FEUDS & ANGLES
MOMENTS THAT MAKE A LIFETIME
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MOMENTS THAT MAKE A LIFETIME
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"We got back to the United States just in time for Jim Crockett Promotions' first annual Great American Bash on July 6 at American Legion Memorial Stadium in Charlotte, NC. Verne Gagne and Crockett had a great relationship and knew we should participate, so they made it happen. With 27,000 screaming lunatics crammed in with almost standing room only in an old outdoor football stadium, we were brought in to face off with the NWA World Tag Team Champions Ivan Koloff and Krusher Khruschev (more familiar to me as Barry Darsow). What happened that night is Road Warriors History.
The anti-Soviet tension in the crowd was extra hot that night in Charlotte, too, because the main event was Ric Flair versus none other than Nikita Koloff. I did find interesting that two of my closest friends (Barry and Nikita) who made it in the business were both Russian heels in the same company.
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The program Flair and Nikita had going into the Bash was a pressure cooker on the verge of exploding. When it finally did, Hawk and I got to ride right in on the political tidal wave they had caused. But we never anticipated the magnitude of the reaction we'd get against Ivan and Barry (Krusher).
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Although we'd been getting some babyface reactions here and there since our debut in St. Paul against Curt Hennig and Steve-O, nothing ever could have prepared us for the ovation we'd receive this time as we ran toward the ring with the AWA belts in our hands. As 'Iron Man' pumped behind us, it might as well have been the national anthem. The Road Warriors, the new American heroes, were coming to bust some Soviet heads.
When we dove under the ropes and ran up on Ivan and Krusher, they took a powder to the ground as the stadium erupted in chants of 'USA, USA.' The whole thing was odd and completely overwhelming. It was one thing adjusting to cheers, but USA chants? That was a new one.
I remember Paul leaning over and saying, 'Boys, tonight you guys are the biggest babyfaces in wrestling.'
There was no argument from me on that one. At that moment, The Road Warriors turned babyface forever.
Because our match was another example of champion versus champion and no titles were being dropped, the four of us gave the fans an evenly battled DQ. The finish came when Hawk and I were setting up Ivan for my new powerslam from the second rope. Hawk hoisted Ivan up heels-over-head and then helped position him on my shoulder as I was sitting perched on the turnbuckle.
Just as I was poised to dive down for the big slam, Krusher jumped up onto the side of the ring with a chair. I let go of Ivan while Hawk grabbed the chair away from Krusher and smashed them both. Bam! Then Hawk tossed referee Earl Hebner across the ring onto his ass, and that was it. Disqualification.
We couldn't have been more thrilled by what happened that night. And I'm not talking about the match. Those Charlotte fans, who had Crockett Promotions/NWA Mid-Atlantic in their blood, fell in love with us right then and there. More importantly, so did Jimmy Crockett.
What transpired at the Great American Bash was similar to the Japanese fans' response to us during that first tour. Once we had that North Carolina face turn, you couldn't book us as heels if you tried. Our tide had completely turned, and the people were behind us for life. Jimmy Crockett saw the bond we made with the fans that night and couldn't get it out of his head. Now he, too, had Road Warriors fever. It was an epidemic."
On April 19, 1986, Jim Crockett Promotions held the inaugural Jim Crockett, Sr. Memorial Cup Tag Team Tournament at The Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana, in collaboration with Bill Watts’ Universal Wrestling Federation. The event featured 24 teams battling for the promoted prize of $1 million US across two shows (one in the afternoon, the other that same evening), and was recorded for VHS distribution, but not shown on pay-per-view or closed circuit.
Tournament Brackets Eight (8) teams received a first-round bye, and featured famous teams such as Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard (representing The Four Horsemen), The Fabulous Ones, The Fantastics, The Rock & Roll Express, The Midnight Express, Dino Bravo & Rick Martel, The Sheepherders, Ivan & Nikita Koloff, and Chavo & Hector Guerrero. Included in the field were teams representing promotions from around the world, including Jim Crockett Promotions, the Universal Wrestling Federation, All Japan Pro Wrestling, Pacific Northwest Wrestling, the Continental Wrestling Federation, Central States Wrestling, and Lutte International. After their first round bye, defeating Mark Youngblood & Wahoo McDaniel in the second round, The Midnight Express in the quarterfinals, and receiving a bye in the semifinals (from a double disqualification between The Fantastics and The Sheepherders), The Road Warriors defeated Magnum TA & Ronnie Garvin to win the tournament and take home the Crockett Cup trophy, along with the “$1 million” check. |
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Unbeknownst to fans at the time, the danger was even greater for Hawk, as he had suffered a broken leg on October 21, 1986. While taking a backdrop early in the match against Giant Baba & Genichiro Tenryu, Hawk landed awkwardly on his left leg and snapped his lower fibula. By early November, Hawk was back in the gym and working through the pain, intent on fulfilling his obligation for Starrcade. Not only did he deliver, but his severe injury was unnoticeable during his performance.
"When Thanksgiving finally arrived on November 27, 1986, I was as ready as I'd ever be. As for Hawk's leg? Well, let's say that when we arrived at the Omni in Atlanta earlier that day, Hawk decided to perform a little cast removal. With a pair of scissors and a knife, he cut into that thing until he had a perfect line sliced from top to bottom. He grabbed both sides of the cast and tore it off, revealing one hell of a pale and atrophied calf muscle. He started laughing. 'Damn, Joe, as if my legs weren't skinny enough already!' He got up and lightly walked on it, and although he winced in pain a little, he said he could manage it. The finish saw all four men hanging from the rungs beneath the platform, with both Eaton and Condrey being kicked loose and dropping to the mat below. Soon thereafter, Ellering chased Cornette up the structure and onto the scaffold, where Animal awaited. Cornette soon fell from the scaffold to the ring, but Bubba did not catch Cornette as planned, resulting in Cornette tearing all of the ligaments in one knee, breaking a bone, and damaging the cartilage.
The match was extremely popular and was featured on the cover of the VHS release for this event. At least four additional scaffold matches between these teams would take place across the next two months. The concept was employed again for Starrcade ‘87, featuring The Rock & Roll Express (Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson) versus The Midnight Express (then comprised of Bobby Eaton & Stan Lane). |
On July 4, 1987, to kick off The Great American Bash ‘87 summer tour, Jim Crockett Promotions presented War Games, which Dusty Rhodes said was inspired by Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome. The match consisted of two teams of five men, fighting inside two rings enclosed by a single cage, including a roof.
Rules of the match stipulated that each team would send in one competitor for a period of five minutes of one-on-one competition. At that time, a coin toss would determine which team sent in their next competitor, gaining them a two-on-one advantage for a period of two minutes. The team that lost the coin toss would then send in a second competitor, evening the odds at two-on-two for two minutes. This pattern continued until all ten competitors had entered the match, at which point the match itself, referred to as “The Match Beyond”, could actually end, by either submission or surrender. The heel team consisted of The Four Horsemen (Arn Anderson, Tully Blanchard, Lex Luger, Ric Flair, and manager James J. Dillon), while the babyface team included Dusty Rhodes, his Super Powers partner Nikita Koloff, The Road Warriors, and manager Paul Ellering. Anderson and Rhodes entered first, and the crowd was hot from the first minute. Since the heel team won the coin toss, which seemed to always happen in War Games matches, the final competitor to enter the ring was a babyface, and on this occasion it was Road Warrior Hawk. The crowd was in a frenzy by this point, and after having stood outside for over twenty minutes watching the action, Hawk was somehow even more excited to finally join the fray. The finish came when The Road Warriors delivered a modified version of their top rope clothesline finished (later dubbed “The Doomsday Device”) to James J. Dillon, who landed badly and injured his shoulder, resulting in his submission and the victory for the babyface team. The War Games match concept was a huge success for Jim Crockett Promotions, and was featured in at least three additional shows during The Great American Bash 1987 tour. Though the competitors would change, War Games remained a staple of Jim Crockett Promotions even through its purchase by Ted Turner and transition into World Championship Wrestling (WCW), with War Games matches appearing again during The Great American Bash ‘88 tour, the pay-per-view of the same name in 1989, and at least one appearance in the summer/fall of each year of WCW’s existence (except for 1999) until its demise in March 2001, when it was purchased by the World Wrestling Federation (WWF). After a 17-year hiatus, then-World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) revived the War Games match in 2017 for their NXT brand, where it became the featured attraction of their TakeOver event in November/December each year. |
In an effort to recreate the immense success of the War Games match, Jim Crockett Promotions created a variation for their Great American Bash 1988 pay-per-view event on July 10, 1988, a match called The Tower of Doom.
Like the War Games match, both sides were comprised of five competitors, each entering a caged structure one at a time, with the team winning a coin toss gaining a temporary advantage. In The Tower of Doom, the structure was made of three cages: the first surrounding the ring (a traditional cage with a roof), topped by a smaller cage, and finally topped by an event smaller cage. An access door was created between each cage, which would open at timed intervals, allowing competitors to pass between cages. Competitors climbed ladders to enter the highest cage, and at timed intervals, doors between the cages would be opened by officials to allow competitors to drop to the next cage. The object of the match is for all members of a team to fight their way from the top cage to the bottom, where pinfall, submission, or escape through the door would determine the winners. The match featured The Road Warriors, Steve Williams, Ronnie Garvin, & Jimmy Garvin (with managers Precious and Paul Ellering) taking on Kevin Sullivan, Mike Rotunda, Al Perez, Ivan Koloff, & The Russian Assassin (with manager Paul Jones), with Jimmy Garvin’s manager Precious holding the key to the cage door. The finish saw Precious unlock the cage for Garvin to escape, only to be pulled into the cage herself by Sullivan, who then pushed Garvin out and locked the cage to have Precious to himself. Hawk broke into the cage to attack Sullivan and save Precious. While the three-tiered cage was an impressive sight, the convoluted rules and lesser star power of many of the competitors led to a diminished reception for the Tower of Doom with audiences. The contest was used in a live event later that summer. The contest was revived in 2000 for the major motion picture Ready To Rumble, which featured WCW wrestlers alongside stars from Hollywood, culminating in a triple cage match at the film’s climax. To help promote the movie, WCW featured the contest, along with star David Arquette as a competitor, in the main event of their Slamboree 2000 pay-per-view event, and again for the September 4, 2000 edition of Monday Nitro, this time as a War Games match. |
This is where opinion and perspective play a significant role in how one views the history of Jim Crockett Promotions (JCP) in the late 1980s.
When The Road Warriors signed with JCP in 1986, they were soon teamed with Dusty Rhodes, even winning the NWA World Six-Man Tag Team Championships together on two separate occasions. Throughout their time together in JCP, Dusty and The Road Warriors frequently teamed up to take on the hottest heels at the time. Many fans (then and now) feel that while Dusty Rhodes’ presence as an established star and multiple-time world champion helped give credibility (A.K.A, “the rub”) to The Road Warriors during this time, other fans felt that Rhodes, recognizing the unprecedented popularity of Hawk & Animal, kept himself associated with them to remain relevant, particularly as other babyface stars began to eclipse him in the singles ranks. This divide was emphasized even more strongly when The Road Warriors turned heel in October 1988, attacking six-man partner Sting (substituting for Dusty Rhodes) and subsequently injuring Rhodes’ eye using a spike from Animal’s shoulder pads. Some saw this as Rhodes attempting to keep the focus on himself, while others argued that turning The Road Warriors heel required them to attack the two top babyfaces in the promotion (Rhodes and Sting). |
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This led to Rhodes facing Animal in a one-on-one match on December 7, 1988 at Clash of the Champions IV (the first under the Turner-owned World Championship Wrestling banner) for control of the NWA World Six-Man Tag Team Championship. Animal defeated Rhodes by disqualification, giving The Road Warriors control of the titles and the right to choose a new partner (ultimately to be Genichiro Tenryu).
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The feud culminated in a match for the NWA World Tag Team Championships at Starrcade 88, where The Road Warriors successfully defended their titles against the team of Dusty Rhodes & Sting. Despite the popularity of Rhodes and Sting, fans still cheered The Road Warriors’ during the match.
Shortly after Starrcade 88, Rhodes was fired from WCW due to him directly violating management orders to avoid blood on WCW television. |
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By February 1989, it was apparent that fans were still cheering The Road Warriors, and that the time had come to return them to the babyface locker room. On February 15, 1989 at Clash of the Champions V, The Road Warriors and Tenryu took on The Varsity Club (Kevin Sullivan, Steve Williams, & Mike Rotunda), who (being the heels that they were) replaced the original challengers (Sting, Michael Hayes, & The Junkyard Dog), who The Varsity Club had locked in the basement of the arena.
The match had been promoted as the babyface team of Sting, Hayes, and JYD taking on heels The Road Warriors and Tenryu, but due to crowd reactions supporting The Road Warriors, the entrapment of the babyfaces and replacement by the heel faction The Varsity Club allowed The Road Warriors & Tenryu to take on the babyface role in the match, which fans rewarded with tremendous support. |
The decision was made to take the NWA World Tag Team Championships off The Road Warriors, but devising a way for heels to beat this unbeatable team was not a simple task, and would require both creativity and a new character emerging into focus.
On April 2, 1989, at Clash of the Champions VI, The babyface turn of The Road Warriors was cemented when, defending their NWA World Tag Team Championships against The Varsity Club (Steve Williams & Mike Rotunda), long-time referee Teddy Long refused to count Hawk’s pinfall of Mike Rotunda, and when Steve Williams jumped Hawk from behind, Long fast-counted Williams’ pin on Hawk. The result was The Varsity Club (Williams & Rotunda) winning their first and only NWA World Tag Team Championship, The Road Warriors being screwed out of their titles, and Teddy Long being “fired” for his actions. In a post-match interview, voicing their frustration over the fast count and threatening both The Varsity Club and Teddy Long, Ellering said: "Now you must face the wrath of The Legion of Doom, The Lords of Discipline." Long would go on to manage numerous heels in WCW, including the amazing team of Doom (Ron Simmons & Butch Reed), followed by a long run in WWE as General Manager of Smackdown.
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