alloy,
Peggy Lee, all four Women, Yeah, Rick McGraw, even though
we don't see him, Yes, the Grand Wizard, Real Monsoon,
Gene Okerland, Rene Goulai, Andre the Giant, Bruno San Martino,
and Homo Kogan. That one hit hard. Let that one
sit in, all right. That's that's where we're at now.
Never that's that's the biggest name I think that's ever
been on The Death Toll. And it's it's weird, it's
kind of real. Now it's real. It really is for
the first time, it's real. Yep for us yep on
the Death Toll to hear his name in that context,
we're always able to skip over his name, you know,
and just be like, oh, remember all these these uh
background players, they're all gone now. I mean, how many
times we're going to hear that The Death Toll is
going to have him every single time we do a show.
That's why we're here. Yep, thanks for that. Yep.
Speaker 1: That was a reset and somebody with us so on
the version I have, and I hope we're working off
the same sheet of music. If not, we'll figure it out.
We open on lots of empty seats and personnel on
the dirt, the ditty and folding chairs and a table,
and there's Mel Phillips and a cameraman and guys and
T shirts walking around, and up in the ring it's
Vince McMahon and a tan blazer and black slacks, two
wrestlers and a referee. This is where you see that
shirtless guy suddenly walk onto the field and the camera range.
Speaker 2: First of many times we see this clown.
Speaker 1: Greenish posts, navy turnbuckles, gray ropes, navy apron, and for
the first time, a purple mat.
Speaker 2: Yes, what is that purple mass about? I don't know.
It's like they get lost everything, like, ah shit, well
we got a all right, let's put some shit together.
Speaker 1: I wonder if it's absorbing of the sun and reflecting
maybe a material color that you can handle it.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: But Vince, his voice echoing across Shay Stadium like he's
Martin Luther King at the million Man March.
Speaker 2: Hi, tonight tonight, dinner, rostling, rostling. He good, please, I
was just gonna say, I don't know. I mean, I
was just gonna say that, well you go, you go.
I was gonna say, I have a whole Michael Cole
giving us a history lesson as to why Vince is
the ring announcer.
Speaker 1: Okay, I'll bring I'll bring Cole in, but Vince list
the judges assigned. He lists doctor Harry Miller as a
physician in attendance, and Billy Capudo, the metro referee, is
introduced as well by Vince, and we get this low
angle hard camera shot. We get a few angles that
we see throughout the course of the broadcast as a
estrada of course up there first and that high angle
hard camera you can see the grass, like I said,
on the top half of your screen, on the far
side of the ring. Yes, And there's a bunch of
photographers assembled at that spot along the ring apron. You
see Bill Apters, see George Napolitano. They're even called out
by the aforementioned Michael Cole and McK foley on their
commentary track. And then from Santra Domingo it's angel or
Angle modea and Michael Cole comes in on this version
from twenty four to seven.
Speaker 2: Yep, here he goes talking about Vince McMahon and the
history of why he's the ring announcer.
Speaker 3: Vince McMahon the ring announcer for this historic event. Mick
and Howard Finkel was supposed to announce the show, but
circumstances prevented him from doing so, And Fink was telling
us that back in nineteen eighty, when our business was territorial,
Jim Crockett Promotions, which was the mid Atlantic area promotion,
had their weekly television show in Buffalo, New York.
Speaker 4: So Fink had to be there. So Vince did the
ring announce.
Speaker 5: It shows you how much the world has changed when
WW was cooperating with Jim Crockett Promotions. I mean, not
only was the year end dow at nine hundred and
sixty three points, not only was the average cost of
a new house nineteen thousand and five hundred, but there
was a great crop cooperation between Crockett Promotions and WW.
Speaker 6: We'll see if.
Speaker 3: There's cooperation between Angel Maravella and Jose Estrada in this
opening podcast.
Speaker 1: What a star studded opener. I don't know about that
whole explanation. I mean, maybe it seems like we only
see Fink in the garden, but.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't understand why they were taping television in Buffalo.
Speaker 2: First of all, well, yeah, why was Jim Crockett up there.
Speaker 1: Don't know, Ye, the crocket results of nineteen eighty are
pretty sparse. Maybe someone of the solar systems can help
try to line up in August ninth, nineteen eighty dight
with this. But even then, why would Finkle announce a
Jim Crockett show? Maybe I'm totally I don't understand.
Speaker 2: Like again, it was like, I mean, it seemed like
he was lent out because there was still you know,
there was still camaraderie. It wasn't as as segregated as
Vince would make it. I don't know it was. It's weird.
It's a weird explanation. I mean, almost as weird as
fucking obviously mc foley being told to have all these
stats available. Yeah, like, oh my god.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they just came in having fun and wikipediaing a
couple of things, and they had their things.
Speaker 2: They would say, I remember, if I remember correctly, this
particular when this aired, when this version of the show aired,
didn't wasn't this Maybe something else, I don't know, but
I thought it was this particular show where everyone was
blown away by Michael Cole that he wasn't just a robot, yes,
that he actually was entertaining as a commentator, and we
all realized for the first time that, Wow, he's really
just being manipulated by Vince over you on commentary and
that's why he sucks. Like, if you let him go,
he's actually pretty good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because this twenty oh seven was the ear he
was literally pantomiming what Vince was saying in his ear right,
and Vince was saying it. He was repeating it in
real time. I don't know if it was this particular show,
but I do know it was as the twenty four
seven broadcasts came out and Cole was able to voice
them over with pretty much free reign, without any producer
and probably very little in the way of oversight as
far as like fear that Vince would ever even listen
to this stuff. That people did realize that Michael Cole
has a personality and if you let him just kind
of free ball a bit, he'll actually carry a broadcast
well and keep you entertained. I think this was really
the first chance he had to show that side of himself.
So right, you're good to pick up on that, and
fully helps a lot too, because he's in there, yes,
kind of opening it, opening up a tone of kind
of joking around, and as someone who would hitchhiked to
the garden and who was a huge, massive WW fan
coming of age at this particular point in time, but
fully definitely could plug into, like, you know, the camp
of what he was seeing on this show. Yeah, oh
for sure, and actually, you know, love it and embrace
it warmly instead of just kind of making merciless fun
of it. He pokes fun at it, of course, as
you have to looking at it twenty thirty years later,
but he does it in a way where you can
tell that he once bought into and he fully understands
why that stadium is full.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean honestly, you know, it's it's fun. They
make fun out of love, not out of criticism. I
mean honestly. It reminded me of us. Yeah, in Matt
we make we make fun out of love, not out
of not out of out of I mean, yes, out
of frustration too, But.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we hate We hate wrestling enough to do seven
hundred thousand hours of podcasting about it over a decade.
So there's Cole, and there's Foley and that Crockett story.
I don't know, I don't know what to make of it.
The cooperation was very real because, as we'll talk about
as we go, none other than NWA World Heavyweight Champion
Harley Race is all over WWF television in nineteen seventy
nine and eighty building towards a September Madison Square Garden
Champion versus champion match against Bob Becklan No less, which
will factor in later as we go. We've already seen
some Harley Race stuff interspersed with our Hogan stuff from
the Hamburg and Allentown television taping, So there is that
sintilla of truth to what he's saying, if nothing else.
So it's andel r Via Vsus Osistrata to totally you know, basic,
not much to say. Ja Brons at the time matched up.
Speaker 2: With the open brilliant. These are these are the main
event anywhere in the world except Chase Stadium apparently.
Speaker 1: Yeah, isn't this just kind of look like a show
Brody would gett stabbed on?
Speaker 2: Oh, for God's sakes, Yes, So.
Speaker 1: They shake hands and Strata hits an arm drag. Former
Junior champion Michael Cole says was a Strata color elbow
in a hip tooss by Marvilla Lock up and headlock Astrata
to the top wristlock. Mrvia trips him to break it up.
There's a standing switch and an arm drag takeover and
Extrata kicks out of a head scissor and gets back
to his feet, collar.
Speaker 2: And elbow to the ropes. Clean break.
Speaker 1: Yep, this is a demonstration, exhibition, if you will, of
wrestling acumen.
Speaker 2: That's that's exactly you know what that's I jotted that
down myself. That Watson the white cowboy hat. There's a
guy in a cowboy had at ringside. Well. Cole does comment
on the on the dress code in nineteen.
Speaker 3: Eighty Vince McMahon back in the day obviously did not
have the dress code enforced as of lettuce Be, especially
around the ring side area.
Speaker 6: Did I see a ring attendant without a shirt?
Speaker 5: Me high socks, delivering soft drinks without a shirt?
Speaker 3: What would happen today if you were a ring attendant
and you showed up without a shirt on.
Speaker 2: Tremendous He couldn't even say anything. Yeah, so put him
in exactly right. I mean, it just goes to show
you what a didn't Wasn't it too? Like even Michael
Cole would get so into it that he yielded a
guy like at a a real celebrity for wearing shorts
or something like that one time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was I think the first time. Yeah, well,
what happened is Lebron had done it, you know, because
they do those high fashion rival shots in NBA games,
and Pat McAfee did it before anyone knew who he was. Well,
I'm before people on ww knew who he was. Showed
up at the building that way to broadcast, and Cole
had to fit because he didn't know about the trend.
It's amazing, yeah, if I recall correctly. And then they
ended up becoming best buddies. So there's that, right. Estrata
tucked in a short punch from a headlock and a
snap mare and headlock takeover. They talked about how Shaye
Stadium had closed in two thousand and eight, which is true,
and this was in fact the final wrestling event at
Shaye Stadium.
Speaker 2: We're watching here. Really yep, that's kind of crazy. Yep.
Speaker 1: Never came back top preslock. Astrata yanks back to a headlock.
Speaker 2: Yeah, listen, we don't want that shit back here. That's
about enough of that, Okay, listen You've had your fun games,
but we prefer legitimate athleticism.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, this was the final wrestling event at Shay
on the athletic legitimatism. At that point, something telld me
we won't stop hearing speculation as hul Cogan becomes the
big star in the business that it's all all roads
lead to Shay once again.
Speaker 7: Oh wow, to.
Speaker 1: Some of the stuff I know is coming that I
don't think people have really appreciated being reported at the time,
as Hulk began his run about whether another Shade Stadium
show would in fact happen, it's in paramedics on the
on the floor watching absolutely entranced, like is this fake?
Like what you can tell that's what they're.
Speaker 2: That's that is the thing, isn't it. You look at
these people who are watching at ringside, who are like
clearly not employees, and they're like, what is this? Is it?
Speaker 6: Like?
Speaker 2: Are we supposed to believe this is legitimate? Is it
is it legitimate? Where are we at here? You just
can't help but read that in their face. Absolutely, they're
just they're they're you know, they're they're not afraid, like
they're just almost dumbfounded.
Speaker 1: It looks like yep, top rislock. Strada pulls him into
a side headlock push off tackle, down goes Angel Morvilla
comes over in a big dropkick by Melvilla. Yes, those
ropes were wobbling after these. That is rough.
Speaker 2: It is going up and down.
Speaker 7: Coal Coal.
Speaker 2: I noticed this especially for this one, but also around
the whole show, but for this match specifically. He is
talking about everything he can besides what's going on in
the ring. Yeah, totally. He is avoiding you know they
there actually is. There seems to be a lot of
disdain from him for to actually call what he's seeing like.
He doesn't seem to want to do that. If if
it's almost like not up to par with what was
going on in present day, that's what it almost feels like.
I could be wrong. I think he has he's a
fan though he isn't he a longtime fan or no,
I don't know. I think he did, you know, look
in every now and then un wrestling growing up. But
so yeah, I think he's like, I don't, I don't.
I don't watch this crap pretty much, not sports entertainment.
So he's got a little bit of Vince McMahon actually
in him. He does he does.
Speaker 1: He definitely watches this as someone who like has been
trained by Vince to think that this was a generation
where everything was so hokey and you know, like the
people were basically like film.
Speaker 2: This is Hoki right right. The minimalism, the minimalism and
actual violence is Hoki. And Goofballs fucking flipping flopping over
the place is fuck.
Speaker 1: The flipping flopping goofballs wearing like right cartoonish outfits and
right calling themselves the dragon.
Speaker 2: Oh well, Tetsum called themselves.
Speaker 1: They pointed out, which is interesting that this Jose Strata
we're seeing wrestling is actually the father of the Jezus
Strata I believe was Jzeus Castillo. Whatever Estrata and Losparique
is the nineteen ninety seven WWF theques the sun would
be around, which was hilarious. Is that uh intel Marvi?
Or is that Richard Pryor side headlock?
Speaker 2: I did think that Richard Pryor moonlighted as a wrestaurer.
I was pretty sure about that.
Speaker 1: But pretty wild as Marvia drop kicks him into Strata,
turns around and soars like a cross body into the ropes.
When he takes the bump, some of these. The trajectory
of some of these bumps that they would take back
in these days completely defy physics. You know, yes they
should be knocked backwards, but instead they somehow pirouet and
take a flat back.
Speaker 2: Well. I also I also love the ones too, like
where they get a drop kick and all of a
sudden they're going front ways over the top rope to
the floor.
Speaker 1: You know, Strata gets stride kicked, He turns around with
his back to the guy who drop kicked him, and
then jumps into the ropes.
Speaker 2: And gets drop kicked. Get drop kicked, Okay, gets drop kicked.
He he does a backflip in the air, lands on
his feet, runs in the then turns around, runs in
the opposite direction, ches strass into the ropes, backward rolls,
and then does a front somersault onto his back and
it's totally it's totally real.
Speaker 1: The Strata takes a drop kick to the face, shakes
his head as if he's wobble. He doesn't even flap back,
and then runs, jumps through the ropes, hits the grass,
runs through the infield all the way to the dugout,
and somersalls.
Speaker 2: Down into the dugout. To sell it. Tratta takes a
drug king to the face. Yep, he stands perfectly still.
Suddenly takes out of his trunks and an umbrella, a
full sized umbrella. Waddles around like Charlie Chaplin, all right,
and then opens the umbrella and floats away like Mary Poppins.
That's a cell job. There's no ceiling on the stadium either,
so he's really gonna fly, So he's really gutting Mary
Poppins's magic dust.
Speaker 1: Jose Estrada takes a drop kick in the face, doesn't bump,
wobbles back and forth, walks to the referee Dick Whirley yep,
reaches in Dick Whorley's pocket, pulls out a handgun and
shoots himself in the head.
Speaker 2: Jestraa ho's his okay? Lastrata takes a drop kick to
the face and explodes that' todai won for you? Get
on at folks. You want to see that like an
atomic bomb explosion, not even like a body explosion, but
like an atomic bomb. Like he's like he's laced with
fucking explosives.
Speaker 1: Shrapnel flying at the screen, mushroom cloud above Shay, Who
did this guy have his body the fuck He said
something about twelve virgins waiting for him and ran right
into that drop kick.
Speaker 2: And and uh and Marvia m off something about him
and Marvia pins the like the blast mark.
Speaker 1: He survives, He survives a fucking nuclear winter inside Chase Stadium.
Speaker 2: He survives and goes for the pin and gets the win,
and they treat it like it was a real win
of a wrestling match.
Speaker 1: It's great, Okay. My instinct is go the exact opposite
and say he takes a drop kick and Vince Senior
runs out, gets in the ring and shoves him down
because he didn't bump, just fucking stabs him. Yeah, speaking
of the brony thing. Yeah, so yeah, that's the kind
of that's where the mind goes when Estrada takes this
foolish bump that's got them cracking up and commentary hold
on the corner of the weapon. A backdrop, pretty bad
one from ever Yea gets one, Astrata thumbs off the
coming up off, the matt thumbs him in the eyes,
and a knee left drops Marvia. Cole says that Hogan
Andre later tonight the first and what would be classic meetings.
Speaker 2: Later on here we go, I got that for you.
We can hear that.
Speaker 3: One Andre the Giant versus Hulk Hogan, the first and
what would be classic meetings later on.
Speaker 1: Yeah, indeed exactly the first, but okay, Strata stomping away
fully says Bruno and Larry's abisco set the standard for
the protege match and the protege feud in program, which
he's right about. Yees out of the fireman's carry. Colsy
security looks like Burl Eyes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was gonna say, Burl lives. Is there? Someone's
having a holly jolly Christmas. Hey.
Speaker 1: The Strata drops Rvia trope first on the top rope
and is choking Marvia a cross those ropes. Astrata then
tries to sit on him, but goes flying and bouncing
up in the air as he misses and sits on
the ropes instead. Marvia sits on him, Yeah, go ahead,
and whipping a right hand of the gut, and again
Estrada sells him right hand to the stomach by flatbacking.
Speaker 2: There's an exchange here that I had. I don't really
know what to make of it, but here we're going
to listen to it.
Speaker 4: That just shows the difference.
Speaker 3: It's out from nineteen eighty to the late nineteen nineties
in the attitude area. You see the bland trunks and
boots and knee pads worn by these two superstars. But
Los Pridique was Remember they showed up in their in
their white suits and they played the Puerto Rican gang faction.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I mean, uh, and I think that was
somewhat reminiscent of the suit that Edge chose to wear
his nuptials to Vicky Guerrero.
Speaker 1: What Vicky Ward especially white suit. Okay, I don't know
for sure.
Speaker 2: Remember I remember the nuptials to Vicky Guerrero, I don't
remember the out the attire and the fact that they're
fucking mentioning that on of Fun Showdown at Shay is hilarious.
It's like immortalized on a nineteen eighty show. I mean
that's like, honestly, that's like us, Yeah, what show, Michael,
what show was it? We're fucking where where Mick Foley
compared the Lost Marique's outfit to fucking Edge fo Edge
Edge's outfit and his nuptials to Vicky Guerrero.
Speaker 1: Great stuff, It's fucking hilarious. Yeah, he keeps calling everything
Bland throughout the course of the broadcast as Michael Cole Bland, Bland, Bland, Yes,
because it's not flippy floppy, uh sports entertainment.
Speaker 2: It's ground and pound wrestling. It's uh, you know, Bland.
I guess, I.
Speaker 1: Guess so yeah, rich whip. Marvia lip frogs over a backdrop,
a flying moscar style head butt lands and it gets
the one two three Angel Marvilla defeats Jose Estrada in
the opening contest of Showdown. At Shay gets his hand
raised fully goes, darn it, where's the ring announcer?
Speaker 2: I know that's right they call for They don't know
where Vince McMann.
Speaker 4: Is Andre the giant version that one.
Speaker 6: Someone c Vince Vince ring it out there?
Speaker 7: Good?
Speaker 6: But rug it out there? Darn it? Darn it? Where's
the rugging ounce?
Speaker 2: That's how vents would sound in their ears.
Speaker 3: Yep, there he is now, Vince having microphone problems. The
more things change, the more they stay the same. Frank
Bullet must have been working at the ringside during this event.
Speaker 2: They're cracking each other up. Yep.
Speaker 1: And this is that time when that short lived period
of time where Mit Fuley was trying out a color
commentary on SmackDown as well.
Speaker 2: Thought he was going to try. I don't remember that
at all, And.
Speaker 1: He quit because Vince was infuriating him on the headset.
He couldn't take it anymore, browbeating him and calling him
an idiot and things like that.
Speaker 2: So when he fucking bumps to the head you dumb
son of a bitch, you gotta talk about Listen. You
want to be in commentary. You need to talk about
cutting edge, deliverable transparency.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would quit too, talk like talk like from
the pages of the USA today.
Speaker 2: You need to say buzzworthy, buzzworthy things, all right, talk
about bandwidth, talk about onboarding, talk about heavy lifting, all right.
You gotta get in the weeds. Damn it, Mick. You
gotta be synergetic and deliverable.
Speaker 1: I hear you, Vince, But can I save the talk
about heavy lifting for the whole care match? So, yeah,
Vince is saying something under the mic, but we can't
hear him. Thus those comments from Colon Foley. Then we
jump ahead to Secluna Baron mckel Saluna suddenly in the
ring and Foley's mid sentence. So I don't know if
the video I have doesn't have the entirety of the
broadcast or what but fully makes reference to Secluna setting
the bar with his Hall of Fame induction. I went
fucking looking for this shit out Like. He's not saying
that I did too. He's not saying the speech was great.
He's saying him being in the Hall of Fame means
anybody can be in the Hall of Fame. Oh I see,
I see. Yeah, Okay, that's what I settled on. Because
there's no video of his speech. There's no way Mick
would have seen Baron mckel secluna is nineteen ninety six
Hall of Fame induction speech. I mean maybe he was
there there, but he was there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess. I don't know. It was ninety five.
He was in the company, she was in the company
Happen to Survivor series that that that Hall of Fame induction.
Speaker 1: I wish I knew, man, I wish I knew. But
that's what I choked it up to. Okay, it wasn't
ninety five that he got inducted.
Speaker 2: I don't remember I remember when. I just I just
was looking for the tapes, and uh, I couldn't, like,
you know, this was.
Speaker 6: When.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean they fucking ninety six, so I thought
I had it. I don't think they've ever released that
whole Hall of Fame induction ceremony. No, none of the
ones from back then. They've They've like, I don't know
if they even have all of them, right, you know
that've got pieces of them, but I don't know about
the whole thing.
Speaker 1: So introducing the principles, Vince wick Mahn says, from the
Isle of Malta barren and they break out a corse
of booze and from metic Italy it's Dominic Danucci.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and uh and and and fully comments on the
pop and of Danucci and and talks about it a
little bit here.
Speaker 6: Listen to the pot for Dominic Denucci.
Speaker 5: Nice hand for the man who would go on to
train one of the great.
Speaker 6: Superstars in wrestling history, Shane.
Speaker 1: Douglas as opposed to him, mckfoley. That was a mister
wreck there, Dominic Denocchi, as far as I can tell.
Speaker 2: But definitely Dominic Deni.
Speaker 1: They call him the most underrated fressman WWF for one
of the just Bruno's buddy, you know, that's how he was.
So they circle and lock up, and they break, and
they lock up over the ropes, and they jostle a
bit in the clinch, and ye, the Baron applies an
arm ringer and flips Dominic Denucci over, who kIPS up,
and Baron Secluna rings and flips him again, rings out
the arm.
Speaker 2: They go into some fucking incredibly bizarre world history talking
about Malta and Maltids for that matter.
Speaker 5: For Baron Mccalchicluna, for our large Maltese population. Of course,
the isl of Malta, best known as the place where Churchill,
Stalin and.
Speaker 6: FDR met to figure out the.
Speaker 5: Remains of World War Two in the infamous Malta Conference.
Speaker 3: Well, if you're talking about history, this is nineteen eighty
when this showdown at Shay took place.
Speaker 6: It was actually the start of the Iran Iraq War.
Speaker 3: How things have changed over the past twenty five years.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and not to mention the fact that Rhodesia gained independence,
became Zimbabwe and Robert Mugabi was a national hero.
Speaker 6: So things really haven't changed there.
Speaker 4: In twenty eight You're like a walking Google.
Speaker 6: I know that I know my African culture.
Speaker 2: It's like I love it. I love to me, the
best part is when they go, of course, you know, like,
of course we all know that this was the Isle
of Malta is where this happened. Of course, yes, I know,
I do.
Speaker 1: Like they had already spent time beating the druma of like, hey,
back then they would appeal to the Puerto Ricans and
and the Polish and the and the Italians and that,
and then would draw the Maltese fans like that's and
he said in a straight face, like that's a big
demographic of New.
Speaker 2: York exactly, exactly hilarious.
Speaker 1: He might be one of the best athletes from Malta.
There's a couple of footballers, a couple of guys.
Speaker 2: All four uh Maltese civilians from New York City. Fucking
would go, I gotta go see bear Sha because that's yeah,
that that the accent out there that's going.
Speaker 1: Isn't there a guy on the Atlanta football team that
played for them from there, the Maltese Falcon. I think
so Baron slugs away Dominic KNUTI get hung up on
the rope.
Speaker 2: Hey, maybe there's you know, you know, uh, Humphrey Bogart
was in the Maltese Falcon and he also was in
a movie about wrestling, So there we go. Never need
a connection. Aaron Michael Seicluna, Okay, the Maltese, the Maltese falcon.
Speaker 1: Consider his face for just a second, his nose looking
like the count, looking like the count from Sesame Street.
Speaker 2: He really does what a fucking like? These these two,
these two clowns. Okay, these clowns, these both the Danutche
and Secluna. It's like they look like, you know, like
math tutors at a at a fucking boarding school. Okay,
like the kind of the kind of boarding school that
that that Paul Jimmatti teaches at. In The Holdovers, Okay,
that's what it fucking looks like. Did you ever see
The Holdovers? I don't think so. You should watch The Holdovers.
It is an inspired Paul Jimmonti performance, and he does
this thing with his eye that is un believable. Okay,
it is unbelievable.
Speaker 1: Meanwhile, that Dom's the Nucci prefers to tuck into Rigatoni
at Giamonds. I think is at Hoboken. I'm not sure.
Speaker 2: I did see a plastic bag on the ringside during
this match. He got takeout for the match so we
could have it in the locker room. There was a
chicken yeah, I think there was a chicken parm with
with linguina there and tin you know, one of those
tin containers.
Speaker 1: If you want to know where the best chicken parm is,
you ask Dominic Tinucci.
Speaker 2: That's simple, exactly. This guy say you come over to
my house. Oh my god, chicken parm.
Speaker 1: Some athletes cut weight. This guy cutlets weight. Okay.
Speaker 2: Oh, some guys rob banks. This guy robs the broccoli. Listen.
It's always a sausage fest at the house. Okay, Oh
my god. Okay. You know, some wrestlers like to meet
the fans now much she likes to meet the balls
and the sauce. I'm the gravy.
Speaker 1: We know exactly exactly what his kitchen smells like on Sunday.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, listens, he smells exactly like my grandmother's
house used to smell, like always like meat and garlic. Okay, great,
and it's glorious. And I would not and I just
sit there and drool, all right, and drool like you know,
I imagine living. You know, he's got to live in
some kind of you know, apartment building, and just like
you just reeks of food all the time.
Speaker 1: He lives on a single level, you know, like the
King of Queen's house or something one of those.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, well either way, listen, they're all fucking
the row house anyway, so they all share walls. So
there's all food everywhere, exactly, all food all the time. Okay,
while so Cluna trying to open up his own his
Maltese restaurant with no success that everyone thinks, he is saying,
everyone thinks he's going to open a malted shop, and
he's like no, no, no, no, no Maltese. Oh my god.
Speaker 1: Okay, now get like a Baltese dishes North African, Mediterranean influence.
So there's tough the neck of course.
Speaker 2: Which wrestler is that it's on the show.
Speaker 1: A rabbit slow cooked and wine and garlic. There we go,
all right, okay, so the rabbit is the big thing
out there. Rabbit great, all right, So Baron game slugging
away the nucies hung up on the ropes and Baron
stomping away till Dnucci grips the ropes and squirms around,
and that causes Baron Secluna to ram Dominic Danuccian too
buckling over on the ring. Apron tries to get back
in the ring and gets stomped. Corner to corner, Danucci
hits the buckling, but then comes back and slugs the
gut of Seclunah.
Speaker 2: They cut.
Speaker 1: To something about Mick was going to say about Baron
having a big influence on his career, and then it
goes silent.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: It seems like they cut something out of mixed commentary
track about what.
Speaker 2: He was about to say. I'm not talking about anymore.
Speaker 1: As Danucci wishbones the legs of Baron mckel's Cicluna and
stomps him to the Apron to get some separation. Danucci
then grabs a side headlock. There's a short tight push
off and a tackle and he charges into a hip
toss and there it is the feet job, the double
kick off of his back. Danucci then with a couple
of Mongolian chops and floors Secluna with a right hand
that gets two. Baron starts fishing in his trunks but
there's nothing there and McK foley puts over, puts over
how hilariously unsecretive Secluna is just blatantly digging in his
trunks in front of the referee. Finally he gets something
and slugs the back of Danucci's head with it, and
he's choking and punching fully reaches. He reaches for saco,
much like Secluna used to reach for his hidden gimmicks,
so apparently some legit inspiration there. There we go, but
Danuci build builds back up like his like his daddy Bruno,
and starts going off. They get a great close shot
of mcluna Secluna's dumb face, and they lose their minds
on this because as he gets donked on the head
Baron mckel Sicluna is making basically three stooges like comedic faces.
His eyes are like bugging out opened and fully absolutely
loses his mind. As there's a head butt and uh
he falls to the canvas. Danucci gets a two count
and then Baron goes to a full nelson. Danucci kind
of bends over so that Baron has to kind of
his back and then runs into the corner. Guess free
stomps the head. Seclutin starts hauling off, whipping a backdrop,
and Dominic Danucci with the worst sunset flip you've ever seen.
The worst sunset flipp honestly, it's it's embarrassing. What's embarrassed
thinking here? But when you do a sunset flip, of
course you flip and land on your on your butt
and you're seated and your legs are on the shoulders
and you're holding the guy down. This one he jumps
over and instead of landing seated, he just lays flat.
He lays souphine on the mask. He's a fucking idiot.
Speaker 2: It just puts his feet over Secluna's shoulders and like
it's like flat, right, because because that's like, I mean,
I don't know, I don't know what to say. I
don't know what to say about it. Is he not
being picked? Right? Who is getting that's the question? Who's
getting pinned? Look the viewers, the audience. Yeah.
Speaker 1: In six minutes, thirty nine seconds, that's the one two three.
By the way, Dominic Danucci defeats Baron mckel's Secluna here
in Shay Stadium, and the crowd rejoices. The baron pretends
he's going to hit Dominic Danucci after the bell and
then just exits. You could tell he's just not feeling
doing a seconds more of physical labor than He's just done.
Speaker 2: He is, that's it, he's done over it.
Speaker 1: Out in the field, they're popping off of the mouth
at each other and Baron mckilscluna is clearly smirking. Dominic
Denucci is clearly smirking. They're having fun out there, and
Michael Cole calls out people. He say, look like Buddy
Harrelson and Pete Rose. Cole's full of you talk about
like us. Cole is full of those on this thing, yes,
saying people look like others.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, Oh my god. It's it's really tremendous movie references.
Speaker 1: It's so we get a wide shot from center field
at Shay Stadium now for the Junior World Wrestling Federation Championship.
Speaker 2: Man hilarious seeing nobody, nobody, nobody. It's like, it's just
it's almos. It's almost embarrassing. Yeah, but it's not flattering.
But yeah, they call it, for some reason, the Junior
World Wrestling Federation Championship instead of the WWF Junior Heavyweight Championship.
When you put junior at the very front of it, me,
it just really to being stupid. I mean that's what
it was like. A junior cheeseburger to.
Speaker 1: Let it sounds like it's children about to wrestle right
from Mexico City. Of course, it's Chavo Guerrero, who, despite
being a veteran of American wrestling territories and being Mexican
of course and a member of the famed Grow wrestling family,
actually is on this card as a new japan Pro
wrestling star as Wild Yeah, one of their junior heavyweight
attraction at the time, constantly wrestling Tatsumi Fujinami and some
of the other juniors they had, and we talked about
how he crossed pollinated with Hulk and a lot of
the Florida boys when they went over there in nineteen eighty.
Speaker 2: How do they determine junior heavyweight?
Speaker 6: What is it? Like?
Speaker 2: I understand, I understand that that's how they do that.
The term junior heavyweight, I mean, it makes it sound
like you should be a kid who's like a heavyweight wrestler,
not a lightweight wrestler. I agree, you know what I mean? Yeah,
like he was.
Speaker 1: Hulk was a junior heavyweight when he was the Big
Fat Kennon's Little League team exactly.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know where that comes from.
It's so they don't want to, uh, they don't want
to create a new term for the weight class right
below heavyweight. They just want to call it like a
subset of heavyweight for some reason. I don't know why,
but you know they'd rename it cruiser weight and other
things light heavyweight. Do you prefer light heavyweight to junior Yes,
I do, I absolutely do. I think that's much better.
Speaker 2: I absolutely do. Cruiser weight's the best light heavyweight is better.
Junior heavyweight is bogus.
Speaker 1: So there's Chavo. Always nice to hear Vince McMahon pronounced
tatsu Fujinami and say he does it wrong or anything.
It's just funny.
Speaker 2: Yes, so this is uh, this is Vince on the call,
and yeah, it's fucking weird.
Speaker 6: Man.
Speaker 2: It's weird to have him do ring announcing and beyond
the call?
Speaker 6: Right?
Speaker 2: Was this one a mystery to you as far as
what this was? What do you mean, like.
Speaker 1: Why he's announcing this one match and not the bigger
matches Vince as a commentator.
Speaker 2: No, this came from This came from a tape I think,
did not.
Speaker 1: This came from September twenty second, nineteen eighty Okay, there's
a show at the Garden headlined by Bob Backlan versus
Harley Race. And for some reason reasons I could try
to speculate on, they did not show the Harley Race
Bob Backland match on MSG cable. They showed the rest
of the Garden card, but when it came time for
that match, they transitioned to matches on tape from Shay
Stadium a month before, including this match between Tatsumi Fujinami
and Chavo Guerrero. Now for the Madison Square Garden broadcast,
Vince McMahon and cal Rudman are in the chairs in
the Garden calling the matches. When it comes time to
have Backland Race, which they do not show and they
show the Shay tape, Vince and Cal just call the
Shay tape live. So that's why when you listen closely
and you hear Vincent cal Rudman doing the announcing, you
hear Howard Finkel introduced Harley Race in the back Yes
I did it, yes, very faintly or like what the fuck?
It seems like like they dubbed over an old tape.
And you know how sometimes the old audio bleeds the right.
Speaker 2: That's what I was thinking.
Speaker 1: I remember, Yes, In fact, it was just the atmospherics
in the building where Vince and cal Rudman were sitting
providing in fact live commentary for this match.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: And another one on the card as well. I forget
which one, but we'll talk about it. It's the women's match.
The women's match, Okay, thank you. So this was a
very strange circumstance. I can only assume, and I couldn't
find any reason that Race or Backland never said for this.
I can only assume that, you know, part of the
arrangement of having the NWA champion, Harley Race, come through
New York and work their television and try to draw
a house at the Garden against Backland, which they did,
they did a good house, was that, you know, the
match finished not be shown in the market, so that
Harley doesn't come off as somehow less marketable as NBA champion.
Speaker 2: If one of people who always draws, aren't always these
champion versus champion matches draws and they drop people to
the no, I mean, I mean they're the matches draws. Yeah.
Speaker 1: In this case, because I know this because there was
a fan there with an eight millimeter camera, and it's
out there. You can find it, just you know, like
we've seen so many times, just a bunch of clips
of these two wrestling. Look like a really strong, scientific
hold for hold battle. It looked like a good match.
And at the end, Backland has Harley locked in a
sleeper hold and Harley's fililling his arms about wildly and
one of those flailing arms strikes the referee in the face.
Referee just qualifies Harley Race accuses him of doing it
on purpose. Race absolutely disputes that and says he did
not do it on purpose. So they get out of
the match without you know, having the ww after the
NBA champion win the match, and I can just imagine
from there that they also worked out a deal where,
you know, it wouldn't be on television so that the
New York fans didn't have to see the NBA Champions
squirming out of an opportunity, but they didn't has to
show Harley Ray squashing Jabroni's and calling out Bob Becklan
like a madman on WWF television. There's some really fiery
promos out there. In fact, I'm gonna try to find
one while we're parked here. If you go to your
nineteen eighty folder, we do have a pretty good one
from Harley where he's head on trying to sell tickets
to this match with Backland, but you don't get to
see it in the local market on television. He's just
trying to move tickets apparently.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So interestingly enough, if you go to nineteen eighty eight
Dash O nine, which was the day of the Shae
Stadium show, there was a traditional WWF card on television
that day. It was Championship Wrestling. It happened to be
a weekend right Saturday, but this was tape July twenty ninth,
but it airs the day of Shaye Stadium. So while
this huge stuff is happening and flushing on TV, they're
seeing this. This is Harley wrestling for the WWF. It
never gets old seeing this. If you have a apple
hit play hold on one thing not coming? Come on,
let's go okay, all right?
Speaker 2: Three two?
Speaker 5: One?
Speaker 8: Play got The next concourse is because up the one ball.
Speaker 2: Look at him.
Speaker 6: Ten minute time limit.
Speaker 1: Hardly in a WWY in to watch.
Speaker 2: The whole thing. Let's just fast forward to uh.
Speaker 4: Three, Well that's not lady.
Speaker 1: After Hartley gets the win with a sooe play and
the usual moves he does. He joins Vince with his
n w A championship in tow. This is just surreal
to see the NBA champion holding the belt with Vince
mcpannon junior on WWF television. If you're at three forty
five or forty seven, actually okay, go for it three
two one.
Speaker 2: Play, Hey, gentlemen.
Speaker 6: The nw A was.
Speaker 2: Harley did unpromoted the latch thing. I'm just talking about
with the.
Speaker 5: Jesus, I'm gonna say something to you have been here,
and let me say it also to every one of
these people and anyone listening.
Speaker 9: I am never then I may never they number one
contender to know human being.
Speaker 7: I am worlds anyway champion. Wow.
Speaker 6: If I'm gonna stand here and.
Speaker 2: Be insulid by you or anyone else. Kylin made not
for white contender back by there.
Speaker 4: For white reason, white racing only, then that stuff true.
Who the better man is?
Speaker 3: Then I cam well no never line good gettingers copy.
Speaker 4: Man who has point hard that is not a number
one contender.
Speaker 8: Then for a lot matter, certainly Bob Beckham is no
number one contender.
Speaker 4: Both champions both extraordinarily gifted in terms of their wrestling.
Speaker 8: Still Harley Race will a challenge last week, bought back
when you heard what he said this week, You'll take
on anybody at any time as designated by the World
Wrestling Federation Commission.
Speaker 2: The Commission. Okay, that's right, the Commission. I mean, seeing
Matt Belt on Dodby television is just bizarre.
Speaker 1: You don't hear that. You're just led to believe that
they were always at a distance, you know, yep, or
you know, if maybe Vince co operates, he sends Andre
you know, but not that would feature another world champion
like that on their television show and call him out
as such.
Speaker 2: But that's what I mean. What could you do when
you have ned Beatia as the champion? It's true.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So next up Fujinami Guerrero. He was tested, no
doubt against Chavo, We're told Fujinami.
Speaker 7: Uh.
Speaker 1: Cal Rudman, of course, on the commentary says that this
is the first appearance in the New York area for
Tatsumi Fujinami nineteen eighty. I could believe that, And yeah,
the New Japan, We've got a good flavor of it.
When we visited Japan for the Hogan series, yeah, and
Fujinami you can tell along with the Nooki and saichisaka Gucci.
We're definitely being presented as you know, the big stars,
the big centers of gravity.
Speaker 2: What a bell dinging. I know, it's insane.
Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen introduced to the corner of my left
and this is uh Vince McMahon again. You can hear
Howard Finkle in the background. Is very disorienting because you're
hearing Vince on commentary, Vince in the ring announcing, and
Howard Finkel in the ring announcing.
Speaker 2: I was one to say, you know again, I was
wondering what the fuck was going on because it was
so confusing. Absolutely, and I mean even though you've explained it,
it's still like, what the fuck?
Speaker 1: Yeah it is, it's a lot. It is a lot
lock up travel with an arm drag and fujinami, kIPS up,
controlling front facelock and hiptoss by the dragon. As Vince says,
who's on commentary now, Uh, the amateur wrestler out there
trying to figure out what he can learn from this match. Uh,
the average amage wrestler out there will learn a lots
from from how this is playing out. You can even
hear Howard Finkle say the National Wrestling Alliance.
Speaker 2: It's weird.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yes, cal Rudman asks how how well, Vince?
Speaker 2: How Yeah, I got this for you.
Speaker 9: How well would the intercollegiate champion do against either one
of these guys?
Speaker 8: Well, if if, now, if they were rustling on intercollegiate rules,
it's that I've got chance.
Speaker 4: But it acquires many of the differences.
Speaker 8: Being a sufficient holes and the angle of what you've
got my holes to the extent of which the angle.
There's just so many different things, and in pro wrestling.
Speaker 6: It's it's pains.
Speaker 8: It's just a difference them all together.
Speaker 1: Really, I'm very glad you played that because not only
does it give us classic Vince and classic cal Rudmand.
Speaker 2: But you can hear fing in the background too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's bell ringing, and it's like Fujinami and Chavo.
There's no reason for the bell to be ringing. But yeah,
that's a great point by Vince.
Speaker 2: You know, I mean what I love is it's like
it's a classic Vince answer to a question like he
was not prepared to be asked. Well, well, you know,
it comes toutely the intercollegiate athleticism. There is a difference
in regards to the certain bases that they were allowed
to participate, in regards to submissions and and things of
that nature, and also in regards to how holds are
applied and how they are unapplied. And we go from
there onto the next match. Clearly we do.
Speaker 1: Clearly, as Fujinami's working a leg a grape plane on
the canvas and shifts to a chin lock, there's a
set out by Chavo Guerrero as he gets the waist
and they're exchanging holds here boss, this is about there,
you know, showing people that when junior heavyweights get on
the mat, it's about quick exchanges of position.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 1: And we see paramedics with their arms folded, okay, riveted
by the.
Speaker 2: Action, yes, indeed, they're just they're just they're like, aha,
here we go, nothing to do here? Really, you know,
it's a manic because this is all fake. So what's
the point.
Speaker 1: Javo Guerrero down on a leg lace, starts wrenching out
on the leg. Tight shot of Fujinami selling on his back.
So they do have some close up cameras, but they
just don't. They don't use them that frequently. Chavo Guerrero
sits on the knee and Fujinami spins right up, limping
and selling as Cal Rudman says he's got that right
leg in trouble does Chavo Guerrero lock up Fujinami with
a sideheadlock and starts cranking as Vince says Fujinami has
been emulating the style of Antonio and Oki. Yes, Rudman says,
how much of a champion he is in Japan? The
martial arts champion? Cal asks, is Bob Beckland? Vin's going
to get a chance to fight Antonio's laughs and says
yes they have met as in.
Speaker 2: Victorious and various incantations of the of the said program.
Speaker 1: I mean no mention of the fact that in Nook
he fucking won the belt from Bob Backland in Japan.
Speaker 2: But we don't know. Oh, you know, these are things
that neither happened nor did they not happen. That's a
good one, That's a really good one.
Speaker 1: Cal would accept that answer. He would take over by Fujinami.
I'm sorry. Cal Redman is the male Mama sorrow The
things he says, the things he chooses to focus on.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, yes, he is back up.
Speaker 1: Push off Fujinami tackles again under leap frog, Fujinami with
leap frog as well. In both men exchange some flying
ankle scissors back to back, thinking the exact same moves
at the exact same time. You can hear the noise
of the mat from backland and race.
Speaker 2: I know it's it's so weird.
Speaker 1: It's orienting. Tie up Fujinami with an arm drag to
an arm bar. But Guerrero stands up and backs into
the ropes throws a chop. Vince says, Guerrero can get
a little rougher than Fujinami can in there. Mmm, it's
the ropes Fujinami with a tackle over the top, cross
body by Fujinami.
Speaker 2: It's one two. They both get back up quick to
the knuckle loocky. Cal compares wrestling with other sports and
art forms. Where is it?
Speaker 9: It's like a fencing match right here? Does a lot
of ballet.
Speaker 2: Dancing into it?
Speaker 7: It's similar?
Speaker 1: It's similar, Yeah, it is, Cal, It's a lot of
It's very similar to ballet l.
Speaker 2: A dancing into it. Similar? Who gave this guy a microphone?
What the honesty? He's he's he's like, what's his button,
King of Thereen ninety four? Yeah, exactly. Gar Donovan like.
Speaker 1: Why why why would you give this guy a microphone?
Remember we were cracking the code. He had some like
background in music, and he like published some really important
newsletter in the business or something, and we were all
confused because we thought one time they were giving Vince
credit for that and one of those spect So apparently
he was some kind of connection to the white world.
So he gets h free will, free, free rain to
go on these broadcasts and just basically ye say in
nane wrestlers.
Speaker 2: Ye ruin it all.
Speaker 1: Apparently, apparently, Chavo to the arm ringer. He steps over
the arm and leaps up to an arm drag and
cal somehow likens it to the fencing match you just mentioned.
Speaker 2: To the corner.
Speaker 1: Fujinami slugs away snap mare and a dropkick. Chavo Guerrero
hits the floor. I welcome you to a nineteen eighty
in which Fujinami is suicide diving in New York for
the business.
Speaker 2: And that is that is where that is, that's that's
Reality's reality is.
Speaker 1: He hits the grass, then says he kind of shoulder
blocked Guerrero. That's what he calls it, a flying shoulder block. Yep,
climbs those blue wooden steps back into the ring, but
Chavo Guero gets right back in and Al immediately picks
up that. You know what, Sumi Fujinami didn't get much
reward or advantage for taking such a big risk there,
as Guerrero's back all over him and throws Fujinami out
of the ring and does the almost like the the
six to one nine spin, but he stops halfway. Yes, yes,
like a spider in the ropes, and cal goes now, awe,
he likes that one. New York cops. New York cops
now showing up everywhere. Yeah, uniformed officers in view.
Speaker 6: See we got to going.
Speaker 2: On there, right, we'll get wrestling.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I used to watch himself as a kid. You know
it was real back then, right, I like this phoniness.
It's not real anymore?
Speaker 1: Back in then double knucklelock. As Chavo goes to the
drop toe hold in Great Minds the leg of Fujinami,
Vince says, if you miss it in terms of execution,
you're in bad shape on the canvas with the shoulders there.
If you miss it in terms of execution.
Speaker 2: If you miss it in terms of execute, yes, I've
always wondered.
Speaker 1: Cal Rudman then says, that looks like real pain, and
I'm thinking to myself as opposed to wild Cal.
Speaker 2: Cal then nothing real about this, okay.
Speaker 1: With a surfboard, yanking back with his boot between the
shoulder blades of Fujinami, Fujinami on his knees, suffering, Cal
says that that makes Fujinami a candidate for orthopedic surgery,
and Vince says, earlier at MSG, it's amazing how those
in the medical profession are amazed at the awesome punishment
that rostlers can take and keep coming right back at you,
and Cal says, well, they do pay for it later
in life, and that's when the surgeons come around to
see him, and Vince is just like, okay, well thanks,
too much of a glimpse on the curtain there, but fine. Exactly,
it's fascinating to see Vince be put in a position
where he's forced to let this cal Rudman say whatever
he wants all over the broadcast.
Speaker 2: That's when that's what happens. When Daddy's still in control.
Speaker 1: Vince just has to nod along. Dorero's working the hammer
lock on the canvas with elbows kneedrops to the arm
the headstand with the delay for some extra leverage. You
know how that works. You stand on your head with
a dammer lock as well.
Speaker 2: R the arm off. That's funny.
Speaker 1: When guys stand at certain positions in the grass, it
looks like they're like actually hovering over the top rope
because they're far enough back that you can't tell that
they're not right in the ringside. There are a lot
of distractions here when you're trying to watch the match.
Speaker 2: Oh, for sure, it's it's a mess. It's a giant
fucking mess.
Speaker 1: Stand up Guerrero with a Kimora lock and Fujinami goes
back to the ropes to get the break. You can
tell these guys are sweltering. I mean, I was looking
it up. Temperatures were in the nineties that evening.
Speaker 2: Oh it's gotta be rough. Yeah, it can't be fun.
Speaker 1: Vince calls Kuerro one of the finest gentlemen you'll meet,
which is so funny because he got fired and like,
oh wait for being a drunk and a complete bad guy.
To the corner Guerrero with the European uppercuts in Fujinami
answers sending Guerrero to the opposite corner. Irish whipped to
that corner as a matter of fact. Chavo then turns
and corner mounts Fujinami and then goes up to the
top rope as he used to do, and does a
straight moon salt off the top rope does Guerrero lands
on his feet and as he does, Fujinami charges into
a backdrop forty. He charges into a backdrop for two.
Vince calls him out for a sloppy cover and showboating tactics,
so he's not really a fan of the moon salt,
even though not at all. Put Java one position, hit
the moot the backdrop, there's a snap mare and a
knee to the back. Garrow then triangles the neck and
cal thinks the pain centers around the ears, So it
makes sense that to him at least, that Gerro's attacking
Fujinami as he is, and Vince says it's not a
very effective hold, so he's decided to turn on this match.
Speaker 2: Vince, things are not effective in the regards of this
particular match. Endeavor this particular match end devort right exactly
lock up side headlocked by Guerrero, push off tackle. Fujinami
catches him coming in with a fireman's carrying an airplane spin.
He dumps him down and he gets all dizzy, and
the crowd reacts to that. Both go for seat to
drop kicks at the very same time, both A flying
in midair and Shay Yeah crash to the canvas. The
crowd loves that. Cal says it's like in boxing, more
damage is done when you miss a punch than landing it.
I repeat, he says, it's like in boxing, more damage
is done when you miss a punch than landing it.
He said that guerreral with an What's wrong with that?
Speaker 1: I sat there and I was like, what is he
trying to say?
Speaker 2: He's saying exactly what you think he's saying. What's wrong
with that?
Speaker 1: I know what he's saying, flying reverse asd attack from
no mid What is he saying? What does you mean
when he says more damage is done when you miss
a punch than when you land it.
Speaker 2: I can tell you.
Speaker 7: Wrestling podcast.
Speaker 10: He's the Lapsed Fan wrestling podcast with Jack and s
MJP Soro.
Speaker 1: It's private okay, Bobby, great answer, by the way, about
the only acceptable did you see Java grow do the
ass attack? You can do a no Mercy by holding
down on a whip.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: You rswoop a guy and your whole bee and you
jump and put him in the fence with your ass.
Speaker 2: He does it here.
Speaker 1: It's of my favorite games watching Japanese guys or wrestlers
from the Japanese circuit compete and figure out where the
the No Mercy developers got the mood set from it.
Speaker 2: It's so fucking true, like.
Speaker 1: The Takata head kick knockout. Yes, yes, Then he does
a cannonball running front flip but misses does Chavo. At
this point, Tatsumi Fujinami tries a brain buster, but Guerrero
goes behind with an O'Connor roll for two, and then
Fujinami steps in and tucks the legs in bridges backwards.
Uh for the one, two three, So finding the pinning combination.
There is Tatsumi Fujinami pinning Chavo Guerrero here at Shay Stadium,
and I don't know, look like Guirero's had popped out
before the three count, but that's okay. The crowd seems
kind of incredulous that Tatsumi Fujinami just won the match
as he gets his arm raised, and it's a rather
surreal scene as Vince steps into the ring to announce
him as the winner while also somehow doing commentary commentary
and twenty eight the winner and still Junior Wrestling Federation
Champion Tatsumi Fujinami.
Speaker 2: Ladies and gentlemen, Wow, it's looking here.
Speaker 1: Fujinami's book real quick, Chavo's book. I feel like he
did say. He said almost nothing.
Speaker 2: You could do.
Speaker 1: Other tours across the United States frequently, I worked the
huge Chase Stadium show or Bruno that's true, well, thirty
thousand people were the most loaded cards I ever worked on.
My good friend Andre had a highly pushed opponent and
a young MP star named Hogan. Andre really took to
Hulk as he let him body slam him in the match,
started to break it to a lot of people, but
the body slam heard around the world at wrestling. He
three was done. Seven years earlier, Antonio and Noki and
other Japanese talent were on the show and Antonio was
the one who got me on the show, and I
was part of their contingent, likely due to Anoki, I
was paid for immediately after the show. At that time,
the then named Worldwide Wrestling Federation treated the Japanese delegation
very well, and Anoki had an excellent working relationship with them.
My role in the card was to challenge Tatsumi Fujinami
for the WWWF it just wasn't Junior Heavyweight belt, and
deliver a good match, which we did.
Speaker 2: They really think that it only changed when Vince took
over the company.
Speaker 1: No, it's it's hard to remember exactly when, but I
mean it was. It was WWF for four years, like
much like what it usually happened in Japan. Tatsumi went over,
but I didn't care. We were asked to go out
and put on a ten minute clinic, and we did.
I challenged Fujinami often in Japan for a different belt
than he had, which was the nwas International Junior Heavyweight Strap.
At this point, I think that Fujinami and I could
have a great match in our sleep. We were praised
for our contest, but we executed dozens of them that
were much better for the Japanese audience.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I bet I bet you did. I bet you did.
Speaker 1: Us fans getting a taste of the Tokyo headquarter. WWF there,
of course, what's wrong with that? Fujinami announces the winner
and again has mentioned the Japanese broadcast of the Shay
Stadiums show when U Japan Television had a post match
interview with Tatsumi Fujinami as well. And then we see
the roof of the garden for a split second. Did
you notice that you suddenly see the roof, miss yeah,
and that's because, of course that's where Vince McMann and
Cal Rudman were seated, and they're going back now to
the garden after this match. We go ahead now to
the Enoki versus Larry Sharp match and Oki of course
the NWF champion and it is announced as being for
the National Wrestling Federation Heavyweight Championship, introducing the challenger from Paulsburn,
New Jersey, weighing two hundred and sixty two pounds, it's
pretty boy Larry Sharp and tipping the.
Speaker 2: Scales looking more like peanut butter Larry Sharp.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, PB and j exactly yep, tipping the scales
at two thirty four as they say. The World Martial
Arts Champion. He's also known as which is basically the
title he created to have mixed rules fights with Muhammad,
Ali Ruska and all these other guys that do other
fighting styles.
Speaker 2: An Toni and Oki. And it's got the blue towel
Tony and the John Void of pro wrest, so always
wearing that damn towel scarf around his God, that's a
John Voyce. John Voight would do it the fucking oscars
all the time.
Speaker 1: God, calm this guy down. He thinks he's a fighter
or something.
Speaker 2: I know, right, dude, you're you. You don't do anything real.
Speaker 1: With an Oki in the ring. Suddenly there's a lot
of Japanese contingencies standing on the grass observing the matchup
that you didn't see before. And yeah, to your point,
the PB on Sharp's jacket not for pretty boy but
peanut Butter.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: Nocchi offers a hand, but there's no shake from Sharpie.
It's not reciprocating. Well, I mean there was a shake,
it was just in Larry Sharp's stomach.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna say I think he had one with David Lynch.
No commentary for this match on the version I have.
I don't know about you. No same thing that you
couldn't find commentary for this one.
Speaker 1: Lots of whistling happening. Not sure if they see a
girl or something, but there's a lot of whistling all
of a sudden, and we start with Sharp leg diving
on Anoke, who side steps it and Noki shoots himself,
but that's also dodged. They tie up and Anoke lunges
him back to the ropes. They get a clean break
lock up, headlocked by Anoch. Many more cameras going off
for this match than Yes you noticed and prior ones.
Of course, that makes sense with the press from Japan
documenting this thing. Sharp counters with a top wristlock, but
Anoki pulls him down, controlling the arm with an arm
ringer and double underhooks, nice and tight the way Anoki's
putting these on. Sharp with the drop toe hold and
grape blinds the leg andnochi. Though with his head under
the ropes, Sharp keeps cranking and finally releases with a
stomp and an Och shakes it loose, lock up collar
and elbow, and Anoki with a snapmare where Sharp's neck
didn't quite go the right way at first. Yeah, Anok's
going to force it and it looked kind of ugly.
Speaker 6: I don't.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's it's kind of funny, you know, this
rotating bystanders thing going on. It's I don't think I've
seen the same person twice, at least I haven't seen
the same person three times. And it just I just
find it weird because no one sits there and watches
the whole show, right, and and and and some people
don't seem to be there in an official capacity.
Speaker 1: Oh definitely not like it's very weird. Runs very casually dressed,
that's what's right.
Speaker 2: You got the guy in green shorts with shirtless, and
next to him, you got I don't know that Tom
Behringer from in the Big Chill. I can't tell.
Speaker 1: Probably not, but it's you know, it was ninety degrees,
so probably the big the big, the big heat or something.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: So Sharp stands up in the sleeper hold and slips
behind to a hammer lock and he's cranking on it,
but brings Anoke down with the canvas sections off the
arm to force him down for a cover for two.
But Anok stands up and fires off a hif toss
to create separation lock up to the ropes, Sharp slugs
and Ok stomps him place to the crowd gets some
big booze, but you can't hear the mat at all.
That's kind of weird, like yeah, very weird. And Oki
drops uh and starts kicking the leg just like he
did Uh Muhammad Ali and the crowd gets with him
for doing this.
Speaker 2: Some some guy yells for four eyes must be in
his way. I don't know, your four eyes must be
the guy.
Speaker 1: I don't know, a nice guy. I can't wait to serve.
Speaker 6: His four ives.
Speaker 2: Your dumb fuck in case you forgot you're in New York.
Your fucking bitch.
Speaker 1: Sounds like flushing to me, idiot, Yes, I have two dogs,
please throwing those closed fists now tries to yank Sharp
out of the corner, but Sharp hangs on to the
ropes and hangs there for just a second, and Oki
then yanks him down forcefully and puts on a toe hold,
standing gets a two count. Sharp has to keep his
shoulders off the mat as he's enrapped in the submission hold,
and Oki goes to the spinning toe hold briefly like
Terry Funk. Sharp gets to the rope selling big trying
to stand, but he can't Anocchi with a steady pursuit.
Sharp kicks him and throws him out of the buckle
twice and Oke blocks like you would in the video
game with your arms up over your head. Yeah, and
then throws a charp a chop and Sharp totally decletes
for the sale job Andnoki gets the crowd behind him
in attacks. I've been kind of surprised the glimpses we've
got of Anoke wrestling in the States, how much he
gets the New York crowd behind him. They really, yeah,
seem to accept him as a big star. Yeah, it's
it's it's wild totainly know. The Japanese media was very
keen to photograph Anocch wrestling in New York. It made
him seem like such a bigger star back home. So
that's part of what's going on here. Gets the crowd
behind him in his attacks, like I said, and Iris
whipping a chop, Sharp leaves his feet taking the bump,
but Sharp comes with a head butt to the gut
and scoop and a body slam, goes up top and
misses a falling splash. Just pretty boy, Larry Sharp, almost
like he slipped off a cliff the way he fell
more than trying to go for a pro wrestler probably did.
He stands up and he's a sitting duck for Antonio
and OK's inziguri that gets too is it's a big
botch because the referee held up the count and Sharp
swung his legs like he was going to kick out
but didn't. But the insiguri was definitely supposed to be
the finish as it always is. Right, so Anoki does
the right thing. He just picks him up and he
does it again.
Speaker 2: You know what, because you know what the referee did.
This is what happened. Referee, you brought it.
Speaker 1: Blue the finish for Anoch. You blew the finish for
the new Japan relationship, and that's a lot of money.
Pal one two three and Toniook defeats pretty boy Larry
Sharp showedown at Shay and there you go.
Speaker 2: So you handle it.
Speaker 1: If it goes wrong, just do it again, Sure, just
do it again. Fist raise jubilation for Anoch and Sharp
comes up like you can barely stand. Nine minutes, forty
one seconds, the Winter Steel World Martial Arts Champion and
NWF champion a Toni Andoki back to Colin Foley to
call the tag team title match. It's WWF champion Bob
Backland and former champ Pedro Morales taking on Samowen's one
and two.
Speaker 2: Indeed back on a call your Champion. I've never seen
Backland's hair so fucking light.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, he's feeling the summer. He's he's enjoying the
summer out in Glastonbury. Nice nice beaches in Glastonbury.
Speaker 2: I don't think it's near the water. I think so
either that's where he lived. Not a weird guy, though
I'm told no normal does.
Speaker 1: Anybody now in the Solar system? Can you let me
know gently if he's got like, not dementia, but like
ct or something. It crosses my mind as we go
through this to try to see if we can interview
the guy, but I really don't think it's worth it
because from what I've heard, he's even less sort of
intelligible then you would expect. But as you read his
book and it's like this guy seems to remember so much,
and I'm sure that's a lot of his co author
doing the work, but it's never see interviews with him.
Speaker 2: I don't know, well, you know, I mean, if maybe
you know. T Diddy's friend Joe always loves to tell
me the fucking story where he he met Bob Becklan
coming into uh I don't know. It was like a
fucking a gas station or repair shops, something like that.
I've heard this story. This guy tells me the story
every time I see him. Yes, he does, Okay, he
tells me the story like he's never fucking told me before.
Every time I every fucking time I know that guy. Hey,
did I ever did I ever die?
Speaker 6: Ever?
Speaker 2: Tell you about the time I met Bob Backland? You
like wrestling? You want to hear that. I'll tell you
this story. I know, Joe, I've heard it. I've heard
it every fucking time I've seen you. I don't see
you often, but I know that every fucking time I
see you, tell me this goddamn story about Bob Backland
in Glastonbury. Tremendous stuff. Bell I love it. As he's
at the stopping shop right exactly.
Speaker 1: Captain Low was there because he was managing the Simoens
and he's doing his work. He's not gonna not make
this about him. Somehow, it seems like again we joined
fully in Cole kind of midstream is there. I'm ending
on things here. Yeah, Albano approaching his seventy seventh birthday
at the time of this recording, of course, no longer
with us again. Vince sounding like a nineteen thirties radio
announcer on the Shay Stadium. PA, nice pop for Pedro Morales.
You see mel Phillips lurking ringside and the foreground WWF
champion Bob back then goofy as ever though a bit tanned.
Thank goodness, Yes indeed comes the fist of the crowd.
Big chorus of booze as well as booze with the
Z for that six hundred and fifteen combined pounds, the
wild samoans, they cut to my man, can you see
Roman's face on sicca or what?
Speaker 7: Oh?
Speaker 1: Yeah they get those type. Yes, it's something else, Jesus Christ.
The attack traps were blue leather at the time, which
I don't remember, but there they are. Best two out
of three falls in this one. Not that Vince heeds
the heeds the warning. As we'll get to later. Cole says,
this is the end of an era in the beginning
of ward wrestling entertainment. I'm like, what are they going
to fucking force here, he busy here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I have this? Do I have this one? Maybe
they don't have this one. I don't have a.
Speaker 1: Constant old school and the Samoans were instrumental in the
rock and wrestling period, And it's like, what, like the Samoans.
Speaker 2: This is what they do.
Speaker 1: We lost the titles in like eighty three did Rocky
Johnson and Tony Alis and we're like never heard from
again in the tag ranks. I mean they were around,
but you know what I mean, this is what they do.
This is what commentary does. They fucking they ruined this shit.
They play out that Offha trained Batista. It's I gotta
look at this, I gotta look at the wild smoke.
Speaker 2: Yes they do. I do have this one. This is
uh like fully compares what it's like having a conversation
with either Offa or Backland in real life, which is
pretty entertaining, ironically.
Speaker 5: Uh, for anyone who's ever had a conversation with both
AFA and Bob Backland, they would tell you that having
the conversation with Backland is a whole lot stranger than
talking to AFA.
Speaker 2: It's not wrong, indeed, that is true.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're basically out of the WWF when the MTV
era hit whatever all right, big sign on a blankets
as Captain's corner. I don't know why he's so excited
to see it mentioned. Lou is the only one who
communicated with the Samoans and they had beaten Putski in
Santana to become the champions, it's explained. And Albano is
kicking something off the apron and walking around like a
guy who spends this day sitting on a lawn chair
on the sidewalk outside of a convenience store in Queens.
That's what he looks like to me on this particular
evening exactly.
Speaker 2: He's a raving derelict, is what he is.
Speaker 1: Oh good, one fol says Bob Backlan is scary nice.
He said when he was a kid, he approached Bob
Backlin for an autograph and Backlan gave him his home
address in Glastonbury asking him to send him a male
so we could send back an autograph. So that's that's
what it was like to run into WWF Champ Bob
Backland back then. Exciting indeed, So there's a lock up
between Peter Morales and Cica to the corner. Ceca misses
a chop and hits Offa and they stand around all
shocked that they hit each other. There's reference to Bob
Backlan passing the title along to Hulk. Cole makes reference
of that through the iron cheek of course lock up and.
Speaker 2: Talks about Pedro being a part of the first Shay
Stadium show in the main event with Bruno.
Speaker 3: Here here is that Pedro was part of the main
event of the first WWE show here at Shay Stadium
in September in nineteen seventy two, when he defended his
title against Bruno San Martino and what would be a
seventy five minute curfew draw seventy five minutes.
Speaker 2: That's absurd.
Speaker 1: It was absurd. Yeah, it was quite a quid approach,
quite a promotion, but I'm not sure it worked. I'm
not sure they never repeated it, you know, with their
future Babyface champs. Really So there's a lock up. Morales
strops to his knees and sends Sika stumbling into Offa
once again. So the strategies apparently to find ways to
get the simoons to run into each other, and they
stand around like a dog who hears a faint noise.
I mean, that's the look on the Simoans face all
the time to me, like a dog who fought you
just said squirrel but isn't sure, trying to tell where
it's coming from without moving that the sound that they hear.
Cole recalls the first a Stadium show, like he just
played Peter Morross with the headlock and attack to Backland,
who grabs his own headlock and a right hand secre
grabs a front headlock, though, lifts him up and sits
on top. Oh no, Backland picks him up like he
did Hogan and puts him on the top rope and
gives him a love tap just to demonstrate his strength
seeking charges and gets tripped several times with the heel
trips that Backland used to do. And yes, Folly's pointing
out with the pantaloon in the bare feet that Captain
Leewell Banno is looking like Uncle Berry Finn on this
particular night. He's walking around with no shoes on. He's
walking around in the grass of Shay Stadium barefoot.
Speaker 2: Luel Banno, what's wrong with that? I'm glad you put
it that way. I think it's normal behavior. I'd walk
around barefoot if I had it with the chance for sure.
Speaker 1: And Folly totally calls attention to people wandering in the infield.
All of a sudden that becomes very gratuitous to him.
Back into the front headlock and Sicca lifts and seats
him on the top rope. Tries to give back Then
a taste of his own medicine, but when he goes
to give him a love tap, Backland blocks it and
throws a right hand and does a double slap irish
whip in a backdrop by Backland. Cole says Bob Beckland
looks like a duck in the ring, called him a
that's pretty funny.
Speaker 2: Dumb fuck is better.
Speaker 1: Some guys giving a tour of ringside. Apparently there's a
fucking field trip going on in the middle of the match.
Lock up to the corner, Backland drops and scurries away.
There's some box that's being pulled under the ring by
some guy, and they call that out after distracting that
is there's some guy literally the middle of this match
fishing under the ring for something or other. Sika chops
away and Bob Becklan with right hands tagged at Pedro Morales,
Afa comes in and they double team and stomp the
shit out of him. Pedro goes to the floor and
lou gets some cheap shots in as well, while Batlan
does nothing about it. Great story by Michael Cole about
how Loue Albano wandered out during a match between Cactus
Jack and Triple H on Raw in nineteen ninety seven.
Never heard this story before, but he was saying that
when fully in his debut is Cactus Jack September twenty seventh,
nineteen ninety seven, Madison Square Garden against Triple H. While
it wasn't on camera, at some point during the match,
Loue Albano, who is there, just wanders out down the ramp,
wanders out into the crowd and starts talking to the
fans and signing autographs and making a scene. When was
this during the Cactus Jack Triple H No Holds Barred
match September twenty second, nineteen ninety seven.
Speaker 2: Yes, the Square Garden. Yes, I remember this. You remember
al Bano coming out? Yes, because we did that show.
I don't remember Albano coming out, Yeah, I do. It's
fucking weird.
Speaker 1: I remember doing the show and they're talking about how
there was absolutely no explanation for why that happened, And
of course mcfully remembers that because he's in the match
tact to Bob back then, who comes into those extra.
Speaker 2: I can't tell you why it happened. You can't exactly
why it happened. Be nice, I am, because he's a
fucking lunatic. He's looking for catering. Probably right exactly, just
wander through the wrong curtain. I'm sure. I'm sure he
bought a ticket. Actually, yeah, I wouldn't doubt that he
bought a ticket just so we could fucking do that.
Speaker 1: Back then, with those extra awkward leaping right hands he
used to do. But they eventually ran back into the corner,
and then they applied the nerve hold, which is back
today courtesy of Jacob Fattu. It's time to sell, Albano
turning around.
Speaker 2: To the gir Let's just keep fucking reminding ourselves how
great Jacob Fattou is. He's bringing back the nerve hole
Albano is. I'll tell you what. I'll tell you what.
He's on My last nerve hole.
Speaker 1: Albato was barefoot, quite literally touching grass here at shay
Cole says Umaga used to the same nerve hold so
that's when Omago is still alive.
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, yeah, yeah, he used to live.
Speaker 1: Simone start double stomping and keeping the pressure on Backland,
cornering him and choking and grabbing at him. Fully calls
out Lou for cheating right in front of the rep.
He steps up the stairs and fires off a few
shots to Backland's kidneys as well. Just Lou, just fine,
little ways body slam on Backland.
Speaker 2: Let's you know these things happen?
Speaker 1: Head butt by an awful missus. Oh yeah, definitely. He
needs talking by himself somehow. He's justify his presence somehow,
that's for sure. Backland dives to tag Pedro Morales and
comes in a house of fire. Is Pedro a house
of fire, Iraq writes Peer four. Brawl breaks out, the
Simone's running to each other off Irish whips Cole calls
it the double nogg and knocker, even though it isn't
quite that uh wow, and then there's uh let's see
back then and offa off almost seems like he's drunk,
and Backland slams some of an atomic drop. Fully calls
it a knee drop.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: Pedro Morales gets the tag, then runs off into Seca
who's on the apron and does an O'Connor roll for
the one, two three. Peter Morrele is pinning off of there,
and you'd like to think the match is over as
Luke gets in the ring standing on the ropes for
some reason, and Vince gets in the ring like he's
gonna announce that this thing is over.
Speaker 2: Oh, this is fucking a Mayan. Vince forgets. Okay, the
match is two out of three falls, and and this
is listen. I got this bit here because it is
just tremendous.
Speaker 3: Well, speaking of Vince McMahon, and we work for the
man on a daily basis. Remember the legend the man
never makes mistakes, He's always right. Well, ladies and gentleman,
I want you to watch history in the making here,
because Vince McMahon is actually going to make a mistake.
Vince forgets that this is the two a three fall.
Speaker 4: That job. We're going to first show your replay the
first fall.
Speaker 3: And I believe the confusion, man, that caused by the
explosion of the thirty six thousand fans here, I think
they I believe that the titles were one.
Speaker 4: And now the referee explained Evince that it's two out
of three Bill.
Speaker 11: And Vince makes the mistake. Who is there to yell
at Vince? Well, that time it would have been his father, even.
Speaker 5: Though it was advertised in the two out of three falls.
Speaker 4: Man, oh, I wish.
Speaker 5: I could go back in time and be Vince's boss
just for a day.
Speaker 3: And that scow you just on his face, Ladies and gentlemen,
I get that every week.
Speaker 2: Awesome. It's like the I mean, that's just while they're
called like really on him out.
Speaker 1: Like it's like on the therapy couch or something. Yeah, seriously,
that's great. Vince forgot it was two or three falls.
And then this is how Vince's mind works. As soon
as he realizes that the ref whispers in his ear,
he immediately has an excuse. He immediately says, I've just
been informed by the referee, right, as if the ref
just decided that it's now two undred three falls. And
of course with the crowd, they start chanting bullshit because
to them, like the match is over and like it
seems like they're trying to cheat to favor the Samoans
to change the rules. Now, about how many times Pedro
Morales and Bob Becklin have to win, so Vince really
fucked that one up. It's great to see him transition
into excuse mode. I've just been aformed you know him.
Speaker 2: Well, just been informed that things of that nature have
occurred and we are going to move in a different direction.
Speaker 1: It works, valid one. I hope they forget it now.
Pedro is lying down on the grasping, assaulted, and somehow
Albano slams Pedro like he's under the giant or something
and all he's old Cogain, I mean, he lives him
and dumbs him. What Albano is doing Jesus choking him
on the floor back then comes over to help. You
can see the infield dirt blowing by their faces like
a cloud. It's hilarious. They throw Pedro Morels back in
and the cops are on the grass. NYPD getting active here.
I don't know why they're all over Albano. They get
involved here, They're all over Albano and they started leading
him out of ringside by the arms for his interference.
So apparently NYPD getting the assignment from the New York
State Athletic Commission to remove on the early Managers folder
calls Don Morocco eating a meatball sub on the way
to the ring in nineteen eighty three against Jimmy Snicica,
and then he says he's going to finish this turkey
and Monster on rye okay, and you can hear him
talk with mouthfuls of food for the next few seconds.
Folly goes in on a turkey and Monster does, yes,
he does.
Speaker 2: Okay, Come on, folks, comes what I mean? I guess,
I guess, I guess we're wrong again. It's okay, as
he digs a huge fucking bite.
Speaker 1: I got on you go fuck yourself all rights, throwing
from his knees, gets to Backland, who comes in throwing
on off runs him in a secub with an aga knocker.
They point out that the Simoans can break coconuts with
their head, but the double nogga knocker still somehow hurts them.
As Backland tries an abdominal stretch up here, four brawl
breaks out and Backland whips him right into the gut,
hooks him up for a big time pile driver. My god,
he does offa instead of landing on the top of
his head, almost lands on his forehead on the spike
Cicca comes over to break up the cover, though Morales
comes in ramseca into the buckling on the apron. Bob
then lifts for another pile driver, but gets hit with
a spike to the throat by Sicca, grazing Backland's tempo
as Cole puts it off of then lifts Bob Backland
up for apparently a somo and drop, but before he
can do it, Pedro Morales comes and drop kicks off
in the face. Bob Backland falls on top of Offa
for the one, the two, and the three, and that
is it. Two falls taken Bob Backland and Pedro Morales.
You're new WWF Tag Team champions defeating the Wild Samoans
here at Shasta.
Speaker 2: Except that Cole says that they are. They're quickly stripped
of the belts. Yes, because the rules dictate yes, you
can't hold two belts at the same time, which made
me think to myself, why was back Then allowed to
wrestle in the match to begin with match to begin with?
Speaker 1: Yes, it's they did not consult the rule book until
after this took place. I guess their thought was that,
even though we know you can't rain as champions, you
can't prevent the WAF champion from trying to become.
Speaker 2: Tex Yes you can, Yes you should, because it's it's
pointless for him to try.
Speaker 1: Crowd was not happy, I don't think when the fan base,
I should say, was not happy. They announced a tournament
after this, and the Samoans won the tournament, so they
got the belts back. Anyways, this never happened, really stupid,
but I guess the kind of thing you do when
your WAF champion has no spot on the Shaye Stadium
card right sert them in their summer.
Speaker 2: I mean, he can't lose if he loses the match,
and he looks like a goof yeah, absolutely, you know,
And they booked themselves into a real fucking hole there.
Speaker 1: Right after the victory, they cut to a great angle
of this massive looking crowd rejoicing. They didn't hit that
angle enough in my opinion. During the course of filming
the show, all of a sudden, it looks like a
huge happening the angle they took in the crowd. But
that's that kind of a brawl continues after the match.
Morales is knocked out of the ring and the ref
raises the titles like he won them, They of course didn't.
As mentioned, Patterson versus Kamada is next. We're back with
Vince on commentary with cal Rudman and Madison Square Garden. Yes,
a nothing match here. Kamata is in the robe going
after pat before the bell, who's in his purple sequin jacket.
Cal Redman says, this is what Kamada usually does, attack
before the show.
Speaker 2: The match even starts. They both they both do comment
on on Patterson's tenacity.
Speaker 4: That's something about Patton. Viders never can't jump the man out.
He has amazing agility.
Speaker 9: I've seen him here at the Garden and Steel Cage
matches and he's like a spider, contortion.
Speaker 7: And gymnast, you name it, he does it all got it.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's what Louis says that there, Oh my god,
all right.
Speaker 2: I've heard Louis say that exact same thing.
Speaker 1: So Irish whipping an amazing one foot drop kick by
the three hundred pound Kamada. This guy can fly. He
goes to the top rope and in a hurry. But
this one was on a Colosseum videotape.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes it was a good call, and you know
what I think, So I'm sitting here thinking to myself,
why did I put Gene Oakland? And I think I
originally used the gen oak I think the gene no, no,
because you wouldn't have had this. I think I traded
a Geneoakreland commentary track from one of these things. That's
usually a good trade, Yeah, usually a pretty good trade. Yep.
I think Gorilla and Gorilla and and Gene are on
one of these and I didn't use it. Fascinating happened,
but I kept them in the death toll. So that's
what happens. Yep.
Speaker 1: Come out of the top rope with a kamikaze or
something Vince says, but it's basically a flying splash. Patterson
moves out of the way, come out of crashes. Patterson climbs,
hits the bombs away knee drop off the top. It
goes to cover, but Kamata lifts the shoulder with the
no cover at all, total no cell of Patterson's finish there.
They put them over as a tough man. As Patterson
comes with those punches he used to do, were used
to at the elbow, you know, hes piston punches. His
knuckles are red. Cal Rudman says, as there's a whip
to the corner and a backdrop high backdrop by Patterson.
I knited the chest on the canvas and Kamata, who's
built like one of those headhunters from the ninety six Rumble,
it just flails about his va. Oh my god, so true.
He really is trying to figure out the body type.
It's the best I could come up with. Vince's one
thing about pat Patterson is he can you can never
count the man out. Yeah, that's where the spider contortion
thing comes from. Another dust cloud from the infield. Dirt
makes itself known. Kamata comes out with some powder in
his hand. He brought some white powder because you know
he's a heel from that part of the world. Patterson
ducks the powder throw though, and it's the referee who
gets a face full of powder. And my god, does
this referee fly like he was actually hit with a
bullet and not just sugar or whatever that is. Dick
Kroll would be the referee here, and he calls for
the bell for disqualification. It rings and Patterson's lamb's tor
Kamada and still covers him in the ref it's still
inclined to count him down, even though that same referee
just ended the match. But Kamata kicks out and they
raised Pat Patterson's hand, so clearly there was some miscommunication
going on here. Clearly Tor Kamada thought it was his
show and his time to shine, kicking out of finish's yes, yeah,
so he kind of made it all look pretty fucking stupid.
But he gets under the floor writhing in a minute
forty eight via his qualification. You're winner is Pat Patterson,
according to Vince McMahon, and they again show a fleeting
glimpse of the ceiling at Madison Square Garden as that's
where Vince and cal Rudman and providing commentary from, and
they switch back to that. We push forward now as
the Fabulous Mula teams with Beverly Shade to defeat Candy
molloy and Peggy Lee. Vince says Mulla is the World
Women's champion before forty thousand here in Madison Square Garden.
He says, of course, he means Shay Stadium, and he
quickly corrects himself.
Speaker 2: YEH.
Speaker 1: Can't blame him though, because he's visibly sitting in the garden.
Speaker 2: Now, what a fucking what a fucking crazy, fucking I
don't know. Yeah, it's a funny. It's bizarre now that
I know that that's really bizarre. Is a lot.
Speaker 1: So these are all women that you know part of
Mulla's stables. She had her compound where she trained and
housed wrestlers, and it got creepy and it got abusive.
Speaker 2: We know the story, but can Beverly's shade looks like
she has ended many of our fights.
Speaker 1: Kenny malloy has tried to discuss living at Camp Mulla
and defended her from Mullah from some comments. Here she
is in a shoot interview that's on YouTube very quickly.
I do think we'll ever get to talk about Candy
malloy again.
Speaker 2: Probably not.
Speaker 12: And I worked for the fabulous Mulas. She was fine
looking agent. I was a professional wrestler for sixteen years,
working back and forth with her, and I lived on
her property with my family.
Speaker 13: So not only yourself, but your family got to know
the fabulous Mulah.
Speaker 12: Oh yes, yes, I started. She trained me in nineteen
seventy eight and I had my last man to ninety five,
so there were a lot of years there with her.
Speaker 13: Your family lived there for quite a while and what
was their years? What was their impression?
Speaker 12: Oh, they loved Molah. She she spoiled my two children
because I was the only one there that had small children.
So the girls and Nolah, they all kind of spoiled
my kids. But she was a wonderful person and she
loved kids, and she loved wrestling. I mean that was
her whole lifeless, her wrestling.
Speaker 13: How did Mullah want the girls to present themselves at
the wrestling shows?
Speaker 12: Ladies?
Speaker 13: The reason I ask you that there has been allegations
internet rumors. They caused a petition that would call for
the fabulous Mula's name to be taken on off the
Battle Royal at WrestleMania. They were going to honor herself.
Speaker 2: Now that's horrible.
Speaker 13: There's been allegations of Mullah pressuring girls into prostitution, drugging
girls from Camp Bullah.
Speaker 12: No, no, no, no, no, there were no drugs. She
wouldn't even allow alcohol on the property. And if she
found out if any of the girls were training, if
they had done any kind of drugs or any kind
of alcohol while they were training, they were gone.
Speaker 13: And as far as men coming onto the property or
approaching you.
Speaker 12: They weren't allowed No one was allowed there except our families.
Men weren't allowed on that property, like I said, unless
it was family. I had three little younger brothers. They
used to come down and visit. But Mulla knew them,
she knew they were my brother But just as far
as having men coming on the property, no, that was right,
big no No.
Speaker 7: A La Wrestling podcast.
Speaker 10: He's the Lapsed Fan Wrestling Podcast with Jack N Seo,
m J p Soo.
Speaker 2: All right, satisfying. Oh listen, I believe everything she said.
Close the book. Yeah good, Yeah is innocent.
Speaker 1: As part of a series of interviews that started to
get after the controversy that the host references there where
they took her name off the Battle Royal because some
women were coming forward claiming abuse at Camp Mulla. And
then all these other women including who we see here,
Candy Molloy from Shay Stadium coming out to defend her
so tag team match Mulla and Shade versus Malloyan Lee
vinces Mula has been the champ a long long time.
Rudman says it was like May says, she's like May West,
Mulla is She's extraordinary. One fall twenty minutes, Mula, I'm
not fooling anyone with that jet black dye job, if
you ask me. But uh huh nineteen eighty, she's still
pretty limber in nineteen eighty. It's wild to see Mula
actually be able to move around the ring for once.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I agreed, agreed.
Speaker 1: It says Shay has something for everyone. Ladies had a
bit of variety in an almost any pro wrestling card.
So immediately apologizing for their presence here, Cal says, a
lot of girls from the South seem to get into.
Speaker 2: It the wrestling. Vince's I don't know why that is.
Nel says, it's survival. Well, hey, he does have a question.
Maybe this is the same thing. I don't have the
whole thing written down, but I do have him asking
a question, an important question regarding women wrestlers.
Speaker 9: You know these lady Russ's up. What do you do
if you're trying to make love to one and it's
not going the way.
Speaker 6: You want to, you'd be in big trouble. You do
have to listen when they do.
Speaker 4: I would thinks like crossing a pirate with a tiger.
Speaker 7: I don't know what you get.
Speaker 4: Way to talk to you better?
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, Cal, that's enough, thank you? Yeah, I
think not funny? Ever?
Speaker 5: Is he?
Speaker 2: Now? Maybe he is?
Speaker 1: He says the women in the South are chopping cotton
all their life and then says, you think so.
Speaker 2: He's all like, that's that's uh, he's he's got that
laugh all over the place and that's cow you can tell. Yeah,
It's like he is, oh fuck, well.
Speaker 1: Is he's talking about like southern ladies and ship It's like,
where do you think Linda is from?
Speaker 8: You know?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Right off? Cal realizes he's doing that or not?
I'm sure not.
Speaker 1: He's a New York guy, you know, says to pretending
he doesn't know what York is. The New York Mulla
takes a couple of Peggy Lee drop kicks. No relation
to the singer Vince wants us to know is more
lures are under the knee lift and a stomp and
a snammr by the hair. Vin's probably getting flashbacks to
getting seasoned assist letters for calling Hulk Gogan Hulk. I
imagine Shade looking like Lauren Ambrose and can heartily wait
gets into the fray hair mares.
Speaker 2: Ain't that the truth? That's really funny.
Speaker 1: They're rerely doing anything. Worst arm bars you've seen. Mulla
comes in, grabs the hair behind the ref's back, while
clearly in the ref's face. Kenny Molloy comes in, Vince
calls her a sweet little gal. Okay, Mulla comes in,
grabs an arm. Cow wells, at what point? At what
point he mentions something with the females integral part of
women's Fuck this? Okay, someone stop this guy. I have
him asking a question about lady wrestlers in.
Speaker 2: Thanks for a Friday. Yeah, I know I can count
on you. Well, well, let's try to move on. Appreciate
I appreciate Cal's insight into women in general here and.
Speaker 9: Watching lady Russell's as in watching ladies in business, you
wonder at what point their emotions enter into it more
than it would a male wrestler, because emotions are, as
we all know, an integral.
Speaker 7: Partners of a woman.
Speaker 8: Yes, whatever, that formula is a fabulous bull the same
I have everything your way.
Speaker 2: It's so fucking nervous. It's like, you know, it's funny,
It's funny how abusive Vince is behind the scenes when
he is on screen. At this point, he's like, well,
you know, these things are are of a cyclical nature
and regards to the hands on approach that we have
here in the w W E uh the we prefer
to talk about, you know, the heavy lifting in the
ring in regards to getting our ducks in a row.
And I want to be completely transparent that we are
currently in an all hands on deck situation. Have you
forgot what Cal said yet? I keep going.
Speaker 1: Someone stopped this guy Mula comes in with an armlock
on Peggy Lee and distracting the referee. Malloy gets in
there and just walks forward into the bodies until the
ref Seas are just horrible stuff. These they're just terrible wrestlers.
Speaker 2: I know, it's it's really awful. It's so bad.
Speaker 1: Talk about how big boned these women are. Oh for god,
it says her name was Bertha. Cal says she did
her best work after the midnight hour.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I have this one prostitutes.
Speaker 4: So I still can't believe that you had chicks.
Speaker 2: No, not that one.
Speaker 6: Big she traveled.
Speaker 9: Well, she did her best work after the midnight our Okay.
Speaker 7: Likes out.
Speaker 2: And listen. Obviously he's just he's just talking about treating women, right, obviously,
that's you know, what is this guy's dealt He has
complete respect for women and does not consider them to
be sexual objects and hookers and whores at all. He
believes in in gender equality.
Speaker 1: He believes everything Kenny Milloyd just said on that shoe
interview is absolutely factual about the lack of sexual activity.
She said and couldn't come on the property, and it's like, yeah,
I know, because they had condoms.
Speaker 2: He should have taken my, uh my, my women's studies
class that I took it in college. Oh, that would
have been a treat to hear him bring that one
down after. Oh my god, that would have been absolutely tremendous.
Candy runs in, what was that teacher's name? I remember
that teacher's name, but she was a trip. I can't
I can't help you there. Yeah, I know, I can
picture though, small blond woman. Oh my god, I can't
think of her fucking name. But she was like, you know, hey, everything, yeah, everything,
you know was a social construct that was exact is
thank god, gender and and and the social contructs constructs thereof.
Speaker 1: How much is tuition again to you hear that? Okay,
just trying to get a sense of proportion here. Yeah,
Candy comes in with absolutely no tag whatsoever. Kind of
whiffs on the punch Peggy Lee does and there's a.
Speaker 2: Monkey must have been an emotional response. If cal Rudman
was commenting on he must have said she came in,
she tagged in via.
Speaker 1: Emotion, trots around in the ring and does another one
to fabulous Mullah. They're just like looking to Mulla for
direction during the match. Cal calls her a rough house lady,
says she could work as a bartender or bounce her anywhere.
I think he's saying of Peggy Lee Shade, Beverly Shade
where her name is, drops her and stumps away. Cal says,
imagine having a lady like that in your corner as
you fight the battles of life. Cal says, you have
a very quizzical look on your face. Vince, I think
I have you thinking about that one. So I think
that's definitely him making a comment about Linda Mulla is
choking Malloy with the tag rope. I think as Cal says,
someone's getting choked to death and the most monotone you
could possibly say that sentence. Candy is scurrying under the
legs and tags Peggy Lee no response whatsoever.
Speaker 2: She tries to do babyface.
Speaker 1: Things in there, monkey flip shade, shade tags Mullah. Mulla
stands on the ropes and literally waves her opponent, Peggy
over to her so she can grab her and throw
her in the ring.
Speaker 2: Over the ropes. Lee with a step over toe hold,
Mulla grabs a hand.
Speaker 1: Candy comes in doing the light crank on sleigh. They're
trying to do like a double submission spot. They both
sit on the legs and crank away. It's just just
so awful. It is Bruno working the hammer locket is
not on the canvas. Okay, it is not quite the
opposite in terms of impact. Peggy Lee is trying to
tell Candy to coordinate jumping down on the knees. They're
trying to do like one, two three jumps. Mulla finally
kicks off missus a splash on Peggy Lee. Lee misses
a splash as well. Mulla comes basically a shotgun dropkick,
dodgers Lee's drop kick, stomps her throat. Cal says, Mulla's
a closer, She's a finisher. I can see it coming.
And indeed there's an Irish whip and a backdrop on
Peggy Lee. By Fabulous Mula and she makes the cover
for the one, two, and the three Fabulous Mula and
Beverly Shade defeat Candy Molloy and Peggy Lee. This one
survives on tape, but not greg Ganya versus at all.
Speaker 2: But the best thing is is that one thing I
did find. I thought i'd found the match. Okay, I
thought I'd found the match, but you know what it was?
What's that somebody reconstructed the card on one of the videos.
I hate that. That happens to me all the time.
It's so fucking annoying that. And so here I am
thinking that I found this fucking you know of course
this you know again Andrew's fork from the Last Supper. No,
and instead it's this. It's like nothing.
Speaker 1: It must have been similar to how they wouldn't show
Harley on WWF television. It must have been some deal
where they didn't want to show. It's funy.
Speaker 2: They wouldn't even tape it. It's funny to me they
wouldn't even tape. Very strange.
Speaker 1: But I mean, let's think about this. Great gun is
floating around backstage. Could this be the first time he
hears about eyes on hullle Cogan goes back and tells
the old man about it, and within months holts in
the AWA. You're going on there, greg eight. Did you
notice back there what they got for talent? Grego, what
they got for talent up there?
Speaker 2: Hey?
Speaker 12: You know?
Speaker 2: Are you know? And guys, we can invite over for
chop dinner.
Speaker 1: Chopped dinner, yes, and says after this one, it's a
little different style than the men, that's one way to
put it. Gl says, Mula closes like Joe Lewis used
to do with the left hook, and Vince gets in
the ring despite begun commentary and announced that this one's
over at six minutes in eighteen seconds. And now we
have Gene with the voiceover for Colisseum home video never
shown on television. There's the Gene right there. He doesn't
announce the matchups, Gens, He's doing the wrap around.
Speaker 2: So to speak.
Speaker 1: It's Tony Atlas versus Ken Petera for the WWF Intercontinental Championship. Literally,
they say, two of the strongest men in the world.
And we talked a lot about Ken and Tony's interactions.
I believe on the Georgia leg of the Hulk Cogan
Journey because there's that moment on Georgia Championship Wrestling where
Sirling Golden cuts promo and then is confronted ringside by
Tony Atlas, who Olie Anderson was bringing in and pushing
strongly at the time, and they were teasing that as
a battle of muscleman. Also, when Hulkgan left Alabama, you'll
recall to go to Memphis, Ron Fuller filled that spot
on the card with Tony Atlas, the next closest thing
he could get to a muscleman. So Ken throwing up
the up yours on the floor is the big time
heel that he was. Atlas is on the ropes barking
down at him, a big time grudge match about to
play out. Here we also read excerpts on that show
from Ken Baterra's book about how much of a nightmare
it could be working in there with Tony Atlas, who
would just hurt you in advertently all the time, and
he'd always come out busted up and worse for wear.
At a certain point he almost loses him on a
grilla breast slam, so almost gets him back there thirty
minute time limit. The Grand Wizard, who is the manager
of Kenpeterira's on the apron and all gold, pointing and
barking at Tony Atlas, who's introduced at two hundred forty
nine pounds to a nice ovation. Two sixty two is
Ken Peterra with the white leather Intercontinental strap on. Not
the one we would know, but they Tara was the
first champion after the initial champion, Pat Patterson. There's Gorilla.
Gorilla is the one who lays down the commentary track
over this match for Colisseum Home video and he says
there's fifty thousand plus.
Speaker 2: Fans on hand for this one, So I think that's
totally accurate.
Speaker 1: Somewhere in the middle problem, the Wizard peels the ring
attire off Ken Peterra. They circle, the Grand Wizard is
putting over the bench press. Part of me, Guerrilla Monsoon
is putting over the bench press and other records held
by Ken Peterra. According to Brian Solomon's book, Gorilla Monsoon
had a great degree of personal respect for Ken Peterra
and actually gave him his scalp so to speak to
retire the very last match. An angle that grin on
Soon did as an active wrestler was Ken Peterra, who
put him out of commission, and in fact Gorilla Monsoon
mentions that in the course of the commentary here son
Tara comes through and blocks a right hand and goes
off a high one foot dropkick by Tony Outlas turns
the tables. Unlike the other commentary tracks on this show,
Guerrilla Monson's track, the way they used to do these
colosseum voiceovers really drowns out the natural crowd noise. Yes,
it does, which for the safe Stadium show is really
nice feature of the show. Yes, Pateria tries pretty brutal.
Those those Colossium video on, those early Colossum video ones
were brutal in regards to that those hot box voiceovers.
So Patia tries to kick, it's caught and Tony Atliss
slugs him in the gut, lifts him high with the
delayed gorilla press and man with Tony Outlas's gorilla press
put his abs on display. Yes, he tosses. Petera ends
up in the rope one foot, caught up there in
total pain. As ken Petera, he comes up with the
need of the gut that somehow again causes Tony Atlas
to fall straight backward instead of hunching forward. Patera with
a whip and a lary it off to the side,
almost like Hulk used to do a boomba Yeah, ups
the elbow for two big kickout though, sends Petera flying
into the ring ropes where he gets tied up like
a spider or something. Those ropes bouncing up and down
like you wouldn't believe.
Speaker 6: Ken.
Speaker 1: Peterra rams Tony Atlass into the corner. Monson says, he
didn't do your homework, Kenny. Tony like that because his
head right, Ken hurt his head. I thought that was
just a Samoan thing. They're trying to say it's just
a brown skin thing. Because that starts to get a
little weird.
Speaker 2: I wouldn't put it past him. I wouldn't put it
past him just.
Speaker 1: Because Bobo Brazil's head was hard. That means Tony, I guess.
So Tony Alis closes in no selling punches with the
big comeback Ken. Petera is selling. His hand is hurting
every time he punches Tony Atlas in the skull and Gorilla.
Monson gives him two demerits for the Grand Wizard not
doing his homework and not advising Petera that punches aren't
worth it against Atlas, who does a leaping cocoa butt
as it's called, and Ken Peterra sells the knockkneed like
he's about to fall down. Another one drops him Tony
Atlas with a high elbow and a head butt and
a splash. He covers Potero for two. Gorilla Monson faults
the referee for being out of position as he's wont
to do two and a quarter. Gorilla declares that pinfall.
Tony Atlas is throwing head butts about a half a dozen,
by Gorilla's count, and he knows a dozen.
Speaker 2: He knows a dozen, Yes, he does. Listen, he knows
a dozen. He knows he especially knows a baker's dozen. Correct.
Speaker 1: Another jumping head butt by Tony at listen. Petera collapses
through the ropes onto the apron. He gets back up front,
face draped across the top rope. Come on, referee, do
your job in there, Gorilla Monson insists. Ken Petera drops
Tony Atlt's throat first on the top rope. Petera then
climbs the ropes and tries a knee but lands on
his feet. Yep, there we go, Gorilla points out the
pitcher's mount in the background as Patera comes with a
gorilla press of his own, but man, he doesn't lock
those arms out. He struggles to get the big Tony
at Liss up and a gorilla press of his own
and almost loses him and dumps him on his head.
That would have been a complete disaster.
Speaker 2: I want to make an announcement. Yeah, it's very important
to announce I found Waldo. Found Waldo Waldo. He's a
He's where's Waldo's ringside guy in a red and white
striped outfit?
Speaker 1: Eric, No, that'd be a fun thing. Where's Waldo in
the crowd at a wrestling show?
Speaker 2: Seriously? I mean, freaking idiot just fighting down in his
in his in his red and white striped shirt, fucking goon. Look.
Speaker 1: Ptera locks out of full Nelson now, which of course
was dreaded. He starts spinning Atlas around like he used
to do in the opening video montage on Colisseum Home
Videos that I didn't didn't So he's got Atlas locked out.
But finally Atlas drapes his locked arms over the top rope.
Monsoon talks about Ken Peterra slapping that on him and
making him retire once upon a time, and that's exactly
what it was. I think it was the July twenty
sixth Spectrum Show nineteen eighty Backlan defended the title against
Peterra in the main event, Monsoon with special referee. They
have a blow up and uses a foreign object. Terra
gets the victory. They have a match later, a grudge
match on a Spectrum show August twenty third, with Peteria's
Intercontinental title on the line, Monsoon declaring that he would
retire if he lost.
Speaker 2: You know it's uh yep.
Speaker 1: He probably got the idea from Bruno and helping fill
the stadium show by saying he'd retire if he lost.
And yeah, he uses a foreign objectis ptearing that match?
Blast Gorilla when the ref isn't looking, covers him for
the one two three, and Gorilla took to the papers
after the match. Used to have a column in the
Pennsylvania newspaper ins Philly, and he wrote a column about
how oh yeah he did no shit did he once
inaccurately reported that Superstar Superstar Graham had passed away and
never bothered to retract it. It was it was his
case fab as it came, and he wrote in his column,
but Tera get in the victory over me in this
manner was not necessarily what makes me hang it up. Rather,
what happened during the match is what made my mind
up for me. From the opening, Allen, for the next
ten minutes, I used everything in my arsenal trying to
dethrone Petera. Although hurt and stunned, Petera somehow managed to
weather the storm. There isn't anything else I know of
that I might have tried, so I figure I don't
have in my attack anymore what it takes to beat
a man of the ability of a ken Paterra little
Monsoon calling it a career the same year that he
helped make Hulk, and no small part by losing to
him several times in nineteen eighty, including as we talked
about a couple of months before the Shay Stadium show
to set up the Andre match. Back to Shay Break
and Petera's stomping away on Tony Atlas on his throat
and pulling up on the ropes while he does it,
Monsoon says Petera took the title from Pat Patterson, which
is an interesting trivia note. The second ever Intercontinental champ ken,
Petera grabs the throat, Tony Atlas breaks free mittal rope,
drops a head butt and sells as much as Petera
does off the impact as us. Yes, he does, helis
with a kind of backhands like sting, a bit like
a trip hammer. Monsoon says, there's a big roundhouse to
the chin, and Petera flare flops for the industry into
the canvas. Tony Atlas hooks up a high delay vertical
suplex or vertical job as Gorilla puts it. Yeah, Atlas
with a cover that Gorilla Monsoon considers half hazard gets
too so just can't expeak, can't expect to beat Petera
that way. So the dreaded burial there from Monsoon back
up in an Irish rip and he leaps back to
a sleeper he's riding. Peterra Potero runs ducks under the
ropes and and he hits the buckling to break the
sleeper hold. He crawls and drapes his arm over on
a knocked out Tony Atlas, but he only gets two.
Monsoon says, you're not going to pint Tony Atlas that way.
You need him in a more compromising position than that
considering all the adrenaline flowing through his system right now.
So we get back up with an Irish whip and
Tony Atlas does a high cross off the ropes. As
soon as he hits the ropes, he takes off and
gets two back up right forearm sends Ta through the
ropes to the floor, Peterra stomping him out in the
in the infield area. As Tony Atlist tries to re
enter the fray, he drops Patera to the grass with
a right to the gut. And the grounds keeper won't
be happy about this monsoon as says, as Ken Peterra
gets in and back out, they're both fighting on the
apron and the finish is Ken Peterra slugging Tony at
Let's over the top rope back into the ring and
the referee calls for the bell. So what that means
is that Ken Peterra loses by count out because he
was on the apron when Atlas was in the ring
or was it vice versa, let me see, yeah, or loses.
Speaker 2: But Terra, Yeah, Atlas went by count out, and but
he's not settled with that. He's not okay with more
gets on the mic and says a bunch of stuff here.
He goes mmm, right, uh, yep. Before a minute, yep.
Speaker 1: Straight talk from Tony. Let's Patera gets back in. Vince
Scram's out of there, but then he leaves again.
Speaker 10: Wrestling podcast He's a lapsed fan wrestling podcast with Jack
and m J.
Speaker 6: P Soo.
Speaker 1: Matches over and uh. Patera grabs a cop and smiles.
You can see him walking away as he prepares to
throw a boulder through McDonald's window. As for Tony outen
times Yeah to Tony Alice, he was once told, according
to him, that everything we gave to Hulk, we were
ready to do for you, but it's just uh okay,
it wouldn't happen.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: An indication of my popularity, he writes in his book,
was a photograph in the newspaper the morning following the
August ninth, nineteen eighty Shay Stadium show, which featured the
blowoff match between Bruno and Larry. More than thirty six
thousand packed the stadium. I was surprised when there was
a picture of me in the newspaper the next day.
I thought they would have used a photo of Bruno,
Larry or even Andre. For my match against Ken Peter
that night, I received a payoff of ten grand, the
biggest payoff of my career. So a big night for
Tony Atlas. Here, as we go back to Foley and
Cole on the commentary, Johnny Rods introduced in black and
yellow pinstripe trunks. Vince calls him a trimline two hundred
and forty one pounds. Ivan Putski the opposition. Cole calls
Putsy another one of those ethnic wrestlers.
Speaker 2: Uh. I would like to point out that at this point,
I haven't Putt is thirty nine years old, thoughts.
Speaker 1: I don't know fountain of youth. I mean it looks
old in the face, looks young in the body.
Speaker 2: He looks like he's fifty five. Bricked up yeap to
a degree that this is him when he's losing kind
of the the baby fat is just kind of the lean,
muscular look, and it's just not okay. He looks twenty
years older than he actually is. I mean, think about
he's younger than us. Oh god, okay, at this point
it's distressing, and he looks like a grandpa. And I've
also never known a Polish person outside of Ivan Putski
who is able to tan like it's insane and I
know he doesn't have any bodies here, but geez, like
you're that's not I don't understand that at all. He
is constantly a crisp golden brown, the hash brown, and
like polish people don't do that, he does, I guess.
Speaker 5: So.
Speaker 1: Yep, another one of those athletic wrestlers being featured here.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 1: Indeed, Rod's blindsides him as ref goober to Raman is
checking on the boots of Putsky. Rod slaps the slaps
him and does a snapmar and drops an elbow. Fully
talks about going to Johnny Rod's school himself in nineteen
eighty five looking for independent work of course in the
Bronx I think or Brooklyn maybe is Johnny Rodge's school,
and how he ended up working out with Taz at
the time and ended up saying that Johnny Rodd said
to the class after Fully left that he will never
make it in the business because Fully kicks with his
left foot, and according to Johnny Rodd's that means you
can't be in the wrestling business, which is a curious
remark to say the least. But Fully competive.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, because you got to you know, and
you gotta work the left limbs. Yeah, okay, if you're
if you're a lefty, you can't fuck how's that work?
That's over? Forget it can't be a wrestler yep, unless,
of course you do, which is and then and then
now Cole talks about the ladies that dude love, as
dude love he'd have around him, and at least them
to talking about Cole's legit news background, which is fascinating.
This whole thing is fascinating.
Speaker 4: I still can't believe that you had chicks at one
point in time.
Speaker 6: They were paid though.
Speaker 5: Julie, the the gimmicker lady, the one who does the tights.
My wife ran out there one time, and uh, the
girl who used to do uh you know, with the
long hair, who had the great Italian last name, who
married the guy played Yankees putskeek cover.
Speaker 6: Terry Philip Petty was her name, remember.
Speaker 4: Her kick out man, Philip Petty.
Speaker 6: I remember Terry.
Speaker 4: Terry was my first producer.
Speaker 6: Was she really oh Man?
Speaker 5: Until until catering Lady Jen Hagg came around. I think
that Terry was my favorite backstage presence had a dream
about her one time.
Speaker 3: I wonder if CNN was covering this showdown at Shay
since this is the first year that CNN went on
the air at nineteen eight.
Speaker 6: Did they did? Indeed they did.
Speaker 3: His wolf Blitzer at written side as Johnny Rods. He
is in trouble against I haven't putski Michael.
Speaker 6: Why don't you ever talk about your legitimate news.
Speaker 4: Background because no one cares.
Speaker 5: I care, and I think our fans would care to
know that you covered uh really important events in the world,
the genocide in Rwanda.
Speaker 4: Yes, I covered the uh Berlin wall coming down. Actually
still have a picture a piece of that in my office.
Speaker 5: I mean, granted, that's not as important as Putsky bear
hugging Rods.
Speaker 2: What the fuck is going on with these two?
Speaker 9: What?
Speaker 5: What?
Speaker 6: Like?
Speaker 2: What happens? Tell us more about the wrestlers? You know,
what are you doing? Nope, Nope, I need to talk
about news that is part of Michael Cole's story. That's
pretty fascinating that I have no doubt about it, and
I'm sure it is fascinating. What place does it have
on a fake sports show?
Speaker 6: Right?
Speaker 2: This is the reason he doesn't put ww in his resume.
Speaker 1: I'm sure he does exactly. He's not going anywhere anyway,
right right, he doesn't even have a resume. So Putski
grabs a side headlock and throws shorthands. Rods collapses, lands
in the middle rope headlock, push off tackle for Putski.
Both fall down. Putski gets a two count, though Rods
pushes off a knee of the gut, great leg drop
and a big elbow from Johnny Rod's Cole wonders the
CNN thing. Yes, Rods comes off the middle, rope, comes
to some flying head stomps. Rods leaps into Putsky's bear hug.
We get a tight shot of Johnny Rodd's suffering in
the hold. Short poke of the eyes to break Putsky
with a headlock over the top. He's huffing and puffing.
You can tell this guy's on a fucking ventilater pretty
soon at this rate.
Speaker 2: He lifts, yeah, seriously, so much.
Speaker 1: Gas lifts Rods again in a bear hug. I wonder
Hogan dropped the hold and stopped doing it. Yeah, right, exactly,
and then Rods with elbows to get free, and he does.
He scoops and slams Putsky.
Speaker 2: And then Foley hits one. I don't know. I probably
would have done this back in the day. I don't
think I would have to do it in my old
age now, but definitely back in the day I would
have said something like this.
Speaker 4: Actually, I called the play by play with a dead
New York mets pit.
Speaker 2: Not that one. This one.
Speaker 5: I think you need to work some Rwandan genocide references
into raw on a regular basis.
Speaker 2: He no sells that one, doesn't He yeah, totally, just
fucking like, just lets it linger. I love that.
Speaker 1: A big leap and a splash missus for Rods, and
Putsky goes off with the rights and lefts you know what.
Time it is Polish hammer time. And it looks great.
The Polish hammer looks great. It's listen, it's it's one
of the great. It's one of the great simple holds.
I don't know why other people haven't used it. I
don't know why it doesn't make a comeback. It's simple,
it's effective, and it looks brutal. It's brutally throws that
huge double fist right Rod's pats him down.
Speaker 2: One, two three.
Speaker 1: New York Territory mainstay Ivan Putsky collects his payday and
his spot on this huge showdown at Shea, defeating perennial
territorial jobber Johnny Rods here just four minutes and forty
seven seconds. Like Hogan said, the Polish power Polish hammer
just as much an influence for the Axi Bomba as
Stan Hanson's lariat. At least that's what he was saying
to Japanese magazines. After Stan Hansen left New Japan for
All Japan, we jumped down to renegule A speaking of
Hogan's past and the Hangman. Hanging Man, of course, Jean Nilguai,
a longtime Montreal and Canadian wrestler. We've talked a lot
about him over the course of Athlete. They don't know
who he is on commentary.
Speaker 2: Actually, I mean I never Actually I'll tell you. I
know I never told you this, But I used to wrestle. Oh, Yes,
I was the Hangman, Yes, a year before I was born.
Speaker 1: After announcing the participants, we get a glimpse of Vince's
steel chair seat right behind the announced table. You can
see him sitting down. He's just an interested observer. Funny
to think of Vin's not really being a VIP and
just sitting there on the grass and a building chair.
Speaker 2: Then he just is just to my favorite, just do
the fuckinge they're re announcing and the ship shut the
waiting for the match, fuck down, shut the fuck up,
Shut the fuck up that whatever it is you think
is best for business, I am here too completely.
Speaker 8: Uh uh.
Speaker 2: Push ahead with the vision you have and to create
the synergetic network of the World Wrestling Entertainment. Great well, great,
all right, I'm so glad. Then all right, Vince, it's
that I don't know what. It's not entertainment, all right,
there's no wardrousting entertainment, all right, it's ward rushing federation
trying to piss me off, saying that I see, I see,
well be the I understand and I believe. Go moving forward.
I will indeed call this company World Wrestling entertain Leave
going forward. I will, indeed. Sounds like a commitment, doesn't it, Mannie,
I said, call it World Wrestling Federation. Yes, and that's
exactly what I said I would do, Dad Pop, I
will call the company again henceforth, moving forward, I will
indeed proclaim our corporate entity to be World Wrestling Entertainment.
Thanks for nothing.
Speaker 6: I'm going.
Speaker 1: Rene Gola versus the Hangman just to keep your spirits up.
Lock up to the corner. Hang man misses the right hand.
Guley is quick on the move. Hip toss is a
drop kick by Gulay. What a goofy look guy with
his hair flowing on both sides but a receding hairline
at the same time.
Speaker 2: And here is Colon Foley talking about Al Lighter, okay,
which leads into another bizarre one upsmanship thing that they do.
Speaker 3: Actually, I called the play by play with a then
New York Met's picture Al Lighter.
Speaker 6: Al Lighter, And I've gone on to know Al well.
Do you know where I see Al frequently? Where? At
Springsteen concerts? Yeah?
Speaker 4: Al is a huge Springsteen fan.
Speaker 3: In fact joined him on stage for Glory Days at
one of the Shay Stadium.
Speaker 4: You joined Bruce on so Al Lighter did he joined?
Speaker 6: Did you know?
Speaker 5: I joined Twisted Sister on stage for We're not going
to take it really to benefit the people who were
you know, killed and injured in that terrible station fire
incident in Providence.
Speaker 3: Well, I joined John Cena on stage to sing his
theme song in San Antonio with the Red.
Speaker 2: Dowks was going on?
Speaker 6: Is that true? Yep? Karaoke let me try to top that.
Speaker 4: Come on, and I've sung.
Speaker 3: I've sang with Pat Patterson too, I did Chester, England
and you know what we sang? What we sang a
song by Queen which actually I cannot even believe this,
and this is complete truth, Pat Patterson, how.
Speaker 6: You're disregarding the hangman goulet matchup? To tell your personal an, Pat.
Speaker 3: Patterson, I actually sang Another One Bites the Dust in
a Manchester bar karaoke, which actually happened to be a
song from nineteen eighty with a.
Speaker 4: Showdown at say took.
Speaker 6: You know, it's amazing some of those songs that were
popular today, like.
Speaker 5: Another One Bites the Dust or ac DC songs or
even Abba have h so well, whereas matches like this
have an age show well the.
Speaker 4: Hangman with the covering.
Speaker 2: Fuckinges in on it. So stupid, man, it's so sad,
that's how they I I can't even handle it.
Speaker 1: Lay with the hiptos and a dropkick, goofy looking guy,
arm drag arm bar hangman rakes the eyes. Let's see
Gula is able to arm drag free and runs into
when need of the gut. But again, and this era,
when you take a shot to the gut. You flat back,
and that's just what he does.
Speaker 2: You flat back or you go or you go to hell.
Speaker 1: Fully with a funny line, how dare you renee Glay
give right young wrestlers any advice with a match like
this in your past, Cole says, Hogan, Andre is still
to come, and you thought they never met before WrestleMania three.
Speaker 4: I got that one too here for you well, still
to comment showed down at Shaye Mick.
Speaker 3: We got Andre the Giant versus Hult Cogan and you
thought they never met before wrestle Mania three.
Speaker 6: Oh, this is really a historic matchup.
Speaker 5: Hogan was new to w BFF at that time, under
the tutelage of Classy Freddy Blasty the Hollywood fashion.
Speaker 1: Plate called us say he kind of remembers the Larry
Bruno feud unfoldings, So apparently he was watching a bit
in nineteen eighty They mentioned that Pope John Paul the
Second came in nineteen seventy nine for prayer service at
Shay Stadium. Cole asks, fully the people would think of
this match, I think he would be okay silence, yes,
So another Pope record they had to break before eighty seven. Yeah,
gallet arm drags, free hits, a right hand, a snapmaron
and a big stomp front face lock and a Judo
Hiptos style cover for two on Hangman Cole asks, is
this what they would call the popcorn match? Fully says,
there's an ebb and flow of a card, and I
questioned some of the decisions here to put this one on,
but yes, this is the match where you would go
get your refreshments. Hang Man, with a head of arm
standing choke, fully says, this is one of those matches
that did not put thirty six thousand people in here.
Speaker 2: You know, we don't know this did We ask everybody
in Chase Aiden who who they came to say, it's
got to be one fan that bought a ticket to
see this match.
Speaker 6: Fan.
Speaker 2: I imagine there's one fan who was like, this is
I have been following this program for months and I
need to know how it ends in at the corner
and there's no other match that matters.
Speaker 1: Hang of course brought a noose to the ring and
Guley is fiddling with it a bit, and Hangman lifts
gulay like a shoulder throw almost and runs to the
corner and tucks his head, so Gule goes into the
buckle galley with a double leg, floats over, drops an elbow. Well,
Cole talks about how I got ringside a photographer looks
like Robert Downey Jr.
Speaker 2: Well, there there's some there's some serendipity right there.
Speaker 1: The snapmare. They discussed Carl Gotch, who of course held
the WWF Tag Team Championships with Renee Gulay, and they
talk about his.
Speaker 2: Oh, I actually think I have that, I have the
I have the uh the RDJ reference here home on.
Speaker 3: I was going to point out that there is a
gentleman at ringside holding a camera and we may there.
You see him right there on the right part of
your screen, a young Robert Downey.
Speaker 4: Junior before his Iron Man days.
Speaker 3: Was that the showdown at Shay Thanks Michael Will Chamberlain
in the background there as well.
Speaker 2: He doesn't stop, does he? I mean he's he's he's
worse than I am.
Speaker 1: Hangman with the body slam. Cole says, hangman's precursor of
failed gimmick is repo man. Yes, he says he's a
precursor of repo man. Foley says, how do you figure
and Cole's at a loss. I don't know because he
carries the fucking rope around.
Speaker 2: Yeah right, how are you thinking that.
Speaker 1: Hayman cranks the chinlock? Cole says, I don't know why
Hangman was not part of the recent gimmick battle Royal.
Speaker 2: Good question. Guy's probably dead. Let's see you. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Renegelae is going to sleep here as much as the
thirty six thousand fans at shay har Cole says that
was a good line. Fully talks about how people can
fast forward through things they don't want to see on
WW twenty four to seven. So don't worry what you
say will probably never be heard because people will be
fast forwarding through this matchup. Galt's building up to some
tepid colaps, Cole says, listening to the crowd, almost ironically,
Polly says this reminds him of the Simon and Garfunkle's
song Sounds of Silence, and he starts talking about how
in nineteen eighty there were windfall tax there were taxes
on windfall oil profits. He's literally reading off like Wikipedia.
As some renege fights back, it's a body slam goes
to the top rope gets cut off and tossed with
a gorilla press slam for two by the Hangman, whipping
a high boot by the Hangman, who's innovating the big
boot before the hulkster. Cole says he'll miss the blue
and orange seats and the rat infested dugouts at Shay
Stadium as Hangman lifts and drops Rene a throte first
on the top rope from a gorilla press position, and
that's good enough for the one, the two, and the three,
thank god. Then it's one second. The Hangman hangs us
out to dry by defeating Rene.
Speaker 2: Gula or Evince calls him the Hangman. The Hangman, Yes,
the Hangman.
Speaker 1: Is, and we transition to why we're here. Live crowd
noise is overwhelming the feed. Did you have commentary on
your hogan Andre?
Speaker 2: I did not? I did, I did. I watched. I watched.
I watched one from the w vault, which has the
cold and Folly commentary.
Speaker 1: Okay, good, I have just you know, atmospherics, so yeah,
I'm not going to necessarily be able to cueue them up.
But it's nice to watch this just with natural crowd noise.
Because I watched it both I watched both good pretty
strong sense right of Hogan. I mean he he is jeered,
he is hated, he is Yes, he provokes a very
strong reaction compared to.
Speaker 2: The reactions we've heard, especially against Andreye for sure. Yeah.
Speaker 1: There he is Hogan with his cape on, marching on
the grass Gold Cape, huge course, abooze, with Fred Blassie
leading the way with his cane on, and all Gold
police officers on both of their sides. The hulkster walking
in to Shay Stadium against Andre, the giant red and
yellow as we talked about on the gear, Andre Chance
firing at Hogan. Vince McMahon himself is personally in the
ring witnessing this all taking shape. It's just amazing to
think that he's bearing direct witness to Hogan's first slam
of Andrea, and so even years later, finds a way
I think we can he convince the whole world they've
never seen anything like it. Andre gets up on the
apron and my god is his frizzy chia pet hair.
Oh it's it's it's an approach compromise by this New
York commodity.
Speaker 2: It's just awful.
Speaker 1: One fall twenty minutes. Gilbert to Ramanas signed last he's introduced,
gets his hands up to a big course of booze,
gets in the ring for this one, Unlike recent tapings
we've been watching where he doesn't even bother getting in
the ring for Hulky makes sure to get in the
ring for Shay Stadium from Venice Beach, tipping the scales
this morn, just this morning, Vince McMahon says, as a
ring announcer. At three hundred and thirty nine pounds, Hulk
Hogan Any points at his future cash cow. Indeed extends
his cape and revealing some purple inside. The gold sideburns
are coming in a bit black, so we're watching that closely.
On Terry Bolet and he's still wearing the black right
elbow pad in case there's a need for loaded axie
boomba and the white miss tape from Grenoble, France. Four
hundred and eighty seven point five pounds, The eighth Wonder
of the World, Andre the Giant, and the hands are
up in the crowd. It's pumping their fists and very
happy to see the great attraction.
Speaker 2: That was Andre the Giant. Folly on this he reads
my fucking mind and comments on the two guys who
are wandering shirtless at ringside.
Speaker 5: These two shirtless guys wandering in, well, where are they're credentials?
Speaker 6: I just wonder how does somebody get a standing perch
like that without wearing a shirt.
Speaker 5: Kevin Dunn would have that guy ejected from the building
almost immediately these days.
Speaker 1: Yes, he would shout out to Kevin Dunn. Yeah, like
the wrestler's doing triple h Shaun Michael's tripper response, exactly,
keeping yourself in good graces. So Blassie on the bottom
rope getting them going. Is Hogan and Andrea face off
in the middle, Hogan's eyes darting around quite a bit.
He takes his way over to Blassy whispers something into
his ear, does Blassie and taps him on the shoulder,
sends him into battle man. But I love to know
what it was that Frank Blassie would say in a
hulk Cogan's ears when they did that, if anything, And.
Speaker 2: Let's go get a goddamn sandwich after this. And here
it is, let's go get a hogy for Hogan. I
mean here it is.
Speaker 1: They stand there in the center motionless for a while.
They really milk it. Hogan Andre face to face, figuring
out how to make this as intense as possible as
they go, and it's awesome. They lock up a wide
base and Andre pushes off Hogan to a corner and
they got a big pop for that. Hogan yanks down
on the ropes and frustration another lock up. The Hulkster
goes to a headlock. Great tight shots of Andre and
his facial expressions, Hogan cranking the standing headlock. Andre lifts
up the Hulkster for a second and the crowd responds
to that, but Andre drops him down and Hogan keeps
cranking on the headlock. Andre then pushes off. There's an
midring collision. Neither Hulk or Andre budge the face off,
so similar to WrestleMania three.
Speaker 2: It is it is.
Speaker 1: It's just the rolls reverse in terms of who the
crowds are rooting for, but they're really running the same playbook.
Hogan's mouth is a gape at the fact that Andre
didn't budge in that collision. Now it's Andre to the side,
headlock off, the lock up, push off. Andre hits the
ropes and bowls into Hogan, and while Hogan backs up
a few inches, it's still a stalemate. After Andrey is
the one on the charge, Hogan ducks under the rope
to get some more counsel from Blassi. Hogan was adjusting
the waistband of his trunks even back then, which he
would do for the rest of his life, so that
waistband goes over the belly button. Oh yep, yep, walk up, Andre, gimmick, dude, absolutely,
and they did the spot on some of the other
matches They had a nineteen eighty that were able to
watch on tape, including the one in Philadelphia. The standing
bow and arrow submission that Andre would do holding the
arms off to the side behind Hogan. He puts that on,
digging his head between the shoulder blades, and Hogan is grimacing,
allowing for a great shot for the photographers and the
cameramen with Andrea towering behind Hogan and Hogan just like
shrinking in front of Andrea with this look of mortification
on his face. As Andrea's cranking the arms behind him.
Andre even is able to lift one of his feet
up and put it between Hogan's shoulder blades and balance
his entire massive body on just one foot. It's normal behavior, right,
a thing the sea is Andre flexing a bit, if
you will, for the big crowd here and showing what
he can do. This, of course, before the nineteen eighty
one ankle injury would make that a very advised move.
Andre to the arms now, almost as if he's trying
to Hulk hold Hulk open for someone else to hit Hulk.
Hulk looking down at his arms like he he's scanning
them and thinking the ways to counter, and slowly he does.
He starts to turn around the standing bow and arrow submission,
but Andre goes with the momentum and keeps rolling and
ends up backing control of Hogan, regains control of both
risks behind Hogan. Hulk then backs him into a corner
to break the hold. He throws a right hand in
frustration and Andre throws back. Enough wrestling here. Hulk is
now begging off and the crowd is with it. A
huge headbutt by Andre and the crowd loves that as well.
Hogan cowers in the corner, ducking under the ropes and
grabs a bear hug on Andre.
Speaker 2: What Andre looks to.
Speaker 1: Close the distance, He's cranking Andre Chancer going off.
Speaker 2: Yes, Cole and Foley talk about talk about the importance
of Hogan and Andre, and well just listen to them.
Speaker 3: These two stars Mick really responsible for turning the WWE
from a small territorial promotion into a global phenomenon, both
Andre the forerunner and then of course Hogan to follow
in his footsteps.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and I'd say that that matchup they had a
WrestleMania three was as responsible as any matchup in the
history of ww in creating that global phenomenon.
Speaker 2: Sure, there it is, Yes, I I I agree. I
don't know if I would call w at this point
a small territory.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a pretty full baseball stadium, man, Yeah, pretty
full baseball.
Speaker 2: I mean they were, They were kind of running a
large portion of the Northeast, So I just don't consider
that to be small potatoes. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, it's got to be for the for the narrative
to hold, you know, that goes Yes, I see some
black back hair on Hulk Hogan's back, some tight shots,
so alarm bells going off there.
Speaker 2: It's got to be at it's got to be a
Hollywood thing, got to be a Hollywood thing.
Speaker 1: I took him to correct that. Andre grabs the head
and hits a huge head butt trying to get out
of the bear hug. You can hear the crowd go yeah.
As Andre lands as Hulk dropped and hits the floor
with his arm draped over Blassy looking for refuge glass.
He's barking at the referee, inventing some some grievance. Hulk
gets up to the apron and Andre snatches him. And
it's time to bring Hogan in the hard way. Yes,
it's time for a vertical soup playing Andre the giant.
Speaker 2: I see no problem with this.
Speaker 1: Is the elevate the Hulkster does the Holster bump and flushing. Yes,
thank you for answering the question. So then Andre stands
and tries to do a big splash. The flash bulbs
go off, but he misses as Hogan gets out of
the way, much like Grilla Monsoon had missed the big
splash at Madison Square Garden before Hogan pinned him in
the match we saw on those New York CBS news
highlights that we looked at last time. Yes, yes, so,
barring spots from that, perhaps Andre chance breakout. Hogan starts
laying into him with big right hands, Andrea is staggering.
Andre hooks the punching arm of Hulk and basically does
a standing komor and starts cranking the arm. Hogan puts
his arm under like he's going to try to slam Andre,
like it crossed his mind for a second, and the
crowd begins to immediately murmur in a noticeable way when
Hogan positions himself for a potential body slam. So the
idea that Hulk could slam Andre was always money, didn't matter,
he was the healer, exactly exactly. Hogan tries again. No,
Andre responds by lifting Hogan to slam him, and while
he's lifting Hogan, Hogan's errant boot flies and hits referee
Gilberto Roman.
Speaker 2: Right in the face. Yes, that's there.
Speaker 1: We go and kaot and ends up ball entangled in
the ropes with his foot.
Speaker 2: I want to say there are a couple of things
here that. First off, fully, he talks about seeing a
picture of Harley Race at Harley Race's House of Race
slaming Andre. Oh sure, so that that little you know?
I don't think. I mean, I really didn't know about
that until we Yes, we we talked about it for WrestleMania,
about how everyone was slaming Andre.
Speaker 1: It's interesting how that WWF put that in there canon exactly.
Speaker 2: Also Fully also comments on Hogan's back here, so it
is a problem he does he does, He mentioned that
he mentioned the back, and then Cole I have a
clip of this. Cole talks about the one thing that
Freddy Blassie looked forward to every year while he was alive.
Speaker 3: One of the greatest things that Freddy used to do,
and when he retired from wrestling, he used to love
to play Santa Claus. Every year he'd come to the
Titan Towers, He'd plays Santa Claus for all the kids,
the ww employees, and that is the one thing that he.
Speaker 6: Looked forward to every single year.
Speaker 3: The only thing, well, the one thing he really looked
forward to was playing Santa Claus.
Speaker 5: He didn't look forward to watching a video, Oh Big
Soup Lacks by the Giant.
Speaker 6: He didn't look forward to watching a copy of My
Breakfast with Blassie.
Speaker 4: Probably not.
Speaker 1: Hell Foley's all pissed that someone else gets to play
Santa I think is when it comes down to think, So,
I think that's interesting. I did not know that about
fred Blassing. So after the impact with referee Goberta Raman
Andre goes over to check on the referee yes, And
to that point, Hogan comes up from behind in digs
and knee roller and fell the Giant. Hogan then collects
up Andrea with the referee still out, and ladies and gentlemen,
we are now no longer in a world where Hulk
Cogan has not slammed Andre the Giant.
Speaker 2: That's right, it's at this.
Speaker 1: Juncture in the contest that with no drama to it
at all, he just instantly scoops and slams Andre and
while the crowd oohs in ohs, it's not a big deal.
Speaker 2: No, I mean, it's also you know, how do you
do that? How do you He's a heel, so it
it almost should come easy, you know, it shouldn't come
as a challenge, like he should be able to do it.
And then it's frightening. He becomes a frightening guy. Now
that's interesting. Yeah, it was just like so abrupt.
Speaker 1: They I mean, they kind of built it up early
when Hogan teased it, but they didn't build it up
to where you felt it was impossible. They really built
it up just enough to where like you kind of
felt like Cogan had to work a little harder for it,
but that it really wasn't that much of an accomplishment,
and maybe it feels that way because it's not the finish.
Hogan does slam Andre, and he goes to cover him,
and Andrea immediately pushes him off. No reft account. Hogan
then steps to Andre, who then lifts and slams Hulk.
So Andre immediately turns the tables and body slams Hogan
and hits a big splash almost immediately on the follow up,
and as Andrea's coming down to splash, we realize Gilberto
Roman has recovered sufficiently enough to come over and count
the cover and I'm sorry, but Hulk Hoven kicks out
it too. There's no way that this is a three
damn right, There's no way. So this lends to me
complete credence to the whole story from the Mid South
Colisseum in New Orleans for Bill Watts that Hogan had
cold feet about doing a clean job to Andrea because
he had no fucking intention of losing to him clean
and Chase Stadium either. Don't know what the story is here,
why it was deemed prudent that, after all this build
up that Hogan had to kick out it too. But
the referee had to still slap three. But Hogan is
learning the ways, and it wouldn't surprise me if he's
starting to rankle WWF management by insisting on finishes like this,
because it's it's it's really like, what was that The
crowd has to act all elated that Andre the Giant won.
Andre has to pump his fists, and a series of
visuals that went on to be absolutely iconic. Whenever they
did Andre highlight packages, they would often show him celebrating
this win with you know, the breeze and his hair
and just just the enormity of the venue and all
of that. But it's it's a really bad finish in
that regard, you know. It's it's just like how he
kicked out a Warrior splash, how he kicked out of
the Anochi roll ups that happened in nineteen eighty in
the Tag League finals with Hansen, and then the match
with him that they had in April of nineteen eighty.
I believe it was. There's always some fucking bullshit with
Hulk kicking out of his losses, you know, there's always something.
He never stays down quite cold for the two three
ever ever, except Yo Kazun. I guess Yeah, he didn't
kick out of yokazun his leg drop.
Speaker 6: Did he?
Speaker 2: But nobody tried he did? He tried?
Speaker 1: I don't remember that, yeah, and just lay there flat
and dead. Yeah, no never, So there It is one
two and three. Hogan and Andre have clashed at Shay
Stadium and Andre is victorious. After the match, Andre's checking
on the ref Hogan attacks him from behind, whips him
into the ropes and hits the axe bomber to the
forehead with the loaded elbow pad. Andrea's head is jerked
back and he falls forward. It looks pretty violent as
the bell is repeatedly sounding. Hogan leaves the ring with
his arms in the air, drawing another chorus of Booze
classic blast. He grabs him by the hand and back
in the ring, Andrea is suffering on the ropes. They
load a girning in there, like Andre is going to
be able to be carried out on that thing, but
in fact the backboard was for the referee Gilbert to raman.
You can hear another explosion of booze as Hogan makes
his way to the dugout air. Yeah, and the cameras
are going nuts. Trying to get Andre all bloody. They
didn't show it for the longest time because they can't
get the right angle on it. They cut the Hogan
kind of limping across the baseball field at Shay Stadium
and the referee being loaded onto the stretcher, and now
it's back to the ring. Andre with the blood all
over his chest and arms. Big time blade job here
from the Giant. It's the exact same thing he did
at the very beginning of this journey in Alabama, isn't.
Speaker 2: It, Boss, exact same thing.
Speaker 1: It's the beatdown from Hulk runs the Razor. And we've
got a series of matches that we'll talk about on
future legs, upcoming legs, forthcoming legs of the Complete They're
going to take Hulk and Andre around the circuit in
New York. But here is the finish for the big
one in Shay Stadium. As Vince comes into the ring
and gets a close look, kind of ogling at the
cut Giant blast, he still rolled around, raising Hell. The
announcements Evince. Seven minutes forty eight seconds, Andre the Giant
is the winner. His hands are raised with his bloody
head staggering about, and they love it. At Shae Stadium,
referee chatting with Andre a bit. They show a replay
of Andre's body slam and splash, and back to Andrea
bloody face panting for breath, and a wide shot from
the center field of Shaye Stadium takes us to our
main event. The cage is up, Vince is in the ring,
Larry's Obisco is as well. The first man out of
the cage is victorious, and the former Pittsburgh a native
huge of former Pittsburgh, let's say, from Pittsburgh. Huge booze
go up, louder than Hogan's booze for sure. For a
self professed new living Legendarry is Abisco. He's got a
nice fresh blonde dye job, as he talked about in
his book, to this one out of a dirty blonde
tinge with the tan. He's looking like a star. And
Brunoso Martino listen, listen to this. Listen to the crowd
when Vince announces Bruno, no d take absolutely no mistake.
They are here to serenade Bruno upon his return to
the squared circle. Yes, yes, very happy to see him.
Arnold scull Ont at his side. It's the match, it's
the final, confrontation Bruno and Larry in the cage. Bruno
enters the cage and pushes out a foot to catch
the charging Tubisco and here we go, boots him in
the face. Larry's selling his ass off and you better
believe the crowd screaming yeah every time.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, oh god, okay, this is it's it's unbelievable.
This is seriously, put a picture up. He's fucking salesman
of the year. Is Larry's obiscos.
Speaker 1: Sill understands the assignment and every time he gets thrown
into the cage wall, the crowd alates. Bruno stumps the
head and they're going nuts. Bruno looks to the crowd like, ah,
I I have fucking bloodlust in my eyes and again
back to the stomps. He stands on Zubisco that drives
his boot in his throat, runs him again into the wall.
Speaker 2: On the far side.
Speaker 1: Bruno, standing tall, looks like Sibisco's gonna blade here is
Bruno rams him into the fence again, Larry jumping into it.
Dad to the impact. They cut to a sign to
the audience, we want blood Bruno, it says on it.
It's like a banner thing they're hanging over one of
the rafters, and then they cut to a still image
for some reason, almost like they inserted it in post,
but it showed more support for Bruno. The cage door
opens and Bruno chokes Subisco near it. Ah, Notice the
cage door doesn't have that chain link pattern. It has
like this horizontal pattern.
Speaker 2: It's yeah, it's kind of weird.
Speaker 1: Different vendor burn, no shredding, so Obisco's forehead like so
much polish cabbage into the fence for all the sea's
making a perogi out of this motherfucker. He really is
running stomps. The crowd is with each and every one.
Suddenly's Obisco throws it right from his knees, maybe.
Speaker 2: A low blo.
Speaker 1: You get to understand the crowd is they they are
they are parched for blood. They're acting like every other
matchress fake and this one's real, yes, and they're parched.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: Finally, Cubisco throws from his knees. Might have even been
a low blow, but it stops Bruno San Martino and
the crowd kind of gasps at that because Brunos stops
his onslaught for a second, the Bruno chance starts it's
Obiscos kicking the hell out of Bruno on the side,
digging in some knees. Bruno's under the ropes taking punishment.
Bruno finally lunges at the Bisco as he tries to
get to the out of the door. Bertzibisco's trying to
get out of the door. Bruno lunges at him, grabs
him by the trunks, and yanks him back into the fray,
but still suffering. Not able to capitalize on all that,
but he did have another in the tank to stop
Zibisco from winning. Zibisco runs Bruno into the cage and
the far side, stomps away and again under the fence.
Sobisco starts climbing, this time trying to escape, gets to
the top rope with one foot over the fence. At
this point, Bruno gets up there and yanks him down aggressively,
and Zibisco crashes to the canvas, selling his back Bruno
with a jumping stomp. Sibisco comes up throwing right hands,
bringing Bruno down to a knee and down to the canvas.
Speaker 2: Eventually, I have here, I have some some coal and
fully commentary here for this one, and they fully talks
about ye how Bruno detractors who say Bruno couldn't hang
around with the modern stars and fully disagrees. It's kind
of nice here.
Speaker 3: I mean, you look at a superstars of today or
some of the greatest of all time still call Steve
Austin for instance. The man was not a high flyer.
He didn't fly around the ring and do all the
lucha libre style. He was a pounding ground attack much
like Bruno. But the reason you like stone cold Steve
Austin because you were emotionally invested in the man. Stone
Cold Steve Austin did what everybody in America wanted to do.
Speaker 4: He told his boss off, he battled his boss. Bruno.
Speaker 3: San Martino was much the same mold because Bruno it
represented the people of America.
Speaker 1: There you go, yeah, thing like that, solid, solid, solid.
So brunwin with a go behind and kicks Obisco and
what looks like the ass Zabisco cells. Not sure if
that was supposed to be a low blower or not,
but Bruno is now choking Zibisco, goozles him by the throat,
lifts him and drops it. Just great, just picks him
up and drops Oh yeah, runs him into the fence again,
they remove covering from one of the turnbuckle pads and
there's it gets used as a foreign object, basically choking
Zibisco with it. Yeah, people watching intently at ringside, there's
just a different intensity.
Speaker 2: God it is. I mean, you know, we talked about
the entire time we did the Bruno tribute the other
Matt this was the real shit. People. People were here
for Bruno, and Bruno was the real deal.
Speaker 1: Put there skepticism and irony aside. They put their sarcasm
aside because this is like, really, it's going down and
we need to fucking see every second of it. Zibisco
tries to climb to get out of the cage again,
he's gorilla pressed off the top and almost lands right
in his head. Honestly, it's it's a hillacious ride for
Larry Ze. I'd love to hear his thoughts on each
blow that lands. Yes, and again's Abisco eats the cage.
Bruno digs anian his face in the corner. They go
corner to corner on the Irish Whipon's Abisco hits hard
with a kick and approaching Bruno comes in and drops
him with the right hand.
Speaker 2: Uh Foley talks about how he used to travel with
Larry's Abisco.
Speaker 6: Back in the day.
Speaker 5: And I used to travel with with Larry from time
to time, and he was a great storyteller.
Speaker 4: Although most travel with Larry, I did travel with Larry.
Speaker 6: I've been around a long time. Call you seem to forget.
Speaker 3: But the point I'm trying to make is who did
all the talk? And you guys couldn't get a word
in edgewise and be like you and Jr. On Commentariat's back.
Speaker 4: Now, Hey, I knew my place when I was younger.
Speaker 5: I only talk over you because I know such more,
so much more than you, so much to the you
do perceeding.
Speaker 2: Nice. Yeah, they would travel in WCW together. That's right, Yep, yep.
Speaker 1: Larry throws a right hand that drops Bruno and Bruno
definitely made Larry's Bbisco's punches look effective and devastating. He
definitely did. He He made Tibisco look like a higher level.
Speaker 2: Mauler.
Speaker 1: Zibisco stomps the head Bruno's ailing on the canvas. Great
tight shot of him squinting in pain to knock down,
drag out fight. It's no other way to put it. Yeah,
they don't fuck around in this match at all. Sobisco's
running down with the double axe handle as well, Larry
pointing accusatally at Bruno as he keeps stopping him. Bruno
starts the the Bruno chance start up again. Kind of wild.
They went through all the scientific wrestling stuff that we
watched during the bill, yes, and here we just get
Bruno just.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's the way you do it. You want
to do that. That's how brilliant is it that he
does this thing. Everyone's excited that he's going to do
this scientific wrestling. But then when after the heel turn,
all people want to see is Larry's Abisco get beat
the fuck up.
Speaker 1: They wanted the technical, they found a way to make
them want that kind of match, and then that just
makes them want this even more even more, and that's
the brawl they're getting here. Sobisco, it's in the blax handles.
He runs Bruno into the buckle shoulder first, punching away
at the head and the psychology. Bruno decided on I'm
gonna blade my arm in this one, like Dusty Wacky
in my arm. So Zabisco keeps gratuitously attacking the shoulder,
running it into the buckle and punching away at the arm.
Zibisco keeps ramming the shoulder in. You can tell keeps
feeding him the shoulder so Larry can punch away at it.
Larry calls for the door. Now he walks over. He
climbs Bruno yanks him back in but one arm, and
he's selling it so well, Bruno, he really is selling
it like a dead army and he never uses it
as if it's back to full power or anything like that.
Sibisco gets back on him with punches and keeps hitting
the same arm. Sibisco calls for the door. It opens.
Bruno again lunges, grabs and polls. He runs him into
the the turnbuckle. I guess the corner buckle, and Sibisco
starts digging in the wrist tape because it's time for
him to bleed as well, and he gets run into
the exposed buckle that had been removed earlier to the
apron and bang into the buckle again goes Ubisco.
Speaker 2: He's writhing.
Speaker 1: Bruno with a kick Knocksibisco backwards. Sibisco was great selling
that he was collapsing out there after. Oh he was,
he was job Sibisco bleeding. Bruno runs him into the
buckle and the apron again, stumps his head, throws him
in the cage again and again and again, and this
times Obisco spills all the way over the fence onto
the apron and again. Sibisco tries to throw himself in
twice and falls down. Throws himself in into the fence twice. Yeah, yeah,
he just jumped. He just takes it hard. Bruno calls
for the door and stomps. This is so great the
way it ends. It just seems anti climactic at first,
but then like you think about the whole story and everything. Yesno,
just stomps him in the head, calls for the uh,
steps over his body. Yep, he's done, throws his arms
up like fuck you at Sibisco, and just steps through
the cage door, onto the steps, onto the grass for
the wind, selling the arm the whole time. Referee raises
the good arm.
Speaker 2: And that's it.
Speaker 1: He just beats the shit out of him and leaves
him there and bounces and Zibisco is like to me,
Zibisco is kind of like, I could go after this guy,
I could have stopped him from escaping, but I don't
think I want anymore. Yeah, he wasn't out cold, he
wasn't left dead. There wasn't this big stupid, like ultra violent.
You know, in cage matches like this, they have to
end when someone puts six ladders on a guy's head
and drops a sledgehammer on it, you know, right, exactly exactly,
go to the extreme ends of the earth to communicate
the kind of violence that they think would necessitate someone
not being able to stop the other guy from escaping
the cage or not pinning him or whatever.
Speaker 2: Back then, it was like, I'm gonna beat the shit
out of you and then I'm done. I've done, I've
done my view. You know you don't want anymore, exactly,
and that's what we had. Not only that, not only that,
not only do you know you don't want anymore? You
know you can't beat me, so why bother?
Speaker 1: They get more of that a bit because even after
Bruno hits the grass and wins the match, Sobisco in
the ring keeps pointing at him and still kind of
he gets on the ring steps, he almost falls off
the ring Stepsibisco, It's pretty funny. They wobble under his feet.
He almost Yeah, and they face off, Bruno and Sibisco
after the match is over, they face off right there
on the grass and he tries to throw punch. Bruno
comes back and clocks him and the crowd that and
then Grazibisco just kind of grabs his his his wrist,
sets it aside, collapses and just uh just takes off.
He just like takes off, just stops wanting to fight.
And Bruno, despite taking tremendous damage from the cut and
from the dead arm and all of that, is led
away by his entourage and some of New York's finest
as Vince makes the announcement thirteen minutes and four seconds
the winner, Bruno se Martine the Bruno chance go off.
Wonder where that cop was that? Yeah, Bruno all the
way to the dugout and yeah it's uh you can
see some cops are looking at Bruno's arm like is
it real? Is that a real cut? Is that a
real going on there? And the replay just shows that
Bruno threw one final stomp to layer his head and
walked off looking at his arm like, son of a bitch,
look what he did to me, like almost being forgetful
of Zubisco's history, as if he'd been this insect that
had been dealt with and now Bruno's got to go
lick the wounds, doing what he had to do. And
then they show Bruno descending into the dugout a wide
shot from center field. What a summer night and flushing
as Bruno, Sammartino and the banners hang for him makes
one last return and lays the case out, lays the
formula out, lays the approach out for a babyface Hulk
Hogan in so many ways. Yep, ye, if he was
worth his salt, was watching intently after his tilt with
Andre the Giant. Well there it is the first deep
dive of the Complete Hulk Hogan showdown at Shaye nineteen eighty.
It will never be the same for Hulk Cogan, and
I guess we can say it'll never be the same
for Bruno Sammartino either.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's fair too.
Speaker 1: We'll see you next time on the complete as Hulk
and Andre take this whole shiz knit on the road
to get as many gates out of it as they can.
As nineteen eighty comes to a close on the complete.
Speaker 2: Preceding Elpan is a TJ.
Speaker 10: DeSantis production, its contents is intended for private use only.