Thomas Bugg Posted January 7, 2014 Share Posted January 7, 2014 What story now? Perez supposedly threatened to shoot on Flair and win the NWA title. According to Gary Hart, Perez told Hart of this, Hart told Flair and Perez was quickly gone from WCW. So that tells me one of three things about Gary Hart: 1) Hart was a friend of Flair or at least liked him. 2) Hart wanted to protect the business. 3) Hart was a snitch trying to earn brownie points. I'm leaning towards 1 and 2, but just had to throw in number 3 due to a Cornette shoot that I listened to recently where Terry Taylor basically threw Cornette under the bus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ryan Posted January 7, 2014 Share Posted January 7, 2014 According to Wikipedia via the WWE Encyclopedia he was a top amateur in the state of Florida in HS. Who knows if that's true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EdA Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Hart covers all this in his book. Perez was something of a shooter. No idea if he could have taken Flair but he supposedly could handle things (and Perez WAS trained by Steve Keirn and Boris Malenko so if the Malenko's were involved, Al could PROBABLY handle his own). He obviously THOUGHT he could take Flair in a shoot - especially if Flair was not expecting it. Hart was tight with Flair and he was managing Perez. Hart squealed on Perez only AFTER trying to talk Perez out of doing something dumb. When Hart couldn't talk sense into Perez, Hart went to Flair and the office and Perez was gone. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niners Fan in CT Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 I don't want to use the word "underrated" but I feel like Ronnie Garvin is not discussed enough and I wonder why.. He had a couple nice runs and I loved how physical he was. The Flair/Garvin Starrcade '87 match comes to mind.. it's nasty in a good way! Those chops and strikes were fierce. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cool arrow Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Which led to Al's totally uneventful WWF run. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sydneybrown Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Which led to Al coming back to WCW as one of the early incarnates of the Black Scorpion, which is why I question the original story since: A) Perez was a heel and never a challenger for Flair's title since Flair was also a heel at the time. B ) Flair didn't seem to have any problem with Perez being back in when he was supposedly so eager to throw him out a year and a half prior. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Bugg Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 B ) Flair didn't seem to have any problem with Perez being back in when he was supposedly so eager to throw him out a year and a half prior. Flair was probably ready this time around and wanted to fuck him up in the ring. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt McGirt Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Anyone planning to shoot on anyone in the ring without warning is unprofessional and should be fired and blacklisted. Fuck that guy. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Bugg Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Anyone planning to shoot on anyone in the ring without warning is unprofessional and should be fired and blacklisted. Fuck that guy. Unless said target of shooting is Russo 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EdA Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Which led to Al coming back to WCW as one of the early incarnates of the Black Scorpion, which is why I question the original story since: A) Perez was a heel and never a challenger for Flair's title since Flair was also a heel at the time. B ) Flair didn't seem to have any problem with Perez being back in when he was supposedly so eager to throw him out a year and a half prior. Agreed. I had never heard the story before until I skimmed thru the Hart book that a co-worker had. This would have to be late-ish 88 (post-GAB, before Starrcade 88) when it happened and Flair was not/very rarely at best facing heels by that point so the story never really added up to me. From memory, Hart claims Perez was getting a match in Florida. So since that was Perez' home state, MAYBE he would have been presented as a face??? But the biggest thing to me other than Flair not facing heels at the time is - Perez was not over in WCW! Why would anyone think anyone would give a shit about a Perez-Flair match when no one cared when Perez was facing anyone else? Doesn't really pass the sniff test to me. But I have no idea why Hart would have made that up. As far as point B goes...Dusty was the booker in 88. Ole was the booker in 90. I am pretty certain Ole did not give a shit what Flair might have thought about bringing Perez back and...really...did ANYONE REALLY want in on the Black Scorpion angle? Dunno. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josh Mann Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 The only thing that makes sense as to why in all of that is that the match in question was in Lakeland, which is 30 minutes from Tampa, and that Perez despite his heel status was being promoted accordingly as the local boy vying for the title. I have no idea what the house levels in Lakeland/Tampa were at the time but it could just be as simple as Dusty was trying ANYTHING at that point and, hey, we got this kid from Tampa. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sydneybrown Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Looking at the history of WWE site, Al Perez's last NWA matches in 1988 were with him teaming with Ric Flair against Luger & Nikita. Then he was suddenly gone. It's not out of the realm that Perez could have been telling Flair "I can take you" during this period. But they were never scheduled to wrestle each other during his NWA run. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
odessasteps Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Perez was the first Black Scorpion right, the one sting wrestled at the Clash? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cool arrow Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Perez was the first Black Scorpion right, the one sting wrestled at the Clash? Yes, but that seems to be his only post-Crockett WCW match. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EdA Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 Looking at the history of WWE site, Al Perez's last NWA matches in 1988 were with him teaming with Ric Flair against Luger & Nikita. Then he was suddenly gone. It's not out of the realm that Perez could have been telling Flair "I can take you" during this period. But they were never scheduled to wrestle each other during his NWA run. Oh there are tons of holes in this, agreed. I am just going from what Gary Hart claimed. Perez was scheduled for a match with Flair in Florida - Lakeland, per Josh Mann above. Why anyone cared to go with match...who knows? To test Perez out to be a future face? Shrug. Perez started telling Hart he was going to shoot on Flair to get the NWA title. Hart tries to talk Perez out of it. Perez blows Hart off. Hart goes to Flair and the office. Perez gets fired. Personally, I can't get past anyone thinking that paying fans would want to see Perez in a world title match. But that's just me. But yeah, this would reek of wrestling urban legend if Hart didn't report himself in his book. It still smells of BS to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben. Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 In an Al Perez shoot I watched, Perez said that he had already given notice to leave Crockett and he was booked in a match with Flair in St. Petersburg. The ending of the match was to be a double DQ so Perez wouldn't lose in front of his "hometown" crowd but last minute they changed the booking and were going to put Flair over clean. Perez got upset, told Kevin Sullivan that he was going to just shoot on him and take the belt out of Crockett and Sullivan then talked to Hart who tried to talk him down but couldn't. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EdA Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 So basically Hart, Perez or both are full of shit? OK. Well at least talking about Al Perez has been more interesting than watching him. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cool arrow Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 True dat. He had the look of a star but that's about it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sydneybrown Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 I'm going to back pedal some, because looking at some old Observers from 1989, it appears that Flair DID sign to wrestle Perez, but the matches never actually happened. So it would been have January 1989 (and the Lakeland show would have been January 23.) Apparently, Perez did try out his abilities on Rick Steiner as there was a Bunkhouse Stampede that January where supposedly the two squared off amateur-style during the match. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tromatagon Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 I just find sitting down and deciding to watch an Al Perez shoot weird Sorry Ben. you weirdo 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cool arrow Posted January 8, 2014 Share Posted January 8, 2014 I'm going to back pedal some, because looking at some old Observers from 1989, it appears that Flair DID sign to wrestle Perez, but the matches never actually happened. So it would been have January 1989 (and the Lakeland show would have been January 23.) Apparently, Perez did try out his abilities on Rick Steiner as there was a Bunkhouse Stampede that January where supposedly the two squared off amateur-style during the match. That sounds like a pretty bad idea. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben. Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 I just find sitting down and deciding to watch an Al Perez shoot weird Sorry Ben. you weirdo Haha, sometimes car trips go by a lot quicker with shoot interviews. This was one of the last ones on a trip to Illinois Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.H. Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 Perez was watchable in World Class. Wasn't he also Wendel Cooley's tag partner before that? James Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jiji Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 Gary Hart loved the hell out of Al Perez. Put him over big time in his book. I remember reading that and thinking if he was talking about the same Al Perez I know of. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josh Mann Posted January 9, 2014 Share Posted January 9, 2014 If all else failed for Al at that time, he could have always been a pitchman for Soul Glo. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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