Cobra Commander

there also used to be a Pitt/Penn State rivalry, so maybe billing a Pittsburgh guy as from "State College" would get some randos in Allegheny County riled up

Ronnie Garvin as a heel in 1988 could have had a fun run.. but obviously that was not meant to be as Garvin immediately left the promotion but yeah, a lot of the 'smart' fans of the late 80s were also Flair ultras so Garvin/Flair was sorta viewed in their eyes as a Flair/Dusty conflict, overlooking that Flair was yearning to work with ultrastiff dudes like Garvin at that time if they could have gotten Greg Valentine out of the WWF at any time between 1986 and 1991, he probably would have worked with/against Flair too even if it probably wouldn't have sold tickets

I watched the rest of Beach Blast 93 today (starting with Blondes vs Anderson/Roma) and the tag match was interesting.. Roma doing a backslide where it looked like he was pinning himself, Pillman doing a fake injury and crumpling on irish whips, Pillman's ass almost being out because of how his tights wedged midmatch, Jesse going on a tangent about the illogical WCW rules on over the top rope moves

"should we put another match in the ring during the 30 minute rest period?" "No, call in the skydivers"

I missed Dustin driving Garvin/Wahoo to the ring, even if I had seen that clip before, because I was wondering about why Wahoo was seen so quickly after his match had just ended but as I already posted... there was an opening for Ron Garvin to do worked "toughman fights" as that was just becoming big at the end of Garvin's career, but wrestling may not have been aware of what was going on: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FEG_iQxHw4

someone in NXT should take the Flex Kavana name as sort of a "yes, we're doing this intentionally" joke.. like maybe they'll redo that Austin Theory/Vince thing with "Flex Kavana" and the Rock meanwhile in things claimed on Wikipedia so which angle do you take here... Windham having his knee surgeries paid for by DiBiase or IRS helping the Windham family out during their counterfeiting experience (even if IRS and counterfeiting are different agencies) The Money Express would be a name to invoke the US Express while sounding like the name of a Fast Cash store

meanwhile JCC Jr has been arrested for deportation-level charges... after being allowed in for the big fight of course

you think the people of West Helena, Arkansas (now West Helena-Helena, AR) knew the star power in the Flex Kavana & Miss Texas vs Punisher & Samantha match they saw well, more on the Rock/Jacqueline side than the Bull Buchanan side Jacqueline wouldn't have had to work so hard flashing herself on PPV if she just got a cushy spot in The Nation in mid-1998

looking at lists of late 95 billed home towns for WWF guys and thinking Dean Douglas and Jean-Pierre LaFitte could have used better hometowns than "University of Higher Learning" and "Baton Rouge" Pennsylvania has a place called "State College" if they wanted a Dean Douglas hometown that is in Shane Douglas' home state and sounds like the home town of a snooty college professor (but then again the WWF ran so heavily in the northeast that their fans would know of "State College" which is the location of Penn State) also gotta note there is a Jean LaFitte, Louisiana for Pierre to be billed from

Razor/Kid vs Shawn/Diesel from Action Zone if you haven’t seen that match in awhile: https://youtu.be/LiYr62_OXaQ?si=1NVEZJgsti3v3Rn4 edit: love how Diesel taking a very comfortable looking nap on the apron is a big moment in this match

Vault unleashs an unaired video of Bam Bam Bigelow throwing a fireball at Bret Hart: https://youtu.be/GzU4ZgyS6ws?si=8P6XkABiSl4OHiqz now that would have really ignited the Bam Bam/LT match. yeah I could see someone saying “you know, Bam Bam should throw fire because his outfit has a bunch of fire on it” caution: a Bam Bam promo precedes the fire

following post inspired by the "Diesel on his way out" video posted today: Vince's announcer approach to Diesel saying he'll only slap hands with his fans is some real "protest movement getting co-opted by entities that don't understand it" stuff.. they likely didn't mean for it to come off like that but was amazing also, the WWF product improved so much once Vince stopped doing commentary and turned heel.. even with the obvious parts that age poorly

having seen Bash 85 and Bash 86 this week, I'm pretty sure any complaints about modern refs trying to steal the attention just don't hold up to vaunted old refs because Tommy Young was chewing scenery out there (not even getting into other topics like Sonny Fargo's red pants or David Crockett in a golf outfit) then again, matches sans commentary means you start focusing on the mannerisms and how people look/act instead of commentary

Rick Long would have been a solid "generic enhancement guy name" for someone named Rycklon

Notes from watching the 86 Bash (7/5/86 Charlotte): More blood for the blood God.. I think some of these matches would fit in on the "Blood Sucking Freaks" thread..

yeah this was the Flair/Morton match in the first Phil "Way of the Blade"

the Public Enemy promo from 1995 on the WWF Slam Jam set ( https://www.youtube.com/shorts/gHJJ6hMfGLQ?si=XuEvM0iqGjgVmdyt ) making me realize that Rocco Rock and Marc Mero really never overlapped in the same spot aside from the last months of Johnny B Badd in WCW

Just remembered the great story from the Austin podcast about how Dario Cueto worked the mic live at a show in Mexico and got mega heat as the fans quickly realized that he’s from Spain

Today on the Vaults The story of Diesel’s last months in the WWF: https://youtu.be/NoZhuHFgres?si=xtO5sJCW15_wePMO And the full 86 Bash from Charlotte (Flair/Morton): https://youtu.be/BNh6ZWsBpYs?si=lh0492CR275WoTq0

In regards to the extended Swaggart family, no man has ever sounded more like Jerry Lee than Mickey Gilley performing “Don’t All The Girls Get Prettier At Closing Time”. https://youtu.be/sYu3e6XtjH8?si=Jr9cEQE6WkMdmLmE

the WWE vault releases today reminding us that Stan Lane was working for the WWF deep into 1995

fortunately the Mr. America angle didn't last long enough for Chris Benoit to work under a mask as Mr. Canada, the tag team partner of Mr. America

Nikita's music sounded like they were playing the Soviet anthem from a tape cassette player also... here's Hakushi and Bull Nakano vs Bob Holly and Alundra Blayze for some reason: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5zDDhOU_hQ

small notes from watching GAB85 ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nqDfXv9GIY ) today: I never really thought of Buddy Landel as a heavyhitter until seeing him exchange with Ron Bass Ole probably has all sorts of little interesting features in the ring that could be easier to notice in a match with no commentary in an area where he's used to working his way One of those impressive crowds where there's at least one camera angle that does not do the crowd size justice, like how World Class managed to have a camera angle for Kerry/Flair in 84 that showed the one part of the stadium where they didn't sell tickets EDIT: oh man, the visual of Kamala being driven to the ring in a golf cart is unintentionally amazing Also gotta imagine the concept of the ring being surrounded by grass is unique for large promotions love that they kept in the ring announcer telling people to move their cars out of the way of the fireworks show Don't have enough "champion enters from a news copter" entrances in modern wrestling David Crockett dressed like he's golfing while refereeing this match Flair taps a gnarly bladejob, a fan rushes the ring and the Charlotte cops have to get him out mid-match, the Russians having to wipe out random babyface doofs postmatch, having wrestlers making saves while in street clothes was a decision after there was a fan rushing the ring mid-match, apparently this was a very drunk crowd, awesome times

I wasn't regularly watching before October 97 but one thing I'm noticing on some earlier 97 Nitros is that at sometime, the Hogan NWO group promo moved from being near the end of the show to being closer to the beginning of the show.. someone can probably figure out if that happened like around the time Nitro went from 2 to 3 hours or what if nWo promos weren't the reason for the "beginning of show talk segment" format it might be 1998 WWF that we can blame for that